still in progress, please forgive me
The world was dreary with a grey drizzle of rain that didn't seem to serve much purpose. It wasn't enough to get you properly wet, just damp, so that you came off smelling like a musty pool of stagnant water. A lot of kimeti hated days like this, kept under the wide branches of the swamp trees, or in hollows, or wherever was most comfortable to them. Me? I like it on days like this. Suits me, you might say. It wasn't hard for me to hide on days like this, and that wasn't a small benefit, either. Not that it mattered much today. No requests to speak of, but work ebbs and flows, and it wasn't like we'd go hungry if we had to fend for ourselves. Plenty around for us to scrape together. Just takes a bit of hoofwork, really.
Still, when that pretty little filly stepped out of the vines around my clearing and smiled awkwardly, I got to my hooves. "Something wrong, Rosie?" I asked her, and she shook her head. "Spill it."
"There's someone to see you." The way she said it made me wonder, but Rosie's as much a mystery as any doe in this swamp, and I'd lived long enough to know that some mysteries just don't want to be solved. "A doe." She looked at me pointedly, and I felt my ears perk up just a little bit.
"About a job?"
"Probably," Rosie muttered, and that pointed look came again, before she turned and disappeared back into the vines. Rosie's one of a kind, but sometimes that compliment makes me more relieved than it does her. I waited, knowing she'd send the doe in. If there's one thing Rosie's learned, it's how to handle callers, and how to weed out the ones I never want to see with the ones I kick myself for missing.
...And she was one of the latter. My jaw didn't drop as she walked into the clearing, but it was a near thing. The drizzle had made her coat a sort of glossy purple-pink threaded with green, white, and yellow, reminding me of wet waterlilies. The spikes along her back glittered from waterdrops that caught what little light there was, and her tail trailed behind her, a sunbright fluff that seemed to make the dreary from the day fade out like a bad dream. And her legs... long and lean and climbing clear up to her horns. She had a delicate walk, didn't really look like she was used to the seedier aspects of life, but that's what I'm for, after all.
She came alone, but the way she moved made me think she had help in the brush. Maybe it was another kimeti, but a few years' experience suggested it was maybe an eaglehound or a lynx. Could even be a caiman, I supposed, but I wasn't planning to give her any reason to show it off. "You don't seem too lost," I noted, wondering just how lost I'd have to get her before she'd finish tucked up against me for a night. Whatever the answer, I decided it wasn't impossible.
"I'm not," she said. I was happy to note that her voice matched the rest of her. It was low, but sweet, like a burst of honeysuckle on your tongue. She was all over flowers, and while I'm not a buck for fancy, I couldn't resist the lure. "I hear you find kimeti."
"I've been known to, on occasion," I allowed, staying still. If a doe catches wise to your interest, she'll lead you right on into the deep waters, and leave you to drown. That's part of the mystery I solved ages ago. "You got someone you want me to find?"
"My son," she said, her voice just as prompt as my lust, and a sight more comfortable. "He's been missing for several days now. We're very close since he made his way back." I nodded understanding, and she continued. "He and I were supposed to take our mongooses out for a snakehunt several days ago. He didn't show. At first, I thought he forgot, so I went to get him, but he wasn't where he usually stays." She paused with a delicate whisper of sound I knew to be a half-sob. Even her tears were classy. "I waited for a couple of days, but he never showed. So I decided to find you... see if you could find him." Her voice softened, muted with worry and concentration as she laid out every detail I'd want to know, and a few that didn't matter.
I smirked. Here was a request and invitation all rolled into one, neatly packaged for my convenience. Find her son, and she'll invite me back for some of that snake, maybe a few berries, maybe a little more. "You know my fee," I said, rather than tell her just how foregone the conclusion was. Easy as it was to count the berries before they ripened, I knew that birds had a habit of eating the very ones you had your eye on.
"Yes," she said. The way she didn't elaborate told me all I needed. She had the meat. She was ready to pay. So all I had to do was go find her son, and everything would fall right into place.
"Don't worry," I told her, even as I escorted her to the edge of the clearing. As much of a looker as she was, I couldn't let her distract me on the job. The faster I sent her off home and got to work, the faster I'd see just how welcoming she really was. "He can't hide from me." And with that reassurance, she walked away. I couldn't say whether she looked back or not. I was already thinking about where to begin.