The Tragedy of Ravan the Great

Chapter Twenty-Four: The Bloody Plague

It took a couple days, but the captain eventually managed to round up his crew for the impromptu trip to Le' Kire. All the while, Ravan made sure that Zair of Flor du Cyan and Adrian von Le' Mille hadn't left the country yet. No one offered the sailors any issues for leaving the island, so long as they weren't headed to any of the neighboring islands or a country on Paradisius. Ravan found himself growing really sick of the sea though, and once he had officially memorized his entire journal, he verified Zair was still in the country, almost finished planning his mission with Adrian. They would be scheduling their departure soon. While this was good to know, it was less than entertaining.

            Upon finding himself with nothing more to occupy his mind, Ravan brought his attention back to Quinn Forsythe, who seemed to be in a bit of a rush. Ravan found him in his room at an inn frantically gathering loose pages of parchment together and stuffing them in a new leather satchel, but there was a lot of parchment to pack. Ravan noticed that Quinn appeared to be in distress and with a cursory search of the area, he discovered why. Four mercenaries wearing the crest of the Earl of Rivas quickly approached the inn on horseback. Once they arrived at the front door, two dismounted and rushed inside while the other two trotted around the inn hoping to catch the bounty hunter should he attempt to flee out a window.

            Quinn had finally finished packing his papers when he heard people yelping down the hall outside in his room, followed by angry men shouting for people to move out of their way. Quinn peered out his window and found one of the mercenaries posted directly below him. Immediately, Quinn iced the man and jumped from his second-story room, landing right beside the spooked horse. Seconds later, the other two mercenaries burst through the door to the room and threw themselves at the open window.

            "Savages!" one of the men cursed.

            "Is he dead?" asked the second.

            Here, the third mercenary approached on his horse below to see his comrade encased in ice still seated on his unhappy horse.

            "What in the blue blazes happened here?" he exclaimed.

            "Where is Forsythe?" asked the first mercenary from the window.

            "I haven't seen him, sir," called the one from below.

            Before anyone could say another word, they heard pounding hooves coming from around the inn and then spotted Quinn as he galloped into the street.

            "After him!" the first mercenary demanded. "Now! We'll be right behind you!"

            The third mercenary kicked his horse into action and did his best to keep up behind Quinn until the others could join him as promised. After seeing what happened to his comrade, he didn't feel confident that he could take Quinn down on his own. Moments into the chase, the mercenary watched as Quinn looked over his shoulder and stretched out his hand. The mercenary knew exactly what was coming and brought up his own hand just in time to use his fire to block the ice which shot his way. The ice exploded in front of him with a force that blew his arm back and jolted his shoulder. He shook his arm out and prayed his comrades would catch up soon as they barreled down the dusty road and stunned Rivans dodged out of their way. Suddenly, Quinn veered down another street and when the mercenary turned to follow, the bounty hunter was gone.

            Quinn had immediately taken another street, but while he slowed some upon realizing he had lost the mercenary, he did not ride with leisure. He proceeded to the Rivas Justice House at a steady trot to deliver his package. A courier handed it over to the judge, who took a great while to read over the paperwork before calling the courier back into his office.