Friday, August 19, 2011

So, here we are again. It's always such a pleasure.

"Let me go back! Let me kill him!" Bryn struggled against the magical restraints Emire used, and she found herself cursing magic casters once again. "I swear, if he so much as looks at Stalar the wrong way, so help me Kord I will smite him. There won't be a single ash left of what once was Burningwood, and the bitch he's got with him can go too." Never mind that the bitch was someone that they had struck a deal with before. Among other things, things that brought the blood rushing to Bryn's face for a multitude of reasons. The silver light emitting from her eyes didn't help matters much. While she'd normally find the effect calming or even funny, right now it was only serving to remind her of the cleric who still hadn't come through the portal. It was only when the man stepped through and the portal shut that she finally calmed down, her labored breaths showing just how hard she had been struggling. "Did he do anything? I swear to all the gods that if anything happened, I will impale him with rusty spoons and get Emire here to heat them up slowly." The tone of her voice left little room for others to think she was joking. It was the only form of torture she could think of that would be fitting for Burningwood. As Stalar tried to talk her out of it (and he did manage to convince her to at least hold off), her thoughts began to turn to what would happen next. When silence settled over them, she even voiced as much. "Well... now what?" Her voice cracked a little as she asked. Bryn hadn't ever had to deal with people leaving. That was normally her job.

They had all separated after that. Well, sorta. Bryn stayed in Stonehaven for a bit, keeping her profile as low as possible. She wasn't quite ready to venture out, and as much as she'd love to have stayed with one of her companions (any of them really), she didn't want to be a burden either. So instead she spent her nights in her favorite low-town tavern with all the scum and drunkards that reminded her of home before the adventure. Or at least reminded her of where she had been, but she couldn't really call that home. Not that it mattered. As she slipped into her normal stool at the bar, she slammed a coin down onto the rough wood. "Whatever this'll get me." The bartender raised an eyebrow, and the unspoken question was easy for her to see in his face. Rough night? A slight dip of her head answered him. The roughest. On the plus side, most of the really bad folk that liked to stalk around the dark areas of the city were all gone or dead. Mostly dead, but Bryn swore that wasn't her fault. Not all of them at least. Her silver eyes hadn't really helped matters. She had taken to covering her whole face, trying to find some sort of cloth she could see through, but even then they could tell. How did Stalar do it? Not make himself stand out like a beacon every time he felt any surge of emotion? Even though she couldn't quite control it yet (although she was getting better. A year of practice would do that), she had discovered some of the nuances of it. Like how when she was happy, the light was more silver, like the moon on a clear night. Or when she was mad, it was more storm grey, and sometimes she could swear she saw hints of orange or red, the same colors that painted the moon's surface during the Harvest Moon. That sorrow held tinges of the dark blue sky interwoven with milky white. It was really amazing how many different lights there really were, yet how they all came from one source. A source that was currently making it hard for her to continue on with her "leave no witnesses" policy since she didn't have the group to back her up.

When Stonehaven's guard burst into her room at the tavern, all they found was a note held down silver coin on the bed, the half-moon etched into it with loving detail. It was her tell, the one thing she always left behind. The note was unimportant, telling what they already knew. Bryn Swift-runner was no longer in Stonehaven.

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