Colors finished his drink long before Sabine or Kaleeth, though he was able to simply act as if there was something remaining in his mug for a few minutes. When Sabine finally decided that it was time, Colors gave her a silent nod, then stood up from his cushion. He did not have to go far, as there was a particular woman he had his eyes on for the last few minutes. She was a young Breton woman standing nearby with her eyes on the other patrons. Her face was all smiles as Colors approached her with his usual confidence. Regardless of her actual opinions, she could keep any kind of act she wished for her job.

Colors had only to exchange a few words with the woman before counting out some gold coins and handing her a small bag of them. From that point, she was completely receptive to any advances he made. Colors walked alongside her, his arm wrapped low around her waist, towards the private "rooms." Although, as he was just starting to step out of sight, he glanced back to Sabine and Kaleeth with a flash of concern. He did actually hope that she knew what she was doing.

Kaleeth, meanwhile, was looking nervous, but she trusted Sabine. She knew the plan, so she just had to follow her lead. She sat close enough to Sabine to make it easy to speak quietly. "Okay, what's the first step now?"

Sabine kept an eye on Colours' approach to his hire. She had expected a more complicated ritual than what she saw, but she relaxed her shoulders with how easy it looked.

When Colours was about to disappear behind the curtain, Sabine's mouth was a thin line, but she knew what to do. She responded to Kaleeth by taking her hand and standing up. Then, towing Kaleeth along with her at a brisk pace, Sabine approached another woman. She was not paying close attention to the one she picked and ended up coming across an Orc woman. She was certainly laden with enough makeup and perfume that she was pretty, for an Orc, though she was still likely kept for more specialist clients.

"Excuse me," Sabine began, finding it hard to keep eye contact. "We have been looking and..." She told herself to stop stalling and gestured to Kaleeth with her free hand. "Would you like to help us both at once?" Sabine flushed at her childish choice of words. She was not used to coming up with the same innuendo as Colours.

The Orc stood with her hand on her hip for a few seconds, looking over Sabine and Kaleeth. She looked tough as they approached, but as soon as Sabine spoke, she started to smile. "I can help as many people as you bring to me. And for just you, I'll tell you what, I'll do it for the regular price."

After exchanging the gold, the Orc walked with Sabine and Kaleeth into one of the stalls. The curtains were all violet covered, and made from heavy, thick fabric. Though, it did little to dampen the sounds from the neighboring stalls. Inside the stall itself was fairly small and simple, being that the only object in the room was a single, large, circular cushion in the middle of the floor with a very...particular smell.

As the Orc closed up the curtain behind them, her expression took a rather surprising turn: sympathy. "Okay, so you two girls are beyond nervous. Saw it the moment you stepped in the door. Your first time here?" She said as she sat down cross-legged on the cushion. "You get dragged here by someone, or this just the first time you've done this? Come on, don't be afraid to talk. No need to rush." Overall, she was being surprisingly friendly for someone whose job was supposedly just seduction. Granted, Sabine had made her emotions rather easy to read.

Sabine stood over the woman they hired and was partway through reaching out to her with an open hand before her tone made her hesitate. The original plan was to simply put the prostitute to sleep with a spell and watch through the curtain from there on, but Sabine slowly brought her hands together and gave a reluctant look to Kaleeth. Perhaps this would not be as sensitive as they thought it would be.

After a sigh, Sabine sat down on the floor by the woman and spoke with more confidence than before. "I am sorry. We are not going to do mate with you. We are here waiting for someone to come in." Sabine took on a pained expression. She did not want to give too much away. "It is a really important thing -- we needed to watch from the curtains so we would not be suspicious. I was...just going to make you sleep for a while so we could watch the room. But if you do not mind waiting, I do not have to do that. Is that okay?"

It probably wasn't the answer that the Orc was expecting, but Sabine did not want to put on an act any more than she had to. She was horrible at lying.

The Orc narrowed her eyes at Sabine and crossed her arms. "Wait, make me sleep? Like, with a spell? Well that's surprisingly...rude for a nervous girl like you."

The Orc's gaze was judgmental for a few seconds before she let out a sigh and gave a shrug. "Well, you already paid me, so as long as you don't ask for that back, we can just sit and chat for a while. Can't say I've ever had a casual chat with my breasts hanging out and skooma in the air, but there's a first for everything, I guess."

Kaleeth trusted Sabine's judgment, so she went ahead and positioned herself next to the curtain so she could look out on the main room. "We don't want to cause any trouble for anyone; we just need to talk to someone and don't want to do the...things that people come here for."

The Orc grunted. "'Least I was right about you two not belonging here. You're not the first to come in here lookin' for someone, but they usually get thrown out after a while. Bouncers don't like it when people loiter around buying nothing, and the boss doesn't like his business becoming a casual meeting spot. People've told him to tell some of his clients to do their business elsewhere, but he don't want to 'offend' them. Some of the people that come looking for them are too proud to give us working girls any coin, but between us, just about any of us would be willing to sit around and talk for coin. I mean, you could pay me to do a lot of things."

Sabine gave a small nod to confirm that she was going to use a spell. She looked at the floor rather than make eye contact, but that was more to do with the guilt she felt for slighting the woman rather than the nudity. She was kinder than Sabine had expected. Though, Sabine's mouth did twitch at the irony of the prostitute having less conversations without clothing than Sabine had.

After hesitating for a nervous hum, Sabine looked at the woman. "That is good. I did not mean to offend you." Sabine paused again. She did not know how else to proceed. Kaleeth was watching, so she defaulted to the basics. "What is your name? I am Sabine," she put a hand to her own chest and then glanced at Kaleeth. "This is Kaleeth-rei."

"Yeah, greetings and all that. Name's Nargrak. "I can't really stay in here forever on the coin you gave me, but you can probably get over an hour out of it, on the high end. Hopefully that's enough for you to find whoever it is you're lookin' for."

Nargrak leaned back, holding herself up with her hands. She looked at Sabine curiously. "Let's see, who could you be meeting here...Lucilia, or maybe one of the Wolgram brothers? Viper, Ara'wha, the Jackdaw, perhaps Cirnorlain? Ah, you probably don't want to mention it. None of those people are very public with their dealings. Biggest question is why someone as seemingly innocent as you two are wanting to meet with anyone that would want to come here? It is 'cause of that other Argonian you came in with, the one that hired Anaya? He in that other room chatting her up too?"

"It is complicated," Sabine said. She opened her mouth and closed it. No doubt that Colours was taking the opportunity he had, there was no need to mention it. "We can...pay you a some more for a while if we run out of time."

Sabine wasn't sure if it was a good idea, but this Nargrak appeared knowledgeable enough to get information from. She took a breath and decided to try. It wasn't as if there was much else to talk about right now. "It sounds like you know a lot about the people here. How..." Sabine stopped and figured that they would meet him in Nargrak's view anyway. "...Do you know anything about the Viper?"

Nargrak chuckled. "Ah, so that's the one you're after. Some thief boss, as far as I know. I think he leads a local guild of thieves or something. Does smuggling, heists, trades information, that sort of thing. Again, I have to wonder why you two would want to meet with him. He's just trouble. Either you have no idea what you're getting into, or...you're more complicated of people than you're letting on."

The Orc rubbed her chin briefly. "You met the man before? Will he be expecting you? You even know what he looks like or when he'll be here? He doesn't usually come at any set time." She asked.

Sabine was comfortable enough to keep sharing. "We know that he is an Imperial with a Colovian accent. We have not met him." Sabine bit her lower lip. "We need his help to get out of the city and...go elsewhere."

As much as she didn't want to put on an act, Sabine and Kaleeth still had a cover story to keep up.

"Hmm, well if I remember right, he's a dark-haired man with a scar on his cheek. Might be hard to notice from a distance, though. More helpful is probably that he's a friend of the boss, so he's allowed to carry a dagger. Not many others, aside from bouncers, who can do that. Hope that helps." Nargrak explained.

Kaleeth was quick to speak up after the Orc started describing Viper. "Wait, he carries a dagger? I see a human with one on his hip right now; I just can't tell from here if he's Breton or Imperial."

"Let me see." Nargrak said, getting up onto her knees and crawling over to the curtain. Kaleeth moved out of the way to allow her to peer out, though it only took a moment for her to turn back with an answer. "Yeah, that's him. Looks like he's about to start on the skooma. Fortunate timing for you two, I guess. Won't have to wait here jabbering with me. Just, uh, take my advice. If you're going to talk to him, get straight down to business. He's not the type that likes to be interrupted for anything else."

After Nargrak confirmed the man Kaleeth saw, Sabine crawled over to peek as well. She was surprised that they would have as much luck finding him tonight as they did.

Sabine shuffled back from the curtain and stood up to her knees. She looked to Nargrak with a reluctant smile. "We should go then. Thank you for your help, Nargrak. It means a lot." She then looked up at Kaleeth and nodded, before standing, waving farewell, and slipping around the curtain with Kaleeth.

They did not approach the Viper immediately. Sabine reached her hand around the edge of the curtain in Colour's stall and knocked twice. "He is here, Colours," Sabine said as loudly as she could without attracting attention.

Whether Colours was in a position to emerge or not, Sabine did not look to be in any rush to approach the Viper. She gave Kaleeth a glance and asked. "Did you want to try talking to him?"

Kaleeth looked at Viper from a distance, through tried to make sure it did not look like she was looking at him. The last thing they wanted was to attract the wrong kind of attention while they were so close. It was hard to tell if Colors had even heard, or chose to hear, Sabine, since he did not respond. So, Kaleeth did not want to rely on him.

"Yes, maybe we should just go talk to him ourselves?" Kaleeth suggested at a whisper. "He doesn't look like he's doing anything important right now, so I think we have a chance. We don't really know what he'll be doing soon enough. The cover is that I'm your close friend trying to get you out of town, and was brought here by my brother, right? We can probably handle him ourselves."

Sabine took one last look at the curtain of Colours' stall and exhaled. "Okay," she breathed in and built her resolve.

With Kaleeth close, Sabine approached the dark haired Imperial and spoke, starting quietly and building into a clear tone. "Excuse me. Are you the Viper? Can you get me to Daggerfall without attention?"

Sabine frowned. She hoped that speaking as quickly as she did would not be too direct, despite Nargrak's advice.

"Huh, who's this?" Viper muttered as Sabine started to speak. He turned partially to face her from the stool on which he was sitting. "Hmm, straight to the point I see. Daggerfall? Guessing you're not looking just for a wagon. Also guessing you're desperate, else you wouldn't be here."

Turning back to the bar a moment, Viper took a drink from his skooma bottle. "Okay, you've got five minutes of my attention. Make it count. If you've got the coin, I could get you to Akavir if you wanted. If you've got the coin. Now, you runnin' for debts, a personal score, or religion?"

The directness reflected back at Sabine should have been encouraging. Her heart was beating so fast that she hardly noticed. It had struck Sabine halfway through the Viper's reply that he might not ask the nature of her flight. Thankfully, that proved to be untrue.

Sabine shot her eyes up to Kaleeth. She supposed she would be talking after all.

Sabine returned her eyes to the Viper. "Religion," she said quickly. "I need to go soon. Within the next few days."

Viper gave a grin, though from a man like him, it was not precisely comforting. "Elves nipping at your heels, then? I can do something about that." He said, taking on a more serious expression when he turned his head to Kaleeth. "And whose the lizard? She don't strike me as one of his faithful."

Kaleeth had been preparing in her mind how to respond to Viper for as many of his questions as she could think of, so it did not take her long to respond. "She is my friend, and has been for many years. They're not really after me, but I don't want to abandon her to the Elves. My...brother figured out that you might be able to help us. He brought us here."

"Oh, and where's this brother now?" He asked.

Kaleeth looked somewhat awkwardly down towards her feet. "He's...with one of the women."

Viper gave an amused huff. "Hmm, my kind of man. But to the point, I'll need a day or so to get things set up, but I can get you on your way in two days. Cost is five hundred gold, per person. Non-negotiable, and payable up front only. If you can get that gold to me by tomorrow morning, I can get you out on your schedule."

Sabine took a shuddering breath in. It was a lot of money for anything, let alone an investigation such as the one they were on. She took solace in her nervousness adding to their act, but Sabine quickly remembered to be direct before stalling too much.

"Okay. Five hundred gold per person." She nodded. "Where should we go to pay you? Here, or...?"

Viper nodded. "I'll make sure to be here tomorrow morning, just after sunrise. And the morning after that, in case you need some more time. When you do pay me, I'll tell you exactly when and where you need to go to meet my people. I'd start packing if I were you, just don't bring too much. Anything you can carry on your person is fair game, but I'll not bring any extra wagons for you."

The man quickly finished off the last of the skooma in his bottle, then let out a long, satisfied breath. "Now, unless you want to pay your fare by joining me in one of those stalls over there, I don't think we have anything else to talk about. Get me my coin, and I'll get you out of here safe and sound. Thalmor won't so much as touch you."

The agreement seemed almost too easy. Sure, the fare was expensive, but there was hardly any details, negotiation, or complication. Sabine was at a loss.

"Um...thank you," she managed. "I will try to gather the gold. Thank you."

Sabine began to turn around, keeping her eyes on the Viper. She was already pacing away when she turned fully, making sure that Kaleeth was still nearby. She made it about halfway to the door before she stopped in her tracks. Her head slowly turned to the stalls and she pursed her lips.

"I do not want to wait here, but we have to get Colours," Sabine said to Kaleeth without looking at her. "How should...?"