Time: Last night and this morning.<br/><br/>Beacon had, well snuck out was a strong term. He had left, made a few excuses that implied that he was still going to be at the Harlot's Crotch, but that situation didn't last long. But he did leave word (and coin to ensure that his words were remembered) about where he would be going. First to find a priest and buy a little offering and prayer for his long departed wife (Paper Lane never really changed.)<br/><br/>Then he'd spent several hours at a place he still remembered for having a horrible grammar on their name tile (not that it mattered. The place was a brothel with pretensions of being an honest, pure smokehouse.) which was still uncorrected. Not that it mattered, most people here didn't speak Skytongue here. The faces had changed, and he was probably the strangest customer that the mada-er the hostess had gotten in a while.<br/><br/><div class="spoiler_container"><div class="spoiler_header" onclick="hideSecond (this);" role="button">Thoughts at the smokehouse</div><div class="spoiler_body">Oh, yes, a bowl of tobacco. No, I shan't smoke it, merely enjoy the smell. He lost himself in the past, before trying to abandon the small, mortal scale of thoughts, and think on the big, durant scale of nations. One circle in Nexus and one in Greenhaven was too small. They needed money, fame. Soft power to go with the hard power of Exaltation.<br/><br/>They needed to be able to grab the ears of nations with words. With letters and Infallible Messengers. He'd bring up the easy way when he got back. Make a company, get rich, get big, get able to say to those self important rulers "I want to speak with you," and be heard.<br/><br/>Then after that, Beacon spent a few hours as Azil, wondering where the Old Man and his daughter were. She'd objected when he dragged a six year old child in here. He'd laughed when the six year old managed to correct her writing. She probably knew that he'd lied and tricked his way to freedom, and said nothing. Well, not knew, but wished it to be so, and was right, but without a way to prove it. (Beacon, then Azil, didn't stay around long enough to find out.)<br/><br/>He'd had to decline the other services of one of the young servers that had the cheek to comment on the weapons he'd kept under the long sleeves of his good shirt. But once he had started to make money, or his circle had shot down his idea and the coins were his to do with as he pleased, then he'd come back here and indulge in a night of excess like he'd been afraid to take when he left Nexus behind him.</div></div><br/>He hadn't spent the night at the Pearl Smoke, however. He'd been around the place in a miserly attempt to keep his money and to think further on his plan. Then, when morning broke he'd started back to the Harlot's Crotch to try and sell his ideas to the others, and hoped that he hadn't missed a messenger. (Although he didn't actually pay that much, so it would be more like missing one of his circlemates, and that would be just a wonderful way to kick off things.)