"When reason dies, old wounds rise like ghosts. And a crowd without hope is just a mob waiting for a cause."
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The pre-dawn darkness clung to Baelur like a funeral shroud, thick with mist that rose from the cursed lands and carried whispers of ancient malevolence. Nisheena stood behind the bar of Nabu's Corner, her crimson eyes surveying the crowded common room with growing unease. The familiar sanctuary of her inn had been transformed into something she barely recognized, a powder keg of human emotion waiting for the smallest spark to explode into violence.
Nearly sixty townspeople had answered the call to gather, cramming into spaces meant for half their number. Farmers rubbed shoulders with craftsmen, merchants whispered urgently to their neighbors, and even a few of the younger women had defied custom to attend what was clearly meant to be a council of war. The air was thick with the smell of unwashed bodies, fear-sweat, and the metallic tang of barely contained rage.
This was not what she had intended when she'd sent Adnir and Torim to spread word of the meeting. She had envisioned a calm discussion of survival strategies, perhaps plans for evacuation or establishing neutral zones where non-combatants could shelter. Instead, she found herself looking out over faces twisted by anger and desperation, men and women who had reached the breaking point and were ready to lash out at anything that represented their powerlessness.
"The Urartu bastards killed Lord Arzash!" shouted Gorek, the scarred blacksmith whose forge provided tools for half the town. His massive fists slammed down on a table, making ale mugs jump. "That was murder under a flag of truce! There's no honor left in them!"
A chorus of angry voices rose in agreement, but they were quickly countered by others. "Arzash was a schemer!" called out Bren, a grain merchant who had always profited more from Urartu trade agreements. "Maybe Tarkun finally got tired of his games and double-dealing!"
"Games?" Meren, the eastern trader, pushed through the crowd toward Bren, her weather-beaten face flushed with indignation. "The man dedicated his life to keeping this town from tearing itself apart. What has Tarkun ever done but break things?"
The room erupted into competing shouts and accusations. Decades of stored grievances poured out like water from a burst dam. Old business disputes, romantic rivalries, family feuds that had simmered for generations, all of it suddenly focused through the lens of the great families' conflict.
Nisheena raised her voice, trying to cut through the chaos. "Listen to me! All of you!" When the noise subsided slightly, she continued. "I know you're angry. I know you're afraid. But picking sides in this war will only get more people killed."
"Easy for you to say," sneered Jorik, a failed farmer whose land had been foreclosed by Dabru moneylenders years ago. "You don't have skin in this game. You're not even—"
He caught himself before finishing the sentence, but the implication hung in the air like smoke. Not even human. Not one of us. The familiar sting of otherness, the reminder that no matter how long she had lived in Baelur, no matter how much she had done for its people, she would always be seen as an outsider when tensions ran high.
"I've lived in this town longer than most of you have been alive," she said quietly, her voice carrying the weight of decades. "I've tended your wounds, buried your dead, and kept my doors open when nowhere else was safe. If that doesn't give me the right to speak for Baelur's welfare, then what does?"
Before anyone could answer, Kael stepped forward from where he had been standing near the fireplace. The young man's face was flushed with emotion, his eyes bright with the fervor of the newly awakened. In the hours since they had rescued the wanderer, something had changed in him. The respectful farm boy who had always deferred to his elders was gone, replaced by someone who radiated confidence and purpose.