Perfect Silver

There was generous moonlight coming in through the circular window in the room when he woke up. It took him a moment, but Fin eventually remembered where he was and why. He was at the Inn of the Juncture in the modest town of Three Rivers, in a small wooden boxlike room that was not his own. He was here to purge the inn, to kill someone.

He sat up and turned to stare out across the rooftops of the city. Truly, it was a beautiful sight, the way the moonlight bathed everything in its silver-white glow, illuminating the darkness, the city becoming a clearly defined mass. It also made everything look the same. The houses all became silver, the rooftops merging together in their sameness. You could hardly tell where the road ended and the rivers that gave the city its name started. The only clearly defined object was the sky itself, as though the moon had spared it the cruelty of sameness.

Fin broke from his pondering and glanced at the loosely fitted door, glaring at how the light managed to squeeze its way through the cracks in the frame to intrude upon his dark beauty, a small stripe of yellow on a silver floor.

That stripe would be gone soon. A shadow would flow on the opposite side of the door, obscuring the light, and a man would walk into his modest room. The target. Fin wondered where he was. He'd slept on the man's bed as he waited, and wondered now whether he'd overslept and the man had seen him and fled.

But that was unlikely. The man would've likely slit his throat instead.

Fin glanced down at his bare feet, and the red blood now plastered to them. It was unfortunate that guard had come into the room and seen him. The puddle on the floor and corpse in the corner would be a pain in the ass for the innkeeper to clean.

Fin started leaning back in the bed, and paused to adjust his deep blue cloak when the shadow crossed the door and paused, blotting out the light. The room was perfect now. Well, except for the puddle, Fin thought. The door burst open and in came a burly man with a young woman in each arm giggling and fawning over him.

Faster than any of the three newcomers could react, Fin tucked and rolled in behind them slamming shut the door. He sprang out of his roll with a gleaming dagger in each hand and drew them across soft fleshy throats.

Suddenly there was only one newcomer.

Fin didn't spare a glance at the new corpses as he slowly circled around them to make his way back to the bed. His gaze was focused at the large man in front of him, who was now sweating and holding out a dagger in front of him.

"Who the hell are you?" He asked in a high-pitched shriek, not befitting his stature.

"I'd keep my voice down. You don't want the innkeeper to find you with all these corpses." Fin replied quietly.

"Who sent you?"

"Sent me?"

"To kill me."

"Oh, no one sent me." Fin paused and frowned. "You're a bad man."

"Do I know you?" The man asked.

"Do you know me?" Fin inquired as he tossed his dagger and caught the tip between his finger and thumb.

The man stepped back towards the door.

"I would stop there. You don't want your blood added to that puddle do you?"

The man glanced down and jumped at the now large puddle of blood he had stepped in.

"I've never even seen your face" The man replied.

"You are Mekhar, am I right?" The man paused, and then nodded. "I haven't seen yours either. Until now, that is."

"What do you want with me then? Who are you?"

"Who am I? I am Fin. I steal things."

"I have nothing for you to steal."

"But you do. I suppose you could say I am here to displace your soul."

"To murder me?"

"I dislike that term. I don't murder, I merely steal the last years of your life. Simple enough. Easiest job I ever had." Fin paused. "And you know why I've chosen to steal yours."

Mekhar made as if to say something, and then lunged with his dagger for Fin. Without rising from his sitting position, Fin shifted out of the daggers path, grabbed the wrist of the hand holding it, and twisted hard until the dagger fell from Mekhar's grasp.

Fin settled back into his spot and smiled. "Now that that's settled, we can do this."

Mekhar seemed to shrink. "Please don't kill me" he muttered pathetically.

"I'm sorry, but they keep telling me to get this over with. They don't like what you did with those children of yours. So there are two ways we can do this-"

Mekhar started. "Who told you?"

"Don't interrupt your choices. We can do it the way you don't want, which I must be honest with you, is what they want. Or-"

"Who's they?"

"Them. The people that tell me to do things. Don't interrupt please. Your other choice is to do it my way."

"Which is?"

"I let you sleep, and kill you then. It will be far more pleasant."

"What's the other way?"

"You try to run or jump out the window. And I cut your hamstrings, cut a few things. It makes a rather large puddle. I don't want to add to the innkeepers troubles." Fin shook his head, a grin creeping onto his face. "Four corpses... This night should've been much cleaner."

Mekhar paused and considered what he had seen and heard. He moved up to the bed. "Move" he said quietly to Fin.

"A wise choice my friend." He stood up and moved to the side, moving his hand into his cloak to feel the reassuring grip of his mace.

Mekhar lay down and closed his eyes. Somehow, he was not surprised by the lack of self pity he felt. Instead, his last thoughts as the mace flew down at his unsuspecting head were for the poor innkeeper, and the mess he'd soon have to clean.

* * *

Fin placed the mace back in its belt loop, and after admiring the fine circular pattern Mekhar's head had made, he turned and put his shoes on, concealing the sticky blood covering them.

He walked down the old wooden stairs of the inn and up to the counter beside a grumpy looking man, whom he smiled and nodded to while stealing a glance at the pouch on his belt, then leaned across and signalling the aged, grizzled looking innkeeper over.

"What're ya havin'?" The innkeeper inquired.

"Nothing for me thanks. I just thought I'd tell you I heard a fight upstairs that sounded kind of nasty. You might want to bring some people up with you to clean it up." He then slapped two gold coins on the table. "And this is will pay for my friend's next round of drinks here." He said, nodding to the man beside him.

"Thanks friend."

"You're quite welcome."

The innkeeper ambled away and signalled two tough looking guards to take a look up stairs. Fin stepped through the front door into the street and smiled at the feel of the gold coins he'd taken from the man who'd been sitting beside him. Someone had to pay for his services.

With the moon slowly fading, Fin walked down the silver lighted streets out of Three Rivers.