The Indigo Veil

Yet Another Short Story

“Why am I here?” he asked, letting his gaze spread around the room. “I have no idea who you people are.”

The hooded figure chuckled. “That is sort of the point, kid.” The speaker was a man, as far as he could tell, and his accent sounded… Arcadian? Maybe further south. Trybach? “But as for why you are here, I think you do know. Or did you think no one would notice your little charade in the marketplace today?”

“Marketplace?” He felt his stomach tighten. He had been so careful! “You must have me confused with someone else. I wasn’t there. I was fishing…”

“Fishing,” repeated the cloaked man. He was incredulous. “Catch anything?”

“Sadly, no. But you know what they say… they call it ‘fishing’, not ‘catching’...” he grinned his best disarming smile as his captors. He never saw the slap that backhanded across his face, and the taste of blood filled his mouth. He spat, and another came from the opposite direction. A slight groan escaped his now-bloody lips.

“Our friends in the marketplace rely on us to keep order,” continued the cloaked figure. “If petty thieves and scam artists are allowed to scurry about unchecked, it is bad for commerce. And bad for commerce means bad for the community. Bad for the community? Bad for all of Kosydar. Do you understand what I am getting at here?”

James looked up from the chair he was tied to and looked around the room again. Seven people in dark blue robes with hoods. No adornment. No visible faces, their hands all tucked into sleeves.

Fuck.

This was the Indigo Veil. He had always thought them to be a myth. A dark fairy tale to scare street urchins from following the Way of the Silent Hand. The stories always ended the same way: thieves and other “undesirables” simply disappeared. No body ever found, no hints to their whereabouts. It was just assumed they were either executed or sent off to the peat bogs across the Jimbro Straight to cut fuel until they dropped dead.

At least that's what the stories were. James had never actually known anyone who had disappeared like that. Any friends he had lost - and he had lost plenty - were either dead and sitting in an urn on their mother’s hearth, or were in the prison factory boiling hides and making bricks.

Another strike across his bruised cheek shook him out of thought. “I asked you a question, boy!” His assailant was irritated now.

“I assumed that was rhetorical,” he slurred through blood and spit. “Yes, I understand that the masters that hold your leash don’t like the common folk to make them look foolish. What is the old mantra? Don’t steal… the Merchants Guild hates competition?”

That earned him another slap, this time hard enough to make him see stars. “You’ve got balls, kid. I’ll give you that. Most in your position crumble and beg by now.”

“Can we cut to the part where you tell me what you want from me? I think we can skip the whole ‘I didn’t do anything’ shit, right? I got caught. There’s not going to be a trial, otherwise I would be in a Watch cell, not here.”

“Ballsy and smart. Good combination,” chuckled the hooded man. “Yeah, there’s no trial today. Our friends would like to make an example of you. A warning, if you will.”

“So… disappeared, then.” His insides churned. This was not how he wanted to go out.

Another voice interrupted. “If you just disappeared, who would notice? Who would care?” This one was female. Older, by the sound of her. Upper-class and likely raised in the courts of Kosydar. “What is one street rat missing to the citizens of our fair city? No, by the end of the week, everyone will know your name.”

“And that of your family,” added another voice, another man. Kandarian, from the sounds of it. “The citizens of Kosydar will be murmuring the name ‘Peroth’ for a generation as a warning to their children and grandchildren, and you can damn well be sure no mother or father will ever name their child ‘James’ again!”

James’ eyes widened. “This… this seems a bit extreme, don’t you think?!”

“Extreme?” The Arcadian laughed. “You stole from a visiting merchant captain, not to mention taking liberties with his daughter…”

“She was a willing participant… very willing, if we are being honest…”

“You destroyed Merchant Guild property…”

“That warehouse was a deathtrap and was completely unsafe…”

“But possibly most heinous of all, you left four of the Captain’s dogs dead from poison!” His accuser spat with contempt.

“Whoa wait what?!” James was wide-eyed. “I may be a lot of things, and gods know I'm no saint, but I would never harm a dog…”

“But a human…”

“Without blinking. Humans are terrible creatures. But animals are who they are. No malice. No deceit. No betrayal. Do whatever you must for my crimes, but I did not kill anyone’s dogs. Ever.”

The robed figures were silent, and James caught the movement of hands, fingers twisting and turning furiously as they turned from one to another.

“We believe you,” the Arcadian said finally. “And we are nothing if not fair arbiters of justice. Ultimately, minus the murder of the animals, your crimes are petty and frankly beneath us. So you will help us discover the guilty party.”