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Manor of the Many

The air was thick with smoke leaf and incense, and the lanterns burning over the tables reminded him of the great lighthouse in the bay, wreathed in fog. Kieran was weaving between the tables, carrying a tray filled with drinks for respectable patrons of the Manor of the Many, and poppied wine to all the other ones. The sandstone walls, the dark wood floor and the smoky air, combined with the torchlight and candlelight, gave a yellow glow to his charcoal fur.

The last conscious individual, seated in the back of the bar was shrouded in a dark shadow, where the light would not reach. Kieran went over to where the man sat, nimbly dodging haphazardly placed chairs, heavy round wooden tables and discarded wine mugs, ducking expertly to avoid the low-slung lanterns, and skipping over a sleeping sailor dexterously, as only a fox could.

The figure Kieran had seen, or sensed, was an old white and black spotted canid of some description. He must have been a foreigner. The Castellanians were common around here, but he didn't look like any of the many species in service to the crown. He had a metal tipped walking stick, about half his height. It was thick as Kieran's arm, and looked like it could deliver a solid whack to any careless servant. Kieran was on his toes, like always, ready to dart away from any drunkards fumbling grasp.

To Kieran, this white and black spotted dog did not look like someone who could lift such a stick, let alone lift himself. He was so far gone on wine and poppy that Kieran feared he coudn't be trusted to leave the bar unassisted. Life always got difficult when Kieran had to confront the drunks.

Kieran was contemplating this logistical problem when the figure spoke to him in a soft, raspy voice. He had to strain to hear what was being said.

"Young man, lend an old man a hand for tonight, help me home" The figure pleaded, but underneath his dark blue, frayed hood, Kieran could see a grin, and grew instantly suspicious. Kieran had been around bad people all his life, and was no stranger to the perverted whims of bar goers. It never made any difference how old and feeble they looked, everyone wanted to put their filthy paws on his rear, or pull his tail up, or make him touch them in various places.

"I think not, stranger. I can lend you a foot if you don't get yourself out of here quick enough" He threatened, shaking his fist. "We are past closing time, and you have had too much to drink, leave now or I will call the guards."

The figure in the robes threw his hands up defensively as Kieran bared his teeth at him. His bench made a creaking sound. There came a distinct and familiar metallic clinking sound from underneath his blue and yellow trimmed, tattered travellers' robes.

"Actually" Kieran said, ears turning to catch the sound of clinking coin. "I might be able to lend you a hand"

The dog in the robes grunted with effort as he lifted himself from the low, cushioned bench, and shakily hoisted himself to his feet with the aid of his wooden stick, which looked much lighter than Kieran first anticipated.

"Take me to the street of beggars, boy." He said shortly

"I figured as much already" Kieran mumbled to himself "Certainly, mister...?"

"Duck" The figure spat out.

He swayed and gripped Kieran's forearm with his thin paws. Kieran called out to the bar maid Kisha, a small painted dog, to mind the bar while he followed this customer outside. If Matron saw Kieran leaving the establishment without her leave, he'd be stuck on floor scrubbing duties until the next full moon. He didn't trust Kisha to not reveal his secrets, but perhaps the coin in the stranger's purse might help levitate Matron's perpetually foul mood.

As the young fox passes the threshold of the bar with the scrawny dog in tow, the figure shifted his grip to Kieran's upper arm, grasping it tightly. It's not that it hurt, or even felt that tight. The grip felt measured. Kieran notices that there was no alcohol on his breath. He might still have indulged the poppy but he's not drunk.

"My apologies for earlier, mister. My temper went away with me. Please forgive me" He pleads with the old dog, consciously aware of the clinging of coin that emerged from underneath the dog's robes with each step.

"Do not concern yourself with that, young man. This old dog is used to rough treatment" He replied, tapping his chest with his free paw. He's had most of his fur and patterns covered with the thick cloak, which looks very heavy, but sways in the wind like silk. Kieran has never felt silk before, but he's pretty sure that this cloak may have cost someone a lot at some point, because there was no way it belonged to this beggar, with his bandaged bare feet, his thin, scruffy arms, and his frail, bent back.

They trailed through the town together, from the merchant's district near the docks, and down the street towards the great dip in the landscape that the sun couldn't touch in the early mornings or late evenings. This dip contained the beggar's district. Only the most dejected and the most desperate lived here. What had begun as a great wide road with establishments and lavish stone houses on either side, well-lit and patrolled by imposing guards, had turned into a narrow street, in which two hand drawn carts would be unable to pass each other.

Kieran noticed that the torches which had lit the streets in the merchant's district were now more scattered and placed with greater infrequency. Often as not, there would be empty sconces along the walls, where a torch might once have lit the street. The air itself seemed darker altogether in this part of town. The houses were getting smaller, and smaller. The structures leaned closer in over the streets, and there were wooden awnings, shelters and extra floors stacked on top and around the buildings' stone exteriors.

Kieran could feel the many suspicious eyes on him now, a lone fox walking a stranger, with a strange coat of black and white, through the streets at night. They stuck out like a pair of fish in the desert. Ripe for the taking.

As they rounded a corner, and came to a small opening in the forest of buildings, two large individuals came out of the shadows behind a derelict market stall. A threatening looking bengal tiger in a night watch uniform complete with breastplate and hauberk, and a great brown ox, dressed in a rich kaftan with a scimitar strapped to his belt. Kieran could see the tiger had some sort of great sword on his back, but he found himself staring at the dimly reflected mirror image of himself in the Guard's dented breastplate. The only light came from a lonely torch on the wall of a boarded-up building in the southern corner of the opening.

"What do we have here?" The tiger grinned. "You lost, boy?"

They were approaching Kieran and the stranger casually, but the tiger had a clear stalking intent to his walk, and the ox was leaning his dominant hand across his breast to his curved sword in a guarded fashion.

"Oh, my excuses my lords, I am only a wine-seller. I'm taking this old man to his home for tonight" Kieran put his hands together and saluted the guard and his companion, and they stopped, a few feet from Kieran and his strange companion.

The ox turned to the tiger and whispered in his ears, but loud enough that Kieran could easily pick up the word "whore" being used a whole lot.

"You. Boy. How much for tonight" The ox said in a poor excuse for the omnipresent Castellanian language

"Sir, I am not a gentleman of leisure" Kieran pleaded, responding in his native dialect, hoping it was also native to the Ox. "I am a wine-seller, I have no price"

"He's free" The tiger translated Kieran's native tongue to Castellanian, a tongue Kieran could understand and speak well enough.

Kieran wanted to run. The old man clutched his arm tight and he wasn't sure he could wrench free in time. The promise of coin was still in the back of his mind. Even if he ran, he'd probably not get very far. The guard would sound the alarm, and the town would be after him. Kieran could feel the old surge of panic, that uneasy sense that there was no way to avoid what was coming next. He backed away on stiff legs. The old man looking on helplessly as Kieran backed away from the tiger, releasing his grasp as the tiger shoved him away violently, so that he fell to the dirt street. Kieran's feet took him backwards right into the ox, who had flanked around and found himself behind the fox.

There was a yank at Kieran's fluffy tail and it was pulled up into the air, his butt and his feet losing their touch with the dirt. He fell forward onto the tiger's cold chest plate, before a large, striped and clawed hand grabbed him by the scruff of his neck. They had him between them, The ox by his tail and the tiger by his neck. Kieran whimpered and prayed that god would strike them down, but no gods came.

"Sirs. Please. There's no need for such violence" came a raspy voice from somewhere. Kieran couldn't move his head, but the voice was the old dog's voice.

"Stay away old man, if you don't want what little life you have left to leave you. This whore is coming with us, and it would be best if you went home now." The tiger growls out in the Castellanian that the old man had used.

Kieran heard the clinking of coins onto the ground. A dull metallic thud followed by more clinks. The tiger turned to the noise. The old man was throwing coins at the ground in front of himself. He was emptying his coin purse out in a bid to release the young fox from his captivity.

"You pathetic fool, are you bribing me? You will be sorry you disregarded my command." The tiger guardsman growled; his tail lashed from side to side as he walked over to the old man. He yanked Kieran along by his scruff, and the ox had to relinquish his grip on Kierans' tail. The fox' feet settled back on the dirt, scrambling to keep up with the tiger's long strides.

I'm taking these as a tax on your stupid gestures, now get lost, or you'll be sorry." He growled at the old stranger, approaching him as the last coin plinked down onto the pile. His rumbling deep voice sent shivers down Kieran's spine, his grasp strengthened, his claws threatened to draw blood. The firm grip was starting to restrict Kieran's breathing.

The ox had drawn his scimitar and was flanking the outskirts of the feeble cone of light cast by the lonely torch. Kieran noticed him emerging from the shadows behind the feeble man, prepared to come up and stick that deadly looking blade in his back. The fox wanted to call out, but could barely even breathe, and not make much noise. He thrashed agains the tiger's wide cloth pants and belt, squirming and kicking the ground in silent, choking protest.

The ox drew back for a slash. A slash which would have been a perfectly executed downward strike, and with all the ox' weight behind it might have severed the old wretch in two. He was right behind the old wretch, he couldn't miss. Only the old wretch was not there anymore. He had dashed away as the blade was descending, there is only a puff of sand and dust where the spotted dog once stood, thrown up by the clumsy follow through of the ox.

From somewhere off in the shadows, the sound of a blade being drawn could be heard, the rasping metallic sound of a sword being unsheathed. The ox looked around in confusion and apprehension, straining his eyes to find movement, and Kieran felt the tiger tense his muscles, the swishing of the orange striped tail ceased. He's almost completely unable to breathe and panic is starting to take over. His legs struck against the dirt road; his paws grasped at his neck but the tiger's mind was fixed on something coming out of the dark. Tiger eyes can see clearly in even the poorest light. Kieran could see them widen as a shock of surprise crept over the tiger's stony expression.

A wraith appeared behind the ox, who was facing them some yards away. The ox had his broad back to the slice of darkness where the tiger and Kieran's eyes were now fixed. A thin metal spike pushed its way out of the rich looking kaftan, just where the heart was supposed to be. To Kieran it looked like a bamboo shoot emerging from a field of roses, only very quickly. The ox didn't move. It looked like he couldn't move, his limbs are were stuck as if frozen in the same guarded position he had been holding a second before. The bamboo shoot disappeared inside the ox' chest, and the ox fell over. Behind him there was a figure in a blue and yellow cloak.

Kieran could hardly believe his eyes, or his luck, as the tiger swore a foul oath and threw him roughly to the sand. His first instinct was to run, but he was so stunned that he couldn't make his legs do what he told them to do. He spent a few seconds on his paws and knees, choking breath back into his chest, before sitting in a heap on the dirt, looking confusedly at this once old, scrawny dog as he straightened his back, and flicked ox blood from a long, slender blade with a sweeping motion. Kieran had never seen a blade so thin before.

The tiger drew his sword, a massive curved sword, Almost as tall as the tiger himself but considerably sharper. It was so large, the tiger had to rest the blade on his padded, armoured shoulder. He growled at the spotted figure and charged. The tiger shortened the distance between them to a few feet. He stomped his heavy feet, grounded himself and handed out a broad sideways cut at his opponent, that would have chopped down a palm tree in a single swipe.

The stranger threw his whole body backwards, and sailed through the air, arcing his back and catching his leap with his feet, and touching down with his paws like some acrobat of combat, doubling the distance between them. As the great sword followed through on its arc, he lunged forward, crossing the distance between them in one great bound, and poked the slender sword at the tiger's exposed, unarmoured throat.

Kieran gasped as the tiger threw himself sideways to avoid the blade, losing his balance. The great cat took a tumble and rolled, landing on his paws and feet seconds later, in a cloud of dust. His great sword clattered to the ground where he had stood. He scrambled for it, but the stranger was on him in a second, placing a foot on the hilt of the discarded blade, and lowering the thin blade towards the tiger. The distance between them is still too great to call the battle won for certain. The tiger is disarmed but the spotted swordsman is two sword lengths away, not close enough to make good on the advantage. The tiger's claws had come out, and his opponent has his guard raised.

The hood had come off his head. He looked young, and lithe, and his eyes were sharp and hard as obsidian. He was clean and upright, and there were no sign of drink or drugs anywhere on him.

"Drop that blade, stranger, or you will be sorry." The tiger threatens, reaching back for a long knife he has strapped to the back of his belt.

"He's got a knife mister" Kieran gasps, his voice raw and weak

The stranger had his legs spread apart. It looked like he was about to take a knee, he was so low to the ground. His left hand was raised behind him for balance, and he was turned sideways towards his attacker.

Kieran thought the spotted dog would dodge when the tiger came at him with his arm raised, knife ready to strike down. Instead he bent his legs back slightly and then bounced forward and up like a low flying arrow. He twisted his body around the outstretched knife the tiger was thrusting towards his neck, and in the same movement shoved the little sword up through the tiger's jaw. The sword slid in quickly as if there was no resistance at all. Kieran can hear a distinct tap as the sword caught on something, and bent sickeningly. It looked like it was about to break, but it sprung back as it withdrew from the tiger. In a swift and fluid recovery movement, the stranger retracted the sword from the tiger's head and nimbly dodged away as the tiger's massive body tumbled to the ground lifeless.

The tiger was motionless, sprawled on his belly, blood seeped from the narrow hole under his jaw where the blade had entered. It looked like a little nick, like the ones Kieran would get when Matron trimmed his fur, but something told Kieran that more damage had been done to the tiger than could be remedied with dabs of cotton and strong wine. The Ox was not moving either. The stranger wiped the blade on the tiger's undercoat, his eyes cold and hard. He looked to the tiger, and then to Kieran.

"Quite the contrary, Tiger, the question reads: will you feel sorry for yourself?" His clear-cut voice carried well in the silence that had fallen after the life had extinguished from the two great brutes.

Kieran was not paying attention to the words. Kieran was on all fours, panting and heaving up the very last of his dinner that day. The Stranger sheathed his blade inside the walking stick. Kieran could only just see how the top of the stick had a gilded heft, which he thought to be brass at first. But it shimmered like gold.

He was panting and whimpering. When the stranger came up to him, Kieran shielded his face with his paws instinctively, wretched and afraid. The stranger took his hand and pulled him up, and Kieran felt something hard, cold and metallic between their two paws. He shakily found his footing and opened his palm, staring at a shining yellow coin. It was of a currency he had not seen, but newly minted, and it was heavy. Out of instinct, Kieran bit down on it. There were no marks from his teeth. The Gold was genuine.

"I see it in your eyes boy, the coin gives you hope. Take it." The spotted dogs' eyes were hard, but some of the chill had left them

Kieran nodded wide eyed. He buried the coin in his pocket and brushed dust off his fur, his fear momentarily forgotten, at the sheen of gold. He wiped some sick from his muzzle with the back of his shaky black paw, his heart pounding still but the world had stopped to let him catch up for a second, and he took in the scene again.

"what should we do? With... With those?" Kieran asked and pointed to the dead bodies.

"It bothers me not if you wish to take their wealth for yourself. It is only just, seeing as they have dishonoured you in the most grievous way." He said, fiercely underlining the dishonour part.

"what do you... WHAT?!" Kieran shouts "Rob them? They are nobles, surely! Such a sin is unthinkable, you cannot lay a hand on a noble! Would not that be dishonourable?" Kieran answers, his fear and instincts blending together with the strong handed discipline he's been receiving as a servant for the last ten years.

The stranger eyes the bodies coldly, and looks back at Kieran. "The greater sin here is murder, for which I shall be damned, young fox. Your theft would be survival, their theft, and their actions were motivated by greed and lust. And for that, I shall meet them when the time comes." He shrugs his shoulders, "Take their coins, and use them to better yourself. Fall not into the trap of sin, and remember to pray for their souls. This is not the church, and I am not your priest, young Fox"

Kieran stared at this murderer, with his learned, clerical voice. He couldn't help but notice that the dead bodies were both very richly dressed. If he left the rings, and only took the money, there'd be no way anyone would find out. He had no doubt that they would steal what little he had on him if they had things their way.

"Fine" He mumbled. Though a fox, and a sneaky one at that, he took no pleasure in stealing from these dead souls. Kieran had never desired the rich life they led; He's seen the misery of the people in the bar who could not spend money fast enough to drown their money troubles.

He swiped the money purses and emptied them into his own pockets with an uneasy eye to the skies where, hopefully, the gods were asleep. The stranger took the tiger's ruby studded signet ring, and studied it closely in the dim light of a nearby torch sconce. Once the riches were in his own possession, he felt somewhat better, though he had no clue what to do with them. He would hide them away for himself and remember the kindness of this once old man, now young man.

"This man was indeed a noble, young fox. I cannot recognize the ox, but he looked like a foreigner by species. A foreigner to this land, and a foreigner to Castellania. Dress up as much as you like, certain aspects betray your birth." The stranger's voice has lost its raspy and wizened nature but has gained a strange accent. one Kieran has never heard before.

Kieran studied his dappled fur in the same torchlight again. "Aspects which betray yours as well?"

Their eyes met, but instead of the cold look he had previously, the spotted dog had a wistful look

"I am also from far away from what I knew as home, young fox." He held the ruby ring to the torch light and let the black fox inspect it.

"You sound like some kind of Castellanian." The fox remarked with a hint of scorn in his tone

The stranger scoffed. "You know little of the world fox. But I can tell you that I am not one of them."

He made as if to leave, but Kieran had unanswered questions, still.

"Mister... mister... I... I promised to follow you to your home."

Two incredulous eyes meet the fox' yellow ones.

"I don't think that will be necessary, young fox."

"It's a matter of honour, mister."

"Honor. You don't know the meaning of that word, but I release you of your vow" The stranger executed a jesters bow, his head effortlessly touching his feet.

"I... I'll tell what I saw..."

"Will you also tell what you took?"

"I'll say you took it"

"And when they check your pockets, your room, the little chest you keep underneath your mattress?"

"I'll have spent it all by... wait a minute"

"Leave now fox, while I still feel inclined to let you leave." His voice was firm, sharp, but without hatred. There was no anger in his eyes. They were smiling, and they were studying the black fox, his flattened ears, his pleading yellow eyes. Duck, the strange dog, pointed with his walking stick at the fox. Kieran stopped in his tracks, He knew far too well what the dog was capable of. The stranger's grin reached his muzzle, and he tossed the ring to Kieran.

"Prove yourself, if you want to find out more. Learn your letters and learn your numbers. When we meet again, you will show me this ring." His eyes darkened, and his tone lowered. "Drink and spend your money on whores and rich foods, and we will not. Now run. The guards are coming." The finality of his words was not lost on Kieran, he turned to the sound of the clattering of sword hilts on belt buckles in the distance. The night watch had rotated guards. Kieran had to get home before they reached the bar. The sounds came from the other side of the beggar's district. When he turned to ask the stranger about where to find him again, the stranger had vanished. He was alone again.

That got Kieran going. He set off in the direction of the market district, his loose cloth pants threatening to fall down with the weight of the coin he pilfered from the dead men, his paw clutched the ring that was thrown to him. It must have meant something. There was writing on the ring. Perhaps he could unlock its secrets. But nobody must know about it.

He found the bar which had been his home for the last 10 years, and scrambled into the dark cot in the cellar where he held his court of one. The cot was a small room underneath the cellar stairs, a crawlspace that Matron of the bar has kindly seen fit to concede to him. The door could be locked from the inside, but not the outside, so Kieran had to hide his valuable belongings in a little chest that he kept under his mattress.

Inside this chest were some coins, a brass necklace which had no value to anyone but him, and now, a solid gold coin. A disc of wealth roughly equivalent to a month's worth of income for the whole bar. Income Kieran had never seen any part of. He also poured the stolen coins into the chest, cautiously as to not make any noise in case Matron should hear him. He stared at the money for a while wistfully, then thought back to what the stranger said. What was his name even? All this time Kieran had simply called him mister. He said something about his name before they left the bar, but it could have been a fake name, like everything else about him, a cloak to obscure the truth.