[Aiden]

In the end, they'd left Beni's house without a word to the sleeping healer. The skies were only just brightening with dawn as Aiden glanced out through the blinds and Maaike waited at the door in preparation for her morning jog. The female therian was a mere shadow along the street when she slinked onto the streets, and by the time the patrolling guards recognized Maaike's face and started to chase her, she was already halfway up the nearest building. As he heard more guards gathering and shouting after the running therian, Aiden whispered a word of prayer to Xanth for Maaike's safety. This idea was crazy, and he owed her big time for the favor she was doing for him.

When he thought the noise had gathered and faded sufficiently, Aiden slipped out of their hiding spot and travelled toward the opposite direction of Maaike. His body protested at first as he lurked along the shadows of walls, but the pain dulled out as his body warmed from movement and he became increasingly focused on his surroundings.

And so, with his heart pounding with dread and adrenaline, Aiden stalked along streets and alleys, hugged shadows, and used whatever he could to hide and re-check his surroundings. By luck, Aiden encountered a group of fishermen heading toward the Marina to gather their boats. Mingling at the edge of their group, he crossed the bridge safely and navigated the smaller streets afterward. He knew that the West Road would be heavily patrolled, and that there would be guards posted along the minor branching streets. There had been one close call when Aiden turned the corner of a street and saw a Guard only a few meters away. However, the Guard's back had been turned toward him, and Aiden quickly escaped the street.

By the time he reached the portal, it was bustling with the morning's tourists and merchants setting up their stalls. Even though the Guard's force was heavier than usual, there couldn't have been a better time for escape. The Guards were looking closely at everybody who walked near the portals though. Hidden among a stack of crates, Aiden shifted painstakingly into his cat form. As a covered wagon travelled close to the crates on its way toward the portals, Aiden hopped in for part of the ride, with Maaike's COM clutched firmly in his jaws, before making a mad dash into the purple light.

He was already low on energy, and once he reached the port town of Espur, Aiden found the cat form too difficult to hold. Muscles twisting and bones popping, he unwilling reverted to his human form. The second shift had taken just about the last reserves of Aiden's
energy for the day, but he still plowed through the maze of side streets and away from the portals before contacting Graeme Easom. Graeme had been thoroughly surprised to hear a stranger on Maaike's phone, and for a panicked moment, Aiden nearly thought that Graeme would end the call. Thankfully, "Sammy" went through to Graeme, and the man agreed upon a meeting site.

As Aiden waited on a bench near a small toy store, he bent forward and held his hand toward his forehead, as if he was nursing a hangover or a headache. The bruises on his face made him less recognizable, but they also drew attention.

[NPC]

(Graeme Easom played by Emma)

Maaike had drilled safety precautions into Graeme until they were both blue in the face, but she had always kept her hunting separate from Greenview and the business he managed. In fact, while in name he may only be her steward, she trusted him completely. After the many failures that had put him squarely in Ashton Dyer's pocket and cost him both his family and his own business, Graeme had been so pleased to be given a second chance he would have done anything for the Therian.

That included protecting her son, so to say he was "surprised" when he received the call -- from Maaike's own COM, no less -- was probably the understatement of the century. He wasn't sure what to make of it. Maaike would sooner die than give away Sammy's existence. She had mentioned working with a Therian guard up in Alexandria, but she hadn't given him details (a way of protecting both Graeme and the guard) and that didn't explain how this person got hold of her COM.

Fearing that she had been tortured or scanned by a telepath, Graeme was reluctant to leave the estate, but the mere mention of Maaike's son made him think the call could be legitimate. If it was, and she had sent a friend in need to him, he couldn't very well ignore it. Besides, while he was not a fighter, he couldn't leave things alone if there was even a chance she had been captured. At the very least, she would want him to know so he could make sure Sammy was safe...

He was late to the agreed meeting place because of his doubts, though only by ten minutes. He continuously scanned his surroundings, paranoia etched across his aging features as he approached a tall man folded onto a bench. “Are... Are you...?” Graeme flinched, looked around nervously, and took a step closer so he could whisper, “... Roy?”

[Aiden]

After the call, Aiden waited a while for Graeme to appear. Since the attack, he'd barely had time to think things over—he pretty much had to start running after he regained consciousness. So while Aiden rested his elbows on his knees and stared at the ground, he thought about the Guard and what could have possibily happened that they would turn on him like they had. Originally, Renna and her accomplices had left Aiden for dead in the alleyways. She'd then framed him for something that he didn't do, which pretty much led to a mass dispatch of Guards into all the corners of New Alexandria. She would've expected the Guard to find a body by now, and now that they didn't—they'd know that he survived.

Which led him to think about his family. Nathan and Estelle were both listed as emergency contacts, per Guard protocol, so the Guard would use them to track Aiden down. Thus, immediately after settling at bench of the toy store, Aiden sent warning messages to all of his siblings. They'd no doubt worry about his situation, for which he was very sorry about. Even after sending out his four text messages, Aiden looked around to see that Graeme had still not arrived. Yawning, Aiden tried to rub the fatigue from his face as he leaned forward to partially rest his face in his palms. Very soon, he heard footsteps approach the bench, and he tensed.

The speaker was middle-aged with greying hair. He looked like somebody who had encountered many things in his world, and he seemed nervous. But that was okay because Aiden was scared as Hel too. “Yes,” responded Aiden, and his legs shook achingly as he stood. “Thank you for coming.”

[NPC]

Graeme's relief was obvious; his shoulders and his spine sagged briefly, before his paranoia straightened them back out. “We should go.” He held out a hand to help the man to his feet. There were faint traces of bruises around his eyes, nose and chin, so he thought perhaps the man had been beaten. It could only be recently, too, else why heal naturally when there were healers in every city neighbourhood? Unless he was too poor to afford one, or he for some reason couldn't approach a member of the Coalition.

Graeme rubbed his temples. His mind was going in circles, trying to find reasons to both trust and not trust this man who claimed to have been sent by Maaike, who knew Sammy's name. He was getting a headache from it all. “This way. Can you walk? It... It's quite far from here.” The estate was on the northern outskirts of the port city, sandwiched between the safety of the regular patrols and the privacy of the wildlands. That was partially why Maaike had opted to stay there rather than selling the place to be rid of the bad memories. Graeme was sure the other reason was to torture herself.

As they moved, Graeme surveyed the man surreptitiously. The uniform alone was enough to tell him that this was an Alexandrian Guardsman, in the very least. The chances of him having Maaike's COM and not be working with or for her were slimmer now, so he felt more comfortable leading Roy to Greenview. “When will Maaike be coming home?”

[Aiden]

Gratitude was evident in Aiden's expression as he grasped Graeme's extended hand. Wobbling slightly as he became steady, Aiden tried to ignore the ache in his side. He still felt like a taroch had trampled over him and the morning job from Alexandria had only drained more of his energy. Thinking back to the escape and how he'd last seen Maaike tailed by a team of Guards, Aiden's frowned slightly at the memory. Dear Xanth, I'm sorry I haven't prayed all that often, but please help Maaike stay safe. When this whole ordeal was over, he'd return to Xanth's Statue with offerings.

“I can walk,” he said quietly to Graeme. He had to walk. There was no other way but to go forward. He was fatigued, hungry, and thirsty all at once, but he hid it as best as he could while Maaike's friend led him toward their destination. Aiden wished that he had a hat on so he could tilt it forward and hide more of his face. The bruises drew attention as they walked, and the uniform made him even more out of place in Espur. The navy-blue uniform pants and dark leather boots would have been easily recognizable to anyone who has met one of Alexandria's Guard. At least he was only wearing a simple white shirt on top—his jacket having been torn and bloodied by a vicious vampire hours ago.

Graeme was assessing him, too. Aiden realized that by the way the older man glanced toward him from time to time. Sometimes Graeme seemed confused by Aiden's presence, and he seemed cautious at another time. Aiden tried to lighten the mood by nodding occasionally at Graeme to show that he was okay. The man was already so helpful for coming to help him, so Aiden wanted to spare the man some anxiety.

His bruises throbbed with the constant motion, and Aiden tried not to think about his still-healing wounds by focusing instead on placing one foot in front of the other foot. The therian was growing tired and in his occasionally foggier moments, he began to stagger.

“When will Maaike be coming home?”

Maaike lived in an estate? Hearing Graeme's question as they passed through a system of alleys, Aiden's mind became clearer, and his lips thinned with worry for the woman. It was only polite to offer as much detail to his helper, so he responded, “She said she'd meet us at the estate once things cooled down with the guards. We've been avoiding them all morning.” He tried to keep the uncertainty out of his voice, but he knew it was there when he spoke. His breath felt stifled just at the thought of Maaike's whereabouts. What if she was still stuck in Alexshire, hiding and waiting for a chance to fly to the portals? If that were the case, Aiden would go back for her—no question about it.

[NPC]

(I was really tempted to post Xanth with a single word: "No." Does that make me evil or a sadist? )

Graeme blinked in confusion. “Wait, I thought... Aren't you a guard yourself?” He stopped walking to look at Roy in growing horror and fear, wondering if perhaps he had made an error in judgement. The trousers the other man wore were clearly those of the Alexandrian Guard, but he wasn't wearing the jacket with the emblem. Perhaps he had actually stolen the trousers and boots and was not a guard at all!

Jostled by a passing Anyeli's wings, Graeme gasped, and then edged away from the tall man. Suddenly, Roy's size seemed overly threatening despite his obvious discomfort. Graeme was working up to an all-out flee, but two words caught his attention and froze him on the spot. "The estate". It was possible Roy knew that the same way he knew about Sammy, through torturing the poor Therian, but Maaike rarely called it "the estate". She hated the place because it was the embodiment of everything she had suffered at Ashton Dyer's hands, but it was also the only home they had. Selling right after Ashton's death would have been suspicious, and it had taken so long for the paperwork to go through anyway. After that, Maaike had been so focused on her hunting that the subject of moving hadn't been broached again, but she rarely called it "home", instead referring to it with derogatory names like "the mausoleum". Graeme thought that was partly to help mask where she lived: If she gave it a cryptic nickname, then no one eavesdropping could know, just from listening, that Greenview was an estate. For the same reason, she rarely spoke the estate's given name, so for Aiden Roy to know she lived on an estate...

And again with the mental circles.

Setting off again, and turning left, Graeme asked, “Wh... Why are you avoiding your own people?” It was more obvious a question than he would have liked, but he was no good at this cloak and dagger stuff.

[Aiden]

((Both! But oooh that would have been hilarious. Well not for Aiden or Graeme but you know.))

Even if Maaike had been captured, there was no way to tell if she had, or where the Guard would keep her. He was afraid to even think about the possibilities of Maaike bumping into Renna. As he kept walking, he realized that Graeme had suddenly stopped. Halting in the same manner, Aiden looked in concern at Graeme's sudden wariness. From the way the human was looking at him, Aiden knew that he had said something wrong. As Graeme edged away, Aiden stepped forward worriedly. “Yes, I'm a guard.” Or was he a guard if he'd been abandoned by his own? His expression grew conflicted with uncertainty that was soon overruled by anxiety as the distance widened between him and Graeme. “No wait!”

The human was suspicious of him, and Aiden couldn't blame him for that. He claimed to be a guard, but was on the run from them. He claimed to know Maaike, but couldn't say where she was. The only thing keeping Graeme here were Maaike's safe words. “Has Maaike told you anything about me?” Aiden asked carefully. Maaike was so secretive that Aiden didn't know who she worked with, or who were her friends, if she had any. He thought she knew a Finbar once, and that turned up to be a ring.

He didn't know how close Graeme was with Maaike, either. Did Graeme know that Maaike had a bounty in Alexandria? Would Graeme abandon the both of them if he knew that the guards were also after Maaike? Graeme did not trust Aiden, and although Aiden had to depend on the human, the distrust was mutual. With hesitation, Aiden continued, “Has Maaike told you anything about me?” After some hesitation, he decided that it was safest to be vague. “I know something that the higher-ups don't want me to know.”

[NPC]

Graeme shook his head almost continuously, having stepped back and jerked his arm away from Aiden for fear of the larger man trying to grab him. When Roy asked again if Maaike had said anything about him, Graeme didn't know whether to be more or less alarmed. This guy could be worried Maaike knew too much about his sly operations for all Graeme knew, rather than trying to assuage his fears.

“I — That. What do you know?” If Graeme had been starting to trust the man, they had just taken a step backwards but it wasn't a total loss. There were reasons to believe Roy, or else the human would have already fled, but it was so hard to know who to trust. Ashton's abuse had affected more than just his wife and son, and Graeme was not exactly the brave type to begin with. Maaike's side job had never touched him before, aside from the occasional instance where they'd been walking down a street and she'd darted off after a bounty she'd just spotted, so he had no idea how to respond to this situation despite her lectures. And she was such a young thing, he worried constantly when she was away from home, but she flatly refused to cave in to anyone now, even when they had only her best interests at heart.

This wasn't good for his nerves.

“I-if you're who I think you are, answer a question: If Maaike needs to contact you, how does she do it?” She had mentioned once, when he'd commented almost in passing that it must be difficult to get organised against the criminal underworld and to communicate with her informants when she couldn't know who to trust, that she had her ways. She hadn't gone into much detail, but she had mentioned leaving notes in the guard's windowsill. She seemed to get a kick out of the cloak and dagger stuff, actually, and if this was really the guard working with her, then surely he'd know the answer.

[Aiden]

If anything, Aiden's last question worsened things further as the elder's eyes darted with alarm from Aiden and toward the streets, no doubt looking for a fast escape. No, no don't... The therian had had his fill of running for the day, no, for the week, and he feared the older man might outrun him if it came to a race. This conversation wasn't good for either of their nerves, but it could still be saved as long as the man was willing to talk.

“My windowsill,” Aiden blurted quickly, “she doesnt trust mailboxes or COMs.” They'd used that method from the beginning. Occasionally, she'd leave a note and a bounty on the doorstep of the guardtower, but that was more to tease Aiden than to provide any real information. He'd recently gotten Maaike's COM number too, but they never really used COMs except for texting smalltalk. Even then, he used a false name for her caller ID, and had no doubt that he was a "Bob" or "Jacob" or "Whatever" on her COM too. There was too much risk of one of them losing their COM, or having it fall out during a run, so it hadn't been their main line of contact until very recently.

How long have they stood on the street? They needed to move, and the anxiety and desperation became plain in Aiden's face. “Please, can we keep going?”

[NPC]

Graeme deflated. “Windowsill. Yeah. Okay.” It was as simple as that. There were a million and one things the guard who knew too much could have said. The chances of him hitting on the right one were so slim, Graeme didn't even consider that he might just have gotten lucky. And even if Maaike had been tortured, the odds were against anyone thinking to ask her something like that.

“C'mon.” Still stressed and nervous, Graeme led the younger man through Espur's streets. Having lived there most of his life, he was familiar enough with the watch patrols that he managed to avoid them, but he chewed on his thumbnail all the way along the main road that would lead them to Nubia, eventually, if they kept going. He only relaxed when they reached the quiet, spacier tracks that led out to the farms and the more "private" mansions like Greenview.

The estate was a little less ostentatious and a little more secure than it had been in Ashton's day. Though Maaike's money was tied up in assets, they had managed to divert some of it shoring up the mansion's defences. Maaike worried about all sorts of things Graeme wouldn't even consider and wanted her staff to be safe in her absence. As a result, the large windows now had thick wooden shutters and the conifers that formed the perimeter had been lashed together with metal spikes. Such measures wouldn't stop a gang of bandits if they really wanted in, but they would at least buy the skeleton staff some time to hide in Ashton's office, which had already been the most secure part of the house and that had since been retrofitted with a much thicker ravenwood door and a mini armoury.

Graeme now suspected these things were not in the event of a bandit attack, after all, but in case the guards ever came for a visit. Maaike, love, what have you done? She had probably bitten off far more than she could chew, but Graeme's loyalty remained intact. She had saved him and given him a second chance. That was all that mattered.

“This way.” Patting the butler on the shoulder as they passed through the main entrance, Graeme led Aiden to the reception room in the south wing where the formal decor Ashton preferred had been left intact. He'd let Maaike decide what to do with the overgrown guard from there.

OOC: I think we should start a new thread in Character Housing for when Maaike gets home. ^^ Graeme would have seated him in the parlour and stayed with him to try for some nervous small talk (rather than leave him alone), and the butler (I need to figure out that guy's name...) would have offered him food and drink. It shouldn't be more than 30 minutes before Maaike gets home, though. Do you want to start or should I have Maaike walk in to find them chatting away or something?

[Maaike]

OOC// Set 30 minutes after Safe as Houses on the 8th of June.

Maaike had underestimated the drive of Aiden's work buddies to find him. Even when she'd managed to lose the ones following her, she had to take such a circuitous route to the portal that she was beginning to think she may as well just walk to Espur. When she finally arrived at Greenview, she was cupping her elbow in an effort to soothe the sting of a graze she'd earned from mis-timing a jump.

Ian greeted her with a frown. The butler's pressed slacks and crisp white shirt weren't nearly as formal as the suit he had worn when serving Ashton, and the sour look that had always pinched his face back then had gradually smoothed out. “Maaike, there is a dirty young man in the reception room.”

Maaike waggled her eyebrows. “How do you know he's dirty?”

Ian huffed, opened his mouth to say something more, then caught sight of her own dirt. “Dear Xanth, how did you get into such a state?” He flapped about as if this was the first time he'd seen her injured or scuffed up. “I'll pour a bath for you and ask Anabel to make you a warm meal. You look like you've been swimming in the Ao.”

“The Cora, if we're being exact.” Maaike patted him on the shoulder as she passed, unknowingly mirroring Graeme's gesture from earlier. “But you don't have to do that. I'll run one myself later. I need to check in with Graeme first.” She was worried that the human's nerves might have gotten the better of him, and she wanted to make sure that Aiden had made it to the estate intact. Or as intact as he'd been when they parted ways, at least.

She headed for the reception room at a steady clip, trailing a bit of river mud that Ian tutted over, but slowed down when she heard voices. Aiden must have earned her business manager's trust; the human was being quite chatty. “— and he was just so surprised that a girl had not only caught him in the act but tied him up before he could escape that I nearly killed myself laughing.”

Grinning, Maaike leaned against the door jamb and crossed her arms over her chest. “Honestly. I chase across the city with a bunch of monkeys on my tail so you can get clear and then I find you here sipping tea like it's a Sunday afternoon. Didja miss me, Sweet Cheeks?”