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Kettikos leapt sinuously backwards, grinning darkly as the thug's blade lashed by within inches of the Toltek's taut belly, the fur waving from the air passing by so dangerously. In return to the brutal slash, up came the Southern warrior's khopesh, the sharp blade slicing a furrow in his attacker's cheek, making him gasp at the sharp pain before the hyena-like figure slammed the flat of his exotic blade across the Free Zoner's temple, dropping him unconscious. Kettikos slowly unwound, his muscles stretching and tensing, then relaxing as he gazed at the trio of unconscious thugs at his feet. They'd mistaken him as just another stupid tribal, a ripe target, one with a few coins and precious items for them to take.

He hadn't been a stupid tribal for some years, though his light, ragged desert gear suggested otherwise to the passing traveler. He'd never really thought of exchanging the clothes of his far-off past for something else, but this was the second time he'd been ambushed like this since he'd entered the "great" city of Choice, and it was only his first day here. Maybe he should look into armour of some kind, he pondered as he took a jingling coin purse from the belt of one of the thugs - the leader, probably, since he was holding onto the group's loot. After a second of extra thought, he took the cheap blades, too - he could maybe get a copper or two off of each, and it made it harder for these thugs to rob anybody else. Now, where was he? Oh yes, armour. Chainmail, maybe? Yes, a nice chain shirt, maybe a shield of some kind, and some new, real clothes to go with it.

Back in the Southlands, in his tribe, armour was decried as the protection of a coward, but after seeing his best friend slaughtered in combat by armoured cataphracts from Tehkros, he had left his home, intent on seeking the wider world and abandoning the ways of his tribal, determined to try and actually live his life, and not the tribe's. And so he had been exiled, never to return under pain of death.

As he hefted the bag of coins in his hand, he reflected that it wasn't such a bad trade over all.

* * *

Laika sat delicately on the edge of the rooftop above, watching the everyday hustle and bustle of the grim street's general day life, tilting her head as she sipped gently from a small clay water jug that she'd managed to pilfer from the local market, pausing with the jar halfway from her lips as she noticed a figure emerging from the alley that she had claimed and made her home.

A Toltek, it looked like, the ones she'd heard stories of. It looked like a human mixed with a hyena, some kind of odd thing - but then, no more odd than herself, as an Ashnavar, but her own kind were not nearly as vicious as the Toltek. This one in particular was tall, with a smooth, athletically muscled build and movements like a dancer's. He - she assumed it was a he, for the lack of breasts, anyway - had dark brown fur, spotted with black patches, as well as having a Mohawk of longer black hair hanging over his piercing, alert blue eyes. He was very underdressed, she noted with the barest hints of a blush.

He had only a harness of boiled leather straps reinforced with small, beaten iron plates, covering his upper torso, with a single larger, circular piece of that crude iron covering his belly, emblazoned with some kind of black paw symbol - he'd been inducted into the Blackfang Enclave at some part in his life, it seemed. Her eyes were then drawn further down, to where a short animal skin loincloth kept him at least somewhat decent, held in place by a wide leather belt, stained and scored with use, into which a strange, exotically curved sword was thrust, the blade carved with runes. A couple of pouches covered the front of the belt, no doubt filled with something important given their placement, but of course, being a young, healthy, female creature faced with an equally young, healthy male creature in scanty clothes, her gaze was pulled to a larger, more precious pouch below, only partially obscured by his loincloth.

She shook her head quickly, snapping herself out of that fog, shocked by her own body and mind's desires as she swiftly clambered on down from the roof, determined to get her toll and share of any loot to come out of her alley, especially from one such as this Toltek.

* * *

Choice. Oh by the gods both above and below, what a shithole. If this was the essence of "civilisation", sophistication, maybe the tribes of his homeland were better off without it after all, better off as savages living in dugouts in the desert wastes. Crumbling buildings, watered ale, starvation, disease, poverty, robbery, rape, murder... Everywhere he looked, he saw a horror in this place, but when he looked north, he saw the biggest horror of them all, seeing it in the high, sculpted, statue-covered marble walls of the nobles' district. Kettikos shook his head bitterly as he made his way toward the nearest bar, intending to ask where he could find a half-decent blacksmith so he could at least buy himself a set of nice, sturdy chainmail.

He jerked in surprise as a figure suddenly bounded off the roof next to him, jumping and clambering lithely down the side to kick off the wall and settle down in front of him before straightening up.

An Ashnavar, a female, the little vixen standing small and slender - certainly no older than eighteen, and maybe five feet, optimistically. She was completely pitch-black in colouration - black, fluffy fur, short, spiky black mane, but with stunning amber, almost orange eyes gazing out from her face, her muzzle twitching. She was dressed in naught but a formless, ragged grey tunic, hanging down to her knees, a length of rope wrapped around her waist serving to keep it in place, with a couple of crude iron shivs stuck into it.

"Oi! Berk, what're you doin' walkin' outta my alley without payin' me th' propah toll?" The girl asked this in what she no doubt assumed was a menacing tone of some kind, puffing herself up to try and make herself look more intimidating.

"And what do they call you, o' brave taker of tolls?" Kettikos asked in reply, his voice as dry as the desert sands that marked his homelands, a matching smirk plastered across his lips.

"Cutter!" She announced in reply, drawing her shivs and waving them in a random pattern out before her, trying to make it look like she was trained with them. The effect probably worked on the meek, impoverished residents of the neighborhood, but to a seasoned warrior, a killer like Kettikos, it was just, well... pathetic.

Such a shame that a fine example of raw, natural beauty such as herself was so crushed and wasted by poverty that--

"Ow!" He reared back, eyes flaring as he reached up to feel the stinging little cut the girl had made against his exposed chest to draw him from his ongoing internal monologue. Maybe not a shame after all. "What was that for?" He demanded angrily, rubbing his chest. Yes, chainmail was definitely called for.

"Ye've been standin' there fer five minutes, ye daft man!"

Oh.

He cleared his throat. "Well, er, what did you want before? Ow! Okay, okay, a toll. Well, come with me, and I'll get you something to eat instead." He grumbled, rubbing his stinging chest again, where another cut awaited the hyena's tender ministrations. "Let's just get going, then."

"Alright, but hurry it up, or the nex' cut's goin' somewhere more precious!" She growled, making him wince as that remark was left hanging. Gods, why did the world ever create females?

* * *

Ah, the iron Fist, best place in the city to get a drink... or at least, least likely place for the ingredients to still be alive when they were served, Harasha mused to herself as she leaned back, sipping carefully at a tankard of what was surprisingly half-decent apple ale, a house specialty, apparently.

Her scutum was strapped to the back of the chair she was in, which of course was in the corner - best seat in the house, of course. The shield was still painted in the glorious blue and gold of her destroyed exploratory Legion, her matching gladius sheathed in easy reach on her hip. The leopardess's well-toned body, white-furred and grey-spotted (she was from the northern parts of the Far East, was Harasha), was covered currently by the strange mix of plates and chainmail and cloth known among her fellow Legionaries back in Lesterai as the Lorica Segmentata, the standard equipment for that nation's armies. She pondered donning the set's heavy iron helm, but decided against it, not wanting it to catch her short blonde hair and tear it out unless she needed to put it on.

Still, she took a quick look around her, glancing at the different patrons in the bar to assess the level of danger that was represented by the more noticeable customers here.

Most of them were currently stuck deep in their own misery, either too disinterested or too fearful of her strange, foreign equipment to bother her, but she did see a few that caught her gaze besides the drunks passed out on the floor.

That one right there, for example. Some kind of dire wolfess from the North, or whatever the hell they were called. She had no idea, but the female was huge, towering over six and a half feet tall, burly and muscularly build, long grey fur hiding ample feminine charms, long brown hair half-hanging over grumpy, glazed emerald green eyes. In addition, it didn't help that her barbaric outfit barely covered her assets... A huge black bear pelt wrapped around her shoulders, the head laid back behind her neck like a hood, dozens of leather straps holding it and several patches of steel, iron, and leather in place across her torso, a knee-length loincloth of black silk hanging down to cover her more intimate region. A massive claymore was sheathed over her back, almost as long as he was tall, notched and old, but no doubt still deadly in her huge hands. She was currently standing at the bar, nursing a massive flagon, too large to be able to fit in any of the stools at the counter itself without breaking them.

Next up, a scholarly-looking figure of some kind or another. An Ashnavar, long silky fur, a stunning white, the fox's long ears perked up above his triangular muzzle and gleaming blue eyes. Tall and skinny, this one, wearing long blue robes trimmed in khaki leather, including a long hood. He cradled a staff in one pale-furred hand, made of wood and bronze and bone, with a majestically gleaming golden tip. The other hand held a delicate, crystal-cut goblet, full of some kind of dark, delicious wine - no doubt more expensive than everything else in this bar. He appeared to be currently under siege by half a dozen adoring young females, the eager girls not noticing the apparent mage's expression, very dry and haughty, as he gifted them with elaborate insults and backhanded compliments alike, making them swoon and gasp, not understanding the insults and hanging on the compliments. A lady's man, was he? Maybe she'd better drag him upstairs sometime later, to see if he cold back up his demeanor.

And there, a pair - oh, she'd rhymed by accident, how lovely - of people (alliteration too, wasn't she just a poet) that would be interesting enough in their own right but, together, were downright fascinating. The first one she noticed was almost like any old street urchin but for one single fact - those eyes! Gleaming, pure amber, a fiery orange hue, shining with unbound, wild magic of some kind. This girl, as unlikely as it was, was a bloodcaster, a natural mage of epic proportions. It was all under lock and key, though, it had to be, or the whole bar would be a smouldering wreck by now. So it was hidden by some other power, so deeply that even she didn't know it was present there. If she was able to reach it at all, it was no doubt only relying on an instinctual level.

The other, then. Enough of the unknowingly powerful vixen with the unnaturally piercing gaze. A tribal of some kind, this one, a strange barbarian of the lands far off to the south - as a matter of fact, a place known oh-so-originally as the Southlands. A Toltek, she'd heard of them, evil, cackling hyena-monsters roaming the desert wastes, killing and eating anything or anyone they came across. This warrior certainly fit that description - scraps of leather and iron, black animal fur loincloth, scarred and vicious-looking, a strangely ornate khopesh of some kind stuck into his belt. His demeanor, however, was entirely different from his appearance. He seemed surprisingly intelligent, for being such a savage, and obviously - to her, anyway - had an interest in the girl he was currently stuffing with cheap but filling tavern food, the usual bread and mutton, with watery ale on the side.

And there... a new person, striding into the tavern, drawing gazes and whispered words of awe from the patrons - the figure was easily seven feet tall, but anything about it was nearly impossible to tell, as it was shrouded entirely by a silky sea-green cloak, hanging down to reveal only the silver steel-shod paws. A long hood remained pulled up over its features as it strode up to the bar counter. Once there, another steel-clad limb - an ornately decorated gauntlet - emerged, placing a fully a handful of strange square coins onto the counter, letting more gasps escape. It was gold - GOLD! The sight of the gleaming coins set the equally vicious gleam of avarice to many an eye. Of course, that spark of greed died just as quickly as it had appeared when the figure cast aside its smooth, clean cyan cloak, revealing the being that had been wearing it, draping the expensive silk garment over a stool and sitting down, the piece of furniture creaking and groaning ominously, but holding.

Vaguely draconic, obviously female. Those were the healer's first notes on the creature that most certainly promised trouble for the relatively calm tavern. Long, lithely muscled, a frame like a dancer's, or more likely a honed killer's. A long reptilian muzzle, with strange whiskers near the nostrils, flowing white hair, a slightly emphasized hourglass shape, covered in a gleaming silver breastplate, her lower half and biceps covered in a coat of scalemail worn under the plates, or something similar to scalemail - small fish-scale plates of laminated bronze. Steel gauntlets and greaves to match the breastplate adorned her hands and feet, a set of smaller, overlapping steel plates covering her long, slinky tail and ending in a sharp spike. No wings rested on her back - she must be some distant cousin to the Dalynther and Drakonid - Western if this strange armour said what it seemed to - but instead the full backpack of a well-off traveler stayed there. A strange, slightly curved sheath rested on one hip, the same shade of sea-green as her cloak, housing a blade with a long hilt and small crossguard. She'd met merchants selling weapons such as these, but not one looked so finely crafted as this - the merchants had called them a katana.

All of this added up to say one thing. This creature was a Western samurai. Upholder of honour and justice, combining arcane power, martial skill, morals, and pure relentlessness into one body. Followers of an archaic system, a code of honour and conduct.

This wouldn't end well, not in this pisshole den of pleasure and violence.

Gods have mercy on them all.

* * *

Laika kept casting glances over at the hulking figure of the oriental warrior sitting not too far away. Her instincts, that much-valued sixth sense that had served her well during her days as a common thief, were telling her, SCREAMING at her, that this woman was watching her. Despite the inner keening, though, every time she looked up, the other foreigner - so many in the tavern, so many! - was fully engrossed in an ancient, cracked leather journal of some kind - a warlock's journal, if her older brother's stories and descriptions of such things were to be believed.

Oh, her brother. She missed him so much. Why did he have to go and set himself up with that protester mob? Why did he have to get himself killed like that?

Why wouldn't the gods even have the decency to let her find the body?

* * *

The dragoness leaned back, watching as the inquisitive vixen suddenly broke down into tears. The surprised Toltek sitting there next to her recoiled for a second as he tried to figure out what was wrong with the poor Ashnavar girl with whom he had just been having a pleasant conversation with, during which she'd been calm before suddenly breaking down as she had, without warning. After his shock faded just a brief moment later, he dared to let himself lean in, wrapping a muscled arm around her back, pulling her in with surprising gentleness, whispering comforting words into her ear. Not so savage after all.

Personally, Tataka hated having to steal into the night thief's mind, using her memories against her, but she couldn't afford the girl noticing what and who she was - a samurai of the West, watching her. Her inner senses might just kick in, then, and that power would be unlocked. She didn't want that, which is exactly why she had come here. Well... part of the reason she had come here. The reason she'd come to Choice, at least. She wanted to train her, unlock that immense power slowly... but these others. They might prove to be a problem. Too many here, too many outsiders, ones who didn't understand how this city worked. Outside, nobody would even notice if another street urchin went missing, but in here, with so many watching, someone would notice, someone would object. Especially that hyena.

Still, these foreigners might be useful. Warriors? Mages? Thieves? Priests? Yes... all she has currently is her personal retinue, consisting of a few serfs, her personal healer, cook, and blacksmith. With the quest she was currently getting ready to start out on, maybe some more warriors could prove to be the difference between success and failure... life and death.

She would have to approach them.

* * *

Arkathka triumphantly hefted the bag of the odd, square coins in her massive paws, grinning widely, thinking back to how easily she had fooled the samurai back there into paying so much for her warrior services. Hrrn. Maybe she'd have to offer some other "services" to make up for this much money. She seemed the type that needed to loosen up, and she wasn't exactly ugly. In any case, it didn't matter that this "quest" might be dangerous, since the dragoness was offering free food and healing an as much ale as she could drink - she was sure her new benefactor would regret that last one in particular. The group was staying in this inn for the night, and so the host had rented a room for them, for all of the ones she'd recruited - the dragoness, the Toltek warrior and his teary-eyes little friend, the Legionary healer, the distant Ashnavar mage, and of course Arkathka herself. Five beds? Six? How many was that? Six, yes. Definitely six. She trudged forward, banging the wooden door open, not even noticing the snap as the lock, shoddily built, burst into pieces, having forgotten that she'd been given a key to the room.

The others - that Legionary and the mage - jumped off of their beds, eyes widening as the door burst open in a storm of sawdust and cheap iron scraps.

She regarded the two with a curious look at the readied fists and wary eyes, realising that they'd changed into normal clothes, or at least somewhat. The mage had discarded his overly fancy - in her own opinion, anyway - robe, now wearing only a long blue loincloth that rather fairly bulged. Now that she could actually see him, though, she realised he was quite scrawny - no doubt barely a male, despite what the large bulge in his crotch told her. His eyes, one blue, the other a solid gold, gazed between her and the healer, who looked just as unnerved, in a blue tunic and khaki leather trousers. She held her gladius - stupid name for a stupid little sword - loosely in one paw, slowly relaxing. "Easy, big girl, you just busted the door!" She complained, sheathing the blade as the others strode into the hall - the samurai and the Toltek, carrying his young friend.

"What happened?" Kettikos demanded as Laika looked up at Arkathka in wonder and a bit of curiousity, skittering free of the hyena's grasp to reach out and hug the huge dire wolf, who looked down in surprise and promptly embraced her in a crushing bear hug before thudding down the row of beds and promptly choosing the largest to flop down in with her newfound blanket as Kettikos gazed away blankly.

It would be an interesting night, he decided as he drew his blade, closed the doors, and set himself on first watch - with no lock, they'd need someone awake at all times. How dreadful.