(Ky)vernus Aueralius - Arcane Trickster

Backstory
This is the city you find yourself in. Want to know what it's about? You can take the measure of a place by looking at its lowliest constituent. Hello there, my name is Ky.

All I've ever known was this, the life of a minx, pranker, mischief-maker. In a city, when resources are scarce, the only tools an abandoned child has to survive is a correctly timed smile, wits, and hands that are quicker than your target. Even then you learn to group together. Strength in numbers. That must be how I fell in with the Lifters. I'm not really sure. You see, there's a funny thing about childhood, the first few years of it you don't remember. Go ahead and try. What was your favorite food when you were two? Three? Maybe you'll remember at 4. As far back as I can recall I was with the Lifters, living up to my name by returning to 'the garrison' with whatever I was able to pocket throughout the day... if I was lucky I'd get to keep some of it. What I didn't keep was rent, hopefully it was enough to cover the two bowls of food and the flea-ridden dumps we ended up calling 'the garrison'. That's probably where I'd still be if I hadn't run across the one sweet soul that afforded me a measure of kindness.

I was padding away from a lift-gone-south when the heat was on. I was chased into the artsy-fartsy district, not the place to get caught. They don't screw around when you get caught where there's money. I did a desperate and dumb thing, I squirmed through the basement window of an uncased building... nine hells, I didn't even know where I was. You learn what to do though. You sit stock still and let your senses adjust. As the dark room I found myself in began to show me its shape and its treasures, I listened to the chase moving away. I remember the smell, it will stick with me, things like this do. It was a faint musty scent with hints of coffee, burnt wood, and old linen in equal measures. The smell of old books.

A stacked shelf to my left and right was all the casing I could get in before I heard his voice, “Come on out, you've got the time to waste. They're going to be doing circles around this block for at least an hour looking for you.” He's wasn't wrong, the guard if anything, are relentless in this district. I couldn't place where the voice was coming from but my eyes had adjusted enough to pick up on the dim candlelight on the far end of the room. I padded to the end of the shelves to get a better look into the room. To my right was where a half-burned candle lit, dripping wax onto its holder. A small table rimmed with books lay beneath. To my left more shelves disappearing into the shadows, but still no trace of the owner of that deeply-soft voice. “What did you take that would have the wrath of the city guard on your tail?”

“Look, Mister I--” I begin, but am interrupted by a touch on my shoulder, “You were about to lie. Let's not begin our relationship on a lie.” His voice calm, measured, comforting, and wary of spooking the animal before him. As he continued to speak his calm, nonplussed demeanor was an island for me to grab onto, my adrenaline fading. “You have a particular bulge in your left pocket, one that the fabric is not used to accommodating. You reek of sweat, clean water spouting through clogged pores, so you aren't as unfamiliar with a sprint as you are a bath.” He taps the pocket and sniffs the air to highlight his words. “So again, what did you take? Show me.” I still hadn't spotted an exit yet, at least not one that wouldn't end me up right back on the streets outside. I didn't have much of a choice but I also didn't feel like he would judge me harshly... maybe this is all retrospect, but I remember feeling safer than I had in awhile.

I pulled the treasures from their home in my pocket and held them out. Now he came around me and I could finally see him as he admired the contents in my hand. Glasses set on a broad nose that hovered just above a pouty green lip book-ended with long tusks. Essentially bald he was clean shaven and well kept, his light purple vest crisp, and his plain white shirt pulled taut over a muscular orcish frame. The edges of his lips curled down into a frown as he examined my catch, “Two rolls and a pouch of tobacco,” his eyes turning to look into mine. “What have we become? This just won't do. Sit.” The last word uttered with the authority of an elder. For the first time in my life I didn't feel the instinct to challenge it. I sat.

He quickly cleared the table of its contents and sat down beside me. “I'm glad you were honest with me, lies are a terrible way to start a relationship. Here.” He ripped one of the rolls open and pushed a bowl of cold soup from the edge of the table over to me. “It's not the best but--” He didn't have time to finish before I set to it, cleaning the bowl and bread in moments. When I was finished I looked up into a smile. “Sometimes lies are necessary though, but most times they get in the way. There are ways of keeping the truth hidden without telling lies, is that something you'd be interested in learning?” I shook my head vigorously... that is EXACTLY the type of thing I was interested in learning. He rose and disappeared again into the darkness, talking as he went. “You have the ability within yourself to change your fate. Right now you are on a well-trod path to a prison cell. I'm sure you are wise enough to know this to be true.” I was. I'd already seen it happen to Lemmy and Merl.

He returned from the dark with a book in his hands. “Start with this and then we will discuss. Spend an hour reading it tonight and meet me back here tomorrow night. Take the same door you used.” He placed the book in front of my blank face, suddenly my stomach dropped.

He watched me sit there, hands on either side of the book, and took in my despair. “Well, this is a hiccup. You can't read can you?” I took a moment not knowing the words. He'd only been kind to me and I didn't know how to express that reading was a useless talent in my life. “No, I haven't found the time.” I said. I'm not sure what was so funny about my answer but the laugh it provoked was hearty and genuine. He rose and went to a small shelf tucked away in the corner. When he returned he had a small stone in his hands. “Here, take this and repeat after me,” he said as the bauble landed in my palm. I closed my hands around it. “Enim drow yreve.” I repeated the words. Nothing happened.

“Did I do it right?” I asked. His eyebrow quirking up at the question. “I don't know, what do you hear in your mind when you look at this?” He motions at the book. I lifted the book and looked at it.

As I scanned the unfamiliar script I heard the words in my mind, The Magic of Misdirection by Vax'ildan. “Go ahead open it up,” I heard him say, “You'll only be able to use it for an hour, might as well make the most of it.” He retrieved the stone from my hand and hid it away as I quickly became entranced by the magic happening in my mind. The script sprang from the page and I could hear the author in my head guiding me on a tour of sleight of hand techniques and hiding objects in plain sight. I ravenously ate through page after page, having now been allowed entry into a new world I never knew existed. When the magic finally faded it felt too soon, but the candle had all but extinguished itself and the room was empty. The tall orc was no where to be seen. I put the book down and weighed possibly the most important decision of my life. I was alone in a room full of expensive books, I could steal some and no one would know, or I could go and come back tomorrow and possibly be let back into that world of the written word...

It took four nights to finish the book. Each night I'd arrive and there would be the book where I left it. The bauble nearby a sandwich or some other dinner. The orc would quietly read or organize the books in the basement. He rarely talked while I was at my work and always when I was finished the candle would be low. I'd blow it out and leave, the orc gone from the room at some point before I was done. Each day I'd spend practicing what I'd read or dreaming about what was to come. When the fifth night came I arrived with a heavy heart, having now finished the book I didn't know what was next. All I knew is that I didn't want it to end.

The orc was in his familiar spot but the book and stone were missing. Not wanting to bring up the obvious absence I talked of other things, “That stone I've been using isn't working right. You said it would only last an hour but last night I was able to keep reading for two. Today I was even able to read some of the signs around the city.” His mouth crooked a bit at the ends into the slightest of smiles as he closed the book he was reading and leaned back to take me in. “That's because you are reading the words. That stone only had three charges. You used the last of them over a night ago. You've learned to read the common tongue. If there is a sign you can't read it's because it is in a different language.”

“Tell me what you've learned.”

And so I did. I explained the techniques for distracting a persons eyes, finding a blind spot, redirecting senses, and how to hide something from view when no shadows are present. He listened intently nodding as I moved through my lessons. When I was done he placed another book in front, this one larger than before, and said “Two hours every night. Here.” Two sandwiches were brought across the table for me. I barely noticed them as I started in on, A Simple Art of Arcanum.

I quickly realized that the lessons weren't going to get easier, but the ideas were so much more than I had ever imagined. This night as he went to leave I noticed him stand. Before he could go I asked, “Are you ever going to tell me your name? Mine is--” his hand shot up silencing me. “If you knew my name, you would know the name of someone who harbored a fugitive from the law. If I knew your name I'd know the name of someone who robbed me of my most valuable possession.”... I didn't quite realize what he meant at the time but he did make it seem important to keep our anonymity.

Each night for years it was the same story. A boy read books by candlelight as an elderly orc went about whatever business he had. My stomach was well fed and the lessons paid off in my daily life. I became adept at hiding in plain sight. I took a job but also worked as a thief and a fence. As I grew into a young adult I learned who could afford to lose and who couldn't. I built a code within myself hoping the make the old man proud, even if he never saw my efforts.

On the third month of my sixteenth year my time with the Lifters ended. Not that it was planned in any way, but on my way to the garrison, after a long night of lessons, it was empty. Obvious signs of struggle could be seen and after a small investigation it was easy to see they'd all been arrested in the night. Only by luck was I in that basement reading about close-combat weapon play, only that kept me from following my path to prison. I decided to change my course that night, as the old orc had prompted so long ago. The next morning I signed up for guard work for traveling merchants.

That night I headed back to the basement to tell my old friend of the new direction I was taking and to give him a proper goodbye, but our room was empty. The familiar books removed from the shelves, the boxes gone. All that remained was the table, a note, and the stone that started my journey. I picked up the note and began to read.

“I've got to leave in a hurry. I can't explain why. I've left you the last book that I have for you. It's in a language you don't know so use the stone to get you started. This is the hardest lesson I have left. Be safe and change your fate.”

I can't say much more about this city. I'm leaving it, possibly for good, it doesn't have much left for me anyway. This is where you find me, leaving the city I was raised in, studying a book that continues to elude my understanding. With a hole in my chest where an old orc once lived.