I bet you’re wondering how long this Kinslayer Chronicle can go for? If you’re asking that quest, then you don’t know me very well.

Chapter 7 – Intermission

He stopped his narration. At first the Chronicler thought maybe he was pausing for effect or catching his breath. But as the moment extended, he looked up to find Koudi staring at his dark black walls with their rusted weapons. He refused to face the Chronicler and his eyes seemed to glimmer in the light filtering in from the window. The Chronicler turned to his notes, scanning quickly over what he’d just written.

Truthfully, he paid little attention to the details of his clients. Once he began writing, he got lost in their voices. His mind worked the syllables and messages into the cypher and their stories were little more than a stream of sound his fingers raced to repeat. The Chronicler had spoken with thieves and rapists, murderers and liars. His was not a position to judge. Divorcing himself from the content and dwelling merely on the transmission made it easier, almost unthinking.

When in the height of his scribing, he was little more than a branch on a tree, weaving and bending to the passage of the wind through him.

So, it took him a few moments to realize the final tale he’d been told as he stretched weary digits.

“I… am sorry,” he offered weakly. The Chronicler wasn’t really accustomed to responding to a person’s tale but the innkeeper slowly nodded, his lips pulling tight over his teeth as he blinded his eyes. The Chronicler turned towards the kitchen to find that Lafnis had taken up residence at the bar. She didn’t even feign ignorance, merely resting her head upon her hand as she watched the two men do their work with a bored gaze.

The Chronicler was, figuratively, left on his own.

“I’m sure they were lovely people.”

The innkeeper took a slow breath, finding solace in his mug. He took down three large gulps before peering at the drained interior before waving it towards the young woman. He took another long breath to calm himself then turned sharply towards the bar when there was no immediate reaction to address his quivering vessel. Lafnis stretched her back, drawing slowly to her feet to grab his mug and disappear into the back room.

“I’ve… I’ve never shared this tale with anyone,” Koudi resumed, his look of annoyance quickly returning to somber sorrow. “I suppose I kept it buried, hidden for it wounded me so deeply.”

“The loss of one’s parents… it is tragic.”

Koudi turned towards him.

“No! One loses a shoe or a coin. One does not lose their kin. They were taken – nay, stolen from me! I share this with you, Chronicler, if only to provide insight into actions to come. For I can not say in that moment I had become the Kinslayer but it would be a falsehood to say that it did not leave an impression upon myself. I was, after all, not even a man yet forced to face such harsh cruelties that life has to offer. Who among us can say they weathered such hardships?”

“Iomhair.”

“Excuse me?”

The Chronicler reassessed his position.

“You asked who had to face such hardships. Forgive me, my knowledge of Maen Nkowainn lore is rather incomplete, but was not great Iomhair orphaned as well?”

“I… suppose you are right.”

“And then there’s mighty Aslaug who, when but a child, was hidden in a harp to be spirited away to safety from the fate in store for her parents. Even the great Aenir Forseti was orphaned by the hand of betrayal of his father and the grip of grief over his mother. Course, if myth is to be believed, it’s rather common given the strife and conflict so many heroes are born into.”

“Fine, fine!” Koudi waved with a frown. “Perhaps there is some poetics to it then. Are you prepared?”

He regarded the Chronicler intensely as Lafnis dropped a fresh mug before him. The Chronicler stood, taking a moment to stretch his back and work some feeling back into sore muscles. The innkeeper waited, but impatiently. His fingers tapped the wood and he kept his intense look until the Chronicler sat once more and gathered up his quill.

He had words to share and he was going to share them now.

“Let me describe to you true suffering.”