He walked into the inn not the biggest person there only standing five foot four and weighing less than one hundred twenty pounds, rather pale, and his breath barely perceptible; his hair coal black and shoulder length, pulled back with a short length of black silk cord; his eyes dark as coal and frighteningly alert, observant, missing nothing as they flicked around the room, from face to face, corner to corner, wall to wall taking in everything and storing it some place inside his mind for future reference if necessity were to make the information useful. He wore all black, black pants, black shirt, black shoes, and a black coat over it all, carrying a black cane, which he didn’t appear to need if you watched him closely as he walked, the golden head of which was simple but elegant depicting nothing easily recognizable. He immediately walked to the back of the room where he found an empty table and sat down, placing his cane upon the table’s surface and unbuttoning his coat.
When he unbuttoned his coat, it was the first time color was seen upon his person… two gold chains around his neck became visible as he pulled out a rather arcane looking book and set it on the table with his cane, one chain upon close inspection appearing to be mottled with red spots, like another metal hammered into the fine gold chain. He left the coat unbuttoned and proceeded to thumb through the book, ignoring the rest of the room it appeared, his observations of his surroundings now done and catalogued, as he evidently awaited someone, whether to take his order or someone he had scheduled to meet here was the question.
He sat at the table alone reading through the book for near on half an hour without anyone coming near him, and he’d have continued to thumb through the book if a great deal of commotion hadn’t brought him from it. He placed the index finger of his right hand in the book where he was presently reading and glanced up to see what all the tumult was for and whom was causing it, destroying the serenity the atmosphere had contained. He found himself looking upon a fight between four men and a woman, one of the men and the lady fighting against the other three guys, unfairly out numbered and apparently fighting for their lives. The one man he found double teamed by two of their adversaries and the lady fought the other, standing with him toe-to-toe, extremely graceful and a lot quicker and stronger than the three guys evidently expected her to be. He almost instinctively knew the three had started this fight, the odds stacked in their favor, and closed his book, taking his cane back in his hand after placing the book back in his coat, thinking it extremely unfair the guy was being double teamed and that the other man would even consider fighting a lady.
As he watched, the lady stayed toe-to-toe with her attacker, dodging attacks as quick as they came and dealing her own, which though they constantly struck home somewhere, almost always with the metallic clang of steel against steel as her blade struck armor of some sort, he continued to endure, and the man being double teamed fended off his two attackers extremely well, though he knew it wouldn’t last for long. He weighed the decision of getting involved, and as he did so, in a split second action the guy being double teamed and one of his attackers took each other out, the guy slashing open his adversary’s throat while his adversary’s sword sunk deep into his stomach. The fallen man’s other adversary went quickly for the final blow… that’s when his decision was made for him. He gripped his cane firmly in his left hand, the lady finishing off her adversary with a quick upwards thrust of the sword in her hands that went completely through his skull and turning about, leaving her sword imbedded in her adversary’s chin as he fell, pulling out a dagger preparing to leap on the guy who was about to kill her partner. With a simple nod of his head, the guy in mid-swing went flying across the room to strike the wall with a great amount of force, the lady standing stunned watching him fly and then strike the wall untouched, and he jumping up onto the table pulling the cane apart to free an extremely fine crafted blade.
The man stood up, shaking his head slightly to clear away the haze of the impact’s force, looked at him standing poised on the table in all black with his cane in two parts, the blade gleaming slightly in the dimness of the room, then the lady standing with a dagger in one hand, blood splattered upon her clothes, and fangs bared at him, then him again, and started quickly towards the lady. Again he made a simple nod of his head and sent the man flying across the room and into the wall, a bit harder this time, the sound of the collision resounding through the now silent room. He stood up, shaking his head to again clear the haze from the collision’s force and this time turned towards him, rage in his eyes, glaring viscously, ignoring the woman completely. He hopped lightly off the table, blade still in hand, and smiled back evilly, his coal black eyes now foreboding and vehement, a stray strand of his hair loose of the silk cloth and lying upon his nose. The man growled under his breath, unable to voice properly the rage building inside, “This is between me and him, short shit! You better mind your business before someone has to teach it to you.”
“Mind my business you say?” he answered, the evil grin and vehemence in his eyes still marring the calm air about him. “Well, now that’s funny coming from the likes of you who probably couldn’t even spell such a big word,” he mocked acidly. “Now that you mention it, I’ve made this my business seeing as the odds were a little unfair, halfwit. How do you like that?” He retained a calm and collected air about him, belying the vehemence in his eyes and the acid in his voice as the man continued to glare at him, the woman watching dumbfounded that he had entered the fight to help her and the guy she was with.
The man suddenly sprinted towards him, growling viciously, and again he went flying into the wall with a simple nod of his head, the stray strand of coal black hair flopping across his face with the simple gesture before coming to rest once again upon the bridge of his nose. The man again got up shaking his head, the haze more resolute not to be ameliorated, glaring at him maliciously “Fight fairly, pipsqueak, or are you afraid of getting your short little ass beat?”
“That’s also funny, more hysterical, coming from the likes of you… fairly: an odd notion from a man who most likely didn’t have the word in his vocabulary before now. It sure didn’t look like being fair mattered to you when you and your dead pal down there were double teaming him,” he nodded to the guy on the floor holding his stomach were the sword had pierced him. “And like you I’m fighting according to my strength –which is not dull, brute force—with which I could have killed you by now. If you have a problem with that, tough shit! And I might be short, but I’ll still kick your ass!”
The man charged him again, but this time he did not nod his head to send him flying towards the wall. He instead lowered his head slightly as he readied himself for the man, the loose strand of hair falling from the bridge of his nose almost defiantly, the lady watching paralyzed to do anything as she thought him insane to fight one so much bigger than he when he could easily take him out from a distance. The man lifted his sword in preparation for a great overhead swing and tightened the muscles in his shoulder to bring it down aimed at his opponent’s head when he got within range but sorely underestimated his adversary. He never got within range to deliver the blow to his adversary because as soon as his sword came up his adversary nodded his head again, his loose strand of hair swinging almost joyfully through the air, this time launching himself at his opponent, sword at arms length. The man being in mid-stride on a crash course with him didn’t have time to dodge the hurtling being with whom he was now definitely on a crash course; all he could do was try to make his swing while in mid-motion, and that’s what he did. The blow flew extremely off course appearing as though he had no clue how to swing the thing as the sword of his opponent pierced his stomach and exited his body through his back. The two collided as well, and both went rolling on the floor of the establishment, both losing their grips on their swords.
They both stood up after a few seconds, the man removing his opponent’s sword from his stomach and lifting it like it was nothing, preparing to strike at his much smaller opponent as blood flowed from the large wound to stain his clothing and drip on the floor, blood also dripping from the blade to the floor. No weapon in hand, he quickly searched for one, his eyes falling upon the dagger in the lady’s hand, which he instantly locked his eyes upon and quickly, harshly nodded towards the guy who now had his sword held high overhead in preparation for a killing blow, that loose strand of hair flopping across his face again with the nod of his head. The dagger came flying forcefully out of her hand to strike home into the back of his opponent’s neck, severing the spinal cord, as the strand of hair came to rest upon the bridge of his nose again; the man fell motionless to the ground, dropping the blade, which immediately flew back to its owner’s hand with a quick nod of his head. He walked over, wiped it off on his opponent’s back and sheathed it. As he did so, the man whom he had come to the rescue of asked weakly, “Is there a healer in the house by chance?”
The lady turned remembering her fallen companion, saying, “Hang on, babe. We’ll get one for you quickly.”
“Don’t bother,” he said as he sheathed his sword, both the lady and the other man looking up at him with mouths agape as he easily slid the blade into the cane and pushed firmly till it snapped in place with a metallic clack. “I can heal him if you give me a second,” he replied as he turned about, the loose strand of hair swinging through the air carelessly again. He walked over to the man, a glee in his eyes that hadn’t been there earlier that surprised both the lady and the man, kneeling down next to him, setting his left hand with the sword cane on the floor and his right hand on the wound. He chanted lightly in a language as mysterious to them as their small benefactor, and as he did so, the wound began to heal, being completely healed by the time he had finished chanting and stood back up. Now that he had time to examine the man, he noticed he was Elven and not human.
The Elf stood as well, running his index finger lightly across his stomach where the wound had been and where there wasn’t even a scar now, no trace that the wound had ever been there, no gruesome reminder of another battle fought hard and bravely. “Thank you.” His voice was quiet, almost a whisper, like he couldn’t voice the words he wanted to speak and had to settle with these two simple words, as he spoke looking down at his unknown benefactor. His voiced gained volume as he continued, as though having spoken those two words had revitalized him in some way, “Thank you for stepping in to aid us when you did, my friend. I was not worried about my own death, mind you, but I was afraid of what that man would have done after having killed me, leaving the two of them alone in this fight. I am Skylair of the Elven Rangers.” The Elf held out what he knew to be the hand of a well-trained swordsman congenially to him.
He took the Elf’s hand and shook it congenially as he spoke firmly, authoritatively Skylair thought, to match his grip, “Tyvarious, Adept Thaumaturge, at your service. It was really nothing to tell you the truth… hardly broke a sweat.” This was quite true, as Tyvarious appeared to show no signs whatsoever of the strain Skylair knew had to have been put upon him after such use of his abilities as a Thaumaturge, neither sweating as would have been expected nor even having the slight reddish hue to his face from the blood rushing throughout his body. “If I hadn’t done so, they’d have killed both of you, and unlike some of the rest of the people in this place, I have a conscious. I didn’t want your deaths on it, as I would have if I had just sat there and watched them kill both of you, her prowess at arms not withstanding,” he smiled at the lady, “but he was a lot better than her opponent.” He stretched his hand to the lady, “I’m Tyvarious, my lady, and you are?”
She took his hand to shake it, but he raised it to his lips and lightly kissed it. “I am Illana…” She looked extremely surprised to have had him just kiss the back of her hand, trailing off in her introduction.
“She’s local law enforcement,” Skylair told him.
“I see,” he replied lightly, not taking his eyes off her just yet as he carefully took note of anything and everything he could discern about her without being able to read her thoughts. She was an extremely attractive woman he thought, standing a bit taller than him, most likely around five foot seven or eight he guessed, weighing around one hundred thirty pounds; her hair a shade or two lighter than his, a good bit longer than his own as it fell down to just above the middle of her back; her eyes a bright blue, a bright blue he hadn’t seen in a number of years that brought back memories he’d tried to avoid for that time period, in which he read compassion, strength, an overprotective nature, fear she wouldn’t admit, and many other things. Her aura spoke to him of a woman lost in what she wanted everyone to think she was… what she wanted herself to be but which she really at heart and in fact wasn’t. “Would the two of you care to join me?” he asked quickly after his statement regarding her profession, it taking him less time to discern all that than it did to describe. He turned, motioning with his cane in a rather slow sweep towards the table at which he had been sitting.
Skylair picked up his sword, “Sure.”
“After I have gathered my weapons,” Illana answered.
Tyvarious turned towards the man he had killed and nodded with his head, eyes locked upon the dagger still embedded in the back of his neck, the dagger forcefully tearing through his neck, blood splattering everywhere. It appeared to clean itself off on the man’s back and flew over to Tyvarious gently who took it into his hand gently as well and turned back about offering it to Illana hilt first. She took it from him with a bright smile, and sheathed it, turning about and bending down to take her sword from her fallen adversary’s head, none to gently either. She wiped the blade clean on his back and sheathed it as well, sliding it into its scabbard with a light yet ear-piercing screech of steel against steel.
He escorted both to his table, pulling out a seat for Illana and pushing it in slightly for her when she had seated herself before himself taking his seat back. He again laid the black cane upon the table, folding his hands over it, before opening his mouth to speak, but was kept from saying anything when Skylair spoke, “Thank you again for helping us.”
“And thank you for healing him,” Illana followed, taking Skylair’s hand in hers and squeezing it gently in a loving and affectionate manner Tyvarious couldn’t help bet recognize, more memories he’d been trying to avoid for years coming back to him.
With a force of will the two would have been surprised to find in such a small person, he shut the door of his consciousness on his memories, allowing them to do what they willed in his subconscious, so as to speak. “There is no thanks needed, either of you because all I did was what I thought needed to be done. If I hadn’t done it, someone else most likely would have.” Tyvarious smiled slightly, the smile telling them he knew he’d just contradicted himself, and his eyes told that he believed his former comment, rather than the latter, to be the correct one.
“So what brings you to this place, Tyvarious? I don’t recall ever seeing you here before,” Illana asked him.
“Oh.” He seemed rather pleased with the change in the conversation topic. “I was just on my way somewhere on an errand and decided to stop here for a bit of a rest and some time to study. My studies have been lacking a bit since becoming more predominant in society and everything… what with all the running around they send me on, this errand I’m on a great prime example.”
“What are you talking about?” she asked, her look quite confused.
He looked back at her curiously. “Are you unaware of the social workings of our kind, my lady?”
“Our kind?” she asked him surprised. “What do you mean, “our kind”? Are you aware of what I am?”
“I’m well aware that you are a vampire, yes. I am as well, and the society we are supposed to be a part of and which you evidently aren’t has me as what most people call an errand boy. I do a little bit of this and a little bit of that, running about the land at the whims of my superiors. My job is rather important, and I am held in high regard for it though most people would not want it.” He absently brushed at the stray strand of hair on his face but didn’t bother to try tying it back up with the rest of his hair.
Explains how pale he looks, Skylair thought to himself.
“How did you know I was a vampire?” Illana asked him quite shocked that he had known since she looked quite human.
“Neat trick I learned from a great Thaumaturge. Nothing more.” He paused and smiled at her slightly. “And for your information, baring your fangs at that guy over there,” he nodded his head toward the guy she had killed, “was a rather big tip-off.” He smiled again, obviously pleased with himself in some way.
She shook her head, a slight smile coming to her lips as she tried to suppress a chuckle. “I suppose you have a point. I was unaware that I had bared my fangs at him, that I had done so at all.”
“You do it all the time, dear,” Skylair told her. “It’s a subconscious thing with you I think.”
Yes, trying to deny your nature is not always the best thing, Tyvarious thought to himself. Your subconscious will always try to remind you of what you are if you do so. “The subconscious is a funny thing,” he spoke aloud. “What was that fight all about anyhow?”
“They were new to town,” Illana told him, “unaware that I was law enforcement, thinking me to be just another woman they could try to get into bed. When I told them to get lost, one of them tried to strike me.” She nodded to the one Tyvarious had killed. “Skylair was quicker than me in deflecting the blow, and then the fight ensued.”
Tyvarious thought, Killed the one that deserved to die heinously. I love it when things go right. “He deserved to die,” he told her, nodding towards the guy he’d killed, that loose strand of hair flopping through his gaze and adding to the almost mirthful look to his eyes. “It’s a shame I hadn’t known he’d tried to hit you. If I had, his death would have been a lot more... how do we say… unpleasant to put it nicely.” He smiled his evil smile again, his eyes sparkling rather brightly at the thoughts parading through his head and that loose strand of hair standing defiantly upon his face now making the look all the more disturbing.
Illana stopped a moment, debating on whether to ask him something. She decided why not and asked him, “What would you have done to him?”
“I’m a Thaumaturge, my Lady. That’s all you need know.” He continued to smile evilly. “My methods of torture are not something I discuss with just anyone and definitely not something I discuss with one so beautiful. It’d be ungentlemanly.” She blushed slightly, something he thought extremely strange for a vampire… creatures that had to force themselves to do most anything human, like blushing or breathing. She’s played human too long, I suppose. She doesn’t think about it any longer. Things like that just happen naturally with her… either that or she’s never been taught the ways of our kind and thus somehow her body managed to revert back to its old habits in life. Extremely interesting.
“I’m quite sure your methods of torture are nothing compared to mine,” she replied. “I’m not the most lady like of any woman you’ll ever meet.” She smiled evilly herself, her fangs still showing.
He returned her smile, baring his own fangs. He raised his hands, balling his right into a fist and placing his left over it, then resting his chin upon them. He retracted his fangs and said, “My Lady, just because that’s what you believe doesn’t make it correct or mean that I will go against what I think to be the correct thing to do by my code of ethics and discuss with you my forms of torture. As I said, let’s just leave it at I’m a Thaumaturge. We’ll both be better off that way. My torture methods will remain a secret, and you won’t have to know exactly how deranged this Thaumaturge’s mind is.”
“I’ve known a few deranged minds in my few years,” she replied quickly before he could continue with his speech. “Mine being one, and I’m sure your mind couldn’t be any more deranged than some of those I’ve met.”
“I’ve learned well and had practice as a vampire, Illana. You’d be surprised what one can learn and even come up with when driven by countless reasons to succeed at his or her studies… when one is driven by demons to put it simply.” His tone was rather nonchalant and detached all at once, as though he was speaking about someone else’s plight more than his own, succeeding quite well at hiding things from Illana she sought to know, causing her to wonder just how intelligent, quick thinking, and resourceful this mysterious and seemingly young vampire actually was.
“I’d never believe such a gentleman as you could possibly be driven by demons of any kind,” she commented seriously, meaning it as both a compliment and a continued argument for him to tell her what she wanted to know.
“You’d also be surprised to find what one can hide when one wishes to do so.” He grinned a kind of whimsical and lackadaisical grin that hinted at more things of which he would not speak. She found him to be annoying in his insistence not to speak on things she wished to know but at the same time found him to be extremely fascinating in how he could say so much yet say so little.
“I’m not going to get anything out of you whatsoever, am I?”
“Most likely not. I have my secrets and my reasons for keeping them just that, secret.” He smiled again, a smile hinting at amusement of some sort and a pleasure she could not quite comprehend, as though he enjoyed being secretive and cryptic, someone to be figured out like a puzzle more than maneuvered into talking. She found it practically impossible to think on his level, in the mind-frame in which he’d chosen to present himself, but at the same time found herself striving to do so because he presented a challenge to her from which she could not back down. “Besides, didn’t you know that most of our kind tend to be of the secretive variety?” he smiled whimsically.
“So do you involve yourself in uneven fights often without knowing the reasons for the fight, Tyvarious?” Skylair spoke, trying to change the subject before Illana could humiliate herself by attempting to out smart the young Vampiric mage.
“To tell you the truth, I try to stay out of any fight if I can at all do so,” he answered quickly, turning his attention to Skylair once again. “This was the first that I had to actually involve myself in due to ethical conflicts. Contrary to popular belief, not all vampires are unethical, uncaring, uncompassionate monsters who delight in pain and suffering inflicted upon others. There are many of us who adhere to high codes of ethics and delight in the joy of life rather than pain and suffering. Some of us retain most of whom and what we were before having the curse laid upon us, and then some of us actually adopt higher codes of ethics than what we had adhered to when we were mortals.”
“Which are you?”
“I, myself, have retained most of whom and what I once was. I cannot truthfully tell you I have not gone through some changes since becoming a vampire, but I am for all intents and purposes still the same person. I’m not like those that cause us to be stereotyped as monsters that either lose all of what once made them human as soon as they become a vampire or eventually lose what once made them human. I still readily pass as human when I so choose, as I could quite plainly tell the two of you both figured me to be.” He smiled slightly before continuing, “It’s a common mistake people make where I am concerned. Since we are some times hunted for the actions of a minority of our kind, my thought is the best place to hide is right out in plain sight.”
“I suppose you have a point. Running wouldn’t do much good and probably only prove in the minds of those hunting your kind that you are nothing more than those they seek to destroy, and hiding would most likely only succeed at keeping them away from you for so long.”