There are times when opportunities literally fall before your hooves, but Locke never thought that meant literally. Until now.

The first he heard it was a sound of a drum, like thunder on the wind at a distance. Perhaps foolishly, the act of weary traveler dropped like a cloak unnoticed to the ground as his head tossed upwards to search the skies. There! The blurry dark spot had an advertisement of ruptured clouds torn to shreds around it. And just as soon as he noticed, it winked out, leaving the clouds to make their own excuses. Snorting in distrust of his senses Locke hesitates. It was normal...had to be…

Magic. Surely. It wasn’t unknown to him. Kalhir had had its own- Gods. When had he last thought that name out. Here he was trying to start fresh, let it go, see the light, go into the unknown or whatever mantra of rebirth you wanted to attach to the age of notion of the naive.  It was the roll of his eye and shoulder, resetting his mind after that unpleasant reminder, that he caught the movement. The movement, dropping-no, falling. Tilting his head back the other way he watches. Down, down, down. Like a cast curse it was driven from the heavens. Then- there!

It landed farther ahead. Weight shifted in our watcher. Most might walk away. Raised brow looks to his left. Some might see the rupturing of the heavens and the rejection of some item as a sign to sell out and move on. There was no one to his left, and he looks to the right. Some might take cover or fall prey to hidden fear by excusing themselves to run away and tell others. There was no one to his right either, so he looks forward where a dark shape dented the white sheets. Some might know better. Amusement raises with his hoof as he steps forward. But Locke, for all his lessons learned and street smarts still suffered one possibly fatal flaw. He was curious.

------

Damn. It wasn’t just some by-gone relic. It was a horse. Strewn in the snow, and seeming both one with the snow and isolated in violet, it was undoubtedly a horse. His gut twisted, not for the blood or damage mind you (He’d seen worse, been worse, and done worse. He bore the three scars on his chest to prove it.) but for the civic notion that as the only witness he now bore responsibility. It soured worse on his tongue than the smell of injury surrounding the fallen.

So he moved to back away uneasily, as any mortal still savoring the breath in their lungs usually does at the site of someone else who has taken their last. It wasn’t that the youth was fearful, but rather he knew dead bodies were like flies for questions and who the hell was going to believe this poor unfortunate soul fell from high in the sky. They’d be calling other things high, and he doubted it would have anything to do with altitude. Yet just as he was turning away, just as his chained ear rattled to follow his thoughts to the path ahead, it caught backwards on the body. Tugged like a string. Curiosity snagging the thief again, asking questions that lead to trouble rather than away. He could check the body for...identification… or valuables.

After a few more side glances, the young opportunist slunk closer to his quarry. A necklace? Leg cuff? Hair ties of metal? Greed danced in his eyes making him almost miss the fact that there was in fact nothing. Ears pin back in accusation, but the creature bore nothing- except for life. A breath, however damaged by the fall, rises in the heaven cast out. Drawing back away from the asp of possible complication, the guilty youth ground his teeth. Should have walked away. “Shit.” came the hissing whisper.

He could still walk away. Locke could whistle a merry tune and take this wracked body as a heaven sent lesson not to anger the gods of this land. He could turn away, so he told himself, and surely in an hour or … day someone would show up to help this creature. Surely. His curiosity was well and truly satisfied (so he lied to himself). Time to ship out and hold to what he should have before: that this could lead nowhere but to questions he didn’t have answers to, nor was he sure he wanted. But where Locke’s curiosity failed, his one raw heart string held solid in some regrettable horse-anity. Could he leave this defenseless creature just to die in the cold wilds? (Well this lands own gods didn’t want him.) Could he be cold enough to be blind to the dream shadow of this creature in his sleep tonight? (He had enough nightmares what was one more?) Did this creature deserve to die?

“Hey!” A white spotted nose attempted to toss snow onto the creature’s face. “Hey- Wake up.” It felt wrong. Awkward, stupid. Worse than a tailor’s first attempt at a ballgown. It kept the young thief’s ears back and face tense, though the humor of before was still hidden in his light manner. Still, when he woke this son of the sky up, Locke was going to take upon himself to kill him for dragging of all things, guilt out of him.

No, don’t underestimate Locke. Even he didn’t dare dream he would be adding ‘savior’ to the list of future prospects created by our tale earlier. 


"Speaking."
OOC:: @Silasthein Sorry for your wait! I can't wait to read more of him! Also I wrote a novel, please do not feel you need to match! 

Helpless. He felt helpless. Tossing snow to rouse a creature who the only comfort he could bring was ‘that looks like it hurts’. Gods, foolish and helpless, pinch of guilt. He really was starting to see why ‘nice guy’ illusions were never in his closet: they were damned uncomfortable.

A gasp caused the boy to flinch, and retreat as consciousness began pumping through the older horse’s blood, what was left of it anyway. For that which had spilled on the snow, well, there wasn’t much hope there. Locke should say something. His gut twisted his diaphragm up to push the words out, but nothing came except a patient, wary stare, and one swish of the tail. Comforting words, especially those not concealing lies like thorns in roses, were never his area. Honestly, the situation had pulled the bastard quite out of his norm, and he was beginning to miss it. Beginning to see why all the remonstrations of his tutors to ‘be polite’, ‘wait your turn’, ‘don’t steal the prince’s jewels in the middle of class’ feel on deaf ears.

The injured slowly sits up, even laughs… strange. Maybe he was delusional. Would explain the staring, though Locke had to admit to doing his own examinations now that life flowed back through the body making the act seem less taboo. The source of the sharp tang in the air revealed itself as it dripped from the fallen’s nose and a few scrapes, but for the most part the pain’s source (and there was evidently a great deal of pain) seemed to come from within. Given that, even the toughened street urchin side of Locke had to give this stubborn bastard credit. He wouldn’t have been this composed about being cast out to fall from that height to the snow padded hard earth. And when he spoke- well if Locke could hold as much humor so near death as this mauve, it’d be worth hiring a bard to write a legend of it.

“And it isn’t death’s landing either.” Unbidden a smirk rose up on the edges of Locke’s lips, and the darkness in his eyes lessened. There were several ways into Locke’s good graces, (even if you were as much in the red as this cast out had started) and fall out boy had just found one. Frosty animosity felt the glowing embers of wit spark to life in the conversation and began to melt along with the ice in his eyes and voice. “Though given that height I bet your body would protest that.”  There was no offer to help, no rushing to the injured side, cautions not to move, or other such pointless nannying. It didn’t even occur to the youth. Maybe he had been refined in a palace, but he was born of the streets, and every so often, such as now, it showed in blinding clarity. Also, he was still slightly bitter for feeling the need to be present at all. Fine, more than slightly bitter.

It was in his own musings that Locke listened to the ramblings of the old man (mind you, everyone was old to the youth). His mind pulling the pieces of the puzzle offered and placing together the story. Or at least the story the other wanted to tell. Inner demonstal- The boy was intelligent, or so he thought himself, but the possibility space travel outside the aid of devines was beyond him. Maybe old Mauve was just grumpy the gods didn’t find him so pretty any more. The humor was cut short with one phrase though- Locke didn’t know who Mauve was… but why would that be good...for who? It was like a ringing of a dinner bell for his ever insatiable curiosity, and when you called that beast for dinner best toss the bucket and run like hell for the fence.

“You’ll find me a poor tour guide I’m afraid.”  The youth spoke, letting the smirk finally give way to an amicable smile, still wrapped in the wiriness of youth and first meetings. “I’ve only arrived myself not too long past, but they call this land Novus.” It had been tricky picking even that up, he’d had to adopt goody two shoes scholar vibe while slipping unnoticed through the lands the first few weeks. And Locke has already made quite clear how he feels about those guises. Damn cover wouldn’t even budge for him to lift anything. He’d given it up two weeks earlier than he’d planned so his intelligence gathering really was much shorter than he’d like.

If Silas had rung the dinner bell to Locke’s curiosity, he was now also ringing it to his greed in as well. The poor broken mauve could not guess what tsunami was now pulling back the waves, nor how it might drown him in his own words. So the grin that looked back at Silas turned slightly. Matching his, but soured like old milk. “It so happens I might…” for what price though. It was then the young magpie remembered his mark didn’t actually have anything valuable. He’d tried it before. It wasn’t his first preference, but he supposed a favor would have to do. (Not to mention the ‘you don’t know me’ comment still echoed in the hallows of his ears and curiosity.) “Locke, of Solterra.” A short nod, a blank check filled out. “Terrastella, the Dusk Court has a Hospital, or so I’ve heard, they reside southwest of here.”  It was second hand, but true or not poor Silas had already signed his name.

Magician? Ah, that explained a LOT. “No I don’t think so…”  Came the absent minded reply, but it was not followed by offers to help. It still never occured to Locke to bother. He’d woken the old mauve, that was life debt enough. Yet the young child didn’t want to let go, not yet. Woken too aggressively and promised a meal his curiosity and avarice licked their lips in the shadows of his souls, kept from his face only by regular practice. “Magician with no magic? Your day seems to have all kinds of fascinating thrills that perhaps strange is as positive as it can be phrased. Yet this all seems common to you. Fall from too high up often?” It was pushing it, so the boy covers it in a warm, light tone, leaping with humor to hide the thorns within. For all the...indeed strangeness, Silas was bringing to his day, the youth was finding his earlier resentment nearly gone for the selfish pleasure the conversation was bringing him. He should wake dead guys more often, maybe he was underestimating them.




"Speaking."
OOC:: @Silasthein This is so delightful!

 

 

There was strange, and then there was beyond strange. This event was certainly one of the latter. Thrown out of a tower? Well, at least the name castout still seemed applicable. Locke was growing rather fond of it as it fit the otherworldly (little did he comprehend how true that adjective was) old mauve and his strange trappings of humor a physical resilience (or ignorance?).

That last part seemed to be growing questionable. Silas looks skyward, finding direction no doubt, but the youth assess the growing weight on the mauve, and it seemed each drop of blood was a chain dragging him to a grave below he was yet blind to. Through the dim of independence and lack of empathy it finally occurs to the young thief that just because his companion could stand and joke, it might not mean he could tick all the other important boxes for sustaining life. All it gains the drowning man was a tilt of Locke’s head however. Even though Locke noticed, the correct or proper reaction to such as realization was just as foreign as the interdeom-interdemon- that fun trip through the heavens straight to pain.

The hesitation at the unfamiliar feeling of caution was wiped clean when Silas once again called forth Locke’s full attention with ideas of promise, and return investment. “Solterra is a little north, mostly east of here. As for finding me I’m afraid I don’t have an easy answer.” Which likely wasn’t going to change even when the youth did take a more permanent title in the city (unless he finally hit the inevitable end of a  jail cell, which he didn’t dare breath into life even in the private halls of his mind). Home addresses were just sign posts for thieves, revenge seekers, and creditors. So you’ll forgive a smart boy for not wanting to keep one. Yet the feeding frenzy going on within his mind and stomach caused him to add: “If you can not find me you can leave a note at the Burning Oasis, third floor.” A whore house in the lower quarter that he used as a lookout was about as close to permanent as he would likely ever get. It did occur to the youth that if he ever wanted to stake out a more reputable practice perhaps a prostitute’s bed was not the place to conduct business. Though he never asked for the services of the room’s occupant he doubted it helped his reputation to share her apartment even temporarily...but then maybe it did.

The ravenous desire for more was quenched by a feast of information so rich and thick the poor youth struggled to process all the clues and puzzle pieces. True he had been conditioned to speed up the workings of his mind, but the old mauve was stacking up books in his arms higher than his head. The young sleuth wanted them, desired them, but his curiosity quickly found its mouth on a meal nearly too large for itself (though certainly satisfying). What did stand out to Locke was that, though he had lost the battle with fate at the moment, this Silas was indeed someone who would be, should be, known. And, to seal Silas’s place permanently out of the red, it seemed the mauve knew the correct definition of fun.“Your determination is good to hear. I wish you luck in your search.”  Truer words had never left that boy’s mouth.

Then the tone turns, drifting over towards the plains of Terrastella. Again Locke notes the blood still dripping from the other’s mouth, and again he remembers that though the other appeared to be alright, that may not be the case. Yet, still he found himself caught, and his mind unable to fill in the blank of “Let me help you by____”. It was the draught of experience caused by his age and his lack of a friendlier figure than a royal rival half brother, and a two timing, back stab- that mare. As if trying to rid his mouth of sour notes such thoughts left, Locke makes an attempt to move along, literally. “I’m going your way for a while yet.” The continued gentle expression holding, an illusion but ever strong. And to support his claim the youth turns south, slightly west and begins to move slowly onward, with the slow pace being the first concession Locke made to the other’s condition.

It was curiosity, the merchant thief told himself, as he paused to wait for the other. Only curiosity, he promised himself. It was certainly not because Locke finally seemed to find someone who shared his sense of humor, or that they continued to feed the ravenous mind of his with all its favorite snacks and morsels without him even having to work for it. And it of course had nothing to do with the fact that Locke had not had a ‘normal’ conversation like this (and this was fairly normal for this realm) in weeks, possibly months. And under no circumstances was it because he seemed to have found the first non-criminal friend since those two unnamed shadows of his memory. No, those couldn’t be the reasons at all why Locke found himself walking slowly along with the castout mauve, waiting without comment to see if he came.


“I know little about your method of travel.” Apparently Locke’s ‘curiosity’ was also pushing him to commit the stupidity  to now volunteer information. “Though I wonder, besides continuing the path you have now laid for yourself: what had you hoped to find here?” It was a weak query, but valid. Locke had arrived here hot off the heels of ‘Get me the hell out of there’, and even in his few weeks as he learned this world he found several in the same position. Silas, didn’t seem to be of the same mind. Locke was taking advantage of his overactive curiosity to fill the void and perhaps discover why someone who was at the pinnacle of their trade would risk it all. Had the youth actually paused to truly think about that statement, or if he had turned the tables on himself (which was a very possible thing to do as he too had left quite a lot behind) Locke would find the answer obvious. But self answered questions did not solve awkward silences, or help young thieves manage the foreign roadmap of manners.



"Speaking."
OOC:: @Silasthein Finally! Sorry for your wait darling! We can keep this going or I can wrap it up next post? Your choice. =]