Assassin in the Night [Short Wheel of Time story, C&C please]

[Tessar]

Thanks to anyone who reads this, and special thanks to anyone who reviews it!

This is just a short Wheel of Time story, which I'll be using as a base to make a new person for a game I play online.

Assassin in the Night

A pale ebony moon high in the night sky illuminated darkly tile roofs of Tear, bringing every detail of the surrounding area into a surreally sharp view. There was a faint tinkling of breaking glass that hung in the silent and chilly night for a moment, and then a sharp cry shattered what remained of the calm and peaceful silence. In houses nearby women sat up in their beds and clutched the sheets close, while men grabbed weapons and stood ready to defend their homes.

But there was no call for their alarm. Soon the men went back to bed, and the women perhaps sat a while longer, straining their ears for the sound of battle, or the shrill scream of death. But neither came, and so they to went back to sleep. But somewhere in the pale city, a strange game was being played. Strange because the cause of the disturbance thought he was the predator, but in truth, was the prey.

Sharp green eyes piercing the night, a darkly clad man slid forward stealthily and tried to calm his rapidly beating heart. He had gotten clumsy, and that had nearly cost him dearly. But now he was in his element, and he wouldn’t be clumsy again.

Bounding from roof to roof, not quite silently, an almost overweight man followed the path his intruder had taken, occasionally knocking a tile down to the streets to shatter against the cold stone street, or almost loosing his footing before a jump. He had left his element, and even his light chain mail and metal armor was too heavy for the world he had entered.

An honorable man, the heavy-set one was known as Alexan. He had left Cairhine only two seasons earlier, fed up with the Game of Houses, as his style was too blunt and too honest for that city’s political level. The few scars on his face, his muscular build, and the thin javelin in his hand marked him as a former warrior turned landowner and politician. All this was known to his strange attacker in the night, an assassin who rarely killed with his dagger, and preferred his sharp wit to any blade.

“Come out where ever you are.” Alexan muttered into the too dark night. A chill breeze raising the hair on his neck and arms, as well as a sudden feeling that perhaps he should never have left his home. It was only some papers that had been taken, but to him they were important, or at least would have been a few seasons back. It probably wasn’t even worth it anymore… he had left that life behind.

A strange feeling replaced the chill on his back and in his gut; it was a feeling he had learned to listen to.

Spinning with lightning speed, Alexan lashed out with his javelin as if it were a whip, slashing the man who had been coming up behind him with raised dagger across the chest, and knocking him back, almost throwing him off the roof with the strength of the strike.

Letting out a muffled cry, hardly even perceivable, the assassin regained his feet with surprising speed and leapt forward with a snarl, lashing out with a booted foot and catching the warrior on his soft stomach. It was a weak kick, but it knew its mark and its power. On the ground Alexan could have withstood it and killed his attacker easily, but the rules of fighting were suddenly switched as the tiles beneath his feet slid apart while he rebalanced, knocking him over onto his side with a crash.

Aiming for an unarmored part in the middle of Alexan’s spine, the assassin tried to drive his dagger into the downed man for a killing blow, but that was the worst thing he could have done. He knew the roof and the ally ways well enough, but he forgot the strength of Borderlander mettle.

Rolling himself with surprising speed, Alexan again brought his Javelin around in a sweeping blow and caught his attacker mid-leap, and as the lash of his javelin threw the assassin back, he assisted the flight with a kick of his own, certainly thrice as powerful as the one he had received.

The green and black clad assassin smashed against the roof tiles, attempting to roll away again and misjudging his distance. One foot came down on the roof and the other missed entirely, his spinning head and the burning wounds on his chest and side destroying his precious balance and allowing him to fall head first to the ground.

Moving carefully on the shifting tiles, Alexan limped across the sharply illuminated roof and peered down over the edge. He couldn’t see a thing in the dark street below, and he didn’t even want to until the morning. If his attacker hadn’t bled to death or died from the fall he would soon, and the papers weren’t worth climbing down himself to the possibility of a still slightly alive assassin.

~