Asad handed one of the folders off to Hector, who began sifting through it. There were many more names than the ones that Lady Amaya had just listed. Most had mug shots to go along with them, and about half had full bios, including breakdowns of their abilities as well as what they were known to be capable of with said abilities.
Hector stared at the pages like they were goddamn treasure maps. He wasn’t accustomed to knowing this much about the enemy prior to battle, but he certainly welcomed the change. He held a page up for himself and another for Garovel as he pored through the intel. He wished he’d been allowed to look at these files yesterday.
‘Do you have pictures of the Elroy children?’ asked Garovel.
“Yes, of course.” Amaya retrieved a much smaller stack of photos from her briefcase and handed them off to Hector. “Bear in mind, these were all taken about a year ago. Also, I will need them back before you leave.”
Hector understood. The Elroys seemed to be in rather high demand around here. No doubt, Lady Amaya didn’t want their images spread around. And indeed, Hector could see why. They all seemed to share the same black hair and harsh bone structure, not to mention the same hard gaze. He wondered if Rainlords considered it improper to smile when having their pictures taken.
Amaya pointed at three of the five faces. “These are the ones we’re looking for. However, this girl here--” She picked out the apparent middle child. “--Emiliana Elroy, she is Chergoa’s servant, and she now has four small horns on her face and claws on her left hand. She may be wearing a black mask if you see her.”
‘Ah,’ said Garovel. ‘Mutation user?’
“Yes.”
Hector lingered on Emiliana’s picture. The servant of Garovel’s sister. How strange. It was as if he were looking at a long lost relative or something. He tilted his head and reevaluated the other four faces.
All through his childhood, his only family had been his mom and dad. No aunts or uncles or grandparents. Maybe this was what it felt like to have cousins. Sort of. Still kinda weird, seeing as they were all white people.
In any case, he tried to burn their faces into his mind. He knew Garovel would remember for him, but this struck him as important enough to warrant the extra effort.
A dark serial novel. Set in a modern fantasy world called Eleg. Mature language. Updates every night at midnight PST by ~400 words.
Thanks for the page.
ReplyDeleteWill have a bonus page up in about twelve hours.
ReplyDeleteThe way you portray Hector - growing as a character without shucking his defining flaws and good qualities - is really great. It seems more realistic than the standard "grows into a different, better person entirely different from who they were" character arc.
ReplyDeleteThere were many more names than the ones that Lady Amaya had just listened.
ReplyDeleteListed maybe?
Indeed, listed. Good catch, thank you.
ReplyDeleteAgh, what a compliment. <3
ReplyDeleteOoh, will the Elroy's and Hector bond like family in the future? That's awesome!
ReplyDeleteAsian people tend to be very xenophobic. Also Hector is not worried that they are white Just that the closest thing he has to family seems to be white people
ReplyDeleteLol he's worried about the fact that they are all white. Thats probably the first thing that always comes to mind on a black person when meeting one. Don't mean anything by it, but you don't see an asian racist often.
ReplyDeleteYou actually see plenty of Asian racists, years ago one of my asian friends once commented that it's great that their grand parents only speak to the other old people in Chinese because if they didn't then my parents probably wouldn't let me go anywhere near their family
ReplyDeleteForget not that xenophobia is a form of racism
ReplyDelete