Hey hey hey!
Welcome back to the gates of Enverdolmal!
I hope you all have been well as always!
Seriously… The world is in a crazy, scary place…
I just want all of you to be Okay.
All I can do is offer you these strange little stories, and hope that they find you well, or help make things just a bit better if anything, you know?
Who doesn't love a new chapter of a story they are following!?
I won't keep you all for long, I know what you are here for!
SMALL side note!
I have officially started the Podcast!
The link will be below, and I will have new episodes out weekly for as long as I can get them out to you all!
I was and still am very…blah when it comes to my own voice lbvs, I can't stand it!
But for you all? I got this!
I hope you all tune in even if you read the series (if possible) I will have fun conversations and extra content to drink down between these main chapter parts.
I will also be just flat-out reading the series aloud for those who just don't have time to read along, or who prefer to just listen to verses read.
I will do my best to post at LEAST one episode a week if not two.
Whatever I can do to make this easier to get into and more available to the world, I will do!
I will let you all be for now and get to the real point of al of this lol
Welcome back!
I present to you:
"No blood on our pillows. Part 1.5."
Enjoy.
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Ajor sighed deeply as she lay atop the dead man, her left ear to his chest.
He was still so very warm.
His skin still clammy with sweat.
Both his and hers.
By this point, more hers than his.
His heart had stopped beating but a few minutes ago, and she could hear the muted tapping of the tips of her blades as they clanked against one another as postmortem reflexes wracked the man's prone form, causing tiny spasms to make the corps twitch and jolt every now and then.
She let go of the handle of the blade in her right hand and raised it above her head, slipping it slowly and softly down and over Jinroy's still-open eyes.
His lids closed to the world for the last time.
A rare sign of respect on Ajor's behalf.
It truly was a rather unfortunate event, this one.
She had really, REALLY like Jinroy…
The mixed feelings that boiled and battled in the center of her chest caused her mind to feel torn and divided.
He had been a relatively decent man in his life.
Well…that she KNEW of.
Had he been as even a tenth as morally sound as Ajor had thought him, he wouldn't have ended up on the wrong side of her blades, only the right side of her bed.
Just how she typically liked him…
Ajor knew this.
She knew that his very presence that night signified his downfall.
It didn't make what she had to do any less bitter-sweet.
Alas, she had given him one last go before his time had come…
It had been more for herself than him, by far.
One more romp before his trip to the other side.
Before his card had been drawn.
Before he had pulled the proverbial "short stick"
Before his execution was due.
Jinroy had been linked to and charged with more crimes against humanity than Ajor had cared to count, especially for one whose very station demanded he "serve and protect." those around him who could not do so for themselves.
He was cold-hearted towards the homeless and cared even less for the street-bound orphans.
His list was one laden with so many ill-doings, that it had made Ajor physically sick when she had been sent his allegation docket…
It had pained her to even imagine that this man, this gentle, generous, able-bodied man was even capable of such cruel and inhuman acts.
Abductions…
Murders…
Sexual assaults…
Organ sales…
Extortion…
Women.
Children.
Elderly.
He didn't seem to discriminate…
She had shed a tear or two even after reading all of what he had done.
A tear for the victims of course,
Another for the order to kill off such an admirable…Shack mate? Bed buddy? Patty partner?
Dare she say, Lover?
Oh well.
He was dead.
His death was earned by his own hand.
His own choices and actions.
His life was taken by her own hand.
By her choice of action.
She would have wanted it no other way.
Ajor's place in life was difficult.
To say the least.
She was an Assassin, yes.
But she too was also very Human.
Well…Humanoid.
She still thought about her actions on a deeply moral level as she lay in bed most nights.
She still had a heart.
She still felt just as keenly as anyone else.
Being Elfym, she was willing to wager that she felt even more than the average pure-blooded Human or Elf. She was so in tune with her emotions that it often made her job that much harder.
It made taking lives that much more difficult.
Even when she did know that they very well deserved what was coming to them.
She didn't care so much about the individuals whose lives she took, she just happened to kind of care about Jinroy…
What bothered her most was the loss of life.
The evil necessity that was her craft.
The NEED for people like her to exist within the folds of society.
What kept her up at night was the fact that she had to do what she did at all…
Enverdolmal was massive.
Filled with hundreds of towns and Dorpies and the like.
Settlements filled with inhabitants both Human and not so.
She didn't know from experience, as she had never left even Wegkrip this far into her life.
Alas, she had seen her fair share of both physical maps and Aetheral projections, and she had sat and spoken at length with Madam Moonrey and many of the more cultured gals of her House about the world at large and its many many curiosities.
Ajor often wondered in her downtime if many of the other places in the world had establishments like the one that she worked for.
Places purposefully crafted to rid their neck of the woods of the worst that Humanity and the subsequent Humanoids had to offer.
She wondered if the rest of the world had any need for Assassins.
She wondered if maybe one day it wouldn't.
It was a foolish question.
She was still yet young by Elfym standards, and thus ignorant to many worldly things, yet she would not let herself be so delusional to believe that the C.C.C was the only place in the whole world that played host to degenerates and low-lives.
This couldn't be the only place, no.
But it also couldn't be the worse of them.
She thought of leaving, and often.
More often recently than ever before.
She had good reason…
Very good reason.
She had her child to care for.
Her one and only daughter.
Her only real reason for living at all.
Her world. Her life. Her love.
Her Nori.
Grootawe was no place for children.
Grootawe was hardly a place for women in general, let alone a female child.
Ajor would make sure that her child would not have to spend the rest of her days here, even if that meant sending her away on her own. She would never allow her to fall into the lifestyle that she had lived as a child…
Stealing.
Robbing.
She had been what was known back then as a "Dock Rat"
She and her childhood friends had made it through each day, each night even, by waiting until the sailors would make port and hit the local taverns and brothels, before they would stealthily board and burglarize the ships, taking all that their bags and pockets could carry.
They would fence their ill-gotten goods on the under-market to whoever would buy them.
It would net them enough to eat for the night and even to pay for a warm bed if they got their hands of enough goods to shift for coin.
That was no life.
Not LIVING anyway…
That was a constant struggle.
That was survival.
That was the last thing that her child would ever have to face.
Ajor had barely escaped that life herself, she had been saved by Madam Moonrey.
She was one of only three survivors of her old crew of eight…
It was a fact that often haunted her whenever she would try to sleep.
A fact that brought her nightmares.
A fact that she had never told Nori.
She shifted her mind back to the task at hand, glancing over at the long candle that she kept lit on her nightstand. Its length denoted the time, and with her last "client" done for the night, she was just a bit behind.
She was due to be heading home by now.
She had to get home to her child and get dinner on the table.
She had wasted a bit too much time savoring her last moments with Jinroy.
She swallowed the feelings and pulled her dual-blades free of the corps in one smooth motion.
They slipped free of the body just as clean as they were before they went in, and just as silently.
The beautifully crafted, deadly pair of blades were known as Ru'piet, they had been a gift from Madam Moonrey, a gift that she was given after she had completed her lethal martial training.
Madam Moonrey had told her that name meant "Cry out." which was rather ironic considering their innate ability to essentially "mute" anyone whom the blades drew blood from.
She looked back and forth between the two with admiration, the flawless crystal-clear blades sparkling in the low light of the candles.
She slipped them both into their respective concealed sheathes above her head, then gripped both of these by their clasp and pulled them in full from where she usually positioned them.
Off to her left was a small end table at the foot of the bed.
She sat them there carefully, so as to not tarnish their beauty.
She would take them home with her, as she always did.
Wegkrip was a Night town, meaning the majority of its inhabitants were the nocturnal type.
It was typically safer to be out in the middle of the darkest nights than it was to be out in the middle of the brightest of days for that reason.
A glance over towards her window, and the thin beam of sunlight that had found its way into her perpetually dark room through her black-out curtains was all the confirmation Ajor needed.
One was more likely to get mugged or assaulted on a bright sunny day as opposed to on a gloomy, rainy night around these parts. She would make her home trip as quick and as short as possible.
After she was done here that is.
She gave the man one last once over before rolling to her right and off of him.
The wooden floor creaked softly as it took on the weight of her left foot, then her right as she turned and stood, her back now to Jinroy.
To the memory of him.
To whatever little good he had had inside of him…
She was not the religious type in the least, but she always found herself saying a quick word of passing for the dead.
She did so, then turned back towards the bed so that she could begin the process of wrapping the body before dumping it down the shoot and into the cellar where it would be incinerated alongside the rest.
The next few steps were a bit ceremonial for her.
She did it the same way every time.
She had no idea why, as she had not been shown or taught how to do it this way, it just came naturally to her, and she let it happen.
She gathered all of the things that Jinroy had come with and got to work.
She removed the pillow from beneath his head, placing his half-helmet on him before laying his head on the white sheets that covered her bed.
She pulled his pants up and fastened the clips, hiding his still-impressive member.
She took both of his arms and folded them over his chest, placing the long sword, sheath, and belt there first so that his hands "held" onto them even in death.
She slipped on the boots that he had kicked off while carrying her to the bed.
When all was done and the body looked as presentable as she could get it, she placed the few material things that he had on him next to his feet.
She pulled the sheet down and over his head and chest.
She pulled the sheet up and over his feet and knees.
She pulled the sheet over from his right side.
She tucked the sheet under his head.
His left shoulder.
His left hand.
His left hip.
His left thigh.
His left calf.
His left foot.
She reached down and gripped the last of the sheet that hung from the bed before her, pulling it up and over the man, and completing the wrapping process.
The final step was simple enough.
Reaching under the bed nearest the head, she pulled out a small wooden box.
The box held dozens of tiny, silver fastening clips.
She removed four, closed the box, and slipped it back under the bed.
The clips would keep the folded sheet in place when the body rolled or slid down the shoot.
She placed a clip over his mouth.
One over his chest.
One over his knees.
The last over his shins.
She stood up straight and took a step back to admire her work.
Looking the corps up and down from head to toe.
It was very well done.
She thought she caught movement down by the man's feet.
Her reflexes had her head turning before she could even think about the motion.
There was nothing there.
Her imagination most likely…
The night had been long and exhausting both physically and mentally.
She was over it and ready to be under her own blankets.
In her own bed.
With her beautiful little Nori.
Enough of that.
Ajor did her best to NOT think about Nori while she was at work.
The two wholly different parts of her life did not mix well.
Nor did she ever want them to.
She needed to finish up and be on her way.
From the corner of her right eye, she picked up a very faint yet very sudden violet glow.
It came from up near the man's…Jinroy's head.
Ajor was frozen.
She felt a sudden spike of Aether in the room…
Her breath caught in her throat.
She hadn't cast any spells since Jinroy had arrived.
Something was very wrong.
She forced the fear from her mind and body, gauging the distance between herself and her daggers before turning to face the source of the light.
A whiff of smoke caught her nose as she turned.
Something was burning.
She completed her turn.
Where there was once cloth over and around Jinroy's eyes, there were now two ever-widening, burning holes.
Ajor watched in bone-locking terror and disbelief.
Jinroy's eyelids were wide open…
From his eye sockets shot forth twin jets of a ghoulish-purple Aether.
Burning orbs of rage rolled about where once were his beautiful eyes.
The man's body jerked and jolted inside of the wrapping, the clip that held the fabric to his face melted away as Jinroy's lower jaw fell open and a third jet of Aether burst forth to join those from his eyes along with an ear-splitting, ghoulish scream that made her window rattle in its pane.
Ajor took a step back from the bed, her hands shot up to shield her ears from the audio onslaught.
The seam that ran from the man's neck down to his toes where the sheet was folded began to glow with the same violent purple Aether, like a chrysalis holding back a rapidly growing insect.
The remaining clips began to melt just as the one on his face had…
Ajor had no idea what was in all the Hellz was going on, but she knew a reanimation spell when she saw one.
She remembered then that Jinroy's sword was in his hands.
Exactly where her own weapons were not…
She leapt for her blades.
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Welcome back to the gates!
Thank you all again for your time and energy!
Thank you for your continued love and support with this series.
Thank you for being so fackin patient with me and my weird drop times!
Thank you for enjoying what I write.
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I will see you all back here soon enough yeah?
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Till next time folks, safe travels.
And as always:
Stay safe.
Stay healthy.
Stay vigilant.
-Redd.