Prologue: An Easy Gig

1050 AA, Fourteen years ago

Vaine Koldan was on her way home from a job when she heard the screams, and everything became significantly more complicated. Tonight was supposed to be easy. A simple in-and-out gig, robbing some poor rich bastard for everything she could carry, then pawning it off at some fifteen shops across Kolgarde. Everything had gone smoothly. Without a hitch. A perfect, easy, simple gig.

She had scouted the place for days beforehand. A large townhouse tucked on the street corner, overlooking the harbor that led into the Radiant Sea. She knew nearly everything about the place without even stepping inside. The voices and echos allowed her to create a decent mental map, and while some corners were a bit fuzzy, she only needed to get a peek while everyone was asleep. She knew when the owner - some rich prick with a Valtresian name she couldn't pronounce - would be out of town on a business trip with his wife. They didn't have kids yet, but they had been decorating a nursery in preparation. The wife seemed a bit too old to be giving birth, but Vaine suspected that was what the mistress was for. That didn't matter. Vaine didn't care who or what the rich arsehole was sticking his dick in. She was here to get rich, not to learn the courting habits of old, Valtresian bureaucrats. 

Vaine decided to take the easy way in, through the front door in the middle of the day. None of the guards would be there. They wouldn't think that anyone would be idiotic enough to break in with the entire city watching. But if Vaine knew anything about the city, it was that the common people on the street haven't a damn to give about a random person entering a random door. As long as she looked natural going in and getting out, which she had sufficient practice in from her 18 years of life. Even if she had somehow failed to act natural, she had also learned that people only tend to care about things like that if they're getting paid, which the common folk are not. So, when she stepped up to the door and placed her hand against the lock, nobody gave her a second glance.

Vaine, in addition to being the best thief on this side of the Radiant, was a kineticrat. She didn't know exactly what that meant, as she wasn't one of the rich nobles who could attend the Academy, but it had something to do with the dead laws. Laws of physics, energy, or something like that. The specifics didn't matter at all. She knew how a lock worked, and that was all she needed to know. There was a shift in the air, then the click of a lock, and Vaine was inside.

It stank of wealth, of excess. Vaine couldn't help but feel disgusted as she looked around this rich arsehole's foyer. Extravagant baroque art ran up the walls to the ceiling, culminating in a chandelier that did nothing but add more clutter to this horrifically gaudy room. More money went into this room where people wiped the mud off of their feet than Vaine's family had ever had. Disgusting.

Vaine immediately set to prying the gold filigree off of the wall-mounted candelabras and lamps. The guards that roamed the halls of this place every night wouldn't notice, and it wasn't so valuable that the owners would start a manhunt to track down their stolen goods. The owners would care, of course, but they would take it more as an insult than an actual robbery. Hopefully, if Vaine did a good enough job, they wouldn't even notice anything was wrong until they got used to their significantly cleaner home.

Vaine continued, taking bits and pieces from just about every room she made her way into until something unexpected happened. She found herself standing in front of a room that she hadn't mapped out. Now, that was exciting. A door out in the open that a kineticrat couldn't sense opening or closing, that sounds wouldn't echo off of? Something important was behind this door. She went to open it, and her hand was on the knob before she thought better of it. If someone went through the trouble of making this room blind to kineticrats, they would go through the trouble of trapping it with some sort of alarm. She'd have to come back later, preferably with a crew to take the fall for her. She moved on and was out of the house by the time the sun touched the horizon and the first guard arrived to patrol the house. Quick and simple. The best gig one could have with a job like hers.

She took her time getting home, wandering the streets, and pawning off little bits of gold and brass at every store she came across. Now and then, she would duck into an alley and change her hair and clothes to avoid being recognized by anyone who had objected to her chosen profession in the past or who had bought goods from her. Those people would draw attention, and in this line of work, attention was bad. She held her head high as she walked past a group of lawbringers - aberrants from the Academy who had devoted themselves to enforcing the rules of society. She always found that idea a bit funny, and almost had to stifle a laugh as they meandered by her. They had a mastery over the broken laws, and they chose to become glorified city guards? Vaine was certain others had brought it up with lawbringers before, and was certain they got hospitalized for their ingenious sense of humor.

The group went on their merry way, and Vaine continued her journey to her hideout. It was in the bad half of Kolgarde, but she didn't much care about that at the moment. She had coin in her pocket, a full stomach from one of the more reputable street vendors, and the satisfaction of a job well done. For the first time in a long while, things were looking up.

Of course, that's when the screaming started, and Vaine buckled over in pain.

As a kineticrat, Vaine Koldan was not only able to influence the energy and movement of the world around her, but also heighten her sense of said energy. In this quiet street, she had begun focusing on detecting whether anyone was following her. She had foolishly altered the laws of reality to essentially make her entire body a tuning fork capable of detecting the slightest vibrations. Now, the bloodcurdling sounds from an argument gone violent pulsed through her body. For the split second before she could stop the noises from reaching her, it felt as though every fiber of her being was being torn apart. As though she were at the epicenter of an earthquake. As though she were the epicenter. She fell to her knees, and her instincts allowed her to pinpoint where the horrendous sound was coming from. The house just to her right. No, "house" was too kind a word. The echoes indicated only three rooms, small, even for this side of town. An entryway, which she could tell by the vibrations that matched the patterns of coats and shoes. One of the rooms was muffled - that would be the bedroom, likely lined with blankets to help keep noise out. The final room, likely a kitchen of some kind, is where the noise came from. Vaine stood up, looking over at the house with a scowl on her face. She muttered under her breath. "Pricks. Keep it down, will you?"

As if in direct disobedience of her command, a third and fourth voice were added to the scuffle. These belonged to children, screaming and crying as who Vaine suspected were their parents yelled at each other. Fuck this. Vaine had been around town enough to know not to get involved in familial drama, and she wasn't going to start now. She turned to walk away, still breathing heavily from the shock and pain, when the situation got infinitely worse. A shockwave rippled from the house, rattling her ribs even without her heightened detection. Shrapnel and debris from what had once been a little hovel flew towards her. She was able to reach out and alter their velocity enough so she wouldn't be sliced apart, but she felt enough resistance to determine what caused it. An aberrant. A kineticrat like her. One that hadn't been discovered and taken by the lawbringers. She was in so much shock that it took her a good few seconds to hear the screams again. Only one voice this time. One of the kids.

Shit. Shit. Shit shit shit shit shit shit shit fuck shit.

Vaine ran to the now-ruined hovel, pushing against the waves - and the instincts - that told her to run in the other direction. She was not about to let children get killed by an angry parent over a few strong words. She pushed through, muscles and mind straining against the sheer power emanating from this place. She pulled a dagger from her belt, ready to slit some bastard's throat. She stumbled up to the ruined brick and sheet metal wall and peeked her head around the corner. The sight was enough to make her wish she hadn't eaten just before this. 

Blood stained every surface that hadn't been decimated by the blast. Bits of flesh and bone clung to the remaining walls and ceiling. Two corpses, both adult, were pinned to the, not by the various kitchen implements and furniture that pierced their bodies, but by the force of the continuous explosion. Another bloody streak pointed in the opposite direction, and... by the gods. Vaine didn't want to think what had happened. She looked to the center of the room and dropped her knife. It went flying away, but Vaine didn't care. It was a good knife, but that didn't matter anymore.

It was a child. The aberrant was a child, a little girl, no more than four years old. She was dressed in a dirty shift dress, barefoot, with matted brown hair. Her face was stained with dirt and tears, her mouth wide open as she cried in both pain and terror. Vaine took a deep breath and began walking towards her, pushing against the expanding blast. She couldn't let the lawbringers get to her. They would imprison her, execute her, or worse...

She pushed out, isolating the rhythm of the vibrations that the child emitted from her screams. She matched them with their opposites and then strengthened them. Slowly but surely, the vibrations lessened before being canceled out altogether. Thank Eiud that worked.

The girl was still crying. Her voice had gone hoarse, and now all she could do was sob and hiccup. Vaine knelt and hugged her, whispering in her ear, trying to calm her down. "It's okay. It's okay. I'm here. I have you."

She didn't stop crying, but after a minute or two, she had slowed enough to make a few words. "Wh... what happened? Where's mommy? Where's..."

Vaine shushed her. "It's okay. Your mom and dad have to go away for a while." It broke Vaine's heart to lie to the girl, but what was she to do? Tell her that she killed her parents, her baby sibling, and that there wasn't enough left of any of them to bury? "I'm going to pick you up now and take you someplace warm, someplace safe. I need you to close your eyes, okay?"

The girl sobbed again and wiped her nose on Vaine's shoulder. She could feel her nodding, and a tiny hand went up to her eyes.

Vaine picked her up, and the girl pressed her head into her. "I'm just gonna ask you some questions, okay? I'd like to know who I'm taking care of for a while. Can you tell me your name?" 

The girl sobbed again, then nodded. She took another breath and gulped, trying to soothe her cracked voice. "I'm... Calliope. Mum calls me Cali."

"That's a very pretty name, Cali." Vaine stumbled out of the hovel and looked around. No lawbringers here yet, if they would ever show up. Good. "Would you like anything to eat, Cali?" She felt the young girl nod her head. "Good. Let's get you taken care of."

So much for a perfect, easy, simple gig.