OE: Accessories Run 2 [M15]

Something real. Well, this door was real enough.  A faintly bitter smile crossed XithArcean's face as she studied this door, a door she'd seen once before. Things were different now, though, she told herself, running her gloved hands over the burnished surface of the door. The last time she was here, it had been simple wood, with a basic iron lock that had been simple to trip, even in her clueless and helpless state. Now the lock had been replaced with some sort of bright, coppery metal, and the entire door seemed darker, like it was a different material. Xith doubted it would be as easy to break in this time.
         But the shop owner wasn't the only one that had learned a few new tricks. XithArcean took a deep breath and stepped away from the door, walking around the corner. Pausing outside the main entrance, she put her hood up to hide her distinctive lavender hair and then slipped inside.
         As her eyes adjusted to the dim lighting inside the shop, she saw that quite a lot had changed since her last visit. Previously the shop had been some sort of statuette shop, and the display items had been mostly cheap iron and other rusty, half-corroded metals. Xith had taken most of the previous stock of nicer items but according to the memo the group had gone right back to trading them, as evidenced by the gleam of valuable metal figurines that now showed amongst the rest of the goods. But what was different this time was the jewelry. A number of black velvety busts stood interspersed between the statuettes, displaying intricate silver and gold necklaces and earrings. It puzzled Xith that the owner had made no attempt at hiding the clearly illegal goods.
         Movement in the darkness behind the counter. "Can I help you?" The voice was bored and ever so slightly belligerent.
         XithArcean set her face and walked forward to the counter. The man looked at her without a trace of recognition. "What I want," she said, leaning on the counter, "are your black-market goods. Now." There, she thought. She wasn't in the mood, so to speak, for playing hidden games.
         The man's face did not change. "Dunno what you're talkin' about."
         Xith jerked a thumb at the goods behind her. "I know they're illegal and I've come to take them."
          "Oh really," began the man, then paused. "Hang on… you're that purple-haired kid that came in here last time. You took my dagger." He looked at her again, eyes traveling over her coat. "Hey, you belong to an Organization or something? Some sort of… Nobody?"
          "Can we skip the introduction?" Xith snapped. "I'd like to make this as fast as possible."
          "You can't like anything," the man pointed out. "You can't feel."
         XithArcean had had enough. She grabbed the front of the man's shirt and yanked him toward her over the counter, bringing out the dagger she had lifted from him last time and setting the tip on his collarbone. "You say I can't feel," she informed him in a low voice. "I say I have just enough emotion left to kill you and feel happy there's one less person in my way." She let out a hiss of breath suddenly, relaxing back. "Wait, no… damn. That should be 'fewer,' shouldn't it." She thought about  it for a second while the man scrabbled awkwardly against the counter to take some of the pressure off his neck. "Yeah, okay," she decided, leaning forward again. "One fewer person in my way. What do you think?"
          "Think… should... let… go," choked the man.
          "Not likely," said Xith with a determination she'd discovered only recently. Still gripping him by the collar, she maneuvered around the counter and headed into the back room, dragging the shopkeeper behind her.
          "All right," she said, gesturing with her dagger to the stacks of crates. "Feel free to lead me to the illegal ones."
          "Why do you care?" interjected the man belligerently, looking up at here – she had a good four inches on him height-wise, and she was holding him in such a way that he had to hunch over in order to avoid being strangled. He continued, "You lot aren't ones to obey the law much either."
         XithArcean hesitated. Truth be told, she was just carrying out the mission. She didn't really have any idea why Eternal wanted her to stop this black-market trade. "We don't care," she said finally, looking directly at him. "According to you, we can't care." She spun him around to face the back room. "That said, you can lead me to the goods now."
         The man took half a step forward and Xith relaxed her grip slightly, expecting him to continue away from her. Instead, he turned and drove a fist into her stomach.
         She dropped to the ground, choking and gasping for breath, lifting an arm to protect herself from his next blow. This time, his knuckles connected with the edge of the bone in her forearm. A dull explosion of pain in her arm and Xith was cradling her possibly-broken arm to her chest and scrabbling backward, trying not to stab herself with the dagger she was still somehow holding. Tears were gathering in her eyes. Mind blank with panic, she resorted to the only combat skill she knew she had an advantage in.
          "Fire," she gasped, and when she struggled to her feet she saw the shopkeeper beating at his clothes, trying to suppress the flames licking up his body.
         Xith smiled briefly to herself and, deciding the man would be occupied for a few moments, began to pull crates off the shelves and examine them, looking for the nondescript symbols that had indicated illegal goods last time. Her arm was throbbing, but the damage only seemed to amount to a deep bruise. She took a brief moment to mutter a Cure spell and felt much better.
         She had been keeping an eye on the actions of the frantic shopkeeper, and when he finally succeeded in extinguishing himself and turned toward her with a murderous expression, she rose, wrapping her hand around the dagger and squeezing its grip tightly.
         Trying to look threatening – or at least like she had the faintest idea what she was doing – Xith let fire grow in her hand again. "Take another step nearer and I'll cast."
         The man paused, eyes flicking between the dagger – his dagger, really – and the fireball. Then he stopped walking and stood perfectly still, seemingly considering his options. Relieved her bluff had succeeded, Xith returned to her search, still watching the shopkeeper out of the corner of her eye.
         A few minutes later he spoke again. "Some of the stuff here is nice. Really nice." Xith looked up, frowning, but he continued. "Nice enough you might be interested in some of it… in exchange for a small favor."
          "Oh." Xith looked down, summoning her pipe and using it to lever the top off the next crate. "You're trying to bribe me," she said conversationally.
          "Not quite," said the man cautiously. "Just suggesting a mutually agreeable solution."
         Xith looked up again. "Why would I care what you want?" Receiving no answer, she finished removing the top of the crate. The lavender-haired Nobody smiled, lifting a thin silver chain off the sparkling collection inside. "Oh, now this is nice." She slipped it over her head, resolving to use it to hang the heart pendant she'd created at Christmas. The chain she had created was lumpy and uneven – she'd had to shape each link individually and it had been quite exhausting.
          "Take that entire crate," the man suggested. "And… and—"
         XithArcean stood, shoving the crate through a portal and began to pull similar crates off the shelves, checking each one briefly and sending the nice ones through to join the others. "You can shut up now," she said without turning around, while some other part of her was wondering where this whole confident attitude was coming from.
          "I've made up my mind what I'm doing with you," she said, kicking the last crate through and closing the portal. As she banished her pipe and sheathed the dagger, she realized exactly where her words were coming from. She was emulating another Nobody… one she would probably never see again. Clenching her teeth against the sudden urge to cry – which technically shouldn't even be possible, she tried to remind herself – XithArcean lifted both hands and met the shopkeeper's eyes.
          "I know if I leave you like this you're just going to keep trading on the black market. So I think I'm going to have to… leave a reminder." She spun to face the wall. "Fira." As the flames exploded against the wall, she sent fire spells in every direction, watching with satisfaction as a few of the crates flared up, spreading the inferno.
         When she turned back to face him she saw the shopkeeper had gone quite pale. "What are you doing?" He sounded more incredulous than afraid. "Everything's going to burn! Maybe even the whole District!"
         Xith shrugged. "I doubt it. I'll keep an eye on it from the outside, though…" She grinned with more malice than she knew she possessed. "If that makes you feel any better." Flicking her wrist, she opened a portal to an alley far enough away from the shop. She stepped through it quickly, ignoring the shopkeeper's protests.
         From the outside, she could see the blaze was in danger of spreading to the shop next door. Casting a series of water spells, she soaked the storefronts around the burning shop, hoping that would be enough to keep the fire from spreading. She wasn't a pyromaniac, after all. She was just trying to do the job right.
          "Xith?" Someone spoke behind her, sounding vaguely horrified. Xith turned to meet the pale blue eyes of Daniel. She flushed.
          "I can expl—"
          "What happened here?" He stepped up to her, hugging her briefly with a trace of his usual grin, then turned serious again. "Who set the fire? Are you okay?"
         XithArcean abruptly realized he did not know she was the cause of the fire in front of them. She nodded. "I'm fine."
         Daniel watched the blaze for a second, eyes distant. "No one ever liked him," he said abruptly. "The only people that could afford his black-market stuff weren't the type we liked around here." Then he seemed to come back to himself, shaking his head. "What am I saying? A fire's a horrible thing to happen to anyone." He hugged her again. "I'm glad you're okay."
         Xith could not meet his eyes. She looked to the side for a moment.
          "D'you know who started it?" Daniel continued anxiously.
         XithArcean took a deep breath and faced him. "Don't worry, Daniel."
          "So you do know who set it?"
         She looked at him for a few moments before replying. "I said don't worry. It was nobody."