Songbird: What it Means to be the Hero

{-Seldir-}

Their purpose for being here boiled down to getting information; all they needed was to know if Mira was here, and where they could find her. The only point where they’d need to resort to any kind of force would be if someone clearly knew something, but didn’t say.

Which, suffice to say, was nearly the exact opposite of what Rennyn was doing. He wasn’t outright antagonizing anyone—if not just because the few that were there usually noticed them and fled—but he had the same kind of expression of someone who thought these people had just killed his parents. A weird way to approach mercenaries he didn’t even think were important enough to check on first…

Then again, it was clear enough that his mind was all over the place. All it meant was that Seldir had to keep an eye on not just Lyrei and Noa, but Rennyn, too, to keep him from doing anything stupid.

It was a good thing, then, that these mercenaries—or “bandits,” as their hideout tried to sell them as—broke pretty easily.

All Rennyn had to do was walk up to one of them before they were able to get away, grab their arm to keep them from running, and remark, “I think you can figure out why we’re here.”

“I—I swear I don’t know anything that you want to know!” the mercenary quickly stammered. “The boss warned us about you—you’re the guys that Merith got to try to find Mira again, right? Well, I swear, that’s the only thing I know! All he told us was to let him know when you showed up. I don’t have any more information for you.”

“I think you know enough that you can tell us something, at least. Who’s this boss of yours? Is he already on his way here?”

Recognizing that, no matter what, the mercenary was going to answer, Seldir put a hand on Rennyn’s shoulder to try to signal him to ease up a bit. At this rate, it appeared that they were the bad guys, and that wasn’t exactly a good look for the heroes. Rennyn only seemed to half-acknowledge what Seldir was trying to do, though, as he did stop gripping onto the mercenary’s arm, but he still kept a rather tight hold on his sword.

“I can’t tell you much about the boss,” the mercenary continued cautiously. “To be honest, I don’t know a lot, either. He doesn’t show his face around unless there’s something really important. I’m pretty sure I’ve never even been told his name. But, I can say for certain that he’s on his way now. That’s probably part of the reason why everyone else ran—was to tell him. That, and you’re really scary, what with that big sword and your scowl…”

“I don’t think that’s really all you know, so let me repeat myself. Who is your boss?”

Seldir stepped up, taking the risk of pushing Rennyn back a little. “I’m pretty sure this guy isn’t lying about it,” Seldir pointed out. “He just seems like one of many lackeys. Those kind of people aren’t told anything, for various reasons, some of which are pretty similar to this situation. Except for the fact that, right now, you’re definitely acting more like a threat than anyone here is.”

Rennyn mumbled something that was either an excuse or an apology, then turned his attention back to the mercenary. “This leader of yours. Is he going to know what you don’t?”

“Definitely. He’s the one in charge of everything—if anyone’s going to be able to tell you anything, it’s him. Just stick around here long enough, and he’ll come and find you. I have to warn you, though… it’s usually not considered a smart idea to go and seek someone like that out. He’s not going to make the information easy to come by.”

“Well, luckily for us, we’re not the kind of people who are easy to mess with, either.” He gestured back towards one of the hallways. “Go on and get out of here. Tell your boss that we’ll be waiting.”

Though surprised at first, the mercenary nodded, then darted off and out of sight.

Rennyn glanced at Seldir. “Be sure to keep an eye on the others. We’ve got to be ready for anything.”

“And you’re sure you don’t want me to bring them back?” Seldir prompted. He almost didn’t want to ask, because he was nearly prepared for the answer to be yes, which was just going to carry a whole different set of problems.

Thankfully, however, Rennyn shook his head. “I might need some backup if things get bad, and I don’t want the others to be left alone.”

Seldir dared to hope that Rennyn had actually learned something about going to fight all of those other monsters on his own…

Even if it seemed to be more to himself than the others, Noa offered, “We’re not going to get in your way.”

“Let’s just keep moving,” Rennyn siad. “We’ve got to figure out who’s the boss of this place and what he knows. At this point, the only thing we have to worry about is finding Lady Mira, and that’s exactly what we’re going to figure out.”

So, they kept walking. The further in they got, the less mercenaries ran away—since, well, there weren’t as many mercenaries in those areas anyway. It made sense; at that point, nearly everyone in the hideout must’ve known that the five of them were here. Or… maybe there really weren’t as many people here as they were supposed to believe. Somehow, Seldir was beginning to get the feeling that all of those people in the beginning were the only people there’d be to find. But unlikely for those mercenaries, the five of them weren’t going to be deterred by them, so the truth of the matter—that there was barely anyone here—became clearer and clearer as they walked.

He was beginning to think that they were going to walk out the other end of it when someone casually wandered up in front of them. This wasn’t just another one of the mercenaries; this was someone who had real power, and real authority… at least within this place.

This was their leader.

“So, you’re the five kids I’ve heard so much about,” the leader remarked with a smirk. There was something else to it, though—a mix of annoyance and uncertainty. Perhaps he wasn’t quite as formidable as his underlings made him out to be? “If you don’t want any trouble, then I’d advise you to leave now. I might just go easy on you then.”

Rennyn wasn’t even fazed. “We have good reason to believe that you know where Lady Mira is. Whether you do or you don’t, I’d advise you to be honest.”

Seldir casually remarked, “You should probably listen to him. He’s more skilled than he looks and I don’t exactly consider him someone with endless patience. I’m only going to stop him if you can honestly say that you have no idea what we’re talking about, which I don’t think you can.”

Surprisingly, the leader only half-tried to defy them anyway. “Was Merith the one who sent you?”

“Since I don’t see a purpose in hiding that, yes,” Rennyn responded simply. “And if that does anything but make you more willing to talk, then you might want to think again.”

The leader sighed. “Fine, I understand that you might not be someone I want to mess with. Or, at least, I didn’t get paid enough to have to deal with this kind of thing. So, I’ll just be honest: when I signed up for this whole thing, I knew exactly what I was going to be responsible for. But I didn’t realize that there’d be people who would try to correct what I did.”

“And for clarification purposes, care to say exactly what you were paid to do?”

“My boys and I were supposed to take Mira from the castle to another spot. It’s all a part of some political conflict going on with the throne or something—I don’t know the specifics, all I know is that Merith wanted Mira out of the picture. He’d told us that he was going to bring her back after a little while, since leaving her here was only going to make more problems than it was worth, but I figured it would be more of a ‘okay, time to let some soldiers come in.’ Not…”

When he trailed off, Lyrei responded, “Not five kids coming in and barging through the place?”

“Yeah,” the leader mumbled. “Not that.”

“But Lady Mira is here,” Kaylin prompted calmly. “As in, you know where she is? This is the right place to be looking?”

The leader almost seemed ready to break, but he didn’t. Instead, he must’ve realized what he was getting paid to do, and he crossed his arms. “I admit to knowing, but you’re going to have to try a little harder to get that kind of information out of me. I’m smarter than to listen to all of your complaints just to have one hell of a time talking to the guy who’s actually paying me.”

Rennyn took one step closer and, though not without a moment of deliberation, Seldir let him. Slowly, Rennyn hissed, “Tell us where to find Lady Mira. We’re bringing her home.”