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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Ed Gentry" data-source="post: 3317210" data-attributes="member: 41901">Book 1, Chapter 3:    The dust and debris in the air settled, motes of the stuff still limiting visibility along the wall. The attackers had pulled back, their numbers paying a heavy price as defenders along the wall claimed victory and revenge at once. The air stank with some sort of odor Edward had never smelled before. It was as though there was some invisible miasma clawing its way up his nostrils. The air felt like a thin layer of fluid, sticky and clammy to his skin. Edward stood from behind the Wardstone and walked toward the wall, stepping over numerous corpses as he went. The rapier-wielding elf was watching Mayfair’s troops as they retreated, some sort of calculations clearly happening in his mind. The large swordsman took his eyes from the ground far below and turned to face Edward but said nothing.    “You fought well,” Edward said.    “You fought behind a big rock,” the man replied.    Edward ignored the barbed comment but nodded. It was true, he had fought from behind the Wardstone. There was no shame in taking shelter during a storm of arrows.    The swordsman began wiping the blood from his blade and moved towards the dwarf.         “Thank you,” he said.            The dwarf looked up from the Watchman’s corpse she was checking. “For what?”    “The warning about the wall,” he replied.     The dwarf shrugged.    “I am Lesarius Groth,” he said.    “Ruthen.”    “I am Kelsen,” the rapier-wielding elf chimed in though he had not previously been in the conversation.    Ruthen looked to Edward and raised an eyebrow.    “Oh, I’m Edward,” he said.    The woodsman and his companion offered their names as well. Edward realized that he and these few people were all that had survived from that section of the wall. He bent over to examine the body of a Watchman that he believed had groaned but the man was too far gone. The last of the air leaking from his lungs, perhaps, Edward thought. He took the badge from the Watchman’s upper arm and examined it closely. Though he was new to Kingsbridge and cared little for its fate in the grander scheme of things, he recognized duty and honor when he saw it and felt a pang of loss for the stranger that he had never known. He whispered a prayer to Ymris to take the man’s soul into the flame, into the light, so that he might know joy.    “You bunch, come with me,” an older man with a mangy beard and matted hair said from the closest stairwell leading to the city below.    “What?” Edward said as the other defenders quietly fell into line to follow the man.    “Where are we going? Who is he?” Edward asked Kelsen.    “He is a Watch commander by his badge insignia. To disobey him would be a mistake,” the elf replied.    Edward nodded and joined the exodus. They descended the stone steps that curled around and around until they emerged in the belly of the city of Kingsbridge. Smoke and dust rose from every side of the city. Apparently the attacks hadn’t been confined to the wall they had just left. Harald Mayfair’s forces had surrounded the city and cut off the some of the trading routes several days before and the lack of contact with the outside world was already showing in the city. Merchants who sold food from carts were dwindling in numbers and most of those who still operated had hired guards during their business hours. Edward imagined most of those hired to protect the carts and the sellers were former sellers themselves who had run out of product.         Theft was rampant, people stealing what little others had in the middle of the day with no fear of being caught. The Watch was spread too thin to concern themselves with domestic disputes or someone making off with someone else’s last piece of bread. People were killing for food, killing for space to sleep and killing simply because they felt trapped by a city they could no longer safely leave. Mayfair had turned Kingsbridge into a prison that would tear itself apart from the inside. The siege could go on for months. Surveying the trouble around him as he walked through the city, Edward was not hopeful about its odds of surviving that long. The attack perpetrated by Mayfair’s forces had only made matters worse.    Passing through the town, they approached St. Mary’s. The tall, thin structure seemed emaciated when one thought of how high its spires were. It was from there that the Sisters Militant, faithful servants of Tzaluth and keepers of the sacred order, worked their healing magics to care for the citizens of Kingsbridge. They did much more than that, Edward knew. Their name did not include ‘Militant’ for no reason. The Sisters were the final line of defense against any civil threat facing the city. Mass fear, hysteria, curses and disease were their domain and the Sisters brooked nothing in their pursuit of their holy goals.    More than forty citizens were huddled around the entrance to St. Mary’s, cries of pain and desperation came from the midst of their mass of bodies crammed into the tiny courtyard. A young Sister of the order stood on the far side of a gate that prevented entrance to the church shouting for order. The people ignored her and pulled hard on the gate trying to bring it down. A fat man near the rear of the crowd was red in the face from screaming as he seemed to agitate the crowd to further action. The Watch Captain scowled at the scene and drew a club from his belt as he waded into the crowd. He shoved people away as though they were tall weeds through which he was strolling. He reached the front of the gathered throng, pulled a young man from his perched position climbing the gate and threw his arms up for silence. A wash of quiet fell over the crowd for a moment but not long enough. Before the Captain could speak, the fat man renewed the vigor of the crowd with shouts of rage. The massed people surged forward, drowning the Captain in their bulk.    “Should we…” Kelsen began to say but stopped short when the woodswoman with whom they traveled dove into the crowd and shouted loudly enough to be heard.    “Cease this instant! You are assaulting a Captain of the Watch. You are not criminals…” she was saying before her words caught short in her throat. The fat man stepped away from her as the crowd parted, a bloodied knife in his hand. The woodswoman crumpled to the ground, shock written across her face. Before her companion the woodsman could react, the fat man dropped his knife and dashed out of the crowd.           Edward took a step as to pursue but stopped when the massive swordsman burst past him towards the assailant. Edward had never seen anyone move as fast as Lesarius and puzzled over how the older man could move so swiftly. Though still in his prime, Lesarius looked to be at least ten years older than Edward. The swordsman’s great strides ate up the head start the fat man had and within a few moments, Lesarius was dangling the attacker two feet in the air from one hand. The fat man tried to speak through his surprise but never got the chance as Lesarius sent an elbow flying into the man’s mouth. The corpulent dangler went limp hanging there in the air, his consciousness gone.         Silence fell over the crowd and all eyes were on Lesarius who dropped the knifeman and spoke loudly. “Leave here now! The church is closed.” His booming voice made an impression and the rabble dispersed immediately.         “Thank you!” the Sister behind the gate said. “Thank you so much. Please, bring your friend over here. I can help her.”         The woodsman carried his companion to the gate and laid her gently on the ground. The Sister Militant knelt beside her and applied several salves and herbs to the knife wound. The woodswoman’s eyes fluttered open and she nodded that she would be okay.         “Thank you, Sister,” the woodsman said with a bow.          “Penny. My name is Penny. Well, Sister Repentance*, actually.”          “Thank you, too, Captain,” Penny said, turning to the Watch Captain. “The people just need help. They need food, water, shelter and healing but we are full-up. We’ve already used most of our magical healing and now we’re running out of our herbs and salves.”          “Aye, Sister. It was no trouble,” the Captain said. “Now, we should be on our way.”The wall-defenders bid their farewells to the young Sister as well as the two woodfolks who insisted they had other matters to attend to**. The rest followed the Captain once again. It was not longer after that they arrived at the Cathedral, central authority of Kingsbridge. All public offices were housed there, including Bishop Barnard, the head of the Tzalite church. As they passed through the front gate Edward felt the scrutinizing eyes of the guardsmen and thought certain he would find trouble there. Ymris was not welcome in the houses of Tzaluth. His order had told him to avoid the Cathedral when he had first accepted the mission that brought him to Kingsbridge. Finding himself in the custody of a high-ranking officer in the Watch, however, had given him little choice. Declining the man’s command to follow would have provoked questions. Questions Edward could not, would not answer.Notes:--------* The DM should correct me on this, but I believe that the Sisters Militant (not all) as well as the Brothers of the Order of St. Ignatius name themselves after their greatest sin so that it may not be used against them as leverage by their enemies.**The two woodsfolks were players who only made the first session before deciding they could not make the game every week due to scheduling conflicts. I don't even recall their names (characters or players), hence...woodsfolks.</blockquote>

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