Fanning Rebellious Flames

Fanning Rebellious Flames

Postby catch » Mon Jul 08, 2013 4:24 pm

Thank goodness it had stormed so thoroughly the day before.

It was an empty thanks, even as it was said by murmurous mouths of a curious crowd. The Inquisitory was made of brick. It was made of stone. It was solid, deep, to protect the precious papers and brilliant minds within. Shaded and parasoled heads bent together like goose-gaggles, whispering and gossiping among themselves, each one adding a bit of the story as the Constabulary worked to remove, from the side of the building, wet and black-charred logs. They had been stacked as high as a man, arranged in a half-pyre, where ash showed the hay, the grasses, that had been used to start it.

The fire.

The hungry flames had done nothing worse than crack a brick, here and there, and left a vicious smear, a scar, of black ash, where flames had licked and roared in draconic fury at the absence of fuel.

Nobody was hurt. Nothing was harmed.

But still they talked. What if wood, next time?

This heat - this summer's heat.
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Re: Fanning Rebellious Flames

Postby Glenn » Tue Jul 09, 2013 12:31 am

The problem, of course, with trying to burn down a place called "The Inquisitory," is that the people within tend to take such a thing personally. An internal investigation began almost immediately.
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Re: Fanning Rebellious Flames

Postby catch » Tue Jul 09, 2013 5:51 am

it is a teacup
a delicate thing, a beautiful thing
turned, over and over
a night, a day, of bitter black milk.
of a secret that must be kept
in order to be quiet.
in order to be clever.
put to a friend's lips
with one hand; and, with the other,
to pinch the nostrils shut.
'It is for the best,' lips had said,
broken
lost.
'It is for the best, and
only we know what is best.

For everyone.'



Another night. The stars winked out and reappeared as trailing wisps passed over them, the children of the storm skipping after their fathers and mothers. The teacup is tucked into the hard, calloused folds of his hands. The blisters had taken just that long to heal. The scars of a million thoughts peppered his palms, his fingers, as he swung open the battered, tin lantern.

Gloria's lantern.

He needed to apologize for borrowing it. He needed to apologize for taking the Dagger's wood from the pile. He needed to apologize to Rhaena, for not going to the Wall like she asked. He couldn't leave Cherny where the Black Man roams with a free hand.

He would have to apologize to Rhaena, too, for burning her precious Black Man. Maybe she would see, one day, in a way they had not seen with Treadwell. The wickedness, the foulness.

The Inquisitory had not worked. So when he came from Ser Baie's shop, choking with cakes and candies and apple-clouds and tainted tea, when he had emptied his guts into the gutters for what he had done, what he had said, heavy fingers pinching flaring nostrils shut, waiting out the screams with the patience of a stal'vak, pouring the drug-laced tea past pretty lips that gasped for air, teeth that howled, all the way to Cloud-hair's brains, his brains, he had pierced further into town. He did not go to his Shack, or the Dagger, or any other places that he had a right to be. He stayed in town.

His coin, little enough though it was, could make whores of sluts. They took more money from him than the answers deserved, for the man had simply held out his hands, and said -

'Tell me what I wish to know. Here is money. T-t-tell me what I wish to know.'

And eventually, they told him. He passed by. He lingered, a little, until one of the staff chased him away with a flapping of hands and a cluck-cluck, as if Catch were a flower-stuffed rooster to be burned.

Now he stood here, in the pitch of night, outside the inn known as the Stinking Sheep, a little teacup tucked against his palm as his fingers swung free the door of Gloria's little, tin lantern. He stood outside of the Stinking Sheep. He stood upon a precipice.

Dead-things must be burned, Catch, Ser Glenn told him. Dead-things must always be burned.

Catch turned the lantern in his hand, and he dumped it - flame, oil, and all - on the waiting pyre.

And then he did not go far. He was not clever. Far enough to be certain the flame caught, to see - perhaps - the deed done. To stir and piss on the ashes of the Black Man.

Then he could be a Good Citizen, like Ser Glenn and Lady Rhaena had always wanted. All he needed to commit was this one, bloodless atrocity.
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Three Lives, One Vision

Postby Glenn » Tue Jul 09, 2013 3:15 pm

The First Life
Jonathan Plantar was a cruel man. Everyone knew it. He'd moved from Heath nine years ago ago with his wife and young daughter. He was a drunk even when things had been good which was how they stopped being good. A cooper by trade, he'd lost the full use of his left leg in an accident when he'd tried to ply his livelihood after having one too many ales. His work had demanded a strength he no longer possessed. Things had been bad when they had been good and they only got worse once they became bad. It became commonplace to hear the sounds of violence from his home. He still possessed strength enough for that.

Myrken was a community full of whispers and recrimination, but only the sort that did no one any good. People looked the other way, tsking in private about the put-upon, oft-battered wife and her poor, poor daughter. There is a shame that is debilitating to adults but that children, full of a sense of justice that the the world has yet to smash, are untouched by. It crippled little Lucy Plantar's mother, but could not pin down the ten-year old girl. She walked right past the whispers and the sighs. She walked to the front door of the Foundation. She walked to the front desk and she told the scribe there of her life. She made her wish.

Now, three months later, Jonathan Plantar sat by the hearth of the Stinky Sheep. He smiled, missing his family but knowing he could get his work done better here. He was too overcome by joy in their presence to focus on even a job he loved, not that he'd ever complain about that. Life had gotten so much better since he stopped drinking, since he started coming here each and every night to work hard so he would have more time with his wife and daughter, so that they could have more of what they deserved. His new job was to sew buttons on the finest of fabrics; knowing that he was making Myrken a better, more beautiful place for his family and his community was one of his true joys.

He was the first to spot the encroaching flame.
-------------------------------
It was the smell. The Man in White had been remade anew by a story: new flesh, new hair, new bones and sinew. A new nose. Why then, when he awakened each and every day, was he still overcome with the stink of burning flesh? Why was it that now, even as he jerked up out of a troubled sleep, that was he overcome with the memories of the flames overtaking his body, of consciousness leaving him far, far too slowly. Why hadn't he died that night, so that his suffering could have ended?

Why had Ariane Emory forced him to live! Well, she suffered enough for that now, whether she knew it or not. His loyalties had been purchased. His life was leashed to Rhaena Olwak's desires, but his mind was still his own, for all that was worth. There were other things with worth. He was younger now, stronger, the endless cycle of inspiration and reciprocation within him forcing, whether he wanted it or not, never-ending vitality. It led to restless sleep, even without the dreams of fire and failure, even without the stench...

the stench that should have faded by now. Why hadn't it faded? Giuseppe's head darted this way and that. Could fire kill him still? Could anything? Why should he fear it now? Why should he fear anything? He didn't. The smell was a memory. The smell would fade, yes? This was a dream, lingering. Reality had gotten away from him again. He would drag it back, if only this phantom smell would fade, if only the screaming would stop.

...the screaming?
-------------------------------
The Second Life
Eliza Jacobson was the daughter of a merchant and a young lady about town. She was sixteen years old and one of the most beautiful girls for miles. She should know. Everyone told her. Her father was a self-made man. Some people said that he capitalized on the suffering of others, but they were fools. When times were tough, things became more sparse and cost more. It was just the way of the world. He was doing what he could to make sure his family had what they needed. Any merchant who said otherwise was a silly fool, and the silliest of all was that lanky girl in the veils with her weird disfigurement. Eliza made sure to tell her so on the street one day too. She and her friends laughed and laughed.

Years passed. She married the son of another merchant and that they could not produce a child saddened her, but they had their father's business to work in and eventually run and there was much in life to enjoy. Still, it matured her, as did time, and she grew to become a well-liked member of the community.

It was only a month ago when, without any warning, she stopped working for her father. She was now in her twenties and still beautiful but almost overnight she had decided that there was someone even more beautiful, someone that she had to emulate. She crafted the gilded scales herself at no small cost and used whatever adhesive she could to stick them on her face. They made her even more beautiful and she loved them. Working for her father had been nice but she found much more joy and fulfillment in serving others as a barmaid at the Stinky Sheep. She'd never been happier.

The fire leaped out at her, searing the golden material to her face. It was her scream that Giuseppe heard.

-------------------------------
The smell, the sound. He was gripped, suddenly, terribly. Fear. It was irrational. He could not be harmed by this. He simply couldn't, not in any way that mattered. He understood how the magic worked. The storyteller was sealed up in Golben and her fate was tied to his, yes, but so long as her fate was imprisonment, so long as Rhaena Olwak's hand hoisted up his rotting soul, then there was little that could end him.

Fire could burn him though. Fire could burn him, just as he'd been burnt before. Fire could burn him, burn off his flesh, skin melting off of muscle and bone. Fire was theirs to control. He remembered the smell of his own nonnina cooking with wine. Reduction, she called it. He remembered and for a moment, he tried to use a story to protect him, a story as a shield not from the flames but from the beating of his own heart.

It was futile. All he could remember, all he could hold on to, was that other tavern, was seeing Ariane Emory's eyes as they made a last, hopeless toast, a last toast at the end of everything that his life had been. Why hadn't he moved out of this damned tavern yet? The Olwak Princess wanted him to. This was below his station. He agreed. It just seemed pointless. Why hadn't he moved out when he could?

All this from just a smell and a scream, but he knew. He knew the primal kiss of the flames and he knew they were coming for him.
-------------------------------
The Third Life
Rollo Lombard was well-liked by his friends and associates. He was a tall man, a skilled man. He was a hunter, an excellent archer, a man more for the woods than for town and a man more for his solitude than anything else. He didn't serve in the militia though he had trained some of the local farmers how to shoot. When he did come to town to sell his kills, he told a fine tale and an even better joke and had a nice enough singing voice so long as he had some sort of accompaniment.

Only four days ago, he had been sitting at a table outside a restaurant in town. He was in a rush and had little time or need with manners. He ate with his hands and after a satisfying swallow of his ale, let out an even more satisfying belch. He had not even seen the disapproving woman walking by.

Now he had wandered in from the outside, eyes bleary, judging. There was so much to do. There was always so much to do. There was a need. It wasn't for food or drink, though. He did not need shelter. No, he saw plates upon tables, food having fallen to the ground. He saw a tablecloth stained. He saw a glass smudged. He saw it everywhere, the dirt, the grime, the untied messes, and he knew that it was all out of place. He knew that he had to help tidy it when he could. If only people would pick up after themselves. He would just have to do it for them.

When the fire burst forth, he was the first to move.
-------------------------------
He would have the story of it later, the Man in White, found upon the ground babbling to himself in his room, pale and shivering. Weeks ago there had been another fire, the Spier manor, already being rebuilt into some other building for some other purpose. The response to that fire had been good, yes, but the response to this had been something else entirely.

It was all due to the sudden leadership of three people. When the need arose, they had acted in unison, astoundingly so. People would later claim that they almost seemed to be finishing one another's sentences while following trained routines. That the woman, a barmaid at the tavern, had pushed past the pain of scalding facial injuries to throw in like she was born for it made the whole incident all the more shocking. They had not acted alone, of course. The room had been full of their friends and neighbors, good people and bad, but so many of them had been encouraged by the three and by others to attend the increasingly popular weekly meetings of Rhaena Burnie's Foundation.

What had started as a purely Governmental branch was now morphing into a civil organization, a voluntary fraternity of sorts that was sweeping through the township, drawing people in with increasing pressure. Civic leaders, popular people, and a number of oddly persistent others were ensuring that the meetings were better attended. There, ways to better Myrken were discussed, needs were raised, questions were answered, and Rhaena Olwak was praised.

There was only so much even well trained men and women could do against fire from inside the tavern. These brave folk did all of them and more. The internal stores of water was brought to use. Blankets were used to beat back the worst of it. People were gathered and corralled to the safest part of the tavern (including a momentarily broken Giuseppe). Windows were broken to provide means of egress, most especially for the few children inside. The three were uniformly firm on that.

Time was purchased, precious time, and on this day, perhaps that would be enough.
-------------------------------
He was a Catch, a Grand Catch, and now that his horn was returned to him, history demanded a certain outcome. He would be glorified. Opulence would reign in Myrken Wood and its people would drown upon the joy and riches that he would provide. He had a role, a proper role, a primal role, one of the most primal in all the world. It was a role that he had filled countless times before.

It was a role that he could not fill in the here and now, for Rhaena Olwak Burnie was there already. He had given her a hand. He had purified her in his light. He had helped to create a monster, had pushed together the tinder that the Storyteller would set alight. She was his creation, usurping his role, leading Myrken Wood to a golden age that he did not create.

He was a Grand Catch, but it was his creation's hand, the very hand that he gave her, that stilled his own on this day.
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Re: Fanning Rebellious Flames

Postby catch » Tue Jul 09, 2013 6:19 pm

He stood and he watched, from first, licking flame to the charred grey of wet, his silvered fingers tight about the empty, tin lantern, working the gentle curve of a teacup with the other. The smoke and choked him, clogged within his nostrils, mingled with blood and honey to create a sticky sweetness. His clothes were swirling ash, his hair awash in it.

It is a Golden City. They take him down the street in chains, they drag him from his temples, his peaceful, quiet gardens, where he can lay himself on the cool, green grass, and watch the stars above, and listen to nothing worse than the singing of crickets, the vibration of june-beetles. It had been long ago when the prosperity had come crashing down. A grandfather's Grandfather's time. There were none, now, who remembered a time before the great slave-carts rolled down gold-cobbled streets, their wooden wheels grinding the pavement, the skulls of the Exotic and the Unbreakable rattling the bars. Before a time where women, girls, boys, could be had and had again, their eyes a drugged memory of better days that had never existed. Where men had replaced beasts, because the beasts had been raped and slaughtered and devoured long before, so that men take the role of beasts upon the tables of the rich.

No. They did not want his Myrken Wood.

He had fallen and risen and fallen again, the High priests, the Magistrates, the Governors. When they became fat with good fortune, he bowed grandly to their praise. When things failed, it was he who's neck dangled from a noose. There is always the Figurehead. The Figurehead with spiders in his belly and great, furry, pegged spider's legs in his mouth, slowly and inexorably clawing it's way out. Rhaena's spider.

And Catch would live in his gardens, and smell his flowers. He would wait until they dragged him free, until they put him upon the altar, until the sky ran red with blood and they screamed, begged, for it to end, for it to end - because only he could end it. It had not begun with Rhaena, and it would never - never - end with her.

Catch stood, watching, as the rhaena-swain swarmed, as they put out his fire. The tough pads of his fingers ran across the cool porcelain of the cup. His eyes never left the vague flashes of Giuseppe, even as his feet drew him closer, this madman, who reeked of smoke. Though others may bade him, sharply, to help, to bring water, bring bandages, bring blankets, he did none of those things as a proper Citizen should.
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Re: Fanning Rebellious Flames

Postby Carnath-Emory » Wed Jul 10, 2013 4:38 am

Ditches aren't good for much, when the fire's deliberately lit. He might as well have filled those trenches with oil, for all they'd accomplished in the end.

The Militia's few principles do not include Prevention - which might have worked in almost any province anywhere, and which for troubled Myrken Wood is simply inapplicable. Better to leave bright dreams like that to fools and to children; being neither, they agreed, they would focus upon developing their capacity to respond.

And so they do. It's a trickle of motion at first: a scattering of capable fellows on the streets, with goedendags for their hands and only the most haphazard sense of organisation. But the Militia has become a hive, an organism, and they defy convention by growing in order as they grow in numbers: by the time the locals are heaving bricks through windows, there are men in those streets shouting commands.

It's an inferno, after all. And it is addressed by men old enough to remember the firestorms of the Fivefold Blight; it is answered by a Militia that had drilled against fire under old Proxenus One-Eye all those years ago, who'd later returned to that self-same training under the Lady Marshall, and of all the drills they'd run through, run to exhaustion, it was this to which they were most personally attached. Fire, with its potential to swallow down whole streets into its hungry flames: there is no more personal threat. Instructions, confident and brisk and shouted over the crackle of flames, have men fetching the buckets strategically stowed all those months ago; have men formed into living chains, delivering their burdens to wells and back again - quickly down the line, boys - because the Constabulary can look to hunting down the responsible, but the Militia cares for nothing but dousing these flames before they can devour, before they can make the leap from this building to the next. Men upon rooftops, leaping one to the next and quick with their shouted assessments. Water. Sand. Children through windows, caught by one set of arms and thrust promptly at another, so that empty hands can be quick with a bucket again.

The process is remarkably efficient. The Militia's second principle, after all, is Containment.


With dawn will come a cool-eyed assessment of the night's performance.
And following assessment, requisitions, committed in ink to paper by a delicately-gloved hand.
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Re: Fanning Rebellious Flames

Postby catch » Wed Jul 10, 2013 9:05 am

When dawn comes, there is no Catch. In the course of the flurry, the fury of staring, he has gone. A night of smoke-addled, mismatched eyes, picking out a soot-smudge form so different from the others, with black hair and dusky skin and black blood in his veins. As he helped. As he helped, his sweat an offensive, dead smell, terrible and iron-bound fingers on a shoulder, an upper arm. And Catch believes not a word of it, if words, indeed, did float in the air, for each word was a lie. Each word was a drunkard's hard hand, momentary, improper rudeness, a hen's cruel chuckle. Every word was overwritten, mutilated, Changed into lies, lies, lies.

Would you rather the bruises, the broken noses?
Would you rather the crass?
Would you rather a girl's tears, brough forth by whip-crack words?


We are perfect. We are perfect. We are perfect.

Wouldn't you like to be perfect, too?

The teacup was hot in his hand. It burned, as surely as golden scales painstakingly glued to a face. As sure as a Black Man's fear, in the pit of his belly. As sure as warm tea, laced with drugs, poured down a bound man's throat. A mixture he did not want to take. Zilliah's swears rang in his head, mingling with the perfection, crashing onto the worm-paths. About how he wish the Baie's beauty to shrivel, to fade. How he wished him to die. Catch felt the words keenly in himself, and though they had been meant for Altias Bromn, Catch was an instrument, a thing to be used, as he had been used again and again and again by the men who wanted power, wanted glory, wanted wishes. His hand shriveled, baggy sacks of skin between skeletal fingers, aged and spotted. His face sagged, his gut hardened from years of hard drink. His limbs were knotty, useless things, worn out long before from years, form years, of chopping wood. From responsibility.

As the sun rises and the Stinky Sheep is viewed upon, the disaster that it was - thank goodness it had rained, that the wood was wet - is when the Meetinghouse could be seen.

It is not blood that is smeared upon the walls, but paint. The cause of buzzing flies would be apparent, the grey morass mingled with compost and cow's waste. An aging hand had swept great symbols upon the windows, the walls, the door.

A. B. C. There is even a D, scraped there with reluctant fingers, for D looked too much like a Fat Man, belly and all.

In the corner, there is a crude, child's drawing. The semblance of a teacup.
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