Eunoia

Chapter 1

I wasn't always a soulless scourge, before all the blood and steel, before Isleen seduced me, I had honor. 

Chapter 1 - Welcome Home

When Shaye first laid eyes on the city that was to become her new home she was quite underwhelmed. For the island city described as evidence of divinity and the cosmopolitan center of this world she thought it rather looked like any other city. There were more buildings, people, and rats, but to her, that didn't seem like something to strive for. She thought that maybe everyone here was smoking something that she had yet to receive. Looking around her current surroundings, she hoped she got some soon.

Shaye's worn boots didn't so much as creak as she made her way along the rotting wood planks on one of the hundreds of docks that sat in the bustling port. She was just one of the many faceless people that would be forgotten before they even had a chance to be remembered. Dockworkers rushed by carrying boxes of putrid smelling goods, or bustled about tying off various boats, then collecting fairs for their stay. As Shaye looked out from under her heavy hood she noticed the number of people on the docks was only rivaled by the number of rats that also ran about to and from the various ships. And all of it was heated to the level that would elicit the most unpleasant smell from everything and everyone toiling under the beating sun.

For someone that had been raised close to the southern pole, Shaye was more accustomed to biting cold. Though, she would have to get used to this suffocating heat if she was to accomplish what she had set out to do. At least now she understood why her mother had had her training by the lava fields.

Shaye strode down the docks in her winter leathers embracing every drop of sweat that fell from her body. It was as if the island was excising the otherness from inside of her, shoving her into this new mold that the island demanded, willing or not.

Shaye's sweat preoccupied thoughts were momentarily diverted when a big lumbering man with a beard that would have rivaled the length of her hair, if it weren't currently hidden under her hooded cloak, strode up the dock. Shaye thought he was probably heading to some pricy boat given the fact he walked in the center of the dock, disregarding the flow of people. The man expected people to move for him. He was one of those people that believed that the world owed him. He had yet to learn that the world was neutral to the plights of humans despite his age. The gaudy silver ring he flaunted on his left hand only helped solidify his impression of being a pompous ass. The poor man. Shaye felt that she should enlighten him, even in some small way, to the callus truth of the world he seemed to have thus far been spared.

Shaye's shoulder checked the big man.

"Watch it boy," came his gruff response, his stride never faltering.

Shaye on the other hand kept her head down and continued away from the big bearded man, losing herself in the throngs of people. Shaye's pious work was completed, though the man wouldn't notice for a while yet.

The man also didn't notice that Shaye was in fact not a boy. She was simply wearing baggy breeches and a loose tunic over the tight wrapping that helped to flatten her breasts, plus her face and long blond hair were covered by her worn cloak. It was always smarter to travel as a boy and since Shaye was already a fairly tall girl at five nine, a little change in her gate and people saw what she wanted them to. Though she did make quite a gangly boy as her rations at sea had been rather scant. But she figured it was best to save her coin for the city, for what was to come.

The Island city sprawled out before Shaye, calling to her weary sea legs that begged for respite after the long voyage. Connected to the docks, a cobbled street clogged with carriages and pedestrians separated the water and a row of weather battered buildings. The docks were at the lowest point of the island and from this, the cobbled roads snaked their way through the city forming its many streets.