The air was heavy with moister and the salty smell of the ocean. The sound of thunder came from the sky not far from the position the drow had taken on a large cliff over looking the ocean. Xuvin looked to the east where the sea and sky meet, in a few moments the horrible sun would show its self.

Sure enough the sky seemed to glow as the blacks and dark purples gave way to a concussion of fiery colors. Reds, yellows, and oranges, danced in the sky as the top of the sun crested the horizon. The light of the sun reflected of the restless dark blue waters, multiplying the power of the dazzling light. As the sun rose higher in the sky, the colors faded and water reflected more light, making the dark elf's light blue eyes water, and sting.

Xuvin set his jaw and stared unblinking into the oncoming light. The sound of thunder was closer now, not just from above, but from below also. As the waves hit the breakers below, they crashed with the power of thunder.

Turning away from the blinding light of the sun, Xuvin ran his hand through his short snowy white hair, a habit he had picked up from living so close to the humans of the world above. They are beast. he thought to himself with a sneer.

Making his way to the small hunting shack he had found "empty" that is after he took care of its last owner. The small shack was situated in a clearing with a few birch trees surrounding it. As the drow stepped into the clearing, he noticed that the door was slightly open. The drow narrowed his eyes and crept toward the house, sword drawn.

Xuvin kicked the door in and made a quick search of the one room shack, every thing seemed in order, or disorder that is. The drow left things on the floor on purpose it was harder for some one to look through your things without moving them. Shaking his head slightly and laughing to himself, for his paranoid thoughts, he went back outside, to check his snares. As alert as the Dark elf was he didn't notice the shadow moving through the white trunks of the birch trees.

I. Hate. Water. Vex thought to herself as she nimbly moved from tree to tree, her great wings helping her keep aloft as she steered along the tops of the forests. More than once she had nearly slipped from her precarious movements along the soaked and water-ladden treetops but had managed to recover. It was hard work doing this in the depths of the night. With a cursory glance she noted that she was getting closer and willed her wings to retract back into her body- which they did- and stopped to silently catch her breath. The rain continued for a moment- and then as if to mock her efforts they stopped altogether.

I. Hate. The. Bloody. Weather. Vex noted. When she became some head honcho water and the weather would be one of the first things to go. Bloody gods- never got anything right on this stupid plane. In Hel? Well, not the most comfortable places but the decor was decent. This one- eh, not so much.

Putting aside her frustrations the demon stopped to listen. Sounds of the forest came to her. Excellent. Things were just starting. With a sigh, Vex started on what she hated.

Waiting.

A few hours later...

It had been an odd request. Find a drow. Determine his intentions. Kill him if he was hostile- if not- try and recruit him. They were a rare bunch, drows were, and some had expected him to be an assassin of some sort. Scry-heavy mages had mapped out his position and had given her his various coordinates but she hadn't actually believed she would see a dark elf. Until he actually appeared. And even then, Vex had to rub her eyes which were already heavy with the need to sleep.

"Well I'll be damned." The demon noted, sharp teeth making her smirk look vicious. "The darn drow really does exist."

With a short hop she launched herself from the trees and angled herself towards the drow...

The dark elf walked through the ever-brightening forest, soon he found what he was looking for the small wire trap had been broken, and a small amount of blood was on the ground around the snare.

Xuvin scowled "There goes my breakfast." he said and snorted. The dark elf replaced the snare and made his way back to the rickety cabin.

Xuvin heard some branches snap and turned to his head in the direction of the noise. The drow saw a shadow fly out of the tree, in seconds the dark elf was facing the oncoming figure. "Who are you." he called out bringing his sword to bear.

OOC: From the descrip, it's hard to tell if my character has her sword drawn or yours. In any case, Vex's weapons are all sheathed.

IC:

"Who are you?"

Vex grinned as she heard those words. They had been repeated to her more times than she could count and in more ways than she could number. There had been the scared ones, and the cautious ones, the brave ones, and the blustery ones, the curious ones and the 'merely' desperate ones. Oh there had been so many... so, so many of them. Victims and dead to the man- and to the woman. It was a useless, instinctive reaction that gave an assassin the time to unsheathe weapon or send a poison dart flying into an unprotected face, neck or arm.

Of course, the drow probably wouldn't appreciate the grin that was snaking around her face so she controlled her reactions and let it end in a small, harmless smile. Not that there was anything harmless about Vex. She was one lean, mean, fighting... thing. Vex almost stumbled as she hit the ground. Hadn't that particular quote gone a wee bit farther than that? Something about... darnit, she couldn't recall. It couldn't have been very important if she couldn't remember, anyways. Probably something fairly silly.

"Who am I?" Vex repeated, her tone mocking the words it spoke. "Come now, dark elf, surely you know who I am? Surely you did not expect the arrival of a drow on the surface world to go unnoticed?" She grinned for real this time baring her fangs. "I am an _assassin_ good drow... and I would like to know who and what you are and what you intend. Not all of us like... competition." She fingered her mace idly.

"An answer... if you'd be so kind."

What ever that thing was its hand was near its mace, the drow griped his sword all the tighter, his knuckles whiteing. He thought it best to answer the question, if he answered right it could save his life. "I am Xuvin Firefingers, and I intend to keep my head." he said in an icy tone. Should he tell her about he bounty hunters, fromt he underdark. They have been becoming more and more frequent. The snares set up around the small hunting shack weren't just for ceatching animals.

"Now that I answerd your questions, it's my turn, Who in the hell are you, and why are your here?" the dark elf's voice was flat and showed no emotion. His sword never moved, if this demon thing even made an attempt to pull its mace out he would attack.

"I have already answered your little question..." Vex said enigmatically. "But if it's a name you want... some call me the Scarlet Assassin." She examined her nails- they were in pristine, unblemished condition. She half-suspected that her demonic heritage was mixed- a bit of combat, a bit of succubus, a bit of elemental... her form was supposed to reflect her mortal life after all. And hadn't she done a bit of everything? Been tempted by all the sins, all the evils? Succumbed to ever vice and pleasure that had been banned under the sun?

And so here she was- a nightmarish mishmash of demonic influences whose sole guiding force was the need to conquer the world. The need to kill Raku. Two twin goals that sustained her and would sustain her until the end of time. Hate... ah yes, hate. The most insidious of sins. The most powerful of forces. It would be Raku's friend... and his greatest foe. Vex would see to it. She would see his head on a pike. Maybe let him stay immortal long enough to see him suffer- suffer more than he had ever suffered.

"I've answered your second question too- and quite handily as well though you see to not have noticed. You though, have yet to answer mine- survival is the answer of prophetic fools." Vex said off-handedly as if it meant nothing to her. In truth it didn't but... she had a job to do and she was keeping her away from her alcohol. The greatest invention of all time. She summoned force the anger that came from being thus separated. In an abrupt turn-about her expression changed, and she snarled:

"Answer me, drow! I care not for your name! Why. Are. You. Here?"

"Answer me, drow! I care not for your name! Why. Are. You. Here?" The beast snarled at Xuvin, the drow ran the question through his head, well he had to escape or he would have been exicuted, that would be the truth, but she didn't want to hear that he was sure of it. So what lie would make this demon thing happy. He was looking for a job, on the suface, if he became associates with this creature, she might help him fight those bounty hunters.

The drow thought about what he was going to say before he said it, that was a fist, "Well I was looking for a job and some powerfull friends to help start me on the surfice, somthing profitable preferably." the dark elf said he was an expert lier, and no one could see through his mask.

The drow lowerd his weapon and lifted his eyebrow, as he gazed upon the demon thing.

OOC: Expert liars are diplomats. Diplomats have the diplomacy skill. =3

IC:

"Well I was looking for a job-" The Dark Elf started. Vex fought the impulse to raise an eyebrow and just stare. Who had ever heard of an elf- or a dark elf!- answering in such a straightforward manner? She had half-expected him to continuously dodge the question until the two of them were black and blue from verbal sparring but here he was either shamelessly lying or just telling the truth. Vex couldn't tell which and didn't much care. All she knew was that this wasn't an average drow or elf. She considered it a good thing- if he had filibustered Vex would have seriously considered offing him just for being annoying.

"We're all looking for a job." The Scarlet Assassin muttered quietly.

"-and some powerful friends-" Was he trying to compliment her? Or state her inadequacy? Or something else altogether? Vex tried to twist and turn the words around but in the end decided on that which was simple: the simple answer was that he was being straightforward. He was looking for some powerful friends and was thus considering herself in that category. Or something along those lines. Vex felt her poor brain cells start heating up and privately agreed with them- too much thinking could be bad for one's health.

"-to help start me on the surfice-" Vex grinned at his accent, wondering if this were an affectation or merely the reality of the language he was speaking being a third or even fourth one. Surely it got confusing after a while, juggling all those different words and meanings and connotations and understandings?

"-something profitable preferably."

Vex grinned sardonically. "Don't we all want to have profitable jobs and powerful friends?" She said rhetorically. "So I guess the question is- are you a powerful friend?"

"So I guess the question is- are you a powerful friend?" the demon thing asked, knowing she really didn't want an answer he just sneered. Gripping his sword even tighter he called a spell to mind, just incase. "Who sent you?" the drow asked just full of questions today. If it was one of those bounty hunters he would ether have to fight or run.

Waiting for the monster to answer his question the dark elf looked around a few paths lead from this clearing, and the trees were not to dense, he could make his way without a path.

"Who sent you?"

It was a simple question but Vex took a moment to answer. She wasn't gathering her thoughts- she was simply watching him. There were two paths one took while addressing questions- either lie or tell the truth. Everything else was just a mix of those two things, gawds knew that they saw each other often enough to probably be considered as intimate as a long-standing married couple. And like a couple they quarreled, had fits, had fights and occasionally backfired on each other. Vex was intent on making sure none of *her* fancies took too much life. There was much to say but all of it had to be true, but said in such a way to be a falsehood.

"Do you recognize this?" She asked, opening her cloak wide and revealing her night-colored armor. The workmanship was intricate, bas-reliefs flowed and flowered here and there, depicting a torrent of fighting that was nothing more than lines that spoke- but spoke loudly. It was also made for mobility... and for protection. The only race in the world, the only race that could conceivably manage such a feat on a regular basis (and even they had but master artisans at work on such precious items) were the drow and the dwarves.

What she was wearing was considered a treasure- some of the dark elf's race best work.

And it was as rare as it was expensive. Seeing such an item upon one that was not a drow should have shook him up at the very least.

"I work for... certain individuals who can afford to reward their servants... lavishly." True enough. It wasn't the entire story though- no employer in his right mind would give her something of so inestimable value. She hoped he'd manage to at least guess that much- if he didn't then he would actually require schooling on how people on the surface thought and that might just be too much trouble...

Underneath the beast's cloak, was a perfict example of dark elvish armor, swearing to himself the drow, started examing the situation. The scarlet assasin could not be working for the bounty hunter, they would never give a surfice dewller armor this well made. The drow let out a sigh of relife.

Turning his toughts back to the demon he looked her over agian, this armor was not only dark elvish but it was very well made. "No employer, would give armor of this quality to an underling." Xuvin said his voice adimant, he knew it was true, eather that or the people on the surfice were complete idiots.

Vex chuckled. There had been a brief, almost non-detectable hesitation in the dark elf's voice. No doubt he had heard stories of the surface- about the goodness of the surface elves, and of the other races... the dwarves, the humans, the hobbits, the halflings, the dragons, the lupines, the elementals... maybe even the orcs. And no doubt, in his mind, he was wondering if the stories he had heard, stories about their gullibility and impressionability were to be believed. Maybe he was already spinning ludicrous schemes to make an easy profit out of such fools.

And then he would be re-assessing. Drows were ever suspicious about anything they heard- and with good reason. The dark elves had backstabbing and political wrangling down to a very, very fine art. Assassination, breaking vows, promises, oaths and alliances- such things were very often second nature to them. Life expectancy among the drow was, therefore, not surprisingly, somewhat low for such a long-lived race. It increased as one went up the echelon (as did all races and creeds) but still... they were an amazingly self-destructive race. It was probably the only reason they had not yet conquered the world.

That and they had this really odd tendency to not magically correct their weakness to sunlight. They had the magic, they had the theory but they just refused to do it. Probably because any expenditure of energy in that direction would mean that their 'successor' would try to re-double their energy into killing them and taking their spot.

"I never said that my employer gave it to me." Vex said, smiling slightly. "So I suppose I guess the question is... how did I get it?"

"Perhaps you have heard of the Dark Destroyers...?" It was a relatively small organization, one that specialized in dungeon delving near the Underdark... and one famed for paying well for the death of any dark elf. She watched, wanting to see how he would react. Would he assume that she had gotten the armor off a dead drow? Or something else? Perhaps he would think her employed by the DD... how entertaining this all was!