TEAM EGGPLANT
Leaving her brother in his broken state weighed heavy in her heart, but Lux steeled herself, repeating the magic words Lowell taught her when she started to fear for the worst. Semper erit lux; there will always be light. Her brother said it meant that everything will turn out right, but she liked to take it more literally. For her, it was a promise that she will always be there for him, no matter what. It was inexplicably effective, and if she ever felt defeated and tired and close to giving up, whispering it once was enough to reignite a spark of hope within her. She will return with a cure and they will Travel the world in search of magic and wonders, just like they planned.
Lux arrived at the eastern gate past dawn without any worries of being left behind. It was sort of the perk of living with an uncle that was a guard and gatekeeper. She made him promise not to let the Traveller out if she wasn't there, but it seemed she didn't need such assurances. Even though she had come late just as she expected, the Traveller had yet to grace the awaiting group with his presence.
When another hour passed and still no Traveller appeared, Lux made herself comfortable on the ground, sitting cross-legged as she cracked open her casebook to the page she had titled 'The Masked Traveller.' She pouted at the nearly blank page staring back at her, mocking her. Lux spent half of Wednesday afternoon trailing after this mysterious Traveller, but even then, the only information she managed to gather was that he wore a metallic mask with an ever-present grin and that he was strange. It was the first time she had been unable to glean relevant information after careful observation and it fanned the flames of her resolve. Lux had quickly written 'figure out Traveller' as one of her side goals, right under 'cure Brother,’ which was written in giant letters and highlighted and underlined.
Below her new goal, Lux began to write down the names of the group that had gathered. They were made of mostly familiar faces (gallivanting about the city in search of cures and mysteries, as she did all her life, came with the perk of meeting someone new each day), although she couldn't quite name all of them. There were those she knew personally—like Mr. Taylor the tailor who made her spiffy cape exactly how she had imagined it (quite a feat, considering he only had her crude drawing as reference!) and Sweeney from Sweeney's whose desserts never fail to make her super happy—and those she'd only observed in passing. For them, she jotted down identifiers, like 'pretty, flaming red hair' and 'pretty but scary sword lady.' Lux hadn't expected quite a big turnout, but it wasn't all too surprising. It boiled down to three main causes, she surmised: boredom, curiosity, necessity. From the looks on some of their faces, she could tell which had belonged in certain categories.
Just as she finished listing the names, the first one on her list had approached her. Lux grinned, giving Emma a two-handed high-five in greeting. "Emmers!"
Her friend's unusually shaky words hadn't gone unnoticed, but Lux thought it rude to point out her obvious anxiousness. Emma, she knew, could never leave behind her master's apothecary without good reason, and that meant she was of the 'necessity' variety. Lux wasn't sure what this good reason was, and as much as she was dying to know, she owed it to Emma not to pry. She would tell her if she wanted to.
The Traveller finally came half past sunrise, still as odd and difficult to read as ever. He greeted the group with a simple 'hi,' which it seemed only she had returned with a simple 'hi' back and wave of her hands. Lux's hands itched to yank the grinning mask from his face, but part of her wanted to enjoy his oddity for a little bit longer. It wasn't every day that a mystery riled her up like this, after all.
In one very quick and vague introduction, Spook arbitrarily separated them in vegetable-themed groups (go Team Eggplant!) and headed off after an even quicker and vaguer instruction. Sensible-as-always Emma was probably right in greeting the rest of the group, but Lux was raring to go.
"Let's go, Emm!" she grinned, hooking her arm around Emma's and dragging her toward the wheelbarrow to retrieve their cages. Lux turned to the elegant raven-haired guard who hadn't the chance to introduce herself because Guard Captain Solidor started hitting on her. "You too, pretty sword lady! C'mon!"
There was an incident unfolding right behind her that took all of her self-control to ignore, even after she heard the Anzivino daughter declaring a duel. The late Marquis' daughter had already scampered off after Spook, and they should probably get going as well. Uncle once told her that the gates can only be opened for so long, and she told Emma and sword lady as much.
Lux headed out the gate with two birdcages in hand (two, because Roy was Team Eggplant but he probably didn't know that), but she didn't get too far before she caught a glimpse of the chaos brewing behind her. Not only was there some feud going on between the Guard Captain, who found another person to hit on (this time literally) in the Anzivino noble, but green-haired giant Roy was running toward them, his giant axe swinging menacingly.
She doubled in laughter at the sight, the iron cages clanging as they brushed against each other. It was like what her brother used to say: when a day started out this interesting, she could be sure that what lay ahead would be much more so.
@Diggerton@Vee@Darinthus@t2wave
