It's late summer now and the winds blowing across the Waking Sea and driving it hard along the rocky, blighted coastline are already sharpening in anticipation for the changes seasons. It's dank and stormy here. The white sun is a smudge in the overcast sky and there is so much salt in the sea air on the Pilgrim's Path that he can taste it on his lips. But most of all, the air here seems unnaturally dense as they wind their way down from the marshy roadways to the stony beaches, picking their way carefully along the grim coast in pursuit of their assignment. He imagines this is what magic must feel like - a strange combination of primal dread coupled with the cotton mouth sensation of lighting on the verge of striking.
Light, it's no wonder they all go strange.
Marcoulf's hand hasn't left his sword all afternoon. It had started as an idle drape of the fingers, his wrist balanced idly on the pommel, but now as they scramble across shale covered beaches wind their way through beaten passages of crumbling basalt he finds his grip has secured itself. They're far from the walls of Amaranthine and in pursuit of a cave where smugglers have been dropping stores of what's rumored to be tainted lyrium. If it isn't darkspan, it will be bandits.
So he makes no move to alter the lay of his fingers when at last they work their way around a promontory by way of a slick, narrow footpath and there in the inlet below them he spies the dark mouth of a cave. Instead Marcoulf simply jerks his elbow toward it, says "There," and spiders his way further along the face of the stony outcropping in search of some way down.
"Got it," is Athessa's reply, and she immediately hops off of the slick, narrow path they'd been traversing and starts skid-hopping from basalt ledge to basalt ledge, a few of her more fluid, immediate hops being more a matter of slipping off the rocks than skill, but she covers for it well. The only thing to do when the roof tiles slip out from under you is to get off the roof, da'len.
In no time at all, she's near the entrance of the cave, but she's not stupid enough to traipse in alone--or, more likely, she's not actually looking for a cave with lyrium in it. What does she care about lyrium? Nothin', 'cept what it'll sell for.
Still, no point in doing nothing while the shem takes his time. Athessa crouches, examining the faint signs of foot traffic to and from the cave entrance. None of it seems particularly fresh.
There's a definitive double take from where he's pasted against the ledge wall as she cuts out down the crumbling stone pillars, making her way with every appearance of neatness to the cave mouth. Which leaves him on his own when it comes to navigating his way down the rocky inlet. The blank, unappreciative blank stare he fixes on Athessa's back surely loses all effectiveness at a distance in the rain but he gives it a try anyway before continuing his slow, methodical descent.
It takes him quite some time to navigate. By the time he's splashing up through the flooded shoals toward her he can feel sweat prickling on his neck and back, the heat unpleasant in the already thick weather. She's likely had time to map the cave entrance and its surroundings to her little heart's content, so maybe it's just practicality and not pettiness that prompts him to ask:
"Rocks, rain, some seaweed--" The latter gets a half-hearted poke with a stick she found nearby, which she then uses to indicate the ground in front of the cave. "Oh, and a bunch of old footprints. Looks like nobody's been here in a while."
She looks up at Marcoulf, either squinting and scrunching up her face as a reaction to the rain, or smirking at him...or both.
"You have fun on the scenic route? Get a good gander at the coastline?"
He gives her a fixed look, line of his mouth all thin and crooked. "Good enough," he says, scuffing his thumb across the line of his brow. "Should I wait while you fetch up whatever seaweed you'd like to take with you?"
She's just so good at pocketing all kinds of things, isn't she?
He smiles (or bares his teeth) and sloshes up through the foaming seawater to the dark mouth of the waiting cave.
With a flick of her wrist, the stick in her hand is tossed end-over-end over her shoulder and she stands up, shrugging her shoulders.
"'Course not, I already collected plenty while I was waiting for you and your clumsy boots to get down here. Let's go find some lyrium, or more likely, giant spiders!"
This time, she definitely is smiling at him as she gestures to the cave entrance with a servile flourish. "After you, bootsie."
There's a low humming noise in Marcoulf's throat for it, a flat look as he unties the torch from where it's been lashed to his belt. He ducks in under the mantle of the cave before unlacing it's oil cloth hood and it's some moments before a spark can be encouraged to catch in the damp air. But eventually (Maker forbid whatever color commentary might occur to her in the interim), he does indeed lead the way into the waiting network of caves torch in one hand and drawn sword in the other.
"Mind to mark the intersections as we pass them." Light, is there anything worse than the idea of being lost underground? "Unless you can sniff our way out when we've finished."
A dog, he thinks. Next time someone wants to send him poking around in caves, he's asking for dog.
"Hate to break it to you but sniffing isn't my speciality," Athessa says with a twitch of her ears, spotting a chalky white rock and picking it up. It leaves a nice white mark on a nearby stalagmite when she scrapes the two surfaces together, and she nods. "This'll do."
The caves are damp, cold, and surprisingly loud. Probably due to the rock funneling the wind and sounds of waves through, or echoes amplifying as they bounce off the walls, or something smart-sounding like that. In any case, perhaps defying expectations considering her sensitive hearing, Athessa preferred the noise to outright silence. Her feet on the rocks made far less noise than Marcoulf's boots, and it was much easier to go undetected when everyone else was already at a disadvantage.
That's too bad seems to be the obvious sentiment. Nonetheless, Marcoulf sloshes along with the torch raised before them, the sound of the surf and weather persisting even as the scant daylight quickly dwindles behind them. It isn't long before the only light cast along the slick, mildewed tunnel is that of the flame. It casts long, foreboding shadows and the fire twitches anxiously in the hiss of wind that must be moving through the highest point of the passage.
When they arrive at their first crossroad, Marcoulf pauses there. Studies the eddies of granular dirt on the ground beneath their feet and-- looks to his companion expectantly.
"Oh, you want me to read the signs?" With a smidge of theatrics, she sighs and crouches down, studying the dirt. She hums, then swipes the ground with her fingers and rubs them together, assessing the feel of the grit.
"Hmmm...I wonder..." She tastes the dirt, then spits it out and stands, marking the wall with her chalky rock. "That way."
Well surely she doesn't expect him to do it, does she? They'll be wandering around in circles if that's the case. So Marcoulf does what he's perfectly useful at: holding the torch nice and high while she sighs and eats dirt, waiting patiently for what must be her considerably more expert assessment). Further, when she straightens he doesn't delay - just moves off in the indicated direction content to trust her opinion despite whatever insult he might impart by asking for it.
The cave winds further into the darkness, the crash of the sea diminishing to a murmur behind them. Soon, he thinks, they will be left with nothing but their own footsteps and the heavy non-sound of the earth around them. If it weren't for the fact that they might be making their way toward a confrontation, that surprise would be best and their voices would carry to ruin it, he might suggest conversation. The knowledge of going down into the ground, of the weight of the earth hanging above them, tingles uneasily between his shoulder blades.
It's fine. They'll find their way to the main chamber of the cave any moment now, face down with the smugglers, make quick work of their cargo between them and then be done with the place. Nothing could be simpler.
When they reach another crossroads, his heart sinks a few meters deeper. "How much farther?"
She's left behind for a moment after he sets off, which is fine because she spends that moment mourning the bit he didn't engage with.
That's fine, just ate dirt for nothing, it's cool. Cool, cool, cool.
Shuffling along in Marcoulf's wake, Athessa keeps an eye on the ground, noting the difference between his fresh boot-prints and the old, faint prints left by whoever traversed this path before. It would seem that her instinct at the last fork in the cave was correct, considering that one branch has definitely had more foot traffic than the other, though truthfully she chose this direction because it was the way the torch flickered.
She defaults to the same tactic now, looking to the flame and seeing it list towards the left moreso than the right; they're deep enough in the cave that it isn't drawn back the way they came, but further inward, following the air flow.
Athessa looks, deadpan, at Marcoulf.
"Because I'd know that," she remarks, then starts down the left path, marking the wall with her little rock. "Can't be too far, right? Who'd wanna do that much work?"
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
two words: GHOST PIRATES
one word: yikes
Light, it's no wonder they all go strange.
Marcoulf's hand hasn't left his sword all afternoon. It had started as an idle drape of the fingers, his wrist balanced idly on the pommel, but now as they scramble across shale covered beaches wind their way through beaten passages of crumbling basalt he finds his grip has secured itself. They're far from the walls of Amaranthine and in pursuit of a cave where smugglers have been dropping stores of what's rumored to be tainted lyrium. If it isn't darkspan, it will be bandits.
So he makes no move to alter the lay of his fingers when at last they work their way around a promontory by way of a slick, narrow footpath and there in the inlet below them he spies the dark mouth of a cave. Instead Marcoulf simply jerks his elbow toward it, says "There," and spiders his way further along the face of the stony outcropping in search of some way down.
no subject
In no time at all, she's near the entrance of the cave, but she's not stupid enough to traipse in alone--or, more likely, she's not actually looking for a cave with lyrium in it. What does she care about lyrium? Nothin', 'cept what it'll sell for.
Still, no point in doing nothing while the shem takes his time. Athessa crouches, examining the faint signs of foot traffic to and from the cave entrance. None of it seems particularly fresh.
no subject
It takes him quite some time to navigate. By the time he's splashing up through the flooded shoals toward her he can feel sweat prickling on his neck and back, the heat unpleasant in the already thick weather. She's likely had time to map the cave entrance and its surroundings to her little heart's content, so maybe it's just practicality and not pettiness that prompts him to ask:
"Found anything?"
no subject
She looks up at Marcoulf, either squinting and scrunching up her face as a reaction to the rain, or smirking at him...or both.
"You have fun on the scenic route? Get a good gander at the coastline?"
no subject
She's just so good at pocketing all kinds of things, isn't she?
He smiles (or bares his teeth) and sloshes up through the foaming seawater to the dark mouth of the waiting cave.
no subject
"'Course not, I already collected plenty while I was waiting for you and your clumsy boots to get down here. Let's go find some lyrium, or more likely, giant spiders!"
This time, she definitely is smiling at him as she gestures to the cave entrance with a servile flourish. "After you, bootsie."
no subject
There's a low humming noise in Marcoulf's throat for it, a flat look as he unties the torch from where it's been lashed to his belt. He ducks in under the mantle of the cave before unlacing it's oil cloth hood and it's some moments before a spark can be encouraged to catch in the damp air. But eventually (Maker forbid whatever color commentary might occur to her in the interim), he does indeed lead the way into the waiting network of caves torch in one hand and drawn sword in the other.
"Mind to mark the intersections as we pass them." Light, is there anything worse than the idea of being lost underground? "Unless you can sniff our way out when we've finished."
A dog, he thinks. Next time someone wants to send him poking around in caves, he's asking for dog.
no subject
The caves are damp, cold, and surprisingly loud. Probably due to the rock funneling the wind and sounds of waves through, or echoes amplifying as they bounce off the walls, or something smart-sounding like that. In any case, perhaps defying expectations considering her sensitive hearing, Athessa preferred the noise to outright silence. Her feet on the rocks made far less noise than Marcoulf's boots, and it was much easier to go undetected when everyone else was already at a disadvantage.
no subject
When they arrive at their first crossroad, Marcoulf pauses there. Studies the eddies of granular dirt on the ground beneath their feet and-- looks to his companion expectantly.
"Well?"
no subject
"Oh, you want me to read the signs?" With a smidge of theatrics, she sighs and crouches down, studying the dirt. She hums, then swipes the ground with her fingers and rubs them together, assessing the feel of the grit.
"Hmmm...I wonder..." She tastes the dirt, then spits it out and stands, marking the wall with her chalky rock. "That way."
no subject
The cave winds further into the darkness, the crash of the sea diminishing to a murmur behind them. Soon, he thinks, they will be left with nothing but their own footsteps and the heavy non-sound of the earth around them. If it weren't for the fact that they might be making their way toward a confrontation, that surprise would be best and their voices would carry to ruin it, he might suggest conversation. The knowledge of going down into the ground, of the weight of the earth hanging above them, tingles uneasily between his shoulder blades.
It's fine. They'll find their way to the main chamber of the cave any moment now, face down with the smugglers, make quick work of their cargo between them and then be done with the place. Nothing could be simpler.
When they reach another crossroads, his heart sinks a few meters deeper. "How much farther?"
As if she has any way of knowing.
no subject
That's fine, just ate dirt for nothing, it's cool. Cool, cool, cool.
Shuffling along in Marcoulf's wake, Athessa keeps an eye on the ground, noting the difference between his fresh boot-prints and the old, faint prints left by whoever traversed this path before. It would seem that her instinct at the last fork in the cave was correct, considering that one branch has definitely had more foot traffic than the other, though truthfully she chose this direction because it was the way the torch flickered.
She defaults to the same tactic now, looking to the flame and seeing it list towards the left moreso than the right; they're deep enough in the cave that it isn't drawn back the way they came, but further inward, following the air flow.
Athessa looks, deadpan, at Marcoulf.
"Because I'd know that," she remarks, then starts down the left path, marking the wall with her little rock. "Can't be too far, right? Who'd wanna do that much work?"