<div class="floatleft">(http://i.imgur.com/waqyLCl.jpg)    </div><strong><span class="bbc_size" style="font-size: 14pt;">Kasmira</span></strong>(http://www.myth-weavers.com/sheetview.php?sheetid=1078361)<br/><strong>AC</strong>: 20<br/><strong>HP</strong>: 12<br/><strong>Status</strong>: Normal<br/><hr/><br/>"Oh, I'm sure of it-- it must be me sister, missus!"<br/><br/>The old woman's breath reeked of sherry and dry tongue, but Kasmira found that detail slightly less unsettling than the lady's shameless exhibition of misery-- the inconsolable are often a hair's breadth from the incapable, and from there it's a sorry jaunt to pathetic. The spark of desperation in the old bat's eyes was nominal.  Simply the lay of the land.  This is what she did... gave them consolation for a moment so they could endure the rest of their pointless lives with a smidge of comfort and a pinch of belief in the divine.<br/><br/>Yes.  What they cannot see.  A pocketful of consolation, a twinge of magic assurance in their droll lives to carry them up and out to their working, snoring, fucking and dying.  On with you, leave your token and go.<br/><br/>"Ask her about the fourth Missus!  Ask her!"<br/><br/>What's this?  A challenge... perhaps, this day, Kasmira would be forced to spark her dulled brain to life and actually read this woman-- here in this dingy room with its lantern gleaming red through the tinted glass (like a whore's) and its black-canvassed table strong, compartmentalized for a number of tricks (like a whore), she would have to read this woman cold and determine the answer to her question.  Else, she'd shatter the trust... she might rebuild it, but the damage would be done if she failed... her reputation was her only source of coin, now, and the belief she felt and knew things she really didn't (like a whore) was what put food on her table and clothes on her back.<br/><br/>Nice clothes, in fact.<br/><br/>She glanced over the woman's mourning garb-- yes, black is her favorite color, but somehow the biddy managed to make it look tackier than ever.<i>Fourth?  Fourth what?  Fourth of the month?</i>At her paste jewelry with glass stones gleaming like gouges in a market-fish's belly.  A cameo-- no one related to this old dog, not from that aquiline nose?  Oh, of course, the kind that they sold at...<br/><br/>"The fair," Kasmira replied.  Her eyes had barely left her customer's, but she gave suitable impression that she was listening to someone unearthly in the room.  "Yes, the fair was here, and she..." the cameo brooch was too cheap to be a token of her own choosing.  It was conciliatory, a gift of obligation.  The cheapest nice-looking thing one could find... "She brought you that brooch."<br/><br/>The woman sank into her chair as if someone had cut her strings.  Not that the idea wasn't tempting, but from the nigh-ecstatic glaze in her soupy eyes, it seemed Kasmira had struck gold.  "I have tried for weeks to find one who could reach her," the woman croaked, "and now, at last."  Kasmira sensed the gravity of this, felt a nauseous twinge in her gut where shame so reveled in its hiding.  And as the woman straightened her back, steadied herself, and dabbed away a couple of leftover tears, Kasmira closed her lips tight, let her lashes fall shut, and was prepared to give an exit speech, to indicate that it was time for her soul to move on... something comforting, and that (contrary to profit's inclinations) would give this woman suitable peace to never visit again.<br/><br/>And that's when it happened.<br/><br/>The cold, bony fingers of this woman, with her thin web of skin clammy and soft, clamped onto Kasmira's bare arm hard enough to hurt.<br/><br/>"Now ask that bitch where she hid my husband's money."<br/><br/>Kasmira's eyes were huge wells as she stared back at this woman, aghast, and managed to swallow a laugh before it escaped her throat.  She looked away-- a gesture spurred by her discomfort, not the need to address an invisible, imaginary entity, and stammered a few sounds that could, perhaps, have become words before Ishani drew back the curtain to her little booth, startling the old woman so badly that she shrieked aloud.<br/><br/>Looking from Ishani to the old bag, then back, Kasmira shook off the cobwebs and spluttered out a response.  "Ah-- the-- the ah link has been severed... madam... she fled, thinking you would... ah... condemn her to hell for what she's done."<br/><br/>The old woman brightened considerably.  "Is that an option?  How much would that cost?"<br/><br/>Another repeat customer.