Chapter Text
Under a blanket on a bed in a house in a city newly rebuilt from the apocalyptic destruction of the old in a world just a little too small rests a boy. This boy is unimportant, and will continue to be so for many pages, many thousands of words more. This boy, who sits and noisily clatters away on his computer which is not quite the model he asked for but which he is grateful for nonetheless, will not even be given a name until many years from now. Years which will be better spent detailing just how we came to rest upon the frowning face of a boy who is not important and will never be important. The boy who has dusty brown eyes and nubby little horns whose parents will not check in on him for another 8 hours as he is supposed to be asleep by now.
This boy is unimportant.
We tear ourselves from this uninteresting boy and instead find ourselves in a place far away, though not too far, and long ago, but not too long. The year is unimportant, relative, and would only serve to convolute the introduction of the winding, interlaced caravan rolling its way through the dew-covered grasslands. The dew is from a morning fog, rolled in from last night’s rain, which rests like a blanket upon the sloping hills of this sparsely populated field which will not be important nor brought up again.
On this caravan there are four people of interest.
Correction, there are nearly five hundred people of interest on this caravan, all with stories and lives as intricate, as important as the four we are about to describe.
We cannot focus on all 500, however.
A dark green-skinned, Half-Orc woman trudges along with the slow yet steady beat of her assigned carriage. She is tall, trained in the field of combat, and has a passion for meeting children. She is only 23 years old yet has spent a lifetime in service of her country’s imperialistic aims. She is an orphan, and she is fairly miserable in the wet yet keeping high spirits.
Her name is Jacques Eloisa.
Alongside her skips a woman even taller, though much less green. She is also older, though only by a year or so. She uses the tip of her spear as a walking stick, against military protocol no doubt but, after all, it’s not like they’re working for the military anymore.
Her name is Suzy Asckar. She resents her last name.
“So I told him” Suzy continues on from an unheard conversation, her voice soft yet audible even though the caravan wheels squeaked noisily, and the horses brayed their displeasure at being forced to drag through this endless fog, “If you even think about going on another date, stay FAR away from dragons!” This comment is humorous, dragons do not exist of course. Elves and Orcs and Magic exist. Dragons do not.
They are interrupted by a cackling laugh, a laugh that neither of them made. It would appear they have a yet unknown voyeur.
“Hey! Get off the cart!” Jacques ordered, waving her sword up at the unamused Tiefling.
“Or what?” The Tiefling replied with a wink, “Gonna stab me?”
“Wh- y-yeah!? That’s my job?” Jacques fumbled for a reply. “Who are you anyway?”
“Me?” The Tiefling jumped, landing between the two guards with utterly silent applause. “Why, I’m Mercy of course! Mercy Prayer!”
Mercy Prayer wasn’t lying, though it wouldn’t be out of character for them to do so. They were, as said before, a Tiefling. Spire-like horns jutted up and out from their well-groomed hair. Their skin was a pleasant shade of baby blue, though their smile, rich with teeth sharp enough to skin a bear and twisted in a most sadistic grin, kept most from assuming a pacifistic nature. Around their rested a symbol to their Goddess, The Raven Queen, the deity than can, and in due time will, die for.
“Well, Mercy.” Jacques sneered, trying to seem intimidating to this man straight out of hell, “If you wouldn’t mind coming with me for some questioning-“
The questioning would never come as, at that exact moment, a sharp, gruff voice split the ears of everyone within a fifty-foot radius.
“Eloisa! Askar!”
The two spun around, Mercy’s head poking over the taller women’s shoulders to see just about the most pathetic man they’d ever laid eyes on.
“Captain Dheryk!” Jacques acknowledged, strolling away on his command, leaving Suzy to watch the prisoner already hopping their way across the caravan roofs in pursuit.
“Jacques,” He muttered, his Half-Elven ears, long and spindly as they were, barely coming up to her shoulders, “Are you aware of the… rumors circulating around this caravan?”
“I… may be, sir.” She thought back to the lively campfire last night, the worried whispers of caravan residents.
“And you are away of the official company stance on it?” The two were slowing down, Dheryk shoving aside several members of a growing crowd in order to force the two of them towards the area of interest.
“That any and all rumors of ‘serial killers’ or ‘murders’ are just that, rumors!” She dutifully recited the official response.
“Yeah, well. I think the rumors are going to be a bit harder to dissuade after this.”
Jacque finally saw it too, a body. It was a crime scene alright, and quite a messy one at that. The crowd had done nothing to help, of course, but laying there in cold death bled the stabbed corpse of what seemed to be a well-dressed gentleman. At least he wore proper attire for his funeral.
“Alright ALRIGHT!” Captain Dheryk shouted over the mumbling chatter of the crowd, “This is a CRIMINAL SCENE AND YOU’RE ALL TO CLEAR OUT IMMEDIATELY SO THAT THE PROPER AUTHORITIES MAY INVESTIGATE, AM I UNDERSTOOD?”
“Absolutely, shouty!”
Dheryk jeered over at the commenter, a beaming Mercy standing firmly next to them as the crowd dispersed.
“I’m sorry, did you need something?” He frowned. He almost seemed to be in a perpetual state of frowning.
“Ohh, nothing much. Just thought you guys might want some help solving the mystery!” Mercy’s eyes twinkled with a child-like sense of mischief. They too were 23.
The adults were having none of it. They had a murder to solve, and the theatrics of a clearly immature Tiefling weren’t going to make things any easier.
“I could honestly care less about what you do, Tiefling.” Dheryk prod a finger towards them, “But I also know you aren’t about to just let this go, are you?”
“Nope!” Mercy grinned.
“Ughhhh, fine! Jacques!” Dheryk glanced back to her.
“Yes sir?” Jacques responded.
“Look after them, don’t let them out of your sight. When we reach Khandor I’ll find out just what exactly we can do in terms of criminal persecution.” Dheryk began to pace away, a handful of caravan guards coming to clean up the scene. “Criminal conspiracy, obstruction of justice, oh! We’ll tack on resisting arrest too how does that sound?”
“Pretty un-prosecutable.” Mercy giggled, moving to go taunt the Captain more before they felt Jacque’s firm grip restrain their arm.
“Aww, come on!” They wilted, feet scampering uselessly in the air, “I wanna tease him more!”
“You’re staying right here, as am I. We have a responsibility to protect the remaining people of the caravan.”
“We?” Mercy raised an eyebrow, “I don’t recall asking to help you in your dumb investigation.”
“You! Literally just offered to hel-“ Jacques pinched the bridge of her nose, groaning in frustration. “Look, one way or another we’re in this together now, okay? Now, I’m assigned to Mr.Loggermouth’s carriage and, considering his wife was one of the people to be mysteriously killed in this death caravan, we’ve got to be on high alert. Now do you want to help or not?”
“… Yeah sure why not” Mercy shrugged as Jacques finally relinquished her grip. The two walked side by side down the caravan line, the carts rolling to a stop as they came to camp for the night. “Oohh, does this mean I’m in the army now?”
“No. Not at all.”
“Can I get a wage?”
“No.”
“Caaan I know government secrets?”
“I don’t even know government secrets.”
“Can I at least have a cool rank?”
Jacques touched her chin in mock contemplation, “Yeah, sure. How does Private Prayer sound?”
“Hehe, private.” Snorted Mercy.
Jacques, through rolling eyes, allowed a rare crack of a smile.
“You’re pretty adept at climbing, right?” Jacques asked, the two of them stopping beside Mr.Loggermouth’s carriage.
“You bet!” Mercy hopped, eagerly waiting to see where this was going.
“How about you take watch on top of his carriage, that way you can see any threats or anything happening in the rest of the caravan!”
Jacques didn’t even have to wait for an answer. Before the words had left her mouth, Mercy was already scampering up the side of the carriage. Once atop, they poked their head over, eyes and horns just about the only bit of them Jacques could see. She gave a thumbs up and opened the flap to Mr.Loggermouth’s carriage.
He greeted her with a cold welcome, clothes soaked from the fog and rain.
None of them knew it at the time, but this would be the last night of his life.