With some 400 pounds of thug held aloft by a fist-full of his shirt, I walked through the rain and slammed him up against a brick wall. As the water ran down his face in little streams, it changed from a dazed look to one of shock (a little slip of a woman like myself just couldn't be holding him up with one arm) to one of anger (he wasn't going to let the little bitch get away with it), and he pulled one of his arms up and sent a fist hurtling towards my skull.

I stopped it easily and grabbed a finger, jerking it back into a very unpleasant position. His face contorted in pain, and I said, "Didn't your mother ever teach you it's not nice to loom up at women out of the murk?"

Anger warred with pain in his face, and he started "Bitch, you-" but didn't get to finish, since I applied a little more pressure to his finger. I was feeling much too pleased with myself, and was about to say something very witty and biting, when I noticed something out of the corner of my eye. I turned my head and saw, far away and high up in the murk, a glowing green light, streaked with red, pulsing irhythmically. Not good.

"The Citadel? What's happened to it?" I asked the thug.

At the mention of the Citadel, the fear that should have been there from the start swept onto his face, and he sputtered "Things- too many- at night- gates opened-"

Damn.

"What day is it?"

He kept going on about things and horrors run amok, so I pulled his finger back even further.

"I'll make it simple. Is today the 18th?"

"Yes!" he gasped.

I dropped him to the ground and clouted him on the side of the head with a carefully considered ammount of force (I didn't want to hurt my hand). He fell to the cobblestones, face in a puddle. I turned him over with my foot so he wouldn't drown (see, I do have a soft spot in my heart for scum), then gave him a quick search. I found two long and wickedly sharp daggers, and a clinking pouch of coins, which he had probably liberated from someone else.

Taking these, I stood up and tilted my head back, feeling the rain wash over my face, taking stock of the situation: I was wet. I was cold. I had all of my limbs attached firmly to their usual locations. A pouch full of third hand gold. A pair of nasty daggers. And, oh yeah, my new job: protecting the Citadel from scheming nobles, power hungry merchants, mad wizards, evil cultists, a demon lord who hated my guts, and, if I was really lucky, a bunch of his pals.

A solo job, all by my little old self.

Wheee

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