Runes of Magic US / AU

Yes this is a fan fiction, yes there is no "world's end tavern" in RoM to tell this story, but I figure RP Forum is better than, say, the Customer Service Forum to put in a Fan Fiction. Names are based on characters in Artemis Realm. (I know, NOT RP, but I go where the muse goes atm).

Lady Bachaeus's legs trembled as she forced herself to stand.
Her slender hands gripped her daggers, she tried to lift in a ready
position. Her black leather armor had been torn to shreds as blood
dripped from the fresh wounds. Yet her eyes, her dark green eyes
narrowed with focus. Her pained groans were stifled, silent. In the
face of her new adversary, she would never give him the satisfaction
of her tears. Her boots dug into the dry ground, but another lapse
of dizziness made her fall to her knees. Her locks of black and red
hair veiled her tiny face away from the two men standing away from
her.

The older of the two lowered his bow and glanced at the cloudy
blood red skies of sunset. His light gray leather armor had small
scratches from his fight with Lady Bachaeus and sweat beaded his
white-blonde brow. Staring back at the struggling woman on her
knees, he instructed his companion leaning against a dry husk of a
tree. “She's all yours now, Dan.”

The man named Dan eased himself to his height. His clear hazel
eyes were filled with a rebellious fire cast away from the older man.
“Leaving me the scraps as usual, thanks Father.”

“To heal, ya dumb ass,” the older man grumbled. “Bind'er
up and we'll take'er back to Obsidian Stronghold-”

“No,” Lady Bachaeus uttered. She attempted to stand once
more. “I-I need to get-”

“Ya wanna get stronger, little one,” the older man sat
against the tree to look over the small cut he received on his calf.
“Ya refuse to tell me your name, or even why ya want to get
stronger. It takes guts to attack my house, and someone with a death
wish. But ya have a scythe brand on your shoulder and by my house's
code, I can't kill a Scythe Rogue. So ya can make this easy for
yourself by tellin' me what the hell you do you think you want, or I
can make sure my boy Dan will make sure ya don't wake up for five
years.”

Dan walked toward the fallen woman. He could tell by her shaking
form, that she was still conscious and perhaps willing to strike once
more. He halted, his shadow blanketed Lady Bachaeus in darkness.

Lady Bachaeus needed to fight more. She wanted to get stronger.
There were two people who counted on her. Two people waiting in a
dark cell at a location she would scour the entirety of Candara to
find. She stared at the two lines, crimson with blood, on her
thighs. She had lost so much blood her vision became blurred. She
needed to hold on and stay awake. For them...

Dan slid forward, catching the young woman in his arms. Blood
smeared on the breast of his gray leather jerkin. She felt as thin
and light as air. Dan discerned from the well-worn soles of her
boots that the woman walked everywhere. Dan whipped his head around
at the sound of cloth ripping to see his father bandaging the small
gash in his leg.

“Dammit,” the old man grumbled. “That cat has claws...”

Dan laid the young woman on the dusty ground. “You messed her
up, that's for sure.”

“Bah, those were just playful taps,” the old man looked to
the leg armor that was tossed aside, useless from battle. “I did
the same to ya when ya were learnin'. Though you might wanna see
about her right arm above the elbow. I might have nicked somethin'
important there.”

Dan lifted the woman's arm, careful of the white bone grip she
still held to the hilts of her daggers. “Damn, she is a Scythe
Rogue...Won't let go until her dying breath. I don't see anything
important you got. She just moved around too much is all.”

“Yeah she fought like she didn't give a damn,” the older man
sighed. He eased himself to his feet, grabbing the torn leg armor
and clasping it beneath his arm.

“Or like she didn't want to let go of something,” Dan
muttered to himself.

“Alright, quit foolin'
around,” the older man limped toward his kneeling son. His gloved
hands wrapped around the brooch with his house crest: three silver
arrows crossed before a sapphire and silver eye. After unclasping
his long cobalt dyed wool cape, he threw it to his son. “Unless ya
don't remember your priorities?"
“Like a tree, from trunk to-” Dan was interrupted by the wad
of cloth falling on his face. He yanked his father's cape from his
face, indignant. He saw his father limp around them and ahead to
another dried husk of a tree where two horses had been crudely
hitched to by the reins.

“The stronghold ain't too far. We should make get there before
it gets too dark,” the older man said over his shoulder. “Don't
do anythin' stupid while I go fetch the horses.”

An evening breeze ran its thin fingers through the older man's
mane of long brown hair. His ice blue eyes narrowed as he wracked
his mind with possible identities of the lone Scythe Rogue.

Women Scythe Rogues were rarely seen outside of their underground
stronghold and been supposedly used as brood mares to replenish their
forces. The young woman's skin was uncommonly dark for a Scythe
Rogue, and she had been trained with those daggers. During his fight
with her, the older man could see the scars on her wrists, a
testament to the signature training of a Scythe Rogue that had their
novices literally bound to their daggers through their training. But
the mark had stayed his hand. The gruesome brand of the Scythe Rogue
was two small arched burns, symbolizing two crossed scythe blades.

The older man stuffed the torn leg armor into one of the saddle
bags and untied the reins. Of all the days to have been interrupted
by a petulant young woman, the Scythe Rogue picked the proper day.
Glancing at the folded piece of parchment, he rolled his eyes in
derision and led the two stallions to where his son was now standing
and laden with the limp body of the young woman.

“Is there anything else to know about her from the fight,
Father?” Dan was emboldened to ask.

“Nothin' more than you might notice,” the older man heaved
himself onto his horse and shifted in his saddle to make room for the
woman.

Without any question, Dan handed Lady Bachaeus's body to his
father's awaiting arms. He sat her up, her head leaning against the
older man's broad chest.

“Ride off ahead of us and tell Dubh that we were held up,”
the older man wrapped his arm around the body and with his free hand,
grasped the reins. “But don't do or say anything else.”

“Should I bring the summons?” Dan slung himself onto the
remaining horse. “Lord Dubh might want to-”

“I'll be right behind ya, Dan. Ya know how that maniac hates
unexpected waits.”

“More like his wife hates waiting,” Dan muttered beneath his
breath.

“What?”

“I err mean,” and with a click of his mouth, Dan ushered his
horse to a canter. He shouted over his shoulder. “I'll see ya
there old man!”

The older man suppressed the urge to gallop after Dan's
retreating form to give him a well deserved disciplinary throttling.
“Dammit, all I need to give him is an inch and he'll hang me with
it.” Slapping the reins against the stallion's long ebony neck,
the horse began to canter along the road to Obsidian Stronghold.