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Ceolfric narrowed his eyes at Aleka as the man gave his explanation. It wasn't quite moralizing, nor was it outright derogatory, but there were haughty undertones there that he wasn't fond of. Or maybe he'd read too far into it; the words themselves were sensible, but the flat affect of the half-elf made any subtext impossible to read. There was a very strong possibility that there simply weren't any unspoken implications at all and Aleka was just weird.

The blue-skinned elf was far more welcoming, in the way Ceolfric assumed a spider might be welcoming to a fly. He was clearly getting some kind of weird kick out of all the new arrivals, though the resumption of his introduction after Aleka had cut him off gave Ceolfric at least a bit of an idea why. Merchants always had a weird forced friendliness about them; it was how they manipulated their customers. For some reason, some of them thought the same thing worked with people who had a blade to their neck. Still, if he was the resident treasurer, Cerric likely had a vested interest in keeping competent people around to line his own pockets. Not exactly a malicious motive, even if it was self-serving. Besides, whatever a 'primordial aetherborn' was probably didn't need to resort to trickery and deceit to incite a man's downfall.

Ceolfric stepped away from the desk upon being dismissed, thankful that Aleka hadn't pressed for more inane details that he had no capacity to provide, and turned his attention back to the motley crew that had followed him inside. None of them had gotten uppity upon overhearing what he was - and he didn't think them nearly virtuous enough to not have eavesdropped - but they [i]were[/i] all whispering to each other like conspiratorial children, and the elven woman looked spooked by... something. Maybe him, maybe the locale. Maybe he should find out.

[color=AA4A44]"If you have something to say, say it,"[/color] He grumbled toward Eila, [color=AA4A44]"Mister Liadon, in his boundless hospitality, did offer to assuage your worries, after all."[/color] There were a few questions of his own he wanted answered, quite frankly. The bandit lazily shifted his gaze between the elves, now resting loosely on Cerric. [color=AA4A44]"I, for one, would like to know if the Bounty House was aware of the creature that roams the forest and leaves giant claw marks beside camping travelers."[/color] 

[hr][@Hero]