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[Draven McNiel]

Early Afternoon of the 3rd Day of Spring, 516

Draven wandered aimlessly around Stormhold Citadel, there were a number of things that he could have been doing, such as practicing the glyphing that he had been avoiding almost religiously up until this point, the search for a teacher was fruitless so far, though to say that it was a search was more than a small stretch as he had just looked and checked to see the tell-tale signs of runes which weren’t easy to come across, especially not in the densely populated city of Syliras. ”Ah, can’t catch a break huh?” Draven said as he stretched out his arms with a yawn escaping his mouth.

”I need to sleep better.” He muttered to himself earning himself a couple of stares as people walked past, his habit was still making him look strange, the teen continued on as if he was oblivious to the looks he was receiving. ”Hm, now what should I do today?” Customers were slow to return thanks to the harsh winter that they had experienced, although he was hoping that would change sometime soon. Stuck deep in his thoughts Draven ended up bumping into a stranger and apologised, slightly embarrassed at his carelessness.

Just slowing down for a second led to Draven being pushed along the hallways of the citadel and was stuck following the flow, you’d expect that a lifetime of growing up within the city would have made him aware of this simple fact. But the crowdedness was something that was hard to get over or used to. ”Damn, stop pushing.” Draven said as he used his slightly superior size to slowly budge people out of the way, but the inflow of people was great until he realized just where he was heading. And in a flash Draven realized that without people to push against him pushing, he’d just end up overcompensating and falling over; which did happen.

When he stood up he found himself at the place commonly referred to as the gates, just outside of nettle district where Draven spent most of his so called “wasted” time. Times like this were rare, and thus so were the events that led to him ending up on the ground. ”Better pick myself up” He said as he brushed himself after standing up. ”Now then since I’m here I might as well do something with my time” He said as he saw a tavern, with a number of crates stacked in front of it.

[Archailist]

My Words | Your Words | My Thoughts

Early spring should have brought with it an end to all the construction increasing the width of the major roads of Stormhold - however, it hadn't brought the final payments for all the cobblers, architects, construction workers and many other labourers in a variety of fields contracted by the higher councils and Knightly divisions to carry out the work. Page's carrier bags were being overfilled with letters and messages being sent all over the castle, even going out to Mithryn Outpost, to contact any available Stewarts or Captains to reorganize the payment plans before they ended up with a true uproar. As it stood, though there was never a shortage of pages to help out with the deliveries, even squires were being drafted to duty in order to spread the workload. Arch was chipping in too.. partially because he had experience as a courier anyway and knew what was to be expected.. and partially because he honestly had little better to do. Though it was true that the Pycon could always stand to improve his martial prowess, he had long since lost any need and therefore any motivation to do so. Compared to his fellow squires, the Pycon knew that he was far above the standard and widening that gap wouldn't do anything more than worsen his standing.

Syliras streets weren't the same as those of Nyka.. where he'd had the opportunity to jump over flat rooftops, hoist over balconies and take advantage of slim cracks between buildings to cut through the middle of a city in practically a straight line to overcome his shortcomings of height. The streets were densely-packed with men and women shoving each-other hard and frequent enough for the whole scene to be steps away from a full-out brawl and there were only sparse cracks in the walls to briefly escape the stampede. He had to stick to the edges and rely mostly on the speed of his dog-mount to avoid sheer death. "Come on Xarex, tha'ts it, yeah!" the Pycon yelled over the bustle and chatter of the streets as he raced by, bucking into legs without so much as a glance backwards. As long as he didn't knock anyone off their feet, he'd be fine.

The White Swan seemed like an odd place to make deliveries to, but then again, knights needed their own days off too. Not every day could be filled with patrols, arrests, paperwork and petch-knew-what-else the higher positions got on with in their daily lives. As long as Ser Maximus was there and he could deliver his package and move swiftly on, he wouldn't bother questioning it. "Left.. right!" The dog growled but a firm bat to the tip of his nose soon silenced him. "Shh, shh." He knew the dog was probably agitated by the cramped conditions but they were soon pushing out into the more open spaces of the Nettle District, nearly sliding straight between a large man's legs who managed to step in their path at the wrong moment. "Watch it!"

It was his fault, anyway. They pushed over and slid up to the side of a few crates stacked up outside the tavern and Arch dismounted, pulling a few tightly-folded notes from one of the saddle-bags at Xarex's side. "Sit. Stay." The dog complied, tongue lolloping from its mouth playfully. "Good boy."

[Draven McNiel]

Draven could have sworn he heard a voice, which caused him to jump which at that moment something ran passed him. He looked around and saw what he knew to be a dog, although he couldn’t put his finger on what kind of breed it was, being quite ignorant on the names of dog breeds...As well as many other things. However what surprised him truly was that it seemed to stop at the tavern all by itself, were dogs really that smart? Draven wasn’t one to think too highly of animals, while he respected them as being more than capable survivors, he didn’t think highly of them in regards to thinking.

However he shrugged and was about to walk into the tavern until a movement in the corner of his eyes caused him to glance back before deciding to walk toward the crates. ”Okay...I’ve gone crazy.” Draven had finally admitted to himself as he saw what appeared to be a statue of a squirrel like thing. ”Why can’t I be like normal people and pretend I haven’t seen anything?” He said to himself as he sighed, before he wished to reach out to the squirrel like statue. ”Urm...I come in peace...squirrel god, what is it you want in this city?” It had to be a squirrel god trying to control this squirrel-like statue right? It was the only thing that made sense in Draven’s mind, not like he really understood gods either...But it was close enough.

”You speak-a de common? Of course you wouldn’t speak this mortal tongue.” Draven said sighing somewhat, wait no...He might just be offending this statue-god-squirrel thing. He closed his eyes as if he was deeply concentrating on something, hoping that something would come to mind. ”Oi, what the hell are you? Never seen a statue move before, you a ghost or something?” He said as he looked down scratching the side of his head, the dog being all but ignored by the fickle swordsmen.

[Archailist]

My Words | Your Words | My Thoughts

He turned smartly on his heel and nearly walked straight into an outstretched palm, apparently trying to pluck his tiny body from the ground like one would a grape from a vine. Instinct told him to stab it with something sharp but this was a public space and there were knights watching. He'd already been in trouble once before near this very same place and after a season cleaning up the stables with the hands, he had absolutely no intention of returning. So he took one long, deep breath and shouted, "DON'T YOU PETCHING DARE." Which must have looked especially odd, considering that Arch's mouth wasn't where his mouth was supposed to be.. well, not if you looked at him like you would a squirrel.

Apart from the obvious case of antlers on his little clay head, the Pycon's face was blank. It had a nose, but that was it. All of his eyes, of which there were many, were haphazardly strewn around the tip of his tail, which hung over his own shoulder like a nosy eavesdropper. His mouth was down on his stomach. Despite having no actual features, however, he still somehow managed to express shock and disgust on what little there still was on his face.. which quickly turned into just shock. There were oddities, strange people who everyone could tell had either gone through something extremely traumatizing or just been born with a few screws loose in the wrong places.. and then there was the surprisingly youthful-looking lad standing overhead, thinking he'd just met a god delivering letters like a damn courier.

This would be another one of the few moments in Arch's life up to this point where he found himself unable to say a word. "I.. yo.. you can't be.." His mouth flapped open and closed like an unsecured tent caught in the wind. "You cannot be serious." He supposed that normally it would flatter people to be considered a godly creature by those they didn't even know but for Archailist, it was rather infuriating and insulting. Especially when the lad actually had to question whether or not he could speak common or understand the utter shyke spewing from his mouth. "Just stop talking. Stop." There was no point answering any questions, so he brushed them aside. "Just stop, okay and listen to me. You.. you need Rak'keli in your life, you got that? Go.. go find a priest. Please. You need one." It might have sounded like a joke but Arch really couldn't be more serious. "Please, go. Petch off. Just.. I.. wow."

Maybe if I just stop paying attention to him, he'll wander off and find somebody else to annoy, he thought to himself while strolling past the civilian without another glance. Like Lhex, after he walks off the end of the docks, he added afterwards. It wasn't that he hated people who stopped him in the street like that, but he was in a hurry and wholly unprepared for whatever the Hai that was. If he was lucky, that would never happen again.

[Draven McNiel]

3rd Day of Sprign, 516 AV

Upon hearing a shout Draven was spooked very quickly knowing that things wouldn’t be looking to great if he did think about plucking the small squirrel like thing up. He flinched back a quickly and merely lowered himself into a squat at this point, using the same hand he was going to pick up the little man with to keep his balance and place it on the ground just in front of him. He looked at the little statue trying to put himself on the same sort of height though it was far too hard to truly try do so. Still he was looking closer at its body and was surprised at the detail in some places, was this really sculpted by someone? Still the voice was a lot deeper than Draven expected from such a small thing, did it turn out he didn’t understand voices either?

The young male looked at the statue, why was its mouth on its stomach; was it a design flaw, accident or something else altogether...However the thing seemed to have been surprised by something of some sort, Draven didn’t know what to make of the creature in the same way it didn’t know what to make him. He was asked whether he was serious, which Draven tilted his head at, he wasn’t sure how to respond to that. ”I guess I’m serious.” He said as he scratched his head, godly riddles were a bit hard to solve. Perhaps he had to pretend this wasn’t a god? No wait, was it even a god… He had seen moving statues every once in awhile, yet kept quiet to preserve everyone’s thoughts on his sanity.

”Who’s Rak’keli, and why the hell do I need ‘im.” Draven unable to properly answer back to the man, however once he was told to petch off; Draven knew that he had messed up somewhere; where exactly that was could be up to questioning but Draven didn’t want to question something that might well be a good all powerful squirrel god. ”No wait...What am I doing, just act like usual…” He thought to himself, unable to bear the fact that he might have just given off a negative impression of him.

”Wait wait!” Draven said almost reaching out to pick up the little statue guy, until he stopped himself at the last second. ”Sorry about that, whatever I messed up anyway.” He said scratching the back of his head and looking down to the ground his other hand tracing circles in the ground. ”Look, I’ll make up for it by helping you out for a whole day, how’s that sound? But yeah...Where the hell’d I mess up anyway?” Draven said unknowing of the fact he wasn’t speaking to either a god or a ghost; those were the only two things he could think of in regards to this creature.

Credit for boxcode goes to Karin

[Archailist]

My Words | Your Words | My Thoughts

Well, he thought, this is about the second most uncomfortable moment of today. He had to physically reel in the urge to not recoil and lean as far away from the man as possible when his hulking form bent down to try and match his eye-level. Which would have been quite a feat.. not just because of the Pycon's height, but because his eyes were on the tip of his tail. Yes, the closer one looked, the more they would realize that he really wasn't that similar to a squirrel at all. Antlers on his head, mouth in his stomach, eyes in his tail.. sometimes he decided to grow a third arm just for a little more variety, although today he was holding that urge back as well.

"Wow." He'd been called many things and treated in many ways but this was undoubtably a first. Someone actually, seriously, believed that he was the physical form of a deity? His first instinct said to threaten to smite the guy, but.. that was cruel. For all he knew, the guy had some serious undiagnosed mental illness. The least he could do was to show a little bit of compassion. Reel in the anger.. he told himself quietly while taking in a deep breath. Calm.. controlled. "Okay, well.. yeah, don't worry about what I said earlier, forget about it." He waved a hand off in a dismissive gesture. "I was just, err, caught off-guard. Yeah. Let's call it that."

In truth, he didn't know the half of it. "Wait, excuse me?" He was extremely thankful that he wasn't in the guy's hands at that moment because he definitely would have done something that they'd both regret. "You.. want to help me? For a whole day? Even though you have no idea who I am or what I'm doing or even my name." His tail lowered, giving the man a narrow glare. Just what is this guy's problem, he asked himself. He was about to turn back around again and just continue with his work as normal, try to forget all of this had ever happened, but.. suddenly the full weight hit him like a brick to the nexus. Hold on. Giant guy, helping me for the whole day, delivering all of these messages. No more jumping between feet, no more being crushed. I could have this whole stack done in ten chimes!

"Well, aha, sure! Why not!" Everything was better now. "Don't worry about all of that nonsense, it's in the past, forgotten, water under the bridge, goodbye!" For once he actually had a genuine smile to offer. "Oh, right. Name's Arch. Well, that's what everyone calls me. Just Arch, not 'squirrel-god' or anything else."

[Draven McNiel]

3rd Day of Spring, 516 AV

Draven used this chance to get a closer look at the creature in front of him, this guy was clearly intelligent however what he previously thought was almost squirrel like seemed to look rather uncomfortable to look at. Other than the mouth on its stomach, its antlers didn’t seem like they fit in Draven’s opinion...Was he crafted, was it a god, or a ghost possessing something. The eyes on its tail were making Draven’s eyes wander constantly to the tail and then back to where he felt the eyes should have been. However upon hearing him speak, he was sure it was a him from the voice at least...No wait it could have been a she?

”No worries! I’m kinda ignorant about these kinda things so I can be offensive without even trying at time. Yeah let’s just forget about all that.” Draven said waving it off, not worrying about that however he was rather relieved to not have offended the guy in front of him or so he hoped. Draven glanced to the side for a second wondering why it was weird that he wanted to help this guy. ”Yeah? Is it really that surprising I wanna be helpful? You seem like a good guy, that dog trusts you right? Heard animals are great judges of character; anyway that doesn’t matter, being small must make some things hard right?” Draven said in return hoping that it helped.

He was happy to hear however he opened up to the idea of Draven helping out. A grin popped onto Draven’s face. ”Haha! No worries, nice to meet ya Arch; I’m Draven McNiel a mercenary.” Draven said introducing both his name and occupation as he usually did. ”So what’re we gonna do today?” He said as he looked around for a second, to take a glance at the surrounding area, hopefully he was a good judge of character he couldn’t go back on his word so he hoped that he didn’t agree to anything bad. But the other question that was on his mind was...

”But seriously what are you? Not being offensive but I’ve never meet anyone like you…” Draven said looking at the pycon with curiosity, hoping that with the more amiable environment that he’d receive some sort of answer.

Credit for boxcode goes to Karin

[Archailist]

My Words | Your Words | My Thoughts

Boy, today's just going to be full of surprises, he thought to himself as he swallowed back a quiet sigh. "Never heard that saying but, yeah, you could say being small does have its disadvantages, y'know. Not that anyone's given a shyke about that before. Nor will they now." Everyone had their own lives to deal with; crops to tend, rabbits to hunt, furniture to craft, ships to build, weapons to smith. It didn't matter if you struggled, it was your job and you carried your own burdens - being as small as he was didn't make it any more likely that people would offer help on a regular basis, just meant they were even more likely to either not notice him at all, or pretend he didn't exist. He wasn't complaining now that someone was actually paying attention, even actually being sympathetic; he was just... confused.

Then the boy said he was a mercenary and it all made sense. Well, no wonder he had time to walk around and help tired little Pycons on his way; it wasn't as if his job was already being done by the very same people that Arch was currently working for. "Mercenary.. oh man, well. That's something." One hand reached up and rubbed the back of his own head. "You sure picked the wrong place to peddle your wares, didn't you." His voice was cheery, in a joking sense, but there was a twinge of sympathy too. The only places he could think of with a high employment rate of mercenaries weren't the best places to live in general, which was a horrible shame because despite his love of the knighthood, he still had a fair amount of respect for the men and women that put their lives on the line to guard and protect those that needed it all over Mizahar. Or at least, that's what he hoped Draven was doing.

Best to move things swiftly along. "Well," he cut in, "We're going to visit a few places and deliver some letters. Hope you've got your walking shoes on." First he needed to deliver a small stack to his patron, Ser Iros.. and collect some more. "I'm a--"

SLAM. That was the sound of the White Swan's door swinging shut behind a hulking Akalak, wearing a tight shirt marked at the breast with a pin of a sword, and thin trousers, neither of which did anything to hide the clearly-outlined musculature underneath. "You're late." He'd actually been a little early, before someone jumped out of nowhere and stalled him for time with odd questions. Now Iros was angry; he had that classic dark frown that put shivers down those that hadn't seen him do it nearly every day for a year. He took one look at Draven, looked back to his squire, leaned down with some obvious effort and pinched the stack of tightly-folded papers from between Arch's outstretched arms, replacing them with a new stack.. even thicker than before. "Top three go to the Ironworks, order for more screws and tools to be made. Next five to the Commerce and Trade Commission, waiting on some last-chime orders that should help secure the remaining bills. All the remainders are for the Employment Office.. they're in charge of the final payments."

He turned to Draven. "He's a pain in my arse, is what." Apparently he'd heard their conversation. Arch had nothing else to add; he didn't feel like explaining the origins of his race to every single person in Syliras, which was practically all he'd done since his birth. After that, Ser Iros opened the door again and disappeared back inside. "You heard the man. Employment Office, chop-chop!"