The two-pence shark across from Jaron is so convinced that his target is just a frivolous noble's son that he doesn't even bother to shuffle in a manner that hides the way he's purposefully shifting the cards.

Under different circumstances, Jaron might call him out on it, might frown at being insulted that way. But the shark is such a sorry excuse for a con that Jaron would likely see through the man even if he was trying, and since Jaron doesn't particularly care for this game anyway, he lets it slide.

He was keeping one eye on the open flaps of the mirror tent across the street before the crowd thickened thanks to a musician on a nearby corner. Even from here Jaron can hear the exquisite sounds of a flute well-played. He's easily the best artist Jaron has heard here so far, and he deserves the praise he's getting, even if it makes watching for Lady Morika difficult.

The shark deals another round and Jaron absently scoops up the cards, the ruby ring on his right hand glinting in the sunlight. The trick hand that has been dealt is so obvious that Jaron almost wants to sigh.

Instead he furrows his brows as if trying to determine what and how he'll play.

He wonders if Lady Morika has made it out of the tent yet, if perhaps he should end this and go loiter to wait for her. The thought of that isn't pleasant, though, especially since she abandoned him inside the maze of mirrors.

The expression of delight on her face when she beheld the space was the first true expression she'd worn in his presence, and it took him by surprise--enough so that when she slipped out of his grasp, he couldn't immediately grab onto her again, and then she was gone.

She is a... curious creature, his betrothed.

Jaron can't say that the prospect of spending the rest of his life with her is inviting. He berates himself for it, because he doesn't know her well enough to make a proper assessment, but...

Her masks are as flawless as his. He doesn't know what to do with such a polished young girl. She has a thousand things to say, and not one of them even remotely interesting. The worst was when she asked after Jenelle's health, not knowing the box of horrors she opened in his mind.

Even now, an hour later, Jaron is struggling internally to put the shadowy demons back out of sight where they belong, and perhaps that's why he remains at this low table beneath the flickering of a shoddy stained-glass lamp--its stand supposedly made of real gold, but he can tell it's just metallic paint--and the warm afternoon sun. A breeze makes the sweat along his spine prickle uncomfortably.

The air itself is chilly, but the number of people packed into this space makes it feel sweltering and claustrophobic.

Jaron tosses down a set of cards--not the Stave, River, and Mer rush that would be the better lead but rather the Flame, Stone, and Inventor cards for a join. The shark obviously set up the deck so that his points beat out Jaron's in the long run, but if Jaron plays counter to the shark's guesses and discards the rushes, drawing anew, he'll even the playing field. And he isn't above cheating himself--or wouldn't be, if this was worth it.

They're only betting a few silvers, though, which isn't much at all. If Jaron were to beat the man, it would be because the shark isn't a good enough con to be worthy of Jaron's money.

The rat faced man watches as Jaron discards three of the remaining four cards in his hand and draws six, his eyes narrowed.

Jaron shuffles the cards around in his hands, organizing them by suit--two more Fire cards, an Earth card, and three Air cards--and then by point value. He now has all four suits in his hand and little to no points. Even if he adds the new Fire cards to his join, he won't get much.

He has two more discards, though. It shouldn't be too difficult to shuffle out the worthless low level cards and pick up new ones.

The shark plays, laying out a three layer rush of low level Earth cards--simple, feasible so as not to draw suspicion. It's sad that the man hasn't realized that Jaron knows he's cheating.

Though, Jaron is intimately familiar with the arrogance of the nobility. Most of them probably would be fooled by the shark's little half-hearted act.

The tallyer sitting crossways to them both calculates the points and lays out their numbers--eighteen for Jaron, thirty-six for the shark.

The shark draws three more cards and it's Jaron's turn again. He wonders where Lady Morika is, if he should end this game and go looking for her.

But he dislikes loitering. And she left him.

He knows that this is supposed to be a date, and that he will eventually have to learn to enjoy--or at least stomach--Morika's presence. And perhaps, if he can get her to drop those masks of hers, she might even prove interesting.

But right now, coddling the petty, ambitious noblewoman his father picked out for him upon her birth--thanks to her pure breeding and the status of her family's name, not to mention a lot of political sallying on the part of Duke Wyrvien--is the last thing Jaron wants to do.

Instead, he studies his hand, even though there's little he can do. He pretends to deliberate, brows drawn together, before he takes the Forge and Glass cards from his hand and lays them with his Fire suit join, adding twelve to his eighteen points. He reaches for the pile to draw two new cards, but the motion is interrupted when the table is upended, the cards scattering.

Jaron blinks once, looking down at the bulky, bleeding man who is lying where the card table was a moment ago.

The shark curses, leaping to his feet, hollering.

The man doesn't get up.

"That's what you get for cheating me," a female voice says irritably. Jaron turns his head to see a young woman--perhaps two or three years younger than him--standing there with her hands on her hips. She wears dark trousers and a colorfully quilted, ruffled jacket open over a tight tan blouse. Long, dark blonde hair has been finagled into an unruly braid, while caramel colored eyes spark at them from beneath sweeping, smokey lashes. Her face is undeniably pretty, almost elfin in appearance, but the scowl on her cupid's bow lips and the mulish tilt to her head take away from her natural beauty somewhat.

"Hush, Hogen," she snaps at the shark.

"You'll pay for my table, girl," the shark says, scowling right back at the woman. "And apologize to His Lordship!" He makes a sweeping gesture in Jaron's direction as if he actually cares what Jaron thinks.

Jaron gives the pair of Troupers a bland look and stands, dusting off his cream colored riding pants. The tailored edges of his navy jacket fall crisply to his thighs as he straightens. "No need," he says, smiling politely. "No harm has been done."

"Good," the girl says, nodding, not sounding overly sympathetic. This image is strengthened when she mutters under her breath, eyes slipping away from his, "Not that I'd have done it anyway."

Jaron pretends not to have heard, eying the bloody, unconscious man lying over his cards. He decides that it isn't worth it to continue the game.

"Excuse me," he murmurs, and steps around the girl.

"But, Your Lordship," the shark--Hogen, apparently--protests, sounding quite put out, "we were just getting started--"

"And yet I am quite finished," Jaron says calmly, moving away without looking back. He searches for a clear path across the street, but with all the people milling around, trying to get a closer look at the divine flute player, there isn't a way.

"It'd have been a waste of your time anyway," the girl says, suddenly standing beside him. Jaron tenses slightly, not having seen or sensed her move. He studies her from the corner of one eye, but she merely folds her arms over her generous chest and looks at the crowd impassively. "Have you gone up to see Fletch yet?"

"Fletch?" Jaron questions, still scanning the crowd for a way through. Behind them, Hogen and his tallyer are trying to haul the man's body out of their space, grunting and cursing. The woman makes no move to help, though it was her fault.

"The flutist," she says, nodding her head to the right, toward the corner where the musician is playing. "He's amazing, no?"

Her tone is slightly cajoling, as if she's half heartedly trying to convince him to head that way.

"A member of your Troupe, is he?" Jaron asks blandly, tapping two fingers against his thigh. He wonders if Lady Morika has gotten bored and gone off to the clothier's stalls by now, or even back into the castle without him.

From the corner of his eye, he catches the woman give him a wry glance. "Aye, he is."

Jaron turns his head to study her for a moment--the lines around her eyes, the nut brown skin that marks her as at least part Slavan, the scars flecking her calloused hands, the sturdy way she stands and the obvious lithe strength in her small, slight frame. A knife thrower, perhaps, or contortionist. She's obviously a skilled fighter--perhaps much stronger or quicker than she looks, a prize fighter?

And in a Troupe with such a skilled musician, too.

"What is the name of your Troupe?" Jaron asks, his tone holding only polite, distant interest.

The woman appraises him. "Izani," she says finally, quirking a light colored brow. "Crimson Inex is our leader."

Jaron has never heard of them, but then, he doesn't exactly make it a point to know the names of traveling Players and their leaders.

He says, "Extend him my congratulations for having such fine performers in his employ."

The woman snorts. "Oh, we're not employed. We're friends." She moves then, suddenly, as if noting a change in the shifting crowd that Jaron couldn't see. "I'll tell them though."

And then she is gone, disappearing effortlessly into the crowd, leaving Jaron to stand on the edge of it uselessly, uncertain what to make of the whole encounter.

Lady Morika has probably gone back to her rooms by now, or found something else to occupy her--the trick riders, perhaps, as she was eying them quite starrily when they passed by earlier. Jaron half expected her to say something about them, but she didn't.

He sighs internally and turns to go, only to be stopped by a commotion in the crowd across the street. He glances back, brows furrowing slightly, then lifting as the sea of people parts, revealing a small boned young woman marching through, ivory skirts lifted daintily in her hands as she smiles prettily.

The commoners scatter out of her way, bowing and scraping. She has them wrapped around her fingers, tied up in the line of her pretty little mysterious smile.

A porcelain doll who controls others as if they are the puppets and not she, that is what the Lady Morika is. Jaron doesn't quite know what to make of her. Any woman in her position is bound to have ambitions, and he almost shudders to learn what they might be.

When she sees him, she gives him a wide smile that does not reach her chocolate eyes. Her artfully displayed curls of the same color are slightly mussed, and the hem of her pristine skirt is stained with dust, but she looks as put together and pretty as ever.

Trained that way, no doubt, by her ever ambitious and controlling father. Duke Wyrvien is an asset to the crown and a pain in its arse at the same time.

His daughter, Jaron thinks with no small measure of weariness, is likely to be similar.

"Forgive me, Your Highness," she says when she reaches him, sweeping an elegant curtsey. Up close, he sees something else in her eyes, a frantic edge that wasn't there before. Was she actually worried when they got separated? Now he almost feels bad for thinking ill of her. "In my carelessness, we got separated." Morika's eyes sweep downward demurely, a mask that doesn't fool him for a moment.

She's far too clever to ever be demure.

"It was my fault," he steps in smoothly, offering her his arm. "I fear I am unused to crowds. Perhaps we should return to the castle."

She gives him a grateful smile that almost seems genuine around the edges--curious. "If that is what pleases you, Your Highness," she murmurs, laying a featherlight gloved hand on his elbow.

Jaron makes a sound of polite agreement and leads her along the edge of the crowd until they escape the sea of people and are able to walk on the path again. On their stroll in this direction earlier, the Lady seemed full to bursting of energy and things to say, though she didn't quite appear to know how to say them. Jaron didn't know what to do with her polished manners aside from make small talk which never went anywhere at all.

Now she's quiet, almost contemplative. Jaron debates asking her what's changed, wonders if it's worth it.

He reminds himself that he's going to be marrying this woman in a year, and the purpose of the months between now and then is for them to get to know each other.

"Are you alright?" He murmurs, head tilted toward her but eyes on the people they pass.

"Quite, yes," she says easily, almost brightly. "It's just..."

Jaron looks down at her, sees the thoughtfulness in her brown eyes. "Yes?" He asks politely.

"It's nothing," she says, offering him a pretty smile as if she thinks he won't notice that it's meant to distract him and hide the angles and corners in her gaze.

"Is it?" He questions, if only to see what she'll do.

Her eyes dart away from his, as if she can't make herself meet his stare. Curious. She only says, "Well, yes, it's only that I met a very interesting man..."

"Oh?" Jaron asks, genuinely curious. Meeting a stranger couldn't possibly be the reason for the frenzy in her gaze when she found him. Perhaps it really was only worry over their separation, though she doesn't seem like the type.

"Yes, he called himself Inex," Morika says.

Inex, the name is familiar. It's the name that woman gave, the leader of the Izani Troupe. Interesting that Jaron should meet her while Morika was meeting him.

"Did he harm you?" Jaron asks.

"No, no," the Lady quickly deflects, her free hand fluttering like a little bird. "He was very nice and helped me find my way out of the maze."

The mirror maze wasn't that difficult, and Jaron rather thought she was smart enough not to get lost in a place that only took him minutes to get out of. But he doesn't say that.

"I shall have to thank this Inex, then," he says simply, patting the hand she's resting on his elbow. Her eyes dart to him again, curiosity in their depths, mixed with something else, something he can't quite get a handle on before both are gone.

"He was a Trouper, yes?" Jaron continues. "I believe I've heard of him and his Troupe. Perhaps we should invite them to play at dinner this evening."

The Lady sweeps her eyes down again, hiding those telling brown depths beneath her lashes so that he can't quite make out what her reaction to the words is. "Whatever pleases you, Your Highness," she says demurely.

Jaron makes a sound of affirmation and pats her hand again, deciding that he really will extend that invitation. He'd like to get a better idea of what has Lady Morika so... spooked. And the musician, Fletch, his playing was certainly excellent enough to warrant the privilege.

Morika says nothing else as they make their way through the hall toward the double doors leading into the cool, crowd-less embrace of the main building. Jaron says nothing either, and wonders if all of their conversations will be this fraught with traps and pitfalls, or if one day they'll be able to look at each other as friends.

He supposes that he has a year to find out--and to resign himself to whatever the truth turns out to be.

Jaron is far too well aware of how the world works to allow himself to hope, but he does think, if only in the back of his mind as he leaves Morika with her loitering, pinch-faced attendant, that the next year will at the least not be boring.

His bride-to-be is a very curious creature indeed.