A Gilded Night

[Petra]

A Gilded Night

2 Ash 121

In Kalzasi, where land is the most precious commodity, vast gardens are truly extravagant expressions of wealth. To boast them in the heart of Adira's Promenade, some of the most valuable real estate in the world, is doubly boastful. Hatakomon Yangseng has more money than he knows what to do with, evidently, but his gardener certainly has ideas. Petra walks towards the main gates beneath great canopies of cherry trees. They are only now beginning to fade into their iconic pink, but Petra can already see their majesty. The great arbors left and right dazzle in shades of green-and-amber, and the topiary is perfectly carved in easy waves and delicate shapes. The stones underfoot are manicured and polished - Petra almost feels bad walking on them, as if she should take her shoes off before walking along the landscaped perfection.

Her eyes wander, to chestnut and bay, down to little patches of the most vibrant color. She breathes in the hundred scents of cultivation, and the bouquet brings a smile to her face. This is wealth, flaunted and astounding. This is generational wealth, a history of constant exploitation, turned into beauty for its own sake. Petra cannot help but admire it. She cannot help but envy it. How paltry the scent of fresh bread seems, compared to lilies in the pond and roses by the path?

"Amazing. I always forget these sorts of places exist."

She murmurs her commentary to Finn, who seems far more suited to these sorts of things. Her cheongsam is conservative, but it clings still, and the fool's gold that hangs around her neck feels heavy. No demon haunts her steps tonight. She looks every bit the aspirant artist's assistant. She's even colored her eyes and put blush on her cheeks, in an effort to mix in. She doesn't look like a member of the bourgeoise, for the pastime of the rich is to make a thousand rules that the lower classes can never hope to follow and will always mark them out as different, but she certainly does not look like a demonologist. She looks like a young woman, a teenager still in the flower of her youth; her tomboyish flair has been filed down, and her sharp features and judging eyes are softened by shades of indigo and rose.

The walls of the palatial complex rise before them, red-brick as is traditional. Good luck and good fortune, they are meant to symbolize with their red-and-gold designs, but their height and thickness indicate something else: outsiders, beware.

And yet, the gate guards will let me pass, and they will nod their heads in welcome - me, come to pilfer their secrets and profit from their property.

The thought helps Petra smile. It is expected of her, but she only gets halfway.

"Are you ready to impress? I need you at your best, Finn. The more you dazzle, the more attention you'll draw, and the faster we can pass the danger and enjoy ourselves."

With any luck, Petra knows, she can get her information and then rejoin the party. Making her fortune off of pilfered secrets is excellent, but she certainly intends to enjoy the open bar and the complimentary buffet, while she watches Finn impress the rich with the talent that exudes from him.

He even looks like music. I doubt a man was ever better made for his craft. Perhaps I should burn incense in thanks - I couldn't ask for a better partner in this.

She moves a hair closer to him. No harm in looking like partners - perhaps a little camaraderie will assuage suspicion from the small crowd of idle nobility waiting outside the gate, mingling and getting their invitations checked.

[Finn]

When learning to forge copper and iron and steel at his mother's knee, she had told him a person could get used to anything. She had meant the weight of the hammer, the heat of the air spun out by the bellows, the weariness in young, growing muscles. He knew that if his career trajectory continued to rise, places like these would more often replace the places like the taproom at the Crown and Lion where he lived and worked like any other inhabitant of the Low-City. He might even accumulate enough of a reputation that he could count his pocket change in gold rather than copper, or own something closer to this than his garret room above the inn.

Could he ever grow accustomed to such luxury, though? Returning to his parents in their village ought to keep him in touch with the place from whence he had come, both in society and in geography. But, of course, he had to act as though he fit in. He wore his nicer clothes, the ones he performed in when he wanted to pass muster above his own social class. The clothes were nice enough, but close inspection would show that some bits were worn out. Other bits had been cannibalized from other garments to maintain these. His magoja was the newest, best garment, which was, he thought, a wise investment as it covered quite a bit of the rest of his clothes. The dark blue set off his pale blue eyes, and there was just enough green in that blue to complement his skin. A tiny bit of thread-of-silver embroidery accentuated the collar.

When he felt Petra move closer, his generally amiable expression sharpened into a smile. While he wasn't an actor, per se, he knew how to play his role as a performer.

"Draw attention? Check." He smiled, took her by the hand, and laid a light kiss upon her knuckles. "Disappear, then. And don't leave without me if you can help it."

The minstrel released her hand and unslung his lute to wander among the guests. He opened his mind through his rune to gauge the general cacophony of symphonies running through the air as he quickly fine-tuned his lute. When his music began in earnest, he reached out to thread a melody into each symphony he passed, catching their attention. Of course, he left Petra's well enough alone, not wanting to distract her from what had brought her here in the first place.

His was a subtle manipulation. He used the Mesmer to catch attention, and let his music do the rest.

A wandering minstrel I —
A thing of shreds and patches
Of ballads, songs, and snatches
And dreamy lullaby!
My catalogue is long
Through every passion ranging
And to your humours changing
I tune my supple song!
I tune my supple song!

[Hozxi]

It did not take the magic of Mesmer to attract Hozxi's attention.

Certain forces were at work in the city. Forces that had caused the hatakomon's previous hire for the task of verifying the accuracy of invitations to have caught a rather bad case of hives from a wasp that had been let loose inside his house. Forces that brought the seer to the guild district peddling her minor fortune telling at the hour in which the hatakomon's majordomo was looking for a quick replacement. Forces that had freed the seer's evening for work, and supplied her with a form fitting dress and a sash of golden silk to replace her normal Memnosyne robes for the occupation.

Whether or not an invitation had been forged was an easy thing to tell. Most of the forgeries lacked the watermark that had been installed by the printer. Those that imitated the watermark failed the alchemical test that followed. Hozxi had come to believe that the majority of her job was not the act of verification, but the work of removing said forgers when they inevitably tried to push their way past her.

"I'm telling you, I got this from the lord himself! If he knew that you'd been detaining me he'd have you thrown out of this city!"

She was arguing with one such noble, a rather portly man in a baggy suit that seemed to imply his weight had somehow been more in the past, when she caught sight of a familiar face she did not expect to see. Hozxi avoids making eye contact as she wills her attention back to the matter at hand.

"I'm sorry, sir, but as you can see, the reaction is blue. This invitation is not genuine. Please, go to the e-"

"Did you not hear me?"

The smell of wine and cheese assaults her nose as the noble leans in close. He had clearly been enjoying himself at another party before this one. Perhaps with another forged invitation.

As the man tries to force his way past, Hozxi wastes no time. The giant kicks the inner shin of the trespasser with Kishoi force and walks into his path so that he crumples into her chest and not the delicate stonework of the narrow passageway.

"Watch your step, sir. Here. Sit a spell."

Hozxi lowers the man down onto the raised stone trim that forms the base of one of the wooden pillars nearby.

Needless to say, simply abandoning her post was out of the question, but as her place was at the gate itself, there was no need to try to ford the river when the current was already in her favor. More guests come, and more invitations present themselves, before Petra and her escort make their way through the line.

"Your invitations, sir and madam."

[Mino]

Mino had come up these steps many times before. He’d taken them on two legs and on four, and somehow he wasn’t sure which form he would have preferred to take. Smoothing a hand over his hair, tucking any stray strands back in place, he ascended the steps toward the inner gate. House colors were prominently on display in his dress, lightened blues and stark whites. White to compliment the sandier tones of his skin, the deep neckline of his shirt just barely revealing the brand at his collarbone. The soft dangle of a chain around his neck, looping through the sheer blue cape that fluttered out around him and seemed to melt into the sleeves of his jeogori.

His smile was much as marker of his presence as any other, teeth gleaming in the light. His gaze slides over the guests in attendance. Some have brought in a plus one, or two; kind of makes him wish he had done the same. But he couldn’t bring Fawn into his work. Not like this. Something about telling her, even if in some measure of it being a lie, didn’t sit right with him. His pupils retracted to a slit, nearly startling a young woman beside him. She may have been intent on speaking with him — not unusual — but was cowed into silence even as he smiled and inclined his head in a nod of greeting before moving on.

The rathari’s purpose this evening was the bare minimum of reconnaissance. Bare minimum in that he had to assess the security and means for which they might be evaded. Surely, a family of hatakomon would have a well-guarded home. But on a night in which it was opened to others was when it was most vulnerable, even if they suspected it would be more secure.

The Lord Lekivian did not mind this sort of work much. Preferred it, really. Nothing quite like taking from someone that had so much to the point that it sometimes took them several days to realize something was missing. And then, they would find themselves in need of a replacement to save face, and the cycle of illegality continued as their replacement was lifted off the hands of someone else. Or, perhaps, made to look startlingly similar to what they had previously possessed.

His smile spread wider. Perhaps he would be entertained tonight.

[Petra]

The hand on hers makes her start. The lips on her knuckles make her blush. She is unused to such contact. She is not ready for it. She shudders at the touch, but does not retract her hand. She is patient with it, determined to outlast the sign of affection. Determined to enjoy it. Pulling away, she is ruffled, but ready. There is a color to her cheeks that is not entirely unwelcome. She straightens herself, and proceeds.

Petra nods at her friend in confirmation. "I am a leaf on the wind. Beyond notice. Impossible to catch."

Perhaps, if I keep telling myself that, I'll finally believe it.

Petra nods, and she feels the swell of power inside her. New power, from new revelation. Her eyes glow for a moment, as if a flame is lit behind them. Then, they return to their cat's eye gleam, and nothing more.

Control, Petra. Control. You must be a being of control, or you are nothing more than an animal.

Her trousers fit her tightly, her boots click on the slabs of rock beneath, her sherwani is of fine jade silk, a fine complement to her eyes. Those eyes blink in shock when they see Hozxi at the door.

"What are you doing here?" Petra reaches into her sherwani and pulls out the pair of entirely-real invitations. She arranged this all just to get them, more or less, and she hands them over with confidence. She has to reach rather high up to give them to Hozxi, but she manages just fine. It's easier after she steps over the man on the ground, whose head is still slumped in pain.

Ah, I know the feeling well. That sudden realization that you're not invincible, after all. What a shock it is, what a particular sort of agony.

The invitations are handed over, and then accepted back. Petra hands Finn's to him, and then pauses in her tracks. It isn't often that she can introduce one friend to another.

Rare enough for me to have two at once.

"Finn, this is Hozxi - a remarkable woman from the deep desert. Hozxi, Finn - a musician of notable talent." She leaves out their magical acumen. Not everyone wears it on their sleeve as proudly as she does, after all. It would be rude to let secrets slip improperly.

"I didn't know you worked as a bodyguard."

[Hozxi]

The invitations are real. The watermark is visible, and after a small dab of solvent from the stamp provided to her turns a dot in the corner of the paper a deep crimson there can be no doubt. It looks like a small dab of blood, Hoxzi muses to herself, as she returns the papers to her-

Friend? Associate? Confidante, and her own attaché? The web of relationships was becoming more tangled the longer Hozxi stayed among the settlers, as her life settled into the city.

"I work wherever the money is good. Lord Yangseng is generous to those willing to help on such short notice."

Her eyes follow Finn as he performs a storm. The crowd loves it. It seems easy to love this stranger, and easier more to follow his tune, as the sounds ring with the joyful aether of a Mesmerising song. One foot makes a measure of tapping before she catches herself.

"Your friend seems to be drawing a great deal of attention."

Hozxi looks askance at some of the armed guards standing at attention by the corner of the plaza. Her lips purse. She turns at Petra as she is bound to leave. The vision she had received earlier was coming into focus, but some things were still unclear. Until she knew the answers, she dared not make her move.

"Please have a wonderful evening. I will come inside to help serve refreshments once the gates are closed."

Hozxi grabs the hand as the invitation she returns to the mage enters it and pulls her close, lowering her voice to a quiet whisper.

"Before then, be very careful, Petra. The punch is wonderful but I have seen it and it is a deep red. Many clothes will be stained that color before the evening is done."

The Kishoi releases her friend, and smiles a thin, forced smile, her eyes that same brilliant topaz but dulled by the gate overhand above and its long shadow.

"Please, your invitations," she calls to the next set of guests in line.

[Mino]

Mino’s ears twitched.

He didn’t, at first, place the voice in a whisper — a habit of straining to hear the words passed in confidence much too strong for him to resist. But the tail end of the words had him more alert than before. His steps didn’t falter as he approached the gates and her keepers. A large woman stood, taking invitations and his brows rose. So this was what Lady Honey had asked for him to check on. Something about one asset or another. He had assumed it had been further inside that he would need to see someone under the house’s employ. But the front gate? It was reminiscent of Daffodil and her earlier work. When he was still trapped by the skirts of Lady Blue and the early stages of his debut into society.

He wasn’t sure if the moratallen had gotten much of a glimpse of him from his place in the tree much earlier this morning, but his voice may give him away. His grin was easy, the one he wore in public for others. “They’ve already found you work, I see.” Not entirely surprising how fast the ladies of Yellow worked; they were the industrious sort and there was always work to be found when you were body in martial movement.

The lord produced an invitation from within the pockets of his coat, presented between two fingers. A very much not fabricated invitation; it hadn’t been hard to procure. A simple matter of speaking to the right people at all times and the wondrous status of hatakomon attached to their name. It would have been considered a slight if they hadn’t had an invitation delivered to them. Not after the cotillion and the attendance of Yangsheng and his children. That, and one of his wives had taken something of a shine to the rathari.

Something he fully intended to take advantage when the time is right.

“I can assure you there is nothing out of place with the invitation myself.” A beat, then, dropping his voice lower: “And maybe we shouldn’t wish ill of an event like tonight. Eat, drink, be prosperous and all that. Though, I suppose you won’t get much chance of that yourself since you’re on the job. But what’s a guest sneaking a drink to the staff, hm?”