Welcome to Yorwyck City

This is the start an anthology of stories set out by different writers all set in the world of Yorwick City. If you like what you see of Yorwyck there is plenty of space for more writers so please get in touch!

 

Prologue

“Is this how you imagined the largest city in the world?” The dead man  asked Pyre casually,

“Is this how you imagined your afterlife?” Pyre replied over his shoulder with a wry smile on his dark face, “How long has it been since you were last here?”

“Not long. Must have been just before I found myself with you, I suppose”. The dead man that called himself Aleistúch shrugged his shoulders nonchalantly; “Yorwick has always been a place of mixed blessing for scorcerists. This boat is quite pleasant though, wonderful engines, maybe we could go for a little cruise for a while? See some more of the world.”

Pyre looked curiously at this strange white man from this strange cold place before turning back and taking in the view of the City of Yorwick as the coal barge made its final approach to harbour.  Everything in the world of the north was done on a massive scale and Yorwick was no different - towers jutted high above the horizon casting dark and ominous shadows and wires glinted with cable cars shooting by each other.  This was a city of old and new, rusted machinery from the age of technocrats stood next to shanty towns of wood and poor metal.  The harbour was lined with huge machines with steel ropes glinting in the sun.

“First of all, you are dead, so you aren’t a scorcerist or even a technician, you’re at most a voice in my head. Secondly, we’re getting off this boat as and when I say we will.” He turned sharply annoyed at himself for losing his patience, he turned to Aleistúch with a forgiving smile “And thirdly, what are those spindly things with the metal wires hanging down?”

Aleistúch remembered little of his own death, except the dark and the fear.  Then he had opened his eyes shaking on a sunny white beach with Pyre asking him who he was and where he was from. Aleistúch looked at his companion; Pyre could not be a better contrast of his pallid ghost self, the man had the dark skin of the Archipelago Empire. The man had some past with The Old One it seemed, binding him as a Deathshead to aid lost souls seeking help.  Aleistúch knew this was why Pyre had helped him so far but the rest of the dark man was a mystery to him,

“They’re called cranes and they’re used to take goods to and from the ships, trains and the canals.  Why can’t we stay on the boat for a little longer and let me look at the engines?” he sighed defeatedly, “I thought you were here to help me?”

“Oh I’m here to help you,” Pyre’s eyes flashed amused; “just maybe you’ll get more than you bargained for with my help.” Looking back across the bay he pointed into the distance “There are things that you left undone in this place and it’s my job to set them straight for you.  Who knows, maybe when we finish the Old One might even let you go on…”

Aleistúch paled as the sun started to set behind the horizon, casting the city in a fiery light.  He looked up and saw the crew lowering one of the dinghies, “You aren’t the most optimistic of men I’ve known, Mr Pyre” he said quietly, “I suppose we’re getting off this evening instead of waiting for the morning.”

“We will be,” Pyre said curtly and walked down the deck to where the captain was overlooking the boat being hoisted over the side.

“Are you getting off this even-tide Mr Pyre?” the captain asked brightly, and Pyre nodded his consent firmly and succinct. “Well I wish you well on your business venture!” the man smiled as he watched the raggedy Archipelagean climb on board the weathered dinghy with the other shadowy figures he had brought over the dark seas. The captain was especially glad to be rid of the dark quiet man, he seemed to have death on his heels that one.  Shaking such foolish thoughts from his old head, he ordered the men to lower the passengers’ boat.

 

The Night-men had begun lighting the Aéther lamps along the quayside as the little dinghy puttered into the dock.  Pyre surveyed them with an appreciative eye,

“Are the streets never dark here?” he asked carefully to not be overheard by those who left the dinghy with them.

“It depends where you are, the city’s infrastructure isn’t as it was even a hundred years ago nowadays.  More maintained parts of the city have these Aéther lamps, whilst a lot of the less well off areas make do with torches and the some boroughs don’t even have those,” Aleistúch cast a worried glance around at the warehouses,

“The rich always protect themselves from the dark at the doorstep,” Pyre quoted sadly, “It’s just a shame that they can’t see the dark that I can.” Looking up to smoke billowing from a thousand furnaces, he saw a pair of eyes glint from the rooftops and a lithe figure disappear over the rooftops. “Where to Master scorcerist?”

 “Well it's a little late to be walking these streets, so I think maybe a gondola up into town would be a good idea...”. Aleistúch was lost in thought for a second as they walked towards the canal, “Are we going straight to my lab tonight?”

“No, who knows what mess your body’s left there, I need a place to rest for the night, which borough should we go to?” he asked, stifling a yawn.

Aleistuch looked first affronted and then worried as he took in Pyre’s words “Well Merchant Parade and Old Bazaar have some nice inns, anywhere in the city has its better places aside from the ghettos...” Aleistúch paused, “So long as we don’t go to Jackal Town we’ll be fine.”

Pyre and Aleistúch stepped down from walled banks of the river and onto the nearest gondola, it was a battered little thing cobbled together from driftwood. The hull was covered and seemed to be waterproofed by brightly coloured shells, although if this was structural or a particularly exotic form of barnacle it was hard to tell, a small sloped roof over one half to keep passengers dry.  A woman with a long snout and glittering black and white scales sat in the stern weaving a small net.  Her bulbous black eyes that didn’t belong above the water studied Pyre inscrutably as she put her netting aside and picked up her oar.

“Where to?” she asked slowly as she stood up, she was well over seven feet tall and her thick coral skin was all she wore.

“Jackal Town,” Pyre responded, smiling and winking at Aleistúch.

“It’ll cost extra with the dead man,” she wheezed slowly, pouring water from a clay amphora down her throat which slid through gills in her neck and splattered on the gondola deck.

“Of course,” Pyre looked at Aleistúch, “off we go again.” and he sat down in the shade amongst old straw cushions, “sit, or you'll fall.”

“She can see me?” Aleistúch looked at the Syng woman in amazement.

“It's a ferry man thing,” Pyre replied nonchalontly and lay down half closing his eyes, he’ never tell Aleistúch but he hated travelling by boat.

Aleistúch looked again at the Syng lady, no one but Pyre knew he existed since he had died the three months before.

“Can you hear me as well?” he asked slightly excited, waving his arms in the air. 

She looked at him as she started to row them upriver; the Syng looked almost like reptillian horses with their long faces and no one had ever seen a male.  None of them lived in the city, instead they chose to live out on the far side of the harbour in houses that lay half in water and half out.  This was due to the terrible state of pollution in the city’s canals, raw sewage from house, mixing with waste from the factories and even more dangerous things from the Apothekary District.  Aleistúch as most citizens of Yorwick knew practically nothing about them, which as a scorcerist he found exhilarating.

“Yes,” she grunted as the boat propelled forward upstream, her huge arms making a quick speed against the current.

“That's amazing!” Aleistúch jumped up and set the boat rocking, “what's your name?”

“It’s Alatus,” She looked at him and cocked her oversized head looking at him “Why did you not swim on to the sacred pool when you outgrew your life shell?”

“I don't know” he sighed looking at the busy river’s commuters as they passed through the traffic like a dart fish. He looked at the Deathshead dozing, “he says that something in my life is left undone.”

“Something bad?” she asked curiously, pausing in a small dock to drench her gills again with fresh salt water from another urn.

“Oh no,” Aleistuch laughed, “I was a good scorcerist, did my work well.  I had nearly completed my work and was going to present my work to the university next month...”

“I knew a good scorcerist once,” The Syng looked at him hard with those large implacable eyes, “used to take him every day from his home to the university for a year.  He made me laugh with his silly talk about things I had no interest in.” She turned her head and displayed a large red welt next to her gills, “He did this to me, he tried to do more in the name of his research.”

Aleistuch looked shamefaced and his face went even paler than his normal ghost sheen, “what happened?” he asked carefully.

She barked a laugh, “I snapped his neck and fed him to my children!” She looked at him again as they set off again “No one may break a Syng's skin and stay in this sea.  My point is this, being a good scorcerist doesn't always make you a good man.” They carried on in silence amongst the hustle and bustle of the ever busy waterways for what seemed an eternity.

“Wait a minute!” Aleistúch cried, “I said not Jackal Town!”

Pyre sat up and smiled, “That's exactly why we're going there,”

“You're a strange one for a DeathsHead,” Alatus laughed, “why am I taking you to the Yorwick version of a snapper fish pit?”

Pyre fixed her with those strange blue eyes of his, “I don't know how the Deathshead in Yorwyck act but I make it my business to get involved with the places I visit.”

“The Deathshead around here are nothing like you,” Alatus frowned, “if it wasn't for that one,” pointing at Aleistuch, “I would of thought you a beggar and snapped your neck for daring to be on my boat.  The Deathsheads here are like salmon.”

“The salmon?” Aleistúch asked looking confused at the word.

“Yes the salmon,” she clucked, “a silly fish like you, spends all its life swimming against the current to f**k and before it knows what it hit it is the meal for a crab.” she paused whilst turning them down into a wide canal next to empty market boats that floated in the ever increasing dark. “You know what I mean ghost, tell him whilst I get us on through here.”

“What are the Deathsheads like here?” Pyre demanded turning to Aleistuch.

“They're a religion, well more a cult of the upper class youth.” Aleistúch paused looking worried, “They’re known for well...killing people in the name of the Old One and then, or so it's said eating their souls...” he looked at Pyre worriedly as the dark man's face was indistinguishable in the evening darkness.

“I see,” he said stiffly.

“I think Alatus is talking about how they dress entirely in black, with skull masks...” he looked at his companion in the tattered grey rags “like the Old One,” to his surprise, Pyre burst into laughter. “What did I say?” he asked puzzled.

“Like the Old One indeed,” he chuckled to himself, wiping tears of laughter from his eyes. Turning to Aleistch, he removed a glove that he wore on his hand and showed the skin to bleached white,with blue veins that pulsed sickeningly, seeming to glow in the poor light of the canals “The Old One took my arm to seal our pact, trust me he is no walking skeleton.” he chuckled again although there was some sorrow in it, “he is no thing so docile as a pile of bones in a cloak.”

 

“We are here,” Alatus announced and in a surprisingly nimble leap for one so large jumped to the quayside and tied the boat up. “My fare from Docksyde to Jackal Town is five Lygo,” she paused, “but with him in tow” she nodded at Aleistch and trailed off.

“A piece of silver?” Pyre added as he handed over his fare, “thank you for the swift swim.” She nodded, and joined the other Syng women nearby.

Aleistúch and Pyre made their way to the wall surrounding Jackal Town, the scorcerist pointed out the archway and hidden trellis “It used to be a fort town back before the city grew, and they never got rid of the wall...”

“And now?” Pyre murmured, aware of the eyes that had turned on him as soon as he had passed through the high archway.

“Now it's home of the repugnant bunch of lowlifes and criminals that are in the city” Aleistch replied in an equally hushed tone, “I never came here in life, although everyone knows about this place. I had contacts who did dealings here for me. I think just up ahead we’ll come to the Black Pillar”

“The black pillar?”

“It's a huge broken pillar covered in portraits of all the people with a price on their head, look there it is!” Aleistch ran to the pillar and started peering at the names. “They say if your face is on here than you’re dead within the week.”

“Anyone you know?” Pyre asked blandly, scanning the portraits and making a note of their faces.

“Hmmm, not really.” said Aleistúch sounding disappointed, “Dick Reuben is up here but after reading that man's articles I'm not surprised he has a price on his head!”

“Articles? Is he one of your type then?” Pyre inquired.

“Oh no!” Aleistúch exclaimed, “definitely not, he's a journalist for that rag of the pape, the Yorwyck Prynt.  Seems to have a knack for getting on people’s bad sides.”

“I see.” Pyre said uninterestedly “Lets find a place to stay.” They wandered through the streets lit  by torches, flickering up the building sides; the smoke was thick and hung over the streets like a fog.

“I don’t understand why they burn reed torches in this part of the city, you can barely see anything,” Aleistúch said, his cloudy form all but lost in the smoke. “There are Aether lamps here but they don’t seem to use them.”

“They use the reed torches because they don’t want you to see them,” Pyre said in a low voice, “In this district they don’t want to see your face or know your name, feels like home.” They had ended up at the end of a small dead end alley way, a sign creaked above them telling them they were at ‘The Hundred Broken Panes’ inn.  “I think this will do.” Pyre smiled and entered the small doorway.

Aleistúch looked at the creaking wooden sign, a glass house shattering into a hundred pieces; it hung barely by a single rusty hinge.  Shaking his head in disappointment, he followed Pyre through the tiny doorway into the inn.  The interior was nearly as smoky as outside, and the regulars regarded the Deathshead with thinly disguised interest, nodding to the more open patrons, Pyre approached the barman.

“Welcome t’ the Broken Panes me new friends,” The Landlord beamed at them and poured Pyre a frothy glass of something dark and winked at Aleistúch, “I guess yer friend won’t be drinking much?”

“You can see me as well?” the ghost murmured looking worriedly to see if anyone else was looking at him, the drinkers seemed to have forgotten the newcomers already and were animatedly discussing their affairs in their smokey corners again.  A fat man had his head down on the bar in his drink and from his snores it sounded like he intended to spend the rest of the night there.

“Of course he can, Aleistúch,” Pyre replied taking the foamy drink, “He’s nearly as dead as you are.”

“Indeed I am sire,” the barman beamed. “The name’s Seamus Malone and this is my inn.” Looking at Pyre’s gloved hand he looked worried, “you’ve not been sent fer me yet have you sire? I still have a good fi’teen years in the deal I struck with him...” he looked over his shoulder and made a obscure sign over his chest.

“Nothing so grim, Master Malone,” Pyre broke into a smile, “I just require room and board and maybe a few interesting tales to keep my mind sharp.” He winked, “you could begin by telling me about this deal you have over another beer.”

“Fer a man on the good side of the Old One, I think I can stretch t’ that.” Pulling a trapdoor up he yelled down, “Woody! I need you t’ look after the bar for a while.”

“Sure thing Mr Malone,” a blonde headed boy climbed up to the bar and started polishing the pewter whilst Seamus led them to a private room at the back of the bar, a crate of bottles in his arms.

“Here we are Sire,” Seamus beamed at them again as he sat down behind a desk, “this is me office. So where do we start, Mr Deathshead?”

“The name’s Pyre and this is Aleistúch,” he said pointing his thumb in the direction of the sorcerist who was trying to unsuccessfully thumb through the latest edition of the ‘Yorwick Prynt’. “He’s the reason I’m here, don’t know what we’re going to be dealing with in the morning but time will tell. What I want to know first of all is how you are still walking and talking with that arrowhead in your heart?”  Aleistúch looked up sharply.

“You’ve still got your old body?” he demanded before the inn keeper could reply.

“Ahhh,well after a fashion” Seamus looked down at his chest and stroked it uncomfortably, “well it all was as much a shock t’ me as anyone,” walking to the wall he pulled aside a tapestry and showed them a one way mirror.  It’s all thanks t’ that blonde lad behind the bar, been working fer me fer years, always thought he was a bit...well simple. Anyway one night we’re shutting up fer the night when these thugs come in with t’ crossbows,” He flexed his arms which definitely hadn’t always pulled pints, “I used t’ be big in the city sports, a wrestler,” he shook his head, “thought I could take on anything... next thing I know I’m on the floor with the worst heartburn I’ve ever felt before. I thought it was the end fer me, the end of the Broken Panes.” He paused and looked at his now rapt audience, Aliestúch stared with his mouth open, the paper still open in front of him.

“After they left us with the night’s taking, Woody came over t’ me.  I told him he had t’ look after Rebe and Shane, that’s my wife and my little boy.  He looks at me with those big dopey eyes of his and tells me that he can’t do it! On my deathbed he tells me he can’t look after my family! Now I was dying but when he said that I was mad. I told him he better find a way to make sure my family were ok and he ran off. I thought he’d scarpered on me and I cursed him black.” He paused as he opened another dark frothy beer and passed it to Pyre, thinking for a second.

“I must of passed out then, the next thing I knew was that Woody was back but he had stripped us both and covered me in this sweet smelling stuff and he’s singing this old chant and throwing salt int’ the air.” He looked at them like they might start laughing at any second but Pyre just nodded silently and gestured for him to continue. “Anyway he’s doing this and suddenly it don’t hurt no more and I stand up and I look down and I see that I’m... dead.  And it’s cold and getting colder and then I can hear him, he’s padding outside the door.”

“Him?” Aleistúch asked, curious to know what happened.

“The Old One,” Seamus nodded at Pyre, “No one ever tells you what he looks like really do they?”

“I think it’s something most living people don’t find out until they really have to,” Pyre said relaxedly but looked round the room, “But you’re not in the usual company so please try for my companion.”

Seamus looked at Aleistuch and nodded tightly, “It’s not against any of the rules is it?” he asked sheepishly.

“Definitely not, everyone meets the Old One in the end anyway.” Pyre nodded again stroking his smooth chin.

“What did you see?” Aleistúch was sitting on the edge of his chair now, the paper long forgotten.

“He... if he is a he, ain’t like they talk about in the proper churches and temples, he’s not some skeleton, or some great black bird or even a relative gone befer you.  He’s the end t’ this life or so I thought and I begged that he didn’t take me that day and that time.”

“What did he say?”

“He asked me what was so important that I should make him come back a second time fer me.”

“What was it?”

“Isn’t it obvious?” Seamus grinned, “This inn of mine needs me or at least another Malone at the helm, I asked him t’ give me twenty years with my son so that he could take over from me before I died.”

“And then?”

“He laughed or barked summat fierce I thought I was dead and told me that my words were wiser than I knew and said it was a deal, then he, he touched my dead body on the floor and here I am.” He grinned, “this is my inn and I know everybody’s name that walks in that door.  It may not seem a lot t’ you but things happen here, things that could happen nowhere else.”

“I know what you mean, there’s a heart to the city and it beats strongest here” Pyre joined him at the mirror overlooking the bar, “Tell me, who’s here tonight and then tell me what is happening in this city of yours.”

Seamus looked at the strange man again, his skin was darker than any man’s he had seen walk into his bar before.  There was an open honesty in him, an intensity that said he’d slit your throat if he had to but you’d know about it.  Seamus trusted this man and so began to tell him what he knew.

“That’s Filc who’s just walked in,” he nodded to a balding anxious man who paced straight up the bar and slapped the fat man asleep on the back and bought them both beers whilst the drunk roused himself. “He’s a runner of some sort, charges too little on the ones he gets in trouble with and charges too much on the honest ones.  Thinks he knows it all but never knows enough t’ keep his nose clean.”

Pyre looked at the small greasy man as he talked animatedly to Woody behind the bar, “Who’s the fat man?”

“That’s Joern, he’s an honest man with dishonest friends.  He’s smart when he’s sober, but I’ve not seen him sober in three months.  Mostly he’s a hired muscle who can keep his mouth shut and give a barehand beating better than most.” Seamus shook his head, “I think he was involved in some nasty business a while back, one of my regulars, Francis, a sorcerist hired him a while back and Francis never came back and I’ve never seen Joern drink so much after a job.  Something bad happened back then.”

Pyre nodded silently, Seamus obviously cared about his regulars.  He let the man have his silent thoughts in that dark  back office for a moment, the landlord carried on without being poked.

“The heavy man in the corner, the one wearing the open robe and drinking alone, that’s the Baron Choernig.  If you want a man killed, the Baron is the man t’ talk t’, he knows all the types that most decent folks never want t’ hear of.  Back in the day he was a Wrestler and I wouldn’t pick a fight with him then or now, the man packs his muscle just behind his sheer ruthlessness.  In his last match, he snapped the opponent’s neck t’ put him out of his misery after he had tricked him int’ a nasty move that would of left him dead within a week.  Strong, ruthless but he has a kinda fierce pride, gives any man a second chance but you cross him twice you’re dead.”

“Who’s that talking in the corner?” Aleistuch asked, “I know that face from somewhere.”

Seamus continued describing the men in his bar and what they did outside its walls, Count Scruic was the man in the corner.  A man of business and mass slaver to a curious group of lizard men from the southern desert; a sly and nasty piece of work into the bargain as well.  The man he was talking to was a government tail, a thin weasley man with a small moustache and his hair waxed down they looked to be drawing up a contract between them as they discussed payment and units.

The man who sat behind the door and was invisible to those entering the inn was called Dew Grass, a Bounder from one of the ghettos near the city wall.  He worked as a smuggler for the most part but had no quibble with tracking jobs either.  He was too stupid for anything else, blew the money he made in the milk bars of the Player’s quarters.

That just left the two in the corner, a weird pair called Lyche and Sark, they muttered in close guarded tones that even the scarily sharp ears of Seamus hadn’t been able to pick up.  “Mostly about which bits of fancy they were after, seemed t’ be stoking each other’s boilers if you know what I mean, loved themselves more than the girls do, those two.” They weren’t regulars to the bar but Seamus said he’d know more about them if Pyre ever came back in.  The Deathshead retired for the evening bidding Seamus thanks whilst Aleistuch hounded the zomby barkeep with questions about the Old One until late into the night.

Reviews

[NCPanthersgurl]

I really like this story, I can really feel the characters interaction as a key point, as well as the overall plot being intriguing.

But, opposite of what you suggested to me (>.

[Justin]

This new world and especially the city is very fascinating, as are the characters that inhabit it. There seems to be just enough description to leave the city open to interpretation, but still give a semi-clear image of this new setting. It would be interesting to see how this progresses since the prologue was so enticing in the beginnings of the plot, but there is still so much more to learn.