[WFRP2e] The Power of One - Part 2 - "Transire Benefaciendo"

[BananaPhone]

Taalia Giovanni

You could take the girl out of the slave pits, but you couldn't take the slave pits out of the girl. Not entirely. That primitive, but entirely life-saving instincts for self-preservation and danger awareness, would never depart the shepardess, now matter how far she went in society. In the pits, death came quietly. Your fellow slaves didn't wait until you were active - they smothered you in your sleep.

It was with that understanding that Taalia's refusal to go back to sleep once she had been awakened by the scritch-scratching from downstairs could be better explained. Her body wanted to, but that little claw-like sounds eminating from the front door of the building might as well have been gunshots going off next to her head.

Silently, not wanting to wake Bella in case of a false alarm, Taalia slipped from her bed. Quietly, she grabbed one of her pistols and her sword and slowly tippie-toed down the stairs, carefully allocating her weight distribution to maximise her silence, as she drew herself near a shadowed corner from where she could view the interloper once they had succeeded.

The door handle would turn...turn...turn...the door would slowly open, the thief would wait a few moments to listen to the still night before entering quietly.

Click! the hammer on a pistol being drawn back and the schlink! of steel drawn from a scabbard, its beautiful blade shimmering whenever it caught the moonlight.

"Do not move."

She'd close the door with her body, shutting off the escape route.

"You had best make your explanation, phenomenally good..."