Chapter One: Gilded Vale

“I want to burn that tree,” Alaise says leaning up against a broken stone wall and not realizing there’s a man next to her, listening.

“Yes,” the man replies, “because burning it would definitely not also burn down the town.”

“Or just break the branches off. Then no more people left to hang.”

“…Off the tree anyway.”

“True, but to leave them there… hanging. Uh.” She shakes her head. “Pun not intended. It’s disgusting. No one else reacts to it with the same distaste as I have. Urgeat seemed just as happy to see them all hang.”

“Welcome to Gilded Vale, then.”

She stops herself short before speaking again, turning her head towards the peculiar looking gentleman smoking a pipe. “Sorry, I-I didn’t think anyone was listening to me.” The left corner of the man’s mouth curls into a smirk.

The man chuckles. “Oh, I definitely was,” he says. “I appreciate the daring, colorful ideas you have, though. I believe the villagers including Lord Raedric would not think the same way. What would I do without my crops?”

“Right… I – uh – was not actually going to burn it. Or anything… Ever.” Alaise scratches the back of her head, a little embarrassed she spoke the way she did before. “I’ve been through a rough day or two of travelling so I am a bit out of sorts.”

“A traveler, huh? Where are you from?”

“Old Vailia.”

He nods his head, taking a few puffs of smoke from the pipe. “Old Vailia… Always wanted to travel there, except well, I guess most places would be better than here.” He held out a hand. “Name is Edér.”

“I’m Alaise,” she says, shaking his hand.

“I was actually just counting the number of people hanging on the tree,” he says. “I counted Nineteen… I think? Though to the people around here, might as well be Nineteen.” Edér’s friendly smile turns into a grimace, looking

her up and down. “Don’t think I’d put you much higher than Twenty-Two, Twenty-three tops. You look like the sort that likes to get involved.”

She nods, guessing it’s true she did get involved… with a lot of things. The reason why she nearly got kicked out of her home village. “Yeah, that’s probably why I didn’t suggest burning the tree, but I don’t plan on staying long,” she says, still looking out at the tree, the dwarf woman she spoke to not too long ago still there, her body moving in gentle lifeless swings.

“You were talking to the dwarf woman. I saw you… You were trying to figure out whether to count her as a person. I think you oughtta.”

“What makes you think I was interested in the dwarf woman?”

Edér’s smirk broadens. “I was smoking over here, saw you staring at her. Twice I refilled my pipe. You never so much as blinked. Your mouth was so slack I took you for a Raedric at first.”

Alaise took offense to that. “Impossible, I don’t drool half as much.”

“Ha! So you’re already familiar. Still, you’ll have to forgive my curiousity. ‘Round here we prefer to turn a blind eye to our dead.”

“I never noticed,” Alaise replies, cynicism lacing her tone. She recalled how people went on with their business not so much as even staring at the rotting corpses. She almost called Urgeat out on it had the bell not rung to indicate something terrible happened to Raedric’s new heir. “Like I said before, I’ve been out of sorts lately.”

“Course. We all got our bad days when we stand perfectly still and stare at corpses for a while without blinking.” Edér adds a wink. “What’s your real reason for being here?”

Alaise sighs. “Well, it’s a long story, but to sum it up, I was offered, along with others, to settle in Gilded Vale from Lord Raedric. However, my caravan was attacked, and I ended up here alone. I’m actually kinda in a bit of trouble right now.” Edér doesn’t say anything just yet, Alaise still tries to figure out how to tell him the next part of the story. “Do you know what a Watcher is?”

As if taken by surprise, Edér’s eyes widen, and looks around. He leans into her ear, whispering, “Careful, friend. Best not use that word ‘round here. Could be any number of Raedric bootlickers within earshot. Ciphers, animancers, Watchers… same thing in the eyes of folks around here, Raedric especially. They come through these parts all the time with their ‘cures’, preying on the desperate. None of them are who they claim to be.” Animancer. The title sounds familiar to Alaise. The dwarf woman she spoke to said she was one, but she did not seem like the type of person who took advantage of others. Quite the opposite from her. “Course seeing you with that funny look, I’d be halfway inclined to believe you WERE having some kind of communion with that dwarf. Heh. Either case, maybe I’m not Nineteen after all. No offense.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

He shrugs. “Hey, don’t blame me, I don’t have a say. You can take my word for that. This town’s had it in for me for a long time now. Only fella who ever stuck up farm, well… he’s number eighteen up there. My headman on the farm. Used to be my captain during the war.”

“And what does your town have against you?”

“I think that may be a story to tell you over a pint…” he says, “or maybe two.”