First Fragment

Thaland of the Walk Part 1

The dark, noisome, refuse-flecked waters of Stormhaven Bay slapped listlessly against the stone jetties and the wooden hulls of the ships anchored nearby. Sails and banners hung heavily in the still, humid, night air. Tendrils of mist, born of the lowering clouds, snaked through the air and across the water’s surface, appearing and vanishing at ghostlike whim.
The fat, yellow-orange glow of oil lanterns and the bright, piercing whiter light of Mage-Lights illuminated the waterfront, turning the dark of midnight into the twilight of a thousand miniature suns. The dark water and rapidly-lowering clouds reflected the light, painting every surface and person with an unhealthy yellowish pallor.

Even at this late Turn (of the Time-Glass), the docks were a swirling confusion of activity. Hundreds of bodies passed to and fro, each intent on their own personal mission. Their voices clamored for attention in every tongue and dialect of man, as well as those of the other intelligent races. Sailors and dock workers cursed and swore as they manhandled cargos about. Merchants, ship owners and prostitutes argued over the prices of goods and services with prospective clients. Longshoremen carried boxes, bundles, barrels and bales from boats to warehouses and back again.
A knot of drunken sailors, each clutching an earthenware bottle of cheap liquor, lurched out of a seedy tavern. They staggered past an unlit, debris-strewn alley, weaving an unsteady course to the brothel two doors away. If they saw the darkly-clad and hooded figure coalesce into existence some feet back from the entrance, none made any comment or reaction.
It was just as well, the figure thought to itself. It wanted no attention from those who were none of its affair. The figure pulled the edge of its hood farther forwarded with a dark-gloved hand; the fewer who saw its features, the better. Then, affecting the stoop and palsied gait of an oldster, the figure stepped into the swirling mix of people. He was surprised to note that; though the people shoved and ran over each other in their haste, they somehow never failed to make way for him, even though he didn’t really need it anymore.

A mere ten Turns ago, at Highsun he’d been adept at making hasty passage through these crowds. Then, he’d been known as Captain Thaland, commander of the Stormhaven City watch, harbor district. He’d carried the responsibility of keeping the lid of law on a boiling pot of exuberance, recklessness and lawlessness that characterized The Walk, as the area was called by the citizens of Stormhaven. He had been good at his job; too good to suit either the Thieves’ Guild or the closely-linked, flesh-pedaling Slavers’ Guild.

Those with high places and/or deep purses who benefitted from the violations committed by the underworld organizations had done much to impede his pursuit of Justice. They had used their pet councilmen to cut his patrol strength, their gold to corrupt his soldiers and their judges to free his prisoners. The Waterfront Station had suffered a ‘mysterious’ fire that resulted in him and his been getting re-stationed further inland due to ‘shortage of funds’.
The figure paused, stepping from the cobblestones into the deeper shadows offered by a recessed corner of the buildings. It sighed at the foolishness of the memories. Perhaps, no…Certainly, he had been too stiff-necked and proud, too idealistic, or both, to believe that continuing his crusade would be without dire consequences.

Thaland had doggedly pursued to battle those who preyed on the honest merchants, sailors and citizens in pursuit of ever more gold. He’d become ruthless in his mission, he saw that now. He had known then that the cutpurses, pilferers, housebreakers, ‘recruiters’ and press gangs had been the mere puppets dancing at the ends of strings wielded by the Guilds’ secretive Masters. Nevertheless, he’d killed the organization’s minions when he needn’t have; likely because he knew that his prisoners were often back at their trade before the ink on his arrest statements had dried.

The ‘Masters’ were nearly always those who had been ruthless, vicious and brutal enough to kill or intimidate their way to the top of the criminal organizations in and around Stormhaven. Nevertheless, there were occasional exceptions that gained power in the guilds due to the political or social influence they or their families carried (coupled with corrupt personalities.) Nevertheless, regardless of their personal past, the vast majority of them lived lavishly: palatial mansions in the city, hordes of servants, ‘country’ estates outside the city walls, yachts…the list was limited only by imagination. The ‘Masters’ prided themselves on making sure the finest of everything the realms could offer went to the most deserving…themselves. Because the finest living was well away from the misery, filth and degeneration their insatiable appetites created, they had no concern for those who were caught or killed in the process.

The figure clenched his fists, his cloaked-and-hooded form trembling slightly from bottled rage. He knew he’d made a difference, else the guilds would not have fought him so viciously. He’d shattered numerous press gangs, slaver rings, arrested uncounted numbers of all manner of thieves and smugglers. When the crooks began beating him out of the jails, he had changed tactics. The press gangs and slavers received the treatments they practiced by becoming their own products. Should they escape their new careers, they would not soon re-open shop in Stormhaven. As a result, he and his squad had made The Walk a place of relative calm and safety for the first time in living memory.