Where Light and Shadow Meet (CH2)

[Elenya Jaromir]

O

verna's uneven, cobbled streets were a wash of coppery golds and peony pink as early evening threatened to overtake the doomed city. It may have been beautiful, but because the throngs of restless city folk surged and jostled one another in their hurry to return home, it made that beauty all but impossible to see. And Elenya, despite knowing better, had found herself unintentionally swept up in the chaos of it all. Harried shopkeepers and elaborately-garbed, ruddy-faced merchants were sweaty with irritability as they struggled to close up and pack their things away— and the sultry summer heat that the capitol had been enduring for the better part a fortnight did little to make an already arduous process any more tolerable.

It was all she could do simply to move at all, much less in any discernable direction, forced to allow the current of bodies to carry her along where they may as she attempted simply to keep from being trampled. Tempers flared because tensions were high. It seemed the whole of the city was suspended in a state of nervous anticipation, with whispers of the Emperor's restlessness and uncharacteristic fury reaching even the peasantry. Like the calm before the storm, the uncertainty had put everyone on edge. And like a herd of deer, they could feel something malevolent approach from afar, and leapt at once to safety. Only in a far less graceful, considerably more undignified fashion. Keep your head down. Get in an honest day's work and then return promptly home. After all, who knew what was going to happen?

It had been this way for days now, and Elenya cursed her own stupidity as she was pushed and shoved, vowing to find a detour tomorrow so that she would not have to suffer the same mindless pandemonium again the following evening.

All at once, a gaggle of unruly children rushed past, cackling and chasing one another about her ankles, before departing in the opposite direction. But not before they'd nearly tripped her in the process. It was all she could do just to catch herself before she fell. Or ... had someone caught her? All she was aware of was the warmth and solidity of another body. And, strangely enough, the scent of smoke. Spices. Then something else that was familiar and unfamiliar to her all at once. Unplaceable. She couldn't even decide whether or not she found the unusual infusion of smells pleasant or not, but was promptly pulled away from that avenue of thought when she caught the glint of her grandmother's necklace in the fading sunlight— where it had slipped free from beneath the neckline of her dress and dangled visibly from about her neck.

" ... I'm so sorry about that," she started, flushed and a little breathless as she hurried to right herself. "Everyone seems to be in a rush, don't they?"

ELENYA & LUCALRITH

✿

[Lucalrith]

this selfish blood runs through my veins

These were the sorts of evenings Luca liked to spend people-watching. He wasn't sure if the atmosphere of malcontent that sat heavily over Overna was a new development or just characteristic of the capitol, but it made for some interesting interactions to spectate; maybe it was just the sun bearing down on them with such cruel disregard, but the folk here were shedding propriety like layers.

He'd watched a cobbler get into a kerfuffle over a tack left too close to the client's heel earlier that day. It was great. He'd remember that battlecry of, "I'll leave a tack in your husband, next!" until the day he died.

He dipped and weaved through the throngs of hurried and harried people, heading nowhere in particular and savoring a hand-pie filled with hare, mushrooms (hedgehog and black trumpet, he thought), and vicious little peppers. The spice made the body heat that was pooling in the crowded streets feel tepid by comparison. He had been keeping his hands to himself, so far. He was flush after receiving his payment from that delivery, could afford to pay for a week of discretion and a hot bath at Challahc's Seabiscuit down on the wharf without dipping his hands in any pockets, and he could feel the first warning signs of a summer cold building in his sinuses. The last thing he wanted was to be caught red-handed because of a cough.

Something clipped his leg. Luca looked down to see that a child had shoulder-checked him in the back of the thigh, shouting to her friends between peals of laughter. He favored the little weasel with a truly Felyan scowl, vitriolic enough to curl the whiskers on a dwarf, and then turned it onto the girl's hollering friends to ensure they gave him a wide berth. He checked his pockets and satchel until he was satisfied everything was accounted for and, sure enough, one of the drawstring pouches of clipped coins he kept for these instances was missing. The unfriendly expression still slacked off his face once they'd all passed him. He increased his pace, hoping to keep sight of them - this didn't seem like the best environment for the inept cutpurse. They'd be caught eventually, and if he could provide a convenient distraction without risking his neck he'd help them out. He didn't have anything better to do.

He followed them for a block or so before they used some poor, unsuspecting young woman as an obstacle in their race and sent her stumbling backwards into him with a spectacular whip of gold swinging around her neck, the blush tones of dusk catching on pearls. He reeled in awe at the perfect storm it created - this was the sort of situation he'd typically have to manufacture.

He could only seize the opportunity. Adding to the chaos of the spastic crowd and the stampeding children, he tossed his dinner into the crowd ahead of them as if the bump had sent it flying.

"It's - uh, not you -" The stranger's soft voice was distracted, his attention pulled in two different directions. He brought his gloved hand up to her elbow to steady her.

"EY! Ey-ey!" He barked after the children, that soft voice suddenly stern and sharp and closer to her ear than most would prefer. "Come back here and apologize to her!"

The children continued on their merry way, disappearing into the afternoon traffic heedless of his reprimand. Luca clicked his tongue before turning to follow them, nodding to the half-elven girl he'd attempted to hustle with, "Stay safe, miss."

It was, superficially, a very brief interaction. Every second of it was designed to overwhelm and overstimulate.

He'd thrown the pie to direct her attention away from herself, placed a hand on her arm so that she had a sensation more solid and distracting than the other hand that delicately tossed some of her hair aside, fine as the wind, to get to the necklace's clasp. He jerked his hand forward so that when it slipped she wouldn't feel it drag over her clavicle once it was unhooked. He'd shouted in her ear as he flicked his wrist to draw the whole length of it into his palm, attempting to disguise the chime of the metal before it disappeared into the depths of his sleeves.

Necklaces weren't a common pinch for him. Generally, the higher one went on the person's body, the more aware they were of what was being done - anything around the legs was child's play, but things got tricky with wrists and hands. The neck? Only when he was feeling lucky.

There was a chance she caught him in the act, or that she'd moved, bumped his wrist, and made him drop the heirloom piece before he had it in hand, but regardless of his success his next move was to put as much distance between them as possible. Unless she had means of stopping him, he ducked around a broad-shouldered man to put a wall between them and continued on to the harbor.

840 . tagged: Elenya Jaromir

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[Elenya Jaromir]

A

s was the nature of life in the capitol, things happened too quickly. Movement and sound and the physical sensation of being impatiently shoved aside, righted again and then held, left her noticeably disoriented. The warmth and gentle pressure of unfamiliar fingers at her elbow were only enough to distract her momentarily, however, as her eyes caught something soaring overhead, though she couldn't quite make out what it had been. Only that it disappeared an instant later to a chorus of enraged shouting further up the cobbled path. Then the voice in her ear. Loud enough to carry over the stampeding crowd. Stern in its tonality, but not necessarily angry as the gaggle of children vanished in a flurry of mischievous, triumphant giggling. "No, it's alright. Thank you." But she wasn't certain he heard her, as she hastily attempted to straighten and gently pull away. By then he had turned - presumably to chase after the unruly youngsters - and was courteous enough to bid her well before embarking on the admirable task of combing his way back through the surrounding crush of bodies.

With her heart still beating rapidly from the accidental collision, she lifted a hand to place it on her chest, as though to help soothe her erratic pulse. And then she froze. Began to pat at her chest and feel around her neck in growing panic for the necklace that she made a rule never to leave home without. And then realization dawned on her. Somewhere in the furthest reaches of her subconscious, she'd known what was happening while it was happening. She'd grown accustomed to the weight of the locket over the many years she had worn it, after all. Had found a strange sort of comfort in its heaviness where she kept it tucked against her chest beneath her dress. She had derived a sense of calm from its constant presence, as though through it, she carried her grandmother's spirit with her. She felt naked without it. Vulnerable. And its absence had been immediately noticeable.

With the flurry of activity and dizzying succession of events all unfolding at once however, she'd been too overwhelmed to act quickly enough. Now visibly distressed, she took a few frantic moments to ensure it hadn't fallen to the ground and been trampled underfoot. Only when it was nowhere to be seen did she snap her head up and peer accusingly in the direction the children and the soft-spoken stranger had gone. It had all been a ruse, hadn't it? How vile, to recruit young and impressionable children to help do such contemptible work on his behalf. It was that sense of incredulous disbelief, anger and her own refusal to allow that sort of exploitative behavior to stand that compelled her to set off after them. Thankfully he hadn't managed to gain enough ground to disappear completely yet, with his shock of silver hair still discernable in the slowly darkening street, where everything else was a monotonous grey or dusty, sandswept yellow.

"Wait!" she shouted, just before she saw him duck out of sight some ways ahead, pushing her way past the oblivious or otherwise preoccupied passersby who couldn't bring themselves to care enough to so much as glance in her direction. "Come back!" she tried again, and grunted as she was forced to physically squeeze between two much larger, bulkier men who stood arguing. At first it seemed as though their gripe was with each other, but as she passed, she caught snippets of their heated conversation about the Emperor's most recent transgressions, and how it was affecting business. How something needed to be done. But she had more pressing concerns that required her attention, and she emerged from around the bend, disappointed when she didn't immediately spot her thief. The sight of the harbor, however, gave her some hope. There was only one place someone like him would seek refuge in this area, and with a sense of renewed determination, she set off in the direction of the docks.

ELENYA & LUCALRITH

✿

[Lucalrith]

this selfish blood runs through my veins

The necklace was stashed in a pocket sewn into the lining of Luca’s poncho, though he longed to take his prize into an alley and examine it more closely - he thought he’d spied jewels in his peripherals, and he wondered if they were rubies or garnets. It wouldn’t have been the wise thing to do, though. It was better to wait until there were a couple of walls between himself and its rightful owner before he indulged his curiosity.

Despite that train of thought, he didn’t actually think there was any chance under Sulara or Nyxus that she’d seen through his sleight of hand until her voice cut through the din of the crowd. Stunned, he paused to search for her in the sea of the faces - it was not so difficult. She’d been caught between a pair of men who towered over her, engaged in some conversation better suited for a less busy street. Half of her face was obscured in the shadow they cast, but locks of hair and hickory-colored irises were catching the sunlight the way her pretty necklace had.

He stood in the same lighting, pale lashes and claret instead of shades of gold, so even from a distance it was obvious when his eyes widened in numb shock. There had been so many instances in his life where he’d been accused of foul play when he was innocent, but he’d never - never once - been caught for something he had done. He lingered a moment too long and a man with hands stained from a day of labor shoved him roughly out of the way, grouching an oath. This snapped him out of his trance.

This time, when he tried to slip into the crowd, he meant it. It’d be foolish to break into a run with her shouting after him, but he was pulling every evasive maneuver he had in his arsenal to get away from her, moving serpentine through the streets and twisting around the currents of bodies with catlike dexterity. He couldn’t check over his shoulder too many times without drawing attention either, but when he rounded the corner and found himself on a street that was more seaside offices, fisheries, and warehouses than complexes and shops, he took a moment just to search for her.

Luca wasn’t particularly religious or given to superstition, but he couldn’t help but feel like something out there hated his guts - every year, his luck seemed to steadily get worse. Now it had infected the only thing he was truly gifted at.

He dipped between two bleached warehouses. They emptied onto a dusty backlane facing Overna’s Southern canals, with their waist-high seawalls - the tide was low and the exposed banks would lead back to the wharf if he followed them. After establishing that he was alone, he scrambled onto the wall with a running start and vaulted over it, falling some nine feet to the waterlogged sand and landing with a roll.

He stood gingerly, brushing sand and kelp off his shirt. He could see the Seabiscuit’s side entrance some twenty feet ahead of him, a small dock for skiffs and such rotting under the abuse of the Eashin feeding into the harbor.

তততততততততততততততততততততততততততততততততততততততত

Some twenty minutes later, he was exchanging stiff pleasantries with Challahc herself at her ramshackle counter - a number of planks retrieved from demolished structures when the Council had finally decided to redo the entire Southern Harbor some fifteen years ago, lacquered and laid over metal scrapped from crab cages to act as legs. He found that entering through the side entrance did not improve the miasma of smoke and oyster stench that pervaded the taproom.

She returned with the azure blue clay mug he’d set on her counter, now filled with whiskey. He thanked her with a strained smile and another few chits before turning away, praying his nice spot on the second floor where he could watch every entrance was still available. He glanced over when the door opened.

“...Oh sweet fucking Oshune,” he said, eye to eye with the woman he’d wronged.

840 . tagged: Elenya Jaromir

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[Elenya Jaromir]

I

f she had been uncertain of his guilt before, his momentary stupor and the prompt retreat that followed it all but confirmed her suspicions. An innocent man would not have run, and even if it had been at a distance, she was certain he had heard or at least noticed her gesturing to him. In her mind, there was no question. It only made sense that he was the culprit. Or perhaps in her anger and frustration, it was simply easier to convince herself that she was right. That she had a solid lead, and her necklace could still be recovered. And so she stubbornly clung to that hope as she took up pursuit, picking up handfuls of her skirts so as not to trip on them as she took off at a run down the winding streets that spiraled down to the dockyard.

The smell of salt and brine and fish entrails amalgamated to become a pungent, eye-watering musk as she found herself pacing the length of the pier. A putrid stench that had grown more intolerable still in the stifling summer heat. The darkened silhouettes of various fishing vessels and trade ships bobbed quietly in the water, but it was eerily still otherwise, and any trace of the silver-haired pickpocket had vanished with the evening's quickening descent. For several minutes she explored the promenade. Peeked between empty fishery offices and warehouses. Stepped around clusters of barrels and piles of frayed rope and tangled netting. In the distance she could hear fits of boisterous laughter and the clink of goblets as sailors and other laborers put their feet up after a long day baking under the Overnan sun, and huffed in annoyance. It was best not to linger for too long after dark here, she reasoned with herself. Especially alone. That, and there was only one place left to look anyway.

It was a miserable affair simply reaching the front door. To start, she'd accidentally stepped in a pile of what she could only assume was the discarded innards of recently cleaned cod that had been left to rot on the paved walkway. She'd spent several minutes then trying to scrape it off of the bottom of her boot by hopping on one foot and scraping the heel against the crumbling stone exterior of a nearby storehouse. By the time she even made it up the stairs to the Seabiscuit, she'd been heckled twice, and had to pass by two burly, heavily muscled men— one of whom had the audacity to swat at her backside as she all but tiptoed past.

Needless to say, her anger had transformed to full blown fury by the time she caught sight of the swift-footed, sticky-fingered jackass on the opposite side of the room.

"You," she seethed, and wasted no time as she stomped toward him, eyes flashing and face flushed with exhaustion and exasperation and all manner of unladylike things she wished she had the nerve to say to him in that moment. "Where did you put it? Give it back to me this instant!" Completely oblivious to the amused expressions and watchful eyes of their audience, she reached forward with every intention of patting him down, shoving her hands beneath the wool poncho clasped at his shoulder in some blind attempt to feel for the jewelry through the fabric. "What sort of a coward do you have to be to recruit children anyway? I can't believe I fell for the sort of cheap tactics only an amateur would stoop so low to use. Did you really think I wouldn't notice?"

ELENYA & LUCALRITH

✿

[Lucalrith]

this selfish blood runs through my veins

The young woman was approaching with a single-minded aggression in her eyes that he normally associated with drug-addled wildcats in pit fights, swatting viciously at anything that had the audacity to exist in their space. Between bafflement and dismay at his own misfortune and the uncharacteristically sluggish way he was piecing together a plan to weasel out of it, he found a moment to worry about whether she had a right hook as mean as those pit beasts.

“Wh-whoa, hey now -” He jolted, arms coming up to shield his face, but she dove under his poncho to root around the folds of blue silk and thin muslin shirts instead. There was plenty of jewelry hidden under there - thin chains of metal, cords strung with wooden beads, rings looped around leather thongs - but her own necklace was still stashed in the pockets. He tolerated this manhandling for about two seconds before spinning in an attempt to shake her off.

This wasn’t ideal. His dull shock at having been caught would make it difficult to sow the seeds of doubt, but his gut told him deny, deny, deny, a principle that had been drilled into him as a teenager. And he couldn’t confirm his guilt and return it to her, even if he wanted to - not in front of all these people. Most of them were some type of vermin, but that didn’t mean you did these things on the ground floor, out in the open.

Besides. They wouldn’t be pleased with him for tracking the hazards of his work back to where they slept- he'd found the criminal underworld more on edge than even the honest civilians in Overna. He was an outsider here. He didn't want to become the whipping boy for their stresses.

He took a step back, one arm braced in front of him like he was bearing an imaginary tower shield while the other held his mug away from the half-elf shaped hazards. Whenever she lunged, he’d try to cut her off with an elbow or a wrist, an incredulous sort of grin twitching at the corners of his mouth. “Slow down, Sabercat. Look, I didn’t share two words with those kids -”

He shrugged with one shoulder and a helpless little laugh, his whiskey sloshing in his mug. It was the truth. The next statement was not. “- and I don’t know what ‘it’ is, so there’s been a miscommunication somewhere. Why don’t we sit down and try to figure it out, civil-like, instead of disturbing the peace of this fine woman’s establishment?”

He gestured to Challahc with his mug (by the blissfully oblivious look of her, the middle-aged half-dwarf couldn’t have cared less. She was trying to decide where the centerpiece basket of walnuts looked best on her counter and had no attention left to spare the squabbling twenty-somethings blocking the main flow of traffic) but his eyes flitted to the side in a pointed gesture. There were a number of wolfish grins leering at them, eager for dinner with a show, but an equal number of people were curled over bowls of fish stew with beleaguered, exhausted expressions.

There was a chance the reasonable tone he'd adopted would make her second guess herself, but he wasn't counting on it. He just prayed she was susceptible to guilt, if not gaslighting.

550 . tagged: Elenya Jaromir

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[Elenya Jaromir]

S

he spent several very frustrating moments clumsily lunging, swatting at and reaching for the dark elf as he maneuvered himself out of reach or otherwise parried her efforts with a level of deftness and grace that was, admittedly, impressive. No motion was wasted, though a good measure of his whiskey suffered for it as it sloshed over the rim of the cup he held in his opposite hand and splashed across the wooden floorboards at their feet. With a cluck of her tongue, she made one final attempt, and then finally resigned herself to standing there glaring at him— chest rising and falling from all of the fruitless exertion.

She got a good look at him now that he was up close, though the haze of smoke and lack of natural light only served to make him look as roguish and disreputable as ever.

That trademark obsidian complexion and silvery hair aside, his eyes were a tired maroon. His nose slightly crooked. His cheekbones were high and arching and the rest of his face was an arrangement of sharp points and angles she may have even considered attractive, had she been studying him in a more benevolent light. As things stood, however, everything about him vexed her. Even just the way he stood was enough to have her huff in displeasure. Body tensed and coiled and ready to spring should he attempt to flee again.

"Oh, you want a civil conversation now?" she snapped, jaw clenched and hair windblown and wild where it lay gathered about the small slope of her shoulders in a tangle of spun gold. "I suppose we could discuss all of the other trinkets and stolen baubles you have hidden under those fancy clothes of yours. How unreasonable that I should presume you to have stolen mine when you already have so. many. others." Her expression was stone cold. She dared not even spare a glance for the preoccupied innkeeper she assumed he was referring to, choosing instead to risk slighting her in favor of keeping her eyes on the only one in the whole of the establishment that actually mattered.

She was not altogether oblivious to their leering audience either, but it was easier for her to overlook them than it seemed to be for him. High on a rush of adrenaline and indignant rage, she continued to stand unfazed by their attention. Or the disruption she was causing. "That necklace belonged to my grandmother," she started, and at least had the presence of mind to lower her voice to a tone that was more conversational and less hysterical. "I have worn it every day for the past seven years. Do you really believe I wouldn't notice it coming off? Besides, you were the only one close enough to have the opportunity to take it to begin with. I've seen the way petty thieves like you work. I've seen all of your stupid tricks. I just wasn't as fast as you, that's all. So ... " She took a step forward, eyes flashing with a fierce, unwavering determination. "I've been awake since before dawn, spent the entirety of my day scrubbing chamber pots and folding laundry, chased you all the way down here through piles of fish guts and past those lecherous thugs outside. And I am not leaving until you give back what you took from me."

She reached a hand out, palm open and upturned expectantly.

"Do you really want to spend the rest of the night doing this?"

ELENYA & LUCALRITH

✿

[Lucalrith]

this selfish blood runs through my veins

She was persistent, if nothing else. Luca fended off his half-elven assailant with increasing malaise as it dawned on him that she wouldn’t have been able to outmaneuver him if her life depended on it, his open, neutral expression growing a little flat as she only succeeded in winding herself. When she finally gave in, the stare down he received was far more intimidating.

Unnerved, he took an interest in his cup. His expression fell at the mouthful sloshing pathetically around in the bottom as he swished it in a little circle, like that would conjure more. “Or - hear me out - none of those were stolen and I just like to accessorize.”

She held out an overturned hand like he was an errant dog with a bird in his mouth, and he realized there was no manipulation that was going to sway her. He'd never had a particular facility for rooting out the cracks in a person's confidence anyway. He was more of a second-story man than a silver-tongued rogue, a grab it and get out kind of guy. He considered it - her hand, that is, not her demands.

He saw the imperfections of her palms, roughened, he assumed, by the wood ash lye a servant would spend much of her time lathering with and softened by balsams and careful adherence, a labor of self-love to remedy labor the world had foisted on her. It was endless fucking work, keeping skin and hair soft when one lived a rough life, just like keeping the body elastic and the mind sharp. That degree of meticulous effort was more worthy of admiration than a noblewoman’s unburnt, inviolate beauty.

Her Sylvan parent had lent her frame some fragility. He could see it in the fine articulation of her phalanges. She was wasted as a servant, Luca thought to himself - she would’ve made for an excellent merchant, shooting down hagglers with the obstinacy of a hammer on a nail, and it wouldn’t have abraded her skin.

But she wasn’t a merchant, and these weren’t the unblemished sorts of hands he looked for when choosing a mark.

He cut that thought off before he could examine it further, deadening the unwanted feeling nipping at the heels of his awareness. He just wasn’t used to having to look people in the eye after the pinch, was all. He huffed through his nose three times in quick succession before his chest swelled with an inaudible sigh, the shadow of a smile playing at the corners of his mouth. If she was keen, she might recognize it as dismissive amusement.

“Fine,” he said, as if they’d come to some sort of agreement. “Then I’ll leave.”

He turned on heel and left her with her palm beseeching empty space, surreptitiously kicking a stool out as he passed it to obstruct her pursuit, certain he was going to be pursued. The cheery little bell above the side entrance he'd entered the Seabiscuit through chimed as walked right back out again, quaffing the mouthful left in his cup before it swung shut.

Now out of sight, if only for a moment, he pulled the necklace from its hiding place and took a moment to admire the craftsmanship. The thing about Elven antique pieces was that some of the methods used to make them died with the creators; living memory was so long that whole libraries’ worth of history could be lost with a single elder who neglected to write or speak on it. Likewise, the death of an artisan meant centuries of progress in their chosen craft perished with them, the works they left behind so complex and unique they couldn’t be reverse engineered. He had no time to study the jeweled, intricate face to determine whether there was anything truly irreplicable about it, but it was very pretty. Deflated, he looped it loosely between his pointer and index to prevent it from slipping through the cracks in the wharf if she snatched it too violently and held it out toward the door.

She’d decided his guilt and there wasn’t any point in arguing it with her - no one here valued him enough to play along with his story and bully her out of the inn. He could slip away again, scale the tavern and hop the gap into the busted window in the warehouse behind it where that fidgety old goblin was selling etherblue dusted shortbread that would entertain him for a few days, long enough for word to get around if she squealed. He’d pick a convenient spot and show his face, and the gendarie would either be on him in a heartbeat if he was wanted or avoiding eye contact with a warding gesture against evil if he was not. He doubted there was another dark elf loitering in the markets. If the guards knew to look out for him, there was no point in sticking around Overna any longer. And he could take her swanky necklace with him.

But…there was just something about keeping it that settled in wrong, all bunched muscles and sharp elbows in a crowded carriage. If there was a sign from the Gods that his luck was running short and he needed to cut his losses, she had to be it. And it was narratively satisfying. Some fourteen years had passed since he pulled a glove from a lady’s bag, and this battering ram of girl was the first person to catch him. She’d be the first person he’d return something to. It was the right choice in a way he didn’t have the words to explain but understood intuitively, like a well-constructed poem.

He waited for the door to open. “What’s your name?”

960. tagged: Elenya Jaromir

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[Elenya Jaromir]

I

n that moment - the moment in which he studied her open palm with glassy, inscrutable eyes - she wished she could peer into his mind. Glimpse his thoughts and decipher them so that she might understand what exactly someone like him could be considering in that prolonged silence between them. The silence that endured solely in the space that they existed in, and excluded the surrounding dissonance of forks scraping against tin plates. The smokey, guttural laughter of sailors hunched over their cups of malt whiskey. The chime of the bell as more work-weary laborers dragged their feet, and then their chairs, across the floorboards before all but falling into them. Nothing else mattered to her but him, and his unfathomable intentions.

There. Had she imagined it? The slightest suggestion of a smile that ghosted about the corners of his mouth? Like the glimmer of an illusion, it was there and then it was not. And then he himself stirred into motion. Standing before her, motionless and silent. Until he was not. But she had chased him this far, and with too much determination and steely resolve to simply surrender now. So she turned as he did. Narrowed her eyes and took a breath as she moved to, once more, take up avid pursuit. But she'd rushed after him a bit too hastily, and found herself caught off-guard by the stool he kicked out from the bar, directly into her path. It was all she could do not to trip over it, catching herself on its flat surface instead, where she stood bent at the waist and flushed with a mix of embarrassment, frustration and growing impatience— particularly as the oblivious innkeeper chose that exact moment to shuffle by bearing a full tray of goblets of ale.

Elenya waited until she passed with bated breath before straightening again, sidestepping the stool and bursting out through the side door he'd slipped out of ahead of her.

She had been fully expecting him to be long gone by then. He could have been. She'd seen how quickly he moved when he was so inclined to, and through a near-impenetrable crowd no less. Needless to say, the sight of him standing there as though he'd been waiting for her shocked her into stillness.

She blinked. Once. Twice. A rapid fluttering of long, tawny eyelashes as her attention shifted between him and the necklace and back again. A trick? When she did take a step toward him, it was with the same reluctance, uncertainty and hopefulness a feral animal might show to its first gesture of kindness. As though it wanted desperately to believe it was genuine, but had been tricked too many times before to really trust in its validity. His question too was unexpected, and she felt her brow furrow as she considered him with a look of thinly-veiled confusion. "Elenya," she surprised herself by answering. She'd had no intention to. Perhaps it was because she was distracted by her own carelessness, being in such a rush to reclaim the necklace in his offered hand.

And then she darted forward, closing the distance between them and catching his hand between two of her own. She deliberately held him like that for a minute too long. As though she'd just successfully caught a firefly she'd spent the entirety of the evening chasing, and didn't want to risk losing it again by acting too swiftly and thoughtlessly. When she did pull away, it was slowly. Carefully. Her eyes lifted to meet his once, in some vague effort to try and gauge what he might be thinking or what he might do. If he'd try to snatch it back after luring her into a false sense of security.

"What's yours?" She didn't know why she'd asked. Until she realized that a part of her genuinely wanted to know.

ELENYA & LUCALRITH

✿

[Lucalrith]

this selfish blood runs through my veins

A light buoy bobbed under the deck, off-course with its anchor severed, but the phosphorus-based reaction in its bulb was still burning brightly after so many years in service. Luca watched the harsh red light creep through the cracks in the boards, waiting for the girl to reclaim her grandmother’s necklace so that he could move forward with his evening - another quick glance through his hair confirmed that she was still hesitating, as if unsure this was what she wanted now that she didn’t have to fight for it. He inhaled and opened his mouth, about to ask her what the problem was.

The onshore breeze laved over the waters and pulled their hair in inconvenient directions. He pulled a few strands from between his lips with a disturbed expression, forced to set his mug down on the post at his back to use his right hand for what would be more easily done with his left - it was still occupied. To his equal surprise, she indulged his question.

"Elenya," he repeated, the last vestiges of an accent older than the thick Portos Docks that dominated his vernacular playing a game with the l and the y.

She chose that moment to spring forward, and he flinched in turn, his teeth shutting with a click and ears laid flat like a disgruntled cat. When she only clasped her hands around his, he settled, wire-strong fingers splaying in hers as he released the chain. But she didn't pull away.

Oh, he thought. She's weird. Touched by the gods, maybe.

Experience and rote memory told him to break her grasp, but he tolerated her touch with deliberate patience. When she finally pulled away, she'd taken the necklace with her. It was a bit like watching one of those street performers vanish a prop with sleight of hand. He slumped against the post at his back, crossing his arms over his chest.

“Nimhal,” he lied without hesitating. He wasn’t going to tell her what to put on the wanted papers; it would be such a simple thing for a city as wealthy and critical to world commerce as Overna to check that name with other ports, and then his week in prison would become a public execution. “You said the weight’s familiar and that’s what tipped you off, which I believe, but you must’ve not put it together fast enough. You didn’t protest when I went after those kids. It’s because of this -”

He lifted his arm and pushed back his layered sleeves, slapped a palm over his elbow. It was much like the way he’d steadied her in the market.

“The mind latches onto a foreign experience before it’ll notice the absence of something familiar. Don’t trust a touch from anybody you don’t know. Even a polite one.”

480. tagged: Elenya Jaromir

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