Fate - First Reply Let the Good Times Roll

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"Money is a thing of your civilization," she replied in her flowing tongue. "We barter among ourselves, not use coins." And murdered and took what they wanted from outsiders, she did not add.

She made a gesture to the girl running the stall indicating she wanted a drink. A bottle or a skin, it didn't matter to Aeyliea as long as it quieted the ache in her arm.

"You have said more to me than any number of your fellow people would have," she said while she waited. She was curious as to why. Vel Anir was not known for its friendliness to non-humans, especially within what it considered to be its borders. She couldn't quite come to terms with why anyone would give her the time of day here.

"Why?"
 
"We barter from time to time, but money is quicker and more consistent," Alistair explained while taking the small pastry he had bought and the drink Aeyliea had bought, then handing it to her.

He made sure to top the girl more than average, as he wanted to reward a young entrepreneur who thought outside of the box.

"Maybe it's from my time as a merchant, or maybe just from my time growing up in Vel Anir...Anirians are tiring to put it lightly. I enjoy the company of outsiders whenever I have the opportunity. It is a nice refreshing change of pace."

In his time, Alistair had the pleasure of visiting several corners of known Arethil. He still planned on visiting Malakath and the Spine when he had the chance, but for now, he was too busy for any extended trips.

"And since my people hate your people so much, then I will be one of the few Anirians to have an acquaintance with one of your kind."

Aeyliea
 
She didn't really know what to say to that. She was accustomed to indifference from most people, and hostility from the select few that knew what the scales meant. She covered her confusion by drinking a great deal of what she had just bought in a single go. The feeling of fire racing down her throat was welcome. Later, when it numbed the nerves in her arm, it would be even better.

"I do not like outsiders," she said with a little hesitation. "Or at least...that was what I was taught to believe. That one not of the Sea could not be trusted, and that they deserved no honor or quarter." For a betrayal thousands of years in the past. Except the Mother had shown her it was not as she had been taught. if the being she had met with was actually the Mother and not just some demon or lost soul tricking her into wickedness.

"I have been away from home for longer than any I have known. Being away from home...raises questions." She sounded uncomfortable about it.
 
Alistair listened intently as he got the sense that this was something important to her. When Aeyliea was finished, Alistair let the silence hang in the air for a moment before he spoke.

"It sounds like your people have some issues just like mine ... No one is perfect, but that is even more true for large groups. They tend to latch on to the negative characteristics and they can only be removed when given a chance by outsiders or those with different viewpoints."

Alistair was an Anirian, born amidst a society that often looked down and spit on those of other races and people. He had been raised to hate and fear, but his experiences had quickly warned him of those dangers. True, he may still be untrustful of an elf or someone from the Empire, but that did not meant he hated them. It just meant politically they may be opposed to him.

The danger that most Anirians did not recognize was that looking down on people often meant that they were unwilling to learn from them. However, Alistair had watched Falwood scouts dance through the trees while he had stumbled over branches. Cortosi sailors walked as if they were born on the seas. The Savannah tribes survived on rations for a month that would last an Anirian for a week.

Everyone had something worth learning.

"If you are asking questions then that is a good start. The question always comes first, and the answers are not always what we want to hear."

Aeyliea
 
"I don't want to ask questions." Life was much simpler when she could rely on the truths that faith had taught. After all, what was better than being able to cast aside anything like doubt or guilt because of what you were taught was inviolate?

There were times she resented pulling back the curtain and shedding light on uncomfortable truths. Even more so because it had been one of her own patrons that dashed her faith on the rocks. Even worse, Lorien had not offered anything to replace it.

Just an empty void where assurance and faith had once been.

"Everything was set in stone. The wheel of the sky, the home for our ancestors-in-waiting. The nonbelievers outside simply villains in an epic tale with us at the center." Her eyes narrowed with anger, hands clenched into fists. "Questions led me to a crisis in faith that my own patron remains silent on."

The words are bitter and angry.

She casts a sidelong look at the fellow and shakes her head. "How does one live when there is no guidance? When there is no word to follow?"
 
Alistair could feel the anger in her speech, but all he felt towards her was pity. That was such a...sad existence. He hesitated a moment to decide on what to say but settled for blunt truths rather than beating around the bush.

"If they aren't answering your question then maybe they weren't much of a patron...Of course, they could simply want you to find the answer yourself." He added the last bit as an attempt to lessen the words' blow.

The next question was one familiar to him. Kristen had been a woman of strong faith and often asked him what he believed in. His answers usually ranged from science, Vel Anir, or really anything else he felt at the time. However, the more he answered the question the more sure his answer became.

"I have faith in myself and what I have experienced and learned. My guide is me from one day ago...Now I do believe in the gods, but...let them give me a reason to put my faith in them and that may change. However, my experience is that they are...busy."

A very practical outlook on life that was certainly fostered in the very reasonable and logical walls of Vel Anir society.

"Although, I once had a friend that had far more similar beliefs than yours. She often compared the questions to a trial by fire to forge her faith into a blade."

Of course, Alistair had often asked the question of what if the blade breaks, but there was no perfect answer to that.

Aeyliea
 
Something stirred in the recesses of her mind. Aeyliea couldn't help but believe there was a certain... smugness... coming from that coiled serpent. Her enigmatic patron apparently agreed with Alistair.

She grit her teeth. "Everything went wrong when I say the bones of one of the Seven with my own two eyes," she said. The words were flat and devoid of emotion, even if it was anger that rolled in her heart. Anger at the betrayal she had believed, and anger at the betrayal she had discovered.

"I can't reconcile what was taught with what my eyes have seen." Pained words. "I can't let go of this hatred even when I have seen that everything it is based on is a lie." A pause. "Most of what it is based on."

After all, the people outside her home were honorless and more or less faithless. Her word was her bond, but too many outside did not keep their word. Too many relied on underhanded tactics to get by in the world. "Realizing all of that hate is based on a lie makes me angry," she admitted.
 
Now that was interesting. She saw the bones of a dead 'god'. He would love to get a chance to look over those bones, but that seemed unlikely, to say the least, not to mention mildly inappropriate given the cultural importance.

"Don't hate what is for where it came from. Not everything gets to choose where it came from, but it can still do good."

Alistair responded with a small frown, it seems he was more experienced with this advice. He had been told the words enough to know.

"That hate may even cause bad things, but it also serves to protect your people...that doesn't make it all right, but you have to find the good and the bad."

His eyes drifted towards the sun as he realized they had been talking and walking for a decent bit of time. The festivities should well be on their way by now.

Aeyliea
 
"You speak as though it is easy to ignore something taught and bred into bone and blood for millennia." She huffed a bitter laugh. "Knowing it is wrong doesn't make it any easier to ignore the compulsion to obey their teachings."

She noticed the direction of his gaze, and frowned.

"I am sorry if I am keeping you from... whatever it was you were doing." It was almost a shocking admission coming from her lips. She did not apologize for inconveniencing humans or others that were lesser. But then...

"Its just that I have never spoken of any of these things to an outsider before. Or...or to anyone else, really." She shifted uncomfortably at the admission. "I need another drink. A lot more." What had already been drank was nowhere near enough to overcome her kind's resistance to poisons, of which alcohol was but one of many. She wanted to get drunk so she could perhaps stop thinking so hard.
 
Al supposed it was easy to look like an outsider when most of his beliefs had remained intact. He had been raised and crafted for Vel Anir, and that had not really changed much. He had also been raised to think tactically and broadly, a rarity among his ranks.

"It might not be easy, but necessary."

Alistair's mind turned to other thoughts before turning back and nodding along, "How about this, take some coin to pay for some of your drinks. Come fine me in a few hours and we can talk some more. I have some business that I need to finish up soon.", he offered.

He had left his stand too long, and the employees were probably more than a little annoyed.

"I have enjoyed our conversations though."

Aeyliea
 
"Thanks, not need coins," she said as she switched back to the trader's tongue. She jingled her purse to remind him that she did, in fact, have her own money. "Will go drink much. Maybe find you in..." She trailed off. It was getting dark, and the wheel of the sky was difficult to judge after the sun had dipped below the horizon.

She made a lazy gesture with one hand, picking her way back to the pot-bellied conveyance that Traveler called their home. No one had touched the barrel of spirits she had set up on the back of the thing. She spent some time trying to find a way to tap it. After she succeeded, she managed to get about half of the contents down before she was reminded of the fact that someone - couldn't remember who, at that moment - had said to meet them.

Somewhere, or something.

She eyed her prize and the people all round her with a wariness born of distrust, and then shrugged her shoulders. Didn't even hurt much, with as much alcohol as ran through her system. The people of this outpost kept well back from Traveler's home and, by extension, from her. Almost as though there were something keeping them away.

Whatever. She didn't care. She got to her feet with surprising grace and balance given the heroic amount of booze she had just drank, and blinked at the stand where Alistair had set up shop. He was not present there. After a long moment she shook her head and marched over there in mostly a straight line, planting herself next to the wagon. "Where is..," who was it again? Oh, right. "Alistair! He told me to find him..."
 
The worker at the stall seemed surprised to see Aeyliea once again, still irritated that his boss had went off and left him to go drink and speak with the woman. He looked around like he was waiting for Alistair to pop out, when he finally sighed and spoke.

"He was just here, he said he is returning to the merchant's district that you two had been in earlier. Not sure what for. When you see him tell him that I could really use a hand back in this direction."

To emphasize the point several more customers walked over to the stall. It was clear that several barrels were empty, and Al was making a handsome profit on this day.

The guard/stall worker was just about to turn and get back to work when he spotted something and pointed to the edge of the square.

"There he is, but he is moving quickly, better hurry."

It was true, Alistair was walking at a brisk pace out of the town square and back towards the merchants quarters and the home of the elite. It was quite clear that he was in a hurry for something as his long legs ate up the ground beneath his feet.

Aeyliea
 
She scowled at the workman and his words but stumbled away and tried to gather her thoughts. They shifted through her fingers like sand for a moment. With enough effort she was able to sharpen her focus and put that attention on the shape of the fellow she had been talking to earlier.

Alistair. Right, he had told her to come find him. That was what she was doing now, going to find him. Something about what the workman had said wormed its way into her head and lodged itself there like the most intrusive of thoughts.

Not sure what for.

Well, that made two of them. About many subjects, including her absent employer who still had not returned. For a moment the nomad stood, conflicted. After a moment, though, she shrugged and started to follow Alistair at a distance.

Some instinct made her not call out to him. Some gut feeling made her not pelt after him - even if she could have without stumbling.

Am I being unreasonable? Maybe, just a little. It wasn't as if she wasn't prone to being unreasonable at times though. Stalking a relative stranger through the streets just because she was curious about an offhand comment from someone that worked for him was just inquisitive nature getting the better of her.

Probably.
 
If Aeyliea had not been specifically looking for the man and had him pointed out, then it would have been very difficult to ever find Alistair. He walked with a quickened pace through the merchant's quarters always seeming to be just out of reach of the magical lamp lights that now lit the darkened roads of the city. Even the shadows themselves seemed to hug at Alistair when he would stop for a moment to let others pass by.

It only took a moment to show where Alistair was moving. He was heading directly to the manor of Gerard LeRou. Just when it looked like he was about to walk directly up to the building, Alistair paused and sidestepped into a shallow alley. He stopped for a moment and let the darkness hide him as he observed the building.

He seemed to be thinking about something before he froze, something having alerted him. His head whipped around to look directly at Aeyliea, his dull grey eyes reflecting the light of the nearby street torch.

Alistair spoke in a whisper, but his voice traveled so that it sounded as if it was spoken directly beside Aeyliea.

"I was hoping we would meet later...This is not an ideal time."

Aeyliea
 
When he stopped, she slowed her pace uncertainly. She was not sure if she wanted to approach him or not. She decided, ultimately, that she was not really stalking him so much as following him.

And so, when she was still quite a distance away, she was startled to hear his voice. Startled enough that she reached reflexively for the thread of power that always resided in her head now. The magic did not respond to her touch, but the presence it was sourced from did.

"I waited, but Traveler is not back. Still in there," she said in a low voice. There was the touch of a slur in her voice, but only faintly so.. The presence of her patron remained like a stain on the world, a silvery, moon-flavored stain that rolled off of the shaman in low waves of power. Shaman, or perhaps warlock? It was difficult to say anymore.

"Your servant pointed you out to me, but you move fast."
 
Alistair sighed, reminding himself he would need to speak with the worker about discretion. However, as he stood there his eyes seemed to see Aeyliea in a new light. In particular, he was looking at the immediate area around her.

"You...nature...No, you have something very interesting within you."

He paused as he made a quick decision and motioned for her to draw close to him. His eyes flickered to the manor once more before he leaned further into the shadows.

"Quickly, I do not wish to be seen. We must be quick about all of this."

His own internal clock was still counting, and things should begin to get exciting in the next few seconds. Almost as soon as he stepped further into the shadows, a scream filled the air from the square. The night was suddenly made bright as a large portion of the city seemed to be on fire.

Aeyliea
 
She could feel the Mother curl about her soul. The tribal had little understanding of the ancient presence in her mind; if asked, she couldn't have begun to ask why it was the undead wyrm had latched on to her. Why she had been granted more power than others. Why the great Mother even held any interest in her to begin with.

She was not sober enough to be doing anything so crass as stealth. She nodded all the same, even as the ruddy glare of fire rose in the darkness and transported her to a different place and a different time.

Many different places, many different times. She was a Seer, but she was also an inveterate raider. She had seen her fair share of burning towns and caravans and homesteads.

She only wished that she had not left her weapon behind with Traveler's conveyance. Oh, well. Hands and feet were as much lethal weapons as we blades and bows.

She followed Alistair in silence, sticking to the decreasing shadows even as those shadows seemed to gather round her like a cloak.
 
"There will be no need to fight. I've thought this through."

Almost in response to the words, the door to the mansion burst open as several guards rushed past racing off in the direction of the fire, likely to help with damage control.

After their exiting, there was a perfect gap for Alistair and Aeyliea to slip into the manor. The building was in a large panic as people ran around trying to figure out what was going on.

Alistair casually made his way up the stairs seeming to already know where Gerard would be, likely the Traveler would be there as well.

"You said you do not know what the Traveler's business is here, right? I would suggest you ensure he is safe when we arrive."

Aeyliea
 
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Reactions: Aeyliea
"Traveller does not tell me what he intends. Ever." There was a bit of heat in her voice. She had tried not to think about what the odd creature that employed her was doing here in the first place. She had no idea what it was that the leather encased creature wanted.

Except that he demanded her services and would not accept her declining a contract. In fact...

...trying to think of when they had met was difficult, shrouded in mist and mystery.

"You do not know what kind of thing it even is," she added as she followed. Of course, neither did she. She was also acutely aware that she stood out among the people in here like a sore thumb, and that her presence would be noted and remarked upon, whatever errand her companion was involved in might be.
 
"Frankly, I could care less as long as they stay out of my way. This is not their business."

It was true, by this point in their endeavor people were starting to give Aeyliea strange looks, but the added chaos of the fires had people panicking. They were trying to help the city, but also prepare the manor incase the fire spread.

Eventually, the panic would not be enough, as Alistair led them up the stairs and to the main study where a single guard stood. The man looked rather confused, but before he could even tell them to stop, a dagger had found itself lodged into his throat. Only a gurgle escaped his throat before Alistair politely opened the door.

"Gerard? I was hoping we could have our meeting now." Alistair looked back to Aeyliea and gave her a wink.

The man known as Gerard LeRou was not the most impressive of men. Sure, maybe in his younger years, it could have been easy to see he had been a powerhouse of a man, likely earning this position through military service. However, now in his old age, much of that muscle had turned to fat. He still maintained a large stature, but it was not as sturdy as the man had once been. The man must also be balding because he clearly wore a rather ornate wig along with ostentatious fine clothing.

He turned from the window with a look of utter confusion on his face.

"What?"
 
She wanted to, but did not say, that this was not her business, either. The intensity of the situation managed to burn off what bit of intoxication she had managed to accomplish; curiosity led her onward in the wake of this man. The merchant had become a much more intense individual.

With the cold and precise murder of the man holding the door, he went from merchant to warrior in the span of a moment.

Traveler was in the room with Gerard, seated in one of the chairs before the unoccupied desk. They were clothed in a leather shell that covered every square inch of their body; the mask seemed to mold itself to their mouth so that no flesh was ever seen there, either. They wore a hooded cloak, and the hood was drawn up so that only the dark leather face could be seen.

The sorcerer did not rise or even look up when Alistair burst into the room. After the exchange, they simply...

...the chair changed positions. One moment it was facing the desk, the next it was facing the tableaux playing out. The cinnamon scent of alien magic wafted through the room.

Aeyliea stared at the strange creature for a moment before turning her attention to Alistair and Gerard. A faint hint of anger lurked beneath the surface of her hard features; this man was responsible for some raids into her homeland. Cutting his head off and putting it on a spike might have been an achievement, once.
 
"Who are you and what are you doing in my home?" Gerard moved to reach for a sword near his desk, but a quick spell from Alistair sent the sword flying off to embed itself in the wall.

"Mayor Gerard, I am a Dreadlord of the 3rd rank and have been sent by the city of Vel Anir to question you on recent activity in the city."

The man looked confused followed quickly by anger as his face turned a purplish hue of red and veins bulged on his neck. "Can't you see this is not the time! My city is burning!"

Alistair glanced at Aeyliea before sighing and stepping forward closer to the man. "There lies the problem. This isn't your city. It is the Republic's and you are simply the steward."

With a wave of his hand, the fire that seemed to grip the city had disappeared. There was no smoke or signs of damage, nothing at all to show the fire had even been there. That was enough to make Alistair smile if only slightly. That had taken a lot of planning and he was quite pleased with how it turned out.

"We are aware of your talks with the bandits, the smugglers, and even some of the local tribes...You truly have no morals."

As so many things were laid out before the man, he struggled to understand the quick-paced and changing information in front of him. His mouth kept moving as it tried to form words, but nothing was coming out.

Aeyliea
 
Her eyes slid between Alistair and Gerard, cold and hard as winter. Her stance relaxed, and she crossed her arms beneath her breasts, watching impassively as the conversation went on. She looked to Traveler once, but that faceless spook merely steepled their hands and rested their chin on it, leaning forward to enjoy the show.

"'twould appear you placed yourself in a prickly pickle of a position," the leather-clad individual said of Gerard. The tone of voice was of irony, the pitch too androgynous to tell whether being spoken by male or female.

Traveler ignored Alistair as effectively as he did Aeyliea.

She eyed her mysterious patron again, but said nothing. There was nothing to say as the scene unfolded before her.
 
The Traveler's voice seemed to shock Gerard back into the moment as he quickly glanced at the leathered being.

"Ah, yes. If you help me out of this situation then I will pay you your weight in gold...and the weight of the girl." Gerard added pleadingly.

Alistair was already moving to step but forward but looked to the individual who seemed to be Aeyliea's master, or at least boss.

"I would suggest you leave, this is not your concern. You do not want to make an enemy of the Republic."

Al unsheathed a dagger at his belt. It did not seem that he was planning on arresting the man. No, the punishment here would be death.

Aeyliea
 
"A malicious misapprehension, maybe?" The hooded head cocked to one side, the voice changing in pitch to that of a woman. "I do not serve anyone but myself," they said to Gerard, and then turned that strange look to Alistair. "And I do not care if I am a friend or a foe of the Republic, Dreadlord."

The words had a grin in them. Helpful to understand the tone and tenor of Traveler's attitude when there wasn't a face to be seen. It was not quite derision of everyone in the room, but it was not far removed from it.

"Why are you here?" The words came from Aeyliea, hard edged as the woman herself was.

"He who speaks to the tribals might know a thing or three," Traveler replied, tone and pitch shifting again to something more androgynous. There was an air of mystery woven into the words.

Both Aeyliea and Traveler looked to the weapon being drawn by Alistair. Aeyliea looked on with a touch of readiness. The spook put off an air of indifferent amusement.
 
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