Somewhere in Southern Taeghas, Fifteen Years Ago

Eight-Fingered Edvick stumbled toward the whore's tent, already drunk as a Aerele midshipman on feastday. His purse was bulging with the spoils of the company's latest skirmish, and the half-chub in his breeches was as much from the fierce thrill of victory-- Haelyn, it had felt good to hew a few heads from that ragtag band of Brosengae insurgents-- as anticipation of Sally's meager charms. Aye, she'd been pretty enough when she'd first showed up, but the Sons of Iron Mountain were as rough on their camp followers as their foes, and she was beginning to look a little worse for wear. Still, she charged a third less than Taren, and Edvick needed to set aside enough to get his brigandine repaired; a canny pikeman had punched a hole right through it two weeks earlier.

He swept aside the tent flap and had his belt half unbuckled before he noticed the tent was empty. Or, rather, empty save for Sally's brat. The scrawny little thing, all knobby knees, dressed in a shapeless sackcloth bag more stains and patches than cloth, crouched in the corner, watching him.

"Oi, where's Sally?" Edvick was irritated, the fog of cheap ale making him more impatient than usual. He needed a quick tumble and didn't fancy paying Taren's Avanil tavern-girl prices.

"She's gone to town." The voice gave him pause. Preternaturally calm, cool, a full octave deeper than he was expecting. "She'll be back within the hour." And so too were the huge eyes in that grimy little face, that watched him from beneath a thicket-tangle of dark red hair. Not afraid, not curious, not looking down or aside... just staring right at him, burrowing into his soul. It made him uncomfortable, angry. He wanted her to either fawn and giggle or avert her gaze and scuttle away like the other camp-following flotsam.

Of course, there was an opportunity here. He crossed the tent in one stride. She tried to dart away-- she was fast, fast as a cornered animal-- but he collared her and pinned her down on Sally's filthy cot. "Quit struggling, brat," he grunted as he attempted to get his breeches down with one hand and keep her still with the other. "You'll be joining mummy in the family trade soon enough. About time we had some new meat around here anyway--"

And then he realized she wasn't struggling, but rather, her free arm was wrapped around him, and a small soft hand was touching the small of his back, groping, where he always kept his--

The word "knife" flicked into his mind right before the glint of steel flashed and his last thought was fast, how is she so gods-damned fast...
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The girl looked down at the corpse in its widening pool of blood, and piss as death emptied its ale-filled bladder, and felt... nothing.

The knife came free in a gush of blood and tissue and clear humours. The strike had been true, at an upward angle through the back of the eye socket where the bones were thin. Her friend the surgeon had explained this to her, as he used tongs to extract the splinter of a shattered halberd shaft from a dead man's eye. She remembered everything he had taught her.

It was easy.

But what to do now? Her mother would beat her terribly if she returned to find a dead customer in her tent, and the mercenaries would do far worse to her mother. The girl hadn't the strength to drag the large man to the woods.

The girl wiped down the knife and tucked it into the frayed rope she wore as a belt. The grip felt good in her hand. She unbuckled the dead man's purse, and her eyes widened. It bulged with silver. There was more here than her mother would earn in three months. Killing men, it seemed, was a quicker way to earn silver than laying with them. Maybe easier, too.

He also had a flask of cheap spirits. She winced at the eye-watering smell. But it gave her an idea.  She carefully stuffed the purse with rags to muffle its conspicuous jingle and bound it to her belt. Then she emptied the flask of spirits, half onto the dead mercenary, and half onto the tent walls. There was a small cookfire just outside, where a few branches were still smoldering.

She watched the blaze for a few moments from the periphery of the forest, then vanished within its shadows.