Ssarak Dyreackthanose

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Naturally, Ssarak was immediately suspicious as soon as Lyn gave him her answer. The claim that she wanted to meet an “old friend” seemed almost ridiculous for someone who had been alive for only about a year, and while he certainly trusted that Lyn was being honest with him, that did not mean he trusted that she was safe. This “old friend” was an unknown, and in this environment, this gala, anything unknown was a potential threat. 

Ssarak stayed close to Keri, but did not tell her what he was doing. He did not take pleasure in keeping important secrets from his allies, but knowledge was dangerous in this place. He could not assume Keri’s mind to be safe from the intrusion of psychomancers, so the less she knew about what Ssarak was doing, the safer Lyn would be. His first step was, of course, to get a sense of what Lyn was walking into. He already had access to Lyn’s mind, so mentally, he tracked her mind as she stepped out onto the balcony and searched for any other minds around her. She seemed to be alone, save for a single other person, and a few nearby songbirds. His next step was to prod the mind of the person Lyn was meeting, though he made sure to do so in no different of a way as all of the other dozens of psychomancers had been doing since they had arrived. Immediately, he detected a strong ward, so he stopped any further attempts to pry into the person’s mind to keep himself from being detected. Feeling a simple prod against one’s ward was nothing unusual at the gala, so it was unlikely that this “old friend” would have a reason to believe they were being specifically observed. 

Despite the setback of the ward, Ssarak was not without options. Being that he was inside Lyn’s mind, he could read her senses of sight and hearing to spy on the conversation without Lyn being any the wiser. However, given Lyn’s knowledge of psychomancy, she had thought far enough ahead to specifically ask Ssarak not to do that exact thing before the gala. Ssarak was willing to break that promise for the purpose of protecting her, but not when he had another option available to him. While there did not seem to be any other people outside, there were far simpler minds he could manipulate. There were birds already close by to the balcony, so Ssarak entered the mind of the nearest one and manipulated it to make it seem appealing to stay in place. He intruded into the bird’s sense of hearing and sight to give himself a metaphorical fly on the wall with which to eavesdrop onto Lyn’s conversation. 

With the bird under Ssarak’s influence, he heard everything in the conversation between Lyn and this vampire man. It allowed him to finally understand the context of how Lyn could have an old friend to begin with; however, the vampire did not reveal too much of use about himself. He seemed friendly, but Ssarak knew well how, with some practice, one could easily hold an olive branch in one hand, and a dagger in the other. Unfortunately, Lyn was not nearly as reserved in what she said, and she gave away information Ssarak really would have preferred to keep secret. Information that could be dangerous to the Naga. As Lyn was walking back inside, Ssarak did not stop observing, so he heard the vampire’s final comment, which only further solidified Ssarak’s desire to act. He encouraged the bird to follow after the vampire, and while Ssarak would not be able to maintain a mental connection with the bird for too far of a distance, it would at least give him a few moments to make his next decisions.