fumiya & arielle & rin | right after the explosion | pg
Fumiya was nearby when the explosion reverberated down the street, shaking everything down to its core. He casually raised a hand to signal his bodyguards. “I’m fine,” he said, and they dutifully stepped back, flanking his sides as he walked past the throngs surrounding the tavern to survey the damage. Fire was beginning to engulf the building, and if nothing was done soon, it’d spread to neighboring ones as well.
Uncertainty thrummed through the crowd, and Fumiya stepped forward to address them. “Stay back,” he said, using Stall and Intimidate in tandem. “Guild members will be coming shortly to rescue the people trapped inside and to secure the area. There is no need to,” add to the death toll was not the right turn of phrase, so he opted for, “go in recklessly. Get water or get ready to tend to the people coming out.”
He received a few hesitant nods in reply and others rushed off to follow his instructions, but the majority was still as they watched the uncontrolled flames in horror. At least they were unmoving. “My biwa.” The instrument was handed to him, and he then instructed, “Contain the crowd.” Turning to face the tavern alone, he held his fingers over the strings as a fighter dragged another woman out the door.
Ari heard the song before the roar of fire or the panicked shouts of the crowd. There was something about bardic music that carried it further, at least to the trained ear; she turned to Rin, knitting her brows as she recognized the melody, though she did not know the voice—“I think someone is hurt.”
That was how their dinner plans were derailed, for as they approached the scene, the severity of the situation became apparent quickly. A building was burning, the flames licking at surrounding structures—crammed close together, in this neighborhood—and though she spotted a lone mage or two flinging spells as the conflagration, it appeared that so far, the fire was entirely uncontained.
Ifrit stirred at the back of her mind; she told him sternly, You can not help here, before turning her attention to the bard who stood where the crowd of sooty, dazed people was beginning to gather, singing. Someone came out of the building, carrying a woman half-draped over his shoulders and headed in the bard’s direction. Survivors, then, pulled from the flames.
Ari’s hands were already undoing the clasps of her mandolin case as they approached—she would never volunteer to go in, but neither could she walk by, and this was something she could do while others fought the fire. “I am going to help him,” she told Rin, though her intent was likely obvious as she quickly tightened the strings and tuned; on the next phrase, she joined her voice to his in a higher octave, careful to match his rhythm as exactly as possible so that they would remain synchronized.
As Ari drew toward the flames, Rin became her shadow. She stood one with the crowd as her friend joined the other man in song. Rin didn’t follow; her abilities would be no aid to the others. Instead, she turned her attention to the mass of onlookers.
Some men were herding back the crowd, but it was a mass that kept growing by the second, surging forward and back. They were drawn toward the scene, and repelled by it in equal measure. No one seemed compelled to charge into the building (yet), perhaps sensing correctly that those sorts of heroics should be left to the Fighters Guild. Still, they were in the way, serving as a hindrance to those actually bringing injured parties from the building.
She turned to the man beside her, tall and imposing. He was one of those who was keeping the crowd in place. Rin gestured backward and he nodded, understanding.
“Come on,” she said gently to the nearest civilian. “Let’s get out of the way.” Slowly but surely, piece by piece, the crowd began to sidle backwards, and out of the way.