Guiding Spirit

Light seeped in under, tickling eyes that his hat brim had failed to protect.  Up the hand to pull down the shade.  The man wasn't ready for the day yet.  It wasn't the fierce growl of a hangover that moved the hand, he didn't get those, it was the sizzling activity the sun brought.  Come dawn the people of the town were up, brave enough in the day to leave their wooden shells to explore the dusty plain that town was situated on.  They'd find the corpses.  Twisted things that may have been as much man as they were beast once the light got to them.  Birds picking at the entry holes for his bullets wouldn't help the shape much either.  They would see it all.  Not understanding any of it they would see it and they would fear.  They would fear the things that went bump in the dark and hide away in their shabby fortresses, but they knew that fear.  If the things in the dark were gone, a new fear would take its place somehow, and he wasn't in the habit of sticking around to become a target.  Still, the old one had been there again, and that powerful a spirit took something out of you a drink only massaged away for so long.  He felt it leaving him, that asuredness that he could keep going against any foe, evaporating in the morning sun.  He needed a rest, and he feared one in equal measure.  When they were done with the pre-possessed corpses they would find him, the barkeep first when he heard which way the man had left in the night.  It hadn't been a long walk away, a few blocks down and then into a side street, an alley, if something so small could really be called one.  It was some effort to brace himself to a wall and slide up to standing, took the man a while of real concentration to get it right.  Figured he would wander off toward the next place he felt callin' him, the next destination that thing men called a soul propelled him toward.  Least, any of the ones he had asked had called it that.  Soul was a tricky idea to get a grasp on.  He only knew if he kept walking the way he felt was best he'd get to the next bar or the next abandoned mine, or the next stone cathedral.  The cathedrals were nice, they let him stay and rest a while, didn't ask many questions before he headed off to the next place.  Just kinda kicked the dirt to see where it would go, feelin' about in the mind.  Towards the sunset as usual.  Always a westward trek these days.  Got to cross the main street though.  Draw as little attention as possible with his head down.  The rifle might have drawn some attention, but without the moonlight it lost its shine, more iron in the grip with yellowed ivory inset.  Not a looker.  Barkeep lookin' down the main way saw him go through, one of his best customers in years.  Wasn't sad to see him go though, he had a nose for things and he could smell trouble like a cloud from all the way down the street.  Wasn't there last night but now it sat like an aura around him.  Somethin' would be happening, and it was happening in the west.

West Don't Mean a Thing

The band lost its heart by his third drink, a strong shot of something fancy, yet powerful.  He wouldn't remember the name afterwards.  It was hard to play for a one man audience that spent most of his time looking the opposite direction.  When they stopped at the end of one piece and didn't start up, he didn't seem to register the loss and so they packed up and headed out into the night with their cased instruments.  He got his fifth shot.  The bartender figured for a lonely night earlier, let the band leave on account of that, and had a hard time figuring out what to do with the man in the dark, almost black it was so dark, green overcoat.  Lizard hide it looked, the way that it had bumps all over and ridges at the collar.  Man didn't talk, just dug into his pockets and flicked another few coins onto the bar.  He hadn't even said a word when he came in, just pointed at a bottle back behind the bar and dropped some money down.  His lips were like old monks to speech, and like them they seemed to hold their alcohol well.  Clock in the corner wound itself around 'till it hit three am.  Bartender would shut down earlier, but the man kept the money flowing and he had needed an excuse to stay up and clean out some of the gunk that accumulated on the floor behind the bar.  Three o'clock though and the man stands up, click of his boots match the tick and he leaves a few more coins on the bar.  Leaves through the saloon-style doors.  It's a bright night out, moons both shining out and the stars in compliment.  Bright enough to have real shadows.  Shadows some men hide in.  Despite the drinks his hands find the holsters easily, practiced.  Draw like a spark and the aiming happens half-way through the trigger pull.  Other man's out before he saw the motion, before his carefully aimed rifle could fire off.  Night like this you forget the sound of gunfire, it gets drowned out in the silence.  Minute later and you doubt you heard anything at all.  Next morning the crows will find him though.  Walking down the streets, the other few filled shadows empty out their occupants, slumping over in mid-shot as he walks.  Some near the end just slink off deeper before he comes.  Too many to forget now, the scent of the powder mixing in a trail that leads back to the bar's steps.  Maybe people are awake, bartender still is, but they don't appear from inside the wooden shacks.  Other end of the village a man sits in the moonlight.  No hat on, silvery hair bright in the moonlight and a gun across his lap.  Stops a good twenty yards back from him.  Looks deep in that direction, seeing more of the gun than the man.  Inlaid silver handle, ivory carved out in the shape of a wolf and carefully tapped into place.  A long steel barrel with a polished shine to it.  Man nods in recognition of it, looks up after a while.  Chair man is just grinning.  Doesn't seem to perturbed.  Man's shadow creeps closer to the chair as the moons set behind him.  Touches the leg and he draws.  Fast, like he means it.  Eyes hard and clear.  Other man disappears, clack of the gun into the chair.  Man walks up and holsters his pistol.  Gingerly grabs the gun where it lies.  Other man watches, leaning up against the wall of a nearby house.  Fades out to leave the man with his old rifle, goin' to exist himself elsewhere for a while.  He'll be back, never does leave the man for long, always shows up after a night like this.  Lone man in the street turns around and walks back to the bar.  Bartender's just about to go to bed, putting away the mop and the bucket right then.  Can smell the burnt gunpowder and registers the rifle slung over the man's shoulder.

"Sir, I'ma need that last drink if you don't mind.  On a night like this one, spirits are genuine powerful in a man."

Bowels of the City

Can't shut off the tunnels to work on them.  City wouldn't stay up if they got shut off, and we can only put her down every few years.  Too risky to do it more than that.  So I'm there, in the tunnels, wind whipping past me stuck onto the ceramic siding with a piton, fixing the cracked tiles and re-etching the runes into the clay.  The chisel chained to my wrist hanging loose right now.  Can't go in here with magical auras up or they'd gunk up the system.  Can't go in here with anything loose or you'd gunk up the system.  More than it already is, mind.  gotta keep an eye out when you're working.  Can't hear anything besides the woosh, and maybe a buzz if you're in the right spot.  Gotta look upwind and hope you see something before it hits you.  Only really works for the big stuff though.  If you can see it early enough to get out of the way, not getting out of the way tends to cause severe injury.  Saw a guy last week who got hit by a flock of birds that got in, ripped to shreds by all the beaks and talons that went by.  Small stuff is harder to deal with.  Gotta wear protection and hope it doesn't let anything through.  Non-magical though, auras, remember?  Can't outfit every worker with mithril armor, so most of us have steel and iron, but not too muck or the weight cracks the tiles.  Anyway, I'm making my way from the service entrance over to a bad spot, musta got hit with something really big to have taken out so many tiles.  Gotta actually bring in some more tiles and fix 'em onto the walls.  Mean's more weight so less armor.  I've got the bag on my front like a chestplate, hope it slows down anything that hits there and doesn't break the tiles too much.  Take a look upstream and I see this bright red trail come round the bend about half a mile up.  Could be blood or it could be wine, both, neither, a long banner caught and threaded its way into the tunnels.  I don't know what, so I start back tracking towards the entrance.  I was a ways off though, so by the time I'm halfway there this stuff hits me square in the face.  It's liquid, that's for sure, but it a'int anything I'm familiar with.  Then I feel the magic in it.  It's a honest to goodness gigantic batch of potion that made its way down here.  Some kook must have poured it off the edge to get rid of it.  I got no idea what this stuff does, but its started working, and that's a bad sign.  This stuff is gonna gunk up the tunnels real good, but more importantly, I may or may not kill me first.  I can turn my head and get a look at it as it flows on past and rounds another bend.  Hope some other guys are luckier than I am in avoiding it.  Gonna have to get a filtration crew in here.  Then I'm slipping.  Look down and see the stuff is eating through my rope.  Doesn't feel like it's doing anything like that to my face, but on the rope it's chewing through it like acid.  Weightless isn't the way to describe it.  It's more like you can feel yourself falling sideways.  Wind just picks you up and throws your body down the tube.  Only way I can get a hold of something is with a lot of luck.  Tiles scatter down-wind of my, falling out of the bag.  I'm going fast, but I know where I'm headed.  There's a gap up here soon.  Intake output for the sky.  It's about a mile down, so I've gotta get luck on my side.  I've got the mithril gauntlets for it, habit of mine, but I'm not near any pitons.  When I do get near this one is broke off, musta got smashed off sometime since last week.  I remember replacing it.  Time's not on my side and I go hurtling out the side, can't get all the way across the gap, tips of my gauntlet bounce off the other side and I'm falling, down this time, and it really does feel weightless now.  Get a good look at the city as I go, white towers stretching upwards toward the sun.  It shrinks slowly, bit by bit until it's the size of pea.  Then I'm going through a cloud.  I'm not gonna turn around, don't wanna know what I'm gonna hit when I hit ground.  Don't know what we're over today, I never really check.  It feels like forever, and then it's water.  Cold, hard against my back as it seeps in through my back-armor.  I'm alive so far, but I don't know how long.  The ground is a tough place, from all I've heard, and I'm sinking.

To Step

The blood rained around him to match the rain, staying on the sword a moment before sliding off with the weather.  To watch him was to see death as incidental to his dance, the sharp footwork married with the graceful swaying of his torso.  All of it was centered around the sword, his partner who never left his hand as he whirled her around the clearing.  Even as the bodies built up he found his way around on the damp ground.  He had proposed the dance and his sword had accepted, following his lead from one move to the next.  After it was over the percussion wouldn't stop, pounding as it did into the red puddles that grouped under silvery chainmail and laquered leather.  A final move and she was sheathed.  He may have chosen the way of the sword, but the sword had just as much part in accepting him.  Letting him possess her.

He was tall, gaunt even, with black, shoulder-length hair and a bored expression that warmed to almost a smile when he danced.  She was long and thin, bright and shining, keen despite much use.  He wore her on his him in a brown leather scabbard that hid out of view under his thick white cloak.  As they walked away those few witnesses from the treeline couldn't see a spot of red on the cloak, on any of him.

It was still in the clearing.  Clean of life, clean of sound, clean of movement.  Dirty though.  To walk through it looking at the bodies or rooting around in pockets or pry wet steel from dead hands left red and brown stains everywhere, blood and dirt and bloody dirt mixing in the rainwater in a sickening paint that stuck to everything.  It would sell for a good profit, the low-people would thank the dancer for that.  

He would face worse, and they would be there too, waiting and watching.  These were a few tempermental guardsmen who took none too kindly to his words over drinks.  They had brothers, uncles, fathers, and sons.  They had friends and lovers and employers.  There would be more to take their place, but the memories wouldn't rest until the dancer rested with a stone above his head.  No stone if some had their way.  The dozen that lay in the clearing would be doubled the next time.  If a time after, there would be double that.  The low-people would see the eventuality.  Even if the dancer never missed a step of the dance, a poisoned cup or a swift knife at midnight would find him where a flashing blade would not.

He never was seen after that cloudy night, no pure white cloak walking through the city in the rain.  It could have been any end to him, they supposed.  Someone might know, would have to know, but it didn't do anyone any good to make sure of it, so they didn't.  A few thought that he might have been wise enough to just leave, but either fear of being wrong or prudence of their own made them keep it as their own drunken rumor.

It didn't take long for the story to pass into the city mythos, latching onto the storytellers and filling out into a fanciful pattern.  Each old man or wagging tongue that sat near a barroom fire took to calling any young man in a cloak a dancer, and the chunkier ones were called clumsy dancers.  The average folk started watching and waiting, not actively, but keeping an eye out.  When the sky starts its music some yearn to see a dance, hope that the skulking patron in the shadowy corner is the dancer, returned to his stage.  There hasn't been a true dance in the city in decades, but they hope.