One Out of Many

Game Master Mowque

Rudabeh looks over the worn copy of The Sacred Keystones. This copy could very well be as old as her, and it was lucky to be in at least half this good of shape in the salty air of Outsea. "Gig," She begins firmly, looking him in the eye. "Just because someone isn't using something doesn't mean they don't want it, or they won't use it later. If you didn't get the old man's permission to take this, it is stealing." She motions for him to put the book away. Placing one hand on her knee, the paladin stands up in a cascasding whisper of shaking plates. "Later, I want you to take me to this old man. You are ging to give his book back, apologize for taking it, and offer to compensate him for using it without his permission. Then we will go and use money to get you your own copy of The Sacred Keystones."

Standing tall in the shining sun with an aura of righteousness and law, Rudabeh was both passing judgement and trying to instruct the ignorant grippili simutaneously. "But we both have our duties to see to first. I will see you soon." She sends him off so she can talk to Ractus.

--------

"Oh, I definitely understand." Rudabeh comments when he says his parents aren't around much. Seems her and the elf had more in common than she thought. A chuckle arrests her breath when he mentions his sister calling his mercenary lifestyle as a phase. "No one's ever said that to me about my passions...Well, don't grow out of it any time soon, I can't handle all this on my own." Her sincere comment is followed by a caustious pursing of her lips when she realizes the elf is needling her over their disagreement on clerics of Gorum. "Hmm, my only experience with clerics that can't read is they tend to make up a lot of "scripture". Still, I suppose I could teach everyone. I just don't think I have the talent for it."

She waves a hand dismissively at his call for her to be tougher on the troops, which attracts the attention of a nearby gull. An icy glare sends it screeching skyward mid-swoop. "I would rather lead by example than by fear. Besides, they deserve to be happy and comfortable now and then considering the risks they take for everyone's safety. IN any case, now we no longer floating down the Sellen we could have some real drills and mock combats."

The thoughts of teaching and drills sparks another thought in her mind. "If you could do me a personal favor while you're out gathering information," Rudabeh says as she looks out at Lubber's Row. "I want to know if The Bastard Bridage is still stationed somewhere around here. It would be nice to see Finn again, even if she's found some new hatchling to dig the latrines and sharpen her sword."

Okay, ready for the homecoming.

Gig goes to his duty without another word, the other Company members on his crew watching him carefully as if he was a cuttlefish loose in a shrimp nursery. Hopefully they didn't skewer him like an Outsear shrimp farmer would do to such a predator.

Not that Rudabeh was opposed to skewered raw cuttlefish.

Ractus laughs and says, "You are the least hobby-like person I have ever met, Rudabeh and I have met a lot. I've traveled with you for, what a month now? And I have no idea what you do for fun. You don't drink, you don't gamble, you don't even read for pleasure." he holds up a large, callused hand, "And yes, I am counting your little writing sessions. If you say coming up with a uniform legal code for the River Kingdoms is your idea of a fun project, I'll quit and jump in the Well."

In her mind Senqhi remarks, We have elves, a few, in my homeland but they are nothing like this one. They are often cold, calculating, serene. Are all elves on this plane like him?

"Mock combat." Ractus sniffed, "I don't knock training, Gods know, but combat isn't something you can do in controlled circumstances. I prefer real, if easy, fights. I'll have a look around." His violet eyes lit up when she mentions Finn and he grins, "A half-elf, you said, right? And your old mentor? Maybe she will have some stories of Rudabeh having a good time."

In short order she and Irovetti are setting off down the road toward her parent's home. The former king had suggested servants but thought better of it after a glance at Rudabeh's face. On both sides the buildings of Landlubber's Row lined the wide, shelled road. It was as busy as before, and they had to dodge traffic of all sorts. Rudabeh noted that small side alleys winded away between buildings and lost in an unseen rats nests off the main road. Those paths had not existed a decade ago and hadn't needed to, the Row had been enough room for all the Lubbers.

What might be breeding in those unseen crannies?

She doesn't have time to wonder long because they reach their destination in short order, which had once been the edge of the Row. Her parent's house, at least was right where she left it. A large rambling half-stone, half-wood structure which rested in the Well as much as on dry land. Rudabeh remembered the workers driving long pilings into the mud to strengthen the wobbling foundation. Many had said the ungainly building was unwise but Gegdev had never wavered, always saying having a foot in both camps, wet and dry, would pay for more then a few pilings. he had been proven right and Rudabeh couldn't help but noticed a few other half and half buildings like it now.

The building was much the same, although two new side wings had been added, which had the look of warehouses. The whole building had also been newly painted a rather fetching blue, with bright white trim. It wouldn't weather very well in Outsea's humid and salt-stained climate but it looks good right now. Her attention was drawn however not to the refurbishments but to the two lumpen looking men slouching away from the front door.

They have sour looks on their faces but one look at a six foot tall undine warrior, complete with sword and full plate hurriedly send them to the street. Rudabeh notes they too have the chalk marks on their backs.

Irovetti sniffs at the retreating men, "Workmen of some kind? Your father needs better taste."

The door opens and Rudabeh's father steps out onto the small rock that acts as a front porch. It has only been a decade or so since he last visit but to her surprise she can see he has aged. His shoulders are stooped slightly and there are heavy bags under his eyes. The once bright turquoise flesh is dull and hangs about him, as if he has lost weight recently.

He opens his mouth to speak, sees Rudabeh and blinks.

"Why, hello Rudabeh." He says honestly enough, his voice still a rich baritone. "I wasn't expecting you. I assume letters have gone amiss?" he says this with the easy experience of a merchant who has seen all too many letters fall by the wayside. Then he shakes himself and says, "Oh, Rudabeh!" And hurries the last few steps to give her a quick hug. She can't help but notice his always confident, firm stride is a bit shaky, as if her father had just recovered from an illness.

His hug is heartfelt though and tight. He smells the same, that combination of salt and sweat, and just a bit of oil that he liked to clean his teeth with.

"It is good to see you, Rudabeh! It has been too long." he finally says stepping back and looking her up and down. "You look good, better then good." he eyes the armor with a salesmen's eye. Then he notices the robed and bearded Irovetti and raises an eyebrow, "And who is this> A husband, finally?"

He grins widely, letting them both in on the joke. It was his old mainstay, to make an obvious joke and yet somehow make it funny by letting everyone to laugh [i]at[i/] it, instead of with it. That trick had sold many cargos.

"Hmph." Rudabeh scoffs when Ractus criticizes her use of free time. "Well, it would be rude to make you salt your clothes, so I will leave it at that."

A little. Elves here are... mercurial, but I have only met a few. I think Ractus is a bit more adventurous than most elves, most are happy in their homeland forest of Kyonin and are only stirred to ferociously defend it. She thinks to Seqhi. If all elves were as smarmy and long-lived as Ractus the world would have problem indeed.

"I know a lost finger or two from bashing goblins makes for good nicknames and better character, but most soldiers don't lose appendages or their lives to wooden poles." Rudabeh says with the air of someone who has thought long about the subject. "But I trust your judgement, you know what we can handle. No dragons, all right?" Or genies. If Satrap Azam never contacted her again, that would be great.

Casting a cool eye over Ractus with a furrowed brow, she ignores his ribbing and asks: "I thought you knew Finn? You acted like you did back in Pitax. Did you merely know of her?"

The walk to her parent's house, and her father's attached warehouses, gives Rudabeh time to notice and appreciate all of the changes Lubber's row has gone through in the past decade. The buildings are more dense, even taller in some places. Some of them feel squeezed together, and the resulting new alleyways are long enough that her darkvision barely pierces beyond stacks of oddly-cut pieces of lumber or the dirty rags hanging from them.

Though the spaces between are a dark mystery, the streets are lively and the open sea air puts a pep in her step. There was even a trope of minstrels playing inside of a new tavern she had never seen before, and a song drifts out from the open windows onto the busy street.

It wasn't the usual drawling shanty by a dozen drunkards, but something new, jaunty and maybe even Taldane. It was odd hearing a song she had never heard in her own homeland, but it stuck in her head all the same.

She sings to herself under her breath while weaving through the crowds, one eye on Irovetti's bobbing head.

"I need a hero,"
"I shall hold out for a hero 'til the end of the night"
"I pray he be hale,"
"Wingèd of heel"
"And newly return’d from the fight."

It was probably irritating to Seqhi that Rudabeh only picked up the refrain, because she just kept repeating it to herself over and over and over.

The tune dies on her lips when she sees what looks like a pair of thugs, or masons, it was difficult to tell the difference, appear to be staked out in front of her parent's house.

Picking up her speed on seeing them, the clanking paladin slows once more when the two humans steal off into the crowd like mackerels returning to their school. More chalk marks. An odd way to be guilded, if that's the case.

"No, the warehouse help my father hires is amphibious. If they were porters, he wouldn't have them standing around for certain." She comments to Irovetti with concern in her voice. Gegdev had probably gotten himself in some sort of local trouble. Again.

Her concerns are confirmed when her father steps out to the porch, and any simmering annoyance at her father's aptitude for trouble vanishes in a sudden wave of worry over his well-being. "Dah!" She calls out to him with a raised hand when his eyes meet hers. It falls to the wayside as she hurries forward in a clatter of metal, arms outstretched to meet his embrace. "I have wasted too much coin feeding letters to this swamp." She says while squeezing him back tightly, careful not to crush him in a steel-backed clamp.

Pulling back to look him over, Rudabeh must admit it wasn't what she imagined. She had thought of seeing him, charging him, and sweeping him up in a crushing hug that lifted him off his feet. He could have handled it before, but now... he looked frail. He was only 200, but if this kept up he would look like Iniidae, the ancient undine she had briefly met not months ago, in but a few more decades.

She feels her throat tightening a bit at the thought of her father turning so frail so quickly, what has the last decade wrought upon him? Her mind was turning over what to say to his comments on her looking good when his joke with Irovetti distracts her. Gegdev could probably tell her heart wasn't truly in her laugh as it usually was, and she glances over to Irovetti with a shake of her head. "This is my advisor, Irovetti. He is a scholar of the arts and wished to meet Ondev after seeing the breath-taking statue of Alseta that stands near the Arch." She grabs her unconsciously grabs her Iron Key, squeezing it. I was so moved, I..."

There is a pause as she once more takes in her father's physique, and Rudabeh cannot stand it any longer.

"...Dah, please, tell me, are you unwell?" She asks suddenly, softly, taking one of his hands into the palm of her gauntlet and squeezing it tightly. "Alseta has blessed me more than I could ever dream, I could ask Her to ease your sickness if you would allow it." Yet, as their matching limpid eyes met, Rudabeh suspected this was not something that could be healed with magic alone.

Seqhi sniffs, not at Rudabeh's somewhat mindless repetition but because on the Fire Plane music is taken very seriously. From their half-jointed memory, the paladin gets vague memories of grand music halls lit by roaring infernos and made of polished bronze, of gigantic orchestras of enslaved musicians and of elaborate productions that took weeks to unfold in a series of concerts.

Not only was the red-hot imagery strange to the paladin, the fact she was 'seeing' Seqhi's memories was more then a bit disturbing. Just how much was passing through the magical filter of this armor?

"Advisor?" Gegdev says, eyeing the man carefully. "Moving up in the world, Ruda. " He turns toward the human and says, "I can't speak for advising, but I know something of the arts. By the Gods I should after all the years living under the same roof as two artists. So you are a student of the arts?"

Irovetti gave Rudabeh a glance and then says, a bit stiffly, "I'd prefer the term, patron of the arts."

Gegdev's eyes light up, "Irovetti, you wouldn't happen to be...that Irovetti?" trust her father to be informed about wider affairs then most Outsears. The man always had his ear to the ground.

Her father took a step closer to the man, "I am told you have exquisite taste. Let's just say, I have a special pipeline directly to the source, if you know what I mean. Perhaps you are in the market?" A predatory look in his eye tells Rudabeh all she needs to know where this is going. Yet...Irovetti is no country mark, ready to be fleeced and sold to the highest bidder either. His face is no less studied and calculated as he surveys the genial undine.

For the first time the Alseta paladin wonders if putting Outsea's greatest salesmen and greatest purchaser in the same room was wise. She was probably witnessed the start of a drama that would bankrupt several local economies.

He waves a hand toward Rudabeh and says gruffly, "Ruda, is that any way to talk to your father. What are you saying, that I look old? Maybe when you reach my age you'll see it isn't an illness." After a few more grumblings he is all smiles again and grabs Irovetti by the shoulder and leads him toward the still open door.

'Will you walk into my parlour?' said the octopus to the crab, so went the old Outsea nursery rhyme. But Rudabeh wondered if perhaps her father had met his match.

"Your mother will be happy to see you, Ruda." Gedev says, guiding the former king of Pitax like a shepherd herding a particular fatty tuna. "She's in her workshop."

They step into the dry part of the house. The entryway is much like her memory has it, except for two new doors leading to the new side wings. The floor is covered in the same worn Taldane carpet and that truly weird green wallpaper is still tacked to the inside. A few of Ondev's earliest paintings are hung here, looking a bit dim. Stained glass suncatchers rest in all the windows, which is new.

"Your mother's latest hobby, at least for the last month. I swear she is keeping the glass works in business by herself."

However, Rudabeh can't help but notice the front door is new and (subtly) heavily reinforced with iron braces. It locks into place behind them with a heavy clunk. Her home had always been locked (a Outsea rarity) but apparently security had been bumped up recently. The two new doors are solid oak too and banded with metal, each with their own keyhole. Curious.

"So what brings you back, Ruda?" he father says as he guides them toward the biggest dry room, the one where he usually entertained lubber clients. "I assume you haven't decided to settle down and take up seahorse ranching in the Well?" A pause and then, "I've heard some awfully interesting rumors about you, via the odd merchant or two that still finds me. Up to great things."

They enter the room, a large expansive room with wood lined walls, a rich (if faded carpet) and more early Ondev artwork. Rudabeh doesn't notice anything new, but that isn't shocking. His work was far too valuable by now to leave at home and they certainly had enough of it by now. Irovetti eyed the few paintings critically and with obvious curiosity.

"A drink?" Rudabeh's father said, moving over to a heavy driftwood cabinet. It was an actual bit of ocean driftwood, imported years ago so Daabi could 'study' it. After a few weeks she grew bored with, so it lived on in the 'squeezes room' as her father sometimes called the dry room for business.

Irovetti waves casually and says, "So, the artist lives here? I greatly desire to meet him and express my apperication...in person."

Gegdev laughs and slips Rudabeh a careful wink. The dance has begun.

"He lives here, but he is rarely here. He spends most of his waking hours, and plenty of his sleeping ones, at his new school across the Well." He gives Rudabeh a nod, "Your bother has apprentices now."

Rudabeh purposely did not use the word patron in front of Gegdev, though she had known it was pointless from the start. A pained twinge crosses her face as the loaded word spills from Irovetti's lips like a bag of chum going overboard.

Yet instead of a swarm of smaller fish, there was only one great big undine there to swallow it up.

Maybe this was the event outlined in her vision the gods bestowed upon her as her soul straddled the line between the material and astral planes. Could this great vortex of a kingly, shrewd art patron and the greatest loosener of purse strings she has ever known lead to the singularity her destiny hinged upon?

A few moments pass, her eyes searching for cryptic symbols or magical currents in the air and she decides no, it doesn't feel prophetic. This was just her father and Irovetti being themselves.

"It's how I talk to my only 200 something father," She drops her hand and gives her father a light punch on the shoulder, which she is now sure he can take. "when he looks like he's just recovered from a bad case of algae gill and pretends everything is fine. Have you been eating enough? Please don't tell me Daabi took all the cookware and made it into a sculpture again." Even though she is concerned, Gegdev seemed healthy of mind and heart even if his body was weakened. Rudabeh lets it drop for now.

Rudabeh has eyes on the door as they walk into the house, immediately noticing the reinforcements on the door.Oh, so he is in trouble. Alseta preserve my family what has he done now... She highly doubted Gegdev had suddenly taken up Alseta worship and this was his particular brand of piety. No, this was to keep someone out.

She is still eyeing the door when her father addresses her, causing her to turn and follow. "Ugh." Rudabeh groans at the mention of him getting news about her through merchants. "The rumors about me grow bolder by the day, I fear. I was sent here by Veleda for no particular purpose. I think it was partly benevolence to allow me to spend some time with my family, and partly to get me out of Daggermark so I wouldn't get into trouble." A teasing blue glance is directed her father's way. "It is a particular trait I developed from a singular influence."

Entering the squeezes room, Rudabeh starts inspecting one of Ondev's earlier paintings and wonders how her brother went from these excellent, if mundane, works to the artistic divinity she witnessed earlier. Had it really been so long? Did he just grow up in her absence?

"Stinger, please." She says without taking her eye off the painting. After a decade away, she really wanted some pickled anemone juice to numb her tongue on.

Turning around suddenly when Gegdev mentions her brother has his own studio now, Rudabeh looks at him in shock. "Ohnee has a school? With apprentices? You're serious?" Looking at his face, she can tell he's not joking. Rudabeh lifts a hand to cover her gaping mouth with soft, heavily stitched leather, eyes moistening. "Oh, goddess." She sniffs a little, before swallowing and trying to compose herself at the sudden influx of pride for her brother's accomplishments and the sorrow for not being here to see it. "He's done so well. I'm so proud of him."

Her father nods and murmurs agreement when she asks for Stinger. Glasses clinked and corks popped as he prepared the drinks, opening cupboards and filling glasses. With his back still turned he said, "I mean, he isn't very good at it. He is, as always, great at the art part, or so people tell me. If anything he is getting better, judging from the response to that Alseta statute."

The merchant turned back and handed out the drinks, giving Irovetti a very dark wine whose aroma half-filled the room. Despite the good wine, the former king's face is somewhat fixed as he realizes that instead of getting to meet perhaps the finest artist in a generation he is stuck attending a rather prosaic domestic reunion.

"But the teaching part rather escapes him." To Rudabeh's surprise her father has poured himself a glass of something, which is unusual for him. It is usually water, to keep his head clear during a meeting. When had he started drinking?

"Oh, the students line up, he has tot urn them away. But I fear actually teaching them much is still beyond him. Can you imagine attending a lecture by your brother, Ruda?"

He focuses on Irovetti, subtly changing his posture, "So I am afraid a direct meeting might not be possible today, but I do many samples of his work. Perhaps after we finish here-"

He is interrupted by a sound at the door. Rudabeh turns to see a young undine girl appear, holding a wax tablet. She is dripping wet and wearing very little (as custom among most Outsears excepting military uniforms).

"I counted those new crates, sir." She says, looking up from her tablet, 'Was there anything-" Then she spots Rudabeh and Irovetti and stammers, "I'm sorry, sir. I didn't know-"

Gegdev waves her to silence with a smile, "Ynide, meet my daughter, Rudabeh." a well timed pause and then, "She is the one in the all the armor." Ynide bobs her head.

"We brought Ynide on a few months back, to help with some things around the house. As Ruda has so gently reminded me, I'm not as young as I once was, so a little extra help around here is appreciated now that we are living alone." he turns back to the girl, "We'll talk about the crates tomorrow. Could I convince you to stay and eat lunch with us?"

"On Land?" Ynide says making a face, giving Irovetti a quick look. Rudabeh knew the feeling. Many undine spent a great deal of time on land, either with work or travel but very few enjoyed eating on land."No thanks, sir. I'll see you tomorrow. Nice meeting you, Rudabeh."

Gegdev shrugs after his youthful helper leaves, "She's been working out nicely, Wuli's girl, from across the way. Nice family even with...."

Her father opens his mouth, eyes Irovetti then quiets. Rudabeh wonders why. She couldn't recall anything about the undine family that lived close by. The usual members of the military and civil service, like many undine. Local natives, unlike her transplant family.

"Well, I'll go get your mother." Gegdev says in the suddenly awkward silence. He gives a glance to Irovetti, "And maybe grab a sample or two for you."

When he leaves the former king turns to Rudabeh and says, "I think I am intruding on a family moment. I'll take my leave and perhaps we can discuss things later. I do need to find accommodations, for example. Yes, best that I leave."

He is just about to make good his escape when Gegdev returns with an undine woman in tow. To Rudabeh's relief, her mother is unchanged from her memory. Average height with bright eyes and somewhat unruly hair, her hands are cut, bruised and stained from any number of craft projects. She is wearing a leather apron which reveals years of absentminded abuse.

"Ruda!" And she throws her arms around her daughter in a warm embrace. "You didn't say you were coming!"

Rudabeh takes the glass from her father, gently bringing it up to her nose to inhale the sour piscine notes coming off of the dull orange liquid. Within the bottle her father held was the source- a snakelocks aneome, fed a particular diet to increase its growth and enhance its flavor, which was then pickled in vinegar for over a year.

She takes a sip, immediately feeling the nostalgic tingling of her lips and tongue as the free aneome toxin numbs while the vinegar burns. Lubbers couldn't stand the stuff and normally outright gagged on it, but it was a popular non-alcoholic drink in Outsea for the aquatic and amphibious. It was also a good way to get in trouble as a kid; daring teens would often challenge one another to chew on the aneomea in the bottle, which completely numbed the mouth and left one unable to speak for hours. Some foolishly swallowed the pickled animal, and lost control of their bowels, or worse, their lungs, but humilitation was a more often occurance than death.

"A lecture?" She says incredulously, her previous emotinal tears seeming to completely vanish. "No, I think his students will have more luck just watching him work instead of him explaining anything."

She is wondering how Ondev got the idea to start a school, or perhaps more accurately who gave him the idea, when the young undine girl appears. "Thank you for helping my father, Ynide." Rudabeh says evenly, giving her a small bow of her head in return.

The awkward silence drags on between them, and Rudabeh is about to say there was a fisher on Lubber's Row that wanted to give her greetings when Gegdev suddenly says he was going to fetch her mother.

Quieting down with a sip of her drink, her gaze shifts to Irovetti, who has been thoroughly thwarted by lack of information. It was odd to see the former king care about social formalities, but then she realized it was because he knew there was no chance of metting her brother."Sorry Ondev isn't here, but I will set up a time for us to see him. You're welcome to stay for lunch at least, but the Company is staying at The Polite Clam, they may have a suite-" "[/b] The paladin is interrupted in giving local reccomendations by the sudden entrance of Daabi.

"Oh, mother!" Rudabeh exclaims, even though she knew she was coming. Setting down her glass of stinger, she tightly embraces Daabi. "I tried to send word, but knowing the mail here you will probably get the letter next month." Smiling, Rudabeh pulls back from her mother, then notcing something odd on the edge of her vision, she looks down. Her shining armor is now covered in some sort of bright yellow powder the odd bit of lack grease in an undine-shaped pattern.

"Ah...I saw your glass arrangments, have you sold many?" She looks it over again before just deciding to move on and find a rag later.

Her eyes find her father's, following up on a thought from before when he said they were lving alone. "Where is Dimi, then? Is it already time for her mandatory service?"

Daabi shrugs, "I don't do it to sell them, Ruda. You know that." Behind her, her father rolls his eyes. Her mother does frown at the stained armor, "Oh...sorry about that. Well, you certainly don't need all that here. Do you need help taking it off? Really Geg, were you going to make her stand at attention the whole time?" Rudabeh's mother smiles and eyes the armor's central jewel. "The shellfish motif is nice. Who made it for you? Someone in Daggermark?"

Then Rudabeh mentions Dimi.

She might as well thrown the rotting carcass of a deer in the center of the room. The smiles die and the air becomes quite cold. Daabi's face freezes into a wooden mask and, to Rudabeh's shock, two tiny tears form at the corner of her eyes. Her father gently grabs her mother's shoulder, hand on her bare skin.

"It's ok." he murmurs, and his own voice is strained.

"Dimi will not be joining us." Daabi finally says, stiffly, controlling herself. A quick shudder and then, in an oddly formal voice "I'll go get something ready in the dry dining room. Rudabeh, I would advise taking off all that armor. Our chairs probably can't take the weight." And then she is gone out the door. Gegdev sighs heavily, watching her go.

Irovetti, having watched the whole thing, seizes his chance with the boldness of a commander spotting an exposed flank. he rises with speed, setting aside the, empty, wineglass.

"Clearly this is a personal matter. I will leave you alone, I have no wish to intrude." The former king says quickly, already stepping for the door.

"Are you sure?" Gegdev says, a bit uncertain. Her father, willing to let a possible mark out of his sight? Things really were wrong here.

"Oh, I must insist. I will send a runner along, Rudabeh, from whatever rooms I can find. Have a pleasant visit." And like a sea snake vanishing into flowing seaweed, he is gone.

"An odd fellow." Gegdev says, rubbing his chin. Then he takes a seat. "Your mother is right, you should take off all that armor." Then, seeing her face he sighs, "I suppose I should explain about Dimi."

Her father finds a chair and sits uneasily in it, holding his glass but not sipping or even looking at it. The silence grew for a moment until he finally spoke, voice soft.

"To make a long story short, I entered into some business arrangements with some...unsavory men. You know how it is Ruda, sometimes you do not know the temperature of the water before you swim in it." The older undine made a face and he suddenly looked far older then his two centuries. "Well, I broke it off with these men. Unfortunately, during our time of...arrangement Daabi fell into friendship with some of them. After I ended the commercial aspect, I asked her to leave them as well. She refused and...well, it did not go well." He takes a quick gulp of his drink for the first time.

"She won't visit or even speak to us. Your mother has not taken it well." And not just her mother, her father looked like death warmed over. "I wouldn't mention her again, Ruda. At least not to your mother."

Oh... what has Dimi done? Rudabeh thinks as soon as the room falls quiet, a pained look crossing her face when her mother begins to crack.

Silently, she watches her mother turn and exit the room, leaving the stained paladin standing in the leftover emotional miasma pervading the room. Her head turns to Irovetti as he makes his exit, and Rudabeh merely lifts a hand to acknowledge his words as he vanishes from sight.

"Yes, please explain." She concurs in Aquan as her father takes a seat, and her hands reach up to find the metal clasps connecting her helmet to the articulating plates covering her neck. I'm sorry, Seqhi. I have some family matters to attend to. I'll talk to you later. Is mentally communicated before she flips the clasp and pulls the helmet loose, severing the armor's connection with the fire whale heart.

With a deep and concerned sigh Rudabeh lets loose her folded ears from the helmet, stretching and flapping the fin-like protusions a few times before they extend to their full height. Anyone who knew her before she began her journey as a paladin would notice she had two perfectly formed ears now instead of the mess of a scar on the left side of her head.

Armor comes off in bits and pieces while Gegdev talks, and Rudabeh has taken off her outlying equipment and taken off her gauntlets by the time he has finished. "I don't want the short story, dah." She says while pulling a sleeve of mail off of her arm. "I saw the thugs standing outside your new, heavily reinforced door."

Reaching behind her back, her breastplate loosens on one edge before her other hand pulls a different clasp, causing it to swing off of her body in one piece, exposing the brightly colored padding and her darkly blood-stained gambeson beneath. "You've made some enemies, haven't you?" She sets the breastplate on the old rug, sitting upright so the oil and yellow dust stays off of the floor. Approaching her father with a frown, the half-armored paladin gets down on one knee and places a hand on top of her father's own. "We can make this better. I can find Daabi. I can talk to these unsavory men, perhaps we can reach an understanding. If not, and if they have broken Outsea's laws I will persecute them. While I take no pride in the prejudice inherent in Outsea's courts, it will be especially easy if they are lubbers. Tell me about them, tell me what happened so I can help."

She uses both of her hands now to grasp his own, wondering when her own hands got as big as her father's. "You are caught in a swirling current of a thousand worries, and seeing you like this hurts me. Please, let me help."

"Oh, Ruda." Gegdev says, looking up at his tall, strong daughter. Even kneeling, her strength and power is evident. "Despite whatever magic healed you up, which looks good by the way, I see it hasn't changed you."

Compulsively the merchant raises his glass and tips the entire contents into his mouth. In a quick swallow it is gone, leaving behind only a faint air of fermented algae. he coughs once and says, voice still low, "You still want to fix everything, Ruda. You always did, long before Alseta and all that."

Still holding her hands, he rises to his feet, pulling her up as well.

"Not everything can be fixed, or wants to be." He pauses and took a shuddering breath, mastering himself. A ghost of his old smile returned, "The long story."

The undine man shrugs, "There isn't much more, to be honest and what else I know will not help you fix things." He raises an eyebrow, "Also, I'm surprised at you. Assuming the unsavory men are humans, or landlubbers at all. I thought I raised you better. Every race has its sneaks and cheats." And that was true enough, Gegdev was an equal opportunity skinner of lambs and he also knew wolves came in many coats. "The men you saw outside are actually an entirely different set of unsavory characters. The Tallies."

Her father shrugged, "They are unhappy about my former business acquaintance and are proving hard to convince of our current estrangement. So I am, as usual, caught between two waves. You know how it is, the burden of being the middle man. Chased by both shark and dolphin. Still, I doubt it will come to anything. Outsea isn't Galt." A flicker of memory crosses Rudabeh's mind, of fire and blood, of burning houses and screaming men.

"You can see my reluctance to get you involved, Ruda." He hurries on, perhaps to cover his own memories, "You are already talking about legal trials and actions to take. You are the one who got out, and are off to bigger and better things. You shouldn't be dragged down into more trouble on account of your father who made a few bad choices. I would hate to add new scars, especially after you got the last ones so expertly removed." A callused finger traces her smooth cheek ever so gently. "I don't want to be a rock tied to your future."

Her brother's old art looked down on them, and it had never seemed so faded.

"Greater powers thought me worthy to be made whole again after an attempt on my life nearly succeeded in Pitax." Rudabeh draws a deep breath as she remembers the pain of those wounds. "The gods held me together, but Veleda restored me to a health I have never knew. I am truly blessed." To say this in front of her ailing father caused her a different kind of pain... "It will not be magical," Rudabeh says as she resolves to be to her father as Veleda was to her, "But I want to heal your burdens, too."

"To be fair," The paladin interjects when she was accused of profiling, "I am merely hoping the ones causing you trouble are lubbers, not assuming. It is a sad truth, but it would be a far easier matter." Though she quiets when her father reveals there are in fact two factions involved in his troubles. It was an all too familiar situation.

Her face softens as her father caresses her cheek, and she closes her eyes. "I was powerless in Galt." The flames, the screaming... it all seems distant, muted, the chaos of Pitax seeming so much worse and fresh in her mind. But through the teaching of Alseta she had fixed it. How could this be worse, with only her father's business dealings at stake instead of the future of an entire kingdom?

Her eyes open, sapphire pools hard and resolute. "But I am no longer. I have the blessing of Alseta. I know this place, its laws. I have a company of soldiers at my command, and the backing of the Pact of Years." Standing up once more, she begins to work on removing her greaves. "I will not be tied down, just as this armor does not stop me from swimming. No, it is my turn to carry you on my back when you are tired and need help, just like you used to carry me."

The final pieces of her armor fall off, and she sets the silversheen plates aside by the driftwood cabinet. "Besides, they say a rock that holds gold is heavier than one without. You, mother, my siblings... you are all as precious as gold to me. I will carry you until my arms and legs give out. You all keep me steady, from floating off towards the surface. It is comforting to know I can always come back, to simpler things." She struggles out of her grimy gambeson, already feeling the cooler air upon her sweat-soaked blouse.

"Who is this business acquaintance?" She asks pointedly, placing her hands on her hips. Something about her time in Pitax rises to the surface of her mind like oil spilled from a lamp. "It's not Gemus Oskara, is it? He helped me greatly during my time in Pitax, and mentioned knowing you."

"Oskara is telling tales?" Gegdev says, making a face. "I'd have thought an operator like him would have known better and kept his mouth shut. He is involved Rudabeh, but only on the edges. If it had just been things like that, I could have handled it. That was just business."

Her father eyes the piled of steel, leather and padding that Rudabeh had so casually laid across his floor. Both of them know it is probably worth more then this entire house and everything in it, which is saying something in the home of a well-stocked trader. But all he says is, "We'll have to go for a swim after and get all that oil and dust off you. " Most Outsears have a weird horrid fascination with dust, and constantly worry about how landlubbers live while being coated in the stuff at all times. 'Doesn't it get in your eyes'? Her father knew better but it still slipped into his speech sometimes.

"Well, sit down then, Ruda." Gegdev insists, waving toward one of the rather comfortable chairs. "I'm not going to explain all this while you are standing there, giving me the look people usually reserve for injured seahorses."

He takes a deep breath and then, with a twinkle of his old smile says, "I'd like to go on the record saying I think this is a mistake. But, Ruda, I could never deny you anything." Which was a bold faced lie. Gegdev the trader had hardly spoiled his children.

"Does the name Vrasa mean anything to you?" Her father asked mysteriously.

Rudabeh Barrister: 1d20 + 10 ⇒ (6) + 10 = 16

The answer is plain on her face and Gegdev says, "I'm not surprised. They only made a big splash after you left. Although I wouldn't be surprised if you hadn't run across the name during your time with the law books. I don't recall, how much criminal law did you end up doing?"

Her father shrugged and went on, "Vrasa is a naga, and in the present tense, controls the crime undercurrent of Outsea." Seeing her face again he waves a hand, "I don't mean the petty types, the seahorse rustlers, the house breakers or that stuff. That's always been going on and goes on everywhere. You know that as well as I." And Rudabeh did. As she had just bee thinking about, robbery was common in the River Kingdoms, and even Outsea, and it was just as rarely unpunished.

"No, Vsara is too smart for that. They have organized the whole thing. I'm not sure how it started but I started hearing rumors seven or eight years ago, about a new power in the Undercurrent." This doesn't shock Rudabeh, her father has long has ties to some rather shady characters. Never anything more immoral then smuggling and customs evasion and never violence but he had a foot in that tide, it could be said. At least enough to hear rumors.

"A new figure, organizing it all. Not robbing houses or smuggling, but controlling those who did. There was some violence, or so people said, but never anything major. It wasn't like a pack of sharks moved in and killed everyone. It was more like algae appearing and suddenly growing on everything. I've...never seen anything like it."

For once, just this once, Rudabeh could smile at her father's naivete. Organized crime was not unknown to her, although it was vanishingly rare in the River Kingdoms. The settlements simply lacked the scale to produce them, unless one counted the more kleptocratic 'nations' that made up the political landscape. But Rudabeh's reading had introduced her to the concept long ago, of someone who essentially made crime a business, and it could be as cost effective and ruthless as the Aspis Consortium.

"Well, they contacted me." Gegdev said, "To arrange certain items without interference from the inspection teams. Going in and out. You know I've done that sort of things before and this seemed no different. If anything, the deal seemed better. The contacts were regulated, their seemed less chance of violence and the pay was better. They barely needed me, considering he had half the inspection teams in his pay, even then." Gegdev laughed sourly. "So, I became there middle man. They arranged everything, we just used my contacts to ferry the supplies in and out, and used my name as the cover story for the traders. It didn't seem that serious and it paid well. For a long time, I just let it ride."

Gegdev glanced at his daughter's face and stood up, "Don't judge me too harshly, Ruda. I wasn't...I mean, it wasn't like I didn't know." Her father started to pace, a very rare sign of agitation. "Vsara grew in power those years and I knew, deep down, I had something to do with it. But it was easy to convince myself everything was fine. Crime was actually down with their control, with fewer gangs and mindless violence. Yes, there were rumors of high corruption but it was easy to dismiss. Gods, Ruda, they said it was Vsara that finally managed to push through the new sinkhole project."

Her father shrugged a bit helplessly and then, after an awkward moment, sat back down. "But things started changing a year ago. Hard to pint down but I've been in the game too long not to have a nose for these things. They started getting too insistent, too demanding and far too secretive. They started saying I couldn't inspect the cargos. They used my name and wouldn't let me look inside! Some of the pilots I knew started to balk and I followed suit. I told them to find someone else, and broke off our, relationship."

"They didn't take it well." Gegdev said with a laugh and picked up his empty glass, "But your father is not exactly a nobody, Ruda. They couldn't just send some bully boys to break my kneecaps and be done with it. So they let me go...and hated me for it." gegdev turned to fill the glass, thought better of it and didn't.

"Not they need violence. Vsara controls enough now that his dislike is enough to kill my business and destroy my contacts. Friends I've had for decades won't answer the door and business deals are never even heard out. I'm alone Ruda, virtually cut off, aside from a few petty scavengings they let me have. Probably like to see me beg."

He turns to Rudabeh, "I suppose I deserve it, though, eh? Surely in all your books, they say such things happen to those who break the law? Just desserts, I think?"

"Oskara was selling goods and services to both sides of a civil war without getting caught." Rudabeh says dryly as she takes a seat in a straight-backed wicker chair that looks like her mother's handicraft. "I think he was trying to see if I wanted in on the business, or using his connection with you to get me to trust him." She waves a hand at the seemingly ancient history. "He ended up being quite helpful when he fully joined the winning side."

She quirks a brow at her father saying he couldn't deny her anything. Was he becoming senile as well? She still remembers as a child in Galt wanting to pay a traveling bard a copper for a song and was told by a certain father not to encourage wandering vagabonds that beg in verse.

Rudabeh says nothing, however, steepling her fingers and setting them just below her chin, body bent over with elbows on her knees. She listens intently, as if it were a confession, though her demeanor is much more casual. The Steward's Iron Key hangs from its chain around her neck, hanging with an eery stillness at the base of the triangle formed by her arms.

"You aided a criminal enterpraise, yes." Rudabeh says bluntly as he finishes, straightening up. "But you have already suffered more than I would ever pass judgement for such a minor role, especially since you turned your back on them in the end. To destroy a man's livelihood simply because he refuses to cooperate... it is petty." It seemed that was the extent of her judgement, and she moves on as if the matter of her father's guilt is finished.

"Where is the Council in all this? To see them cede any power to one not of their ranks is astonishing. Are some of them being bribed? Or has Vsara taken a simpler route and gotten himself a seat on the Council?" She had hoped this organized crime was not too far entertwined with the government, like the Asssassin's and Poisoner's guild was with Daggermark's elites. Perhaps there was still time to save Outsea from becoming another pseudo-lawless place in the River Kingdoms.

"And these Tallies... you said they are opposed to Vrasa's enterprise, but think you are still working with them?" Rudabeh was eager to determine the connections and power dynamics between these groups. Outsea had changed so much in ten years, and she was determined to catch up.

"How deep is Dimi in all this? Doing odd jobs? Or is she robbing houses and stealing eggs from the basket? Or just... hanging around these people?" She wanted to be surprised, but deep down Rudabeh had always feared this day would come. Her sister had always seemed to have a fascination with.... rogueish types.

"Oskara was a contact during the early days. I wasn't selling him weapons or anything like that, I should add." Gegdev says, shaking his head, "Mostly food, to be honest. I never even met him in person, just long distance contact. Pitax seemed quite complicated but rumors says you turned it inside out, Ruda. And you can imagine my shock when you brought the King into my house." The undine merchant shrugs this off, getting back to the manner at hand.

Her father does not react when she discusses his own shortcomings. The paladin has judged many people through the years, the high and the low, the guilty and the innocent (more frequently, the vast swath of people in between). Sometimes this had been easy and sometimes this had been hard, but in all cases it had never been personal. It was her judgement versus the facts and how best to solve the issue. And she had just done the same with her own father. She wondered what Alseta made of the whole thing. Was it right for a daughter to judge her father? But was it wrong for a judge to not judge? Or was this more of a confession, that much older rite of her faith.

Gegdev bends down and helps Rudabeh gather up all of her armor, the silversheen clinking lightly as he piles it on a table. The merchant gives the large firewhale heart a long look but lays it with the rest. Rudabeh can hear the heavy oak creak but it seems to bear the load.

"The Council is concerned with their own affairs. Vsara is careful not to interfere with the military or foreign relations. You know as well as I do that the Council has its own school of grudges and problems, some of them centuries old. They rather bite each other, then worry about smaller fish. I have heard more then a few are in cooperation with him. Derbacam seems untouched, at least." Derbacam was the undine member of the Council, or at least had been when Rudabeh was here last. Each race chose their Council member in their own way but the undine elected, for life. Derbacam had been their Councilor since before Rudabeh's family arrived in Outsea. He had never considered them true Outsears, due to being such recent emigres, but otherwise kept aloof from them. Rudabeh and her family were, in the grand scheme, rather small fry.

"No, Vsara prefers to rule from the shadows. Why bother with a Council seat when you can do what you want without it? The only real bloc totally opposed is Danglosa, but you know how that goes." Both pause to reflect on that strange divine entity that dwells not too far away, at least in physical distance.

"The Tallies..." Gegdev sighs, "I'm not an expert on that, but they are a bunch of human workers, brought in for the new sinkhole project. The Council hired lots of them, to speed up the work, and plenty brought families and others with them. I'm sure you noticed how big the Row is getting? Well, some of these new arrivals aren't happy that humans don't have a say on the Council. Most are talking about representation but a few radicals have been talking Secession. Peeling off the surface and making it it's own city, with its own, human, government." Gegdev shakes his head, "Plenty of the old-timer landlubbers say it is crazy but a few have been caught up in it. It isn't as bad yet, but some of the talk.... reminds me of Galt."

The older undine looks around at the nice house, the art hanging on the walls and the sunshine filtering in the curtained window. Despite the bright light and humid air from the Well not far away, it suddenly feels very cold to Rudabeh.

"Perhaps we will need to move on, again." Her father says, voice wistful, "Not the first time, but I had hoped to put down roots here. Perhaps we are not fated to do so."

Then Rudabeh mentions Dimi again but to her surprise he father gives her a slow smile. "Always so quick to judge her, Ruda. Just because she was a little rebel, doesn't make her a bad person. Not everyone can follow Alseta." But the smile fades as her father realizes they are not talking about a family squabble over chores.

"She hasn't fallen in with the real bad types. I think she just likes the danger. Or the idea of it. She was only twelve in Galt, she doesn't remember, like you do. Last I heard she was making a living hustling down in Gargant's Angle." Gargant's Angle was a well known gambling, fighting and drinking grotto down the Well, fashionably disreputable. At least from what Rudabeh recalled. Not many murders there, anyway. If that was as bad as it got, the whole Dimi situation might be salvageable.

"Pitax turned itself inside out." She responds to her father's recollections of the rumors surrounding the city's descent into brief anarchy. "Though I must admit I found myself holding the knife that made the initial cut. The People of Pitax craved justice, and when I gave it to them...." She sighs and waves a hand, causing some dust to swirl in the air. "It is a long stsory, but I shall tell you sometime. But I do want to make one point. Irovetti is the former king of Pitax and works for the Pact of Years now. I hope his career as a public servant will be less interesting than his time as king."

"Hm." Rudabeh grunts in response about Derbacam, and Vrasa staying out of the Council's affairs. It was one less thing to worry about, though she wonders if she should request an audience with the undine representative just to prepare for the inevitable request to appear before the council.

"Danglosa is opposed? How so?" Rudabeh says with an edge of surprise in her voice. Vague ramblings were about as much as she ever remembered getting out of any oracle of Danglosa. "Vrasa is brave indeed to tempt the wrath of the twin god. What is stopping Danglosa from making Vrasa this year's snack "completely by chance"?" She tries to remember any other times, or records of the times, their enigmatic anglerfish god/dess held grudges or made decrees, and what actions were taken by them.

knowledge: local: 1d20 + 6 ⇒ (12) + 6 = 18

"I haven't seen the new sinkhole yet, where is it and what's it called?" Please, she prayed to Alseta. don't let it be "New Sinkhole".

"I was always thought it asinine to not give lubbers a vote on the Council." Rudabeh says as they begin discussing politics. "The advisory council is just a turban shell for the lubbers to make wishes into, and nothing happens. They bring in this many lubbers that make their own problems and they can't fix any of them, of course they want a voice." Rudabeh huffs and shakes her head. "This isn't Galt, though. Even if the Council cracks down on dissidents, I don't see why the undines would be swept up in it. The humans would always be fighting a defensive battle, unable to use the canals, forced into the lochs at worse." If it was from talk alone, her father could tell that she had seen her share of battles in the past decade.

"Do the Tallies have a de facto leader?" Rudabeh shifts in her chair, lifting one leg to rest on her knee while she leans back. "You need clients and once they understand the situation it would be a good place to start. Besides, I can tell them first hand what a civil war looks like and how it's not in their interest."

"Just preparing for the worst." The paladin says about Dimi, spreading her webless hands out in front of her. "Don't you remember when I caught her throwing a bucket of crabs in Old Ummit's starfish nursey because he told her she had a swordfish nose? How many times did I have to drag her back for breaking curfew when a group of goblins was kidnapping grindylow at night, only for her to splash silver paint all over my room? That girl is vindictive and breaks rules for fun." Taking in a breath, Rudabeh calms down from getting worked up. She did not go so far as to say Gegdev was never hard enough on her, or that Daabi never seemed to pay her much mind, leaving Rudabeh to try and raise her sibling with no success. She wasn't here to start a fight, but to help her father out of a bad situation.

"Well, hustling in Gargant's isn't so bad." She admits, relaxing a little bit to know her sister is just small-timing with the rowdies. As long as she isn't swimming for the ham on the hook, she can only get in so much trouble circling the lobster pot. Even I've drank too much and rolled some dice there." Rudabeh rubs her hands over her face before massaging her temples., ears extending fully while she looks at the ground. "Maybe I could convince her to come with me. When her Mandatory comes up she'd just end up in penal for mouthing off more than anything. She could get all the danger she wanted, I could teach her some discipline..." Loooking up, Rudabeh gauges her father's reaction at turning his youngest into a soldier. "I'd have her train as a archer." As if that was going to make it better. "Unless she's put on some weight I don't think she's stout enough for the blade."

"Former king..." Gegdev muses wonderingly, glancing at the door where the small man had so recently retreated. "I only know him by reputation but I think you have a barracuda by the fin with that one, Ruda. He'll lead you right off the seamount if you let him."

"Did he get the treasury out with him?" Her father asks casually, before turning back to the matter at hand. trust he father, even amidst a grave moral crisis, to calculate the weight of a man's wallet.

he waves a hand at her about Danglosa. "Not Danglosa herself. Gods, literally, only know what they actually think. I meant the clerics, Ruda. The word through the coral is they don't much care for Vsara after they tried to push one of their cronies into the priesthood. Stupid idea, really. I'm not even from here and I know how they are."

Rudabeh knew that Danglosa's actual opinions are nearly impossible to discern although theological debate rages if that means the underwater figure is merely beyond mortal comprehension or is really just erratic. Her oracles and clerics have offered divinations and prophecies at times but never anything concrete or solid, and they have always kept out of mortal affairs. Save once.

Rudabeh knew, vaguely, that when Outsea was debating joining Veleda's Pact, it was Danglosa's chief priest that had arrived at a Council meeting, invoking an ancient right to speak there, and state that his mistress desired joining the Pact. The motion has passed unanimously a few moments later.

The paladin had a feeling what he father meant was, the very mortal people who made up Dangoloa's obscure church didn't like Vsara, which, while not quite as imposing at upsetting the twin god themselves, was still dangerous. Outsea's religion was not one for the faint hearted.

"It doesn't have a name yet." Gegdev says, referring to the new sink hole under construction. "There has been lots of talk about it, but no one can agree on anything. I know the Tallies are now arguing it should never be filled with water and made a human city." Her father laughs at the idea but sobers up when Rudabeh contemplates how violence might go.

"You are forgetting something, Ruda. It wouldn't be a street battle. It would be a siege." The merchant says, adding, "You are making the same mistake I have heard among the older crowd. Outsea just isn't a simple lake anymore. It has a complex system of canals, drainage tunnels, settling ponds and outflows. If the Tallies could capture, or even damage some of it....Imagine if Outsea was inundated with fresh water for a week? We are far more fragile and dependent then we like to think. If it comes to violence, everything they have built here would be destroyed, or at least set back generations."

Gegdev stands back, rubbing the back of his beck, "I agree with you, of course. They should have given the landlubbers a seat years ago. They'd still have total control of the Council but an actual vote would ease things, but they won't hear of it. Totally out of the question, or so the backwash goes." He walked over to the window and looked out of it, the bright sun playing across his aquamarine skin, lighter then Rudabeh's. In the glare he looked his full age and then some, with the wrinkles as clear and harsh as atolls. A hand went to his belt, where he hung the usual collection of pouches and pockets. Rudabeh watched her father pull out a coin and tumbled it through his fingers with dexterity born of long practice.

His lucky coin.

She knew lots of soldiers who had the same talisman, but no one did it like her father. Gegdev did not have a single coin that he claimed gave him luck or good fortune. After every successful trade or deal, he solemnly made sure to give the client his old lucky coin and to replace it from one out of the trade. A constant market between him and the world, or so her father said. She never knew where he got his first one, and what he gave in exchange.

Her father flips the coin and catches it.

"You give me a bad feeling, Ruda. You are a big fish now and your thrashing around in Outsea might cause a hurricane. Just...be careful. And not just for your own sake. Others might be caught up in your wake." He rolls the coin over his knuckle and Rudabeh can see by the sparkle, this latest coin is a Taldane lion. She wonders if it has hung around longer then he'd have liked it to. "I don't know anything about the Tallies, I keep my distance. They are dangerous people, Ruda. Even for folks with a mercenary company at their back."

Her father pockets the coin and turns to the subject of Dimi, remaining standing. The older undine shakes his head, "You never met a shell you didn't want to crack, Ruda. Your sister isn't a conch, to be smashed open by brute force. You go to her and talk about military service, you'll make things worse." Her shakes his head, "You always had a bent for that sort of discipline Ruda, every since you were little. You used to plan the walks with your brother like marches, you had a schedule!"

"Dimi doesn't, and you know it. Don't go to her to convince her, or recruit her or anything like that. Talk to her. I don't thinks he is that far gone yet, like you said. Cheating at stones or playing a bit of Snatch isn't that concerning. Normally, I would just call it a phase and let it go." Rudabeh can't help but recall her father originally calling her religious stirrings 'a phase'. He hadn't meant anything by it, and dropped it quickly upon seeing Rudabeh's obvious dedication to Alseta, but she still remembered that brief current between them.

"But with the way things are, having her closer at fin, and talking to us, would be a comfort."

"That's what everyone keeps telling me." She replies regarding Irovetti's potential to carry her over the side of a waterfall. "But I made an oath, and I intend to fulfill it."

She chuckles softly when her father asks about Irovetti's funds. "I actually do think he looted the Pitax treasury on the way out. I looked for where he's hiding it once, but he's sneakier than an octopus lying on the sea floor." Rudabeh reflects on letting him get away with taking the nation's tax money with him on his exodus. "It was unethical to let him take all that money, but it was one of the prices for peace. At least he pays his own bills most of the time."

Rudabeh quietly takes in the information on Danglosa's clergy, recalling the momentuous occasion when the twin god gave a direct and tanglible message on something. Even the oracles seemed shocked, but no one complained. "That's good, I would fear for the clearness of the priest's already murky minds if Danglosa's messages started to make any sense." Though of questionable reliability, the priesthood of Danglosa could be helpful in building a case against Vrasa. Besides, Rudabeh needed some divine scrolls and wax tablets.

"Are the Tallies truly so crazed to chop off their own foot just to bleed on Outsea's rug?" She had heard that one before from an Orsian mercenary in the Bastard Brigade. "To damage, or even threaten the systems of Oustea would risk total war with the council. Even if they succeeded, what would they have? A brackish lake neither salt nor freshwater could live in? The foundation of their livelihoods would be destroyed if the Council didn't find a way to wipe them out." Her fingers drums along her thigh in thought. "A shark is dangerous before it is tamed, as well. If they are open to discussion, danger can be averted. Sometimes the council just needs a good reason to stop biting at each other's toes and do something." Turning to look towards her father, she watches his shimmering turquoise skin. It was odd to see it happen on someone whose after so long, but comforting. "I could at least get them off your back. Until then, do you want some guards? I could spare a few soldiers to watch the house."

Rudabeh gets up from her seat as her father digs out his current lucky coin, performing all manner of dexterious feats with the lion-headed currency. "While it is my duty to ensure peace and spread Law, the point here is for you to get caught up in the wake, da." She says while moving over to her bag of holding. "I have never seen you at such a low tide, even when we lost the house and the mill in Galt." She picks up the bag, grabbing its leather strap and bringing it over to the window where Gegdev stood. "You've rebuilt twice by yourself before, once with the help of this very bag."

Rudabeh reaches up to place a hand on one of her father's broad shoulders. He was slouching a bit, but they were close to the same height, and standing together it was easy to tell they were two pearls in a clam. "You don't have to do it alone this time. Let me bring in the tide, and give you the opportunity to be the first in the water."

Her hand drops and she opens the clasp on the embroidered bag. "I do have some business I would like to discuss with you." She thinks of, and quickly pulls out, a buldging cloak that has been tied into a knot at the top. "It's a long story, but my company killed two gigas clams and harvested a substainial amount of mother-of-pearl, as well as keeping two of the shells nearly intact." Placing the cloak on the floor, the giant pearls inside rumble and shift as they settle. "Even if you're not in the position to buy from us, I was hoping you could appraise what we've found, arrange a sale, or point me towards some buyers at least." The paladin's fingers deftly untied the knot on the top of the bag, exposing the fist-sized or greater pearls to the sunlight coming through the window. "The rest is on the barge."

Squatting next to them, she watches the iridescent colors dance across the surface. "The cloak is magical too, but I haven't tried it on." A frown crosses her face as she remembers the Hag Hut and its insidious owner. "I'm afraid it may be cursed because it used to belong to a sea hag. I killed it, but gods... the stories you told me as a child fail to describe how truly ugly and awful they are."

"I'll talk to Dimi." She says, not exactly as an aside, but knowing her father was right and not wanting to argue about it further. "I may be able to reel her back in before she gets too deep."

Her father considers her offer of a few guards for the house carefully. "You know I've never cared for guards, Ruda. I've always felt it was just asking for trouble. Guards are taken, by some people, like a challenge." but he remains thoughtful and adds, "But if you are going to be stirring up the silt....do you have anyone discreet? I'm not having some hulking barbarian standing at my front door, scaring the neighbors."

"It is good to have you home, Ruda." Gegdev the trader says at her words but he does pull a wry smile, "Even if you always upset the applecart." Another laugh at her raised eyebrow at his choice of idiom. "A landlubber used it a few weeks back and I like it. A cart full of apples. How odd! And it certainly fits you."

When she mentions business his eyes brighten and he says, "Let's go find your mother while we talk business. We've let her stew about Dimi long enough." As they head out of the squeezes room, Rudabeh explains her commercial opportunity.

"Gigas clams...in freshwater? Sounds like a good story," Her father says, falling slightly back into his old role as parent and teacher of trading. "Always play up the story, Ruda. Customers like that. They want to buy the story as much as the item itself." His sharp eyes surveys the bag quickly, and he reaches out to handle the mother of pearl. It clinks loudly over their footsteps as they maneuver deeper into the house.

"Good quality." he rubs his chin, "And good timing, Ruda. I think the Council has been putting out some contracts for new uniforms and I know they use mother of pearl for buttons and some of the rank insignia. Have to have flashy awards for the soldiers." A flippant remark revealing some of his casual dismissal of Outsea's military. Gegdev had never been much impressed by the armed forces of the city, being too cynical and free wheeling.

"As for the clam shells...Let me think on it." her father says musingly, "I still have a few contacts who might be interested. I'm a paraiah but not totally isolated."

"A real life hag?" her father says making a face, "Maybe that is a story you should not tell."

As they near the kitchen Gegdev waves a hand when she mentions Dimi, and says in a soft voice "Fine, but later. You'll upset your mother."

They find her in the dry kitchen. Few homes in Outsea, apart from the lubbers and other undine (who breathe air), bother with such a room but Gegdev's mercantile efforts had led to many landlubbers being entertained at Rudabeh's childhood home. The kitchen, while a bit bizarre and exotic, had paid for itself many times over. The fact her mother is in the kitchen itself shows her level of stress. generally her parents shared the cooking, with her father doing a bit more of it. Frankly, both of them were too distracted by other things to care about food. Luckily, Outsea cuisine tends toward raw and quick. It was a landlubber trait to linger over meals. Outsears would rather eat and then talk.

Daabi looks up from a plate of cut carrots and narrows her eyes, "Just the two of you?"

Her father shrugs, "Ruda's guest excused himself."

Rudabeh's mother sighed and dropped the knife instantly, "Then I've been wasting my time with carrots and fire for nothing. Still, better late then never. Let's go eat some real food." Vegetables forgotten, she leads them back into the wet part of the house.

In short order Rudabeh is standing over the stone pit that leads to the underwater, marine section of their living space. It had been tricky to build, shifting from wood to stone, but Gegdev had been insistent that a strong foundation was important. Contrary to his words, her father had planned a long life here. He had never built such a house in Taldor or Galt.

"Well, since you didn't give me any warning, I don't have anything set up for you, Ruda." Her mother was saying, taking off her work apron and a few other items of protective clothing. "I'll have to go tot he market. We'll just have to make do with the usual." Outsears did not make much of food normally, but everyone knew Landlubbers barely knew what food was. Mushy bread? Boiled peas? Gruel? Unthinkable. Even other undine, who generally dined on land, almost solely ate fresh seafood.

Rudabeh walks down the worn stairs that lead into the water with open relief. The tangy scent of salt fills her nose even as she strides into the welcome embrace of Outsea. The water is warm here, close to the surface. It swirls around her, and Rudabeh can instantly feel the healing vigor fill her body. Even uninjured, submerging herself just feels good.

The stairs drop them into a large round living space, the walls made of roughly hacked stone set into the native mud. The difference between the neat landlubberly built building above and this space, created by marine Outsea, is as stark as possible. Above the building has solid, square corners and a distinct, rigid style. Underwater it was far more rugged and wild, with rocks left disjointed and the floor as uneven as a cave.

There were no chairs, of course, but there were piles of roughly shapes stones that could serve as both eating platforms and seating, if one required it. Cubbies of all sorts lined the walls, many with a simple cage or mesh across the front to keep items in place. It was fairly dark since the wooden house was mostly sitting on top of them, but windows, round portholes, had been carved into he walls to let in some light. The gloom did not bother Rudabeh or her family. She did note a few new colored glass items dangling in the windows, glinting in the rare shard of sunlight that caught them. They really were quite good.

Her mother, obviously happy to be submerged too said casually, "We have been eating dry more often lately, because of Ynide." Few other undine, even in Outsea, were fully aquatic. Ynide could probably hold her breath better then a seal, but it still wasn't possible for her to eat lunch down here, not in comfort.

"I'll see what we have." She gracefully swims over and pulls up a wooden trapdoor in the floor, cover to the small pantry. As she digs around, Rudabeh merely enjoys being home again, with all as it should be.

House fry dart in and out of the windows, the tiny fish schooling among the rocks, eating even tiner plankton . The usual collection of crabs crawls along the rough stone, looking for anything edible to scavenge. A small pool of bright purple seaslugs is working their way along the ceiling, determinedly grazing a patch of floating seaweed growing out of a crack. She noted a few kelp holdfasts were growing close tot he window and probably needed trimming or the place would be even darker.

"Ah, here we go." Dabbi said and pulled out a dark red octopus. "We've had him for a few days, waiting for the right moment." The celephod was tied up with his own legs, little more then a floating bag. Rudabeh's mother tossed it to her, and it floated gently through the water. She would, of course, untie it to eat it. "Oh!" her mother says, reaching back down in the pantry. "Get out of here, you!" And she flicks away a small team of hermit crabs busily trying to dig into a basket of live shrimp. They are quickly tossed out the window, except for one which she casually sucks out of the shell with a slurp and a crunch.

"Here, you go Ruda." She hands her daughter a double fistful of live oysters. "I can't imagine they eat them right on the road." She grins, "Oh, it is so good to have you home."

She settles back and just as Rudabeh is starting to eat says, "I assume you and your father have solved all the world's problems?"

Rudabeh makes a skeptical face at her father's desire for discretion. "I have the opposite opinion on dissuading threats. Also, Finn, Kosan, and Zaih saved all our lives and they were about as discreet as an albino humpback." She waves a hand at any retorts. "I understand, though. I encourage valor, not discreetion, among my troops but there are a few that walk and talk softer than the others." A hand-picked team lead by Litta may suffice. She would even suggest putting up some traps and snares if she didn't know her mother would absolutely blunder into them. "Give them a place to sleep and some food and I'll take care of the rest."

She smiles warmly when her father says it's good to be back, even if he was implying she was going to spill Outsea's contents all over the place. It is good to be back. I've missed this place. I've missed my family." Is said wistfully as she looks up at the old paintings on the walls. Truthfully she was excited to leave a decade ago, but distance has made her heart grow fond, and the bad memories have faded into important, lesson-filled hardships.

"Fulfilling a council contract would give me an excuse to talk to Derbacam." Rudabeh comments as they pass her pile of armor and The Sixth Peak leaned against the cabinet on their way to the kitchen. "I'm afraid after Pitax I may have a reputation for supporting rebellions. If I'm going to talk to the Tallies and get them off your back, I should be above board with the Council about why I'm speaking to them. Maybe I can even start some dialogue between the two."

There was no complaints from the daughter when Daabi dropped the knife and they all started to make they way towards the wet rooms. Walking casually down the stairs, she feels the salt water flood into her clothes and stick to her skin. She breaths deeply as her head submerges, drawing in all the smells of their home and maybe a few lost plankon.

"I don't think you understand," She begins as they move into the dining area, swiping at a crab to shoo it away from the sea slugs cleaning the ceiling. "I am excited for the usual. It's all dried bread, cheese, and smoked meat downriver."

While her mother swims to the pantry, Rudabeh floats lazily a few feet off the floor, spinning in a slow, uncontrolled roll. "Oh!" A sudden memory, an exciting moment from her travels to share causes her to ball up her body and suddenly flip upright. "I ate some tojandi a few months ago, boiled in the human fashion. It was sweet, but with a fatty richness I was not expecting." She falls silent for a moment, recalling, too, the argument with Viridia over the morality of eating such a creature. Oh, Viridia. Perhaps under different circumstances they could have been friends.

Kilarra too, comes to mind, and Rudabeh wondered where the wayward and abandoned priestess had gone. It was not the first, or last time her actions had pushed away those that could not accept her neutrality, or snse of justice. It was a sad cost of doing her duty, and partly why she used to travel alone.

The slowly tossed red octopus nearly collides with the far-off, ruminating undine, but her hand shoots up in a rush of bubbles to catch the cephalopod by the head. Supressing both a sigh and the thoughts of work, she grabs a smooth, palm-sized rock from one of the shelves, places the octopus on the floor, and bashes its brains in several times.

You know, some druids can see through animals, and I think that's how Veleda keeps track of me. I hope this wasn't one of hers! She thinks to one of the voices usually in her head, only to be met by forgetful silence. Though it was probably for the best Seqhi wasn't present, a bit of lonliness settles on Rudabeh's shoulders.

With a small kick she swims closer to her parents, seeking the brief comfort of a simple life, dead octopus trailing blood behind her.

Seeing the live oysters makes her mouth open, an excited groan escaping from deep in her diaphram that caused a nosy passing gillman to briefly look through the window. Suddenly, the miasma from before seems to lift. "They don't even have oysters!" Rudabeh proclaims before lifting the octopus to her mouth, biting off a still wriggling tentacle before tossing it up for her mother to catch and taking the oysters.

Rudabeh is chewing on the rubbery red flesh of the octopus hen her mother asks about solving the world's problems. A few bits escape her mouth, but are quickly sucked down by an excited swarm of house fry that have started to form.

"Soon." She says after swallowing. "Once I get my magical brine dragon powers from your great-great-great-great-grandmother, the world will never have a problem again." It was all said teasingly, of course, and reflexively she had to repeat the other running joke in the household. "You know -" Suddenly she remember the running joke was that Dimi was finally going to be the one to develop these magical powers, and changes course. "-there is a sorcereress in my company. I'd say she could help me unlock my potential, but she's all fire and sunlight."

Rudabeh starts to pry open an oyster while some nearby bright blue crabs scuttle over and begin to rhymetically dance in anticipation at the possibility of scraps . "What I wouldn't give to shoot ice from my fingertips on a hot summer day. Sometimes I feel like I'm going to boil alive in that armor."

Both her parents know the trials of human food all too well. Indeed, during their time in Galt, the only maritime food was that which they caught themselves since the local markets and traders did not stock undine delicacies. It was only after their move to Outsea that they could once again indulge in the foods they enjoyed in distant Cataokerp. if anything, due to the concentration of underwater people the selection was actually better in Outsea then it had been in the actual ocean, except one couldn't get whale here....

"I almost had tojandi once," her father mentions, busy pulling apart his own clams. "A Taldane merchant client had one for a fancy dinner, but I couldn't it." A diplomatic way of saying that such high social events in Taldor were almost always strictly human affairs.

"Fire magic seems useful." Rudabeh's mother says politely, although she knows as much about tactics and battle as the oyster Rudabeh is busy slurping down. "Also to keep you warm. I remember those cold winter nights in Galt." All three shiver with memories but not just of the climate.

"So, Ruda," Gegdev says expansively, munching on a fistful of crunchy seaweed, heavily coated with salt. "Tell us about your adventures. You mention things in your letters but it isn't the same. What is Daggermark like? I've always wanted to visit but have never had the chance." Her father grins, "And what about Veleda? Share some information with your poor peasant parents."

Regale them, as you see fit

The hours pass most pleasantly. It is good to be home, surrounded by those she loves and cares about and in a place near her heart. Outsea had not been her only home and indeed, she had been an adult by the time they came here but it still held a special place in Rudabeh's heart and always would be. It was quite a relief from the last few weeks to sit here in peace and comfort, even if only for a few moments. Perhaps a storm was building outside, as her father's words indicated, but for the moment she was safe and whole. Right now she was not Rudabeh the successor of Veleda, who carried the weight of the Pact's future on her back. She was not the hero (or villain) of the Pitax revolution, who dispenses death and justice. She was not even Rudabeh, commander of the Company.

She was just Rudabeh of Outsea, daughter of Gegdev and Daabi. It was nice while it lasted, but all good things came to an end. A knock sounded on the wall and a face peeked through a small window. A young undine, probably from one of the local homes.

"Message for Rudabeh! From Gargant's!" Without waiting the lad chucked in a small clam shell and darted off, swimming easily through the bright water.

Gegdev sighed and picked it up, wiping off some grime. Such messages swimmers were common on Outsea, and were the best way to send notes this side of military dispatches.

Gegdev hands over the bright blue shell to Rudabeh who reads it automatically, surprised to see it is in Common not Aquan.

"Your boy is making a mess."
"Finn"

"I liked the winters in Galt." Rudabeh mentions, lazy corkscrewing through the water when she wasn't cracking open clams. "I miss the big snowstorms and the ice. Especially the few times when the Sellen froze over, the water tasted so much better and it was such nice swimming."

"I try not to think of them as adventures. I was merely doing my duty to Alseta." The paladin says , doing a slow backflip to land on the balls of her feet. A coy smile creeps onto her face, though. "But some of them are definitely adventures..."

I'm too lazy to write anything out

With her stomach full Rudabeh is in an excellent position to tell them of Daggermark, the massive city always managing to surprise her, a place where you can find anything and everything. Veleda, too, was both exactly as she imagined after years of looking up to her, but she points out that the woman is as mortal as the rest of them when you got to know her. The Grove was a masterpiece, a huge functional building grown entirely from trees and plants that nurtured and provided for one another, just as the Pact of Years is supposed to.

"...so there I was, in this park in the middle of Daggermark with Irovetti, and two assassins jump out of the bushes." Rudabeh talks with her hands as she sets the scene, shooing away a bluestreak cleaner wrasse that really wanted to clean her teeth.

"I'm getting ready to fight these two, and Veleda just... appears from the side. These two huge men just look at each other and run away! Can you believe anyone could have such influence and power?" It would be even funnier if Irovetti hadn't been in actual danger.

She was about to explain more when the messenger boy appears, and she takes the blue shell with a frown. So much for relaxing. It was nice while it lasted. Is thought with a sigh, which the bluestreak wrasse takes as its signal to get in a few moments with her teeth.

Pulling back her gums to let the fish do its job cleaning bits of detritus from her mouth, she stares at the simple message for a few moments.

The wrasse had just started to excitedly clean her molars when she spits it out to speak. "This is from Finn! But...Why did the messenger say it was from Gargant's?" The logic of the message didn't make much sense. "Her boy" was probably Ractus, but how did he get to Gargant's, he was supposed to be at Lubber's Row in the Polite Clam with the Company. PLus, Ractus could swim, but he couldn't breathe underwater. Maybe the message was referring to Gig, and she had hoped the grippili had not been chased off by the Company, or pursued someone taking too close of a look at their clam shells.

She looks at her parents wearily. "I had a much quieter life when I traveled alone. Every day it's something...I wanted to stay longer but I best look into this." Rudabeh begins to swim towards the ramp leading to the dry part of the house to retrieve her belongings, clean the grease off her armor, and make for Gargent's.

Rudabeh Sense Motive on dear old Ma and Pa: 1d20 + 10 ⇒ (3) + 10 = 13

Rudabeh catches a quick glance between her parents at the mention of Finn but the paladin is too distracted by the cleaning wrasse protesting her departure to get a good look. When she focuses, her parents faces are as bland as ever.

"You'll be back, of course?" her mother says, which is touching and a bit out of character. Rudabeh had come and gone many times in her youth without her mother even noticing, let alone being concerned. Maybe with things so unstable even her mother had drawn some comfort from having her daughter close at hand?

Her father goes with her back into the dry part of the house, where she starts putting her armor back on. She doesn't bother drying off first, since she plans to jump right back into the Well. Gegdev is uncharacteristically silent as he hands her bits of silversheen plating at her command which involves a good bit of pointing and 'that flat bit there'.. Her father never traded much in weapons so is rather clueless about the difference between a pauldron or a poleyn. Still, it does faster when Rudabeh has help, another sign she needs a page or apprentice or something....Just what she needed. More responsibility.

"Be careful." Her father says when he hands her the helmet, the final bit of the complicated jigsaw puzzle Gezzerbial made. Seeing his daughter's eyebrow cock the merchant shrugs, "About everything. Outsea is a rough place, don't let the fact that it is home blind you to danger." A small laugh, "I've been skinned at the local market far more then at major fairs. Don't let down your guard."

Then, with a flash of his old self he adds, "And bring the King back again, assuming his credit is good. Taking some of his gold might cheer me up."

Shall we go to a wretched hive of scum and villainy?

"Of course I'll be back. Even if Veleda recalls me to Daggermark in the next hour, I'll find both of you before I step foot on a barge." Rudabeh responds confidently to her mother's question. She takes a look back at her mother, and is tempted to ask why is was caring now, but instead the undine turns away to swim up the slope to air. Maybe having an empty clutch was doing things to her head and heart.

Rudabeh is also silent as she armors back up, besides from the occasional command to her father. She was still stuck wondering what had happened, and how FInn had gotten involved. Did someone beat up Gig and take the clam shells from the barge? Maybe it was a mistake to put him on guard duty, btu she have him the greenest of jobs and explicit instructions not to engage hostiles. If Ractus was somehow at Gargant's... well, there's no telling what trouble he had gotten into, or how much coin he was swindeled out of for a water breathing spell.

She is wondering who else could be "her boy" as Gegdev hands her the intricate, high-crested silversheen helmet. Folding her ears back and sliding the armor over her skull, she deftly tucks the articulating plates under the backbrace and catches the latches near her neck. The prickling, muddy sensation starts at her toes and works its way up her body as she responds to her father's concerns. "I will be. I used to keep in the school, if on the edges, so you wouldn't fret. But I have strength, my goddess, and purpose now. I can swim these currents alone if need be. Don't waste your worry on me, I'll find a way."

THe paladin would hug her father, but she looks down at the yellow mess covering her breastplate. "Uh, well, starting with asking you for a rag for a wipe-down ."

Gagdev laughs, "You have no idea how many business meetings I have started before realizing I was smeared with oil, grease or paint. And that isn't even mentioning that paper mache period." he mocked shuddered, "The glue..."

Her father pulls out a washcloth and quickly has the silversheen metal cleaned off although a rag can't fix the dents, scraps and gouges Rudabeh has already accumulated in the armor. What she needed was a good blacksmith, which wasn't an area Outsea prided itself in. Armor here tended to be shell, bone hide or more exotic materials that could be worked cold (or, more accurately wet). Still, the lubber community seemed larger then ever so there were perhaps some armorsmiths among them? It was perhaps worth thinking about.

For now however, she donned her armor and set off into the true Well, after some final farewells to her father. Her mother, true to form, was clearly lost in some art project by now.

It was late afternoon when Rudabeh swam out of the round hole that served as the 'back door' for her parent's home. Thick beams of light thrust down into the shifting water, looking like cathedral columns expect for the delicate rippling dancing across the white streaks. Above the surface was a dazzling plate of liquid white, reflecting the surface in a thousand tiny scales. It was breathtakingly gorgeous but more important then how it looked was how it felt.

Rudabeh had heard humans talk about how good fresh bread smell or the scent of mown grass. Other mentioned the feel of the air after a good rain or even the soft caress of warm sunlight on tired bones. A few times on cold winters, the undine had even seen people huddle around a fire and sigh in contentment, bathed in the orange glow of the fire.

Swimming in salt water was like all of this and more, at the same time. It surrounded her, coated her, permeated her in a shell of comfort and strength. From her glittering eyes to smoothed sore muscles, the water was like a magical tonic, an all body rejuvenator. Even her heavy armor felt lighter and more nimble here, below the surface.

Her trip across the Shallows was dominated by, as usual, life. This did not just mean the busy citizens of Oustea, although they were certainly present. Merchants and porters headed for the docks for some late day trading, or simply local citizens visiting their neighbors and friends. Rudabeh even caught sight of a military patrol arising from the twilight or perhaps even the Darkness. Such idlily wonders what sort of danger they had been seeking. Intelligent or monster?

But life in Outsea meant much more then that. Unlike a human city, the Well was an active ongoing ecosystem that was not shut out of doors and ignored. It was everywhere. Even as she sawm a small school of mackerel followed in her wake, enjoying the slightly easier swim for a few moments. Jellyfish floated past, and she noted the numbers seems a little high. A culling was probably in the offing then.

Her followers got distracted by a cloud of sardines and soon Rudabeh was swimming alone again until a single solitary cod joined her. The fish was an old one, longer then her leg and far thicker. She saw a gold ring in the tail that marked it as a safe from fishing, considering useful and healthy breeding stock. Such studs for the larger fish existed all through the Well, left alone to contribute good traits to the rest of the population. It swam alongside her, smooth and strong, as Rudabeh headed downward, away from the light and toward a rocky wall.

The edge of the Well loomed ahead of her, a vast rocky expanse of terraces, caves and holes. Some were natural formations, formed in the divine act of creation while others were later additions of Outseas citizens. generations of kelp farms, coral rows and oyster beds had been made here, often rotated. Homes and dwellings of all sorts were burrowed into the rock, everything from tiny snug huts to big storage grottos.

Rudabeh headed down farther swimming past color reefs (being harvested for sea cucumbers) and dark green kelp stands. The cod kept pace with her, obviously heading the same way.

Gargant's stood just at the very edge of the Shallows, fashionably deep. Any farther and it became real Twilight, which was both gauche (and increasingly actually dangerous). This, though was just on the side of respectable.

As the undine came to a stop, the cod circled once then sailed off into the deepening gloom of the twilight with a flip of a tail.

Senqhi lets out a long sigh of delight and wonder.

Ahead of Rudabeh sat Gargants and it was...bigger then she recalled. It was a large hole gouged out of the limestone rock, surrounded by a broad shelf littered with benches, tables and other seating. The door seemed larger then she remembered and the seating more pronounced. It was busy, with lots of customers outside or waiting to get inside. The air was heavy with the scents of skin, blood and grease.

It also seemed rougher then she remembered. Theere were three bouncers at the door, and all of them armed with heavy clubs. She also notes visitors are checked and forced to give up weapons. This makes her smile. Most in Oustea who want to cause trouble have plenty of natural means to do so. Still, it might be annoying for her.

Music drifts out of the open door, the driving percussion so heavily favored by Outsea. Dance is a favored activity among the locals and three dimensions lets them do things no lubber could dream of.

Rudabeh ripples through the water, arms at her side while her back legs and torso undulate as a single unit. In her armor it was much easier swimming down than up, making her travel to Gargant's akin to a leisurely stroll. Her eyes followed sunbeams into farms and businesses, picking out the orderly, manufactured shapes and colors against the tangle of life and the sea's myriad of hues attempting to overgrow what the sentients of Outsea had built. She wondered if Veleda had ever visited, and what she would have to say about the balance, even the cooperation, the inhabitants had struck with nature.

Swimming together with the stud cod, Rudabeh casts him an eye a few times. It was huge, maybe nearing a hundred pounds, and would make any fisher sing with glee at the weight in their net before seeing the golden band and changing their tune. How many times had this particular stud been thrown back, she wonders. How many times had a fisher sacrificed their indivudual gain so the whole of Outsea could benefit? It was a system that made her think, and appreciate, the society that had formed in the Well.

The cod and herself part ways near the Twilight, and she joins Seqhi in her appreciation of nature. For if a fish could be brave it would certainly be that cod, given the danger and disregard for the law found in the areas where the light touches with only ghostly fingers at noon. It would take a stupid, brash, water-breather to kill a stud for the gold ring around its tail, but she had seen it happen. The reward for reporting poaching in Outsea was enough to make any trader turn even their friends other to the guard.

Touching down on the limetone with a puff of marine snow some several feet from the entrance to Gargant's, Rudabeh takes in the building slowly, gaguging its growth. The change made her a little sad. There were good and bad memories here, from friends made to lively debates, or drinking too much and learning that gambling was not her forte. She wanted it to stay the same foreverf, though she must remember what the Sacred Keystones says: Change is the hallway we must all walk if we are to grasp the handle of our Destination.

So she walks slowly up to the thugs at the door, who have been eyeing her steel-cacooned exterior, one another, and shifting their postures just in case. Rudabeh touches her Iron Key as she approaches, asking her Goddess for power to see auras.

Rudabeh casts Detect Chaos and will keep it active.

As her hand falls away she smiles at the guards, her teeth ivory in the muted light. "Good currents." Is her disarmingly friendly greeting in Aquan before she begins to literally disarm, reaching up to unstrap her spear from her body, and her dagger from her boot. "My bag is magical and filled with air." She explains while handing over her visible weapons. Her sword, which was sub-optimal underwater, was in her bag, protected from the ravages of Outsea's saltwater. "The contents are precious and must remain dry, so I cannot consent to a search. If I made an oath to not to open it until I leave, would you accept it?"

She attempts what she considers a reasonable request to persaude the bouncers to let her through without taking her bag- Rudabeh was not going to risk someone opening and flooding the extradimensional space.

diplomacy: 1d20 + 11 ⇒ (3) + 11 = 14

Detecting Chaos was like looking for stars in a clear night sky. As in, you couldn't see much else. The whole area gives off a faint aura of Chaos, from the few patrons outside to the bully boys out front, and almost to the very stones themselves. Rudabeh wonders if Gargants makes much money if they are so disorganized. Still, there is no worryingly bright auras or halos. No Orzas were visible. At least at the moment anyway.

The bouncers eyes Rudabeh carefully for a long moment taking in the glittering armor, the magical bag and the offered armful of weapons. Her trove attracts a few curious anchovies, mouths bouncing harmless off the silvered steel. One of the thugs waves them away like a lubber warding off flies.

A shell cracks under Rudabeh's armored boot and she notes the bouncers (all three being rather untidy merfolk) have a bucket of raw sea-snails. Even as she watches one plucks out a mollusks, sucks the snail out and tosses the shell onto the rocky floor. Judging from the tiny piles of shells, they have been at it for awhile.

"There's no need for that." One of them says, in Aquan. He waves a tail flipper at Rudabeh dismissively, "You are on the list. Go on." He does pause and add, "Still, we don't want any trouble. Keep your sword to yourself."

Assuming you go inside

Rudabeh half-floated, half stepped over the threshold into the place, still encased in steel.

She finds herself in a round grotto, hacked out of the solid rock of the Well wall. It is dim inside and her darkvision takes over for a moment, casting the scene in shades of shifting gray. The center of the room is taken up by a large pillar of stone, surrounded in a ring that acts as a bar. Behind it, bartenders hurriedly swim this way and that, grabbing bottles for patrons.

They are busy because the place is packed, even by Outsea standards. Not only is the floor covered but guests fill the water up to the ceiling, floating in little knots and groups. Everyone is drinking, talking and laughing at the same time. It is a very diverse crowd but water breathers only, of course. The scent of Outsea food wafts though the water, rich and alive. Blood.

There are two doors leading out of the tavern into other rooms. One is even darker, more like a cave then a room. Pounding music cascades out of it, and the smell of sweat and pheromones' filters into Rudabeh's nose.

The other door is more brightly lit and more people are coming and going, swimming through it. There is a roar of shouting and cursing, the jangle of coins and a much stronger scent of blood.

Gargants is rougher then Rudabeh's remember and way more popular. Curious.

No sign of her sister or Finn from here, not that she can see much from her current angle.

Though briefly surprised, Rudabeh places her spear back in its holster with a smooth, practiced motion. "Thank you, sirs." Is her polite and succinct response before pushing off with one foot and glidling into Gargant's in a gentle arc. Is Finn working here? She must have informed the guards. Or whomever she is working for...

The specks of chaos dot her darkvision, causing more annoyance than discomfort like when she looked at Irovetti, or Ractus. Part of her wants to supress the gift of her goddess, but being nearly killed by an exploding Samuel look-alike had instilled her with a skeptism about messages from friends.

She didn't think Finn was going to explode, but something about being brought here smelled... fishy.

Litterally and figuravitely, the scene of Gargant's was an array of smells and sights Rudabeh was not prepared to witness. This place has become much more popular in the past decade. She expounds to Seqhi in her mind. In my youth I would come here to drink and gamble with friends. It was a relatively quiet dive with only the occasional fight, and we liked it that way. I don't think my 50 year old self would be interested in this. Rhythmic banging reverberated inside of her helmet, and she thought it didn't suit her current self either.

It had been a long time since she had smelled such a concentration of aquanity in one place. She conciously blocks off nasal passage- smell would do her no good here.

With a combination of hops and swirling hand movements, she arrives at the stone bar. Raising a hand to attract the attention of a bartender, she also raises her voice. "I am Rudabeh," She begins in case instructions had been left with the staff, "Can you please tell me what room Finn is in?" Her other hand tactfully places a worn Taldan copper piece upon the limestone in case they needed some incentive to focus for a moment.

Seqhi is silent for a long moment, whatever arcane senses she possessed sweeping the wild gathering. In a tiny part of her mind Rudabeh can sense the soul inside her armor considering the drifting clouds of drunk patrons, the intoxicating music seeping out of the darkened cave, the babble of talk.

Well, it is not quiet.

Fair enough. The ruckus has even driven away most of the undersea life that marks Outsea, although the undine notes note more then a few crabs scuttling along the floor, snatching up food drifting down from above. Clearly such pests can get used to anything, even rowdy tavern noise. Rudabeh wonders how much louder it would be if she didn't have her helmet on.

It is so loud Rudabeh has to repeat her question twice to the young skum tending bar, although she isn't sure if this is the noise or the fact the barkeep is too busy staring at her armor.

Finally she says, "Oh, Rudabeh. Right, er, that way." They point to the brighter room leading up, before being distracted by a massive chull in a far corner demanding more eel bladders, preferably still inside the eel. The skum does take the time to swipe the copper coin however before swimming off.

Swimming up, Rudabeh passes through the rather high arch into the next room. It is quite different.

The room, while still hacked out of the raw foundation rock of the Well, is high and airy, lit with both the traditional glowing jellyfish and a few arcane lamps. Curious, the old Gargant's could never have afforded that luxury.

The light bathed a rather comfortable looking room with two distinct halves. One half is clearly given over to that old standby, gaming and gambling. Outsea gambling however, was not quite the same pastime that landlubbers would expect. Sure, Outsears would play stones or even play with cards made of stone or carved seashells, and indeed, Rudabeh noted a few groups doing just that. But Outsea games often had a certain...edge.

Take Snatch, one of the most favored games of chance in Rudabeh's old home. It was a simple enough game really. Take a few creatures, mark one in a distinct way, bundle them together and then let them loose at the same time. Whoever caught the marked creature first, won. The marked creature was then, usually, eaten. A harmless game, often played with goldfish by children but it could be scaled up to any number of animals for those with more demanding tastes.

Rudabeh knew that, in the depths, saughin played with hungry sharks.

A games were going right now, with a variety of sea life. Other games involved hiding an eel in a bit of jagged coral and risking fingers by trying to pull it out. Despite the description it would be a sophisticated test of skill and endurance.

Before Rudabeh had time to really process it, a cheer from the other side of the room distracted her. Here, she could see a round rocky pit carved into the ground, the floor being the upper lip. Around the outer edge was a ring of Outseas, all shouting, cheering and cursing into it. Clearly some sort of fight was going on, which was not unusual. She has never seen it at Gargant's before but wrestling both being and beast were popular in Outsea. Gods only knew what was in that pit but it seemed to be entertaining the crowd. The scent of blood grew stronger.

Intriguingly however stairs led to an upper viewing area above the fighting circle, stairs that led to, if her eyes did not deceive her, a surface. Was there a dry bubble of air up there?

Rudabeh's feet only touch the stairs once as she bounds up them, gracefully landing at the top on the heel of her right boot. With a kick of her left leg and a wave of her hand she rotates briefly on that axis, taking in the high-ceiling room with a bit of wonder. There used to be slime growing on the walls in here, and you had to fight the nibblers for your shrimp. When did this get so stately? Something about the place was starting to remind her of Daggermark. Externally wealthy, internally rotten.

A stray, unmarked mackerel from a game of Snatch flashes towards her in an act of desperation, maybe seeing the safety of a school in her shining armor. It wedges its head in the netting separating the two rooms and thrashes pitifully, dorsal fin causing it to be stuck fast.

The cheer from the other side of the room distracts her, and she kicks off to get closer while leaving the mackerel to its fate. A blood bowl in Gargant's? She thinks to Seqhi. That's new. There are a few in Outsea, some more dangerous than others, but all of them are popular. There are many water-dwellers that experienced constant, pent up aggression, and sometimes fighting a trained barracuda with your bare fins is the only way to feel alive. Or so I've been told. By her tone, Rudabeh wasn't impressed by the sport fighting but knew it was here to stay as long as waters lapped the shores of the Well.

She was going to look in the pit because she was fully expecting to see Ractus somehow beating up a dolphin with a trident strapped to its belly, but the tell-tale shimmer of a surface above her causes her to quickly and smoothly redirect. Lubber seating? Here? I truly don't know this place anymore. This may be the deepest she has ever seen amenities for lubbers. What next, were they raising sheep somewhere?

The undine doesn't even touch the steps until she gets to the top, instead brushing her hand against a nearby wall and flicking her legs to propel herself upward. Expelling the water from her lungs in a great burst, she prepares to transition to the air. While Finn surely had the means to get a magical form of underwater breathing and locomotion, all lubbers preferred their dry air. Surely her old mentor would be in the bubble.

Would not fighting an untrained barracuda be better? Senqhi remarks before adding, Seems barbaric either way. My homeland had such places, many of them, I never cared for them. At least your people seem to fight freely, instead of slaves. Rudabeh is slightly concerned at how much Senqhi seems to be picking out of her memory. How did she even know what a barracuda was?

The paladin had little time to consider this however, as she glided over to the stairs and began to weird underwater climb up. The angle of the fighting pit blocked her view of the spectacle below, but a rising of cheers and groans tells her the event is still ongoing. Skum, merefolk and even a few tritons make up the crowd, many with handful of gems or shells that make up true currency in the marine regions of Outsea. Coins are certainly recognized (witness the barkeep's swipe of the bribe) but no self respected Outsea was going to pay a personal debt with Taldane coppers.

Rudabeh breaks through the surface of the water with all the grace of a broaching dougong. A shower of water sheets from her armor, like a thousand tiny waterfalls, a miniature cataract. Small bits of seaweed and other grit was sloshed away by the sudden imposition of gravity. It might have been majestic except for the fact that Rudabeh added to the torrent by coughing up two lung fulls of seawater. The paladin is still shaking salty water from her eyes when a human voice says in Common,

"I always thought that was gross, kid."

It was a smooth, worn voice like a strong but weathered leather strap. Faintly melodic as well, with just a hint of some musical training. It was also nearly as familiar as her mother's voice. Larviss Finn's voice.

Rudabeh's vision cleared and she saw her old mentor, trainer and perhaps friend, for the first time in a decade. For a moment the rest of the space went unexamined as Rudabeh took in the fighter.

Rudabeh's life had given her great experience with martial men and women. Generally they fell into two categories, soldiers who considered fighting a profession and warriors who considered fighting a way of life. Finn however, was the third type. Finn was a killer.

The female half-elf was long and lean, leaning back in a roughly made chair, her worn boots on nearby table. She was dressed in functional but well made clothes, all of it perfectly dry. Nothing flashy, just simple sturdy cloth and leather yet it seemed elegant on her wiry frame. No, not elegant...well-suited. A backsword hung from her belt, neatly packed in a battered old scabbard, worn smooth by long service. The hilt was simple wrapped wrapped, black as a mine.

Some things had changed, however. On her left hand, two of the long, strong fingers were missing, replaced with clean, bare scars. There was more jewelry around her neck, incongruous against the utilitarian, almost spartan look of the rest of her garb. Her eyes however, those dark green eyes were the same. Rich, sparkling and very very sharp.

They were fixed on Rudabeh now as the old fighter grinned, revealing a mouth full of even white teeth. "You look good, kid. You really do." She gestured with her chin, that old conservative of movement. Where another man might wave a hand or point, Finn got the same effect with a narrowed eye or a slight nod.

"Nice armor, looks custom. Planar?" The eyes narrowed briefly on Sixth Peak. "And a grand sword. Let me guess, you actually named it?" Rudabeh's face, even half hidden, must have given her away for the half-elf laughs, "I knew it! I knew you'd name your first real sword1" She rocks her chair forward with a wooden slam, still laughing. Easily she kicks out another chair toward Rudabeh, which skids to a halt just in front of the undine. "Come on, sit down. Let's catch up."

Blinking, Rudabeh took the rest of the room in for the first time. It wasn't a very big space, just a small round space of bare rock over the fighting pit below. A few simple chairs and tables were scattered about. Three men sat around one, drinking and playing cards. Rudabeh didn't recognize any of them, but they had the look of fighters.

"Don't mind them, kid " Finn said, following Rudabeh's eye. It was a strange talent of her old mentor, the mercenary always seemed to know where other people were looking. "They are with me."

From below, another roar of the crowd and the sound of intense splashing.

Rudabeh has been meaning to have a conversation with Seqhi about how much she can see into her mind and memories; she seemed.... better at it than Teken, somehow. The fact it seemed to be a skill was even more disturbing than the reality the two could do it at all.

But now was not the time, nor had it been every time she thinks of having that particular conversation.

Another rote transition to land- she inhales deeply to fill her lungs, nicatating membranes flicker back and forth over her eyes to clear the water. But what she sees and hears is special. Larviss Finn, in the flesh, mere feet away.

"Finn!" The undine exclaims with a bright smile, spreading her arms out wide in a gesture that sends water in a great arc in front of her. "I could never seem to catch up with you, it's so great to finally see you..."

Though Finn's deep green eyes had already taken in every part of her, Rudabeh does a glance at what catches her eye. The jewelry was new, and she presumed magical. There were rich Outseers that had jewelry that allowed them to function on land, and she knew the reverse was true for lubbers. Finn would never be caught at a disadvantage, and the undine would guess the half-elf could swim faster than her somehow.

Which is why the two missing fingers on her left hand was shocking, even confusing. Everyone got unlucky, but her mentor had never went into a fight she didn't know she could win, and tried to drill the same philosophy into her pupil. So what, or who, had gotten the better of Larviss Finn, and why did she keep the scars?

It reminded Rudabeh that there was always a bigger fish out there. Even one bigger than the greatest sword master she had ever known.

"Planar, yes." Rudabeh comments on the make of her armor before looking embarrassed about her sword. "It already had a name when it was given to me! The Sixth Peak was named by its Maheto craftsdwarfs." The defense was maybe given a little too quickly, a little too emotionally to be taken as anything else besides trying to save face in front of her mentor.

A dripping hand is placed on top of the simple ashen chair, immediately causing rivelets of water to find and run down the grains of the wood. "I would love to catch up," She says while easily lifting the chair off the ground. "But your message said someone was causing a mess and I must first clean it up." Taking a deep breath, she looks ready to fall backwards into the water to speed off to whatever disaster was waiting instead of sitting down. "I swore an oath to Alseta to put Duty above Comfort, and taking care of those under my command is my duty." She makes a face that would also be appropraite for finding an octopus in a lobster trap; equal parts disappointed and impressed. "Is it Ractus? I can see him thinking wrestling sharks is a good way to find work for the Company."

Finn quirks a smile at Rudabeh's hurried defense and says, "Sure, sure. I am curious where you got the armor though. Looks solid, if a bit shiny. Hard to sneak up on someone when you shine like a lighthouse. Then again, full plate isn't really made for sneaking." Rudabeh is all too aware that even the two steps toward the table sounded like someone had thrown a cabinet of cutlery down the stairs.

When Rudabeh mentions the mess, her old mentor's face becomes just a bit more guarded, the smile fading just ever so slightly. Someone who hadn't literally grown up with her probably would never have noticed.

"He should stick to sharks." Finn said bluntly and then shrugged, her usual casual demeanor taking over, "You are still the same, kid. Put work before yourself. Good trait in a solider, but the world will eat you up." With oiled grace the mercenary stood up while saying, "But I suppose you won't be able to relax until we deal with it."

With that same economy of movement, Rudabeh's old mentor paces over to the rim of the fighting pit. "Down there?"

Feeling more awkward then usual, Rudabeh clatters over to the edge and peers down.

The pit is a round circle of roughs tone, almost coral-like. The floor is fine white sand, probably imported or magically created. By some trick of magic, it is only half filled with water, a bubble within a bubble. In the middle stands Ractus, about waist deep in water, holding a rather bulky skum over his head.

"Ractus, eh?" Finn murmurs next to her, eyeing the shirtless muscular elf like a butcher considering a promising side of beef. "Not bad, Rudabeh, not bad."

With an audible grunt, Ractus tosses the skum against the side of the fighting ring. There is a sickening grunt and splash of water as his foe sinks below the surface. He doesn't get up.

"Come on!" Ractus roars in Common, voice distorted by the layers of air and water. "Is that all you got?" The elf slaps the water with the palms of his hands, sending up a sheet. The crowd booes and hisses.

A few other skum enter the ring and half drag/half carry their unconscious colleague. Ractus waves them away without a word.

"He's been at it for the last few hours." Finn says quietly, "He's winning fights that some people who rather he lose."

Ah.

"Said he was looking for work." Finn continues on conversationally, "Says he represents a new mercenary company. Dropped your name." Rudabeh's old teacher turns toward her, questions in her eyes. "Never thought you'd take after me, Rudabeh. Sellsword now? I heard different but things change."

Those green eyes punch right through her armor and skin both, surveying her soul. Then they shit away, back to the sweating, bellowing elf below.

"The armor was a gift from a salamander slave I helped set free." She waves a hand around a bit to help clarify, sending droplets everywhere. "The kind from the City of Brass, not the kind that lives in puddles." Even with Finn, she didn't want to talk about Gezzerbiel too much. The sooner he was forgotten the sooner he woud be truly free.

She hoped he made it south before winter set in, and he hadn't terrorized any hamlets along the way.

"I wasn't made for sneaking, anyway. My shoulders are too broad." Rudabeh comments when she follows Finn over to the edge of the pit, looking through the distorted bubble to see her Captain doing exactly what she had anticipated.

A groan escapes form deep within her throat when Finn mentions Ractus dropped her name at Gargant's then proceeded to muck with the house's fight fixing. "That's him." She say wih a loud sigh. "He said he was going to ask around, I should have known he'd sniff out a blood bowl and dive in."

Looking over at Finn, Rudabeh is met with those piercing green eyes, and feels compelled to explain herself. "I'm trying to create a peacekeeping corps for the Pact of Years. Soldiers, not mercenaries." Her mentor was back to looking at Ractus, though Rudabeh's gaze does not waver. "I'm trying to teach them that being loyal to a cause with steady pay is safer and more fufilling than being tossed around from one killing field to another by farmers with fat purses and generational grudges." Rudabeh had been to some of those fights with Finn. Ranchers with land disputes each hiring mercenaries to die in their stead, tired of each other's cattle wandering across broken fences.

When their unenthusiastic opponents inevitably routed they had chased out a few more families from their homes than she'd like.

The paladin looks back to Ractus now, his chaotic aura shimmering through the lens of the double-bubble. He looked wet, wild, and quite happy. "It's a slow process."

"In any case, he's done enough. I'll grab him before he gets made into an example." Sticking out a hand, Rudabeh leans over the stone wall and tries to disrupt the surface. "How do I get down there? Can I jump through this?"

"Causes make poor employers, I've found." Finn said casually. For all the world she looked like a young girl, leaning on the rail, letting it take her full weight, legs bent. Yet, on a second glance, there was energy there, like a coiled spring. "Give me fat purses any day, Rudabeh."

The economic debate was cut short by Rudabeh's duty and her desire to intervene before Ractus got in deeper.

"You can,"" Finn said easily, nodding toward the effervescent bubble surface. It had the slightly coloration, the rainbow shine of a bubble. "Might wreck the spell though. Never asked."

This causes Rudabeh to hesitate just long enough to be distracted from below.

A coral grate is shoved aside as huge figure enters the ring. A mammoth sahuagin lumbered onto the sand, four arms thick as tree trunks. The Outsear loomed half again as tall as the elf, making the imposing mercenary look like a child. A mouthful of needle sharp teeth shine in the dim light as the sahuagin lets out a deep, primal bellow that shakes the fighting pit. Even the crowd flinches back from the display, their cries lost in the tumult.

Two of the muscular hands grip bits of wood, like cut oar handles. Thick as Rudabeh's arm, they would make dangerous weapons, particularly wielded by such a strong creature. Clearly Ractus had upset whoever was running things here. This was not a fight, it was a slaughter.

The paladin was just about to jump over the rail when Finn rang her knuckles off Rudabeh's silvered armor. The sound was like a priest shaking a tiny bell, perfect yet distant.

"Just wait. You can't break it up now, that would make things worse. The match has already started. You wade in there with that horse slicer, you'll just make people upset." Her green eyes glittered, still fixed on the scene below. "Besides...I have a hunch."

One of Lavriss Finn's famous hunches. How many ambushes had the half-elf detected, how many stealth missions succeeded based off her vague gut?

Rudabeh stops when Finn knuckles her armor, one knee on the railing, Looking over at the half-elf with bewilderment, she glances back down at the mutant sahuagin for some sign of this "hunch", but sees nothing.

The paladin was torn in several directions at once- Ractus was clearly in danger and she should help him, but at the same time the match had started and her interference was surely against the rules. She could jump down and stop the fight with a spell, but she has no idea if the bubble would break, causing untold damage and possibly drowning some unprepared lubber. It seemed if she acted now she would be causing more chaos than anything.

The paladin's leg slowly comes down from the railing, and she anxiously drums her fingers across the stone. "All right." She finally decides. Finn had an uncanny, some claimed magical, intuition, and Rudabeh had trusted her with matters more serious than this before. "All right." She repeats, slapping her palm on the railing and blowing air out of her pursed lips in exasperation. "As long as his head doesn't get taken off in a blood frenzy I can patch him back together."

"What is your hunch? Do you think the sahaugin is going to throw the fight?" She asks, crossing her arms and directing a furrowed brow at the evolving contest. "Ractus is good, but he has to be tired by now."

Rudabeh fidgets throughout the match. This sport fighting irritated her. As she became closer to Alseta the thought of violence for the sake of violence bothered her more than it used to, especially with the corruption it typically attracted.

Finn gives a barely detectable shrugs, "You don't think people get tired in a real fight? You want to see what he can do, that's your job as the leader, kid. Knowing how far people can go before they break."

Her tone makes Rudabeh glance toward her old mentor. While no one would ever call Larviss Finn soft, there was a dark edge to her voice that the undine did not recognize, a jagged sharpness. One should never break one's tools. Had Rudabeh simply not noticed this bleakness in Finn before or was it new?

"Besides, I want to see how good he is." She says, turning her gaze onto the tableau below.

Ractus had taken a step back when the huge sahaugin lumbered into the fighting ring, obviously taken aback by the sheer size of his new opponent. The elf recovered quickly however, that cocky grin returning. He turned to the hollering crowds thronging around the rail.

"Are you sending your children? I've seen bigger fighters in nurseries!" And then, without warning, charged directly at the sahaugin.

The Outsear hesitated for a moment, obviously unused to fighting such reckless madmen. Ractus, pumping legs spraying water everywhere, was on him in a moment, dodging one hasty stick with ease. The elf jammed a hard elbow into his foe's midsection with a loud thump, then rolled away, dodging another clumsy attack.

The looming saughin looked unharmed if confused but Ractus was laughing. First hit had been his, at least.

"So, why are you here, Rudabeh?" Finn asked casually, her voice somehow effortlessly cutting through the roar of the crowd and the splashing of the fight below. "I'd guess a simple visit home, except for having a full mercenary company at your back."

The half-elf goes on, "Should I be....professionally interested?"

Rudabeh blinks at Finnn's tone, casting a searching glance at the half-elf. "He's also my friend." She says a little defensively at Finn's attitiude towards her Captain. "What, am I next down there so you can see if I've picked up any new tricks?" Is asked playfully, though the paladin was tugging on this particular line, seeing if she could fish anything out of that dark edge in her former teacher's voice.

Swinging her head back to the fight when the yelling and splashing starts up again, she tracks Ractus' movement through the water. Most lubbers would be helpless in water that deep, their leggs slowed annd their lungs burning from exertion. Any water-breather would be switching from swimming to standing, moving between air and water to get the advantage on their foe. The elf seemed to be managing all right keeping his head up.

"I don't know." Rudabeh initially answers Finn's question with a simple reply. "Veleda sent me here from Daggermark with no clear directives. I assume it was to keep me out of trouble in Daggermark, but trouble seems to follow or preclude me these days. I intend to reinforce the relationship of the Pact of Years with the Council of Generals if I can, at least."

A quick laugh barks from Rudabeh's throat when Finn asks if she should be interested. "As much as I'd like to, I can't afford you, Finn." She looks over with a grin. "Even if I could, you'd be bored. I want the soldiers in the Pact's employ to be making the lands safer and more stable for the citizens of Pact members, not hunting down lost relics or entering land disputes. We won't be bidding against you on those jobs, I am not interested in running an adventurer's guild and sending children in blacksmith aprons for armor to die in a kobold's trap."

"But let me know if you have a sudden a chartible streak and want to teach my small frys how to hold a sword properly and run drills for a fraction of what you're making now."

Tilting her head, the undine goes on to question: "If you can divulge, who are you working for now?" Her eyes wander to the men at the table playing cards. Where they all working here? "You're overqualified if you're on Gargant's security payroll."

Finn gives a short laugh, "You aren't the sort for sport fighting. Besides, your style doesn't lend itself to a crowd. I taught you how to kill, not how to entertain and I doubt you'd picked it up since." That dark feeling settles down, like a shadow, between them.

"Your man there, your friend, seems to have the knack however."

Ractus was eyeing the four armed saughin carefully, rolling on his heels. The water sloshed around his knees, scummy with sweat, blood and dirt. His foe seems impassive, weapons held high. The elf darted forward, feinted to the left, juked to the right and -

Ran straight into a twin set of fists. The blow slammed into his upper body and arm, throwing him half way across the fighting ring. There was a thick thud as he crashed into the wooden barriers, and it sent up a sheet of water. When it settled Ractus was still standing but he was weaving a bit, rubbing his chin with a thumb. The saughin let out a roar and strode forward, face set in a hungry looking grin.

"Fighting kobolds is good work." Finn says easily, "We all have to start somewhere." Rudabeh's old mentor's face is turned toward the fight below but she seems to be staring right through it.

Then she glances over, "I'd say you are fishing for information but my patience for water based puns is at a low ebb." The fighter winces in feigned pain, "See, I just did it again. Outsea can be so unbearable at times. I've never heard so many 'fin' jokes."

Outsears loved both wordplay and bad jokes. Rudabeh can only imagine what they make of the fighter's name. It didn't bear dwelling on.

"But sure, let's lay all our cards on the table." A pause as Finn shifts her gaze to her old student, "I'm working for Vsara." The human watches Rudabeh face and then smiles, "I see you've heard the name? News travels fast, You've only been back in the city for a day. Still, good to know you still keep your eyes and ears open."

A flurry of movement down below distracts them. The saughin moves in, penning Ractus in against the side of the pit, using his long arms to block the escape. The elf gives a grin and then launches himself up into the air, pushing off the wall. With a spray of water he grabs the saughin's shoulder, heaves himself over it like a gymnast and slides down the Oustear's broad back.

When the mercenary hits the ground, he twists, and grabs one of his foes still forward-facing arms. With a grimace Ractus holds the massive wrist with one hand and then punches the forearm with the other. There is a splintering cracking sound as bone and muscle break under the blow. Ractus darts back, nimble through the water.

The saughin bellows in pain and confusion, the wounded arm hanging uselessly at an unnatural angle.

"Not bad." Finn remarks. "Still, I think he is just making it angry. " Indeed, despite the savage wound, the saughin doesn't seem to be slowed at all.

"True." Rudabeh responds when Finn says she was taught to kill. "And I wanted to thank you for that. If you had merely taught me how to defend myself I would have already perished in my duties as a paladin. Defending ideals requires the same convinction as taking a life." Her mentor seemed more like her old self again, and she was willing to accept the sudden nihilism as the cost of another decade of mercenary work.

"Oh, he has the fan of a sea lion." She says of Ractus, her brow furrowing while he smashes against one of the walls. She had soundly beaten him in Daggermark, but the elf had a cask's worth of wine in him and she had the help of her goddess. Maybe Finn was right, this was a chance to see his real capabilities.

A low snort escapes the undine's nose when Finn trips over multiple water-based puns, a grin creasing her lips at the mercenary's beleaguered expression. "You're soaked in salt now, it just starts to happen after a while."

"Hmmm..." Rudabeh begins when Finn reveals she is under Vrasa's employ, and the paladin opens her mouth to reply when splashing causes her head to swing back to the left. Tracking Ractus's wavy form through the air bubble added oppurunity for some extra imagination, so his acrobatic escape seemed extra impressive in the end. She grimmaces a little at the broken arm- nothing a bit of magic couldn't heal, but it all seemed so unessecary. Violence for the sake of violence.

"Well, hopefully the Lord in Iron is entertained at least." She responds to Finn's observation that Ractus is swimming against the current, and to finish her own thought about what purpose the sport fighting could serve. This fighting was a form of worship for Ractus. She had to accept it.

"I'm not casting any lines. I just want to know what you're up to, what you think about Outsea" The undine says sincerely, taking her eyes off the fight to look at Finn. "It's been a decade and I'm happy to see you."

With a small sigh and a shifting of plates, she switches the weight on her legs and looks back into the arena. "Vrasa is causing some trouble for my father. So are the Tallies. I aim to fix it." Her hands widen on the wailing, leather rasping against dry stone. "Outsea is a violent place," Her remarks were puncuated by the cheers of the crowd. "But these are not problems to be solved by the sword. An understanding can be reached, when I know more."

With a gesture to the disinterested, unfamiliar men at the far table, Rudabeh asks the question that had bothering her since seeing Finn sitting by herself. "Are Kosan and Zaih still with you?" It was a delicate matter asking after friends that willingly threw themselves into the kind of danger measured in platinum coins. She was ready to hear they were dead, though she hoped it was not so.

Finn snorts at Rudabeh invocation of the gods, and says, "Gorum never lacks for entertainment. I don't mind tossing up a prayer before a fight, but worshipping him? Not a good sign of mental health. Your friend is one of the fanatics? He is crazier then I thought."

Then Finn grins, "I'm happy to see you too, kid. Glad to see you are making something of yourself. You are following a different path then me, but I'll take some credit."

Below the crowd is booing the elf, who is grinning and waving to the crowd as if they were chanting his name. His muscles gleam with both sweat and splashed seawater. One bloody fist is raised in salute, although who to, Rudabeh is not sure. The crowd? His god? To Rudabeh? or perhaps, simply to himself. In any case, he has little time to celebrate.

With a roar the saughin charges forward, head down. The elf is quick but not quick enough. before he can get clear a massive hand grabs his shoulder, like a parent stopping a a wayward child. That brief delay is all the Outsear needs, and suddenly he descends on the elf like a shark on a wounded seal. The saughin steps on Ractus's foot in an old boxer's trick, while one huge hand grabs the elf's head. Held in the grip, the other two fists pummel the mercenary, one bearing the heavy club. Ractus raises his hands in a fighter's block but the beating is still savage. It is like watching a kid get beat up over his lunch.

The crowd howls in delight as the outsider gets the worse of it.

'I've heard about your father." Finn said quietly. "That was before I got here. I'm a new hire, only been in town a few months. Although, as far as such things go, your father was only frozen out. We both know things could have been much worse. People like Vsara can be far less...measured."

"As for the Tallies," Finn gives Rudabeh a searching look, " Dealing with them is the main reason I've been brought in as a troubleshooter. What exactly do you have in mind as apparently self-appointed problem solver?"

At her final question Finn's face grows darker but her tone is still the casual one, "Not at the moment." Seeing Rudabeh face she waves a somewhat apologetic hand, a rather extravagant gesture from the female half-elf. "Both of them are fine. Zaih is off completing some obscure self-denial ritual at a temple and Kosan..." A thoughtful pause from the usually laconic woman , her eyes unusually bright. "We are taking a break. I'll patch it up later." Then that momentary weakness is gone and Rudabeh's mentor puts her guard back in place. "I'm sure they send their best. "

Below the saughin finally tosses Ractus aside, after one final blow to the head with a club. The elf splashes heavily into the water, face down. His body seems limp, and merely half floats, half sinks in the churned, filthy water.

"Just wait," Finn says, eyeing the action, "Just for another moment."

"I wouldn't call him a fanatic," Rudabeh says of Ractus, his description of The First Blade heralding times of strife at the front of her mind. "but he is certainly a believer." As if to puncuate this, she extends with an open palm to the elf, who was waving to the crowd like he was the head of a parade.

Her face turns to a grimmace when Ractus becomes stuck, his foot trapped underneath the massive four-armed mutant. Giving her head a shake at the beat down, the paladin turns to focus her gaze on Finn. "Oh, I'm well aware..." How many people did Irovetti send to the dungeons for "betraying" him, when in reality they wanted out of his drug smuggling operation?

"He would have been all right if only Vrasa had frozen him out. But the Tallies seem to think he still works for Vrasa. Or maybe they don't care. I'd like to meet with their leaders if I can figure out who they are." Rudabeh continues, raising her voice to be heard over the cheering crowd. "I don't know enough about the Tallies, or what they want besides representation on the Council to give you any ideas. What is their problem with Vrasa? Weren't these humans brought in to work on the new sinkhole by Vrasa? If this is just a labor dispute, I'd be happy to mediate."

Slightly quirking one brow, she asks of her mentor: "How do you propose dealing with them?"

Rudabeh had a joke ready about Ziah- something along the lines of people (Ractus) calling a paladin stuffy, but a ritual of self-denial?. That was stuffy. Yet the news of Finn and Kosan having a spat closes her mouth faster than a prodded clam. "Oh." Is all the undine manages, a little stunned Finn had nearly admitted, in an off-handed way, that the two were actually in some kind of relationship.

It was an open secret, really- denied by both parties but anyone with half a brain knew what was going on between them. Some of the longer-lived companions in the Bastard Birgade often joked that the languid pace of Finn and Kosan's relationship seemed to be full elf speed instead of half.

So Rudabeh is unsure how to react to both an admission of involvement and bad news simultaneously. In the end her confusion fades and she merely smiles sincerely before stating; "When you see them again, give them the same from me." and then dropping the subject entirely.

She would have been interrupted if she had continued, anyway. Ractus's limp body made a terrible thud when it was tossed against the wall, and Rudabeh is already on the balls of her feet trying to get a better view to gauge his conciousness.

"He can't..." She replies to Finn when told to wait, fearing the elf was going to drown at this rate. But she stops her figiting, inhales quickly through her nose, and holds her breath as the seconds seem to crawl into minutes.

At the mention of mediation Finn looks away from the deadly struggle below and gives her old friend and apprentice a long hard look. A speculative light enters her sharp green eyes and the half-elf nods. "Not a bad idea, actually. Having a local oversee things might ruffle less feathers. Or scales, I suppose." A pause at the pun and then, "Or make things worse. Some of the Tallies won't like dealing with an Outsear. I'll run it by the boss, see what they think."

Their attention both shifts below as the saughin stamps over to the floating elf. Finn however has a slight quirk of her lips, and she leans forward expecting something. Rudabeh, on the other hand, is ready to start casting healing magic to save her friend. Just how far was she going to indulge Finn's love of theater-

Ractus exploded out of the water like an alligator seizing a drinking deer. His fists smash into the saughin's face, and sharp teeth go flying all directions. The Outsear stumbles back under a battery of blows as the bloody elf hammers home a series of heavy body blows. Trying to recover the saughin brings down an overhand swing with a truncheon but Ractus merely held up a forearm. The wooden club hit the arm...and cracked, the brawler's bones somehow overcoming the hardened wood.

Rctus kept pounding away at his opponent, a blur of movement, ignoring the feeble counterstrikes. Again and again his knuckles slam into the saughin's stomach, torso and face. Blood sprays everywhere as slowly, finally, the saughin starts to sway. The crowd, screaming through all fo this goes silent as the towering Outsear starts to totter. Then, like a mighty tree in a storm, gracefully and majestically topples into the foaming water. Gore flies everywhere, giving Ractus yet another layer of filth. The crowd is utterly silent now as Ractus raises a scarred, broken fist.

And then falls backwater into the water in utter exhaustion.

The crowd erupts in cheers and whistles, weirdly distorted by the shimmering magical bubble. Whatever else, Ractus has won some supporters through his sheer grit. Rudabeh's fellow marine folks were judgmental but they loved a good fight.

"I like him." Finn says, giving a small nod. "He likes to win."

She is about to say more when a new commotion breaks out below. The cheers change to shouts of alarm and screams of pain. People peel back from the packed arena, panicking. Even as Rudabeh watches someone runs by, far below, shouting, "It's loose!"

A slithering mass of shining metal heaves into view, rolling like a ball of oil through the water. Without slowing it rolls through the bubble and lands with a splash in the fighting pit. The surface of the thing is shining metallic, catching the dim lighting and making darting rainbows.

[i]"It's beautiful."[/b] Senqhi says.

"Ok, now you go." Finn says, voice whip quick. "I'll meet you down there." The half-elf turns to her men, even as she ismoving toward the stairs. 'Come on lads, time to earn our keep."

For a single moment they stare at her, confused, cards still in hand.

"Now." Finn growls, and they leap to their feet, grabbing weapons with little skill. "Amateurs." Finn mutters already vanishing down the stairs.

Below, the ooze starts to approach both fallen fighters.

"I certainly don't feel like a local anymore." Rudabeh comments sadly about her association with Outsea. "This place has changed." For a place with as many multi-centennials as Kyonin, it certainly seemed more like a human settlement now. "But please do. I will take it upon myself to speak with the Tallies and gauge their interest in mediation." Alseta willing, she could settle at least one dispute in Outsea with her skills before Finn's skills need to be involved. If it would let her generate enough clout to convince both the Tallies and Vrasa to ease off her father at the same time; all the better.

Staring at the scene below with bated breath, Rudabeh's grip on the stone railing tightens. She does not jump when Ractus explodes out of the water in a sudden frenzy, but instead relaxes her tensed frame with a sigh and scraping metal. "I had seen the rage within his eyes at times... but never unleashed..." Rudabeh says breathlessly, lips slightly agape in awe. The paladin struggled between being impressed at the martial prowess or affronted by the chaotic, brutal methods.

Torn as she was, there was no jubilation in her face when her Captain wins his bout, and Rudabeh continues to stand still staring at the scene below even as the elf collapses. Irovetti and Ractus... Two forces of chaos, equally powerful in their own way. Can they really be harnessed to bring order, or will they merely breed more chaos?

The paladin felt as if she had been given two powerful magic wands, no instructions on how to use them, and was hesitant to point them at any problems for fear of collateral damage. Would the gains be worth the costs when the time came to lean upon them?

"Mmm." Is her response to Finn's praise of Ractus, lost in her own contemplation.

Both were shook out of their respective lines of thought by the panic and shouts, and Rudabeh leans over the railing to try and see the source. The shining metal ball rolls out into the arena, and Rudabeh's head snaps to attention at Finn's orders. "Aye aye!"

Backpedaling a few steps while Finn yells to her muscle, she leans forward and takes two powerful pumps of her legs towards the railing, grabbing the edge and vaulting over the side. Water briefly slicks her exterior, and her hands wave in instinctive cupping motions to right her body and control her rapid descent. Rudabeh's stomach lurches as she inevitably plummets through the bubble membrane into the arena below; a delayed reminder that she absolutely hates the sensation of falling.

Gritting her teeth and looking below her as much as her retracted bevor would allow, the crowd would see a shining, silver humanoid streaking through the air with flailing arms as it attempts to land feet-first in the waters below.

acrobatics to negate fall: 1d20 - 4 ⇒ (18) - 4 = 14 I think the DC is 15 to negate the first 10 feet of damage. Depending on the amount of water between the bubble and the railing she might have been able to slow/control her fall a bit more?

Also a reminder she has Detect Chaos active if this is some kind of chaos ooze.

The bubble spell warps around Rudabeh and, with no sensation whatever, snaps back into place behind her. It was like a child poking a finger into a soapy bubble. Even her hurtling armor merely deformed the spell, not breaking it. Impressive really, a small part of her brain noted, even as the rest of her was focused on the sudden plunging feeling in her stomach.

In the back of her mind however, she can feel Senqhi squealing like a schoolgirl on a swing set. A total rush of exhilaration and joy at the speeding fall. The feeling was so strong it almost blocked out her own rather less enthused feelings on the matter. She was reflecting if this was good or bad when she hit the floor of the fighting pit with jarring force.

The undine smashes through the floor as if she had jumped on a eggshell. In an instant the fighting pit is a crumbling vortex of water, sand, broken rock, Ractus, saughin and ooze. All flowing downward into some sort of dark tunnel. Rudabeh just has time to note the shocked, surprised faces of the crowd before they flicker out of sight as she is swallowed by the earth.

The world is a dark blur of motion as she tumbles down a stony slide, tumbling like a leaf caught in a current. Once she hits a heavy rock that knocks the wind out of her and another time she brushes against something soft and soggy. The ooze? Ractus?

Then, just as abruptly, she is dumped out. Rudabeh finds herself on her back, in utter pitch black (or at least it would be to non-darkvision eyes). Shaking her head, she blearily looks around. They are in a natural underground chamber, the roof covered with pointed stalactites. Ractus lies near at hand and so is the saughin, both unmoving but breathing. Rudabeh is so bewildered it takes her a moment to realize that she is standing in a open air. The tunnel is an air pocket of some kind.

Then there is a gurgling, slurping noise. Out of the gloom the ooze lurches forward, apparently unperturbed by the change in circumstances.

Rudabeh inaitive: 1d20 + 1 ⇒ (8) + 1 = 9
Ooze: 1d20 - 5 ⇒ (9) - 5 = 4

Rudabeh can detect no evil or chaos from the slithering creature. It is what it appears to be, an ooze. She reaches for her weapons and found....nothing.

Her spear, her bag, all of her gear had been lost in the tumble. Not good.

Seqhi's squrealing was such a change from her usual paniced whimpering when they plunged into the water that Rudabeh barely registered her feet touching the ground.

It was mostly because her boots actually punched through the ground, and she was swept up in a current of sand and dirty water with only a moment to look upward and throw out a hand into the open air in futility.

Instinctively the undine closes her mouth and holds her breath as the first it of sand graces her tongue, leaving a dritty and iron taste in her mouth. Nicitating membranes cover her eyes, allowing her to watch as light vanished from her surroundings to be replaced by swirling, incohereent black-and-white lines of darkvision.

Tumbling, flailing, her hands try to grasp anything they can find along the stone chute but there is nothing to hold but sand and slick stone.

The floor levels out as she rolls to a stop, and Rudabeh scrambles with all four limbs to sit upright. Ractus and the saughin were confirmed to be the two lumps at her side with a quick turn of her head, but from the way they came...

Quickly reaching for her spear and finding nothing, her hand darts down to her boot for the dagger always strapped there.

Nothing.

"Well paint me like a Osirion galleon and strike the colors!" Rudabeh curses whole-heartedly before rolling over, stretching, and slapping a hand onto the leg of the unconcious sahuagin.

Divine power flows from her Iron Key, emanating in a flash of light that briefly illuminates the cave. Positive energy flows into the four-armed mutant, rapidly fixing the worst of the damage Ractus inflicted upon him. While he was an unknown, at least he would be able to see in the blackness. Ractus was going to be blind until she could call upon Alseta for some sustained light.

"Wake up! We're below the arena!" She shouts while picking herself out of the sandy slush and stumbling on two legs towards Ractus. "What is that ooze?!" A finger points towards the undulating mass slowly approaching.

Move action: Get up from prone

Standard action: Lay on hands on the sahuagin.

lay on hands: 3d6 ⇒ (1, 2, 3) = 6 Come on Alseta. Need a little bit more juice.

Senqhi remarks on Rudabeh's oath, her voice as calm and dry as ever. The paladin would be concerned that the disembodied ifrit was more interested in a leap then in her possible death, but she was used to it now.

"What is an Osirion? Or a galleon/ And what colors are they?"

Rudabeh didn't have time to play Material Plane guide right now. Things looked bad. With heavy clanking she shuffled over to the prone sahuagin and laid her hands on them. Even as she summoned Alseta's divine powers she shouted at Ractus to wake up. Fighting this ooze with her bare hands would be bad enough, doing so while trying to protect two unconscious bodies was worse. As Finn once remarked, "Do one thing, not two, if you can."

After the brief divine glow fades the fallen Outsear takes a huge gasping breath, muscles trembling. His breath smells like a mixture of old fish and rotting seaweed, and not in a good way. The dark eyes snap open and the fists start to flail weakly, trying to get his bearings.

"Danglosa's eyes....where are we?" The saughin blinks again and focuses on Rudabeh. "Who in the Deeps are you? get off me!"

From Ractus all she gets is a groan. So is alive, but apparently not much in fighting shape.

Meanwhile the ooze lumbers on, slimly crossing the wet surface of the cavern. In the pitch dark the creature has lost the irriscdent glitter but the surface is still smooth and slick, like liquid metal. It moves forward toward Rudabeh, ignoring the other two now. In moments it'll be on her.

From above, faint noises can be heard. Shouts?

It is 15 feet away and moving toward you. Ractus is somewhat closer, off to the side. Clear enough?

I'll tell you later! It was an optimistic thought, she realized, as she looked back at the slowly advancing ooze.

"We're under the arena. I am Rudabeh. That ooze is trying to eat us." Rudabeh firmly repeats in a lower voice when the confused saughin wakes. She whips her head back and forth between the ooze and Ractus. There wasn't enough time to wake him too, unless...

Seqhi, please make me go faster! The desperate thought was followed up with confidence the Ifrit would infuse her with a burst of speed, as Rudabeh is already jumping towards Ractus in two giant steps.

Bending over and wrapping one of her arms under his shoulder, she drags him across the wet stone floor several feet in a hunched-over carry that made her back hurt.

When she felt she had gained a little ground on the ooze, and fully exfoliated Ractus' back, the paladin shifts to a kneel and places both hands on the elf's bare chest.

lay on hands: 3d6 ⇒ (3, 6, 2) = 11

Light spills forth from her fingertips for a few seconds, and the moment it ends she is roughly shaking her captain awake. "Get up! There's an ooze trying to eat us."

Swift action: Activate Burst of Speed for +10 feet movement.

Move action: Drag Ractus back as far as possible. Dragging allows for moving the dragged up to 1/2 movement speed, so maximum 15 ft.

Standard action: Lay on hands on Ractus.

"Under?" the hulking Outsear said, sitting up carefully, a massive hand on his head. "I feel like I've got the bends.." Then he noticed the ooze and his slow waking up become far more rapid. With a fighter's innate sense of recovery, he rolled to his feet and quickly, is shakily, moved for the slick, steep ramp leading up to Gargant's.

In her mind, Senqhi seemed to fade slightly, as if distracted by something. Then the world around Rudabeh slowed. The water around her feet suddenly seemed to flow like thick molasses, sloshing with ponderous grace. Ractus labored breath was now as slow and even as a heavy sleepers. Even the ooze's already leisurely slump became a dawdling lurch. Rudabeh herself was unaffected, if anything, she seemed faster. her pulse quickened, her stride smooth and sure.

None of it made Ractus any lighter however and when she stopped dragging him, her shoulder's burned. Why hadn't she chosen a smaller man to be her captain? A gnome, maybe...

Again she called on her divine power and the cavern flared with temporary light. It seemed to last a heartbeat longer this time, and Rudabeh wondered if this was random chance or slightly more divine favor for the elf. No time to figure that out now. Ractus's purple eyes flew open and he quickly stood up. His body was still covered in cuts, bruises and blood, but at least he seemed to not have any broken bones.

"I'm up." he said quickly, "Now what? It's as black as Gorum's as-" he shut up when the ooze slithered across something that made a rattling sound on the rough natural stone. Instinctually the elf tried to back up, away from, to him invisible, the sound. One of his hands found Rudabeh's shoulder and he held on tightly.

The ooze came on, at the same rate as ever, more like a tiny landslide then a hunting beast. There was no trace of frustration, fear or consideration, just implacable hunger. It rolled on toward them.

Rudabeh's ears attempt to unfurl inside of her helmet as she strains to catch the clattering sound as the ooze moves towards them. Her spear? Dagger? No, it was too much to hope for- an ancient plank of pine with a bent, rusty nail in it would be just as nice to see.

"It seems fixated on me." She comments as Ractus moves behind her, grabbing onto her pauldron. "I'm going to make some light, shield your eyes." Hand darting to her holy symbol, she grasps it tightly and prays.

The paladin's prayers were always genuine, but this one had a little bit of extra force behind it.

"Alseta, please give me your light, give me your strength!" She yells into the cavern voice clear as struck crystal. There was no wavering in the confidence that her goddess will see her through this.

Rudabeh's gauntlets first shine with a bright white light that both illuminates the tunnel down to its pores and casts long, pitch-black shadows from the stalactites and stalagmites. An instant later they also burst into flames, holy fire licking up to her wrists but doing no harm.

"I'm going to lead it away, get around it and see if you can find my weapons on the ground." She begins to move away from Ractus, hoping the ooze will follow her.

Thank you, Seqhi. Rudabeh thinks while hustling away from the rolling ball of hunger. Do you have any idea what this ooze is?

Standard action: Use Divine Bond to imbue her gauntlets with Flaming. They also shed white light with the intensity of a torch, which is 30ft of bright light and then 30 ft of low light.

Move action: Move 20ft away from ooze, leading it away from Ractus.

At first it is merely Rudabeh's voice ringing out, echoing off the solemn cave walls. The sound seems swallowed by the endless, cloying darkness that has laid here since the world was made. Then, without warning, dawn comes.

Divine luminesce suddenly fills the cavern, holy fire radiating from Rudabeh's hands. Swirling flames engulf her gauntlets, a deep rich brown edged with gold. The light reflects off the walls, revealing veins of crystals and salt, and magnifies the brilliance of Alseta's gift. Soon the cavern is as bright as day, or more, with the paladin standing like a mighty stone, hands held at her side, burning as brilliantly as any star.

Rudabeh can feel Alseta's power thrumming through her, a warmth that has nothing to do with the fire and everything to do with divine grace. The paladin was always connected to her goddess and had never felt the lack but it was usually a soft, comfortable feeling, a sense of security. But this...this was another side of her god. Of Power and Might. What had the firit called Alseta in his land?

In her mind Senqhi supplies, Steward of the Outward Facing Flame

Indeed.

Then she ran.

Rudabeh moved away and around the ooze, trying to draw it away from Ractus and the sahuaguin (who was still trying to vainly climb the slippery slope up). Still, the space is small and the ooze follows her. It seems unconcerned for flame, light or prayers to divine powers. The creature follows an older and more primal calling. To feed.

Ractus grunts and looks around for weapons but Rudabeh soon has he hands full as she finally runs out of space to run. The ooze bears down on her, lumpy tendrils reaching out of the otherwise formless mass.

ooze attack: 1d20 + 13 ⇒ (15) + 13 = 28
Damage: 2d6 + 10 ⇒ (5, 3) + 10 = 18

One of the tendrils, thick as a young tree trunk, slams her hard enough to rattle her against the glittering wall of the cavern. Ironically, she seems to have fallen through a fighting pit into another one. Her head rings from the impact, but her fire is undaunted. Luckily the ooze seems to have no acid or other way to damage except for brute force but Alseta, it was strong.

Do you need a map or more description? I will note, going forward, you can outpace the ooze, it only got close because you had to move away from ractus and it. If that makes sense?