"Don’t fight me, come quietly and I won’t have to hurt you."
Non-intrusive, subtle, and quiet, the elf who had stopped next to him murmured casually, “Don’t fight me, come quietly and I won’t have to hurt you.” Their every cloaked move spoke calm confidence, and they bore a voice that gave virtually no hint of gender. Considering he lurked near the apartments of Silverhome in a recess from the shaded streets of the Row, the approach rang as positively courteous.
He had no doubt they could knock him out or worse before he could cast or shout.
Filo? The priest’s first reaction was to reach out for his shadow. No answer came.
It was the third time something like this had happened within the last three years. Twice that he had been accosted directly in front of a place he considered home, no less. Andreo needed to be even more careful, though he was not entirely sure how to go about being so.
At least this one did not hold a weapon to him like the last.
He looked aside from the book he had been skimming through, his back to the wall and legs stretched across a step. After a warning from Reme, once, he almost always kept his back to a solid surface when anywhere remotely near the Row.
The priest rolled his wrist out towards the street, gesturing loosely with his book which flipped shut in the same motion. “I do love a good walk. To where shall we tread, my fine new friend?”
The snap of the book caused a flash of silver in the figure’s hand, and the robed elf stilled. In a slow motion, he left the volume on the steps where he had been seated.
He was made to walk ahead.
Internally, Andreo’s mood turned sour despite the jovial tones. Nyaeiph promised him a cupcake if he stayed put right near the apartment for just an hour or two while the poet ran through a quick list of errands for Filorian that had stacked up recently.
He truly had his hopes up over that cupcake.
Quiet indications from his all too polite abductor led him from alley to alley, past the edge of the Bazaar, and to the derelict paths that bordered too close to the scar ripped through what once had been the city’s heart.
Four people awaited him in the abandoned, corrupted building to which he was herded. His guide made five. A big welcoming party, for one slender healer.
"Ah, Alaen." A fellow with a lovely, ringing tenor stepped forward from his companions. "Or should I say Eidan? I never would have guessed you masqueraded as some pretty little priest. Tell me, mister Laddry, do you remember…"
Oh, Light, the waifish caster thought, attention divided as the man who took point talked. I can’t handle this many.
Incapacitate or kill? A voice rolled through his head like the distant thunder accompanying a spring rain, wholly serene. Relief washed through him so abruptly that he exhaled a rush of breath, prompting a laugh from the tall elf before him.
"Scared? Eidan, we just want to repay you for Shattrath. Oh. Right. Maybe you should be scared."
Incapacitate, Andreo answered automatically. Person behind me, first.
What person behind you? Filorian’s response dripped with amusement.
One down, four to go.I’m rather curious about what happened in Shattrath. The cleric inquired silently as he rose behind one of the other four like some specter, stepping out of their own shadow.
Fingers hooking in and hand lifting to ready another spell even as he sent one of the assailants screaming in abject terror, Andreo hesitated. His attention turned to a man who rounded on Filorian with a blade in hand, shadows whipping upwards from the ground to tangle the lackey’s legs and sword arm.
Flipping pages to a clean sheet, the Dawn Priest sat in the grass, silent and in solitude. The book across his lap had a cover in sunset colors; oranges, reds, and violet, dotted with silver and gold stars. He wrote with a dulled, worn down charcoal, because it was the only thing he happened to have on him for the moment.
"Seductors, slave auctions, pseudonyms actively used, dancing blink dragons, a bottle of Black Forest violet, two mishaps with blades, thistle, and I don't even know what that crystal was.
What the fuck am I doing?
I'm just going to go steal Filorian's books and read for a while."
Writing it down did not effect his mood towards the better, for once. He snapped the book shut and shoved it into his satchel as though the paper were laced with venom.
