The well worn dirt trail we'd been following, lined by fences that'd been broken down in different places, was finally interrupted, a set of gates and walls ahead.
A mix of wood and stone, the latter overtaking and enforcing the former, it wasn't even half as tall as city walls. It was still more than enough to keep out animals and basic Grimm. Not only that, but along its top a variety of weapons lined the edges. Most were older model and inefficient dust powered guns, with a few old fashioned ballistae mixed in. Only one, at the very center of all those weapons and pointed down at the trail, was up to date, its multibarrel more than capable of the powerful rapid fire the others lacked.
Several manned the wall and its weapons, one standing between the guns, a hand raised.
"They're not going to shoot us, are they?" Emerald whispered as I raised my own hand, returning the distant woman's wave. Emerald had taken a slight step behind me, hands at her revolvers. Cinder kept a hand on the handle of one of her swords, but she did that at pretty much all times, not so bothered by the weapons pointing at us that she was any tenser than usual.
"Don't give them any reason to and you'll be fine." I said. "Life's rougher out here, so the people have to be too."
"If you say so." Emerald dropped a hand, the other staying fully hidden beneath her cloak.
As we came upon the distant walls, the one who initially waved raised a hand for us to stop and took a step closer to the edge, getting a better look at us.
"Just passing through or have you got business here?" She questioned, the old bayonet in her hands just shy of being pointed straight at us.
"We were hired to deliver some personal items from Mistral."
"By an older lady? With gray hair and brown eyes?" I nodded and the woman shook her head. "Damn woman just can't help herself." She muttered, the words likely lost on Cinder and Emerald but the movements of her lips giving away each one to me. "How'd you three get here so quickly? Just yesterday she was still looking for people to take on her little delivery and I don't see any car or airship."
"Semblance."
"Must be quite the semblance then." She said. "Well? Toss it up."
I nodded to Emerald who shifted her cloak, drawing out small box wrapped up in brown packaging and throwing it up. Catching it, she ripped it open and took one quick look into the box before setting it down, a dark envelope tossed down.
"The other half of your payment." She said. "So, you all staying the night or leaving?"
"Staying." Semblance and aura aside, the sun was already well on its way to setting. There was no point in skipping out on a bed or even just a set of walls to set up behind when we weren't going to make it that far from the town before stopping.
One order from the woman and the gates were opened.
"I'm sure you can figure out where the bar is. Head there for food and drinks. It doubles as an inn for you wandering types too but if you don't want to pay up, there are communal rooms set up in the town center. Just don't expect anything comfortable or private." She called out from above as we stepped through the gates.
Unlike Mistral or Vale, made of so many different districts that were each wide spanning on their own, a settlement like this was called small for a reason. In terms of sections, what might be called the town's central area more or less made up everything, a number of different buildings, most made of wood with a handful standing out to their stone structure, spread about. Another section was strictly dedicated to farming, plowed fields taking up an entire corner of the space behind the walls.
"People really choose to live out in places like this instead of the city?" Emerald muttered as the gates creaked closed behind us, watching the handful of kids running around in the distance. Aside from their laughs, a majority of the noise came from one of those few stone buildings, further standing out as the only one with a wooden sign hanging from the edge of its roof, the bed and plate of food depicted self explanatory.
"Doesn't your home have holes in the roof?" I questioned, taking the lead down the path.
"Not anymore." She said, smug and proud. Good for her if she actually used her lien for a better place.
"People have more reason than you think for choosing to live away from the main cities." I said. "Freedom, family, or just the chance to be first to set something up out here. Some just don't like how people in the cities live. Take your pick."
"Yeahhh." Emerald said, looking beyond the fences to the right. Just opposite to the farmland was a large barn with different areas sectioned off for different livestock. While the air out here might've had a sort of freeing freshness compared to a city, I wouldn't exactly call it clean with animals now so close. "I don't see the appeal."
Most who spent so much of their time behind kingdom walls wouldn't. It'd taken me a while to get used to it all myself, thanks to a whole other lifetime of comparatively comfortable living.
"What about you Cinder?" I asked, looking over my shoulder. "You prefer the cities or something like this?"
She shrugged. I'd expected her to say the wilds, but I guess it made sense she didn't have much of a preference. She'd been an orphan struggling to get by out in places like this only for her first time in a city to be with a collar around her neck and thankless work thrown on her.
Neither were lives anyone would wish for.
"You really know how to kill a conversation, you know that?"
"Maybe you shouldn't be so worried about running your mouth." Cinder bit back, an annoyed side eye shot Emerald's way.
"Hey, I'm just pointing out the facts." Emerald said with a shrug. "So, are you from a city or place like this? I can't really tell with you." Cinder grunted, looking away. "Yep, that is just the perfect answer to prove me wrong."
Maybe it was due to what I said to her or the nature of our work forcing us to stick together in ways most jobs didn't, but Emerald, while still thrown off by Cinder's attitude, didn't let it get to her, lightly prodding at her to get a conversation going. Most failed entirely due to Cinder but even if it wasn't by choice, she was adjusting to Emerald's more curious presence.
Still wasn't sure the two were going to get along though.
The few wooden steps of the bar creaked beneath our feet as we climbed them and pushed open its half doors. Chatter dropped by a noticeable degree, eyes from every direction on us. More so on me than them, my face the only one still covered. While some curious gazes remained, the moment passed quickly, everyone returning to their drinks and food.
Hunters back from a long trek. Farmers in the middle of wrapping up for the day. A few builders like smiths and carpenters. And so many others. In a place as small as this, it was only natural for everyone to not only play some vital role, but all unwind in the same place.
We took up seats at a round table on the first floor, Cinder quick to take the seat that placed her back to the wall and kept everyone else in view.
"We should split the pay four ways." I said, placing both the envelope we just received on our way in and the other the client had given us before leaving Mistral at the center of the table.
"Four?" Emerald asked for both her and Cinder.
"We should set aside lien for a group fund if we're going to be taking on more work like this. For food, places to stay, repairs for gear. That sort of thing." I explained. "We don't have to. Just seems convenient to me."
"How much are we putting into this group fund?" Emerald asked.
"Just a little off the top of each of our cuts."
"I guess I'm fine with it then." Emerald quickly decided. It was really all about lien with her.
Cinder wasn't so convinced, arms crossed as she watched me open up the envelopes and start separating the money. "And we're just supposed to trust you with it?"
"Who said anything about me being the one to keep it?" I said as I finished up splitting up the cards into three different stacks before taking a few off the top of each of them to create one at the center of the table. I pushed that one, along with her stack towards Cinder. "Consider that question you volunteering yourself for the job."
Suddenly being given the money didn't help either, her pointed gaze only a little confused now. "You're not worried I'll eventually run off with it?"
"Don't even say it." Emerald pipped in the moment I nudged my head towards her, a chuckle slipping out of me. I guess all the thief jokes were already getting old.
"Nope." I said, pocketing my own stack. Cinder silently stared, once again seemingly trying to demask me with looks alone. Eventually she stored the stacks in different pouches without a word.
"What can I get all of you?" The waitress that'd been busy with others finally stepped up to our table, looking between the three of us. I raised a foot, tapping Cinder's ankle.
"Three rooms and whatever food you serve." She answered, despite her initial annoyance, realizing what it was about. If she was going to be the one with the group fund I might as well let her have the responsibility of deciding how it was used too.
Not the biggest show of trust considering lien barely made my list of concerns, but I did trust her with it. If there was anything we had in common it was that we had our sights on far bigger things than a bit of money.
XOXO
DINNNG!
Cinder shot up, sword brought along with her.
The room, dark quiet and up on the second floor of that bar they'd stopped in, was empty of anyone else. Rays of moonlight poured through its single window, the faint ring that'd awoken her fading away.
Had she just dreamed that up or-
DINNNNNG!
Again, this time far louder, the sound was set off, the ringing close enough to bring the beginning of pain to her ears. Stepping up from the uncomfortable bed, she slipped on her jacket and grabbed her other blade, leaving the small room behind.
Emerald, in just a tank top and pants, stepped out from hers, one revolver drawn and the other in its holster. Talon, mask already concealing all but his freely flowing black hair, stood outside his room, that giant weight he called a weapon laxly propped against one of his shoulders.
"What's going on?" Emerald questioned over that ringing through a yawn.
"You three!" A yell from one of the people shuffling through the first floor came from below. "We got a Grimm attack on our hands. Either join everyone in the stone building at the center of town while its handled or help out." With that, they and many others set out of the building.
They should grab their stuff, take a look at things, and leave if the people here didn't look like they could fend off the attack.
Talon jumped over the wooden railing of the second floor, following the others towards the exit. Without his bag.
"What are you doing?" Cinder called out after him.
"Going out to help."
"Our job was to deliver something and we did that. This doesn't have anything to do with us."
"True." He said with a nod. Despite that, he waved, heading towards the exit. "You don't got to involve yourself in this if you don't want to."
That idiot. Cinder thought. Where was the sense in walking off towards enough Grimm to set off the warning bells of a town?
Emerald vaulted over the railing and looked back up at her. "Maybe we'll find a way to get some extra lien out of this?" She offered up the excuse while pulling out her other revolver. "And, I mean, we're kind of a team, right?" She finished with a hesitant smile before dashing out of the dark bar.
She was naïve. Talon was too.
What was the point in taking risks for strangers only concerned with themselves? And that team nonsense. Was that girl so desperate for some kind of friend that she was ignoring the fact that they were using each other?
Talon was a meal ticket for Emerald, leading her to more lien than she knew what to do with.
She was using him for strength.
And Talon? Cinder still couldn't figure out his angle, unsure of what he was getting out of his interest in the both of them, but there had to be one. None of this made sense otherwise.
"Idiots." Cinder muttered to herself, following after them. At the very least, she had to see what was going on before deciding what to do.
XOXO
Powerstone Goal = 500
(A/N: Cinder being a downer as always, and Emerald, probably a little more optimistic than she should be. Either way they're shaping up to be something of a mercenary group bit by bit.
For those interested in reading ahead to that here's the link:
patreon .com/ thirdratewriter
Don't got nothing to run my mouth about today so I'm off!)