Strife | a fragment

The following is a lightly-edited fragment of a what was intended to be a longer bit of fiction I wrote in January 2015. I found it while looking for old files on a portable HDD to see how hard it would be to recreate “Rust” from my post yesterday. No dice… yet, anyway. I may be looking for the wrong filename and it could be under another name entirely. The song I referred to as “Myrrh” (which is only one of many “Myrrh”-titled songs I’ve worked on) is actually fully intact and on my modern DAW, so I might have to share that (with vocals!) once I decide what those lyrics should be. But, on with the story… I’ll say a bit more about this piece after the fragment.

Strife

The smell of excrement, rot and chemicals rose from the waters as the barge Vivienne and Llewellyn were riding floated across the River Strife to the slaughter yards south of the river. The copper smell of fresh blood drifted over the other smells and Llewellyn had to choke back a the bile that threatened to add to the miasma of roiling in the dark twilight waters below.

“Good gods, how does anyone deal with this stench on a daily basis?” he asked no one in particular, and didn’t expect to get a response. He covered his face with a handkerchief.

The ferryman thrust his pole into the silt below and shoved with a grunt. As he lifted the pole back up to push again, he paused long enough to respond. “What stench, sar, do ye speak of? I only smell the Strife, and bare’y at that.”

Vivienne gave Llewellyn a coy smile and winked. “Overstatement is one of your tragic flaws, luv.” She inhaled deeply. “Smells like the life of the city, if you ask me. The smell of shite is barely noticeable.” She took another deep breath through her nose and sighed. “It almost smells…. floral.”

Llewellyn gagged again as he watched her, feeling even more sick on her behalf due to the display she had put on.

“If you mean floral like the smell from a corpse flower, then you are entirely correct,” he muttered so only Vivienne could hear. “What bring us to the lovely garden district of our fair city? Am I your chaperone for a tryst with one of your new paramours to ensure that he behaves himself, or are we on a shopping expedition for the latest perfume?”

“Neither of those, I am sad to report,” said Vivienne without a hint sadness in her voice. “I wouldn’t mind a new plaything, truth be told, but the boys at the alehouse have gotten wise about my little fetishes and tend to avoid me these days. No one seems all that keen to pair up with me after what happened to poor Randolph last month. I don’t think he’s stopped shaking since that night and he’s now prone to shrieking when he sees me.” She chuckled. “I told him he didn’t want mess with me, but he insisted that he was more than man enough to deal with a few fey…”

“You warned him, I assume.”

Vivienne nodded. “Tiny tarts with wings, I believe is what he said that night. He ignored my advice about their teeth and having a modicum of control over the fifth element,” she recalled. “He completely ignored me.”

“Men!” She used the word as an expletive. “Always so certain that the fair sex need to be saved from the world.”

“I suppose he also ignored your warnings about fey carrying daggers to augment any damage their teeth can inflict,” said Llewellyn. “And… To be fair, you aren’t a typical woman. Quite a few ladies are quite happy to accept a bit of chivalry now and again. He may have mistaken you for one of those fair creatures.”

“Ahh, you and he both have mistaken me for a lady, as many a man has been wont to do. I’d thought you were smarter than that.”

Llewellyn smiled and for a brief moment forgot about the stench filling his nostrils. “Oh, don’t worry, I would never mistake you for a lady… I’m still fond of living.”

“Randolph said he had seen drawings of their daggers and laughed at my concerns for his well-being, thinking it a great joke that someone might be fearful of what he called ‘sewing needles’ and then felt the need to brandish his dress sword to prove he could ‘slay’ any of those ‘little whores’, topping it off with an unsubtle thrust of the hips as if to suggest he might be skilled with his other supposedly manly blades.” Vivienne shuddered at the memory. “Too much insecurity, if you ask me.”

Llewellyn rolled his eyes.

“I’m surprised he actually survived your little excursion, considering how ill-prepared he seemed to be for the reality of what you were going to encounter. I’m not sure which cuts deeper, a fairy’s teeth or their daggers,”

“He survived?” was Vivienne curt response, and she looked out over the Strife towards the warehouses immediately downstream on the shores for which they were bound, signaling the end of that particular discussion. “That’s good to hear; I wasn’t sure he had managed to keep his sanity intact when I last saw him making amateurish and entirely ineffective warding signs in my direction.”

The last rays of the day’s sunlight pierced the narrow space between some buildings on the far shore and cut through the air to highlight Vivienne’s fire-touched hair, making the locks come to life as if they were more aflame than normal.

Llewellyn could see why men pursued his friend and sometimes partner. Not only was she naturally beautiful, but something about her self-assured certainty that she could overcome almost any obstacle she encountered and the wisdom to avoid those struggles that could not be won, was often the final ambrosia that made men drunk with desire. Nearly all of the men who had courted her thought Vivienne was a wild horse to be tamed and it was quite plain to Llewellyn that she would suffer no man who would try to quench that wildness and make her his object to be placed on a shelf.

He, himself, had no such desires – Vivienne was more a sister who happened to be unrelated by blood to him, and the idea that he could be intimate with her was as appalling as the waters upon which they now traveled.

Dark was quickly consuming the last remnants of daylight and the boatman paused with his poling and let the Strife carry the barge with a languid laziness downstream as he reached into his coat for steel and flint. “Wownt be much of a cruise if’nother boat like to strike us. ‘Scuse me while I light da lamps, y’ken,” he said as he made to light the oil lamps at both fore and aft of his humble vessel.

After he finished, Vivienne pulled him aside on the way back to the platform he worked his pole from. “I’ll tip you a half-sovereign if you douse those lights when we near our destination,” she said. She raised a hand to silence his protests before they began in earnest and added, “And I will cover the costs of replacement should any other boat sink this vessel,” which seemed to assuage the boatman’s concerns.

Llewellyn looked into the waters and thought he saw a severed hand connected to a forearm float past and was not certain that his own concerns had been salved nearly as well as the boatman’s had been. He remained unconvinced that any amount of gold could return him to health if they ended up taking an impromptu swim in the Strife that evening. He kept his thoughts to himself and asked a question more related to their present endeavors.

“I’m guessing our journey to the slaughterhouse district has little to do with restocking your larder, considering you could have easily sent for any fresh meats you might require, or you know, visited the local market like most persons of means might.”

“The astuteness of your observation is absolutely genius,” was Vivienne response and Llewellyn wasn’t certain if Vivienne intended the comment to be taken as a compliment or if to chide him for stating the obvious. Llewellyn chose not to pursue that particular line of inquiry and instead waited in the near silence of the water lapping against the punt until his companion decided to disclose more.

After a few moments, Vivienne turned away for the far shore to Llewellyn and made a small gesture with her hand to indicate that he should come closer. He looked to the boatman, who seemed focused on poling and navigation. Not sure how much Vivienne intended to make common knowledge, he chose to approach her as if he was seeking a better view of the far shore, choosing a perch close enough that they might be able to speak in something akin to a whisper, but far enough away from her to suggest that it might be anything but conversation they were sharing.

She continued to stare ahead, her elbows resting on the railing of the boat and without looking his way, began to talk in a low voice.

“You brought the kit that you and I developed for our standard work, I hope,” she asked. Llewellyn responded with a single nod that may or may not have been an affirmation during any normal discussion, but was easily recognised as such when the two held confidences with each other and then gently patted the outer part of his oiled leather greatcoat. He carried the kit in the various special padded pockets he’d sewn himself into the lining of the greatcoat, finding that those occasions he needed to carry the various vials, powders, unguents and basic alchymical tools often required an element of secrecy, something a toolbox more often than not failed to procure. Having the kit contained within his greatcoat also had the additional benefit of making it easier to run in pursuit, or escape, than a bulky wooden box would typically allow.

Vivienne took a few moments to extract a pair of flintlocks from the many folds of the lush bustled dress and inspected the powder in each pan ensure there was sufficient amount and that it hadn’t somehow been wetted in their journey to the punt and across the broad shallows of the Strife. Llewellyn was glad he’d opted to strap on his rapier earlier. As often as not, Vivienne’s escapades would eventually lead to events requiring the use of weaponry. While he preferred to the people who liked to fight do all of the fighting, his skin remaining intact was more imperative, and thought it wise to be prepared when Vivienne required his presence and skills of alchemy.

Vivienne turned slightly in his direction and explained in a confidential tone, “We’re performing Order business tonight, and this time they expect results. I wouldn’t put it past the grand-master to have this particular foray observed for compliance with our charter. It’s been implied that we’ve come under scrutiny for our handling of that affair back earlier this spring in Gran-on-Strife.”

Llewellyn failed to stifle a tired sigh. The laws of their charter were succinct and left little room for improvisation, but sometimes indiscriminate killing wasn’t always the best solution to a given problem. The two of them had been censored before for what had been perceived as incomplete work on their part and while both disagreed with the grand-master’s stance on how best to deal with their targets, Llewellyn had to concur they had not always lived up to the laws of Ceidwad Cŵn Annwn, a secret Order sworn to defending the country from the malefactors crossing the Caol Áit, the thin places betwixt and between, and visiting their depredations on the people of this world.

“We’re actually — believe it or no — going to work this fair summer evening.”

Wow! You made it to the end! Congrats.

Based on scant notes, I intended in 2015 to develop this into a full novella or a series of interlocking short stories about the “Ceidwad Cŵn Annwn”, or another secret order similarly named with similar goals. It was a running theme for me at the time to pit a secret order against some naughtiness just on the other side of the veil. Looking at this, this was actually one of the better thought-out attempts — the other “big” one had more extensive notes, but was fairly nebulous in the end goal. I should also note that that one had a protagonist named Llewellyn as well. I was quite taken by the name in the 2010s and will admit it is quite possibly what I would have named a son, had one come into my possession. But one has not and I have no intention of bringing one into this world, so I am free to go to town on naming all of my male characters Llewellyn, should it please.

If I were to revisit this piece, I’d probably redo some of the dialog, as it feels a bit stilted and I have far more practice at writing dialog ten years later. But, on a whole, it feels like it holds up and doesn’t feel too dated.

Constructive comments are always welcome.