Avishraa Reloaded

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====== The Bow is Bent, the Arrow Flies ======
===== Chase =====
The dark-blue male skidded around a corner, glanced up and down the crossroad, and then galloped along it, skidding around the very next corner in a completely different direction; the sounds of pursuit got fainter, but there were still fliers overhead tracking him. He should, he admitted wryly to himself, have changed his disguise much earlier, but he'd gotten cocky, lost his opportunity. And since then, he'd had eyes on him the whole time. Say what you like, they had an efficient Watch here in Borek.

Civically admirable as it might have been, he had to concede that it was causing him some difficulty. He might have to take some drastic steps if he couldn't find sufficient cover.

The river was up ahead, but even at this time of night, it would be thick with fishermen, both above and below the surface, going about their business; however murky the water was, there would be too many witnesses around. He couldn't - hold on, hold on, there was the dockyard up ahead. Like the piers themselves, many of the buildings there were constructed on stilts, to keep them above water even during a mild flood. His antennae lifted in a brief grin.

He scuttled down the street and across the mud adjacent to the river - he'd leave footprints, but it couldn't be helped; flying would just draw more attention from the airborne watchmen - and ducked underneath a ramshackle building, a recently-abandoned fisher's hut by the looks of it. He crept underneath the center of the building-

"Wha?" A voice mumbled. The blue male whirled around; in the gloom, half-hidden under a pile of rotted burlap sacks, another male lifted his head and blinked at him. "Wha're y' doin', I dun-"

"Shhhh," the blue male replied soothingly, stepping gently over to him. "No need to be alarmed. I'm just looking for-"

He brought his forepaw down, claws extended, across the other's throat.

"-a place to hide," he continued, then added, "Undisturbed." As his victim's muscles tightened, he observed critically that the poor fellow must've been extremely drunk or otherwise inhibited; normally the poison caused a lot more, well, clenching than that, not that it mattered with a slashed throat.//On the bright side//, he thought, cheering up, //at least he'd likely been cushioned enough not to suffer.//

It was a pleasant thought that he'd been able to do a small kindness, however unintentionally.

It was an even more pleasant thought that this happy little meeting had presented a wonderful little opportunity. The blue male studied his victim intently for a few moments, uncovering him from the sacks to do so, and then lay on the ground. His form, and that of the recent resident of the crawlspace, both [[chosen:magic:shift|blurred]]; and then, after a moment, it seemed that the two had switch places; the victim, still with a slashed throat pumping blood onto the ground, was young and dark blue, while an unharmed and considerably older red takma lay a short distance away.

//Unharmed... yes, best to fix that.//

Without evident reluctance, the red extended his claws again and inflicted a few scratches and cuts over his forelegs and face. Then he tossed a purse in front of the corpse and flopped down, contriving to look exhausted and in pain, until the watchmen caught up.

===== Escape =====
A takma lounged atop a heavy branch in a large tree. He was uniformly [[takma:scales_and_coloration|bronze-scaled]], though covered with recent scratches upon his forelegs and face, and quite young, not yet halfway through his third cycle and only barely into adolescence. His antennae seemed permanently upturned in an expression of cheery cheekiness; it was the sort of face many would happily be friends with, though possibly they would be unwise to trust it not to be behind a practical joke. He was also unusually small for his age, which was why he had covered himself in a tatty, weather-stained cloak and chosen a tree some distance away from the road. Everyone knew that stunted growth meant someone was a [[chosen:|witch]], even if it wasn't really so.

The takma, whose name was [[person:Zadireth]], knew that this was unfair. He also knew, being capable of shapeshifting - among [[chosen:magic:substance|other talents]] - that, //as// a witch, it was even less fair when it was perfectly accurate.

Zadireth was finding himself in a difficult position, though he supposed he should count himself lucky. The stolen purse had been taken in hand by the watchmen; there hadn't been much choice. If they hadn't found it with the body, they would have searched him next anyway, and started asking uncomfortable questions. As things had stood, he was just an innocent bystander who had, however unwittingly, killed a troublesome thief and prevented the watchmen from having to continue their chase and, moreover, had volunteered to help heave the body into the river - it would've floated well out of sight before it changed back to its original appearance - thereby earning gratitude and a few coins.

But a few coins didn't equal the funds he'd expected from the purse he'd stolen, which was why he was spending the end of the vigil in a tree rather than some cozy inn, and it meant he'd have to make another score. Probably he'd move on to the next town upriver, which was said to be smaller and quieter; though he wouldn't have been recognized from his little fiasco, he found it prudent not to stay too long in any one place. There was no point in risking detection when there a whole world out there to play his part in, after all.

He sighed and shifted position on the branch, trying to make himself comfortable. //Play my part... a laughable way of putting it, really.// What part did he have? Stealing, swindling, petty crime, those were his trade. And he'd only turned to them because his other talents drew too much attention.

Shapeshifting in public, of course, wasn't to be thought of. He could also transform and synthesize various substances, feeling the changes through a sort of mental "taste", and could come up with some very rare and lucrative things that way: medicines, drugs and inebriants, even poisons. He'd made an awful lot of money on a few occasions. But he'd also found that the local authorities, however understandably, were rather inflexible on the subject of exotic substances being sold in unusual quantities, and tended to start suspecting witchcraft even before they'd worked out his own existence. But ordinary crime, now - //that//, against all sense, was safer, so long as you were careful. They might hound you, but no one ever asked questions about why you stole money or what dark magic was involved.

But it wasn't a living. It wasn't //life//. He found it somewhat objectionable that the [[mythology:imperial_religion:siathar:|gods]], who had graced countless millions with things like purpose and structure and societies to participate in, had neglected to include himself in the list. There was no town or village he'd ever heard of where he, as himself, could just stay and live, at least not without serious abuse. So: no fixed abode, no home, no direction. Somehow it was the last one that [[chosen:#Srians|irked him most of all]]; he was feeling aimless.

On very rare occasions, it was almost enough to make him want to go back to the Room. It was a horrifying thought, given what he'd been through there and the trouble he'd taken to escape, but at least there he'd known what his place was. It was the sort of thought he'd gotten good at avoiding. 

Besides, there was no Room to go back to. He'd made sure of that. The thought helped lift Zadireth out of his funk, and he felt cheerful again. That //had// been a good day; any day was a good day if there was an explosion involved. He wondered if he could get away with blowing something up in the next town. Contemplating this, he curled his tail around the branch and fell asleep, dreaming of carefully placed detonations.

==== Capture ====
He'd hoped, on a road next to a river, that there would be some other traffic to extract assistance from. If all else failed, he could have taken up the profession of highwayman, which he hadn't done in ages, and there was little law enforcement outside the towns. But the next town, Uurin, apparently was even quieter than rumored; he hadn't seen a soul on the road, and arrived there after several uneventful vigils, by which time he was starting to feel his hunger keenly. In the guise of an elderly orange male, he hobbled up to a fruit cart near the outskirts, squintingly peered at the //[[species:iraah|iraahar]]//, and, in a rusty, cracked voice, asked the seller, "My eyes aren't as good as they once were. Could you tell me, young man, how much these are?"

The seller scowled. "I'm female, so I suppose your eyes //aren't// as good as they once were. Fifteen hexes each."

"//Fifteen?//" Zadireth exclaimed. "Look here, young man, that's a little steep, isn't it?"

"//Iraah's// never cheap, uncle," the seller replied shortly. She added, with considerable annoyance, "And I am //not// a young man."

"Very well then, very well then, sir, what do you have that's cheaper?"

The seller sighed, and turned to the other end of the cart. "We have some fine //[[species:peka|pekar]]// over here, uncle." she said, trying to keep herself under control. "And //[[species:katelli|katellir]]//. Only two hexes each, very reasonable..."

In the end, Zadireth came away with two //katellir//, duly paid for, and one //iraah//, not so much. Once out of sight of the cart, he located a deserted-looking dock by the waterfront, blessedly free of occupation this time, and came out in the form of a strutting young brown male, happily eating the, hah, fruits of his labor.

That dock wasn't the only area that was deserted, he noticed. The whole town appeared to be going through hard times; there were abandoned houses everywhere. He was frankly disappointed; he had no moral objection to robbing the poor, since he was technically almost always poorer, but one never gained much that way. But there had to be some officials in town that were worth investigating, some purse-lining local matriarch or something. There usually was, it was the way of the world.

At first, it seemed as if there was a good candidate. Seated calmly on a doorstep, watching the world go by, was a [[person:dlyss|figure in a white robe]]; a child, from the size, so unlikely to have much money, but possibly they could be kidnapped and ransomed. At the very least, he might be able to get some information out of them, which was often better than currency. It was this he had in mind as he approached, but something began to seem off: the blue-violet figure was clearly female, but not so clearly a child, the shape of her face and the deep color of her facial markings suggesting an adult.

And the way the few locals around keep glancing her way as they passed... by the Mother! Another witch!

He'd never met another witch before, not once. He wasn't entirely sure he wanted to meet one now; it would... complicate things. But... perhaps later. He could learn from her, maybe?

But as he tried to walk nonchalantly past (there was a faint tingling in his head as he did, and wondered if she was reading his mind), she turned her head to watch him. Her eyes were an eerie, icy blue. He strolled onward, avoiding the urge to look back, and turned at the next corner, as if he'd intended to do it all along; once around the corner, he paused.

She didn't follow.

Feeling more himself, he wandered casually into an alleyway and stopped to gather his wits - which was difficult, since the tingling in his head hadn't gone away. It bothered him to think that his mind might be open for someone to read; the privacy of his head was what he relied on for his bread and butter. If someone could just //see// what he was thinking, then how could he deceive them?

Satisfied at last that the witch wasn't about to follow him, he turned around; a pair of icy-blue eyes were staring up at his.

Her paw clamped around his foreleg. She spoke a single word:

"Come."

And then, the entire world winked out.

===== Release =====
For a brief interval, Zadireth could make no sense of what he was seeing, but it all resolved itself into a stone-walled room. Though he was dizzy and confused, he lashed out with his free paw, claws extended.

At that range, she should have been an easy target, and it was therefore a mystery as to why it failed to connect. One moment his captor had been there, clutching his foreleg; the next, she was gone.

"I have no intention of harming you-" began a vaguely dreamy sort of voice behind him. He kicked out at it with a hindleg, but similarly failed to connect. He whirled around, spotted the female in white, and lunged; but even before the movement was completed, she had moved gently aside, and then easily dodged again as he tried to snap at her with his teeth (currently secreting a nasty neurotoxin).

"I feel," she began again, calmly, "that it would be in your benefit to calm down."

"Mmm," Zadireth replied. "And what, pray tell, would be in it for me?"

"It would make all this a much shorter proc-"

He charged. Immediately, the world blinked, and he found himself hitting a wall that he'd been a lot further from when he started; the room spun around him, and he staggered, sliding to the ground.

The female approached slowly. She seemed young, though still older than Zadireth. She also looked faintly annoyed. "This does not have to go this-" She paused to make a gesture at a blob of acid that Zadireth had spit at her, causing it to vanish. "-way. If I intended to be an obstacle to you, I could do so with much less effort... Zadireth son of Evlith."

"I had no mother," the bronze murmured, subsiding for the moment. "I had someone who squeezed my egg out of her nethers. So-"

"No," the female said, sitting primly on the floor next to him. "I am not reading your mind."

"Then-"

"I am reading your past. And future."

Zadireth remained silent. So did the other witch. There didn't really seem to be anything to say to that. Expressing disbelief, under the circumstances, seemed rather futile.

He settled for: "Oh?"

The female nodded. "Your guise guards you in the present. But in the past, and in the future, you have your true shape. I see you there."

He began struggling to his feet. "And how much would you know of my past, whoever you are?"

"I am Dlyss," she replied. "And..." her eyes unfocused. "I know that Evlith was very concerned with the gods. She thought you were possessed. She put you in a room that-"

"Stop," Zadireth whispered.

"-and you accumulated poison within your body, so that when you escaped, you could go to the well and-"

//"Stop,"// he repeated, much more forcefully. She stopped to regard him. His antennae were twitching violently. He stared at her, and then managed, through a clenched jaw, "so what do you want with me... Dlyss?"

"Now you do not wish to show me your future," Dlyss said, in the same calm, dreamy voice, "because what I know of your past was unpleasant. But I must tell you that, should I leave you to your current way, there //is// no future for you. Your path leads nowhere, only stretches on and on until you die."

"And you have a better one for me?" Zadireth asked, lounging against the wall.

"Glory. Authority. Fulfillment. The favor of the gods."

"The gods," he said, "have never-"

"What have you done with their gift - the magic - that is worthy of their favor?"

"Why-"

"Any fool can keep themselves alive. The gods have given us the capacity for greatness, to stretch ourselves higher than they who that did not choose; they expect us to use it."

The bronze was profoundly skeptical. The gods, so far as he could ever tell, handed out gifts on a fairly random basis, and many never made use of them at all. But, perhaps, Dlyss in her rambling had a point, at least in that he ought to be doing something with his abilities. Giving himself time to think, he looked at his surroundings for the first time; the room appeared to be some kind of cellar. Walls and floor were old stone; the ceiling consisted of ancient, crumbling wood, but at some point someone had shoveled some kind of thatching over top of it. In the corner, ratty blankets covered two piles of leaves that were evidently beds, and some rickety shelves were lined with jars and boxes. There was no fire, but someone had managed to scrounge together some runes to make light and a small bit of heat; the [[concept:enchantment|symbol-incised stones]] shone faintly.

"I have taken up residence here," Dlyss volunteered. "There is a ruined house outside the town, but the cellar is intact. I have made it... livable."

"Cozy," Zadireth commented vaguely. It occurred to him that her habit of answering questions before they were asked was a point in favor of her seeing into the future. //If one could see it coming, why wait? How boring must it be if you did? How much impatience was she holding in, just while he thought?//

"What are we expected to use it for?" he asked aloud. "How are you using //yours//?"

Dlyss' expression did not seem to change much; she looked, and sounded, generally serene, with only faint expression. But there was, perhaps, a faint tinge of satisfaction. "We have all been Chosen, Zadireth," she replied. "We are few, but even individually we are formidable. As a group, we would be mighty. We can change the face of the world, and the lives of all who live upon it. I seek the path to bring forward the day of the Chosen. And I see it going through //you//."

Zadireth blinked. "Why me, exactly?"

She looked intently at him. "There is a place where many Chosen have gathered. I have seen it. We can go there, and be among our own kind; and we will. But they, like you, have no path of their own. They have no future. Left to themselves, they will remain in their own place, turning inward. They - we - could have the world. I must show them this. But I will need you to help me. I am-" For the first time, she hesitated, looking uncertain. "I, I am not good at... swaying people. You know the ways of persuasion. You know how to play the roles that people want. You can convey messages and cause them to be listened to."

Zadireth sat down, lost in thought. A place where witches lived? It sounded ludicrous. But he'd always been good with crowds, when he'd put his mind to it. It was hard to banish the image: standing before a rapt crowd, speaking with all the conviction and authority of one chosen by the gods, directing them like a dam diverting a river...

He squinted shrewdly at her. "You know what I'm-"

"What you may do. What you will likely do. There is no... certainty, in the future; merely possibilities, though one possibility is often close to certainty. And, yes, I see now that you will accept." She saw him glance at the two beds, and added, with might have been amusement, "I was prepared."

"I suppose you would've been." Zadireth stared at the beds. It would be wrong to say he had no choice. He could defy her, right now, by smashing his way through the flimsy roof and flying off. It was a tiny possibility, but a possibility nonetheless. And then... what? What would he do that was any better? At least this way, even if what she said turned out to be utterly wrong, at least it'd be interesting. And she'd be a useful accomplice. With a faint sigh and a sort of mental shrug, he dropped his guise, reverting to his natural form. "Well, let's see what happens, I suppose."

"Good," Dlyss replied, matter-of-factly. She turn toward her bed. "You have not had much to eat recently, so you will rest here for a vigil or two. When the sun comes up, we can be on our way. The jars on the shelves have food."

Zadireth nodded awkwardly. He turned toward the shelves, the hesitated. "Dlyss... //what// will we show the witches how to do?"

The blue-violet female stretched out on her makeshift bed - rather attractively, Zadireth noted - and murmured, "To push back."