Completed How You've Changed [Wrenmae]

[Kit Rowan]

Morning, Day 13, Season of Summer, 513 AV

Kit had standards.

In Alvadas, Whet had advised her to play to the strengths of her sex as she got older, and her answer had been straight up no. When people threw coins into her hat, Kit wanted to know it wasn't cause of a low cut or skin but cause they watched her perform and thought her show was worth the money. It made her life a little difficult, sometimes, but she stuck to it. It gave her peace of mind.

But the cripple who called himself her master didn't care. Kit might have had pride, but Red's 'master' wasn't about to permit anything that might lose him out on a few extra mizas. Kit found her way to the Merchant's Ring, jacket tucked in tight around her body. Red the slave girl couldn't have standards; she wasn't allowed it. Gods, how Kit hated being Red.

Kit picked a new spot, in the merchant's ring again today, just along the edge, between them and the docks. Jet might suck up the cripple, but he seemed willing to tell her where people with disposable income might walk past. He wouldn't lie about that. If it would've helped his precious master, he would have told her anything at all. Kit tossed an empty broad-brimmed hat to the ground. It was lumpy and malformed by the abuse of travel, Ekytol heat and assault by slavers on the road. It looked a little sad to Kit.

She breathed, applied another illusion of fresh skin across Ionu's mark and pulled off her jacket. The cripple's choice in attire for her was entirely black; her pants were simple and stopped just below her knees. Her shirt exposed her navel, left her arms entirely bare. She felt the eyes on her already. The passerbys weren't turning down the offer of free skin.

Kit tried to ignore them as best she could, tried to forget her standards and the shame of breaking them. She breathed, sat down and began to stretch, and Kit smiled at the languorous pleasure of it; another joy they hadn't managed to take from her yet. It was a very short list.

"Nice," someone said, and Kit felt her cheeks getting hot. No, she breathed. You need to be Red for a while, and Red doesn't need standards. Kit shook her head and moved on to her next stretch, trying to distract herself.

[Wrenmae]

The cradle of Rhysol was, as expected, a cunning mask. Wren had spent little time in the city but with the benefit of being largely unknown, he'd managed to accrue a little knowledge about how things were run. The boatmen had information...it would make sense...they were the stand in for horses along the waterways of Ravok. Power was handed down from above. At the top of everything was the elusive Rhysol...power mad, petching crazy, but a benefactor of the young mage and an opportunity for more sway and influence in the world. The next was the equally elusive Voice, master of the Black Sun who were priests that carried the whims of Rhysol abroad. The Ebonstryfe kept matters safe at home, doling out justice at their behest. They were simply the Knights of Syliras dressed in black and without that annoying 'higher than thou' attitude. These men knew they were enforcing for the peace of the city...not the whims of some whisper-tree.

Valdinox, Lazarin, and Nitrozian were the families of note. While not specifically 'noble', they might as well have taken the name. These were the families with the most holdings, those that spun the wheels of Ravok's economy. While the former two held deeper ties in the Ebonstryfe and Black Sun, the last was the mercantile powerhouse of the entire city. More than a few businesses had the name of Nitrozian somewhere inside.

Interesting, interesting. Things to know, certainly. Now he needed to find a job in the stryfe or the sun and then petch some high family, bare a son, and slip into the folds of riches and favors without a ripple.

He was distracted, entirely inside his own head. It wasn't even him, it was Zan who noticed.

Wren. Wren. WREN

What?!

Street performer! How long since we stopped to get a look at one of those?

Alvadas...definitely Alvadas. What of it?

Fine. Muse in your head then, but I want to see.

It's hardly the time or place to take a form, Zan.

Then hold me up and plot your silly little murder-plots. I promise I won't peek.

Not that it matters. They aren't murder plots.

That's how they all begin.

Sighing, Wren turned to the gathering crowd and pushed himself through. The girl was a wispy thing, or at least appeared so at first glance. While thin, even whip-like, there was a strong reinforcement of muscles that rippled beneath her skin. She certainly dressed to highlight her qualities.

A few whistles of appreciation punctuated the general murmur of the crowd and Wren sighed, picking Zan off his belt and holding him up in one palm at the very front of the masses...especially to not appear like an idiot. Only the performer would know he was uselessly holding up a bottle at her.

But he hardly cared what she thought.

His mind drifted, stalled, and began layering.

Yes...first he'd need to establish some more contacts...maybe stop into the Temple again? Or perhaps the barracks? He could move from there certainly, but he'd need to impress a family somehow.

Somehow.

[Kit Rowan]

"Luck," Kit murmured, so soft she couldn't hear the sound of it in her own ear, bolstered her courage with it. "Luck." She slapped herself on the thigh and turned her head toward the sky and loose a long, steady breath from her lips. The first step was a smile. She tested its shape on her mouth and found it convincing enough.

Half the trick to busking was the guilt. Every so often you'd come across some saint blessed enough to drop some mizas in the hat for the sake of a good show. In Kit's experience, shame was the better tool. And if you wanted someone to feel shame for slighting you, then what you really needed was them to acknowledge you were actually a person.

Kit pushed her way up to her feet and balanced back on her heels for a moment. She slipped on her brightest smile and let a hand fall casually on her waist. "See I've built a little audience already," she said, tilting her head playfully to the side. Rapport was another good way to make them look at you. "Call me Red," she bowed her head slightly toward them, still smiling. A name worked to that end too, even a false one. After all, how could they tell?

She began to look over the crowd; there were a pair of boys with eyes for every part of her below the neck to the far right. Only practice armored her cheeks against the blush that tried to take them. They'd give generously, at least. "My master sent me out to come see if I could get some triflings for my tumbling." Next was a woman with features like they were chiseled out of stone. Hard to impress, Kit wagered, but a good giver once she was.

Her eyes ticked down the line, labeled and categorized. Kit's gaze stopped and stuttered over a scarred young man with features that tickled at the back of her mind. His expression was closed like a secret, and Kit's mind filtered him into her list and put him under 'cheap, motherless bastard' and urged her not to grace him with the time of day. But Kit's eyes snared on his iridescent flask, the itch in the back of her mind redoubled and her smile flickered into puzzlement for a short heartbeat.

Then the act was back up, and Kit lowered her eyes and contorted her face in a mask of melancholy too theatrical to be real. "And if I don't bring back enough Mizas to make it worth his while he's like to open my throat," she made a demonstrative motion with her fingers. "And throw me into the lake."

Kit watched her audience. There were chuckles, starts of smiles, and Kit brought up more feigned mirth to show she shared their amusement. Hard to screw over someone who made you laugh, or laughed with you. "My old partner will take all your donations, if you please." Kit made a gesture toward the limp-edged broad-brimmed hat laid out on the street in front of her. "If you'd like me to breath long enough to entertain you another day."

Kit hoped she was exaggerating. She'd never seen the cripple take a slave to task for bringing in too little before, and did not know how he handled it.

"Not for free now though, ah?" Kit winked at her audience and brushed a lock of hair out of her eyes. "You want a show?"

Kit prepared in the space of one deep breath. She flung herself backwards and caught herself with a hand, stopping her before she landed on her head and sprung off the canal pavement. "Ah!" Some voices said, not because what she did was difficult but cause it was unexpected. Kit was facing toward the wall now, her body only just realizing what was happening and beginning to urge her onward, onward. Kit gathered what momentum she could and planted her foot on the wall, like she meant to run up the side. She managed two steps upward before gravity began to reign her in.

She shoved off the wall, savoring the feeling of free flight as she soared, almost weightless. Kit curled herself into a ball and the rotation sped; once she turned through the, twice she turned in the air . . . She landed perfect, hands spread out. Her body begged for more; real, legitimate mirth that made her forget the chains on her. "By . . ." Ionu, Her mouth wanted to say, but Kit caught herself. Barely. Maybe they wouldn't notice her pause? "I can give you a show!"

[Wrenmae]

I like her.

You like anyone that can entertain you.

What's wrong with that? So few people take the effort anymore.

Not many want to placate a glass vial.

Not many know the secrets of inanimate objects. Oh those poor fools.

Wren was yanked from his reverie by the cheers of the crowd, forcing him to look at the girl as she continued to perform her warm up. She had a showman's spirit, that was for sure. He remembered Alvadas...the way the buskers worked the streets with characteristic grace and panache. As a boy, he had lived to see the firedancers and the jugglers, the acrobats and the storytellers. Once upon a time he might have joined her, complimenting her contorting body with a tale of some master thief and a treasure held by the gods.

For a moment, a small rebellious smile broke his concentrated frown and he lost sight of the machinations he was planning for Ravok. She was familiar, or perhaps it was just that she reminded him of home. Home...Alric, Kit, Seidaku...the folk who had meant so much to him in the helter skelter life he'd led. Maybe that was it, the girl reminded him of Kit.

She certainly looked similar, older, surely, but not by much...but the girl was an entertainer entirely by skill, not sex appeal and she was far across the seas in Alvadas, or at least that was where he had left her. In the moment, he realized he'd forgotten to write her. Things had been so hectic after the shipwreck, he'd never gotten around to it.

Perhaps she thought him dead now.

And a frown returned to his face.

[Kit Rowan]

Had she been wrong about that one, Kit wondered? He had all the sympathy of a stone when he first came around, but the man was looking at her almost fond now. A good trend Kit thought, and one she wasn't about to muck up by doing something different to pander to him. But gods take her, he and his stupid flask danced across her mind and drove her up a wall. That damnable itch . . .

But she couldn't afford to break routine to go up and give the man's face a once over for the hell of it. Kit had started the performance and she was gonna see its narrative to the conclusion, and it left little room and little time for her to satisfy her curiosity in a random stranger's eyes.

. . . Didn't it? Maybe not.

She kept up a little longer, more flips and rolls are cartwheels and talking to the crowd. The chimes ticked by. When she could feel the lethargy of exhaustion beginning to creep its way into her muscles, she knew it was time for the climax.

Kit had planned on ending with an impressive series of flips and tricks, but on a whim she switched the last scene with something different. She wiped her forehead clean with an arm and blew air out her nose. "Alright!" Kit said, planting both hands on her hips. "Haven't done this in a while. Can I have some volunteers?" A moment's silence. The lecher twin's hands shot up into the air. More silence. "Come on, I need more!"

She didn't allow them the chance to recover bravery. "How about you?" She said, turning toward the cause of her itch. Usually, Kit didn't like to give people much choice when it came to volunteering. It was so much more convincing when you didn't word it as a question. But she was ever so aware of the brand burned on her back. Even that coercion might be too much. "Yes you, with the glowing philter. You feeling up for it?" Kit made her smile as wide and bright and friendly as she could. Whatever the itch was, Kit was sure she'd find a way to scratch it if she only got a closer look at the man. This would make a fine excuse.

[Wrenmae]

Gods! You're so lucky! Next time I get to be the person and you the bottle.

Wrenmae blinked, caught off guard by the girl's enthusiasm. Around him, the crowd murmured ascent. Among them were the whispered lamentations...oh but how pretty he could be if not for the scars. Yes, yes, tragic for him to be marked at such a young age. Was he mercenary? Perhaps he was from Sunberth, yes, yes, he seemed the criminal type.

I can't be a bottle.

Maybe not...erm...Oh! You can be my pet raven, sitting on my shoulder.

Very well, Zan. If it gets you to shut up.

Nothing by god or man can get me to do that.

Wrenmae forced a smile, stepping out of the ring of people and toward Kit. Again that nagging sense of familiarity at the back of his mind. Gods did she look like Kit, but it was simply implausible that it would be her. She should be back in Alvadas and nothing save the threat of death or Ionu's words could force her to dress like that.

He let the muted recognition fade form his thoughts and shook his shoulders. The cloak there jostled, strangely heavier than other materials. "Very well, girl," he said with a rare smile, "What do you have in mind for me?"

In a show of good faith, he took three gold rimmed mizas from his pocket and tossed them into the open hat, eliciting a cheer from the crowd. Such high tips for the girl, but it would pay in the long run to show his willingness to donate to the artform in Ravok. Of yet, he had not made much of a name for himself.

It was time to begin.

[Kit Rowan]

Three gold mizas! Gods above had Kit misjudged this man. For a while, she was told that greed was what people felt when they wanted what they didn't need. Whet had told her different. Greed is what people feel when they see a coin that means steady meals for the next week, for the next season. There ain't no shame in greed. So when her eyes found the mizas in the basket, she felt no shame in her revelry.

But the itch! Right. Kit stood up next to the scarred man smiling, letting the audience draw the parallels. She held up a hand over his head, then hers, then back again. See how tall he is? See how small I am? See? See? See? You didn't always need words. Whet had told her that, too.

She stepped in front of them and clapped her hands, bouncing off her feet a moment. Kit looked from the right to left, sure to look at the twins first and give them the impression of special treatment before she gave more time to her itch. When she got to him she took a moment to look. It was easier now; the whole crowd knew she was watching him and it didn't matter because she was supposed to now.

So familiar . . .

Kit's face was smiling, open and brilliant as she began to unravel the mystery. Kit's expression was confused, head tilted to the side as she found the answer. Kit's eyes were startled, confused and almost panicked with recognition as she confirmed it to be the truth.

Show must go on show must go on. Show. Must. Go. On. "I—It's simple!" Kit said again, conjuring her bright and sunny countenance back from its home. Gods above, Wrenmae saw her like this. Somehow, she had submerged the shame of performing in this before a whole crowd of strangers, but the thought of one person she truly knew made her face very red. "I'm going to need you all to lean over and put your hands on your knees." She stepped back to demonstrate herself and used the excuse to turn her face away from them a moment and recover her bearings.

She almost managed it by the time she jumped back up and around to face the crowd. "We gotta set the mood," she said to them. The show must go on, and then, then I'll unravel whatever cruel prank the gods are playing. "Clap with me!" She said, bringing her hands together hard as she could, forgetting in her rush to worry whether citizens would find the order acceptable from a slave.

Evidently it was, or her little crowd was enthralled enough they didn't register it as a command. A scattered handful of the crowd began clapping with her, then more, then all of them. "Stomp your feet!" She sang, pounding her right foot against the ground, and they did that too.

Get them excited, get them caught in the mood and a crowd will turn dumb enough to turn more generous and happy enough to come back for it again the next day. The show had to end. It had to end right, however much she wanted to stop and shake Wrenmae till his bones came loose beneath his skin.

The audience clapped and stomped. Someone whoooped, hollered. Some of their faces were still plain, still unconvinced, but Kit could do nothing about them now. She made a run at a jog and put ten feet between her and the little line of bodies. Breathed in, breathed out. In, out. Measure, calm, focus, why is Wrenmae here NO. Focus. The run. The jump.

Kit knelt down, eyes on the line and tried to fill her mind with the thought of what she was about to do. She touched her knuckles against the canal and forgot the crowd for a little while. She took off in a hard dash, closing the distance as fast as her feet could carry her.

She was on a collision course, and moving quick. What would happen to a slave that hit a citizen like that? No Kit, focus, focus! Closer. Closer. Closer . . . Now.

Kit bounced off the ground, vaulting over the trio. Kit had tried and failed this a dozen times with Darilava and Whet. It was easy to screw up. Don't squeeze your legs in close enough, and you brush their backs and fall. Don't put enough forward momentum, you never make it to the other side. Not enough upward, you won't even clear their backs.

But today? Today it worked.

No spins, nothing fancy; she just leapt over three people. Kit uncoiled at the end and landed on both her feet, and bounced up, preserving her momentum and ending the show in one last flip. She landed on the balls of her feet, breathing hard, spread out her arms and smiled, momentarily forgetting Wren in the joy of raw motion. She would like to have said the crowd went wild. They didn't. But they seemed appreciative.

Kit picked up her old friend and began soliciting the crowd for funds, daring to look back over her shoulder at Wrenmae only as often as she could get away with it.

[Wrenmae]

When she moved, he tensed. His muscles told him to leap out of the way, to grab and hurl her, anything but allow her to vault. But he remained still, taught like coiled wire as she hurtled over his head and landed at a tumble.

He turned as swiftly as she fell, marking the landing and the way she sprung from the ground with only a twinge of relief. Had she hurt himself, how would he have explained that?

Zan was quiet, glum that he hadn't been included in the festivities. The applause was modest for the acrobatic feat, and he brought his hands together as well. Credit where credit was due.

When she sought to solicit the crowd, he turned and headed away from the girl and the ring her performance had earned her. He'd already left her coins and that nagging familiarity at the back of his head had motivated him to find some quill and parchment, write Kit and tell her that her Uncle was alive and well. Some cunning lie perhaps...no, not cunning, sweet. It would not do to give her wild tales now, nothing that might convince her to take to the sea and get nearly killed by the monsters that dwelt there.

He was already forming it in his mind, the curve of letters, the way he'd sound...missing home but happy to be abroad. He'd ask her what Alvadas was like now...yes, she should be happy to hear form him.

He didn't think to look behind him, check her furtive glances. His mind was already dedicated to the writing. He shifted Zan back into his belt, never thinking that there was no longer anyone to write back in Alvadas.

Fate had brought them both to Ravok.

What he didn't realize was that Zan had other plans. With Wrenmae's mind on other things, the clever familiar dropped from his belt, becoming water before hitting the ground to mask the fall. Slowly, purposefully, he slithered across cracks till he was where Wren had originally stood during her performance, becoming a bottle once more...incandescent skyblue, shimmering where it had seemingly dropped.

Let the man leave without another tip. He'd force the fool to wrestle with that when this girl brought him back.

Or...you know, try to sell him for scratch.

There was always that.

Ah...but Zan was always up for adventures.

[Kit Rowan]

Kit's eyes caught Wrenmae in their corners as he turned and made his way away and she fought the urge to hiss something impolite through her smile. Three mizas was worth half a day's work all by itself, make no mistake, and had it been any other patron Kit would have considered it a win and hoped to see him later. But this wasn't even about performing. Gods above, if these rubes could stop trying to talk to her and throw their money in the hat like they were supposed to everything would end perfect.

It took strenuous ticks to let the crowd disperse, and Kit was afraid she had been too ham-fisted with them. "It's a good haul," Kit said, holding her hat up appreciatively and smiling. "You'll probably find me back here later. Thank you for your time." Translation: I am done with you. Leave off. Get ye gone. The twins took a little more effort to shake off; time would have pulled them away from her eventually but Kit could still peek over her shoulder and see Wrenmae retreating.

Did he not want to talk to her? Did he not even recognize her? Kit didn't know what would be worse.

She needed the lecher twins off her back then and now. But how? Kit breathed deep and laid her hands on their shoulders, one each, while they stared big-smiled at her. "See you again tomorrow?" She said, leaned forward and gave them each a chaste kiss on the cheek and a wink. It seemed to satisfy them, but not before one slapped a hand on her back, too low for Kit to feel anything but sullied as they promised they would in chorus.

There wouldn't be a tomorrow, 'course. But they didn't need to know that.

As soon as the crowd had dispersed Kit turned around with her hat and picked up her jacket, stuffed her arms roughly through their holes and shoveled her money from the hat into her pockets, never bothering to restrap her jacket enough pretend at modesty. There wasn't time!

With no more need for pretense Kit's search for Wrenmae in the crowd was keen and undistracted. How could he not have noticed her? And if he had noticed her, how could he have borne not stopping?

Kit's eyes snagged on a familiar bottle of shimmering blue. A flicker of confusion rolled across her face. Had it fallen? Surely she would have seen. Except it had fallen; what other reason would it have to be there? She scowled at the philter. "That clumsy . . ." She let the curse carry off into mutterings as she half-stalked, half-ran past, leaning to the side and down just far enough to swipe her uncle's poorly-kept treasure off the pavement and stuff it into her jacket.

Kit claimed a nearby barrel full of Ionu-knew-what as her perch over the crowd. She made the leap and stood on the top as it swayed and threatened to pitch beneath her, holding a hand above her eye, her normally negligible height enough to put her well above the heads of the crowd with the barrel as an aid. When she finally picked out a brown back of the head that looked suitably brooding Kit leapt off and hit the ground in loping strides before anyone watching could think to disapprove.

She ducked, dove and spun around the crowds, chasing fading glimpses of a weather storyteller through the gaps until she caught it moving into a side canal. She breathed in gasped, her heart pounding; this was supposed to be when she rested and stretched and watched the world go by. Instead she was in a gods-damned chase! Kit pounded a fist against her chest, staggered and breathed out a long, strained wheeze. But she broke through the crowds and into what she might have called a side-street she been in a true city rather than a hundred and a half lashed-together boats.

Breathe momentarily stolen, Kit leaned against the side of the nearest building, pulled the glowing philter from her jacket and wove it in amnesty. Look. Look! This is yours. Stop!

[Wrenmae]

He was oblivious, and in being so...had no idea where he was walking. His feet knew the hum-drum of steps and found that the walkways and bridges of Ravok were easily traversed. Wrenmae was completely lost in though, considering the implications of his situation here in Ravok. Already he'd gained the notice of the Black Sun, a step he had chosen to take willingly...but there were further implications by this 'Rising Dawn'. His relationship with Inoadar would eventually come to a head when he was forced to reveal there wasn't actually anyone Wren was supposed to be guarding. Many things to consider and at the moment, they all sort of floated there.

Underground movement against Rhysol...the maladicted bird skull, Clyde Sullins, Marcus Ahysen, Inoadar....his letter to Kit.

He almost missed the sheen of Zan, or rather, would have...if his familiar did not speak.

Hey. Hey. HEY! Buddy-boy! Wanna see a magic trick?

Not now Zan.

No. It's good. Watch. Shamir, Zazop. Limban!

What?

Magic words. Go along with it.

Very well Zan...what happened?

Two spells. I brought the performer to you and teleported into her hand! I'm so good at this. Tip me! Or something...whatever it is you fleshlings consider adequate reward.

What?!

Um. I think the word you're looking for is 'amazing'

Wrenmae jerked up from his reverie, staring hard at Kit waving at him, exhausted, from the ally. She held Zan.

Muttering under his breath, the hypnotist stalked across the ground between them and held out his hand, forcing a pleasant smile on his face as he approached.

"I'm terribly sorry, Miss," he said, frowning, "I had no idea it slipped from my belt. Must have a mind of its own." The last words dripped with sarcasm, but he did his best to hide it.

Directed at Zan, of course, but the bottle could not speak back.

Wren could feel Zan's amusement.

"You're quite talented," Wren offered her after a moment, surprised at himself for continuing the conversation, "You remind me of a niece I left home in Alvadas. She's rather similar to you although...apologies, her outfits for performance were rather more..." he paused, deciding not to insult the girl he'd just met, "Erm, colorful...Alvadans rather prefer larger spectrums...but..." He sighed and shook his head. "I'm wasting your time. I'm sure you have other performances to get to, or proceeds to count...yes?"