The Eye Watches Wearily (Closed) [Archive]

Tristilde

01-04-16, 11:13 AM

“This book has all the answers if you know the questions,” sighed Tristilde. She closed the volume and dropped it onto the table between herself and her travelling companion. Two tankards wobbled, threatening to spill their heads on the tarnished oak planks.

“Or,” Jahkay offered, “If you stop asking it all the wrong questions.”

Tristilde, to her frustration, could not argue with that. She knew all too well she was not as world weary as her elder sister, but she wished Jahkay would learn to be less heavy-handed with her experience. It would make Tristilde’s constant failures easier for her to bear and the journey from Jehenny less tedious.

“Look around you, Jah. Tell me what you see.” The astrologer gestured with arms wide.

Dheathain seldom brought its many peoples together under one roof. The Dead Drop was its answer to reducing crime in the city of Talmhaidh. If foreigners were too inebriated to steal, kill, and riot all the better for the Drakari Enforcers. It was suitably seedy and in desperate need of paint.

“I see too many cultures in one big pot, all trying to carve out a piece of ‘home’.” Jahkay looked around with a cursory glance to flatter her sister long enough to coax her point from her.

Tristilde saw a mishmash of architecture, rickety tables, and multi-layered sections. Claustrophobic to an extreme, the changes in decor marked out unspoken hierarchies between tiered balconies and booths. One wrong step and a customer would learn how the pub earnt its name. There were so many forgotten nooks and crannies and tables with blind spots that people literally dropped off the face of the earth.

“Yet you wonder why I can’t work out who, and where the Drakari is?” The astrologer shrugged, her voice straining with growing frustration.

Jah curled her lips into a sympathetic smile, picked up her tankard, and partook in as much of the rancid mead as she could. It was, according to the orcish barman, ‘an acquired taste’. Three days prior, they had consulted the Orrery on a matter of grave importance. The Elders had all seen glimpses of a flame bound half-dragon who would prove to be of great historical importance in the years to come.

“We will find him like we always do, and we will watch.” Jahkay set the tankard down slowly. She drew her sister’s attentions and repeated herself for emphasis. “We. Will. Watch.”

“I know. I know…” Tristilde fell silent.

As her elder, Jah held seniority of Tristilde, even though the younger sibling had mastered the rudiments of astrology and mechanics many years before Jah. What Trist lacked in experience of the outer world, she made up for in piles of enthusiasm and eagerness.

“The elders were certain he would come to a place where nine worlds meet by the turn of the moon. How many days left, Trist?”

Distracting her sister with astrology was a tried and tested method of getting things done. Jah felt a pang of guilt every time she did it, but it was necessary. She would, by all means, have to deal with her sister's’ curiosity one day. But not today. Tristilde sat up straight in her chair and rested her hands on her lap. She closed her eyes and took a deep breath, a much practiced ritual amongst her people.

“By star’s rise and moon’s fall…,” she muttered, focussing on the ebb and flow of static in the air. She picked apart the senses, until she tugged only at the Leyline, and completed a myriad calculations in her mind as she scanned mentally stored star charts and calendars. She opened her eyes and let the din of the tavern’s occupants wash over her. “Two days.”

Jah smiled, in earnest this time, and raised the tankard high. Tristilde mirrored her and they clashed them together in a toast. Nobody in the tavern paid them attention. People were too busy playing dice, catching up, and plotting revolutions against supposed tyrants to pay them heed. Had they chosen to do so, they would have set eyes upon two unremarkable, dark skinned woman with oiled faces and steam stained worker’s clothing.

“We find him. We watch. We record.” Jah said to finish the toast. The smell of mushrooms filled her nostrils, which served to remind her to skip a second pint and go on to the wine.

“Stars blessed, give me guidance true,” they said together.