((This is just a little quest, open for up to two other characters, PM for plot details but feel free to jump in))
The sun was setting on the water in a golden blaze, lighting the cloud-streaked sky with incredible colors. The sight almost made up for the smell.
Ports almost never smell good. Sure, the sea breeze is bracing and salty and all that, but it's a rare wind that can clear the stench of sweat and pitch, fish and rot, mangy animals and equally mangy people. Some people could get used to such a pervading odor eventually, but Jade was not currently one of those people. Her wanderings had brought her to this place, and for curiosity she was willing to forsake comfort. She had never been near ships before, and spent the whole day exploring and generally getting in the way.
The glamor was gone now though, replaced by fish smells and a cold breath off the sea that reminded her she had yet to find a place to sleep that night. Jade was stubbornly ignoring the darkening sky at her back, preferring to sit at the end of one of the piers and throw giblets of fish over the water for her pet crow, Craven, to catch. Her legs dangled off the edge, bare feet kicking although the water was some ten feet below.
Craven caught the last morsel neatly and winged his way back to his customary perch on top of her head. Jade began to stand, but movement caught her eye and she stilled.
Two piers over, three men were carrying a crate toward a small sailing ship. This was not an unusual thing in and of itself, but the docks were mostly empty of workers and seamen at this time of day, and something about their attitudes troubled her. They moved the same way she did when she was doing something she wasn't supposed to; careful with every step, looking around at all times, nervous. They hadn't seen her yet. Jade scooted back behind a stack of supplies on her pier and watched them through a crack between two barrels. She would have bet her last copper that they were up to no good.
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