Who: Nic Santoro and Gideon Foster
What: Retribution for the Masquerade; the Library closes down the Market (beginnings of a war)
Where: The Market grounds
When: Backdated to the seventeenth, early morning.
Status: Ongoing.
Mornings in mid-winter were bright; cold clarity and early industriousness and the Market grounds were clustered crowds and the ongoing scuttle and movement of men and women who put the Market together deftly and quickly each time the Market rolled back into town, sprawling, yawning beast that she was. With it, Market brought spices and sins, the far-off tastes of places whose names required languages long forgotten, with it, Market brought the quelled sensation of absence, of something missing. Nic Santoro, who'd spent night with the restlessness of one who could not put aside concerns for the handful of hours that constituted 'rest' was pacing borders, overseeing wards re-painted blood-bright on walls and across Market-consecrated ground -- the ministrations and preparations of a week of barter and sell, of hands passing across Market-sanctified point of being and reconnecting.
Marion (prowling; stillness came easily to her but so did the fluid threat of what might happen if she stood in absence of movement, he'd noticed the fear in eyes as she passed by with the cool admiration of a possession that did as it ought to) was marking boundaries, setting up meetings, acting barrier to all the tiresome concerns of those that did not merit meeting with
Merchant so much as subordinates and it was her who'd put coffee into his hands on meeting him without so much as greeting - cutting to the quick of what was necessary and business-like, rapid-quiet tone and distilled knowledge of what occurred in his absence. It was Marion whose job it was to play second, and squinting across in too-sharp sunshine, it was Marion whose name came first when Nic noticed the phalanx of sober-clad men clustered up against Market-drawn line in the sand.
The Library belled out, sent its messengers down to Market ground even as the tents unfurled, the banners began to bloom against sky blue enough to be lapis lazuli brought home from Egypt. Nic walked quick, walked quiet, took steps toward boundary line and waited there like tiger yawning behind cage's bars.
"Foster," he said pleasantly, like silk over acid, "I'm afraid we're not open yet."
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