All stories, small or grand, have a beginning. This tale's true beginning was some years priveous, when the young Viscount of the city state Brixia took ill and died, not 3 years after his rule began. With no heirs of his own, the position was past to his younger brother. A vile and lazy man, the new Viscount allowed his greed to guide him. He increased taxes, made laws suggested by other nobles in his city to keep the rising elf and dwarf populations from achieving the same social standards as the clearly superior human nobility. With the proper pay offs, criminals operated mostly unmolested in Brixia.

Many hoped that once the Viscount died, the city would be able to return to the way it had been, but that hope was in vain.

During his reign, the Viscount sired a son, who grew to be more intelligent and devious than his father. Where the old man had made laws out of laziness and disinterest, his son, Jafallo Trastead saw opportunities to increase his wealth while cementing his power over the pitiful people his father ruled. When Jafallo came of age, his father also suddenly took ill like his brother had so long ago and died, though few believed this illness had been natural. Talking his place of power, Viscount Trastead began a iron handed rule of Brixia and surrounding lands. Segregation among the races became the norm. Crime increased further, which seemed to call foul things like goblins to the city, soon making a place for themselves in the criminal element.

Now, 10 years after Trastead began his rule, some people have had enough. Talks of rebellion are whispered behind closed doors, though knowing who to trust is hard. Old hatreds between races rekindle under the Viscount"s rule and he has spies everywhere. Who is there to trust? And who has the will to stand up to make a change?

 

Character Sheets:

Name:

Gender:

Race:

Appearance:

History:

Weapons:

 

My characters

 

Character Sheets:

Name: Ander

Age: 20

Gender: Male

Race: half human, half dark elf

Appearance: Short by human standards. Athletic build. Dark grey skin and bright blue eyes. Messy white hair that sometimes gets in his eyes. Usually wears simple shirt and baggy pants in earth tones. Has a larger monk tunic he wears when he doesn't want to be harassed. Though he prefers to be bare foot, he keeps a pair of wood sandals around.

History: Left an orphan outside a monastery near Brixia, Ander was dealt two bad cards by life. First, he was a half breed of human and elf, meaning despised by both. Second, the elf who had been his parent had been a dark elf. Only the intervention of another half breed monk prevented Ander from a life of isolation or worse. Using Brixia as the grounds, Ander's teacher taught him all the survival techniques he had learned before becoming a monk from how to move through a city like a monkey in the trees to developing a thick skin to ignore what the small minded said about him. Ander was also taught how to the simple movement forms the monks used as a basis for fighting with no weapons. In recent years, his home has been hit by attacks from local bandits. Many monks, trying to talk it out, were killed. His master, one of the casualties, spoke his suspicion of Viscount Trastead's hand in the attack before he died. Armed with this, Ander feels the shift of winds as he leaves the monastery to assume a new place in Brixia.

Weapons: None.

 

Character Sheets:

Name: Dral Grindstone

Gender: Male

Race: Dwarf

Appearance: short and stocky. Most of his face is obscured behind a long, braided beard that is brown with veins of grey running through it. A crooked nose peaks put above the beard, as does one keen, dark brown eye. Where the other should be is covered by an eyepatch. Wears a mix of leather and chain mail common among dwarves along with an iron helm to cover his shaved bald head.

History: The co-owner of a jewelry store, Dral Grindstone is kept away from the customers as much as possible. It is well known that he hates all humans, hobbits and elves with a more powerful version given over to goblins. Those who know Dral don't pay this too much mind as he also seems to hate every dwarf he lays his eye on. Some say that before he became a jeweler, he had fought in several wars in his younger days, though any who ask are cussed out and told to mind their own bees wax. Now a days, with more problems coming from the Viscount, Dral has been becoming less vocal and more quite. Like the calm before the storm.

Weapons: crossbow and one handed ax.

Character Sheets:

Name: Sybille

Age: 13

Gender: female

Race: human

Appearance: average height for a young teenager, rather thin and delicate with fair unmarked skin and hazel eyes. Her blonde hair is kept in a long braid that falls down to the small of her back. Her clothing is of a high quaility indigo fabric sewn into a flowly dress brushing just above her knees.

History: Sybille was born into a high class noble family. Her father is in charge of the viscount's guard and such has very high rank amoungst the humans. Because of daily threats from rebels Sybille is rarely let outside of the protective walls of their home and longs to discover what the town is like and why the other towns people hate her family.

Weapon: none

 

Character Sheets:

Name: Joker

Gender: female

Age: 18

Race: elf

Appearance: with her face covered with a scarf, all that is visible are deep green eyes and a few loose strands of black hair. She is tall and slender but still strong. She covers herself in a long black suit covering her arms and legs but close enough to her skin so nothing could be grabbed to be held against her in battle.

History: Joker got her name for being the 4th person to join the rebellion against the cruel viscount. Being recruited when she was 14 she had to learn quickly to fight and hold her own against other who opposed their group's cause. After various assasinations her mentors one by one had fallen leaving her to guid the new rebbelion again the viscount and to take over the city

Weapons: bow and arrow with various knives hidden on her person

(Alright, here we go.)

 

Market street was packed as people bustled around, some roaming to each booth for what ever bargain they could weasel out, others battling the crowd to get what they needed and then get out. No one looked at the guards that stood in key positions in the market or patrolled through the crowd. Once upon a time, the sight of the City Guard would have been a reassuring sight, but now they were one of the many things a person had to avoid to stay alive.

The figure in long monk's robes secretly watched them, his face carefully concealed under his hood. Ander had had a few run ins with the guard when he was younger, but his master had taught him well enough that it was simple practice to escape them. Most understood that they weren't getting paid enough to chase after a half breed monkey.

Now was different, of course. Ander had come to stay this time. He was going to live here for the foreseeable future. Who ever was behind the attack on the monastery would need to be found. He thought he knew it was, but to prove it, he would have to be patient. Patients, of a sorts, was one of the few things the other monks could install in him from their teaching.

A shadowy figure slipped through the deserted alley ways avoiding the reaching hands of shouting guards. Joker clutched a small envelope not daring to glance back at her pursuers. She frantically wracked her mind for a possible escape route before spotting a crowd of a market and running into it pulling her scarf back up over her nose to hide her face. She wove her way gracefully through the crowd quickly created distance between herself and the guards. She tried to peak over the crowd to see where she ended up but the taller people around ger made in nearly impossible so she blended further into the crowd easily disappearing with her dark clothing.

Ander heard the shots of guards. Considering that anything, including breathing the wrong way, was a reason for guards to shout and chase, Ander wasn't that interested. What did interest him was that a few nonchalant elves had mosed over to a wagon full of barrels and started retying the ropes holding the barrels in place with slip knots once they heard the shouts.

"So, it wasn't someone with a hiccup." He thought.

That meant something actually interesting was going on. He decided it was some sort of robbery, but not one the Viscount had been paid to overlook. That could mean new comers to the city or maybe someone who didn't think you should pay to steal.

His curiosity piqued, Ander made his way towards the shouting.

As Joker ran by her smirk was hidden under her scarf when she saw her friends helping her out. It quickly disappeared however when the guards easily dodged their baffle. She tried to keep her head down and blend in but it was difficult getting by the the humans trying to kick and trip her as she fled from the guards and their sharpened weapons. It led her to wonder about the importance of the letter she had stolen and she tucked it into a fabric belt that was wrapped around her waist.

Ander watched the diversion go off, but the guards pushed on. That was surprising. Who ever they were after must have really ticked off the wrong person. That...might be worth looking into. Ander pushed his way to an alley way. Once there, he stripped off the bulky outer robes he wore to cover his dark grey skin. He ran a short way down the alley and used a rubbish pile to launch himself up to the level of a low roof nearby. He grabbed a ledge and pulled himself up. Now with a better height advantage, he moved along the rooftops to get a birds eye view of the markets and, hopefully, the subject of the guard chase.

Joker cursed her luck silently as she glanced back at the guards who were quickly gaining ground. "Vicount must of train his guards harder..." she thought. Then a guard grabbed at her causing Joker to trip and fall falling victim to the screaming kicking have humans. One of the guards grabbed her arm and pulled her roughly to his feet yelling at her for the object she had stolen. Joker looked up at him in an innocent manner her fear hidden by her scarf. When the guard reached to pull it from her head she grabbed his arm twisting hard before taking off in a sprint once again. "Atleast they are still stupid..."

"There you are." Ander muttered as he witnessed the guards grab someone.

A girl, by the look of it. He smirked at her get away. He had to admit, he liked her style. He was about move to better watch her progress when he saw another guard came up beside the one the girl got away from and raise a crossbow to his shoulder. Ander's eyes widened. Were they that desperate to stop the thief that they were willing to risk killing random people in the just to stop her?

The half breed boy stood up so that everyone in the crowd could see him. With a leap, he landed on a pile of boxes that brought him closer to the guards while still give him some height.

"Oy!" He yelled. "Copperheads!"

The bow wielding guard turned his head to see Ander whip his leg around in a kick, sending the wood sandal on his foot sailing through the air to smash into the guard's face. As he went down, he squeezed the trigger of his crossbow. Ander blessed his luck that the bow had been facing up as the bolt arced up and landed on a roof.

Ander got his mind back on track and began to hope and leap from box plies and store fronts as he chased after the thief. He had moved openly for her. He was going to find out what she had done now, whether she liked it or not.

Ignoring the crashing and shouting behind her, she ran faster through the market ducking and weaving through the people finally able to create distance between herself and the guards. Once she was out if their sight she turned quickly into a shadowed alleyway and leaned against the wall catching her breath. "Heh havent done that in a while" she smiled a little to herself before looking around the alley. It was mostly empty except for a few wooden boxes and a tom cat perched on a brick wall at the end of it. Joker relaxed a little and took the letter from her belt examining the high quality paper and deep blue ink. "This must be from a noble" she muttered to herself flipping it over and running her finger over the wax stamp holding it closed.

Ander stopped his half roof top chase, trying to get another look at his quarry. He barred his teeth in frustration. He had lost her. How could he..

He froze. He heard something. A voice, barely audible. Then he heard a voice bellowing back towards the market. Mostly foul language followed by at where the dark elf was, with an added crack about his parentage.

Ander jump up fully onto the roof top then dropped down fully into the alley where he thought he heard something, a few yards from Joker.

She looked up quickly hearing a thud not too far away. Spotting a shadow of a man in the alley she quickly stuffed the unopened letter back into her belt. Joker felt lucky her scarf was still pulled up as she examined the figure. "He wasnt here before was he? No" she silenced her doubts forming in her mind as her hand rested uneasily on one of her many knives. "whos there?" she called out her voice muffled somewhat by the scarf.

"A concerned citizen." Ander answered, a little annoyance in his voice. "One that has sacrificed a sandal and possibly his lively hood because your little follow the leader group decided firing crossbows into crowds was fun."

He stepped a little closer to Joker, but not close enough to spook her, he hoped.

"Must have done something real bad to a human noble somewhere."

Her snear was hidden under her scarf, "what you choose to sacrifice on behalf of a stranger is not a concern to me. And my business is not of concern to such a stranger" Joker turn and started walking out of the alley thinking of what idiot would think she of all people owed someone something. She kept her hand resting on a knife as she walked hoping he would give up his little rant.

"Don't make this difficult." He told her back. "Like I said, I don't have much of a lively hood around here anymore. What makes you think stopping you makes any difference to me now?"

He walked slowly after her. The idea that she was just a common thief was fast becoming the main theory, but she had something important. And if he wanted to make any head way in this city, he might need it.

"Besides, I'm sure your friends that helped with the wagon might be a little more talkitive than you if I asked right."

She quickly turned around pointing a knife at his chest, "if I see you anywhere near any of them I will personally remove your head from your body" the look in her eyes was cold and emotionless.

"Youve got alot of guts coming here thinking you own the place you have no idea what your getting in to and I think its about time you return to wherever you came from." Her free had was held protectively over the letter peaking from her belt.

"Can't." Ander told her. "It's burning as we speak. Bandits, the guards say. But let's just say I'm a little suspect since the monastery where I lived was one of the few places around here the Viscount didn't control."

He kept his eyes on Joker's, matching her cold look with a smoldering anger that was kept in check because it was being saved for something else, though his face remained impassive.

"No proof, of course, but I'll find that. Maybe in the letter you seem to be clutching. So, you stole information that someone of high birth wants. I'd offer to buy it off you, but your concern for your friends doesn't sound like a normal thief. I won't ask you to reveal your reasons, but I doask you give me a look at that letter. If it has nothing to do with what I'm looking for, we walk our separate ways."

"Thats not going to happen" he turned around again continuing to walk a little faster this time keeping the knife clutched tightly in her hand.

"This isnt the place to share your sob stories" she walked out of the alley slipping back into the crowd. "Idiot I cant believe that guy" she thought silently as she blended into the crowd now calmed from earlier events. "A dark elven monk? Thats the worst cover story ive ever heard..."

"I'll see you when you come for my head." He called after Joker as she left.

He stepped back into the shadows of the alley. He turned and broke into a run. He used the momentum as he ran a few steps up a wall, grabbing hold of the eves of the roof and pulled himself up. He moved away for the edge, but stopped. He was interested to see if the girl would realize his threat and if so, what she would do.

Joker clenchd her fists and walked him leave. "Well they dont know anything about it anyways..." she muttered heading out toward the edge of town. "I cant believe him..." at the very edge of town she entered a small dark house moving aside a small cloth that acted as a door. She relaxed once she was in her dark two room home taking her scarf from her head to let her black hair small down her back. "Now to look at this letter..." she layed back on her bed and opened the envelope carefully so not to rip the paper.

Ander waited a minute before leaving the roof above the alley himself. He had hoped that she would have reacted a little more violently, but even then he might not be able to work it to his advantage. He carefully made his way back to the alley where he left his over robes. Once there, he put them back on. He stuffed his remaining sandal in his robes and walked bare foot out into the street, keeping his hood up. Now, to find those elves. It wouldn't be easy, but Ander had a good memory for faces and time.

She kicked off her flats and opened the letter.

To whom it may concern,

With the rising of the elven comminuty against the viscount, a special elite team of soldiers have been given a mission the assasinate the current leader of the rebellion-

She stopped reading and let the letter slip from her hands. "They know who I am...? But ive always hidden my face... my real name is a mystery to all but myself..." she looked out the open window. Joker left the letter on the floor and curled up on her bed to keep from trembling.

After a time of searching, Ander paid the owner of the barrel laden cart, a dwarf wine merchant, a visit. He was supervising clean up of the broken barrels and spilled wine.

"Come on, I haven't got all day." He barked at some of his workers.

"Excuse me." Ander said from behind the dwarf merchant.

The dwarf turned and glared at the heavily robed figure behind him.

"What do you want?" He demanded.

Ander was about to answer, but the dwarf held up a hand.

"Sorry, didn't mean to snap." He said, letting out a breath. "Today just has been going my way. You here buying or selling?"

"Buying." Ander answered. "Information on the elves that ruined your load."

The merchant's eyes narrowed.

"And why would I tell you something like that?" He demanded, sounding testy again.

Ander shrugged.

"Could help you gain recompense for your losses."

The dwarf snorted.

"I don't need your help with that." He said. "My lads are gonna find those knife-ears and teach 'em to mess with my business. Best be on your way, you ain't gettin' nothing from me."

The dwarf started to turn, but stopped when Ander placed a hand on his shoulder.

"Reconsider." The robed half breed said as he applied pressure on key pressure points on the dwarf's shoulder. "You'll come out better for it."

The dwarf's face twisted a little with pain from Ander's grasp, but defiance was still in his eyes. He spat at Ander and opened his mouth to yell. There was a blurred motion as Ander's fist came up and struck the dwarf square in the jaw. The dwarf would have gone over backwards if not for Ander's hold on his shoulder.

Ander lessee his grip on the unconscious merchant's shoulder and started dragging him away. Any one that noticed either didn't care or couldn't get to them in the crowd as Ander took his new friend some where private.

Joker recovered remembering the half breed's threat. "Hmm time for a meeting.." She released a small yellow bird from a cage in her room letting it fly out the window. After a minute of watching the bird she ran out of her small dwelling heading toward an old bar further into town.

Upon entering, a crowd of elves looked at her expectantly, she sat at the front of the small bar that had been taken over as a meeting place for the elves.

"We have a problem" she started looking at the different faces of her allies. "Who let those barrels loose earlier today?" Three elves stepped forward. "We have a nosy civilian that could prove to be dangerous its best for you to disappear for a few days"

The dwarf wine merchant was jerked awake from some rain water dumped on him. He tried to get up, but felt a bare foot resting on his neck as he lay on the ground. He looked up to see the same robed figure as before.

"Who were the elves who spilled your barrels?" Ander asked in a slow, patient voice.

"Go to hurrgh!" The dwarf began to say, but was cut off by added pressure on his neck.

"Not nice." Ander chided him. "Try again."

The pressure was lifted and the merchant could breath again.

"I don't know where they are." He wheezed.

"But you know who."

He nodded.

"Then tell me."

He shook his head. In an instant he was up and pinned against the wall of an alley, with the robed figure's arm taking the place of his foot. From this new vantage point, the merchant could see the hooded man's face. His eyes widened as he saw the dark grey skin.

"But but, if you find 'em, you'll kill 'em." He spluttered. "That would come back on my head. And if the Viscount don't cut me open as an example, then the knife-ears will."

Ander rolled his eyes.

"Look, I'm not going to kill-"

Ander was caught off as what felt like a club hit the back of one of his knees. His knees buckled and he landed on them. In an instant, he felt a powerful arm wrap around his neck. A moment later, a blade was there too. He managed a peak down to see that it was an hand ax.

"While this bugger deserves some wallopin', I'm not too sure where you'd stop, laddie." Said a voice by Ander's ear. "So why don't ya let him down before I give your neck some ventilation?"

The room suddenly exploded into a series of uproars, "We can take one elf!! We'll just kill 'im!!" One elf shouted capturing Joker's attention.

"Is that what you think we are? A bunch of murderers just hanging around the cause trouble?" She approached the taller elf. " Is that really what you think?" The darkness in her eyes and the confrontation silenced the room. The elf not expecting Joker to hear his remark sealed his lips and looked down ashamed.

" However.... He has a point" She sat back down, "We need to find out more about  this new comer and why he is sticking his nose in everything... He could be a threat to our goal." She sunk low into her chair thinking. "He is just as agile as any of us so it would be far too difficult to capture him for questioning." Joker got up from her chair and walked out deep in thought pulling her scarf over her face as she stepped out onto the street. Her eyes were focused on the ground in front of her. Being so focused on the problem handed to her she failed to notice a dark figure following her not too far off.

"Hmmm what if i let him see the letter... pretended I needed his help. Maybe he would reveal his goal in all of-" Joker's thought was cut off as she heard shuffling behind her.

"who's there??" She called out quickly turning around. She was disturbed when not a soul was in sight. She decided not to take any chances and took to the roof tops to get back home.