Open Chronicles Something in the Water

[Aeyliea]

The snap of reins was lost to the noise of the crowd. Even so late, Alliria never really slept. Sky alight with thousands of stars and moons absent, the streets were thronged with the many and varied people that called this place their home. Myriad travelers passing on their way through to somewhere else hurried along and tried to avoid unwanted attention. Even the cooler nights did not keep the throng at bay; if anything, it merely encouraged more to come out of an evening, and this being the Shallows...

...well. The disreputable were commonplace here, amid the stink of sewage and marshes that flooded with the tides. Plenty of problems had been tossed into those fetid pools, too. The Shallows always had been and, likely, always would be a den of scum and villainy.

She stepped out the rickety door of a ramshackle building that billed itself the headquarters of Samsun and Son's Overland with a pouch that clinked as she tossed and caught it. The carts and wagons were dispersing to wherever it was they would head. And wherever that was, was no longer her concern.

The No'rei despised the city. She despised the people in it, despised the coins in the little satchel in her hand. Scum and villainy, but then that was everyone else, wasn't it? And as the thought twisted through the snake-filled recesses of her mind, something stirred and gave a disapproving grunt.

The Seer scowled, turned on the boardwalk, and wended her way through dockworkers and the riffraff of the great trade hub. She could feel the occasional set of eyes on her as she stalked along. Had she a tail, it would have swished angrily; the waist-length braid of white hair nearly served as such. The seeming decorations in it clicked and fluttered, constant companions worn not out of vanity (even though she was vain) but utility. Some of those looks might have been for that, or simply the fact that one of her kind walked the street.

Not unheard, but uncommon. And with a reputation for foul tempers and an inclination to violence that made them a thorn in the side of most police forces in those places surrounding the plains.

She knew exactly where she was going. The last time she had been in the city she had found just the place to indulge herself. That was the order of the night; drinking, fighting, or fucking - one of the three. She personally wanted the first two options. It had been a miserable day and she wanted to make someone else' day just as miserable. It was a talent of hers, and she intended to practice it.

The hole barely qualified as such. The floor at one end had collapsed at some point, and someone had stacked a few empty casks and a couple of stolen doors to replace it. Beneath, dark water lapped at the rotten boards, the humors of the bog wafting up every so often. The tables were thick and heavy enough to take abuse and not be easily tossed about, the chairs similar. The owner knew their clientele.

Stepping in from the street, she scowled at the selection on display. Ne'er-do-wells, drunk wife-beating fishermen, dockworkers, and thieves sat at most of the tables. A young woman in a dirty, low cut dress belted out a bawdy tune off key to the out-of-place lute. She barely stpped through the door when a massive hand the size of a ham gripped her shoulder. For a moment she entertained the idea of gutting the bastard, then cooled her temper.

"Weapons." The man gestured with a thumb to a small pile of swords and the like and she scowled, doffed the carrying case with her spears and then stared at the bouncer defiantly. He simply gestured with his head and released her. With a distasteful grunt, she wended her way through the tables to one of the few in the center of the room unoccupied, sat down with her arms crossed beneath her breasts and scowled. It did not take long for someone to show, see the color of her coin and take an order for something strong enough to strip paint.

While she waited, she eyed the room warily.

 

[Mogrin Dhuumal]

Imports and exports.

Not the most exciting business to be engaged in, that was for sure. But, at the base of it, it was the business of trading out the stuff you have and trading for the stuff you don't have. This latter part was what concerned Mogrin here on this venture to Alliria. So what could have convinced him, an ogre whose ancestors were far more accustomed to the rough heights of the Spine than to anything resembling seaborne travel, to get aboard a trade vessel and make for Alliria? It wasn't coin; although it wasn't bad, that could always be gotten in other means. It wasn't because he necessarily liked to travel. And it wasn't because Alliria was some gem of a city promising a good time, even if a good time might accidentally be had.

Nope. None of that. It was for chocolate. Pure and simple.

Mogrin had no idea where it came from, what all was involved in making it or refining it or whatever it was that the confection-makers needed to do with it, he had no idea how rare it was or how much it cost (whether or not the merchant in Gild he was contracted by was getting ripped off wasn't his particular concern), and he didn't care. He didn't care about any of the fancier, loftier intricacies around the art of trade, transport, or anything to do with chocolate as a commodity.

All Mogrin cared about was that he liked to eat it. That was it. And he couldn't eat it if Gild didn't have a stock. That's what could convince an ogre to get onto a boat and sail from the Anatol sea, around the jagged point of the Allir Reach, and into one of the many harbors of the great trade city of Alliria.

It was going to be a few days at port, so Mogrin needed something to fill the time; the work he was engaged in, overseeing the correct quantity of the manifest and seeing to the labor of loading, was mostly done by the end of the first day, and it was just a matter of waiting on the other goods bound elsewhere in Campania to be loaded onto the vessel.

So Mogrin descended down into the seedy part of the city: the Shallows.

He had the strong impression that this might be a bad idea, what with the way those boards which comprised the walkways over the swamplands were creaking under his weight. But they held. No surprise swimming. He just needed to watch his step across those parts.

Eventually he came to a tavern where, even outside the door, he could hear all the ruckus loudly and clearly enough from inside. Perfect. Just what he was looking for. Like always outside of Gild though, the doorway was going to be a problem. At best it was built for orcs on the larger side, elves on the taller side, people like that. It helped. But Mogrin would still have to crouch down and turn to the side and shimmy through the portal, and, once inside, it wasn't going to get any better, because he wouldn't be able to stand up to full height and none of the chairs would be able to support him.

But he wanted a beer. He had come to get a beer. So he was getting a beer. A little ruckus on the side was always a boon.

Mogrin's entrance into the tavern looked like it made the doorman's night. "You're a big sonuva bitch."

"That's right," said Mogrin. "My mother would be honored you said that."

The doorman gestured with his thumb in the same manner he had done with Aeyliea, back toward the pile of assorted armaments. "Weapons."

Fair was fair. Mogrin dispensed with his axes (he had left his club at home) and handed them over. The doorman preferred to take the ogre-sized weapons one at a time, dropping one in the pile and getting the other and doing the same.

Now came the scoot to the nearest table. No sense in going too far in to the tavern, getting too much in other peoples' way more than he already was, and making his eventual exit that much more of a hassle. So he sat cross-legged on the floor at a table that looked laughably too small for him.

This size disparity was even more pronounced when he produced from his coin pouch a few pieces of silver coinage, all of which looked absolutely dwarfed in the palm of his hand. He set to counting them, figuring the volume of beer he'd need to purchase to get tipsy.

Aeyliea

 

[Aeyliea]

The girl that took her coin and her order was too young to work in a place like this, and too hard used for her age. The disgust on the mercenary's face was plain and easy to read. It was mirrored, too; her kith and kin were not well known outside the Savannah but the few who did know had little love for them.

Feeling was mutual. At least she did not sell her body - certain parts of it anyway - to make her way in the world.

She scowled as she waited. The ache in her left arm was abominable this particular day. Might have been the changing weather, might have been the humidity of the coast. Most likely, it was what passed for humor among the Seven. Misery was their particular joy, typically visited upon the godless ones outside the Sea. Well, she was among those godless ones right now. Outcast, alone.

Something slithered in her head. She pointedly ignored the terrifying thing therein, both its reminder that it was there and the amusement at the run of her thoughts.

A bottle arrived at the same time as the ogre did. Moodily snatching the promise of oblivion away, she nevertheless stared at the beast. They were not native to her homeland. Hell, she had never seen one before today unless it was at a distance. She marveled at the thick body, a veritable wall of flesh and bone. What a formidable opponent that would be!

She shook her head, fetish-bedecked braid fluttering and clicking as she did so. Admirable though the build, she was not here to go moon-eyed over monstrosities given form. She was here to seek an end to the damnable throb of old injuries. Maybe earn some new ones, one way and another. She popped the cork, took a sniff of what was inside.

It smelled of apples. Well, mostly apples.

With a shrug, she disregarded the cup she had been offered and drank from the bottle. Slammed the bottle into the table, sending a spout of liquid shooting into the air. Had she not been coughing and huffing for breath, she might have been surprised when it did not eat through the table. It took a minute to regain her composure, mind tracing the fire that ran down her throat and pooled in the guts. Those guts rolled and roiled.

The creak of wood and the shifting of the table announced a new arrival. Aeyliea looked up at the offending individual, face flushed from the coughing, and scowled. A brute of a man had taken a seat across from her, easily twice her weight. A dock worker by the look of him, broad of shoulder. He gave her a sour look.

"Never fink t'see a lizard-neck here," he said. He sized her up, and grinned. The gaze lingered on her twisted left arm, the muscle misshapen and heavily scarred, before turning to her face. "Ent you lot s'posed t' stay out the city?"

She sat in silence for a moment, ever inch of her radiating a hostility bordering on murderous. "Not free seat," she said in thickly accented common. "Leave. Am wait for someone," she added. There was no mistaking her meaning: she wanted the unwelcome man to get up and go somewhere else. This was her middle of nowhere, and he was not welcome.

To punctuate, she picked up the bottle and drank again. This time expecting the snake-venom bit, she only sputtered a bit.

"Jes askin' friendly questions, friend," he said in a cheerful voice. The smile on his face did not reach his eyes. Her own bored into his head like augurs. This seemed to amuse him more than anything else. He leaned in closer, rotten breath washing over her as he did. "Reckon y'ought get y'gone from here, scale-shite. Brother, him got t'problem wi' ye and yers. Pal."

He stood up. She glowered at him but did not move beyond taking another drink of the godawful piss-water that passed for a drink here. A deliberate drink, in which she stared at him malevolently the entire time.

Deliberately set the bottle back on the table.

Deliberately leaned back in her chair and gave him a quite deliberate smile that also did not reach her eyes. A muscle in his cheek feathered, but he said nothing.

Just spun round, surprisingly adroit for a man of his size, and stalked away. She gave him a rude gesture as he went, snatched the bottle from where she had set it, and continued to work her way through it.

 

[Mogrin Dhuumal]

Mogrin had the coins in his palm counted out (a task none too easy, what with fingers oversized for the job) and he looked up. By now he'd have thought one of the barmaids would have come by. Yet, from what he could see, the two behind the bar counter looked highly apprehensive about going anywhere near him. They had been looking his way, talking to each other in a hushed manner which Mogrin could only imagine went something like, "You do it," "No, you do it," and when they saw that he had glanced toward them, quickly did they avert their gazes.

That could prove to be something of a problem.

Before he could put much thought into solving it though, a slight confrontation took place in front of him, at the table directly across from his. Mogrin didn't catch all of it, but what he did hear told the tale well enough, and an old and venerable tale it was: as drink inspired (often foolish) bravery and as well loosened inhibitions, many a time it was that abrasive honesty came bellowing out. Here, a big human had some manner of problem with a half-lizard white-haired...human, Mogrin didn't know what else to call her. The latter toasted to the former's departure with a big swig on her drink.

Why not try his luck with her?

"Hey," Mogrin called to the white-haired woman. "Can I ask you a favor? I'll buy you another drink for it."

Aeyliea

 

[Aeyliea]

Fire, spreading and mellowing as it did so. The damnable ache didn't improve any, and neither did her mood as a result. At least the ribs that had stopped the blade from killing her didn't ache today. She cast a side-eyed look at the fellow who had approached her, saw him at another table with three others. One of them, a blade-slender fellow with a dark cast to his face, eyed her darkly while his brother spoke to him in as much a hushed tone as could be heard over the sound of music.

Her head snapped round at a loud voice. Her head spun a little at the sudden motion, courtesy of drinking a fire drake's piss, and she was not immediately sure it was she that was being spoken to. Uncommon enough that it was a better bet to assume not.

She found the wall of flesh addressing her. She stared at him for a very long moment, eyes inscrutable and face blank. "What favor. What want?" That thick accent made it difficult to understand her broken common, but her face at least was expressive enough to give some hint. Annoyance, but not outright hostility. Not yet, anyway. More importantly, she was completely and utterly unintimidated by his size or presence. "Not done with this one," she said, raising the bottle to emphasize the point. It sloshed, half empty already.

Half empty already, and the effects of the first swallow not yet having fully manifested themselves yet.

 

[Mogrin Dhuumal]

Mogrin gave a jerk of his head toward the bar counter and made a motion with his handful of coins. Then he spoke of the favor he needed, "Go up to the bar and buy me all the beer I can get with this—after you take a little cut for yourself."

He spared some glances around the busy tavern, its crowded environs. Could he get up to the bar? Undoubtedly. But his arms, his thighs, and his butt would be greeting everybody along the way, shoving aside tables, pushing chairs and their occupants all over the tavern floor; if he did, that woman in the low cut dress would have something new to sing about: that time an ogre redecorated the place. The thought of the barmaids growing pale with alarm upon his hypothetical approach was a touch amusing, though.

Mogrin summarized his minor plight gruffly, "I would, but it'll be a pain in the ass."

Aeyliea

 

[Aeyliea]

She blinked, cold blue eyes widening a touch in surprise. He spoke to her, a complete stranger and of a particular people that were not well liked, just to get beer. She could not help the short bark of a laugh. It was just too absurd. Then again, he was an immense fellow and she had seen how others regarded him. The only difference between them was that he was big enough to intimidate anyone from doing anything silly.

He was also not a woman alone in a shit-stained dive of a bar. All of the help here were little more than flesh up for an offer of coin (if the young woman was lucky enough not to get cornered). Not that she herself cared, of course; she was completely capable and absolutely willing to break bones to get her point across.

She stood, and stumbled a touch when she did. Happily, her balance wasn't so off that she couldn't stand or walk. She eyed the bottle she had been drinking, wondering just what it was that she had ordered that was so strong. Shrugged, and picked her way by the ogre. "Is fine," she said with another shrug.

She made her way to the bar, dropping the coins on the counter. She could feel eyes on her, but ignored them. It took a moment to get the attention of the wench minding the counter, and an uncomfortable amount of time to convey what the ogre wanted without mentioning the beast. They were only a little more comfortable with her than they would have been with him but once she was sure that they wouldn't just pocket the money and bail, she made her way back.

Unwelcome hands found her on the way back, but she ignored them. The dragon's piss was definitely in her veins now, and when she took a seat it was after grabbing her bottle and heading to Mogrin's table. She dropped like a sack of potatoes, sprawling in her chair. She offered the bottle to him, face mildly flushed. Completely out of character, for her at least. "Done," she said.

 

[Mogrin Dhuumal]

Worked out just fine. He could have easily have been blown off by the woman, caught, perhaps, in the ire stoked by that man with the vocal problem. Whether it was Mogrin being the more welcome of the two petitions for her attention in the past moment, or whether it was the simple promise of some more drink (and some more free drink at that), his beer was on the way and he was happy.

And, as it turned out, he might have gotten a drinking buddy out of the exchange—the scaly-human woman sat down at his table.

"Thanks," said Mogrin, seeing the barkeep and barmaids working on filling up tankard after tankard.

She offered the bottle and he accepted it, not knowing what was inside. Pinching the bottle between his thumb and two of his fingers, Mogrin partook of Aeyliea's generosity and drank.

His eyes lit up after the first swallow. Mogrin coughed hoarsely afterward, setting the bottle down and thumping his chest with a fist a few times. With a choked effort, his other arm hovering in front of his mouth, he managed to say, "What have you got in there, the blood of a demon?"

He liked getting sloshed as much as any of his Maulgar kin, but beer was far more fun to drink than this firewater. That his woman here (part dragon?) could do so, and apparently with some regularity at that, spoke well to her fortitude. Surprising.

Aeyliea

 

[Aeyliea]

Throbbing. But getting easier to ignore. She absently - and gingerly - rubbed at the offending left arm. "Not know. Taste like raksh shit," she said. "Not drink for fun. Help with pain." She waved the scarred and twisted arm for emphasis.

She regarded him, sitting there. He was too damned big; thick and muscle-bound and tall as all hells. She found herself idly wondering how, exactly, she would fight such a creature. Honor (and no small amount of pride) would not have let her take the safe way out in such an instance. Getting hit by him would be like getting hit with a tree trunk, which he could likely wield like a club.

She snorted at the image in her head.

"You? Demon? Not see so big here. None on Sea," she said. The feeling of being watched returned, but she continued to ignore it.

 

[Mogrin Dhuumal]

Mogrin didn't know what had happened to her arm, and he didn't ask—just nodded. Maybe it was a recent injury, fresh from a battle of not so long ago, still throbbing with aches. Among many of his fellow ogres, such things were seen as blessings from Threshkuul, and proudly were wounds endured, scars displayed, for having the fortitude to weather many of both was pleasing to the Almighty One.

Her question brought out a hearty laugh from Mogrin.

"A demon? No." Not quite following through on saying what he was, but instead indulging on the idea of demons, Mogrin mused, "I haven't fought a demon yet. But they're hard to come by. I missed my chance with the Pandemonium Crisis."

Then he gave her a broad, almost goading smile and asked, "Are you a demon? Those scales, drinking this liquid fire. Maybe demons come with white hair, I don't know."

Irene, a friend of his, probably would've taken that as half a compliment, half an insult, and not known how to feel about it. Time to see if this woman here was the same or different.

Aeyliea

 

[Aeyliea]

She flinched at the comment about her hair. It was subtle, but if you knew what to look for it was there. Her hair was, of course, unusual among her people - they tended towards dark hair. It was seen as a sign from the Seven, or a marker of their favor, to be born with such a thing. Albinism was equally prized, but far more rare even than her.

"No'rei," she said. Liquid fire had done its part to make her a touch friendlier than normal, else this conversation might never even have happened. Concentrating was... difficult and concentrating on her many and varied prejudices at the moment seemed distant. Unimportant.

Happily, the presence in her head had become little more than a background buzzing. Just as well as she did not want to deal with the demon in her head.

"Not many here. Only stay in Sea, away from outsiders. Unbelievers, traitors, god-slayers," she said. A touch of heat entered her voice at the last; she was nothing if not fanatical in her devotion to the Seven. Even after they had spurned her.

Even after her encounter with the false one.

 

[Mogrin Dhuumal]

"Yes'rei," Mogrin said. Waited for two seconds with a flat expressionless face. Then grinned.

He couldn't say he'd ever met one before, a No'rei, or even much heard of one. After a few (ogre-sized) drinks, some of Mogrin's stark honesty might come tumbling out on that point: most everyone who wasn't over eight feet tall just looked like humans to him. Elves were skinny humans, orcs were green humans, and these No'rei were humans with a few rough patches.

The barkeep was arranging all of Mogrin's drinks on a wooden platter on the bar counter, preparing to lift the heavy load and take it over.

Aeyliea added a few more details. Mogrin would've made a comment on the "only stay in Sea" remark, but that very last word was too good to let pass by.

"God-slayers? Sounds like a tall tale to me. You can't kill a god. Wouldn't be much of a god if you could." He barked out a laugh. "Guess there are some dumb mages out there who think they are gods. They find out quick that they're not when they get their skull bashed in."

Aeyliea

 

[Aeyliea]

She bristled immediately at the perceived derision, glassy eyes flashing dangerously in the poor light of the place. "All things can die," she said. "The Seven are no tale," she added in an even more low and dangerous voice.

It was hard to doubt the validity of one's deities when they spoke directly to you. Even if the voice in her head right now was that of a demon - an imposter, a false idol, a liar. Either the alcohol had managed to drown the thing out, as it had the ceaseless ache in her arm, or it had lost interest in her.

"Many who go to the Sea, never return." She made a gesture with her good hand, the universal slice across the throat motion. The No'rei were not friendly with outsiders, and scarcely much better among the many disparate clans and tribes among them. Life was bloody, violent, and often quite short. That she had made it to her current age spoke plenty of her ability.

Beside, his words tickled a part of her that still denied the words of the demon in her head. A god shouldn't be able to be slain by anything less than an army. It made her agitated and fidgety, and she took another drink of the liquid fire almost as a reflex.

 

[Mogrin Dhuumal]

A feisty No'rei human. Mogrin liked that, and he gave an amused grunt of approval.

The barkeep (surely wrangled into the task by the unwillingness of his barmaids) came up to the table and set the platter upon it. He stood there for a moment, as if unsure how to gracefully disengage from the pair of Aeyliea and Mogrin, a slight apprehension of both in his eyes. He settled on an awkward sort of half bow, then spun around on his heel and with some amount of haste walked back behind the safety of his bar counter.

Mogrin's hand engulfed the first tankard, and he downed the whole container in a single go, throwing back his head and more or less hurling the beverage into his open mouth.

"You a sailor? You can have that life." Mogrin guffawed. "I just came off a ship. Don't care too much for the sea. Now if the damn ship can just make it back where it came without—" he repeated the same throat slicing motion she had, "—any of that happening, I'll be a happy ogre."

He wasn't too fond of the idea of a "burial" at sea. Of course, unbeknownst to him, the sea he was talking about and the Sea Aeyliea was talking about were, likely, two different things.

Aeyliea

 

[Aeyliea]

She blanched at the notion of going aboard one of the creaking wooden things the locals called ships. She found she could stand on the shore and admire the presence of vast amounts of water, or wade through the shallows. Stepping off into water she could not see the bottom of nor touch with her feet was a terrifying ordeals, and trusting yourself to float on the wider waters on something that moved and made unsettling noises?

Not her cup of tea.

After thinking - sluggishly - over the answer to his question, she scowled. "Not sailor." She thought for a minute longer, picking over her words carefully. She sometimes forgot that the people outside the Sea referred to the great waters as such a thing. The Sea she referred to was the Sea of Grass, colloquially known as the Aberresai Savannah. "Not much water in the... the Sea of Grass?" A quizzical expression, here and then gone. "One side, no water open to sky."

She made a warding gesture again. "Big water for outsiders. Me? No. Never."

She noted raised voices in anger somewhere in the room, but when she looked she could not see anything. The keep that had delivered the ogre's booze was eyeing one corner of the room uneasily, cutting glances to the bouncer at the door. Aeyliea could not see what it was that had the man's attention.

 

[Mogrin Dhuumal]

Not sailor.

Mogrin cocked his head. Then what was all this talk about the sea, then?

Oh. A Sea of Grass. There were two big "seas" of grass that Mogrin knew of, one on Liadain and one on Epressa: the Savannah and the Steppe respectively. Probably wasn't the second one she was talking about; there were Steppe ogres (who looked down on the "civilized" ogres from Gild and Tyr, much to Mogrin's ire), and chances were, if she was from there, she probably would've seen one. So the Savannah it was then. Farther west than Mogrin had ever been, that was for sure.

Mogrin downed another tankard for beer. Didn't pay too much mind yet to the indistinct anger rising above the rest of the tavern's din.

"Ha! You and me both. I don't swim. I'm never going to swim. Let the kivren and the naga have the ocean. I need solid earth beneath my feet." Which was one of the reasons why coming down to the Shallows, with its creaking walkways over the swamp, was something he had to think twice about.

He set the empty tankard down on table.

"Mogrin, by the way. Outsider to both Alliria and your Sea of Grass. You?"

Aeyliea

 

[Aeyliea]

She did not even have a word for swimming. Easterly, the monsoons might create temporary bodies of water but those places had their own dangers that definitively discouraged going into the water unless absolutely necessary.

She regarded the brute and said nothing. Names were not important in a place like this. Their acquaintance was too brief to warrant names, and in a city of this size it was unlikely that they would cross paths again. That and the fact that her people were not exactly well known for their disposition towards others even among their own kind. The Seven encouraged strife and violence, after all; only the strong should survive. Friends and allies were rare things, often limited to one's family and no other.

She opened her mouth to speak and was interrupted by the scrape of rough chairs being drug across the floor. A thick man, built like a brick shithouse, reversed the chair and sat in it with the back in front of him. Several others of varying builds hung about near and far, eyeing the ogre far more nervously than the white-haired outsider.

Aeyliea took the opportunity to fix the newcomer, unwelcome to the table, with a dark, hard-eyed scowl. "Leave," was all she said. "Other tables there are? To them you go." There was just a touch of a slur to her speech.

The heavyset man cast a sidelong (and decidedly uneasy) look at Mogrin. Some kind of mental calculation was going on inside that muscle-bound head. "'s a free tavern. Ya'll looked like y'could use some comp'ny over here." The look he gave her was pure malice. "'sides, not often I get t'rub elbows with an ogre. See which of us drinks 'isself under the table, ne?"

Her scowl deepened.

 

[Mogrin Dhuumal]

To the heavyset man Mogrin said simply, "No."

He grabbed his third tankard, taking his time drinking this one instead of throwing it all down in one go. This wasn't the first time he'd been asked such a thing, or been asked to arm wrestle by a man either drunk or delusional or both. And to these inquiries Mogrin always said no. Because it wasn't fair in either case, and there was nothing else to it.

Other than that, Mogrin didn't mind if the man stayed or if the man went, but the white-haired woman surely minded. Her scowl could turn a full moon new, making it hide with fright.

Mogrin set the half-emptied tankard down and looked back to the man.

"You got anything else you want to say?"

Aeyliea

 

[Aeyliea]

Cold calculation behind his eyes. He might be a thug and a troublemaker, but this fellow was not stupid. Her cast a side-eyed look at Aeyliea and noted the scowl on her face, grinned unpleasantly. "Jes' curiosity. What brings an ogre like you down out t'north? If s'work, ye could make a killing on the docks."

True enough. Mogrin could likely pick up as much in one hand as two or three men could together. There were other things that the ogre would excel at, not least of which was cracking skulls.

"Somewhere else," she repeated and offered a smile to the fellow, all teeth and not a jot of friendliness. He looked at her, the glittering malice in his eyes still clear as day. "Not her for fight."

"'s called conversation an' bein' friendly, scale-skin," he shot back. "You lot might not understand it though. We're not fightin'." Yet.

He turned back to Mogrin, shrugged and held up his hands as though to indicate he couldn't understand how someone could not. "I'll even buy ya a round o' drinks, an all."

The ice in Aeyliea's eyes did not thaw.

 

[Mogrin Dhuumal]

Mogrin came for some beer and a little ruckus on the side, and it looked like he'd end up getting both. There was a saying among the Maulgar, at least those who hailed from the Spine like his ancestors did. The saying was this: "Two stones do not bend."

And what Mogrin had before him were two stones.

His gaze bounced between the man and Aeyliea and the man again as they traded words in what passed for conversation but certainly wasn't friendly. It did seem like this man—and maybe some others, he wagered—knew something about the No'rei people. Or had assumptions. Either one.

"Alright," said Mogrin, taking the man up on his offer. If he wanted to buy drinks and then get into a scrap with the white-haired woman because he wouldn't take get lost for an answer, that was on him. "I'll take a beer, and then I'll tell you exactly what brings an ogre to Alliria." Seeing as the man said "the north", thinking Mogrin to be from the Steppe, he might find the answer to be fallen short of his expectation. Another one of his problems, because Mogrin would have his beer.

"You want a drink?" Mogrin asked of Aeyliea, wondering vaguely if she'd take advantage of the offer or, like the stone of the saying, not bend at all.

Aeyliea

 

[Aeyliea]

She fixed Mogrin with an acidic glare, gestured to the bottle of refined piss she had been drinking, and then shifted that ugly look to the unwelcome party at the table. Who ignored her and her unsociable attitude as if he had plenty of practice doing so.

The fellow gestured to a seeming friend at the bar, who spoke to the proprietor. Coin exchanged hands, amid a flurry of quick spoken, soft words between the one server with the ample bosom - the very one that had been so deathly afraid of Mogrin and uneasy by the tribal wench even now scowling at the unwelcome guest.

"So s'not work that bring ye down, then," the fellow said. "All mysterious-like, like our white-haired savage here, I reckon." A flashed smile at her, and an almost earnest one to the ogre. It was clear which he was more concerned about, and it wasn't the woman. Her arm had started to throb again, the alcohol already burning from her blood. Her people had no tolerance to alcohol, but their very nature made any poison a short-lived thing.

"Came here to drink. Not talk with sun-bleached..," she began, and trailed off. Couldn't think of an insult just then. That was not her way, after all; the spears taken from her would have been lubricated quite liberally with this fat pigs' blood if they hadn't been taken from her at the door. It was with a considerable bit of effort that she pushed her temper back to a smoldering ember. She wrestled with that temper, soaked in alcohol as it was, and turned back to Mogrin. "Aeyliea. As they say, hired sword. Not use sword, yet," she said. She pointedly did not look to their guest.

 

[Mogrin Dhuumal]

Seemed like the Kindly Fellow (and now he was pegged in Mogrin's mind as such) was spurring for a fight. And just Kind enough was this Fellow that he was practically encouraging the woman to throw the first punch. Maybe it was all to help paint her as the "white-haired savage" he accused her of being, doubtless causing her some grief with the Allirian authority, or at least what passed for it down in the Shallows or in this rickety tavern in particular, but damn if Mogrin didn't want to see that fight. The Kindly Fellow stood a whole head taller than the savage he was provoking, but even Mogrin himself had been beaten in wrestling spars by opponents a whole head shorter than him who used clever techniques, matching his brute strength up against their foresight and wit.

"I'm a hired axe myself from time to time," Mogrin replied to Aeyliea. And then with an acknowledging glance to the Kindly Fellow before looking back to Aeyliea, he said, "But I came here for chocolate. Trade mission. That stuff doesn't grow in Campania and I wish it did. It'd make these sorts of trips a lot shorter."

Aeyliea

 

[Aeyliea]

Aeyliea sniffed at the notion of trade. There was virtually no trade between her people and the outside world, unless you included trading blows with one another. That notion was a little harder to believe now than it might once have been, but she was nothing if not stubborn. Knowledge that did not fit the box she had made of the outside world was quite often ignored.

"Trade, only trouble it brings," she said simply. Mr. Friendly, as Mogrin had deemed him in his own head, scoffed at that.

"Stuffs' too expensive fer me, friend," he said. It was true enough. "Have trouble 'nough stayin' alive round here, wot with the gangs and stuff. An' some o' the work, why, we do not always come back from in one piece. Or at all."

"Only strong survive," the white-haired woman replied in a matter-of-fact tone. It was the truth of her own life among the clans. Drinks arrived, were set in front of the unwelcome guest and in front of Mogrin as well.

 

[Mogrin Dhuumal]

Too expensive for the Kindly Fellow, and while he wasn't wrong, the sum Mogrin would be getting for doing all the legwork for the Gildan merchant would help in whatever regard he saw fit—including the purchase of some chocolate-covered cherries from his favorite confectionery.

Only strong survive.

Mogrin raised a tankard and tipped a nod in Aeyliea's direction, showing his agreeance with that before he set to drinking down another volume of beer. There was a nasty word in the old tongue of his ancestors that described the attitude of the Kindly Fellow, that defeated and dispirited demeanor complaining of his lot. Aeyliea, on the other hand:

"You have a Maulgar's heart," Mogrin said to her, setting down yet another empty tankard. "And it doesn't matter the size of the body, but the drum that beats within."

Mogrin thumped his chest with a fist, twice over his heart, and then reached for the newly arrived tankard of beer, courtesy of the Kindly Fellow.

Aeyliea

 

[Aeyliea]

"They dun have hearts," Mr. Kindly said in response, and Aeyliea huffed once in response cutting her eyes to the side, something akin to murder buried there.

<"And coyotes don't have brains. Or courage. And if you keep going, you won't have a dick, either,"> she hissed at him in her native tongue, words flowing like water in a brook. Sweet, clear, and as cold as winter itself. She was directly looking at him now, hands balled into fists. Well, one hand balled into a fist, the other trying very hard and failing.

A shadow fell over her, and Kindly Fellow grinned. "'yotes don't normally put themselves in traps, neither." Malice gleamed in his eyes as he shifted to face her. A hand landed on her shoulder, squeezing painfully. One of Kindly's boys. "Brother, he learned your savage words. Before you lot gutted 'im. Been breaking you scale-skinned cowards e'er since."

He stood up, cracking his knuckles.

"Two of you only?" She laughed at him straight to his face. "Friends, you get them. If have any. Will need them." There is absolutely not one ounce of fear in her steel blue eyes. She stares him straight in the face, ignoring the one holding her.

Kindly Fellow turns to Mogrin, tips a hat he doesn't have. "Sorry, pal. Jes' need t'take out the trash, then we can drink in style."