Flashback Escape Artists

[Celeste Arumen]

19th Day of Summer, 509 AV

They were an easy mark at first sight, though appearances could often deceive. The man stood there, furling and unfurling what could only be a map, casting nervous glances here and there throughout the marketplace. The Bizarre was a good place for shopping and a better place to get lost, especially for tourists. Alvadas on its own was troubling to navigate; the ever-changing, ephemeral streets could quickly turn unforgiving, if one knew no better. Celeste knew better. The City of Illusions was her home, after all.

Her eyelids creased shut, allowing for better focus. She slowly visualized her djed, a brilliant filigree of teak and gold, dark and light and with careful precision began to unravel it, pulling apart that which encompassed her body and that which encompassed her mind. It took several chimes; she was no master, after all, only a fortunate soul that’d been afforded a great deal of practice. Once satisfactorily loosened she began to alter her shape, hidden by the cool embrace of the shadows.

Carefully, she found that which set her apart from the other sex – breasts, hips, legs – and began to draw them in, flattening her chest, raising her center of gravity and lengthening her legs ever-so slightly. She snapped up the length of her hair, the djed a brilliant ray of whirling gold and replaced it with linear, dour brown, the color of bread. Even her features had to go, smooth skin becoming pitted and pockmarked. It’d only taken a slight adjustment to her otherwise smooth complexion, but it itched something awful.

Before long, the disguise was complete. Celeste was a teenage boy sporting whippet-like frame, all legs and arms. However, the purple triangle of Ionu still remained and with no warning it activated, edges slightly aglow. She smirked. ”Hail, friend!” She said, clapping the lost man on the shoulder. The illusion masked her girlish alto, something she could not change through the simple art of morphing. ”I see you’re lost. I could help you find your way, if you like.” The man looked nervous.

”I think I can find my way,” he said, shrugging from his grasp. ”Thank you.”

That was not something she’d anticipated. He was very obviously lost. ”Nonsense,” she said cheerfully. ”You have the look of the lost. Perhaps I can direct you to a few stalls,” he said, secretly attempting to locate his coin purse. The man narrowed his eyes. ”I said I’m fine,” he growled, clearly irritated. This did not look like a man who would become aggressive. Celeste took a reflexive step back, holding out her palms in a conciliatory gesture.

”Now, now, no need to be hasty,” she said, fighting a frown. ”I’m sure-“ The man grasped her shoulder roughly and she gasped, attempting to pull free. ”Now you look, boy” he spat, ”I have no tolerance for insolent little wretches like you. I know your kind.”

Perhaps an urchin hadn’t been the best disguise.

EEE!I'm so sorry this took forever! I really am.

[Kit Rowan]

The Bizarre was as good a place as Kit could think of to set up to watch people, though the noise and movement made it a troublesome place to practice any of her auristics. Today instead of sitting up somewhere and leaving five chimes later, Kit elected to get a taste of the wares in the bizare the old fashioned way. She danced around the crowd, threw coins on a table and took a cooked fish, skewered with a small wooden stick. Kit snagged it, took a bite out of it and tasted something like chocolate.

She knelt against a well and watched the traffic rush around her. A man with a strip of yellow in his hair pounded his fist on a stand, gestured violently as the vendor shook his head. A pair of children, maybe five or six, darted through the crowd, one chasing the other, both laughing like bells. A boy made of bones and skin and little else ambushed a tourist with a colorful map in hand, and Kit cracked a smile as she took another bite, knowing the look of a con when she saw it. How often had she tried to pull a foreigner in for a trick, offered false direction for a coin? Countless . . .

It seemed like this one was wiser by a hair, as he seized the little trickster . . . But not wise enough, if he really thought he could abuse an Alvad in a city full of them. Kit ripped the last bit of meat off her snack and let the wood fall to the ground, crept forward through the crowds. She was as transparent as a brick wall, but as circumstances had placed the foreigner's attention firmly on the boy, Kit found her way up to his back easily.

She swallowed the food down, bit down on the edge of her lip. Had he turned around? No, he was still shaking, hissing something at the boy-thief. Kit grabbed hold of the bottom hem of his cloak and stood up. "What?" He said, feeling the sudden change in weight on his shoulders and she lifted the cloak, and began to turn his head.

Not fast enough!

Kit jumped onto his back, pulled the cloak over his head, over his eyes! He hissed a word, released the boy and staggered forward under Kit's weight, reached back toward her with his hands, grabbing hold of both her arms. "Got you, little blighter!"

Kit squeaked as his hands grabbed her, eyes very wide . . . Maybe this wasn't such a keen idea?

[Celeste Arumen]

Celeste blinked, taken off-guard by the girl’s timely intervention. Ah, the old cloak over the eyes trick. But it went sour, fast; the man had a grip on both her arms and wasn’t letting go. Out of options, she did the only thing she could think to do. With one bony fist, she struck the man square in the jaw.

He reeled backward, letting go of her arms to grasp at his face. Seeing their exit, she reached out and grabbed toward one of the girl’s hands. ”Let’s go!” Long legs took off, momentum dragging her along for the ride. This taller form was fast and of that she was grateful. Unhappy murmurs and cries erupted from behind them. They’d made quite a scene and this girl was in her true-seeming, as far as Celeste was aware. It wouldn’t do to give her a bad reputation.

As they ran, she peered back every so often to get a better look at her partner in crime. The girl was thin and sweet-faced, with bright intelligent eyes and currently, a vigorous expression. She was older than Celeste by more than a couple of years, thirteen or fourteen maybe. The young girl couldn’t help but smile. Kit looked very strikingly similar to a fox and Celeste adored foxes.

After they rounded a corner or five, she dug in her heels and skidded to a halt. It took a minute to catch her breath but when she did, she straightened out and grinned, first letting the illusion disperse. ”Thanks,” the boy said in a distinctly feminine voice. Then, she let her djed return to normal, small breasts reappearing, legs suddenly thin and short. Before long stood Celeste in her true form, long tawny hair waving to the middle of her back, amber eyes smiling.

”You saved my arse back there,” she said, brushing off her pants. ”I thought I was in for trouble.” She held out one small hand in a business-like manner. ”I’m Celeste. What’s your name?”

[Kit Rowan]

The boy's punch wasn't overwhelming, wasn't strong, but it still did everything it needed to. The foreigner's hands fell loose, shaken by the shock of the hit, and Kit took the opportunity to drop from his back while she still could. The boy grabbed Kit's hand and dashed, practically dragged Kit with him, leaving her stumbling and staggering before she could fall into a slightly steadier pace behind him. She was lithe and athletic but made for leaps, not bounds.

Kit glanced over her shoulder and saw the foreigner flipping the cloak over his face, glaring after them, his face red. She took a moment to stick out her tongue and kept on running, now barely keeping pace with the boy, as dashed together out of the exit that was always there when you needed it to be. Only then did she shake off the boy's hand, irked by the thought of being dragged along, and kept up under her own locomotion, trailing behind only just.

A turn left, a turn right, a turn right . . . More . . . More . . . If Ionu favored them the city would twist on their trail and leave their pursuer lost. At last, when Kit felt her legs trembling under the effort, when she doubted she could keep up any longer, the boy staggered to a stop. Kit kept on running for a few more steps, electing for a slower stop. She reached up, wiped her arm across her brow. "Color and shade," Kit hissed, knelt over and let her hands rest on her knee while her chest heaved from effort, eyes shut tight. "Luck . . ."

It was only when a girl's voice said 'thanks' that Kit turned her head upward, her head tilted in a way that meant question. And she watched as the boy shrank, thinned, became a small girl before her eyes, years shorter than Kit's estimation of the boy, with long hair and a face still graced by childhood's color and smoothness. Kit whistled in appreciation of the little miracle, stood up and dusted off her shirt.

Kit accepted Celeste's hand, gave the other girl a smile touched still by the exhilaration of the run. "Ain't no foreigner who'd know to trick someone who was walking around with a map," Kit's voice was more derisive of the man than a sneer. "And I could never leave an Alvad hanging at their mercy, could I?"

"Keen trick you've got there, Celeste." Kit said, propping her free hand on her hip and raising an eyebrow at the other girl. "That illusion? Or . . ." Just magic? Kit bit down on her lip for a brief tick before she let herself smile again.

[Celeste Arumen]

The girl had a firm handshake, one that could be appreciated. Celeste beamed. She had an earnest face for such an unsavory reputation. ”Of course not,” she agreed, withdrawing her hand. She could have done the same, no doubt. Perhaps conjured up a distraction or just slipped their wallet. Either would have sufficed.

To the question, she smoothed her palms down the front of her cloak. ”Both,” she replied conversationally. ”Though just how is a trade secret. Of course, you understand.” She flashed a set of relatively kept teeth, though they had their imperfections. Being an urchin did that.

She leaned to one side of the alley, allowing her shoulder to assume her fragile weight. ”I noticed you didn’t tell me your name. I’d like to know it, though I won’t press you.” She picked up a stone and tossed it lightly. Mid-air, through the power of her mark, she turned it to a shiny red apple apple, letting it drop and roll with a dull thud. ”Neat, huh?”

Celeste narrowed her eyes, calculating. This girl might possess any degree of useful knowledge: secrets, contacts, tricks of the trade. It could be beneficial for them to get to know one another. Make friends, even, if Lhex saw it that way. But that would require a bit of trust, a little sacrifice. It was a tough game to play. That was, assuming this girl was as much a scoundrel as she.

”Of course, you don’t have any reason to trust me.” She stared evenly. ”Perhaps, if you name your price, we could fix that.” Sophisticated reasoning for a nine year old, but that was the price of living on the street.

[Kit Rowan]

"A magician never reveals their secrets, do they?" Kit smirked. "I can appreciate that." Questions raced behind her eyes. Her father had told her of the sort of wizard that was safe to trust, before he finally passed on. No wizard. No wizard was safe to trust.

And yet here this girl was. She didn't look like a wizard, she looked like a sweet little girl. Kit leaned down to pick up the apple from the ground where Celeste threw it, but when she grabbed it her fingers told her it was still a rock. She stuck out her tongue and touch it, and it felt rough and uneven and nasty. She made a pinched expression and tossed the apple over her shoulder. "Keen," She said again, but when Celeste's mien had been a boy her fingers had seemed much different, her gait much longer. She did not know whether just illusionism could do all that.

She could turn around, walk away from Celeste. No wizard is safe to trust. But Kit didn't want too. She saw her old partner's in crime in this girl. Kit drew an inverted triangle over her heart with her left thumb and tried to peer at Celeste's aura. But gods, it was hard! The aura of a sentient was a mess of color and passion and want, she could not wrangle Celeste's will from the storm of color and impossible light. She rubbed her hands over her eyes, and when she opened them again the aura was gone.

"Well, little sorceress, you gave your name," Kit said evenly. "So I'll give you my name and let you pick its worth. I'm Kit Rowan," she said, stepping back and spreading imaginary skirts in the deepest curtsy she could manage. Maybe she sould tell this girl about her own sorcery. But a secret was like a stone in a sling. You could throw it at any moment, but once let go it could never be called back.

But a secret like this was also like a little stone in the heart, and lonely besides. Kit let little Celeste have a breadcrumb. She reached up and scratched behind her ear with a finger on her right hand, palm open toward Celeste, the thin, neat scar of her initiation clear for a moment before she tucked her hands behind her back. "Can't say this is the first time I've had to run from an angry mark," Kit shrugged, then smiled. "Sometimes these things just turn sour."

[Celeste Arumen]

Kit just had to test the apple. Or, pseudo-apple, rather. Celeste couldn’t quite stifle a grin. But it was enough; she watched as her counterpart sniffed the proverbial bait. And cautiously, just like a fox, she approached, offering up a name. ”Kit Rowan,” Celeste echoed, still smiling. How appropriate. It was a pretty name for a pretty fox-girl. She struggled to curb the overflow of sudden affection. It would do her no good.

Vivid amber eyes snapped to the flesh of Kit’s palm before they could be called back. It was an obvious tell. Celeste was only good at lying when she wasn’t attached to the person at hand. She flashed her new friend an arch look and ever-so-casually mirrored the gesture, her raised, white line kissed by sunlight for a brief moment before it disappeared behind her head. ”Of course,” she replied, feigning sheepish.

So it’d be like that, eh?

”Tell you what,” Celeste said with a wry grin, ”why don’t we celebrate this lovely weather with a bit of a walk? I could use some company.” And movement would help prevent them from being overheard, or worse, discovered. The city often provided little areas to hole up in. It was just a matter of finding them. ”If you like, we can go off on an adventure.” Her words were deeply embedded with significance, though an outsider would likely think nothing of the exchange.

As much as she tried to tell herself it was nothing but a trade of ideas, Celeste knew it wasn’t true. She was lonely. With each passing day, Grams grew more distant and the little girl was left to roam. It’d be so nice, she thought, to have a friend who understood her. Perhaps this russet-haired girl could turn out to be just that.

Or perhaps she was about to get scammed.

[Kit Rowan]

When Celeste raised her hand in mirror, Kit's stomach jumped up to her throat. Not only did she know what it meant, but she . . . but she . . .

Her father had told her never trust a strange wizard. Her father had taught her everything she knew. But her father had been dead, utterly dead for a year. A Year! And Kit had allowed discretion, made it a secret thing between her, Ionu and Akajia. But what was the point of it if she never made use of it? Never took a risk?

Still, Kit felt a goose sticking its head out for the butcher. She shoved her hands into her pockets, offered a shy smile. "You know, that sounds keen." There was something lurking between Celeste's words, made her soul tremble. It had grown jealous of its secrets, and wanted desperately to offer up nothing at all. "I'm always up for an adventure."

But while Kit's father had taught her to fear, he had likewise taught her to want.

Kit took Celeste up on her offer for a walk, and stuck closer to the younger girl, to allow her to keep her voice low. She did her very best to try to tell her body to act the part of a normal girl walking down the street, chatting with a friend, but still she caught herself glancing to the side at the sound footsteps, glancing over her shoulder.

"Mama was a traveling performer," Kit announced, "she met papa out there. He was taught, at a school, somewhere else." She stopped as a half-Isur with a dark look on their face brushed pay, turned and watched him vanish behind them. As they walked on, the streets began to grow narrow and tight, turn curved, and bits of extended masonry and overhanging wire left the sun to dapple over the now multicolored cobble beneath their feet.

"Usually they stayed for a couple weeks, visited and went on." On where, Kit did not know, and she did not say. "But the last time, papa was to sick to keep going, and he stayed. Taught me a few things, since he wanted to teach me something before he . . ." Kit shrugged. ". . . Went." The point of this story was the teaching, not the death, and Kit had no intention of focusing on it. "We didn't have time for a whole lot, but we did some. Basic things."

[Celeste Arumen]

Celeste beamed. It required a little effort to match their strides as the young Alvad was far taller than she, but it wasn’t anything out of the ordinary. She was shorter than just about everyone. They walked together, keeping their shoulders flush and their heads low. Kit’s voice was a lilting hum, just octaves above the otherwise ambient noise around them. ”I see,” she said, eyes on the man they passed by.

So Kit was a daughter of the city, too. ”If I ever had parents, I never knew them,” she replied sympathetically. ”The city raised me, as I’m sure it did with you.” It was a guardian and a crook – the worst kind of parent, or the best, depending on who you spoke with. She kept the crowds fixed in her peripheral vision as they went by. ”I was raised by my Grams, but she’s never been much for children.”

She gave Kit a lingering glance, eyes swimming with emotion: sadness, nostalgia and just a little gleam of hope. ”She taught me some things, too. Some basic, others more... Advanced, I guess. I help her brew philters and remedies,” she continued offhand, listing the most innocuous of her talents. ”Among other things.” Like stealing the ingredients for said philters and remedies.

”I don’t have many friends,” she said plainly. None, in fact, if she were to be totally honest. ”I work the Bizarre using what I know and I try to learn. But otherwise, I spend more time with the birds and the mice than anything.” Alley cats, foxes, rodents and squirrels. Those were her enduring companions. She looked so sad, just a lost little girl in a huge city.

”My parents were killed by the Silencers. Grams doesn’t like to admit it, but it’s true.” She eyed a shift in the road ahead, a little byway leading to nowhere. It hadn’t been there before. ”We can go that way,” she said, subtly inclining her head in that direction. ”They were both dead before I can even remember. I overheard some Listeners talking about it one day, when I was hiding. They were looking for me.” She wore a grave expression.

”Mum went mad and my Father tried to stop her. She was very talented, but the wind just started whistling right through her ears, stirring up her thoughts. Overgiving, they said. When they came, he tried to stop them.” It was a sad tale. One she’d never really uttered before. ”Then they both went… And all I had was Grams.”

[Kit Rowan]

At first it seemed to Kit that Celeste was rearing up to tell a different sort of story. Discard word of her parents in the first sentence and leave them there, and Kit had left her father. But Celeste returned to them eventually, let loose the tale . . . How long must she have waited to tell this story, to let it loose on eager ears? Unburden herself?

The narrow streets grew ever narrower, stopped in a small circle, all high walls without buildings. Sounds of exotic birds echoed down from streams of light that broke through what had been clothes hangers but were now vines, green and vibrant, swaying gentle in an invisible breeze.

There were certain things you came to know growing up in the streets of Alvadas. Trust in the stones beneath your feet, laugh free, disbelieve everything. This was a trust so great that Kit could scarcely believe it as she stared sideways at Celeste. The little wizard looked no more than a child then, like Kit, lost and far from safe places. Kit did the only thing she could think too.

They were already walking close, so it was not difficult for Kit to reach around Celeste's back. Kit pulled her in squeezed her tight and desperate, like an old friend met after a long parting. Celeste and Kit seemed peers, neither pampering the other, huddled together in a moment of mutual comfort.

Kit couldn't think of anything to say. Everything is fine? It wasn't. It'll be alright? Probably wouldn't be. If Celeste's aim had been tricking her, if she had meant to mislead her as her father had warned . . . Well, if that was her aim, the girl had won. Celeste understood and she was so small and so clearly in need . . .

A secret for a secret. "When I was little, too little to remember anything else, my mama and papa left me with my aunt and uncle and kept on their travels. They fed me, kept me safe, but they didn't want me, and they didn't know what to do with me. I slipped away into the streets. For days, sometimes. Alvadas was always waiting . . ." Kit seized up, stopped talking, shut her eyes. She remembered running from the Speakers after a particular bad stunt. Hiding away with Shy and Rechail and Nim, waiting for the storm to pass. But Celeste had it worse, and she was all alone.

"I'll be your friend, Celeste. If you let me. Trickster take my eyes if I lie."