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A Rose In The Wind: A Saga of the Halmae -- Updated June 19, 2014
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<blockquote data-quote="Ilex" data-source="post: 5289242" data-attributes="member: 82687"><p><strong>13x04</strong></p><p></p><p>Arden paced behind Savina and Mena through Cauldron's main marketplace, losing an internal battle against impatience. After days of standing silently in the back of meetings (if she was admitted at all), she found herself restless to go back to Pol Henna. This afternoon, Savina had asked Mena to help her shop for better traveling clothes and equipment, anticipating that they'd soon be departing the city to assist Lord Ono. Arden couldn't argue with Savina's logic (boots were one item on the girl's shopping list), but it did mean that Arden was now carrying all the new armor that Mena had selected for herself, Savina, and Tavi, and it looked like the load was only going to get bigger.</p><p></p><p>Then Mena suggested that Savina buy Arden a new dagger, and unexpectedly, Savina consented. With the small weight of the new weapon at her hip, Arden summoned her willpower and silenced the complaining voice in her head. Returning to Pol Henna was simply not an option. The mission Savina had so naively gotten them all into – to stop a string of heretical rapes disguised as an Alirrian ritual – was important. And Rose's problems were by no means solved… and the prophecy itself was not exactly comforting… </p><p></p><p>A man was shouting at them from a market stall: "Pretty ladies! Pretty ladies! Pretty ladies!" Arden ignored him, thinking about the prophecy's structure: <em>Four verses. "Find the breath… catch the drop… fan the coals..." Those all sound helpful. Like we're supposed to save symbols of Sedellus, Alirria, Ehkt. But then there's "break the stone…" and that doesn't sound helpful at all. Is something wrong with Kettenek?</em> </p><p></p><p>"Pretty ladies! <a href="http://www.enworld.org/forum/story-hour/251423-rose-wind-saga-halmae-updated-august-12-2010-a-5.html#post4801080" target="_blank">Good bagel</a> here!"</p><p></p><p>Arden stopped dead.</p><p></p><p>"You're kidding me," she said to no one in particular.</p><p></p><p>"Arden?" asked Mena.</p><p></p><p>"Pretty ladies! Good bagel! Make you good bagel, great bagel, have many dildos!" </p><p></p><p>“What?” said Arden.</p><p></p><p>“Huh?” said Mena.</p><p></p><p>"Dildos?" asked Savina, brightly curious.</p><p></p><p>"That salesman…" Arden said, turning away her face from the enthusiastic dwarf, repressing a strange urge to hide from him outright. "I met him in Lord's Edge. He's a swindler."</p><p></p><p>"How do you know?" asked Mena.</p><p></p><p>"I don't trust him. He won't talk straight."</p><p></p><p>"Arden, that isn't a good enough reason to condemn someone," admonished Savina, and walked right up to the man. Mena followed. Arden rolled her eyes helplessly and trailed behind.</p><p></p><p>"By 'bagel,' do you mean 'bargain'?" Savina asked the dwarf, who was quivering with gladness at their approach. </p><p></p><p>The dwarf shook his head "no," smiling ingratiatingly. "Is bagel," he said. "Make <em>bagel</em>."</p><p></p><p>"Perhaps you might explain to us what goes into making bagels," said Mena. </p><p></p><p>He grinned and held out his hands. "Is bagel," he answered. “Everyone is know how make bagel. And with best bagel come best customer!”</p><p></p><p>Arden studied the dwarf. His natural beard was beginning to grow in, but he'd lengthened it with extensions. </p><p></p><p>"Then might we see your very best bagel?" Mena pressed. </p><p></p><p>The dwarf was delighted. He rummaged behind his stall and produced an old burlap sack. <em>Here we go,</em> thought Arden. <em>Just the sort of thing you'd need to toss over Savina's head before dragging her off to your bagel smithy.</em> The dwarf leaned conspiratorially over the countertop and opened the bag. Savina peered in first. </p><p></p><p>"Oh!" she gasped. "Why – it's beautiful!"</p><p></p><p>Arden stole a glance over Mena's shoulder. There was a scintillation in the depths of the bag where a shimmery cloth caught sparkles of sunlight through the gaps in the burlap. It <em>was</em> pretty. </p><p></p><p>Mena reached in to touch it, and the dwarf snatched the bag away. "No no no," he said. "No touch. Is best bagel."</p><p></p><p>"What's it for?" asked Mena.</p><p></p><p>"Is for keeping wet," said the dwarf, and pantomimed shivering and throwing a cloak over his shoulders.</p><p></p><p>"Warm?" asked Savina. "Do you mean warm?"</p><p></p><p>"Yah. Sure. Is that."</p><p></p><p>"How much?" asked Savina. Arden suppressed a groan.</p><p></p><p>"One thousand gold for good bagel." </p><p></p><p>Savina, to her credit, frowned. Even she wasn't willing to hand over that much money – at least not right away. "Mena," muttered Arden, seizing her chance. "His beard is fake. And what's he doing here instead of in Lord's Edge?"</p><p></p><p>Mena nodded. "Both these ladies would like to know a little more about you," she told the dwarf. "With such an expensive purchase, it's nice to know something about the seller, don't you agree? My friend Arden says that she met you recently in Lord's Edge. Why are you here?"</p><p></p><p>Here the dwarf looked briefly askance. "Ah… Is – is better business. Here people know good bagel."</p><p></p><p>"Can you tell us anything more about this cloth?" asked Savina. "What makes it so very precious if all it does is keep you … wet?"</p><p></p><p>The dwarf grinned at her. "Is precious because one-time dildo!" he proclaimed.</p><p></p><p>They stared at him. “Perhaps this would be easier if we used a tongue he is more familiar with,” Mena finally murmured, and then said something to the dwarf in her most courteous Dwarven.</p><p></p><p>But the dwarf smiled and shook his head. “No, no,” he replied proudly in Common. “Am visit to your land. Am learn to speak your language with tongue.”</p><p></p><p>"What's your clan name?" demanded Mena flatly.</p><p></p><p>"Rockminder."</p><p></p><p>All their eyebrows shot up at that. <em>Rockminder</em>, thought Arden, her mind racing. <em>How could he be related to the dwarfs we rescued? He's so… squirrelly.</em> Mena immediately questioned him in more detail, asking if he knew Kurtan or Sertani, but he shook his head. She finally declared that dwarven clans were massive and this salesman was clearly from a different branch. Arden was frustrated. Just as in Lord's Edge, she wanted to know what was going on here, and just as in Lord's Edge, she had a sinking feeling that she wasn't going to find out. </p><p></p><p>Mena asked one final question. "Dwarven beards are only removed for great dishonor," she said. "How did you lose yours?"</p><p></p><p>"Is … accident with fire," the salesman said.</p><p></p><p>"Is bull!#&*," Mena answered.</p><p></p><p>"With respect, Dame Mena," said Arden, having finally lost all patience, "you and the Blessed Daughter are such close friends with the leader of the Adepts … and the Head Inquisitor… Maybe your close friends would like to know more about this man's wonderful bagels. I bet the Inquisition, especially, would – "</p><p></p><p>"Eh, good night," said the dwarf, though it was still broad daylight. He shoved the bag back under the counter and began packing up his things. In the process, he scrabbled around in a dirty crate, produced a forked piece of wood, and shoved it into Savina's hands. "Nice lady, pretty lady," he said. "Is present. Present for you."</p><p></p><p>"Is this – ? It is! This is a divining rod," Savina said.</p><p></p><p>"Yah yah, good present for you. Good night, good night." He ducked down below the stall again.</p><p></p><p>Arden smiled, pleased to see him scared. She caught Savina's eye and realized that the girl was frowning at her, but she didn't care. Savina leaned back over the stall to glimpse the dwarf. </p><p></p><p>"We didn’t want to frighten you," she said in her kindest voice. "We wish no more than to satisfy our curiosity about your merchandise."</p><p></p><p>"Good night!" He would no longer raise his head.</p><p></p><p>"We shouldn't have scared him like that," said Savina. <em>He was asking for it</em>, Arden answered her silently, and maybe her irritation showed on her face, because Savina dropped the matter.</p><p></p><p>As they walked on and Savina resumed shopping, Arden did realize, with a pang of remaining annoyance, that she still had no real proof what "bagel" actually meant.</p><p></p><p>### </p><p></p><p>The next day, Arden found herself standing in the back of another meeting in Lord Ono's cluttered office. Lady Akiko had consented to the group's plan, and Lord Ono was briefing Savina, Tavi, Kormick, and the others on what would be expected of them as deputized Inquisitors. Arden kept her eye on Kormick, curious to see how these foreign duties might conflict with his idiosyncratic commitment to Justice. He seemed unperturbed.</p><p></p><p>Next, Lord Ono requested that everyone except Arden take a formal oath of office. The wording was slightly awkward, suggesting that it had been hastily amended to incorporate the heathens' belief in four gods. Arden was relieved to be left out, not least because she had learned to hate making promises. Slaves weren't in charge of their own lives; an owner's demand could always destroy the best of intentions. Promises weren't worth making, and oaths weren't worth taking, unless you were prepared to defy the world and everything in it to keep them.</p><p></p><p>Lord Ono presented each of his new deputies with a gray Inquisitorial robe and a ceremonial wakizashi. Arden traded her Alirrian colors for a gray surcoat, just like the other servants around the place were wearing. And with that, they had become Inquisitors. Heathen Inquisitors.</p><p></p><p>Before they left, Twiggy asked, "Have you had any luck finding that old record we asked for, Lord Ono-san?" </p><p></p><p>"Ah. Well. It has been suggested to me that it may be somewhere on my desk … " Lord Ono ventured, glancing helplessly at the mountains of paper.</p><p></p><p>"Oh," said Twiggy. "Maybe by the time we're back, then."</p><p></p><p>"Indeed."</p><p></p><p>### </p><p></p><p>They spent a few hours back at the Adept House, packing. Arden helped load the carriage that would carry them into Hillside District. Then she made sure Savina was comfortable inside next to Rose. As she finally climbed up to the outside front seat, she overheard Rose say, "I knew this would be a long and unusual path. Still, this is a bit longer and far more unusual than even I expected…" </p><p></p><p>Kormick swung himself up next to Arden and took the reins. </p><p></p><p>"Be ready to brutally murder anyone who looks at us oddly," he told her. "We're not the popular kids right now."</p><p></p><p>"When's the law ever popular, Justicar?" Arden asked. He crooked a half-smile and twitched the reins.</p><p></p><p>They drove up the curving, sloping street to the city's gates. Everyone made way for their carriage, some bowing heads respectfully – or fearfully – to the passing Inquisitors. The traffic thinned as they passed out of the gates and began their journey down the long and winding road to the base of the mountain that Cauldron was built atop, but their fellow travelers still made way.</p><p></p><p>Until three didn't. A woman stood square in the middle of the road, blocking their path. Two men flanked her. </p><p></p><p>The woman's arms were crossed. As the carriage bore down, she didn't budge. She just glared.</p><p></p><p>Kormick pulled up on the reins. Arden lowered her hand to her new dagger.</p><p></p><p>And then, as the carriage stopped, the woman yelled.</p><p></p><p>"Octavian di Raprezzi, Roseanna di Raprezzi, I am taking you home to your mother. <strong>Now</strong>!"</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Ilex, post: 5289242, member: 82687"] [b]13x04[/b] Arden paced behind Savina and Mena through Cauldron's main marketplace, losing an internal battle against impatience. After days of standing silently in the back of meetings (if she was admitted at all), she found herself restless to go back to Pol Henna. This afternoon, Savina had asked Mena to help her shop for better traveling clothes and equipment, anticipating that they'd soon be departing the city to assist Lord Ono. Arden couldn't argue with Savina's logic (boots were one item on the girl's shopping list), but it did mean that Arden was now carrying all the new armor that Mena had selected for herself, Savina, and Tavi, and it looked like the load was only going to get bigger. Then Mena suggested that Savina buy Arden a new dagger, and unexpectedly, Savina consented. With the small weight of the new weapon at her hip, Arden summoned her willpower and silenced the complaining voice in her head. Returning to Pol Henna was simply not an option. The mission Savina had so naively gotten them all into – to stop a string of heretical rapes disguised as an Alirrian ritual – was important. And Rose's problems were by no means solved… and the prophecy itself was not exactly comforting… A man was shouting at them from a market stall: "Pretty ladies! Pretty ladies! Pretty ladies!" Arden ignored him, thinking about the prophecy's structure: [i]Four verses. "Find the breath… catch the drop… fan the coals..." Those all sound helpful. Like we're supposed to save symbols of Sedellus, Alirria, Ehkt. But then there's "break the stone…" and that doesn't sound helpful at all. Is something wrong with Kettenek?[/i] "Pretty ladies! [URL="http://www.enworld.org/forum/story-hour/251423-rose-wind-saga-halmae-updated-august-12-2010-a-5.html#post4801080"]Good bagel[/URL] here!" Arden stopped dead. "You're kidding me," she said to no one in particular. "Arden?" asked Mena. "Pretty ladies! Good bagel! Make you good bagel, great bagel, have many dildos!" “What?” said Arden. “Huh?” said Mena. "Dildos?" asked Savina, brightly curious. "That salesman…" Arden said, turning away her face from the enthusiastic dwarf, repressing a strange urge to hide from him outright. "I met him in Lord's Edge. He's a swindler." "How do you know?" asked Mena. "I don't trust him. He won't talk straight." "Arden, that isn't a good enough reason to condemn someone," admonished Savina, and walked right up to the man. Mena followed. Arden rolled her eyes helplessly and trailed behind. "By 'bagel,' do you mean 'bargain'?" Savina asked the dwarf, who was quivering with gladness at their approach. The dwarf shook his head "no," smiling ingratiatingly. "Is bagel," he said. "Make [i]bagel[/i]." "Perhaps you might explain to us what goes into making bagels," said Mena. He grinned and held out his hands. "Is bagel," he answered. “Everyone is know how make bagel. And with best bagel come best customer!” Arden studied the dwarf. His natural beard was beginning to grow in, but he'd lengthened it with extensions. "Then might we see your very best bagel?" Mena pressed. The dwarf was delighted. He rummaged behind his stall and produced an old burlap sack. [i]Here we go,[/i] thought Arden. [i]Just the sort of thing you'd need to toss over Savina's head before dragging her off to your bagel smithy.[/i] The dwarf leaned conspiratorially over the countertop and opened the bag. Savina peered in first. "Oh!" she gasped. "Why – it's beautiful!" Arden stole a glance over Mena's shoulder. There was a scintillation in the depths of the bag where a shimmery cloth caught sparkles of sunlight through the gaps in the burlap. It [i]was[/i] pretty. Mena reached in to touch it, and the dwarf snatched the bag away. "No no no," he said. "No touch. Is best bagel." "What's it for?" asked Mena. "Is for keeping wet," said the dwarf, and pantomimed shivering and throwing a cloak over his shoulders. "Warm?" asked Savina. "Do you mean warm?" "Yah. Sure. Is that." "How much?" asked Savina. Arden suppressed a groan. "One thousand gold for good bagel." Savina, to her credit, frowned. Even she wasn't willing to hand over that much money – at least not right away. "Mena," muttered Arden, seizing her chance. "His beard is fake. And what's he doing here instead of in Lord's Edge?" Mena nodded. "Both these ladies would like to know a little more about you," she told the dwarf. "With such an expensive purchase, it's nice to know something about the seller, don't you agree? My friend Arden says that she met you recently in Lord's Edge. Why are you here?" Here the dwarf looked briefly askance. "Ah… Is – is better business. Here people know good bagel." "Can you tell us anything more about this cloth?" asked Savina. "What makes it so very precious if all it does is keep you … wet?" The dwarf grinned at her. "Is precious because one-time dildo!" he proclaimed. They stared at him. “Perhaps this would be easier if we used a tongue he is more familiar with,” Mena finally murmured, and then said something to the dwarf in her most courteous Dwarven. But the dwarf smiled and shook his head. “No, no,” he replied proudly in Common. “Am visit to your land. Am learn to speak your language with tongue.” "What's your clan name?" demanded Mena flatly. "Rockminder." All their eyebrows shot up at that. [i]Rockminder[/i], thought Arden, her mind racing. [i]How could he be related to the dwarfs we rescued? He's so… squirrelly.[/i] Mena immediately questioned him in more detail, asking if he knew Kurtan or Sertani, but he shook his head. She finally declared that dwarven clans were massive and this salesman was clearly from a different branch. Arden was frustrated. Just as in Lord's Edge, she wanted to know what was going on here, and just as in Lord's Edge, she had a sinking feeling that she wasn't going to find out. Mena asked one final question. "Dwarven beards are only removed for great dishonor," she said. "How did you lose yours?" "Is … accident with fire," the salesman said. "Is bull!#&*," Mena answered. "With respect, Dame Mena," said Arden, having finally lost all patience, "you and the Blessed Daughter are such close friends with the leader of the Adepts … and the Head Inquisitor… Maybe your close friends would like to know more about this man's wonderful bagels. I bet the Inquisition, especially, would – " "Eh, good night," said the dwarf, though it was still broad daylight. He shoved the bag back under the counter and began packing up his things. In the process, he scrabbled around in a dirty crate, produced a forked piece of wood, and shoved it into Savina's hands. "Nice lady, pretty lady," he said. "Is present. Present for you." "Is this – ? It is! This is a divining rod," Savina said. "Yah yah, good present for you. Good night, good night." He ducked down below the stall again. Arden smiled, pleased to see him scared. She caught Savina's eye and realized that the girl was frowning at her, but she didn't care. Savina leaned back over the stall to glimpse the dwarf. "We didn’t want to frighten you," she said in her kindest voice. "We wish no more than to satisfy our curiosity about your merchandise." "Good night!" He would no longer raise his head. "We shouldn't have scared him like that," said Savina. [i]He was asking for it[/i], Arden answered her silently, and maybe her irritation showed on her face, because Savina dropped the matter. As they walked on and Savina resumed shopping, Arden did realize, with a pang of remaining annoyance, that she still had no real proof what "bagel" actually meant. ### The next day, Arden found herself standing in the back of another meeting in Lord Ono's cluttered office. Lady Akiko had consented to the group's plan, and Lord Ono was briefing Savina, Tavi, Kormick, and the others on what would be expected of them as deputized Inquisitors. Arden kept her eye on Kormick, curious to see how these foreign duties might conflict with his idiosyncratic commitment to Justice. He seemed unperturbed. Next, Lord Ono requested that everyone except Arden take a formal oath of office. The wording was slightly awkward, suggesting that it had been hastily amended to incorporate the heathens' belief in four gods. Arden was relieved to be left out, not least because she had learned to hate making promises. Slaves weren't in charge of their own lives; an owner's demand could always destroy the best of intentions. Promises weren't worth making, and oaths weren't worth taking, unless you were prepared to defy the world and everything in it to keep them. Lord Ono presented each of his new deputies with a gray Inquisitorial robe and a ceremonial wakizashi. Arden traded her Alirrian colors for a gray surcoat, just like the other servants around the place were wearing. And with that, they had become Inquisitors. Heathen Inquisitors. Before they left, Twiggy asked, "Have you had any luck finding that old record we asked for, Lord Ono-san?" "Ah. Well. It has been suggested to me that it may be somewhere on my desk … " Lord Ono ventured, glancing helplessly at the mountains of paper. "Oh," said Twiggy. "Maybe by the time we're back, then." "Indeed." ### They spent a few hours back at the Adept House, packing. Arden helped load the carriage that would carry them into Hillside District. Then she made sure Savina was comfortable inside next to Rose. As she finally climbed up to the outside front seat, she overheard Rose say, "I knew this would be a long and unusual path. Still, this is a bit longer and far more unusual than even I expected…" Kormick swung himself up next to Arden and took the reins. "Be ready to brutally murder anyone who looks at us oddly," he told her. "We're not the popular kids right now." "When's the law ever popular, Justicar?" Arden asked. He crooked a half-smile and twitched the reins. They drove up the curving, sloping street to the city's gates. Everyone made way for their carriage, some bowing heads respectfully – or fearfully – to the passing Inquisitors. The traffic thinned as they passed out of the gates and began their journey down the long and winding road to the base of the mountain that Cauldron was built atop, but their fellow travelers still made way. Until three didn't. A woman stood square in the middle of the road, blocking their path. Two men flanked her. The woman's arms were crossed. As the carriage bore down, she didn't budge. She just glared. Kormick pulled up on the reins. Arden lowered her hand to her new dagger. And then, as the carriage stopped, the woman yelled. "Octavian di Raprezzi, Roseanna di Raprezzi, I am taking you home to your mother. [b]Now[/b]!" [/QUOTE]
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