Quoted By:
>Cutler’s Lane
“It must have been at Cutler’s Lane. At the Youngtree and Saffron’s workshop, earlier in the year, when they exhibited those arms.” A bittersweet taste clings to my tongue as I speak. A little before I was deemed old enough to carry my own, I could walk through the street and wall-to-wall there would be workshops; their long knives, byknives, and pokers as plentiful as mackerel in our wet markets. Since his war with the guild, I could count the number of workshops whose doors remain open.
Then again, had we bought our feders back then, it would have been us at the sickhouse, bits of our neck and ears and noses sheared off by the poorly made tips of such swords.
“Ah. I do recall it now the adventuress and her queer little retinue.” Miss Waroon brushes her knuckles against her chin.
“You- you knew them before they were in the country? What were they like? Did you buy arms from them too?” Baiyok shrinks a little as she realizes the silence between us. “Oh. Uh. It’s- if it’s fine with you. I don’t wish to pry.”
“I think the whole of it is beyond the scope of today, but we do have a moment to spare.” The blackly dressed man pets her arm before turning to face us. “We first heard of them from Jinfolk tradesmen, and the case of the Headwater Gate…”
As Jiragarn speaks, I notice a couple particulars that betray the apparent youthful visage; a little below his hairline is a row of scars, large and small, wrapped around his head like a crown of thorns (Flick cuts from live edges aren’t -that- big, are they?); the slight crease and wrinkle beneath the eyes only visible when he looks up (twenty four, twenty five years?); and the few dots and streaks of darker skin on the wrist and back of hand (Hot metal, most likely. Burns from molasses and liquids aren’t pretty little dots as these).
“… could be done, but the heart of it is the bind; it bites wood with more might than plain edge. It’s better to throw that cut at the head or hand of the man.” Senior Jiragarn mentions something about the undulate sword of his and its purpose: not necessarily to cut off polearm heads, rather, to bite into the shaft for long enough so it can be seized and subjugated. This works with swords as well.
“And that is the endsay. Now, I believe it is time for us to leave. Have a good evening, junior.” With his fingers around her wrist, they bow—-
For a moment, I thought I saw… nevermind. Veins don’t move like centipedes. They can’t. They…
They bow out.
