Oliver's investigation of the mysterious book ended up being rather inconclusive, sadly; the strange script was just as undecipherable on page fifty as it was on page one, although this came as no great surprise to him. He began flipping through the pages rather absentmindedly, scanning each page for any sign of a language he could understand. At last he settled on a something he recognized: the Royal Crest of Ikana. It seemed to be part of some sort of diagram, based on the various arrows, footnotes and a small map on the adjacent page. Before he could investigate further, however, he was promptly handed a flier by an attractive young woman. Rather surprised that he suddenly had company, he quickly took the flier and snapped the book shut with his other hand, unintentionally creating a rather loud [i]clap[/i] that startled even him. The whole affair made him look quite defensive, in the end, and although he didn't want anyone asking too many questions about the book, he never liked to come off as overly suspicious.

"Catching the show tonight?" asked the girl. Whatever she'd said before was lost on Oliver, who had been thoroughly occupied with his complete failure to glean anything from the book. Oliver took a quick moment to scan over the flier, which was for one "Black Marsh Circus." He'd been to Marshfall a few times in his travels, so he'd heard the name, but had never been able to spare enough time to see a show. Upon closer observation, the aforementioned girl happened to be featured prominently on the flier.

"Hey, this is you, right?" he asked, pointing to her picture on the flier. "Wow, I can't believe I'm talking to a celebrity right now. You don't look nearly as blue in person, though," he joked, referring to the stylized ink drawings on the flier. He hoped that little quip made up for the awkward defensive book snap reaction, but he guessed she was probably eager to move on and pass out more fliers. It was at this point that he realized he had yet to actually provide an answer her initial question, which was likely all she wanted to hear from him in the first place. He hadn't actually read the show times before, so he figured he'd just give a blanket, non-committal answer.

"Gosh, though, I'm actually really busy handling contracts this time of year. I will try my very best to make it to a show while you guys are in town," promised Oliver, placing both the strange book and the circus flier in his satchel. These assurances were both lies, however; once Oliver had heard the Prince would be in town he purposely arranged to have his contracts covered so that he could be free to see that. He also had little intention of actually attending some circus act now that he had this strange book to investigate. Either way it was unlikely that she would notice him even if she did show up; by the looks of things she'd been distributing fliers all day. He doubted that she would sorely miss one mildly handsome young swordsman amid a slew of far more interested fans.

[INDENT][b]Oliver temporarily obtained the Black Marsh Circus Flier![/b]

An advertisement for the Black Marsh Circus. Lists show times for the carnival season. Likely to be deposited in a trash can once Lynette is out of sight.[/INDENT]

"Will you be signing autographs after these shows? I don't want to hold you up now, I'm sure you're terribly busy and I'm [i]already[/i] being a bother as it is, but a friend of mine is a very big fan of yours, and I'm sure if you signed something for him he would be delighted," he lied. The very least he could do was throw her a softball, small-talk question before he went back to his reading.