[Envinyatar]

Khaz left the palace at a run. It would take some time to put the ships and captains he wanted together, and he still had some obligations he needed to square away. A great many of the citizens had already been slain or detained at the warehouse prison on the docks. And there were some among them who were not completely averse to a new leadership taking over, seeing it as a chance to advance themselves and their fortunes. He smiled to himself, thinking on this. There was a little Corsair in every man’s heart, or so it seemed to him. It only needed the right temptation to bring it out.

These thoughts played through his mind as he and a band of ten Corsairs under his direction swept the western perimeter of the city, in the area of the main gates. The smoke was thick in the air from the still burning military ships in the harbor. Though luckily, the wind had changed and most of it was now blown out to sea.

They had reached the area of the gates, moving quietly through the shadows of the buildings. Khaz watched as small bands of citizens wandered aimlessly in the streets, dazed. None of them looked to be of any danger to the new regime, none were armed. He held his fist up, the signal to stop, and the band flattened itself against the shadowed wall.

An Elf, on horseback, had foolishly entered the city. He admired her for her unthinking bravery, and thanked the winds that she was so foolish as not to have drawn her arms. But then, he smiled, it would not have mattered anyway. He signaled to the men in the shadows across from him, then stepped out before her as she asked her question.

‘Does no one know?’ he heard her cry to the air. ‘What is it you wish to know, m’Lady?’ came his soft reply.

Before the words fell from her mouth, the two behind her had thrown their net, and pulled her from her horse, drawing the strong web close around her.

‘Secure her!’ he ordered, as his other men drove her horse with cudgels and swords from the area. ‘Take her to Yr Saldan. Perhaps he has use for an Elf.’