When Kyran reappeared at the bottom of the stairs, his meagre pack on his shoulder, both women regarded him silently. For a moment, the male Drow entertained worrying thoughts of them becoming best friends in the time he had gone, and the implications that would entail - such as the likelihood of him being used for target practice by two equally mad females - then he shoved the thought from his mind. They were Drow and elf, after all. Both were far, far too proud to even consider becoming friends with the other. Still, considering Tomoko's indiscrimination when it came to potential bedfellows... He shook his head in an attempt to remove the thought from his mind. That was the last thing he wanted to consider!

Tomoko looked at him with a blank expression as he approached the table, and then got to her feet. "Aren't you going to wait for me to pack?"

"I've already done it." He gestured to the small pack.

The elf's face flushed. "But that's not everything..."

"These are the most important things. Which is to say, not very much. You own some real junk, do you know that?"

The fire mage's fists clenched. "I don't care what you think about it, that's my junk, to do with as I see fit. You have no right to leave it behind."

"I have every right, right now." The Drow sighed heavily. "Or would you rather stay in the company of our esteemed lady whilst I gathered up every little frippery that you own? Bearing in mind that could take hours because sometimes, for someone who is so obsessed with neatness, you can be so untidy sometimes it's unreal. I think it must be due to your laziness."

Tomoko's face blushed redder and redder as the bard spoke, and nearly gave in to the urge to slap him so hard that his face would match the embarrassed colour of her own. "How I sleep in my room is none of your concern. Go and fetch my things."

Kyran simply stood insolently in front of her and folded his arms.

Slowly, Tomoko began moving her fingers in a strange and arcane gesture. The spell, once cast, would cause her great satisfaction, as it would set alight some random part of Kyran's clothing. But at the final gesture, she came to an abrupt halt - Erelvayas had got to her feet and was behind the elf without the fire mage even hearing that she had moved. Her slim, dark hand rested on Tomoko's shoulder innocently enough, but she could tell from the tension in it that she could be in a great amount of pain should this eerie Priestess wish for her to be. A swift, irate gesture with one hand dispelled the mischievous conjuration and Tomoko stomped off to her room to collect the items Kyran had left.

Erelvayas looked sidelong at Kyran. "You should learn to recognise the spells she is casting."

The male Drow shrugged. "It never concerns me."

"One day, she might kill you."

"For all her boasts," Kyran looked directly at the Priestess, "I don't think she would get all that far without me. I bring in more money than she does, and that means more to her than she will admit." When Erelvayas's expression shifted to one of blank incomprehension, Kyran sighed. "I am a bard."

The Priestess stared at him, her expression rapidly changing to one of shock. "A proud Drow, as a mere bard?!"

"You've demonstrated already that I'm less than proud." Kyran muttered. "It's a form of... employment. It pays. And I'm not too bad at it, so it pays quite well."

"A travelling musician. A Drow." The Priestess was so obviously disgusted at the thought of it that Kyran was suddenly finding himself amused with her. "However you could lower yourself to such a position I cannot understand."

A wry smile twisted the corners of his mouth upwards slightly. "I'm living Above. To you, I don't think that even being a bard can lower me further."

---

Tomoko sulked noisily down the stairs again and glared at Kyran like a spoilt child. "I've got everything now." She tugged on a rough rope that she was holding the end of in her right hand, and the red sacking bag slid down the last pair of wooden steps with audible thuds and tinkles, apparently careless about the contents.

Kyran stared at her. "If those things are so important to you, why are you..." His voice trailed off as he saw the look on her face, and decided to abandon that train of thought before she made it burst into flame. "Never mind."

Erelvayas treated Tomoko to her customary revolted look. "I expect the term 'travelling light' is one that you have not heard before."

"I know it, I just don't live by it." Tomoko stated shortly, her expression mirroring the Drow Priestess's. "Life's too short."

"Speak for yourself." The Drow eyed the elf calmly.

"Only a few thousand years in which to live, and so much to do." Tomoko snapped, revealing more anger than she intended. "And I'm sure your life is just so full."

Kyran sighed inaudibly, more relieved than he could ever have imagined that the two women were arguing. After all, for as long as they were distracted with hating one another, they couldn't turn their attention to him.

Tomoko growled deep in her throat at some offhand insulting comment the Drow Priestess had made, which sounded even more feral than she looked. Without a word she spun on her heel, turning away from as abruptly as she could muster. Grabbing Kyran's narrow right wrist with her free left hand, she stormed from the tavern, hauling her trinkets along on one side and the startled Drow male along at the other. The door slammed loudly behind her, making a few of the less inebriated customers jump in alarm.

Erelvayas smiled smugly. Round two went to the Drow, it seemed.

---

After trying unsuccessfully three times to wrench his arm from the angry elf's grasp, Kyran resignedly stuck the small and neat fingernails of his left hand into the soft skin at the back of Tomoko's own left hand.

Immediately the fire mage yelped in surprise and let go, jerking her hand away from the Drow male. "What did you do that for?!"

Kyran's reactions mirrored her own as he cradled his wrist in his other hand. Slowly, taking care to stay out of Tomoko's reach, he showed her what her grip had done to his skin. Pale marks showed clearly against the Drow's dark flesh, perfectly depicting all four fingers and thumb of Tomoko's hand, surrounded by angry lines a darker shade than his already near-black skin. Even the veins were visible through the slightly lighter tone of his wrist. "Because you did this."

Tomoko opened her mouth to apologise, but after a moment closed it again when she realised that she could not remember a time she had ever said those words sincerely - they were usually spoken either in sarcasm or under duress.

"You look like a fish when you do that," Kyran remarked almost conversationally as he tried to bring the life back to his arm and hand by rubbing them vigorously with his other hand, and winced as for a moment it felt like someone had impaled his fingers with a thousand needles.

Tomoko shrugged. "It's an improvement over looking like a fish all the time, I suppose."

Kyran could not work out if this was intended to be an insult thrown in his direction or one of the occasional random sentences Tomoko came out with every once in a while. Instead of wasting his time trying to puzzle it out, he glanced up at the night sky, marvelling at its beauty. There was likely to be a frost in the morning and the stars looked all the more magnificent because of it. The winter chill in the air appeared to give the tiny lights a more crisp edge, creating pinpoint sharp dots in the velvet of the deep blue-black sky. The Drow male could not help but be astonished and awed by the beauty of the sky every time he looked up at it. His race valued beauty above all, even taking it to extreme measures by killing new-borns if they did not fit the minimum standard of attractiveness. And yet, Kyran thought sadly, most Drow refused to venture above ground at all their petty warring and hatred of the elves Above kept them trapped in their own prison and rendered them unable to see such wondrous sights as these.

Of course, some he could think of appeared to not notice the more beautiful things in the world Above, even when they had spent their entire lives there. Tomoko completely ignored the panoramic scene above her in favour of trying to find a tavern that served her favourite drinks. "Why did we have to leave the Wyvern?" She grumbled loudly as she dropped the handle to her red sack bag and put both hands upon her hips, scanning the area around her for a place that didn't appear to be in the late stages of disintegrating. "I liked it there, and the rooms were comfortable."

"Did you really want to stay in a place where Erelvayas could find you and teach you the Drow way of punishment at any time? Or perhaps where she would..." His voice trailed off, trying to find something that would indicate to Tomoko that he hadn't wanted to stay, but would phrase it in a way that she would understand. "...Where she would stop you from drinking anything but water because she wanted you to have a clear head?"

Tomoko paused, then asked quietly, "would she really do that?"

"She would do anything in her power to prevent anything from going wrong if it is something she really wants." The Drow stated with conviction.

Tomoko shuddered slightly. "Maybe it was best to leave then. She was strange, after all. How would I be to know that she wouldn't suddenly try to, I don't know, get in my shower with me or something."

Kyran thought that if that had happened, it wouldn't be the first time for a start. And Tomoko would probably not actually object to it either. He wisely kept his mouth shut on the subject.

The elf looked around herself again in disgust. "This place is a mess, a complete dump."

"What do you expect for a less than savoury port town in the middle of an area known for its piracy and bandits?" Kyran hefted his own pack onto his shoulders more securely and began to walk towards a side street.

Tomoko stared at his retreating back in confusion for a moment, before snatching up her things and trotting after him, her shoes making audible clacks on the rough cobbles where they were clean. "Where are you going?" She looked around herself uneasily. A girl could be unsafe in a place like this. A lesser girl, anyhow."

Ahead of her, Kyrans hair glowed almost orange as he paused under a flickering street light and looked around at her. "If we are going to find somewhere better to stay, I think we should get away from there. Or the best we could hope for would probably be a boat." He didn't add that a boat would be good.

"But if we were to sleep in a boat," the elf's voice was quietly thoughtful, "then we couldn't exactly be held responsible for what happens if it were to sail away?"

Kyran smiled humourlessly as she caught up with him. "I was thinking the same thing, but... she'd just track us down somehow. And if she didn't, then my matron's soldiers would."

"Soldiers?" Tomoko's green eyes were wide. She had never heard the Dark Elf speak of his family before, or say much on the subject of Drow culture. "Is she a powerful woman?"

"You could say that." The Drow fell into step beside her as they continued down the sporadically lit alleyway. "Most houses in Menzoberranzan have a certain degree of status they want to keep up. And so they have soldiers, or cannon fodder, whichever term you prefer, because the amount of soldiers reflects on the amount of status that the matron has." When the elf nodded her comprehension, he continued. "The soldiers also serve another purpose. Matrons can attack one another, to try to wipe out rival houses." Then he stopped abruptly. "I think I'm talking too much on this subject, that wasn't what you asked."

"Carry on," Tomoko pouted. "It's interesting."

Kyran stared at her, looking as though he could not understand what she was finding interesting about it, when it was all so normal to him. A brief memory of his thoughts on the sky came back to him. Maybe it was what you saw every day that you saw the least of. "All right. What was I saying... Oh, yes, matrons attack one another. I think to some, they consider it a game of chess, with all their little soldiers as pawns. A successful attack is not just one that wipes out the entire opposing force and family, but one that goes unseen. They have this rule, that if the obliteration of another house has no witnesses, then it simply never happened."

Tomoko's face was a picture of shock and horror. "What?! How do they explain the bodies, the disappearance of the family?"

Kyran shrugged a little. "I think Drow have a great capacity for imagination. They pretend they never existed. The house ranked below them moves up into their place, or maybe it was that the house that did the erasing of the other takes its place. I don't remember, I'm just a male." This was said with bitterness. "I was never told the things that females learn and the way they run things, I was just expected to wave a sword around, go to a school I hated and be obedient and pretty."

Tomoko listened, evidently enraptured with his story. This was the most she had heard him speak on any subject that she could remember - which she knew didn't stand for too much, she had even fallen asleep during some of his longer songs about their travels. "What else? I'm curious."

The white haired Drow shook his head. "I don't like remembering it, I hated it below ground. Fairly untypical for a Dark Elf." He laughed dryly. "When I ran away, I expect I brought great shame and disgrace on my family. It would be big embarrassment for a matron, especially when someone as lowly as a fourth born son is the one bringing it upon her. The other matrons would talk about her behind her back and believe her to be weak, if she could not even keep her boy child under control. Then follows attacks on the house." He shut his eyes for a moment and narrowly avoided walking into one of the lamp posts that lined the long passageway. "The fact that my matron is still alive and ruling her house means she was strong enough to repel those attacks and has most likely risen higher in the ranks of Menzoberranzan by now. Which means more soldiers, and more embarrassment should it be found out that I am still alive. She can well afford to kill me, should she wish to. And believe me, she will wish to."

Tomoko frowned a little, but said nothing more. The entire culture seemed so alien to her, she couldn't help but be interested but at the same time the world he described disgusted her. She preferred to have her power over men because the men themselves willing surrendered it to her, rather than have it be the only way that things were. It was so much more fun that way. She stopped at the passageway end and looked sidelong at Kyran. "So the world Above is definitely your home now?"

The Dark Elf nodded, then pulled his hood up over his head, covering his face. "But others would disagree. Come on, we have to find somewhere to stay before sunrise."