The Whisper of the Nightingale

Chapter 74: The Jig is Up!

Far west of Raven's current location, a certain bird sat perched on a high beam within the so called Black Talon Manor. The former home of the main Nightingale family had once been furnished with abstemious luxury, with every installment contributing to a sense of elegance but never flaunting the family's wealth. Now it was entirely different.

After the fire, the Nightingale Manor had been reduced to little more than cindered rubble so naturally the estate had to be rebuilt before the Talon family could move in. They had chosen to, supposedly, honor the previous residents of the palace-like manor by rebuilding it into an exact replica of what it had been before . . . only, a bit larger in scale, and with an extra room here and there.

Once completed, the family matriarch - that is to say Lady Anhinga - had put her own touch on the place by requesting large parts of the manor to be decorated with gold and copper inlays, quickly obscuring the original grace of the manor. Yet the changes hadn't stopped there.

The bird looked out over the now clustered main hall, completely stuffed with things of extravagance, and an oddly human-like disdainful scorn shone in its eyes. It couldn't help but burr up its feathers in annoyance as two servants walked in, hauling yet another addition the room's so called splendor between the two of them - a tacky looking falcon made of gold and sparkling gems in different colors.

'Is there no end to this . . . gluttony?' wondered Hoatzin with distaste as the servants carefully lowered the falcon onto a small but sturdy podium next to his aunts throne in the center of the hall. This would not be the statue's final position; it would only stay there for a few days, until Lady Anhinga grew tired of it and replaced it with a new one.

This wanton practice utterly enraged Hoatzin. He had been surveying the Black Talon Manor and the surrounding city for nearly six months now and it had grown clear to him that while his aunt and uncle practically bathed in wealth, the city around it was growing poorer with every passing week.

It couldn't be seen on the surface - every house looked pristine and there wasn't a shop that didn't sell high end goods for exorbitant prices - but if you had insight in the lives of the people actually living in those houses and working in those stores, a shockingly large portion of them couldn't afford to buy dinner most of the days.

Rage built up within Hoatzin as he thought of the unnecessarily high taxes that the Talon Clan demanded from the city inhabitants, which was nearly twice as high as it had been before.

Finally, the target of his anger strode in through the hall's large double doors. As usual, Lady Anhinga wore a blue velvet dress while her pale grey-blonde hair was arranged in an intricate knot at the nape of her neck. New, however, was the golden circlet she wore over her brow like a crown. Next to her waddled her husband, the official head of the family but if there had ever been any doubts about who truly ruled the Talon Clan it was definitely gone by now. Uncle Gyps' eyes were glazed with an odd sheen and his gaze was unfocused; while he previously had the mannerisms of a successful businessman at the pinnacle of his career, Hoatzin's uncle now seemed almost hollow, only reacting to shiny gems and, of course, food.

Hoatzin had gotten the distinct impression that his aunt perhaps never really had loved her husband - she had been married to him for political reasons, arranged by her parents, but the man was too weak to match Anhinga's ambitions. Once she took over her brother's position, Anhinga had power in her own right and no longer needed to rely on the meeker Gyps.

Anhinga wasn't alone in her low opinion of him though; when Dunlin used the midwinter break to come and visit his hometown, he had disregarded his father completely.