Transparents and Truants

[Harbor]

{{No worries. Until recently I’ve had a long-term guest with me and wouldn’t have replied anyway.}}

Rowanis rolled her eyes. Didn’t keeping an eye out stand to reason? Any fool with any sense would have done it. Granted, he may have assumed that since she didn’t have to keep an eye out for herself she may have fallen out of the habit—that was a rational thought, she admitted, but it didn’t apply to her. Rowanis missed her own life too much to pretend as if she were no longer living it. She still treated herself as if she were alive as much as she could, just to spare herself some of the insanity of being the only dead woman walking among all of the living beings of the world. Rowanis poked her head through the wood of the door—the softer the object was the less uncomfortable it was to reach through—to see if there were any people about, and returned again. ”You’re clear,” she promised.

She smiled when he didn’t shut the door on her, despite knowing that it provided little obstacle to her. She may like him yet. ”Thank you, love,” she said as she breezed through. A faint shout reached them as she silently closed the door, and she frowned. ”I’ve no idea what that is.”

{Oo have at it!}

[Timmir]

Upon hearing the faint shout, instinct kicked in as he quickly dove behind a nearby statue that has recently been broken. His hand gripped the hilt of his blade as he peeked out from his hiding place, hearing Rowanis comment that she had no idea what shouted.

"Me neither." Trelik softly repied, before noticing a guard coming from that direction towards the room the duo were just in.

"...no way anyone could have gotten past our guard. Who does that man think he is to order me around, and just because that witch and her brother said there was someone in the record. It is impossible." The guard mumbled angrily as he walked before noticing the damaged statue, "And looked at the damage her magic has caused to the statue of the lord's father. Hero's or not, I can't wait til the lord throws their lot out."

The guard pulled out his keys with a sigh, moving them around to the one that would open the lock. Trelik stayed deathly silent as he took his chance to slip past the guard. He honestly hoped that Rowanis had locked the door for if not, the guard might immediately suspect something and notice Trelik before he could get away.

((There we go. Also, if you want to do anything with the guard,go ahead.))

[Harbor]

Trelik was much more bothered by the distant bellow than she, though he had far more reasons to be. Rowanis simply crossed her arms and waited for the bellows to make themselves into something she had reason to contend with. Even she couldn't fight things she couldn't see. Rather, she didn't believe she could. She'd never tried it. When a guard appeared with a clinking coil of keys and headed for the door to the records room, Rowanis jumped. "Oh, shoot." She reached out a hand toward the lock and, since it was a small mechanism and not yet far away, it slid into place. Unfortunately, there was nothing she could do about the fact that its motion was clearly audible. She slapped a hand to her face with frustration.

The guard eyed the lock with blatant concern, wariness nearing to fear, and then hastened to unlock the door and shove it open. At first he didn't seem to find anything amiss, but when he noticed a certain disorganization to the many ledgers and scrolls, he stalked closer. Then he darted back out of the room and howled down the hall about intruders. Well, apparently the ledgers had been organized after all. But it wasn't like they had knocked them down.

"I think we ought to go," Rowanis suggested to Trelik, as half a dozen other employees came sprinting toward the apparent scene of the crime. Only one of them was on a line to intercept Trelik so far, and she hurried over to that one, looping her arm around a pillar of air and swinging it forward, rolling it into the man's shins. With a short, astonished cry, he toppled in spectacular fashion, and Rowanis grinned.

[Timmir]

As he heard the guard open the door, Trelik moved quickly in order to avoid being spotted. His luck failed as it turned the guard had somehow notice the records have been tampered with. Of course it would be the one guard who would recognize such a thing.

Cursing under his breath, Trelik quickly took cover as guards, servents, maids, and other people employed by the castle ran towards the records room to see what all the commotion is at. Rowanis voiced what Trelik as he began to make a mad rush towards the gates before they were able to close them. As he ran, he saw a man in the chaos running towards Trelik before he apparently tripped over his own legs. Sighing with some relief he turned to see that he was to late, and the gates were down with several guards in front of it with weapons drawn.

"Shoot, look likes I'm not leaving through the front. Looks like I'll have to go with plan B." He said under his breath, hugging the wall in order to remain unseen. This did beg the question though, what was plan B. Trying to get past all the guards guarding the gate would be suicidal at best. And even if he were to get past them, he needed to somehow open the gates without being seen. He needed to instead either head towards another exit that wasn't as likely to be guarded, or hide out somewhere until the heat was lost, then leave.

Deciding quickly, Trelik climbed the stairs up while everything was still chaotic. If he could reach the roof, he would be able to climb down the wall and escape that way. Or he could just hide out in an abandon room til the commotion has died down, when he could slip through the front gate without being seen. Either way, he just needed to make sure to put as much space between him and the guards as humanly possible.

[Harbor]

"Great," Rowanis replied, not concerned in the least, but quite enjoying herself. Even if Trelik were caught she could just let him out when the guards weren't looking. "What's plan B?"

Trelik took off in favor of the stairs. "What?" she shouted after him, admittedly a bit offended. "You can't tell me what plan B is because you're a super-secret agent of something or other?" Or he just didn't want anyone else to overhear. Well, that was acceptable. But she didn't want to say as much. She'd apologize later if he felt he needed apologizing too.

Rowanis couldn't run as quickly as Trelik could, even as a ghost. Her body was still bound by the limitations she expected of it. Not all of them, or her ability to coerce the breezes would be nonexistent, but in many ways bound nonetheless. In an effort to keep up with him she had to vanish every several steps and reappear several steps ahead of where she would have been if she'd merely kept running without using any ghostly travel.She imagined it would look quite odd if Trelik were to look back, but it was probably for the best that he tended to look in the direction he was running.

A harried-looking guard burst out of a door to Rowanis's left and sprinted dazedly through her, startling her. It was such an unpleasant feeling when people did that. Irritated, she bowled a cloud of air at him, shoving him away from her until he slid along the floor, crying out with astonishment, and down the stairs behind them. "This is fun," she remarked to herself. She turned, wondering where Trelik had gotten to, and realized that she'd somehow gotten ahead of him. She hoped the guard she'd sent down the stairs hadn't rolled into him. Looking back, she saw him coming now, and she saw another guard waiting for him behind a corner only she could see. Throwing out an arm to point, she shouted, "Look out!"

[Timmir]

As he ran, a look of awe and confusion was on his face as he saw Rowanis speed past him with some type of teleportation. He didn't get much time to appraise this strange skill however as she sent some poor guard on a collision course towards him. He cursed as he saw this, and quickly jumped over the man. However, climbing the stairs at the time, his landing proved to be less then graceful as he felt a sharp pain in his right ankle that had nearly caused him to slip, and fall/slid down the stairs himself.

He silently cursed as he did his best to ignored the pain as he finished climbing the stairs. Knowing full well that the crowd was likely to go check on the poor man that Rowanis bowled down the stairs, he had to disappear from sight before the crowd notice him and pin this on him too. The thief caught sight of Rowanis again as he got to the second, trying to hide his anger, but to no avail. Then he noticed that she was trying to warn him of something as he passed the guard hiding behind the corner.

Trelik turned to see the guard as said guard began to move to apprehend him. Instict took Trelik over as time felt like it began to slow. He honestly wanted to save this for a last resort, but he didn't see much choice. He raised his left hand and began to focus on the pool of energy within his mind.

"Slytha" Trelik said in a near whisper as a scar on his left hand began to slightly glow. The guards eyes grew wide before seemingly becoming very heavy as he began to stumble in a drunken stupor. His back then found the wall next to him as he lied against it and slowly slipped down as he fell asleep. Trelik took heavy breathes as he feltt the sudden exhaustion caused by the spell, causing him a second of pause. He then shook his head to regain his senses as he reminded himself of the eminent danger he was currently in.

Trelik quickly looked at the rooms around, seemingly searching for something. With a glint in his eye, he found what he was looking for as he came to a door and quickly went to work. After a few tedious seconds of him picking the lock, he opened the door, signalling for Rowanis to get in. They didn't have long.

Inside she would find a room that didn't look to much apart from the room they were in earlier. Bookcases lined the walls with several different types of books each with a layer of dust showing that they haven't been touch in some time and are probably just mostly for show. A lone desk sat at the end of the room with a nothing but a few nicknacks on it, and a few dusty chairs for people to use to sit by it. Behind the desk lied a window with great a view of the gate in front of the castle and of parts of Teirm. Overall, the room seemed fairly high class, if mostly unused.

[Harbor]

Rowanis winced when the man she'd more or less thrown took Trelik down with him. She hadn't meant for that to happen. But Trelik took care of himself better than a living Rowanis would have been able to in a similar situation. Of course, skirts and petticoats greatly hampered one's ability to right themselves after falling on the stairs, but neither did she have the natural grace that he seemed to have, either. But seeing his face her own fell. Why the scowl? She was just trying to help. She hadn't been able to see him on the stairs.

But then Trelik raised his hand, and Rowanis's eyes widened as she glimpsed on his palm a symbol she'd never seen before. It glowed. How was that even possible? Human beings didn't glow, as a rule. Fish, maybe, but she couldn't think of anything else that did, and he didn't look like he shared any parentage with lightning bugs. She didn't hear what he said, but she saw his lips move and blinked in abject fascination as the guard swayed, turning soft like a moistened dishcloth, and drooped into the wall and onto the floor. What on earth?

Trelik looked about, found a door he liked and had it open in seconds. When he beckoned she hurried over and through the door, nearly flushing with the gladness of how it felt to be treated as though solid objects still caused her anything more than annoyance. But after the door closed behind them her shoulders fell as she took in the room. "Not this again." She glanced sidelong at him, embarrassed. It had been a long time since she'd felt embarrassment, and she didn't like it. "Sorry about hitting you with a person." And that didn't sound at all like utter lunacy. But then, this situation had turned to lunacy in a flash, hadn't it? At least to her. Perhaps Trelik got up to this sort of trickery all the time and was used to it. Couldn't a handsome fellow like him find work in any other industry than thievery? An amused smile at the thought touched her lips. Already he was fixed in her mind as always doing what he was now--she couldn't visualize him as an accountant, or a dock worker, or any other menial, daytime worker.

Crossing her arms, Rowanis walked to the center of the room and inspected the walls and ceiling, wondering what they were looking for, besides a way out. "I'm afraid this really isn't where my strong suits lie. Is there anything I can help you with? Oo, I can keep the door shut." Having found a purpose, she went and stood before the locked door. No matter how hard they pushed, even if they got it unlocked the door wouldn't open unless she lost her focus and let it. A useful task, at last. She could hear shouting in the hall now. Trouble on the way. She was enjoying this far too much.

[Timmir]

Once Rowanis had entered the room, Trelik closed and locked the door behind them. The thief didn't bother to respond to Rowanis' apology as he headed toward the window on the far side of the room. He then opened it and looked down to check it's height. "Okay, that looks doable." He said with a smirk as he closed it again.

Hearing Rowanis saying she could keep the door shut, Trelik eyes widened as he quickly turned around. "Don't. We don't want them to know we've been in here, and that illusion is hard to create if they find the door blocked. Now I suggest that you hide." He explained to her, hoping she would understand his reasoning for this. He then ducked under the desk, completely out of sight from anyone looking from the doorway.

[Harbor]

Rowanis's shoulders dropped when he told her, though politely and not in as many words, that this last idea of hers was just as likely to go poorly as the last one, when she'd inadvertently thrown a guard at him. Was there nothing useful she could do? She felt simultaneously very old, as though her mind had softened and lost all useful traction, and too young, as though she didn't understand the way the world worked yet. Perhaps it was only his world she didn't comprehend, but that wasn't a question she could sit down and ask him. Rowanis stepped away from the door, her arms crossed.

At Trelik's suggestion, she only sadly smiled. Even if they could see her, despite how Trelik was the only adult who ever had, they wouldn't be able to touch her unless she allowed them to, and she wasn't about to let him in on the secret that she could in fact touch the living still; for numerous reasons, he just didn't need to know. She shook her head. "They can't touch me. I doubt they'll even see me. You're the only adult who ever has." She felt she neither needed nor wanted to explain how lonely that existence was some days.

Rowanis turned to face the door, checking once to see that her thief was indeed out of sight, and waited as she heard the guards converging, then the rattling of keys as they began checking doors as half of them went up the next flight of stairs. When they opened the door before her she straightened, but relaxed again as the guard in the front took one step toward her, blind of her existence. She stood perfectly still as he stopped with his shoulder a few inches from her nose and took a quick glance throughout the room. Once he'd closed and locked the door behind him again she sighed. "You see?" She faced him again. "So what is the rest of your plan?"

{On my phone, sorry if it's short.}

[Timmir]

Trelik held his breath as the guard opened the door. While Rowanis kept claiming that she couldn't be seen by anyone other then him, it didn't ease his mind as the guard seemed to look straight at her. Her words proved to be true however as the guard left the room, seemingly unaware of Rowanis' presence entirely. Once the coast was clear, Trelik left his hiding place with a sigh of relief.

"I guess you were right. Sorry, it's still a little hard getting my head around this ghost business." He told Rowanis as he leaned against the desk, trying to keep weight off his injured leg. "As for what I have plan. Well I guess there's little reason not to tell you. I'm gonna rest here while the heat wears off a bit. Then I'm gonna make a brake for it, putting as much space between me and this castle as I can."

Trelik paused as he carefully lowed himself onto the floor. His aching leg was starting to catch up with him as the adrenaline of what just happened slowly faded from his body. Hey Neldral. This is going to take me a little longer then I had originally planned. He mentally told Neldral as he sent his mind out towards the dragon.

What do you mean it's going to take a little longer? What did you do now? Neldral asked, obviously worried about his rider.

Nothing. I just gathered some unneeded attention, that's all. I'll make sure to meet you outside the city before daybreak.

Neldral knew that Trelik was only telling half the truth, but had decided to let it past. You'd better, or else I'm going to brake you out of that castle myself. The dragon threatened, knowing full well that that is the last thing his rider wanted.

"I'd expect nothing less." He sighed before looking over at Rowanis, "You don't have to stay here you know? There's no point risking your own safety for my sake." He told the woman, curious why she was still hanging around him.

[Harbor]

Trelik’s anxiety was understandable, and Rowanis did wonder for a moment if there might be more than one adult in the world who could recognize her presence, but the hope wasn’t very strong—what were the odds when it had taken eighty years for the first one to crop up? ”No worries,” she assured him calmly, shifting her arms as though to adjust her pale pink shawl and realizing that it must have blown off in the chaos. Well, it would reappear when she was least thinking about it; it always did. She was bound to the things she had died with. She even had a small sewing hoop and some embroidery in the beaded pouch hanging inside her skirt. She’d hid it there so she could sew while listening to the concert she and her husband had been preparing to attend, and hadn’t wanted anyone to look askance at her as she walked in.

Rowanis smiled when she listened to him concede to telling her his plan and then proceeded to tell her nothing of it that any man couldn’t have guessed on his own. He must have been at this life for quite a while to have acquired such solid habits. But did he do it consciously? Some people would have been caught by that small concession, not consciously realizing themselves that he’d given them nothing concrete or informative. It was a pretty trick she’d never have thought of using herself, and was glad he’d made her consider it. For his sake she decided to make the effort to stop harassing him. She’d noticed that he seemed to be in pain, and didn’t want to stress him more.

And as for his difficulties with what she was…. Rowanis sighed. ”I understand. With the ‘ghost business,’ I mean. I’d imagine it’s hard to adjust to someone that even the causer of your….adjustment….has never experienced before. A snail and a fox might as well try to tell each other how they eat.

”What did you do to your leg?” she asked then, concerned, as he gingerly sat. She glanced about the room for a chair to sit in, having rarely sat upon the ground either in life or death, and finding none to her liking settled carefully down as well, still stuck in her own habits of rumpling her gown as little as possible and maintaining a straight back as well. She held out an open palm, though she was carefully more than an arm’s length away. ”I think I can cool it, if you think that might help.”

Something told her he wasn’t fully listening, so when he said he’d expect nothing less she blinked, baffled. ”Nothing less of what?” He didn’t answer immediately, as if he’d been only talking to himself, so she answered his question as if she hadn’t asked him hers.

”I have nothing else to do. I spend most of my days either wandering or playing with the occasional child who can see me. A lot of the time I spend picking up after people I like and picking on people I don’t. Harmless stuff.” She shrugged, and spread her hands in a self-deprecating manner. ”I have nothing else to do. Talking to someone who can talk back to me is like being deaf my entire ‘afterlife’ before only now regaining my hearing. And remember, you can’t touch me.” Unless I allow you to. ”Neither can they. The most I risk is my own embarrassment while you tell me how my help just isn’t helpful.”

[Timmir]

((Just are a few chairs by the desk Trelik is sitting against that Rowanis could of sat down on))

"Nice analogy." Trelik said in response to Rowanis' comment on how she understood how weird this must be for him. At least he has had quite a bit of experience dealing with weird. He had no idea how someone else would handle this situation.

He then looked up as he heard Rowanis ask about his leg, and offered to help him by cooling it. "It's nothing. I just sat on it wrong is all." Trelik lied to Rowanis. He didn't have the heart to tell her that he had injured his leg when he had to jump over the man she sent tumbling down the stairs.

Trelik then listened as Rowanis gave him her reason why she hadn't left. He guessed that it must be a sad and pitiful existence to have no one else to talk to, and the only ones who can see you are kids. It made sense to him now why she had decided to stay with him. Plus, she didn't believe she was in any real danger. She was already dead afterall.

Trelik gave a sigh as he heard Rowinis' last comment. "If you want, I guess cooling my leg could help sooth it. Just be careful okay. I prefer not to lose it due to frostbite." He told her as he stretched his injured leg out with a slight groan so that she could do whatever she was about to do easier.

"Rowanis, I'm curious about something. From the sounds of it, your not one who seems to be well acquainted with what's been going on in recent times. So if you don't mind me asking, what exactly do you know about the events going on outside the city walls?" Trelik asked Rowanis, deciding to start a conversation with the ghost while he waited for his strength to renew.

[Harbor]

{Edited, thank you. Forgot that desks usually are accompanied by chairs.}

She nodded to his explanation, not suspecting this time that he’d done anything but what he’d told her. She’d pulled odd and unexpected muscles doing odd and unexpected things, it wasn’t all that strange. She was pleased though that he trusted her—more or less—enough to permit her to try to help him, since her help thus far had been of dubious value. ”Don’t worry,” she assured him with a small smile, holding out her hand and shifting a few inches closer. ”I’m not strong enough for that. I can only do small temperature changes.” She positioned her hand an inch above where she suspected he was the stiffest—not wanting to question him about the injury, knowing how men could be about such things—and reminded herself of the sensation of coolness: an early-morning ocean breeze, or the clouds drifting over the sun on a brisk day. When she did this by accident or on purpose, just to test it, people tended to shiver as though a raindrop had snuck beneath their upturned collars, but that was when they walked right through her, usually. In localized areas all she could do was cause goosebumps. He was safe from any harm of this variation.

At the sound of her name she looked up, having lost herself briefly to thought. He brought up an interesting conversation through his question, and it was an entirely valid one. She shook her head. ”I don’t mind at all. Feel free to ask whatever you wish.” She quirked a smile. ”It’s not like I have to answer if I decide to take offense.” Rowanis spent a moment thinking about his question though, trying to find a way to explain it best without coming off as a lunatic or soft of mind. At last she frowned. Looking down at her cooled hand she admitted at last, ”It’s hard, for me….to learn things about the living world. I can observe it, and occasionally minimally influence small parts of it, but I can’t really interact with it, at least not properly. Learning is a form of interaction, and because of what I am it makes it hard for me to remember certain things. I haven’t left the city since my death, I remember that well, but I also know that for all my time spent listening to people and gathering information simply because it interests me, I can’t hold onto it for long. If I let my mind or self drift for too long it’s lost. I’ve understood the state of the world outside before, multiple times, but how much I know of it comes and goes as I hear of it and forget it.” Rowanis paused, and breathed deeply in, regretting this part of herself almost more than not being able to talk to people. Realizing she hadn’t properly answered his question in the way that he expected her to answer, she finished briefly. ”I know the Empire and the Varden are at odds, as they always have been, but now they’ve come to outright violence with their disagreements. I lose the technicalities and details first, but that’s all right. I’ve always felt that the Varden had the right of most things, if not all. I’d like to help you if I can.” At any rate, how burdensome could someone who required no food, rest, water or necessities be? Her greatest burden would be her company.

[Timmir]

Trelik watched as Rowanis placed her hands over his leg. The more paranoid part of him wanted to yell at him for being so reckless and stupid. This could easily be a trap or trick of some kind, yet the highly doubted it. For the past hour or so he had known the ghost, he knew she didn't mean him any harm. Purposefully, at least.

His leg began to feel odd, as if some had just placed a thin layer of melting snow over it. He shivered a bit at the sudden chill, but not much else. At least the cold seemed to have numbed the pain his leg was in into something more tolerable. In fact, the thief had the passing idea of trying to walk on it now, though he gave up the thought knowing his leg hasn't actually healed yet. "Thanks. That actually seemed to help." He told Rowanis, a bit relieved that he had one less thing to worry about.

Trelik then went on to listen as Rowanis explained that she had a hard time learning about the living world. Without being to interact with it in any real way, it seemed she had a hard time remembering what she has learned. She did seem to know about the war that was currently going on at least, which was a start. She even seem to have the mindset of most citizens that the Varden was the better of the two.

Trelik then raised an eyebrow when Rowanis told him that she wanted to help him. However, in the context of what she had just said before, Trelik couldn't help, but think she had assumed he was apart of the Varden. "You want to help me? Well I hope you understand that I'm not affiliated with the Varden, so helping me doesn't mean you'll be helping them." Trelik told Rowanis plainly, "If you can deal with that though, I guess you could come with me for the time being. Having a ghost's help could prove to be a useful thing to have. Besides, who knows, we might meet up with someone else who is able to see and hear you." Trelik thought for a moment why exactly he was able to see Rowanis, but no one else seems to be able to. Could it be because he was a Rider, or was it something else? He then wondered if Neldral would even be able to see hear. Well, he guessed that if Rowanis decided to come along with him after all. he'll find out.

[Harbor]

Rowanis smiled to his gratitude. ”I’m glad to get something right. Let me know if it gets too cold.” She didn’t expect that it would but never having been on the receiving end of one of her chills she couldn’t know for sure. All she had to run her guesses by was the reactions of others. ”I’ve got a couple of tricks, but to be honest I don’t exercise them much, or try to expand on them.” She wasn’t entirely sure why not, considering how much free time she had on her hands. She supposed it was less fun to practice something that she, thus far, didn’t put to much use.

To his—thankfully honest—statement, Rowanis pursed her lips. ”Will your efforts be hurting them? If not I don’t see enough of a difference to care. I feel like I’ve been stuck in one house for years and you just unlocked the door.” She smiled half to herself. ”I’ll make every effort not to trample you in my great escape.”

Rowanis lifted her hand just long enough to stretch out her hands, which still ached sometimes just from memory, and returned it to where she’d left it before. At least she never felt genuine pain, just the sores she remembered having on occasion in life. ”So where are you going now?” she wondered. ”How will you get there?” She’d only join him when he stopped if he was riding at a pace faster than she could walk. Sure she could just sit on the back of his horse, but even her balance wasn’t perfect, and she wasn’t about to prove she could touch him. She liked that small lie. ”We had a number of horses before, but I’m not sure where their foals have gotten to now.”

[Timmir]

Trelik gave a small chuckle at Rowanis' joke. "You see to that. Being trampled by a ghost isn't exactly on my todo list." Trelik told her before taking a more serious expression, "And don't worry. I have no intention on harming the Varden. Purposefully, at least. I have enough enemies as it is, and I don't wish to add them to the list."

Rowanis then brought up a few good questions. The first one was simple enough, as it was the whole point of this trip in the first place. The other one was gonna to be harder to explain. It wasn't exactly something that Trelik wanted to give away yet.

"Well, if you want to know, I was planning on heading towards a small town a few miles west of Uru'bean to find the thing that I was tracking down. Also, unless you need one, don't worry about the horses. I have travel plans already arranged." Trelik told her as he glanced over at the window, moving his injured leg as he did. It shouldn't be to long now before he should be able to make his escape.

[Harbor]

Rowanis smiled, glad to have been able to give him amusement. Amusement was a more useful and filling commodity than most people realized. Although the perfect lady in life, well versed in literature and culture, and appropriately intelligent if sheltered, Rowanis had never tried, in life, to make herself any cleverer than she had been born. Her small blunders—such as not realizing that a foreign friend’s father’s supposed nickname was his actual name, on account of its strangeness to her—had so amused her family, and later her husband, that she’d preferred to laugh with them as they laughed at her than to learn with other women who preferred sharper and quicker talents. ”So long as you’ve no nefarious intentions toward them I shan’t be displeased, I’m sure,” she said absently, still caught somewhat in the film that memories created. ”I’d rather assist someone with slightly different motives than mine who can speak to me than someone with the exact same motives who can’t.” The fact that he could see her was the vast majority of the reason she wished to stay with him—she hoped he understood that. But then again, would that strike him as selfish? Shallow? Would he grow to patronize her for coming with him to satisfy her own desires primarily and the needs of others simply by convenience.

She supposed it didn’t really matter. Even if the only person in the world who knew her hated her, at least she’d have someone to argue with. And how much could a certain selfish shallowness mean to a thief? Perhaps she was the one judging him now, but she had never tried to claim perfection in life and wasn’t about to try to adhere to it now.

Uru’baen.” Rowanis shuddered. ”Ugh, that place just sounds horrible, if nothing else. I heard it was a great city once, but a name can do a lot to change something. And no,” she said, unsure of whether she ought to bring up her own peculiar means of travel, ”I don’t need any travel accommodations, I just wondered.” She pursed her lips, raising her hand slightly as he fidgeted, and lowering it again as he stilled. ”I’ll probably not be able to travel with you when you do,” she said at last, ”unless you’re walking, but I can come about at night. Traveling for me isn’t hard, it’s just different.” And as effortless as it may be, she wasn’t about to submit herself to the awkwardness of how she would feel and look—to him at least—to run along beside him as he rode his horse, as she expected he would. She doubted he’d be walking.

[Timmir]

Trelik nodded as Rowanis spoke about her opinion about Uru'baen. He himself never liked going to that city, and tried to avoid going to it when he could. The name itself just gave a sense of despair. Though he had to admit, every time he has been in there, it didn't seem much different from any other empire city he's been to. Well... Other then Galbatorix's castle looking menacing over the entire city.

Trelik also found it interesting as Rowanis said she didn't need any form of transportation. She claimed that unless he was traveling by foot, she just meet up with him that night. Though how she was going to catch up with him she was very vague about. Thinking back on their escape just a short while ago, Trelik figured he had a good idea how.

"I'm guessing that means your travel plans are going to include that strange teleporting thing you were doing earlier. Though I have to say that I don't like the idea very much, I guess we'll have no choice." The thief said as he used the desk to help stand up. While his leg was still sore, it wasn't as bad as it was before, and he didn't see any reason to waste any more time.

Testing his leg real quick, he made his way over to the window. It seemed the guards outside were more laxed. The guards were probably still checking the upper rooms trying to find him. So this was as good a chance as any to make his escape.

"Sorry to cut this conversation short, but I prefer to leave before they get the idea to check this room again." He told the ghost as he opened the window. To some, jumping out of a second story window would be a daunting task, but not to Trelik. It was all about knowing how to fall.

((Sorry for the poor post. I was kindof suffering from writers block as I wrote it.))

[Harbor]

Rowanis's thin brows rose when Trelik voiced an opinion against her methods of travel. He didn't seem the type to oppose others' methods unless they directly worked against his own. "Would you have me travel directly with you?" She could, if he requested it, but she wouldn't otherwise. Why ride double on his horse when she didn't need to? Discomfort didn't come to her the same way it had when her flesh had been real, but that meant nothing when she felt she was being an imposition, and was therefore discomfited in another way. "The teleporting, as you called it, is my only way to keep up with someone who is faster than I and also stay in their presence. Distance is no matter, though I've never tried to go somewhere I've never been. I can find my way by finding specific people, though."

Trelik stood, and Rowanis brought her hand back to her lap, pushing off the floor to join him at the window, brushing her hands off out of habit. "That's a long drop," she said, peeking out over his shoulder, tone carefully inflectionless. Who was she to judge the abilities of a man she barely knew? "I can't do anything but numb your leg if you shatter it completely." She hadn't planned on adding anything resembling an opinion, but it tripped over her tongue before she could stop herself. She crossed her arms, pointedly not saying any more.

Rowanis glanced over her shoulder toward the door. She didn't hear anything past it, neither her sight nor her hearing having improved upon her death; that didn't stop her from worrying. Her ability to spring someone from jail was questionable.

{No worries; same here.}

[Timmir]

"I'll keep that in mind." Trelik said in response to Rowanis' warning as he dropped his backpack down the window. "Though I will tell you that there is little need to worry. A couple floors up, I probably would shatter my legs from the fall, but from thisnheight the worse I should suffer is a couple of sore legs." Trelik then looked downed again to make sure his backpack landed okay and no one had noticed it on it's way down. "Or a broken neck." He added with a smug grin, finally prepared to get out of this gloomy place.

Trelik took no time at all as he climbed out the window til he was hanging off the window by his finger tips. He then let go to drop down the rest of the distance. The thief landed on the ground gracefully, or as gracefully as he could with an injured leg, and had quickly recovered his backpack. Then he stealthily went on his way to leave the castle's grounds.

While it took him a few moments, Trelik had managed to finally get away from that castle and it's guards. He knew full well that he wasn't in the clear yet, however, as he guessed the guards patroling the city were informed of his intrusion in the castle. So there was a good chance that they were going to be on the lookout for any suspicious figures wandering around at night. That, and with the gates leading outside of the city, he won't be able to leave the city until morning. Unless he plans on either scaling the wall, or taking the gate for himself. Both of which he considered to be pretty horrible ideas. Why did he seem to always forget about details like this until they mattered most?

"Well... I guess I might as well wait here for awhile until I can figure something out." Trelik said to himself as he ducked down and hid in the shadows of an alleyway. He then gave a silent yawn as he fought against sleep. "Rowanis, you still with me?" He then decided to ask in a whisper, curious if the ghost had managed to keep up with him during his escape.