Requiem for the Lost Ones

[Ran Yoko]

REQUIEM FOR THE LOST ONES--PART 1--SURVIVOR

 

People say that revenge does nothing but eat away at you. But not all revenge means killing someone.

 

Jala inwardly smiled as she surveyed the building from her perch in the huge oak tree. Despite her warning letter, there was only a handful of guards around Torneo's mansion.

Still, as it was Torneo, she had better expect a lot of traps. Just thinking the man's name gave her the feeling of bile rising in her throat. She swallowed hard and forced herself to think of more important matters.

She stiffened as two guards wandered over to under the tree. She wondered what they were deep in discussion about, but knew better than to climb down. Even if it was around the midnight hour, she had no wish to draw unnecessary attention to herself.

She silently slid her hand into her pocket to make sure that the grappling hook was still there. Her 'work uniform' was black pants and a thick long-sleeved shirt with a hood pulled up over her short reddish-brown hair. The high, loose neck of her shirt made a good mask when pulled up over her nose. Gloves and clf-skin boots completed it.

Her dark green eyes watched the guards make their way back to the main gate. She waited until they had gotten there before slowly stretching her cramped legs and arms, one at a time. She smiled as she stood carefully and, pressing her small, wiry body to the tree, began to climb.

The tree stood near the edge of the large stone mansion. A high wall was around the estate, leaving room for several yards of well-kept grounds. A fountain was near the tree, a statue of the Water Guardian, Korimizu, in the center of it. Korimizu's steed, a water dragon, was rearing up with the Guardian riding on its back, and the water trickled out of the dragon's mouth into the basin below.

Jala reached the top of the tree in record time, and cautiously crawled out a ways onto a thick limb. After making sure no guards were around, she pulled out the grappling hook. Letting it out on a length of rope, she threw it into the air.

The clack of the grappling hook on the roof was muffled, still she waited several moments before tugging the rope to make sure it was secure. She jumped off the tree limb and soared out into open space, her legs stretched out in front of her.

Her boots made little sound as they hit the stone wall. Waiting a moment for the pain to recede, Jala started to climb the rope. She got to the third floor and checked to see if the room was completely empty. Judging from the amount of dust, it was probably a guest room that hadn't been used in quite a while.

She pulled from her pouch a rolled-up piece of paper and stuck the corner edge of it to the corner of the small window pane. She unrolled it with one hand, making sure that every part of it was flat against the glass. Giving each corner of the pane a sharp tap, she peeled the paper off. Stuck to the sticky mixture coating the one side of the paper was the glass shards from the window pane.

Reaching through the empty pane, she unlatched the window and carefully swung it open. She stepped inside and, with a expert flick of her wrist, dislodged the grappling hook and coiled the rope up again, returning it to her pocket.

She closed the window almost completely, and took a deep breath. "Just forget about whose house this is," she thought. "Only focus on getting the gem."

She made her way slowly across the room and into the hall, taking care that none of the floorboards creaked under her weight. Once in the hall, she turned left. At the end of the hall was a magnificent picture of a unicorn. It stood under a cascading waterfall, it's horn turning the water into a rainbow of colors. It was large and almost as tall as the wall.

Jala carefully tapped the picture's sides, right where they connected to the frame. Feeling a slight movement on the left side, she pushed hard. The left side of the picture swung in and the right side swung out, revealing a huge treasure room behind the picture.