Chapter 7: Having Found Peace
Hollin and her husband awoke early the next morning to watch "Plutarch" depart. They gave him a fruit basket for the voyage and bid him "Goodbye!" and "Safe voyage!". Odric rounded up his knights and priests and loaded the wagons. The team pushed off from Borgen's End from the front gate and made their way to Havengul, where they would take a boat to the port city of Hanweir in Gavony. They would stay a few nights in Hanweir before departing to venture to Thraben, center of the Church of Avacyn.
The wagons road out at daybreak, when the sun just pierced the sky. Colors spilled like blood, cleansing the sky of the night before.
Ashiok rode a horse beside Odric, who led the march on the winding roads. The air was still crisp, and the dirt on the ground still matted to the ground. The road was thin, with only brief and sparse tree cover along the way.
At the start of the trip, as the group exited the city and entered the surrounding crop fields, Odric had commented on the line of dead crops. Ashiok cackled in his head, but noted aloud how the zombies had went in that direction to get to Maerell.
"Very true," Odric said, "And I wouldn't be surprised if their damned bodies could destroy these quaint people's source of food."
There was silence for a while, as they exited the crops, took to the grassy plains, and finally entered what the majority of the Nephalia region was made up: swamp. There was a tangled road that winded through this one, but many others did not have the same convenience. As the party lurched to duck tree branches and fallen logs, and wove themselves around murky bends, conversation once again picked up.
"I suspect you are pious, Plutarch," Odric spoke up.
"Indeed," Ashiok replied, suspecting the same thing.
"Loyal to the Church of Avacyn?" Odric questioned.
"Utmost," he said, "Having found peace in Maerell, I turned to her grace."
Odric laughed a sad, sad laugh. "'Having found peace'," he mumbled, "I'm glad someone could. Peace is a tough thing to find, harder even so to keep."
"I hear that," Ashiok said, "Peace soon was lost to me, as is seen with my presence here."
Odric sighed. "The Lunarch Council does all they can to keep Avacyn's followers happy and safe, but with the terrors that haunt this land, it is as impossible a task as, as…"
He looked around him for something to compare it to, before finally finding the first thing that came to his mind. "As me combining with this horse!"
'Plutarch' chuckled. "Quite an impossibility you've come up with."
"Now, we were quite worse off half a year ago," Odric responded, "And so I must be thankful for that. We had no Avacyn, no guardian, no hope. Now, even with her back, while we are in a much better position, it's still not ideal."
"And it never will be," Ashiok added, "And that's why we're here, yes?"
Odric agreed, and they rode off, exiting the swamp a bit after the sunset and arrived in Havengul just moments later. There were no guards outside of the gate, but it was open already, so they just walked in.
They found Havengul is disarray. There were petitions and violent riots being held outside of the town hall, there were brawls occurring in the streets, houses being ransacked. Worse yet, there were no guards anywhere in sight.
Ashiok noted some powerful-looking figures creeping into the marvelous building in city center, but also in the many dark alleys all around the buildings. It was a dark city, it was cramped, it was full of shadows, and full of roguish people.
Ashiok already liked it.
"What is the meaning of this?" Odric asked himself. He motioned for the team to follow him and then jostled his horse, sending it galloping into city center.
Ashiok and the other soldiers did the same, and soon found themselves in the thick of the riots.
"What is the meaning of this?" Odric repeated, booming this time. "What has become of Havengul?"
The fighting almost instantly came to a halt. People ran into the town hall and summoned three different people to come out and speak.
"Sir Odric," one of them said. He was dressed in red and black robes. "Won't you carry on your business, for you have no quarrel with any of us here."
"Master Ovenbalt," Odric replied, "I seem to remember a conspiracy rooted in your clan. Perhaps, a conspiracy revealing your criminal ways. What is this? Have all the crime gangs in Havengul risen up at once?"
There was silence, and Odric sighed. "Of course, so that's what this is."
A woman strolled forwards who had emerged from the town hall. She wore a marvelous blue gown.
"Sir Odric, as master Ovenbalt had called you," she said, "It appears that Mayor Salabruk has been slain in the town hall. In his wake, I tried to step up as interim mayor to keep order, but these two criminal leaders rivaled me, and riots broke out between their gangs."
"And what gives you the authority to do that?" Odric asked.
"I am the Captain of the Havengul Guard," she answered.
"But a gang leader like us as well, Mallio," Ovenbalt added.
Mallio chuckled. "That as well," she mumbled.
"And so what of this third one?" Odric inquired, motioning to the third man who had come out. He was an obese thing, adorned in a fine green suit. He wore a tricorn hat, and had a dangling flab of skin under his chin. On one side of his neck, there was a grotesque bulge, and on the other, an odd pattern of scars and indents.
"And I," he boomed. He was a large man, with an equally large voice, "Am the man Avarus chose as his successor, for I am his brother! Coldree Salabruk!"
"Well, then I see no question," Odric said, "As chosen successor, Coldree shall be the new mayor."
Oh, boo. Ashiok thought in his head. Although he hated war and battle, he loved human torment. Does the fighting really have to end so soon?
Ashiok looked around the group of people and found someone with a loaded crossbow. Perfect.
He twisted his hand around stealthily, pulling up a bit of Innistrad's mana. The disguise began to distort around his spell, and his real hand began to appear, with a dark essence around it. He had to be secretive and quick, in order to not alert anyone around him.
He would have one chance to get this right. With the spell ready in his hand, he swiftly put his middle and pointer fingers together, and lifted them up in a semicircle motion. Just as the tips of his fingers were parallel with the man's eyes, he discharged the spell. Silently, he crept into the man's darkest nightmares and made them reality in front of him.
The man screamed and backed away, accidentally firing the crossbow in the process. It could've been in fear, or at the enormous bear he thought he saw in front of him. Either way, it struck another man in the back of the head, sending his dead corpse sprawling to the ground.
Instantly, someone tackled the man and the fighting resumed. Another rogue put a blade into the back of the tackler. Like a machine, Odric's army drew their swords and clopped forward into the crowds.
Ashiok was the only not to. He was holding back laughter, but no one noticed that he didn't go forward. With their Avacynian swords, they fought back the crowds as they fought each other. It was bloodspill before they receded back into the shadows. Mallio and Ovenbalt went with them. Only Coldree remained.
"No one else should question your authority," Odric said.
They spent the night in an inn in Havengul, and then got on their boat the following morning. As the sun rose over the horizon, they set sail for Hanweir.
