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[Thrax]

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It was dark. Time to close shop and go home, Harvey thought. He and his wife Fatima stood outside the "Tanned Hide." Fatima began the long walk home, expecting the usual delay as her husband secured the door behind her. "I see a light on at the Bakery. I will see if Regan would like us to walk her home," she said, making her way there.

"All right," Harvey replied, inserting a key into the lock on the thick wooden door and turning it. "I'll be right there." As he withdrew the key, he felt the point of something very sharp against the small of his back.

He almost cried out, and would have, except for the whispered warning. "Say nothing. Tell her you forgot something and will be along shortly. Then open the door again and let us go inside, shopkeeper."

Resisting the urge both to turn and view his assailant or yell for help, Harvey meekly obeyed. From the near side of the Jolly Baker, he heard his wife's casual response, "Take your time. We'll just talk a while til you get here."

Harvey, his mouth dry and palms sweating profusely, unlocked the door and was shoved inside. The familiar odor of leather filled his senses. He felt his knees shake and almost buckle as he felt a hand wrap tightly around his collar. A second later he was flat on the floor, his nose and bottom lip bleeding from the hard, unexpected, fall. He had been tripped, deliberately, by his attacker, whose foot now pressed down hard on the back of his neck. He glanced sideways, his eyes slowly becoming used to the darkness. Through a window, Trammel, in full phase, appeared from behind a cloud, filling the room with its eerie white glow. He could see the man was dressed in black and wore a red skull helmet to cover his face. The blade of the dagger the man held in his right hand gleamed menacingly in the light. "Wh..what do you want? I..."

The man's foot pressed down harder on his neck, choking off his wind and effectively silencing him. "Shut your mouth!" he ordered. "I will ask the questions, and if you answer to my satisfaction, you may get out of here alive," he threatened.

Harvey tried to nod. "Please... don't kill me," he begged.

The skull-faced man released the pressure of his foot from Harvey's neck, pulled up a stool and sat down beside him. "You have seen an orc wearing a black helm, have you? Do not lie, I know you have."

Harvey nodded. "He came here yesterday," he replied, tasting the blood oozing from his lip.

"The next time he comes, and it shall be once per week, at no particular time of day, you shall pay him twenty-five gold coins. Do you understand?"

"But... that will cut deeply into my prof.."

"Not quite as deep as this will cut into your flesh!" he interrupted, waving the dagger. "And you must keep this little meeting of ours a secret. That is the new arrangement. Is your part clear to you?"

"It is. I will tell no one, I swear!"

The man laughed. "You lying fool! Once I am gone you will run straight to the Duke and Duchess and tell them about the bad man who came to you by night with his keen dagger."

"No! No, I won't! I promise!"

The shopkeeper's groveling pleased the man no end. "Well, let me say this... if you *do* tell them, or your wife, or anyone, then you'd best consign your shade to whatever god you worship, for I will speed you on your way to meet it! And dismiss thoughts of escaping me. I will find you in whatever hole you crawl down to hide. What they may find of you will not even be enough to identify, much less piece together."

Harvey shuddered. "I will tell no one, believe me!" he vowed.

There was a brief pause. The man stood up. "There will be some measure of benefit for this service. I will see that the orcs allow you to live here and sell your goods without hindrance. You may feel secure in that."

But I already have protection from the Duke, Harvey thought to himself, though he dare not say it. His courage was returning and he knew what he had to do: he had to tell the Duke and Duchess! Who else might this vile man threaten and blackmail?

"You have children, do you not?" the skull-faced man asked, calmly.

Harvey's blood ran cold. He nodded, reluctantly, but fully believing the man knew it was true, making a denial clumsy and insulting. "Two," he confessed.

The man laughed, a hissing, coarse, mocking, laughter. "Aye, you do," was all he said. "Lovely ones too from what I have seen."

The conversation was interrupted by a pounding on the door. A loud voice boomed out, "Open up in the name of the Duke! Open the door I say!!"

Harvey looked at the man, waiting for orders. The man leaned over and with one quick swipe, so fast it seemed a blur, lay back the flesh on Harvey's face with his dagger, drawing a line from chin to ear. Blood flowed freely. He pointed the tip of the dagger at Harvey and then fled into the shadows of the room. Harvey got up quickly and opened the door, allowing two fully equipped soldiers, swords ready, to enter the room. One held up a lit lantern. Fatima ran in, embracing her husband. The soldiers looked Harvey over. "Your wife saw something odd and when you were late in coming, she alerted us. We were on patrol this eve," an officer explained. "Are you all right, sir?" he asked, noting the blood on the man's face.

Glancing to the back of the dark room, weighing his chances, hesitating as he knew he was likely deciding his own fate and that of his family, he chuckled, "Yes, yes, I am fine! I came back inside and tripped! Knocked myself out!" he lied, as he rubbed a non-existent head injury.

"Your face, it's cut and bleeding!" Fatima noted, taking a cloth out of her pocket to wipe the wound tenderly. It would leave a scar that would match the other.

One of the soldiers nodded. "It looks like a knife cut." At that, the other soldier began scanning the darkened recesses of the room more closely. The door behind him creaked slightly and the sound of it made them all turn to look. But they saw nothing except shadows dancing in the flickering light.

Harvey wiped the rest of the congealed blood off the side of his face and pointed to the stool. "Must have hit it on the way down. Who knows?" Then, turning to his wife and the guards, "Let's be on our way. Everyone... go on. I'm all right," he said as he shooed them out the door. They all complied, albeit slowly. He locked his shop and the soldiers escorted them both safely away.

Outside, under the concealment of shadows projected by the eaves of the shop's roof, Ivan Blackhands turned to leave. "Wise decision, shopkeeper. You live to see another day," he whispered to himself, sheathing his dagger.