Open Not quite a social butterfly. But it does fly.

[Threnody]

3rd Winter 515 AV

Throughout the cavern which houses the city of Kalinor vibrantly coloured threads of silk span immense chasms between hanging buildings. Baskets maneuvered their way across the bright red threads, carrying goods and visitors around the city while the almost weightless acrobatic Symenestrans shimmied across the threads effortlessly. One of the many hanging buildings which made up the hanging city was the Opsum House, a sizable stalactite which had been carved out and decorated almost as beautifully as the rest of Kalinor's magnificent hanging architecture. In one of the many rooms of the empty building, a tall figure stretched out his wings as he lay out what little possessions he had traveled with. The Zith grunted in frustration as he tried to shake the backpack off of his sharp claws. The annoyingly soft material had gotten caught on the razored edges of his clawed fingers.
"Should've . . . Used . . . Harness . . . "
Threnody muttered quietly as he brought his free hand down upon the stubborn fabric, wincing as it tore free with a loud ripping sound. A loud, supersonic cursing ripped through the Opsum House as Threnody suddenly tore into the bag again and again in anger before he cast it aside, utterly shredded.

The young Zith left his room far calmer than he had been mere seconds ago. The violent explosive nature of his outbursts usually lead to exceptional differences in his mood from moment to moment, something he had inherited from his father, which only amplified the usual fickle nature of Zith. Threnody looked out across the world of Kalinor, his eyes penetrating the opalgloam lit haze with ease. In the tumultuous sea of threads and the tangle of silk, Threnody had no doubt that he would not be able to fly fully within the confines of the city. He did recall something from his days as a younger Zith that would help though. Branching with his twin brother through the forests around castle Xy. He paused and took a breath before he leapt from the entrance, his wings flaring out behind him. He glided through the dark cavern air for a short while before he began to descend, lighting upon the next hanging building before he repeated the process again.

A good while later the large zith had arrived at the peculiar marketplace of the symenestran city.
A peculiar race . . . Very . . . Tender . . .
Threnody thought as he wandered through the market with his black, leathery wings wrapped around himself. The immense elegance and skill of what the symenestrans did in Kalinor was lost on him, for all he saw was a weaker race attempting to compensate for their weakness through other means. He was not stupid though, while he was a predator, he had no intentions of preying upon the symenestrans in their home. There were simply too many of them for it to be a feasible idea. The large zith seemed to be given a wide birth as he continued browsing the market stalls, looking for some form of food or perhaps a harness to replace his shredded backpack.

[Thomas Cosa]

"FORTUNES, ADVICE, I'VE GOT IT ALL!"

He'd only been in Kalinor for a few days at most, and Thomas was still exhausted from the trip. He'd been lucky enough to trick some poor sap that he could give him the answers that would allow his business to flourish in some glass city to the south. Lies, but they were creative enough to hitch a ride to the spider's nest. He'd only just realized there wasn't a market for magic anywhere outside Sahova, such were the superstitions of the peoples of the mainlands. Luckily, the glossy lily mark on the back of his left hand helped him play on those.

"AVALIS-BLESSED, COME GET YOUR FORTUNES DIVINED AND READ,"

He pushed his magical sense forward in a pulse, surrounding the area before he pulled it back in. Kalinor proved to favor the Symenstra race, and what little light the opalgloams gave wasn't enough for Thomas' very human eyes. Auristics, however, proved more than enough to help guide him through the dusky city. Again, he pulsed his magic, hoping to catch someone's interest; an effort to pull in a client.

Thomas hadn't expected to find something that would interest him.

Zith, he thought, his magic focused on as the creature fluttered down in front of him. He couldn't make out any details aside the general form, he couldn't identify color or even facial expressions with his magic. As his physicals senses were limited; if he couldn't see without it, auristics wouldn't let him see either. Still, he could feel his thick, coarse fur, the large wings. Either a Zith or a fail beast, and Thomas hadn't known fail beast to be so well behaved in the market.

"Zith! Would you care to have your fortunes told?"

[Threnody]

The Zith paused as the voice called out to him. He could not smell other Zith in the area, the voice must have been referring to him. Threnody tilted his head slightly as his predatory eyes pierced the gloom, gazing towards the source of the voice. It was human, or so it looked. Its bony, slender form could easily have fitted one of the spider-folk which filled the web city. However, this one did not have the long arms and legs, which meant it likely couldn't escape by climbing the walls if Threnody got it into a corner. Either way, Threnody's curiosity had been roused by this creature's cries of business. He approached the human with his peculiar gait, almost as if he were always in a position to pounce upon prey, or take flight if need be.
"What is it that reading my fortune could help?"
He asked as his black, leathery wings closed around his black body and crimson edged limbs.

The large Zith, who would only be 1 inch taller than Thomas if the latter were standing, could not help but notice how poor of a slave the human would make. Its frail figure looked like it would scarcely survive a day of manual labour, let alone being taken as a female's mate. For what reason the Symenestrans had allowed this one into their city Threnody could only guess. This fortune business however, had his curiosity piqued. He had heard many slaves speak of improving their fortunes, these ones were usually either speaking of becoming a favoured slave . . . Or attempting to escape, which hardly ever ended well. From what Threnody understood of the concept, it was a non-zith way of comprehending a bad or good hunt and what decided which it was. This was strange for the Zith, who merely saw each hunt as an opportunity. If there were few options for prey then it was simply that the prey were elsewhere, not that some cosmic force had conspired against the zith.
"Do you actually believe this . . . Fortune stuff is real at all?"
Threnody intoned in his deep voice, a small subsonic rumble creeping its way into his speech.

[Thomas Cosa]

Thomas shrugged, "It's fortune-telling. You either believe it, listen to what I say, and probably live all the better for it, or," the wizard paused for effect, "Or you keep on blindly as you've been doing, and trust me, you're as blind as me in this cavern. Metaphorically speaking, of course," he added hurriedly, remembering how the Zith had easily glided down into the market. Even with his magic, Thomas couldn't ever hope to match the creature's easy grace; not that he could fly, either. Still, it was something he was jealous of, both the Zith and the Symenstra seemed to have such an easy command over their bodies that the animator could hardly hope to ever match. He wondered if it's was their closer relation to the wild beasts of the unforgiving, because surely, even despite the civilization around him, nothing truly tame could ever move the way they did, the way a predator hunted.

Thomas laughed at the next question, the man couldn't have sounded more condescending if he tried; the sound that escaped him was sharp, loud, and cold. "I'm god-marked by the goddess of fortune-telling," the Seer flashed his the mark on his left hand, a glowing lily of obsidian that somehow still managed to shine reflected light despite the dead glow of opalgloam. "So, yeah, I would say I believe in all this 'fortune-telling stuff," his voice carried the last words, his fingers emphasizing the words in air quotes. Sure, he might not be the most talented of fortune-tellers, or even really know what he was doing, but he could fool a non-believer like the Zith easily enough.

"Here, ask me any question, and then give me your hand," Thomas commanded, hardly taking no for an answer. This was his job, and he needed the money. His magic reached around the Zith like a lasso, catching his soul impression. There was a sickly taste of suspicion, marked with the curiosity, a sticky tar that was heavy with interest. He would continue to read the aura until he got something he needed -- if the beast really needed convincing, Thomas could always divine something from his past.

[Threnody]

Threnody paused regarding Thomas curiously. For someone who clearly had physical shortcomings, the Zith found him to be exceptionally confident in the face of the current situation. There was no denying he would have been an exceptionally quick meal around any Zith hunting grounds, but here, Threnody was the guest whose behavior mattered most. Despite the human's claims of support from a god Threnody had never heard of, and the presentation of a mark which meant absolutely nothing to the hunter, his curiosity had been captured almost as soon as the conversation had begun. He yearned to understand how it was that this human could apparently read someone's luck.

Threnody drew one hand out of the cloak created by his wings and held it out. The five razor-clawed fingers snapped back in a single fluid motion to expose the lightly crimson furred palm. With curious blue eyes Threnody looked from his open palm to the fortune-teller. While the significance of the hand was completely lost at him, he would not question this human's ways, not yet anyhow.
"Okay then human . . . What kind of fortune will I have tomorrow? . . . Is that the correct form of question? Does the question matter in some way or can you just read my fortune like one of those leather bound parchment things your kind use?" Threnody spoke in his deep voice which still carried hints of subsonic interference here and there.

[Thomas Cosa]

Curiosity bubbles, delicately warm, washing over the flat-sticky-cold of suspicion. Thomas knows suspicion as the weaker emotion, and isn't surprised to see it dulled to curiosity's natural excitement. There are other scents that escape him, textures that misguide, imagined tastes that lay awkwardly on his tongue; these, the wizard knows, are too be ignored. Robbed of the Citadel's vast resources, blindly using magic isn't a choice best made if he wishes to retain his mind. Avalis only knows for how long he'll entertain his magic today, and straining to understand the unknown while maintain a sense of the physical world around him would certainly edge him into over-giving.

He breathes, focusing himself, his spell pulling back into a routine skim of the creature's aura. Deep enough to catch the usual emotions, the stronger ones, but not deep to get caught on something strange. Curiosity, his own, was like a drug to his magic. It was a delicate balance, feeding the spell enough of himself to keep it alive, while still able to force his own desire over the greedy castling.

"Tomorrow you'll live the same as you did today, nothing too interesting," The faux fortune teller tried, his magic settling on the fur as his mouth settled into a frown. There was nothing for him to read, he realized, as his spell tried unsuccessfully to breach the thick fur, rife with beast musk and a cold dried feeling Thomas didn't dare to explore. If he couldn't read this thing's palm, how would he prove himself? The claws perhaps - a thought, daring and bright, eased his lips into a smile.

"You're claws, though, they are interesting," he started, his voice raspier, breathier than before. It was obviously done for effect, Thomas was hardly an actor. Still, he learned to play the part the best he could to sell his lie. "You're a hunter, obviously, like the rest of your kind. Like the spiders here," he concluded, remembering the sharp fingers of the hotel staff. His magic felt along the claws, as did his fingers, exploring the texture, the tears and knots that developed over time. Smooth-ish, but not perfectly, enough to where Thomas could spin something believable. "You lived a hard life, even by the standards of your own kind. You sought an escape? A refuge, perhaps," His voice dropped off as his spell tasted the examine aura for any strike in emotion, something to let him know the way he was going was correct -- or wrong. "You seek civilization, a new place to call home? Is that right?," the would-be fortune teller waited with baited breath, not sure if he was right or wrong -- only that he could hope to correct the matter if proved otherwise.