A Timeless Beginning

The night was calm and dark, but it had a peacefulness to it that Lander always seemed to enjoy. It was the kind of night that didn't seem quite so bad, the street tufts seemed a little more amiable, the beggars seemed a little less hopeless. It was just the kind of night in Saala City that led Lander to really appreciate the beauty of the city. Saala city was one of the major cities in the country of Salenala. Lander sat behind a crate in his usual starting place before moving further throughout the slums. He sat in an ally right next to the bakery in the slums of Saala city. Even though the slums of Saala permeated with the stench of booze and a moldy dampness, the bread shop "The Dragons Wheel" cut through the stench with an aroma of Landers favorite sweet bread. Also the Dragons Wheel was quite close to a bar he wanted to check out this evening. He typically wore a much finer linen cloth when he was back in his estates. He wasn't the person who owned the estates, he was just next in line to the Hoffenstien household after his father passed away. He hoped that wouldn't be for a long, long time. Besides he was only 16 years old hardly old enough to take command of the entire estate. About three weeks ago Lander first started deciding to take a small midnight excursion into the slums of the city. He was just so sick and tired of all the propriety, fine dining and especially the boringness of his day to day duties. So he decided to walk the slums maybe find a game of dice, or even practice his sword training on a street bandit if the encounter arises. Lander found himself in a bar called "Beams Bar". There a few street tufts were playing a game called "Kings Decree" it was a fairly simple game but required the players to each own a set of dice a d20, d12, d10 and finally a d8. The d20 was always your king and the other three dice were always your soldiers. So anyone who wanted to participate in the so called "battle" would drop in the designated entry bid and everyone involved would throw all four dice. If your d20 or King came up seven higher then another kings his kingdom was stronger and he automatically executes the weaker king. But if the face number on the king is within six numbers your soldiers decide the victor. In that instance you'd add the rolled numbers on all three of the soldier dice and the higher number of the soldiers wins the pot. Lander sat and played with the tufts for a short time but caught something out of the corner of one eye. A small girl with bandage wraps around her arms and legs, with a ragged and torn rough cloth shirt and trousers. She also had dirty matted black hair with deep purple eyes. He saw her sneaking around the corner, and was surprised by her nimbleness. She quickly and deftly slinked over to the table with an extra large tuft and she snatched a small remaining chunk of bread the man was working on and then dove underneath the table. It didn't take long for the big man to stand up and start accusing anyone near him of thieving. Lander silently chuckled to himself as he reached over to start working on his remaining sweet bread and startlingly found his bread was missing too! "What in the Goddess of Timing is going on?" Lander thought to himself. He scanned the room skeptically trying to find signs of where that girl ducked off to. He looked fervently then finally scooting his chair back and peering underneath the tables. There he saw her on both knees with about five loaves worth! The mysterious little urchin smiled and lander and not whispering but not easily being head over the rowdiness of the bar said "Hiya! Sorry did I take your bread? I was just hungry and it looked like you were eatin it pretty slowly, so I figured I'd help ya." Lander thought carefully for a moment as she held one of her hands out to give him back a small chunk of sweet bread. She seemed to have a very shrill way of speaking not to nasally but also the sort of voice that bespoke immaturity. Lander stretched his arm out reaching for one of the loaves as he held her gaze. It seemed almost in as quick as an eye blink her eyes glowed with this purple and black undertone and she spoke one word. "BAM!" Immediately Landers body felt a knee jerk reaction as his body pulled back and away from the girl in what seemed to be an insurmountable type of terror. He then found himself unable to speak and move as this monstrous amalgamation of meat seemed to spring to life growing larger and larger in size. He noticed the girl ducking out of Beams Bar but he couldn't find it in himself to care as he stood petrified in the presence of this nightmare. It only could have been a minute or so but to him it seemed like an eternity. Finally the big tuft, a man who everyone seemed to be referring to as Logan, said something to Lander. "Wwwhat was that?" Lander seemed to croak out. What was what? Logan said looking to lander with not only a flushed face of anger and drunkenness but also a bit of bewilderment. "You're telling me you didn't see whatever that meat man was?" Logan looked troubled and shouted to the bar keep. "Hey mr. Beam I think this one here has had enough to drink, I don't think someone his size holds his alcohol very well." Lander just stood there for another moment trying to asses what terrible nightmare just struck him and then heard that voice again. "Damnit boy, you really are pathetic. Getting frightened by a little girl who can just show you a trick of the eye." Lander just ignored the voice in his head like he usually had to do and started as he realized the entire bar was frowning I his direction. "Timing perfect!" Lander cursed under his breath. "I'm sorry I guess maybe, I have overstayed tonight. I'll be on my way." Lander sprinted from the Bar in a less then ideal way but he didn't need people asking questions about him or spreading rumors. The last thing he needed was for his parents to find out that he started sneaking about at night. If they did it would just be back to boring old estate business for the rest of his life. Lander shivered a bit as the combination of the cold night air, the meat man and the thought of losing his small bit of freedom bounced around in his mind. He walked slowly back to his original hiding place in the ally next to the bakery to catch his breath before making his way home. As he slumped down on the side of a crate in the ally he heard a bit of giggling and he looked up to see the same little girl standing on the top of the crate looking down at him. Lander quickly jumped up and cursed to the girl. "What in the Timing world are you doing! Who are you and how did you summon a monster of meat that only I can see!? Are you a demon sent to torment me? Well I already have one of those so you can time off!" Lander thinking of the voice seemed to summon it to the foreground of his thoughts again. "Boy I've told you time and time again you will need to get stronger and stop being such a pathetic welp." Lander then uncaring if he sounded crazy to anyone around him yelled back at the voice even though he knew no one else could hear the voice. "I told you to time off, get out of my head and leave me alone." The little girl cocked her head in confusion and said "but I'm not in your head right now?" Lander responded getting louder and louder just frustrated to no end with the situation. "Not you this timing voice that keeps popping up trying to tell me what to do! All it does is get me in trouble!" The voice interjected again with the same deep strong voice that it always has. "Now boy, you say I get you in trouble but all I do is help you to not be such a spineless bitch." At this point the little girl was smiling very wide and she said. "Wow you hear voices in your head too!? Is the Nightmother trying to get you to do her bidding as well?" Lander replied with a very confused air about him. "Nightmother? Voice in your head? What? Ah I get it you're just as crazy as I am I guess. Well I guess that I should be going now." As Lander turned he was completely winded as he felt like he ran into a wall. When he looked up however, it wasn't a wall but it was Logan frowning down and him and the small girl still standing atop the crate. Logan started by holding a hand out to help him up and said "I heard someone yelling and figured I'd come see what was happening sorry for knocking you over." Logan's words started to slow down as he looked to the girl as he helped Lander to his feet and saw jutting from her pockets was 4 loaves of bread. "Hey! so it was the both of you that were stealing from me!" Logan shouted while his face began to flush with anger again. Lander began to plead frantically. "No no no, this is all a misunderstand the timing girls came out of no where you se...." His words cut off as Logan pull on his arm with a force he wasn't prepared for and he took a strong solid knee to the gut. Lander wretched on the ground trying to compose himself. Suddenly a thick black leather boot from the side of his vision came barreling into his face. As his head hit boot then connected with the wooden crate, his vision began swimming. The little girls eyes started to glow but the drunkard Logan wasn't paying much attention to looking at the girl as he stepped up and threw all of his weight into a punch having the small girl soar off the top of the crate slamming into the wall of the ally and then into the refuse filled ground. The voice started stirring in his mind again "Damn you Boy, stand and take care of the pathetic street brawler. You're more then this insect. Much more. Don't be a Bitch." Lander coughed up a mixture of retchings and blood then stood to his feet and undoing a clasp hold his sword in place. Lander drew his sword it was a fairly un ornamented steel sword but has a small bright red signet of the Hoffenstien household on the hilt. Lander fell into the royal sword forms that seemed to imitate a type of fencing sword style even though the blade wasn't perfect for that style of fighting. He lunged forward just grazing Logan as he couldn't see straight still. "Hah!" Logan yelled you think you can hit me with that Timing sword?! You should stick to using a dagger more fitting for a cowardly thief!" Logan reaches forward and Lander flourished the blade upward trying to take off a hand as Logan reached for him. Unfortunately Logan didn't reach for Lander he reached to grab his sword. It would leave Logan with a nasty cut on his hand but now that he had ahold of the sword Logan smiled knowingly as he realized he now had the upper hand now and could over power Lander easily. Logan reaving at the sword pulled it free from his hands and then kicked Lander square in the face. He became dazed, barely staying conscious. Lander felt something a warmth within him, but no that couldn't really be there. Or was this what it felt like when you died? He felt his eyes growing heavy body growing warmer and he heard the shrill voice of that girl again her face looked a tad bit bloody but her eyes glowed again with that deep purple and black undertone. "Hey you!" As Logan's eyes looked up from landers body meeting her eyes she said one word as his eyes drooped shut. "Bam!"