PM to join To Great Journeys! (Jorin, Teresa)

[Uleru]

Jorin doesn't come down to the beach anywhere near often enough for Uleru's liking. Then again, nobody does. Now that Fall has its chilly grip firmly around the port city the beach-goers have quickly trickled down to a few hardened souls and wizened fishermen. Which is unfortunate, really, because she needs to ask the actor something very important.

She's been searching for him off and on for a few days now. Taking a few bells here and there to scan the beaches and docks, always with her empty glass jar tucked under one arm, just in case she spots him. But as wont to happen, the Otani is quick to be distracted even on these important hunts for her actor friend. And this morning she has found one such distraction.

∆∆∆∆

A little girl, with a fistful of colorful chalk, sits off to the side of the dock to play and draw out of the way of her parents and their busy feet. She lays on her front, her palette of dusty color artfully arranged beside her in descending order of favorites, with her tongue clamped between her teeth because that is what her dad does when he's thinking really hard. And she thinks it makes him look ever so clever when he’s thinking really hard.

But she is not drawing on the worn planks of the wide dock, or even being naughty and coloring on the crates stacked around her. She has found herself a new canvas to play with, and the canvas plays back!

Picking up the red chalk (her very favorite) she breaks the tip off with her stubby fingernails, grinding it into a pulpy dust in her fingers. The tongue is back between her teeth, a thoughtful look in her big blue eyes, before taking the pinch of red chalk and smearing it across the lip of the Otani thats hanging off the dock in front of her.

The monster's face has seen its fair share of little girl whims over the last few chimes. Her eyelids are heavy with smeared purple chalk, swirly pink streaks cover most of her cheeks and a valiant effort has gone into turning her hair white, though the girl only had enough to cover the dome of her head and nothing more. She looks quite frightening, to be honest. Like an escapee of a glassworkers and painters most vivid shared nightmare. But the way she is humming like a purring cat you would think the girl was turning her into a painted beauty.

And the Otani herself is not above her own artistic ventures. As the girl is scribbling on her face, the moulding has been taking her long blonde hair, lock by lock, and twisting it into a crown. She takes a piece between her fingers, pulling res from her hand into a opalescent mist, and twists the lock into shape as she crystalizes the mist into ice in her hair. Most of the girl’s hair is now curled and pinned behind her head like a pair of interlocking horns. All in all Uleru is quite proud of the effect. It makes her look like an ice princess.

Its all going quite amiably as the monster and the little girl take turns messing with each others hair and face, respectively, until a shriek that would frost Ivaks balls erupts from behind the pair like a cornered Wailer.

The little girl is grabbed from under the arms and snatched away by what must be the most homely fisherwoman in all of Riverfall, her fiery red hair haloed around her head like an angry miasma. The chalk scatters into the water and the Otani gets smite in the jaw by a flailing little girl foot as she is pulled away. And Uleru has just enough time to register what happened when a three pronged net hook is stabbed through her hand and what must be another two inches of hardened wood underneath, leaving her to hang absurdly by the elbow off the dock.

"Paul!" the woman screams, holding the now crying child to her breast and knocking out the ice in her hair like its infested with beetles. "Paul why weren't you watching Emily?! Oh hush baby, Mama's here", she soothes even as she is almost yanking out her daughters hair to get the ice out.

Cheated out of her sweet little companion and what was destined to be a pleasant morning of play, and now bouncing by her one hand as she tries to wiggle herself out of the trap, Uleru's mood sours fast.

"What?! Devil woman! Evil, evil woman! Off!" she clicks in annoyed Char, making another pull at the hook in her hand. She finds the Charoda’s language sounds the right kind of harsh above the water for the situation.

Scooping up the floating chalk she can reach, and still clicking angrily, the Otani hauls herself up to place them back on the dock to try and placate her loudly crying companion. And while she's there she takes a quick swipe for the thick ankles peeking under the woman’s skirts, mouth curled into a an ugly, gargoyle hiss. Just to make a point, honest.

For which a push broom descends from on high to boff her on top of the head.

"Evil evil evil evil evil!" Uleru barks like an angry mantra in the Common tongue. She turns up a storm in the water at her feet as she tries to pull her way out of the net hook and avoid the broom someone is now pushing at her. Hoping, perhaps, that the moulding will abandon the limb and swim away.

[Jorin Ertihan]

Season of Fall, Day 30, 513 AV

Eleventh Bell

It had started out as a good day. Well, as good a day as Jorin usually had when there was an imminent show on the horizon, none of his fellow actors had prepared nearly enough (though honestly neither had he), and there was at least seven props that had been damaged when someone had left the door open last week and the wind had blown them over.

Grumbling as he figured in his head, Jorin barely registered where he was going. For the most part, he'd figured out the needed at least seventeen gold-rimmed Mizas more in the budget to cover replacements. Problem was the budget didn't stretch that far. So he'd have to cut corners again, see what fat he could trim, and where. It was always like this for Jorin; a delicate balancing act of a little bit here, a little bit there, to make the numbers on the Amphitheater ledger agree. Because if it didn't agree, bad things happened. Very bad things happened.

Jorin's musings were interrupted when he heard some screeching off to his left. In his absorbed state he hadn't heard what was actually said, but it sounded like a woman berating someone. Wonder what that was all about? Jorin looked up, brow smoothing out from the furrow it had taken while thinking about numbers and figures. He really needed to lose his habit of random wandering while thinking. Someday he'd end up in a pit or a cave.

In any case, looking about he realized he had wandered to the docks. The shouting continued, but the crates piled about had an odd echoing effect that made it difficult to discern what was actually being said. Deciding to investigate further, Jorin pressed on, and found himself looking at a very interesting sight.

Uleru seemed to be pinned on some sort of three-pronged net-hook. As the Otoni struggled, a fiery-haired woman was screaming at her.

"Evil evil evil evil evil!" she screeched, batting at Uleru with a broom, while holding a small girl away from her. Jorin sighed, and wondered what Uleru could have done to deserve such a reaction. He was surprised a fisherwoman wouldn't know what an Otani was. Granted Jorin didn't know when he first met her, but he had an excuse! He was, after all, a land-lubber. Well - he had lived in Zeltiva, a port town, but he'd never really gone out to sea very often. That still counted ... right?

In any case, poor Uleru was getting the worse of this exchange, and Jorin ran up to them.

"Please, please, I'm sure Uleru meant no harm," Jorin cried out, face drawn in a wide smile as he tried to be diplomatic. Solving disputes was never something he'd been particularly good at. He'd given up trying to convince his father when it was clear the man had much superior logic than he did. Since then he'd never really bothered with it. But a friend needed his help. Stooping to pick up a few of the chalk pieces that had rolled away onto the docks, Jorin held them out.

"Please my good woman, won't you calm down? I'm sure your daughter was just having fun drawing on my friend," Jorin soothed, as he gave her one of his dramatic bows, and smiled his best smile.

"I am Jorin Ertihan, actor of the Amphitheater," Jorin announced, by way of introduction. "And this is Uleru of the Otani," he added, indicating Uleru's form.

"She is a gentle person, she'd never harm your daughter," Jorin insisted. "Please won't you let her go?"

[Uleru]

"Please, please, I'm sure Uleru ment no harm."

Both Uleru and the Fisherwoman are so surprised by this unexpected interruption that Uleru stops her barking chant and the woman stops her broom mid face-push. And for a second all you could hear is the sniffling of the child.

'How ironic that he should find me', is the only thought to cross the moulding mind. After days of searching, he poodles around and finds her as soon as she makes a ruckus. And right on the heels of this thought is a vast sense of relief. Maybe she can keep the arm after all.

"Please my good woman, wont you calm down? I'm sure your daughter was just having fun drawing on my friend." and then Jorin gives the red headed woman a stately bow and smiles with all of his wonderfully white teeth.

He introduces himself as if to an audience, and gives the Otani a name that sounds like a title. Then goes on to explain that she is a "gentle person" and would "never harm [her] daughter" and would she please let her go?

During this exchange Uleru uses the reprieve of broom-lashing to get both elbows back on the dock and pry at the hook in her hand for all she's worth. Sure that -any second now- that woman is going to turn back around as whack her about the head again. The costal people are hardly ever aggressive, and neither are the Otani. Given half the chance the fisher people would leave an Otani well enough alone and hope they do the same. But there is something about their children that turn these kind and gentle souls into absolute lunatics.

Uleru looks up from her work to see the mad Fisherwoman squinting at Jorin with a look halfway between flustered, flattered and confused. She can almost see the gears whirling in her head as she tries to figure out what this guy is and what he's playing at. The moulding smiles secretly at the ground, twisting the hook this way and that to pry it free. The first time she met Jorin, the first thing he said to her was 'my lady'. She seriously doubts he understands the kind of relationship Laviku's servants have with the people who make their home on the sea. Its not a bad relationship, mind, its just a little bit... different.

At last the hook comes free and she flings it aside, dropping safely back into the water and nearly letting out a loud 'ha!' of victory. And when she looks up (to make frantic hand gestures to let Jorin know she's free) its just in time to see that the mad woman is coming to terms with this strange situation in the only way that makes sense: to beat it senseless.

She puts the kid down, raises the broom to middling hight, and sticks Jorin with the prickly bristles like she's wielding a jousting stick.

"Get off my dock you poofter. Go! Get!"

The Fisherwoman proceeds to chase him down the rest of the dock with her skirts up over her knees; wielding warnings towards what would happen to him, his appearance, and his sexual organs should she ever see him near her boat, herself, or her daughter again. While the Otani, for her part, keeps pace shouting encouragement and wincing every time the woman successfully sticks him.

At last the homely woman runs out of both breath and dock. So with incomprehensible mumbling and a toss of her halo of red hair she turns on her heels and marches back. Uleru deems it safe to pull herself ashore again, and crosses her arms over the wooden planks at the actors feet.

"Don't you wonder why you always get hurt when I'm around?" she questions, chewing thoughtfully on her tongue. "You've gotten bruised, almost drowned, and now you can add attacked by a madwoman on the list. Honestly, I must be some kind of awful luck", and you could almost mistake this for an apology if it wasn't for the huge shit-eating grin on her face.

"Thanks for helping me get away. That was quite exciting, wasn't it? Actually I'm glad you found me for a few different reasons. I really need to talk to you."

[Jorin Ertihan]

Season of Fall, Day 30, 513 AV

Eleventh Bell

Jorin's smile lasted about as long as the silence did. It morphed into an expression of concern, then panic as the woman started chasing after him, broom upraised and shouting out the many things she'd do to him if she ever caught him on her pier again. Jorin winced at some of the things she threatened. Well, that sounded painful. And problematic, if he ever wanted to be with Rinya.

He ran for all he was worth across that pier, legs pumping beneath him as his breath came out in short bursts. For once, Jorin was glad he'd learned breathing techniques at the Kendoka Sasaran or he'd be out of breath and at this woman's mercy already. He could feel the end of the broom stick him in the back several times as he dashed across, wincing each time she managed to catch him. For a woman her size, she sure was strong.

Jorin briefly wondered what had become of Uleru. He saw her manage to wriggle her way free and plop back into the water, frantically waving to him that she was safe, but by that time, he wasn't. Jorin was glad that she was able to escape the fisherwoman's clutches but, all he could hear were her shouts of encouragement floating over from the sea. He had no idea where she actually was. Jorin could feel his lungs burning; he wasn't used to prolonged running. Perhaps it would be yet another thing he'd need to train in.

Suddenly, the woman stopped. Jorin dared a glance backward to see her pivot and march back, apparently out of breath and unwilling to continue the chase. Jorin just leaned over, heaving for breath, trying desperately to get his pounding heart under control. He hadn't run like that since ... well he couldn't remember, actually. He could barely hear Uleru above the rush of blood through his ears, but he tossed her an exhausted grin.

"Hang ... on," he panted, as he gasped for a few more breaths. Finally, he swallowed and stood up. Jorin frowned briefly. He really ought to be in better shape than that. With his acting and weapons training at the Sasaran, he would have thought that a brief dash like that would not have tired him out so easily. Jorin filed it away into the back of his mind. It was something to think about later.

"Well, I'm always open for an adventure," Jorin assured her, as he got his breathing under control. "What did you want to talk to me about?"

[Uleru]

"Hold on."

The Otani leaves him to get his breath back as she goes back for her glass jar. Funny, now that she has his attention her courage seems to have deserted her. It was all safely distant when the plan was nothing more than finding the human. But now that she actually has to face what she is asking of him... Well, it crosses her mind that she can just collect the jar and keep swimming until she reaches Nyka.

But alas she comes back a few chimes later clutching her jar, her face set into a mask of determination. The smile from before has melted into a thin line that is rarely seen on Uleru.

"You feeling better?" she asks. At least it looks like his breath is coming back to him. The Otani doesn't wait for his answer but ploughs on. "See this?" she reaches up and plonks the jar on the dock, the interior brimming with seawater. "I need you to take this" -she thrusts a shimmering blue finger at the innocent jar- "up there" -she thrusts the same finger up to the mouth of the crashing waterfall some three tiers above them.

"And I", she points to herself, "will be in that", she points back to the jar. She continues to make finger-thrusting motions towards the waterfall, the jar and herself in a kind of triangle motion as if she were trying to connect the three things with a tangible thread of logic. Though for her the logic left the conversation the moment she suggested this mad plan.

Finally she sighs and her hand drops back into the water with a hollow splash. She rubs the bridge of her nose and looks at him, her voice softening into something almost venerable. "You see, I want to go inland a bit and see what's up there. But I cant leave the water and I cant climb the falls. If you can take me to the river I can swim inland myself. Really, this is the only way to do it. And trust me, I considered everything."

Although she has knows Jorin for only a season, he is the only person she would ask this from. He strikes her as genuine and kind (the incident with the mad fisherwoman just proves her point), and he wouldn't do anything to jeopardize his friends. If has to trust anyone, it would be him.

"You had a lot of interesting stories about your travels across the grass. Maybe I could see some of these things myself!" she coos with delight, a ghost of her smile returning and her eyes lighting up into glittering jewels.

[Jorin Ertihan]

Season of Fall, Day 30, 513 AV

Eleventh Bell

Jorin stared at Uleru uncomprehendingly for a few moments after Uleru was finished explaining her plan, mind trying to grasp the totality of what she was asking him to do. She had pointed at him, then the jar in her arms, then the top of the waterfall, and her eyes were almost pleading with him to help her accomplish what she wanted to do. And while Jorin was always happy to help a friend, especially one as warm and fun-loving as Uleru, he had some ... logistical issues with her idea.

"I, ummm," he hesitated, "Well I mean, would you even fit in that jar?" he asked. It was the most important question, in his opinion, because she looked to be about the size of a petite human woman, albeit differently-colored, and he wondered if her full mass would fit in there. He knew from their encounter on the beach that Uleru was very flexible, but he had no idea if she could contort to the degree she'd fit inside such a relatively small area.

"And, uhh, I noticed that you never go too far from the ocean. Would you be OK up there? Is fresh water fine for you, or do you need salt water?" Jorin couldn't help it. It was in his nature to try to figure out logistics. Blame it on his father, but whenever a plan was proposed, he always tried to work out the details. It was a lot easier than trying to improvise solutions when things went inevitably belly-up.

Jorin sighed. "Well, if you're sure about this, I'm happy to help," he said eventually. Of course he would help. Uleru was a good friend; if she needed him, he would be there for her, as he was sure she'd do the same for him. He grinned a little as he cocked his head to the side.

"I'll admit," he confessed, "I'm really curious to see how exactly you plan to put yourself into that jar."

[Uleru]

"Oh, I knew you would help me!", Uleru beams. It's not the arrogance of thinking he couldn't help but do as she says that makes her say this. And its not a validation that she has him pegged and understood. It is, quite simply, knowing that he has her back.
 
At the mention of salt versus fresh water the Otani nods her understanding, impressed that he would even consider the implications. "It's fine", she assures him "as long as it's water I'll be ok." And while that is true, she is still full of apprehension about what will soon be her new watery home. It will have new types of vegetation and completely different creatures. Will she be able to feed herself in the new environment? Will the current be too strange, too strong? Will her connection to Laviku still be there so far from the sea?
 
Overcome with a sudden spike of trepidation, her hand snaps out to grasp Jorin's ankle. "Jorin", she gasps, "when you have me in here, when you take me into town, you know I will be completely at your mercy, right? If you drop me, I will quickly dry out and die. If you put me down and forget about me I'll starve. And if you sell me you'll make yourself a few coins, but you'll not only make an enemy of my kin, but of the Sea Father as well. You wont even be able to take a bath without them descending on you like a tsunami, or take a sip of water without choking. I mean it." she ends with a kind of wide-eyed apprehension that undermines every threat she just made.
 
But, despite all these horrible possibilities, she has to risk it to see further inland. She has to. The she can finally see this mysterious place that the land dwellers talk about. She keeps losing friends to the mountains and the dirt, as they kiss the dangerous oceans goodbye and go back to shore. What could be up there? What can be so great that they will leave the realm of the sea king behind?
 
All of this passes before her eyes before she realizes that she still has Jorin's ankle in a death grip. And once she realizes what she said she lets go so quickly you would think his leg was made of salt. "But no, of course you wont, of course. I'm sorry. I'm just-... you know." she pats his shin gently in what is suppose to be a dismissive way, but comes off as more of a muscle spasm.
 
How could she think that of him? That was wrong. This is Jorin, the guy who calls monsters "lady" and puts himself in front of murderous Drykras. He wouldn't just leave her to rot, he wouldn't be so carless and he would never turn her over for a profit. when she looks him in the eye again her smile is apologetic.
 
But it doesn't take long for that smile to swing full circle and become playful again. Her emotions are battling so fiercely something will eventually snap, she's sure. 
 
"Oh, yes, wanna see me fit in the jar? Its pretty cool. Come here, I'll need your help." 
 
She motions him down to her level. As is always the case with this particular human, as soon as he expresses interest the Otani cant help but feel the need to show off. Something about him just squeezes out a need to impress him, whereas everyone else would watch the transformation the same way she always does it. Maybe its because he's a performer himself. Who knows?
 
Once he is kneeling she takes his hand and submerges it in the water, making a sort of cup with his palm. And inside this cup she inserts her fist. It takes much longer to change size than it does to change shape, though she could have herself condensed into the size of a drop in a chime or less. This time, however, she draws out the process mercilessly.
 
And the process looks rather disturbingly like the moulding is folding in on herself. She loses the human visage almost immediately, bubbling down into the essence of what she is behind the flashy scales and the smiling face. And when she is done she is nothing more than a blue globe, like a drop of colored glass the size of a thumbnail, resting securely in Jorin's hand and ready to be transferred into the jar.

[Jorin Ertihan]

Season of Fall, Day 30, 513 AV

Jorin smiled at Uleru's obvious happiness that he would help her. Of course he would! He nodded in understanding when she mentioned that she would be fine with fresh water. Truthfully, he suspected she would be, otherwise she wouldn't have requested this in the first place. He figured she wasn't suicidal after all; if fresh water was a problem for her she wouldn't go up there to begin with. But it was always best to make sure. After all, for all her good qualities, Uleru didn't seem like the type of woman to always think her plans through.

Suddenly, Uleru grabbed Jorin's ankle, and he froze. She had an almost terrified look on her face as she gasped out her fears. That he might drop her. That he might lose her. That he might ... sell her? Jorin felt horrified. He could never do that! The thought hadn't even occurred to him until she mentioned it and now that it did, he couldn't think of a worse thing he could do.

Truth was, Jorin was a very laid-back, easygoing person. But there was one thing he truly loathed and that was treachery. If someone trusted you, betraying that person was the single worst thing you could do as a person, at least so Jorin felt. He felt almost sick to his stomach at the idea that he might betray Uleru. She was clearly putting a lot of trust in him. He could never do that.

"Uleru, I could never do that to you," he assured her. "You're a friend, I can't imagine the sort of person who'd betray a friend like that. Your friendship is worth a lot more to me than a few measly Mizas. Or even a lot of measly Mizas."

As for dropping her ... Jorin thought about the route he'd have to take to bring her up there. He tried to calculate when the foot-traffic would be worst. He definitely wanted to avoid the Bazaar at all costs; that many people almost guaranteed he'd bump into someone and potentially fatally drop Uleru. Not to mention, that many people meant someone might start asking awkward questions. No matter, Uleru seemed to have calmed down some, and was now offering to show him how she planned to fit inside the jar.

He knelt down as instructed, and Uleru cupped his hands in the water. And Uleru started to change her form losing its human shape and almost seeming to fold in on itself. Jorin watched in amazement as she grew smaller and smaller until she became a tiny blue marble in his hands. Was this what she looked like in her natural form? Incredible!

Jorin very carefully lifted his hands out of the water, transferring Uleru delicately into the jar. Her tiny, marble-like form dropped into the water, and Jorin picked it up and carefully placed it into his backpack. Right. Don't drop her. Jorin's heart pounded in his chest. He held her very life in his hands. He had to be careful. Avoid crowded streets... and peering eyes.

"Ok, Uleru, here we go!" he cried out, with much more confidence than he really felt, and set off in the direction of the cliff.

[Uleru]

His hands are so warm and so incredibly safe that she nearly squawks in protest when he gently places her in the jar. Once inside expands gently, displacing a few cups of water, until she doesn't feel so helpless. She gives this form a roughly human shape in the same way sketches of stick men have a roughly human shape; nothing more than a set of vaguely disproportionate limbs, eyes and a mouth. But it is all for naught when she also loses the tiny bit of colour she had been keeping, so (unless someone were to notice a patch of water that doesn't quite move with the rest) the vessel becomes nothing more than an innocuous jar of water.

The jar is then placed just so in the backpack the actor had been carrying. There is a thrill of claustrophobia that she has to battle as the leather reaches above her on all sides. The flap closes overtop and all she has is a sliver of sky with which to peer at, along with a few assortments of possessions: including a wooden comb, a wrapped bar of soap, and a knife that'd be absolutely useless in a fight.

"Ok, Uleru, here we go!" Jorin calls, the backpack tipping and settling as he lifts it onto his back. And his voice, so light and seemingly full of confidence, bolsters her spirits.

"Onward nobel steed!" she replies heartily, and is pleased to hear her voice is steady. And though the sound is muffled somewhat by the backpack and strangely hollow, like she's talking into a wine bottle, at least she's confident he can hear her.

They start off at a steady pace and the moulding tries her best to keep herself under control. At first she prays, swaying gently with the actors gait, but she soon becomes restless and loses her thread of thought. She has only been carried this way once before, and that was over fifty years ago. Even so the situation is radically different than back then, she tells herself. At the time she was trapped in a trough outside Nyka, after being dragged ashore by some entrepreneurial traders that were handy with a spear. At that time she had no choice but to beg Torias (a Symenstra of dubious moral fibre who she would later meet again as an equally dubious Nuit) to smuggle her back to the sea in a flask. She doesn't remember much of the journey after that. It wasn't long at all but she was in such a state of stress and nearly catatonic with anxiety that it could have been a lifetime.

This reminiscing does nothing to ease her, and she shuts it down. That was way back then and this is totally different. She chose this, first of all. Otani are not meant to be confined in such a way, but it is only temporary. A bell or two at most. And whatever she has to see up the river can't take very long (or she wont be able to stand it for very long) and she'll be back in a few weeks, right?

Slowly, through the layer of leather, she can hear the unmistakable sounds of a thriving city underneath the shrinking sounds of the dock and the sea. Oh the sea. She misses it already. But the thrumming of the city is quickly pulling her interest and she pushes against the lip of the container to better hear. How exotic and how oh so alien.

It doesn't take long for her emotions to fray under the excitement and the nerves and the fear. She is being pulled in a hundred different directions by a vat of feelings she didn't even know she had. Cycling through them all on a hair trigger, its not surprising, really, when she cant keep quiet any longer.

Now an innocuous jar of water might be a good disguise, if a bit odd. But a very vocal jar of water is quickly going to attract attention. But Uleru cant help herself. By ten chimes into this adventure she is sounding off like a mechanical toy. Sometimes she is breathless with curiosity, or her voice is tight with fear, she's shrieking with elation or she's snarling with cornered aggression. But its always the same question: what was that?

"Jorin, Jorin! What was that? Why are we swaying? Are we on stairs? Wait! What was that?! I hear a hatch!" she exclaims in recognition, having never heard a door close before besides what the Sevfra use on their ships. At this point she pauses to hiss like an angry cat at whoever it was who brushed by the human and (consequently) his backpack. "Oh by Laviku's scraggly beard there must be a million people out there! Jorin! Jorin whats that?! That smell? That's fruit isn't it?! Oh you must get me some!"

There is most likely very few people out there, but all the same everything is just a bit too in-focus for the moulding. And she dissolves into a fluctuating noise somewhere between a happy purr and an angry buzzing before her next round of exclamations and questions.

[Jorin Ertihan]

Season of Fall, Day 30, 513 AV

Jorin had not really known what to expect on this unique sojourn. The journey began simply enough, with Jorin trudging up the steps of the port, past the Pearl House (still under repair, apparently, from the damage it'd sustained from the Autumn storm), and toward Jia's place.

The walkways actually were not that crowded, and if Uleru hadn't piped up they might well have gotten all the way to the Crystal Rose without really anybody at all noticing anything amiss. But that was when Uleru's curiosity overwhelmed her sense of self-preservation.

Every question she asked was a variant of "oh, what's that?", her voice a mixture of wonder, excitement and fear. Jorin briefly contemplated whether this was rather what having an actual child would be like, before shaking that thought off.

"Shhh, Uleru, we don't want to attract too much attention," he cautioned her, "But yes, that's a door. And I'll see if I can't get some fruit for you..."

Jorin approached the friendly-looking fruit merchant, and was going to ask how much one of the succulent-looking pears cost when Uleru spoke up again when someone bumped into him and jostled her jar. The merchant stared at Jorin wildly, then started looking around for the source of the voice. Jorin groaned inwardly, then plastered on the biggest smile he could manage.

"Greetings, friend! Do you have any pears for sale?" he asked, as though nothing at all was wrong.

The man's lips quivered as he stammered out, "G-g-ghosts! You have ghosts hanging around you sir!"

Jorin made a show of looking about, his face the perfect mask of confusion.

"I see no ghosts here, my good man," he insisted nonchalantly, making sure to put the right amount of humor into his voice. "Are you sure you're not just imagining things?"

Uleru took that moment to speak up again, and Jorin almost winced. No. Can't break character. The merchant's face was turning an interesting shade of green. "There! I heard it again!" he wailed. Jorin shrugged.

"I really don't know what you're talking about," he insisted. "So, no pears then?" he added.

The merchant just took one of his pears and fairly threw it at Jorin. "Just get that ghost away from here!" he shouted, as Jorin deftly caught the pear before it smacked him in the face. Shrugging, he put the pear in his pack next to Uleru's jar.

"There," he said to Uleru softly, so that he did not look like a lunatic speaking to thin air. "A pear for you! But Uleru, we need to be careful. A talking jar might attract more attention than we want," he cautioned her gently.

As they walked away, Jorin grinned at her excited buzzing. She really was like a child on her first journey. He just hoped her curiosity wouldn't get them into any more trouble.