Salted Folly

Arren Illiathan could not sleep. This was the first comfortable bed that he'd lain in since Camdella, there were no fleas and only a few lumps in the fresh straw mattress. He fluffed the worn down pillow on the bed and rolled over to his side, staring out the watery glass window. The nights here were hot by comparison to those in Andmar. Hot and humid, sweat stuck to his body like a greasy film. He wanted to open the glass windows to feel the slight breeze that blew through the portside town of San Balliares but then, of course, the wretched insects would suck him dry. So, Arren just lay there, miserably waiting for morning to rise. The moon slowly made it's way across the sky, it's slight sliver now out of view of the window, yet it still cast a faint light through the distorted pane. The sound of raucous sailors could still be heard drifting through the floorboards. They were talking of Alk'Haran women that they'd had. Arren realized that he'd only ever had one woman, a fair skinned Dornish girl who's father owned half the merchant ships in Dornheim. They had stayed in the man's manor for almost a week, waiting out a terrible storm, unfortunately, the Dornish merchant lord discovered where his daughter kept mysteriously sneaking off to and shackled him to a whipping post swearing to cut off his head in the morning. That had been another long sleepless night which had had an end. Arren never knew what Nerro had told the man, but after twelve long hours tied to the post in a raging storm he was set free, and the weather abated soon after. Since that day, Arren was never allowed to sail into Dornish waters. Arren's past seemed like another life time, he was steeped so far into affairs foreign to his childhood. He rubbed the scar around his left eye, and put on his glasses.

He hadn't written to his sister in nearly a fortnight. He rose from bed and sloppily donned his trousers and shirt, thought about it and buckled his sword, the Salt Blade, to his side. The Sons of Kandor had warned him not to wear it in public, but Arren looked at it another way, if they saw him wearing this sword, maybe people would give him a wide birth. He gathered his parchment, wax, pen ink and sands and made his way down to the tavern hall. The sailor's conversation had moved on to their distaste for the Sons of Kandor, when they saw him stepping down the stairs they silenced their conversation, Arren noticed one of them eye his sword and nudge his companion. By the time Arren had settled himself at a table the three men had moved to the other side of the bar. It had worked, nobody would bother him with the Salt Blade at his side. Arren removed his glasses from their hard wood and leather case and began writing in relative peace, using the fire from the hearth as a much better light source than the single candle in his room. He had completed half the letter, describing the events of the past twenty days by the time he noticed the large man in front of him. He looked up.

"Nice sword, where'd you get it?"

"Pardon?" Arren would try playing dumb.

"Where's the prince, thief?"
Arren stammered, and began to rise to his feet.

"Let's bring this thief to justice boys, for prince Kalimesh!"

The man's large fist swung quickly toward Arren's head, he barely had time to duck the blow and ram his shoulder into the man's ribs. He heard a crack and then shoved the man to the ground striding past to the other sailor who stood his ground smirking. Arren whipped around in time to see the dagger enter his side. The third sailor had snuck behind him while the large one was talking. Arren fell backward onto the table with his parchment, ink spilled with blood, and he drew his sword. Salt Blade made a raspy sound as it escaped it's scabbard. All three men descended upon him at once, Arren quickly rolled off the table and spun in a tight spiral, his sword expertly struck all three men as they closed in on him, slicing the meat of their thighs, they quickly crumbled to the floor. Arren hesitated for a second, he could dispatch of the thugs now, but then he caught the aghast eye of the barmaid, she had seen the whole exchange. Instead, Arren turned over a table and ran, he ran as fast as he could into the dark port town, bleeding in his wake. There were some battles that Arren could never physically win. His own pride it seems was his folly, Arren realized now how his brothers had died, they had too much pride in their skills and in their weapons, others had seen that and taken their lives for it. Arren just hoped he wouldn't make the same mistake.