AU: A different kind of witch-hunting

[Sophie Tillman]

Two weeks had passed with no sign of Nanny Olena, and Sophie wasn't sure who was more concerned - her, or their increasingly irate customers. Usually the routine trip to the next city over only took four, maybe five days. Even last winter when the snowfall had piled to her shoulder at the roadsides, one week was all it took. Nany Olena must have made the trip a hundred times to replenish their harder-to-obtain supplies, but this time she hadn't come back.

Well, this was a problem for their customers. Many of them had been coming to Olena for their potions and powders and brews longer than Sophie had been alive. How could they trust a witch who hadn't even finished her apprenticeship to meet their needs?

Others were more... blunt. To them, Sophie knew, she would never be a proper witch no matter how long or hard she worked at it. Those people had been there from day one. She was used to them... mostly. And truth be told, having Nanny Olena around made them much easier to deal with.

For the fifth time since noon, the bell above her shop door jingled as another patron left the heavy smells and sprawling plants behind for the hot, noisy street outside with nothing purchased and nothing spent. Sophie slumped onto the stool behind the counter, elbows propped up on its uneven wooden surface. She'd filed a report with city police several days ago, and they'd turned up nothing so far. What if they never did? She didn't want to believe it, but that dread had been wheedling hints of itself into all of the magic she'd been attempting for days. 

With a sigh, Sophie stood once more and strode to one of the plants behind the counter, a low-hanging creature with bright red blossoms, and began to pluck leaves from one of its tendrils. Best to stay busy. If Nanny Olena came back to find she'd been worrying instead of working, she'd have a fit.

[Rhea Hartman]

“And without even leaving someone to tend the store while she's gone! Sometimes, I think that Nanny Olena could afford to be a little more mindful of her customers. I'm not saying she's irresponsible, but Olena aught to remember that she's not the only witch in this city.” Irritated Customer #14 sniffed while she put away the skin powder that she had condescended Sophie to retrieve for her, in lack of a witch to do so. “And you say you don't know when she'll be back?”

The door behind her jangled, and Mood-as-of-Yet-Unknown Customer #15 stepped through the door. Irritated Customer #14 looked over her shoulder as the figure settled into a patch of shade against the wall. “Hm. Well, I won't keep you,” she said with a final huff. “Good afternoon to you.” And she bustled back out into the fading afternoon.

Customer #15 waited until the door closed before moving up to the front counter. “I take it Olena's still missing, then.”

The figure placed an advertisement on the counter at the same time that they pushed back their hood. The face that looked down at Sophie – and it was down – was black and white. Curly, snow-colored hair made braided stripes across an ink-black scalp, and delicate eyebrows and thick white lashes stood stark against dark skin. Leaf-shaped ears extended from the rounded, feminine face, and the eyes that glanced over Sophie glinted purple. The drow woman quirked an eyebrow. “And who're you?” On the counter, her hand rested on the Missing Person notice that the police had posted several days ago.

[Sophie Tillman]

The smile Sophie wished the woman a good day with didn't reach her eyes, and it vanished entirely as soon as she turned her back. Of course Olena wasn't the only witch in the city - which would be true even if it hadn't been said as a slight - but she was head and shoulders above the rest, and half of these customers would be up a river without her. She deserved to have her disappearance treated like more than a mere inconvenience.

"No, not yet," Sophie confirmed with a small sigh as she set aside the powder to shelve. She opened her mouth to ask how she could help - there was a business to run, after all - when the newcomer produced a now-very familiar flier. Hood lowered, Sophie recognized her as a drow, and her agitation was replaced with unease.

"I'm Sophie, Olena's apprentice," she replied. No need to ask if this person was with the police; drow in the police force were nearly as rare as men in witchcraft. Still, if she was interested in the search, she might already have some information. And Sophie was so ready for news. "What can I do for you, Miss...?"

[Rhea Hartman]

"Rhea," the drow completed. She was pleased that Sophie hadn't recoiled. She'd lived on the surface world long enough to grow used to her race's reputation, but you couldn't do business once the pitchforks were out. Her eyes skimmed over the young...person at the counter, taking in the long hair, women's robes, bald chin, and masculine brow bones. But she said nothing, only moved the advertisement to the center of the counter.

"I'd like to help find Olena," the drow named Rhea said. "She's an old friend, and I'm good at finding people." She nodded to the curtain behind the counter. "Is there somewhere more private we can talk?"

[Sophie Tillman]

Sophie's lips pursed, a small crack in her composure hinting at the alarm underneath. Olena, friends with a drow? Surely this Rhea was lying. Who knew why; she didn't pretend to understand the workings of the drow mind or their machinations.

Whatever temptation there was to turn her away,though, the fact remained that Sophie had heard nothing from the police whatsoever. And desperation was a hell of a drug.

"Of course. Follow me." Stepping aside to make room, Sophie swept the heavy burlap curtain to the side with one arm. Behind it was the workshop where, on normal days, she and Olena would prepare the concoctions that patrons came seeking. With no one in it at the moment, it was shrouded in near darkness, the oil lamps suspended from the ceiling burning low. With a brief twist of her free hand, the tiny flames within them grew, pouring light over the table and tools. Simple magic; it was much easier to manipulate fire that already burned than to produce it from thin air. Sophie gestured to a squashy purple armchair and waited for Rhea to take it before perching herself stiffly on the wooden stool near it, ankles crossed primly below her.

"May I ask how you know Olena?" she asked once they were settled.

[Rhea Hartman]

“Thank you.” Rhea swept the advertisement back up, rounded the counter, and ducked under the burlap curtain that Sophie held open. She was broad-shouldered and considerably taller than Sophie, though her long, heavy cloak made it hard to tell much more about her. She glanced over her shoulder at Sophie as she glided into the dark room, and for a moment her eyes flashed teal circles like a cat's. Shining in the dark, outlined with white eyebrows in a face that otherwise disappeared into the gloom, her glance looked like something out of a cautionary fairy tale.

The image vanished with the darkness, and the drow perched on the edge of the offered armchair in exactly the same way that dozens of customers had done before her. She smoothed out the advertisement on her knee. “I've known Olena for a long time,” she said with unexpected kindness in her voice. “About, oh it must have been forty years ago, we were traveling on the same trade caravan. We were ambushed, and afterwards she helped patch me up.” She slapped the advertisement fondly. “Not many humans will heal a drow. I come to her if I'm in the area and need some help, and in return I help her get her hands on supplies she needs.” She glanced over Sophie again. "And you're her apprentice, you said?"

[Sophie Tillman]

Forty years, then? Longer than Sophie had even been alive, let alone under Nanny Olena's instruction. That alone wasn't suspicious; Olena had many clients who had relied on her business for several decades, longer even than this Rhea. Or longer than Rhea claimed, anyway.

No, it was the drow's suggestion of a current, active relationship with Olena that didn't sit right.

"That's correct," Sophie replied, polite but brooking no argument. If Rhea wanted to question the legitimacy of her apprenticeship she certainly wouldn't be the first, but if either of them deserved to be doubted, it was the drow who claimed to be a longtime patron of Olena's despite never having set foot in the shop. Sophie would have remembered such a visit, she was sure of it.

"Forgive me," she began, with a small apologetic smile, "but Olena never mentioned having a drow acquaintance." And she wouldn't keep secrets from me, Sophie left unsaid. Olena trusted and respected her, of that she was also sure. She had to; Sophie had never given her a reason not to. "But I'm thankful for any help in locating her. Is there anything you can tell me at this point? I haven't heard much from the police."

[Rhea Hartman]

“People usually don't,” Rhea replied placidly. She eyed Sophie with a slightly unsettling expression. Appraisal, with a hint of...not nervousness, but something approaching it. Alertness. “I always came at night, and I kept my head down,” she added, still with that strange look. “It would have been bad for business. Look,” she said, adjusting her weight forward and gesturing to Sophie. “Has Olena ever told you about...anything, ah, unusual? Things a witch doesn't normally do?”

The question resonated in a room in which sat Olena's cross-dressing apprentice. A room that Rhea knew, and she hoped Sophie knew as well because she didn't want to explain it, had a second, secret cellar under the floor.

[Sophie Tillman]

Technically, she supposed it was possible, what Rhea was telling her. Sophie didn't live above the shop like Olena did; very close by, of course, but not close enough that she could watch it at night. There were defenses in place, enchantments that could awaken her if there were trespassers... but Olena would know how to silence them as though they weren't there at all.

She didn't want to believe it. She wanted a more mundane explanation, a safer one, in which this drow didn't make clandestine visits without her knowledge. Unfortunately, this was all Sophie had. For now.

"If you're referring to the services we offer," she replied pointedly, "there are a number that other witches in the region are unable to perform for one reason or another, but it's a matter of Olena's skill, not ...legality."

[Rhea Hartman]

The look on Rhea's face moved towards tension, then she sighed and bowed her head. “I'm not, unfortunately.” She stood up and glided towards the center of the room. “Olena is a kind, brilliant, active woman,” she said. There was a hint almost of defensiveness in her voice. “And as you get older, sometimes...” She rubbed the bridge of her nose. “Never mind. Just...push this rock here.” She pointed to a brick high up on the fireplace. “And say an opening spell.”

[Sophie Tillman]

Sophie rose from her stool not a moment after Rhea, not wishing to be seated while the drow moved about. Call it paranoia, call it precaution, whichever; as civil as Rhea's behavior was, her agitation was obvious, and she wanted to be that much closer to the exit if need be. So when instructed to cast a spell on the fireplace, Sophie hesitated - either it was a trick and a waste of time, or she was about to learn more than she'd bargained for about her mentor.

"...All right. This one here?" Sophie pointed, confirming, before pressing her palm flat against the rough brick above the mantle. "Apertus."

A low rumble began from deep below the fireplace, where hard-packed earth should have been, until the bricks at the base fell away. Instead of disappearing, where they landed they formed a step, then two, until brick by brick the belly of the fireplace formed a staircase leading down into the dark. Sophie's composure finally broke as she watched, wide-eyed, lips parted in surprise. Nanny Olena, what is this?

When the dust settled, she cleared her throat and attempted to pull herself back together.

"I suppose you should lead the way."

[Rhea Hartman]

Rhea watched the fireplace sink into a staircase impassively. Most of her attention was on Sophie. Olena clearly hadn't told the poor girl--boy--whatever, about the Witch's Brokerage. Rhea could hardly imagine a worse way to find out about it, but she didn't know where she'd even begin to explain it. Better to just let Sophie see for herself.

At least she hadn't started crying or anything. Rhea nodded and ducked into the fireplace. Her head sank quickly out of view as she descended the stairs, which turned toward the rear of the shop and deposited her in a small brick cellar probably underneath the back shed. Rhea didn't need any light, but for Sophie's sake she lit a small lamp set into the wall near the opening of the stairwell.

As far as rooms at the end of secret staircases went, it was unimpressive. A low, tiny cellar, small enough that the light of the single lamp reached all the way to the corners, and with barely room for the bed and the desk that filled it. One of Nanny Olena's quilts covered the bed, and a tidy stack of maps sat on the locked desk. It smelled like herbs, soil and dust. Rhea stepped aside and gestured superfluously to the bed. "That's where I stayed."

[Sophie Tillman]

It wasn't much to take in, this little room and its meager contents, but it was one little room more than Sophie had believed existed until just now. As she studied the place, brown eyes flitting over the neatly made bed and the maps, brow burrowed, mouth pressed into a hard line, she wondered, what else could there be? She wanted to trust Olena, but at this point unwavering faith in her mentor meant forsaking her own senses.

Stepping past Rhea, Sophie's head bowed to peer at the map sitting atop the stack on the desk. Her fingers, long and thin, traced the edge of the parchment while she read. This was a map of Thallas, the metropolis Olena had been traveling to when she'd vanished, but what were these red x's along the city's border? Sophie swallowed and realized her mouth had gone dry.

"...Why were you here?" she asked, looking up from the map to fix her gaze back on the drow. It seemed like a sensible first question, at least out of the dozens chasing each other through her brain. "Why did you come to Nanny Olena, of all people? What did she do for you?"

[Rhea Hartman]

The dramatic way to answer Sophie's question would be to push up her sleeves and display the ropy scars that laced up her forearms. Rhea had never gone in much for drama. "I'm a bounty hunter," she replied, still standing awkwardly by the door. "It's a rough job. There aren't a lot of people skyside who will help out a drow."

Rhea hesitated, then continued, "Olena is part of a group called the Witch's Brokerage. A lot of them do this sort of thing." She gestured around the tiny, herb-scented room. "As I understand it, human witches aren't supposed to meddle." She had never been able to fathom the reason why. "The Brokerage is made of witches who, well, meddle." She shrugged. "Politics, healing drow, things like that."

[Sophie Tillman]

The drow's response raised more questions than it answered; whatever the Witch's Brokerage really was, Sophie had never heard of it in her life. But there was no denying that certain of the few pieces she'd been given already fit.

Nanny Olena was excellent at keeping secrets. It was why many of their clientele sought her out, and why Sophie felt so proud whenever she saw fit to share them with her. Several of the services Olena provided, although not illegal, were frowned upon enough that they needed to be done quietly. The first time her mentor had allowed her to assist with such a service, Sophie had been too thrilled that she was entrusted with it to question whether they should have been leaving well enough alone. 

Now, she wonder grimly whether Olena truly operated within the law as she'd thought.

"The police," Sophie said sharply, thinking of the report she'd filed, "do they know about the, ah, Brokerage? Should we be worried about their involvement?"