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Zhavi · **07-16-2015, 02:54 PM**

Brindle struggled, he really did. Somehow, as much as he struggled, the big roe seemed even less to notice, not even when Brindle showed off his impressive vocabulary of dockside words. In the end, he wore himself out, and resolved to make himself as much of a burden as possible: he went limp under Styrm's arm and went unresponsive in general.

He was still listening. In fact, as they moved and as he watched Styrm in his interactions, he began to get a funny feeling in his gut. There was something different about the roe, about the way he moved and talked, about the way he asked questions. Even the way he got frustrated. Brindle would have said he was clueless, but even that wasn't so, not exactly. It was more like he was all rusted up and picking it off in bits, bright steel showing in spades.

It took two places, with Brindle existing in a mostly sullen silence, before he chose to speak words that were not prompted by spite or the urge to jeer at Styrm.

"Who are ye?"

Goodfellow · **07-16-2015, 05:10 PM**

"Ye gods, he speaks!" Styrm gasped in mock surprise.Â "Thought yer tongue must've fallen out some way back," he added with a chuckle, distracted and halfhearted.Â They were both silent a moment, Styrm's heavy feet stomping irregularly with weariness and the mounting dead weight of the boy.Â He sighed heavily at last.Â

"Styrmsthal Tyrbsyn's th'name, laddie."

Zhavi · **07-16-2015, 06:28 PM**

Brindle thought about that a moment, eyebrows drawn close over his nose.

"What's that mean?"

Goodfellow · **07-16-2015, 10:19 PM**

Styrmsthal stopped in his tracks.Â He cocked his head--Taru--and laughed.Â "No one's e'er thought t'ask me that.Â Storm-steel, Son of the Cyclone in Eorzean, it is."Â His voice seemed to swell and his posture straightened perceptibly.Â "And yers?Â Yer mammy call ye Brindle?"

Zhavi · **07-17-2015, 12:12 PM**

Brindle shrugged, and squirmed a little: he resented being carried like some wet-nosed brat. "Ye mean yer mam named ye that? What, ye ain't changed t'fit who yer runnin' wi'?"

Goodfellow · **07-17-2015, 02:13 PM**

The pause before his response was brief, enough so as to almost pass unnoticed.Â Almost.Â "Nay, ain't e'er looked t'change it.Â Don't care t'disrespect th'men what gave it t'me, an' it fits me besides."Â He looked ahead as he spoke and continued to walk.

Zhavi · **07-17-2015, 03:32 PM**

Something Styrm had said made Brindle go quiet and still for a moment.

"An' they let ye do that, hey?"

Goodfellow · **07-17-2015, 11:18 PM**

"Gods, been up too long, ain't bein' clear.Â Not a soul let me keep me name, it's them what named me.Â Ship's crew, o' th'Eyriberk, an' th'toughest Sea Wolf ye e'er saw: Ahldbyrm Ankasyn.Â 'S them an' him gave Styrm 'is name. "Â Through his clear and mounting exhaustion, a note of life or something like it carried through his voice as he spoke of the Eyriberk and of Ahldbyrm.Â "An' a damn good name, it is," he added.

He glanced down at the boy then and said through lips hinting at a smile, "Who gave ye yers, Brindle, if it weren't 'er what birthed ye?"

Zhavi · **09-11-2015, 01:42 PM**

Brindle blinked. He narrowed his eyes, body rigid under Styrm's arm. "So ye work fer a ship's crew, is't?"

He didn't show a sign of hearing the roe's question.

Goodfellow · **09-13-2015, 02:06 AM**

Styrm decided not to push to hard just then.Â He'd gotten the lad talking, and that was better than nothing.Â He'd let him skip the less important questions just then, if it kept his lips loose.Â

"Th'Eyriberk's not so seaworthy these days, an' most o' th'old crew's gone off an' afar.Â An' Ahldbyrm, well..." he trailed off.Â "Don't work that ship no more, nay."

Zhavi · **09-15-2015, 02:35 PM**

Lower lip outthrust and tone full of suspicion, he demanded, "'Oo's it yer wi', then?"

Goodfellow · **09-15-2015, 10:48 PM**

"I'm wit' ye, lad.Â Right now," he huffed, "short o' Taru showin' up--" an' damn 'is disappearin' arse-- "it's ye an' I, Brindle an' Styrm."Â He added with a rye grin, marred by the tired, lopped line of his jaw, "Jus' two colleagues o' sorts, on th'trail o' their good friend Kink."Â

Aye, Jozzie...

Zhavi · **09-16-2015, 12:08 PM**

"I ain't wi' ye."

Goodfellow · **09-20-2015, 11:56 PM**

"Aye?Â Well, ye sure as 'ells ain't carryin' yer own arse, now are ye?" he asked.Â His voice was sardonic as he gave the boy under his arm a light, but emphatic, shake.Â "Aye, we're together ye an' I, an' so we'll be till we find th'girl, er till we find someone what knows more 'an ye do."

Zhavi · **11-03-2015, 08:11 PM**

Brindle clamped his teeth down hard, as if to stubbornly refuse to say anything else that might provide the roe -- thus far classified as probably an enemy -- any more fuel.

But, snark was too hard to resist. His teeth opened on a snarl: "I'll not help ye find 'er."

They were approaching lights: another hole-in-the-wall. Time for more questions, and more of the half-answers Limsan Lominsans were so rutting good at.

______________

There were times when Solitaire knew in the depths of his gut that he was onto something good. Anyone else might spit on it, but he'd always trusted his instincts. His instincts were good. He had the stashes to prove it. The encounter with the roegadyn had triggered something in him, and even several bells after they'd parted his mind kept returning to it, itching, and itching. Something was going on, and it smelled like gil.

He'd two things needed seeing to, and he did them in order. He prided himself on being reliable, but while he was about his business he dropped a few lines, and felt them up for tension. As usual there was more than a fair share of various nefarious things going on, some further abovedecks than others. It took time to sift through the tall tales, rumors, and hard pearls of truth. One thing he knew for true, though, was that a small number of interesting folk were tailing after the crook-tailed scut. What he didn't know was why.

He was finishing a delivery when he heard a few strongarms laughing at a tall weed of a duskwight. The man was distinctly out of place in the smoking shop, even for its illicit backrooms. He looked like a navigator off a merchant ship, the sort of man best at home with books, puffed-up snobs, and overpriced wine.

"I was speaking to the shop owner," the man was saying, low voice cutting through the guttural chuckles.

A bag of gil was produced, taken, and the rowdy sailors were unceremoniously shooed out with the customary banter of regulars.

Solitaire turned to a display of elaborately carved pipes and their accouterments, shuffling sideways to another shelf with trays of leaf so he was out of direct line of sight of the duskwight.

"I've a package gone missing, along with the runner what was charged with its safekeeping."

"What'd ye have me do for ye?" The owner asked, voice all velvet.

"All manner o' missing things come traipsing through. I've a mind to make sure if what's lost finds its way through your door, it finds its way home."

Solitaire strained to hear the next few exchanges, and caught only a few words -- one of which was 'tail.' A longshot, that word. But his gut told him it was one worth following.

When the duskwight left the shop, Solitaire was not long behind. . .with a fresh pouch of leaf in his pocket.

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Innocence and Avarice [closed]

RPC has moved! These pages have been kept for historical purposes