Random 71

Sebastian noticed it too, testing the floorboards gently with the tip of his boot at first. In spite of his suspicions, he put more weight on that foot and made the mistake of wiping his eyes. A mistake, in that the boards under him broke with a resounding snap, leaving him flailing for a handhold while half-blinded.

No purchase -- but with his gloves on, he didn't even scratch his hand all that badly. Sebastian fell down, eyes wide and watering even more as he crashed down, hit a shelf and landed on the lower floor. For a moment he tried to breathe in that disgusting air and found that all the air had been knocked out of him, enough so that he couldn't even curse in between wheezes. The first thing he saw, next to himself, was a box. In spite of the discomfort, he grinned for a second.

"Wha--" Sylvie took a step in the direction of the fresh hole before she caught up with what had happened, and that that course of action was a bad idea. Instead running on top of the sturdy beam on the edge of the top floor, she crossed to the other side of the building, where a steep set of stairs led to the lower level. She did not quite trust the construction, so she down backwards, putting her hands on higher steps to distribute her weight. On the way she could see at least the part of the floor closest to the wall with the windows was taken up by large basins built right into the ground.

The other side of the room was more shadowed, and cluttered. Her palms itched. "Sebastian?"

It wasn't hard to find him, even though his eyes were squinted -- they still glowed, and then of course there was the wheezing. He banged his fist on the floor so as to help him drag himself at least to his knees, coughing. "I'm fine," came a whisper. At least he hoped he was fine, Sebastian thought and went through his pockets, hoping his gear wasn't any worse off. "Found it."

"Well done." She grimaced when she realised what she had just said. Avoiding a broken crate, she approaching him in an arc that brought her closer to the centre of the room. She spotted the gleam of glass near a corner, against the side wall, just behind a support beam that had hidden it from view from the staircase.

"Thank you," he managed, realising that he might not have escaped utterly unscatched. A minor matter, he told himself and dragged himself to his feet and took a deep breath through his mouth. A minor matter, he repeated, swaying a little before placing his hand on the nearest item for balance. "I'll be more careful next time."

Sylvie stepped to his other side, ready to support him if he needed it. "Yes, please." She was, and sounded, worried. "No rush now. Are you sure you're all right?" With the distraction from the powerful artifact, and her own magic still more atuned to water, she could not check right now herself.

Sebastian did a mental inventory again. Wrist as good as it was, stitches holding, full awareness of surroundings. Yes. "A little dizzy. It's the smell and the disorientation from the fall," he said, glancing at a ripped finger nail and a few bloodied fingertips with splinters in them. Not bad. Ignoring it, he turned to look around again, at toward the artifact. Unsurprisingly, the cylinder was just next to it, and without much ado, Sebastian (though now with some difficulty) began to work the artifact into its tin.

Afterward, he exhaled deeply. "Let's get out of here," he muttered, feeling the first pangs of a headache. The smell... "We're going to need a damn bath after this," the man muttered.

"A hot bath," Sylvie agreed. "If it came with a dry change of clothes, I'd give my last penny."

She had Sebastian go ahead of her so she could keep an eye on him.

He moved as limberly as always, keeping his wounded hand over his mouth in vain. The stench was going to follow him, he just knew it, and it wasn't until he crashed outside into the rain that he leaned against the wall and was sick. Lucky about that small meal.

"I hate my job," he growled, turning his head toward the sky and sucking in some of the rainwater, only to spit it out and wipe his mouth with the back of his hand.

As soon as Sylvie was in the only relatively fresh air, she looked up and down the street. She could make out two figures at the cross-street.

"Would you give me the key? The sooner we get out of this quarter..."

"The better," Sebastian said, wiping his mouth once more and handing over the key, holding it gingerly with two fingers. The index finger was the one with the torn nail, but he didn't mind. He spat a few more times and rubbed his chin. Scratch there too? Damn. If old patterns held true, he surmised there might be something nasty coming along.

Sylvie took with with a sympathetic grimace, but hurried up so they could leave. She found the keyhole by feel and locked the door. The back of her neck itched, purely a matter of nerves, but looking around more would just make them look suspicious. More suspicious? When she was finished, though, the people she had seen had moved on.

"Quitting is not an option, hm?"

He closed his eyes at that question, straightened himself and rubbed his chin, turning to look around, some moisture still in his eyes from the effort of first keeping his lunch in and then making it exit. He sniffed, apparently not noticing anything but their surroundings for a moment. As it happened, that was one of the questions he didn't want to discuss, no, not now, but as it was -- he'd made himself promise to be truthful. "I keep trying to talk sense into my patrons, but they never answer," Sebastian said quietly. "But I've also promised this will be the last time. I'm tired of this."

He glanced at her, looked around again and nodded toward the direction they needed to go next. Not quite as much as something else at that moment, he wanted out of the district. What he wanted the most... that was different.

Once they were moving, Sylvie reached for Sebastian, figuring he could do with a little moral support, but unsure how much space he wanted. The stink clung to her, too, for one thing.

Stink or no, at least they stank the same... more or less. Sebastian still tasted the bile in his mouth, but smiled faintly at her touch, accepting it with a glad sideways glance. And reciprocating with his own touch, too.

As it happened, he wouldn't let go as they navigated the streets toward the location nearest to House Crow, where there was hopefully a chance for a hot bath. Somehow, it seemed likely the owner might even insist on that, but that was a priority for later. The smell of the tanneries grew faint aside from what exuded from two wandering strangers, and eventually and without any other sort of excitement than an old boot washing down the stream on the street, the building stood in front of them.

It was still as Sebastian remembered, at least. Tall, foreboding, all three stories, slightly diagonal to the rest buildings next to it -- it was a remainder and reminder of some old fire in Canyet, and had been rebuilt partially. How quaint, thought Sebastian as he squinted at the two stories of windows before shrugging. This was going to be a bit trickier, so before he said, "I can't see anyone in there," he settled for overwatch again, biting his lip. Make it or break it, he sighed mentally.

A few minutes into the walk, Sylvie started teasing the splinters from Sebastian's fingers. Using magic for something not absolutely neccessary just then may have been unwise, but they were small, she found plant matter easiest to hold on to of all materials, and having things stuck under the skin of her hands would drive her insane.

At the last location, Sylvie could hear people moving nearby. She weighted ideas how to bleed off the trap's charge here as subtly as possible. If she could release it more slowly, maybe moving the rain sideways rather than against gravity might work, and look like a gust of wind if someone saw it.

Trusting Sebastian to keep watch, she tried that, and found it worked even better than expected. Maybe this was the location where Brice had triggered the trap once.

"Clear."

That surprised Sebastian, who didn't know how her magic and that of Langoll's worked. "Fast," he commented, slipping to the door, opening it with that last key and ushering her in...

...to a somewhat dusty old house. The dust had been disturbed recently, which came as no surprise, but as they headed through the dark corridor into the first room, Sebastian holding Sylvie's hand tightly, they came upon a room filled with ghostly shapes. Furniture, art work, a counter, all covered with white cloth.

For Sebastian, it was a throwback to the old days. It seemed little had changed in terms of where the furniture had been, or the counter, and he could still remember that hoarse voice talking to him. No, not the time for reminescence.

They found the artifact in the attic. Here it had been placed in a vat some way away from the next wall, a pipe run outside, reducing the water damage. The the air was still moist enough to bead, and droplets ran down the rafters above the glass spindle. Sylvie lent a hand getting the artifact out of the water and into the metal cylinder.

Nothing went wrong at all.

Back on the street, while Sebastian locked the door, Sylvie turned her face to the sky for a moment. Now evening-dark, it was still pouring rain as before. What had gathered already would have to fall? The thought "it will look better in the morning" made her smile.

She heard murmuring voices, a door closing, people going about their business.

Having nothing go wrong at all both pleased and worried him. Adjusting his cloak as he put the key back into one of his pockets, he glanced over at the sound of life other than them, blinking owlishly but paying no further attention. Instead, he gave a long, long sigh. "All right," he said quietly, taking a moment to stare at the sky as well, smiling faintly and letting himself relax for a while. He let some of the water drip into his reflective eyes, then glanced at Sylvie.

More or less across the street, someone paid attention to something that shouldn't have been there. Noting two figures standing in front of that old house, she frowned and took a closer look through the window -- and widened her stare upon noticing two shining shapes move around. It took a while to realise that they had to be eyes. Quickly closing the curtains, she ran to get something to get her mind off the fright.

In the meantime, outside, Sebastian smelled his wrist and wrinkled his nose afterward. "Time to get tidied up?"

"I wonder if we should talk to Riya right now. If the weather visibly improves only after we tell her, we'd be more believable?" Sylvie leaned against the wall and rubbed her eyes with one hand. Her heartbeat was quick and she felt a bit unsteady, rather like the "wired" stage of being over-tired. Trying to imagine that conversation, which would likely involve Gemma, too, gave her headaches and made her feel queasy. Some of that discomfort leached into her voice. "Not sure I could make sense."