Closed Finding Work

[Vassarka Oleander]

Timestamp: Afternoon, 81st of Spring 513

Vassarka finished unsaddling Flash, then smiled back at Zaed. "We should probably go and look for sssome work, don't you think?" she said flirtatiously, then she turned and walked out of the stable door, back into the street, where she then moved down the road with ease, where she wanted to get to the Employment Office as soon as possible so that she could get a job. They needed to put a few mizas in their pockets before they could actually leave the city. How would they leave? She figured that their best bet was by sea, where they could go across, making the journey so much easier. Why hadn't she thought of this before? She strode across the busy roads without checking that Zaed was behind her, and eventually found herself in front of the Employment Office.

[Zaed Martel]

Several minutes later, Zaed walked with Vassarka out of the employment office. He felt somewhat disappointed about the fact that they would be spending so much time in Syliras, after all, he had expected to be travelling north before he had run across Vassarka, but he swallowed it, and continued forwards. Just a couple of weeks, he thought to himself, we can save up some money and then we'll be off. Zaed was stopped in his tracks for a moment, and smiled slightly. It had been a while since he had ever referred to himself as part of 'we'. He glanced up and looked at Vassarka his new companion. He still didn't fully trust her of course, but it was a comfort to be travelling with another person.
"So i guess we wait now, we can come back tommorrow to check if he's got any jobs for us. But for now...any plans?" He asked.

[Vassarka Oleander]

Vassarka gazed at Zaed for a while. He was pretty handsome actually, and as a matter of fact there were several plans that she would like to...execute with him, but she could save those for later. "How about we go and have a look around the cccity?" she suggested. "We can vissssit sssome of the taverns and see what there isss to sssee"

[Zaed Martel]

Zaed nodded and set off down the street at a leisurely pace. He glanced to the side and not for the first time, realised just how little he knew about his travelling companion. Glancing down at his feet, he asked, "Why exactly do you want to get to Kalinor so badly? You've never really said." As soon as he had asked the question however, he knew it was too far. The woman had been secretive from the moment he had met her, he doubted she would tolerate his digging into her affairs. However, he felt a rush of confidence when he realised that despite her hostility, she had chosen to travel with him and as such, perhaps she, like him, was tired of travelling alone.

[Vassarka Oleander]

Vassarka glanced up at the man, readying herself to get aggressive and defensive, as she usually did when someone started enquiring about herself, her past or her motives. However, instead of seeing the usual perverse interest in her because she was Symenestra or the hostile enquiry of an enemy in his face, Vassarka saw only curiosity, and perhaps a more friendly desire to know about her than she was used to. She sighed, and steeled herself, perhaps almost already knowing that she may regret this one day. "Well... asss you know, I'm a Sssymenesstra" she began, "but asss you probably don't know, we asss a raccce are not very tolerated here in Sssyliras, and unfortunately for me, thisss is where I was brought up. I never knew my own parents, and as a child up until only a short while ago, I wasss brought up by a woman, a human" she put some emphasis on this word as though it was a dirty swear word. "known only to me by the name of Mamma. In my 13th year, I finally dissscovered that I was actually a Ssssymenessstra, and sssince then...I...I wasssn't able to trussst my Mamma any more; she who had previously been the one perssson that I truly could. Of courssse I had had trusssted friends, but none of them could do anything once the trussst in Mamma was gone." Vassarka took a deep breath, and glanced back up at Zaed's handsome face, and said quietly. "Ssso, I want to go to Kalinor to find out more about my raccce, and learn what I wasssn't told, or wasss fed lies about before. I wantto be able to trussst ssssomeone again...but I don't know if that is ever going to happen." Vassarka took a deep breath and looked up at Zaed, feeling strangely naked without her air of mystery that she usually relied on to hold power over people. She had just revealed something she'd told nobody else before to an almost complete stranger; she had only just met him yesterday!

[Zaed Martel]

Zaed listened patiently, and gave a comforting smile when Vassarka finished. He could see that she was somewhat uncomfortable with telling him these things, but he was grateful that now he at least had some idea of why they would be travelling across the sea. He placed a hand on Vassarka's shoulder, suddenly seeing her as a girl only just out of her teens, rather than a woman now, and gently squeezed it. "Thank you for telling me...why don't we find a drink somewhere?2

[Vassarka Oleander]

Vassarka shrugged his hand off playfully, and smiled back at him, pleased that he wasn't judging her on her history, and glad that he was supportive of her. "Sssure" she said in a slightly flirtatious tone of voice. "Let'ssss go for a drink" Tossing her hair behind her, she headed down the street, taking care to put a little bit of sway into her hips. She was almost sure that she was interested in him in more ways than as a friend, and she wanted to let him know that. She believed that she was no longer a child, and wanted him to know that...there had been something in his eyes that looked at her as though she was his little sister, but she wanted to dispel any notion of that in his mind.

[Lakina Fairntune]

Lakina stared around at the bustling city street from on Brindle, her Zavian horse's, back. There were so many people here, even more than she was used to in Alvadas. She had been travelling for a while, and had been largely on her own, so the sudden change in population was a bit unsettling to her. "Well" she thought to herself, "Better go and find somewhere to stay" looking around at the towering buildings on either side of her. There was an armory immediately to her left, and shop selling multitudes of herbs next to that. To her right, a jewelers stood, glittering in the sunlight, and then a grocers shop next to the jewelers. She thought she'd better remember where the grocers was, she didn't fancy dining on weeds and scrawny rats another night, as she had done the previous three nights. As she traveled closer to the city, meat had become scarcer, and she hungrier.
The road wound on in front of her and, as it was the only way she could see to go, she followed it, guiding Brindle out of the way of people and animals walking carelessly in the street. As she was on horseback, she had a decent view over the crowd and saw a sign with an arrow pointing down a left fork, detailing that somewhere down that road there would be a tavern, which Lakina supposed would have sleeping quarters in it. Gently touching Brindle with her heels, she turned his head towards the left fork and the two made their way through the throng of people the way the arrow had pointed.