Of Gods and Faekyn - The Shadow Tavern 4

Part 3 be here: https://www.reddit.com/user/ValorB/comments/1ufi9b8/of_gods_and_faekyn_the_shadow_tavern_3/

The green light that flooded into the Tavern’s foray started to encircle itself before splintering off into various directions.  The holder stepped at the threshold, revealing the source of the light to be an odd vial with the head of some sort of small, feral creature.

On seeing the hood, Rial swore quietly, attracting the golden gaze of what lay beneath that tattered faded blue cloth.

“You here too?” The figure, another Faekyn questioned.  The voice sounded harsh, like being filtered through rough patches of paper.  Then the hood tilted further, immediately drawn to Tessa’s still frame on the table, “Is that who I think it is?”

“Jeri, don’t step over the threshold,” Rial warned, holding up a gloved hand to try and ward the Faekyn off, “This place is haunted by a fear demon, it’s keeping us trapped within,”

The Faekyn named Jeri heard the words, their blood red ears flicking off the rain before shifting from one end of the room to the next.

“I smell blood, anyone hurt?”

“Dying.”

With that exchange, Jeri immediately stepped through.

Faekyn were a race as tall as dwarves, but slender like elves, making them appear to be a human adolescence, depending of course, of the woodland creature they sprung from.  Though they did not have reverse joints or feral claws of their ancestors, their sense of smell had been far keener than the rest of Lyt’s children.

They were supposed to be the Wrath of the Faeries.  Meant to wear armor and bare spear or blade against aggressors of the Great Southern Wood in the days of yore.  They, like the Elves in the North, were meant to guard the Southern Wood.

They failed, with the Yggdrasil surrounded by blackened stone, rotting wood, and ash.

As Tessa had ears and tail of a rodent, more accurately, a rat.  Jeri was a fox, or the partial view of their maw and the ears through the slits of the faded blue, and rain stained hood.  The cloak wrapped around him kept them from seeing his tail, though they could tell it was twitching irritable.

“And you just trapped yourself in here with us.” Rial sighed, rubbing at his eyes.

Jeri simply swept those golden eyes around at the group, though the metallic gaze focused solely on Drakkin.  The dwarf shifted uncomfortably, which provoked the laughter of the demon again.

Though both Rial and Jeri remained standing, Jeri now stared directly at the floor.  The mirth of whatever it started to express seemed to die prematurely.  Jeri slowly kneeled, spreading out that cloak so he can stare down at the floor boards.

“Did I?” the Fox questioned, then snorted in contempt.  It was as if this was some sort of minor inconvenience to him, and not something life threatening.  He did not take his eyes off the floor as he proceeded to fetch a pipe from beneath the cloak, and packed it with smoking weed.

“So, why is Tessa on the table?  Tried to head butt a spell again?” the creature asked dully.

Rial nodded once, “Thought she could absorb the magic, but missed it with her hands, I mean-”

“-don’t bother, I’m not some purest southern hick about words.  Hands, Paws, Mals, Male,” Jeria lit the pipe, and then turned his gaze once more on Drakkin, “Skinning, Murdering.”

“Me be from up North, over the mountains, twenty years me swear!” Drakkin offered quickly.

Item defended him, repeating the statement, but Jeri huffed out smoke through the nose.

Jeri gestured at the dwarf with the pipe, “Mithril Griffons, it’s on your lapel.”

As Drakkin reached up to touch it, Jeri turned away, “Your clan no longer holds my interest, your safe."

The Faekyn flung off the heavy wet cloak, revealing how heavily armed he was, which appeared very little.  A sword inverted slightly, just to keep it from being shown from outside the cloak, a dagger of the same design, and a bolt action pistol, all of Faekyn make.

The armor was a broken black chain mail shirt over faded blue robes that had dark stains along the edges, and armored boots.  James, noting the robes, and the pistol, asked the obvious, “Healer or a Witch Hunter?”

Jeri did not answer immediately.  Instead he looked at James, then the rest of them, before shifting his bare, bushy blood red fox tail into view..

“Nemesis,” was all he explained.

Nemesis, Goddess of Revenge.  They were violent murderers seeking vengeance against those that had wronged them.  Those who worshipped her would scar themselves with red marks, cry out her name in all manner of emotion.

Those who were chosen were tainted red forever.  And here Jeri stood with the fur apparently blood red from tip of ear to tail.  They were rumored to have weird powers or abilities blessed to them by their bloody goddess.

The floor once more rumbled as fear fed the demon, and though it affected everyone else, again, neither Jeri or Rial were phased.

“That is becoming annoying.” Jeri offered bluntly.

((If you would stop scaring the plebeians)) Rial remarked sharply in the Elven Tongue, ((Fear Demon.  Do you know how to kill it?))

Jeri scuffed, still puffing out smoke at every other breath, though spoke the same language as everyone else.  He knew what Rial was trying to do. Not spread any sort of panic.  Jeri absolutely did not care, “I hunt the undead, be lucky the Necrophasia led me here.”

Rial gritted his teeth, looking over James, Dawn, Drakkin and even Item.  Necrophasia only wafted around the Undead, and clung to their Mortal caretakers.

((Where did you start from?))

((Doesn’t matter)) Jeri remarked, now speaking that elvish language himself.  They slowly started to pace the floor, ((It led me here, so I’m here.  The rodent is in danger, who pegged the demon?))

Rial pointed out Dawn, and the woman suddenly became apprehensive under those golden eyes.

“Necromancy?” Jeri asked boldly.

“How dare you!” Dawn snapped back, “I don’t care if you are blessed by that whore, I would never snoop down to such horrid methods of magics.”

Jeri gave no reaction, but simply stated, “And touching tainted tomes of the Dark Ones would brand you something far worse than a murdering bastard like me.”

With no retort in Dawn's arsenal, Jeria then turned to Gram, guarded by Drakkin and Item.

“You, the one without an arm.  You still with us?” came the question.

“Hurts,” Gram replied and Jeri inspected the wound from just out of the reach of everyone else.  Gram was near to tears, struggling to stay conscious as they clutched at their missing arm.  “Scared.  Don’t want to die.”

“You got family?” Jeri questioned, glancing over the rest to see if anyone, even James, would interject.  No one said anything, but Gram started to nod.

“Yeah, folks up in North Point,” they managed, now starting to openly cry, “Oh Gods, I’m not going to see them again, am I?”

“Shh, easy big fellow.  Easy,” Jeri instructed the man, now stepping close enough to the table that everyone else had parted.  The Faekyn pulled over a chair, made for a man much less his kind, and sat next to Gram.  “Close your eyes, think of your family.”

Gram flinched as he did so, and the rumble echoed through again, drawing Jeri’s brief glare.

“Okay, okay,” Gram sucked in a breath, trying to steady them.

“How many kin you got?”

“Mom and Dad, got a little sister.  Just came of age,” Gram exhaled, and inhaled again, “Joined the Guild.  Sent out on her first assignment a week ago,”

“Your mom and dad?” Jeri continued on, arms crossing over his chest.

“Dad’s forging things, Smithing Guild all the way.  Mom worked for the baker but it got burned down, some freak accident,” Gram continued, “I miss her apple pie,”

“You remember what that pie tasted like?”

“Yeah,”

“Can you taste it now?  Describe it to us?” Jeri edged Gram on.

“Yeah, Gods it was so-.”

As Gram carried on about his fond memories, Jeri drew his thin sword and held it high.  No one was quick enough to stop him bringing the weapon down and cutting off Gram’s head in mid-sentence.  By the time Drakkin shoved Jeri away, the head had already rolled across the floor.

Jeri did not lose his footing, and held his weapon in challenge while the other clasping on the pistol.

“Murderin’ Bastard!” Drakkin raged, and Item stood next to their friend.  Dawn looked to be preparing a spell, and James simply drifted further away.

Drakkin reached for his axe “We could’ve nursed him back to health!”

“I said he was dying!” Rial spoke up, though he did not put his hands on any weapon, “Now he’s not suffering.”

“Well what if Tessa is dying!” James shouted over towards Rial, “What if-.”

Jeri drew his pistol, the weapon aimed at James and discharged in motion.  The bullet, a specialized one designed to over-penetrate heavy dwarven plate and explode, ripped through the wall and did as it was meant to do.  James, and everyone else, threw themselves down as rotten wood threw inward at the occupants, again, making the Demon below nearly howl in joy.

By the time they had managed to get back to their feet, James was halted as Jeri jammed the barrel of the pistol into their chest, and the sword raised to strike.

“Tiberius!” a voice snapped, with a crack of a whip sounded across the room.

Jeri locked into position as if he had been paralyzed, but the expression on his face went from cold, unyielding rage, to a more relaxed, if not disappointed face.

Tessa shifted off the table, hand on her head and her eyes flicking around.  Her voice had an elvish accent, something all the Northern Wood Faekyn had.  It made them distinctly different from their southern kin.

She wore a silver chain link vest over her leather armor, and bore no weapons, though there had been a scabbard for a rapier at her hip.

Though still disoriented, the Faekyn jammed a finger towards the other one, nearly snarling, “What have I told you about firing that blasted thing in my presence?!"

“Woke you up, didn’t it?” Rial grunted, earning him a side eye from Tessa.

Jeri simply snorted out more smoke, his pipe never leaving his lips, "Well, it did."

Tessa then turned on the blue robed Faekyn, putting her hands on her hips, "And what are you doing?"

"Stuff." Jeri said, as if that would have been the awnser.

"He killed Gram!" Drakkin shouted, still angry at the action.

"He shot at me!" James nearly screetched.

Tessa's eyes narrowed on Jeri in both disgust, and disapointment.

"Oh, and that," Jeri added casually. There was no shame in his tone, the fox like Faekyn did not even care, "I did that."