Closed Salt and Mirrors (Pho)

[Naia Whitewater]

Speech | 3rd of Winter, 515 AV | Thoughts | ooc'Salt and Mirrors' because Naia's going to be salty af, though 'Common Critic' was another strong contender if you prefer that title?
Also, I'll let you dictate wherever they end up sitting or standing!

As much as Naia liked to feign contempt for the flourishes of colour and wild costumes that those upon The Mischief so commonly donned, it would be a lie for her to claim that she did not adore the bright gowns and the striking colours.

For all a Svefra that she was, there was Nykan blood that ran through her veins, and though the sea and the waters north would always call her, as would those funny little nuances that put her mind right back in the city of monks, to the Heart of The World. Like colour, Gods she revelled in colour. Her older teenage years were clad in the brightest of reds and the most vibrant blues, and when the last pay had reached her pockets, and fellow sailors made mention of practically being required to attend the show in the Crooked Playhouse, the joy of the opportunity to purchase a dress almost outweighed her hatred of illusions.

Thus she stood tall and proud outside of The Crook, as she would insist she always did, bright brocade dress of blue and tan pulled close to her form, a light flaxen coat tucked under her arm in the unlikely event the weather would cool enough to warrant its use, though she did not discount the possibility of rain or an evening breeze. She was much earlier than she would have hoped, and she could not quite place what had propelled her to get ready and arrive with such speed.

Perhaps the dire need for preparation at sea was merely taking her, pushing, pulling, and fraying her mind until she has accounted for every possibility. As if on cue, her thoughts soon dug themselves into a hole. The playhouse could catch fire, she thought, the anxiety that seemed to have taken the city could take the crowd, the illusions could fail, or they could scare her out of sensible thought - she could go to the bathroom and later be accused for failing to help or attend, and face the wrath of her fellows.

'It's the paranoia of the city, it has got me too. This wasn't a good idea. I shouldn’t have to be here, I should be able to take my damn nice dress to a damn nice bar and be done with it.'

She caught a glimpse of one of the performers then, or at least she was quite convinced she had, and all the joy she had leeched out of the glory of wearing nice clothes finally ran dry, and it was not from the cold that gooseflesh took to her arms. There was no wild costume worn, not by The Mischief’s standards, but the wrinkled face was unmistakable, the performer’s pace brisk and gaze blank, pressed forward as he strode by. It was always the ones that looked the least beguiling that conjured the wildest tricks, and her feet followed him in an uneven pace. She was not going to let some balding man in his late forties make her wish for a blanket covering her head, Zulrav damn it. She was going to find him, make sure he at least vaguely recognised her, and she was going to wish him Kelwyn’s luck. Yes. She was going to wish an illusionist well right in his bright, beady little eyes.

She knew she was probably going to have her wits spooked out of her, for even the most stunning of illusions could unnerve the Svefra, but they didn’t have to know that. It was less the illusions themselves, and more the prospect that her senses could be so easily fooled that left her so uncomfortable. If she could so easily believe that a whale could fly through the sky, then what of those she spoke to? Were they as they seemed, or something far more horrible?

Bitterness took to her tongue and thoughts as she delved deeper into the amphitheatre, darting gaze quickly losing the man’s gleaming skull as she lost herself in the peculiarity of the place. The conflicts of wood and stone and stacked galleys were all too fitting for the city, and she was all at once overcome with awe, breath rolling from her lungs in a hefty sigh.

It was going to be a long night, she might as well make herself comfortable.

[Phobius]

OOCSorry this took so long! X__x

Phobius had never much liked being indoors. As far as he was concerned, there was nothing more confining than four walls and a roof over one's head; it was a million times better to be outside, where there were a lot of trees to climb and pretty flowers to smell and tiny animals to watch as they scurried around. And you could go wherever you wanted, whenever you wanted to, no matter how cold or hot or rainy it was.

Back in Wind Reach, when his Bendi hadn't demanded that he peel potatoes in a stuffy room or feed the furnaces at The Glass Reverie, the boy had made an effort to spend as much time as he could outdoors. It was the one place where he'd felt the most comfortable; the one place where he could find happiness, even on the saddest of days. For a while, wandering around Alvadas had felt no different, but as fall had tapered into winter he'd begun to enjoy it less and less. As if that wasn't troubling enough, not an inch of snow had fallen, leaving Phobius to stare gloomily out his window every morning he awoke from dreams of making snow-people and rolling down white, fluffy hils.

All in all, winter hadn't had a very promising start, but the boy had reason to believe that things would get better. Miss Georgia had told him about some kind of show that the people from The Mischief would be putting on at the Crooked Playhouse—today, of all days—and he had practically ran out of the Inn when she'd finished speaking, his blue scarf flapping wildly behind him. Having never seen a show, before, Phobius felt as though he couldn't miss it; thank Ionu for giving him something fun to do.

It wasn't long until he arrived at the all-too-familiar archway. Phobius stared up at it for a moment, then stepped under and made his way into the dimly-lit tunnel, his mind taking him back to the first time he'd had to feel his way through it all those months ago. Eventually, it led him to the belly of the theatre, where a bunch of other people already seemed to be seating themselves. Were they all here for the same show?

Feeling a bit overwhelmed, the boy forbid himself from going any further, shoving his hands into the pockets of his katinu and looking around, instead. It seemed like most people had brought their friends with them, and the ones who hadn't were sitting...save for a woman in a pretty blue dress who wasn't too far away from him.

Smiling a bit, Phobius walked over to her and tapped her on the shoulder. "Is this The Mischief show...?" he asked.

[Naia Whitewater]

Speech | 3rd of Winter, 515 AV | Thoughts | oocNo worries at all!

Naia wasn't at all sure what she was expecting.

Well, yes and no. Half of her was expecting it all to be far too grand for such an arguably-more-normal-city-girl to be able to handle, the other half of her envisioned something much simpler. Zulrav knew the illusions and performance would be wild enough that such a stage wasn't required for any additional affect.

People just kept piling in, many with friends and family in tow - she'd been lucky enough to witness quite the comical falling out between a couple, with the rather roguish man having his words trip and tumble out his mouth as he explained away the reason why he'd been so distracted by the length of another woman's dress. Naia had tried not to laugh, sort of. Her snort was loud, the couple seemed to have willfully ignored her, but a hand quite immediately shot to cover her wicked smirk.

She'd stormed off one way, and he another, and the short lived entertained had a rather boring end. She was forced to feign interest in patches of wall and the colour of her shoes, then, unwilling to to take a seat for fear she'd be shoved so far into the middle chances of escape would be all but lost, and, well. She had the standing option already covered. Close enough to the entrance it looked like she might be waiting for someone, far enough away she wasn't as risk of being bumped as groups rushed through.

Once she'd been rendered to the crowds' ambient chatter for long enough, she was able to drown it from her mind as it became little more than white noise, and her gaze became hooded as she stared absently forward, hanging stars before her in the vacant space.

She imagined Illan, the zigzag of the eastern skies, and she straightened her back as she turned her naval to face the sea directly. She pictured it as best she could, and then took a mental step to the North, as she tried then to envision the crooked cross. Her mind's eye kept imagining the piece as being much larger than she should have, but any attempt to make it smaller in thought seemed to make it appear even more out of place.

'I need to be able to see the stars without the in front of me. I haven't truly learned it otherwise.'

She tried again to pull it from memory, this time calling it by the much more playful title, 'Hot Crossed Bun,' and was much more satisfied with the collection she called from the back of her mind. A breath rushed from her lungs as she called a conclusion to her own, personal mental exercise, and the hard expression she so often wore when troubling thought took her melted, and her tense shoulders rolled and dropped.

It was barely a half chime later that she felt the soft tap, and heard a stranger say something, and she blinked twice with her mouth hung so elegantly open as she processed the words, mind working in overdrive as it also tried in vain to place the accent, eyes searching the man's sweet face as her thoughts continued to run themselves into a wall. "Oh?" she was not nearly as quick witted as she liked to present herself as.

"Oh, Yes, yes it," she cleared her throat and gave a soft shake of her head, "Sorry, just..." a deeper breath rolled from her lungs, and she fixed the red haired man one of her more winsome smiles, feeling for whatever reason that she owed the man reason for such a dazed reply. "Nervous, I suppose," the man didn't appear to have any company, and by the nature of his question she assumed him alone for the rest of the night, and thus another random face to who she could give unflattering honesty without backlash.

Worst case he thought her strange, and left her alone. Best case he felt similar, and either provided nice banter, or left her alone. It was all quite the nice little win-win situation, really.

[Phobius]

At first, the woman didn't seem to have heard him; she merely blinked, looking more than a little confused, and for a moment Phobius considered repeating his question, wondering if the noise of the gathering crowds had drowned his voice out. Then she cleared her throat and said that yes, he'd come to the right place.

"Sorry, just...nervous, I suppose."

"That's okay," the boy said, mirroring her smile with a warm, friendly one of his own. "There are lots of people; sometimes that makes me nervous, too."

He then glanced over at the stage, where some people seemed to be setting things up. From the colorful clothes that they all wore, he assumed that they were performers. It wasn't until a few ticks had gone by that he realized he'd been distracted by one man's incredibly poofy pants, and though it took a great deal of effort, he managed to tear his eyes away from them, still smiling as he returned his attention to the woman.

"Do you know what the show is?" he asked. "I don't, but I like surprises. This is gonna be my first ever show. Did you ever see a show, before...?"

It was a genuine question, and he sounded as though he was curious as to what her answer would be, but before she could say so much as a word he was walking off, briefly vanishing amongst the ever-moving throngs of people as more and more of them poured into the theater. When the boy reappeared a short moment later, he wasn't far from the woman; having spotted an empty pair of seats, he'd gone to claim them before anyone else could, and was sitting in one of them, now, waving an arm at the woman while he patted the chair next to his own.

That the woman might not want to sit with him was something Phobius hadn't considered. As far as he could tell, she hadn't come with anyone, and she seemed nice, so if they sat together they'd be able to talk. And maybe watching a show with someone was better than watching it alone.

"Hey! Over here!" he called to her, still waving.

[Naia Whitewater]

Speech | 3rd of Winter, 515 AV | Thoughts |

The man was softer spoken than Naia had imagined, and another dozen leaps kinder, and she could have sworn his common rung with a strange edge and lilt, though she couldn't fathom of what accent it could be.

His smile was friendly, at the very least, though his gaze was easily drawn elsewhere, and the Svefra wondered if he was seeking a face amongst the crowd or a better hold of the scene that surrounded them. The performers had been much more organised and coherent than the Svefra had expected them to be, for they'd brewed up quite the storm on board when they'd finally set sail for Alvadas. The man's expression hadn't changed when he once more faced her, and a question that could have the man respond very poorly, or very well, was phrased, but his attention was once more grasped elsewhere, and Naia was left with the drawing of her brows, and her lips set poised to set words that soon died in her throat.

She couldn't help but watch him walk away, having half expected him to take only several steps before his red hair rustled and he turned, making some sort of hint or tell that he did indeed wish for his questions to be answered, or at the very least give some semblance of a farewell, but no such action followed, and he was shortly one with the sea of bright bodies. Perhaps he had, and she'd just missed it? Were his questions meant in some way rhetorical? They hadn't seemed to her.

As soon as he was gone, he seemed to appear again, smile bright, a waving arm and beckoning words calling her to a free seat he'd somehow caught. Right. I suppose my company for the evening has been decided upon.

The brunette waved back in kind, her grin one in full grasp that she perhaps needed to rid herself of sensibility for the evening, lest her own fraying nerves at the thought of the show to come have her decide to bail. She'd at the very least not need to be concerned about several parts and places, though there several shows that the performers kept secret from even each other, and thoughts of knives disguised as flowers, sweeping clouds truly flames, and vice versa, then struck her. Illusions could be such a beautiful thing, in the same breath that they could be so utterly terrifying.

Much like the sea, she thought. Would she fear the water were she not ocean born?

Her thoughts had continued to dally as she picked her way to the red haired man, her smile keeping though her eyes portrayed thoughts elsewhere, and she slid into the chair wondering how to portray her gratitude, if she should show any at all. "Thank you," she hummed, then taking a short look to the stage, in attempts to see the opening act, or at least the makings for it. "You said this would be your first show? There are many acts, quite a few illusions - The Mischief only docked this morning... I wonder if any are not over their sea legs," she gave a light giggle, and adjusted herself in her seat, "That'd be my kind of surprise."

The picture that took to her mind caused the polite smile to turn to a smirk, and she quickly sorted thought all the names and faces she knew of, and tried to figure which, if any, would have such a risk, and which would be the most entertaining.

[Phobius]

WIP