Jacynta Laringfass's page

Mother insists that the University will be good for me, and that it will keep me safe from the War. She says it is time for me to stop daydreaming and playing in the woods like a child, and that when I return she expects me to help her manage the Ramble, and I suppose I must. I will miss the woods more, I think, than she knows.

I have more packing to do, and mother is calling. Until next time, Diary.

***
Sul, 8 Rhaan, 993
Dear Diary
It has been a whirlwind of a day, and I scarcely know where to begin! Our caravan arrived in Sharn without incident, and one of the hands was kind enough to walk me through the city to the University. As I made my way to the admissions office, I passed another caravan at the University. One of their horses was having some kind of fit, and the man handling it was being an absolute brute, yelling at and beating the poor thing. Before I knew what I was doing, I found myself shouting the man down and taking care of the animal myself. When it had calmed I found I had a small audience, including an older (and, if I admit, rather dashing) dark-skinned man in fine traveling clothes.

He asked if I was a student, and I told him I would be, when my paperwork was done. He told me his name was Master Aemon Grahame, that he was a professor here at the University, that he was in need of an assistant for an expedition, and that if I was smart enough to be a student, and brave and compassionate enough to shout down a man four times my size on behalf of an animal twelve times my size, then he wanted me along. I asked where he was going, and he told me they were heading for Stormreach--Xen'drik! The last great wilderness!

I was dumbstruck, but when I found my voice I told him that I couldn't possibly, that I hadn't even finished my paperwork, that I was supposed to be studying numbers and business to help my mother with the inn. He told me that their boat would leave in a few hours, and if I my papers were in order and I changed my mind before they cast off, there was a place for me.

There were too many reasons not to go. Mother would lose her mind, and I don't know anything about research or expeditions, and it would be *mad* for me to go haring off to *Xen'drik*, of all places. I simply couldn't go.

I must be mad, then, because here I am, on a boat, headed away from all the plans I've made and towards an unknown bigger than anything I've ever imagined.

***
Far, 13 Rhaan, 995
Dear Diary
I meant to update things in here on the second anniversary, but it's been a mad few days. Then again, I don't seem to have many days that aren't mad. It seems strange to look back on who I was when I arrived. That girl was so nervous, so anxious to please, and everything was big and loud and wonderful and terrifying, all at once. If I told that girl that today I'm recovering from trying to outdrink a table of drow over a bet to decide whether or not I'd let them shave my head, I'm certain she'd faint dead away.

(We compromised, by the way: we all stopped before the scorpion wine could start to kill us, and I've still got half my hair.)

I made a new friend last month, as well. Another halfling, from the Talenta Plains. He calls himself Tuk Nimbleguts, "187th of his name". Apparently it's some ridiculous family thing. He's got a dinosaur, as well. It's a velociraptor dromisauridae, or rhavad'eth, though he laughed when I called it by its proper name. He called it--her--a clawfoot, and said her name was "Rain Sweeping Down Before A Stormfront After A Dry Summer", but that I could call her "Rain". I was wary at first, but I must say that she's a beautiful specimen, and I've warmed to her quickly.

It's not that Tuk is particularly unique, of course, in terms of the men I've met here; there was that poet I fell head-over-heels for in my first month, and bawled my eyes out for two when he left, and there was the researcher on drow culture last year that I caught with that burly dwarf woman. There was even another halfling from the Plains, who was so full of himself I threw him out of my rooms halfway through the night.

This Tuk, though . . . I like him. I feel like he respects me, but not because I'm some kind of authority figure. It was like he looked at me, and decided instantly that he would never need to coddle me, or talk down to me, or make sure I'm keeping up. I feel like I could walk side by side with him, and I could just him to have my back, like he expects that I'd have his.

And he makes me laugh.

Anyway, I've talked Aemon into hiring him as part of our expeditionary guard. I'm looking forward to spending a lot more time with him, and with Rain. Who knows? This might go somewhere interesting.

***
Zor, 26 Rhaan, 996
Jacynta watched the hand tick by on the Cannith-made clock. The interviewer was late, but she wasn't terribly surprised. Whoever it was almost certainly thought he had better things things to do than meet with some student fresh out of Morgrave. She shifted, grimacing at the strict fit of her new clothes. After three years of well-worn trousers and light armor made for trekking through the jungle, the starched, high-necked blouse and long skirt felt simultaneously vulnerable and restrictive.

The door swung open, and a harried-looking human man entered, carrying a bundle of papers and a parcel under one arm. Jacynta didn't see a Mark on him immediately, but that didn't mean he didn't have one, of course. His coat bore the emblem of House Vadalis all the same. She rose to greet him, but we waved her hand away.

"Sit, sit," he said, dumping his things on the room's desk. "I haven't got much time for niceties."

She resumed her seat, and the man shuffled through the things on his desk, finally clearing everything to one side but three items: two letters, one of which she recognized, and a small parcel wrapped in brown paper.

"So, Miss Laringfass," he said, picking up the letter she recognized--her application for the position, sent from Sylbaran a week ago, and he scanned it as he spoke. "You want to help rear and train animals for us, and you believe your time as part of a research expedition out of Stormreach qualifies you to do so."

"I do," she said, sitting up a little straighter--not that it made much difference; she may as well have been sitting on the floor, given how this man looked down at her. "I spent extensive time with a variety of pack breeds, as well as--"

"I can read perfectly well," the man said, cutting her off. "Your resume is impressive, I'll admit. Generally, though, we like to bring in people that are more connected to Vadalis, people that we know."

Jacynta's shoulders slumped, but the man continued, dropping her letter and picking up the second envelope.

"Which brings us to this--a letter from your sponsor, a Master Aemon Grahame, Morgrave University Professor, and a number of education titles that I don't really recognize anyway. He vouches for you in a most hearty and expletive-laden fashion, and while his letter is hardly professional, it does address some of my concerns.

"Including why you are here, now, when the rest of the research team is still in Xen'drik."

Jacynta didn't know how to respond to that. She looked up at the man, and he met her eyes coolly, and with maybe a trace of pity. She looked away again.

"I will be frank with you," the man said, setting down the second letter and folding his hands on the desk. "If you had any qualifications but the ones you do, I wouldn't have even bothered to meet you. We don't really deal with pack animals. We don't always, strictly speaking, deal with animals. Some of the creatures we handle are truly vicious, in the way that stupid people often wrongly assume simple beasts to be. They are dangerous, in ways that animals are not capable of being. Are you absolutely certain that this is a job you want?"

Jacynta met his eyes again. The pity was gone, if it had been there to begin with, and the look now was simply piercing.

"Yes. I'm certain."

The man grunted. "In that case, I'll see you back here tomorrow morning for you to being training. Wear something sensible."

He pushed the paper-wrapped parcel across the desk towards her.

"Master Grahame sent that as well. He said you'd forgotten it when you left."

Jacynta frowned, but took the package and unwrapped it. A worn book fell out of the paper, and her breath caugth. She lifted it carefully, running a thumb over the pages, and something fell out and drifted to her lap. A feather.

The man frowned at it when she picked it up. "I can't say I'm familiar with that plumage. What kind of bird did that come from?"

"It's not from a bird," she said softly, caressing it with one finger. "It came from a velociraptor dromisauridae, or rhavad'eth. On the Talenta Plains, they call them clawfoots.

"This one's name is--was--Rain."