Thread: A little something from the archives.

Found this when I was, oddly enough, trolling my own Documents folder. Can't for the life of me remember to what point and purpose I originally envisioned this little narrative leading but there's a kernel of promise amongst all the silliness here. I might very well have to reinstate the protagonist in some form or other around this place, too. Be nice. I clearly wrote this when I was delusional some years ago The flames danced in the grate of the fireplace of the Great Hall, and Silas watched. Plucked as if by invisible strings they twisted in indefinable shapes, as if striving to deny the comparative stillness of the air that suffused the room around them. They flickered and twisted too in the eyes of the one who watched them-marking points of unfamiliar warmth in steely pools of darkest blue hue. What those eyes saw, what they truly saw when they lay fixed so forcibly upon a point was a secret known only to their owner. However, it seemed they had seen their fill as he allowed a soft twitch of acknowledgement to touch his lips before he spoke. It was not a smile, persay, just the barest trace of acceptance at what he had come to realise in his head. ??Something is coming here.? The voice echoed against the vaulting walls, and had it belonged to anyone else it may well have been consumed in the confusion of its own origin. Yet if anything it simply seemed to gain resonance as it reverberated off the firmament itself, as if this were precisely the effect the figure had intended. It was rumoured the Gilded Blade never performed any act, no matter how small, without an eye on the consequences. Had there been one or two of the more?impressionable?students present it was doubtful that myth would have come any closer to being laid to rest. ??There is always something coming, Silas.? An older, significantly less commanding voice retorted from the gathering of figures that arrayed themselves in a tight-knit oval around a table not more than ten yards from where he stood. ??If that is all you have to tell us, it were better you sat yourself at the table with the rest of the Masters.? It was a curious feature of the speaker, but this voice did ??not?? echo. It merely cut the air as if it were cloth before a knife, and was none more pleasant to hear for doing so. Silas, perhaps practiced in many encounters with this baiting tongue, did not react immediately. When he did turn, however, it was to throw a disdainful look upon the gathering of men who scraped knife and fork across plates piled with the excesses of good living. Like many men who had achieved feats far beyond those normally attributed to a mortal lifespan, Silas had grown disdainful of the mundane. It was perhaps his greatest shortcoming. A sense of pride in his being that occasionally flirted with the realms of base vanity had helped mould Silas Carn into a stern, solitary figure in the hierarchy of the guild. Officially his title was Grand Master of the Shadowed Cloak, but he had long accepted that the internal politics of the organisation resisted fiercely to the idea of a single man ruling all. Still, his was the name bandied around whenever a benchmark was needed. His was the face you never wished to see over your shoulder. It was Silas?? voice who spoke last on issues. Which wasn??t bad for a figure who looked barely to be stretching his years over twenty. But then that was the Gilded Blade??s gift. He fought with more than just the weapon in his hand. He knew the art of the silver tongue, and the deceitful look. It had served him well on his ascension up the ranks of this profession, and it was a brave man who claimed he knew even now what Silas?? motives were for settling as he had in charge of them all. Money did not hold his fascination, nor did notoriety trouble him. Even the hunt no longer seemed to bring sign of joy upon those carefully kept features of his. He carried everywhere the silent countenance of shadow without a body. In short, he puzzled them all. ??Something is coming, of that I assure you gentlemen.? The subdued chatter that accompanied the masters?? evening meal was effectively silenced by the time the first footfall of those soft leather heels had scuffed the tiles of the chamber floor as Silas walked to join them. ??It is on the wind and it is on the flame, and it is coming here.? ??Outrageous!? One of the masters scoffed into his forkful, ??Who would attack a fortress of killers? It defies logic!? ??More to the point, why would they?? The reedy tones of Master Shafe again, always trying to offbalance him, to prove he was the stronger man. It would amuse him on any other day, but tonight it was merely distraction. ??The fire does not deal in specifics.? Less a comment and more a whip crack of annoyance that set the table to stony silence again. ??It merely tells what it has heard from the world around it. And what that means tonight is that somewhere, somehow that world has changed against us. And beyond that I cannot say!? For the first time that day, a flicker of emotion plumbed the depths of the soul behind the eyes. A flash of post-firelight in the iris, a tightening of the gaze. The Gilded Blade had found a force that could spark him to feeling, and that was just as unsettling for the table as if he had brandished his knife before them. Master Shafe was first to break the moment, his voice like a tombstone in the silence. ??Then, deal with it, Silas Carn. Or why else do the Harbingers of the Brotherhood of the Knife retain your services?? Silas bristled, once, as if he had been struck about the face by the gaunt man rather than merely offered a suggestion. His mouth grew tighter still, a line holding back a tongue that sore wished to strike back. But the assassin was better than this, he knew. It would simply be folly to leap at such an obvious bait. Instead, the young man??s smooth brow relaxed into an expression of almost benign gladness, and he lowered his silver-crowned mane in a solemn bow of respect. ??The stones of the Morguin College hail me, and I go.? He said simply, before turning on his heel and, ebon cloak wheeling on his shoulders with him, sharply stepping away from the gathering toward the doors of the hall. To begin the search for this...shift in the balance of things. Also, applications for work as a 'Harbinger of the Brotherhood of the Knife' must be lodged through the correct channels in the administration block. I can't help you beyond that