The Boys
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Weasel Strand snuck about around at dusk, followed along by the biggest boys he had. You could never bring enough strong lads with flexible morals and light purses. That was needed for this sort of job, she'd only described the man and explained where he might be on any given day. Gold had stalled any further questions.
"I want you to find this man and take anything from him that looks like a document, letter, or even just paper. Or whatever else you want." The smiling woman had said. That's all he had seen, the lower half of her face in the faint candlelight. She sat behind a storage crate she was using as a desk,"Do you understand?"
He did. He remembered her lips curling, teeth glinting red in the ruddy candlelight. "I'm glad we understand eachother."
One of his boys gestured with a meaty arm to the a figure strolling towards the Windpeak Inn. "That him?" Weasel gently pushed the mans arm down and extended his foldable telescope. "Yeah, that's him in'it? Well, it don't matter, we still got the coin if it ain't. Maybe we can take some off him too while we're at it." There was a light murmur of approval.
--
Five minutes later
Weasel and the remaining survivors of his boys fled. Weasel swore under his breath, "Fuck, fuck, fucking fuck." He had the papers in his hand, but that was little comfort. The man was chasing him last time he turned around and he hadn't checked to see if he were still following.
One of his boys looked to him, shouting, "He killed Willow and Blackard!"
Weasel swore again, then said with more cogience, "Shut your damn mouth and follow me." They all, Weasel and four other men, darted into an alleyway. He said, panting, "We gotta avoid the guards and get back to the woman. If we say she did it, we may come out of this with our heads still attached to our necks. And maybe if we're lucky, our asses still attached to our waists. You got me?" One man opened his mouth and Weasel stabbed him, fast and hard. The man sputtered, a silent scream leaving his mouth. The other men looked on in horror. Weasel released the man to the ground, hands covered in blood, staring the second toughest looking bastard in the eye, "You got me?!"
He returned to the docks, the location of the woman and his first meeting. He told his last three boys to wait outside, she had asked he come alone. As he came in, he was surprised to find she was already there. The lighting was similar. He was starting to think she had set the candles that way on purpose.
She smiled, "Are you here for my pleasant company, or do you have what I asked for?"
Weasel snorted, "I got it."
She said, flatly, "Give them to me."
Weasel laughed, "Why should I do that, when I could return the papers to Ashav, bring you to him, and steal what you plan to pay me?"
Her smile quickly turned into a frown of deep unhappiness, almost disappointment, "I really wouldn't suggest that."
He planted his hands on the damned crate she was using as a desk, one among many in the room, "Yeah, bitch, you wouldn't suggest that? What the fu-" and just like Raelyn thrust a hand forward, fish gutting knife flashing through the air then down. Weasels left hand was very quickly left pinned to the crate, blood seeping from where the blade met flesh. He stared at his twitching hand in disbelief, then wailed as the pain suddenly swept all the way through to his arm.
The woman sneered, her smile turning into clenched toothed menace, "Do you think I'm fucking stupid? You think I hired the smartest thug I could find, someone who I could trust? No, I hired the smallest, weakest, cowardly damn idiot with a thirst for gold!" She twisted the dagger, Weasel wailed through clenched teeth. She eventually released the dagger and Weasel stumbled back, staring at the new hole in his hand. He pointed at Raelyn with his good hand, "You crazy bitch, my boys are going to tear you apart in a minute!" He backed against the wall, reaching for his own knife.
She swung herself over the crate and he could see her unremarkable face. She laughed, "What boys? The men outside currently being accosted by the town guard? I told them a bunch of thugs who robbed Ashav would be here!" She wasn't lying either, if Weasel strained his ears he could hear the sounds of blades clashing.
Weasel blurted, waving his knife, "Stand back, or I'll cut that fucking smile out of you-" and suddenly her fist drove into his chest, then another fist to his face, then a firm embrace of his shoulders followed by a knee to his groin. He fell over, in utter agony.
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Raelyn looked at the writhing man below her and made one final curbstomp to his skull, ensuring he wouldn't be moving for a while. She breathed slowly in and out, panting. She needed to calm down, think things over. After a moment to catch her breath and gather the papers that Weasel had stolen, she calmly pried open the crate she had been using as a desk. She shoved Weasel into it, hammered it shut, and looked through a tiny peephole she had made in her temporary hideaway to see if the guards were still outside. They were not. She left, to search for a man with low enough moral scruples for what she had planned. Or at least didn't ask too many questions.
-----
She went about the Nord docks, heart a flutter. Would someone find the box? Would she be found out? No, there was no tie to the man. Other than the prisoners she had just gotten arrested or killed might speak of him. Maybe he knew what she looked like. She couldn't think about that, she had to find the shadiest looking man.
She spent some hours just looking for someone that wasn't a Nord. Nordic men were generally more scupulous, believing in honor and such. That wasn't what she needed. She needed someone who thought honor was just a word the soon to be dead spoke of. She eventually heard of a man who had once operated in the Dunmer slave trade, skin as black as his heart by pretending to care about a drunkard sailors ramblings about other ships and their bastard crew.
He said, voice raspy, "His skins as black as his heart it is! Redguard, through and through. Rat bastard used to trade in slaves before Red Mountain erupted! Sent him right angry, that, when he found his gold had blown too!" A smile sprung on Raelyns face that she didn't even have to force.
"Hellooooo" she sung.
The Redguard Ex-slave trader looked her over, "You some kind of jester?"
She paused at that, "No, I'm someone with a lot of gold." She waited for a response.
"I'm listening." he said.
"How would you feel about dumping a box into the middle of the ocean?"
He stared hard at her, "What's in the box?"
"Some Altmer memorabilia."
The man spat, "I'd almost do that for free!"
"Will you?"
"No.
--------
They were back in the storage room. Raelyn said, "Here's the crate. I need you to bring it out of eyesight of the shore, and dump it into the ocean, like I said."
The man nodded, rubbing his chin, "This can be done."
Raelyn gripped his hand and slid fifty septims into his palm, She said, "And if anyone asks about what is in the box."
Waylod said, "I don't know, check yourself."
Raelyn slipped another ten septims into his hand. He answered again, "That's none of your damn business."
She slipped ten more into his hand. "What box?"
She slipped ten more. "What is a box?"
She smiled, "A man after my own heart."
----
Several hours later, Waylod ordered his men to bring a specific crate from the hold and push it into the ocean. Before this was done though, he opened it. There was a man inside, possibly dead but he wasn't sure at this distance. He nearly wretched. That bitch said...well, there wasn't anything he could do about it now. He quickly shut the box before his first mate saw.
"What is it, Captain?" Romav said.
Waylod frowned, "Nothing. Get this off the side."
He watched it sink, bubbles forming as the water forced itself into the crate. Eventually the weight sunk it and he figured that was that. He wasn't sure how good he felt about it.
(Sevine doesn't count because she has DK)