The cardsharp was shaking with fright by the time he made it out into the street. Where had the man gone, and how had he disappeared like that? He rubbed his eyes, trying to shake the jittery feeling that had come from escaping near disaster yet again. If the Guard had caught him, if that crowd hadn't been quite so distracted by the wealth he had thrown…

"Maybe my life's a little too adventurous," he said to himself, sighing. Then he remembered the crow. Looking skyward, he saw it turn at an intersection and coast over an office building, landing behind it. And he was off again, following its path, darting through back alleys he knew like the spread of his deck. He had something of an idea what would be awaiting him behind that building… or, rather, who.

And he was right. As he turned the corner, the whore stood up, as though taken by surprise.

"What the -- what are you doing here!" she asked in consternation, her eyes white with fear.

The cardsharp chuckled, feeling a little guilty. "Relax," he said reassuringly. "You don't have to be so startled -- I chased him away."

"Chased who away, exactly?" the prostitute asked, her eyes narrowing in her dark face.

He stared. "The Ubiquitous guy, of course!"

She stared right back. "I have no idea who you're talking about. Are you here for a reason, or are you just gaping? That doesn't come cheap, you know."

"You're … look, I can tell when people are playing dumb with me. You knew full well that guy was after you. That's why you went for the back alley. Just how long have you been in this city, anyhow?" The young man's brow furrowed. The girl had a slight accent which he couldn't quite identify. Surely she wasn't that new to the city. But then… why had she gone and used what could only be some kind of magic? She had to have known she would have been caught.

Something about the girl made her look very dangerous indeed as she strode slowly down the alley, closing the distance between them. "If I told you how long I've been here, I would have to kill you. Now, I'm gonna ask you for the last time… are you here for a lay, or are you just wasting my time?"

He coughed. Somehow, he hadn't thought she would be so blunt about it. Sighing, he wondered where to begin.

"No, I don't want to lay you," he started, but she silenced him with a motion.

"Then leave me alone and go your own way. Just because you chased some creep off doesn't mean you get any freebies." She folded her arms and appeared to be willing him to move along. He sighed again and shook his head.

"You don't seem to understand," he said. "I'm not here to buy… you… and I'm not here to brag about what I did. But I saw you turn into a crow and fl--"

He stopped there because she had suddenly scurried behind him and clapped her hand over his mouth. "Don't say another word," she menaced, and he acquiesced. She let go of him, and he turned as she slowly drew away from him. "If you want to talk to me that badly," she said bluntly, stubbornness in her eyes, "then let's get off the streets to do it. The walls have ears, you know."

The cardsharp glanced toward the dumpsters, but there was nothing and no one in the alleyway but them. Still, he saw her point. "'Kay," he said, and took to the streets, aware of her presence behind him as she followed.

Soon a likely place presented itself. An apartment complex loomed against the backdrop of Hyrule Castle, and he trudged up the walkway and through the door without even looking at the sign. Two flights of stairs and one creaky door onto the landing later, the two stopped in front of Apartment #4. He fumbled in his pocket, then drew out something -- it was too dark for the prostitute to quite catch what it was -- and rummaged for the lock.

"You live here?" the whore whispered.

He grinned, chuckling. "Hell no. It looks unoccupied, though."

She raised an eyebrow, wonderingly. "I mentioned that a safe place would be a good thing, right?"

"It's safe." The lock clicked and the door swung open. The cardsharp stuck the bobby pin back in his pocket. "For now."

The afternoon light streamed through the curtains, lighting up the apartment. It was a tiny place -- living room adjoining to kitchen adjoining to bedroom -- and there were probably about seven more apartments exactly like this one within this building. The prostitute followed the young man deeper within the house until they reached the bedroom. He turned to face her, blushing a little as he sat on the bed.

"Damn, how cliché," he remarked offhandedly, leaning back onto the mattress. "I'm sitting in a bedroom with a whore. Well, I guess not very many get this kind of luxury," he added, then sat up again.

The girl remained unmoved as she leaned against the wall. "How much did you see?"

He studied her, his expression critical, and for a long while he said nothing. At last, "You don't like beating around the bush, do you?" He thought about this for a while, then blushed. "Crap, that was a bad pun. They just keep coming. … There was another one. Dammit." He began to laugh, in spite of himself. The whore stared at him impassively, both her eyebrows raised.

"Did you break into this house just to crack jokes about me?" she inquired frigidly.

"Oh, absolutely. I do this all the time, can't you tell?" His laughter trailed off, and he cleared his eyes of their mirthful tears. "No… I'm sorry, I really am. I'm not used to talking to whores, you see." He went on, more seriously now. "I saw you turn into a crow and fly away… following the road. It's really not safe to do that, you know. Why did you do it? Surely you know about the Ubiquitous."

Her nostrils flared slightly. "I preferto be referred to as a prostitute, thank you. And no one would have sent me out walking if I didn't know about them. What kind of an establishment do you think I belong to?"

"Oh… I didn't realize that you were actually hired by an establishment." His voice was soft, but there was a hint of poison beneath. "I thought you were just another one of those Academy girls who winds up faced with a tuition larger than she can pay. Funny how the Goddesses don't seem to care about them, isn't it?"

The whore rolled her eyes. "I didn't come here for morality talks, and I'm not some university prig. If I didn't know better, I would think you were a Ubiquitous yourself."

This surprised the gambler a little. "How do you know I'm not?" he asked curiously.

"I don't." The prostitute looked surprised at her own answer, a thing which she apparently didn't like. She rebutted hard and fast. "Just how long have you been in Hyrule City, mister? Seems to me that I should be asking you that question. Blithering on about Academy girls… you'd think you'd be used to what happens here by now." She peered at him closely, gauging his reply.

"No, not really." He shrugged. "I've lived here nearly all my life… except during the dark times, of course, when Ganon was in power. But it just never fails to surprise me. I guess I thought by your bearing that you might have the same opinions…"

"My bearing?" she asked disdainfully, as though he had criticized her.

"You don't walk like a tramp," he said simply, and then, at her scandalized glance, "Prostitute! All right, all right! Sorry… geez." He searched again for his misplaced thought. "You don't seem like the kind of woman who's been beaten down by anything. You look like you're ready and willing to take on the world… and capable of doing it, for that matter. But don't tell me that's all a façade. There's anger in it too, and I can see it. Especially when I call you a whore." He grinned, but his eyes were serious. "I'm not blind."

As he had spoken, her disdain had begun to filter away, bit by bit, leaving her with an inscrutable look on her face. She sat down on the bed and pulled one knee up to her chest, looking at him with an air of surprise.

"Who are you, anyhow?" she asked.

He smiled. "They call me Cardsharp. Or other things, but I'd prefer not to go into that." He saw her look of recognition and grinned. "You've heard of me, I take it?"

"Heard of you? You're only the most famous con artist in the whole city… and the most unbearably self-righteous, to boot, if the rumors are right." She chuckled derisively. "I guess I can see where they got that one. Is it true you've never been caught cheating or seen drinking?"

"My reputation precedes me," he said grandly, and laughed. "I don't drink. Or cheat, for that matter, but I guess that depends on what you call cheating… which brings me back to your little feathered display…" He nodded to her. "By the way, I didn't happen to catch your name."

She shrugged. "I've always been able to do it -- transform, that is. It serves me well, as you can imagine. And I only tell my name to people who will scream it later."

She rather enjoyed the brief shock on his face at her vulgar suggestions. "Well…" he said slowly after it had worn off, "I have to call you something, don't I? Don't you have a name -- besides the one your customers call you, that is?"

Her expression grew closed very quickly. "I have no one I would tell it to," she said pointedly, her voice like acid, "and there is nothing in that name for me anymore." Her eyes dared him to inquire further.

Cardsharp considered inquiring further anyhow. His eyes traced the pattern of the bedspread they were sitting on, flickered up to meet her scowl. "I think I'll call you Meryl," he decided.

"Meryl?"

"It means blackbird or raven in some ancient language, I've forgotten… and I expect Raven is what they usually call you," he said languidly. She stood stock still.

"How did you know?" she hissed. He half-smiled at his luck, happy to have given her a shock for a change with that.

"I didn't."

Meryl appeared to be mulling this over, and the statement, miraculously, quieted her attitude a little. She turned so that she could sit, tailor-fashion, on the bed, and leaned on an elbow, thinking about the unasked question which she had refused to answer.

"I've always had these powers," she said, her voice quiet with remembrance. "They were passed down to me from both sides of my family. My father was Gerudo… they said he had been descended from an ancient sage. But I was raised by my mother, until I was around ten. She was a Sheikah… and so I'm part Sheikah, too." She laughed a little. "Ironic, isn't it? My mother's line began as guardians of royals and nobles, and here I am today… but I have no regrets."

"But why did you fly with the roads?" Cardsharp pressed on. "Why didn't you try and fly like a crow would?"

She shrugged. "You want the truth? I got scared. I haven't been out for quite a while, and I could tell that guy was following me… I was spooked pretty bad. It took me longer to change, too, because of that. I'm not ordinarily that slow."

Her eyes dared him to doubt this, and, once again, he was severely tempted. She could tell by the grin. Somewhat reluctantly, she allowed the glare to slide off her face. Feeling strange without it, she continued by unlacing one side of her bodice.

Cardsharp averted his eyes. "Um…? Did you miss the part where I said, thank you, no?" he inquired, but she couldn't miss the blush on his face.

She snorted. "Did you miss the part where I said no freebies, you perv?" She socked him in the arm, then laced her bodice up again. He turned his head as she did so to look at the strange object which she had drawn out.

"What is it?" It looked like only a wooden block.

She responded by opening it. He gave a low whistle. What had appeared to be a rough, unfinished plank was actually the back of a triptych. The device was missing two of its panels, the left and center, but upon the right, an intricate etching of a raven took flight amidst swirling patterns adrift with the Eye of Truth.

"Spiffy," he remarked, and she closed it and put it away.

"It was my mother's… passed down in my family," she said. "I never knew what happened to her, or my sister… this, and a flute I have here --" she motioned to her hair, which was braided and put up, stuck through with what he assumed were pins but which now, on closer inspection, proved to have keys -- "are all I have to remember them by. But, like I said," she shrugged, "no regrets."

"Amen," he said softly. There was a restful silence. The tide of light coming through the window waxed and waned as the two wondered what else there was to say.

"Now what?" Cardsharp wondered to himself, then turned to Meryl. "Do you have someplace safe to go? I mean, now that that guy's after you? I don't think he'll wind up giving up very easily."

Meryl nodded. "I do. Why, were you offering?" She smiled slyly.

"No." Only posthumously did he realize that she was joking. He grinned sheepishly, averting his eyes. "Actually… I was wondering if this place of yours might have room for me. I don't exactly have access to the best of accommodations… generally, I keep clear of trouble with the Ubiquitous, but today that wasn't exactly an option for me. They'll easily find me if I sleep in an alley tonight -- I need to lie low for a while."

Meryl nodded again, lying back on the bed and thinking. "You know… you were right. About the U., I mean. Everyone's favorite group of overreligious housewives…"

"If they were all overreligious housewives, you and I would have nothing to fear." Cardsharp smiled, and something like a reciprocation twitched about Meryl's lips as well. He shrugged. "I'm not usually one to complain, though. I guess seeing you and that guy brought some of that indignation back."

Meryl nodded. "You were right, though."

He sighed, hunching over slightly inside his coat. "All that repression for Goddesses that they can't even prove exist."

"You don't believe in the Goddesses?"

Cardsharp chuckled. "Don't tell me faith is common among prostitutes. Call me an agnostic. I don't want to serve Goddesses who tell me I can't even play solitaire without roasting forever in an alternate dimension." He sighed. "And now they're poised to topple what's left of the monarchy, too…"

Meryl's eyes widened in shock, and she sat up. "…No! Why… what makes you think that? Impa is still here!"

"Regent Impa won't be there for long. The Ubiquitous won't be satisfied with small-scale repression… my guess is they've already infiltrated the Royal Guard with their people." Cardsharp shrugged. "It's only a matter of time, really, unless the Queen or Link comes back."

Meryl thought this over, then nodded. "The only people Hyrule would trust to govern this new hysteria… I see what you mean." She got up and walked to the window, hips swaying gently with her steps as she squinted into the afternoon sun. The swell of its light made the pause even more pregnant.

"You can come with me to the safehouse, if you want," Meryl said finally. "It's not too far across town. Although I can't say what kind of reception you'll get…" She smiled wickedly at him. "Not all of my coworkers are quite as … inhibited as I am. If they catch wind that you're actually Cardsharp, I won't vouch for how many people will be in bed with you when you wake up tomorrow morning…" Her smile broadened at his look of faint discomfort, but the suggestion was broken by a distant, drawn-out squeak. Cardsharp bolted up from the bed as if it had burned him. For a moment, they were both silent again…

"The door to the landing," Cardsharp breathed, glancing about for an exit. Save the window, there was none.

"What are you waiting for?" Meryl spat, and, reaching into her bodice, she flung a small object onto the ground too quickly for the eye to follow. In one blinding flash of light, she was a raven again.

Cardsharp stared as she pecked at the window, then froze as he heard the doorknob turning. A muffled "what the…?" from the apartment's owner caught his ear. He had left the door unlocked.

"Dammit!" He threw the window open and the raven, without sparing a backward glance, bolted out. He glanced down. "Now what'm I supposed to do…?" He looked around for the prostitute, but she was nowhere to be found. He rolled his eyes. "…Thanks, Mer'."

The young man spared a glance over his shoulder. Footsteps were coming closer, he could hear them as they echoed on the wood floor of the kitchen, and then…

"Nothing for it…" He placed a foot on the windowsill and vaulted himself into the air.

It took a surprisingly short time to reach the cobblestones from two stories above ground, the interval only leaving him enough time to think, "Holy Farore, how stupid was that?" before landing. His left leg crumpled under him; as he landed, the air was released from his body in a single burst as his head hit the street. Numb with pain, the surroundings dancing a reel around his befuddled eyes, he dimly observed a crow wheeling overhead, blotting out the sun… and, as his face turned to the gathering crowd, a familiar-looking man dressed in blue. The man smirked. Dammit, not again, was his last thought as the crowd swept over him and he plummeted into unconsciousness.