PM to join Bumping Heads [Crypt]

[Vanari]

Fall, Day 25, 513 AV For the past three days, the door belonging to a certain room at Tarsin's, which in turn belonged to a certain fear-stricken Vantha, remained firmly locked and shut. She had her meals brought up, a bath drawn only once, and the chamber pot emptied everyday at Syna's brightest hour, no sooner and no later. Sometimes her surly face would appear at the window, but mostly she kept out of sight, whittling like a madwoman at her rickety little bedside table. It may as well have been the only thing that mattered in the world for all the rest of Ravok knew. The one greatest disadvantage to being unemployed was having nothing to do. No where to be, no one to please, no schedules to keep. Try as she might, Vanari could not get a single night's worth of decent rest. Not after what she had witnessed only a few days ago. Between her feverish excitement at having found her first true link to Ionu and her equally feverish nightmares involving mangled corpses, blood-curdling screams, and ever nearing footsteps, there wasn't much room for her mind to find some peace and quiet. Never mind the fact that anytime she set foot outside now, she was filled with a dreadful sense of paranoia and fear. Did the Stryfe from that night see her face, or Ria's? If they did, were they looking for two conspicuous girls? Had they found her already and were simply waiting for her to grow comfortable? The only sanctuary Vanari could find from these never-ending cycles of curiosity, imagination, and panic was to carve, carve, carve away. Her simple, bedside table was now almost covered entirely in geometric patterns of every shape, size, and combination imaginable. There was no other sound in her sparse room, only that of the scratch-scratching of her knife against wood. She was as careful and methodical as ever, but there was also a sense of urgency, of feverishness that she could not shake. The more triangles, waves, and lines she carved, the more immersed she became in the task. And then finally, on the third day, Vanari finished covering every surface of the table in carvings, and her brain snapped violently out of her panic-induced stasis. "What the petch have I been doing, wasting away like this?" she demanded aloud of herself. Then she rubbed her face, put away her tools, and combed through her hair rigorously with a wooden brush before donning a cloak and exiting, for the first time in three days, her dusty little room. It was an immense relief, stepping out into the cool, evening air and feeling five times lighter than she had been before. Ravok herself had not changed the slightest, bustling with people and noise and energy throughout most hours of the day. It stopped for nothing and no one, Vanari reminded herself, as all of life does. What had she been thinking, holing herself up like some kind of rat in a cage? Something glinted on the ground. Without thinking, she bent to pick it up, thinking it was her lucky day to find a gold miza on the ground. And that's when, in the process of bending, she smacked her head right into that of a dark haired stranger.

[Crypt]

A fine day, was it not?

A break from babysitting the children of the Nitrozian estate; one day where he would be able to recuperate from the inhumane torments that he had been forced to undergo in his capacity as 'bodyguard' of the Nitrozians.

Perhaps it was training. Yes, training to strengthen oneself, training to improve his mental fortitude. After all, it would not do to have an employee vulnerable to juvenile forms of torture - the very notion of it!

Youthful inadvertent sadism aside, Crypt was on his way to the People's Market to obtain some fruit, seeing as he was rather peckish after the strenuous ordeal earlier that day.

Perhaps some apples? Apricots? Dates? Let's see what strikes my fancy there -

As was his habit when working in the Nitrozian Estate, Crypt would often apply illusions to cloak his entire body or disguise himself as a nondescript person of no importance whatsoever, removing them whenever he was sure that no one would notice in order to extend the use of the illusions as long as possible. This morning was not an exception; to the children he appeared as a pale-skinned man without a trace of the tattoos carved - marked - all over his body, with blonde hair and a distinct lack of the scars that marred him.

As Vanari bent to pick up something shiny, she headbutted the unsuspecting Crypt in the abdomen, prompting a gasp and forcing Crypt to bend over in that moment of pain. His concentration, as little as it was, flickered in that instant, removing his illusions to reveal his true self before he regained his composure after a few seconds. The Drykas hastily reapplied them before anyone could take more than a quick glance at him.

[Vanari]

Vanari's head shot up in alarm, the shiny coin on the dusty ground all but forgotten. Since the man had bent over upon her first impact, her head made contact with his chin and the second impact sent them both reeling in pain. She rubbed the back of her head furiously as she straightened out from underneath the stranger. Her first thought, pathetically enough, was not, "is the person I just headbutted alright?" but "oh gods please don't let him be Stryfe." On the night of the massacre, though it had been dark and much too chaotic, Vanari had been close enough to get a good look at what the Stryfe more or less looked like. It was difficult to make out their exact features, but they had all been wearing black armor, and there was a demeanor about them that all but screamed authority. In that sense, she mused, they were very much like the knights of Syliras, only their armor was of a different color. Otherwise, they were virtually identical, even down to their ruthless and unquestioning deliverance of justice. No, a Stryfe couldn't simply just be standing around, lost enough in thought to allow someone like herself to ram her head into their unarmored stomach. Besides, most of the ones she had seen that night seemed dark of features. She blinked, took a good look at the man's pale skin and blond hair, and would have visibly relaxed, had she not witnessed something that drove thoughts of the Ebonstryfe clear from her mind, just as the abrupt contact to his abdomen had with the coin. Was that...did she just witness...a flicker of glamour? Vanari stared, not knowing what to think, say, or believe. I mean, it was only a glimpse, she reasoned, a fraction of a tick's worth of a glimpse. It could have been a trick of the eye, or of light, or of my hermit-addled mind. "Oh, gods," Vanari blurted, having realized at last that she ought to say something, for the man's face was still contorted with pain. "Are you alright? I'm so terribly sorry. Please, take this..." The Vantha bent her knees to pick up the coin on the ground, careful to keep her head no where near her recent victim, and held the gold miza out like an offering. "The name's Ari. Please accept this, as well was my deepest apologies, Mister...?" She had tacked on the last bit in hopes that he would be less inclined to ditch her at the first possible tick, or stab her. Whichever fancied this particular inhabitant of the dark city of Ravok. Either way, she hoped at least to find out, somehow, whether or not what she had witnessed was a true illusion. Because if it was, she was going to ply every trick, charm, and skill she had to obtain more information on The Trickster. Even if it was the last thing she did.

[Crypt]

OOC Note :

Technically, it's still Christmas somewhere!

Female. Human? Tall enough. Most probably. I thought I saw a flicker in her eyes when I bumped into her, but that's probably my imagination. Looks alright. Nothing sneaky, hopefully.

He noted the slight pressure on his thighs - nothing was stolen, nothing had fallen out of a slit made by a small dagger.

Both remained silent for a few moments. Crypt noted that she was staring at him, as if she had seen something strange.

No, it can't be that I'm that attractive. So what then? Perhaps she saw my illusions flickering? Perhaps there's a glaring flaw in the illusions somewhere? Maybe I missed something. I'll need to know more. Although I don't know how to do that.

"Urggh... It's alright, just an accident. No need to give me anything, 'twas my own fault, Ari."

A pause to gauge her response to his deflection of her apology and offered compensation.

"My name is... Well, I'd rather not tell you my real name. You can call me Sepulcher."

What will she do next?

[Vanari]

Sepulcher, what an odd name. Then again, she'd heard odder. He was surprisingly courteous. Most of the other commoners would have, at the very least, glared at her, or scolded her for her carelessness. And not talking the gold miza between her fingers? Well, that was something new indeed. So, she churned within the confines of her own head. How to go about this? Should she just be blunt and ask outright if he was marked? No, that would be stupid. No one would appreciate their cover blown in broad daylight, especially not an illusionist. Then what should she do? Well, the streets were a poor place to begin. She ought to try and get them somewhere quieter, and without so many people present. When she had discovered Ria's mark, they'd been on top of a sooty roof in the dead of night, with only the Stryfe and flocks of screaming victims below. And, even then, the compact illusionist had been highly reserved about divulging any information. Ari thought for a moment, and came up with nothing. Looked like she was going to have to resort to the tried and true method, assuming this fellow was as gentleman-like as he sounded. "That's not a problem, I understand," she responded to his honest admittance of not using his real name. And it was, really. She suspected that the majority of the people she'd met in Ravok had given her false names, including Ria herself. Not surprise there. Everyone was as paranoid as paranoid folk come, and for good reason. "Um," Ari blurted awkwardly. "I'm...a bit lost. I'm trying to get to the market. Would you happen to know the way?" She winced. It wasn't her smoothest strategy, though it was half true anyway and she was rather short on options. The Vantha looked at the man uncertainly, wondering if he would buy her rather flimsy but reasonable request.