Iron Quill Submission: The Green Faery

[Hardlec]

THE GREEN FAERY

Alcohol requires fermentation. Fermentation requires mainly yeast and sugar. The yeast that grows on the grapes in Malifaux produces an inferior wine. Even the Governor can scarce afford to import wine from across the breach.

Beer is another matter. The beer brewed in Malifaux has become the second most valuable export. No better way to refresh on a hot day than a cold mug of malty suds.

Distilled Spirits were by far the most popular libation. Gin was the cheapest way to get drunk. Whisky was popular in the saloons that sprang up in the small towns. Every farm seemed to have a still and every watering hole its special label.

Lucius and the Governor both enjoyed Absinthe. Last night, both men enjoyed a date with the green faery.

In the short moments between sleep and wakefulness, Lucius had a vivid dream. A sugar cube on a slotted spoon. Iced water poured slowly over the sugar. The green clear liquid became the delectable louche. There was a strange design on the spoon; a chess rook. As Lucius looked into the forming louche he saw it again. Strange. Sleep began to dissipate, and the hangover began to take hold. This was going to be a long day.

A knock at the door. Decorum kept the ever cool Lucius from heaving his chamber pot at the noise that was splitting his head. Instead he got up, donned a dressing robe, and opened the door. There stood a page. "Poor lad" thought the bureaucrat, his uniform must weigh more than he does.

"A note from the Governor Sir. He requests a reply."

"Your presence is requested and required at Breakfast, at 7:00 sharp."

The wax seal looked odd. A chess rook. Again with the chess rook. On reinspection it was the governor's seal.

Lucius wasted no time. He took the note to his writing desk, penned "yes" under the signature, refolded the envelope and affixed his own wax seal.

The note was given to the page who accepted it back on its silver tray. Then Lucius went swiftly about the business of dressing.

Throughout the tasks of getting ready, the shadowy images of chess rooks. They began to abate when Lucius took his aspirin.

There are as many hangover remedies as hangovers, or so it might seem. The wonder drug from the old side of the breech was pricey, even for a high level official. They reduced pain, fever and inflammation. It helped with hangovers, and it was worth the price.

"The first order of business today" began the governor; "who here is seeing visions of chess rooks?"

Everyone raised a hand.

"Who here did not drink Absinthe?"

Every hand lowered.

"I thought as much.

The train carrying soul stones across the breech was robbed yesterday. There were no survivors.

Lucius, I want you to take my private car, and some troops. Go out to the breech and check into this. I want to know which faction is involved, and get an investigation going. I also want you to go to River point and check the Absinthe distillery. If this chess thing is a prank, I'm going to personally hang whoever did it. If not, well, changes may need to be made.

Finish your tea, Lucius, and then head out. I have the train readying; you can pick your troops. There will be a proper breakfast there."

Lucius stood, proffered his teacup to the group in salute, then quaffed the oolong and went off.

After sending half a dozen pages in half a dozen directions with orders, Lucius went into the Guard barracks to see who was available. Tor, a guard captain was there, training a squad of guardsmen and associated guild hounds. "I have a squad of Guards ready to go, and four hounds that just finished training. Would we do?"

"Yes quite so. Is Caleb about?"

"Caleb is in the Yard with some new birds. He's probably aching for some action. The other Austringers are out."

Caleb was indeed out in the yard. Sasha, his great black and white raptor, was on a perch. Two other Raptors were closer at hand, being trained. Judging by their performance, they were ready.

"Caleb! Are you ready for some honest work?"

The man turned and made a quick bow from the neck. "Aye, milord. I have two new birds here who are ready for a re) mission. Shall I bring them?

"yes, yes. We are going to investigate a train robbery. More good eyes will be better. We need to move right away."

"Their cages are right here." The Austringèr quickly stashed the birds and with a scant twist of his lure, summoned Sasha.

A Malifaux Raptor is to a falcon as a falcon is to a budgie. Three raptors could carry off a man. Lucius had seen flocks of Raptors destroy greater Nephelhiem. The idea that he would have more animals than people did not bother him at all. Neither hounds nor birds bit the hand that fed them.

The Governor's train left at 7:47. Tor saw to the guards and Caleb getting breakfast, and extra rations for the dogs and birds. Like all good soldiers, the Guards, hounds and birds quickly finished their meals and went to sleep. Caleb too began to nap.

Lucius was not so lucky. He had a pile of paperwork and it was no easier on the governor's desk than on his own.

The visions had stopped. The warm tea had become soothing and the paperwork pile was refreshingly smaller.

Two short blasts on the whistle summoned Lucius to the engine. "We are getting near to the place where the freight train was robbed. I am looking for the brakeman's lantern. "

"There, just ahead."

The short train braked quickly and there was a flurry of action. In an area that seemed desperate to be a lot of nothing in the middle of nowhere there was chaos in control. The Guards and birds and hounds set up a perimeter. The train crew was busy, tending the train and setting their flares to prevent another train from crashing into them. Caleb searched the ground. Lucius walked the track.

About a hundred yards behind the lantern left by the ambushed train, Lucius saw three black marks on the track. Regularly spaced. Torpedoes. The crew had been signaled to stop by someone who knew about trains.

Caleb commented: "It looks like ressers hit this train. No body parts."

Lucius replied: "It could be. What do you think of this?" he pointed to the three regularly spaced black scars on the track.

"I have no idea sir."

Caleb was an expert tracker and this was not his first investigation.

"Torpedoes. small tubes filled with black powder. A train runs over them, and they make a big bang, but just noise. No damage. Three in a row like this is a signal for an emergency stop, but you have to be technically proficient to set them."

"Not ressers then. Who?"

"I don't know, Caleb, and I have less of a clue now than I had before."

The troops returned to the train and all headed to the breech port. Caleb mentioned to Lucius that the hounds and raptors seemed oddly calm. Ressers work usually left the animals upset.

At the train yard at Breech Port, the place was a buzz with the rumor that the ressers had knocked off an M&SU train full of Gild treasure. Lucius and Caleb looked at the door on the treasure car. It looked as if a giant beast had torn it open. Tor, the guard captain broke the concerned silence.

"No beast did that --" he pointed to the door. "That was done by a steam-bot. The marks are too clean, there's no blood in them from damage to the claws, no broken bits of claw. That's not resser work, unless they are buying steambots."

Lucius felt his headache comming back. "This is a nightmare" he thought to himself.

"We are not your enemies, young one. We will, we must, protect ourselves, but we are not your enemies." Not a voice, a thought, but too clear. Something was off. This was too like the chess rook. Lucius reached for the aspirin. Too like the the -- the -- the hangover. Not the Absinthe, the hangover.

Well, there was still work to do. They all went to Riverpointe.

The raptors were shrieking, and the hounds were barking. Something was upsetting them.

"What now?" thought Lucius. Then he saw it.

The lighthouse on Riverpointe resembled a tower from an old castle. "The Chess Rook. " Now the puzzle began to make sense.

Lucius diverted the train to the lighthouse. He ran to the door, crashed it open, and the smell and dust began to overwhelm him. As a soul stone user, Lucius could already feel the energy of the great cashed of stones. This was a M&SU outpost. They hit their own train, blamed the ressers and would double sell the soul stones. The headache came back. A reaction to the dust and smell.

"We are not your enemies, young one. The guild goes to war against the ressers. The M&SU supplies weapons to both sides, but we Never Born must make a choice. War is an ill wind that blows no one any good.

No war today, young one. Keep the peace.

The headache allowed me to communicate with you. The hangover, not the drink. Images are much easier to convey than words. I started with the lighthouse, and you miss read this to be a chess rook. It is difficult to 'speak' to you Young One. Remember: no war today."

The connection was broken. Lucius found the source of the bizzar dreams and the stolen soul stones. he avoided a war. It was a good day.

One thing bothered him. Who would call him, a superannuated bureaucrat: "young one."

[ThePandaDirector]

I think you just outdid Thchosenone on non-canon characters

Jokes aside, I'll have to dissappoint and say I only marginally enjoyed this. There was the potential for a nice simple story, but the plot, wording, characterisation and theme all take a turn for the worse in one way or another.

My immediate thought was "why is Lucius getting drunk? How does he get drunk when he always wears his mask in public?" Overall I really don't understand why Lucius is in this, and why you needed to show the perspective of the Governor and that level of authority.

Then there's the wording ("War is an ill wind that blows no one any good" sounds kinda sexual ), which lacked a lot of flow, but was made worse by the structure of your paragraphs. The pacing was a bit all over the place and you skipped over things either too swiftly (the ending) or missed them completely (River Point though I imagine that was intentional). There didn't seem to be any weight to anything or any suspense or development, just A-B-C-DEFG...

The ending as well was very poor, and it made no sense that the Neverborn wouldn't want their enemies to destroy each other. Ironically in an effort to make them uncharacteristically peaceful you remove the aspect that makes them the argued 'good guys' of the game (natives fighting off foreign invasion).

You're take on the theme is certainly more original than some, but as far as the emphasis on "hangover" over "alcohol" and the overall goal combined with what is basically "we communicate best when you're pished", it kinda falls apart.

Ok, so I could go into more detail into what I thought was wrong, but I want to try and end on a positive.

Like I said, it has potential to be a nice simple story. I actually liked the Guild Guards and Austringer. I couldn't really determine the relevence of all the beasts (could have connected them to a theme or the Neverborn), but overall I don't think you would have gone far wrong making the story simply about a Guild team sent to investigate a collection of scenes (each reacting differently to these visions giving to them through some kind of poison/potion) before finally finding the SS and the Neverborn who use the Guild to clear the way for them (the Neverborn) before claiming the SS for themselves. No need for Lucius, no need for any complex plot elements, just some simple storytelling.

Apologies, but I at least hope my criticisms can be of some help.

Oh and congrats on making it before the deadline, you're already a winner as far as the DNFs are concerned =D

[UberGruber]

Opening -

was offbeat enough to keep me reading.

Setting -

It's clearly malifaux, though there's not a great deal of actual description. Mind you, the style doesn't really suit overmuch description, so fair enough.

Plot - The plot was okay though I didn't much care for the 'we are your friends' ending as my understanding is that every faction in Malifaux is more or less at war with the others, temporary truces perhaps notwithstanding.

Character - the characters were pretty 'spare'. Again I think that's a feature of the very simple (not a derogatory comment) style

Dialogue - could maybe use a little work. It wasn't bad but there wasn't a lot to distinguish one speaker from another, I thought.

Point of view -

As i'm going to always say, people get their knickers in a knot about this and I seldom see the need to in 3rd person. So fine.

Theme -

I'm just commenting on the chess piece and hangover here as I'm not much into themes. . . the chess piece was well used, I thought, but I wish you hand't continually referred to it as a 'chess rook' (a minor point really but it did bother me). The hangover was okay though it seemed more alcohol than hangover if you see what I mean.

Three best things about the story -

It's strange, I really wanted to hate the matter of fact statement style but it actually grew on me quite a lot and for some reason it works and despite myself I found it rather effective.

I liked the intro too. As I say, the 'theme' seems more alcohol than hangover but I thought the first paragraph (again surprisingly) fitted well with the story even though not being strictly part of it.

There were some nice touches, like the page whose uniform weighed more than he did . . . observations like that lift the piece.

Three things you think could be changed for the biggest improvement -

I'd like the Neverborn to be more sinister, there to be more of the rather amusing - but apposite - observations (like that of the page and his uniform) and for the dialogue to be a little more diverse between characters.

[Hardlec]

I had to rush a bit to meet the deadline and it shows.

I wanted the neverborne to be more diabolical and missdirecting. W(e don't want war ... yet. I am your friend until you trust me. Needs work.

The vision was mistaken for a rook, not a rook. That needs expansion.

There is a lot more to do,and I need to learn to edit on a tablet.

[Grantt]

I just can't like dialogue driven text.

The style was reminiscent of Carter, with numerous abstract metaphors used to describe details. I liked it, but it became a little too much after a while. I would have liked more description and exposition (without it being dialogue) presented in less jarring ways.

Didn't like the Neverborn portrayal. Man, this is negative.

I like the mystery style.

---------- Post added at 11:02 PM ---------- Previous post was at 11:01 PM ----------

Yeah; the intro was wicked.

[Sliver Chocobo]

This would be better if it wasn't about Lucus, since might be Neverborn (also one word not two)

Also not sneaky enough for Neverborn?