Rats Revision Page107

The next page is here: faile35.deviantart.com/art/Rat… . For more information on the entire series, read the "'Demon's Due' Defined" journal entry here faile35.deviantart.com/journal… or the "'Demon's Due' Plus" journal entry here faile35.deviantart.com/journal… .

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Once again, Valerin is plunged into the vast cellar, and in the darkness, immobility, and humiliation of her predicament, her imagination spirals into a maelstrom of frightening images and desperate questions, at the center of which walks a wounded mountain of a man. The gag between her teeth effectively denies her any communication beyond grunts of effort and groans of outrage which she knows will have no effect on her captor. But the distressing thought galvanizes her mind and prompts the question "What will affect the innkeeper?" As the shadowy world passes beneath her on her bulky perch, Valerin begins to apply her experience as a bounty hunter, gathering what she knows of Master Fiskerne and adding to that her impressions of him on this dark day. Fueled by her desperation, the analysis is quick and decisive, particularly when the man's distant, one-sided conversation is figured in along with his miraculous healing from the potentially fatal wound she had given him a short moment before.

Albert Fiskerne is not the mastermind behind whatever wickedness is rooted in and beneath the Fair Harvest Inn, even though Valerin's mental image places him at the center of the confusing maelstrom. Though he is obviously quite mad, she senses that his is a tree of madness that seems rooted in a garden of the common and practical, more of an acceptance of the realities around him than a denial of them. Valerin cringes at the thought that whatever compels him to behave as he does, whether the working of sorcery or the exploitative necessities of business, in it the man finds a measure of peace that defies the brooding, sour weight of his face. Though he grumbles about them vocally, seemingly at odds with whatever imagined entity shares in his wickedness, the innkeeper moves no more against their disruptive presence than he does to wipe at the blood still dripping down over his right eye.

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Albert Count: 28. Albert Fiskerne was drawn using the reference provided by a mystery deviant still un-guessed. Be the first to correctly guess his identity and I'll add a couple of your deviations to the "'Demon's Due' Plus" journal linked above. If we make it to the end of this chapter with no one correctly guessing the identity of Albert Fiskerne's stock model, I'll probably just announce it at that point so the individual in question can get some kudos for his/her work ("her"? Yeah, right. ). He's been nice to help me quite selflessly at the last minute, as it were, and I'd like to give him a bit more enjoyment over it.

Enjoy!

Note: Rats in the Cellar and Demon's Due are a work of fantasy and fiction. The artist/creator in no way condones this kind of treatment toward any woman or man, by living person, gremlin, plant, assassin, ratman, viscous fluid, programmed device, animated home furnishings, or otherworldly spiritual beings. Furthermore, the artist opposes the marginalizing and restriction of women in general by any institution, political and/or religious, including those which have individual women amongst their membership touting/promoting their own happiness within that institution as evidence that ALL women should feel the same way. This includes the religion I was raised in and which I have utterly discarded from my life over this and other issues.