Completed The Fragrance of Dark Coffee

[Garrod Arlette]

"Here's the place," Garrod said, standing before a nondescript stone wall in the middle market district.

Clean grey stonework, almost white, still straight and tall even if the smell of some day old piss wafted through the air. "Now," he trailed off as he rant his fingerpads along the surface of the masonry. One brick stuck out, ever so, "There it is," he chimed. It was down by his waist, and he pressed the raised brick down. It slid in. He felt a click, though maybe Elinyra had heard it. The stone face of the brick slid down, and revealed a runic circle etched there in the stonework that had taken its place. "Secret entrance," he said with a hint of pride there in the rumble of his voice.

The spell-blade reached out and placed his middle and forefingers there upon its lines. He closed his eye and let out an even breath. His fingers against the stone, he traced the lines, an a bright reddish-orange seemed to crackle and pop with fires light in the trail of his touch.

The circle, alit by the exchange, pulsed once, long and full, and the brick face slid shut once more. Another click saw its mundane disguise pop back into its just-so-slightly dislodged place. A section of the wall scraped open and came to an abrupt stop. It was narrower than Garrod's frame even out of his armor.

He turned back to Elinyra, and smirked. "Gotta feed the rune some magick to get in," he flashed his teeth, and stepped through the open frame. The door slid shut behind him.

Just another grey wall on the outside.

Inside, it was warmly lit, an open room with tall stacked bookshelves all along the walls in tiers, with ladders, going up some floors above. There were no windows, but magick lamps a plenty, their light sterile, but tinged with soft orange and in some corners, a cool blue in others. People lounged across divans, sat up at sturdy old desks, and calmly walked about. A young man moved about the room with tray in hand, and small cups placed gingerly atop. A tall copper contraption set there centermost as he stopped by readers and scribblers and offered them some of the fragrant concoction. Its rich smell filled the room with the toasted smell of dried berries and spiced nuts.

Garrod took in a deep breath, and smiled as he stepped in to Kin'Kenny's Trove.

Elinyra

 

[Elinyra Derwinthir]

The cool empty shade adjacent to a stone wall was a welcome relief from the bustle of the market, the shouting and shoving and, worst of all, the jewelry merchants. She had no idea why any of them thought she looked like she had money to begin with, but if Elinyra had to listen to one more proclamation of how cut gemstones were a lady’s best friend, she might lose her mind.

But currently her attention was on Garrod’s fidgeting with this mundane-seeming masonry. It was with more curiosity than anything; she’d come to learn in the course of their travels together that the mercenary had gathered quite the collection of knowledge both worldly and eclectic. His intimate treatment of the stonework was not much stranger than anything else they’d seen recently.

He had promised this to be a particular site of interest. The city so far had been as trite as any other, but the rune in the wall suggested something special lay beyond.

The doorway sealed perfectly behind him as he stepped through it. As if he’d never been there. Elinyra pressed the brick again and stared at the runic circle that appeared in the wall. It felt as if it was staring back at her, expectantly. Apprehensively, she reached out and touched the surface. She felt the subtle indentations in the bricks, and a soft, deep green moss grew out from her fingertips until it filled in every crack of the circle. She appreciated the scene for a moment, until a necrotic darkness spread from her fingers and devoured the green as quickly as fire through oil.

She drew her hand back in horror, but the rune circle lit up as it had with Garrod’s touch and the door opened. Elinyra drew her cloak close around her as she stepped inside.

She was first met by a pleasant, spicy odor that permeated a large library unlike anything she’d ever seen. Despite being a stone-walled structure lacking any windows, the lamps, the cozy furniture, the fancy decor and the general atmosphere made the place seem inviting, like a castle rather than a place to store tomes. As if it was designed to let people in instead of keeping them out. Having only ever been to the libraries of Fal’Addas, where books were considered so priceless that it was an odyssey to be able to even touch one, Elynira found this to be a surreal experience.

“What is this place?” she asked absently, staring after the man carrying a tray of cups with a confused expression.

 

[Garrod Arlette]

"One of Alliria's best kept secrets," Garrod said with a smile, and was stopped just a few steps ahead of the druid. "Had a feeling the old bones was gonna let you in," he turned his eye back to the walls of shelf stacks, so laden with the proud old spines of weathered old tomes and more easily made books. A few people were halfway up long ladders, one of them even sat upon one of the rungs, just reading along.

An aubergine hood bobbed across the floor, proud yellowed horns poked out from its side and a bone-white mask set in the shadow of its cowl. The purple hood came right up to Garrod and Elinyra, They held a jeweled staff in one hand, and pendants that gleamed like stars adorned their robes. Two eyes that were but infinitesimal silver flames there at the back of empty sockets looked up at the elven druid. A sparkling pink gem glowed a the center of the forehead, just above the nose hole.

"Hmm, what's this then?" came a hollow croak of a voice from the halfling sized skeleton. "A child of the Falwood? In my Trove? A rarity in its own right, but no, no, there is something more to you than that, isn't there..." his voice came from the resonance of bone. The talking skeleton turned its gaze to Garrod. "You bring her here?"

Garrod shrugged. "Thought you might want to meet her,"

The small undead turned to regard the druid once more. "Hmm, well, can't say you were wrong," he nodded. "A most curious practicioner, with a most curious magick, yes," his eyes turned to Garrod. "You aren't wearing your gauntlet today," he noted. "Curious," he stated, and turned away from them and began to shuffle away, his staff picked away at the stone floor with a clean metallic ring. "Most curious,"

Garrod stared at the purple cloak as they got lost behind some bookshelves. "That, was Kin'Kenny," he looked back to Elinyra. "No one really knows much about him, other than that, well... this is his Trove," he stepped forward, and moved on to find himself a place to sit. "Has been for as long as anyone can remember," he grumbled back.

Elinyra

 

[Elinyra Derwinthir]

“What a strange little person,” Elinyra commented as she watched the small skeletal creature amble across the library. Of course keepers of lore were customarily strange, having spent much more of their time with books and old relics than with living people, but this one could have been a relic.

“He just allows whoever finds his secret door to come in and peruse his library? That’s…. surprisingly charitable of him.”

She followed Garrod to the cluster of neat little tables set up in one corner of the extensive interior, pausing for a moment to read the embroidered words on a wall-sized maroon tapestry. The flawless needlework, stitched out in silvery-white lettering of a cheerful font, declared in no uncertain terms:

Rules of Kin’Kenny

~All rulebreakers will have curses and fees applied~

No books shall be on a table with the coffee

No books shall leave the library

Be quiet and considerate of others

No use of magic unless approved by Kin’Kenny

Do not give coffee to the quasits

No pets, familiars, noble steeds, totem spirits or summoned creatures

Any damage to books or relics must be reported

Do not open the red door​

What is a ‘coffee’? She wondered, sitting across from Garrod at one of the tables beneath the gentle glow of a magic-lit lamp. It was a pleasing arrangement, with half of the tables in a warm, sunny light and half in the simulated light of a full moon. A trio of humans that Elinyra guessed to be nobles, by the rich colors of their clothes, conversed cheerfully on the sunny side, while some more brooding types sat silently in the arcane night.

The tray-wielding young man came to their table to offer them the contents of the little cups, some sugar and a small jar of cream.

“Please remember to enjoy your coffee separately from your reading. Unless you want to be cursed!” he reminded them with a winning smile.

“What is this drink made from?” Elinyra asked after an inquisitive whiff of the dark beverage.

“Beans,” he said.

“Beans? As is some sort of magic bean?”

“Must be. Most people can’t get enough of it,” he replied with a shrug. “And quasits. Never let one of those nasty things get into the coffee…” he shivered and shook his head, as if to dismiss some terrible memory, before continuing on with whatever business someone carrying around little cups of bean tea had.

Elinyra pondered her bean tea, then looked at Garrod, who seemed to be enjoying his.

“How in the world did you find this place?” she asked.

 

[Garrod Arlette]

Garrod blew a cool breath across the black surface of his coffee. "Hmm?" he sounded, and his eye, angled to better see Elinyra who sat across from him, drift up to regard her. "Find this place?" he repeated, and took in the smell that lingered about just below his nose. He let the earthenware cup down, a rusty colored clay thing made of coils meticulously layered and smoothed. It clinked lightly against smooth stone plate.

"I don't think many find this place," he confessed. "More so they are shown it," he smirked, and worked free the small leather satchel he had worn in, and placed it down by the side of his leg. He picked up the cup, still warm against his hand, and took a sip. An unabashed smile there as he drank the bean juice down.

He leaned forward, and rest his elbows on the table, "Was my mentor who showed it to me," he let her know. "And who showed him, well," his eye looked around, scanning the faces. "Couldn't quite tell ya," his eye came back to her, and he nodded to the cup in his hand. "Whatcha think?" he asked, curious as a cat.

Elinyra

 

[Elinyra Derwinthir]

Curls of steam from the drink brought a pungent, bitter scent that reminded her of the charr of toasted nuts. She took a slow sip of the mysterious black liquid and found the powerful taste of that strong bitterness akin to some medicinal tonic.

“Hmmm, well it’s potent,” she said, trying not to make a face, and set the cup down. She glanced over at the jar of cream and bowl of sugar in the middle of the table, which made perfect sense now.

She helped herself to some of the cream and sugar, which toned down the bitterness until it was more of a treat than a tonic. A treat that, along with Garrod’s mention of a former teacher, put her in a reminiscing mood.

“So you used to come here with your mentor?" she asked and looked around, trying to picture two warrior types lounging around in such a decidedly scholarly locale. "How long did you study under him, if you don’t mind my asking?”

Garrod Arlette

 

[Garrod Arlette]

"Yup," he answered, his eye looking down into the brew as he took another drink from his bitter cup. His lips parted from the rim, and he thought a moment on her question. Steam danced and bent about, moved by his breath and the shift of the liquid. "Must've been," he trailed off, trying to remember how long.

How long had it been?

Gulliver's ever constant presence and reminders didn't help get an accurate estimate. Spontaneous bit of fun that he was, he would show up whenever he pleased. Some gift or small nothing there to mark the occasion. Days he claimed were meant to mark Garrod's day of birth. But that would have made him almost fifty by now, and that was a fair bit off the mark. He almost laughed at the thought, when he returned to the more common mystery before him.

"Some twelve years, I take it," another sip, and more memories flooded through his mind, and his eye scanned about the room. "Showed me this place pretty early on, couldn't have been little more than ten" he could almost see old Sinns moving about the room. His long brimmed hat, and its proud feather bouncing about with his step. Long duster coat trailing behind him. Damn near heroic in those long boots of his. Didn't matter that he was pot bellied and round of face. Or that he drank too much, and mostly came to help with the hangovers.

"Said it was part of being a successful Monster Hunter. Didn't make no sense to me at the time, but, it beat the hell out of being cold and hungry out on the streets," he smirked, remembering the hell he used to put the old man through. Sour looks, foul moods, and all kinds of foul mood pretend. "Man knew the importance of words and numbers," his eye flicked back to Elinyra. "Made sure to teach me how to read, and keep count, before any of the spell craft came around," he closed his eye for a long moment, and he leaned back in his chair.

"What about you?" he asked, and took a drink, savoring the familiar taste before his eye came open again. "Care to tell an outsider bout your druidic arts?" he teased, a hint of playful malice in his eye.

Elinyra

 

[Elinyra Derwinthir]

“I don’t see any harm in it. Except of course all of the secret moonlight rituals and skyclad festivals. I swore on my life not to discuss those.” Elinyra teased in return, though she couldn’t help but smirk slightly.

“I was born into a circle. My parents were both druids, and I took the oath when I came of age.” She paused in reflection, her hazel eyes almost sparkling with the happy memories of days past. “A little early, actually… I was but twenty-three when I joined the first rank. But I was so excited, the elders couldn’t get me to wait a few more years. Although I didn’t make a very good bard – could barely play a drum properly.

“Eventually I joined another circle and met my mentor, Sil’edain. She became the arch-druid of our grove only a few years after I became an ovate. Hard to believe that was a century ago,” she laughed.

A different time. When Elinyra felt immovable within her grove. Before her illness had taken it all away. Memories bittersweet like the coffee she was drinking.

Yet maybe there was something magical to this bean after all, for it seemed that both their spirits had lifted. Garrod even seemed relaxed, like a great weight had been lifted from his shoulders. Elinyra suspected there was more to that than the coffee; even Kin’Kenny had observed that he had arrived without the gauntlet he usually wore. Whatever it was, he seemed…. Different somehow.

Garrod Arlette

 

[Garrod Arlette]

He mullled over her words, circles, ranks, oaths and Arch druids. Sounded almost like the divisions of nobility. Though, he supposed that made sense. People were people, and order tended to help. In some form of the other. Chieftains, elders, seers, matriarchs. All learned from those that came before them. In some form or the other.

He laughed, small beneath his breath, "Young at twenty, and only a century ago," there was a feigned pain there before he took another sip. "I'll be lucky to make it to half a century," he shook his head and sipped from his half empty cup. "Time sure is a funny thing," he said, mouth hidden behind the cup as his look grew distant.

How old had Sinns lived to be? Sixty? Garrod couldn't quite recall ever learning the man's age.

"Your mother and father," he cut through his own reminiscing. "They still around?" he asked, and looked to Elinyra.

Elinyra

 

[Elinyra Derwinthir]

Elinyra frowned, trying to be sympathetic despite her difficulty understanding a human's perception of time.
"It isn't about how long one lives, but how one spends the time they've been given," she quoted some of the lore she learned early in her training before adding on a more personal note, "Look at all the places you've seen, the things you've done, and let that be the measure of your life."

She took a slow, savoring sip of her coffee. Such was the difference between elves and humans, she mused. She would still be drinking this when it had gone cold, if only to consider the differences of taste, to compare it to the flavor of the next one. Garrod enjoyed his drink equally, but in her eyes he was drinking it as if it could be his last.

She cocked an eyebrow at the question about her parents. "Well, yes they are, as far as I know. I think mother still works with her order. Last I heard, my father moved to Fal’Addas to work on some research of his.

"Elven families aren't usually as close as some of the other races. The result of long lifespans and large forests, I suppose." She shrugged before appraising him seriously.

"You said that your mentor taught you to read and write; kept you out of the streets. Then am I to take it your parents....?"

Garrod Arlette

 

[Garrod Arlette]

"Taken by a fever," he said, matter of fact. "Lot of kids lost their folks that year, damn disease ripped through the shallows," they were like a swarm of little rats. He could still remember. "So many grubby faces come peeking out of their families darkened huts." he shook his head, as if to dislodge the memory, and took another drink. How many more died, on account of simple neglect? No healers brave enough, or paid enough, to come help rid the homes of their dead.

His eye narrowed, and his brow knit together. "Pardon," he managed, with a bow of his head. "Suppose that is part of why we tend to stick so close together," he smirked. " Humans I mean," he tilted the cup one way, and its dark contents with it. "We see how fragile and small we are, compared to it all," but he mulled over her earlier words. Thought of the places he had been. Of his long marches with Sinns, watching the old dog carry the blade Garrod would inherit. The same blade he carried now, and had raised in defense of the ship he met Elinyra upon. He remembered their conversation upon the deck that first night of their shared voyage.

"You..." he started, but caught himself, his cup had wandered down to the table, and nothing obstructed his view of her. Till he took another drink, his cup near empty. "You know, it takes some getting used to," he added. "Acquiring the taste for black coffee," he wore a fragile little curl upon his lips as the cup came down to the table again and he stared at the black pool that gathered there, oily and thick, the walls of the cup painted with the sunglow mage-lights. "Used to hate it black back when we first arrived, but that's how Sinns liked it,"

Elinyra

 

[Elinyra Derwinthir]

Elinyra met Garrod's gaze with a sad smile. In some ways, she understood. The elves that had died in the attack on her grove, the humans who died in a small, forgotten village in one corner of the Falwood; death was death, when it came down to it, and it cared not who you were. Or who cared about you.

"I'm sorry. I -" she was cut short when the cup that she’d set on the table suddenly shook, nearly spilling its contents. Practically everybody in Kin’Kenny’s Trove felt the floor shake at that moment, as if the place had been hit by a minor earthquake. Elinyra looked over with alarm at the entrance, where an enormous body was standing.

She recognized an ogre; rather round, muscular, thick-skinned, and very large. This one had two heads. The one with a nose ring and a small leather cap looked around with an odd glimmer of, perhaps, intelligence in its eyes, and a rather annoyed expression on its face. The other head, adorned with a messy top-knot of hair and a red scarf, peered around with a blissfully ignorant grin.

"I want the book about squirrels!" the head with the top-knot exclaimed for all the library to hear. The opposite hand came around and whacked it on the nose.

"I told you we're here to revisit Seem-alir's Spellbook. Your squirrels can wait!" the other head hissed in an angry whisper.

"But-" the first began to whine until Kin'Kenny's horns and violet robe appeared. He shuffled up to the ogre and politely addressed it.

​

"Ah, yes hello again Aggron," Kin'Kenny addressed both heads. "Seem-alir's Spellbook, you say? Yes, yes it is right over here. Curious that you would like to see it... again."

The ogre stomped away behind the establishment's diminutive owner, one of its heads still muttering something about small forest animals as the other patrons settled back into their seats.

"Suddenly, small and fragile seems to describe everything here," Elinyra said coyly.

 

[Garrod Arlette]

There was a slight upturned crook to the corner of Garrod's lip, and he brought his eye back from Aggron to Elinyra. "Spose that's the way of it, isn't it," he agreed with a nod of his head, cup still in his hand while it rest on the table. "Never know when something big'll come around and change the order of things," his eyes started to wander to her arm. The one he had seen turn to a whip of bramble and thorn and... darkness. But his eye did not stop there. It stopped on his own right hand.

The skin along the back of it was marred with silvered scars, parts of its flesh, rough, malformed, as if fire and teeth had taken bits and pieces, here and there. It moved stiffly too. He balled it into a fist, suddenly aware of it. His eye widened some, and he decided to take the last drink of his coffee. When he was finished, he put the cup down, and pushed it to the side, made sure to keep his right hand down below the table. Soon, one of the servers would come by to collect the cup and the plate.

"Aggie, You always want to learn about the deep dark secrets, curses this, hexes that, but Gron just wants to learn about the critters, Aggie. Possums. Squirrels. Hedgehogs." came the baritone voice from the distance.

"Hush now, Aggron," Kin'Kenny cut. "Remember the rules,"

Elinyra

 

[Elinyra Derwinthir]

"I don't recall who once said that change is the only order of things," she recollected distantly. "It seemed silly to me at the time, but maybe I just understand it better now."

She noticed Garrod glancing at her wrapped hand and felt suddenly uncomfortable. She’d intentionally stopped thinking about the wound until she had the chance to find a good healer. As large as Alliria was, there certainly had to be a fair number of physicians here. While she sincerely doubted that even an expert healer could completely cure her strange affliction, perhaps they could halt its spread.

But that was a worry for tomorrow. Today was a day for rest and, unexpectedly, a time for reflection. She put her troubles out of her mind again, as best she could, while she sipped her coffee.

The druid glanced around again at the shelves full of books, each the promise of new knowledge or a dalliance with adventure. She could imagine the ten-year-old Garrod bouncing around the library, catching stories like butterflies and building make-believe forts beneath divans and tables. That was truly the magic of this place, she decided; it was a sanctuary for the mind, whether it be human, elf, or the oddball literate ogre.

She turned her attention back to Garrod, who seemed to have returned to his normal mannerism of sitting on pins and needles.

“Are there some books here that you enjoy? Or do you just come here for the coffee?”

Garrod Arlette

 

[Garrod Arlette]

He smiled softly as he let her words in. "Change is the only order, huh?" he parroted. "S'pose it is," he nodded, and found some comfort in the sentiment as his one hand went back to fiddling with his empty cup, his eye fixed on its rim.

His eye flit up to her when she asked of books, and the coffee. "Not too many places where you can get beans that taste as good as Kin'Kenny's," he smirked. "Though I did find myself sitting over a nice cup in the Delta, of all places," he leaned back and looked over at the array of so many colored covers and spines. It reminded him of a forest in the fall. The leaves changing into every which color as the trees readied for a long winter. "But yes, on occasion, I do enjoy a good book off the shelf," he turned back to face her, and nod his head to a section just behind her left shoulder. "Poetry, ballads, and sagas just over there. Surprisingly useful stuff for a monster hunter, believe it or not,"

The young man with the ornate copper pot came by. "More coffee?" he asked.

Garrod gave a polite shake of his head. "That's enough for now, thanks,"

The young man bowed his head to both in turn, and scooped up Garrod's empty cup and plate and made off.

The tactful turn of conversation seemed to put Garrod at ease again. "There is one collection of works I remember stumbling upon, years and years ago," his eye narrowed, as if he were peering at that same moment from so many moons past. "Words of a Wicked Heart, I think it was called," his eye drift up to the shelves he had pointed out just a moment ago. "I'd go grab it, but," he nodded toward her coffee laden cup. "Wouldn't want to incur the old bones' wrath," he said playfully.

Elinyra

 

[Elinyra Derwinthir]

"It is not so surprising. Traditions and history are passed down through stories, although the monsters and heroes get grander with every telling; and I imagine it takes tales of great deeds and heroic victories to make running into mortal peril seem a little less grim," she replied and set her coffee cup on a neighboring empty table.

"Yes, it's best to not offend our host. But I'd like to see this book collection of yours."

She was trying to think how long it had been since she read a book for enjoyment rather than for research. Even her journey to the great library of Fal’Addas had been for the sole purpose of finding out more about the blight. She'd tried to catch the occasional play or bardic performance on the road, but ships at sea and small farming communities didn't have much to offer in the way of culture. That normally suited Elinyra just fine; she was drawn more to the wilderness than to the dramas of civilization anyway.

 

[Garrod Arlette]

"Too right," Garrod said, and got up from the table. "I'll be just a moment then," he took a step away, one hand still lingering on the table. "Or, you could follow, see if there is anything that catches your eye? Maybe even get lost in it all, for just a bit," he shrugged. Whether she came along or decided to wait, Garrod would make his way across the floor, nodding to a few faces that looked familiar, and peeking in to isles where readers were hidden away.

"Yes, yes it is just as I remember," Aggie, the sharp head of Aggron, muttered to himself, as his squinted eyes peered down at the gilded symbols that gleamed across the pages of Seem-Alir's Spellbook. "The heart of the ice-river newt, that was the missing component."

"Hi, Garrod," Gron said pleasantly, and the thick fingered hand that had been pointing through the scrawled notes of Seem-Allir ceased its task, and waved, a slow and clumsy wave.

Garrod's eye saw Gron, and he nod his head to acknowledge the friendlier half of the two.

"Gron! You fool," Aggie near shout with snarled teeth and a growl in his throat, that turned to purr and his voice to squeak as the head halved in size. "You made me lose my place, now how am I supposed to remember what we need to curse our foes?"

Gron frowned, and in a hushed tone, his head still its full size. "Sorry, Aggie, just sayin hi to Garrod is all,"

"Garrod?" came the voice that sounded like it had been squeezed through a miniscule glass box, Aggie's already beady eyes turned narrowed, like chips of flint. "Why in the bloody~"

A few rows over, and the books trapped the sound behind their bindings and pages. Before the collection of poems and ballads, Garrod scanned for the spine he sought. He remembered it was usually kept low, so he squat down to better look for it, fingers of his right hand scrolling across the stamped names and denominations.

Something scurried nearby, in the blindness of his left eye. He craned his head to get a better look, but there was nothing there. Odd. Garrod thought. He could have sworn he heard little claws scrabbling about.

Elinyra

 

[Elinyra Derwinthir]

Elinyra shrugged and followed Garrod into the encompassing silence of the tall shelves. Well, silent except for one ogre who was both friendly and not. Noting its greeting - half its greeting - toward Garrod, she couldn't help but appreciate that the monster hunter could be amiable to something so different than himself. Something that others with that same title would consider only as prey. Perhaps a lesson for herself too, as she sheepishly hurried past Aggron while he was busy arguing with himself.

She looked over the titles of books while waiting for Garrod to find what he was looking for. Some she recognized, the epic sagas that had taken root in probably every culture in the world. Histories of various cultures and races, of which Kin'Kenny had apparently amassed an impressive assortment. Some collections of poetry.

She picked out one tome, so old the spine had begun to crack and all the pages were yellow, but impeccably kept. Something she hadn't expected to find in a predominantly-human city - the title and all the text were in the original elvish, the old elvish. Thumbing through it, she smiled when she found a very familiar poem. She read it aloud, translating it for Garrod's sake but appreciating the sound of it for her own:

"From the wilderness, wolves scent morning prey,
Birds rise from meadowed nest,
Many are the wild things of the wood,
That they flee from out of the greening earth.

Good is the season of peaceful summer;
The council of the trees gather together,
A band unshaken by the whistling wind,
A green gathering in the sheltered woods;
Eddies swirl the stream,
Good is the warm turf under us."

The memory of cool water, warm sun and laughter descended through time and the Trove's thick stone walls for a moment. The last time she'd recited that poem, one summer day.

 

[Garrod Arlette]

His search paused a moment as Elinyra seemed to get her hands on something and dug it out of the stacks. Curious man that he was, he watched her pull free an old elven tome. Her eyes happily reading across the scrawl, and her hand carefully turning the old yellowed pages until she came to a find. Her mind seemed to turn something over.

It calmed him, the sight of her, enjoying something he enjoyed. Warmed him even, the thought that they shared it now. This moment in time and its place. She read the words aloud, and there was a warmth to them too. Along with the crisp cool of a wind he knew so well. The glittering light that filtered through the leaves. Grass at his back. Tall and gently swaying trunks, stood all around.

"Careful," Garrod warned with a winning crook of his lip, . "Read another poem like that, and we might catch one of Kin'Kenny's curses," he turned his eye back to his task, and he went on. "No magic allowed," he added in feigned whisper.

A glint of joy twinkled in the green of the hunter's eye, "There it is," he said as he hooked his fingers around the divot of the spine. He pulled it free, its leather dyed black. It was not a large collection, still he opened it, and popped up from his squat, his fingers quick to find the page. He leaned back, and rest against a wooden beam there between the shelves, and he read from the pages.

"In the desert
I saw a creature, naked, bestial,
who, squatting upon the ground,
Held his heart in his hands,
And ate of it.
I said, "Is it good, friend?"
"It is bitter bitter," he answered;
"But I like it
Because it is bitter,
And because it is my heart."

He wore a weird smile, as he kept his eye down on the page. It was a true thing, and a thing he had been shown. The old hunter slouched against such a beam, reading from the small black book, down to him, who looked up at the man in his stupid brimmed hat with its proud feather taller still.

 

[Elinyra Derwinthir]

Elinyra turned to him with a slight roll of her eyes.

"If he were to forbid the magic of writing, he might as well command the sun not to shine," she retorted with a playful scoff and carefully replaced the old poetry book on its shelf.

"Bitter and dark like your coffee. I suppose that's why you like it," she commented with a grin when he had finished reading. Or Maybe it was that strange spark in his eye, a warmer memory hidden somewhere within those melancholy words.

Wham! Elinyra started at the noise behind her. Turning to check it out, she saw that it was just a book that had fallen off of one of the shelves. Sighing, she walked over to put it back...

Garrod Arlette

 

[Garrod Arlette]

His fingers rubbed at the edge of the cover. Felt the groves where so many fingers had rest and hands had held that same old book. Small as it was, with a collection as strange as it was.

"It-" A book fell to the ground with loud smack, and it pulled his eye up too see the old dusty tome, cover first upon the floor. His eye followed its fall, saw a little shadow skulk around the book base. He squint, eyes on the spot the shadow had slinked out of view. It was probably nothing.

Garrod looked back down at the little book in his hand, "Well, my mentor," he started, and flipped through the pages, not really stopping to read any. "Old bastard that he was, Artorias," he closed the little book and gave it a shake. "He never told me those old bard's tales," he laughed, a little breathy thing. "The ones that get grander and grander I mean. He liked to keep them bitter, honest. At least, when he was sober. When he was hear." Garrod looked up to her, coy. "Drinkin coffee,"

 

[Elinyra Derwinthir]

Coffee: a beverage made by roasting and crushing a very special bean, then pouring hot water through it. Beloved by many types of kith in the few places that had access to it; but arguably none craved it moreso than the humble, mischievous quasit. And among that semi-sentient race of tiny, scaly, rather gremlin-faced creatures, arguably the one that craved it most was the old quasit with a torn ear that the master of the library had spitefully named Vex.

When Kin’Kenny hadn’t directly commanded Vex to be doing something useful, she was usually spending her time lounging indolently around in the quietest corner of the library, which happened to be where the dictionaries were stored. It was the perfect nest; far from Kin’Kenny’s watchful eyes – or sparks where eyes once were – but still close enough to the alluring scent of that wonderful black nectar. And sometimes, rarely, one of the patrons would leave a half-drunk cup in the open and the server would forget to pick it up.

Vex stuck her gaunt head out of her nest on the far side of a bookend and scoured the tables with large, insect-like eyes, honing in on a lonely cup on one table. Glancing around further, Kin’Kenny was nowhere to be seen and the server was busily brewing more coffee. A lucky day for her!

She scampered as quickly as her little claws would take her, darting from table to table until she came upon the clayware-cradled treasure. It was nearly empty, but sweetened with cream and sugar that any alley cat would be jealous of.

Sparing not a moment more there that might get her caught, Vex took the whole cup and spirited it away to the nearest shadow behind a bookshelf... to enjoy her prize. The other quasits in the library could only watch her theft with spiteful envy; not one of them dared to try to pry the precious coffee from the tough, old Vex.

Once she had sucked down every last drop of the abandoned coffee, Vex nestled herself quite happily between the rather shredded pages of a copy of To All the Gnomes I’ve Loved Before (which had not been noticed). She wouldn’t stay here long, for the coffee’s energizing properties were kicking in, and that meant there was extra mischief to be made.

It started with a book shoved off of a shelf in an act of rebellion. Then another. And one more. That was fun for a few minutes, but she soon craved a more dramatic form of chaos. She considered, at the full capacity that her simple brain was capable of, what would be the best form for this chaos to take.

The one-eyed man and the pointy-eared woman standing in one of the aisles holding books and spewing words at each other seemed like good candidates.

---------------------------​

Elinyra glanced up at the bookshelf above her and saw the spot the book had fallen from, far out of her reach. She pulled over one of the ladders and climbed to the shelf, but paused when she swore she saw the glint of eyes in the shadows between two books. She heard some small, scratchy voice muttering just before one of the clay cups came flying out of the hole and collided with her nose.

She yelped, more in surprise than pain, dropping the book and nearly falling from the ladder as the quasit laughed.

And what one quasit found funny, the others did too.

 

[Garrod Arlette]

Garrod's eye went wide, and he went to hold down the ladder before Elinyra fell off. Books rained down from that upper shelf, one after the other. Not just carelessly knocked away, aimed at him.

"Vex!" Garrod growled out, dodging what heavy tome he could, the priceless tomes spun about, and smacked hard against the floor, again and again. Some sprung open, their pages aflutter, as they flew.

Vex hissed her raspy old laugh, holding one book proudly over her head with both her grubby little clutches, her big bug eyes seeming to stare at both of them as she smiled her snaggle toothed smile. Her whole little frame bent back, and she heaved the book at Elinyra before she zipped. off.

All around, bauble and cups, tomes and book ends, sailed across the air. The raspy little voices of so many quasits snickered and laughed as things shattered and crashed all around.

"Protect, the coffee!" came Kin'Kenny's voice, louder than all the commotion, and deeper by two octaves.

The servers ran, frantic as they tried to clear the cups and hide away the copper pots.

Vex snickered and zipped away, faster than all that stirred about her. Folks had abandoned their cups, and took cover under the tables and some even under a couch as all manner of object still sailed across the room and glass and clay shattered about the floor.

One person shout in panic, as their ladder tipped over.

 

[Elinyra Derwinthir]

Elinyra ducked the book meant for her head and slid down to the floor.

"You know that creature?!" she exclaimed, keeping one hand over her head as a shield against whatever else might come flying at her. She watched the tiny menace dart away with surprising speed before taking shelter from the hail of everything as best she could between the shelving and an end table. Another quasit ran between the aisles, pausing long enough to make a rude gesture at them.

They could hear a grumble above the din that rose to an angry grunt. Apparently the quasits were now bothering Aggron the ogre. The stomping that followed suit shook the poor bookshelves even more and sent another ladder toppling over.

 

[Garrod Arlette]

A crash, as ladder smashed down, and the young half-orc scholar who had been perched atop it reading made a daring jump off his rung. Right on to Aggie's head.

"What, what on Epressa is the meaning of thi-" a scrabbling hand dug its way into Aggie's mouth, as panicked feet kicked and tried to find purchase against Aggron's robes.

Gron just smiled, laughed, and clapped his hands as books and baubles soared about. "Coffee, coffee, always want the coffee," the cheerful head sung along.

It wasn't that Vex wanted to lead. Vex just wanted what Vex wanted. More coffee. And the other Quasits, Bogbert in particular, made fine distractions. And the more distractions the big folk and that silver eyed devil had, the more coffee there would be for the taking. Probably.

So, she snickered and hissed, and grumbled and greebled to some of the quasits around her. Bogbert, just sort of stared at her, slack jawed and empty eyed. She smacked him upside the head, and yanked him toward her, her clutches grabbed his big head and guided his eyes toward the copper contraption she knew had more coffee in it.

Bogbert made a slow sound, almost realization. And the two smaller quasits beside him tittered with excitement.

Vex bared her teeth in happy smile.

---

What had been but utter chaos, soon seemed to shift. Bunches of quasits would emerge from the stacks, leaping from their hidey holes and bouncing along the heads of the patrons and atop the couches and the tables in an organized swarm.

A cerulean light struck out, Once. Twice. Thrice. And the three coordinated Quasits were enveloped in a ethereal blue bubbles that gently float up toward the ceiling. At the center of the lounging area, where pots of coffee and half drank cups still laid about, stood the purple robed Kin'Kenny, staff in hand, its blue gem full with arcane light.

"I hearby authorize the use of non-lethal magicks in the trove," another swarm of quasits scurried across the floor. "Until such a time where this quasit crisis is diffused!" he struck out with another flash of power from his staff.