Draga Of The Vanguard

"I came from a family known as the Espoirs, a n.o.ble family that once ruled over a territory in Incursia, the capital city of the Vivlia family"s territory. We were in charge of...things that couldn"t be encouraged by the public." said Morte as he looked at Rei"s reaction, hoping his metaphor had covered up most of what they really did.

"Okay...So you guys handle the shady stuff." said Rei. "Yeah...we handled the transfer of bribes, a.s.sasinations, false accusations and other things. But our forte was artifact theft." said Morte.

"If you were an Espoir, you had to have your own unique artifact, by the age of 30. We had tons of them... a magic flute which controlled rats, a broom which could fly, a sword which could make food...but our most priceless...was this."

Morte pointed at the finger where he had worn his ring. "This is an artifact stolen from another of the eight families, the Scáth. A ring that can allow you to disappear or make your body only take a third of a single hit in its shadow form...the Ring of Night." said Morte.

"It was my father"s. And the one who had told him about it was me after I heard it from one of the Scáth children. It was treasured, as it could make a hit from a dragon bearable, and allow for the theft of more objects. My father praised me for it, congratulating me for my success...then they came."

Rei looked at Morte as he lied down and continued from this inconvenient cliffhanger.

"The Scáth"s finest a.s.sasins...they moved like shadows and killed many before they were noticed. My father was one of those who were killed that night. They didn"t find the ring...because I had taken it from him earlier." Morte said in a low tone.

"That night, of the Espoir household, which contained over 32 people, only 4 survived. My mother, two concubines and me. My mother told me and the concubines to run and make a new life, in a new state. We ran towards Edalbe...where I shook off the women and ran towards the Scáth"s territory."

Rei was puzzled. "Why run to the Scáth? They just killed your family." he asked.

"How do you think they found out about the theft?" Morte said, covering his head with his imp skin pillow.

"I wanted that ring to be my artifact. I simply asked Father for some men to steal it...then he went and took it for himself... so I told the Scáth that he had stolen it. They were thankful and promised me a reward once they had taken it back."

"So I was going to return the ring when I happened to hear a conversation."

"I turned invisible and eavesdropped, and found out something that saved my life. The Scáth had poisoned my mother and brutally killed the two concubines. They were waiting for me to bring the ring and then kill me last. This was my reward."

"I ran as fast as I possibly could and stopped only to eat and sleep. I kept running till I came upon a road. I waited there until a carriage pa.s.sed. I stopped them and asked if I could be taken to the safest city at the edge of the territory of the Empire des Huit. He named a price and I hopped on. That was how I ended up here..." said Morte.

"I quickly changed my name from Lance to Morte, but kept my surname as a matter of pride. A weak brat at first, no one would take care of me. I eventually ran out of money, and survived by doing odd jobs."

"Soon I decided I needed to get a stable job that paid well, that even I could do...it was either that or slavery, which would be the death of me...."

"So I joined the Vanguard. I met Gars and Pierre, with two other guys, in the persons of Nicolai and Trent. We had fun, barely training and sc.r.a.ping by doing fumigations... I was the alpha dog, and we did whatever we liked." he said smiling.

"Then Nicolai died while following one of my orders. We were in despair, crying for days as we remembered the imps eating his limbs." Morte said shiddering.

"They brought his replacement, Fargus, who died even faster. We were in this cycle for a year and a half, losing teammates left and right...until we couldn"t take it. We stopped accepting commisions and chose to starve to death..." Morte said, then he turned his head and peeked at May.

"Then came the beast that is Mayln Töröl. She was like a wild animal, and I immediately moved to establish my authority. Simply put...I got my a.s.s beat. Her punches were so strong and fast that even my shadow form couldn"t take it. I gave up and called her Alpha while bowing, the others following my example." Morte said smiling.

"She then trained us...we were beaten down, dragged across the floor, and crushed to dust. Then we were refirmed into killing machines. After a while, we were accepting Direwolf exterminations. A few months later, Wilbur came along and the place was fun."

Morte said removing his pillow from his face. "Then an ogre squashed the poor boy. Ever since we"ve called every ogre we"ve met, "Wilbur"s killer". We were sad but then and there we decided, if any new members joined us, we would train them as h.e.l.lishly as we were trained, and make them realise that the Vanguard aren"t a joke." said Morte as he got up and grabbed his new silver dagger.

"You know the rest so let"s stop wasting our time. We can train while the others are out."

As Morte stepped out of the outpost, Rei looked at the door and silently muttered. "So that"s why May keeps him quiet...he"s definitely a bad influence." he said as he got off his bed and went out the outpost and trained with Morte, who seemed not to care about the fact that he just told someone he was basically a hunted n.o.ble.

********************************************

"Sir, we intercepted a battle report with information that I"m sure you"ll find helpful." said a man in a black cloak.

He was wearing a blank mask that only showed his eyes, so his features were impossible to discern. "The attack on Asfáleia...The perpetrator, a Steampunk Imp, was captured. Of the ones who captured it...There is one called Morte Espoir."

"Espoir....the child from the family that had the gall to steal from us...we"ve found the b.a.s.t.a.r.d." said a man sitting on a black throne.

He wore armor with a striking color, his torso white with black stripes, and his limbs completely black. He wore a black mask with star shapes were the eyes should be, and his light blue eyes gave him a certain presense.

He sported an average height and long dark hair, giving him the presence of a lord of the night. "Lance Espoir....would it have killed you to change your surname." the man said, laughing at his target"s stupidity.

"This should be good."