After Lorsan's most recent foray into adventuring, having returned to Quillpond and taking his rest for the night, Lorsan sat down to undress. Sliding off one boot and then the other, he reached down to unhook the whip from his belt and, as his hand made contact with the handle, a sudden jolt of energy tightened every muscle and he collapsed into the bed.
The gentle glow of candlelight through his eyelids quickly faded to darkness before slowly fading back to a greying landscape. He stood on a dais situated in the center of an amphitheater. Rows of stone steps surround him on all sides. As his eyes continued to adjust, robed figures begin to fade into view. Lorsan twisted and turned, looking on all sides. Tens of these figures stood on the surrounding steps. He instinctively reached down to the whip but found only its leather strap. A moment of panic filled Lorsan’s chest as his breath shortened and stuttered.
His eyes searched for a path of escape, his mind buzzing with what route would offer the least interaction with these figures. As his muscles tightened to jump, an airy, calming voice broke the silence.
"Do not panic. Do not run."
The figure in front of Lorsan strode forward. Their motion warped Lorsan’s sense of dimension in the amphitheater, as if some sort of optical illusion were in play. He realized that the stone steps are much farther away and larger than he initially thought. That jump might have killed him. He rubbed his eyes, willing them to adjust, as the figure continued to approach, growing larger and larger before stopping some twenty feet away.
Shrouded in dark robes, the figure stood, at Lorsan’s best estimate, nearly twenty feet in height. They reached up and slowly pull back the hood of the robe to reveal a face with sharp, feminine elven features. They scrutinized Lorsan for what felt like an eternity, their eyes obscured by the shadow of their brow.
In a somewhat familiar, ethereal voice, they finally broke the silence. "I am The Mercy Not Promised to the Fiend at Fate's End. Welcome, child."
Lorsan relaxed, but only slightly. “Oh, this is a dream-thing! And I’m even wearing clothes in this one!”
He seemed proud of himself for making the not-quite-correct deduction before he finally registered the voice and the name. “Oh. OH! You’re the… whip? No, not just a whip. Oh gods, what did Gaston call you…. The Hexblade! You’re the Hexblade, er my Hexblade? I’m still really unsure how that part really wo….”
The sound of a whip crack silenced Lorsan’s ramblings. His back straightened and he dropped the humorous demeanor. No, this will be no time for joking. “Why am I here?” he asked.
Mercy stared deeply into Lorsan’s eyes, considering the question. Their eyes scanned him briefly before returning to meet his gaze.
“That is a good question, child. Why are you here? What brought you to this moment in time?” they asked, slowly and purposefully.
“What brought me?” Lorsan puzzled. “Uh, nothing? Trying to get some sleep after plants tried to kill me? I don’t think I did a “please take me into a dream-talk with your whip” dance before bed. I kinda thought you did this. Or at least knew who did. Now I might be a little worried.”
Mercy reached down to their side and a familiar whip appeared in their hand. They lifted it in front of them, letting the length of it run through the other hand before a deafening crack filled Lorsan’s ears. The sound reverberated for a moment before silence again flooded the space around him. “What about the power that you found in this brought you to this moment in time?” they challenged Lorsan, holding the whip, which is now easily twenty feet in length, in front of them.
Lorsan’s eyes never left the whip, terrified of where this was going. “Umm, curiosity I guess?” his voice broke, like back in puberty. “I mean, we’ve worked together for a while now since that… alleyway. And I know I agreed to something. But I really don’t remember what? And was that a promise to you or? I guess I have a lot of questions. And Gaston, he’s the wizard in town, really has just been good at giving me more questions.”
Mercy coiled the whip in their hands and caressed it for a moment before it vanished. As their hands return to their sides, they strode forward, now looming over Lorsan.
With a stern, but encouraging look, Mercy’s voice boomed. “You called out for power. Power was granted to you. Go back to that alleyway. Find the reason you called out. Perhaps then you can find the reasons for why you are here, now, in this moment.”
Mercy’s hand waves across Lorsan’s vision and as it passes, he found himself standing on the street, just outside of that alleyway on that fateful night.
This whole thing was as confusing as it was frustrating to Lorsan. He’d gotten by most of his life with some cunning words and humor. Having to actually work at something was… not his favorite thing. “I mean, I wanted to stop that little shit!” he grumbled. “No one that short should be able to outrun me, that’s not right. And they took what wasn’t theirs. And I was going to get in trouble if they got away. So yeah, I wanted an edge, something to let me stop the thief. And preferably without running through half of Port Bova.”
Lorsan huffed. “So yeah, at the core of it, I wanted to both do what I was supposed to, and a shortcut to get there with less effort. Or at least with my current level of effort. I always hated all that exercising stuff.”
He rubbed his face and started to pace around the stone floor of the alley. “I mean, I didn’t really expect to suddenly be throwing force bombs at people, but it’s been really useful. Scared me though, so I ran from Port Bova. Couldn’t go home, so I went to Quillpond. Now stuff’s going on here, bad stuff. And I don’t like it. It makes me worry about Aunt Ivis. And, I guess to be honest, most everyone else here too. And I don’t know if that’s my fault because I made some deal with a devil, no offense, that brought all this bad stuff with me or if I’m doing it all wrong and I’m supposed to be on a quest or something?”
Mercy’s demeanor shifted to one of concern and confusion. “So you delve back to this turning point of your life and you settle on fear and laziness as your motivations?” they say with an almost sarcastic tone. “Surely you think more of me than to believe I would gift MY power to a scared layabout.”
Mercy took another step forward, staring down at Lorsan.
“You were scared, yes, and you ARE lazy. But you ran into that alleyway for a different emotion deep down inside you. I could feel the energy emanating from you. Your quarry was in the wrong. A thief, a liar, a criminal.” they say as the formerly shadowy eyes begin to glow a fiery blue. “I felt the most pure essence of righteous vengeance, in you, at that moment.”
This idea hadn’t crossed Lorsan’s mind at all. And he was pretty sure he got a sense of smug satisfaction from Mercy on leading him by the proverbial nose to the answer. “Okay, so that… Would be a much more positive way to look at all of this. Never really thought of myself as the righteous vengeance type. More the type that would end up on the other side of it because I did something dumb or lazy. But, yeah, that’s what I felt. That’s what I feel now when someone tries to hurt the people I love or my new home. It sort of fills me and then, well, it leaves me. Usually violently against whoever is in the wrong.”
“But still, why me?” Lorsan questioned aloud. ”Something special about me? And Mercy, did you nudge me to go back to Quillpond or is there someone else in all this. Oh man, the vengeance I could have brought in Port Bova, but I knew I had to get out of there. Like, am I the low man, you’re the underboss and there’s a big boss somewhere else up the line? Where am I in all of this? And I feel certain more is expected of me than to just bring vengeance on occasion.”
"Vengeance is temperamental and can overtake some. It has not overtaken you. You can still learn to control your vengeance and harness it." Mercy spoke in a quiet, reassuring tone. "Fate will take you where it may. I do not control you, Lorsan. I merely provide the power to pursue your fate."
Mercy turned and takes a couple of hulking steps away. They paused, looking over their shoulder. "Your arrangement is with me and me alone. If you should not want this responsibility any longer, it is yours to walk away from. You are the Hand of Mercy Not Promised and your charge is to protect the good of the world and strike down evil wherever you may find it.”
“That seems a lot bigger than shovelling shit out of a stall with magic…” Lorsan worried.
For the first time, a faint smile stretched across Mercy’s face. Their hand reached out and a deafening crack flooded the space again as they snapped their fingers. Lorsan instinctively closed his eyes and winced. Peeking from clinched eyes, he found himself once again in his bedroom, the candles flickering, barely alight. In his ears, he heard Mercy’s voice. “Well, shit needs shoveling, too. You are precisely where you need to be at this moment. Follow your fate. Learn. Grow. As long as you do, I will be at your side.”
Lorsan looked down as an otherworldly glow slowly faded from the whip in his hand. He reattached the whip to his side “That’s me. Lorsan Brightwood. Remover of Shit - both physical and metaphysical.”