[University of Zeltiva] Halls (Hrair, Hadrian and...

[Hrair Ansoub]

Hrair took a sip of his tea. He nodded. Giving blood was not going to be a problem. In truth he doubted the idea would work in any event. He had been seeking her for so long now. His hopes were high but at the same time Hrair was more than prepared to have them dashed yet again by this young scholar.

That said, Hrair liked his new found friend. Although he had seemed quiet and reserved in the social context of the bar he seemed to have taken on a new confidence when discussing the blood amulet. He was obviously keen on his subject and had evidently spent a lot of time thinking about the subject. Hrair could not help fear his confidence was misplaced.

Hrair was begining to build a trust in this chap and wondered whether he should tell him how he had lost his sister. Hrair closed his eyes as he let the warm tea flow down his throat and cast his mind back to the day when they had landed on the rock and taken his sister.

It was his fault. He knew it. Had he just been there. Moments sooner and he would have been..."dead like his brother" resounded the thought throughout his brain. He chose to hide rather than fight and face the men who had landed on the rock. Did it make him a coward? Would he have been better to have died?
What was his sister doing now? Where was she? The thoughts that flowed through his mind a thousand times a day flowed through his mind again and he pinched the bridge of his nose. He felt a sudden urge for more ale, for kelp beer to numb the thoughts and kill the pain.

As he closed his eyes he could see his sisters face, smiling at him as they ran from the waves on the rocks. All of a sudden the picture in his mind changed.

He could see himself peeping from behind the grass where the men and THAT MAN pulled and pushed his sister. As he delved deeper into his own thoughts he coulds see his brother, being hit and punched and kicked and stabbed...he could almost taste the sea, and he could feel. Feel that feeling of complete and total futility as his brother and sister were tortured by the men, whilst his mother and father lay dead on the floor. He wanted to help them but his legs would not move. He knew to rush them with his spear would have meant death but death was deserved for his cowardice.

Hrair realised he had begun to gently weep, and he looked up to see Hadrian staring at him. Dare he share his cowardice with his new found friend?

[Hadrian]

Hadrian couldn't be sure of what exactly was going through Hrair's mind as he began to weep, but he knew that whatever traumatic event had precipitated the loss of his sister to the alleged Tainted, there were likely layers upon layers of angst from which to draw. Unfortunately for Hrair, Hadrian was not the best man to deal with emotions. But fortunately for Hrair, he had something better than tea for something like this, and definitely better than kelp beer.

Disappearing into the kitchen, Hrair's tears were accompanied briefly by a rattle and clank. He returned with two small glasses and a stoppered bottle of what he would soon find to be a nice cognac.

Hadrian poured and set one in front of the man. And because he didn't know what to do in the face of a grown man crying, he talked of practical things toward fixing the root cause.

"If you have anything of your sister's, that will help make the amulet more accurate. I'm going to work on an inversion such that only you can use the thing because it will sense your blood, and it will look for the closest match to your blood. Living blood. But anything specifically your sisters will help me key it more accurately, like I said. So if you do have anything like that, now's the time to tell me."

He sipped the cognac, though he fully expected Hrair to gulp it. Hadrian was savvy enough to recognize someone who really loved their drink.

[Hrair Ansoub]

Hrair could not believe his ears. There was a chance he could find his sister. He had to take it.

"Fantastic" he called through to the kitchen, "say do you have anymore of that brandy?"

[Hadrian]

"Only if you promise not to cry again," he said with a half-hearted smirk, hoping the humor would get the fisherman to buck up. He poured him another glass of the cognac and topped off his own.

"So, yes. Anything of your sister's you're willing to part with would make it more accurate. Do you have any questions for me?"

[Hrair Ansoub]

"I do" replied Hrair, "lots."

Hrair sat back in his chair and took another swig of brandy. Hrair was a fairly bright chap and noticed much in the world around him. He was often frustrated by his limited reading ability. Unless it was presented to him the form of a navigational chart he struggled with words. He liked to have things explained to him and when the mood took him would keep asking questions until he fully understood the reason for being. The mood so took him.

"So exactly how are you going to make this blood amulet then?" he enquired with his eyebrow raised. "Talk me through it!"

He took another large swig of brandy clearing his glass and looked at Hadrian waiting patiently for the young mage to fill his glass.

[Hadrian]

Hadrian poured the fisherman another brandy and made a mental note to hide the alcoholic stores whenever he was around. If he couldn't ration it out, Hrair might drink him out of house and home. He sat down and collected his thoughts.

"Well, I'll start some time after the 34th. I have to make sure everything is ready -- delicate process -- and on the 34th, I have some research to do for Professor Stonemiller, which might actually help with this... He has a habit of assigning me work that ends up being germane to whatever project I'm working on or the one he has planned for me next.

"In a nutshell, I take the quartz sphere and put it on this pedestal in the lab that's ringed by glyphs. I watch it, and start opening new pathways in and out of it with Djed, helping it to accumulate enough to take on the patterns I'll work into it, and enough to seal its purpose. I'll decant your blood in a beaker above it that'll let it drop onto the sphere, slowly, drop by drop, so the stone can absorb it. Oh, and the blood will be decanted in a glyphed beaker so it doesn't coagulate while it's sitting there. The whole process will take about ten days, and at the end I soak the finished product in a solution of specially charged water."

He gave Hrair a good overview, though of course it was more complicated than that. Still, a magician was not keen on giving away secrets of the trade.

"One thing, though... If it turns out you have any blood relatives other than your sister and they're closer, it'll lead you to them. In which case, hurrah for extra, unknown family, but also you'll want to send them far, far away so it can focus on your sister, assuming she's alive. It won't work for anyone more distant than a first cousin, though... That's just too diluted a blood match."

[Hrair Ansoub]

Hrair nodded. He had understood most of it up to the 34th. "Is there anything else I can help with?" he asked, sipping his brandy.

[Hadrian]

Hadrian shook his head. "I just need your blood and anything that belonged to your sister..."

[Hrair Ansoub]

"Hmmm" though Hrair to himself.

"That could be a problem, I am not sure I have anything." He began. "You see what happened is we lived many days east of here, and when they came..." Hrair face shaded with anger " He curled his fist in anger.

Hadrian looked at Hrair in a puzzled manner. Hrair explained "You see she was at the shoreside, I was up the hill. I hid from them, the sailors, the ones with the tatoes and the one with mark. He looked so evil.".. Hrair shiverred and took a sip of his brandy.

" I could see the whole thing the whole thing from where I was" Hrair paused and looked to his left. "Hiding" he said guiltily. "They threw her and hit her and did things..." Hrair gulped "anyway my courage returned, so the anger came, they just came and took her you know?" recalled Hrair, "they stripped our home, took everything of value and left. By the time I had come to my senses and found my courage to follow them, to wherever they maybe, there was little left. I had to pick carefully what I took on the hope with me for she is not a large ship and water and food was what was needed. She wore little in the way of clothes and what little she had the smeggers took." Hrair paused and thought for a second. "We shared much, I have shared things..." he stopped suddenly as he thought of something.

"Oh..." he exclaimed, "what about her berth on the hope, it was her bed really and no one has slept in it since?" said Hrair.

[Hadrian]

Again Hrair went into the emotional particulars with which Hadrian was unequipped to deal. Again he tried to steer the conversation toward more productive things, like making this blood-compass a success and help send him on his way with more tools to rescue the girl, if there was anything left of her to rescue.

"I'll have you take me to the berth soon and we'll see if I can't find a hair of hers or something. Then I can use that to make it track her more specifically. Perhaps I can use the hair as a trigger to key her into the compass, and then once you've found her, we could perhaps key it to look for any other relatives you might have... Well, I'll have to talk to Professor Stonemiller about that, but if not, certainly that would help it search for her."