COMPLETED ~ Eldar X Rogue: CSI DC- There's a murderer on the loose...

Whatever the boy had, there was no guarantee it would work and Soneya was – surprisingly – glad all of a sudden that she had Lutis with her and that the man possessed a certain skill set that could come in very handy in this respect. Maybe she should work on her own skills some more. Lockpicking had never been her forte but she could see where it would be useful.

Soneya watched the exchange between man and boy without comment, but as soon as the boy hurried off again, all smiles and parading his reward before the others, she turned to Lutis with a raised eyebrow. “I didn’t know there was actually something sweet about you.” Of course, she meant the candy. Nothing else. Obviously.

“Maybe we shouldn’t try the key here either,” the mage suggested with a telling look towards the never diminishing crowd. “We already have spectators enough and if we try to wriggle open a lock, no matter how, it would draw far too much attention. I’m sure you’ve got plenty of rooms in those pockets of yours to fit in a key. And I’m guessing also a book, hm?”

Soneya glanced around the place once more. The people were bugging her but she wasn’t sure they had found everything they needed or could use yet. She also wanted to know what was inside this ominous book. “Think your employees will find anything else? Do you want to keep looking or do you want to scamper?” No matter what he replied, she might follow his lead. Might.

“You’re not so sour yourself,” Lutis replied quickly to Soneya’s quip, producing the key again and looking at it closely. It certainly was small enough to go into the book, but whether it was actually the right one would remain to be seen. Thankfully Soneya was thinking along similar lines to how he was, and he tucked the little golden piece away into a safe pocket, jiggling around a few unnamed items of his other pockets to make room for the somewhat larger book. Thankfully it didn’t quite fit into the description of ‘a tome’, but it was certainly getting there, from the weight of it.

For all the people hanging around, they weren’t doing a particularly good job of ransacking the place- well, anything left out in open view wasn’t taken yet, but there were a good few things Lutis could see with a bit more looking around, mostly under rubble. No initiative, that’s what was lacking in the general village.
“They’re doing pretty good. Let’s hang around here for a bit more, then gar an’ see this thing, if it opens. I ain’t got a long supply of sweets anyway.”
Luck played against them for finding much more though, as it didn’t take long for whistles and shouts to start at the entrance (what might have been called an entrance…) of the ‘building’ to sound.
“Off with ya, off with ya! Go on, skit. This is property of the lawkeepers, get out of here!” Cue lawkeepers to arrive, of course, with darkening night. It made perfect sense; sprains and broken limbs abounded if all those who were currently occupying the ruins continued to all night, and it was a crime scene after all.

Not so sour? Soneya almost replied but managed to keep her mouth shut. She didn’t want to go into this kind of debate. She hadn’t meant him. Not at all. She had meant.. Oh whatever...

Following his gaze, she noticed a few more items poking out from underneath the rubble as well but none of it quite piqued her interest enough to bend down and retrieve it. The magical feel of the whole place was finally starting to ebb away completely as well and with that gone, some of the pull the late house had exerted on Soneya was vanishing as well.

When the law enforcers suddenly appeared, Soneya’s head whipped towards them before locking eyes with Lutis. “Yup! Time to get out of here! We should listen to the man.” Not that she had ever voluntarily listened to a lawkeeper unless it had been necessary but in this instance it seemed like the best course of action.

“Out back, come on!” She wasn’t particularly in the mood to come across someone they might have encountered earlier in the day already, and she was fairly certain that Lutis felt the same way. Ignoring the rush of people in the other direction, towards what had once been the main entrance to the building, Soneya headed for the kitchen area, or what she supposed might have been a kitchen, where there was another door leading towards the outside – not that any of the ruins could be described as particularly ‘inside’.

For once, it seemed their luck was holding. Without wanting to jinx it, Soneya really did hope that they could avoid bumping into old friends. “I have a room at an inn, not too far from here,” was all she gave by way of explanation when she took it upon herself to lead the way. The innkeeper already didn’t like her, so the added bonus of giving them something else to badmouth her over, didn’t rattle her much. She wasn’t planning on staying around much longer anyway, but the room would give them some privacy and since Lutis hadn’t been particularly forthcoming on personal information, she wasn’t even sure whether he had accommodation or not.

Soon enough, as soon as Lutis had stepped inside, Soneya slammed the door shut and leaned against it heavily. After a few more deep breaths, she finally heaved a sigh of relief before pushing herself away from the door and heading towards a chair.

Lutis’s eyes went wide too as the unwelcome sound of law enforcers reached his ears, one hand moving to cover his face and pull up the neck of his coat, trying to make himself less conspicuous.
“We should, law’s the law. After you.” He hurried Soneya forwards, glancing back frequently behind them as they clambered over the ruin of stone on the ground. They weren’t particularly quiet about it, stones tumbling beneath their feet and overturning all sorts of things. Lutis grabbed hold of a dusty sheaf of papers as a rock came loose and the paleness of the paper caught his eye, shoving them gracelessly into a pocket with everything else. They could be looked after properly later, but for now, they had to get out of there!

There wasn’t anything else of interest as they scrambled out the back- or at least, nothing that was within easy reach for a second’s grab. There were some menial things vaguely hidden under rock, but they didn’t have time to stop for them- Lutis made a mental list as they hurried away down the road, grasping at his pockets to make sure that nothing fell out. Their quest had at least rewarded physical items, but only further inspection would tell them whether it was of any use or not.

Very familial, to be let into Soneya’s own room, Lutis thought as she ushered him inside her lodging for the night. Although, on another point, there hardly was anywhere he could show her to… but they could have stayed in the room downstairs. He wasn’t going to question it either way, taking a look around and a quick peek outside before drawing closed the shutters and pulling out their findings.
“Have a peek at these, grabbed ‘em on our way out.” He passed her the assorted papers he had brought with him, saving the book for his own tinkerings.

With a surprised glance at Lutis, Soneya picked up the sheets of paper he handed her. She hadn’t even seen him pick them out. Must have been when they were running for it, when he had been behind her. But he really was good then. He hadn’t even stopped in his tracks to grab them.

She was tempted to compliment him on the pull but pushed the thought aside. No, she wouldn’t go down that road. They may have worked fairly well together in this little search – for a while at least and aside the fact that he had called her his girl – but he was still as annoying as ever.

It was a good thing the room had come equipped with two chairs and a small table. Soneya had never really seen the use in either of those – until this moment. Then again, she hadn’t thought she might have visitors in her bedroom – until this moment.
It really had been a very strange day.

Turning over sheet after sheet, the mage grew more and more disappointed however, her shoulders sagging as she propped her head on her hand, lying half across the table. Most contained some sort of scribbling over experiments that were of no use to her, neither for her own research nor pertaining to this particular day, and there were even a couple of cooking recipes. What were they supposed to do with this nonsense?

Sighing, Soneya almost wanted to loudly state her annoyance over this when she reached the final paper. “Oh…”
Maybe this heap wasn’t so useless after all. Staring back at her from the paper was the symbol, the one they had been searching for. All around it, the vanished mage’s tiny handwriting utterly filled the page, not leaving a single free spot. She couldn’t make neither head nor tails of what was written there however. “Useless piece of…!!”

Joining Soneya at the table, Lutis drew the book close to him before taking out the key and putting it nearby. Inspecting the book from all angles, he couldn’t see any evidence of wear and tear at all; if he hadn’t known it had been dragged out of a ruined building, he would have said that it was brand new, hot from the inker’s. Strange, really, to find a book in such good quality- even those in bookstores were rarely found in such a pristine condition. That was magic for you though; strange things happened.
He turned it over a few times before looking more closely at the lock. Just like the rest of it, perfectly clean, not a speck of dust or dirt in it. Frowning, he slid in the key- and was amazed to find it fit. And turned, too, although it was stiff and reluctant to turn properly. Lutis leaned close to the tome as he wrestled with the lock, not paying much attention to Soneya’s rustling of paper next to him. He hadn’t looked through the pages… they could be completely useless, or pure gold.

He let out a small puff of satisfaction as the lock clicked again and the key finally turned properly, the covers falling open onto the table. Then he gave a yell of horror as a poisonous looking armoured insect scuttled out, its fat tail raised high to strike with a huge needle on the end. Lutis knocked over his chair in an attempt to scramble back, grabbing hold of the book after a moment of dithering to smash it down on the scorpion’s back. A horrible series of crunching and clicking noises came from underneath the hardback as he pressed down firmly on it, grimacing at Soneya.
“Not sure this investigation lark’s such a good idea any more.” Even if it did mean they had found something now; whatever the creature was guarding inside the book, and Soneya’s thickly-scribbled upon page of notes.

Soneya almost didn’t notice Lutis’ struggle with the book but all of a sudden her attention was caught by something wiggling about that had no business being on the table. Her eyes grew round as saucers when she took in the scorpion and she was up and out of her chair before she could have uttered a single word.

Luckily, Lutis quickly closed the book and Soneya was left standing a few steps away from the table, clutching the papers to her chest. Her gaze finally tore away from the book and locked on the man’s face, hearing his words but not quite sure what to do with them. It was their only lead, so far, along with a bit of gibberish on pages she couldn’t decipher.

“Want to tell me what that was?!” She still remained where she was, dubiously eyeing the book while the noises kept coming from underneath the cover. “That is not normal.” Slowly she moved closer and stretched her hand out towards the book as if to touch it but just before she did so, she looked at Lutis again. “You better hold on tight to that cover!”

The seconds were stretching infinitely while Soneya moved her hand closer to the book again, reluctant to touch it but at the same time the magic seemed to almost call to her. “It’s magic I do not know,” she whispered, more to herself than for Lutis’ benefit.

Then finally her fingertips touched the cover and the mage gasped. “Oh, wow!” The magic was powerful and its pull had her firmly in its grip now. Her whole hand was on the cover before she knew it and her fingers were moving towards the lock Lutis was holding shut tightly though that had not at all been what she wanted to do. No matter how hard she tried however, her fingers would not obey her anymore. Sweat exploded onto her forehead and she let go of the papers, ignoring the way they erratically scattered throughout the room, messing up their order – if there ever really had been one – while she went for her own hand, trying to get it off the book. She didn’t know what would happen, but as her fingers began scratching at Lutis’ hand, she knew that it would be a very bad thing if the cover were to open.

“Lutis!” she gasped, unable to breathe properly, her heart jumping like crazy in her chest. “Lutis!”

Lutis’ grimace didn’t leave his face as he tried to crush down the little monster inside the book, really not enjoying himself.
“I don’t even know what that is, t’tell you,” he said, peering round to the lock hesitantly, although he didn’t let off the pressure yet. A shiver ran down his back at the inhuman noises coming from within, what he would label as distinctly angry, despite no words being said.
That would have been more on the terrifying scale than the disgusting and freaky, to hear the creature talk.

“Watch it!” He tried to pull the book away from Soneya as she reached out to touch it, although as he jerked it across the table from her, her hand just followed. There was absolutely no way he was going to let go of the book, even if she said so, when he was sure that thing was unfortunately still alive. In fact, he thought it might be best just to lock it away again now and throw the whole thing in the fire. His fingers clawed against the cover as Soneya’s nails scratched against him, refusing to budge even as her voice became more shrill.
“What are you doing? Back off, do you want to get stung?” She was mad, to suddenly want the book when she had seen just as well as he had what was inside. And still alive, by the sounds of it, noisier than ever now. He pressed down more heavily on the cover, feeling the book bend underneath his hands, but something about it would refuse to break the creature inside; stupid magic, wired so it wouldn’t get them out of trouble. Shoving at Soneya’s hand with his free one, he tried to prize her away, then draw the book out from under her hand instead.

“Do something already!” Soneya’s voice had almost reached levels of volume only dogs could hear and she was panting as though she had been running for miles without a break. Sweat was running down her back in rivers and she wanted nothing more than to get away, get away from that book!

Alas, her hand had other ideas and she could hardly leave the room without her hand while it was still attached to her. Lutis’ hand was starting to not look good anymore but whatever he did with the book, her hand remained where it was, doing damage and trying its best to open the book. The screeching coming from inside was suddenly starting to slightly change its tone, from angry to seducing to demanding. Soneya had to get the book open but at the same time, she also knew that this could not happen, because if it did, something bad would come of it.

Finally, after what seemed like an eternity, Lutis yanked hard enough and the book finally escaped from her grasp. Soneya instantly jerked her hand back, stepping away from Lutis and the book as quickly as possible until her back was pressed against the wall – and her leg had made the acquaintance of the corner of the bed.

“What the hell is going on?” Her voice rasped and she was still breathing hard, while massaging her hand as though that could do any good in erasing the past experience from her mind. “What just happened?” After what seemed like another eternity, she finally tore her eyes away from the book again and looked at Lutis. Tears had started streaming down her face though she didn’t even notice. She had never been used in such a way, she had never been abused by magic. This was an entirely new experience and she didn’t care for it at all.

It was quite obvious that Soneya had lost her mind, her nails leaving red marks on Lutis’ hand as she fought to get into the book, but he wasn’t having it. That thing inside, if it didn’t die by being squashed, then who knew what havoc it might wreck if it got out? It was increasingly noisy too, pitch risen from an upset clicking and whirring, to something much louder, and much more insistent. Certainly it seemed like a creature smart enough to know that Lutis had wanted to do it harm, and if the book got opened again by Soneya, he didn’t like to think of the stings he would earn.

He didn’t have enough hands to hold down the cover, push Soneya away and reach for the key to lock the thing shut again, so he just had to try for the first two as he tugged it away from her across the table.
As soon as she let go, he pulled the book to the far edge, away from her, and crushed down on it with both hands again, watching her with wide eyes and judgement as she backed away to the other side of the room, brushing his fingers over the scratches she had left on him. Then he remembered what he was going to do, and scrabbled for the key, swiftly turning it in the lock of the book and trapping away the monster inside more firmly.
Strangely, the noises stopped at once, apparently placated by the book being locked again. Or, it knew that it couldn’t escape now. Breathing a small sigh of relief, he slowly drew his hands away, as if the whole book might pounce. It stayed mercifully still.
“What was that about?” he asked, looked up at Soneya, then his face turning a little unsure as he saw the state of her tear-streaked cheeks. “Oh…” Magic was such a pain in the ass. “You ahreet?”

For a brief moment, Soneya was utterly still, trying to catch her breathing, regain her composure – anything! Though she already knew that it was a futile attempt. So she didn’t waste any more effort on that and simply snapped: “No, I’m not bloody alright!”

It was clearly visible, wasn’t it? Wiping the tears from her face with a savage gesture, Soneya turned her back on Lutis’ judging gaze and moved towards the small dresser where a bowl and a pitcher of water stood. She didn’t want to explain, she didn’t want to see him judge her, even though he had every right to do so. Instead, she poured some water into the bowl and dunked her hands in it, the cool instantly easing her pain a little.

After splashing some of it into her face, she grabbed one of the towels and dunked it into the bowl, before turning back to Lutis. Towel in hand, she moved towards the table, forcing herself to not even glance at the book from the corners of her eyes and gruffly asked for his hands.

Lutis might normally have had a snarky retort as a response to Soneya’s snapped words, but at the look on her face, he knew not to bait her any more tonight. Instead he looked down at the book again, giving her a bit of space as she so unhappily started to clean herself up. Magic. It did strange things, and apparently, those that used it weren’t immune to its wiles, just as the rest of them weren’t.
He didn’t know what to make of anything that had just happened, but he knew he wasn’t going to get anything out of Soneya for the moment, so he started to outline the events that had just happened in his head, and try and put explanation to them.
First I opened this book, and that thing jumped out. Looked like a scorpion or something. But when it got squished back inside the book, it didn’t die.
So, it must have been some sort of magic. And the book too, magic.
And Soneya is magic… so… maybe it did something to her magic? He didn’t know well enough on the subject to draw any conclusion from that. But it made sense… and that was why she was suddenly distraught. Because it had just taken control, and done what it liked. She had seen what had been inside, and there was no way she would have voluntarily wanted that thing out.

He was a little reluctant to let Soneya touch him after the thin gouges she had made against the backs of his hands, but figured she had managed to gain control of herself again. Trying to avoid looking at her too closely, he carefully reached through the cloth to hold her hands lightly in his.
"What did it do t'you?"

Her initial reaction was to pull back her hands as soon as Lutis tried to hold them but it felt too good to have human contact at the moment, light as the touch was, to step away. For a moment, she just remained the way she was with the cloth in between her lightly held hands. She didn’t want to reply, not really.

Though the experience was eating at her and after a few more seconds, Soneya couldn’t hold in any longer. Grasping his hands and holding on, she hiccuped, trying to hold back another outburst of tears.

“It controlled me. Or my hand rather. It... it told me to hold on, to open it. It wanted me to open the book and let out the creature.” A shudder shook her and her fingers clasped Lutis’ a little tighter, not wanting to let go now that she knew she wasn’t quite alone, no matter how much the man angered her most of the time.
“There was nothing I could do to stop it,” she whispered, the memory of that knowledge the worst of the whole situation. “There was nothing I could do. It was so strong.” She still couldn’t quite explain how it had been possible, how it would most likely be possible again if they didn’t get rid of the book, but it had to have something to do with the fact that she knew how to use magic, if a very different kind to the one surrounding the book.

“I’m sorry,” she said though she avoided his eyes. She had hurt him, and no matter how many times she had considered slapping him silly for being him, she hadn’t wanted to do this. She hadn’t actually wanted to hurt him. Her thumb idly traced over the bit of hand she could reach, following the line of a particularly nasty scratch. “I’m really sorry.”

Whatever the pair of them had been thrown together in, it was dark magic. Lutis felt way out of his depth, on all accounts, but there wasn’t much point or use in simply flailing around and hoping that things would sort themselves out on their own around him, and there would be a happy consequence for him too; no. He would have to just suck it up and try and work out this whole mess- starting with Soneya. She was the one with the experience in this sort of thing, and he couldn’t afford for her to be a wreck, through one moment in time, or back out completely. So, he didn’t let go for the moment, his eyes down on their clasped hands.
“I don’t know what that thing was,” Lutis started slowly as she seemed to tail off, his words a little hesitant as he deal with things he didn’t truly understand, “but I know it’s not something good. Dark magic, innit? You can’t expect to… be able to counter everything. Even having magic. We’re sucked into something bad here, worse than Kaionar stuff.” It wasn’t a particularly soothing thought. “You didn’t open it, and you ain’t gonna. I’ll take it up to the lawhouse in t’morning.” And throw it at the door, before anyone realised who it was had delivered the evil book. Let someone else deal with possessed items, Lutis didn’t want to get stung by some super-powerful golem.

“Don’t worry yourself over it. Had worse.” Lutis tried to brush off Soneya’s words, not wanting her to get even more upset than she already was; he was fairly adept at coping with mild distress, but if it got any worse… he would have been at a loss on how to comfort her. He did wince as she brushed her thumb over where she had dug in her nails though, his eyes tightening at the corners. “I’d rather you didn’t uh… make it worse, though.”

His words were soothing, though it was more the tone of voice than the actual words that finally seemed to reach Soneya. She began to relax a little, the tension slowly drifting out of her frame. He was right – as painful as that thought actually was. There was nothing they could do about this, both of them were way out of their league with this. Soneya herself was a simple water mage and had nothing whatsoever to do with dark magic or any other magic really for the most part. And as for Lutis, well, the man was a thief and if he had any kind of magical skill, he would certainly not waste it on figuring out a book but for other things.

She was about to express her wish to be able to heal injuries when he winced at her touch. ‘Make it worse?’ As nice as he might have been before, those words stung, even if they hadn’t been meant to even be remotely hurtful.
“Fine.” The word was out before she could stop it. She instantly dropped his hands, snatched up the towel and turned back to the bowl of water. Anything not to have to look at him right then. What the hell was wrong with her?

In order to distract herself, she tried to pick up their sort of conversation. “It would probably be best if we did hand the book over to those investigating this case. It is none of our business anyway. Maybe we would have done better to never get involved in the first place.” Though that had been spectacularly out of their hands ever since they had stumbled onto the body by chance and had been incarcerated for that very unfortunate incident.

Her hands were clean by the time she was talking and she painstakingly folded the towel and put it next to the bowl. There was nothing else left to do, yet she couldn’t bring herself to turn around.
There was a book on the table, and she would see it if she turned around. Plus, there was a man in that direction and she did not want to see his face at that particular moment.
Instead, she put her hands on the dresser and heavily leaned on them, taking a few deep breaths.
The situation had completely gone out of hand and she was unsure how to deal with it.

Oops, the wrong thing to say. Lutis winced as Soneya snapped out at him again, the peace between them well and truly shattered. Easy come, easy go, as the saying went... He wished she didn't snap so quickly, though.
"Sorry." He winced, his fingers curling into loose fists as she turned away from him sharply again. Right back to square one. Great. Just great.
He wanted to wash his hands, but feared Soneya's wrath if he interrupted this new sulking fit of hers. Washing his new scratches would have to wait until later, then. He drew one hand up to his mouth to suck at the back of it, sitting back down at the side of the table now it was safe to do so. Hopefully.

"Maybe. We're kinda stuck in this whole thing now though... I'm not sure how there's a way outta it without just gettin' to the end." This whole thing was way too like the fantastic stories children made up to scare their friends in the middle of the night; you tried to escape, but the monsters just kept on following you regardless. And then decided they were bored of that, and chomp! you were the next victim.
Lutis really hoped he wouldn't earn that unfortunate title. He rather hoped that Soneya wouldn't either, even for all her mood-swings and sarcasm. Drawing the book towards him slowly across the table, he turned it over a couple of times with a thunk, listening for any sounds of the beast within, but the tome was steadfastly silent. Apparently it only got angry when it was unlocked.
"We can't really do anything with this anyway, with a bloody great magic scorpion inside. What a crap red herring." He picked up the book properly and looked closely at the lock, although kept his fingers away from the keyhole itself. That thing had had one hell of a stinger... Not pleasant in the slightest. "Somebody's not going to be pleased in the mornin' when they find this beastie..." Perhaps they shouldn't leave the key. In fact, that probably was a good call. They didn't want to get called in for real murder through nonchalance.

Such a decision didn't really move forwards their own investigation any though. Lutis put the book to one side as Soneya messed with her back to him, apparently unwilling to communicate properly with him. Back to her old haughty self. "Ahreet. Enough about this excuse of a useful object. You found something interesting too, didn't ya?" He had been somewhat distracted when her call had come, but it registered with him now.

She ignored the apology in favour or trying to keep her breathing and her emotions in check. For the time being, Soneya really wasn’t sure what to think of all of this. In a way, Lutis was right. They couldn’t just get out of this now, and she knew that. They were in a little too deep for a quick get-away. On the other hand, she didn’t see the point in doing the lawkeepers’ job either. Then again. what if that… that thing inside the book got loose?

Upon his question, she finally turned around. “Oh, yeah, I found something,” she replied, sarcasm tainting her voice. “A bloody, worthless piece of shit!” Her voice had risen with each word and she finally threw her hands in the air, before flopping back against the dresser.

“Sorry,” she muttered through gritted teeth as she forced herself to calm down. “This is just frustrating.” Sighing, she pushed herself away from the piece of furniture and began to gather up the papers which seemed to have scattered just about everywhere on the floor during their struggle with the book. She couldn’t even remember dropping them.

“I did find something though,” she said in an attempt to pick up the conversation in a somewhat measured tone. “But with everything, there is a drawback. The symbol is exactly what we’re looking for.” She rummaged through the pieces until she found the one she had in mind and placed it on the table before Lutis. “But there is so much writing on there, I can’t even begin to decipher most of the notes, and the ones I can read are impossible to comprehend. I have absolutely no idea what this guy meant with all these scribbles.”

Sighing again, Soneya took her seat at the table again as well. She flicked through the pages again, just for the sake of it. They were completely in disorder now. Besides, there hadn’t been much of interest or use in them anyway. She felt like she wanted to rip her hair out in frustration, or curl into a ball on the bed. With yet another sigh, she tore her eyes away from the papers and fixed her gaze on Lutis instead. Maybe he could make something of the writing? Though she doubted it, since it’s supposedly magic-related.

“What should we do now?”

“Woah, you don’t have to take it out on me,” Lutis said, starting to get a little bit annoyed now with Soneya’s constant grousing and sniping at him, even for things that weren’t his fault. She might think herself perfect, but that was far from the case. Perhaps it was getting close to the time to take a break, when they were biting at each other like wolves for the smallest things. He reached for the mess of papers strewn across the desk as Soneya sulked, flicking through each one in turn as he put them back into a pile. There wasn’t any order, just higgldy-piggldy; he had scooped them up on the way through, and anything could have been written on the pages. It looked like all sorts of things were, a strange mixture from doodles, to thick notes, to all sorts of other things. Great. That’d be more time wasted reading through to-do lists of some malicious sorcerer.

He smoothed his hands across the piece of paper she laid in front of him, bending closely to try and read the scrawled handwriting around the symbol Lutis was starting to become uncomfortably familiar with now. His eyes narrowed to slits to try and make out the thick pen marks, then he shook his head as it dawned on him.
“Oh guardians, we are gonna be in hella trouble if your magic user works out we’ve got this.” He ran a finger along the marks, turning over the paper and inspecting it from every angle before almost pressing his nose back against it in how closely he looked to read it. “There’s reasons you can’t decipher this; most of it’s not in common symbols. You got a pen?” He wasn’t very good with letters, his writing crude at best, but he could make sense of these cryptic runes. “We got ourselves a rogue sorcerer, looks like. These are thief glyphs.” Not good, if their murderer had taken up working with the underground.

Soneya went very still when Lutis completely ignored her in order to intently stare at the writing on the page. Without wanting to, her heart started beating faster when he kept fidgeting with the page, turning it this way and that, scrunching his face together in an attempt to read the writing.

She was bursting, desperately wanting to ask what it was he had seen that she had not – which stung a little but she was glad that he actually had found something she had not, it at least meant that this hadn’t been completely for nothing.

“Not in common symbols?” she repeated, intrigued, but she didn’t question further. Instead she got up to rummage through her bag sitting next to the bed. As soon as she had found the pen, and oh wonders a spare piece of paper, she placed both in front of Lutis and took her seat once more.

“Rogue sorcerer doesn’t sound very good,” she muttered more to herself than to Lutis’ benefit since the man was busy scribbling his own notes.
“They’re what? Thief glyphs? What is that?” Soneya had never heard of such a thing, then again, it shouldn’t be such a surprise that thieves had their own way of communicating. Smuggling and thieving had to work, and it couldn’t if every common farmer could figure out the secret messages passed on between individual parties.

“What does it say? Can you make anything of it?” She didn’t want to rush him but her curiosity was growing. She was still a little weary about the book and tried to stay as far away from it as possible but the paper had so far been harmless, and she hoped it stayed that way. Unable to keep patient any longer, she got up and positioned herself so that she could lean in and look over Lutis’ shoulder, watching him as he worked.

Lutis narrowed his eyes at the words as he heard Soneya moving around the room, only looking up as she put his requested items next to him. Okay, from the top, he had to work out what all the words meant, then spell them right…
“Uhm, well…” Lutis paused as he started to translate across the words, pulling a bit of a face at Soneya’s question. Oops. “They’re a Kaionar thing. They’re fairly well known…” he bluffed, trying to cover up his tracks badly again. “You know. Common in one place, unknown somewhere else. Everybody knows ‘em. Even kids.” Pickpocketing ones. Soneya was going to find out the unpleasant truth about him sooner or later, but he rather hoped that he would have her on his side enough by then that she wouldn’t go running straight to the authorities. He wasn’t sure she would now, but even still. They had hardly known each other a long time, even if since meeting they hadn’t been apart.

“Anyway, heh. Wait a bit, I’m not very good at this.” It took a lot of concentration for Lutis to read and then, even more, copy across the words onto paper, each stroke meticulously placed, even if most of them were then wobbly or wonky. He had been taught to write, but he did live in Kaionar, after all. After he had finished copying across a couple of scribbled paragraphs, he sat back to take a break, putting down his pen decisively next to the paper.
Source a pint of ebony hunter blood Yarrowitz rainforest—CHARIS
~~Nightshade~~; got, under floorboards with ~~blister beetles~~
--> Does it need to be fresh?
Dark magic works subconsciously on the emotions and morality of those it is undertaken on. Manipulation is certainly a possibility if applied right. They may need some more influence than mere application however.
Wolf, Scroll. River, Poltergeist, Guardian, Tower… You need to find the others too

“Try that out.” Lutis read over the list more slowly, most of it a mess of information to him, but he was sure that some of it at least was relevant. It was difficult to tell, when it was all mixed together.

Keeping her impatience in check was difficult, but Soneya managed nonetheless. She wanted to snap at Lutis again but she also realised that she had done more than enough of that already. Not that it really made much of a difference to her but she also knew that her attitude wasn’t the easiest to deal with, so she at least tried to be good for the time being.

The words didn’t make much sense to her either however, at least not at first glance. Nightshade? Blister beetles? “Those look like ingredients,” she said as her finger traced over parts of the writing. At the mention of blood, goose bumps spread up her arms, making the tiny hairs there stand on edge.

“There is nowhere any mention of a night dragon in this. Do you think that was one of the ‘others’ the sorcerer was talking about here?” She pointed to the relevant passage in Lutis’ writing, letting her finger linger over the words ‘wolf’ and ‘scroll’ for a while. “If he is after dragons for a particular reason, then wolf and scroll may be the next victims.” Though how could they possibly know if that was really the case or how it could be prevented when they couldn’t be sure about anything.

The only thing that really did seem clear was the fact that she had a dark soul and was thus easier affected by the influence of the dark arts. “So I was affected because my heart is black enough to be manipulated by this kind of magic.” Soneya straightened up and stepped away from the table. “Wonderful news.”
Shivering, she rubbed her arms but it didn’t help, so she quite simply took the quilt from the bed and wrapped it around herself in an attempt to suppress the shivers.
Trying not to succumb to self-pity and even more frustration, the woman turned her attention back to Lutis. “What do you make of all this? Can you make something of it?”

"Ingredients for what?" Lutis asked, following Soneya's finger across the page. "What the hell is a blister beetle?" He didn't think he wanted to go looking under the floorboards for whatever those were- they didn't sound at all nice. "That thing inside the book?" Although that had looked more like a scorpion than a bug...
There didn't seem to be much sense in the words that had been translated so far, but perhaps there would be more once Lutis had dealt with the whole page. For now though, they had some interesting new leads to go on. Well, hopefully they were leads. They might just be dead ends- like the book.

"Perhaps... well, it sounds kinda stupid. Maybe he thought night dragons and ebony hunters are the same? They're both kinda dark looking... I dunno about you, but I've never seen an ebony hunter." They were rare dragons, shy and secluded in the depths of the rainforest- unlike the somewhat more common night dragon, a glittering, eye-catching beast. Still not a breed you'd see every day, but more likely to be found than the former. "Or it could be one of the others, yeah... How's he gonna get hold of a Guardian though? They're not easy dragons to find, let alone knock on the head." The fate of any wolf or scroll dragons in the area didn't look good though, it had to be said.
It almost looked like a list of dragons on a hit list, when you started looking it at like that. Mention of a night dragon, and it would have been pretty solid proof.

He looked up at Soneya as she straightened with bitter words, shaking his head. "Nah, I don't think that's the case. That'd be crazy. I should have been clawing that book too, if that was how things worked. Maybe it was just 'cos you're a magician. Makes you more susceptible to all this stuff." He leaned back in his chair, rubbing over his hand absentmindedly. He hadn't done any writing for a long while, and even a little of the close concentration had made his fingers ache. "I think I better translate the rest of this thing before we start makin' any full decisions. This guy's definitely got something dodgy going on though. I wouldn't want to be a wolf dragon tonight, that's for certain. I don't understand these other bits, either. Poltergeist? What do you even... how do you do anything to one of those? Are there even such things?" It seemed to be a weird word to put in amongst a group of other, much more normal and easier sourced things.

“Maybe you’re right,” Soneya conceded but she wasn’t convinced. If the thing had only attacked her because she was a magician, it still didn’t speak for the state of her soul, but she was glad for Lutis’ words, and said as much, though the words were spoken quietly again since she wasn't all too keen on admitting these kinds of things, or talking about them in any way. She had already had had far too many mushy moments with Lutis. It wasn't good.

“Mmmhh, maybe the entirety of the page will indeed clue us in a little more but I’m not sure we should count on it. Everything seems so overly complicated and convoluted. Or just plain doesn't make any sense.” Soneya went back to the dresser and this time poured two mugs of water from the jug, almost emptying it. “Poltergeists do exist but only if they’re summoned. You need a specific and very complicated ritual with many different ingredients to make it work. Though as far as Guardians are concerned. Well if anyone wants to go up against one of them, better them than me. I would definitely not dare, even if I had more power and skill than I do.”
She shook her head and picked up the two mugs to return to the table and sit down, placing one in front of Lutis. “No, that would be utter nonsense.”

After quietly musing for a while, slumped in her chair, chin on her left hand while the right was fiddling with the handle of the mug, she finally picked up their conversation again. “But I do like your theory about the night dragon and ebony hunter confusion. I have never seen an ebony hunter either and you’re right, they do look similar, if common descriptions are anything to go by. Maybe that’s why we’re left with the carcass? Maybe something went wrong with the ritual? Or maybe we should consider this from a completely different angle. Or maybe we should really just wait on the conspiracy theories until we have more information.”

Lutis tapped his fingers on the table, musing over the situation. It probably didn’t help that they’d been thinking about it all day, a constant thing on their minds… they needed a fresh look at it, without the feeling that they were scrambling around for clues in exactly the wrong place.
He rested his elbow on the table as Soneya talked, rubbing one hand over his face. He didn’t particularly want to pick apart the whole page of gibberish now, but if they left it… another dragon might get their throat cut. And that was before they even worked out what it all meant.
“Cheers.” Water wasn’t really enough for him to comprehend all this properly, but he would take what he was given. Slowly quaffing from his mug, he thought about the guardians and poltergeists. Neither sounded easy to find, but he was sure he could remember something about them… and the other things listed too.
“Maybe this mage is… just as confused as we are.” Literally, it was such a mess of information, it was difficult to imagine anybody understanding it all. “This feels more like… well, more like conspiracies than actual tryin’ to do something.” There were scribbles and marks all over the page, haphazard notes, rather than something planned and scripted. “You’d think that if you were gonna go out and start killin’ dragons, you’d at least have a plan. And know what you’re going after, rather than just stabbing the first dragon you came across.” They had found clues, certainly, but that didn’t mean they were any closer to getting somewhere with figuring this whole thing out.

“Maybe we should sort all this.” That seemed logical. “Then maybe check through these other papers we picked up too. They might seem like gibberish now, but I bet they’ll make sense with this page translated.” It was all gibberish, when you tried to read it like a book page. “If this mage needed ebony hunter blood for his magic stuff, then a night dragon wouldn’t really cut it, I’d think.” Was that why the place had blown up so spectacularly?

“We probably should yes,” Soneya agreed, reaching for the flying sheets of paper and trying to get them sorted again – somehow. The papers still all seemed like gibberish to her, but maybe Lutis was right. Maybe this really was more notes than actual knowledge of something in particular. Maybe…

“What if this isn’t the guy we need? What if some kind of spell just happened to go wrong for this mage and it has nothing at all to do with the murder of the dragon?”
Shaking her head, she continued: “But then why the symbol? It isn’t as though it was commonly used. At least not from what I know.” Then again, lately, what did she know? All the incidents here seemed to indicate that she was a completely hollow nut when it came to magic and that she was basically just a shell with no filling, which was to say no magical knowledge whatsoever.

“No, no two kinds of blood are ever the same or would ever have the same effect if used for a spell or anything. The wrong blood might not mix well with whatever it was intended to be used for.” Once again, Soneya replied to Lutis’ musings without really paying attention to the actual words but by now she was too tired to do anything.

“You know, maybe sleeping over it wouldn’t be a bad idea. We’re never going to make heads nor tails of this if we keep mulling it over and over again, going back to the same things all the time. Maybe in a few hours things look different?”
She was also very aware of the fact however that any hour they spent sleeping was an hour lost on rescuing the next dragon. Then again, if they were on the wrong track, all of this was going to be in vain and a huge waste of time.

» COMPLETED ~ Party Time! With Liz and Eldar
» Anyone for the rescue? (Cold, Parade, Eldar)
» Chance Meeting [Kor] - Completed
» Height of the Hunt (Eldar & Nen)
» The Altar of Stars (Alex X Eldar)