Private Tales Sickly Sweet

[Trix]

"So he likes torture," Trix nodded and tapped her bottom lip as though this discovery explained many a mystery about her old friend. Unfortunately for Alistair the discovery made him far more interesting to Trix than she had been before.

"Come on," standing, she left a few coins on the table to pay for their tea and exited the shop. It took a few weeds to loosen the lock to the whores house and soon they had joined Alistair in the bedroom. "Well isn't this cozy, cherie," she cooed and plopped herself on the sunken mattress. "I hope you didn't get to the good part without us?"

 

[Kitra Sen]

Kitra remained by the door.

The room was not made to fit so many in a space, but Kitra knew Alistair and Trix could bring about an answer in due time. For herself, she watched the woman they were to question, hoping to glean a mimicry of body language, movement, demeanour. On the rare occasions did Kit's thoughts mirror what the other thought, or an emotion be felt.

The Lyrebird of Vel Cirak. No one could lie to her.

All she needed was the others to keep the courtesan talking long enough for Kitra to mimic.

 

[Alistair Krixus]

By the time the others had walked over, Alistair had fully clothed himself and was working on putting his hair back in its proper position. The arrival of more people seemed to put the woman on further edge, but at this point, Alistair just looked annoyed that he had to go through all of this. He hated when he had to do sexual things for missions, and then it proved to not even matter.

"Mrs., I'm going to be completely honest with you right now. Those two can get the truth out of you whenever they want, but I'm in a really bad mood right now so I'm going to try first."

Alistair removed a long thin knife from a hidden sheath on his leg that was etched with several runes along the blade.

"I suggest we don't find out what my response is to the words 'I don't know.' or anything similar. Now, what do you know about the death of Jedidiah Delaney?"

Kitra Sen Trix

 

[Trix]

Trix kicked her feet with barely contained giddy excitement. Al was so much more fun since he had shucked off that girl of his. Getting angry. Threatening helpless women. Usually she liked to be the one to coax secrets from tightly pressed lips but she found herself enjoying watching for once.

"Nothing! I know nothing!" the woman pleaded, her eyes desperately looking to Trix and then Kitra, hoping for some sympathy from amongst her own sex.

The Dreadlord clapped her hands together.

"Oh I was so hoping you would say that."

 

[Kitra Sen]

Kitra stifled a snort, but already she could feel the woman's desperation. Kit shuffled on her feet, allowing herself to take on the reflection of the woman's emotions and demeanour.

She had gotten good at steeling herself when taking on the effects of others, and so Kit found herself sighing in order to release some of the pent up feelings the courtesan was holding onto. "She's hiding something."

Horror crossed the woman's face, and she start to shake her head profusely at Alistair and his knife. "I am not! I promise you! Please, don't do this!"

"She has an injured shoulder." Kitra's own felt stiff and sore, and a hand went to her left shoulder as the courtesan tried to lift her left shoulder to make it appear as if it was good as new.

 

[Alistair Krixus]

Alistair could only sigh before a look of disappointment and then sadness crossed his face. He had told her not to find out, and what was the first thing she went and did?

"You see Merryn, this one could make vomit, piss, and shit at the same time all the while hallucinating to the point that you would not even realize you told us the answers." He explained while pointing his knife to Trix.

"Then she would just slowly become you until she knew the answer even before you did." Further explaining as he pointed to Kitra.

"I am not so skilled, so my methods are far more brutish."

With incredible speed and alacrity, Alistair whipped the knife around and left the smallest of cuts along the woman's arm. However, the pain that followed would be unlike anything she had ever felt before.

"I personally think this one is rather clever. A play on empathy magic that enhances your sensitivity to all forms of pain...It's broken Dreadlords better than you."

While explaining the effects of his runes, he began to dig inside his jacket like he was looking for something.

"I think my next experiment will be with bloodworm, a rather peculiar liquid that when injected makes it feel like worms crawling beneath the skin...I've been told it is excruciating."

Kitra Sen Trix

 

[Trix]

The woman's cry was a sweet symphony to Trix's ears. She gave a contented sigh then leant back on her elbows to make herself comfy to watch the show.

"N-no! Please, I swear it! I don't know who killed him," she sobbed, her body shuddering as the waves of pain from Alistair's simple cut racked through her body. "He was just acting strange the last time I saw him. Shouting, throwing stuff. He hit me," she said not with fear but indignantly, as though she were some Queen not used to violent behaviour from her worshippers.

 

[Kitra Sen]

Kitra took a step closer into the room.

"Truth."

Her eyes were on Alistair.

"Do not doubt what you saw, cherie." Kitra mimicked Trix's confidence so naturally, her voice even changed to the same of her colleague. Trix was, in Kit's mind, a cat playing with a mouse. She needed the mouse to say it all, to give them a lead to go off on. "Do not spare any detail..."

The mouse's lips trembled, eyes wide as she stumbled over her words.

"He said he made some new friends... he wanted to introduce his favourite girls to them..." And Kitra could feel the revulsion, the slight fear.

"Truth." She said, cutting off her magical connection with anyone in this room. Kitra turned her head away, thinking and leaning against the door frame once more.

 

[Alistair Krixus]

Alistair was already shaking his head in disappointment as he casually made another cut with his magical knife. Several of her answers while technically true were just vague enough that she could sneak around some forms of truth-telling magic. She may not know the killer, but she has answers.

"Merryn, I thought you were smarter than this. I need specifics. What was he shouting? Who were these friends?"

He emphasized this series of questions by finally removing a vial from his bag of a milky white liquid with black veins that seemed to constantly move.

"Rest assured, there are no actual worms in this serum. It's actually far more painful than if I just put worms under your skin."

He held the vial just over the open wound, dangerously close to tipping the serum open and onto the wound.

Kitra Sen Trix

 

[Trix]

Trix's brows rose at Kitra mimicked her voice. Freaky. There had been a student in her year who had been able to do similar, changing his whole appearance and pitch to copy his subject perfectly. She hadn't liked that much either. At least the truth sensing was helpful, even if Trix enjoyed the more... physical ways of checking.

The woman screamed again distracting the Dreadlord and returning her attention to their current problem as the single drop of serum hit her wounds. She thrashed in the chair, straining against the chains that bound her as though she would somehow be able to escape the pain.

"Please! Stop, please," she sobbed when the screaming ended, voice hoarse and tears streaming down her face. "I-I don't know who they were. They didn't say their names. O-one had red hair and a gap between his teeth, t-the other one had a tattoo on his hand. L-like a snake. They said they were celebrating. That's all I know!"

 

[Kitra Sen]

Kit froze, remembering a detail she had come across at the crime scene.

She whipped around, stalking towards the woman that began to sob. There was no apology on her lips, nor her countenance. "Do you remember what they smelled like?"

The woman looked worried, stressed, but Kitra only furrowed her brows. "This is important."

"Y-yes... it was sweet... I don't remember how to describe it but I remember it being a little too sweet for my liking."

Kit clicked her tongue.

"Red hair, gap tooth. Tattoo on the hand..." Such description was not all too common in Vel Anir. Kitra actually felt hopeful that she knew someone that may even steer them in the correct direction.

 

[Alistair Krixus]

It was quickly apparent that Alistair was satisfied because he moved to take a small secondary vial and drop it into the woman's womb. That was the anecdote that quickly relieved the woman of her pain and stopped the effects of the poison.

He then completely dismissed her as he packed up his tools and turned to the others.

"Alright, so now we have two individuals to find...Tracking by smell will likely be more effective than sight, but still difficult given the size of the population."

Expectantly he waited for the others to provide their own analysis. It was unlikely that their targets would return to the brothel, but maybe they were still looking to celebrate somewhere else.

Kitra Sen Trix

 

[Trix]

"It's a shame that mutt isn't with us," Trix sighed, thinking for the first time since Graduation of Davi. The shapeshifting magic had always made her sneer but there had been upsides - tracking one of them.

"Unfortunately, my plants are not sniffer dogs, and so many rich nobles here use perfumes that could be described as sweet," she tapped her bottom lip in thought. It would have to be the old fashioned way. They knew where the pair were seen last and it was at least a starting point. "Where would you go to continue a celebration, friends?" she asked with a knowing smile.

 

[Kitra Sen]

Perhaps she should be glad they had not looked her way and asked if it was possible for her to mimic a bloodhound's keen nose.

Kitra wasn't sure if she would be able to to begin with, but she began to hum to herself in thought. "A pub. It's where one would go to celebrate and let everyone else know about it."

They could throw a stone and it would hit a pub from the courtesan's doorstep, but if you were to get away with murder, why celebrate in the Merchants Quarter?

"You would not celebrate here in the area where you will kill, you would go somewhere with some... flair... perhaps even... a stage. Perhaps not a pub, although it is possible." How easy it was to lose her own train of thoughts when it came to relying on the autonomy of her magic's word. To get into the patterns that have been done over and over, across Arethil. "A gentleman's club dances between pub and brothel. You get drinks, food, and a show. You would tell the girls of how successful you are and pay them to agree with you."

Her eyes fell on the courtesan, recovering and whimpering in the presences of the Vigilite. As if feeling her stare, the woman met Kitra's gaze.

"You work at one of these establishments." Kitra stated.

 

[Alistair Krixus]

Alistair listened closely as Kitra explained her reasoning, which he genuinely took to heart. She likely has the best understanding of the human psyche. No offense to himself or Trix, but they both could not give a fuck what other people were thinking.

However, there was one bit that he did not agree with, and was already shaking his head to show it.

"They won't be bragging just yet, and if they are then they are truly idiots. The kill is still fresh and there is a real chance of getting caught. This isn't the death of some gang member or merchant that they can afford to brag about casually. This is a military official and Vel Anir...treats criminals of this kind with special care."

He did not disagree with the brothel guess as it would also serve as a pseudo brag by the murderer to return to a similar place to that of the murder, but the problem was that there were still a decent number of brothels in the city.

"Merryn, you work for a brothel of good repute. Who are your primary competitors?"

Kitra Sen Trix