Completed [Tine's Exotic Goods] Did somebody lose a bird?(Imass)

[Yonega]

Timestamp: Spring 7, 513

Yonega had taken flight along the lakeshore the moment the band was off, circling briefly over Cosmo's head and peering down upon him when the staffers boarded the ship. She would have to find a way back to that man and thank him. How he'd managed to get her out of there was as big a question on her mind as whether he was going to be in any serious trouble with the staff from the Institute. But for now, that no longer mattered. What mattered was getting as far away from the Institute as she could lest she be rounded up and re-caged.

She was reaching some docks and warehouses before long, the city and its various canals exploding beneath her as she flew, beating her ebony wings as hard and fast as she could to put that not-too-pleasant place behind her. However, such a flight was taking its toll and before long the natural flier found herself panting heavily, black beak open and beady eyes searching the ground below for a landing point. She wasn't used to this kind of flight! Even the aviary hadn't allowed this much stretching of ones wings.

She felt close to collapse when she spotted something that might give her a breather: a blue man, strolling outside a rather small storefront with a far larger building stretching behind it. Whatever the place might be, the man for just as little reason looked like an ideal perch to land and take a breather. Far more accomodating than the alient structures around him (who knows what kinds of hoops and hands might come reaching from them to ensnare her again!).

Tucking her wings, the raven descended quickly, only opening them and flapping again when she was near enough to plant her scaley black feet upon his left shoulder and fold her wings in close, releasing a noisy 'RAWK' as she did so. The Kelvic perched there, breathing hard with beak still wide and dark eyes looking everywhere but at her newfound perch, wary. There was no iron band upon her leg now, but she had no idea where to shift just yet, or if it would be safe. What if there were staffers here?! They might bring her back! They certainly didn't look pleased to find her up and active when they were coming aboard the boat. Hopefully the blue-man wouldn't mind. He looked safer than those shrivelling creatures in the hoods did. Of course, she couldn't see the other side of his face just yet.

[Imass]

Swaggering drunk through the Plaza of Dark Delights, the scorched warrior seemed to be lost in thought. In one hand the Akalak held a skin of wine that smelt strongly sour. In the other hand he held an apple from the market stalls. A woman had given him the apple. He remembered her dark brown hair and eyes. She was attractively athletic, but plain faced in retrospect. Perhaps he had a chance at bedding her?

On his body he wore fine silk shirt tucked into black breeches. His heavy black boots were new polished leather. Despite having such fine quality cloths they where already dirty and smelling of alcohol. His mind wandered to the plain woman with the large bosom who he saw washing clothes. Perhaps he could pay her to clean his shirt?

At his left hip swung a large, basket-griped sword. A smaller blade was tucked into the right side of his belt. The threat of force was necessary in both encounters he remembered. Both of those women initiated violence on him and then he acted solely in self interest. Now Garonn was thinking of returning to at least one of them for a service. He wandered how that interaction would play out. Perhaps he would actually have to kill a crazy female for psychotic reasons in his life?

The pensive brother replaced meditation and prayer with never ending thoughts and speculations. From ear to ear, his mind was an eerie valley of skepticism. Some might even call it paranoia, but Garonn called it true awareness. Despite his own preconceived notions of safety, chance decided not to prepare him for life's next encounter. A black raven suddenly landed on his shoulder. Turning his head the Akalak's eyes widened in disbelief. Never before in his life had a bird landed on his shoulder. He was trained in the art of steel, but knew nothing else.

In his drunken state of mind, Garonn responded by staring at the bird for a second, while deciding a course of action. He just wanted to laugh at the fact a bird landed on him. Without really thinking he smashed the apple with his left hand, turned his head slightly to stare at the bird, and tried to feed it a piece of soft juicy apple.

[Yonega]

The raven had not expected her newfound perch to react in that way; then again, she hadn't expected any kind of reaction other than general tolerance; it was the only acceptable thing that the handlers back at the institute seemed to allow. Pooping on them certainly wasn't a worthy adventure, nor pecking their fingers. That tended to result in unpleasant periods of time spent doing equally unpleasant things; researchers were...strange, at best.

But this man seemed more interested in offering her a bite of a righteous smelling apple and not throwing her, or hitting her, or outright 'freaking out'. No, this man seemed...amused? The avian kraa'd once more and canted her head down upon the delicacy that was so rarely afforded to the predominant scavenger. An apple, of all things! That was more often a treat for the big-beaked, long-tailed macaws and the occasional songbirds (though most of them, she had observed, favored seeds, nuts, and small berries as opposed to larger fruits). But an apple! The difficulties of speaking while in her animal form proved equally challenging when the Kelvic tried to voice her gratitude, clacking beak twice and providing the pseudo-speech common of mimicry. "Dangs!" Well, she tried.

Down her beak descended to take a chunk of the crushed apple and work it against the smooth tongue inside, tasting, and then tossing it down her gullet in a quick upwards flick of beak. This was all followed by another noisy 'KRAA' before the raven tried to step onto the hand that held the apple. If the drunkard did not object or resist, he'd find himself more comfortably face to face with the brown-necked bird, intelligent eyes focused on him as she deftly balanced upon the wrist previously unoccupied. Again, the birds beak opened to caw off that not-quite-verbalizations. "Haaiiyy?" That didn't sound right. She meant hide, but damn the birdy throat its inability to better enunciate! Shifting out here mightn't be the best thing if those staffers had made it out this way already. She had to be careful right now.

[Imass]

"The fruits of my labor have been well paid for," the Akalak said to himself as he stared at the Raven eat the fruit. He had no training with birds so he was ignorant to the fact she was an intelligent bird. The hefty price he paid for the apple also included the repair bill on a broken stall-cart. The apple he was sharing with her represented a debt caused by failure to seduce a plain faced woman.

The black raven squawked after eating the first piece of fruit. It almost sounded like the bird said 'thanks' but the scorched warrior was too drunk to even make the connection. His mind wasn't hearing or registering the fact the bird was actually standing on his hand. It was just there all of a sudden. That is when he realized that he blacked out for a second. Garonn looked at the bird and it squawked again.

"This was an expensive apple. I almost paid life and limb for it," the Akalak said as he feed the bird the second piece of apple. He didn't expect or think the bird would listen to him. He was just shocked and amazed the bird was on his arm and not attacking him. Drunk and slightly impaired, Garonn plastered a smile on his face and feed the bird.

[Yonega]

-Okay....maybe not the wisest choice of perches I could've made. Hm...there's still too many people to change around. What if they're a researcher?! I need somewhere to hide but...maybe this was just a bad idea.-

The raven almost seemed to frown at Garron as she thought over this, her head-feathers ruffling up into a comical-looking crest as she ate another piece of the offered apple. Flying off might be a problem now, she was still fairly worn out, but the sweet treat was a little bit rejuvenating. Still, it might be easier to hide in human form than the recognizable animal she was now, that brown-neck fairly unusual for ravens of the region.

If I peck him, he's sure to take offense. Maybe just a nip...

The raven pinched her claws lightly on the wrist of the blue-skinned man and rawked loudly once again, arching her wings out high and wide and then bringing them in close, though one was used to cover her head as it was tucked into the hollow between wing and side. She withdrew it a moment later, stared fixedly at him, and repeated it.

Come on. It's not that hard to understand is it? I need to hide! Gods if you don't stink, though. What pile have you been rolling in? Referring to the odor of alcohol that came from the man, though this all remained neatly tucked inside her head. "HAAIIIYYY."

[Imass]

The raven readily ate the second piece of fruit that Garonn had offered. The Akalak found a sense of relief when the bird was able to eat. After all, the warrior wasn't hungry at all. An incredible thirst for wine overwhelmed him, but he dared no scare the bird away to chase his addiction. He still couldn't believe this was happening. His drunk eyes glued on the bird, he witnessed it acting extremely strange.

The black raven started to flap it's wing over its head. The bird was looking Garonn in the eyes, this fact was unmistakable. The blue man raised and eye brow as the bird digged it's claws deeper into his skin. It rawked again loudly. The drunk couldn't understand exactly what the bird was trying to communicate, but he was awed by it's antics. "This bird has got to be trained. I have never witnessed a wild bird that acted in such a manner. This is unbelievable!"

The Knight didn't know what to do so he just talked to the bird like he would to a human. He knew that is how peoples raised dogs, maybe it would work for Ravens. "What do you want? Show me. Show me."

[Yonega]

Hm...how to show him...

The raven smoothed her feathers back out again and peered around, looking this way and that in typical bird-like fashion only to freeze. She recognized guards, at least, entities that did exist around the institute, though usually on the outside and not the inside. The Kelvics didn't exactly escape, afterall. But the guard kept walking, unperturbed by the scene occuring outside the Tine. The avian at last spotted a vantage she might be able to make use of....

Near the goods store, and a bit across a bridge, she spotted an alley. Well, it looked like an alley from here. She didn't know one of the canals was there and a small dock attached to it with one of the ravosala's secured. What she saw was a smaller, quieter place that people weren't coming and going immediately from; somewhere that she'd be able to comfortably shift and maybe get some help from this man.

Turning her head back towards him, the raven clacked her beak twice and twisted to face the spot she'd seen, her body turning upon the wrist and toes tightening once more to keep his attention. She bobbed upon her perch once, twice, three times and then took off, circling over his head briefly. She needed to keep the blue-mans attention so he could follow her to that spot. Only when she was absolutely positive he was still watching her did she fly towards the "alley", landing briefly upon a post above the trade-peoples, cawing at him, and then taking off once more to land a little further on, but closer to the alley. If he followed, it would take them completely there, no more than a hop, skip, and jump to the canal-alleyway.

-----------------------------

Upon entering the alley (and confirming the man was still following), the raven landed on the edge of the small dock. Her feathers fluffed out, her wings flapped twice with tail-plumes spread, and then she was still, looking at the little boat with her back to the alley's entrance. And then, in no more than the blink of an eye, the bird had disappeared. There was a bright show of colors in that singular instant before the fair-skinned maiden was perched upon the edge of the wooden dock. Her back was to Garronn, but what he could see of her was a short-haired woman in relatively good health except for the slight irritation on her right ankle where something had been before. Over her left hip was a jagged edged discoloration that stood out to the otherwise unmarked flesh, a birthmark of some sort. The most obvious thing was the lack of clothes.

A great sigh escaped her lips afterwards and the young woman that had taken the place of the bird stood, turning on the pier to face the fellow she'd so far interacted with rather poorly. "That's better. I don't really like cramped spaces, I hope you understand. What I was trying to ask was if you knew somewhere I could hide. I don't know if they're still following me or if they caught that man who took my tag off. I don't even know if I should really trust you. You smell really bad, by the way. Did you roll in something or someone spill something on you? I reccommend a good bath, mhm. It will improve the odor immensely. Why is your skin blue, by the way? I've never seen someone with blue skin before. Is it normal? Maybe you should see a doctor; I bet they could help."

Her words were quick, moving almost fluidly between sentences as she stared at him, arms at her sides and head canted slightly so that her bangs fell across one of those almost black eyes, the unnaturally large pupil the only real clue that she wasn't exactly...human.

[Imass]

Following the raven into the alley made Garonn feel like a child. He was drunk though, so his mental justifications were distorted. Not only that, it almost seemed like the bird wanted him to follow by the way it squawked and flew in circles. Garonn couldn't help but grin as he chased. Turning the corner of the alley, the Knight instinctively looked over his shoulder to make sure no one was following or watching.

Standing on the edge of the dock, the raven fluffed it's feathers out and turned it's back to Garonn. The raven paused for a moment, then surpringly disappeared behind a flash of bright light. Jaw dropping, the knight watched seemingly magically a woman appeared on the dock in place of the bird. At first the foolish drunk was amazed at what just happened, but he quickly realized that it was a kelvic. The Knight knew nothing about the kelvic race other than the basic signs of identification, mainly the fact they could shapeshift and where prominant Akalak breeders.

Garonn let the naked woman talk. She spoke quickly and stood with her arms tucked into her body. She had big brown eyes and short black hair. The Akalak could not help eye her up and down. She was much smaller than him. Standing next to her, he was like double her size and tripple her weight. She was also talking about needing a place to hide. Amongst many other things, her whole speech sounded like mumbo jumbo to the ears of a drunk man.

The Akalak decided to ignore in response her comments on the alcoholic stink of his clothes and his blue skin. Looking at her for a few seconds he forumated a drunken tangent, "Sounds like you were being chased huh?" the Knight rested his hand on the pommel of his sword for a moment and looked at her head to toe, "Slavers probally..."

"I can hide you from your enemies," the Knight drew his sword. The gleaming metal sparkeled in the water. The effect was almost magicial, "I can also protect you from your enemies. I can kill them if they attempt to use force on you."

"Is this something you are interested in Kelvic?" Garonn looked the female directly in her big brown eyes when he asked this one.

[Yonega]

The raven-gone-human eyed more nervously the drawing of the blade from its sheath and stepped back a teensy bit from him, ready to...what? She didn't know how to swim and she didn't have the energy to transform again right now. The woman would be at his mercy and running past the big blue man seemed absurd without the greater agility of her feathered form. But his words settled some of her unease and the woman relaxed, muscles visible lightening as she eyed him closely.

"Slavers. I know that word, I think. They're like the crowds when the staff takes the unusables up for sale each season. I don't know why they're unusable or what those people want, but I don't like the crowd. It makes me nervous and twitchy. I don't know if I was being chased. That man cut my identification ring and I fled because there were people coming aboard and they looked like some of the guard and they looked really, really mad. I hope that guy's okay. I don't want him hurt on my account."

The Kelvic paused, taking a few rapid breaths until she could talk again in the same slightly rushed way she had, as though her thoughts were simply uncontrollable and the only way to keep them in check was by releasing them in the almost single-breath rush she had been so far doing.

"I don't think I'd like them to be killed, as much as they frighten me. They didn't precisely hurt me, but I'd rather not risk it, you know? Where would you hide me? You seem kinda unsteady already, but you talk okay. Maybe it's from what you rolled in...Maybe you should have some water if you don't want a bath. There's lots here!" The woman waved a hand around her and grinned. It was a toothy, excited grin, not unlike a teenagers when faced with some particularly juicy bit of gossip.

Noise in the street behind them rose for a moment and the Kelvic jumped visibly, hopping closer to the Akalak and wrapping her arms around the one not wielding his sword, peering past him and to the street beyond. It appeared that someone disagreed with the price being offered by a shopkeeper for something, though what that something could be was unbeknownst to either in the alley! Neither did it involve them. While the dispute continued, their voices rising, Yonega looked up nervously to the man. "Keep me safe."

[Imass]

The woman tensed up at the sight of his blade. It amused the drunk to see her attribute the sharpened steel to her own death. To the warrior, the blade shimmering in the sunlight was a beautiful thing. Even though the blade was not of the best quality, it was still masterfully crafted in the eyes of the drunk. However, when the kelvic woman began to talk Garonn noticed that she became more comfortable.

The brown-eyed female spoke at a million miles per hour. She spat out her thoughts without any inhebitions. She had a vague idea of what a slaver was. Then she seened to suggest that she escaped some sort of captivity with the help of another man. Half way in her mental reguritation, she took two super quick breaths and rushed to finish her piece. She went on to say that she did not want anyone killed and asked questions of where she would be hidden. In the end, her rushed and almost frightened way of talking was too much for the drunk Akalak to comprehend, much less answer.

Standing there wide eyed, he thought on her words for a moment as his drunk mind tried to formulate a response. Before he could say anything though, the naked girl jumped on his arm and hugged it tightly. She wanted him to keep her safe. Even Garonn could not deny her seemingly helplessness was attractive, but his inner skeptic could not allow these feelings.

Wrenching her off his arm, he took a step backwards and stared at her in the eyes. His face was suddenly grim and his grotesque features now more visible in the sunlight. Barring his teeth he spoke, "Get off me female!"

"Do you realize what you have gotten yourself into?" asked rhetorically as he pointed the sword in a wide circle around him, "You are in world now -- not a cage. Freedom for you here isn't easy. If I protect you, then I'll be putting my own life on the line. I cannot do that, nay, not without payment. How can you expect for someone to fight for your freedom for free? Freedom isn't free."

The Skeptic eyed her again, though not suggestively, "I have a sword and the training to preserve your freedom, but what can you offer me?"