Wander Inn (See Rule 1)

[Snowsaber]

Kadira's eyes shot to Desiree, emerging from beneath a counter. They returned to the strange man before her, and her hand brushed his as she took the key he extended.
Her gaze dropped to the number, the tiny inscription on the key that seemed made for her... odd.
Her lips pursed in a small pout, wishing the man had answered her implicit question - where in the green moons of Aenthor am I? but she wasn't willing to voice that question, to further admit her ignorance of her location.
Instead she grasped the key, the metal firmly denting the pale skin where it pressed.

She half smiled a thanks to the elf, for the key, and the woman for the information. Kadira took the path that seemed most likely, to find the room herself rather than voice a demand for direction. She'd learned long ago that admitting ignorance was admitting weakness, and weakness was.... costly.

The room, when she found it, submitted to her key, and she pushed open the door to find a room with low cushions for chairs, a small, burnished mahogany table beside them atop which stood a crystal pitcher of water and a small drinking bowl. A polished mirror hung from the walls, and across from it was a mattress on the floor with large pillows and fluffed blankets. The room was lit dimly, and from the ceiling hung heavy drapes which billowed in the gentle breeze from the windows. Everything was colored like dusk... deep black, purples and reds.

((I made the assumption that the inn would provide a room most to the characters comfort... I wasn't sure if that's correct. Lemme know if I was wrong and I'll alter the post 8D. Also, I'd like to request a favor- could you guys either pm or post your character's physical descriptions for me? I don't want to hunt them down... just a few words so I can visualize who I'm talking too. <3 ))

[Lirael]

The elf smiled broadly, and laughed for the first time since his entrance, ringing against the walls. At last, the bright lady out of her shell, it was a beautiful sight, the lines of laughter in her eyes, the tinkle of it in her voice.

"To tell you true, Desiree," he replied, still smiling widely with a shrug, "that is something I know not. I only come with the knowledge given to me by one owner, and history and sense of the Other, Lirael and Felicity, respectively."

He paused to bow his head to the mohawked lady as she took her key from him, sure that she would find what she needed in her room, before returning his gaze to Desiree. He rose, then, and followed her back behind the counter, scanning the shelves hidden in shadow with his better vision, crouching beside her.

"I think the only mean...refrain from opening any unknown bottles," he continued, "I have heard some horror stories," he finished with a chuckle, a wink in her direction.

[angelofnwn]

Crouched beside the elf, Desiree maintained what she felt was a comfortable distance but smiled at his joke.

"Horror stories? Oh, do tell!" she said, uncertain whether or not she was comfortable with him - or whether or not she really wanted to hear said stories. "You said your name was... Elthanis, right?"

[Lirael]

"Elthanas, yes, Miss Desiree," came the easy reply. He did not look to her, let her decide her sentiments without outside interference. While she did that, he managed to find a pan. "JFS... I cannot remember what it stands for, but never touch a bottle of it. Absinthe and arsenic lie side by side on this shelf, so... care must be taken."

[Snowsaber]

"I swear I just heard the word Absinthe" Kadira said, reemerging into the common area. The proclamation was followed by a deep blush, as she remembered she was dealing with strangers, not friends, but the blush quickly faded and she leaned comfortably against a table.
"My room is fantastic, I must thank you." she announced, directing it as much at the elf as the room around her, unsure who or what was really to thank.

She felt awkward, unsure of how to communicate, so she slipped from the table to a seat and took a small device from her belt- about the size of a photograph, but an inch or so wide, and fiddled with it for a moment. The top changed from a deep grey to beige, and dark words appeared on it.

[angelofnwn]

Desiree, still crouched below the counter, did not see the item Kadira was manipulating, but probably would have been curious had she seen it. Magic, in this place, was becoming less of thing to be feared and more a thing to be admired and put to good use. Just a shame I guess that no one at home thought to put magic to such good uses... if the people at home are even capable of such good things... Desiree's home had little contact with magic, and what little there was tended to be almost exclusively violent and destructive.

"Elthanas, why would the inn even stock such items, poisonous as they are? I hope they don't get used in the cooking." Her forhead creased with slight worry as she poked around, turning the bottles to read any that had labels. She had moved an inch or so closer, the task at hand helping her to forget her discomfort and embarassment.

[Lirael]

The elf smiled widely, silent laughter behind his eyes only, as befitted his quiet nature. "The owners, Desiree, were the only ones who would come behind these counters. Though others have been so stupid since. They did not cook with them, to my knowledge."

His voice had been pitched to carry over the counter as well, and it was to this currently-unseen figure that he directed the next comment: "They will not answer, you know. But perhaps you may sense the... nod? instead, Miss."

"Ah!" he interrupted himself, seizing a simple green bottle, two hand-spans in height, in which swam a liquid whose color was masked by tinted glass. "Oil," he pronounced with some pride, and set the bottle down between them.

OOC: I may post for Jenna later tonight. As it is, I'm heading home and need to write a test and the like. So will see!

[angelofnwn]

"Well a pan and some oil are good, but what I'd really like are some," and mid sentence Desiree stood up, shaking out her leggs as she did so, and spotted the strange one holding a small, almost glowing, brick. "...eggs," she finished her eyes fixed on Kadira's strange object. Slowly she was learning that not all magic was bad, but it would take perhaps years to undo her ingrained fear of it.

[Capt Brian C Keltcher]

((OOC: Update! I am doing fine, and have not been able to check on GAIA for a lil while. But, does not mean I have forgotten, I shall return! domokun *dashes out*))

[Lirael]

The small woman came nearly bounding down the stairs, hair flying in every direction. Until her dark eyes caught sight of the strange creature seated at the table with dark in her clothes and magic in her hands.
That last bound turned into a jump, a roll, and in the flash of the world rolling over, Jenna realized what she was doing and broke out of it in a spring to land on the stage.
An acrobat. An entertainer. A performance, and nothing more. This is what her body sung, arms outflung as a gymnast finishing her dance on the mats, waiting for that perfect score. Jenna relaxed from it much faster, though, and instead shot a sideways glance at the unknown woman and the heads behind the counter.
So the elf was still here. She could see his tapered ears peeking out from behind the woodwork from time to time, could hear the soft sussurous of his voice. That hint of uncertainty, of kindness, completely contradicted everything her instincts told her, everything in his silence and his catlike grace. A threat in body but not in mind? It didn't make sense.
For a few moments, the lady wished she'd stayed upstairs.

"Greetings, hail and welcome," she offered to the newcomer with a bow, still standing on the stage. "I am Dana. And who might you be?"

[Snowsaber]

She recoiled, dropping the small device n the table where it snapped closed, gasping as the tiny woman entered in a flurry of movements and excitement. She recovered in time to smile, clapping softly at the miniature performance.

"Greetings to you as well, Dana. I am Kadira. I am..." she paused, uncertain, "... very lost. Are you a bard?"

She swung her legs, her entire body rotating to face Dana as she spoke. Her hand grasped her abandoned device, tossed it to spin through the air, then caught it and slid it seamlessly into its synthetic leather holster at her belt.

[Lirael]

The inward sigh of relief, the sudden screaming silence of the blood that stopped rushing and pounding through her hears, seemed so loud that Jenna feared it was as audible as it seemed. Glady, it was only her imagination that constructed the aural fantasy. Yes, an entertainer and nothing more.

But her answer was another bow, a slight, wry smile, and a reply that screamed an affermative even in its ambiguity.

"Mayhap I serve such functions. A body gets to doin' a lot of things over the course of time."

Her smile grew wider. "Pleasure to meet you, Kadira.... are you?"

It was no mistake that her eyes followed the disappearance of the strange device, but inquiring about it now would get her nowhere, and it did not scream danger to her as some things did. Let it be thought of as the notorious curiosity of the wandering entertainers.

He had noticed the entrance - who could not have? It was nearly loud enough in movement to wake the dead, though her steps could have been louder than they were. It was the tumblethat most gave her away, and that split second he peeked over the counter only to comfirm the goings-on in the room.

Ear tips longed to redden with the weight and wariness of the small woman's stare, though from annoyance or embarrassment one could not say. Instead, he cleared his throat and smiled once more to Desiree. "Eggs may be had... I will check in the back."

No sooner said than the elf disappeared into the great unknown: the kitchen of the Wander Inn. A good excuse to leave the little deceptor be.

His internal sigh was a morning gale.

[Snowsaber]

"Am I bard? hardly!" she responded laughingly, deliberately misinterpreting the question.
Something seemed a bit off, the slight pause before the answer, a moment's hesitation and a case of nerves. Yes, something wasn't right... with anything.

But it wasn't Kadira's inn, or home, or ship... or anything. She had no jurisdiction to demand a truth, to demand clear explanations or straightforward answers, so she didn't press.

"You're a fantastic tumbler." she declared, as if this thought were the most significant thing to be said.

She had no grace for small talk.

[Lirael]

A blast that shook the Inn to its very foundations paused all activity and conversation. But just for the split second it took for the building to decide that nothing untoward had happened and it could go about its regular business of being a possibly mysteriously semi-sentient building.

It did, however, take a moment to expel a not-too-reluctant, but appearing-unscathed elf from the bowels of the back room, his arms held protectively over bright red orbs. It was these strange-colored things that he offered to Desiree with a smile. "Eggs?"

The bright red orbs seemed to be. Slightly ovular, like eggs. Cold, fragile shells, like eggs. Smelled like eggs. They would even stand and roll like eggs. Clearly, this made them eggs.

But red eggs?

What a strange place this was.

Jenna rose from the stabilising crouch she'd fallen into with the blast to stand as she had been previously. Though, after a split moment, she instead elected to sit down. She'd spoken loudly enough already.

And this one seemed to sense something. There were words that were spoken too loudly, and others loudly enough. Let the dance of words begin along the webs of lies and misdirection. It was a game as any other, where one's life was, at some times, the only appropriate stake.

The woman, Kadira, did not look dangerous. Or too dangerous. But her perception was unsettling. At least she knew her place, as Jenna brightly decided to pretend she did not know hers. All places were home when you had none. And entertainers had no homes.
And imaginary West wind warmed her back with thoughts of sand and sun, gone again in a fleeting instant.

"You speak too kindly, Miss," 'Dana' returned. "But I apologize that I nearly ran into you earlier. Did you just come in?"

A clearing of the throat, an obvious indication that this small talk was as awkward on this end as on the other. Half of her attention threw itself at the red eggs that she eyed so suspiciously.