Role

Chapter 9

In the dull of night by a lone candle, upstairs in a room next to the attic,
a Felar sits at a desk, trusting his thoughts to paper:

"I have tried this idea on myself as a dancer tries on a new outfit. I have
researched this most thoroughly. The ritual would be simple enough, a blood
sacrifice made of someone dear to me. And there's only one such person.

...We met here in the Inn. I was young, she probably even younger by her
people's standards. She was wary of me, but found we had things in common.
I'm sure she found me scary, and I reveled in that. Toying with another's
mind, a deal sweeter than the primal joy of hunt.

Little things added up to create a bond. We both had sight related trouble.
We both cared for the Inn's future. We knew how to have a good time telling
a story, and we both had keen interest in the happenings of the world. She
always looked past our differences, and I repaid with the same.

I should've been jealous, but I accepted her as High Herald."

He stares at the text and at his own ink-stained paw, and in the moonlight
it seems like blood. After a long pause, he picks the sheet and sets it on
fire on the candle, staring at it silently till the flame almost burns him.
Dusting off the ashes, he grabs a new sheet, writing down another line:

"Sometimes, a man has to make a stand. Sometimes, it kills him."