[Najmi] spend our vacation at

[mr_gaeta]

Despite Azimar's assertions otherwise (and Gaeta's own firsthand experience, now), he still wants to learn how to decipher the language he sees around him in occasional signs and charts. Considering the maps they'll soon have on hand, he thinks it doubly important. You can't navigate if you can't read.

So, for the time being, he's taken to the manor library. Gaeta nearly upended a tiny dish of ink as he was pulling down a couple of texts, but caught himself in time; now, he's trying to puzzle over the written language as Kaya taught him. Under his breath, he sounds out each word as carefully as he can, with the halting uncertainty of someone far younger.

Comments

[mr_gaeta]

" -- Okay, right, yes," he says once he gets a closer look, nodding to himself as he touches the very tip of his finger to the letter. Backtracking a little, he repeats the word with the correction added in.

[no_thief]

Anthi'ar, it reads.

"It's the name of the river," Kaya says. "It's the old word for arrow."

[mr_gaeta]

"Oh," he murmurs. Gaeta skates his finger down the page to the illustration. "I can see why they named it that."

[no_thief]

"And the book says here --"

She's pointing to the block of text at the bottom, and her words cut off in a tiny indrawn gasp.

[mr_gaeta]

He blinks, looks to the text, glances back to her with his eyebrows pulled together.

"What?"

[no_thief]

Very softly: "It used to also be called the Iron Road River."

He should remember; he wasn't there when Itral had her first fit of prophecy, naming the broken city, but he's heard Kaya and Itral go over the words again and again.

Follow the black, the blue, the --

[mr_gaeta]

"Oh my gods."

Not much louder than Kaya, as he stares at the words she's highlighted. The back of his mind keeps turning, puzzling out the letters, shaping them to words, cross-referencing them to the translation she's provided. The rest of him stands stock-still and motionless, trying to take in its other meaning.

"That's the route. Is there -- " He's skimming the whole page again, though he knows it won't do any good. "Any mention of black or blue there? As landmarks, or...?"

[no_thief]

"I don't see anything, wait --"

Her finger's sliding across the text, tracing the words as she reads them silently.

[mr_gaeta]

Gaeta peers over her shoulder, following the path of her finger as if reading along.

A brief movement catches his eye, but when he glances up in an automatic check of their surroundings, he doesn't spot anything. Frowning, Gaeta studies the spot for another moment before returning to the book.

[no_thief]

"It doesn't say anything about blue or black."

She lowers her hand, her shoulders slumping a little.

Doubtfully: "Maybe the Voice just meant the color of the river?"

[mr_gaeta]

"Maybe." He doesn't sound any more sure of it than she does. "It doesn't seem like it would -- "

Another skittering burst of movement in the corner of his eye. Gaeta's head snaps around.

[no_thief]

Kaya starts, looking in the same direction. "What?"

(Under the reading desk, her hand closes on her knife.)

[mr_gaeta]

"I thought I..."

He blinks, and shakes his head in a tiny frustrated movement. Ghosts on a DRADIS screen, he thinks.

"Never mind. I thought I saw something."

[no_thief]

"Where?" Low and intent.

She's close enough to him that he can probably feel it: she's tensed all over.

[mr_gaeta]

Gaeta tips his head toward a chair some ten feet from where they're seated.

"I'm sure it wasn't anything," he whispers.

[no_thief]

Kaya is by no means sure.

"What did it look like?"

[mr_gaeta]

"I don't know," he mutters. "Dark; kind of indistinct. Small, though," he adds, peering toward the chair. "Maybe..."

He holds two fingers about three inches apart.

[no_thief]

She looks up at him in some surprise, her brow clearing.

"Did it have hands?"

[mr_gaeta]

"I, ah."

Gaeta blinks, mirroring the surprise and adding a fair bit of puzzlement to it.

"I don't know. I couldn't tell."

[no_thief]

Somehow, all the tension is gone from her posture, and she's smiling. "I bet I know what it was --"

Kaya raises her head and makes a coaxing, beckoning noise, clicking her tongue; it's a sound he's heard her make, once before. Years before, for him.

"Are you here?" she asks the air.

[mr_gaeta]

Gaeta remembers that sound; he can't be sure why she's making it, though, and slants another bemused look her way.

At least, until another movement catches his eye. He turns.

For a while, all he and the tiny, fuzzy -- he isn't even sure what it is, aside from a collection of thin limbs and huge eyes -- stare at each other in equal surprise. The creature blinks, solemnly.

"Um," says Gaeta.

[no_thief]

"I thought so." Kaya's voice is soft, and delighted. "Inkyfaces!"

Yes, plural. There's another one perched on the shelf at the far end of the room, and another peering out from behind a curtain. The name is entirely descriptive; the little creatures are a grayish brown all over, darkening to an inky black on hands, feet, and faces.

The closest one tilts its head close to ninety degrees, and peers at Gaeta from the new angle.

[mr_gaeta]

Gaeta comes within inches of mimicking the gesture, realizes what he's doing, and catches himself.

(The other urge, which is to reach out a hand to the closest one, is considerably easier to suppress.)

"What are they?" he whispers.

[no_thief]

She glances at him in renewed surprise. "You've never heard of inkyfaces?"

[mr_gaeta]

"No," he murmurs. "We, ah. We didn't have anything like them where I'm from."

He lifts a cautious (and still faintly bemused) hand, and gives the inkyface a tiny wave hello.