Authors: Spike and Archangel
Title: The Legend of Dragoon: Torrent of the Wicked
Chapter 1: The Twins Fraternal
A full moon loomed like a spotlight over the market town of Lohan, illuminating the cobblestone streets with a deep blue light, the kind a carefree spirit could go swimming in. It was obviously enough to be described of as dark, but what made Girsham and Falda so worrisome was that it could be darker. Someone could spot them fleeing in the streets on a night like this… two less-tan-carefree spirits, no swimming tonight.
The problem was that on nights like this, after having been gone so long without a decent meal to call dinner, the amount of light wasn't the worst of their concerns. So in that slim and pitch black alleyway they sat, waiting for the last of the stores to close down. Soon the last market closed its door and the lantern was dimmed.
"Ready?" Girsham asked, looking over to his sister.
"Ready to what? Eat?" she chuckled. "Are you kidding?" He heard the slight shake in her voice, he wasn't surprised, neither of the twins could ever shake that nasty feeling. They knew what they were doing was wrong, but they had to eat to live. Unfortunately in their impoverished situation eating meant stealing. Girsham pulled his two daggers from their sheaths around his belt, and heard his sister draw her tomahawk from its sling on her own belt.
The fat merchant turned his back to leave through the door on the other side of the store. This was their chance!
Quickly and lightly the twins bolted across the dimly lit cobblestone street, into the tall merchant building. They kicked at the door, and jumped inside. Just as the merchant turned around to see the noise, he had a knife blade pressed hard on his throat.
"It's nothing personal, pal," Girsham said. "Gotta eat somehow, gotta buy food, you know how it goes." The plump old man was far too frightened with the aspect of dying to say anything audible. They were usually like that. Girsham looked around. "There's a lotta good stuff in here, we'll only take enough to get by, I promise."
"T-take anything, please! Dont hurt me! I have a family!" He continued giving the pathetic speech about what he had to lose and who would lose him, blah blah blah, all the stuff Girsham never cared to listen to. Instead, he looked around to Falda, and watched her fill her satchel with goods, while grabbing food and putting it under her arm.
When she'd grabbed all she could, she tip toed behind the merchant and put her lips right next to his ear.
"This is how to play the game right, gramps," she said coyly. "We leave now, but when you decide to call for help, we'd better be out of ear shot. Because if we're not, and we get guards on us, we'll come back, and give them something cool to arrest us for. You know, something like murder." The merchant shook violently but stiffened best he could at the word 'murder'. Falda let a long pause haunt him for a moment before a very cute sounding "kay?" The twins bolted out of the door. Falda threw Girsham the satchel, and they began the long jog out of the city, under the pale moonlight.
They never heard a scream.
A few moments later, Girsham and Falda slowed down, and Falda tossed her brother a loaf of bread, which he consumed greedily. He started to reach into the bag that held their 'catch', but as he half predicted, his sister slapped his hand.
"Ah-ah-ah, it's bad luck to check the bag before we're totally safe, you know that," she said.
Girsham did know that. Why was he reaching in there? "I know, that was weird."
He decided to let it go, like a bad habit trying to resurface, and let the full bag hang loosely. It would be an hour walk to the old forest east of the town. There they'd hopefully pawn off what they'd stolen, and come into some money for once… maybe things would go smoothly, maybe they'd run into trouble. It was all part of the life.
Several hours later, with the first peeks of sunlight pushed their way over the horizon, the twins sat leaned over a small, make-shift table from a suspicious merchant.
"I'm telling you, no one followed us, they never do. It's safe to buy," Falda said. Girsham, as usual sat back with his arms crossed, looking dangerous and intimidating. Falda pushed their loot, while he made buyers afraid to say no, the system worked rather well. Girsham just kept his neck straight, with his chin down, allowing his dark brown bangs to partly cover his eyes and nose. The general response to this appearance was a nervous glance every few seconds that told him the sale was going to happen.
Falda, meanwhile, was leaned forward on the table, on her elbows, palms facing the merchant across the bag from them. She kept a confident contact with his eyes, using her own, almost unblinkingly. She wasn't lying, and never gave reason for anyone to think she was with those ice blue eyes. Girsham loved those eyes on his little sister, something that would always keep them together, because it was the most intense physical feature they shared. They were the same height, with the same hair color and shape, but it was their eyes that gave them a sort of insignia amongst their fellow villagers.
The merchant rubbed his bearded chin, and shrugged after a moment (and a few quick glances at Girsham). "Couldn't hurt to look, could it?"
"Name me one time looking hurt someone," Falda said as she grabbed the bottom of the bag and pulled it off of the material, which began to sparkle in the stretching sunlight, enticing the fat merchant. He put his hand in it, and spread it over the table, causing some of the stolen goods to roll off one another. A small, red gem rolled out of a brass goblet, and off of the table.
Girsham looked to Falda. He watched her eyes follow the gem to the ground, she acted like she wanted to scratch her leg, above her boot, reached down and picked up the spherical stone.
She couldn't explain it, the moment that she was aware of that stone, she was unwilling to sell it. She felt like it belonged to her, like she was meant to have it. She caught Girsham's stare, the stare that said "Isn't that going back on the table?"
She rolled her eyes, and ignored him, the merchant hadn't even seen the stone, they wouldn't lose anything if she kept it. He might whine about it later, but he'd understand, hopefully. Out of the corner of her eye she saw the merchant pick up something.
"This is very interesting," he said. She looked to see the gem in his hand and almost jumped. It was almost exactly like the gem she was hiding. It was spherical, with a slit down the center, the only difference was hers was red and this one was a dark indigo color. It looked expensive.
"What!? How did that get there?" Girsham asked, suddenly. He reached over the table, startling the merchant as he siezed the stone from his hand. "Sorry, this is mine, it must have fallen out of my pocket into the satchel."
The merchant looked almost angry at being denied that gem, but let it go when Girsham resumed his threatening stature. To herself, Falda smiled, she wouldn't hear him whining now. They both had a keepsake. She looked down at her little prize, and remarked at how it seemed to glow a little more than it should be in this small amount of light.
The sun made its usual arc over the Endiness skies, as Girsham and Falda moved to and fro throughout the forest, seeling all but the two gems that they'd pocketed. As the sun met a mirror of the horizon opposite to the one that birthed it, the brother and sister sat upon a high hill in the center of the forest.
Girsham rubbed the gem in his hand, taking note how the stone always seemed to be watching him, with that slit. He looked over and saw his sister doing the same thing. Then between them he saw a fair sized bag of gold pieces they'd collected.
"You'd think we could actually do something cool with all this money," Girsham said. "Move somewhere and start over, if the world were better."
"I was thinking the same thing," Falda said.
The twins had lost their parents in a robbery that turned ugly several years ago. The thieves killed their parents, and left the children crying and with nothing. They turned to the streets for a new family, and had been raised amongst bums and gangs and thieves. Perhaps they'd even encountered the murderers of their parents, but they would never know.
"We never leave Lohan, it bothers me. What if things are better north of this forest?" Falda said. Girsham shrugged.
"We know the layout here, that's what makes thieving for food easy. Stuff could go wrong in a new place; it's difficult to say," Girsham said thoughtfully. He gave Falda a small grin that let her know they were doing it again. Falda was a fiesty, ambitious thing, powerful yet wild, and Girsham was her buffer, a voice of reason, but lacked the ambition to get things done without a shove. They were perfect siblings for each other, and the whole city of Lohan knew it. They were now on the short path to deciding something.
"For once, let's do it, let's just pick up and go someplace new. You said yourself we could do something cool with this money," Falda said.
"It would be risky, and this has always been our home," Girsham said in defense.
"It has, but there are too many bad memories, too many people we've hurt to stay alive, if there's any chance that somewhere else we can get by honestly, I want to go looking for it." Falda said.
Girsham would have shook his head, he would have said no, and he would have change the subject to make himself feel better about keeping his sister safe. But instead he looked down to the gem in his hand, and his mind gradually changed its opinion… "All right, let's go," he said.
Falda's eyes widened drastically. "Really!?"
Girsham nodded and stood up. "You better get us moving before I change my mind…"
The twins pocketed what they had, and for the first time ever, they moved forward without thinking, and contrary to what Girsham always thought it would be like, it felt good.
Author's Note: That's right ladies and gentlemen, we're back! We've been wanting to come up with another story for a while now, but Spike's passion for Legacy from the Ashes died, so we put our heads together and made something totally different, we hope you enjoy The Legend of Dragoon: Torrent of the Wicked. Please Review!