Locating the Lost [Hershey]
Posted: Mon Jan 11, 2021 12:28 pm
25th of Frost, Mid Morning
Leith was restless. She couldn't quite wrap around her head around the fact that despite the size of the city, it often felt so constrictive around her. She was used to homes that moved on the water, only staying in ports as long as repairs and supplies were needed then returning to the vast ocean. The novelty and newness of the city hadn't yet worn away, but a certain homesickness had done the wearing in it its absence. She had so much to do and accomplish if she was looking to open a business in this city, but when the beast grew ornery Leith knew better than to go against the grain.
So she let her thoughts drift and decided today was a day for pure exploration. No goal other than to understand the levels of Kalzasi better, and if she had found nothing worthwhile by days end, then she'd at least know which parts not to return to.
With this settled Leith kept a bit of underlying agitation, but proceeded in a comparatively calm and leisurely manner to the Plaza of Jeweled Arches. She enjoyed the colorful rooftops, and let herself be led to shops one by one by picking out a color she liked and discovering what lay beneath, memorizing this and taking a peek at what a shop had to offer, then moved on. She found the bathhouse and stopped planted on the cobblestones, warring with herself to go inside and relax in the warm waters, but forced herself to keep moving. Perhaps a reward at the end of her day, but she suspected she wouldn't leave once she entered.
After that her wandering became even more aimless. Lured by the scents of a perfume shop, Leith closed her eyes, trying to identify the scents as best she could with her Zoan form. Balsam, Rose, Lavender, Lemongrass, the mingling of more pungent scents muddied the whole, but she could still with a bit of effort pick out the individual smells. Of course she was still walking, with eyes closed in a busy market, and so it was absolutely no surprise when her leg swung into something soft that gave a grunt.
Leith froze, hopped back a half pace, an interesting sight indeed for a woman of her build and gazed down at whom she had so rudely walked into. A human woman was bent over the cobblestones, and despite the noise she had made, barely paid Leith a glance before resuming her activity. This seemed to be to the Rathari, digging in between the cobbles, hunched back, fingers stained with dirt and other refuse as if she was trying to remove each cobble individually.
"Apologies." Leith said, but this had even less of an effect than her nearly kicking the woman over, so with a grunt of her own Leith sat onto her haunches next to the woman and ran her finger through some of the in-between-cobble-dirt as well.
"Looking for something?" This combination of things, along with the words said close to the woman's ear, seemed to do the trick. Bright hazel eyes darted up, took in Leith in a moment, and nodded in a fairly manic way, a dirty finger reaching up to tuck a loose strand of burgundy hair back behind her ear, and leaving a long brown line on her face to show for it.
"It's a chain of silver, belonged to my Grandmother." This admission put a new crease of worry across her face, and the fingers went back to digging.
Leith cleared her throat. "If the chain was in these dozen or so cobbles, I think you would have found it."
The woman gave a weary sigh and clenched her hands together. "You're right, of course you're right, but I know I was in the plaza, and this area is where I spent the most time, I just..."
A perplexing series of emotions washed over Leith in that moment. The beast was still restless, feeling cooped up and constrained after being for perhaps the longest she had ever been on land. She felt annoyance at herself for her self insertion into this woman's problems, a desire to leave and continue her day, and to walk briskly far from here and forget this happened. The other part of Leith wanted to feed this woman and get her something to wash up with. Neither of these feelings would actually help this person, however. She gave one lengthy moment of thought, then uttered hesitantly. "Perhaps I can help you look for this chain?" She felt about as lost at how to help as the woman who introduced herself as Cecilia looked, but knew she had no way out when the woman's eyes turned up to her hopefully. Strangely in that moment, Leith thought she sensed out of the corner of her eye, another approaching.