The Taste of Ink

[Adeen Pinebarrow]

Adeen entered their fourth tea party prepared.

Cinnamon and cured rind, with too-expensive white tea from the eastern reaches, for energy, warmth, and compliance. Even the crockery changed, and Adeen employed a pot and cup combination free of chips and unified in color. Aldridge took his cup with gusto, praised the blend, and launched into his tidings.

Adeen drank deep as Aldridge carried on, and savored the sharp tea as she waited for her moment.

He spoke at length about Nire's training regimen, the added duties of a craftbeast, and of the voice beneath. He called the voice a nightmare when he dare acknowledge their truth, but mostly he discussed current events and Madder Barrow matters. Where once sat a stoat drenched in fear and tea splatters, now lounged a warrior growing into the Crane's finality. Adeen studied his limbs, the assurance of his stance, and wondered where this strength would lead.

If his strength could help her stop The Crater.

"You're quiet," said Aldridge. "More so than usual. And if you tapped your paw any more then we might need a new kettle."

Only then did Adeen notice her footpaw jittering as she studied, and the skitter of the tea set towards the table's edge. Readdressing her mission stilled her claws; first the questions, then the question.

"You've upcoming bouts. What if you earn your freedom?"

"I'm not so sure Nire would ever give it, no matter what he says. But, if he did, I'd go to ground and find a way to free the villagers. Though, I'd be surprised if he didn't already know that."

"You play a game you cannot win." Adeen's journal hung heavy from her belt. A full four pages incorporated the stoat into her design, into pages of plans and research leading towards an end. "But we could make our own, you and I."

Aldridge sipped twice and crossed his legs before replying.

"It would be difficult. Nire controls the board, both sets of pieces. What did you have in mind?"

Adeen's fur rose beneath her hood. Aldridge stood convinced of the sloppy lynx' grasp, even in the hypothetical. No amount of searching revealed a jest on the stoat's expression. No amount of calculating refit this subdued beast into her scheme. She searched once more.

"I'm more concerned with what's in yours. Has Borean scared you so?"

"Scared? No. Condemned. He has set me on a path to kill or be killed, and that, I cannot escape. But there are other beasts here, and for as long as they hate what Nire does, there is hope for this place."

"Hope of what? Hope the tyrants deign to let you live? You build your castles on sand, and damn your village to a tomb beneath."

"You're wrong." The voice of a father, the voice of a beast without doubt. "I will show you the new Mark Wall. Perhaps you'll see what I mean."

"The Mark...Wall?"

The question went unanswered as Aldridge ushered her away. They swept down the many twists of The Crater's lower tiers. Ill-trodden rooms turned into abandoned corridors, and false benches flipped into hidden alcoves. The Mark Wall stood apparent as they entered. Symbols carved into the far, wooden surface: a pair of crossed swords, what looked like a town center encroached by paw steps and trees, and more.

Adeen ran her paws over the grooves. She recognized the skill of the carving, at what pliable wood allowed that inflexible stone did not.

At the far end, Aldridge stood proud beside his work.

"You see? We were brought here, and now we stake our claim."

A claim would not stop Nire, thought Adeen. A claim could not burn temples and topple thrones. This beast, who knew the dangers of the system first paw, would rather accept the infection instead of lancing the abomination from on high.

He'd rather sit on the throne.

"And for as long as we breathe, we search for ways to make this place worthy of our name."

"No, Aldridge." Grit filled Adeen's throat, and churned harder with every word. "Blood built the walls you carve, and no decoration will change this. The masons must pay and the arena must fall. Only then can we start again."

"Blood builds everything. The best we can do is make the Crater better than itself - so much so, that we can honor our dead instead of resenting their loss. To make it worth the blood that was paid."

Adeen's paw recoiled from the wall. She searched her claws for sandstone dust, for fractions of her husband's name, and found neither. Only a proud stoat in the throes of hypnosis remained.

"And we could do it! You know we have the ability, and the force of will. Even this place could be wrought beautiful."

Aldridge held out his paw in offer. Adeen fled.

Little time remained, and four pages needed editing.

~*~

"Mushrooms won't work," said Rinam. "What we need is flavor, not more...mush."

Rinam prodded at the kettle of gruel on the slave gallery's one woodstove. The beige paste bubbled and spit at the white mouse, and she slapped the muck with a makeshift ladle. Her too-young ferret apprentice, with an apron full of withered mushrooms, jumped back.

"Sorry, Mayor. I'll look harder next time..."

"Rinam, Fletch. I'm no Mayor. Maybe of this kitchen, but no more."

"Sorry, Rinam..."

"An honest mistake. Let's see how we can fix this one." Though Rinam's expression remained flat, the stump of her capped tail jiggled with discovery. "Wine will work. I've a skin sealed in my bunk. Fetch it, and a cup of milk sap."

Fletch glowed with purpose, and left Rinam with her stove and a line of hungry slaves. The lower gallery ran adjacent, but separate, from the gladiators' Mess Hall. As such, the eatery looked little more than a collection of junkwood tables, uneven benches, and bins of salvaged dishes. Still, many a slave gladly waited in line, where they spoke free of defaced displays, and acts of defiance, without fear of Nire's beasts overhearing.

Rinam observed the bubble of the gruel, the crackle of wood, and slashes of ink along her claws and face. The stains remained. Neither fat-heavy soap, nor the powders of delousers, rid the mouse of the Widow's mark. She dug at the gruel for distraction.

The crests of mash curled like dunes.

Crushed wheat did not exist in Rinam's tent city.

The Mice of Dawn harvested the dates of fringe wells, the juniper of hearty desert bushes, and succulents ripe with nectar. A mug of tea hotter than midday sun, the glimmer of sand-polished gold along her dress and armbands. Rinam spread her arms and embraced the ever-shifting horizon as she danced free across the dunes.

Her tribemates rose with the sun, their tails capped with gold and safe from ferals awaiting in the sand, their prayers rising above the wind as the praised All That Is. A dervish of curled fur and white linen. A gospel of freedom and safety in the harshest terrain. They danced in the cool of the morning until their limbs knew warmth once more.

Then emerald banners forested the horizon.

Fletch woke Rinam at the fourth prod.

The little ferret staggered with his armload. A severed helmet served as a pan, and the sap reduced as Rinam chopped the mushrooms with a sharpened rock. Once the sap thinned, she added the mushrooms and let them drink in the fir and nettle of the deep woods. Then came the wine. Rinam's mix remained true, and the once-sealed wineskin erupted in a bouquet of stolen bread, fermented fruit, and time.

A splash of wine, a few tosses of the pan, and then she stirred the vivified mushrooms into the gruel.

"Make sure everybeast has a cup." Fletch saluted his master. "Pour them a measure of what remains."

A cheer rose from the line as Fletch served everybeast Rinam's improvised fruit wine. The slaves cycled with ease and speed, and each received a ladle of mushroom gruel and a short "eat well." Once the line ended, she scrapped the remainder onto the helmet pan, grabbed her near-empty wineskin, and wadded into the feasters.

Fletch saved Rinam a seat. In unison, the ferret and mouse closed their eyes and enacted a series of pawsigns over their meal. Rinam's signs cycled free and true, with Fletch mimicking as best he could, and nearby slaves nervously attempting the same.

Silence from all as Rinam chanted:

"From All That Is, this bounty leads us through,
Our borrowed bliss, repaid with grace when due."

With the blessing enacted, Rinam dug in as others tittered about the latest Crater gossip - a whitewashed symbol, a tavern stabbing, and all else the white mouse tuned out. The mushrooms proved a fitting distraction from the grain base, from the chatter, and slaves who knew no better marveled at the white mouse's creation. Across the table, Fletch squirmed on his seat as he sipped at the fruit wine. Already the young one's eyes glazed, and more than once the gruel spoon missed his muzzle.

A spot of joy in the bowels of a nightmare; a fitting distraction. Yet, this was no way forward, or away.

"Cheers again." More slaves at their table joined the Fletch's slurred toast. "Fer the drink and winnin' yer match!"

"I didn't fight in the exhibition."

"No no no." Fletch pointed at a wide-eyed creature down the table, who lapped at the fruit wine with shameless intensity. "That monster was tellin' us about you smashin' the Widow."

Rinam did not recognize this 'monster.' A creature of nightmare in all ways, complete with ebon wings and a long snout crowned with fangs. Speculation and wonder rolled along the table. Rinam polished off the last of her gruel and gripped the bowl with purpose.

"And what does this 'monster' know of my dealings." Rinam locked onto the creature, and moved slaves aside as she slid down the bench. "You weren't there. I'd remember you."

The scent of danger cleared their portion of the table, so only Rinam, a gawking Fletch, and the nightmare remained.

"Me? A monster? Ha!" The bat laughed a little too long, a little too loud. "I'm the Amazing Kali! Or, I was. I still think I'm pretty amazing and that's all that counts, right?"

Rinam slammed the bowl on the table, and Kali's giant eyes bugged out to their maximum.

"How did you know about the Widow."

"Iwasabard."

"And."

"Nire's bard. Adeen worked for him too, and told me herself what happened. How she got those scars. Some heathen barbarian smashed her across the face with..."

Fletch stifled tipsy laughter as Kali focused on the bowl in Rinam's grip.

"Oh. I say barbarian in the most-kindest way, of course."

Rinam said nothing. She allowed the bard some sweat, the eavesdropping slaves some courage, and her own heart to still. The opportunity sat before her, rank and trembling for fear of a bowl. Violence against the scribe did not work, yet the inclination whispered into Rinam's ear and suggested the bard needed some motivation.

How dare she defy the Pearl Dawn; how dare she joke and play when usurpers ran free.

A series of signs with her free paw, a silent prayer, and Rinam's rage subsided.

"Pleasedon'thitme. I am pretty enough without scars." Kali's laughter rose to shrieking hysterics. "Can we put the bowl down? Please!?"

"You hear a lot, don't you." Rinam set the bowl aside, grabbed Kali's cup, and poured her the last dregs from her wineskin. "You must hear how the Widow moves as well."

The fear vanished as soon as the scent of fruit wine hit the bat's nostrils. Kali lapped the dregs with a freakishly long tongue, all while maintaining eye contact. If Rinam flinched or winced, one could not tell through the slash of ink across her face.

"I've not seen her in the underbelly," said Rinam.

Or in The Drag, or either mess, or anywhere a normal slave would hide. Every hint of the vole's whereabouts ended in shadows. Every search of the Widow's quarters uncovered busywork and ledgers, but no vole of secrets and whispers.

No dagger or list.

"Where has she gone, bard?"

~*~

Fletch waved Rinam onward turn by turn.

Together they navigated the stretch between The Drag and the Crater Lake Pub. Chatter and celebration sifted through the pub's closed doors, and two rat guards, meant as security, were three pints deep at the hallway's end instead.

"Easy entry, as Kali promised." Rinam gestured the way they came. "Go back and serve the bat another skin. They've earned it for their honesty."

Apprentice Fletch heeded Rinam's command and left.

The pub's door stood only a push away, but Rinam's strength fled as her blackened paw touched the wood. Only then did she realize no plan existed. The bard claimed the scribe held an appointment in the pub this evening, but she could think of no fitting approach. Brute force yielded nothing from the vole when they first met, and words dissipated in the air.

But without the Widow the list was lost. And no chance at Canen remained without the list.

Rinam opened the door and melted into the crowd of revelers. No voles sat at the main bar, and the floor of standing tables packed with volunteers and veterans trading stories. Only the wall booths remained, set against the limestone and beneath the banners of fallen champions.

A hood adorned with golden vines rested in a back-corner booth.

From across the pub, as beasts passed between, Rinam watched the Widow speak with a striking male vole. Any standing table would prove a fit battering ram, and the crowd would not interfere at first. Yet, as her claws gripped the nearest table, Rinam knew overt violence earned only a pulped vole and an execution.

Instead, the white mouse rounded the pub, slunk into a tall-backed booth beside the voles, and eavesdropped.

"Lists of apple recipes and farming tips?" The amiable clip of the male's voice. "Now, I don't mind cider, but surely you can summarize this, ah, generous pile of paperwork."

"Read more than the first page." The curt clip of the scribe's reply. "Wait. I assumed you could read. How careless of me."

"I only read if there's a bet involved, or a more-than-friendly dare. Those usually involve a little more...excitement. A pinched opportunity, libation under moonlight, and a tense thirty seconds we wouldn't tell an abbey friar about. Maybe our mothers if things go wrong."

"Disgusting." Even indirect, Rinam winced at the weight of the Widow's repulsion. "I imagine these lines work on most of your targets."

"Well, you tell me."

A pause. A pause so long Rinam wondered if they still occupied the booth. Right as she scooted for a lean, the scribe spoke and she shot back.

"Just look again. I've marked parts of interest."

"So you have; so you have." The flipping of parchment, and the long, drawn hums of an actor playing at consideration. "Then you've met your end of the deal. Does this mean our date is over? You've barely touched your drink, and I'm dying to know if my overwhelming charm changed your mind."

"Are your beasts ready?"

"...business before pleasure it is." Rinam heard two sharp claps. "They cost a few coins, but I'm hoping your notes will score me many more. You might want to slide over. I won't have our guest sitting on my side. I'm a pious and proper gentlebeast, you know."

Rinam tilted her head, and caught the meaning of "our guest" a moment too late. She could not fight as a pair of thuggish weasels dragged her from her booth, frog marched her to the voles, and held her muzzle sideways against their table. A few test squirms confirmed her utter entrapment, and only served in jostling the near-full whiskey before the scribe.

A trap from the start. Rinam silently cursed the bard, herself, the Widow, the sands of time, the nobles of Southsward, the masons of Mossflower, the-

Three white slashes crossed the Widow's face. The intensity of the scars did not match the slate of the her expression - no pain, fear, or triumph, only the scrutiny of a beast gazing on a puzzle piece.

"A not-so-little charmer you've here." The male vole again, though Rinam could not see him with her head held down. "Such pretty fur, and, ah, muscles. I can see why your standards are so high. Shall I leave you two alone, or can I observe how you play at seduction?"

"Quiet, Speakeasy." She didn't look at him when she spoke. Nothing broke the spell between the Widow and her target. "You two, place her beside me."

"Are you sure?" said Sly. "A matching set of scars...well, I might not be able to resist you then."

"Do it." Adeen reached into her cloak and revealed only the cloud-etched pommel of the rondel. "We've an understanding."

Rinam nodded knowing no choice remained. The rondel's point pricked her ribs after the weasels forced her into the booth. Anise and whiskey radiated from the scribe, foreign and familiar, abrasive and soothing. The finality of the desert rested in the vole's cadence, so different from her posturing in the underbelly.

"Not much time remains, so I'll make myself plain," said Adeen. "Your list is a lie, and you work for those who wish you dead. I'm offering you another path."

"Offers at knife point," said Rinam. "How can I resist."

The male vole chuckled into his tankard, but the scribe remained focused, unblinking.

"The dagger is a precaution given our...history. You will sit, you will listen, and you may leave free and whole unless you give me cause. Understood?" Rinam did not answer, and Adeen continued. "The majority of your list's names are squirrels, with a few added as a blind. They're important squirrels enslaved, traveling from Southsward on our train through Bastion. There's only one beast we've in common that'd want squirrel rivals dead."

"We've nothing in common, murderer."

"We've everything in common." A curl of ire on the vole's muzzle. "Nire's employ offered certain...privileges. Through him I discovered how Bastion was formed."

"And what of it."

"Tell me, were you Mayor before Granz stole your land and Canen your people?"

In the swirl of the whiskey, in the murk of the scribe's fur, in the ink of her own stained paws. Against her will, Rinam shrunk alone and young before her self-appointed rulers.

Duke Phyllius Granz stood upon the fresh-carved walls of Bastion. He didn't look at Rinam as he proclaimed, and yawned twice throughout the ceremony. Ever at his side, ever in the shadow, Canen Pinebarrow watched on from the bordertown's wall, built upon the land of those he enslaved.

"Rinam of the Pearl Dawn, the second daughter-son of the late, ah, the late father. Yes. As your regent, by the authority of Southsward's court, I hereby appoint you Mayor of Bastion. May our union forever bear fruit, or some such."

The squirrel tossed her father's dagger from his perch, and it landed in the sand at her footpaws. The gold of the hilt, and the cloud etching of her bloodline. No Mice of Dawn remained to form deep-salvaged gold into bangles, daggers, and other tokens of union. No tribal elders remained to stand against the red devils from the south.

Only emerald banners, sandstone towers, and squirrels graced the dunes she called home.

"It doesn't matter..."

"It does to me; it's why I approach you at all. Granz will not fulfill this list's promise. You would do him a favor and he would see you buried in return."

Adeen pulled the original list from her vest and slapped it onto the table. The 'Three for Canen' leapt from the page, but so did the vole's notes beside each name. In the finest script, the scribe measured out the rank, species, and whereabouts of each slave. The majority were squirrels from minor Southsward houses, with a few arena newcomers between.

The dagger retreated from Rinam's side, and Adeen weighted the list down with its hilt. The scribe kept the cloud etchings free of grit, and a fresh slick of oil adorned the blade.

"Again, I ask you to use this for me instead," said Adeen. "For us both."

"You ask me to trade one liar for another," said Rinam. "What keeps me from stabbing you now."

"I can bring Canen to us where Granz will not." Adeen picked up her glass but did not drink. She only swirled the whiskey until a funnel formed. "And you didn't attack me on sight, our first meeting or tonight. I need your savagery, but I know a wise beast rests beneath. Only an artist could make gruel so delicious."

A glow of pink shone along Rinam's white cheeks. No amount of caution or blending hid her from the vole's observation. Part of her wondered if even Fletch's apprentice intentions were true, or yet another player in the scribe's performance. Whatever the depth, the rondel did not split her ribs, and the hilt rested free and ready before Rinam.

"Kindness from a beast I've hurt," said Rinam. "I'm a fool to listen to any of this."

"But you will. I know what it is to lose yourself." For the first time the scribe turned aside, for the first time she focused on nothing. "We deserve another chance."

The two beasts broiled in silence...

...until Sly finished his tankard and applauded. In unison, the maids fixed on the lush, and thought of slamming the whiskey glass upside his grinning muzzle.

"Wonderfully done, ladies. Wonderfully done." Sly slipped a gold coin from his headband and flicked it onto the pub's floor. The two weasel thugs bumped after one another in a tussle over the tip. "Touching even! Brought a few dozen tears to my eye - only the left one. Though, something is amiss. You said this would end in a fight, m'dear. I think you owe me."

"We will fight." Adeen took a long swig of the whiskey, though her body twisted at the taste. "I needed Rinam's support first."

"A fight?" said Rinam. "Did I knock more than teeth loose, Widow?"

"Adeen, and only ribs." She touched her side as a test, and nodded when no pain followed. "Another brawl will see our notoriety build and Nire will push us into the arena. The cat cannot resist a storied battle."

"Do you mind if I stay and watch?" Sly hummed and leaned back in luxury. "There's something...invigorating about watching able maids roll along the floor."

Without comment, Adeen leaned across the table and poured the remainder of her whiskey on Sly's lap. The male jumped up and scuttled from the pub with all manner of protest and feigned injury at his lip.

Only then did Rinam notice the dagger, and all the papers on the table, were absent.

"He'll return your dagger. He better for what I've paid him." Adeen shivered again, as though snow blanketed her cloak. "The whiskey takes hold. Let us begin."

"No, I'm not fighting you. It'll only end in chains." Rinam made to stand. "I've beasts that depend on me. I can't protect them from a cage."

"And how will you save them? How will you stop all of this?" The scribe sniffed at one of Sly's tankards, waiting only so long for the mouse who would not recover. "Join me in this. We lure Canen with what he wants, and give him what he needs. One after another until The Crater is a ruins."

How the widow screamed in the streets of Bastion, how she twisted against the bonds, and bit for the sky as well as flesh. Rinam watched from the back of a wagon, bound near as tight by a pine marten wearing chains. Canen spat on the scribe then, and pronounced his display for all to hear.

"Look for me in the stands. I will be there when Nire?s thugs butcher you like you butchered my son."

"Madness," said Rinam. "Absolute madness. This cannot work."

Yet, as the denial left Rinam's muzzle she recalled the notes on the list, the setup in luring her to the pub, and the absolute assurance lighting the scribe's eyes.

"It will." Adeen pushed Rinam from the booth with a surprising amount of strength for a bookish beast. The mouse fell onto the floor, sending nearby beasts back in astonishment as she scrambled upright. "It must."

In the blur of adrenaline, Rinam saw only more ink spreading up her arms and over her body. Her paw signs for peace from All That Is reaped nothing, and against her will she drew up tall and ready. The madness coiled infectious along Rinam's throat, and her doubts diminished with every breath.

The mason would pay for his part, then the lynx, then the squirrel. They would never again know peace, as she'd known none since the Southsward banners filled the horizon.

"...w-where does this lead, Adeen?"

"You will see."

Rinam dodged the first tankard Adeen threw, but the second caught her square on the chest. Before Adeen threw a third, the mouse rammed into the vole and sent them both crashing into an occupied table. Pandemonium broke loose. Gladiators still spoiling for a fight took a swing at their nearest neighbor. Slaves without release threw chairs into the crowd. All looking for an excuse took the mouse and vole's brawl as an invitation.

In time guards stormed the pub. Despite the chaos, and the more raucous brawlers throughout, beasts pointed out Adeen and Rinam at the center of the melee.

The vole sported a swollen eye, and tears along and throughout her cloak.
The ink-stained mouse now spattered with the blood of strangers.

Both breathed free as the guards dragged them away.