8 Flamerule
—A twelve-year-old girl stood in front of the plain wooden cabin.
Ajantis had offered her sweeties.
"You are trespassing on my land-home; the seas cry for vengeance; and in the name of the Bitch Queen you will all meet your end here."
She wielded a flail half her size that glittered with enchantment, and the power of a cleric gathered about her left hand.
"But I only had two left...they're sugared almonds and... And we're only looking for an evil witch, little girl, so that we can slay her in righteousness to protect you and others from her, and..." Ajantis shook his head; and the little girl shouted "Die!" and aimed what seemed to be a command spell at him. He withstood the effect, shaking his head in bewilderment.
"Sonner and Telman sent you! I can tell!" the girl cried. Suddenly the plants around us were as damp as if a sea-wave had fallen upon them, and they rose up to bind us in place as if they were shackles of wire, shaped as and smelling as seaweed. "The Bitch Queen does not brook murderers like you!" None of us could move; Faldorn muttered some words to release herself, and Shar-Teel and Viconia exchanged a grin of mutual amusement whilst the little girl's next quick move was to slam the flail into Ajantis' lower midsection, denting his old plate.
"Some...misunderstanding...young missy..." the squire gasped out.
"All right, kid, the male's a fool, but it's time you told us what's going on." Shar-Teel freed herself with a stroke of her sword, and stepped forward.
"I will keep killing you!" the girl cried. I could see that she was a child, much younger than Faldorn, short although thick-boned; she stood with a confidence not unlike the druid. Thunder seemed to erupt from her hands when she clapped them together. In a deafening blast of sound, Ajantis fell backwards to the ground, and I could scarcely hear anything. Shar-Teel's lips were moving again, and the child stared up at her; Faldorn also said something, and the girl then clasped her hands to her face and seemed to yell fiercely back. Tears of anger flowed from her eyes.
Imoen clapped one hand to her ears, gesturing; Hurts—can't spellcast, but just a kid—she signalled to me. Viconia's lips moved under her hood; she clutched tightly at her head with both hands, and the expression on her face resembled a scream of agony. So the girl was an Umberlant, from her words; all my father's captains pay tribute to the temple in the docks before they sail, though he worships Tyr himself... The buzzing in my ears gradually began to clear.
"—murdered my mother and stole her bowl and I want it back and I want you to fetch it for me!" the girl cried to Shar-Teel.
"...But...are you sure you don't know an evil witch? Are you sure you're not the evil witch attacking the village fishermen?" Ajantis said; he still lay prone.
"I have more power than mother had, I have Umberlee's anger and the will to beg the seas!" She kicked out at him; I cringed in reflexive pain. "But I get so tired. The goddess is so demanding. Fetch my bowl, please."
"Umberlee is an evil goddess..." he said "But you are only a child—"
"I will teach you only, you fishgut-breath bastard son of a squid-brained octopus spat out of a slime-scumming oyster's rear end show respect to the Bitch Queen or else—"
"I see our houj'jaluk is defeated by a female infant," Viconia said; and laughed, still clutching her ears somewhat painedly.
"Please stop it, little—ah, stop it, milady Tenya! I think—I think we should help you after they murdered your mother!" Ajantis yelled, raising his hands to block the furious attacks.
"Excellent," said the squirrel on Imoen's shoulders. "You're thinking, boy."
Shar-Teel shrugged. "What's in it for us, kid?"
The girl Tenya drew herself to her full, compact height, standing perfectly still. Something blue and terrible seemed to glitter behind her eyes. "For the Bitch Queen, who is not patient...and you are not yet upon her good side."
It took us hours to walk back to the village, and we were attacked by ankhegs; it was still breeding season for them, so said the druid. We knew better how to defeat them. Ajantis seemed slow and hesitant in his fighting, wounded by acid and healed by Faldorn; I only stood at the back, and tried to aim arrows at the creatures...
"Sonner. Telman. Jebadoah," Ajantis said heavily, to the three who had come in from some labours, hauling nets and stinking grey bodies of fish, sea-stained, their clothing old and ragged.
Shar-Teel was not so dramatic. "Hand over the bowl, males."
"I warned you she was a treacherous witch!" The man on the left opened his mouth to shout; he smelled strongly of fish, and a ragged scar was cut on his right cheek. "Gone and believed her lies, have you—"
"I cannot tell who lies or not!" Ajantis cried. "I thought you innocent farmers; when I could measure intent I did not see—"
"The bitch priestess cheated us for years!" the second man said. "The price just kept climbing, and we couldn't sail without paying! The cleric of Talos said—"
"Another evil deity," Ajantis said.
"Males have such an ability to waste time." Viconia's eyes glowed a bright scarlet in the evening; and with her hood lowered she stepped forward. "Our leader won't ask again, iblith. I despise men who kill priestesses."
"A drow—"
"Observant are we not, jaluk?" Viconia's dark blue cloak swirled away from her body, revealing the combination of parts of plate that sculpted to her form and tight leather armour she wore as protection. She spoke in those particularly deep and throbbing tones, where I could not tell if she added a divine compulsion, or needed none to strengthen her persuasion. "Would an offering of your foul rothe blood be an insult to my dark lady? I shall find out."
"You can have the bowl. You can have the bowl. I kept it on me for safety. Please don't kill us." The third man brought it out from his cloak; a yellow thing, made of something that seemed too smooth for wood yet without the gleam of brass or copper, evenly carved and varnished. He passed it into Shar-Teel's hands. "You gave us little choice. The Storm Lord will know who it is that opposes him. I should stay well away from any Talos shrine if I was you."
"We won't kill you—" I began.
"You sure?" Shar-Teel casually tossed the bowl to Viconia, and reached for her sword. The fishermen ran quickly from us, as if they were afraid of what we would do.
The Storm Lord will know—
It had begun to rain, and somewhere beyond the waters, dark clouds were gathered, and starting to flash with the pale blue of lightning. I could see the huts of the villagers, built from some dark wood, and the fields that were stretched further away. Somewhere there was the burial ground where the funeral of the farmer's son had been when first we came to the village; and somewhere the storm continued to move across the sea.
"No killing the fishers," Ajantis repeated hollowly. "Were they evil? If they killed Tenya's mother...but she was a priestess of Umberlee...but they are Talosians. We should give Tenya her lawful property of the bowl, at least, I suppose..."
Imoen patted him companionably on the shoulder. "C'mon, it's raining. Let's find a room for the night somewhere here. You don't want to stay out here all night, do you, Skie?"
Faldorn sniffed. "The purpose of the cycle of the rain is to cleanse the earth and refresh the roots. You shouldn't fear it, Imoen."
"—It rusts armour, too," Ajantis said.
Farmer Brun; the man who had lost his son to ankhegs, I remembered Ajantis saying from before. I do not know how old the son was when he died. In any case, the old man put us up in his barn for some coin; and I know that Imoen added extra to the sum, from things taken from the mine. Warm there, with a fire, wooden and primitive, not dissimilar to that storage place at the time I spent with Eldoth, before he went—it's better like this because he can live. We'll need more supplies soon, and either the rough brown bread or the village's water makes me slightly ill.
We trudged northwards again; we would not enter the city. Perhaps if we go north for long enough, we could find Waterdeep, or Ruathym, or the isle that Branwen once said she came from; anywhere but here.
"The bowl," Tenya told us, and grasped at it greedily. "Umberlee is mother now, and she is well pleased. If they are wise they will never set sail again, for the sea will take their worthless lives." She raised her hand in gestures like a wizard trying to disappear; but Shar-Teel, Viconia, and Faldorn had all moved forward to grab her—
"Not so fast, kid," I heard Shar-Teel say. "You were swinging that flail like a male peasant. If you're going to humiliate men twice your size, do it properly."
"We priestesses ought to exchange some degree of wisdom," Viconia followed.
"And Umberlee of the waters serves a part of the Oak Father's domain, so I must aid you," Faldorn finished. The three of them gathered closely around Tenya for some time; and Imoen, Ajantis and I do not know exactly what she was told, but in the end she finished her disappearance, the expression upon her face a great deal more intimidating than it had been...
"You will be paid by the Sea Queen...in time."
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houj'jaluk - failure
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