1????????Soul Bound
1.3??????Making a Splash
1.3.3????An Unrequited Love
1.3.3.4? Making a stand
He tried lecturing them again, until he realised that his words no longer reached his targets, like when Bungo had let orphans try kicking footballs past his enchanted shield. Meschino faltered, juddering nearly as badly as the gear train had after the shoe dropped. She waited for him to explode in anger, but he just whispered something to the guard captain, and they drew back in good order.
Tomsk: “I don’t like the look of that. They’re professional.”
Bulgaria, Bungo and Wellington joined them in time to hear Affi’s response, as he pointed to where a limping green-haired Trolezzo stood, supported by the towering gentle Giare whose colourful hood was now stained with blood.
Affi: “Professional? They’re thugs! They’re bashing anyone who doesn’t get out of the way fast enough, and twice as hard if they don’t look pure Covadan or able to fight back. They treat us like dirt.”
Other voices joined in.
“Fight back!”
“Hold the line!”
“We will not be moved!”
“Here we stand!”
“What do we stand for?”
“Life!”
“Liberty!”
“Justice!”
“Remember Goffa!”
“Kill the guards!”
“Burn the guilds!”
“Burn everything!”
System: [Quest “Stand and be counted” available. Do not run away, while even a single shield brother depending upon you remains standing. Difficulty rank D. Reward: Krev’s favour. Do you wish to accept? Penalty for failure: death or dishonour.]
Tomsk: {If Pazzi’s forces assault this position with just melee warriors, I think the workers would win the initial battle. But, even if I lead them, there would be a lot of blood spilled on both sides. What’s your objective, and what are you prepared to risk to gain it?}
Bungo: {Our objective is to survive and level while demonstrating that thinking outside the box can be both fun and effective.}
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Tomsk: {The draft manifesto Bulgaria drew up, for recruiting people to help us with Trustworthy Tiaras?}
Bungo nodded.
Bulgaria: {Helping these guys stand up for themselves and gain safer working conditions would be good. But we have to do it in the right way. Solving their problems for them won’t help others in similar situations; and violence, even if we won here, wouldn’t set the right example. It might teach bravery, or even self-respect, but it wouldn’t teach people to think for themselves.}
System: [Quest “Stand and be counted” declined. New quest available: “The road less travelled” - keep at least 100 supporters of the Worker’s Charter at liberty until the sun sets, without killing any of their opponents. Difficulty rank C. Reward: Zer’s favour. Penalty for failure: unspecified.]
They didn’t even need to discuss it.
System: [Quest accepted. Current supporters at liberty: 300. Time until sunset: 250 minutes]
Wellington: {Bungo and Kafana, talk to the workers. Tomsk, defence and delaying measures. Bulgaria, we need safe evacuation routes. Alderney, what are the guards up to?}
A moment later he repeated. {Alderney?}. Kafana looked around. Without trace or explanation, their only scout had completely vanished. Should she go looking or at least ask questions? She quashed the urge. Wellington had given her a task, and she had to trust him and the others. If you didn’t give your trust when doing so was hard, it wasn’t really trust, was it? She forced herself to turn away, and concentrate on the individuals in the crowd.
Bungo was talking with Krewe Captain Madero, who’d joined the elder workers responsible for drafting the charter, so she went in the opposite direction, looking for those in need of healing or calming, trying to get a feel not just for the group, but for the sub-groups inside it and how they were thinking and might react. She could use her Truesight skill, use magic to pick out patterns, but it was wearying and would work better if she made her own observations first, as a base for the skill to sort through.
Behind a group of shovel wielding stokers she came across a crouching figure, pale faced and shivering.
Kafana: “Pierrot, are you hurt? What happened?”
She drew out a couple of sweet desserts her vessel had prepared, and held out to him an orange dariole on a flat palm, as she would to a nervous animal. She waited patiently, undemanding, as he slowly uncurled and then took it in one long fingered trembling hand.
He wouldn’t meet her eyes, just passed her a note - the message he’d carried to the barracks from Beadle Enmo, ignorant of its contents until a sneering guard captain had chucked it away after reading it and the curious messenger, no longer bound to keep it confidential, had plucked it out of a rubbish bin.
He flinched as she took in the words, almost as though he expected her at any moment to beat him with a stick and drive him away, to denounce him as a traitor and murderer. If Nicolo could read Kafana like a book then Pierrot, with his expressive face that reflected and magnified his every thought and feeling, would be a large print book, or perhaps an audiobook broadcast through a stadium-quality speaker system. She hugged him, and spoke reassurances until his trembling lessened and tears welled silently in his eyes.
Kafana: “Pierrot, you did nothing wrong. You couldn’t have known, you aren’t to blame.”
He shook his head, pointing to where other part-Zeradan workers had been injured, but he drew himself upright, and reluctantly she moved onwards.
A few minutes later the missing twelfth guard cantered up and handed something to his captain who then showed it to the priest. The captain came forward alone.
Captain Farinacci: “I hold in my hand a decree signed in Count Basso’s own hand and bearing his official seal. It authorises me to detain for trial any protestor who disobeys a direct order from a member of the Count’s Guard, and to take any measures I deem appropriate to deal with any who resist being detained.”
He paused for a moment to let the implications of his words sink in, while he put the tooled leather scroll case back in a pouch hanging from his baldrick.
