Missed Steps and Pitfalls

[adi]

Hrothgar woke up fairly quickly as he usually did, though the process was hastened by disorientation. This was clearly not a bed he was laying upon, he was outside. Why was he outside? That is right, they were in... city. He'd remember it soon enough. What was his head resting on? This was not his bag, it was-- oh.

The scholar sat up quickly and sheepishly, wiping his mouth self-consciously with the back of his hand. The last thing he needed was to have drooled like some incontinent old man. Though, he reflected as he rummaged around for his satchel, he would have been mortified weeks ago to be found in such a position. He was just happy to have gotten some rest. He scribbled out the fleeting details of the night's dream in his journal, and set to waking up properly.

After a few moments of trying to organize his disheveled appearance (though a makeshift comb of one's fingers can only do so much), Hrothgar surveyed the park he collapsed in. He left his satchel tucked next to her hip, but was careful not to stray too far from her in case he was needed. Instead he meandered and observed the park, heading towards the exit. If anything, he could try to get wind from the rumor mill from those gathering just outside. When he reached the group of bums, he waved hesitantly and greeted them politely.

[Nayt]

Kei remained sleeping even after Hrothgar got up and reintroduced himself to the notion of being conscious to the world around him. She'd had a hard time getting to sleep last night and was probably going to be out of it for another hour or two, at least.

The homeless crew comprised something of a small family. There was an esteemed older gentleman, a noble and learned lady, and a son that didn't know the difference between a cricket and a grasshopper-- only that they were mutually decent sources of nutrients and were to be hunted when summer allowed for it.

The esteemed gentleman wore a tarnished overcoat and grew a poorly trimmed beard to match his half-way balding head. The lady by his side was in roughly the same condition, tattered overcoat, poorly trimmed beard, half balding head, and the whole eleven and a half yards. The both of them were missing several teeth, though the gentleman didn't seem to mind flashing a toothy smile at Hrothgar. The young boy between the lady and gentleman seemed to be the most average of the three of them.

"G'mornin', fine sir," the gentleman said.

He spoke with the same brand of esteem that a noble knight or lord would have. If it were possible to ignore his drab appearance and focus only on his speech-- and the rather pristine looking ivory cane sitting in his lap --then one might even confuse him to be a courtier of some brand.

"Not from around here, are you?" he deduced rather quickly.

[adi]

"Salutations," Hrothgar nodded, taking a moment to soak in the absurdity of it all. The scholar was in a decidedly chipper mood, so much that he could not hide a smile and jovial tone. He couldn't say that he had expected any of the past few days to ever happen to him, but somehow this took the cake. The sheer fact that he was talking civilly with hobos seemed to tip the situation over whatever his limit of trying to deal with it all (while maintaining some guise of sanity) had been reduced to.

"You would be correct in that assumption, sir," the scholar admitted. He exhibited all the manners he would have shown when conversing with his father's business partners. It seemed wrong not to-- whatever higher class Hrothgar had maintained was disregarded in front of this mostly toothless family. Even if he did insist, it would get him nowhere as no one would believe him. Besides that, he supposed that such a family deserved some amount of respect-- they survived with much less than he had and could still smile despite it. Hrothgar bowed ever so slightly and hold out his hand to shake as he introduced himself by only his last name.

"I apologize most sincerely if my companion and I are intruding on any sort of organization you and your family may have established, sir," he continued, "We have had a very tiring few days. If ventures go as well as I pray they do, we shouldn't be a thorn in your side for very much longer."

[Nayt]

"Why! It's certainly fine, young sir!" the woman exclaimed cheerily. It seemed the fact that Horthgar was so willing to formally come to them like this had put her in great spirits.

"Our land is a free land," the man smiled toothlessly.

The man stood from his seated position to meet Hrothgar eye-to-eye. The woman did the same. The boy reluctantly got up and shuffled to stand behind the man and woman. He was young, but he was just as dirty and poor as the two he was hanging around. There didn't appear to be any family resemblance, however.

"Allow me to introduce myself," the man half-bowed regally, "I am the Duke of Antigahn, and this fine lady is my wife, the Duchess of Antigahn."

The woman curtsied.

In any materialistic society, such a thing would be utterly unheard of. A bold-faced lie. But the way these folk carried themselves, it was as if it were genuinely true or, at the very least, they sincerely believed what they were saying.

"And this young lad is our Paige," the Duke of Antigahn said as he set his hand upon the boy's head. The boy scrunched his nose disapprovingly. "He's a scrappy young fellow, but I know he'll make a glorious knight one day."

[adi]

"It is a great pleasure to meet all of you," Hrothgar insisted.

Hrothgar scratched side of his nose thoughtfully with a hint of a smile at his lips, looking much more rascal than he had any right to be. He crouched down and even offered his hand to the young boy genially, complimenting him and saying that he looked as though they boy didn't even have potential to be a knight, it was clear on his face that he simply was going to be a great knight. No questions asked. If he was even the slightest bit untruthful in that statement, it was hard to tell. His amusement at his own situation coated his every word and made him much more amicable then the past few days should have made him.

"As a man and women with status as high as yourselves, surely you are one of the first to hear rumors and great goings on involving the security of your fine city. I must ask, if you have heard any rumors regarding any trouble last night regarding an injured young man brought to the gates?"

Hrothgar postured humbly, aware of how suspicious his knowledge after arriving would make him appear. But if he couldn't gather any scrap of objective information from the Duke and his family, then he wouldn't know where else to begin. He did not wish to deal again with Hollis. He knew, as objective as the scarred man tried to be, his duties to protect the city would still overshadow any glimmer of innocence he thought the three scholars might have.

[Nayt]

The Paige scrunched his nose again, this time at Hrothgar. It seemed to be his default expression of displeasure, but despite that, he still reached out to take and shake Hrothgar's hand. It was about as polite as he wanted to be right now, it seemed.

"Ah, well, if information is what you're looking for, you've come to the right place!" the Duke of Antigahn said cheerily, "I make it my place to know the goings on of my people. Including that boy who was brought in from the outside, long after sundown."

"Oh yes, that boy. It's a shame he was so bad off!" the Duke's wife exclaimed.

"I certainly hope he'll be all right," the Duke thought aloud before anything else.

"I, too."

Well, they were at least a friendly pair of homeless folk, regardless of a relative sort of insanity that would probably become progressively more and more convincing as time went on . . .

[adi]

"So you have heard news of him?" Hrothgar asked, eager to hear of any news of how Aiden was doing. His previous hesitations in alerting the homeless trio to his role in the previous night's escapades were washed away. Even if they were to spread the information around, they were very clearly off-kilter and their words would be taken with quite a few grains of salt.

"Has there been any news at all about Ai-- the boy's health?" Hrothgar stammered. As sure as he was that these three would be ignored by the general populace, he decided it was for the best not to cement himself as part of the situation by revealing he knew Aiden's name. He wanted to avoid going to Hollis until he got some form of presentable. At this point, homeless people recognized him as their own, and that was not a terribly appropriate appearance to present an argument in.

"Or where he is, or in which hospital he is being taken care of?"

[Nayt]

"My, my! With all this energy, I might venture to say you know the boy!" the Duke of Antigahn exclaimed enthusiastically. Far too enthusiastic about this conclusion to use it as an excuse to go ratting Hrothgar out, or something to that effect. Well, not intentionally.

"I guess so," came a sleep voice behind Hrothgar.

It was Kei. She yawned loudly and stretched her arms out wide, almost wide enough to wrap one of her arms around Hrothgar's shoulders as she about passed him. She didn't pass him by, though. Instead, she stopped just behind him and patted him on the shoulder. It was a casual way of telling him to calm down, that she had this covered.

"My friend and I saw the kid being brought into town," she explained for Hrothgar, "Around the time we were being turned down at every inn in the city . . ."

"Ah, yes, many innkeepers in my city greatly overcharge for their services," the Duke nodded with a sad smile.

"Well, uh, anyways . . ." Kei hadn't actually met the Duke yet, only overheard what Hrothgar was saying. The Duke was almost overwhelmingly strange to her. "My friend's just a little concerned, is all . . ."

The Duke of Antigahn nodded in understanding. "From what I've heard, the child is resting in the Antigahn City Clinic. They say he's stable, in fact!"

[adi]

Hrothgar's posture sagged in relief at hearing about Aiden's stability. It felt as if a great wave of guilt had been lifted from his shoulders. Partially. Though he would have to meet again with that captain of the guard in order and confirm his story from the night before, Aiden's was still alive-- and recovering. For once in the past few days, things seemed to be boding well.

"That's good," the freckled man sighed. "I mean, it's always a sad day when young people get hurt." He stepped back and to the side to widen the circle of conversation.

"If it's not too much trouble, could you give us some directions on how to get there?"

[Nayt]

"Why yes, of course," said the Duke smilingly, "I feel it is my duty to know my city's topography like second nature."

"He really does," said the Duke's wife.

The Paige boy scrunched his nose in agreement.

This bunch was stranger and stranger by the second. Kei was beginning to wonder if she hadn't just woken up to find Hroth mingling with the homeless crowd, and if she was, in fact, currently in a dream. She even pinched herself just to tell. Unfortunately, that pinch kind of hurt.

The Duke proceeded to give Hrothgar (and Kei, by extension) directions to the Antigahn City Clinic. It was abhorrently disorienting. It was like this whole city didn't know what a singular main road was. Or maybe it had no city planner? Because these directions were downright psychotic. The Duke suggested that it was less than a mile away from them, but holy-hell-in-a-handbasket, actually getting there required a total of fourteen lefts, twelve rights, and a weird sort of loop-de-loop under the conditions that "if you've reached a culdesac, do a u-turn and reverse the next half of the directions, because you have gone too far!"

[adi]

Hrothgar smiled amicably after the Duke had finished his directions, nodding as though he understood. He hadn't the slightest idea where the hell the man had learned to give directions, but it was certainly the worst place to learn such talents. He shook the man's hand again in parting, wishing the not-so-noble-nobles farewells and well wishes. After collecting his satchel from Kei, the two set off.

The scholar had no more clue as to wear the hospital was than before he had asked for directions. But he had gotten the beginning of the homeless man's ramblings, so at the very least he could exit in the correct direction. For all extents and purposes, he knew the first turn, and as soon as he and Kei had passed it, they could seek out someone for proper assistance.

"What a bunch of characters," Hrothgar chuckled as soon as they had traveled reasonably far out of earshot. His good mood from earlier had only been raised with the news of Aiden's safety. "I hope not everyone in this place gives directions like that."

[Nayt]

"Y-yeah," Kei replied with a nervous scratch of the back of her neck, followed in short by another yawn. Oddly enough, she had slept pretty decently last night. "Weird-- but in a nice way?"

For having a general direction to go off of, Kei and Hrothgar really had a tough time actually getting to the clinic. At first, they were on the right track. Well, sort of. They'd taken a wrong turn at one point, and somehow this led them back to one of the inns that turned them down last night. Kei had to buck up and ask the lady for directions. The lady promptly refused to speak with a potential freeloader. So, then they had to talk to strangers on the street. That went well. They got directions, yes, but they were all reasonably psychotic, and they were all delivered with the same manner of presentation. Kei and Hrothgar would get lost, they'd find a kind soul who'd help them out, and that kind soul would tell them how to get back on the right track-- then reiterate the right track from that point. All the twists and turns and rights and lefts were utterly disorienting, and everyone here seemed so used to it that getting to a place requiring roughly forty five splits in direction was completely normal.

This was incredulously frivolous!

"I'm starting to hate this city," Kei remarked truthfully. She didn't sound explicitly angry or anything. She was just stating a fact, was all. "Way more than the last one."

[adi]

"Oh, I don't know," Hrothgar scratched at his jawline. Two nights without a proper basin to shave at and negligent care before them had left his facial hair a conglomeration of itch. It was irritating, but he was more worried about the acne that had a tendency to form in such conditions. Friendly as the homeless might be around this city, he was not entirely okay with the idea of looking like one.

"Between a shitty set up of roads or coming back to an inn to find your new friend coagulating in a pool of his own blood and on the brinks of death with absolutely no indication as to why---eeeeh," Hrothgar squinched his face up, gesticulating his hands in a mimicry of a scale balance.

"I think I will be okay with walking in circles for a bit, frustrating as it might be." Whatever joviality those hobos had infected Hrothgar with, it seemed as though it would stay for a while. "After all, by the sounds of it, the clinic isn't that far off by now. I bet if we stop looking for it and just keep our eyes open we'll find it."

[Nayt]

"Hm. Point . . ." Kei conceded without a second thought, "Sorry. Probably just the morning talking."

It was a little more than just the morning talking, actually. It'd been a rough few days. Kei had slept pretty well last night, but her back was killing her right now. This much would be obvious, as she leaned forward at one point to try to get some cracks out of it, failed, and proceeded to pat herself on the lower back with a closed fist, as if mimicking an old woman with a mussed up spine.

"Hey, we should find some work, um-- after we find this clinic," Kei said as she straightened up enough to observe the taller structures surrounding them.

This looked like a market sort of district. All the structures around them were two to three stories tall, and the roads were finally beginning to make sense.

"I'd love to sleep on a bed tonight." Kei wasn't one to do much complaining, but her life wasn't often this stressful. She and Hrothgar deserved a nice bed for their efforts.

[adi]

Hrothgar shrugged, pausing and allowing Kei her moment of geriatric imitation. He felt he should thank her for allowing him the use of her lap as a pillow, but it would be a rather awkward thing to say in public. "We could always wait on the clinic visit."

"I mean, it's not like Aiden is going to get up and walk out," he said. Truth be told, Hrothgar was nowhere near eager to speak with Hollis again. He seemed like an honest and fair man, but speaking with him meant that he would have to face the consequences for a panicked decisions-- consequences that he had no way of knowing if they would be in his favor or not. He wanted to run away for a little longer.

"Besides, what reason would the Duke have to lie to us about what he heard about Aiden's condition? We can just keep our eyes out for the clinic while we are working, too. That way we won't waste time that could be spent earning cash looking for something that will probably turn out to be right in front of us the whole time."