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[Korva]

91st of Vhalar, 718 (Scalvoris)
*Speaking Rakahi
*Speaking Common


“Really?”

“‘Course,” Korva smiled, chin in hand at the two men sitting across from her, their eyes flashing in green disbelief, “I wouldn’t lie to ya.”

“You came out of that without a scratch? Bull.”

The Biqaj woman’s grin only smoothed out in lazy triumph as she lifted her other arm, showing off her cuts with ease. Scabbed over, mostly superficial now but that lent to the story, “Didn’t say I came outta there without a scratch, they got a few good swipes before I sent ‘em back to U’frek.”

One of the men pursed his lips while the other let out a low whistle, “Lemme buy that drink for ya, then ya can tell me where ya keep yer port. We can take ya on our next trip. Can never have too many hands these days.”

“Yer telling me.” She agreed peaceably while the other rolled his eyes, “Never take on a job I can’t do, ain’t gotta look like Imma set yer ship on fire.”

“Of course you won’t.” Was the dry reply right before a name rang out in the tavern, followed by the over eager patter of children’s feet. Tall and big eyes the child reach Korvas seat with purpose, babbling wildly, too quick for the Biqaj woman to understand at first.

“Kamina! Ya gotta help! The deal went bad and the Mer took it!”

“Slow down, love,” She said, blinking rapidly at the change in topics before she pulled up a chair for the girl, “Start at the beginning and don’t leave nothing out.”

“Kamina? Thought your name was Korva.”

“I go by either,” Korva murmured distractedly, eyes roaming over the girl, “Go on.”

The child took a deep breath, “We were wondering what to get and then my sister, she remembered ya talking about how Mer make deal with Biqaj and get us the best stuff. So we found one and were gonna pay it to get pearl but it stole my sisters necklace!”

“Yer sister break the deal or something?” One of the men piped up, leaning forward curiously.

“No! Swear she didn’t! The Mer said to pay first, said wouldn’t deal with us otherwise, so she paid then when she went to get the pearl the Mer said it was more, stole the locket right off her neck and ran away! She cheated!”

That made Korvas eyes flint over, “Breaking bargains with kids ain’t something no one should do. Ya know better than to be making deals ya can’t keep and without yer mama or papa.”

“It was a surprise for ma, da says her names Pearl so we were gonna give her it during Gift days! Please, you gotta help us get it back, I know ya can!”

“‘Course I am but I don’t know this Mer—“

“It lives down by Almund. Ya can just use yer magic and make them give it back, please! We don’t even want the pearl no more.”

“Of course Korva will do it. She just fought off Thralls, a Mer won’t be a problem.”

She threw a dark look over at the two men but then smiled at the girl. It was just a Mer and a locket. Wouldn’t be too hard to trade something for the locket back, and the girl had the darkest watery eyes, lips trembling and all. It broke a little part of her heart, Korva would later blame that on why she nodded, promises falling from her lips as she wiped away the girls tears before sending her off with a hug.

“Well ain’t ya a real sweet one.”

“A real something.” The other muttered with narrowed eyes, reassessing her cuts now that she’d agreed to the task so easily.

For a moment Korva just stared after the child, eyes flashing silver before the easy smile curved her lips, “‘Course I am, now ‘bout paying for the drinks…”

**Borrowed this template from free to use

[Korva]

93rd of Vhalar, 718(Almund)
*Speaking Rakahi
*Speaking Common

Scalvoris was made up of more than its namesake town, Korva had only been to two, so this was a blessing in disguise. But Almund was not what she expected. It was like a bargain priced version of Scalvoris town. Not only that but she had no idea where to even begin looking for a mer, she’d yet to ever even see one. The girls, Oceanqua, directions had been vague, confused, scared, and all around useless. Which could make things easier since it she could say she never found the mer but the Biqaj had to try, the memory of the girls glowing eyes hard to disappoint, even if this would likely end in failure.

Her first stop had been the beach, gazing at the mishmash town of what looked like a shipwrecked roped together to form a town, but it had given her nothing but its startling red sands. Korva had almost been used to the shocking green, like false grass, sands of Scalvoris town that she’d forgotten how many colors Scalvoris supposedly had. Idly she’d made a mental note to circle the island at some point and collect some from each part.

But now she couldn’t avoid the town. The woman wasn’t stupid, it wasn’t hard to imagine that she’d find the…rougher sort but that wasn’t what bothered her. It was how like home it could be. Ships on more than docks. More than just the scent of sea and its human sailors for company. It would be how much more like her ships at Na’haer it would seem, how little every frivolity was around, just the basics of a town made of ships.

The dimming light told her it the short days of the cool seasons wouldn’t pay her dallying any favors, forcing her off the beach and straight into town. Of which, she was pleasantly surprised.

“Oy! Who carves?” Korva snatched the nearest passerby

“You new? Everyone, now leggo.”

She did so peaceably, distracted as she moved along, near forgetting why she was there. A mer! She needed to try and find that damned mer, “Oy! You!”

Three people turned, one looked annoyed, one looked like they’d gut her, the other looked vaguely interested. They’d too.

“Ya’ll know mer? Fish people?” She tried in accented Common.

Two said no while the other knew of them but not where they were. All three did mention that only sailors seen mer, they had no reason to come into town. But that only gave the confused Biqaj woman more questions, how on Idalos did mer get on land? She’d only been wanting to find help to find the mer in town. Now she hears they can be in town? Maybe she needed to learn more Common because that sounded wrong. Then again, what did she know? A whole lot of nothing.

With a slight pout at not having an excuse to look at the carvings more Korva headed back to the docks, where her own sloop was. Turns out she would have to bug the sailors.

**Borrowed this template from free to use

[Korva]

*Speaking Rakahi
*Speaking Common

If she was smart Korva would've paid more attention to where her own ship was. If she was smart she would've done more research but Korva wasn't the smartest of sailors. Wasn't much a person for learning or books or any sort of Common sense, because it she was she would've known better than to search a port with the name Diablo, and people who looked more and more like they belonged on a real pirate ships. At some point a smart person would've have stopped asking the more the faces grew wary and suspicious, a smart person would've left. Korva was normal person. Just stupid. So no warnings went off in her head when the shipwright told her he knew someone who could help.

"Thanks! Ain't know how find."

"Sure you don't, missy, people got to help new comers like yourself."

Korva nodded, "Sailors always help sailors."

"Sure they do." She also missed the hard emphasis on they as he led her down the docks of port. Her eyes were too absorbed in the the ships themselves. Gorgeous pieces of work, something she wanted to get her hands on for a real feel, see if they sailed as well as good as they looked. The carver and shipwrights here had to be some of the best she'd seen, and she'd live in Na'haer for years! "Here we are!"

As he brought them to a stop, she could see the end of an empty dock, “Is always empty?”

“This one and a few others.” He said casually as he dropped a few coins in the water. They rippled and twinkled. He squatted by the edge, motioning for her to do the same.

“We wait?” The woman asked as she bent closer, eyes curious and excited on water, waiting to see an elusive mer.

“Nope.” He replied right before pushing her hard in the back to send her flying off the dock. There was no chance for her to gasp or cry out. Her eyes stayed wide open in surprise as something—someone—surged up to meet her under the water. Through blurring colors of light, brown, sky through the water, blurred and strange hands the color of seaweed wrapped around her wrists. As the salt water slide down her throat, those hands dragging her down farther and farther.

The Biqaj woman wanted to struggle but her body was too busy fighting the water slipping into her lungs, still in shock at her own moronic ideas, though she would likely drown it was strangely the farthest worry from her mind.

**Borrowed this template from free to use

[Korva]

*Speaking Rakahi
*Speaking Common


The first thing Korva did when she hit the surface was see colors she thought her eyes could only make, right before she threw up a rainbow of breakfast. She managed to try and drag herself half on shore, thinking the creature had finally been done with her or through her dead and a face slithered up between her legs, head resting on her waist. A smug, self-satisfied smile was on its grey face, its teeth flashing in the light, reflecting too harshly on her eyes. Exhausted Korva let her head fall back, lights flashing behind her closed eyes. Well, she had wanted to met a mer. That was a plus.

“Why ain’t…I dead?” The woman finally gasped out when it no longer felt like she’d vomit but instead of a response there was a strange, angry, antagonistic feelings rearing up that were not her own. Faint colors that usually only reflection her her eyes rang in her mind along with the simplistic smug words of the Mer. It made her already building headache throb angrily, pulsing so hard she almost missed the slippery words.

“I no eat junk food.”

The excitement for seeing one died down at that, if she could call it excitement, more like an adrenaline crash. "Then why didn't ya drown me, isn't that what he paid ya for?"

It made sense now, and the Biqaj felt a flare of shame mingled with a hot, hateful rush of anger she hadn't felt in a long time. If she saw the slime bastard again--

"I no want to..." It's smile widened, more threatening than before, "yet."

"Great." The Biqaj muttered tiredly before she remembered the necklace, might as well try because she wasn't dead yet, opening her eyes she took in the strange lack of hair, sharp talons and the shining locket and almost laughed aloud. The damn thing was playing her but how it knew what she wanted, she wasn't sure. The thought, not the slowest of her realizations for the day, makes her refrain from anything else, wincing as her head once more is plagued with thoughts, like a knife slicing its way into her brain. It was curious, annoyed, and hungry. Of course it was hungry, the woman thought in mild amusement, fish were always hungry, "How are ya making me get...feelings?"

It was all she had for lack of better word, "Is cousins, is sending, cousins is too stupid to hear it."

"Thanks." Korva said drily, licking her lips, knowing she'd regret asking, "Since we're cousins, ya gonna gimme the locket or ya gonna keep playing games, fish?"

There was delighted laugh that sounded astoundingly like burbling brooks before her legs were yanked, pulling her closer to the mer. Dragging her back to the water until there were chest to chest, eye to eye with the only thing keeping her from drowning was the mers hands on her waist.

"Why? Girls give, they say you can take but you no take cousin, you drown."

"I can't give ya something else!" Korva said, nerves beginning to creep into her voice straining to keep her gaze locked on the mer and not let her catch the lie for what it was. Panic. Complete panic.

“Why no just drown? End problem.”

“I’ll owe ya.” The Biqaj bargained through her teeth, forcibly calming her voice in response to the mers smug tone.

“Owe?” The mer smiled even wide, all teeth, like a shark to match the tail she could see flicking idly behind it like a content cat as the hands squeezed in warning along Korvas side. A short lived warning right before the burn of its nail, an instant, painful grip that pinned her in place like a speared deer. Her instinct was to shriek, to squirm away but the moment she did the claws of the mer were likely to rend the flesh from sides than release her. "Why owe? Just drown now."

“Then ya wouldn’t find the bigger necklace!”

“Big?” The mer asked curiously, gripe loosening just enough to to stay burningly painful but not as if she were about to be torn to shreds.

“Yeah, big. Way bigger.”

“Where?”

“I ain’t stupid fish, ain’t telling ya till ya give me the necklace.”

“You can be lying. Humans lie.”

“Those girls didn’t lie, ya did! And ya ain’t gonna know so pick, fish.” Korva said as sternly as possible, wishing she was farther up shore and not waist deep in water for once. “On U’frek I’ll get ya want ya want! But ya gotta give me the necklace.”

“Your Immortal is nothing for me.”

“I ain’t gonna use his name for lying, either ya drown me or ya trust me.” Those fingers bit in farther again the disappearing as the mer cocked her head, seeming to come to a decision as her eyes scanned her over. The Biqaj was pretty sure it was about to bite her when the fingers loosened far enough to make her gasp as she slipped farther down, feeling the blood flow from them now that realized how truly deep the mers nails had been. Farther into the water she slid, hands working too late to scale for ground to heave herself back up, the mers face--grinning again--surging up to probably bite off her face but ended up by her ear instead, hissing into it dangerously as salt water slid down her throat.

“Won’t drown you yet. Will find you. Can’t hide in seas, they are mine. Will find. You will owe cousin, and you will pay or I will drown you and yours.”

When it finished it gave her no time to catch her breath or spit out the water before it turned tail, grabbing her legs again and dragging her under. This time she just let the water in, sure whether by accident or on purpose she was about to drown before taloned hands shoved her on a hard surface, something cool and hard being pressed into her fingers. The splash echoing around her and silence said from a the whispers of people and trudge of feet telling her she was finally free of the mer. Again Korva found herself vomiting and sputtering, though thankfully this time on a minutely familiar deck. As she drew herself shakily to her knees more vomit rising but only the remains of heaving escaping with the dribble of water from her lips a familiar voice called out.

“Have fun, girlie? Surprised your back, didn't think you would be.”

It was several beats before Korva responded, on wobbly limbs she finally stood, brushing her hair out of her face a smile painted on her lips though her eyes swirled dangerously, “‘Course I did, ain’t swam with mer a’fore, new and exciting. Learned how they drown all ‘em sailors, just like you.”

The words were bland but she seen the sailors eyes narrow, assessing if she was going to attack him. Though her grip around the necklace was tight, angry, she didn’t do anything but widen the curve of her lips, forcibly relaxing her own stance as he laughed then walked off. “U’frek, if it ever came to that, you’d never get that ones body. But dead people ain't gonna learn.”

He'd get his. Korva would make sure of that. But for now she had a damned necklace to get back to a kid.

**Borrowed this template from free to use

[Korva]

110th of Vhalar, 718 (Scalvoris)
*Speaking Rakahi
*Speaking Common

Probably would’ve been a better idea to come straight back rather than worry the kid she was dead but she needed a break, and a closer look at the carvings, and maybe, just maybe she worried U’frek wouldn’t do anything if the mer did decide to drag her off her boat and into the water. Still, an lap full of half-crying kid was not what she expected when she’d cozied up in the tavern, showing off her ‘shark bite’, “Hey kiddo—“

“Yer back!” Thine arms wrapped around her waist, they pressed into her side painfully but aside from the strained smile Korva said nothing just returned the hug. The Biqaj woman hadn’t realize how much she missed these, how much she wanted small arms wrapped around in thanks. The smile softened at the edges, even if the pain didn’t quite discolor her eyes. Fondly she ran fingers through the girls hair. Her half-disbelieving audience scooting away or waiting with impatient gazes until she finished.

“‘Course I am, said I’d get it for ya, didn’t I?”

“I knew ya would! Told everyone the best fighter I knew was getting it for me! The other kids said I was lyin’!”

“Ya a liar? Never! Ya tell ‘em to come to me if they needing some proof.” Holding her at arms length she gave her a mischievous smile that the girl returned before the woman reach around her neck to unclip the locket. She’d been leaving it on until she seen the kid again to give it to her, “Now don’t ya be going making deal with no mer pirates, ya hear? Go fish for a pearl yerself.”

“Yes ma’am.” The girl gave a little salute, squealing in delight before running off. Korva shook her head fondly, ready to continue her tale when the girl came running back in, a small group of kids with her. “See! I told ya! Look! Kaminas gonna tell us how she got it back! Right?”

Well, she couldn’t say no to that face, with a little cough she jerked her head to the table, surprised but not unhappy when the girl sat herself in Korvas lap, “I was just telling ‘em here how I had to fight a shark to find the mer—“

“No ya were—“

“‘Course I was, yer drink just made ya forget.”

“Ya said it was fishing—“

“I did, fishing for locket treasure, she can tell ya, was a special mission, weren’t it?”

“Yeah! Kamina knows magic and fighting, she never loses!”

“That’s right!” Korva said in amusement, “Now, I was saying the shark was big as my sloop! Bigger even, ya never know under water, and that mer was using it like a hunting dog. Nasty thing with all ‘em teeth…”

A few patrons moved from the table, clearly done now that they figured her lies, drunker patrons or less disbelieving—like the kids—stayed till the end of her story, a mix of lies and truths that no one had called her on yet.

**Borrowed this template from free to use

[Alistair]

Korva

Knowledges
Discipline: Not screaming when in pain
Swimming: Holding your breath when unprepared
Detection: Figuring out when someone is playing you
Negotiation: Bribery as a bargaining chip
Storytelling: Uses injuries to embellish stories
Storytelling: Mixing truth with lies

Racial: Mer
Racial (Mer): Have sharp teeth
Racial (Mer): Have telepathy?
Korva: Owes a Mer a debt
Korva: Wants revenge on dock worker who threw her to the mer
Location: Almund
Location (Almund): Has carvings on all buildings
Location (Almund): Shady town

Loot: +1 Locket
Injuries: Gashes along both ribs, an inch deep - these will remain open for around 2 trials, and will not recover until 14 trials later naturally. The nausea from sea sickness will recover in around 4 trials.
Renown: +10

Points 10

Comments: This was such a complete story, with so much happening yet it was so natural and smooth during each transition. I feel like I just dove into the world of Korva - this was a highly immersive thread. Really appreciate your detailed writing, the skillful way you portrayed the dialect, and the maritime events! Great job and enjoy your rewards.

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