1st Draft Fridays - A Fistful of ... (#6)

Saf, Salles

The intermittent flames cast odd shadows, the pervasive smoke muddies the view, and an acrid reek fills Dakadza's nose as he slips through the city on bare feet. A smile flirts with his face as he pictures Aidan's expression upon realizing he'd left the boots behind.

Bare feet bring risk right now, from those who are seeking to violently enforce what they think should exist. The streets have broken glass and other detritus, too, and the intermittent fires and lanterns don't light enough to see well enough to avoid it, so his choice brings pain, too.

But bare feet keep him in touch with the earth, without having to reach for it, and he's far safer, this way. His earth magic maintains his body's natural state: healthy and uninjured.

Ash still tears up his lungs, even through the moistened scarf covering his face. His magic ensures that the discomfort is only consistent, not worsening, like the people he sees in the worst areas who are choking up bile or passed out—when they're alive at all. And he can mostly avoid coughing, which helps him slip by people screaming and fighting without getting noticed.

It also helps him get close enough to step between some fools with more aggression than wits and the ragged, soot-covered family trying to flee them.

That redirects the aggressors' attention (and violence) on him, but his father had valued him for his ability to fight, even kill. He's dueled since childhood. These people...haven't—or at least haven't fought together—and he doesn't care to play weaker than he is, even if it gives him away as an elemental.

Even with how lazy he's been in Breidentel, he's in better condition to run than any of these fools, and he's not going to be in Saf long enough for them to gather a posse to lynch him, if they're so inclined.

Of course, his mother could step out of the shadows and slice the forearm of the man who flings a rock at the family's fleeing backs. The cut's shallow, made mostly by the motion of his arm against where she happened to hold her dagger, but it rips the vein, and the blood floods out.

"You hurt me!"

"What do you think that rock would've done if it hit your target?" asks another female from behind his mother, one whose body is soft in a way that Dakadza had never seen before her but has already glimpsed in multiple others in Saf. "This isn't the Green Stars' territory."

"Your master know you're not wearing his mark, right now?" he snaps, so they have some knowledge of each other.

"Yes," she—Wight—answers easily, squinting a little as she scans the rubble-and-ash–littered street. "If you can't have it, nobody can, I see."

"Like you have any idea what's been happening, this week."

"Are you waiting to bleed out?" Wight snaps, then orders the others. "Bind his forsook arm before he kills himself."

From the way his mother eyes them, Dakadza isn't alone in his amusement that these people leap to obey this woman, even though they know she's a slave.

As the most obvious fool's life is spared by proper tending, Wight says, "Mercenaries razed all dwarf-owned and openly dwarf-friendly places in dockside, starting with Little Alpa and conveniently breaking communication lines for foreign-owned businesses that might've been able to call for help.

"Or did you mean how Ush and all three of her heirs died in the mess, so the Moon Slickers fell apart? And how that leaves their territory and two gates open for their neighbors to fight over, and the Green Stars can only reach that if they take gateside and circle around the city?"

The group hunches, and the fool flushes deeply enough for it to be visible by the light available.

Then Wight demands, "Get out of here," and they scatter.

Dakadza's mother starts chortling.

Dakadza exchanges a grin at her, but...disquiet tugs at him. They left too easily, might return with more numbers. "We should move."

"Yes." Wight yawns. "We have to meet up with the prince and some other man I don't know."

"William Jarvim, they said," comments Dakadza's mother. "Is Aidan in town?"

"I know where he is," Dakadza says slowly, reluctant to speak openly, especially in public. "It'll be better to get William first."

"Very well." Wight peers around them. "Right. Somebody tore down the overhang on this street. This way."

Dakaza glances to his mother, waiting for her okay, before joining them.