Edicts

Edicts

Postby catch » Tue Mar 03, 2015 11:04 am

(following the Dream)

He had spent so long hiding. After the Red-and-Gold summer, he had kept his head down, walked the Town's streets at night, at the height of day, when crowds and multitude-eyes were scarce, or when there were so many that no stones may be thrown. He was a specter of Humanity, a lunatick to be forgotten, and - for a very long time - that was what he wished. Why linger in the town? He'd rather their eyes slide over him. Dismiss him.

He could no longer do that.

Catch rode atop Bruiser, the magpie mare's coat, and his own, dusted with snow. He had no bridle on her, nor saddle, because he could not figure out the straps. And he did not want to bind Lady Bruiser, who was a Noble in her own right. With her powerful frame, and his, they drew they eye - Catch, in his star-spangled coat, in every bit of finery he owned or scrounged. Green-stained theater jewelry looped about his neck, about his face, the best he could do for collar-and-crown. His skull was hidden under a woolen cap. He could not bear them staring at his scar.

Through the crowd he goes, gentle touch telling Bruiser to push aside anyone who did not step away. Grumbles and barks of indignation lingered into bewildered silence. Catch saw eyes, many, many eyes, wet and every-color, round like berries. He hoped Cherny's crows would come, and pluck out every eye - but there was no such luck. The eyes followed him - others followed him - curious, perhaps, laughing at his outlandishness, wondering what he hoped to do, what he was doing. A lunatick, good for a laugh.

He comes to the Market Square, where wares are hawked and great carts line one road, ready to take what the river brings, and deposit it in the stalls. There is a raised platform, here, for announcements, for call. Catch urges Bruiser up the wooden steps, her hoofbeats a thunderous tattoo as she, and he, lurch onto the platform. It was tall. He was so tall, he thought he could see the world, his mismatched eyes quailing at the amount of people he saw, pale faces and dark turning up, glancing. Some lingered. Others went. That would not do.

Catch sat upon Bruiser's back, as straight and tall as he could - his throat bulged - and from his throat, instead of a yell, a Herald, a call, there emerged a clamorous, discordant tone - a bronze and silver sound - the sound of bells, made only by his Will. When he cut off the Call, every face was turned towards him. His insides shook; his throat wanted to call more, more!. He strangled both thoughts.

"You are no longer welcome to the Woods," he says, his voice trembling from the echo of the bells. "I - I am your Guardian, and I say no game is to be taken, n-no fruit, no nuts. Not even a mushroom. You may not enter. You may, you m-m-may no longer take. You will live and work in th-the Town alone, in the narrow places of farms and mines, and use wh-what you make, what you g-grow. You may take these things f-from one place to the next, by staying upon the roads. But the Woods are, are shut."

From a busted, old-leather satchel at his side, the addled man slips free his trophy; he lofts it up, so that all may see. The grisly thing stunk of sour, of shit. It is a hand, made skeletal by enzyme and acid, dripping syrupy flesh from the arcing bones; tangled within are the brown beads of Madame de Lanz. Catch throws it from him, throws it at the faces, the eyes. They recoiled from the thing, and Catch allowed a thread of contemptuousness to bolster his flagging confidence.

"You will write letters, set words upon the woods and the paths. You will make posters. You will g-g-go to the Wood's edge, and call the Red Dragon. You will call me, if you have complaint against the Dragon. I am your Guardian."

I am your king.
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Re: Edicts

Postby Rance » Tue Mar 03, 2015 2:43 pm

Today, she bought a dress.

Never before in her life had she purchased a dress. Fabricated them, yes, like an amateur tailor; donned the passed-down raiments of old dead women; on one occasion, she'd stolen; had been given, gifted. But never ("Their seams are off; they're lazy, they're fastly done, and if you pop the stitches, you'll find a bit of blood from their fingertips," she'd once explained to Cherny) had she put coin into another palm for a measured, cinched, and lengthened garment. The shillings (three of them, and one for alterations) had come from a fund of bittersweetness: those coins had been meant for tiny stockings, for a wetwood bassinet, for--

For these long, olive-dyed sleeves without holes worn into them. For piss-bleached petticoats, only white as long as she might dare to keep them from dragging through the mud. For a woman's trappings.

Mothers, after all, were not children.

She was increasingly thankful, too, for the serendipitous acquisition of a new dress and a slatted bonnet to bar the bitter winter. When she heard the commotion, the mutters, the whispers, confused and enraged and curious -- and all of them ended in Catch, lunatik, or the man who brought the soup -- she drifted, magnetized, toward the scaffolding. Gloria saw him there. A platinum mountain swaying like a military general atop Ailova's beloved horse. A man. A Guardian. Something about him screamed with majesty, as though he'd shed his flesh and had become a beacon of caustic light, a vaporous presence, an idea donning a long, beastly face. His proclamation both cut her and horrified her. What? she wanted to ask. What?

He threw beads drawn from a bag of offal.

They fall at her feet. She realized that the crowd had pulled back away from the scaffold like a wave receding from a shore.

She stood alone.

"Catch?"
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Re: Edicts

Postby Jirai » Tue Mar 03, 2015 3:42 pm

There were eyes on the Madman. There always were, when he was around.

As he spoke, as he sounded the Bells, he gathered more eyes to him.

One pair was blue, and belonged to a loitering urchin.

Another pair was brown, and these belonged to a woman in a constable's uniform.

"What th' hell is he up to this time?" Constable Breve muttered to her companion, who started to return a flippant response when the madman pulled out his grisly trophy and flung it at the crowd.

"...Shit."

The Constables began weaving through the crowd towards the madman.
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Re: Edicts

Postby Treadwell » Tue Mar 03, 2015 4:03 pm

Nothing calamitous that occurs within the Market Square truly escapes Lord Steward Treadwell. At its center, nearest the Deck on which Catch and horse now stand, is his toy shop: prime real estate for a store, easily identified, and easily found. Otherwise, he is on the dearest of terms with numerous of the town criers, particularly one loyal Tubbian Jack Alldale, who keep him informed of anything that might have happened while at a meal or lost in a nap. There is also his position at the Meetinghouse, where he hears complaints from folks often enough.

And here is Catch, outside the toy shop, giving a most disagreeable complaint of his own.

Catch is not the only one in a disagreeable mood. Nights of restless sleep, being lost in dreams he ought not be having, have left the toymaker drained, to say the least, feeling emptied. Of course, there have been the good nights of rest, the ones where all was well and as it should be. And then there were the more distressing ones: the ones of a potentially near future in a wheelchair, of a body and mind slipping gently, of wealth, of fame, of position and power. These intrusions into the usual nights spent with attention on other concerns than those of mortals were becoming frequent enough to leave Aloisius just as he is at the moment as he listens to Catch through the walls of the toy store, over the dull crackle and hum of his fireplace.

It's all enough to cause him to stop carving what is in his hands and to look down on it for the first time today.

This latest design had come to him not of any conscious thought or desire; he merely sat down this morning, grabbed a piece of wood from the box near the fire, and started to work. Now, after but a few hours of dedicated trimming and chipping and smoothing, without truly thinking of it all, there is in hand something both perfectly familiar and queerly chilling.

"The heft is a little light, Aloisius. The color is off. And the tip!"

It is a wooden scepter in the making, a replica of the massy, weighty one of silver shaft and emerald-sparkling head from his dreams these last few nights.

He frowns, staring at his handiwork, wondering, puzzling.

And then, outside, the last of Catch's demands--and, wait? Constables making through the crowd?

Wooden mace of authority is set aside atop the fireplace, and crumbs and slivers are brushed off. Cane is taken in hand, and up Treadwell goes, making to peek out of his front door, still wearing his leather belt of toymaking tools over the day's choice of burgundy robe and hat.
"Looks like a table to me. Do you think it could hold up someone as bulbous as Treadwell?" -- Dr. Brennan, Myrken Wood Rememdium Edificium
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Re: Edicts

Postby catch » Wed Mar 04, 2015 1:53 am

Gloria. Of course she is there. Beyond the milling crowd, Catch's eyes can no longer discern between the good timber-and-stone buildings, and buildings washed with tin and gold. He looks down at her, and - for all his usual height - it only now strikes him how far above her he is. She had Glass Words. He musn't let her speak them.

"Soodsy," he tells her. He senses, rather than sees the Constables, barracudas weaving through milling crowds of fish. Bruiser does, too, and under him she begins to dance, her eyes bright in anticipation. She is Airy Ann, a Lady-Warrior. Catch tightens his fingers in her mane, not to stop her, but to keep his precarious seat. His voice is leaden with desperation as shock turns to outrage.

"I c-c-can bring Soodsy here, so you may hold her, and rock her, and - and g-g-give her kisses and love. But I must be a Guardian, Gloria. I must be a King."

Madness, surely. But in his mismatched eyes, there burned a terrible Sanity.
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Re: Edicts

Postby Serrus » Wed Mar 04, 2015 3:43 am

She sits with clenched fists and chattering teeth, frostbitten toes that she could barely feel and a soaking cloak, wet with mud snow, quivering against the wooden pylon that held up the craft shop. She sat exactly where she fell when the last person she'd asked about her long-life friend had promptly shoved her and landed her in a heap of gown and muddy hair, naught but a dog to be kicked, a rag to be tossed aside. The same men might find her another time and demand service, and she would want to refuse them but accept for the payment it brought, for food did not simply come to being when one wished for it.

She whispers his name over iced bleeding lips, from dawn to dusk and dawn again she's searched throughout the town and upon the outskirts, and none could bring her closer to finding him than before, either they didn't know, or didn't care. A crippled whore, a jape for men to laugh at, and outcast among the outcasts. She whispered his name again, a tear forming upon the open eye, and she thought of spiced wine and mutton pie and the smell of burning incense. Such wonderful food, such a sweet smell, but it had been embittered by hatreds wrought, by lashing tongues and cruel insinuations.

You think yourself a man of talent? You think they appreciate you? A King would not appoint you his fool, a mummer his freak, nor a monk his chambermaid. A worthless, spineless hack, a jester in a boy's clothing; none shall remember your name. I for one am able to leave a man satisfied when all is said and done.

She bites harsh teeth into frozen fingers, her stomach heaving as she curls into a heap, a pained moan escaping her lips. It's a certainty she does not want to accept, a bitter stone so hard to swallow. I have to see him, I have to know. I must know. Haydon, what have they done? As quickly as the great weight and knot in her gut pulls, it eases, as if someone or something had touched her, and she hears something, a note, the note to start a song, only this came from the greatest of songs, the songs men could not sing, only the whisper of the trees, the sounds that did not come from the realms of men. What was that? Like the great strummed note on her zither, or the perfect harmony between two voices, it stirs her, and she rises to her feet. A commotion in the markets, a crowd gathering of some kind. Voices and slander, shouts and mockery, and other sounds of apprehension. And through the great sea of people, an odd giant on an old horse stands on the crier's podium. She does not see the ghastly hand, nor hear the startled cries. Something inside her stirs, and she cannot explain it, she simply knows. Whatever it was that had drawn all and sundry to the markets, whatever had made that song, it was a sound she had to understand. He… he knows. He knows what I might find.

She staggers through mud and slush, the slippers upon her feet long gone, replaced with bleak frostbitten toes and a mud-sodden frock and dress. She pushes, she shoves, heaving her way through the crowd. She sees the armed men, men of order, men who would offer her fine promises of protection one day then beat her senseless the next. But they would stop the one on the horse, and then she could not ask him.

"W… Wait!" she calls out, staggering as she almost trips, slipping past a short girl in a dress with olive dyed sleeves. "S-stop.. let him speak, I have to kno—"

Her foot finds mud and she slips and staggers, sliding along the great muck to fall spread eagled on her buttocks, ice biting her fingers and toes and filling her ears, her arms and hair splayed out in front of the gelding in a great comical display. Raucous laughter erupts from a large circle of men; bakers, smiths, apprentices, fishermen and huntsmen, they holler and hoot, some bending over to slap their knees and guffaw. The one-eyed whore finds herself angered and flushed, and she looks up to the giant riding the horse, seeing mismatched eyes, a great monstrosity of a man that does not look like much a man at all, and her one eye widens, lost for words, her lips trembling in her cold and fatigue.
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Re: Edicts

Postby Selestia » Wed Mar 04, 2015 4:16 am

The bardess was standing there, lips pursed with her eyebrows up, surprised but otherwise rather nonplussed about the procession and the edicts. She, herself, preferred not to go out into the Wood. Not after the stint of bad luck out there. There had been too much mishap in those Woods for a lass such as her to go in, 'less she planned to whollop a nastie with her guitar.

"Y'dun see tha' every day." Caoimhe turns to look at the tall girl who has come up next to her, lower half of her face covered in a mask to hide most of her features. Leathers, and the smell of wild. If that was not enough of a hint to her identity, the bow and quiver on her back was. Wildling. Woodkin.

"Nah," she agrees with Pryderi, canting her blonde head to the side so that she could speak in lower tones to the wildling girl. "Wut 'xactly have I got meself into by agreein' t'come oot this way?" To the Myrken, to this quiet little...mad town.

"Well, looks like y'didn't get yerself into th'Woods," the wilding says bluntly. A clap on the bardess's cloaked shoulder, and she pauses, peering backward over Caoimhe's back. "Y'blighted?"

Caoimhe chuckles and shakes her head, turning enough that she can lift the cloak and reveal the instruments she carried, tucked away neatly beneath to protect them from the cold elements. "Tho'thinkin' stayin' 'ere might make me tha'way."

The wildling runs a hand over her face and down to her throat, pulling the heavy woolen scarf around her neck up higher, covering exposed flesh. "We're all mad 'ere." Another clap on Caoimhe's shoulder. "Stay out of th'Wood, eh? Beastie's a right nastie."

"Y'met it?" Rumors had swirled about this beast in the Woods, something so fast no one saw it and so large it swallowed horses whole. The bardess was intrigued by such--that was how legends were born. Myths and stories and--

Obviously not so much one of those here. Not here.

"Run in, aye. Twice." And lived to tell the tale. Pryderi nods, but does not give the blonde lass more details. "Stay out th'Wood. Y'might keep yer head."

"You'n stay oot th'Wood yerself, eh? Goin' 'bout widda bow?" Caoimhe looks around, grey eyes darting back and forth in case anyone was watching, listening to the exchange. "Wut I'm gatherin', that'un's a mad'un, but 'e is more." Her hand comes up, wagging a finger at this brash wildling. "Keep yer 'ead down, eh?"

Pryderi grins beneath the mask enough that her kohl-lined eyes crinkle up before slapping the bardess on the shoulder once again. "Aye, aye. An' y'ave a job t' do now, doncha, music lady? Go'n spread th'word." The wildling turns in short fashion, moving away to slip off between buildings, to get out of the town, out of civilization.

"Stay out o' th'Wood."
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Re: Edicts

Postby Cherny » Wed Mar 04, 2015 6:44 am

The madman's stately progress across the square is noted, observed. At first maybe a handful of idle faces turn towards him here and there, noting a mild oddity, something of passing interest among the bustle of the marketplace; then, after that peal rings from his throat, with wide eyes and taut features, a ripple of confused unease passing through the crowd at this interruption to the day's commerce. At the bookseller's stall the squire looks up in alarm, teeth pressed together, lips tight as he chokes back an echo of Song.

The madman rides up onto the platform, his steed's hooves a slow drumbeat on the weathered timber, and then he speaks - addresses the crowd in his star-lined coat and woollen hat, issues bans and prohibitions, lays out the new laws, the way things will be. They listen, startled into silence at first, though eyes harden at the constraints laid upon them, features settling into scowls at what is forbidden - livelihoods abruptly outlawed by a madman upon a magpie horse, and a murmur of discontent rises from the crowd as the lunatick continues.

That grisly relic wins gasps of dismay and - a moment after - revulsion, anger, a shift from startlement to something uglier. There's been word of troubles in the woods - rumours of travellers lost, of trappers missing, of livestock taken - and here is the lunatick on his fine horse, allying himself with whatever lies at the heart of it. Those with longer memories recall the Baie, the Ashfiend, the dark elves and other monsters who struck from the shadows and murdered without remorse, dark nights they'd dared to hope were behind them. Fresher are the scars of the Red-and-Gold Summer, of similarly nonsensical decrees and draconian penalties, of letters and posters and the imposition of arbitrary rules.

The mood turns further, darkens, and in the centre of it all, like Glenn Burnie before him, stands the pale rider who appoints himself Protector, and who has made of himself such a fine and prominent target.

The first clot of muddy slush and snow is thrown from somewhere further back in the crowd, arcing high over the heads of the townsfolk to splatter harmlessly on the planks a yard or more to the madman's left; others - idle youths spotting a chance for a bit of cruel sport - quickly get the idea, stooping to gather up further missiles of their own, wadding dirt and slush and ice into fist-sized lumps, casting them towards the stage with raucous jeers of defiance and derision.
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Re: Edicts

Postby Rance » Wed Mar 04, 2015 4:10 pm

Too fast. Too quick. Sense crumbles.

I c-c-can bring Soodsy here, so you may hold her, and rock her, and - and g-g-give her kisses and love.

She hasn't the time to question the validity of the statement before chaos begins to erupt. Cold spatters of slush and mud clip her as, missiles with intent, they loose from common hands toward a common target. Simultaneously, Constables in their sleek uniform and muted insignia march forward, memories of Red-and-Gold flashing far too recently in the eyes of their thoughts. The crowd undulates, surges like a sea. Some of its constituents turn on themselves, begin driven to collide just for the satisfaction of a fight; others are more sensible, either winging muddy projectiles from a safe distant or ushering themselves away from the confusion--

A body strikes the ground next to her. Men laugh. Gloria looks down toward the one-eyed girl, neither recoiling nor even seeming to register the scarred mass of the socket staring back at her. But the seamstress herself is no sight to behold: underneath her bonnet, her face is a swollen map of bruises and her nostrils are caked with rings of brown blood. She holds out her hand -- her only hand -- to help the girl stand, her fingers a blistered offering. Stand, her battered face says. Stand.

Her gaze darts back up to Catch. A sudden realization, a plan--

"You tell me," Gloria says to the self-professed King, her words frantic, "if you know where my child is, Ser Catch, and I'll keep them from beating you until you bleed.

"You tell me you know, and -- and I won't let them hurt you."
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Re: Edicts

Postby highawaywoman » Thu Mar 05, 2015 3:16 am

Beside Gloria the highwaywoman stepped up, a grim smile twisting her lips as she surveyed the giant on her mare, both of them resplendent in their mission.

"Feckin' 'ells." The crowd surged, angrily tossing mud and debris. Ailova found herself being pushed forward with the mass of humanity. "Gloria, 'elp me. I'll not lose 'er to an angry mob!" A shrill whistle came from Ailova's lips, the call meant for the tobiano mare and her alone.

Bruiser had been calm, trusting Catch completely and enjoying the outing with the tall one who pampered her so sweetly. However, when the crowd turned ugly, the spotted mare became fractious. Humans were dangerous when balled together and angered. When the shite started to fly she danced a jig beneath Catch, tossing her head and baring her teeth to those assembled.

The whistle cut through the horse's spooking mind, Mistress. Bruiser whinnied loudly, her head whipping towards the call.

"Feckin' get oot o' me bleedin' way!" Ailova smashed the nose of a red-faced sod who'd just tossed a large rock towards the pair. Blood spurted and it was immensely satisfying to feel the tender beak flatten beneath her fist.

Now it was a race to get her horse out of there and away from the mob.
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Re: Edicts

Postby channe » Thu Mar 05, 2015 3:23 am

Maybe the swordswoman Agnieszka Kaczmarek River would have stopped, a long time ago, and helped, or tried to fix things.

But she's seen Catch ride in on his horse, and make his proclamation, and she's hefted the bale of produce she's just purchased on her shoulder and makes her way from the square. They did not want her, so she shall not help them.
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Re: Edicts

Postby Jirai » Thu Mar 05, 2015 4:05 pm

The constables moved quietly at first, hoping to simply remove the madman (hah!) before the situation devolved.

It devolved quickly.

Constable Breve muttered a curse under her breath before lifting her voice. "That's enough!" The stocky woman bellowed. "Clear the square!"

There were other constables, and Breve was quick to order them about. "You, you... you two... Get them out of here. We'll take care of him." Her partner gave her a side-eye at that, but didn't protest. Leaving the other constables to handle the crowd that was rapidly turning ugly, Breve and her partner started pushing through towards Catch.
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Re: Edicts

Postby Selestia » Thu Mar 05, 2015 4:12 pm

Perilat was amongst the Constables that Breve has called out, and he was quick to his job, moving his cloak back so that the badge was shown, hands up as he waved to get attention of the angering crowds.

"Alright people, the show is over. Let's make haste to places we need to be that are not here, alright?"

What a nightmare. Myrken never got a single day of rest it seemed before something else happened. He looks over his shoulder to see Breve and her partner heading for the more entertaining task. The sharp whistle that got the horse's attention gets his attention, and he looks to see the woman with the talented lips. What a nightmare.

Muttering was turning into angry sounds, and he turns around to put his arms out at his sides, garnering attention. "OI," he bellows, barking the words in a tone he did not need to use often, did not like to use often. Charisma and charm was Perilat's way, not brute force. "Clear. The. SQUARE!"
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Re: Edicts

Postby catch » Fri Mar 06, 2015 12:50 am

Let them. Won't let them.

I won't let them hurt you.

Catch's face did not twist in fury. It simple went dead, cold and hard, and it is in these moments that he looks the most alien, the most bestial, a vague, equine gargoyle with lewd suggestions in his face, the set of his shoulders. It turned this way even before the missiles. They were muddy snow and, when one was found, mere stones. Catch struggled to stay atop Bruiser, who loved another too deeply for him to touch. He hadn't wanted to touch it. Many horses would not let him even a brief stroke of fingers, like the grand Peropis, because they smelled him, knew what he was, and feared. Bruiser had smelled a different part of him, and let him even upon her back.

The missiles, the familiar whistle. Bruiser nickered under his knees, and he is very hard-pressed to stay upright, now, as she lurches towards the stairs, a far more awkward process than going up them had been. Catch's cold fury only grew greater as he saw them - comparable to no other animal he knew, because animals had senses, even down to pigs and rats - squabbling and fighting, hurling their snow and their stones. He smells his own blood, a cut above his ruined brow. The constables shouted to restore order, as they turned on one another.

Catch's voice could no longer keep the tinge of bells from itself, and they grated together in terrible dissonance as Bruiser carried him away, down from his perch and into the melee.

"Why d-d-don't you tell them how long you knew, Glour'ya." Her true name was harsh and bitter, splintering from his tongue as all Jernoan did. "At least I told them!"

His attempt at grandness was a ruin around him, muddied, befilthed, and bruised, yet making no effort to swat aside the projectiles, all of his efforts going to grimly holding on to Bruiser.

Half of him was very, very afraid. The other half struggled to Sing, overjoyed. He had to fight it, before he could speak again, as loud as he could - echoing against the sky, the hidden stars a tremble.

"The Forest is shut, or you will die!"
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Re: Edicts

Postby Serrus » Fri Mar 06, 2015 2:59 am

The laughter had died as soon as it had begun, with the first flinged pile of mud soaring towards the podium. She lay deep in the muck, terrified of being trampled by a gelding, and there was too much confusion in the space of a mere few moments for her to even see the offered hand, the plea from the stranger's eyes. Get up, she told herself. Get up you fool.

The noises of the crowd were changing, the murmured buzz of bees to the raging drone of hornets with the change in tone, harsh, angered and panicked cries. More mud is flung, and the whore staggers and slips, a pathetic display, before finding her feet to glance with the high pitched sound of the whistle from the Constables, and the great shout of from those in the familiar uniforms to clear the area. What was once a crowd is now a mob, and the whore scrambles backward as the gelding stirs on all fours. A shout came from the crowd, a woman she did not know, as the gelding seemed to cry out in the sounds they so often made when terrifed. A man staggered, crimson blood a red pitter-patter sheen in the air to splash onto white dotted-muck, and he fell to the brunt of the other woman's fist. Her one copper eye was wild, searching for a way out, an answer, but all she sees is calamity.

But I need to know, I have to know, where ... where...

Her mind is blotted out, like a great wave had suddenly struck invisible reefs in the recesses of her subconscious. A great pulsating thrum, a tubular bell, a tuning fork struck against the ear, a perfect note of a plucked string, the ring of resonating crystal. At such close proximity with her tone-attuned ears, the music raised from the stranger on the horse creates an awful din inside her mind, and she finds herself stumbling to the side, hands clasping her ears, a great pounding in her head, as if the orchestra were to suddenly crescendo it would burst. A whine from her lips turns into an angered, painful groan, fighting back the urge to scream. Revulsion swells inside her, all questions gone, and she feels nothing but compulsion to be rid of this place, to be gone. She stumbles forward into the mass, trying to push her way free, out of the shifting crowd and away from this painful barrage of audial senses.
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