literature

Exiled: A Special Occasion

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Exiled: A Special Occasion

         Kole finished toweling his hair dry and pulled his coat on. A second glance in the mirror told him his teeth really were clean. Kole didn’t bother double checking his hands. Getting under his nails and finding all the inconvenient creases had become as easy as cleaning a gun. Kole wandered out into his living room-kitchen area. A brownish red spot on one of the fake tiles near the sink caught his eye. Kole draped his towel over his camp chair and grabbed one of the napkins he’d helped himself to at Joey Joe’s. He bent over and scrubbed the spot off his tile. Kole was glad he’d noticed. Any kind of blood sets horribly if it’s left alone. The dirty napkin went in the grocery sack filled with balled up and bloody napkins. Kole dismissed the bulging sack from his mind. He’d expected it to be a bit messy. At least he hadn’t gotten much on the carpet.

         Kole straightened up and started unpacking the bowls, wine, and other materials that would go into consecrating a hunter’s shrine to the memory of George Vivardi and all the others he’d lost over the years. He pulled the plastic wrapper off the red tablecloth and started peeling the price stickers off the little wooden bowls and the stone candle plates. The now half-empty box of FauxBlud-Lite caught his eye through the pile of discarded plastic. A smile played across Kole’s lips. Despite the lingering texture of badly mixed instant coffee, the false blood still glowed inside him like hot chocolate in a snowstorm.
The amount of time he’d spent telling himself he didn’t have blood need or putting off actually using the synthetic blood once he acknowledged that aspect of his curse seemed really stupid now that he’d actually tried the stuff. Kole felt immensely better, physically and mentally, now that he wasn’t starving. He hadn’t killed or maimed anyone for blood. As far as Kole was concerned, none of his actions had made him a monster. It was better to not focus on how close he’d come to snapping. He hadn’t killed anyone. It would be moronic to obsess about the three people he would have needed to drain raisin-dry to get the amount of synthetic he’d drank during his blood-starved frenzy.

        Kole rinsed the wooden bowls out and laid out the bag of whole grain, the small bottle of two-dollar wine, the steel filings taken from a knife that had killed a monster and started to place the three candles on their small coaster-shaped stone plates. Kole frowned. He’d forgotten he couldn’t afford either larger candle bases or the more expensive, but thinner ritual-grade candles. Repeatedly melting and reshaping the fruit scented wax until the candles fit on their holders would take at least an hour and a half. The potential delay reminded Kole of the suit and envelope waiting for him on his bed. Kole had fallen asleep in the kitchen after drinking, satisfying his blood need for the first time. He might not have enough time to ignore the note after all the time it had taken him to clean up. Kole sighed. He really hated delaying the shrine, the least he could do was get all of the materials ready.

         After a short trip to his closet to open his locked suitcase and retrieve a small leather pouch, Kole returned to the kitchen area cradling the worn down leather in his hand. Kole slid two solid gold bright-elf Sols out of the bag and placed them somewhere a thief wouldn’t likely find them. Despite having a diameter as long as his thumb, the coins weren’t the most valuable item Kole kept in that pouch. That honor belonged to the melted and fire-deformed piece of black plastic that had once been the front right wheel of a toy fire truck. It was the only memento Kole had kept of the burnt out wreak of Imogen city. He’d found the toy fire truck in a still-burning building he thought might have been an elementary school. Kole couldn’t stand anything else that reminded him of the were-rat plague and the flame throwers that destroyed it and its victims. He placed the burnt wheel on the counter.

        “I remember you,” Kole whispered, renewing his old promise. Kole stood for a minute, lost in memories of people now dead, and then moved into his bedroom where the suit and letter were waiting for him.

         Kole pulled his gloves out of his pocket and slid them on before he touched the heavy cream-colored envelope. There might be a contact poison or a mind-altering enchantment on the envelope for all Kole knew. Kole glanced at the glittering letters spelling out his new name, noted that there was no sender’s name or address and opened the envelope. Inside, there was a folded letter and a second envelope. Kole slid the letter out of its package.

         The letter didn’t explain the suit, and told Kole very little about Eileen Flynn except that she was expecting him to attend an unnamed gala. The second envelope contained, as promised, his invitation to the Wazao Gala, starting Friday (oh, that was tonight) at seven at the Wazao Estate (no other address given) and then moving to the west wing of Thelin Museum of Art at 9:30. It was all very official. Kole held the letter near a light and started looking for the unofficial message that would tell him what was really going on. The light caught the edges of a watermark and Kole moved the paper closer to the light, revealing a spear glowing with lightning and flanked by two crows. He smiled. This was Family stationary of the highest order. He wouldn’t need to deal with long messes involving invisible ink, strong encoding, or fickle moon runes.

        “By the blood of Caelif who died, in the name of the Spear of Wisdom, and on my soul, I swear I am true. By the Grimmblade, no soul shall be taken before my sight except that I bled defending it,” Kole said in the ancient and secret language of the Grimm Knights while casually making the sign of the spear with his free hand. The Grimmblade watermark flared with silver light and the writing faded and was replaced with even-handed script that shimmered with residual silver light. Kole shook the extra magic condensing on the page off of the letter like he always did, and started reading. The secret letter was written in the dialect of the Grimm Sentinels, the intelligence officers of the Family. Apparently Ms. Flynn was a spook, but who else would they assign to watch him?

         Kole’s instructions were to attend the Wazao Gala exactly on time. He was not to case either location of the party beforehand. He was to come unarmed. He was to leave his armored and spell proof coat at home. He would wear the suit provided for him, including the tie. He should use the socialite persona (this should be easy because you’re so good at repressing your uncivilized nature.) but under no circumstances was he to act under any name but Kole Damir. The list of things he was and wasn’t supposed to do in order to make his first meeting with Ms. Flynn go smoothly was insultingly long. She even threatened to have someone kill him if he didn’t obey each of her edicts. As if Kole didn’t know that already. It was like the Family had assigned someone who didn’t even want to see Kole reformed. That thought derailed Kole’s growing mental rant: The Family really might have assigned him a parole officer known to hate him and his actions. How else could they have allowed someone to put him on the Demon Blood Index when everything else they’d done indicated a desire to see him vanish from the official record?

         Kole checked the time on his phone. He didn’t have enough time to covertly case either building. He needed to spend time looking up the Wazao Estate and planning out how to get there and back on seventeen dollars. Kole hated not being able to case the party before he went. He hated going anywhere without his coat too. It was obviously a ploy designed to show how much he was at Ms. Flynn’s mercy. Kole picked up the suit jacket. At least she’d picked a good Aylani suit with good lines and fabric the color of a cold winter’s midnight.
I hope you like it. Kole is almost to the gala.

This is a deviation for :iconthelinbuilders: and all of the setting materials and minor characters can be used for works done in that setting. Otherwise, all uses of my work require my written permission.
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