An important matter

[Caipra]

*Takes place during the "Inside Under the Crown of Ogotay" thread right after Ziad and Caipra have left the crew*

Caipra's eyes met Kriss's ones, who was watching them leaving,a little surprised. The old woman quickly smiled to her and moved toward another room. When she felt sure that Ziad and her were alone, she faced him, crossed her arms and said.
"I'm listening."

[Ziad]

Ziad had stepped aside to let Caipra enter the room first - a storage room right next to the main room of the tavern, but there wasn´t too much stored here for now, so the room did not appear too claustrophobic. Stepping in himself, he closed the door, hoping that this would make sure there would be no unwanted listeners.

"I came here to have a word with you," he started, keeping a watchful eye on the sorceress, but also keeping a rather neutral tone. Testing the waters for now. "About some of the guests who seem to be staying here lately."

[Caipra]

Caipra supported Ziad's glance. She perfectly knew where he was getting, but she didn't want to jump the steps. She answered, with a very calm tone.
"You're talking about Sinbad and his crew? They are good friends. They used to come here often before, but I haven't seen them for more than a year."

[Ziad]

For a moment he fought the urge to narrow his eyes at her, trying to detect whether she was hiding something. But he saw no reason in playing a game of hide and seek he decided. Not as long as it was not getting anywhere.

"I am." he said, answering her question. "or at least I think so. If I am correctly informed the ones back there," he gave a barely visible nod back towards the tavern, "are not the only ones. What about the young woman who is travelling with them?"

It was partly a guess into the blue. He had heard rather disturbing news earlier. A young woman using some kind of magic and from all he knew there was a connection between her and these guests. He had to make sure what this connection was all about. And sometimes finding out such delicate things worked better when not boorishly going like a bull at a gate.

[Caipra]

"Bryn. She's part of the crew. She was tired after the long trip, so she went to sleep a few moments ago."

Caipra was now sure that Ziad wanted to talk to her about what happened in the streets with Bryn. But he seemed hesitant to talk about it, like if he was expecting the old woman to reveal everything by herself.
Ziad was already breaking the law, by hiding Caipra's true identity, but the old sorceress didn't know how the guard was going to act with Bryn.

However, she knew that she couldn't escape the conversation anymore, so she stopped that little game and said.
"You didn't come here just to talk to me about the crew, did you? Because if you want to meet them, they're right here." She pointed the door, leading to the main room of the tavern.
"What's going on, Ziad?"

[Ziad]

Apparently she was looking right through his little masquerade - which hardly was one at all.
Ziad leant his back against the door, crossing his arms in front of his chest.

"I didn´t want to make this a big matter," he said. "yet. About an hour ago, I got news from one of the townspeople about a young woman using some sort of magic. By the looks of it, it was a dangerous sort of magic and the description fits with this ... Bryn." As did the fact that she had retired because she was ´tired after the long trip´as Caipra had put it. Things fit too well here.

He didn´t make any commands or accusations. Not yet. He couldn´t be certain about how much Caipra knew or whether she was planning to hide things from him.

[Caipra]

Caipra listened to Ziad and sat on a wooden box. He wasn't clearly saying that Bryn was the person he was looking for, but the wise woman knew he wasn't stupid. An accident implying magic, which happened the same day a ship arrived in Basra, the town where everyone knew that magic was forbidden, this couldn't be a coincidence.

"Yes I...heard about it. Or I rather felt it." she said calmly.

Then she added, still without mentioning Bryn's name.
"Did that person also mentionned that a little boy had been attacked by men. Whoever that person was, she just wanted to protect the boy."

[Ziad]

"He did not." Ziad replied, knowing the moment that Caipra hesitated that his guess had turned out correct. "but what he did mention was concerning. Matters such as the protection of children should be left to my men, not be solved with magic which as you should very well be aware of is forbidden in this city. With good reason as it seems."

Ziad himself didn´t understand magic, nor was he in a position to judge whether the banishment of magic that had been passed was justifyable or good, but it was a decision that had been made by the lord of the city whom he served and since it was so, it was the law he accepted and executed.

[Caipra]

"Yes I'm more than aware about it."
She took a deep breath, looked at Ziad in the eyes and said not to the guard, but to her friend.
"Magic is not necessarily bad, you should know this more than anyone else, since I saved you from a certain death."

Caipra remembered that day, Ziad and two of his men had come to the healer after a street fight. Ziad had been fatally hurt by a knife. While she was trying to stop the hemorrhage, Caipra had looked at Ziad's imploring eyes. They had stayed like that a few second before she suddenly asked the two other guards to get out of the room.
Then she had used her magic to heal him. The old sorceress knew that this act could have signed her death sentence, but Ziad was so indebted to her that he never told anything about it. They had become good friends since that day.

The old woman came back to reality and just added.
"What happened in the street, was an accident."

[Ziad]

Ziad´s eyes which had been fixed on the sorceress till now strayed a little, showing the slight discomfort the captain of the guards was feeling. Of course he knew that magic was not to be condemned entirely and he himself was ambigious to the ban of all magic within the confines of Basra. But he was also bound to Omar and that put him into a rather uncomfortable situation.

"What kind of an accident?" he enquired, deciding that by trying to get a clearer picture of the situation and what had happened exactly, he might win time to come to a better plan about how to act. He wasn´t sure yet. Had he already made up his mind on the matter, he would not have come here alone.

[Caipra]

Caipra knew that Ziad should enforce the law. He just followed Omar's orders, even if they were not always justified. But the fact is that this evening, he has decided to come to see her first, without any guards, instead of acting directly, and right now, she could feel that he seemed hesitant, as he had been with her case before.

The old sorceress tried to explain her point of view.
"Sometimes, when a magician feels in danger, or is afraid of something, he can loose the control of his powers. It's a way to defend himself. If someone attacked you, you would grab your sword and try to protect yourself, even if you have to hurt your attacker. This is something we learn to control with time."

She stopped a few moment, and added before Ziad could say something.
"Tell me Ziad, why did you come to see me, instead of arresting that person?"

She hoped she could have found the witnesses of the scene before the guards did, otherwise she knew that she would be hard to save Bryn. Maybe Sinbad could have tried to talk to Omar but still...But the fact that Ziad was the one who had been the first warned could change everything.

[Ziad]

"I prefer to act on the possibility of a doubt." Ziad replied calmly, his momentary moment of insecurity gone again. This was putting him into a rather tricky situation where he was torn between his obligaions as a guard and his common sense with regards to a friend´s word.

"But despite that, I could not just send that man away and leave things at that. My head is a bit too close to a sling for comfort already."

[Caipra]

They both felt uncomfortable. The outcome of this conversation could bring a lot of consequences...or not.
If Ziad decided not to arrest Bryn, things would come back to normal, and this accident would be forgotten quickly. But if he decided to arrest her, Bryn could be sentenced to death, everyone would hear about it in Basra. Without thinking about Sinbad, who would surely do everything to save her, even if he would have to break his friendship with Omar.

Caipra thought about erasing Ziad's memory, for a moment, but she quickly forget about that idea. She couldn't do this to her friend who trusted her.

"So what are you gonna do, now?" she simply asked, without knowing what else to say.

[Ziad]

Even though Ziad felt torn and uncomfortable in this situation, his outer appearance didn´t betray that insecurity. He had learned, over the years, to keep things under control in a situation like this, since a cool head usually helped looking at things with a clearer mind.

"I am going to warn you," he therefore said, keeping the eye contact. "I am not sure whether the man who came to see me is the only witness, because if that is so, things look a little less dire." There was a hidden question in that, the question whether there were more than one man who had seen what had been happening on the streets. The more witnesses, the harder would it be to cover things up. And a part of his mind told him clearly that he should not even consider the "covering up".

[Caipra]

Caipra had thought about it before Ziad came to her. She ignored how many people have seen the scene, and if she didn't act now, the story could spread quickly, bringing more problems that they already have.
An idea came in her mind, but she would need Ziad's help to succeed.

"You could ask that man if there are other witnesses and if he knows them. If we find them, I may have an idea to ensure they can never talk about what happened that night...but you're not going to like it."
She watched Ziad, waiting for his reaction.