The Ul'Dah market was a busy place. It was a long, hot thoroughfare just inside the city's walls, shaded by dozens of colorful awnings stretched across the road and shops. As the city was the major trade hub for the entire region, merchants visited it from all over Eorzea. Everything from food to spices to fine cloth and gems were bought and sold there. One end of the market was located strategically near the stairs leading down from the airship landing, high in the city's center. All new arrivals had to pass by the market, and many a visitor had been fleeced within an hour of arriving in the great city.
Koharu loved the market, especially when she had money to spend. The fortune telling business had picked up over the last two weeks, ever since Lilira had done the reading for Fyrgeiss. Koharu had been forced to endure her headache over and over as rich customers flocked to have their fortunes told, and to see if Lilira was as good as advertised. Naturally, she was.
The dark warrior continued to appear in Koharu's visions, but she tried not to mention him. Whenever a vision of him overlapped a customer's vision, it felt different. With effort, Koharu could sort the two visions apart-sometimes. The important thing was that she had managed to not screw up a reading in two whole weeks, and they had money to spend.
Despite the blazing sun, Koharu wore a long robe, a head covering, and a veil. This wasn't unusual in Ul'Dah, as the women of several desert tribes dressed this way in public. Koharu wore hers to hide her horns and scales. Lilira had insisted on it since she was a little girl, and Koharu no longer questioned it.
She moved among the stalls by herself, a moneybag in her inner pocket, browsing the wares of the merchants. She wanted cloth to make herself a new dress, blue, if possible. The textile merchants were down at the end of the market nearest the exit from the Hasting Strip, where the airships docked. As Koharu browsed, she noticed an airship passing overhead, making for the landing. The newcomers would be arriving in a few minutes.
Koharu had had a vision that morning of the dark warrior arriving by airship. As long as she was hooded and veiled, surrounded by a crowd, he could not possibly recognize her. Koharu wanted to see him for herself. Who was this monster who haunted her inner eye? Why did the gods keep warning her about him? How monstrous could he be within the walls of the city? After all, if he drew his sword, the guards would descend on him at once.
So she shopped and loitered in the shade, and watched the stairs.
She had not long to wait. A couple of servants appeared, carrying bundles of luggage. Two of them led chocobos, one yellow, one black. Next came a richly-dressed Lalafel, striding along as importantly as his short legs would carry him. After him came two men: a Hyur and an Au Ra.
Koharu stared through her veil. There was her dark warrior, exactly as she had seen him. His armor was dark gray, not black, but the sword on his back was unmistakable. And his face! She knew every detail of the scales on his nose and jaw, every ridge and twist of his horns, the glow of those blue eyes.
What she had not expected was to see him smiling. He and the Hyur were laughing and talking as they descended the stairs, pointing like tourists. Koharu watched, dumbfounded. Her dark warrior, vicious slayer of monsters, was simply a young man under the broad light of day. A young man with a sword, true, but he looked … happy. No snarl, no fierce expression. And who was the Hyur? In no vision had she ever seen a healer with her dark warrior. But once she thought about it, she realized that it made sense. Any warrior worth his steel employed a healer. These two appeared to be great friends. Some of the tension she had carried for so long eased away. Here was no fantastic specter from the void. Here was a mortal man, and a ridiculously handsome one, at that. She fervently admired the unique patterns of his scales and the beautiful twists of his horns. Azim and Nhaama! If she had to die at a warrior's hand, let it be his.
As she watched them walk past, making for the city's main road, the dark warrior turned his head and looked at Koharu.
Koharu stared at him from behind her veil, and her nerves jangled like bells. He couldn't see her eyes, could he? Not through the veil. She stared into those blue eyes for a split second as he passed by.
A vision sprang to life, bringing with it the familiar headache. She saw her dark warrior surrounded by Amaljaa, fighting for his life. But in the distance, a single archer loomed against the sky, aiming a deadly arrow at the warrior's back. The arrow flew free. The warrior fell, and the swords of the Amaljaa flashed.
Koharu flinched and returned to herself. The dark warrior and his friend had passed by and were walking away through the market. Neither made any sign that they had noticed her.
Koharu stared after them, tormented by indecision. Her dark warrior would kill her, right? But he was going to die to an arrow in the back and the swords of the Amaljaa. He would not be killing a Raen girl.
Without meaning to, her feet carried her after him, drifting through the crowd like a veiled wraith. She could at least see where he was staying. She could send him a message, slide a note under his door, something to put him on his guard.
But wait! part of her mind screamed. Remember the cards! He brings death! Her footsteps faltered.
The other half of her mind retorted, The cards have been wrong before. And what if the death that he brings is his own?
Her footsteps strengthened, racing after the two men and their escort.
She shadowed them all the way to the edge of the market, and saw them enter the biggest inn of Ul'Dah's market district, The Quicksand. Good, she ought to be able to find them there.
She returned to the market and was in the middle of buying eight yalms of fabric when Lilira found her.
"Koharu! What are you thinking? So much money!"
"Please, Mother," Koharu begged, entirely innocent of following strange men through the marketplace. "I haven't had a new dress in six years."
Lilira looked at the fabric and snorted. "Fine, buy it. But you're doing all the sewing. I'll not touch a single pin."
"Thank you, Mother!" Beaming behind her veil, Koharu bought the fabric and trotted home with it. All she could think of was looking her best when she saw the dark warrior face to face for the first time. If he killed her because of some fate she didn't understand, then at least she would look good at the funeral.
"Why do you think it's called the Quicksand?" said Charles.
Bayan and Charles sat at a table with cool drinks, waiting as the inn prepared their rooms. Tololi had taken his leave and left them to settle in, saying that he would return with his master the following day. It was late evening, and they were tired.
Bayan looked around at the heavy limestone pillars that supported the roof, the clean-swept floor, and the raked sand beneath the tables in the center of the room. "Perhaps, like quicksand, patrons find it hard to leave."
Charles leaned back in his chair and laughed. Five days on an airship, through rough weather, had kept him confined to his bunk with airsickness. Now that they were back on the ground, Charles was nearly hyperactive. "I hope that means the beds are soft. Shall we sink in up to our necks? Shall we wallow in hospitality? Shall we find ourselves stuck here, day after day?"
Bayan looked at the drink in Charles's hand. "How much alcohol did they give you?"
"It's only fruit juice," said Charles, taking another drink. "Wonderfully refreshing. And the aether out here! Wind and fire aspect. Let me know if my healing spells feel different, because I feel like I could throw fireballs."
"Please, don't," said Bayan. He glanced at the walls and doors again, then at the patrons. Mostly Lalafel occupied the tables, their child-like faces cheerful, feet dangling above the floor. At the bar were a set of heavy-limbed Hyur, dark of skin, probably refugees from Ala Mhigo. Bayan watched them and wondered how well they swung swords.
Behind these surface thoughts, his quest for a wife nagged at him. He had seen something in the marketplace that stirred his heart, but for the life of him, he couldn't tell what he had seen. Women in veils? Women shopping? He had seen no Raen girls on their way through the crowded market. But what if he had been near to her? What if he had brushed by and not seen her in the crowd? The urge came over him to return to the market, find a place to sit, and watch the crowds. Something had changed within him. His deep, penetrating loneliness had become laced with anticipation. But how? And when? He had not seen her, but his soul had recognized hers. Would she know him? Would she realize that their lives had been fated to intertwine since birth?
He sighed and sipped his drink, barely paying attention to the sweet, exotic flavor. Oh my Nhaama, where are you?
As they sat there, Charles fidgeting and Bayan with weariness growing on him, a woman walked through the open inn door. She was veiled and robed, but Bayan recognized her as an Au Ra at once. Something about the shape of her body, the way she walked, and the way the veil hung from the points of her horns. He sat up straighter, the anticipation in his heart flaming into excitement.
The girl clutched her robe, gazing around the room, as if unsure of what she was doing there. She began a slow circuit of the room, halting at each pillar, as if trying to hide in its shadow. With the veil in place, Bayan couldn't tell if she was watching him. But he felt her gaze on the back of his head. He pretended he didn't know exactly where she was at all times, and sipped his drink.
"Hey, look over there," Charles said, staring in the opposite direction. "They're playing Triple Triad!"
"Do you play?" Bayan asked, only half paying attention.
"I'm rotten at it, but I play," said Charles. "I wonder if they'd let me join? Do you mind?"
Bayan waved a hand. Charles sidled across the inn to where three Lalafel were placing nine cards in a grid with furious concentration. Charles waited until they finished their round, then introduced himself. The Lalafel welcomed him to the game, and loaned him a pack of cards. Soon Charles was bent over the table, too, spinning cards about in his fingertips.
"Excuse me," said a voice.
Bayan looked up. The veiled girl had made her way to the other side of his table. She stood with her hands clasped, as if terribly nervous. Tiny, dainty hands.
"Yes?" he said, relaxed in his chair with a glass in hand. Exactly as if her very presence didn't sing to him.
"I'm sorry, this is very awkward," she murmured, looking around as if afraid of pursuit. "Please sir, what is your name?"
"Bayan Avagnar," he replied. "At your service."
"Bayan Avagnar," she murmured, as if his name was a magic spell. "Y-yes, Bayan Avagnar. I've come to warn you that your life is in danger."
He straightened and set down his glass. "Yes? Please, sit down."
"I-I can't," she murmured. One hand gripped the back of a chair until the knuckles whitened. "I had a vision of-of you. You were fighting Amaljaa warriors. But someone-an Elezen, I think-shot you in the back with an arrow, and you fell."
Bayan stared at her, questions spinning through his head. "A … vision. How did you know I was hired to hunt Amaljaa?"
"Visions come to me at times," she said, looking down. "I work with a fortune teller-" She clapped a hand to her veiled mouth, as if she had said too much. Then abruptly she turned and ran.
Bayan rose to his feet and stood, watching in dismay, as she fled the inn and vanished into the night. There she was, his girl, the one he had been searching for … wasn't she? He had yet to lay eyes on her. If she wasn't Raen, and if the soul link didn't work as he gazed into her eyes … blast it all. He pinched the bridge of his nose.
Charles saw him get up, and saw the girl running away. He bade goodbye to his gaming friends and returned to Bayan in concern. "What's going on?"
Bayan sat back down and related the incident in a low voice. "And Charles … I think she's the one. The girl I've been looking for. I can't be sure until I look into her eyes, but …" He trailed off. What if he was grossly mistaken? By the gods, it would not do to set his heart on this veiled stranger, only to find that she was not his Nhaama.
Charles was more concerned about the vision. "That's nice and all, but if this vision of hers is right, you won't have much of a chance to get to know her. Somebody is going to try to bump you off?"
"Apparently," said Bayan. "And I don't know why." He picked up his empty glass and slid it from hand to hand. "What have we walked into, here? Why would someone hire us, then kill us off?"
"We'd better go about this carefully," Charles muttered. "Let's take a day to gossip around town, see if we can learn more about this Chief Foreman Fyrgeiss. Maybe he has enemies trying to sabotage him."
"Agreed," said Bayan. "Also, the girl mentioned that she works as a fortune teller. I have a mind to have my fortune told tomorrow."
"Suddenly, I have the same urge," said Charles, grinning.
Koharu was in awful trouble with Lilira when she arrived back home.
One of Lilira's many, many rules was that Koharu was never to go out at night. Koharu had waited until her mother was snoring in bed, then slipped out to warn her dark warrior.
But upon her return, Lilira was waiting up with a lamp, and her expression was terrible. "Where did you go?" she stormed in a whisper.
Koharu bowed deeply in apology, her back prickling in anticipation of the whipping she was about to receive. "I'm sorry, Mother. I had to ask a merchant about the price of cloth before the marketplace closed for the night."
"The market closes at sundown," said Lilira, her voice even more deadly. "If you're going to lie, make it convincing, you stupid girl. Where did you go?"
Koharu bowed her head and didn't answer. She would not tell about her dark warrior. He was her secret, and so was her vision of his murder.
The thought of him sustained her through the following whipping. She hugged the memory of him as she lay in bed with her back smarting. He had been even more handsome in person, and perfectly courteous. No raging battle fiend, only an ordinary Au Ra warrior for hire, like so many of Ul'Dah's gladiators. Being in his presence had been remarkable-that string that connected them grew tighter and tighter all the time. Even now, she had the irrational desire to fling herself into his arms. If she dared look into his eyes, unveiled, she might see her Azim, the sun to her moon, and then she would truly be lost.
Maybe this was what the visions had been trying to tell her. Not that he was a brute coming to kill her, but that he was her lover come to die. That matched the cards' interpretation, too.
She had warned him, yes, but she had to do more. She must find out who wanted him dead, and stop them, herself. She could not swing a sword, but her visions would let her peer into any mind for the information she needed. She knew a tiny amount of magic. As a young girl, she had learned a simple spell for making herself unnoticeable. It was not invisibility-instead, it reacted on people's minds, making her appear so insignificant that their eyes slid past her without ever realizing she was there. She sometimes used it when a customer demanded to peer behind the curtain in the reading room. They looked right at her without ever noticing.
Such a spell would not work on Bayan Avagnar. She had used it tonight, in the inn, to avoid notice, and he had watched her every step. Was this what happened when a Nhaama found her Azim? Her heart swelled with love and desire. She must contrive to look into his eyes and see if he was hers. If he was, she would pledge her troth to him on the spot. Lilira would be upset, but maybe Bayan could placate her with a large dowry.
But first, there was the problem of him being killed. Koharu pondered what she knew. Fyrgeiss had lost a mine to the Amaljaa. He had lost other fighters to them and sought a legendary warrior this time. But someone else was working with the Amaljaa to kill those who might free the mine. Fyrgeiss had enemies, and she needed to know who.
She thought about it until she fell asleep. But no visions came in the night to guide her. Only ordinary dreams of a handsome Xaela warrior and his smile.
Ul'Dah had numerous fortune tellers throughout its markets, as Charles and Bayan discovered the next morning. Every corner seemed to host someone offering to do readings. They read palms, tea leaves, bones, and even eye color. They read crystal balls, aetheryte, and magic auras. One even offered to give Bayan a reading of the scales on the backs of his hands. None of them featured a young, pretty Auri girl. Most of them were Lalafel or Hyur, greasy and furtive.
Charles and Bayan met in a shady courtyard to compare notes. The sun had reached its zenith, and the burning stone pavement rippled with heat. Charles rather thought he might faint. After the temperate weather of the Twelveswood, the desert threatened to fry him to a crisp.
Bayan was suffering nearly as much, but said nothing of it. "You should not be taxing yourself this way," Bayan scolded. "You're barely over your funguar poisoning. I can't afford to pay more medical bills."
Charles looked at the ground in shame. "I thought we could find her, that's all. I didn't think there would be hundreds of fortune tellers. To hear them talk, there's never been an Auri girl among them, ever."
"I met the same problem," Bayan said in a low, dejected voice. "Every one I found was a Lalafel. I even had a few read my fortune. They promise riches and success, not an arrow in the back. Waste of money."
"What do we do, now?" Charles said.
Bayan shook his head. "I'm going to keep looking. You're going back to the Quicksand Inn to rest."
"And if you die of sunstroke out here?" Charles said, folding his arms. "Not much of an ending for your romance. 'And then he died of sunstroke two blocks from where his lover awaited him.'"
Bayan smiled ruefully. "Perhaps I'll rest for a while. Only until the hottest part of the day is over."
They left their shaded courtyard for the blinding white of the sidewalk. The walls on either side reflected heat, and the ground burned. Charles's whole body felt weak and stunted. He wanted water, a gallon of water, then the chance to lie down in some cool place, away from this intense, burning sunlight. How did people live like this? And they had about a mile of these streets to traverse before they found the inn.
"Excuse me, sirs! Would you care for a drink?"
Charles squinted. A Lalafel woman stood in the doorway of one of the endless stone houses. She was dressed in layers of shawls, and her hair was gray. But she held out a pitcher of water invitingly. "Come in and rest a while," she wheedled. "I can read your fortunes as you rest."
Charles glanced at Bayan, who nodded. Bayan had gone the rounds in a light tunic, pants, and boots. He didn't resemble a warrior at all, except maybe in the breadth of his shoulders. Sweat trickled down his face, and he looked as tired and miserable as Charles felt.
"Thank you, ma'am," said Charles with a smile. "We'd appreciate a chance to rest."
The woman led the way through a deep, sheltered porch, and into one of the thick-walled houses so common in the city. It was twenty degrees cooler inside, with welcome coolness breathing from the floor and walls. Charles closed his eyes and stood in the entry passage for a moment, simply enjoying relief from the sun.
"Please, come this way," said the old woman, tapping her cane on the floor twice. She led Charles and Bayan into a room where the walls were draped in black cloth. A table stood in the middle of this room with benches on either side. A crystal ball occupied the table.
Charles sat down with a groan of relief. Bayan sat beside him, and the Lalafel poured them tall glasses of cool water. They drank slowly and deeply, savoring the blessed coolness that refreshed and restored.
"You know," Charles said, "I'm a healer by trade, and no spell comes close to being as refreshing as this one drink."
"Thank you, my lord," the old woman purred, climbing into the bench opposite them. "Ul'Dah's wells are deep and our water pure."
"It is delicious," Bayan agreed. His glowing blue eyes roamed the room and the black curtains, ceaselessly, restlessly, as if he sensed a trap.
"When you gentlemen are ready, I can begin the reading," the old woman said.
"Give me a minute," Charles said. "I'm feeling kind of lightheaded." He leaned his elbows on the table and closed his eyes. The relief from the heat and the sudden cold drink had given him a peculiar feeling, as if his head was about to detach from his body and drift away. He muttered to Bayan, "Catch me if I pass out."
Bayan immediately steadied him with a hand on his back, his gaze anxious.
"Is there aught I can do?" said the old woman.
Bayan shook his head. "He's barely recovered from illness, and should not have been out in the sun so long. Forgive us, we only need to rest for a few minutes."
"I have a cure for sunstruck travelers," said the old woman. "I'll fetch it. Just a moment." She hopped off the bench and hurried away.
As the old woman left, the curtain behind her side of the table fluttered in an odd way. Charles only saw it because he was staring at it, his head between his hands, hoping he didn't faint and humiliate himself. He turned his head slightly. "Bayan," he whispered, "there's someone behind that curtain."
Bayan tensed. Then in one swift movement, he slid out of the bench, reached across the table, and swept the curtain back.
On another bench behind the curtain sat a Raen girl. She was a slim, pretty thing, dressed in a worn brown dress, her feet tucked under her. Her horns were white, shading to coral-pink at the bases, and swirled backward, the opposite of Bayan's, which pointed forward. She gasped as the curtain moved, then she and Bayan stood face to face, staring at one another.
Bayan drew a long breath, but otherwise stood perfectly still. The girl stared up at him, her eyes glowing a soft gold.
"No," she whispered.
"Yes," he whispered back.
She shut her eyes and turned away. "Close the curtain. She'll beat me if she sees."
"My Nhaama," Bayan whispered huskily.
"Please," said the girl entreatingly. "Close it."
Bayan let the curtain fall and whisked back onto the bench. Charles felt him trembling.
"She the one?" Charles said under his breath.
Bayan nodded.
Charles knew she was the instant he'd seen her white horns. Why was she hidden back there? But as soon as he thought about it for half a second, he knew. A speaking pipe was nailed to the wall beside the girl. She must be the one with real powers of second sight. She must pass on her visions to the old woman, who was the front man.
Bayan was still trembling when the old woman returned, carrying a glass of brownish liquid. "Here," she said, passing it to Charles. "It will help. Drink it slowly."
Charles tasted it. It was sweet fruit juice diluted with water, with a slightly bitter aftertaste. "It's not poison, is it?" he said.
"Of course not," said the Lalafel, offended. "It is a mineral compound with great restorative properties. I will drink it if you doubt."
Charles held it out and watched as the old woman took a sip. When she didn't immediately drop dead, he took a drink, himself. He didn't trust the old fortune teller not to randomly poison them, not when someone planned to kill Bayan for no reason he could see.
As Charles drank and felt his lightheadedness abate, Bayan said, "Perhaps you can help us, ma'am. We seek an Auri girl of the Raen tribe. I have seen her in a vision and I must find her."
The woman's blue eyes widened a fraction, but she said smoothly, "I know of no such girls in this district, honorable sir. Perhaps you ought to try the Steps of Thal, where various other races live."
Bayan's free hand curled into a fist under the table. But he said pleasantly, "Yes, I'll try there. Thank you."
The old woman smiled. "Shall I proceed with the reading, then?"
"Me, first," Charles said. He didn't think the girl would have many visions of Bayan that weren't disgustingly romantic at the moment. That soul-binding thing had gone off, just as Bayan had said it would. What might happen next was anyone's guess.
The old woman placed her hands on either side of the crystal ball and gazed into it in silence. "What is it you seek?" she asked him. "Fame? Power? Riches?"
"You tell me," Charles said. "You're the fortune teller." In his head, he added, "I want to know who wants us dead."
He noticed how close the woman sat to the other end of that speaking tube behind the curtain. As he watched, the woman lifted her hands, eyes closed, and leaned conveniently closer to the tube. "The spirits bring a vision," she whispered. "They show me a great man in black armor. But what's this? He has … wings? Yes, wings. He descends from the sky, swinging a sword of bone." Her eyes opened, and she stared at Charles in fear. "What does this vision mean?"
"Beats me," said Charles. "Are you sure it's not a metaphor for a politician? Someone on the Syndicate, perhaps?"
"I know of no one on the Syndicate with a bone sword," said the old woman. She turned unwillingly to Bayan. "And you, sir?"
"I seek answers," said Bayan. "Read them from the aether. Someone wishes me dead. I would know who."
The old woman pretended to go into her trance again. Charles watched the curtain behind her, which never moved. The girl was good.
"A red sun rises," said the old woman. "The moon follows. Beneath their light stands a man who speaks to the Amaljaa. He hands over a chest of gil."
"What man?" said Bayan. "Describe him."
"I … I cannot," gasped the old woman. "The vision fades from sight."
Bayan drew a quick breath, as if about to speak. Then he thought better of it and reached for the moneybag at his belt. "Thank you for the drinks and the readings," he said, counting out fifty gil. "If your readings hold true, you will likely never see us again."
"Fortune telling is an imprecise art," said the old woman. "One must only alter the course of his steps to choose another destination."
Charles rose to his feet, cautiously, but found his head clear. He bowed to the old woman, and he and Bayan departed.
Not until they were back in the hot street and a block away from the fortune teller's house did Bayan speak. "It was her."
"I figured," Charles said, grinning. "You two saw each other and you both reacted like lightning had struck."
"I don't even know her name," Bayan breathed, smoothing back his hair. "I looked into her eyes and saw the moon goddess, herself. I can't describe it. The gods only know what she saw in my eyes. Charles!" He turned, grabbed Charles's shoulders, and shook him lightly. "My quest is at an end! I have found my Nhaama! And she is …" he released Charles and turned away. "She is unattainable."
Charles grinned and straightened his tunic. "About to explode, are you?"
"Yes!" Bayan roared suddenly. "She lives and breathes! She posseses magic beyond anything I dreamed! And how do I even speak to her? She is as good as a prisoner!" His voice dropped to a savage whisper. "The old woman beats her. Did you hear? Beats her."
"I heard," said Charles uncomfortably. "Perhaps the old woman can be bought with a dowry?"
"A dowry," Bayan muttered. "Yes, perhaps. Gods, what do I offer?"
"Money," said Charles. "That girl has the visions and the old woman sells them. You take the girl, the old lady loses her business. Make the dowry big enough, she can bank it and live on the interest."
Bayan sighed and wiped a bead of sweat out of his right eye. "Perhaps I can earn it slaying these Amaljaa."
"If we don't die in the process," said Charles. "Come on, let's get back to the inn."
But he could see that Bayan wasn't listening. The warrior had retreated into his own thoughts, making plans for securing his bride. He didn't speak all the way back to the Quicksand Inn. When they parted ways to go to their rooms, Bayan barely grunted a goodbye.
Charles was glad to go into his cool, dim room and collapse on the bed. "Zana," he whispered to the ceiling, "I wish you were here. You'd know what to do."