Melanie woke up to a slight throb in her head. The Thanalassian heat combined with the wine from last night was already doing a number on her. A welcome glass of chilled water, courtesy of the workers at The Hourglass, was waiting for her on the bedside cartonier as well as her freshly cleaned garments. The warm Thanalassian air made quick work of drying garments that laundry became part of the service for adventurers staying at the guild. Employees would also leave glasses of frozen ice water so that by morning it would have melted down and still retained its frosty bite for a much needed chilled refreshment.
Melanie took a few sips of the water and groaned slightly. Every bit of sunlight that managed to pass through the ornate panels in the windows was like daggers piercing through her eyes into her head. She wondered how Suyaya must be faring after having drank more than twice the amount of the wine last night. Melanie placed the now empty glass back onto the cartonier and slowly pushed herself out of bed with a loud yawn. Slowly and drowsily she stumbled across the room to a wooden table where a basin of slightly warmed water and a clean towel awaited her. After giving her face a good wash she was more or less ready to start the day.
Melanie slipped out of her nightware and into her cleaned red mage garments. Even her rapier and its focus had been cleaned and sharpened - another service courtesy of The Hourglass. The inn took great pride in taking care of the adventurers' well being ensuring they had plenty of comfort, clean garments, and even polishing and repairing any damaged clothes and weapons. Not every adventurer deserved such a service - those who were too unruly and abusive were denied lodgings at the inn and thus had to take care of themselves. This was true to all inns that had shared dealerships with adventuring guilds, and word got around quickly between them too so if you were denied lodgings at one due to bad behaviour it was a guarantee you'd be denied lodgings at all other city inns. This was not only to discourage mistreatment of the staff but also to discourage fighting among competing adventurers.
After securing her weapons to her belt, Melanie grabbed hold of her satchel which had been lying on the floor next to her bed and began to make her way to The Quicksand. Her head started to throb less now that she washed and had some fluids inside her. She could already hear the loud clinking of cutlery and plates as she left her room and the smell of strong liqour and spiced meats filled the air and her nostrils. Alcohol was the last thing she wanted on her mind right now - all she really wanted was just a coffee with something light to eat for breakfast.
Her comrades were already waiting for her downstairs at a reserved table. Shuyaya looked very worse for wear with head buried in her arms and flinching at every loud clatter of plate and glass. Only Reubemont and Holskwyb looked well rested whilst Johnas was nowhere to be seen. Reubemont was too busy counting his coins in his purse to notice Melanie coming down the stairway.
"Good monring" she said to them as she took a seat at the table.
"Ah, good morrow!" Reubemont said heartily as he put away his purse. "I take it you slept well?"
"As good as can be" Melanie replied.
"It can't be any worse than me..." Suyaya groaned from under her arms. She raised her head slightly to reveal her puffy redenned eyes and pale skin complexion. Melanie's face grimaced at the sight. "Yikes!" she gasped.
"I don't suppose you saw Johnas on the way down?" Reubemont asked Melanie, who then shaked her head with a puzzled look. "Is he missing?"
"Nobody's seen him since last night" Holskwyb chipped in.
"We suspect he may have left overnight as there was a hume fitting his description seen boarding the airship back to Gridania not long after we went our separate ways, but nobody who was around at the time could completely verify if it was him or not" Reubemont sighed a little.
"Gods knows why he would want to return to Gridania alone..." Suyaya groaned barely lifting her head from the table. "Being a wanted man he would be walking right into the hands of the local authorties."
Melanie started to ponder when everyone's linkpearls chimed at once. Suyaya grimaced raising a hand to her ear to answer the call.
"Hi, this is Johnas" the voice said from the other end. "I take it you're all together?"
"Yes" Reubemont responded, "where..."
"Ah good, I need you guys to listen" Johnas's voice continued. "I returned to Gridania last night with intent on handing myself over to the local authorities, however it appears things have changed overnight in a rather...dramatic way. You need to come on over and see for yourselves. Besides which, the Elder Seedseer also wishes to see you herself. The sooner the better."
"All right, we'll make our way over" Reubemont replied. Everyone except for Suyaya looked at each other with concerned looks. "What do you guys think, do you think this is a trap?" he asked.
Melanie began to replay Johna's words in her head. There was nothing to indicate that Johnas was being deceptive or not, and without the echo to show her any clues she was at a loss whether this was a trap or not.
"Johnas might not be much of a talker but I highly doubt he'd rat us out" Holskwyb said confidently.
"I agree" Suyaya replied from under her arms.
Reubemont looked across to Melanie. "That gift of insight sure could come in handy right about now" he said to her. "I take it too haven't been given any visions?" Melanie shook her head. Reubemont sighed a little then leaned forward on the table and looked over to Holskwyb and Suyaya. "Then I guess I'll follow on your advice, since you believe that Johnas is to be trusted then I say let's set sail - to Gridania!" Reubemont raised a fist into the air enthusiastically. Everyone nodded in agreement including Suyaya whose head was still buried in her arms.
----
The airship ride across the Thalanassian deserts towards the Black Shroud was a smooth and quiet one. Nobody else was onboard except for Reubemont and the rest of the team. Melanie was sat against the airship mast. Her anxieties over her fear of heights would still continue to kick in, especially when she wasn't sure what was waiting for her at the other side. This was the only way to stop herself from freaking out, although the altitude was still a reminder that she wasn't on the ground and it often triggered a panic attack that she had to grip tightly onto something, take several deep breaths to calm herself down and quietly talk herself out of it.
Reubemont chatted away with his other comrades for a while before heading over to Melanie and took a seat next to her. "How are you faring?" he asked her.
"Truth be told, not so good...but I'm kinda managing as long as I don't stand up and look over the edge" Melanie replied.
Reubemont nodded a little then leaned in a little closer to her. "I couldn't help but be concerned about last night. When you showed up at the table you were looking very pale as if you'd seen a ghost. Would you like to talk about it? You don't have to if you don't want to, but just know that I'm here to help and if you do decide you want to talk then it will only be kept between us two."
Melanie closed her eyes to mull over what to say. I was approached by a dark figure who warned me not to draw attention because I'm the Warrior of Light - but I'm also from another world - and I need to relearn how to become a warrior so that I can continue to save the world and my friends trapped on the 13th...but in order to do that I need to maintain a low profile because if word got around to the Republic that I'm weak and no longer capable of saving the world then they would use this opportunity to retalliate and everything that's accomplished by the grand companies so far would've all been for nothing.
"Yeah, that's not going to happen" Melanie thought to herself. She didn't want to keep on lying to her friends, but she couldn't tell them the truth either. She needed to come up with an answer that would be more or less the truth but without saying too much that would compromise her.
"I was approached by a dark figure last night who gave me a warning that as newly fledged adventurers we should be more mindful, especially where politics are involved, so that we don't draw unwanted attention to ourselves. But there was something about the way he said it that left me feeling very uncomfortable" she said. "Wow, did I really think that all up by myself?" she thought to herself proudly.
"Oh, I see..." Reubemont said pondering. "Did you manage to get a look at his face and find out who he was?" Melanie shook her head leaving Reubemont to continue to ponder more. "Whoever this mysterious person was is right, we certainly are taking great strides into the unknown before we're even ready to face what's in front of us and interfering with other country's politics is asking for trouble. Perhaps we should take heed of his advice and lower our pace and our profile. How strange though that he approached you and not me since I'm the one who's been leading us into these situations."
Melanie shrugged. "I guess it's because I was more approachable and by myself."
"Ah yes, of course!" Reubemont exclaimed a bit of excitement in his voice. "I was surrounded by masters at the Triple Triad games whilst Suyaya was being cheered at by the tenders at the main entrance, and Holskwyb was busy leaping across various small islands high above Costa Del Sol for anyone to even try to keep up and approach her." Reubemont looked down at Melanie. "I'm so sorry that you were left to face him alone. The thought never crossed my mind that even in such a busy place that anyone would try to take such an advantage. I'll be a bit more mindful in future and make sure that we're not without someone to watch our backs."
Melanie breathed a quiet sigh of relief. At least she was able to tell Reubemont a plausible half-truth without going into detail about her secret. That made her feel so much better that she wasn't having to tell yet another lie.
As the airship began to fly over the Black Shroud, Melanie welcomed the cooler air and the smell of fresh running river water filling the air and carrying with it scents of various wild flowers and wild stag. She felt like she could just plunge herself into the waters at the base of the waterfall just below Gridania. The songs of various birds made her feel more relaxed and, for a moment, she was reminded of her real home back on Earth and started to feel a little sad and homesick.
Whilst she was enjoying herself travelling to various places and experimenting with new-found abilities, she began to miss the comforts of being at home. She missed her own bed and her computer and lazy days watching Netflix, but more important of all she was missing her husband Tony. They may not have been intimate or spoken much to each other the past few months, but she still missed seeing his face. She started to think back to the more happier times when they were often seen together arm in arm. He smiled more back then too. She felt a pang in her heart as she recalled those moments and wished she could just run straight into his arms and tell him she was sorry that she spent so many years ignoring him and wasting away in her own little room doing nothing but play video games all day. But then would she even be here if it wasn't for that?
The airship finally began its gentle descent into the trees and slowed as it approached Gridania. Melanie pulled herself back on her feet and gave a long stretch. Having been sat down for so long had made her legs feel a little stiff. Reubemont raised himself up onto his feet and took position in front of his comrades as the airship stood to a halt at the docking area. "Allow me" he said looking over his shoulders to his comrades. "I just want to be first in line so should anything be amiss I'll be the first one to face it and give you time to escape." He cautiously stepped off the airship onto the deck and looked around.
"Hmm, nothing so far" he mumbled to himself. He walked further down the deck with his comrades and Melanie slowly following behind him. "Still nothing..." he mumbled again as he peered through the doors that led into the airship's entrance and departure terminal, then he turned to his comrades. "I think we're safe. Let's see if we can locate where Johnas is and find out what's been going on here in our absence."
Leaving the airship docking area they began to scale the winding staircase leading up to the Carline Canopy. Melanie couldn't help but notice that nobody was paying any attention to their arrival and that they all seemed to be preoccupied gossping to each other.
"He calls himself The Black Jekyll" she heard one of them say. "Nobody's ever seen his face. Some think he's some kind of special hire from a small band of elite assassins from the far north."
As they finally emerged from the staircase Reubemont looked around in surprise at how uninterested everyone was about their arrival. Even the guards were paying no attention to them. "Strange..." Reubemont whispered.
Melanie's ears began to twitch as she caught wind of another conversation from some nearby villagers, "and their bodies were left on display right in the middle of the plaza, yet nobody even saw who brought them there! And there was this note that was pinned on one of the bodies - it said those who ecourage others to give in to acts of crime, whether it be as an act of desperation or as recruitment, will be punished just as harsly as those who fall. -The Black Jekyll. I can only imagine this has something to do with those two girls who were here many moons ago. Didn't they both become members of the Coeurlclaw? I honestly can't remember."
All around them people were gossiping about "The Black Jekyll" and the bodies that had been left on display in Gridania. Reubemont sided up to Melanie and quietly whispered in her ear, "Do you think this Black Jekyll has anything to do with the mystery man who approached you last night?" Melanie shrugged slowly. She was just as bewildered as he was that none of them had been arrested yet.
As they left the canopy they heard a familiar voice just up the path towards the plaza. "Ah, you finally made it." Johnas waved and hurried over to their position.
"Johnas!" Reubemont exclaimed in relief to see his friend safe and sound. "Tell me, what is going on and what's all this talk about a Black Jekyll?"
"You're never going to believe this" Johnas said a little enthusiastically. "Those guards you beat up the other day? Someone going by the name The Black Jekyll took them out and left their corpses in the middle of Gridania. It's all everyone's talking about now."
Melanie's eyes and mouth opened agape. "So, that's what he meant about cleaning up my mess" she thought to herself. It was now beyond a shadow of a doubt that the man who approached her last night was none other than the assassin going by the name The Black Jekyll.
"Wait, what?" Reubemont gasped.
"Come, we'd best go somewhere a bit more quiet." Johnas ushered them from the canopy and led them to a quieter part of Gridania near the waterfall where they could be alone. "After that brawl you had with those two guards, Gridania went into a state of emergency with mostly people who weren't born Gridanian rioting and petitioning for a change for the treatment of non-native Gridanias, and demanding justice against the two guards responsible for the deaths of the two sisters who they mistreated and were later recruited by the Coeurlclaw. That was until this morning when their bodies were found lying against the aetheryte plaza having been assassinated in an execution style along with a note left by The Black Jekyll with a warning to all who encourage others into engaging in criminal behaviour to survive. The Elder Seedseer has taken this matter very seriously and already addressed the Gridanians earlier this morning. She's proposed new changes that will change the way non-native Gridanians are treated and disciplinary action against those who fail to treat everyone as equals. It seems that Gridania's finally going to do what it's been promising to do for years and do away with all this nonsense over who is and who isn't a true Gridanian and be more welcoming to outsiders so they aren't left out in the forests to starve and be lulled into joining the Coeurclaw."
"Wow" Reubemont exclaimed. "All this because of a bar brawl?"
"Most people have already forgotten about that and are talking more about The Black Jekyll" Johnas replied. "Whoever this mysterious man is he's done us a big favour. He's now the only other subject on peoples' minds with the brawl being yesterday's news, leaving us to be able to walk around freely without drawing too much attention. But with that said the Elder Seedseer still wishes to have a private audience with us."
"Then I guess we shouldn't keep the Seedseer waiting" Reubemont said with his arms folded. Johnas nodded and together the group made their way towards an ancient and sacred area known as Nophica's Altar in Old Gridania.
