Topic: The slow breath

Ewan Corinsson

Date: 2007-08-24 19:40 EST
Ewan rubbed finger and thumb together as he checked the texture of the blood. It was tacky not dry. The death had been within the hour, but not from blood loss. There was too little blood on the coat around the wound or the ground beneath the unfortunate man. Grim set to his mouth, keen green eyes and light of touch hands surveyed the corpse. It was an unusually calm death, subtle and slow. It was also a suicide, though made to look like a stabbing. The man had ingested some poison, but in his weakened state, accounting for the odd angle and weak puncture of the blade wound, stabbed himself.

As the Master of Arms sat back on his heels and looked to the opening of the alleyway where lanterns glowed dimly in the late hour having nearly spent their fuel. Ewan would let the legal system wrangle out the reasons this man took his own life. Its occurrence did not touch him or cause one moment's thought of sympathy. It was a body. A few circumspect questions later would assure him what he already guessed: this had nothing to do with the grim, abated doings in West End. Something would break though, like the crash of a high beam sea against a dinghy. It tickled at the back of his neck this waiting.

A preternatural silence to his movements, Ewan turned deeper into the alleyway to his initial purpose of going down this little cranny forgotten between two buildings. The entrance to the Tunnels was hidden well at the jarring meeting of the back and west wall. He pressed upon the loose corner and the wall turned to carry him in and another matching corner of wall was seen outside. A quick trot down the stairs into the main Tunnels and he went about his way to find another secret exit to appear close to a Holding House and find out the latest news as well as report the dead man.

Ewan Corinsson

Date: 2007-09-20 18:20 EST
"Speak up, man, I cannot hear you," Ewan hissed into the trembling man's ear. An arm about the man's neck, fingers dug under the jaw to keep him still and keep the pain dull and present upon the man. Ewan punched the hilt of his knife deep into tender tissue of the man's lower back. A stunned gasp, Ewan released his hold and came out from behind, "With whom are you working" Who is asking you to fence those items?"

The man's mouth worked in a haphazard fashion as though he were just learning speech, "I don't know. I was given a note; told where to find the stuff and where to place the money. I don't know who it is."

Ewan stood before the man, his head tilted one way and then it moved slow the other way. "And how do they know you?"

The terrified man actually managed a smile and some strength of bravado, "Maybe it's because I'm the best there is in these parts."

"Unlikely," Ewan smirked. "They know you, I would say, or at least met you before. Where is it your type holes up" The 54th warehouse is it not' My guess is a room in the cellar. Tends to flood though, if I recall correctly."

Blue eyes widened at the words, and in those eyes one could see the man fought against the temporary paralysis though nothing moved. "I don't know what you're talking about."

Time pushed up the darkness from inside Ewan. He did not stamp it down. "I have not the time for this now. I will tend to you later." A dagger in hand, Ewan stepped in close, pressed sharply upon the nerve center to release the man from his immobility, and thrust the knife deeply into the man's lower abdomen. "I, however, can also not have you wandering around letting people know I am asking questions."

Blood flowed its warmth down the man's breeches and turned them brown to black. He stumbled forward, but Ewan caught him up. "The fortunate thing for you is I am usually a patient man in my questioning." He kicked the man's feet into a stumbling walk. "I will get you somewhere to be mended, and then you and I will have long discussions about what I need to know. You only must decide if your flesh or your secrets are more precious." The pale man, face starting to perspire, looked up at the dark haired man who carried and threatened him. With a patch over one eye, a full dark beard, and a ragged scar that cut a ragged patch of skin free of hair from lip to jaw line Ewan did not look as himself. The man did not see the Master of Arms beneath the disguise.

Fear and pain made him manageable, and Ewan was able to get him to The Willow Tree for mending. As he passed the man off to the practitioner, Ewan smiled, "Answers should be a bit easier now. Let Gaston question the fellow. I will be out of country for the next several days.?

Ewan Corinsson

Date: 2007-10-25 13:25 EST
Ewan walked the streets of Rhydin, purpose in his movements, discretion in his placement. A scruff of sound, brisk movement of leaves along cobblestones, and he turned the corner to an alleyway not far from The Marketplace. Waiting for a moment to let observations wander past his position, he ruminated on a repeating question in his mind. "Do you plan on living here?" the Baroness had insinuated in a more carefully worded phrase. The exact words were of no matter, but the meaning behind them was.

His reply had assured her his home was Yransea and wherever his wife was. Home had been, since he was but a young man, where loyalties lay not where his body lay. And not only his devotion to his wife kept him here in this land.

A clench of hands, working the heat of his blood into the tips of his fingers as chill winds whipped swirling clouds of dust and debris about him. Ewan had made vows, promises to himself and to others, and it was time he kept them. Slipping from his concealed place, he continued down the street accompanying shadows of twilight as he made his way to The Water's Edge tavern and the stable behind.

The new owner was a Tunneler and had taken the abandoned son of Jolin into his care. They all knew Ewan, and something in the stern, set gaze told them to keep their silence and ignore his passing. He stopped at the first door where Zesperis had been slaughtered savagely. His right hand moved to the bracelet of hair twined and plaited combining the reminder of the deaths that night that encircled his left wrist. Its multihued twist stained dark with old blood he did not wash away. Between finger and thumb he traced the turns of hair in that gruesome bracelet.

A breath of wind careened through the stables and caused unlatched stall doors to moan on weary hinges. It was time to pursue the promises made. Darkness, like the enveloping shadow of moonless night, rose inside him. The pool of unrelenting destruction and sharpened sense of exacting cruelty in measure steeled his mind and his spirit. That part of him controlled so often was now to be released in measure, splitting him in two; the gentle, quiet man for those he loved and Mistress Death's right hand for those who made him enemy.