Questionable Transactions (Open)

[phaedra]

The Black Market was always teeming. Throngs of diverse creatures, both the merchants and the goods. It wasn't held to standards of night and day, closing time didn't exist; it was a never-ending shopping center of restricted items and fleshy merchandise. Chirps, buzzing, chatter, laughter, arguments, a chorus of bartering and haggling filled the ears to a point where everything was quiet, and the sounds blended into one another. Which sound was which had no meaning.

She stood out like a sore thumb, tall, and ominous, her skin had an ethereal glow, like a white light that illuminated from the pale flesh that wrapped her innards. Anaphina was never one for blending in; she didn't have to. She looked like a Queen, with her white hair wrapped around two cones on the sides of her head, inter-laced with silver chains that dangled from the cone tips, ending in large tear drop sapphires. A regal, majestic collar bloomed from around her neck, laced tight around her throat like a corset. Her amulet hung between her compacted cleavage, pressed firm by the wasp-like, black corset wound taut about her waist, and from the waist, a beautiful, flowing skirt, like an upside-down tulip, blossomed, with four sections, two black, two pale blue. Her heels kept her head above nearly all others present at the market, 6" spikes, buckled around the ankles and closed around the toes, if she had feeling in her toes, she'd be in pain.
The ground beneath her frosted, each time to spikes of her heels burrowed into the earth, and flakes of snow trailed behind her from beneath her dress, not enough to stick, but the pure white shades definitely stood out in the dreary, torchlit surroundings of the black market. Earth tones, grays, even the clothing they wore was colorless, a mess of browns, blacks and grays, and she shone like a star, in a sea of darkness.

At either side was her muscle, so to speak. Just a pair of goblins, barely half her height, if not a little shorter. Green, plump, and utterly ugly, with long snouts and wirey, gray hair. One of them lugged a bag on his back, while the other handled a large mace with both hands, which was funny, considering he already had a weapon sheathed at his side. But, the mace wasn't his; it was hers. The only means to tell the pair apart was that the one carrying glasses wore obnoxious, round spectacles, and the other did not.

Anaphina's blue shaded lips smirked as they approached a stall, housing in a cage, a rather large looking basilisk, with her eyes duely blindfolded. She sashayed to the cage, with long legged steps, and her dress made bell swoops side to side as she swished her hips. She knelt beside the cage and prodded the scales with a finger tip. The basilisk struck with lightning speed, and she removed her finger hastily, with low laughter. "Oh, you are a naughty one, aren't you?..." The attendant approached her, a swamp witch, short, plump, and drab looking, with unkempt, ragged hair, and nasty brown clothing. "Don't touch the merchandise." She asserted, placing her hands on her obtrusive hips.
Anaphina stood, towering high above the little fat witch, immediately squelching whatever confidence the poor thing had once held. She placed a single hand on her hip, and one, long finger pointed its talon-like nail toward the creature. "What shade are its eyes?"

The little witch studdered, as she looked up at the cold, stoic face of her icy superior. "Uhhh... sh..we.. are you crazy? You can't look 'em in the eyes!"
Anaphina arched an eyebrow, a single, thin line forming a perfect arch upon her brow. "Well, then how am I supposed to know if she'll match my dress?..." She shook her head dismissively and grabbed a portion of her dress from the floor. "...It's fine. I like them better on ice." She spoke lowly, waltzing away toward the slave block.

"Let's buy something sentient, shall we?..." She rhetorically asked her two servants, as she examined the different slaves being auctioned. "...Lork!"
The goblin with spectacles duely bowed his head. His name was actually Howser, but he didn't dare correct her. "Yes, your majesty?"
"What am I looking for?" She placed the tip of her pinky between her lips, as she crossed her other arm before her chest, hips shifting to a perfect contropasto pose.
"Well... we've already so many things... perhaps..." Howser began.
"Nevermind. I'll pick whatever I like." She cut him off carelessly, and she held out her hand. "...Cigarette? And light it away from me. It's already terribly hot in here. I can hardly breathe."
Howser lugged the bag from his shoulder and went through it, finding a white papered cigarette from its silver case. He lit it between his own lips, before wiping the tip off with a handkerchief and slipping it into her snapping fingers. "Well, madame, you are wearing that tight thingy..."
She sucked the smoking papered stick lustfully, like a greedy child with a piece of candy, but his words caused her to turn on him, with hateful eyes, and seething smoke swirling beside her hollowed cheeks. "And what do you propose the alternative is? Do you want me to look disgusting? Like that filthy, fat little witch that looks more like your kind than her own? Keep silent and do as your told, Gwarp."
Howser shook his head and joined her in examining the slaves. Half the time they came down here, they found nothing, and the other half, it seemed she didn't buy anything. She took it. Slaves didn't interest her. It was the free ones she liked. The ones she could break, force into a pact, and eventually, turn into a trophy. That was how she got the two goblins. They had been vendors here, once upon a time.

[Queen Fixatia]

...Conquest.

The Black Market was hot, dirty, and utterly disgusting. So, why was the queen of the succubi here? Fixatia had already asked herself that question about a hundred and fifteen times. In all honesty, she knew why she was down in the Underdark, walking through the aisle at the marketplace. The succubus was looking for a particular potion that was one of the rarest of the rare. She had been coming to the marketplace for a handful of years now, looking for this particular potion.

Fixatia had prettied herself up in pink attire like she normally did. The queen never went anywhere without sprucing herself up. She had decided on a pale pink dress today with white and pink ribbons. The skirts of the dress went down to the top of her knees. White stockings went up to her knees. Pale pink shoes adorn her feet with delicate straps the wrapped up her ankles. Upon her hands were lacy white gloves with pink ribbons around the wrist. Even the dear queen’s makeup and hair were done up. Her face had been powdered. Her hair had been done up in ribbons and feathers.

The succubus felt quite regal today especially around the Black Market where many people were wearing rags and nasty clothing. As she went through the marketplace her four servants were walking behind her in two rows of two. They were all wearing plan matching light pink dresses with their hair tied back loosely. They were looking around when their attention was not focused on Fixatia. Every once in a while one would point out an object that Fixatia might have been interested in. Other than that, the servants did not say much.

The queen paused by a table close to where a row of slaves were being kept. Her eyes looked over what had been presented by the vender. There were various bottles on the table all containing some sort of substance.

“My lady, you should definitely try this perfume,” the vender was saying to the queen. “It is made from a rare flower found in the rugged lands of the north. It was dug up from beneath the thick snow.”

Fixatia was ignoring the seller. She was more concern with her searching. As it was, she already probably smelled quite a bit better than that perfume probably did.

[phaedra]

The Ice Maji was bored with the slaves. Nothing of interest. She'd seen them all! And she had them all, packed away in a frozen prison, preserved for infinity, so long as she lived. Her gift, the chilling solemnity of eternal beauty.
The sole of her shoe clicked now, with her incessant, vacant tapping upon a floor now frozen by her standing upon it. Click. Click. Click. Her hands were occupied. They rested on the scalps of her entourage, long, sharp fingernails delicately raking through the little hair they had left. In fact, their thinning hairlines followed the exact pattern that she so frequently indulged upon scraping, during those increasingly dull moments when she had nothing else to do.

This reprieve from chaos had taken its toll on the Ice Maji. For the past three hundred years, she'd been inactive, a brewing ice storm in the north, rarely taking to leaving her icy abode, waiting. Patiently waiting. Longing for the old days of war and war heroes, when the strong were recognized, and the weak were conquered, when history was written with names and faces, rather than long, periods of tranquility and simplicity.
Her mirror had been her only friend, and for a hundred years, she stood before it, the full length reflection, staring. Staring. In fact, she'd froze there, completely, a soulless work of ice, dormant and stiff, with only the eyes shifting up and down, up and down. And what seemed like it would be her eternal slumber ended only recently. The ice around her form cracked, and her pale limbs moved, and she emerged once again from the calling.

Her ears caught something interesting from the side. Perfume. From a flower. Her lands? The devil take the day when something grew in the harsh north! It seemed the ice had grown soft in her absence.
Her nails nearly slid into their skins, as her fingers crunched together upon their scalps, and the goblins cringed for fear of being paralyzed by the poisonous talons. Her upper lip curled with a brewing disgust, and it twitched, ever so slightly to reveal a slight glimpse of sharp, white teeth. But she was quick to calm, just like an avalanche, the ice fell dead with the loss of inertia, and her face became solid.

Her silhouette fell upon the seller with her approach, the tall, looming spectre of shadow, willowy in frame, painfully skinny in the waist, and spikes upon her head. She leaned, and her head became level with the seller's own face. "Tell me..." Her eyes shifted to the perfume in his hand, then back to his filthy face. She swore he was missing an eye. "...How does a second thing of beauty grow in a land where only one can survive?" She asked, with a tone as condescending to the seller as her staggering height. She crossed her arms, and her fingertips tapped along the sides of her upper arms impatiently awaiting an answer.
The goblins stood beside her, silent and still. They knew better. If the brewing heat of the Maji's temper effected her body, they were sure she'd be melted.

Anaphina noted the one sitting upon the table with her eyes, but she kept them majorly fixed on the seller. She pondered the attire briefly and came to the conclusion the girl was clothed in the first splash of elegance she'd yet to see on the streets of the black market. She made a mental note to issue a compliment after this encounter with the perfume seller was through.

[Queen Fixatia]

...Bitch craft.

Fixatia’s concentration on searching for the potion she had been looking for broke as someone new came up to the table. The queen at once took note of the cold air that seemed to surround this woman, and the succubus could not help but to glance up at this newcomer. She made her eyes quick, though, seeming to keep her interest on her search.

The woman had addressed the vender in a harsh tone that had caused him to instantly start to shake and grip for words. The man was rather tiny compared to both this stranger and to Fixatia which was really saying something. The queen may have been powerful but to most she was rather short.

The seller was quick to cower from the rather tall and intimidating stranger. His hands, which held the bottle of perfume, began to shake rather violently has he tried to regain himself but failed miserably.

“The temperature has warmed up… quite a bit in one of the regions of the northern lands… my lady,” the seller said, trying to find his words. “To the east, close to the swamplands… there is an area of the frozen lands that has thawed out. I found the flower there… One of the sweetest I have ever had a chance to smell.”

The vender gave a nervous smile as if to try to calm himself down. “Does the lady wish to smell it?” he questioned, holding the bottle out toward the stranger.

Fixatia watched with some inquisitiveness. This woman had seemed rather angry at the thought of the flower in the northern lands. The queen became curious to who this woman was. She seemed familiar, though, as if she had seen some sort of picture of this one or heard of a story of such a description. Of course, it could all be to her imagination. Fixatia had been alive for thousands of years, and could easily be confusing this woman with some legend.

[phaedra]

Anaphina listened to the bumbling clod ramble and stutter like a fool. She rolled her eyes as he explained about the flower and its location, and eventually, his voice lost its frequency, and she just stared at him. Examining his features.
How did he find the nerve to wake each morning? What could he possibly have to look forward to? His skin was so uneven and textured with muck and signs of no bathing, and his smell made her nostrils cringe with curling ripples. His hair was greasy and unkempt, and the thinness of it caused the strands to clump together in a rather disgusting fashion. She found herself day-dreaming about being the fire Maji, rather than the ice Maji. She could see it, clear as day in her mind, roasting him over a fire until only ash remained, and his ugliness was expunged from the world forever.

Her fantasy was ruined though, like a puff of smoke, when the seller asked her if she'd like to sample his perfume. She glared daggers at his hand and dreaded the idea of even coming near it, but she couldn't resist being wicked. She clamped the top of the bottle with her index and thumb, and she brought the bottle beneath her nostrils in a prim fashion. She breathed in, taking a gentle whiff of the fragrance, and she couldn't deny its smell was indeed tantalizing. But she was much too spiteful.
She handed the bottle back to the seller, and the liquid inside was quite frozen, pure ice, and she dismissed him curtly. "Go away now." She urged, with an ushering of her hand.

She stepped around the bewildered seller, whose wares were now cold and scentless, and she seated herself at the table where the pretty one in pink sat. She crossed her legs and sat up straight, her goblin servants taking position behind her. "And what, might I ask, is such a beauty doing down here... in this.... dump?" She asked, with a tilting of her head and jingling of the long, dangling thin chains that hung from the cones in her hair.
She was already scrutinizing the woman, pondering how she'd look in one of her halls. Perhaps, she would place her beside someone just as regal, or maybe beside a monstrous creature to add contrast. She tried to determine the girl's species. She'd gotten quite good, and she determined the succubus wasn't human, but her exact race, she'd have to wait and see before she could even hope to decide where she'd wish to put her.

[Queen Fixatia]

...Tantalizing.

Fixatia turned her gaze to the cold stranger as she sat beside the queen. The succubus could not be too cruel to this one, now, she had given her a compliment. Really, the queen could no complain already. Being as vain as Fixatia was, she could not help but smile at the word beauty being sent to her.

She put down a bottle she had been examining as she thought of how to address this stranger. Fixatia was always careful of her words when she was on a quest for a particular item. Some people did not need to know the details of the succubus’s life, and she often completely flat out lied to people.

“I am looking for a particular item that I heard could be found in the Black Market,” Fixatia said with a smile. “And I must thank you for you compliment. You are rather beautiful yourself and quite tantalizing in a sense.”

The queen’s four servants stood off to her side as she conversed with this stranger. Their eyes shifted from weary glances at the stranger to anticipating looks to their master.

[phaedra]

Anaphina's long, glassy fingernails tapped the wood of the table, in elegant, sequential taps, while her cool, frozen gaze continued to examine the Queen. She admired the fabric, the lacy details, and the poofy nature of her petticoat. The color.. well, Anaphina would never be caught wearing pink, but on this one, the color suited well.
She propped her elbow on the table and outstretched her fingers. Her goblin knew the drill, and he immediately lit the tip of a cigarette, turning his back to keep the open flame far from his mistress. A cigarette holder, made of pure ice, long and pleasing to the eye, with beautiful curvature, formed in between Anaphina's index and middle finger, and the goblin stuffed the tip with the smoking stick.

Anaphina puffed on the icy edge of her holder, briefly closing her eyes as the smoke filled her lungs and exhaled through her nostrils with a smooth, longing release. The succubus mentioned searching for a special item, only found in the Black market, and Anaphina's interest was immediately peaked. What could possibly be only found here? Well, that was a silly question, since it was the black market, after all, but she wanted to know what it was. How rare it was, its value, and whether it would be a worthy addition to her collection.
She smiled with a slight curl of her lips at the compliment returned, and she chose it as an opportune time for an introduction. "I am called Anaphina. And, you are?" She asked, with a gentle gesture of her hand, as a cloud of smoke issued from her lips and surrounded the head of one of the servants across the table with a cold carelessness for proper manners only an Ice Maji could produce.

Introductions, then conversation, then prying. Anaphina wanted to know everything she could about this one, her title, her race, her abilities, and of course, what she was possibly searching for in the black market.

[Queen Fixatia]

...Ice cold.

“I am Fixatia,” the succubus said to Anaphina with a polite little smile. The name, Anaphina, did ring a bell within the mind of the queen. This one was the Ice Maji which she had heard a bit about during her lifetime in Yviex. They had never formally met, as it would be. Fixatia had simply heard of the Ice Maji’s power and tails about the witch.

The queen’s eyes turned back to the table, seeming to slowly lose interested. There was nothing on the table that Fixatia cared to have or was even looking for. What a waste of time. Why was it such a difficult task to find just one potion?

“What brings someone of great power and beauty such as yourself to the Black Market?” Fixatia asked the Maji now as she looked back at her. “Looking for anything in particular?”

[phaedra]

Anaphina knew of Fixatia, the name was far too unique to forget. She'd heard of her, royalty, and some form of demon. She could've guessed, but she opted not to. The potential royal title was more than enough incentive to keep Anaphina's interest for the moment.

Anaphina thought a moment when Fixatia asked if there was anything in particular she was looking for. She could've lied and claimed to be looking for some mystical artifact or another slave to keep her icy chambers neat and clean, crystal and cold, but why lie? She knew the black market like a familiar catalog. The merchandise was the same now as it had been the last time she'd come, nearly three thousand years ago. That was when she'd obtained her first gorgon. Such a volatile animal, but beautiful in its own way. The serpents in her hair, the long, twisting, snake-like tail, the feminine features like carved marble, she'd made one of her goblins remove the blindfold before freezing the gorgon in eternal beauty.
"I'm just surveying for now. Something may catch my interest or perhaps not. The Black Market is limited when one's a frequent shopper." Anaphina responded, with the smoothness of a frozen lake. She wedged her icy holder between her cold, pale aqua lips, and the cherry on the tip blazed as she puffed.
"How about we stroll together? What was it exactly you were looking for? Perhaps one of us can spot it." Anaphina asked with a wily smirk. She held out her hand gracefully, and the goblin to her right took it, to which her lips curled in a tinge of disgust. She pulled herself from her seat and stood prostrate, looming like an overhead cloud, shadowing over what fell before her form.
"Shall we?"

[Queen Fixatia]

...Time takes us all.

The queen of the succubi stood up from where she had been sitting, dusting off the skirts of her dress as she did so. One of her servants quickly stepped forward and powdered her cheeks. Another knelt down, cleaning the dirt off of Fixatia’s shoes in quick gestures. Another of the servants stepped forward with a mirror for the queen to examine her newly powdered face. Fixatia waved the mirror away when she was content with how she looked.

“Perhaps, we could search for what we desire together,” she said, directing her attention back to Anaphina. “But I will keep my search to myself. I know exactly what it is I seek. I know what it looks like, feels like, smells like. I will leave you for your browsing around and not pry anymore to what suits your fancy.”

The queen gave a polite little smile and a nod of her head. “I tend to keep such business to myself, so no disrespect Anaphina.”

[phaedra]

The Ice Maji observed Fixatia's beauty routine, the diligent pampering done by her servants to beautify and perfect the natural physical prowess. Anaphina had never trusted any of her servants to do anything in regards to her face. Clumsy, filthy goblins with long, wiry fingers. Some goblins were renown as expert craftsmen, with careful hands, but her servants were not those goblins, and she would freeze herself before she would ever let them lay a hand on her carved marble countenance.

Anaphina bowed elegantly, with a swooping spread of her blossoming dress. "But of course..." She said with an understanding smile in response to the Queen's refusal to reveal her pursuit. "...I would not expect anything less, Fixatia." And she arose, tall and poised.

She strode through the bustles of merchants and consumers, head high above the rest with slow, long legged strides for Fixatia to keep up. Her eyes gleaned the wares, but she kept the corner reserved for Fixatia, carefully scrutinizing what the succubus would divert her attention to.
Then, she spotted something, a beautiful glimmer in the sea of rot and useless. It was a necklace, and she paused, looking over the item at the stand. There were many trinkets hanging, and some were laid out upon a red velvet cloth upon the table, but this one stood out above the rest. Diamonds. A webbing of silver chains, intertwined together, linked by valuable, sparkling gems, clear, like ice. Her hand reached, and the glassy claws slid underneath the chain, lifting it into the air before her awestruck eyes. She knew the item. She'd seen it before. It was not some mere little trinket. It was a historical relic, 6,000 years old.
She remembered watching the original owner in her mirror. A noblewoman, whose husband loved her more than anything else. He commissioned the work to dwarves, but the diamonds he'd wished to use, well, they thought were cursed, so instead, he commissioned goblins, and they did the job. The noblewoman was given the necklace for their 10th anniversary, and as soon as she put it on, she changed. She lost the desire to live, and in the dead of the night, she left the manor, and she went into the forest and never returned, leaving her husband and two children without a word.

Such a horrible story. "I must have it..." Anaphina whispered with the eyes of a longing child.

[Queen Fixatia]

...Gem in the dark.

Fixatia followed after the Ice Maji, watching as Anaphina's eyes browsed about. The queen of the succubi had decided this could be rather interesting. It had been a while that she had been with another whose age was rather close to her own, give or take a couple of thousand years.

When the witch seemed to find something that sparked her attention, the succubus was almost not surprised. It was something historical and worth a good look at. She, too, knew the story behind the necklace, but the jewelry was not something she craved. If Anaphina wanted it, Fixatia was sure that Anaphina would get it.

"Then, take it, dear Anaphina," Fixatia said as she sat upon the table where the necklace had been sitting. She crossed her legs at the ankles. "You should allow me to pay for it, unless you desire to simply snatch it from the poor fool who would dare lose such a gem. You could consider it a present."

The queen of the succubi flashed a polite little smile. She was not one to simply buy things for people. Yet, why not? If Anaphina was willing to accept such a thing from Fixatia, so be it.