Faith Morningstar
The fog and pain that came with a hangover were immediately present within my mind, but so was the sense that something was very wrong.
"Good morning, Morningstar. This is your wake-up call!"
Something, someone, was coming close, too fast to do anything but leap from my bed.
My body had been honed to a lethal weapon, but my senses were still awash in last night's revelry. I landed roughly to one side of my bed before rolling to my feet. The last thing I remembered from last night was leaving my bag of Echo-dust on my bedside table. My memory of the room's layout was a half-smeared haze, but I knew the space was narrow and cramped.
"Blind, dazed, and smelling of cheap ale. Not what I expected from your reputation, Deadstar." The owner of the voice flung something through the air, and the oscillating sound it made told me it was likely to be a bolas. I jumped, flipping end over end, grabbing the bolas by its thin cord, and struck out near where I last heard the voice.
I felt the hard stone ends of the weapon strike true, brushing flesh and cracking bone. The voice's body fell to the floor, cold and unmoving. I took a few deep breaths before dropping the bolas.
"Filthy bounty hunter." I walked unsteadily over to the bedside table and found my pouch of Echo-dust. I gathered up a small mouthful, "Idiot didn't even think to rob me first." I brought the dust up to my mouth, allowing it to dissolve slowly, filling my mouth with the flavor of ripe strawberries. I opened my eyes, just as a thick blade entered my stomach just below my sternum. I gaged as my eyes registered what I was seeing.
A man stood in the corner of my room. He'd likely been there since the beginning of the fight, and in my half-drunk state, I just failed to sense his presence. He wore a red mask that covered the lower half of his face. I tried to push him away, but he brought me in close as the icy dagger dug deeper into my body.
"How fitting." He said as he maintained our embrace. "Do you have any idea who we even are? Who I am? Any idea which one of your victims hated you so much as to follow you across so many desolate ruins?" he chuckled, "Not just blind, but utterly clueless."
I reached up and ripped the mask from his face. His features were angular, nose long and rounded, a well-groomed pointed beard and mustache, dark as oil, adorned his face. I blinked at him because he was right, I had no memory of this man.
His smile widened as my vision slowly began to swim once again. He twisted the blade before pushing me to the floor.
Jasper Thorne
The sun was nearing twilight as my sisters and I marched from our cloister. I wore a suit of silver chain and shimmering bone plate. Each segment of my armor was twice blessed and reinforced against any other force borne from the powers of the Echoes. At my side stood Keligon Amberlight, my sworn protector. Together, we marched into the village as the festival was in full swing. Children brought us gifts of Echo-dust, neat little pouches wrapped in golden ribbon. As the night went on, we oversaw the gathering of bodies from the local graveyard. These dead did not yet posses voices of their own, their songs unfocused and fragmented and by gathering them now I knew that these souls would be spared the coming winter, and would protect the village from any potential possession and/or reanimation. As the proceedings continued, there was a sudden uproar around the local inn. Keligon and I hurried over as two bodies were pulled out of the inn and roughly dropped onto the ground.
"What's the meaning of this?" I called out as we approached.
"Assassins." One man said, spitting as if the word itself tasted foul.
I examined the body of the stout man. He had taken a blow to the head. The whispering spirits spoke of a slow, painful death stretching out as blood pooled within his skull. I sighed. This was not a kind death. His face still wore a black mask, and his cuffed shirt held a small pin. I pulled it free and showed it to Keligon.
His head tilted. "Oblivion, a known faction of assassins."
"It's true. This man was an assassin." The spirits began to whisper, a hushed and frantic energy filling the air.
"And what of this one?" I asked as I shifted the body slightly to see her face.
"That one was an outsider." The innkeeper said. "She paid her bill in full, saying she was here for the festival."
"I saw her just yesterday." The tanner said from behind Keligon. "She was a generous one. Paid for a pair of boots and a cloak."
The body had a deep wound running down her abdomen. It looked as if she hadn't even had the opportunity to dress for the day as she still wore her night clothes. I pulled some of her thick red hair to the side, revealing her face. Her skin was fair and dotted with a small gathering of freckles. Even as a corpse, her skin looked almost golden, a color richer than I'd ever seen before as though she'd spent her entire life under the summer sun.
I looked at her wound again and realized something. "Where's the weapon?"
"Weapon?" The two men who had dragged the bodies from the inn looked at each other and shook their heads. "There weren't nothing else in the room apart from some clothes."
"Now that can't be right." The tanner pushed his way forward. "That girl had more Echo-dust on her than most of the village put together!"
Keligon rumble, "Thieves and murders."
"We'll need to bring this to the attention of Mother superior." I said, "I am hardly qualified to investigate something like this."
"This is an ill omen." Keligon said, his lich-fire eyes glancing towards the darkening sky. "The spirits sense something foul in the air."
I could feel it as well. The spirit song had shifted from a playful melody to something akin to a desperate howl. "Everyone please, I think it best if we call an end to the festival." There were nods of approval. I pointed to the two men who brought out the bodies, "Go find the Mother superior and tell her what you found. I'll deal with the bodies."
"Careful with these ones." Keligon said. "Violent death does not sit well with the soul."
I reached out with one hand as my first two fingers outstretched as I began the process of collecting this poor girl's soul. "May your very essence find peace and tranquility within the silent halls of Quietus's domain." I brought my fingers to my lips before reaching out to press my fingers to her delicate rose colored lips. "In the name of the Paladins of Quietus I offer you—"
There was a sudden crack of thunder as my fingers touched her. The air filled with a foul-smelling, ravenous wind. In the flashes of lightning, I witnessed a massive storm rolling through the valley. A cloud, black as night, stretched as a funnel down from the heavens and began tearing through earth, stone, and building alike. Keligon dove over me, grasping the cobble stones beneath us. I was forced to the ground next to the body of the woman and as the world shuttered, lightning blasting every surface around us, and the darkened cloud devouring everything and everyone, the woman beneath me gasped as her eyes shot open.