Magic people - the gathering (Emmz)

Now here was something that felt familiar. A market. The set-up appeared to be universal even if the terrain of this city-scape wasn't. Hastily erected stalls and canopies boxing in their occupants and laying bare an array of wares of enticing variety. She had navigated a dumping ground of vehicles to be here, but she already felt more at home than the sterile store fronts and factory yards she had first observed on arrival.

Kiara had a more southern heritage than most of the people present. That was not just evident in the shading of her skin but in the manner of her dress. She wore a simple white blouse with coloured flower patterns across the shoulders and a peplum framing her waist; this accompanied by a cotton-sewn wrap skirt and nothing in the way of footwear. Her hair, on this occasion, was wrapped into tight plaits and kept close to her head, while hanging off the back of her neck by a looped string was an elaborate ornate mask which has lost half it's splendour (being recently deplumed). The shaman carried with her a staff topped with a decorative skull and a small satchel was tied across her waist half-hidden by her clothes. A separate cloth wrapping hung off the end of the staff, like a hobo's luggage. The outfit looked worn and dirt was well ingrained under her fingernails.

The elder teen took great interest in the clothing booths, casting sad glances at her coin pouch as she did so. Eating was the priority. She also made passing investigations of a collection of DVDs and video games. Their use escaped her, so she quickly moved on. Finally she came to a food stall and bought some kind of fatty meat on a stick of which to dine upon. The lithe girl hungrily began to devour the offering.

Hazel would be dressed in her "witch outfit" as in, her very revealing purple dress that showed more cleavage than a bikini model while still keeping herself PG-13, her hair loose and flowing with a witch's hat sat upon her head, this to any normal American might have given off a sense of mystery, or allure, or even excitable danger, and these were all the reasons why she wore it, to attract customers, as she owned one of these stalls, a sign hanging down below the metal scaffolding and tarp that shaped her stall and allowed her to stay dry, the sign said Hazel's Herbals, and another sign sat in the corner of the stall's counter that informed first time customers about signing a waver before buying any potions.

Hazel saw the unique looking girl and smiled, the girl's staff gave her hopes of someone possessing magical abilities like her "hello! Fellow magic user!" she called out to Kiara, the poor girl looked down on her luck, Hazel felt for her, as it could indeed be difficult for magic users to earn a living in the world of science and loss of imagination.

Hearing the greeting, Kiara stopped by the stall, grease running down her chin, quickly brushed away with the back of her hand, "Hi." After a moment or two of chewing she cottoned on to what the stranger had implied, "Wait. Fellow? Oh. You are the shaman here?" Kiara hadn't seen any shamans this far north yet. She was beginning to think they did not have them in California. Their dress seemed a little... eccentric but it was nothing a few chokers and tattoos couldn't sort out.

The lady's beauty struck Kiara and she felt an instinctual pang of jealousy that was soon lost as she read the stall sign. Herbal was, like, plants and stuff. She knew plants and stuff. She hadn't expected anyone to be selling them here. At once she grew interested. Maybe she could replace the fronds of her mask now! It's spirit-scaring capabilities had surely been lost now that it was only half its usual height.

She observed the stock on display, "You sell bottle magic and earth medicines? My dad does this too!" It occurred to Kiara that maybe she too should be selling more tangible examples of her talents like these. But the idea immediately hit a rock when asking where glass bottles were suppose to be acquired from. She only had the few and she needed them for her own draughts.

When the girl mentioned the word shaman it gave her more of an inkling of the type of person she was dealing with "well I'm the local witch yes" she corrected her, so she might be informed to what kind of magic Hazel did, even though they were slightly different, they could still find common ground in the bounties of the earth.

When Kiara saw her potions Hazel nodded "mhmm, I've got some health potions that heal from common indigestion to growing back limbs, but, healing times vary on the ailment, I've also got some luck potions, love potions, and I sell herbal soaps and oils too" she said smiling.

Kiara hadn't heard of a witch. Or had she? She seemed to recall something in reference to witches when she'd once come across a blighted land. Hadn't given it much thought back then. So a witch was like a busty shaman with a funny hat. Cool. The healing potions sounded like the sort of thing her father dealt with and yet so much more potent. She almost didn't believe the claim that they could grow back limbs. But she supposed she didn't know very much about the subject.

The other potion examples also interested her. Such tools sounded powerful and surprised Kiara that they were being disseminated so freely on an open market, "There are potions for that? Wow. Ahem. Do the um love potions, like, work?" Kiara picked one up when pointed out and sloshed the liquid around. Its tinge sort of seemed like what she'd expect a genuine love potion to look like.

Hazel nodded at Kiara's question "mhmm, as long as you believe and follow the instructions they'll work, although you have to do some work yourself, they won't make someone instantly fall in love with you" she told her.

Whilst she'd kind of figured the love potion wouldn't be an instant fantasy granter, Kiara still liked the idea of the brew. Often times she had trouble just getting into a conversation with a cute guy. They seemed off-put, sometimes from her extravagant clothing or else by her dull-wittedness. And then there were the occasions where spiritual ghoulies kind of killed the mood.

She just wanted a better chance at a first impression. She didn't want to be a traveller all her life. There had to be a guy out there that she could stay with. Moral ambiguities suggested that drugging people against their will to receive you more favourably was wrong. But the witch didn't seem to have a problem with it. And sometimes you had to do a little wrong to reach a happy conclusion.

Despite the pointed mention of instructions, Kiara did not read them. The seller would probably mention all the important stuff herself, "So how do I use the potion? Would I drink it? Or would I throw it into the guy's face? N-Not that I need the potion. It just might be nice, y'know?" If Kiara had to guess she would say this woman did not know the struggles of getting a date.

"Well you'd have to pour it over the person's food or drink and recite the correct spell, once they have it in their body they'll become calmer and more patient, allowing you to woo them" Hazel explained, although Kiara said that she didn't need the potion, she had heard people ask and say that many times.

"Oh, I almost forgot, first potion is free to all newcomers" she added, this was just a policy she had made up just now, since she had seen Kiara so down on her luck, she figured a free potion would help bolster their relationship, there were hardly any witches or shamans or wizards or any magical humans in this city, it made her a little homesick for the halls of her boarding school so she wanted to get to know Kiara and hopefully become her friend so they could talk about magical things together at girly sleepovers.

Kiara looked through the bottle's contents at Hazel as she spoke. She gasped with glee, "Really? That's such a sensible policy. More people should have that." Kiara was moving through new areas all the time. If people just did this for newcomers she would never need worry for anything. Seemed a pretty obvious way to go about things to her. The shaman took the bottle and hugged it against her chest, beaming.

"I'm Kiara by the way! Kiara Tzul, happy to meet you. I love your shop. It's very pretty. And useful. Not like the DVD seller down there. I think he's high on something." This last observation was whispered hoarsely across the wares, as the seller in question was visible in the background holding a disc up to sunlight and staring at it's reflections.

Kiara tried to put the bottle in her satchel, ignorant of the waver sign.

Hazel chuckled, she liked Kiara's spirit "I'm Hazel Fairweather, but you can just call me Hazel" she said happily "thanks for the compliment, if you need anything else just say, we fellow magical people have to look out for each other, magic is special and the good kind should be kept alive" she said proudly, she didn't want to outright say it, but Kiara looked a little worse for wear, she hoped Kiara would ask for more things from her but she didn't want to be rude and imply that Kiara looked rough, the Englishness in her still held her back from saying her true thoughts in exchange for being polite.

"If I need anything. Hmm." Kiara tilted her head back. Well there was no ferns on display to remake her outfit so that was a bit of a bummer. And it was bad manners to straight up ask for money. Not that she thought she needed that. So got by on less than most people. And she'd already had a park bench pointed out to her which would make a decent napping spot, so no need to ask for that. Benighted did not think of anything immediate.

Then she clicked her fingers and her face brightened, "Oh! Of course. How silly of me. I should probably ask you about the portents of death and devastation I've been following. You must know all about it. Being all magic. Have you got it under control yet?" Kiara had been aimlessly meandering her way north in search of vague auspices of evil. She had no idea what the substance of the thing she was after was. She would just keep moving until she found it.

Hazel suddenly looked confused at her asking "uhh...you've been following death and devastation? I haven't seen such things so far" she said, should she know what Kiara was talking about? She wasn't so sure, she felt bad for not being able to help Kiara, but they didn't teach her anything about that in school, must be a shaman thing "sorry, I haven't seen anything like that, so far things have been quiet around here, I think the good guy heroes must have those things under control around here" she said.

Suddenly an idea popped into Hazel's head "hey do you want to come to my house? Maybe with our gathered magical power we can use my crystal ball to try and locate them" she said happily, of course, she had no idea if that would work or not, but maybe upon seeing the comfy house she could then offer Kiara the guest room to stay in, at least for a little bit, since Kiara didn't seem the type to like staying cooped up indoors, and then she could show Kiara all the cool magical things that she had.

Oh good. So it wasn't just Kiara in the dark. Even the local magic community was blissfully unaware of the horrible, awful, terrifying fate that awaited them. Presumably. It was always awkward being out of the loop. Boy did she know.

Hazel's use of the term 'heroes' was not initially deciphered by Tzul. There were 'heroes' from all walks of life. It stood to reason each area had their own good Samaritans about. Her mind did not consider adding an affix of 'super' to the title. She'd heard of superiormen and wonderous women. But they were stories so remote and distant she hadn't dwelled on them.

The next offer, though, piqued her interest. Maybe the witch could help her after all, "A crystal ball? Neat. If you think it might help, I'd love to try." She had no clue what one of those even was. But Hazel sounded sure, "It might be better than my methods. When do you finish tending your store, then?"

"Whenever I want" she said as she would wave her wand and the stall would fold up in on itself while preserving it's contents and folded up into a wooden square about the size of a floppy disk which she put into her pocket, she picked up her broomstick from the floor and hopped onto it "people can make orders on my website if they need to" she said before patting the soft straw of her broomstick "hop on, I'll take us back to my house" she said as the broom sat between her legs horizontally.

The folding stall was impressive. So impressive that when Hazel brought out her ratty old broom Kiara froze in puzzlement. She'd used a brush quite a few times in her life. But never by placing it between her legs. And this did not seem to be an appropriate time for spring cleaning of any nature. Her imagination failed her.

"I don't... I don't think you can walk fast like that."

It would take more coaxing from Hazel to attempt to mount the broom. Even more so that Kiara would place her hands somewhere secure in preparation. This was pretty silly, even by her unique standards.