[The Equinox] An Inkling of Affliction (Wrenmae)

[Wart]

43rd of Summer 512 AV "A'right a'right, look, you don't gotta wear the lingerie but a' least wear the corset?" Wart pushed his hands off of her shoulders, her irritation growing. "I've already told you I ain't goin' along with whatever scheme you've got Tongue." "But Swarthy c'mon please? Jus' for like, five chimes, I swear. Coal can't do it and you're the o'ly otha' one here who can pass for a woman!" Ignoring that last comment she finally turned in her stool to face him. Her face did very little to hide the anger he was bringing her to. "Can you focus on your job for like, two seconds?! You got away with a lot of crap initiating me but that don't mean I'm a petching toy." Glancing towards the door she sighed, half out of exasperation half of relief. "Anyway looks like you got a customer waitin' for you vagik." Looking up Tongue broke into a smile. It was a Svefran woman. With a quick "Thanks, vagik," he left to tend to her. Finally. Rolling her eyes Wart swiveled back to her station and continued the cleaning she'd been doing before. It had been a busy day for the parlour so far. She'd been practicing a pattern on some pig skin when she was interrupted by the sudden burst of business. Days like this weren't unusual, but for the few days prior it had been pretty quiet and she expected to get plenty of training done. Now she was forced to put away her practice equipment so that she could be ready should see need to attend to a customer. Since starting her employment at the Equinox she'd spent most of her time training, either under Tongue or Eth. Most customers would go to one of the other three, but on days like this she usually ended up having to apply them as well. She'd gotten better, no thanks to the teachings of Tongue. Most of the time he was busy with some antic or another and just annoyed her to the point of incessant arguments. After some scrubbing and soaking in cleaning solutions, Wart's needles were clean enough to put away. The pig skin, now with half a fish on it, went back into a drawer, to be completed another time. Running her hand through her hair, she glanced around the shop. Coal was busy with a wiry looking human, a visitor to Zeltiva by the looks of it. Wart always appreciated the intensity of her concentration. She always took pride in the art she would flawlessly produce. Eth next to her was working on a young woman laying back in the seat, applying a rose to her ankle. She was very obviously affected by his appearance, her cheeks flushed. As usual he wasn't wearing a shirt, revealing the toned muscles that he was too humble to realize were basically worshiped by almost every female customer to the shop. He was speaking quietly to her, probably asking about menial things like her occupation and family with the genuine interest his voice always carried. Tongue, never deviating from his name, was talking it up with the woman who had just sat down at his station. She was beautiful, long dark hair, shapely curves. Wart couldn't help but feel bad that Tongue was far too caught up to notice the glances she kept sneaking at Eth. Well. Every stations full. This meant the next customer was hers. She wasn't nervous, having grown plenty comfortable by now. She wasn't thrilled though, either. Perhaps it was just him being himself, but Lewd never missed the chance to brutally criticize her, whether it was about her facial expression when she was lost in concentration, or about some small mistake she made with the ink or needle size. Huh speaking of the brute... A look towards his office confirmed that her boss's door was still shut. He'd been in there nearly all day. Probably petching drunk. Wart shook her head, irked not so much by the fact that he was acting irresponsibly but that she wasn't drinking herself. Whatever, least the vagik's not out here to talk crap. Turning back to her station again she began to idly scratch small designs into the wooden drawers beside her, waiting to find out if she'd get to work today.

[Wrenmae]

"Please, I'm sorry sir, I'm sorry. Please, have some leniancy. I was hungry. Zeltiva's hard on its feet after the famine of Spring, can you spare some pity for a poor begger?" Shroud frowned, hand on the hilt of his rapier, rapping the embossed handle with his knuckles in a rhythmic time. The man in front of him was a wretched creature, ragged and scarred with the hardships poverty had lent him. His hair was a tapestry of tangles and snarls, a testimony to the nights spent in alleys or chased half-waking from his under-bridge perches by the Waveguard. Vagrants like this man were the scapegoats of the rich. Of course. Victims were the same the world over, but it was in Sunberth that Shroud had gained a certain insight into the psychology of the foraging drifters. There, to be rich was to invite unwanted attention. Some forsook their finery upon entering the city for a life of almost invisibility. When one wore the clothes better fit for a years at ground beneath a tombstone, it was amazing the lack of notice one could have. This fellow was no different, likely cutting from Sunberth to find the patronage of Zeltiva. Without the thugs and gangs to contend with, crime was an afterthought managed by citizen volunteers. An experienced thief would not have trouble cutting a life for themselves out of this noble city. The wretch held up his hands, pleading mercy. Shroud's mind told him no. But his mouth protested, stumbling over the castigation he had meant to utter and into a sympathetic, "I will not see it happen again." Before he could stop himself. Bowing, scraping, the creature retreated without his prize, a loaf of bread cast unceremoniously onto the floor. Pressing a hand against his forehead, Shroud wrestled with the internal convergence the manacle forced upon him. This invisible iron...curse, had been working at the edges of his mind since he'd arrived in Zeltiva. Now his very identity was threatened...and what did he have to show for it? Pride? The uniform he wore? The unmarked graves left in Sunberth? His name wasn't even a name, more a noun for a thing that one put over something to conceal. Was he really that? Something to conceal? Leaning back against the alley wall, he took a moment to collect himself. "Not that it matters now," Zan mumbled from within, "But that guy had some gold mizas tucked into his shoes." "How could you possibly have known that?" "Jingle jangle, really faint with all his bowing and scraping, but just enough." "Careful, you might convince me that you're a credit to me after all. We wouldn't want that, would we?" "Ha-Ha," Zan responded dryly, "How would you enjoy burns on the INSIDE of your stomach?" "As much as you would enjoy me making a meal of ice for the next week." "Ass" "Worthless" Shroud smiled, shaking his head. The familiar was always a source of comedy to turn to in such dark times, the only voice that knew him, knew of all of him. After tailing Tock and dropping his hints, it felt about right to carve a new identity. Shroud was a pseudonym, the almost immature admission of a shard. When Wrenmae had lost his family to Vayt, a decision he'd made to save his own skin, he'd cast away the name he used to have. Egyptus Murdock, trader's bastard. Egyptus didn't suite him, too clunky with jagged edges. Murdock seemed more appropriate. It was no ones at the moment, just a name that had once belonged to a boy who no longer wanted it. So he'd claim it. If that made his tenuous grasp on sentience any stronger, he'd commit to it body and soul. But how best to brand such a directive? Perhaps it was fate that led his eyes to the Equinox, a strange shop of inks and colors. Of course. To write the name upon his skin with indelible ink might help him maintain his control when all pieces shifted to a whole. Cutting it wouldn't do, jagged scars were hardly appropriate when the entire city seemed to be suffering of one ailment or another. He'd stayed too long, but no longer than he'd been in Sunberth. Perhaps it was the comparable difference of living standard that made Zeltiva seem so wan and sickly...Sunberth almost always seemed to suffer from one plague or another. Perhaps there were others of his kind there. Perhaps...but he'd seen none. When he opened the door to the establishment, the light glinted off the Waveguard shield across his back and the blades at his waist. In the blue of authority he sauntered in, eyes seeking a berth, a place of rest. Only one worker was open, a thin girl, waif by any other standards. Shroud smiled at her, a disarming and comforting grin, but a confident one nonetheless. Taking his weapons from his belt and the shield from his back, he laid them beside the chair before sitting, looking at at Wart with a wink. "Afternoon, Miss..." he trailed off, shaking his head and smiling again, "I apologize. I haven't been in this establishment before, so I'm afraid I haven't had the opportunity to learn your name. Mine is simple enough, Wr-..." he paused, laughing and putting a hand to his head, "Murdock, Just Murdock. And I'd like that inked somewhere, if that's possible." Hidden to her, the manacle on his wrist thrummed, its energy pulling his identities together, no matter how hard they struggled. "Ever feel," he sighed, hand against his head, "Like you were losing your mind? That you just needed that one piece of truth to cling to and perhaps when the storm passed, you'd still be you?" "All the time," Zan murmured. "Bonding to you is like that every bloody day." Shut up, Zan.

[Wart]

Hearing the familiar opening of the door, Wart reluctantly looked up. The first thing she noticed was what he was wearing. The blades. The shield. The uniform. Unconsciously her hand reached up and grabbed at her hair, biting her tongue. Ah shyke its a waveguard... You didn't see anyone in uniform in the shop very often, and all of the tattoo artists got a little tense when they did. Everyone there had some bit of lawlessness in their past (besides Eth, of course), especially regarding what they might have done regarding their initiations. Most of it wasn't very major, certainly nothing that would catch enough attention from the waveguard to be concerned about. Even so, everyone couldn't help but be just a little wary. Wart herself wasn't nervous so much as angry once again at Tongue. With her luck, some "higher up" little prick was there for her streaking incident and made a fuss loud enough about it. If I get in trouble because of that little punk I swear I'll kill him... When he saw that her station was the only vacant one, he gave her a smile that broke her out of her thoughts. It caught her off guard, holding a friendliness and confidence she rarely saw actually directed towards her. She gave him an awkward smile in return, then leaned down, taking a couple papers out of her station drawers, just to give her a reason to look away. Looking back up she saw that he was sitting down, setting his things besides the chair. A wink. Then he asked her name. ... Why the hell... Oh Gods this man's petching with me. She watched him more carefully now. His random pause almost made it seem he was putting out a false name. Murdock. Uh huh... "Name's Swarthy." It came automatically, the name she'd been going by in the shop. For a moment she considered correcting herself, then decided against it. She nodded slightly, her eyes swirling from cyan to a deep ruby. She had no idea how to feel about his question. Oh shyke I hope he ain't some crazy or something... In the back of her mind, she still felt she could sort of relate, though, remembering when she first started coloring around her eyes to fight the horrid white-ness in Avanthal. "I... Well, ya sure kinda?" For the first time someone was making her feel unsure, uncomfortable. It was a weird feeling and she didn't like it. Grabbing the papers she'd pulled out early she got a thin piece of graphite and turned to the man. "So uh, Murdock, you have like a specific style for the letterin' or somthin' you thinkin' bout?"

[Wrenmae]

“Black, over my heart.” His answer was short, but hardly curt. Instead his words failed at the end, almost trailing off. A headache, hand to his head, and he sat back. He could sense the unease in her voice, the stutter of pause. Sighing, he called a stream of Djed up to coil around his tongue. It had no taste, just the unspecific weight of power. “Calm down,” he sighed, “I’m just a customer, like any other.” Out came the hypnotic strands of djed, cutting into Wart’s aura and assaulting her mind. Rather than any command, it only repeated a mantra of calming assurances. Why fear him? He was a part of the law, was he not? Handsome even, personable, and despite the frown that sank the light of his features into troubled shadows, she certainly had nothing to worry from him. Nothing at all. Glancing around the room, he followed the motions of the other tattooists, their craft, their passions. How simply they worked, breathing color and art onto skin that did not ordinarily display such plumage. They were the gods here, changing the design nature had intended to suit the needs of the patronage. Some carved messages into themselves, addages otherwise lost to time and memory’s casualties. Some were pictures, marks, designs, they marked themselves like slaves. And now he would as well, hopefully to brand life into his flickering persona. His flickering self. “Swarthy,” he mixed the name on his tongue, tasting its syllables before letting it loose from his lips, “Are you a native here? Were you born so near the surf?” He paused. Why was he asking? Did he need to know her story? No, certainly not. But a part of him felt compelled to ask, obsessed with that tangled tapestry inherently unique to each soul he met. “My apologies,” he corrected himself, shaking his head, “I don’t mean to pry…passing curiosity I suppose.”

[Wart]

oocI apologize for the frame madness, but the one I was using was awful so I'll just be going without one for now.
"Calm down, I'm just a customer, like any other." Wart nodded. Sure… Why 'm I worried, jus' another guard, seems harmless enough, handsome- She narrowed her eyes and looked at him. Er… sure I guess. Shaking her head she spread a sheet over the drawers at her station. Time to get her mind back down to business.

If he wanted it over his heart, it was going to have to be fairly small. And black, that was easy enough, but she'd expected him to give her a lettering style. No matter, she was the artist, the way she figured coming up with the design was her job and she usually preferred it anyway. Taking the graphite to the paper she started with the M. She used sweeping strokes, giving it a look of calligraphy but mixed with an air of mystery as apposed to anything feminine. She then continued with the u and r, slowly, sketching with several lines trying to give it the look she wanted for each letter. It was messy looking, but of course it was only a concept sketch. The tattoo would be precise.

Wart smiled, replying to the man but keeping her eyes on her work. "Petch I don' care, no shyke to hide here." The uncomfortable feelings she'd had gone, her usual dirty mouth was running freely. "Nah, 'm from Avanthal." The word left her lips with distaste and venom, her eyes, previously their usual purple, were edged by a glow of red.

She stared at the 'd' she'd just finished. The stem had ended up longer than the height of the 'M.' Petch… Wart decided to simply scratch it out. The 'd' was directly in the middle of name, and if it stood out like that it'd irritate the hell out of her.