A Night on the Town

Take a look into the life of a not-so-ordninary servant of the light!

Topic/Postby Lilandris » 27 Dec 2013, 05:56

A Night on the Town

Latest story that I've been working on, turned out longer than I thought it would, but I guess that's a good thing in a way. A much more light-hearted tone for once! Enjoy!

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A night on the town

A normal evening as could be, too normal. It was fairly warm in Stormwind this eve, the streets bustled a little longer into the evening than usual, the first time in a long time that many of the shop stalls had kept open so long that they risked being bothered by the early evening drunkards, everyone wanted to be out and about today. And Lil just sat indoors at her desk below the open window, reclined against the back of her chair with her hooves on the table, with a tobacco roll between her fingers, listening to the people in the streets outside.

The sound of heavy hooves over the floorboards gave away that Keurlan had entered the room. Lil turned her head to the left at the sound, not to look at him but rather acknowledge his presence in case there was something on his mind. He answered her assumption quickly.
“How does the evening find you, Lil?” He kept walking towards a cabinet on the far side of the room.
“I’ll be honest, dear, I’m quite bored.” Lil followed him with her eyes as soon as he entered her field of view, as he stopped by the cabinet she flicked the ashes from her tobacco roll into an ashtray and turned her head back towards the window. “So then, big boy, when are you going to take me out for an evening?”
Keurlan crouched down to open one of the lower cabinet doors and rummaged around inside, judging by the sounds the contents made, he was looking for a drink.
“We’ll have to take a rain-check on that I’m afraid, love, I have some of the boring parts of my job to take care of.” He was referring to paperwork of course.
“Hardly sounds like the best way to spend this evening to me.” Lil took a drag from her tobacco roll.
“That’s the man’s world sometimes I’m afraid, you should remember I’m the one keeping us fed and housed... And our pockets a little lined.” He grinned at her over his shoulder, she grinned back, she was in no place to argue, as it was the truth.
Keurlan turned his attention back to the cabinet.
“Did you drink my brandy, Lil?” Keurlan pulled out a bottle from the cabinet and held it up by the base, showing it to Lil, it was empty.
“Nope.” Lil answered.
“What about the Westfall Whisky?”
“You know I don’t drink whisky, dear.”
“And what about the Pupellyverbos Port?”
“I had a glass of it last weekend, but that’s all.”
“Then why in blazes are there no proper drinks left in this house?” He spoke slightly louder with annoyance.
“I believe you’ll have to ask your little daughter about that.” Lil chuckled.
Keurlan grunted. “I swear, sometimes I boggle at how juvenile she can be, drinking my expensive liquor like this, and she doesn’t even ask! The gall of that girl sometimes!”
“Nothing you wouldn’t have done in her place I reckon.” Lil felt a little need to defend Ianah. She gave a smile at Keurlan. He sighed.
“I suppose you’re right.”
There was silence for a few seconds.
“Now tell me dear, what makes pleasing your customer more important than pleasing your woman this evening then?” Lil gave a wicked smirk at Keurlan.
“Don-...” He started, raising his index finger at her, but stopped just as quickly.
“You make a fair point, love.” He looked down at the empty bottle in his hand. “I was sort of itching for a drink anyway.”

Not five minutes later the two of them were walking down the street hand in hand. Keurlan wore a long orange-brown, double-buttoned coat, split down the centre on the back from just above the waist, it had large cuffs with brass buttons. Underneath he wore a collared off-white shirt, and long, wide, dark brown trousers. Lil was wearing a teal and purple top with long sleeves with flared ends, and a long royal blue skirt with blood red embroideries, held in place by a thick white satin belt with a silver buckle. A few people were greeting Keurlan as they passed, some of them gave strange bewildered looks as well, as if they’d never expected to see such a couple walk down the street.

“Lil, love, I hope you’re okay with us going to the Pig n’ Whistle? I’m afraid Reese is the only one in town who serves the kind of brandy I like”
“You could have taken me anywhere, and I’d still be happy, dear.” Lil gave Keurlan a beaming smile. They kept walking for a few minutes, then suddenly Lil heard a familiar voice coming from behind them, she turned around to see her sister Kynidris catching up.
“Lil! Keurlan! Where are you headed? Wow, you two look a bit overdressed tonight.” Kynidris was, as always, wearing her plated gauntlets and shoulder guards, she wore those with anything. Other than that she was wearing a simple slightly frayed short-sleeved light blue tunic and some black leggings that looked like a skirt at first, but closer inspection would reveal they were actually very wide trousers. “Lady-like, but more practical” She commented as she noticed Lil inspecting her leggings. Lil assumed she had to be wearing something chain mail-like on her ankles, as her steps sounded like she was wearing spurs. On her back was a shield, akin to the disc-like ones their fellow Draenei made. There was no sword at her hip, however.
“What’s the occasion, then?” Kynidris grinned, as if making fun of them.
“Murdering, can’t you tell we’re dressed to kill?” Keurlan uttered monotonously, he didn’t laugh at his own joke either, Lil resisted the urge. Kynidris allowed herself a little giggle though.
“We’re on a date actually.” Lil explained.
“You’re on a date, Lil, I’m just out for a drink.” Keurlan gave Lil a wicked, yet playful smirk.
“Awf! You buffoon.” Lil grinned and gave Keurlan a little punch in the arm in return.
“Mind if I tag along? I’ve been hurting for some company all day, and it looks like I might have to make sure the two of you stay civil tonight.” Kynidris snickered at them through a toothy smile.
Lil and Keurlan looked at each other, first they raised an eyebrow at each other, then they grinned. Keurlan looked back at Kynidris. “Fine, as long as you don’t mind me staring luridly at your little sister all evening.”
Kynidris rolled her eyes with a smile. “Men... Alright, lead the way!”

The Pig and Whistle was as it always was, not the classiest of places, thugs and lowlives always had a liking for the place. Off-duty soldiers and conscripts usually drank here as well, so it wasn’t all bad. Two soldiers sat by a table close to the door, they raised their mugs at Lil, Keurlan and Kynidris as they entered, one of them winked at Kynidris as well, she pretended she didn’t see it.
“You two find us some seats, I’ll fetch us some drinks.” Keurlan motioned to the tables, there were two empty ones in the centre of the room, he didn’t even ask what the ladies were having before he wandered off towards the bar. Lil noticed some of the men in the room were leaning in and whispering to each other while keeping an eye on Keurlan. She always figured he was a man who carried a rumor or two about him.
“Stop gawking and sit down, sis’!” Kynidris giggled at her little sister. “You look like you’re lost.”
“Oh... Sorry.” Lil sat down to the left of Kynidris, who was sitting at the end of the table.
Keurlan returned with the drinks not long after. As expected, he had a glass of deep amber colored brandy for himself. He slid a glass across the table towards Lil, it contained a grey-hinted, blank substance. Lil lifted the glass to her nose and had a whiff of the liquid.
“Caraway Burnwine, you know me too well, dear.” She smiled.
“The best is good enough, hm?” He returned a smirk.
Keurlan sat down before passing on the last drink. He grinned at Kynidris.
“So, what’s your poison then, Kynidris?”
“I have a feeling my answer is irrelevant.”
Keurlan passed the lidded mug on to Lil who passed it on to Kynidris, Keurlan kept a smirk the whole time.
Kynidris lifted the lid off the mug with the thumb handle and smelled the contents, all while staring back at Keurlan.
“The man has made a very good assumption of my taste. Ale, the closer the color gets to oil, the better.”
“I asked if he had any engine grease first, but I had to settle for ale in the end.” He rubbed his chin. “And I like to believe I can tell what people are like just from looking at them.”
“I like to believe I’m not that easily read, I guess I have to work on my act then.” Kynidris answered non-chalantly.

The next moment a small-statured human man sat down at their table opposite of Keurlan, he was dressed in black leather armour and bald as the moon. He had a tattoo slightly visible on the lower part of his neck, obviously a shady thug. His voice was raspy and almost bassless. The scene reminded Lil of when a small noisy dog meets a large calmer dog, she had to stifle a giggle.
“Oy, Keurlan, you owe the boss some money, ‘e’s roight fed up with you stallin’ on the paiyment, so ya better cough up the money roight quick, eh?” The thug leaned in over the table, resting on his elbows.
“Go away, runt, I’m not in the mood for your kind tonight.” Keurlan gave the thug a glance before turning his eyes towards his glass and taking a sip.
The thug pulled out a switchblade, sprung the blade out and pointed it at Keurlan.
“I’m not in the mood for deaf draenei blokes either, now pay up!”
“That knife isn’t good for gutting as much as a fish, much less a man. Now make yourself scarce before you lose your fingers.” Keurlan looked wearily at the knife, then at the thug.
“I’ve got plenty of friends in this room if you wanna play tough, mate.”
“Then it is an even fight.”
Lil intervened: “Now now, boys, there’s no need to get violent here, you can settle this some other day.”
“Shut yer bloody trap, harlot! The men are talking!” The thug twitched his head towards Lil as he snapped at her before turning back to Keurlan. Lil and Kynidris were seething with rage at the rudeness of the annoying thug. Lil was about to stand up to make a racket, but she couldn’t even finish the thought, as she heard the subtle, slightly muffled sound of glass breaking next to her. Keurlan had shattered his glass in his palm in anger at the thug’s disrespect. If the glass breaking wasn’t enough, Lil could see Keurlan was boiling with rage under his restrained demeanor.
“You do not speak to my lady that way, fool!”
“Oh, did I touch a ner-AAAAH!” The thug couldn’t finish his retort as Keurlan had grabbed him by the wrist of the hand holding the knife and pulled him out of his seat and over the table. Keurlan slammed him to the floor on his back and punched him brutally in the elbow in order to break his arm, to which the thug screamed in pain and dropped the knife. Keurlan picked it up and stabbed it into the table so deep that only a third of the blade was sticking out of the wood. All of which the whole pub clientele had turned their attention to. The thug yelled for his friends to join the imminent fight.

[Oh hai! have some mood music! ]

Several more thuggish characters of both genders rose from their seats to have at the three draenei in the middle of the room. Some of the off-duty soldiers decided to come to the aid of the three draenei though, so they were slightly less outnumbered than anticipated.
“Hey! There’s no need for this to get uglier, alright?” Lil raised her voice to address everyone in the room.
“Aghh! Teach the bloody goats a lesson!” The thug on the floor growled.
Lil sighed. “I guess there’s no reasoning with these fools.”
“Come on, Lil, I’ve been wanting to see if my sister was any good at fisticuffs!” Kynidris replied with an amused, wicked grin.
Keurlan didn’t utter a single word, and his expression was as cold as a death knight’s skin. He was done talking. The three readied themselves as the thugs attacked, complete chaos ensued. Sounds of shouting, bottles breaking and colourful language filled the tavern. Keurlan fended off two humans coming at him. He handled it in a heavy-handed yet oddly agile way. Kynidris was jumped by a gnomette from behind who appeared to attempt some sort of strangle or head lock, to which she darted forwards towards the nearest wall and swinging around at the last second, sandwiching the gnomette between the wall and Kynidris’ shield that was on her back. The blow was enough to make the gnomette lose grip and drop to the floor, to which Kynidris turned around in order to adorn the gnomette’s face with a hoof print. Lil on the other hand found herself dealing with a human woman with raven black hair in a pony tail and an eyepatch over her left eye.
“It’s going to be quite a shame to ruin that pretty face of yours, draenei!”
She swung at Lil’s face, Lil, in a stroke of pure luck, barely managed to dodge the would-be painful right hook by instinctively leaning backwards; the woman had brass knuckles on her right fist. The heavy-handedness of the punch left the woman out of balance, and it only took a hard kick in the woman’s knee to almost topple her over, she stumbled away from Lil a pace or two with Lil giving chase in order to shoulder-tackle her. The woman fell flat on her belly and Lil slammed her hoof down on the woman’s right wrist and pried the brass knuckles from her and adorned her own right hand with them, she figured she’d have good use for them, as she wasn’t nearly as strong or hand-to-hand savvy as Keurlan and Kynidris.

She pulled the pony tail of the woman in order to stand her back up and turned her around and grabbed her by the coat collar, the woman was squealing in pain the whole time.
“Maybe you will learn some less clichéd insults when I beat some sense into you, human!” Lil delivered two punches to the woman’s mouth, knocking out one of her front teeth, she delivered a third blow to the woman’s face, which must have broken her nose, judging by the sound that was heard. Lil then swung the woman around by her collar and sent her sliding across the floor. In the adrenaline rush that followed, Lil gave an almost bloodthirsty roar and clenched her fists.
“Come oooon!” She yelled, and moved over to Keurlan to give him a hand with a quite tall and burly man who currently had Keurlan in a grip from behind with his back to Lil. Lil pulled her right hand way back and delivered a crushing punch in the burly man’s neck, and then putting a hoof in the back of his leg. The man sank to the floor like a half-full sack of orc skulls, he must have passed out from the blow.
“Thank you, my little bird.” Keurlan said in a voice that was a little too monotonous for the situation. Not to mention the usually sweet nickname he used didn’t fit Lil at this time.

Keurlan and Lil kept fighting back to back for a while. Kynidris on her end was apparently having a blast, as a wicked laughter in her voice assured Lil, plated gauntlets are most likely very useful in a fist fight if you want an edge. After bruising a couple more thugs and denting a table with a dwarf’s head, Keurlan was suddenly blindsided by a thrown chair, which collided with Keurlan’s head. He fell to his knees and was left disoriented for a few seconds. Not a moment later, a blackjack connected with Lil’s face and broke her cheek bone, to which Lil yelled in pain. The man who had swung the blackjack at her followed up his strike with tripping Lil over and giving her a strong kick in the ribs, thankfully no ribs were broken, but the kick was painful nevertheless. Lil’s scream of agony made Keurlan snap out of his disorientation and stand up and return the favor Lil had did him earlier. The man with the blackjack was quickly disarmed, then pummeled repeatedly in the face with his own blackjack, and then sent to the floor with an arm-twisting throw. Keurlan then extended a hand to Lil to help her up.
“Are you alright, Lil?” There was a little more concern in his voice this time.
“I can still fight. Thank you, my heavy-handed gentleman.” Lil answered in a joking manner.

“Ack! Let go of me you introverted Gilnean fleabag!” Kynidris yelled at the Worgen man who had his paws around Kynidris’ neck in a stranglehold and lifted her off the floor. She struggled to break his grip on her, but to no avail. In a quick thought, Lil grabbed a oil lamp from a nearby table and threw it at the Worgen, to her luck, the fragile lamp shattered at the Worgen’s feet, setting his fur on fire in the process, forcing him to shift his focus from Kynidris to his own well-being. He gave a blood curdling howl as he ran on all fours out the door, most likely headed for the canals. Mrs. Langston, Reese Langston’s wife, was standing by the door, gripping a serving platter tightly in her hands, frozen in fear. Lil gave her a firm yet reassuring look.
“Go fetch water to put the fire out!” Lil then yelled to her. Mrs. Langston stormed out the door.
“Nice going, sis! Are you trying to get us all killed!?” Kynidris yelled at Lil, there was some distress in her voice. Lil gave a shrug in return. “What was I supposed to do? He was twice my size!”

Not a moment later the sound of the Stormwind Guardsmen’s attention battle-horns broke up the fight, as several armoured guards rushed inside, some of the ones in the back of the line were carrying water buckets and rushed over to the small fire to put it out. Lil felt a bit of relief.
“By order of the King! Cease your fighting! You are under arrest for disturbing the peace!” The sergeant yelled, after which the other guards behind him got busy clapping the thugs and the three draenei in irons.

Later, in the ground level holding cells of the Stormwind Stockade, Keurlan, Lil and Kynidris sat on the bunks in their cell, tending their wounds as best they could, or at least Lil and Kynidris did. Keurlan didn’t bother and just sat there as he would be sitting in his own house without worry with his arms across his chest. Kynidris patched herself up with some bandages the prison guards had given them. Lil was busy healing her broken cheek bone with holy magics, sitting hunched over with her right elbow on her right knee.
“So how much money do you supposedly owe the thugs’ boss?” Lil looked at Keurlan.
“I believe the claim is at about 50-60 gold.” Keurlan answered rubbing his chin.
“You know, you could have just paid the chump that pocket change and we could have continued having a quiet evening, Keurlan.” Lil turned her face back towards the iron bars on the far side of the cell and shifted her healing focus to her ribs where she had been kicked.
“It’s a matter of principle, Lil, as I’m sure you understand. And besides, you won’t have me believe you didn’t have fun anyway.” Keurlan turned his head to look at Lil on his right.
“I guess.” Lil kept her focus on her wounds.
“And I was afraid you would stop loving me if I didn’t keep a stiff spine, Lil.”
Lil looked back at Keurlan.
“Right.” They exchanged grins, Lil straightened herself up to kiss Keurlan, then she ran her index finger down one of the fresh cuts on Keurlan’s cheek, healing it with her magics.
Kynidris broke the silence: “I have to admit, Lil, you handled yourself surprisingly well back there, when you weren’t trying to make us guilty of arson.” She gave a chuckle and a grin to her little sister.
“I’m glad you approve, sister.” Lil gave a grin back. “You looked like you’d been under the weather before too.”
Kynidris stretched her arms before resting them on the back of her head.
“Oh yes, having been raised in a Shattrath City orphanage where 4 out of 5 of the other children were boys has taught me a thing or two. I’ve come across some bad situations since then as well.” She smiled.
“Right.” Lil nodded. “So, Keurlan, any plans as to how we’ll get out of here? We’ll be facing a month in here otherwise for the charges against us.” Lil turned to Keurlan again.
“Don’t worry, dear Lil.” He smiled at her, then had a look at his pocket watch from the inner pocket of his coat. “The captain of this establishment happens to be a good friend of mine, and he owes me a favour too. He’ll be here in a few minutes.”
Lil gave a little laugh at herself doubting her boyfriend, he was full of surprises and always had a trick or two up his sleeve.
“You know, when you say it like that it sounds so shifty.” Lil chuckled, Kynidris gave a grin as well.

As Keurlan promised, the Captain of the Stockade showed up a few minutes later.
“A little bird told me a big, stylishly dressed, draenei fellow and two fair draenei ladies had been arrested a while ago.” The Captain winked at Keurlan. “Don’t worry, I’ve made sure your charges have been written off on account of self-defense, and the little firestart was handled swiftly, so I’ve decided to write that off as well out of goodwill.” The Captain gave a little smile and unlocked the door. “You are free to go, the ladies will find their armaments - the knuckle dusters and shield, according to the arrest report, in the chest over yonder by the exit door. Have a good evening.”
“You have my thanks, Captain, I appreciate it.” Keurlan said as the three of them stood up to walk out of the cell. As Keurlan passed the captain, he halted for a moment and spoke in a little more hushed tone. “Give the missus my regards, eh? Best of luck to you in the future as well.”

The three draenei “ruffians” wandered home in the small hours of the morning, Lil had even acquired a nice souvenir this evening - the brass knuckles, they still had some dried blood on them.

The End.
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Lilandris
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Topic/Postby Tormeron » 27 Dec 2013, 15:49

Started reading... figured i'll read it some other time since i need more focus to read this... started very nice
Lilandris wrote:Liandrix' words not mine, but Tormeron is a god apparently. Probably a bit like Loki.

serendipity wrote:Reason: Potato.

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Topic/Postby Lilandris » 27 Dec 2013, 15:59

Hehe, take your time, it's over 4000 words, way more than I thought it would be x) But the latter part of the story sort of demanded it to add atmosphere.
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