This is the first part of the new storyline, The Roadside Inn. We hope you will enjoy reading these story articles as they are released bi-weekly! Check out our First story, One Last Hurrah here!
The Roadside Inn, Part 1
The roadside inn looked peaceful from the outside, with only lights leaving the small windows in the light summer night. Two travelers arrived and jumped off the horses that looked as they had been ridden through most of the night. As they stopped by the small stable by the Inn a stable boy met them. The travelers got off and handed the stable boy a small pile of golden coins and the stable boy quickly got the horses into the stable. The travelers looked at each other, nodded and went inside.
Inside the inn there was several lanterns, the dimly lit lantern was empty, from everyone but an almost sleeping barkeep, sitting by the bar, with a pipe in one hand and a pen in the other, scrabbling on the paper. It looked like he was trying to calculate his current income.
The two travelers walked up to the bar, put another golden coin on the table and barkeep shone up as he poured two glasses of the finest wine he had. The travelers then swiftly walked over to one of the tables in the corner. Exhausted, they both sat down. Taking of their traveling cloaks revealed that one of them had a mask of black and ivory and the other a veil of pure white silk.
“should we remove our masks? They are more telling of who we are here than our regular faces?” the veiled woman said to the masked figure. The masked figure nodded as they removed their mask, revealing a face that looked as it had recently been burned perfectly on a line over the nose. They put it on the table and looked at the woman.
The veiled woman removed her top hat, putting it on the table, following that she lifted up her veil and put it over her brown hair. Her green dress flowed beautifully were she sat and the vest shape at the top made it unexpectedly easy to move around in. She stretched her arms and legs before she sighed from exhaustion and looked over to the other person.
The person had short blond hair, beautiful green eyes and a body that was extremely muscular, they wore a studded leather vest and a long leather coat. They had put the greatsword that they usually carried on their back by the side of them, letting it rest on the bench that they were sitting on.
These two figures were the Repossessor and the Mirror Oracle, The Queens Assassin and Warmonger and the Queens Medium and Bodyguard respectively. They looked puzzled at each other as the barkeep brought in a stew that might or might not have been put on the fire for one to many hours. It smelled lightly charred, but it was better than nothing.
With each bite they took the silence fell heavier on the table, neither wanted to speak about last evening or what was going to happen next, but they had to. What had happen had been bigger then any of them had ever thought. At first it just looked like an assassination attempt, but that wouldn’t have worked, as the queen was almost indestructible. What had happened was a lot worse than just an assassination attempt, something almost unexplainable, but one thing was sure. With this, with the destruction of the capital city and the fall of the Black Queen, they had to find an answer to whatever had done that.
They finished their meals and the almost complete silence, with only the clatter of spoons and plates, fell into complete silence. They just looked at each other, The Repossessor occasionally looking towards their blade and then to the Oracle, as the Oracle only looked into the window over by the next side. After almost half an hour had passed of this silence, the Repossessor spoke.
“So, what do we do now? The empires capital is destroyed, burned and ripped to the ground, and we are sitting at an inn.”
The Mirror Oracle looked at them, closed her eyes, sighed and looked up at them once more. “We need to understand what they are” she said as she shook her head. “I know that I’m the knowledgeable one of us, but I’ve only heard of creatures like that in myths, stories and folktales!”
“So which folktale is there that we have, where there are creatures that can raze entire castles with the swing of an arm, or burn an army to cinders?” The repossessor said, sarcastically, back to the oracle. “None that I’ve ever heard of, that is for sure”.
The Mirror Oracle looked back to the Repossessor as she took a sip from her wine glass. “Folktales was more of an explanation of what I meant.” She took another sip from her glass before she continued. “There is only one story I can think off where the creatures could do this, It’s an age-old story though. About the times before the black queen rose to power. It talks about creatures of pure Sulphur that roamed and controlled the earth of Scathia as well as every living being within it. These beings were so powerful that they could with ease, destroy humanity. But they had no reason to, we were to weak.”
The repossessor cut in. “If what we saw last night is their power, I totally agree with the sentiment that we are weak.”
“Yeah…” The Mirror Oracle sighed and looked at her wine glass. It wasn’t almost empty, but this conversation would take a while, so she waved the barkeep to the table. “more wine, please, a bottle if possible.”
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