Chapter 3-Globe of Ban'helai

Chapter 3

A man sits alone in a small room. The one door from the hallway opens into a room that is approximately twelve feet wide and fifteen feet long, furnished with simple furniture, a bed, a small bedside table, a wardrobe cabinet and a fairly good sized table with two chairs. On the opposite wall hangs a window that offers a pleasant view of the city and the river that rushes pass just outside the city wall. The room is one of a dozen or so that make up the second floor of this building, all of which are occupied. Some of the other guests have added better quality furnishings and all have decorated their rooms with keepsakes from home and personal items. The man in this room is not like the others. His room is Spartan and one would be hard pressed to figure out where this man calls home from a tour of his room. The only thing of significance in the entire room is a large map spread across the main table. The map displays the entire known world. Scattered, for no apparent reason on top of the map, are a handful of ordinary looking pebbles. It is late afternoon and the shadows begin to fill the room, so the man lights the oil lamps that adorn the walls. He had earlier pulled the bedside table close to the map and had placed a unique lamp on it. The lamp had the normal base of an oil lantern, but added to all four sides, just above the flame were four highly polished three inch long metal plates. These plates were attached at such an angle, that when the lamp was lit, the light hit the plates and cast off a more brilliant glow. Returning to the tables, he lights this lamp and retakes his seat before the map.
So engrossed is he in his study of the map that it takes four attempts of loud knocking before he is aware that he has company.
“Enter,” he calls out.
A tall, fair skinned, human enters the room clad in a chain mail shirt, black leather pants, black leather boots, and a dark blue cloak. Walking with the stride of a confident warrior, he carries his six foot long spike with him into the room.
“You have a visitor, sir,” the guard announces.
Without moving his gaze from the map, the man behind the table says in a tone dripping with rebuke, “I thought my instructions were clear, Borban. I am not to be disturbed.”
“Yes, sir,” the guard replies, “your order was clear, but this visitor is most insistent. Also, this morning I heard you asking for this visitor, mentioning that she was overdue in reporting to you.”
As soon as the last sentence left his lips, Borban knew he had made a critical mistake.
The man behind the table stood quickly and fixed a hard glare at the guard.
“So, now, your duties include listening to my conversations, do they?”
“Uh…no, sir…I…uh...was just…,” the guard stammered, trying to explain himself when the man behind the table cut him off.
“Silence! I will deal with your error momentarily. Tell me who this visitor is.”
“It is Flit, sir,” the guard informed in a much subdued voice.
“Ah, yes, Flit, Send her in and then go and bring Iltor to me.”
At the mention of Iltor, Borban’s expression changed dramatically. He went from looking like a hardened soldier to looking like a ten year old boy facing down a pack of war wolves. Terror was not simply written on his face, terror was the very fabric of it.
“Don’t just stand there, do as you are told. I wouldn’t want to have to add more subjects for Iltor to address with you,” the man behind the table barked.
As the guard scrambled out the door, the man returned to his seat. He was playing with the pendent on his necklace, which seemed to have a calming effect on his facial expressions, when Flit entered the room.

No footfalls betrayed Flit’s entrance into the room, as a mater of fact, the only sound preceding her, was a soft whirring sound. The man behind the table smiled as he watched Flit enter. He always enjoyed the way she moved. Flit flew into the room about five feet from the floor. She darted about, not with aimless movement, but with the steps of a dance with an unseen partner. It was as if she were dancing with the very air. She waltzed with the air for a minute or two and then lit on the back of the chair opposite the man behind the table.
“Did you miss me, my friend?” Flit asked, her four wings making an almost melodic sound as they beat quickly.
“We will speak in your language for now.” The man instructed.
He thought that the similarities Flit bore to her animal kin, the dragonfly, were remarkable. She was about twice the size of a dragonfly, almost one foot long. Her body, wings and head were proportionate to that size, but in keeping with a dragonfly’s basic body make-up. Her coloring was beautiful, a sleek jet black tail ending in a gold tip, her body and head were various shades of red and black and her wings, shimmering, translucent silver. Unlike the dragonfly, her wings were not only a flight necessity, but they were a protective devise. Their apparent flimsy look belied the reality that a drakonfluer’s wings were one of the hardest substances known. If one was able to kill a drakonfluer, not a task many creatures accomplished, the wings proved not only a good luck charm, but a welcomed addition to any armor.
“Very well, if you think you can keep up, my language is not for the tongue of many earth-walkers. They are such slow-tongued creatures.” Flit responded with a snicker, although the whole exchange sounded more like an impatient person tapping on a table.
“You will find that I am unlike any earth-walker you have ever met, my swift friend.”
The man behind the table leaned back a little in his chair, not to be more at ease, but to focus more on Flit. He had engaged the services of this drakonfluer soon after arriving in this town. Drakonfluers serve one basic purpose in the civilized world. They are messengers. Twenty years ago, the head of the Council of Twelve, Ban’helai of Arnavenia met Flaze Duskdarter, leader of a clan of drakonfluers living near the Council’s town. Learning of the drakonfluer’s ability to learn languages and appreciating their amazing speed, he asked Flaze to join the Council of Twelve and be their official messenger, a post of both honor and great responsibility. Flaze accepted immediately, recruiting the rest of his clan to serve as the core of the Council’s Messengers. Since then, drakonfluers of different clans have joined the Council’s Messengers, while others serve individuals. Flit is of the Flaze clan, but refused to join the Council’s Messengers, wanting the freedom to do as she pleased and right now it pleased her to help this man.
“Do you what day it is?” the man behind the desk asked with a hint of displeasure.
“Is that honeysuckle, I smell? I believe it is. A very good choice, though it smells a bit overripe, of course that can’t be avoided now, can it? But I guess it will serve your purpose better than the lilac scent you were using when I left you.” Flit needled.
“Your purpose here is not to critique my choice of scent. You do know that you are three days late in reporting.’
“Honeysuckle really is the best choice I believe. It’s strong enough to mask…oops, I mean compliment any other scent that might be present while still being pleasant to experience. You really should stay with the honeysuckle.”
No one that knew the man behind the desk would have dared ignore his questions, much less insult or rib him, but Flit was not like anyone else and she knew that while the man behind the desk brooked no insubordination, he enjoyed her little needling, or at least tolerated it.
“Are you quite done, my dear Flit? Do you need more time, perhaps you would like to comment on my decorating skills?”
‘Oh don’t get me started on that, you have less sense of décor than a millworm.”
Neither spoke for a minute after that, Flit savoring the ribbing and the man behind the desk merely waiting for the report that he knew she was now ready to give him.
“Your friends are sometimes too thorough and then sometimes they are wholly ineffective.”
The man behind the desk folded his arms over his chest and shot her an exasperated look.
“Don’t get all excited, big guy. I will give this report the way I want and you will just have to live with that.”
Flit paused a moment, not liking the look on the man’s face. On he surface, it was the same, ‘Oh, get on with it already’ look he always gave her, which she enjoyed. But beneath the surface, there was a clear look that told her that this earth-walker would only tolerate so much nonsense and defiance and she was too close.
“The group you sent to the Boknor area was too thorough. They totally destroyed that little marsh Halfling village, but left no one alive to tell the tale. What a waste of destruction.”
“Where are they now?” the man questioned her, apparently not as upset as she thought he would be.
“They’re twelve miles south of Boknor. They’ve avoided Boknor so far, as they’re still just ten creatures. They’re looking for other fun things to destroy. Perhaps you should remind them of their true mission.”
“Allow me to deal with my friends actions. You stick to your mission.’
“The group you sent to Kairn’s Keep has met with a slight set back.”
“A slight set back?”
“Well, more of a total defeat.’
“What?” the man sat straight up in his chair, “What happened?”
“Seems that while they were having fun with that family of orcs the dwarfs have befriended, they met some dwarfs that didn’t like the way they were having fun. Three dwarfs, I think a father and his sons, wiped out all five of your buddies. What magnificent fighters those dwarfs were, and the weapon the father used was amazing, some kind of hammer that he could throw and swing around. What a mess he made of those guys…”
“Jocknor’s son, that meddlesome dwarf!” the man bellowed as he sprang to his feet, sending his chair sprawling on the floor behind him and causing the pebbles on the table to jump into the air as he smashed his fist onto the table.
Flit dashed off her perch as soon as she saw his anger rise. She was hovering a few feet away from the table now, amazed at his anger. He was livid and the honeysuckle scent had curdled with the rise of his fury.
Almost as if he had thrown off a dirty coat, the man behind the desk regained his composure. He picked his chair back up, stroked his pendent and sat back down.
“Forgive me, my dear Flit. I apologize for my outburst. It was most unbecoming. I just don’t like dwarfs and when they stick their noses where they don’t belong, it irks me.”
Flit waited a minute more before returning to her chair, not believing for a minute that that was a momentary outburst or that he was as calm as his words tried to convey. Flit was convinced that this was one earth-walker to be wary of. She also knew that while no earth-walker could hope to catch a wary drakonfluer, this earth-walker just might be an exception.
“Do you have anything more to report?” The man asked with a forced restraint in his voice.
Flit hesitated; she knew that he was not going to like what she saw at the end of the fight. There was something not quite right with his friends. She had no explanation for what the last attacker had become right before its death, but she knew that this would set the man behind the desk off even more if she told him. She chose to omit that detail and simply tell him that she had left when she saw that the battle was over.
“You need to go back to Kairn’s Keep. I need to know what that bothersome dwarf has done with my friends’ remains, and what he plans to do about the attack. Take someone with you that you trust, send them back with the report and you stay with that dwarf. I want to know everything he does. Follow him into the Keep if you have to, but I want to know everything.”
Flit had never seen such intensity on the man’s face before. She was beginning to regret choosing this man as an employer, but she would see this through.
“I will take my brother, Dar.”
“Go now, do not delay.”
As Flit started for the door, the man said with an icy calm, “I am depending on you, Flit. You would be wise not to let me down.”
Flit vowed that this was the last time she worked for this man as she passed a 7’ tall Minotaur and a squeamish-looking human approach the door. She was barely passed those two when she heard the man behind the desk say in disturbing voice, “Now, this will make me feel better.” Then the door to his room slammed shut.