[ Identity ] Faileas Anmoch

[ Site ] The Founders

[ Link ] Linky!

[ Notes ] Snitter, who is the name of the player who wrote this, is exceedingly long-winded. She wrote this as an introduction to a summer-length plotline involving Faileas and Eiliona Derwent, a girl Faileas liked (who has since retired). Snitter, however, is still around, and Faileas is quite the popular character. If you like the sound of what he does here, I'd suggest looking up a few of his other exploits... they tend to be rather fun.

As for a little background on Faileas... he's a thief, and a very good one, going as the so-called "King of Thieves" in Edinburgh.

If you want to read through this... Just to warn you that Snitter is not exactly a G-rated roleplayer. It contains swear words (relatively minor) and violence (mostly implied).

[ Nomination ]

The cobblestones rang with the dull rattling splatter of an assault of drops, their surfaces slick as rain poured down, down, down... it wasn't anything unusual, of course. Where did you think this was? The Sahara? No, no... this was Edinburgh. It rained all the time in Edinburgh. The sheets of rain that dropped down freely were nothing unnatural whatsoever, especially in late Spring. The date was June sixth, 1002. The rain, being such a normal thing, didn't ever seem to trouble anyone. However, there was one young man who found it very troubling indeed. Very, very much so.

"You shouldn't go out there, Majesty," they warned him before he left. The rain made the streets slick, and it was a dark evening to boot... but Faileas had laughed at them, laughed as they chided their King of Thieves. Darkness, he said, was the perfect cover, and the slick streets didn’t matter, so long as he didn’t have to run very far! The thief was confident. Nothing would go amiss on this trip. It wasn’t really a trip, though, it was a job, a very, very big job. Naturally. The Anmoch had ascended fully into the position of the King of Thieves, and he wasn’t going to do any dangerous jobs that were not very big. He had people to do it for him. Of course, when someone else did a job, they got a sizeable cut of the profits, and thereby, he got less. Furthermore, Faileas was a very popular King of Thieves. He did not demand some of the booty or profit from the other thieves; no, he still pulled his own weight and kept himself alive as he always had. Didn’t they realize that Anmoch was still a thrill seeker?

No, they hadn’t. Faileas left confidently to go clean out a lovely noblewoman’s purse as well as take all of the jewels she wasn’t wearing, on the same night as a large party in her townhouse. Suicide. That’s what they all called it. But, you see, Faileas had his reasons. The house was situated in the center of the city, with enough security to kill a squirrel that somehow managed to get in. However, because of the party, security would be lax, and no one would be in the chambers where her riches were kept. The woman was a widow, an old dowager known for throwing parties that lasted all night and were very rowdy, so Faileas figured that he could slip in and out without drawing too much attention.

Everything had went so well… at first…

The rain did prove a blessing, at first. He slipped easily through the disgusting alleys and dark streets of Edinburgh; it was nighttime, past ten if the town clock was to be believed. In the dark and the sheets of rain, as well as the clouds that hid the moon, Faileas Anmoch, King of Thieves, was nowhere to be seen—though he was most certainly there. The house of the party was loud and well lit; clearly, many expenses were made to make this party extravagant beyond others. Happily, Faileas noted that the group of five guard dogs, demon like dogs with slavering jaws and very hungry noses, were tethered strongly out of the way. He knew that there were only five dogs on the premises. Excellent.

The Anmoch had selected well-fitted black clothes for his venture, without loose fabric to snag on anything. He did, however, wear a black vest, so like his usual vest, though instead it was loaded with just about every single thieving tool he would require, and a few others he wasn’t sure of, not to mention a wooden plank strapped on his back, a necessity for this bugulary.

Climbing over the high wall around the garden was not difficult, though he had to walk all the way around in a cesspit of an alleyway to find a place where no one would notice a shadow scurrying lithely up the stone. At the top, he paused, looking over the windows. The advantage of being King of Thieves was that you had people to do intel for you, so he knew what room the jewels were in… Two windows on this side of the house—which was the proper side, of course—did not have lights in them. It was one of them. He counted up from the ground and then right from where the chimney was. Perfect. He’d found his mark. The thief dropped silently into the garden and slipped, still like a passing shadow, to the wall of the house.

The windows were all shadowed by curtains, though light burst forth, so Faileas felt secure climbing up onto the windowsill. He didn’t have anything for scaling vertical walls that raised three stories, though no thieves did, so this was going to be the challenging bit. The rain made everything a little slicker, and Faileas’ bare hands got cold very quickly. He ignored the pain as he reached upwards for a grip… There… just a tiny space between two stones… He lodged one hand into the tiny gap and probed upwards for a foothold, finding a place… and the agonizing climb began…

Before he reached the windowsill of his destination, nearly an hour in the cold and rain had passed. Faileas was drenched, his hair was drenched beneath the black hood he donned for, and he felt that if he couldn’t get in soon, he would die. Turning back was not an option; he would have to climb all the way back down or take the fall. If it was daylight and the ground was dry, he could take the fall—after all, the Anmoch had the same level of acrobatic skill as the best professional acrobat or actor.

The windowsill was hardly present, but he managed to grip it, just barely. This was when he required his first tools. He hung, by one arm, as he reached into his vest and removed a small, metal, wood, and cloth contraption that looked rather ridiculous. Shoving it onto the windowsill, he closed the metal grip over it and reached, still hanging by one hand, to the plank on his back. Removing that from the gentle way he had secured it there, he put it over the device, where a hole in the plank corresponded with a peg in the same place. The plank was both on top of the metal and on top of the windowsill. Removing another instrument, he secured the plank on top, and also tied it with a short length of rope. Only then did he pull himself up. The plank extended the ledge wonderfully, giving him just enough room to stand. Thank heavens he had done this so many times, both in practice and in other jobs, that standing over a three story drop on a windowsill and a wooden plank did not give him the willies.

Examining the window, Faileas determined that it was a single layer of glass, and there was no way he could possibly open it. There was a reason this room held the lady’s jewels. He couldn’t break it, as the noise would be ghastly. However, yet another thing happened that made Faileas think his luck had to be with him tonight. Below, the sounds of a brawl in the party broke loose. Naturally, these parties were rowdy—the widow liked watching men pummel each other. He heard someone banging on a window below. Closing his eyes and listening closely, Faileas smiled as he knew he could hear someone trying to break the glass… just a moment more… He had a tool out, a lightweight, hard metal object that would be perfect…

Shatter!

At the same moment, someone fell through a window on the first floor and into the garden, making the noise of the party even louder. At the same time, Faileas’ hand cracked a single, large pane, shattering the glass inward. Faileas smiled, pressing himself against the wall. If anyone looked up, they would only see darkness. The shattered window pane was small… but he’d fit into smaller gaps. This was going to be challenging…

After another hour, somehow, Faileas had cautiously made his way through the window. It was midnight, but he wasn’t tired. Success thus far proved he was lucky tonight. He’d only cut himself minorly, on the arm and on the foot, and he hadn’t torn his shoes! Some people would call him sloppy, getting cut, but they have clearly never climbed through a broken window pane, hardly wide enough for one’s shoulders, from the windowsill outside in the cold and the dark. Now… to work.

Faileas drew his wand and muttered, “Lumos.” The light skittered over the dark room. It was very plain—nothing to draw a thief’s attention. He searched the room, first with his eyes, then under every rug and tapestry, in every drawer… Until he found what he was looking for. Hidden within a drawer of a lovely set of drawers of rich mahogany—very valuable—Faileas found a small chest, hardly more than one hand span deep, one hand span tall, and two wide. Exactly…

It was locked, of course, but the lock was easy to pick with yet another tool in his arsenal of illegality. Within… ah… therein lay his target. The many jewels of the rich widow lay here, layered upon rich violet velvet… ah… Faileas set his wand down, still with the tip pointing the right way, and pulled out a small black bag. Hastily, he poured the entire contents of the chest into the bag, the velvet pieces and all… in fact, the velvet was quite valuable, and it made it so the jewelry could not rattle. With a smile, he replaced the chest in the drawer, though he pulled a piece of parchment—the only thing on him that was not soaked—from a pocket. He unfolded it and dropped it into the chest. Written upon it in black ink was:

“A pleasant evening, milady.
Anmoch”

Beneath it was a skillfully drawn silhouette of the running fox, an exact duplicate of the scar that the law enforcement already knew about—he didn’t expose anything. Grabbing his wand, he put it out and closed the drawer.

With a smile, Faileas turned back to the window and, with even more caution as he slipped the jewels through and tied them to the piece of rope that helped secure his plank. There. Tying another rope to a table leg, the table being against the wall so that it would not slide with his slight weight (Faileas was a thin little bugger), Faileas began the long and careful process of descending back to the ground. This time he could have a rope without having to throw a grappling hook. As he began to work his way through the window, gripping the rope tightly, he heard voices and footsteps outside the door. He only had his head, shoulders and arms outside, but…

“Why yes,” an old woman was saying as he heard a key enter a lock, “I do have a few tapestries you might like, Count. Here, I’ve put them on the walls in here so they aren’t damaged in the party; you saw how it was, didn’t you?” When there came a chuckling from multiple grown men, Faileas’ heart dropped all the way to the ground, three stories below, and then came back to him, racing in his chest.

Ignoring the pain that came because of the shards of glass that cut into his hips and legs as he forced himself out of the window as the door opened. Faileas, using the rope to help him, straightened up and looked over his shoulder. Silence reigned as the people, a small group, which had entered the room, stared at the black clad figure perched impossibly upon the thin windowsill. The hood which hid Faileas’ characteristic hair had fallen off, and had now fluttered into the darkness of the rain; despite the wet, Faileas’ hair still stood up. The candle that the old widow carried was quivering.

Faileas smiled at them, his mischievous half-smile, knowing that even though he was bleeding and he had been seen, they would know who he was anyhow. And with that smile, he dropped down the rope into darkness.

At least, that was the appearance that he gave to the insiders of the room. No, he dropped down only out of sight, dangling on the rope as he quickly removed his metal clamp, the plank, and the bag of jewels, which he tied to his belt, from the windowsill. Only then did he drop to the ground and turn, racing away into the night. He discarded the plank as the dowager gave a high-pithced scream, a single word that cut through the night:

“ANMOCH!”

The party fell silent, people gathering at the windows and hoping the light would fall into the garden to reveal the fleeing thief. Failes scrambled up the garden wall, before perching there and calling over his shoulder. The words cut through the sound of the rain and the silence that reigned in the house quite clearly.

“Deagh oidhche!” he said, before dropping down to the other side and out of sight. For those who do not speak Scottish Gaelic to whom he might relate this story, Faileas had wished the partygoers and the robbed dowager a good night. But then he was out of sight and out of the garden, lost to the night.

He heard the guards of the house cut loose the dogs into the street as a cry went up, spread throughout the city in an instant; this was the rich quarter, and everyone all set the cry to the air as soon as something like this happened.

“THIEF! THE ANMOCH! STOP, THIEF!”

…and so on and so forth. Faileas wasn’t going to hang around any longer. He’d edged out of the alleyway, a different way than the way he’d come, hearing the dogs on his tail already, as well as the yelling guards, concerned citizens, and partygoers. Oh, this was going to be a fun chase. Faileas’ shoes weren’t made for this; the guards were all wearing thick boots, made to manage slick cobblestones. Faileas, however, wore thin-soled, light, thin leather shoes, just a single layer, that allowed for more speed when the surface was dry or rough… but here, here he had the distinct disadvantage.

With a vehement Gaelic Curse, Faileas turned down another side street, calling up his mental map of the city and forcing himself not to look behind him. He was quite a ways from the Stag’s Heart, the only safe haven, and even further from his hideout. There weren’t any safehouses nearby, either… they were all near the Stag’s Heart. With the dogs, there would be nowhere, except rooftops, to hide, unless he got out of their sight; the rain was bad enough to dull their sense of smell.

Cursing again, Faileas ran down an alleyway as he left the rich quarter. The streets were in the same condition; they were just as dirty, just as slick, and just as dark here. However, they were narrower, more pressed-upon… And there were more people aroused by the now widespread cries. Faileas cursed yet again as he narrowly missed someone grabbing him. More people were chasing him, and he knew that unless he wanted to run by them, he’d be passing a guardhouse soon…

Plunging headfirst through the darkness, Faileas continued to flee, the bag of jewels jingling at his waist. He was managing fairly well across the slippery cobblestones, until his foot landed on one at a different angle from most of the others and slid out from beneath him. As he had known he was going to do, Faileas tripped, his foot flying magnificently out from underneath him…

But rather than meeting the cold stones beneath him, the light of a torch flared nearby as two thick, strong arms caught him, gripping him strongly—by the hair.

Faileas yelled as the man pulled him up, another swarming close with a torch. The man holding him was monstrous, easily a head taller than Faileas—which put him at an unnaturally tall height—and built like an ox. Tears came to Faileas’ eyes, though his hand dropped to where his knife was sheathed in a makeshift cloth sheath.

A hand grabbed his wrist, and another trapped his other hand sternly, squeezing mercilessly. The guard who held his feet off the ground though his hand was gripping the boy’s long, stand-up hair, glared at him, eye-to-eye.

“So,” he grunted. “This kid is the Anmoch?” He dropped Faileas cruelly, though not before the other hands that had grabbed his wrists had bound them together behind his back in rough ropes. The knots were tight, very tight, and the ropes were very, very rough. Faileas landed on the slick cobblestones, grunting as his ankles slipped. He only maintained his standing position by the infinite grace he possessed as a thief. The guard, clearly a guard for the city, glared down at him as people gathered close, the people who had chased him for so far. Reaching down, he used Faileas’ own knife to cut open the well-fit, black clothes, even drawing some blood as he knifed it open to reveal the his right collarbone.

“There’s that scar. It’s really you, you sly little fox,” he said with a cruel smile. One of the guards yanked the bag of jewels off of his belt, tossing it over to a servant who had joined in the chase, evidently one from the old dowager’s house. He nodded and dashed off into the rain.

“Let’s get this brat off the streets. Mayhaps they’ll hang him tomorrow morning and remove the Scourge of the Forth,” another man said nearby, and Faileas was pushed forwards. Somehow, he managed to stay upright, wincing as he realized how much the various cuts he had hurt. Oh… damn. The guards pushed him off over the slick cobblestones and into the guardhouse nearby, leaving a disappointed crowd behind. Some of them hissed after the guards, causing them to pause before shutting the door.

“Can’t leave ‘em disappointed, eh?” grunted the giant-man who was now dragging Faileas by the ear. Some of the guards guffawed in agreement. Faileas groaned—which earned him a cuff across the ear—as the guards turned and hualed him back out, though not before they removed all of his expensive, finely crafted tools and dumped them in a corner of the guardhouse.

The crowd cheered as Faileas was dragged out again, though many of them had returned to their dry beds, especially those that had kept up the chase from the start. Faileas was pushed forwards, and he dropped to his knees with a cry, the rain pouring down on him in sheets. “A good flogging,” said one of the guards behind him, “will most certainly keep these people happy ‘till they hand ‘im, eh?”

The silence of the night, formerly just yells and the like, which were relatively commonplace in Edinburgh, as well as the sound of rainfall, was shattered by the screams of a very guilty young man.



“I can’t hang him,” the Count Escalus said, turning to face the bruised, soggy young man and his escort, along with all the dignitaries of Edinburgh. The Count, nephew of the Prince of Scotland, had been the same Count as the one at the dowager’s party. He was also the highest ranking noble currently in Edinburgh, as the Royal family was in London, working out some fragile treaty that was sure to shatter. “This man is too young. We don’t hang anyone his age, and I know it’s a silly law, but we can’t.” His voice was a smooth, rumbling basso with the delicate accent of a city Scotsman, rather than the thick, almost guttural and yet very sleek accent that Faileas had.

After a flogging, a nighttime in a cramped, wet cell, chained to the wall, and a long time refusing to answer any questions about who the current King of Thieves was and what his real name was, Faileas had been hauled here for the trial and sentencing, all rolled into one. The County gazed at him coldly, noting the bruises and cuts from the flogging the guards gave him last night. Faileas’ sleek black clothes, reserved only for high-priority robberies, were grimy and torn. His and ankles were bound, though he sat with the same amount of dignity as any of the nobles in the room.

“I can’t deny that the sentence was the gallows, but we’d never caught him before, and no one realized how young he really was. Unfortunately, the only question he would answer was that he was the Anmoch and that he was fourteen years old. Fourteen, though old enough to marry amongst nobility, is not old enough for a hanging. However,” the County said, and Faileas knew that he had decided upon an equally horrid thing, except without the dying bit, “there are a few things we can do. Boy,” he snapped, and Faileas looked at him, his eyes gray and, despite being pained, almost mocking. “Who are your parents?”

“Oh, well, I’ll tell you that,” he said gleefully, his accent sounding quite out of place in this environment. After a moment of silence in which the Count glared at him, expecting an answer, Faileas said, “They’re Jesus, the Messiah, and the Queen of the Fairy Folk, who sends her little brownies every night to tuck me in before they tie the elflocks in maiden’s hair and go out to dance on the beach with the selkies. My grandfather is royally angry at my father, naturally, because he’s been—”

“Silence!” roared the Count, and Faileas obediently fell silent, though his rebellious half-smile still danced on his face.

“Which means,” said someone, “that he’s probably an orphan.”

The Count, having anticipated this, smiled cruelly. “Alright, boy, you can get you father to save you, if you like. I think that it would be fitting if he went to the stocks.” After a moment, the County added, “And he will stay there until a member of his family comes and pays the bounty, or until we have another miscrent to put in. Also, for his cheek, I think another flogging would be in order… And make sure that the guard who nabbed him gets a portion of the reward. The rest goes to the dowager for her damaged property…”



The date was sometime after or on June 18, 1002, Anno Domini. Since the time when Faileas Anmoch had been captured and sentence, the Circle of Thieves lived in turmoil, knowing that none of them could pull off being a member of Faileas’ family; they would be recognized as thieves and also fall. But they dared not go against the King who had been so fair, so usually, they just watched the stocks from a safe distance, watched Faileas as he stood there, his hair still as spiked as ever, still held in the stocks.

He hadn’t moved from this position for over a week and a half, and Faileas decided that if he ever got out of this, he would personally kill the Count Escalus. How on earth was he supposed to guide—even greet—Eiliona? He’d promised her that he’d guide her, show her the works, give her the grand tour… But he was in the stocks. Where would she go when she arrived? Hopefully to main square, to at least see that he hadn’t been hung, despite the lack of wanted posters around the rich quarter.

The one thing his time in the stocks gave him, other than very sore legs, very sore neck, very sore arms, very sore wrists, and very dirty clothes, was the admiration and forgiveness of most of the commoners in Edinburgh. They all came by here for the market, and all of them had seen the helpless Anmoch, bound in the stocks… Including those who had not seen the two public floggings before he had been put here. Most of the bruises were healed, though he still had a few cuts that were infected. No one cared, though, even though most of the commoners were on his side.

The main advantage to them being with him and not against him (despite the fact that most of them had suffered in some way because of his stealing)) was that occasionally an attractive young woman, lured by the prospect of the handsome but dejected thief, or perhaps some old mother, would come and bring him water and food. The nearby guard didn’t stop him—that much was custom.

The other main advantage is that rocks and their waste, both food waste and otherwise, were no longer being thrown at him, though he occasionally drew in the shy rotten tomato.

It was nearing midday, and the sun burned the back of his neck, what little of it was exposed. His skin was filthy—though the rainwater had helped keep the filth on him down, as it still rained regularly—his hair crawled with various little things he usually would have weeded out magically by now, and his clothes were bloody, dirty, moldy, and very hot under the sun—being black and covering him entirely.

The guard nearby leaned against the wall, picking his teeth as he waited for his relief. His only duty was to be sure no one tried to help Faileas get away. That was it. Let them throw rocks, let them beat at him… he didn’t care. Naturally, there was an improvised poster pinned up near to where the stocks were, as was the custom, with the following printed upon it in the Prince’s hand, in both English and Scottish Gaelic:

“The Anmoch, renowned Scourge of the Forth and Fox of Edinburgh, THIEF.
Freed when a member of his family should present him or herself with
TWENTY-FIVE gold coins, any minting, or something of approximate equal value deemed worthy by the guard on duty, the THIEF will be handed over to him or her.”

It was, all in all, rather silly, as the fee just meant that whatever bribe the guard was accepting would do. It was really just a way to reward the soldier-guards for their hard work.

Faileas, however, had the problem that no one he knew here in Edinburgh was plucky enough to stand up for him like that. After all, his own creed didn’t allow for very close friends, and most certainly, anyone with enough money for the bribe would not risk it. So, Faileas Anmoch, Scourge of the Forth and King of Thieves, was going to remain here until they decided he’d stood in the stocks for long enough, flogged him again, and sent him on his way.

King of Thieves? At the moment, by the smell around him, he was the King of Rotten Vegetables and Various Other Bits of Shit.

Such a lovely title.