Closed The Shadow Without a Light (Yisanareysin)

[Kaleidoscope]

"Speech."

67th Summer, 516 AV
Early Evening at the Stallion's Rear

Outside, the day slowly faded away into sunset, rays piercing low-hanging clouds with crimson, peach, mango rays of Syna's beauty. The streets of Alvadas simmered quietly with the old passions of the people who lived there, the quiet, timorous worry and anxiety that seemed to be Alvadas' new skin as of late. The past span of days had been tough to the city, and the woman, who hurried along those same streets, was feeling the strain of it.

Passing down a narrow street, she stumbled upon the Stallion's Rear Tavern, and without much of a hesitation passed inside. The atmosphere inside the tavern was not that much different from outside, the ceiling showed the rosy colours of the sky outside, yet the expressions were far from friendly. Conversations glimmered quietly in the corners, and suspicious eyes cast about. Yet, through it all, the patrons wanted to drink, and relax, so although they were on guard they kicked back, and tried to reign in their mistrust.

The woman who entered the tavern cast about for a place to sit, and chose the bar, ordering an ale in its wooden mug. She was short, barely above four feet, with straight, ashy grey hair cropped short about her shoulders. Her coat remained wrapped about her shoulders as she huddled, uncomfortably on the stool, looking out of place. Then she abandoned the ale as if it were a pretext. Her nearest neighbour glanced at her oddly as she bent in to ask him a question, "Have you seen this child?"

From her coat, she produced a picture, a small, but good quality painting of a young boy, with a smiling face and white hair. Half of his face was obscured with a lazy, purple-winestain birthmark or scar. The man looked at it, and shook his head. She went onto the next patron and found the same result, again and again. In silence now, the woman hung her head, and returned to her ale. But it wasn't until much later in the evening, when a stranger approached her, and spoke a few words, muttering, quiet. A few ticks later and a doubtful, yet hopeful spark of light entered her eyes. She passed on the picture, and watched as the stranger returned to his seat.

A few moments later, and she left the tavern. The conversation she'd had played back in her mind, as she deliberated whether she'd made the right decision or not.

The stranger approached her. "I hear you're looking for someone. Care to show me the picture too?"
She showed them, hesitantly. "Aah, I see. Are you willing to pay for information?"
The woman nodded, and spoke up in a hushed voice, "Yes, I'm willing to pay, and pay well. Do you know something?"
The stranger shook their head. "Not me. But I could find someone who might. I'll ask my friends. Could I take this picture?"
She clutched it to her chest, and shied away. But the stranger was insistent. "Yes, you can have it. But tell your friend to meet me at the Crooked Playhouse tomorrow morning, with the picture." A brief hesitation. "Can I trust you?"
The stranger nodded, and took the picture, placing it in their bag carefully. They spoke up again.
"If I don't find anyone, then I'll meet you tomorrow to return the picture. Could I have your name, perhaps?"

"It's Meranne."

OOC :

The stranger mentioned could be one of your contacts, or one of your contact's friends. Obviously, they need not know that you're a searcher of information/spy, but they'd just be asking around, same as Meranne. Hopefully that gives you enough scope to be creative! :S

[Yisanareysin]

It was an unfortunate reality that in a career like intelligence, it was sometimes difficult for freelancers to make friends. Friends required a certain openness or vulnerability, after all, and clients often pitted spies against one another. Paranoia and caution were practically required for this job, when it came down to it.

So no, friends were not common among spies. Allies, on the other hand, had most of the benefits of friends, and none of the dangers involved. So when a certain well dressed, dark skinned man dropped down on the seat next to Rey, and gave him a kiss on the cheek, he returned the gesture, and turned to face him.

"Blanchard. Ssurprise to ssee you here." It wasn't his real name, of course, but the alias was a professional courtesy. Bernard Savoy was a native Alvad, the youngest son of a fairly well off merchant family. How he'd started on this path, or where his allegiances truly lay, Rey had yet to discover, but the human had been a trustworthy resource in the past, so Rey was inclined to give him the benefit of the doubt.

"Ah, Raven, my dear friend." Rey was fairly certain Blanchard knew his real name, but, again. Professional courtesy. "While this..." His lip curled ever so slightly at the crowd in the Wolf's Cave, "tavern is hardly one of my usual retreats, I was actually hoping to find you here. I take it you're not currently employed?" Rey shook his head. "Excellent."

Slinging an arm around Rey's shoulder, Blanchard produced a picture from his pocket. "There was a woman in the Rear last night, or so my contacts tell me. She was looking for this child here. Willing to pay, too. I was going to take it myself, but something's come up that requires my immediate attention. Interested?"

"Why me?"

"Because I thought to myself, out of the kindness of my heart, that my darling friend Raven might appreciate a tip on a job?" Rey snorted in disbelief, and the human sighed heavily, like he'd never had an imposition weigh so heavily on him. "I don't like owing people. I'd like this to make us even."

Rey shook his head, tallying up their list of favours and weighing them. "Iss only a tip on a job, ass you ssay. And only a ssimple one at that."

Blanchard narrowed his eyes, then shook his head. "Alright, brings us closer to even, then. Not much point in me holding on to this job. Deadline is this morning. For all I know the client might already be at the meeting spot. You in?"

Well, why not, he supposed. Not like he had any jobs lined up, and a missing person case seemed like a good way to get in more practice with pathfinding. Reaching out, he snagged the picture from Blanchard's hand.

"Excellent. You'll want to be at the Crook soon, while it's still morning. Bring the picture with you, look for a short woman called Meranne. Tell me how it goes, love." Dropping another kiss on Rey's cheek, he swept off, leaving Rey to study the picture in his hand.

Burning the image into his memory, Rey stood as well, and headed off for the Crooked Playhouse. Time to find his new client.

Snake Tongue | Common | Arumenic

[Kaleidoscope]

The description Rey had been given was unfortunate, for when he reached the Crooked Playhouse there was not one, but at least three women who were short. 'Short', after all, was not much of a description to go by. Yet, there was only one who was wringing their scarf nervously, looking here and there but without any real goal in mind. That one woman was pale, with short, silvery-grey hair lightly fluttering in the slight breeze that blew from the entrance of the Crook.

If it wasn't obvious to the Dhani, it soon would be. The nervousness was writ plain on her face, and besides, the other two short women soon left, leaving his target all on her own. She was dressed in the same coat as the previous night, a long trench coat that fell all the way to the floor, made of a dark, navy blue material. Even though it was the middle of Summer, the woman had a light red scarf tied tightly around her throat too, and the ends of it were torn ragged. Her face, similarly, was pitted and trenched with frowns and creases, visible signs of worry and age.

As Rey approached her, she would glance at him once cursorily, the again as her eyes assessed the man. If he drew closer though, a light would spark in her eyes. Was this the man that could help her? Quickly, she'd wave her hand to signal the man over, hurriedly and anxiously. Her scarf flapped loose for a tick before she took it back under control, wringing it in her hands. If she wasn't as clearly distressed as she was, the sight might have been comical. She looked for all the world like she had just come fresh from a play. Apart from the very obvious signs of sleep deprivation. And the tick in her eye.

"Are you here to help me find my son? Have you got his picture with you?" As soon as she saw it, she'd snatch it from his hand and hold it to her chest, her hands shaking lightly as she gently stroked the parchment it was painted on. "Anything, really anything you need from me I will be happy to help." Her voice was soft and low, with a gentle scratch to it.

[Yisanareysin]

Rey padded down the streets of Alvadas, mind focused on working over the information at hand. He'd cultivated a healthy dose of paranoia over the years, and it had occurred to him almost immediately that this could be a trap Blanchard was setting for him. The thought was dismissed almost as soon as it appeared. If this were a trap, Blanchard would have set it in the underground, his home turf. Besides, Rey hadn't made any enemies recently, and he wasn't on a job.

So, a legitimate job. A missing person, apparently. Not a bad job, unfortunate incident with Wally aside, but Rey never really like dealing with the clients in these kinds of cases. Panicked and desperate humans were the most annoying kind. And he always had to pretend to care and that was always just such a hassle.

Still, these jobs were well worth the hassle. Clients would often throw as much coin as they could around to get their friends and family back, and besides, there was always a good story behind a kidnapping or a runaway. It was with that happy thought that Rey found himself in front of the Crooked Playhouse.

The Crook was a familiar sight now, and Rey smiled briefly as he recalled his first visit. With any luck, this encounter would prove to be just as interesting. Slipping inside, Rey paused in the shadow of the doorway to read the room.

The Crook was between shows at the moment, so there were only a handful of people inside. A quick scan of room identified three woman that matched the description Blanche had given him. One in particular stood out, her face drawn tight with nervousness. Schooling his face into a professional mask, Rey stepped forwards, holding the picture at his side where it was clearly visible.

Yes, this was her alright, wearing her distress on her sleeve. Her voice, when she spoke, was a little rough, and her hands were visibly shaking. Not an unusual reaction, if a little more intense than usual. Hmm. This usually went easier if they were calm.

Reaching out, Rey touched her shoulder gently, and drew her to the side so they could sit. "Calm down." He murmured softly. "Explain first, then we will ssee. Tell what happened, who are you and your sson, where he hass gone, anything you can think of. "

Snake Tongue | Common | Arumenic

[Kaleidoscope]

OOC"And he always had to pretend to care and that was always just such a hassle." Oh man, Rey, I totally agree with you mate.

The woman was pliable, like clay. She walked over the the side with the investigator, and sat. Her eyes were dark with worry as she gazed at the man's face. His speech made her crook an eyebrow inquisitively, but she apparently brushed over it as she launched clumsily into her answers.

She held the picture of her son in her hands as she spoke. "My boy, he's called Olan. We... we'd had an argument. We often argued. He's an only child and I'm a single mother," she said by way of explanation. As she talked, the worry seeped out of her voice as she got into the background of describing what had happened. In fact, she almost looked lost in recollection.

"Anyway, we argued that morning. I can't even remember what the argument was about. And now... and now, he's disappeared. He's an odd child, not quite there in the head. He's always making up lies and deceptions, but he's harmless enough. And now he's gone I can't say sorry for what I said. I need him back, sir. He's so very dear to me."

"And my name's Meranne. I think, no... the only place I can think of that he might have gone is the Bizarre. Or maybe the Underground? He liked playing with the urchins there." She smiled fondly, and then the worry crashed back, like a tidal wave consuming a shore. Her face had been looking younger, now the worry lines marched back and set up camp, transforming her into a mess of a woman again.

"I suppose I should say a little more of what he looks like, if that's help? He's about this tall (she indicated the height as roughly torso height), and he was wearing plain white clothes the last time I saw him. He has a fondness for plain clothes, Ionu only knows why. When they get dirtier so much quicker." It was a thing only a mother would say, and she rubbed a tired thumb between her eyebrows.

"I've tried searching myself, but I couldn't find him. It's odd, because ordinarily I'm good at finding things, yet now he's completely disappeared. It's as if he's been caught by someone, or like he's... like he's..." dead. The sentence remained unfinished, but her voice had pitched higher and higher with anxiety.

"Please! Tell me you can help me!"

[Yisanareysin]

As Rey led the woman to the side, he focused inwards, reaching for his core, his djed. It gathered into a tight ball in his chest when he inhaled, then spread out, flooding his nose and mouth and eyes on the exhale. His mind filled with scents and smells, and he allowed himself a fraction of a tick to bask in the auras of the Crook and everything within before focusing on the client before him.

She tasted of sour anxiety and musty sorrow, as expected. Rey didn't expect anything particuarly strange, but he found these things went easiest when Rey tried and matched his client's emotional cadence, and this was the easiest way to do so.

He listened silently as she spoke, sorting and digesting each scrap of information as it came. A family of two, huh. Rey couldn't imagine a nest that small, ever. Or his mother ever apologising to him, or rather, having ever said anything to him that would warrant an apology. Still, human lives were so short, it was only natural their family structure would seem strange to him. He tucked that little oddity in the back of his mind for further inspection later.

More of interest to him were the spikes and dips of her scent. There were the overtones Rey expected of a mother worrying for her child, of course, but there were hints of something else. A fleeting dash of hot fury, a twist of peppery annoyance, or possibly irritation, and even a dark, coffeelike bitterness at the root of his tongue and the back of his throat.

It was a taste Rey typically associated with hatred, but in this case, it had to be something else. Perhaps the loving frustration he imagined his own parents had felt whenever he and Ziyal were being particularly disruptive and troublesome. It still sat a little oddly in him, but he let it go. The oddities of humans was no concern of his.

Rey couldn't be bothered to reach out to comfort her, but he made his voice as soothing as he could. "Don't worry, I can find him. He disappeared yessterday? Then it sshould be fine."

Letting his sense fade, Rey briefly considered asking her to bring him to where she'd last seen the boy, but dismissed it. He knew it had been at least a day or so, which meant that more likely than not, both the scent of the boy and his pathfinding trail would be too faded to follow.

He had a better lead to follow, anyways. He'd go check in with his contacts at the Bizarre, then go see if Mae and her gang of urchins knew anything about this boy Olan. Even if they didn't, they'd almost certainly know who would. If he was lucky, perhaps the boy might even be with them.

Snake Tongue | Common | Arumenic

[Kaleidoscope]

_____

It was busy in the Bizarre, if Rey visited. At the entrance, two stalls in competition with each other were arguing about stolen recipes and sabotage. Further in, not that it meant much in such such a space-bending place, traders haggled over the price of spices from Eyktol. Reysin's contacts would prove illusive. Elsewhere, children ran like monkeys past lovers, whilst a man sold cherry pasties to a tall woman dressed in her best. It was a colourful place, was the Bizarre. Full of the strange and the odd. Yet if asked, not one would be able to recognise the pale looking creature captured in Meranne's painting.

_____

Meanwhile...

It was growing dark in the winding streets of Alvadas. The Twisted Streeters were about somewhere, bedtime tales for the naughty children who had the luxury of parents to tell such stories. Others had no such luxury. These were the gutter rats of Alvadas, the lonely, the forgotten, the unwashed rascals that just seemed to belong nowhere and everywhere, all at once. Olan: fierce, mysterious, devilishly tricksome- was decidedly one of them.

The red moon that was a constant presence in the Underground shone with a pallid light on the boy's hair as he ran past the grimy window of an ex-butcher's shop turned homeless shelter. Inside, the mumbling shadows barely stirred as Olan ran past, feet barely making a sound as he leapt up the stairs taking two steps at a time. The second floor was his space. None of the houseguests, such as they were, had ever seemed interested in hauling themselves up the rickety flight of stairs. So Olan had the place to himself.

It was a veritable nest. Like a magpie, the young boy had a growing collection of items. The room flickered to life as he lit a candle, gently cradling the small, warm flame as one would a baby bird. His eyes shone golden for a tick as he passed the flame beneath him. In the corners, dull gold glittered, silver plates gleamed with tarnished splendour. Olan spent the next bell wandering over the entire room, touching each and every item. Then he picked up a plate, and glanced at his reflection. A chime or so later, and the young boy was wearing someone else's face. A light grin graced his features as he stepped with the elegance of a dancer through his treasures to the door. Nightfall was his time: the time of the urchin.

[Yisanareysin]

The Bizarre was as entertaining as ever, and Rey took a moment to bask in the hustle and bustle of the marketplace. Then he was off hunting, sorting mentally through his list of contacts. The Velys twins were probably not around at this time of day, Anne was out at sea, Talion.. Talion was right there. How convenient. The con artist frowned, pocketing something as Rey approached.

"White hair and a birthmark.... Doesn't ring a bell for me. Name doesn't sound familiar either. I could ask around, if you want?" Talion's eyes gleamed as he spoke. He'd learned by now that Rey paid well for information, and even more for discretion, making him one of Rey's more reliable contacts.

At a nod from Rey, the man slipped away, leaving Rey to try again. And again. And again.

Nothing. By the time he gave up and left a bell later, he still had no lead on the boy. No one he'd spoken to seemed to recognise either the description or the name. The closest he'd gotten was a tentative mention of a blond boy named Oleg, which Rey was pretty sure was just a coincidence.

There was something troubling Rey about the situation, but he couldn't quite figure out what. He mulled over it as he searched for an entrance to the underground, and by the time he found a ladder in a dark corner, he'd worked it out.

Meranne had mentioned the Bizarre specifically as a place that she thought the boy was likely to be, which typically would suggest the boy spent a lot of time there. Yet no one Rey had spoken to, not the shopkeepers, or the thieves and con artists, or even the performers had any recollection of him.

It could be nothing. Ionu knew there seemed to be dozens of children constantly scampering about the place, and it wouldn't be hard to overlook one. But every one of his contacts? And a boy so distinctive in appearance? It made his scales itch in concern.

Perhaps Mae could shed some light on the situation. Once in the underground, it was an easier enough matter to find Mae and her gang of urchin runners. In this case, he found Mort first, and followed the shy boy to where Mae was play-wrestling with one of the older boys.

"Hey, Hiss! 'Aven't seen you around inna while." She called out cheerfully, before shoving her opponent to the ground. "Hah! What'd'ya need?"

"Looking for a boy. Name iss Olan, about sso tall, white hair and clothess, hass a large" Rey gestured vaguely at his face, not recalling the word in common. "large purple. On hiss facce. Wass told he likess to come down and play with the children down here?"

Snake Tongue | Common | Arumenic

[Kaleidoscope]

At the mention of the name Mae tensed up, her face screwing into a twisted, crumpled expression that conveyed different emotions: primarily that of confusion, but also something like that of a clam suddenly retreating into its shell. It was clear that the girl knew something, but whether that information was going to be easy to discover was another question. She aimed an idle kick at the boy she'd defeated, who looked to be wanting to say something.

"Why d'ya wanna know, Hiss?" Mae frowned, and picked at her nails sullenly. Suddenly, the boy sprang up and shot a quick glare at his victor before running to a safe distance and calling out, "Hey, me an' Grimmer saw a boy like tha..-" Mae gasped and chased after the boy, jumping onto him and punching at his head to bring him down, like a hunter going in for the final kill. She was a flurry of activity, and the poor boy beneath her whimpered as he dropped like a dead lump onto the ground as Mae continued to rain a flurry of blows to his form.

Through gasps, she said, "You an' Grimmer don't want to be getting in trouble now. He don't want to know about your guesses and 'approximations', so shu'-up and quit givin' false information. You haven't seen Olan!" She turned now to face Reysin, confident that the boy wasn't going to speak up without her say so, but wearing the slightly guilty expression of a dictator caught in the act of dictatorship. "Olan doesn't exist, Mister. Him and Grimmer are idiots, they don't know anything." She leaned in conspiratorially, and said, "They prob'ly saw Fei."

"Hey, FEI! Get 'ere!" A boy soon rounded the corner, lanky and certainly matching the description in terms of hair colour. He possessed a mop of the palest blonde hair that lay flat on his head, littered through with mud and debris. His cheeks were flushed red from messing in the gutter, and he carried a dagger in his top pocket. With a grin, he ran up to Mae and happily punched her shoulder. "What's up?"

"Mister here wanted to see you, ain't that right?" Yet the boy had one feature that was remarkably absent, the purple birthmark on his face. Mae slinked off as Fei proved to be completely useless, leaving Rey with nothing but the beaten up youth, who had stood painfully during the conversation and had moved to lean against a wall a little way away.

He was nursing a split lip and a rapidly approaching black eye, muttering curse words no child should know under his breath. Grimmer lay at his feet, apparently a small puppy of no distinguishable breed that appeared to be either blind, deaf, lame, or a mixture of all three. He would take little convincing to tell what he knew, if indeed he knew anything at all. All the curses that passed his lips were directed at the now-disappeared form of Mae.

[Yisanareysin]

Rey worked to keep his face neutral as he watched the interaction between the urchins. Now, this was certainly something. Mae was often belligerent, but rarely ever this tyrannical with her gang. Add that to her odd reaction to Olan's name, and Rey felt the shape of the situation begin to form in his mind. He was still missing most of the pieces, but it was clear that there was more to this job than he'd initially thought.

Mae was not a girl easily cowed. But it seemed something had her panicked, or protective. Maybe both. Whatever it was, it seemed not all her gang was in on it. Mort might know, but for all that he seemed like a pushover, he was fiercely loyal to Mae, and was unlikely to spill anything.

Fei was not particularly helpful either, seeming to be totally oblivious to the situation at hand, though he did have quite a lot of things to say about where best to look for mizas in the gutter, and which rats made the best racers. So many things. Rey had never realized so many words could come out of such a small body.

By the time the boy got bored and scampered off, all the urchins had scattered, save for Mae's unfortunate victim, and the puppy at his feet. The boy was gingerly tending to his wounds, and making some choice comments about Mae's mother, father, and the man her mother had cheated on her father with.

Slowly, so as not to startle the boy, Rey stepped closer, and knelt to be level with him. Holding his breath for a moment, he focused, drawing a swell of djed from his chest and let it spread through him. Pulling out a scrap of cloth, he wetted it from his waterskin, and handed it to the boy in a friendly, compassionate gesture. "Mind your lip." He said, nudging the boy towards a sense of goodwill.

"Guessing it wassn't Fei you and Grimmer saw." Rey glanced down, and scratched behind the pup's ear. "Where'd you ssee Olan? And why's Mae sso scared? "

Snake Tongue | Common | Arumenic