Chapter Text
Ireena steps back from the door with one final look out past them, her eyes seeking other trouble in the waxing night and Emet finds himself glancing as well. Beside him, Roshan stares unblinking at the young woman with red hair. The old man’s smile falters, and even as Ismark ushers the group of strangers into their home, Roshan holds the woman in his eyes like a man seeing the ghost of someone lost within a stranger. The most precious of stolen wonders. Even when he is shuffled in by Evie and Evrrot nudging him ahead, Roshan seems unaware of all else around him. Only her.
Ireena stands off to the side with arms gently wrapped about herself. She absently rubs the soft wool of the well worn scarlet scarf wrapped around her neck like a gentle serpent. Her fingers worrying at the fabric, settling it this way and that as though never satisfied where it rests. Ireena offers each new guest a brief polite smile and a nod, her eyes flicking to Ismark between each expectantly, awaiting the answers to questions Emet can tell she expects her brother to offer sooner rather than later. Namely, who are these people?
Ismark catches her look only after the last guest enters and he swings the door shut.
“Oh, ah, this is my sister Ireena Kolyana. And Ireena, these are—”
Ismark stutters to a halt, a bit of flush spreading across his face.
“Forgive me, in all our conversation I never asked your names,” he smiles sheepishly.
Roshan snaps out of his strange trance, but his sad eyes do not loosen their hold on Ireena, “I am Roshan. It is of great pleasure to meet you, Ireena.”
Her polite and practiced smile is a little hesitant under his intense stare, but she offers it all the same as she likely has been taught to do so to every guest that has been welcomed within these halls. And once rich halls they have been.
Emet studies the foyer as the others offer their names—first names only, of course—and polite hellos. The manor holds the decadent finery of a middle tier barony, but the metal is tarnished, the wood scuffed and wanting for polish, the tapestry faded and thread worn, the furniture in need of a seamstress’ fine touch. The illusion of grandeur long since having fallen, a lord who still receives invitation to galas, but only out of pity for who they once were. A family clinging to the decadence of a memory that now eludes them. Like the Blood on the Vine tavern, the manor holds the wear of a place lived in, not a callus and sterile palace of perfection that is more a museum to wealth than a home. Wealth lost to time and decay.
Ireena’s burnt honey eyes catch Emet’s gaze wandering about her home with a sense of anticipation and he realizes he is all that is left in these introductions.
“Emet, the pleasure of your company is mine.”
He dips his head in a half bow, hair spilling past his shoulders and sharp elven ears. Her eyes linger on them and follow him back up to full height with curiosity written across her expression, but she holds herself back before she can voice whatever question holds her captive.
Ismark quickly shuffles to a set of closed double doors with little scratch marks near their base as if a cat or small dog once pawed for entry in its past. There’s a hurriedness to him as though trying to make up for his previous lapse in introductions.
“Come, we can sit and—”
Ireena’s eyes widen even before the doors open, her hand flashing out in silent command. But it is too late. The doors swing inward to reveal a dark sitting room with a fireplace long gone cold and still, every curtain drawn tight as the grave. Fitting, as an open coffin sits atop the low coffee table.
Evrrot grabs Roshan’ shoulder in the split second it takes for Ireena to reach the doors the charmer is already pointing at the casket, its upper half hinged open with the silhouette of a body just beyond the bar of light stretching across the floors from the open doors. He gives the holy man a look as if to say, That’s a body. That’s a f*cking body right there. You’re seeing this right?
Ireena grabs the doors from her brother’s hands and slams them shut behind her back. She leans against them protectively, face flushed half as bright as her hair. Ismark gives his sister an apologetic look and she burns him with a silent glare, torn between embarrassment and frustration. He’d clearly known, but if the darkened circled under his eyes speak of anything, it is a message of forgetfulness born of endless restlessness. Not carelessness.
“Sorry,” Ireena breathes hastily, “Our father…we haven’t had a moment to lay him to rest. We’ve been preoccupied.”
She touches her neck as she says the last word, adjusting the scarlet scarf once more with a gentle tug higher. Her gaze softens toward Ismark, all forgiven in an instant. He kisses the top of her head.
“All is well.” Emet can almost feel the ache in Roshan’s voice as the holy man watches the two siblings a moment longer. Something heavy and dark sits behind his eyes before they shutter shut in an instant, closing as sharply as the doors and the warm smile returns, “Do you have any powdered silver?”
“Powdered silver?” Ireena repeats.
“If you do not mind. I can perform a funeral rite so your father may rest undisturbed.”
“Undis—ah. I’m afraid we have nothing so fine, though I am grateful for the offer. Truly.” She straightens, tapping the door behind her lightly as though afraid they will open of their own accord,” But you are our guests. Please, is there anything I might get you? Drink or food perhaps. Our supplies are limited I’m afraid, but we have wine and I can make a stew for dinner if you are staying?”
“I wouldn’t say no to some food,” Evrrot pipes up, his belly still full—Emet would hope—with his very recent late lunch.
All but Ireena give him a questioning glance.
“A man’s gotta eat,” he shrugs. An alluring smiles curls over his devilish fangs,”And anything crafted by your lovely hands would be most welcome.”
Evie looks like she wants to punch him. Emet wouldn’t mind the distraction.
“Of course, I’ll start to prepare something.”
Ismark stops his sister with a light touch before she can go, a troubled expression having taken him over before the offering for food and having deafened him to Evrrot’s comment. His voice holds a weight in his throat as though he does not wish to speak what he must say, but he steels himself.
“There is something we must discuss first, Ireena. This group will accompany you to Vallaki in the morning. They have already agreed to escort you on their way to their own business. You will be safer there—”
A tight smile cuts across Ireena’s soft features, silencing her brother.
“Would you all excuse me and my brother?” Ireena asks sweetly, though her tone poorly hides the sharp edge within it. She holds Ismark beneath her stern gaze. “There’s something we need to discuss. Privately.”
Ismark’s shoulders fall and Ireena takes his hand, dragging him across the foyer to a set of doors opposite the coffin filled sitting room. The door closes behind them with a sharp snap.
It takes all of five seconds for Evrrot’s tenuous hold on self control to completely disintegrate without supervision. His seductive charming smile drops like a curtain over a stage and he opens the sitting room doors, strolling right up to the corpse filled coffin as though it is a piece of art to be admired. Evie and Roshan share a you first look before they both follow. Emet shakes his head and remains in the foyer. He crosses his arms and squeezes the muscle, releasing his tension with a breath. This isn’t their home. And if Ireena wanted her father on full display, she wouldn’t have shut the doors.
Emet’s never understood nosiness. The people who pry into every place they do not belong, riffling through the cabinets of other’s lives and homes seeking knowledge they themselves would hide. Everyone has their secrets. Some are not meant to be plucked from the shelf and opened like a book upon a desk. Some should stay shelved forever.
His back to the coffin room, Emet listens to the hushed conversation behind him while doing his best to ignore the muffled heated words ahead.
“See that?” Evrrot’s quiet voice carries across the wooden floors. “Wolf claws likely. Not zombie. The cuts are too sharp and deep for any sort of humanoid fingers. Our nails don’t get that sharp.”
“Speak for yourself,” Evie retorts, flashing he newly sharpened talons.
Emet shivers. Phantom hands trail across his body, their cold fingers tracing over every scar with a promise to open them again. The largest of his scars, the deep wound marring his back and piercing through to its twin upon his chest aches deeply.
“The coffin’s poorly made,” Evie says under her breath. She trails one of her sharpened nails along the rough planks and Emet grips his arms tightly, feeling its ghost trail along his bones. Poorly hammered nails and glue keep the coffin together without skill, but there is no lack of care. “Guess there’s no proper undertakers in this place.”
“Or they have been taken under themselves,” Roshan says grimly.
Evrrot sweeps out of the room on silent feet toward the closed door where Ireena and Ismark argue in hushed tones, his interest in the dead lost. Emet half wishes he grabbed the tiefling as he passed, but if the charmer desires the ire of his hosts, it will be all too deserving a fate. With one tapered red ear carefully set against the door, Evrrot closes his eyes and listens. To Emet, the words are muffled and hushed, spoken by people who do not wish to be heard, but having a conversation filled with emotion that demands volume.
He can make out a few sentences against his better judgement, but there is nowhere else to go. Ireena yells she is no coward, that she will not abandon friend and neighbor. Ismark explaining he does not think her one and that he is not asking her to abandon anyone. He says their people in Vallaki need a leader. They need her.
There is such silence afterward Emet wonders if all has been spoken. But Ismark voice returns now with a tremor in his voice. It is Ireena’s choice in the end, but he cannot bear to loose her too. Ireena’s fire falls to tears and she tells him she will go. Even if only for him. But she has one condition. Whatever is spoken next is so quiet Emet would guess even the meddlesome tiefling fails to hear it.
Were he a better man, Emet would have dragged Evrrot away from the door by the horns or at least made some noise loud enough for their hosts to realize they have an audience. Were he a better anything, maybe he wouldn’t have listened himself. But Emet supposes he stopped being a good man months ago.
The phantom hands tracing his scars briefly wrap around his throat and fade away.
Evrrot slips from the door deftly, barely a sound as he sidesteps to a nearby decorative table topped with various trinkets and examines them with feigned interest just as the doors softly click open.
Ireena and Ismark walk out together, their faces blotchy and stained with the trails of recent tears. Emet casts his eyes to the side and allows them a moment to wipe away the stray rivers of their eyes and sniffle back the last of what remains. Those who grieve do not need prying eyes upon them.
When Ismark finally addresses him, Emet meets the man’s eyes without letting his gaze wander like a pointed finger to their reddened eyes and noses. They both offer him a faint nod in thanks.
“You look strong, if you don’t mind me saying.” Ireena clears the strain from her throat, “Would you be willing to help bear our father to the church in the morning so we might finally give him rest?”
“Of course. It would be no trouble.”
“I can as well.” Evie steps from the open coffin room, “I’m stronger than I look, especially when it comes to coffins.”
An interesting choice of words.
Ireena eyes her as Evie drifts out of the room she closed off to them—Roshan still within and praying over the coffin. There’s almost relief and resignation in that look. Perhaps there is peace when the skeleton no longer must be hidden in the closet. She gives Evie a nod and Emet realizes he never really noticed how short Evie is until this moment. Even with her platform boots and swept up hair, she still stands beneath Ireena’s height. Emet wonders how well carrying a coffin will go between the two of them.
“Ismark and I talked,” Ireena continues. “I’ll come with you to Vallaki. It may be best after all.”
Emet thought he’d hear resignation in her tone, perhaps resentment or the continued indignation she’d displayed at plans having been made about her life without her consent. But whatever hushed words were spoken behind those closed doors soothed her anger and warmed her to the idea—even if only faintly. The young woman turns to her brother and takes him in as if trying to remember every last detail should it be the last. Her eyes start to glisten once more.
Were he a kinder man, Emet would never ask now the question they all politely avoid. But if they are to stay here this night and if Ireena is to join them further, it is an answer they must know.
“There is something we should know.”
Ireena wipes at her eyes and Ismark sniffles.
“Might I ask why your…” Emet thinks a moment for a gentler word,” late night visitor is so fascinated with you, Ireena?”
Ireena swallows the lump in her throat and adjusts her scarf once more. He catches a glimpse of the angry punctures along her neck this time, swollen and red. Two deep fissures the width of a human mouth’s canines scarring her perfectly smooth skin, the faint bruising along the rest of her neck where the other teeth once left their indentation. She hides it beneath the soft scarlet cloth as vibrant as the blood that must have spilled down her throat.
Ismark rubs his sister’s shoulder and from the corner of his vision, Evie’s glare threatens Emet with physical violence. But Emet continues without accusation or blame in his questioning, trying to be as careful as one can with such a delicate subject.
“I only ask to assess the dangers we may face in your company. It is better to know what we are dealing with before it is too late to ask.”
Ireena nods to herself, fingers pressed tightly into the folds of crimson cloth. “I wish I knew…but I don’t.”
There is such vulnerability to those words.
Within her hands she holds a broken fragment of herself, one violently shattered like porcelain in the careless hands of another. If she held up what was broken it would fit in the space left behind, but it will never look the same. There will always be the lines of fracture. Evidence of harm making sure she can never go back to how she was before. Everything poured within will spill out and remind her again that she will never be whole.
The scar along Emet’s chest aches and Ireena’s eyes find the floor.
“Perhaps they’re like mosquitoes,” Evie smiles for the first time, her dark tinted lips soft and gentle, filled with such radiating warmth. And it is such a genuine, disarming thing, held out only for Ireena. “Mosquitoes have an attraction to red hair.”
Ireena chuckles despite herself, gratitude in her eyes.
Evie’s face reddens a little.
“So what about dinner?” Evrrot asks, leaning against the decorative table. Perhaps it is his own way of diffusing the situation—or perhaps he is simply an ass.
“You just ate!” Evie snaps.
Ireena’s smile brights and throws her head back in laughter, wiping away tears of another kind.
Ismark grabs a thick winter coat from a hook beside the front door and bow leaning in the corner, “It is no worry. I will hunt us something while I am out organizing the search for Gertruda.”
The ache still radiates hollow in Emet’s chest. He is grateful Evie undid the pain in Ireena. “Please don’t go out of your way for us.” Emet says, “Save your supplies.”
Ismark waves him off and slings the bow over his shoulder, kissing Ireena on the cheek in farewell. She tells him to be back soon and he slips out into the bitter cold of the setting day with promises of return. Ireena locks the doors behind him, several bolts and locks and bars sliding into place.
Roshan looks up from his prayers over the coffin, “How about salt. Do you have salt?”
Emet wonders if the old man is even aware of the past few minutes.
Ireena is just as confused by the sudden change in direction, “We have some, yes—”
“Good, good. I can perform a different rite for your father to help preserve his body. One that does not require the silver.”
It does not take Ireena long to procure a small pouch of salt from the kitchens, the leather satchel barely larger than her closed fist. Emet hopes that isn’t all they possess. His gut sinks at the thought of eating so dearly into their meager supplies.
Roshan bows as he takes the salt and sets himself up around the open coffin. Ireena tosses a few pieces of wood—the few left—into the fireplace and lights it, giving the holy man some light to work by. They gather around the coffin.
Emet glimpses the corpse for the first time, taking in the squared off jaw, the sharp cut corners of his face. The resemblance to Ismark is strong, yet he sees none within Ireena. The body isn’t very old either. Though his flesh is a shade of pale on the dead can achieve, one would think the man were sleeping if he weren’t resting within coffin. The unnatural stillness of his chest, the lack of a gentle pulse in his neck, and the deep gouge of darkened blood peeking above the clean cut collar the only signs that he is not merely resting.
And there’s that emptiness. The kind Emet never could get use to.
A void where a person should be and though your eyes tell you they are right there, one gentle touch from opening their eyes, you can feel it. An absence and emptiness. The hollow left behind when a soul has fallen through a hole in the world you cannot see nor follow. The sensation of stepping to the edge of a cliff not knowing glass has been stretched across it. You cannot fall and yet you feel the emptiness beneath your feet calling and wonder if you are wrong.
Emet feels the pull as he looks into the coffin. The body a portal into a fate that awaits him and all on another day. The edge of some place he cannot yet see nor reach. Not yet. But it is there all the same.
“What caused these wounds?” Emet asks, trying to chase away the thoughts and memories of a field of bodies all calling for him to follow.
“Wolves,” Ireena replies softly. She watches Roshan’s hands work, his calloused fingers setting two copper coin atop the man’s sealed eyes. “They were everywhere during the siege. The risen dead, wolves, and whatever else joined the small army surrounding our home.”
“Regular wolves or dire?” Emet pauses realizing this must sound like an interrogation. “Apologies for the questions. I suppose I’m trying to understand the dangers of this land.”
“It’s okay, all of this must be so strange to you. They were regular, I think. Maybe a few larger. My father told me to keep away from the windows before they were boarded up with whatever we could sacrifice to block the entrances. So I suppose I didn’t get a good look.”
“Why him?” Emet presses gently, “If you don’t mind…”
“I don’t. Kolyan—my father—he is the,” Ireena stops herself, “was the burgomaster before Ismark. Ismark isn’t technically burgomaster yet, but he might as well be. The people have no one else to turn to. No one else to blame. He might as well hold the title.”
Though Emet can see the same questions in the others’ eyes, none open their mouths, seeing fit to let him continue swallowing the blade on their behalf. They busy themselves with interest in Roshan’s ritual, but their ears listen.
“And what made the hoard leave?” He asks.
Quiet settles over Ireena, heavy as a mourning veil. Only the hushed murmurs of Roshan’s prayers fill the expectant silence.
“They left after my father fell. For an entire week, they did not break these walls. This old house held out strong and the boards on the windows kept them at bay. Repairing the boards was dangerous work. The more intelligent of the creatures outside kept attacking them like they knew it was the weakest part of our defenses, others battered themselves against the stones mindlessly until their skulls were broken and their hands little more than stubs. A wolf managed to gnaw its way through one of the weakened planks, its jaws snapping and trying to break off more. My father tried repairing it before the wolf could get inside, but its jaws found him instead.”
Ireena’s voice grows quiet and soft, tender with guilt for all the possibilities she did not make reality. “I didn’t see what happened…I was upstairs. But Ismark told me the beast dragged him through and shredded him. It went quiet after that.”
She looks so small and vulnerable. A wounded creature with blood in her fur and horrors her eyes. Emet wants to mend her pain and take away its burden, but he doesn’t know how. His healing cannot close these wounds.
Emet glances back into the coffin at the man who was claimed to be shredded. Kolyan’s face is left almost entirely untouched. Strahd must have wanted it to be known without doubt who he’d killed for the deep gouge in the man’s neck is the only visible wound. But like Emet’s, the majority hide beneath his fine clothes. Unnatural wrinkles in the shirt and trousers where the cloth sinks too deeply. The wolf must have eaten well.
Emet pities the son forced to dress the ruined remains of his father. Those are memories that will haunt Ismark’s dreams forever.
“Strahd was likely making a point,” Emet says. “That if he could get to the most powerful of you, then he can get to anyone.”
Ireena quickly swipes away a tear, “That’s what Ismark thinks too.”
Evie inches closer to Ireena, a desire in her eyes to comfort the young woman but not knowing how. She resolves to stand close, perhaps willing her strength into the girl she wants to save.
Roshan continues his prayers without stop, the words spoken so low and quick Emet isn’t entirely sure he speaks the common tongue at all, but another. One unfamiliar to Emet’s ears. Copper coins glint atop forever shut eyes, the holy man’s weathered and scarred hands sprinkling the salt in patterns across Kolyan’s stilled chest. It seems this rite is no sooner to being done than the moon is to rising and the rest of them are of no aid in its completion.
Ireena reaches out a hand to her fallen father, but stops before she can touch his chest. Her palm hovering over the body with trembling fingers wanting so desperately to feel him, but frozen at the idea. Feeling what has been stolen will only break her again. Emet takes a heavy step away from the coffin, allowing his gauntlet to scrape against the rough wood as he turns. The sound pulls Ireena back and she blinks, withdrawing her hand in a clenched fist.
She straightens her navy doublet and takes a filling breath, releasing the hold of the dead on her mind, “Come, I’ll show you to your rooms.”
Ireena shepherds Emet and Evie out, leaving the holy man to do his righteous business. It’s only now Emet realizes that Evrrot is nowhere to be seen. The charmer likely already snooping where he is unwanted and unwelcome.
Opposite the front doors, a set of oak stairs covered in worn and faded blue runners vanish into the darkness of the second floor. Ireena plucks a candle from one of the sconces and lights the path ahead of them. The stairs creak gently beneath their weight, the tired old bones of the manor beginning to sag and bow beneath the weight of generations.
The upper floor bisects the manor, two halves of a hall stretching in opposite directions with their stairs at their center. The candlelight—brighter than the sun in these lands—reveals multiple doors lining each path and one tiefling standing in the shadows. Evrrot looks into one of the rooms down the right hall.
“I see you’ve found our guest rooms,” Ireena remarks lightly.
Evrrot straightens, but does not apologize. He doesn’t even appear embarrassed.
“I can take this one.”
A single bed fills the modest room, the decor having seen better days as most have in Barovia but it’s functional and better still than most inns. Evrrot roughly tosses his bag into a corner and hops onto the bed, boots and all. His long coat drapes over the fine linens likely staining them in the leather’s smokey scent. Lounging on the bed like he’s spent his life sleeping in it, Evrrot props his boots up on the footboard and folds his hands beneath his head, careful to avoid the sharp points of his horns. He spends a few seconds adjusting his tail until it lays just right.
“Close the door behind you, please.”
Ireena does so politely.
A second single-bed room shares its wall further down the same hall. Ireena opens the available room’s door with a brief showing and leaves it ajar as an option. To the left of the stairs, Ireena opens two more doors. The room closest the stairs holds two small beds, perhaps a bit more worn in the way a children’s room is always more worn than that of the parents. Maybe this is where Ismark and Ireena slept as children.
The farthest room down this left hall holds a modest sized bed with a small bath. This room is clearly lived in more so than the previous guest rooms. A pastel pink canopy falls across the pale bedding embroidered in floral patterns.
“This was my room.” Ireena picks at her scarf, “But I don’t like to stay here anymore.”
There is no delicate way to ask, but Emet tries, “Can he enter the entire building or just this room?”
“Everything, I’m afraid. If your concern is for your safety, perhaps each of you could share rooms tonight. It would probably be safer that way anyways…”
“My concern is less for myself, and more for you.”
Ireena blinks at that, watching Emet as he studies the entry points of the rooms and the proximity and distance between them with an expression caught between surprise and a touched warmth. Emet averts his eyes, finding himself undeserving of the change after the questions he asked so coldly.
“If you need anything, just call out. I sleep little and light being what I am,” he touches one of the points of his ears. “No matter the time, I’ll be there.”
The warmth in Ireena’s faint smile grows until even the candle dims beneath it and she quickly goes about fussing with the room in a flustered hurry. Ireena adjusts the already immaculate bedding and fluffs the pillows a bit more, finding something beneath them and quickly tossing it in one of her wardrobes. She keeps looking around the room as if expecting to find some embarrassing item or two to hide, but finally ushers Emet in to settle himself.
He sets his bag on the floor beside the door and Ireena debates between closing it or keeping it open. She settles on halfway.
“I’ll have dinner ready in a few hours if you’d like to rest for now.”
“Thank you, I’ll be down.”
Evie keeps to Ireena’s side as the two women leave him for the double-bed room next to his and with the door open, Emet can hear their conversation.
Evie clears her throat lightly, “If it’s alright with you, I’d rather not share a room with a strange man. I’ve only just met these people, literally this day as long ago as that might seem at this point. And…” she ventures carefully, “it didn’t sound like you were too eager to be in your own room. Would you be willing to share with me? If that’s better for you. If you’d rather not, like, bunk up that’s fine too.”
“No, no. It’s completely okay with me.” There’s a gladness in Ireena’s tone that Evie asked first. “This isn’t the best room, I hope that’s alright.”
“That’s fine with me. I mean, I’ll sleep on the floors these days, I really don’t care.”
“That won’t be needed,” a smile in her voice.
“I have a blanket and everything—”
“We have two beds!” Ireena laughs, “And I wouldn’t ask it. I’d much rather you be cozy, especially after what you’ve been through coming to this land. I’m sure you need a decent night’s sleep.”
Emet smiles as he hears Ireena settle Evie into the room.
“May your soul find the ever-rising dawn of Lathander’s light,” Roshan whispers.
His weathered and scarred fingers sprinkle the last of the salted patterns atop Kolyan’s quiet chest and he voices the final line of his prayers. Roshan’s words ignite something in the body’s core beneath the patterns of salt and he feels it bloom in his own chest. A pulse of heat radiating off hot desert sands and warming his bones. It is the presence Roshan has felt beside him ever since he found his faith at the end of his chains. A presence that has been cold ever since he found himself in these death touched lands. But now it returns.
His god has returned.
Roshan sighs deeply, clutching the warmth in his chest to hold it close forever though knowing that it will rise and set as the sun within him. It is always strong when he uses his gifts, a blazing heat that burns within his heart and hands, igniting his tongue in divine power. And it is a gentle warmth when his gifts are not needed. The affection of a lover that warms the soul and keeps it aglow.
The heat settles into the coziness of a cat curling up in a sunbeam and Roshan knows his faith has been proven. His god’s favor has found him even in lands where the sun is choked into submission by the dark and it’s warmth is little more than a shallow grave drowning beneath a river’s cold waters. But his god is here. He feels him now.
A dawn light falls over Kalyan’s body though there is no open windows nor sun to cast it. The rays descending from the darkened ceiling, breaking through from the heavens to answer his prayers. It fades all too soon and slips away like a vision in the night. But Roshan knows his prayers are answered. Kolyan’s remains are sanctified and Lathander has found his faithful servant once more.
“Thank you for finding me again, my lord.”
Roshan sits back on his knees and watches with reverence as the last of the ritual’s dawn light slowly fades. But the vision twists as his eyes catch on Kolyan’s wounds. Dark scars cutting deep into the man’s pale flesh vanish to further horrors beneath his clothes. The wounds weep in the light as though the congealed blood has thinned again and the heart has found its beat.
Roshan blinks and the vision is gone. The wounds dry and blood dark with coagulation once more. He rubs his eyes. The wounds remain old. It has been a long day…perhaps it was simply his eyes.
Roshan rises from his prayerful kneel.
“I am done—where has everyone gone?”
He is halfway out of the sitting room when Ireena quietly descends the stairs.
“Was it successful?” She asks, hope suspended in her voice.
“The body should be okay for about ten days.”
She breathes in relief, “Thank you. That is a weight off my shoulders. Ismark will be pleased as well.”
“Better than having you kill your own father if he rises again.”
That was probably not the best thing to say, he realizes too late.
“Yes, that—that’s for the best,” Ireena stammers. “I can show you to your room, if you’d like.”
The old stairs complain as much as Roshan’s feet as they climb. He takes his time, leaning on his shepherd’s crook with each step and Ireena slows to match his pace. His feet may truly ache, but that is more because he has spent the better part of two days walking. It has nothing to do with his age. He is only thirty-two after all. But Roshan has learned many things in his life, and one of those lessons is that if you act old, people will treat you like you are old. And they will never guess how quickly you can move. He will laugh the day he dashes around Ireena.
The young red haired woman studies Roshan curiously as they climb the old steps and the not-so-old old man realizes she must have seen the sadness in his eyes when they first met and seeks its source now. It is obvious she wants to ask, but Ireena does not do so with her words. The nobles of Calimshan were the same. Politeness overrules many things among nobility.
Roshan simply smiles warmly at her, a smile he knows does not shine in his eyes when he looks at her. Ireena reminds him of someone he misses quite dearly and the sweetness of seeing a young woman so similar to her is tinged with sorrow’s bitter taste.
Ireena leads him down the right hall at the top of the steps.
“Evrrot has taken this first room, but there is another just there past it.” She points to the open door down the hall.
“And where is your room?”
“First door on the left,” she points down the opposite hall. “I’ll be staying with Evie.”
He hums to himself. The distance is more than Roshan would like if any threat were to visit this dear girl in the night. Evie may be in the room with her, but he is not certain of the angry girl’s abilities in a true fight. He worries her hiss may be worse than her bite.
“And Evrrot is in this one?”
Ireena nods, “I’ll be just downstairs if you need anything. Dinner should be ready in a couple hours.”
The lovely girl descends the old staircase and Roshan knocks on Evrrot’s door. A loud sigh comes from the room before the door opens. The tiefling raises his brow, the picture of a man who has been interrupted doing something of the utmost importance in his very empty room with nothing to occupy him. Except himself, Roshan supposes.
“Do you want to room together, friend?”
“No.”
“Okay.” Roshan half turns to go, “Is it not better to be safe in numbers?”
“I wanna sleep by myself.”
Evrrot closes the door in Roshan’s face.
“Okay.”
Roshan does not let Evrrot dampen his good cheer in the slightest. His lord has led him to his purpose, guided him from the cursed forest to a town with answers, led him to Ismark and Ireena, blessed him with the power to sanctify Kolyan’s body, and returned to him again as the sun returns to the land every dawn. This is a good day.
And if anything should happen in the night, he trusts his lord will wake him. Either that or the sounds of screams.
Evrrot shuts the door in the old man’s face.
Does he want to share a room—of course he doesn’t to share a room with the old badger! That doddering old fool chasing his godsdamned “holy” feather is why Evrrot’s stuck in this cursed sh*t hole and the priest has been stepping on Evrrot’s heels ever since. The others are no better. Tailor—how else would the f*cking giant find clothes to fit—and Thorns were dragged by their weird trinkets too, no matter what lies they told him. Arcane focus and heirloom or some sh*t. Not the worst lies. Not the best.
He should know.
The best lies hide the truth by using it. And the best liars can tell a man he picked up the wrong sword from weapon collection and make him believe a hilt stuck in a scabbard full of rocks is his while you walk away with a new blade to sell. Tone, emotion, plausibility. All of these are necessary. Threads was close calling that amber shard an arcane focus. Evrrot suspects there’s a small bit of truth to that, but the man tried to sound too casual. Casual in the way someone who’s just had their diary picked up tries to say it’s just a book they’re not particularly enjoying in the hopes the other will lose interest and leave it before their secrets come spilling out of the pages for all the world to see.
And Thorns. Evrrot would’ve expected her to be a born liar with the way she acts and dresses. He can’t imagine a punk on the street would get very far without a silver tongue. Maybe he caught her off guard with the question. She had just been dragged into a new world by the very thing she wanted to keep secret, after all. Guess it surprised her too.
Evrrot surveys the bedroom he’s claimed for the night. It’s close to the stairs should sh*t go down, there’s only one window, and the planks across it look like they’ve seen the least amount of damage out of all the rooms. He checked. Evrrot suspects one good kick from the inside and he’ll be home free should he need a second exit. It’s a two story jump, but he’s dealt with worse.
At first glance around the room there’s little of interest. But first glances often miss quite a bit and Evrrot isn’t the type of man who likes to miss things. Missed things turn into bad things that can be quite dangerous for one’s health—like when there’s an explosive rune carved into a jewelry box if you don’t have the key. But on occasion, missed things turn out to be quite beneficial when found. That’s why a bit of impolite prying can turn up some pretty interesting secrets. The kind that can be weaponized at the right moment. And the best way to hide those is with magic.
Evrrot’s never been particularly adept at magic. He can’t exactly spit out spell after spell like those wizardy sorcerous types, but he has a few tricks of his own. Tracing a brief sigil in the air with the force of what little infernal arcanum burns in his blood, the sigil ignites like embers in the air and flashes in his eyes. The dark brown burning to hellish gold as the room unfolds around him in faint colorful auras.
If there’s anything here hidden by magic of any kind, it will light up like a faerie bonfire of colored light in his arcana infused eyes. The spell only lasts ten minutes, but that’s more than enough time for someone with his expertise in a room as small as this one.
He glances around with the eager itch of excitement in his fingertips..
f*ck.
There is absolutely nothing. Not a single trace of arcane aura anywhere. That’s not exactly uncommon, but it catches him as a bit strange. Were this a tavern or an inn, sure. The owners would never waste their money on enchanted things that could be stolen by guests. Were this the home of some poor sod off the street, it would also make sense. They can never afford anything beyond the food in their bellies. But a rich man’s house? Even as faded from wealth and high society as Ismark and Ireena have become, he expected something to catch his spell even if it’s no more than a little enchantment on the windows to keep the draft out or some small spell to make sure the bed is never cold.
Evrrot plops himself heavily on the side of the bed, his ass sinking several inches into the plush layers and bending his tail uncomfortably. He shifts it without thought as one born with a tail does after all these years. How the other races exist without a tail, he doesn’t understand. What must it feel like to not have a counterbalance? And how do they not confuse each other when there’s no expression in their tails while they speak? Anger isn’t just furrowing one’s brows and making fists. There’s fiery anger, irritated anger, cold anger and the tail is how he’s always read which he’s dealing with. It’s hard to read tailless folk sometimes, but he’s gotten better over the years.
Bored and hungry, his tail taps an irritated rhythm along the soft covers. Evrrot is about to leave and see if anyone’s made food yet when his eyes drift to the small night table beside the bed. A tarnished candlestick catches the dripping wax of the freshly lit candlestick Ireena lit for him. Next to it, tucked beside a fancy paperweight, sits a small book—a journal likely seeing as it holds no title along its cover or spine.
He snatches it up and flips through the pages back to front. A habit he picked up in his line of work. People are more likely to hide the best bits near the end or on the backside of pages. Most of the pages are crisp and blank. Disappointing. The only thing of interest is a list of names near the front. None of them are familiar but they all sound very Barovian based off the names he’s heard so far. Lot’s of -vich’s and -yana’s. Several of the names are crossed off, but a small group circled thrice over snags his attention in passing.
Oleg, Mirasov, Svetlana, Liliana, Ivanna.
All of them ending in Lansten.
Evrrot files the names in his mind incase they will be of interest later and tosses the book back on the night table. There are still several minutes left on his magic detection spell, so Evrrot goes about checking all the usual places people hide their secrets. And when he finishes with the room, he sneaks out and finds the places not welcome to him.
The rich always have secrets.
