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

Kage · **05-16-2015, 03:33 PM**

((2))

Anstarra · **05-16-2015, 03:52 PM**

((2! And reveal that you know her, personally! See how he reacts...))

Edda · **05-16-2015, 04:28 PM**

1. That's YOUR poster bro ))

Roen · **05-16-2015, 04:28 PM**

(( 2! Make that sale! ))

Jana · **05-16-2015, 04:57 PM**

>2, how much do material possessions matter compared to memories? ...And easy gil?

Verad · **05-17-2015, 10:08 PM**

Find Another Poster:Â 3
Sell My Own Poster:Â 5

My bit of ledger-checking theater finishes with an enigmatic smile. "You're in luck," I say, my voice bright and chipper as I snap the ledger shut. "I happen to have just such a poster in my inventory."

Heidolf shows the first real expression of interest I've seen all night. It's a subtle change, seen in the lift of his traditionally non-existent Ala Mhigan eyebrows and in the straightening of his posture, but it's there. "Is that so?"

"Indeed! Signed, no less." It's not signed by me, which would of course raise the value of the piece even further, but by the woman herself. Still quite valuable to somebody in the right markets. "Now I don't have it with me, but I can have it here within the bell if you're willing to wait. It's in excellentÂ condition. You can have a look, and then we shall settle on a price?"

He hasn't heard the last sentence or two, the far-off look in his eyes suggesting his mind is somewhere being dazzled by a display of Twelve-given good fortune. I have him. I may even make a profitÂ on this. It's hard to keep my grin from being wolfish.

---

The guilt only starts to hit once I reach my company's ward of the Goblet. It was polite enough to keep the pangs down to a slight itch through the city itself, but once I hit the residential areas it becomes a full-blown twinge, as such things are categorized. After all, it was the only thing left I had of our relationship. Could I really sell it that easily?

Near the corner of my estate, I paused to take a breath. I could imagine several people, if they knew the circumstances, calling this quite low. The poster was a gift, after all, and a solid link to something that was otherwise only a memory.

OnlyÂ a memory. I can't hide my snort, expressed to nobody save myself. A statement expressed only by those who had an excess of the same, who never had to do without. The thought is left at that; no sense being bitter about it.

Rounding the corner, the small wooden box, upside-down and propped up at an angle, is the first thing to catch my attention. The rest of the exterior of Dubious Distributions is as it always is - far better than I really have any right to have. It's a crate meant for a small shipment of fruit, but it seems to have been re-purposed as a simple trap; I can see a twig propping up the box's interior. Underneath is a small, wrinkled popoto.

My employment rolls are still small, so if nothing else I know who's responsible for this by process of "There is literally nobody else on my employment roll who would be responsible for this." I'm just trying to figure out why she'd do it hereÂ of all places.

"Miss Sandraix? Do you really think this is the best place?"

There's a crash in the foliage behind the estate wall as Alienne Sandraix exposes herself from her hiding place in a nearby shrub. It's a small shrub, and she's a rather tall Wildwood, so it takes quite a lot of exposure. "Oh! Heya, Mr. V!" She gives me a bright smile before furrowing her brows and looking around the environs. "You didn't see any apes or nothin' before you cames here? Don't want you scaring them off!"

This is my bodyguard. A former pirate and a born survivor in a very real sense, having survived both the Calamity and several bizarre instances of a voidsent murdering everyone but her on her vessel. When it comes to combat, there is hardly anyone better. Basic problem solving, however . . . well, I wouldn't hire security that wasn't dubious, would I?
Â
"No, Miss Sandraix," I laugh, there being no real point in exasperation with Alienne. "How's the trap working for you?"

"Oh real good! I used that picture you gave me of that rope thing you used for hunting puddings." She bobs her head, the mop of dark-green hair combed to one side flailing over her face in her enthusiasm, and gives a thumbs-up. "Only I used a box on account of this is an ape and it could break out of a rope pretty easy."

"It doesÂ look good - but where's the string?"

"There's supposed to be a string? I thought it were a rope."

Never mind. If I stop to explain this I'll be here until the next sun, and Heidolf will surely be gone. "Capital work, Miss Sandraix. Keep it up." I reach out to pat her on the shoulder. "You really think that ape will come here?" This is technically her leve - finding an ape that fled some merchant. It's been moons; I suspect it's had time to found its own empire by now, but it keeps her paid and busy.

"Last place, Mr. V! Last place. I mean if I were an ape I'd - " She pauses, lost in thought. "I dunno what I'd do, but thisÂ ape'll come here. He's real crafty like that."

"Well get some sleep at some point," I say as I step past her. "I'm just in to pick up some stock for a customer."

"Whoawhoawhoa, a customer?" She steps in front of me. "Come on Mr. V, I gotta go with ya's."

"I'm quite capable of handling myself, Miss Sandraix, it's all perfectly legitimate!"

"'Ain't nobody allowed to do nothin' all by their lonesome in Dubious Distributions if they're dealing with - " She frowns, having forgotten the rest. "Well I gotta come with you anyhow."

She's reciting the Martyrdom Clause back at me, or trying to, in her own particular patois. It's a rule I established as I was drafting up the company charter. Simply put, it means that no member of the group is allowed to handle dangerous situations by themselves if they've already failed to do so at least once. The intent was to try and curtail what I've seen of free companies in the past, where a half-dozen young and eager adventurers fall all over themselves trying to resolve the shadows of their past without help, fail in an overwrought fashion, and make their problems worse for everyone.

It's a common problem amongst adventurers, and reckless to boot. What's the point of being in the damn company if one insists on being a stoic and standoffish loner, anyhow? So I made a rule to deny it. It is to my great misfortune that the rule is now indulging in a bit of petard-hoisting.

Alienne has a point - after getting myself enslaved in the Coblyn's Fancy Mining Company, beaten by Brass Blades while robbing a warehouse, and kidnapped by Dravanian heretics, I already fall under the dictates of the Martyrdom Clause.

Still. It's Alienne.

What should Verad do next?

1. I'll have to concede the point and take her with me. Rules are rules, and I can't expect people to follow them if I don't do it myself. She may be a bit abrasive and prone to saying literally anything that's on her mind at any point, but I can work around that with a bit of good salesmanship.

2. The Martyrdom Clause is specifically for dangerous situations or shadows from the past. I am at least ninety-percent confident that a random stranger I approached in a bar isn't somebody who's out to kill me for some crime I don't even remember. Worse, only a few moments of conversation with Alienne can turn a customer sour. She could jeopardize everything! I should tell her to concentrate on her leve. It won't take too much convincing.

Anstarra · **05-17-2015, 10:34 PM**

((2. We're Adventurers! Legally anyway. We'll never get any work done around here if the Martyrdom Clause becomes too ubiquitous!))

Seye Qhesu · **05-17-2015, 10:37 PM**

((1))

Edda · **05-18-2015, 11:03 AM**

1! ))

cuideag · **05-18-2015, 11:15 AM**

(( 1! ))

Kage · **05-18-2015, 11:17 AM**

((1!))

**Unnamed Mercenary** · **05-18-2015, 12:24 PM**

((2))

Melkire · **05-18-2015, 12:26 PM**

(( 2 ))

GloryRhodes · **05-18-2015, 12:29 PM**

((Selfish, but 1))

Verad · **05-19-2015, 04:59 PM**

Take Alienne With Me - 6 (5 in thread, 1 vote in rep)
Leave Alienne - 3

"When you are right, you are right," I say, bowing my head with a conciliatory manner, hands spread wide. "Go ahead and move the box out of the way so none of the other members trip over it, hm? I'll just go fetch the poster."

Upon my acquiescence, she gets a grin on her face that one could read as either eager or unsettling. I opt for a charitable impression and choose the first. And why shouldn't she be eager? She is my bodyguard, after all, and it's rare that she actually gets to indulge in the act of guarding my body. That sounds worse in my head than I intend, but there's no need to revise it, I think.

She bobs her head and starts scanning the garden for a good, conspicuous space to place her trap where it won't be an obstacle for the staff but still be obvious to any rogue popoto-eating apes that might happen by. Leaving her to her work, I make my way into the estate and to my office.

The poster is easy enough to find once it's there. Beyond the clutter and piles of books on my desk, I keep the place organized, if I do say so myself, with samples of my dubious goods kept in a cupboard to the left of my desk and personal mementos tucked away in the dresser that dominates the back wall, behind the partition that separates work from sleep space. A moment's quick rummaging and there it is, the parchment still in good shape despite the somewhat musty conditions. Ul'dah is occasionally bad for paper with its sudden rainstorms and humid shocks, but this particular advertisement seems to be made of better stock.

To ensure that there are no unusual damages, I take the poster to my desk and unroll it. And there, in all her prime, is a fine likeness of Burning Edge, dark and muscular frame clad in a very tiny amount of leather armor indeed and wielding her signature macuahuitl over her shoulder, flame-orange hair billowing in a fictional wind, a defiant grin on her face. The poster advertises her as one of a trio of exhibition matches from some twelve cycles ago. If I recall correctly, this one ended in a victory for her. The artist certainly captured her spirit.

I'll confess to being lost in a momentary admiration. Whether I have it up for sale or not, it isÂ still my poster, after all, and I am allowed a bit of admiration. Perhaps too much, as what shakes me out of it is Alienne's voice, high and sharp like a brass knife. "Wow, Mr. V, look at the tits on her! Was she one'a your harem?"

Miss Sandraix has a knack for understanding the situation perfectly and yet phrasing it incorrectly. "I do not have a harem, Alienne," I chide as I look up at her from her position, peering at the poster from the other side of the desk. "I have a number of attractive members of the opposite sex living with me as employees. That is completelyÂ different." I start rolling the poster up again. "And no, she was not."

"Oh, well, what's that say there?" She points towards one corner in the lower right, where Burning's script is placed in a careful scrawl. "That a misprint or something?"

"'For a Burning Desire'," I say, reciting the words. This happens often - Miss Sandraix is more like the native populace than adventuring and mercantile society in being unlettered. "She was rather, ah, effusive in her gratitude after I cleared up the trouble with the debt-slavery ring."

She mulls over this, her nose wrinkling, and for a moment it seems like she has more to say. Then her eyes light up in recognition, and she nods. "Okay, I got it! Lemme go get my axe and we'll go on and see this guy about this paper."

She saunters out of the building as if she has a plan. The plan is probably no more complicated than hitting people who look at me cross-eyed with one part or another of the axe, but it isÂ a plan. I have to remind myself of that as I roll up the poster and bind it to protect it in transit. Alienne is not a dumb woman. She is merely very direct.

---

The trip back to the Quicksand is pleasantly quiet, and I have to say I am glad I decided to accede to Miss Sandraix's requests. Blade patrols are heavy tonight, in order to watch for criminals. It wouldn't do to have them cutting into the Blades' business, after all. A few of them glance my way, as near as I can tell with those masks of theirs, but one look at Miss Sandraix in her armor, wielding that cleaver of an axe on her back, and they think better of it. Perhaps they couldÂ overpower us both, she with her axe and I with my knives, but the cost of rolling me for whatever gil I could muster may not be worth the limbs, and so we are unmolested.

By my reckoning on the time, there's still a quarter-bell left in my arrangement's deadline, but I wouldn't put it past Heidolf to think I used my claim as an excuse to leave for politeness' sake and absent himself entirely. It's a relief to see he's still there, having placed his own axe against his back, leaning against a wall with arms crossed and an absently expected look, as if there are perfectly good reasons for him to be standing there by his lonesome and he wouldn't actually be waitingÂ for anybody, oh, no, that would be too much trouble. It's the sort of stance I normally see from Tias waiting for a date. Strange to see it on a Highlander, and in regards to such a meeting, but no matter!

I am already halfway into my usual flourishing bow before I'm even face to face with the man, holding the poster across my shoulder as more demon-may-care types might do with a sword. "My apologies for the wait, and by gratitude for your patience! May I present you with your poster."

He looks down at it, brow knitting in thought, before looking past my shoulder to Alienne, where she stands a not-quite respectable distance away. "Who's the Wildwood?"

"Hm? Ah, my security chief, Miss Sandraix." I gesture to her. She waves, perhaps too wildly. "It is late, after all, and one can never be too sure what might occur in the streets of Ul'dah. Especially with an item like this!" I tap the top of the rolled parchment. "Go ahead, have a look."

As he takes the poster and removes the binding, I take a moment to glance around the area. It's cleared up a little bit, but the Quicksand might as well be called the Myrmidon Nest for the way it always crawls with activity. Some of the customers have left, and I can't see the adventurers or the brooding elezen, but there are no doubt more. Once this matter is resolved I'll be sure to look for another customer. Presuming the bad streak is resolved, of course.

"Huh, I remember this match," he says, and I turn back to see he's unrolled the poster and is scrutinizing it. "And it isÂ signed!"

"Indeed it is! Now, normally I would suggest a price of fifty gil for this piece of material, based on market value. But given the signature, I think that raises the price considerably, to at least a hundred and fifty." This is an outrageous sum compared to any of the items in my usual stock, but he seems like a collector and enthusiast, and if I'm going to end a cold streak, I'd like to do so in spectacular fashion.

"'For a Burning Desire,'" he mouths, looking over the signature. "Was this for a fan? Seems like a signature for a fan."

"Naw, naw, she wrote that 'cause Mr. V used to bang her!"

My mouth was only halfway open, my brain only a fraction of an ilm away from formulating a better response. The circuit between Alienne's mind and her tongue is a very fast one indeed. I am, for the moment, frozen.

Heidolf, however, is not. His eyes lift from the poster to scan over my face. "Wait, you knewÂ her?"

Alienne is quicker to respond. The fact that she is direct also means that she can, at times, be very very dumb. "Yeah, he used to make her effuse all over the place! You gotta watch out for this guy, he's a real charmer with the ladies."

Can a beard turn red? Is that possible? Faces can, certainly, but a beard? I'll have to find a mirror, or a reflectively-polished mug.

It's probably not a bell before I clear my throat and regain my composure, but I manage a response in what feels like that time. "I did have a personal relationship with Miss Edge in recent moons, yes," I say. "But please, don't mind the sentimental value of the poster. One-hundred and fifty gil should be enou - "

I had my hand outstretched as if to indicate where the sum could be placed, and I feel pressure on it. A quick glance, and I see he's clutching my wrist through the sleeve of my tunic, looking up at me through the small difference between our heights.

"If you knew her," he says. "Then please, help me."

Neither of us expected this move, and I can hear, Alienne from behind me, reaching for her axe. Her armor always clatters in a certain way when she does so. My eyes, however, are fixed on his. This is the first serious shift in his expressionÂ that I've seen. Posture, tone, these have changed when I've spoken with Heidolf. But this is the first time the eyes have changed, have shown a desperation, a widening of the irises.

"Now you oughta let go of Mr. V," she says, very politely. "Or I'm gonna have to crack open your skull on account of - "

I hold up my other hand. "No. No, Alienne, it's fine. Let's hear him talk."

Turn to Page 96 to Continue!

« Next Oldest \| Next Newest »
Pages (3): « Previous 1 2 3 Next »

I Am A Crafty Merchant [CYOA, OOC Welcome]

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