6 Days After the Coffin Closed

The real shit of the city only comes out in the daytime. The elven obsession with order lends Danfalla a strange quality during the nighttime, black brick laid out in order. But the sun lays it all shining brown. Accumulated grime traps the sunlight and shines it back. Even the barest patch of accumulated dirt stands out with light cast upon it, sinking back into the shadow of the night, the only time those high in the northern district turn their eyes downward, admiring the dark orderliness of the city.

Morello spits over the edge of the building he lounges on and watches the glob tumble away, landing between the feet of a beggar. The woman looks up, makes a gesture at him to tell him to go fuck himself, and turns her attention back to the foot traffic around her. He wonders briefly if that woman will survive the next few weeks. Probably not.

Across the busy street, Morello watches as a procession of twenty heavily armed men and women approaches, a white-haired man wearing black robes at their front. He isn't the only one to notice; everyone on the street is forced to take note. Those failing to do so are shoved out of the way as the thugs approach the building. He is only spared momentary glances; a man sitting on a roof wearing worn worker's clothes with a tin lunch pail at his side garners little attention. Today, he doesn't even need to walk in disguise. There is something freeing in that.

The last of any consequence to notice the procession marching down the street are the two guards standing just in front of an iron-wrought gate. They guard a huge rectangular building, all black brick of course, a ten-foot high perimeter fence running around the lot. Even without being told beforehand, Morello could have easily picked the place out as belonging to a noble family. The brick stands too clean, no litter left to linger on the fitted stones that run around the property.

They must not be able to help themselves, he figures–elves, that is. Everything has to be nice, presentable. Even if you are hiding arms within the city, you can't let your storehouse go to waste. What would the other weapon dealers say?

Finally noticing the approaching raid, one of the guards speaks hurriedly to the other, slipping in through the gate to warn someone inside. The sole remaining man tries to halt the advance. For his trouble, he is run into a wall and his hands and arms are bound in shackles. It doesn't take long for the young man at the head of the procession to kick in the gate, those around him racing forward to encircle the place.

"I can't believe it."

Morello turns at the sound, finding Lumina standing further back on the rooftop, far enough not to be seen from the street. Dressed in her dark colors with a hood pulled over her face, Morello doubts that it would matter if anyone did see her. Then again, he had thought himself in the clear before, but that red-head had apparently picked him out more than once. Why not be safe?

"Yeah. They're just going along with it, aren't they? They think they have everything figured out, not knowing that they run through a tunnel we made, only one way to go."

Commotion erupts from the building across the street; people are pushed out of the front and made to lie down on the stone with their hands behind their heads. The yelling echoing over is unintelligible, the bustle of the street outside the gate distorting the sound, but Morello doesn't need to hear the words to understand the message. Someone is angry, and they are out to cause hurt. Who could blame them for that?"

"Preacher always spoke about the elves like they were some divine messengers," Lumina says, taking a step closer to see the raid more clearly. "Like they were perfect things. Like their long lives came them smarts we could never match. Wanted us to think that we are just children, even when we are old, when compared to them. They talked about things like peasant uprisings as foolish, things that can't happen because of how the world works."

"Sounds like what a preacher would say," Morello says. "They gotta make sure they stay on the lord approved message, they risk the rope."

"But they aren't smarter than us, are they?" Lumina continues.

"I figure not." Morello flips open his tin pail, removing a jar from inside that contains a sparkling crimson liquid. It goes down like honey, and he can't help but sigh as he returns the lid to the jar. "Everyone is mostly a fool; ignorant too, but that's another thing. Doesn't matter how long a fool goes puttering around. A fool can live a thousand years, and a witty man will still get the better of 'em. Time doesn't fix that." He gestures at the building in front of them. "We got our witty woman set them to run about, and look, that's exactly what they are doing."

"Helps that the branch family was smuggling weapons into the city behind the back of the Duke," Lumina says.

"Certainly helps. You have to wonder if it ever crossed their minds that those leading them around by the nose used to be just some ignorant humans from some towns no bigger than a neighborhood in this stinking city. Likely not. That hometown preacher of yours had one thing right: uprisings are impossible. The world just won't allow it."

"Isn't that what we are doing here?" Lumina asks. "We are going to tear them down. Maybe not all of them, but a Duchy is a good place to start."

Morello turns, looking at her for a long moment, watching as she turns her face away, pulling her hood down to avoid his stare. "If you want to look at it that way, girl, you can. We are going to destroy a city, won't just be the elves affected by that."

She nods. "A lot of people will die."

"That they will." The urge to unscrew the lid once more and gulp down the rest of the container is powerful. It seems to grow stronger each day. Only through a concerted effort does Morello manage to stop himself from doing so, grabbing his clenched right fist in his left hand and squeezing hard. "That bother you?"

"I feel like it should," Lumina says. "I want to say that it does, know that I should, but it is only the wanting to want it. Can't say that it does anymore."

"Yeah. One of the things that goes away. Did you manage to find anything good inside before the good guys arrived, you know, the ones kicking that warehouse worker?"

"Not here," Lumina says. "Mostly different kinds of pretty cloth and other stuff that is waiting to be shipped out. Took a peek at a shipping list, but I couldn't make sense of it."

"Means you need to be more selective in your eating," Morello says. "You feed off the ignorant and poor too much, and you'll become that way. Ask Ferro about it, he has a good nose for that kind of thing." Morello groans as he pulls himself to his feet. The sound is more of a habit than anything anymore. He feels younger now than he did as a teenager. "Hope you took something pretty for yourself," he says.

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"Not today," Lumina says. She steps away from him when he turns toward her, hiding her backward hands behind her back. "Sigrid said you'd want to know that the head of the Ca'Mari got scooped up this morning, that his trial in front of the Duke will be on the next full moon."

"She just wants to gloat," Morello says, rolling his eyes.

"You did that, right? Made it so they would grab her?"

He shrugs, scooping up his lunch pail, being careful not to overturn the jar inside. "Just put some papers in a place they would be found. Astoundin' what people will leave lying around their house when only family is in residence."

"I think you're the astounding one," Lumina says.

He quirks a brow at her, trying to see where the jest is. Remarkably, he settles on finding her sincere. "I've got more work to be about. The 4th won't ship itself out of the city."

As he moves to go past her, she steps in his way, almost reaching for his arm but hesitating at the last moment. "Kessa told me somethin'," she says. "Told me that you made a body look like another one."

"I did."

"Can you…can you fix me?" Lumina asks. She looks up at him, and even in the shadow of her hood, he can see her full face. Her features are mixed up, her eyes and mouth looking to have been rotated around her nose. She only grants a momentary glance, just long enough to see the pleading in her eyes before she stares down at her feet. "The master promised I would be beautiful. He said that I would be strong, that I wouldn't ever have to hurt again."

The words seep into Morello's brain, moving toward a vacant spot in his mind, a place where something used to be alive. They find nothing, fitting awkwardly into his understanding, leaving him more confused than anything. He stares down at the girl, wondering how this is his issue. "Sometimes, I think the master's idea of beauty and ours is a pretty different thing. You've seen him. Not hard to understand we might be thinking different things."

"But you aren't ugly," Lumina says. She reaches out, curling her fingers in the fabric of his loose shirt, balling her fist. "I've seen you make yourself into women prettier than any I've ever seen before. Can you do that to me, Mr. Morello? Please."

"Can't," he says, pulling his arm away. "What I do only works on me and the dead, and despite what Dal might say, we aren't dead. That ever changes, I'll let you know." The sudden urge to get away from the sad girl overpowers him, and he is happy to be led away by it. "Looks like there's commotion going on down there. Let me know how the raid turns out." Morello waves back to her as he makes it to the ladder leading to the street. He spares a single glance back, seeing her standing there, a dark spot on the bright roof.

Why did everyone always try to make their problems his problems? Doesn't he already have enough horseshit to shovel?

The side door of the warehouse on Ivykeys Road bangs open. The force of the manager's body hitting the door knocks it into the wall hard enough to bounce back and hit the man before he can fully tumble outside. A dark boot in his chest helps him make it all the way out, falling onto the harsh stone surrounding the building, his already torn shirt doing little to stop the stone from scraping across his back as he falls. The man tries to cry out, but the air is gone from his lungs, making him wheeze as he tries scooting away, not caring as his delicate palms are torn by the ground in a similar way to his back. Even for an elf, the man is thin, and this morning is already proving as more physical excitement than he has seen in a decade.

His first attempt to breath, trying to suck down the sooty air of east Danfalla, the pain in his ribs stops him. He scrambles up, holding the stitch in his side, or is that a broken rib? Stumbling feet manage to make it to the dumpster on the side of the building that sits full of broken wood, unused timber, and rusted iron. He falls against it, shaking in a breath, forcing his lungs to expand.

The monster bangs out of the side door after him. The manager has heard of the demons the Mari clan is capable of summoning, has seen a few on occasion as well, but this thing pursuing him through the warehouse is worse than he can understand. It chases him, its eyes dark, tangles of snow-white hair hanging around its head in mad bunches, its body swollen with muscle beneath its black robes, two small horns protruding from its head.

"I…I don't…I don't," the manager wheezes.

"You had better figure it out," Jor'Mari says, stepping close to loom over the man. His right hand twitches at his side as he looks down on the little man. He can't help but grab the manager's collar. Gods, why couldn't this be the place? Why couldn't this be the one?

"Where is she?" The question leaves his mouth as more of a growl than real words. His exhale carries spit from between his clenched teeth to land on the manager's face. "Where!?"

"You're killing him!"

The words cut into his thoughts, a woman's voice. Not the one he is looking for. He can't even look away from the shaking man in front of him to spare a glance. Jor'Mari's entire body shakes; even his eyes can't sit still. The world shakes with him, as if his rage boils beneath the streets and the stone, straining to get free, straining to leave him.

This little twerp is trying to stop him, trying to hide her from him. He can't let…

The world tilts, spinning with a strange sense of vertigo. For a moment, Jor'Mari thinks he might be dead. For a moment, that thought is soothing. Then, his head cracks against the ground, and he sees the lizardkin woman standing over him, Jess. His heart still pounds in his chest, his veins still pulse with the rush of his blood, the stretching of his skin like the warnings of an explosion, but the world has stopped shaking. Jess stares down at him, a frown on her face, but no anger there.

He hears the sound of a choking gasp. Why couldn't he hear that before? Jor'Mari rolls to his hands, putting the warehouse manager the right way up in his vision. A large red mark circles the man's throat, and Jor'MAri can still feel the warmth on his right palm.

"What in Three Hells was that!?" Jess harshly whispers down at him, not wanting to attract more attention to their little corner of the lot. Her fist balls, and for a moment, she looks like she is going to hit him. Swearing in her native tongue, she settles for pushing him over with her foot instead. "You told me that people weren't going to get hurt."

"And you believed me?" He tries, rocking back onto his heels, his reflexive smirk only half-forming on his face before Jess' withering glare drives it away. "Sorry. I'm just…I'm so fucking angry. All the time. For six days, it has felt like someone is stabbing me in the chest."

"I know." The anger melts in an instant, and she helps pull him to his feet. "I know."

"I know you do," he says.

"That doesn't mean you can go around killing innocent people," Jess says.

"Who says that he is innocent?" Jor'Mari growls, pulling the manager's attention back to himself. The man quivers on the ground, squirming.

"I'm only after one," Jess says.

"We'll find her," Jor'Mari says, stepping forward again, but keeping a few feet of distance between him and the man on the ground, best to keep him out of reach. "Where is Priscilla Ca'Mari?"

The manager squawks, shaking his head and swallowing several times. "No one knows. She disappeared almost a week ago. The madam was very upset about it."

"Horseshit!" The anger snaps back in an instant, as if it had never gone. Before he can take a step forward, Jess grabs his arm, holding him in place. She is far stronger than her form would give away. "Priscilla Ca'Mari has been spotted almost a dozen times over the last week. Where is she, and where are her associates?"

The man leaning against the dumpster breaks into incoherence, babbling out answers that grow more and more useless as time drags on. Eventually, Jor'Mari has him hauled away, taken to the holding cells where the rest of those in the Ca'Mari employ are being held for questioning.

"We will find her," Jess tells him as they start to move off the lot.

"We will," he confirms. "Even if we have to turn over every inch of this city. We will find her."

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