Ashande/MouseSchtuff2
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Mouse Sctuff, part 2
by Ashande
The Hidden Mouse Moon snickered to himself as the last of the clouds finally arrived, coasting over the silver body that he took part of his name from and giving him the cover of darkness he required.
He had been here, waiting, for nearly four hours, secreted in a patch of shadow created by a small stand of ancient oaks, staring at those who might have once been his compatriots as they walked along the ramparts of the old camp, calling out every half hour that all was well.
You might think so, my friend, but all is not well. I assure you of that. Snickering again, he broke cover, darting towards the wall and creeping along it. The last call of “all’s well” had been decidedly blurry indeed; the chill of the night and the case of wine that Divier had arranged to be delivered this afternoon had ensured that. Now it was a simple thing to merely call on a shred of his Essence and disappear, below the radar of all but the most alert of the guards. Even they would have trouble spotting him, and Mouse doubted many of them would be looking, in any case.
His position chosen, his cover still assured, Mouse sunk his hands into a gap in the bricks and pulled himself upwards, using the whip he had stolen from the boathouse back in Kirighast – more than a week ago, that had been, now – to anchor himself and slip easily over the wall. Recoiling it, he slid carefully along the wall once more, now inside, keeping to the shadow cast by the outer ring and allowing the gifts of the Malfeans to hide him.
He thought briefly of the time and trouble it had taken him to get this far – after his gift, the Eye had been more than willing to allow him use of his alchemical laboratory, and though his labor was slow, it was well rewarded; the poison he had crafted seemed to have the desired effect, at least on one of Monument’s wayward cultists. Now the true test would be had.
If asked exactly why he was doing this, the Hidden Mouse Moon would be unlikely to provide a satisfactory answer; few things he chose to do were so easily rationalized and compartmentalized. But his thirst for the pain of the Slug’s mercenaries was well known, and the opportunity for distraction and potential gain here was too great to pass up, especially since the few Dragon Blooded who came to this camp were currently in Kirighast, assisting the hunters. Now he had only to deliver it, and set the wheels in motion.
The water tower, situated as it was at a corner, almost looking to Mouse like a great dildo coming up from between a whore’s thighs – he often thought in such phallic terms, especially since the Princess’ mutilation – was his goal, and with his gifts and the guard’s sedate state, it was a simple enough task to reach it. Now would come the hard part.
Before climbing, Mouse checked within his coat, ensuring all was well; where normally his bandoliers held a seemingly impossible array of sharp implements, now each loop contained a single glass vial. Thirty of them in all, each carefully stoppered and filled to the brim with the concotion he had labored over for four days in the depths of Cold House. Below them, hung about his hips beneath the coat, the comforting weight of Broken Promise and Faltering Hope hung, as they always did, but tonight they would not sing their song; not if things went as they should.
Mouse clung to one of the legs of the water tower like some blasphemous spider, waiting patiently for the guardsman to circle around to the other side and give his cry. “Three o’ the clock, and all’s well!” Once he heard the cry, and identified it’s direction, Mouse began to scuttle up to the top, his nimble body and the numerous handholds and ladder fragments making it an easier job than it might have been otherwise.
Halfway up, Mouse froze in place, as he detected the sound of the crier creeping closer; pushing himself against the tower, willing himself to disappear, one might almost think he had. The guard paused, staring intently at the tower for a long moment, before shaking his head and rubbing his eyes. “Starting to go senile, old boy; coulda sworn…”
Mouse glared at the guard from his position, not daring to move just yet, but feeling the ache in his arms as he struggled to hold on. His glare spoke volumes, words he’d not dare say. Move, you twit. Go on about your business. Move, goddamn you.
As the strain was nearing the breaking point, his arms shrieking to be let go, and damn the consequences, the guard moved on, beginning to sing merrily to himself. “Tiddle-de-ay, tiddle-te-day, and ripsy tipsy lo…”
Snarling to himself, muttering: “I’ll Tiddle your ay.” Mouse resumed his climb, scrabbling to the door without further incident, and perching on the edge of the tower. Again, he waited, staring at the clouds that were beginning to part, waiting and hoping for the guard to hurry up and get to the other wall quickly.
At last, judging the sound to be far enough away, Mouse opened the hatch – gritting his teeth even at the small “creak” but unable to avoid it – and thanking the gods for the nature of his gifts, as they literally seemed to kill the sound except to the finest ear or the closest – he began his work, moving quickly to uncork each vial and send the poison into the supply, grinning to himself as he worked.
Finishing his work, the Mouse closed the door and took a last glance around. Good. Oh, the fun I’ll be having with these fools come nooners. Allowing himself a smile, he pulled back into himself and leapt from the tower, landing on the soft earth opposite the wall with barely a sound, bracing himself with one hand and waiting for the last footsteps of the guard to pass overhead before returning to his post in the shadow of the trees, to watch and to wait.
Mouse burrowed into the soft ground once the sounds of the mercenaries’ camp began to pick up, and they worked toward wakefulness. He had dug the hole the night before, and had brought a bit of tarp to cover it; he was undisturbed by the potential for spotting him, at least this morning. Most of them would be worried about their hangovers and breakfast, and after breakfast, it would cease to matter.
So he waited, even going to far as to nap a little, his dreams a black void of remembrance, nothing to cling to his waking thoughts when he opened them again and judged the time of day. By the Sun’s position, it was nearly noon. Excellent. Meal time would be the perfect time; the poison would have had long enough to work, and they’d all be together, eating and drinking more of it when he made his entrance.
Mouse peered out, and saw no guards were watching him. That was good. Slipping from the hole, he circled the camp, to come to the front entrance, where he was stopped by a pair of the men; both of them were wavering, and apparently still hung over from the night before. Smiling at them, Mouse hailed with a whistle known to him from his time at his former home that – so far as he was aware – hadn’t changed much in the interim.
The guardsmen didn’t appear particularly wary, merely waved him over, squinting at him. “You, boy. What are you doing here?”
Mouse gave them his best smile. “I am Divier, come from far off lands to seek respite with people of my own kind.”
The guards chortled. “Say whut, boy? I didn’t catch that.”
Mouse continued to grin, the grin becoming menacing and almost vile; the guardsmen almost laughed at him, but managed to keep his sound to himself; a good thing, too, for if he had let it loose, not all the planning in the world would have stopped “Divier” from killing the man where he stood.
“I said, I come from the lands to the east, on a journey homeward; I saw your banners – that is the banner of Alerion Daeno, is it not? – and thought I might ask for some food. I can pay, or help, if I must, but I served in his troops as well. Krothar’s regiment, in the Sou…”
Before he had gotten that far, the guard’s smirk had faded, and the other had paled. “You come from Krothar?”
Mouse nodded. “I did, once. I left them some four years ago. Why? What does it matter?”
The guardsmen exchanged nervous glances, then turned their gaze back on the boy. “Krothar…” Mouse’s face seemed to be shifting before him, black blossoms spreading around him; the guard swayed a bit on his feet, and Mouse’s smile grew wider.
“Yes. I know. Krothar is dead, his camp a blasted ruin. Nasty, wasn’t it? Now,” and then his voice became an ironclad command, one the poison within the guard found perfectly acceptable… “you will let me in.”
The guardsmen nodded, looking almost bewildered as the Hidden Mouse Moon strode evenly into the camp. He already knew where he was going, and the mess hall was hardly difficult to find, given the clanging of dishes and the roaring of mercenary’s voices over the din. He stepped through the door, taking careful assessement, watching every glass that was raised and grinning to himself. Good.
After that long appraising moment, Mouse leapt to the front of the room, cracking his neck and thudding to the wooden floor of the announcement podium, grinning as all eyes slowly turned to him and more than a few reached for their weapons.
Mouse raised one hand in a calming gesture – after all, was he not only an unarmed boy, standing before them? He was. As his fingers twisted in the old handsign of his former company, some of the hands gripping weapons released; quite a few were still there, however, and one strident voice called out “Who’re you, boy, and what business have you here!”
Mouse let his Essence flow into his voice, though he showed none of it; through his gifts, he allowed himself to speak in the tongue of his masters, rather than his own, and he was certain that the reverberating, echoing sound would drive these men into even further compliance than otherwise, given their likely hallucinatory state and the sleepy weakness of will it engendered.
He began to move along the small podium, gesturing wildly with his hands as he spoke: “I come as emissary from Krothar; his blood was not shed willingly, and it sings unquiet on the ground. His men add their howls to his,” at this point, it almost appeared that a whipping gust of wind screamed in counterpoint, though it proved to be nothing more than Mouse throwing his voice, grinning all the while, “and all of them cry out “murder!”
At this cry, the remaining weapons were released. Curiousity, and a kind of drugged stare, rippled through the room, as eyes focused on Mouse.
“They cry out, for they have died, and those hunting in Kirighast, seeking the servants of death, the Void-Blessed, have found their murderer…. And let him go! And so they shriek out, asking that you, their comrades in spirit if not in truth, avenge them.”
Mouse smiled to himself, letting it linger in the air for a moment; he knew it would take that moment, for they were obviously drugged. At last, it came: “What must we do?”
The voice proved familiar to Mouse. Very familiar indeed, and a moment later it came to him, as he studied the sturdy young blond man – surely not much older than Mouse himself – and remembered that face leering from behind a metal mask, holding a barbed whip in his hand.
“You… Krothar had you in his service, did he not?”
The blonde man nodded slowly. “Yar.”
Mouse smiled once more. “Then I tell you what must be done. As a company, you must raise your banners to honor Krothar and his team. You must sing paens to the dead, and honor them with your good will. And you must do all you may to bring his killer to justice.” Again throwing his voice, Mouse made several sounds, as though whispering throughout the hall, aided once more by his magic. “You must make sacrifice for them, and offer yourselves up as their instruments of vengeance. And you…” Mouse narrowed his eyes, searing through his memory for a moment, but still drawing a blank. He gestured to the blonde man again. “You must come with me, to a place I have been shown. There you will find the truth of what happened; you will be granted the power to right this, ‘ere you return here.”
Nods and shouts came from them, many already gathering things from their pockets to burn as sacrifice to the dead. Faltering Hope and Broken Promise seemed to seethe against his skin, knowing that such sacrifices would never reach their intended owners – how could they, when they had been forged into simple tools? – but still burdened with their obligation to their master.
The blonde man rose, and then asked the final question, the one Mouse had been counting on all along: “I will go with you, stranger, but I must know the name of their murderer; if you know it, speak it, and I will follow.”
The Hidden Mouse Moon smiled thinly, allowing two simple syllables to fall from his lips:
“Dewdrop.”
