The woman with the bloodstained hands had been in that room all night. Deiva knew, because she too had been sitting in the bar since the man was dragged in, bleeding and crying out for help. She had watched silently as the woman had taken charge leading the man and his children into the room upstairs. And she had sat there as his and his children's screams echoed through the floor and the abandoned bowl of fruit grew more and more brown.

Deiva had heard her fair share of grief in life, and this was no difference. First the crying and wailing and cursing the heavens, and then came a quiet acceptance that nothing you, or anyone, could do would bring them back. Others may have cried at the emotion radiating from the first floor room, but Deiva was past that now, past caring if someone lived or died. Did that make her mad? To some people, probably. But nobody ever noticed her anyway. Nobody glanced in her direction long enough to see the person. All they saw were the scars that tore her face, the pink swathes of tissue, all that remained as a reminder of that fire so long ago.

The woman came out of the room in the morning, her face twisted in a grim half-smile. She also didn't notice Deiva, sitting in the corner of the tavern, face half covered by her hood. She made her way out across the festival, seemingly numb to everything around her, the drummers warming up for the day, the scent of freshly baked sweet rolls and the colourful scarfs that floated around the thoroughfare. 

Well, might as well see if the woman had left anything. Sneaking into the room, she noticed a leather pouch on the nightstand. Prying it open she found... Four coppers. Well, money was money, didn't matter where it had come from, only where it was going. Pocketing the pouch, she sauntered back out of the room, heading towards the festival.

She didn't make it far before seeing the woman again, on the other side of the festival. She debated going up to her, telling her she had heard the events in the tavern, or perhaps giving her the leather coin pouch. No, she wouldn't give up that money. She turned to go, but as she turned away, she stumbled and fell into a pile of crates for carrying stall tents. They crashed onto the ground, the trays inside ringing on the cobbles. [i]Dammit.[/i]