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Verse 2, Master of the Four Dragons
🕑 Added 2023-06-30 22:00:04 +0000 UTCNo good story truly ever starts at the very beginning. Some of the best tales pick up right in the middle of the action, although the challenge is thus much more complicated. They must not only tell a great, sweeping narrative forwards, they then also face the challenge to suitably grip and captivate the reader enough to allow them to explain what came before; what many wild, varying, and often confusing rules and details of the magical world there are, and the many faces we come to know.
We never come into each other’s lives with complete knowledge of who we are, let alone who this perfect stranger, or group of strangers, is before us. We all start in the middle of one story or another, and it is up to us to tell the tale both forwards and back, for the sake of context, for investment, and for clarity.
This perhaps is my greatest weakness, for the number of tales I have to tell and share during this great, grand, mad adventure that I have found myself upon, all begin somewhere in the middling area between beginning and exposition. I could drone on, and on, about the very creation of the cosmos itself, and probably get most if not all of it wrong.
I’ve less of a real world clue as to the origin of the world I live within than you do; all I can do is simply live my life one day at a time and control the present, for it is all we ever truly have. I know what I am, but it does not decide who I am. My fate is not determined by the circumstances surrounding my birth, nor even the misguided, tragic story of my parents. Perhaps theirs is a tale I will tell as well, but later.
My mission, my true quest, is to tell you, the reader, my story in the way only I could, and in a way that makes you want to learn more, to read more of my companions’ and my exploits, both before we came to be fellow Adventurers, how we all managed to encounter one another in this mad, chaotic dash called life and what momentous, world-changing events our actions would one day help shape.
This is a story of how I, Oborro Othello, together with my one-day beloved companions, go about saving the world. Our stories are many, and just as important are our heroic deeds done together but also our beginnings as well; four broken, wandering children brought together by some design or another. We found one another, helped and healed one another, and together, we knew that we had the power, the obligation, to help protect this world so that others need not suffer the way we had.
Along the way, we will meet many others, all off on their own quests, their own self-imposed missions to achieve satisfaction, peace, or whatever else drives the hearts of adventurers ever on. Some will be friends, some acquaintances, yet others rivals or even foes. All have their own tales to tell, and we will get to those in time as well.
As for my tale, or rather the tale of myself and my three intrepid companions, it is not simply a lust for gold, status, ambition, or personal satisfaction that powers us ever on. All four of us desire to reconcile not only our pasts but find a future all our own, taken by our very hands if need be. This world of ours may not be perfect, but it is ours, and we were going to be the fighting force that helped bring about a new dawn. We will face trials that no one else could have dreamed we would; rising armies, mysterious cults, monstrous beasts, and even the challenges of opening hearts long scarred over. We would find those things we always lacked in our lives; friendship, safety, and most importantly to me, love.
I shall do my best to explain in my wanton wandering way who these characters I find myself beside, the world we inhabit, and the nature of our quest that has brought together such drastically differing sorts as our happy, dysfunctional little family. But before I tell you all about my friends, my companions, and the adventures we shared, I must first tell you one of mine. That of the importance of good will, of forgiveness, and the day I met who would become the love of my life. For I am a Bard, and I too, have my own stories to tell.
Oborro Othello, Master of the Four Dragons
He awoke to the drip of cold water slowly trailing down his nose. Eyes, one purple, one pure black from iris to pupil, blinked in surprise, then annoyance. Wet. Wet and cold. The ground beneath him was clammy and slick, and yet sticky at the same time. And yet he was laying on something very solid, confirmed to be a second later as a thick, cold, stone floor. That had to be the worst way to wake up.
Especially when the next first immediate sensation was that of horrible pain inside of his head. It felt like his skull had been transformed into the most sensitive-sided bell in the world; every motion, every sound, every tiny thought just set it to ringing. Waking up to a headache, that was the worst way to wake up.
Lifting a hand shakily, he tried to cup the throbbing side of his head, only to have it bring up short in a sudden jerk. The jingle-jingle-scrape of metal on metal, horribly rusted through years of neglect, caused an entire belltower of ringing echos inside his poor, aching dome. That, combined with the slight restriction around his wrists, iron against his skin making his fingers go partially numb, gave him yet another clue.
So in summation: somewhere cold and damp, head injured, and apparently taken prisoner. That had to be, in a very long line of unfortunate events in his life that he could easily have said could claim the same before today: the absolute worst way to wake up.
What he wouldn’t give to go back to sleep, to the blissful time only seconds ago.
Another drop of water splashed into his eye, trailing down its trail to his nose and there dripping off like the world’s saddest little stalactite.
“Fuck off…life…I do not…want to deal with you right now…” His throbbing eyes closed slowly, gently, like falling feathers. The tolling of the bells, the chilling clamor of the iron manacles, all began to fade away once more… “I just…want…to sleep.”
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‘If you wake up complaining boy, you best be ready to work twice as hard to earn me having to hear about it.’
Belligerent sunlight streamed in through the opened window, shining directly in his bleary eyes. He did not need to sit up to see the sadist that had drawn them in preparation for the day. He took far too much pleasure in rousing his apprentice. “...Good morning to you too, old man.”
‘Comb your hair; you look like a tupped rooster coming out of the haypile. If your unconfident ass could even get a date. Women are never going to go for you, boy, if you don’t walk without that hunch of yours. Bards are supposed to be charmers, to bring in the love and adoration of the crowds. That sour mug of yours is more likely to draw the wrong kind of attention.’ The sour, cynical grin beneath that short, well-cropped goatee beard was especially frustrating to look at today.
Sitting up, he felt his back twinge hard. “My back is hunched because you had me filing books in the library for four hours after midnight! No other Apprentice is filing books four hours after midnight! I know, because I’ve asked! That might account for my ‘sour mug’”
Crystal blue eyes rolled in their weathered, dark sockets. He must have been a truly rakish sort in his youth, his master. Raven-black hair, tied back out of his face and hanging to his broad shoulders, was starting to thread through with grey; it only made the old fox even more insufferable and charming to the ladies. They never had to deal with his consternation and curmudgeonliness in the mornings. ‘Ungrateful. The personalized training I offer him, and he complains. The unique and individualized training I set up meticulously for you to cater to your very special circumstance, and you don’t appreciate it? Half-Bloods these days.’
Ignoring the slightly racist comment that he knew the old man did not truly mean, merely trying to get a rise out of him, he just shook his head and forced himself to swing his legs out of bed. “I’m so sorry that I don’t appreciate the three hours of sleep I get a night because of your special training. Forgive me, oh great Master Knight-Shield, if sleep deprivation has robbed me of my appreciation for your oh so gracious special instruction.”
‘You’re a mean drunk the next day, you know that?’
“Whose drinking? I’m not drinking! If anyone is drinking, it’s you! I know, because I’m up all night shelving books and boxes for you, and you’re just in there raiding the liquor cabinet. News flash, old man, my starting wages working in the taverns of the Entertainment district are not enough to afford school supplies and keep you buzzed on Wyvernese moonshine.”
‘Point taken, oh Lord Sulky-Pants; I can see someone woke up on the wrong side of the wrong face. I guess I can allow my personal apprentice to be graciously exempted here today and allowed to sleep his ass in, and won’t have to go on this little job I got from the council.’ There it was. That self-satisfied, twinkling smile that meant he had a great, if arduous, surprise in store for his pupil’s unorthodox studies.
“...Wait, are you serious?” Gone was the lethargy and soreness. A Bard had no time for such things.
‘Yep.’ That characteristic pop of his lips when he said that one word seemed so iconic, so very much a him mannerism. ‘Some old ruin just got unearthed during a tsunami off the coastline, and we’re the ones being sent to explore it before any of the other Wings of the college. I may have had to wheel and deal quite extensively with Master Fulhart to acquire first rights. Shame you’d rather sleep in. Maybe I’ll offer my extra-credit course to someone more appreciative. Maybe young master Thames. He’s fiery enough for these expeditions.”
“Who, Sean? You’d run screaming if you had to put up with him on the Apprentice Retreats. For such a little guy, the dude has a mouth! He never shuts up, and if you aren’t someone he respects, he walks all over you.”
‘It’s called Charisma, Mister Othello. Bards are defined most of all, above song, dance, instrument, or oratory performance, for their Charisma. Your Halfling friend, Sean, was it? Sounds like he has plenty to spare. But it’s a shame you don’t want to go.’
“I still want to go, Master.”
‘Oh, now I’m Master. When I have something you actually want, I’m Master? I wasn’t aware I was buying your time and studies with a college degree. I assumed, how wrong of me, that I sponsored you to become a great Bard, that it didn’t matter if you came from the streets. What mattered was your hard work and determination. You were showing all those naysayers out there that said, ‘Oborro, you just can’t do it.’ But you’d rather sleep in. Oh well.’
“...I get it, I’m sorry, Master Knight-Shield, that I woke up complaining; now can you tell me what the job is and stop passive-aggressively manipulating me?”
‘Sure can, my boy. As soon as you can do the dishes.’
“I don’t wanna do the dishes! You do the dishes for once.”
“Can’t. Sorry. Ironclad legislature says otherwise.”
“Oh, ironclad malarky.”
‘Aghast, my boy! There is no need for that kind of language.’
“Hogwash, hocum, humbug, ma-lar-ky.”
‘To think I take care of an ungrateful sort to utter the three H’s under this roof. For shame, Montegraine Knight-Shield. Your bloodline really will die out with you.’
“Just show me this, quote unquote, law.”
‘I am the Master Bard, you are the Apprentice Bard. Clause A, Paragraph G, Subsection Q under select individual circumstances of the College Charter, you signed, Mr. Othello, states: On all nights unless physically ill or beleaguered, injured or otherwise incapacitated, the Apprentice Bard does the dishes.’
“There is no way that is a real thing. You are making that up, old man.”
‘Read it and weep, my young Half-Sidhe.”
Out came the magical contract Oborro had signed upon admission to the Bardic College of Arts, the lavish guild whose massive halls dominated a vast cliff-face in an impressive, if opulent palace. Its sparkling walls overlooked the radiant, smudge-based gem that was New Aurot, City of the Free Peoples. Filigree of the city’s outline, a famous staple image on much of their heraldry, was decorated all along the glowing, golden pages.
Scrolling through endless columns of ridiculously back-trailing writing, he found the subsection mentioned. The words were as clear on the magical old parchment as they had been the first time he read them. “Son…of a bitch…”
‘Now get to scrubbing. Also, while you’re at it, boil the chamber pots.’
“I…hate you Old Man.”
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Another raindrop stirred him from the recollections of the past presented to him again in such vivid detail. Gone was the warm, stuffy study, full of the smell of parchment, dust, and restoration oil for the many various relics lining the wall. Once again he was laying, rather than on the soft down bedding on the hard, cold ground. Cold and wet. Bells tolled in his head. His fingers were almost entirely numb, all the way up to his arms.
It was getting hard to breathe, that tingly chill slowly but surely overtaking his whole body from the points of contact against the metal of his shackles. He had to move. There was no time. The iron of the manacles would soon start to cause physical skin necrosis. After that, severe epidural burns, bleeding sores, and a pain worse than even the abbey’s worth of bells that echoed in his skull. The Iron pain.
Oborro jerked awake and began gasping for air. His chest was tight, tightening, skin as grey and cold as the slab floor he lay upon. Had to…get them…off! His limp fingers, stiff and half-unresponsive, slapped against the rims of the bitingly cold iron bands around his wrists. He would never be able to pick the lock like this; which meant he had to take the second option. How he hated having to learn how to do it.
Yet another painful lesson taught to him by Montegraine. Even through his haze, he couldn’t help but feel miserably grateful for all the times he’d had to practice this…
Snap, went one thumb as he popped it out of the socket. Snap, went the other, a deep aching pounding as the separated tendons stretched like they weren’t supposed to be. He scuffled at the manacles, kicked, and pried and wiggled, and finally, blissfully off they came. His wrists ached and stung from the small knicks and cuts they’d caused, the blood silvery in the dim light. Collapsing back he sagged onto his back, gasping, as air, life, color, and warmth came back to him in a tingling rush. Like a great weight lifting from him, his lungs became uncompressed and he breathed.
If he had not been merely Half-Blooded, he would already have been dead, or so said the tales. Stories of Fey beings being weakened or even outright slain by mortal Iron were not just the stuff of folklore. All at once, he was made perfectly clear on that knowledge, and it served as his final stirring reminder to awaken. Lights and flickers quickly became reality in his twisting-centered eye. All and terribly at once, he was aware, and how he hated it.
He sat up, fingers tingling and itching, rubbing at his throat. Out came a cough, and a strangled gurgle, and finally “Holy…hells. What a way to wake up…” The throbbing of his dislocated thumbs outdid the blow he had taken to the head in intensity, and the stinging shock of when he reconnected them served to inspire him to come to his senses.
Oborro Othello sat up in the dark and dusty, wet and musty, stone prison, and smiled. “I win again, world; you can’t kill me, even in my sleep. The Greatest Bard who Never Lived would never die to a challenge as weak as this. Do your worst.” And he laughed. Aching head or no, one could not cheat death by so narrow a margin and not celebrate the utter joy that was life.
“What the? What was that?!” came a new voice from down the corridor, swiftly cutting through his merriment. Straining his eyes, he quickly picked up the shapes of old tombs, sarcophagi lining the walls, bedecked with dust and cobwebs as lavishly as a royal coach’s finery. There was a light at the end of that tunnel, too bright to be torchlight, his keen ears hearing three distinctly barking voices speaking from that direction.
“I think…it came from…the cells…”
“He’s awake? How the hell is he awake? Burn just knocked him senseless not a few hours ago. There’s no way a skinny little shit like that wakes up after a knock to the head like that.”
“You’re one to talk, Garrote,” snickered another of the feral-sounding voices. There were several doglike growls and snarls before a soft clap resounded around the walls, accompanied by a pair of pained, surprised yips.
“Shut up, both of you,” growled the most commanding of the three voices. “We barely came to a decision just now so stop before you start questioning the plan. So what that he’s awake? There’s no way he’s getting out of the cell without his fancy stuff.”
“Oh, I don’t know,” sighed Oborro, already scanning his surroundings for any sign, clue, or detail that would help him accomplish just that. This wasn’t the first cell he would have to improvise his way out of. “I’ve been in worse spots.”
Digging back through his pale hair, he extracted what he hoped he would find: a small, silvery pin he used to help tie his long tresses mostly back out of his face. He set to delicately plying the lock on the rusted old gate, careful not to let his skin linger in contact against the bars more than he had to. His fingers were only just now starting to get their normal level of maneuverability back. Now all he had to do was keep his captors talking.
“Oh yeah?” growled the prominent voice down the corridor. “Want me to come in there and knock you back out?”
“You’d be more than welcome to try,” he challenged, grinning from ear to pointed ear. “You wouldn’t have the jump on me like you did last night. Might not work out so well for you, even without my ‘fancy gear’.” He could feel the distant currents of familiar air at his beck and call, but without line of sight, he couldn’t summon any of his belongings to his side. The lingering taste of Iron was still heavy in his mouth as well, so magic was also not an option.
“Did he just..?!”
“I think he did.”
“...Change of plans. We don’t leave you on the side of the road after this with your fancy gear, minus your money. Now, we kill you, Half-Elf.”
“So quick to jump to violence. One might wonder if you really have it in you.” He had to stall more. “And Half-Elf? Really? So you’re racists too? Youths today, no manners. No common decency in how to treat others. Kill me if you like, but that’s inexcusable.”
Some silence then, as the out of sight miscreants were considering what he’d said.
“I’m not racist toward Half-Breeds if that’s your issue… I don’t have a problem with your parents being of different species...”
A small pause. The speaker down the hall continued.
“I’m just saying that because…I’m still gonna kill you, because if I assaulted you I know I’m facing prison anyway. Fearmen like us, we don’t get a fair trial. But I’m not some cowardly dog; I won’t make it painful. Even if you are a cocky asshole. I just want you to know that first.”
“No, no, it’s not the half-blooded thing. Can’t change what half what and half not that I am. It’s the Elf part of that sentence I find to be the racially insensitive term. Specifically Half-Elf. ‘Elves’ don’t like being called Elves, they prefer their original names, the Sidhe, before the Humans bastardized all language and labeled their own as the Common tongue and all other races were forced to adapt to them. For ‘convenience’. You know a culture is dead or dying when their own language is being suppressed by the new ‘enlightened’ government. Point being, it’s Sidhe, not Elf.”
There were some confused grumblings. “I didn’t know that,” commented one of the three.
“So what’s a Half-Elf then? Half…Sidhe?”
“Per the term, a Half-Elf would then be in their language: Aos Si.”
“...Then…I’m very sorry if I offended you, by calling you a Half-Elf, Mister Aos Si.”
“You don’t need to be. I wasn’t offended personally; it's the principle of the thing. Racial labels are so limiting in the public eye. I am simply and entirely myself, all any of us can really be asked of. I just wanted to make that distinction clear. Misunderstandings like that over species labels is where it all starts, but I am sorry for calling you a racist.”
Ignorance is no crime unless it comes from the ignoring of intelligence and wisdom.
“Well..thank you. Glad we got that straightened out.”
“Absolutely grand. Now, are you going to kill me?.”
“Yes…”
He clicked his tongue. “Hmm… don’t sound all that confident now do we? You don’t strike me as the killer type.”
A heavy growl came down the hall. More frustration than actual anger. “I could be…”
Sighing, Oborro shook his head. “Son, a real killer would already have done so, not stand here having philosophical debates with a captured prisoner. Not saying I don’t appreciate your civility and all, but this doesn’t sound like something you really want to do. Is it?”
The silence was pregnant with tension. “...No.”
“Then could you be a friend and tell me what the hour is?”
“It’s…afternoon. Close to evening?”
He sighed. “Fantastic, I haven’t missed closing hour. Now please let me out.”
“No.”
“What?”
“No!” came the barking voice, growing more vehement.
“Why not?”
“Because…we already assaulted you. Attacked you. On the road. Stole…your…stuff.”
“Possessions are just things. Now I would greatly like my ‘stuff’ back, but I don’t see that a simple misunderstanding such as ours has to be resolved with such extremes.”
The young Fearmen’s voice faltered even more, sounding more and more unsure. “If we let you go…you’d run to the authorities. It’s…better this way.”
“It’s better you leave me in this god's forsaken cell?”
“We don’t have crap going for us in New Aurot. Our packs live on the outskirts, take the jobs no one else wants. The People’s Army threatens us daily, makes sure we stay in line. I’m tired of being treated like…like a dog.” The feral growling from all three ‘bandits’ at that age-old, hated slang used for their kind, only helped Oborro understand better why they had been so understanding when he’d corrected them before. Still, he knew he wasn’t out of the woods just yet.
“Better we pocket what you had on you, sell your fancy gear, and make new lives for ourselves across the border,” Burn muttered. Oborro had never heard a more miserable sounding plan.
“No…” sighed the Bard. “That’s not it. That’s not the version of yourself you want to remember. You can be better, and you are better just for realizing you made a mistake. It takes a big person to realize that, a really big one.”
“But…I don’t…” Now the speaker sounded more emotional, almost on the verge of tears. For the first time, the true innocence of youth broke through fear and stubbornness.
“Woah, Burrel,” muttered another of the voices. “You all right?”
“Of course I’m all right!” he snapped, trying to snarl but failing. “And it’s…Burn, now.”
Oborro sighed. Better to be diplomatic about this even if he knew that the story could still play out any number of ways. So, instead of continuing to try and be polite, and with his captors’ suspected ages in mind, he opted for a different approach.. “I’m sorry, but I have a strict schedule to keep and this little misadventure has cost me quite enough time. I’m willing to make a deal so long as it gets me out of here and no one else need get hurt. I’m not a great fan of violence myself, and a bar doesn’t run itself, you know?”
There was a short, terse silence. Then, “...You’re a barkeeper?”
“Oh yes. Well, technically tavern owner.”
“And you really wouldn’t say a word?”
“What good would it serve to jail three boys like yourself for a simple, if a bit extreme, mistake? We all make them, and the best answer to realize that, and move forward with humility, is understanding. The stories of our past tell of heroes not only great but small as well. Lesser kindness is still kindness, and a powerful weapon. We need not be subjected to decades of old hatred. We all write our own stories after all.”
“Wait…wait I know who he is! He’s that…that Bard in the Lower Quarter! The one pack-father was talking about!”
“Not the one who…” popped up one of the remaining duo of youths.
“Nah, no way,” argued the other, cutting his friends off vehemently. “He’s just some fancy fop fresh from the upper city, come out here to the fringes to lord his fancy foppishness over the ones like us.”
“I can assure you, fine gentlemen,” he cut in. “I am neither fancy nor a fop. I’m a simple man of the People and the Arts.” He realized a second later perhaps that hadn’t been the best thing to say, so he quickly amended it. “And by People, I do not mean I am a supporter of the People’s Army. They steer well clear of me, and I of them, on account of the whole removal of the Manus-Umbrae business.”
Those dark, wartorn cobbled streets again surged to the forefront of his mind. The blood, the fear, the desperation, the preying of the malignant upon the innocent. No matter how far he got, the horrors of his childhood occurring once again seemed far too possible.
The only difference, this time, was that he had not been a starving orphan half-breed in the midst of all the riots and rival factions going to war over control of the Lower Quarter. No, this time, he had been strong enough to do something about it, and so he had. Hardfought peace had been his reward, and a reputation amongst the lower class that perhaps he could have done without. Still, better to put his own spin on it.
“Told you it was him! O…Otho or something.”
“Oborro Othello; Owner and Proprietor of the Four Dragons, in gleamingly obscene New Aurot’s Lower, but not lesser, Quarter.” Now was the best time to make sure of no more confusion and hopefully soothe this whole thing over. “Every Five-Day is happy hour, story-tellers welcome and Bards play for their supper. Still hiring staff. Glad you’ve heard of me.”
A prolonged silence then, broken only by whispering mutters. One voice spoke up louder than the other two, seemingly still vehement what he had said could not be true.
“There is no way this skinny little shit…”
“Now hold that tone,” Oborro snapped, cutting the naysayer off. “I’ll get to you next. Your foul-language aside, you constantly keep remarking about how skinny I am. I may be slim but I’m not skinny. I’m well-fed, of a respectable and healthy weight for what I am, Male, of the specific species I belong to. I can afford to do so based on how hard I worked to earn it. Hard-work and good intentions driving it have gotten me pretty far in life. I’d hope to impart that sort of thinking upon everyone.”
“And it’s…nice, this inn of yours?”
“Tavern,” he corrected, then sighed wistfully. “The very best.” He could picture it now: cramped common room, upraised stage with shelves to fit all of his instruments, the smell of fine cooked meals by his kitchen staff, laughter, song, and the smiles of both those he knew and did not know yet. To see so many people happy by his own hand and labors truly made all the rest of it worth it in the end. A place all his own, that no one could take away from him.
“All right…we’ll…let you out.”
Oborro’s smile doubled. “Splendid news, but there is no need…I’ve quite taken care of that myself, thank you. Just wanted to hear you agree.” Out into the light of day he stepped, emerging from but one of the abandoned catacombs that littered the vast lands of New Aurot.
As the sun hit his pale face, golden locks combed back behind his face and his dual-colored set of eyes firmly fixed on the horizon, the Greatest Bard that Never Lived strode to center stage. Or at least, that would be how he’d write it when he got back to the tavern. His clothes were sodden, his head still ached a little, but he was no less diminished in this moment than he had been before the events of the previous night.
Little did he know, that today would become one of the most important in his life.
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It had been a rather mundane and uninteresting Thursday when she came to the bar, just another young girl looking troubled. Even Humans, especially Humans, were not free, even in New Aurot, of the hardships of poverty in their own cities. Those that did not support the People’s Army were treated less than well. Rough enforcers of the law when the guards couldn’t be bothered at the best of descriptions, professional bandits and racketeers at their worst.
The girl was pretty, and young, and she had carried a desperate look in her eyes, the kind that meant she wasn’t sure where to turn to look, but she needed help. It was not an easy thing to fake; her distress was genuine. Just another testament to the cruelty of the world. Another lost soul, looking for help in a world that was freshly running out of good examples to offer it. They were dark days, those first few years after the fall of Malig’s dark Empire.
Dark enough that even here, on the outskirts of what were considered to be the ‘safest’ of places, the Landsrayd, there were still little evils lurking everywhere. All villainy in the world had not been toppled with Malig’s burning, iron-spiked fortress. All evil did not cower or rest with the defeat of yes, one of the mightiest examples of it.
It was the little evils, like these men who stood dumbfounded around him, pushed to desperation and fear, that gave birth to the real horrors that were always to come. Even those wrongs wrought by the ‘well-meaning’ misguided thugs of the People’s Army paled in comparison to real evil, but the damage they did was still all too real. It was still a world desperately in need of saving. Even in his retirement, Oborro could not stand to let even one soul go unaided.
Her request of him had been a simple one, with no promise of payment or reward. He hadn’t needed one. The look in her eyes as she asked him to look for some of her missing friends who had been getting themselves into trouble; that had been enough to be able to alleviate her worries.
They were wanted back home, and Oborro, who had never truly had a home before, knew the special longing for such a place. Pay was unimportant if he could make a difference in lives who had not yet truly turned to the side of and doing real evil.
Knock to the head aside, this was still worth him coming all the way out here.
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The three would-be bandits stared at the back of the drenched, bedraggled, messy-haired Half-Elf that had staggered out past them from the necropolis’ entrance. This base of theirs, a recent and lucky find, was the resting place of some legendary hero of ages past. His bones were buried behind a wall the trio had not been able to crack, obviously hiding some great treasure.
Still, the sounds they all swore they could hear at night, coming echoing down the passageways sometimes, they knew had to be coming from behind that wall. That single, terrifying feature guaranteed a number of things they needed to establish the base of their future bandit hideout. A good base must be safe, out of the way, and a reliable place that no one else around here would remember existed.
The Robber Bandit trio: Burn, Slayer, and Garrote. They were tomb-robbers, highwaymen, storybook bandit dogs through and true, and fake as snow in the summer. They pilfered coffers, ran out on tabs, sometimes picked pockets, and generally intended to make a living doing all those rude, abrupt, disruptive things that one might suspect.
Granted, they hadn’t really pillaged any coffers just yet, only skipped out the one time, and the pick pocketing was more an accident than anything, with them too sheepish to come clean about it. Burrel, Slater, and Horner had always been trouble-makers, even as children, and now nearly come, of the age of men, they somehow were just the same: rude, noisy, mean from their upbringing, and just as truly nonviolent.
So nonviolent that Burn’s, or Burrel’s, destructive episode last night, manifesting itself into escalating their crimes to a much more serious kind: armed robbery and theft, had stunned all three of them. It had been the third night of squirrel-stew, which Slayer argued it was rabbit, and Horner was vehement it was weasel.
Already half-drunk on the wine they’d managed to buy with their inconsistent pay as various unappreciated workers, the sight of the lone man challenging them at night, demanding they cease their actions and return the things they had stolen, had driven Burn into a rage. Just one more Hairless looking down on them, judging them without any care for their story.
Everyone knew the three were no real danger. Everyone knew that no matter how they acted, they were cowardly, that they’d never actually hurt someone, and that in the end, all they were was forgotten and ignored otherwise. Those kinds of thoughts plagued Burn late at night when his friends were off on one of their little disgusting contents like who could burp loudest, or eat the largest mouthful of food. He knew they were, by nature, simple creatures, but even so, Burn was a Fearmen tired of not getting taken seriously. Worse, he was tired of being walked on and looked down upon for simply being what he was.
The way the challenger had postured, demanding they cease before they incurred the wrath of the local garrison. It made his fur stand up on end when he even thought about it. How dare someone talk to him like that? His ancestors were the Wargmen, the feral, animal-headed race who fought in Malig’s army. Sure, they were more ‘domesticated’ now, reduced from equivalent of a wolf to a house dog.
But Burn was proud of his past, even if they had done some monstrous things. They had not always been soldiers in a tyrant’s employ; long ago, legends told of Wargmen who ruled entire forests in kingdoms never seen by the eyes of Humans or even Elves. They were a proud people, even reduced as they were now. Still strong.
A single blow had been all it took to down the so-called Bard who denounced them, just a swing of the tankard in his hand to the fair man’s temple. The trio had stood stunned over the down man. Had he been slain? Then a low, unconscious groan from him set them all to sighs of relief, followed by that of their instincts of immediate flight.
“Quick, grab his leg!” had said someone.
“Faster, faster!” whispered someone else.
In short order, they’d gotten back to their hideout, sure that on every step of the way that they were about to be ridden down by the Aurot Rangers. It was a tableau the boys had grown up very aware of, the images driven into their brains by their instructors who always professed peace and obedience to the Hairless Humans. A wave of mounted lances, closing in on a terrified, fleeing band of wolf-headed creatures. The Wolfen Rout had become legendary, and served as a fierce reminder of the generosity of New Aurot in allowing the Fearmen to be recognized again as a species, separate from the enemies of this new, rapidly growing kingdom.
Having arrived at their base with now prisoner in tow, the three boys quickly tried to come up with an explanation or a plan. Half-drunk as they were, none of the ideas were good ones, and there were many slaps of each over the head, punches to the gut, or snaps of their sharp, canine teeth. They all agreed that they would lay low for a while, wait for the guy to wake up on his own, and find his stuff still there, minus his money. The purse they’d acquired had been their biggest ever, overflowing with coins spanning the entirety of New Aurot’s minted currency.
They’d only even just come to the agreement that was what they would do, when Oborro stepped out between them all. There was a stunned pause, a silence between all four of them, Half-Elf and Fearmen alike. It was an auspicious day for all, it would seem. Fate had a funny way of showing its hand.
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“Afternoon, gentlemen,” Oborro spoke first. He worked his fingers into the hem of his soaked, fine-silk trousers, currently missing his filigreed belt, and struck a confident stance as if he were no less magnificent out of his kit than he was in it. “Oborro Othello,” he jerked a thumb back at the cave. “We spoke back at the tomb.”
Furtive canine eyes glanced rapidly from each other as they cautiously twitched back and forth in frantic motions. Burrel wasn’t feeling very confident right now, Slater was shaking so hard his rickety spine almost sounded as if it were jittering, and Horner, the shortest of them, spun his ears so much they might have been in danger of falling off.
“Okay…no one else is going to say anything?” he ventured. “All right. I’ll forget this whole incident occurred, if you return my things and kindly give up this life of fake banditry before all three of you young men get hurt. Seriously hurt. By someone who isn’t going to be so forgiving as me.”
The murmurs between the boys were unanimous. The largest of the trio hurried back inside from the entrance to the necropolis, and returned with a bundle of things wrapped in a purple cloak. Oborro grinned, counting through the pile. His blade, knife, scroll-case, and carved wood flute; they were all still there. Oh. Small scratch on the flute, probably from its rough handling lately. He rubbed his fingers over the polished surface, remembering the kind, constantly boozy man who had given it to him.
Just the memory of him was enough to call his image perfectly to mind: dark hair, graying throughout like the pelt of a wolf. Short beard around his mouth, dignified and only a tad scruffy. Sunken bright eyes, haunted by his lost legacy, doomed to be the last herald of a once great house. Even so, he carried the rapier at his side with grace, and even as a drunk, all his fellow Master Bards knew and paid him his due respect. Even now, he heard Montegraine Knight-Shield’s sonorous grumble as clearly as if it were the first time.
‘Take care of your instruments. A Bard may be clad in rags, but his instruments make the man what he is.’
A little magic and the scratch buffed right out.
Oborro quickly then assessed the condition of the rest of his belongings. Everything was there and accounted for: quicksilver vest, attached half breastplate and singular pauldron, silver-stiched cloak to hang off one arm, polished sword in its silver sheath, his cane, and most importantly of all, his instruments.
Happy to see everything the way it should have been, he packed them back into the pack; he would dress himself once he had returned home. It was still warm enough out, and, using the natural spell of sunlight that streamed around him in a glorious sunset to dry his clothes.
Once satisfied, he lifted his pack up onto his shoulder. It was lighter now, he noticed now, a minute detail of but a simple coin purse, and only detectable by the owner of said magical bag. He glanced to the trio again, raising an eyebrow and fixing them with a stern, if patient eye. They tried not to meet his gaze, sheepishly shuffling in place, but, one after the other, each of the three lads’ eyes turned at last to meet his, taking in the look of him now in full sunlight.
A long scar carved a way down the side of his face, much paler compared to the rest of his decently tanned skin, but it was his eyes that had the tendency to capture. One purple, one black from iris to sclera. The pointed ears, blonde hair, the slender handsome grace of those with Sidhe blood, all of them were in some way captivating to the gaze, but it was the Bard’s eyes that drew people into his stories most.
All three had heard small stories all about the extravagant yet infamous tavern owner. When he had walked into town randomly only a few years ago and in one swoop, bought the old burned out remains of what had been Wildmount Inn, it had started all sorts of stories. Even more so had his joining in the Lower Quarter war between the People’s Army and a cell of the infamously sinister Manus-Umbrae crime syndicate.
Without his aid, the war might have gone on for years, caused countless casualties, and birthed untold numbers of orphan children, just like he had been. Instead, he had sealed his fate to be the talk of the entire province, supposedly nearly routing the rogues by himself, then declaring his section of the city to be off-limits to the People’s Army’s protection rackets. All the word was abuzz; whenever you had need, whether for song or assistance, go to the Four Dragon Inn, and ask for Oborro Othello. For drinks, merriment, and a weaving, winding, often disorderly tale, was his to share with them all.
‘If good men do nothing, evil grows and grows like a creeper. We are to be the sword that cuts the snag, the flame that burns away the dark. Let the shadows and monsters be only tales we tell, and those we perform for spared of the true horrors of the world. Such is a Bard’s calling; more than music, gallantry is our creed.’
Silently to himself, Oborro whispered Montegraine’s words:
“With Music and Might, we bring about what is Right. Creature foul, or soul lost to the Dark, none shall threaten the song of the Lark. For tomorrow is the Dawning, the emergence of the Light. For we are the Bards, so sleep ye safely this Night.”
His eyes opened once again to view the three confused, curious young men standing before him. He had saved them from becoming bandits, but his duty, his mission, was not yet done.
“Now, I imagine three strapping examples of virile Fearmen could do with a quality line of work. Everyone sees your kind and they think ‘Oh yes I’ll hire them as lower class workers, tenders of my herd or cleaning crews.’ They do not see the Wolf your people once were, and still are in some hidden corners of the world, no, only the tamed dog that so disrespects an entire culture. I don’t make company with the likes of those men. Cannot stand racism. That’s why the staff at the Four Dragons is welcome to all those who wish to earn good honest pay. We model ourselves after the heroes and legends of the past, the valorous men and women who gave everything for the freedoms we now all rejoice in. All are welcome.”
“Even…Fearmen?” asked Slater hopefully.
“Oh yes, definitely. My job requirements however are quite strict on personal conduct and behavior. I can offer paid meals, job security and satisfaction, as well as steady income, so long as you three follow that criteria. Failure to adhere to my simple rules of business means that I would be unable to help you; for inside each and all of you is the hardest battle of all. You must choose to do better, to rise above adversity, and become the men your ancestors would be proud of. My rules are not hard to avoid breaking, but we can go over those later. Suffice to say, your days of drinking on hilltops, stealing and running out on your tavern dues, and bullying others ends now.”
Their answer was immediate and unanimous; nowhere and with no one else would they receive a better offer.
“You’re an adventurer, right Mister Othello?,” ventured Horner then. His words drew their collective attention and his ears folded back before he continued at Oborro’s kind nod.
“Once a time before I came to New Aurot, aye, I found that line of work one I still at times experience a certain calling for.”
“So you’ve been out there, the real world?” Oborro simply nodded, looking of course grand and mysteriously benevolent. “Did you really meet a Wolfen, like our Pack-father says you did?”
“A Wolfen?” mused Oborro. “Yes, but not in the context of the ones you mean: the noble savage Beastmen. I’ve only ever met the one, and he terrified me, I’m not ashamed to say. I’d be a happy man if I were never to run into that chap again.”
“Was he…a bandit too?” asked one of them.
“Him? That man, a bandit? Oh, oh no. His morals and codes were far too strict and stringent for that. Terrifying man all the same. But I don’t judge all Wolfen, nor Fearmen, as by his example, nor should anyone else who does not want to be called a hypocrite. The atrocities done on both sides of the war were many and great, although the victor’s are the only ones who are immediately forgiven while others are made scapegoats.”
Silent nods were his response and he grinned.
“That is to say, my fine Fearmen lads, that the legend of your people that you spread from this day are the ones future generations will remember. You write your own stories with every step, every turn of the page. You live in momentous times, and you could all three become great heroes all on your own. But all of us start much more humbly, much smaller. There’s no shame in a quiet, happy life, proud of who and what you are. And, no matter what path your stories take, what better place to base yourselves off of and from than the Four Dragons? All the best stories start in a tavern, after all.”
They all smiled, nodded eagerly, and made to follow after him with a new passion, gathering their few things and leaving behind only that which did not need to come with them into a potentially new life. His grin fell on them again, causing them to pause.
“Good answer, and good energy boys. It’ll be the dinner rush soon, and we simply must get ourselves back if you’re to start your first day working for me. Just one more issue to bring up before we head back to the city. Which one of you is Burrel?”
Striding to the front, looking unsure, Burrel, forgetting he ever once wanted to change it to something as silly as Burn, met the Bard’s eyes warily. The large bruise on the side of his head stood out starkly against his carved, attractive features. “That’s…me,” he admitted.
Their eyes locked, just as they had the previous night over the crackle of the fire. Defiant, confused teenage hotheadedness met the gaze of someone with patience but a stern air that belied the youth of his face. He had a light to him, almost a silver sheen, one that drew the eye. His eyes were gentle but firm, like the ones Burn had grown up always wishing he could see. It reminded him too much of old hurts around the pack-den.
“Lurraine says for you to come home. And that she wants to talk.”
Tears leapt unbidden to the youth’s eyes yet again. “She…she does? She forgives me?”
“For being a dumb, jealous boy, yes. She does. Although you owe someone called…” Oborro tapped his chin, then winced at a small surge of pain from his bump on the head. “Carver, an apology.”
“Carver wasn’t…” Burrel started to object, then faltered at the same look that flashed at him in those dual-colored eyes. “Yessir. I will.”
Oborro Othello smiled. “Good lad. This world could do with a few more ‘I’m sorry’s’ and those who then follow through after saying them.”
‘An apology is not an excuse, but a promise to be better.’
Understanding passed across the faces of the youths as they absorbed what he said. There was an awkward pause, and then Burrel held out a paw, containing the Bard’s purloined purse. “I…guess you’ll be wanting this back…” he muttered.
Oborro shrugged. “Actually, I’d rather invest it.” Their canine eyes looked at him confusedly. “Consider it a down-payment on your wages to have you begin working at my tavern, effective immediately. You will, however, use that coin to pay recompense to all of those you’ve slighted or wronged, and I will speak for you if the guards have to be summoned in any situation. You may face some punishment for the petty crimes you’ve been accumulating, but if you work hard, be honest, and promise to turn yourselves around, you have a future. That’s a precious thing nowadays.”
‘Be for others the person you needed in the past; an open hand, a fresh start, a welcoming and unassuming mind.’
From the looks on their faces as they reverently all agreed to the generous offer, he knew he’d made the right choice. The world needed more understanding if it truly was to be the Age of Enlightenment come again. The boys fell in step with him as he turned and began the trek down the hillside towards the Trade road down below.
As he led the way back across the rolling countryside of New Aurot, Oborro mused on the setting of the sun. The three scrappy Fearmen boys pestered and dogged him for details about the stories that circled around him and those of his trade. He answered what questions he willed but did not want to spoil any performances once they arrived back home.
Adventurers were commonplace in the world of Talamh, but even so, their kind were the stuff of legend to others. He was no gallant knight, nor warrior sworn, no mysterious Assassin or powerful Wizard, but he was a Bard. Those of his vocation still had great legends and epics told about them, helped along by that they were the ones who usually got to tell their own tales. And Oborro had quite a few tales of his own to tell.
Out there, on a distant plain, he saw the silvery gleam of what might have been a patrol of Aurot Rangers just cresting a faraway hill. The light cast by their lances and sabres were a common staple, a reminder of just and gallant men who still rode their country, keeping them safe in the new age brought on in the wake of Malig’s downfall. Great kingdoms tended to spring up in the footsteps of those that came before, New Aurot emerging just as Malig’s empire had risen after the fall of the Varithiir Sidhe.
These were the lands where legends came to rest and rose anew, like the fiery symbol of the mythical phoenix that had become the national symbol of the foundling kingdom. A new land, risen from the ashes, ready to see the world return to the light before Malig’s darkness. It was, as ever, a troubled and tumultuous time to be sure, with every kindness being forced to wage war over stories of overwhelming greed, indifference, and ambition for power or station. Oborro just wanted to do some good in it.
“Master Othello?” came the voice of Burrel.
His attention snapped back to the present. “Yes?”
“We…didn’t hurt any of your instruments did we? We only saw the flute after all.”
“Not at all, good lad,” he beamed back at the young Fearmen teens. “I typically only carry a few with me on the road anyway, reduces potential accidents and such.” He then grinned, tapping his pack. “And besides, you could throw this bag of mine down a mountainside and it wouldn’t hurt what’s inside. Magic, you know? And it fits a lot more inside than you’d think.”
“Could we hear a song, please?” asked Horner then. He twitched so much from eager nervousness that the Bard couldn’t help but smile and oblige. Then again, he rarely needed a reason to break into song. There were so many new songs to learn now.
Oborro saw great potential in the Landsrayd, those peoples of Humans who resisted Malig’s rule; clans of Sidhe Dark, Wild, and Bright, the Dwarves, even some outlying members of the reclusive Draach. One last alliance amongst the races and peoples not yet conquered by Malig had become a vast mixing pot of all cultures welcomed supposedly.
Even those species that had stood on the losing side; the Fearmen, the Goblins, and even the ferocious Orcs; all were allowed to find peaceful enough lives, working off the debt of their people in the prospect of becoming full citizens as well. If they wanted it, that was. Some preferred to retreat back into the wilds, returning to their ancestral ways.
So many cultures, so many peoples and ideas, so many new songs. That was the main reason Oborro had decided to try and finally settle from his roaming, wild, wandering days. No one knew of him in these lands, or hadn’t, thus making it all the better a place to establish a new home, where no one knew his face and his name could mean whatever he wanted it to. His only wish: to keep this one for much longer. He was getting very tired of running.
“Certainly, you may, young master Horner. I’ve just the tune for it: the anthem that I always play for newcomers to the Four Dragons. You all like stories of heroes, yes?”
Unanimous were their eager head bobs and wagging tails. As good of an audience to him as even a tavern full of patrons, all waiting in anticipation for the show to begin.
“Then here is a familiar reel, based on some of our most famous heroes. You’ve heard the words, so just sing along with me as we go.”
Out came the flute in a flash and a merry tune soon rang among the twilight-darkening hills and roads they traveled down. Passerbys stopped, stared, and then smiled as they went, slowly gathering a small train as they came into the outskirts of the city proper. The whole while, Oborro’s fingers danced on the holes of his flute, and so too did the sounds of his viol and long-handled, brightly strung lute. His Bardic magic allowed him to switch between instruments at will with ease, floating them out of his magical bag and into his hands as he needed them, or playing them alongside him, floating in midair, as if he were not one Bard but three.
Every Bard had a Masterpiece, and his was this: Empty Orchestra.
Voices sang the age-old chorus as if they were the first ones to have done so. All around the returning Bard's path were the homes of simple, kindly, honest peoples of New Aurot as Oborro led the way back on the winding way home.
Don't Stop Believin' (Irish Folk Version) (March to the Four Dragons)
He could see it now...
Once through the doors of his beloved tavern, he would immediately be hailed in a chorusing roar by all those treasured faces he had grown to love each and individually. Some old, some newer, all raising tankards, fists, pipes, or voices to welcome home their friend. Drinks would be poured, carried to tables by the invisible Jeoffrey, his, usually friendly, in-house poltergeist, or served at the bar by his Goblin barkeeper, Mitch.
Such was the Four Dragons: a haven, a sanctuary, a place of celebration with friends both old and new. A place where kindness was a currency and everyone spent it well and readily. A refuge away from racism, from suspicion, and that allowed people to simply live, laugh, and listen. Such was the example put down by its owner, a humble Bard that any and all could happily agree was one of the Greatest to bear the name. Or at least, that was what he told himself.
As they crested the last hill, the sun just beginning to sink towards the horizon and coloring everything in grand shades of purple and orange, the three Fearmen youths and Oborro at last came into sight of the majestic, spiral-topped towers cresting over pearly white walls. New Aurot, City of the Free Arts. It may have been a newer city, but it looked strong enough to last the test of the ages, so long as good people kept hope and music in their hearts.
It did not, however, look strong enough for the massive war-camp just outside the gates. That was most definitely new. The song fell away at once as the four of them stared, dumbstruck, at the rapidly assembled wooden fortifications and vast array of pitched tents spread out across the fields, stretching out farther than any of them could see.
Too many to have moved in so swiftly, far too many for even the roving patrols of Aurot Rangers to have been able to hinder. Only magic of a great scale could have achieved such a thing. This was no longer a land of warfare and violence; Talamh had had quite enough of that over the last few decades. To see an army such as this, camped on the very doorstep of the first and last Free city, still accepting refugees displaced by Malig's wars, was enough to shake even Oborro's sense of confidence and good will.
Even so, he knew that something must be done. If the banners flapping above the roughshod walls were those of who he thought them to be, time was of the essence. He had no faith in the diplomats of the Courts, and the Bard's College would claim neutrality, even if located inside the same city as that was which besieged.
Turning quickly to the terrified trio of lads, he unholstered his bag and shoved it into Burrel's paws. "Take this," he instructed, which Burrel did. No time to don his armor, and carrying a sword would have been foolish if approaching a warcamp. He took only one thing, his favorite instrument, a long-handled lute, and slung it under one arm by its attached, silvery cord. Satisfied, he again faced the boys who still stared at him in utter confusion. "You three take good care of that for me."
"B-but where are you going?"
Oborro spared the three a kindly smile. "To do what Bards do best," he replied, then lifting his lute, began to strum a quick melody. Magic began to fill him, channeled through the mithral strings of his prized tool, motes of light floating about the three Fearmen boys. Their eyes gazed at him in both rapture and worry as he focused on the complex spell he was weaving. "Bardic Masterpiece, Willihard's Portal Demesne."
Then he lifted a single hand, carried on the beat of his final short performance, and snapped his fingers once. Burrel, Slater and Horner had time for a collective surprised bark before they abruptly disappeared in a loud pop, reappearing, as he knew they would, at the Four Dragons Tavern. Oborro could not help but grin at having woven the spell perfectly; Willihard would have been proud. Even so, his satisfaction was short-lived; the Greatest Bard who Never Lived had work to do.
It had been a rather dull and mundane Thursday...
