Author's Kind of Weird Note: On and ahoy, maties, for t'next chap'er o' thay tayle! Aye aye, cap'ain—oh, be quiet Bob, or detention! (this, you see, was my sailor personality, Bob, and then my teacher personality, Madame Esmeralda Sharpe: you see, how unlucky can one be?) Anyway: aboard for the continuation of this fairly interesting tale. Hope you like it, and don't die of malaria reading it. I mean, if you aren't Sauron, Saruman,Viggo Mortensen or my brothers, who are the only persons I wouldn't mind dying of malaria. Well, Sauron's fairly nice, but I don't like the bit about him being only an eye, it's kind of freaky. As for Saruman, he is a brilliant man (I mean, magician), but he is kind of sly, and I hate slyness. Vigo M.? Never mind. Just read, and enjoy. And Review, Of Course.

Chapter Three

The Gleaming Stick

When she heard the man's harsh voice abruptly telling her to wake up, Arach's first move was to reach, quicksilver, for her dagger, usually in a pocket of her muddy-brown coat. As she found nothing, her fingers only encountering the dead mouse, a few grains and three little vials, she abruptly sat up, looking around her, blinking in the raw light coming in the room by the clean, clear curtain-less window. Hawkke completed to wake her up with a vigorous cuff, which immediately threw her into a great fury.

'You have no right to strike me like that!' she yelled, tossing her legs from the bed to the clean wooden floor.

The door opened with a slight creak, and a handsome, attractive maid with a long plait of blond curls and long lashes of sober appeal came in, looking anxious:

'What is the mat—'

The strange scene under her languorous eyes made her quiet. Arach, pale with sleep and with her lips bloodier than ever in the ghastly of her small face, looking enraged, in her big brown threadbare cloak, on the bed; and Hawkke, even more pale, his eyes narrow slits of gold, squeezing the dagger he was about to pull in a pocket of his own rich velvet and fur coat in his gloved hand. But the only thing Yrees really noticed as she stepped back was Arach's milk-white throat among the dark material of her clothes. Looking from Hawkke to Arach in a flabbergasted way, she stammered out:

'Oh…I…Her…You…'

Yrees drew back and closed the door as fast as she had opened it, snapping the panel shut. Arach and Hawkke turned their head to the door, listening to the woman's pace dying away in the corridor, and then two trails of scarlet blemished her opaline cheeks, as she understood what that silly wench had believed she had seen.

'I am not going anywhere,' she declared in a very stubborn way, standing up.

'You are going to come with me; I need you to help me to find your employer.'

'I needed money!' cried Arach, exasperated, 'I just had to kill and take the money! Ha!' she then cried, throwing her hands in the air, 'What a pity that I had to kill you!'

'Aha, you regret then…,' he said mockingly, gathering svelte arrows he was pulling in a leather quiver, 'I am honored…

'Yeah, I regret I had not just poisoned you!' she replied, immediately stuffing her fist in her mouth, as if trying to cram the words back inside.

He instantaneously got the thread:

'Poison? Where do you find the poison?' he hissed, dropping down the quiver, which fell with a discreet, soft sound, as he reached out to grab her frail wrists, which were still aching from his torture of the day before.

'Let go of me, or I will scream,' she said threateningly, all too aware that she was for the first time at the mercy of someone, that she was, in fact, the prey instead of the hunter.

'Where!' he snarled.

'I bought it,' she lied, and tears were starting to gleam in her eyes, liquid crystals of suffering reflecting the jet, so unbearable was the pain in her wrists as he twisted them, squeezing the blood out of them.

'Liar!' he yelled, 'You perfectly know that you need a fortune to buy poison here! The only place you can get poison from is the Alchematoria of Nariee!'

'I have a friend Master,' she said, on the off chance, already knowing it was hopeless as she looked in the gold of his remarkable eyes.

'You're a master, then!' he exclaimed, looking like an illuminated, 'No,' he corrected himself, 'You're too young. You are an apprentice. I should've known'

He released her, and she immediately started rubbing her poor sore wrists, looking at him accusingly. He lunged for his quiver, quickly tossed it over his head around his torso, and in a movement, gathered all the things he needed, then dragged her out of the bedroom, through the already crowded corridors of the Bird's Tavern, in the grey roads were the cold lights of metallic sunless dawn were starting to appear, bathing everything in a grey flood of dirty light. Subtly, she tried to slip away from him, but each time his hand tightened over her searingly painful wrist, and as the pain grew too much for her to ignore it or even pretend to, she finally followed him without protestations, nearly running so long and quick were his steps on the stones floor.

He dragged her all the way down the village, and finally he arrived at his destination: the port. Even if it was nearly still the morning, the port was already full fit to burst. Sailors in large, coarse white shirts and dark brown trousers of crude cotton were shouting, laughing, working, running, fighting all over the place, merchants in rich, unsuiting velvets were yelling at each other in what they obliviously thought to be a polite, subtly calm and reserved way, while the ships were coming in and out, massif or tiny, light of heavy, rich or poor, while the spot of dim light created by the sun behind the thick screen of clouds was slowly appearing above the faraway forest which overhanged the slight curve of the land over the village, opposite the sea, chasing the mists of smoky whites toward the dark, serenely dangerous waters.

Still holding Arach by her thin arm, Hawkke went toward a fat, red faced man, who was barking out orders to his sailors, dressed in blue and red, with a large feathered hat in his hands and shining leather boots with squeaked like trapped mice as he walked on the wet stones of the floor.

'Are you the captain of the Gleaming Stick?' Hawkke asked unceremoniously, and arrogantly.

'Aye aye good sir,' said the captain, smiling a wide smile like a piano's keys at Arach as if she was the one that had asked the question, 'Captain Grain, at yer service, good sir.'

'Your ship is leaving StonePort , isn't she?'

'Thass right!' boomed the captain 'We're leavin' just now for the GreenLand o' Silver Ocean. But I'm sorry to tell ye vat we have no more place, be gum,' he added in a hypocritically sorry, his eyes gleaming at Arach's huge coat pockets.

Arach withdrew slightly behind Hawkke, looking with hostility at the fat, greedy sweaty man, while Hawkke took a fat, heavy purse out of one of his smarlty discreet pockets and conjured on his palm five shining, beautiful Empire Golds. The Captain's eyes started to shine like the coins, and he said in a sweet voice.

'Oh, but in viss case…There's prhaps a li'le place left…'

'I am paying for the kid,' said Hawkke, scornfully dumping the coins in the merchant's avid hand.

'I'm not a kid!' protested Arach, glaring at Hawkke in her narrow eyes, and viciously pinching his arms, without any result.

'You look like one too me,' he retorted, and, turning to Captain Grain, 'When are we going?'

'Juss now. Ye go to the Gleamin' Stick, I'm comin' in a minute, t'time to pay several things,' answered the merchant, and he disappeared in the crowd of sailors and merchant that was overpopulating the port.

Hawkke sized Arach's arm, and went on dragging her along down the port, dashing past behind a big warehouse. She suddenly stopped, and slipped away from his hold as quickly and slyly as a slippery fish in the hands of a starving child.

'Hey, I am not going anywhere till you don't tell what exactly you're doing,' she said, walking slowly away as he tried to catch her back, his fine face twisted with irritation and annoy for the counter-time and her own rebelliousness.

'I am taking you to my domains, in GreenLands, where you're going to help me to find the woman that paid you,' he said, stopping to follow her, his golden eyes glaring at her.

'She didn't pay me, that's the great problem of my life,' she replied, still stepping back, half-dancing, away from his grasp, 'and anyway, I'm sure you can find her yourself, you're a hunter after all, farewells.'

Turning around quick as silver, she tore in a run, away from him. In a few minutes, had taken hold of her yet again:

'It's dangerous for you to stay here now that you failed at killing me.'

'Ah, because you care about my personal life, now, do you? How sweet,' she said sarcastically, trying to pull away from him.

'And the fact that you are in danger puts me in danger too,' he went on, still glaring at her as if to try to make her understand by the only force of his powerful eyes.

'But I am not in danger,' she cried, starting to feel annoyed, 'And let go of me!'

'The woman that wanted you to kill me will certainly be very upset that you failed,' he said, 'she must have been mad anyway, to give you a so hard job.'

He said it without irony, looking at her in a way she found far too pitiful to be born.

'Hey, I am one of the bests Assassin of StonePort,' she said, trying to free herself from his grasp, and ready to bite him.

'You are certainly not very good at killing Hunter, I may say.'

'You may not. I killed nine hunters at all in my life,' she said, ceasing to try to free herself, and tossing back her head in an arrogant way.

'And how many peoples have you killed, in your life?'

'Not a lot, alas. Didn't have time. Sixteen,' she answered.

He couldn't help being surprised. He looked at her with a mixture of admiration and disgust in his lofty eyes, and said:

'Sixteen? How possibly can a kid kill sixteen people?'

'I am not a kid!' she yelled, and pulled away from him so fiercely he let her go.

He was going to said something, but at this moment they heard a great shout that make both of them pause:

'The Gleamin' Stick is leaving in two minutes! The Gleamin' Stick in leaving in two minutes!'

With a grunt of anger, he snatched her arm and started to run, ignoring her protestations.

The Gleaming Stick was not a very big ship. It was light, dark, with beautiful white sails undulating in the northern wind. Sailors were starting the pull the anchor up, and Hawkke and Arach had to run to embark in time. The Merchant, who was yelling orders, seemed please to see them, and he told them when he had finished bawling orders:

'Yer rooms are just next te mine; I am takin'yous to vem.'

He took them to the rooms. It was in fact just a room, but rather large, with a big wooden bed in a corner, a table and two chairs, and two chests in another corner. The merchant smiled in a conspiratory way, and withdrew, closing the door silently behind him. Hawkke let go of the young girl's wrist, and sat on the bed, sighing.

'There is no way I sleep in that room,' spat Arach, thrusting her hands in her pockets in a definitive way.

'Why?' he asked, leaning back on the ancient-smelling pillows. He seemed very tired, annoyed, and he turned his back to her, without even waiting for an answer.

Arach, silently, came behind him, and bent over the pillow. He was sleeping, his eyes shut, his face pale and drawn. Arach smiled wickedly, and, pulling both of her hands over his arm and resting her slight body against his warm one, she said:

'Hey, it wouldn't be difficult for me to go, would it?'

He turned his head toward her, and opened his amber-gold eyes menacingly, he muttered:

'What do you want me to tell you? Let me sleep, that's all I ask.'

He turned back toward the wall, but she gripped his arm tight, shaking it, and again:

'You're tired?'

He grunted and incoherent answer, and didn't move.

'Why?'

'It wasn't very easy for me to sleep, as you were on my bed,' he said, turning to her, looking at her with the irritation turning to fury.

'And who's fault is it?' she sing-sang, grinning meanly.

He suddenly bolted upright, and she stepped back, surprised, telling herself that it was perhaps not a so good idea to annoy him.

'What the hell do you finally want?' he yelled.

'I want to make you regret taking me with you in those GreenLands Domains of yours,' she said, in a ringing voice.

'Well, if it makes you happy, I am already regretting, but I have no choice. Now, you let me sleep or something seriously bad is going to happen to this fine frame of yours.'

And he lied back down, abruptly turned, and closed his eyes one more time in a definitive way. Arach stood up, and said very loudly:

'Right then, sleep, you bloodless zombie, I am going to look for something funny on the deck.'

And she went away from the room, slamming the door behind her. Up on the busy deck, she started to prowl around, annoying the sailors she was encountering, making them lost their time, telling them lots of lies just for the fun of it. When she was tired of annoying everyone without result, she went to lean against the edge of the boat, and looked at the brooding, deep black, sea, gazing toward the disappearing stone city which she hadn't leave for four years, and had become her home, her cradle of miserable sufferings and misty darkness. If she had not be with the moody, attractive Hawkke, she would have had great fun, having an adventure, thinking in her young mind about blood-thirsty pirates, desperate treasure in the middle of thundering sea and such deliciously foolhardy things of the ocean. However, after spending several hours dreaming about breathless adventures, desperate flights and slaughtery fights, terrifying pirates, greedy, scavenging hunters, frighteningly huge strongholds, and everything she could think of, she started to feel tired and bored of irrationality. She pulled her coat of, and decided to climb to the crow's nest, where the look-out was gazing at the horizon, chewing a peace of leathery bread. When he saw the young girl hoist herself in his little basket, he gasped out loud and pitilessly scolded her, with angry words and a vigorous cuff; but soon he had shared a piece of his bread with her, and they were talking like long-friends. It was rather cool, so high, and he gave her a fur blanket he kept in a corner for his own use, in which she cuddled, before falling heavily asleep, serenely breathing in the slashing green wind that tore invisible screams into the briny air.

Author's Thoroughly Silly After-Note: so, ladies and gemmen, what thought you of this small peace of writing? Bob likes it—we don't care what Bob is thinking! He's academic level is always as lowa and—shut up Sharpe! (Sorry, those two are always arguing, but Minotaur's always here to knock them down—oops, he's a little bit too violent today, andkdjbsa,ejkfch.s—stop it, will you, Mino? Sorry, girls and boys, but this poor Mino's not a really good typer…Oh gosh, my body is really crowded today.) Anyway, did you like this third Chapter? I think its not bad—I only wish I could have been there to annoy the handsome hunter—but :fatalistic sigh: all the handsome men are gone form our planet long ago. We only have the old men and the kids left…Anyway :heart breaking-sob, small sniff: just REVIEW, if you don't me to send you a mental bomb that will have you running down the street covered in acne under moonlight—told you I could be cruel at times, niark niark niark (you, the evil snicker…)