Bringing the Wolf to the Door (Leiyuu, Miro)

[Inoadar]

xxxxxxx57th day of Summer, 514

Inoadar

The poisoner remembered hearing the phrase "when it rains, it pours" before he'd come to Ravok. You had to have lived somewhere else to make the connection, because the weather was just one of several things controlled by the divine benevolence of Rhysol. However, it was a commonly known adage, even here, that "when things go wrong, they go REALLY wrong!" It seemed to mean the same thing.

Well things had certainly gone "really wrong" for Inoadar lately. The arrest, the torture, the questions regarding a subject he knew nothing about, the loss of fingers, the strange paranoia and confusion, the impossible task. Even when he figured a way to get out from under one weight, he found himself anchored by another.

He'd found a way to trigger the booby trap that had been hanging over his professional head for the last year and a half. It had eliminated the "Fish Feeders" and the booby trap in one stroke. It had cost him his shop, for which he still owed twelve hundred mizas. But he'd been willing to take that hit. He had two thousand plus saved up, and it gave him a chance to start fresh with a new building and major upgrades to his lab gear.

He'd be in debt for longer now, but that had not hindered his lifestyle before. And with the NMSS as a fallback, and the new developments he'd made, and new products to release, the future was bright beyond the immediate debt. Then, the slave girl Yoona, the one fed to the monster fish and presumed dead, that had helped him turn the plot with his shop, had turned out to have been owned by the Ebonstryfe soldier that had come back to inspect the NMSS as part of the investigation of the shop's burning.

She'd attacked the man! Inoadar hadn't had any idea of the connection between the two. As a result, to avoid new imprisonment or execution as an accomplice, he'd been forced to buy her on the spot, paying a thousand mizas to the grinning soldier.

So much for paying off the old debt...

As usual though, he chalked it up to the kind of suffering that makes strong men stronger. He knew he'd make it through this. He could see the way through, long though it would be. He knew new levels of pain he could endure without breaking. He'd learned a new application of The Flux under pressure. He was even more immune to intimidation than he'd been before. Who was going to have any chance of scaring him after facing down the Warden of The Black Hole? And his suspicion that he was beginning to develop a general resistance to toxins had been borne out.

So, as usual, his philosophy that you deserved what you got in life, whether as a holdover of your actions in your last life, or something done in your current one, had been supported as far as he was concerned. So the only question was what was the end result of the little girl that was NOW following him?

He'd seen her before, as he'd been in the grip of the Chaon curse inflicted on him by Ematho, the Warden. At the time, he'd not really noticed her. He was so convinced that EVERYONE was out to get him, that she didn't stand out enough to be noteworthy. But now that he was free of the mental distortion, he could see that she was the only one really tracking him.

He thought back to her previous appearances. Her manner of dress had been adjusted each time to suit the attire of the surrounding citizenry. Clearly someone with some knowledge of the craft was supporting this effort. But they apparently still believed him debilitated by his previously confused condition.

On THAT score, whoever was sponsoring this girl would learn their error.

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[Leiyuu]

It was raining. Leiyuu looked out to the scenery before her and breathed out a long sigh. All things were drown in the sound of thousand droplets. Those ice cold gems silently found their way into her jacket, panting her vision blurring white. Her boots were soaking wet, although she had tried to move closer to the wall. Standing under the veranda of a bakery, Leiyuu shivered hard. Her hands had long gone numb. She could no longer feel them wrapped around her anymore and she thought they may very well resemble dead branches of a willow. Her teeth was chattering. Funny and even sound made her bored and sick. There were other sound too, muffle and small. There were voices of people rattling behind her back, giving orders and quick answers. There were voices of customers making their order, hastily passing each other to avoid the rain. Smell of freshly baked good called out to the little girl in its cotton candy voice, tempting and teasing. She gritted her teeth in annoyance. What was she doing here again? It was bell 8 in the afternoon. Leiyuu had waited for six hours in total under this veranda. It started at bell 7 in the morning. After defining her target, she had followed him through street after street, building after building. All she did was waiting patiently. Her back was writhing a razor sharp retort after hours of standing. She sometimes moved out of her way buying something in order to avoid staring, which she had had enough these hours. In order to avoid attention, she wore plain clothes to blend with the surrounding. It was his advice. She thought that it was a nice idea. However, all she wanted now was a nice long bath and a heavenly deep sleep. Oh, she needed her beauty sleep. It would do her good, not standing here as a living statue. A figure from the opposite building suddenly fell into her view. He was a wiry man, standing tall and proud with a glowing pair of green eyes. Leiyuu didn't tear her eyes from him. There was her target.

[Inoadar]

Inoadar

If someone HE was following made such an obvious effort to become noticeable, he'd be ducking for cover, figuring a trap was already in place. But this girl did not seem affected by his plain step into plain sight. if anything, she looked relieved. "Amateur..." he muttered in disdain.

Of course, he could not discount the possibility that she was being sacrificed as an even more expendable level of "bait" than even HE had considered at first. After his ordeal with Clyde Sullins, and the scrolls that had made a charcoal briquette out of his shop, he thought she just might be on a suicide mission that she would not be privy to until, literally, the last moment.

So, where he at first had thought of grabbing her and "persuading" her to be verbose about who sent her and why, he now thought of simply biding his time in hiding, reversing the surveillance and following HER back to her little hidey hole, to see who came calling for information.

Aahhh, but the tedium of appearances. If he simply spent several bells walking, going nowhere in particular, she would get suspicious, at least she should. No, he needed to stop in a place or two and see if she waited for him outside, or came in after him. Unless she knew Ravok as well as he did, she would have to consider the possibility of rear entrances and exits.

With a chuckle of innuendo, he had his answer. 'The house of Immortal Pleasures!' Not only would there be a number of entryways to watch, as well as windows with access to the roof, he would possibly get an idea if she could read. That would help him reassure himself that this child was not carrying a "suicide scroll". His pace picked up as he made his way toward the notorious brothel.

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