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[bostonhowler]

[ Brigid tucks hair behind her ear, looking at the computer in front of her. ]

While I appreciate the welcome, and the information, I have to say that I am unimpressed with the method by which I was brought.

[ Meaning, she’s a little salty right now. ]

I don’t suppose there is a school I could teach at is there? I can translate four languages, speak two, and have a doctorate in Irish history.

[ She’s hoping there’s some call for her skills somewhere in this place. ]

If not, I also have some skill with Krav Maga and could, potentially, teach that, if there’s some call for it. Basically, I wish to teach. If someone could direct me to a few opportunities, I’d be grateful.

[ She leans forward and cuts off the feed. ]

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video; -> ACTION

[bostonhowler]

I look forward to meeting you face to face.

[ She cuts the feed.

A week later, she's at the Healer's guild, her nose assaulted with all the smells, and her ears with all the sounds. She finds someone to direct her to where Solomon would be working.

She taps at the door, letting herself into his workroom. ]

Hello, Solomon. I'm Brigid.

[peacefullywreathed]

[Today Solomon's working in the small office off the morgue, where he keeps his notes regarding autopsies. He's not the official coroner--conflict of interest and all that, since Raine runs the place--but he's listed as a consultant and is allowed to use the morgue as often as he needs.

[Luckily, he hasn't been into the morgue today, so he won't be especially offensive to Brigid's nose. Even so, he's an eclectic assortment of smells--he does all the various cooking in his house, and he regularly visits various places in the city, but he will also have a unique deathly smell; dry and cold rather than pungent and decaying.

[Solomon hears her approach, but he can't tell whether it's someone he knows until she stops; at which point he looks up from his engraved 'map' of kedanese physiology. His gaze hits the area about a foot to the side of her, unfocussed, but he smiles.]

Ms Finn. Please come in and take a seat.

[There's another armchair nearby, though the office is small so there's generally not much room. It's tidy, at least.]

[bostonhowler]

[ One thing she's glad of is that there's no heads in jars, or random preserved babies, or... well, all the other things that television - what little she watched of it - told her would be in the morgue office.

She notices his smell, but decides not to comment on it. That would just be weird and might out herself.

She settles into the chair. ]

What are you reading?

[peacefullywreathed]

[Definitely not. The office is mostly paper and wire and clay, actually; pins on cockboards or clay models which give shape to diagrams Solomon can't otherwise see. In light of that, the unusual smell could well be compared to that of an archaeologist who handles bones.]

Kedanese physiology.

[He turns the book so she can look at it properly. The 'map', at first glance, isn't much different to a human's. The many differences only arise on closer inspection.]

The best way to define a kedan's physiology is either those who can't shapeshift well or when they're young and haven't started. Still, there are some major variations. This is the thickness of the paper you'd be using, by the way.

[bostonhowler]

[ She reaches out a hand and runs her fingers over it. It's thicker than standard notebook paper, but she's worked with some parchment before that had this thickness. It'll be fine. ]

So, everyone shapeshifts?

[ Perhaps she'd be able to work on the full shift? No, too dangerous. ]

The paper shouldn't be any trouble.

[peacefullywreathed]

The kedan do, racially; sometimes their shapes can get fairly esoteric. We also have one or two shapeshifters among the Foreigners as well. If you're staying at the Hotel, you might see one of them--a giant wolf, if I recall.

[He smiles brightly, in false innocence.]

But don't worry. I hear she's been domesticated by the proprietor.

[Don't tell Valdis he said that. As he speaks he turns to reach for one of the research books he's kept around, despite the fact that he can't read it well anymore.]

[bostonhowler]

[ That innocence is patently false. ]

A giant wolf?

[ A werewolf that has the full shift perhaps? She'll have to be careful. ]

I would like to meet her, I think.

[ Maybe. ]

I've been thinking of learning the local language. Just because someone needs to know it.

[peacefullywreathed]

Hellhound, I think.

[He's fairly sure he hasn't heard 'werewolf' at all. Solomon smiles at her approvingly.]

Ah; a pragmatist. Good to see. There are seventeen kedanese dialects, however, so I recommend learning some phrases from the two most common to start with. Street-signs, and such.

I've lost most of the books I had a few years ago, but I believe there's one or two on the shelf by the door which might help you with that. Children's books--they use pictures to match to words instead of text.

[Some of the books he'd found were from one dialect into another, which was less than useful when he hadn't known anything from either. These days it doesn't matter regardless, but he'd known a decent amount of the written languages by the time of his accident.]

[bostonhowler]

A... hellhound? As in, a hell hound?

[ Pardon her while she's a bit incredulous. ]

Seventeen? Well, it will keep me busy, anyway. I didn't learn Gaelic overnight. I'll borrow your books, if you don't mind?

[peacefullywreathed]

Mm. That, or some kind of goddess. Bit up herself, really.

[Solomon stop shit-talking the hellhound in absentia. He waves a hand toward the bookcase.]

Of course. Go ahead; they're not being used for anything these days. I believe one of them has a similar script to Ogham, so it's likely to be useful to you regarding this engraved script we were discussing. In the meantime, the research.

[He turns to find one of his books as an example, sorting through the books on the desk through touch. The one he finds and holds out to her is a similar style of book, same thickness of paper with handwriting; but the languages inside are English and Irish (the latter, stylistically, an odd blend of modern and as far back as the 1600s). The handwriting is gorgeous, bordering on calligraphy; Solomon had been a nobleman's son, after all. The content ... well, is possibly unnerving. There's a lot about life and death, Dreaming and khajbit, a 'shadow realm'--which, oddly, is an Egyptian term, if Brigid recognises it. Though used as abstract concepts, they're not talking about as though they're abstracts, but physical locations.]

[bostonhowler]

[ She turns from her perusal of the books and takes the book from him. It is a bit unnerving, but she doesn't have to understand it all to translate it. Surely he wouldn't want her translating things that were illegal or anything of that nature, right?

Brigid doesn't recognize the Egyptian word, but will ask about it later.

She settles into a seat, and frowns, reading over the text. ]

I can understand why I'm your first choice to translate this.

[ The Irish isn't hard to understand, at all. Neither is the English. ]

You want this all translated into Ogham?

[peacefullywreathed]

That's right. It's useless to me as it is now; I can't read it, and it's hardly efficient to keep someone on hand to read everything to me.

[Even if there was someone around who knew both languages whom he could stand for more than a few hours.]

Do you have a going price, yet?

[bostonhowler]

Well.

[ She ponders for a moment. ]

Normally, I'd charge five dollars a page, but seeing as that isn't the currency here, and you've no reason to trust me...

[ She doesn't want to low ball it, but she also is looking at all the work that's ahead of her. ]

Ten juulan per twenty pages. You'll get them back in twenty page increments.