The Stilwell Girl
- --by Silverdawn
"His crime? What do you mean 'his crime'? Martin Brun and his brothers are Defias. Defias are bandits, Sophia. This isn't enough for you?"
Sophia lowered her eyes to the table, brushing aside black tufts of directionless hair from her face as her absent gaze scanned the aged map of Westfall sprawled open on dusty parchment, set alight by the fickle sputters of a thick old candle that wheezed a rancid smoke. Gryan Stoutmantle was a man of soldierly austerity. He found a sturdy comfort in the massive stone walls and stiff straw floors of the militia towers, a taste Sophia Stilwell suspected was ingrained in his ruthless manner. But such was the nature of her task.
"I know Martin Brun. He's a hard worker. His farm doesn't make much but he provides. You're sure about this?" Gryan's scarred upper lip twisted into a scowl beneath his ashen whiskers.
"I'm positive. This is how these masks operate. They blend in, surround us, pluck us out one by one. One farmstead's gone, then another." Sophia closed her eyes, her brow tensing underneath beads of sweat. "So we hit them before they hit us. Terrify them, keep the masks along the edges where we can watch them." Gryan dragged rough fingernails through the gray wires of a heavy beard, tugging at them with his knuckles. "Don't lose your will. Remember what they did to Caius."
She opened her eyes sharply, leatherbound fist squeezing the hilt of a blade at her waist. Caius Stilwell was a good father. Be upright or be made upright, he said, before falling fictim to that paradox of fate which dictates, with no sympathy nor ear for mercy, that terrible things should happen to good people who were at the wrong place at the wrong time. She never forgot what the masks did to him. Young, brash masks, breath lurid with power and ale. Little Sophia watched from beneath the straw bed as his life bled across the floor planks in a trembling scarlet haze, unable to look away, or blink. Just watching with frozen eyes.
"I've never forgotten." Sophia's eyes narrowed, boring deep into Gryan's own with such intensity as to make him flinch from impact. He flared his nostrils and glanced away for just a moment. "Good. Then don't forget our agreement either. Do this, Sophia, and I'll pardon the Stilwell debts and your father's funeral costs."
Ever since the night red masks murdered Caius open, Sophia had discovered within herself an inability to flee from terror, to cover her eyes, to look away or to scream. Her hate was a noise, one that drowned all sense of fear and reason, instead creating within her an inescapable urgency to strike, to do unto others as they have done unto oneself.
She slammed her blade into the table, digging the knife's point into a small red X marked Brun Farmstead. The edge quivered within a veil of thick candlesmoke, shivering, this way, that way.
Sunset turned the meager Brum Farmstead amber, the last rays of dusk casting smoky illuminations across the wooden home of Martin Brum, farmhand, redmask and traitor. Sophia never waited until night had escaped free from the suspensions of twilight and enveloped Westfall. She moved and struck when the day was exhaling.
Martin Brum was not expecting company tonight, so the knock at his door came as a surprise. "Just a moment, I'm at supper!"
She stood with an ascetic's patience. Sophia came as she was. The frayed edge of a grand straw hat shaded her eyes, severing her lips from her chin with a veil of shadow. Her arms rested languidly at her sides beneath a long, simple shawl of rough brown wool that wrapped along her shoulders and draped well past her waist. Martin opened the door, wiping his lips clean with a stained towel, his overalls still dirty from labor. The young man had a perceptive look in his eyes, but Sophia merely smiled, curtseying lightly with her feet. "Something you need, miss?"
"I'm a traveler, on my way to Stormwind. I have no horse. There is no water in westfall." Sophia's voice was quiet and soft, both bare hands outstretched infront of a bewildered Martin. Her hands bore no scars and she had soft fingers. Sophia never believed herself to be an actress or a liar. When she arrived infront of the Martins' door, the garb of a pauper was not a means of deception. She did not reflect on her situation. There was no mental rehearsal of this execution. Just outstretched hands.
Martin was silent for some time, scratching the back of his head in hesitation. "Lady, nobody in Westfall really has much left to give in charity. Maybe if you asked Stoutmantle and his militia but..." He squinted his eyes to peer at the small tower sitting upon the old hill far towards the horizon as he polished the side of a dusty flask of amber ale. "...but that's a long way to walk, I guess. Alright just...just come in. I can get you some water."
Her foot creaked against the floorboards. He led her around a narrow walkway to a meager kitchen where a small stone stove smoldered with the remains of supper's coals. She kept her eyes to the ground, still hidden underneath the straw hat. When he filled a small tankard with crisp water for her, she brought it to her lips to wet it and placed it quietly on the table beside her. Outside, twilight had faded from the horizon. Slender beams of amber light receded from the slits of the window blinds, cloaking the farmstead in night. "You're Martin Brun."
Martin paused, eyes narrowed. He turned at his feet. She slipped a knife out from beneath her cloak. Its white blade stretched from the pommel at her thumb, curving into a slender hook. "You...Gryan sent--"
Sophia Stilwell closed the distance in a breath's time. She rushed, swift as a trail of silk. Her straw hat fluttered from her head, revealing her mess of ebon locks and cold, sharp blue eyes, her face inches from his, both fists pressed against Martin's choked ribs, until she could hear them snap beneath the pressure of the pommel and a foot of steel. "This is for Caius Stilwell." She whispered, his eyes white and wide, jaw trembling as his hands struggled to reach for her. Once again Sophia heard the noise screaming inside her. She pulled the scarlet daggers from his chest as he fell into a crumpled heap, red pooling on the floorboards beneath him.
Sophia bent to pick up her straw hat, and upon lifting it back onto her head, listened as Henry Brun rushed downstairs, having heard the noise. She had expected him, pale with horror and fury. Before he could react, she rushed, her feet striking the floor three times, terminating with a choked scream, slashing with her wrist across his throat. One more. Luc Brun. She repeated his name in a whisper within her mind, rushing up the stairs. Her heel kicked the door open, snapping the wood at the lock, and found Luc Brun huddled underneath the straw bed, stifling his sobs.
He was a boy of six or seven, face slick with tears and sweat. Sophia felt her breath choke within her lungs, standing paralyzed, unable to escape the sudden judgement thrust upon her, and finding herself forced to confront the reality her bloody, furious noise had left in its merciless wake. Brun farmstead sank into the night when she left, and her footsteps along with it. Blinded by the inescapable truth in the boy's eyes, staggering along to the watchtower in the chill of pale moonlight, her sleeves soaked in blood, the assassin known as Sophia Stilwell dropped her daggers onto the grass and sank to her knees.
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