Shifting Encounter

"What do you mean you lost them?" Keyleth questioned.

"I lost their trail, I can't see it anymore, I can't smell them either." Faylen clarified. He leaned down to try and find the trail again but was having no success. Rhen looked at Faylen with a confused expression.

'What does he mean by smelling them?' Rhen thought, but as no one else questioned it he didn't voice his query. Instead chose to also try his best to locate the trail of the assassin. James followed their example and started to look around for any clues. The three of them wandered around without any idea as to how they would find their assassin.

As the boys did their best to find the assassin, Keyleth tried a different approach. She walked over to the homeless human man who was currently taking small bites out of stale bread. He had a scruffy beard, short blonde hair, and light brown eyes, he wore a tattered navy-blue tunic and stained brown pants. "Hello, sir, could I take a moment of your time?" She asked politely. The man looked up at her and didn't say anything, he only held his piece of bread closer to his body. Keyleth noticed how he seemed worried she would take his food, so she backed away a bit and lifted her hands to show she meant no harm. "I'm sorry to interrupt you, sir, I promise I only need a moment of your time. Could you help me really quick?"

"I… I suppose I could since you're askin' nicely," the man said in a gruff tone. He clearly wasn't accustomed to speaking often.

"Great! First, my name is Keyleth Thairin. What's yours?" She exclaimed and gave the man a short curtsy. The man's eyes widened seemly astonished by her behavior.

"Oh. Uh. It's been a while since I've been asked my name…" The man scratched the back of his head as if pondering his own name, "I'm Trey Springfield, it's nice to meet you miss Thairin, what can a useless man like me do for you?"

"I wouldn't say you're useless, Trey. Did you happen to see someone run past here not too long ago?" Keyleth pried, hoping she can get some information on who they were pursuing. Trey scratched his head again and looked down the road.

"Well now that you mention it, I did see a man run down over to that house in a hurry," Trey said while pointing at a small house down the street. "He came from the opposite direction and was really huffing. I assumed he must have been late for something."

"That's wonderful! Could you tell me what he was dressed in or any features?" Keyleth pushed, as she was hoping to get this whole situation resolved quickly. She also felt that this man wasn't lying to her. She was pretty skilled at telling when someone was lying, 'His breathing is calm, and he doesn't seem to be in a rush to get rid of me. If he is lying, he's quite good.'

"Um. Yes. He. Uh," Trey struggled to recall the man's features but finally said, "Oh right! He was in a dark cloak, I think he had long ginger hair, and he was a few inches taller than you miss."

"Brilliant!" Keyleth proclaimed and reached for the small pouch at her waist and pulled out another small pouch slightly larger in size. She then handed it to the homeless man. "Here you go, for your trouble. It's five gold, you can go down the road that way," she said as she pointed towards the inn. "And you'll find this Inn call The Rat Tail, I know the name sounds like it's not a very nice establishment but trust me I checked and it's the nicest in town and their food is pretty good." Trey just looked at the pouch in his hand astonished, looked at Keyleth, then back at the pouch, and then to the pouch at Keyleth's waist. "Oh, you must not know what this is, it's a magical bag that I can store all sorts of things in as long as they fit inside the opening." She explained. "It's pretty handy, right?!"

"Yes, it is," Trey said finally snapping out of his daze. "But miss this is a lot of money! I can't possibly accept this!"

"What? That's nonsense of course you can, that should be enough money for you to get some new clothes, get a room, and some food." Keyleth smiled and insisted, "You take it, I have enough. You really helped me out."

"I can't believe this." Trey teared up, "Thank you Miss Keyleth Thairin! I will remember this day. I promise one day I'll return your kindness!" Trey announced. As he stood up and bowed to Keyleth. Which made her uncomfortable.

"No, don't worry. Just go take a bath and enjoy a nice warm bed." She said embarrassed.

"I will. Thank you again miss." Trey bowed once more before heading off to the inn.

'Jeez, I was just trying to repay him. Did I really give him too much money? I thought five gold was the standard rate you paid servants.' Keyleth pondered but was soon interrupted by bickering behind her.

"No, I swear their trail was going this way!" Faylen yelled.

"Yeah, well now I'm going to prison because we can't find the actual culprit!" Rhen yelled back.

"Just to be clear I never said I wasn't taking you to prison, I simply think that it's possible that Faylen could be correct," James explained. Then the three continued to yell and talk over each other until Keyleth stepped in.

"Boys! Boys! Calm down," She yelled in hopes of getting their attention, they quickly did and looked in her direction, "Wow that was easy. Anyway, listen." She said as she walked closer to their small group. "I talked to a man who was sitting in the street over there, he said he saw someone run past here and into that house," Keyleth explained as she pointed at the house the homeless man had moments ago.

"You got this information from a homeless man?" James asked and crossed his arms after looking around. "What if he was our culprit and you let him go?"

"No, I'm certain he wasn't." Keyleth retorted, "You see I'm pretty good at telling when someone is lying, and even more so at night." She explained and looked up at the half-moon above her head. "Moon Elves like myself can do this very easily, only someone who is an expert at deception could get past me."

"Right, because an assassin couldn't possibly be an expert at deception," James teased. Which caused Keyleth's face to redden.

"Look I'm pretty sure he wasn't lying!" Keyleth vented her frustration, "This whole situation sucks! I just wanted to get answers and I did!"

"Ok, you calm down now princess," Faylen said trying to bring Keyleth's temper back down.

"P-princess?" Keyleth exclaimed. "Why would you call me that?"

"What? No reason. Just relax." Faylen backed away and tried to steer the conversation somewhere else, "Next time you do something like that let me know, I'm also pretty good at seeing through deception. Regardless let's check this house out and see what we find. Did he give you a description of our assassin?"

"Yeah, he did," Keyleth started to explain, calming down a little. "He said he was slightly taller than me, had long ginger hair, and was wearing a black cloak."

"Well, the black cloak doesn't help much," Rhen said as he walked towards the house, "But at least we know his rough height and hair color." James stepped in front of Rhen and shook his head.

"No, I'll be handling this, you guys' step back and let me work." James explained his stance on the situation, "If this is our culprit, I should be the one to speak to them."

"Fair enough," Rhen backed off and allowed James to do his job. Though Faylen moved forward.

"Well let me check something first," Faylen said and stepped towards the house. It was a small one-story wooden house with an angled shingled roof, that had seen better days. The front porch had a short fence that surrounded it and an opening was in front of the house's door that allowed for one person to walk through at a time. He looked around and bent down to the ground before the wooden floor of the porch. He then got back up and walked over to the group who were standing in the middle of the road. "Yeah, I think this is the house. Their scent is the same as back at the inn and the footprints on the porch match that we were following before." He explained and gave a thumbs up to Keyleth. "Good job." Keyleth just crossed her arms and took a sassy stance since it was obvious to her that she was right to trust the homeless man.

'There he goes talking about scents again and no one says a thing' Rhen noted.

"I'll go talk to them, stay here for the time being." James clarified, "I'm trusting you guys for now." James walked through the small gap and knocked on the door. After a brief pause a short, tan, human man with short messy black hair, wearing a sleeveless shirt and black pants, stepped out.

"Can I help you guard?" The man said in a groggy voice.

"Sorry to disturb you, sir." James apologized and gave a slight bow, "You see I am following up on a report that there was a disturbance at this residence." James explained and leaned over to investigate the inside of the house, but the man stepped in his way.

"And why is that of any concern to me at this hour Mr.?" The man grumbled.

"I understand you must not want to be bothered at this hour, but I must do my job," James pushed the topic and gave the man an apologetic smile. "Do you live alone sir?"

"Huh?" The man blurted, "No I don't. I live here with my partner. His name is, Roger. I'm Gerard."

"Well Gerard, it's nice to meet you. My name is James, would you mind asking your partner to come and speak with me as well?" James asked in the nicest tone he could.

"Yeah alright. Just give me a moment." Gerard scoffed and gently left the door ajar as he went inside. James then turned and gave the group a big smile and a thumbs up to show them everything was proceeding well. That was until the door opened quickly and Gerard was there again. He swiftly brought a mace down onto James' head, denting his helmet and knocking him unconscious instantly. As James's body fell back towards the road, blood flicked onto the light-colored wood of the porch. The short man was briskly over James' body again ready to deliver a final blow to the unconscious guard, but his mace was stopped by a silver blade. Gerard looked up to see a pair of green eyes looking into his soul, as they glowed with mystical energy.

"You shouldn't have done that," Faylen stated in a cold tone. As the two locked their weapons together, another man, wearing a black cloak, who was about the same height as Gerard, and whose brown hair was just as short, stepped out and was poised to attack Faylen with a rusty short sword. Faylen noticed the man coming at him and was about to dodge out of the way when someone raced passed him and met the new man in combat. Knocking the blade back with his dagger Rhen was positioned between Faylen and the new combatant who stood in the doorway.

"I don't really understand what's going on, but you guys attacked my new guard friend, and I don't like when my friends are attacked," Rhen said and pulled out another dagger, taking a defensive stance. Keyleth had given him a speed boost with her magic to make sure Faylen wouldn't get attacked. She then had another spell ready, within seconds.

"Firebolt!" She yelled and pointed at Gerard who was currently trying to evade Faylen's strike. A few sparks of lightning came out of Keyleth's fingers and struck the man square in the chest sending him flying towards the front wall of the house. Faylen followed up rapidly and thrusted his blade at the man who rolled out of the way just in time to avoid the tip of Faylen's sword.

"Good fake out Keyleth, keep up the support!" Faylen yelled as he tried his best to gain ground against Gerard.

"Hehe… Yeah." Keyleth gave an awkward laugh as she was internally kicking herself because her magic had misfired, but it had worked out, so it seemed like she did it on purpose. 'Come on girl focus,' she pumped herself up as she tried her best to prepare another spell to help Rhen. He was currently trying to disarm the man who was holding the doorway. It seemed like he didn't want them entering the house. "Rhen give me a clear shot!" Keyleth yelled. Rhen nodded and stabbed both his dagger forward causing the man to take a step back, as he did Rhen promptly stepped to the side, giving Keyleth room to hit the brown-haired man who was currently off balance. She thrust her arm forward expelling a gust of wind from her open palm, it hit the man in the doorway sending him hurtling into the house.

"Nice! I'll go after him." Rhen announced and jumped through the doorway in pursuit of the man. After quickly getting his bearings Rhen noticed that the man was laying on a now broken set of chairs and a wood table. Rhen ran over to the man and kicked his sword away, then placed a dagger at the man's throat before he could get up. "No sudden movements. Surrender." Rhen locked eyes with the man showing he was serious; the man signed and slowly raised his arms. "Good!"

Outside Faylen was still dancing around Gerard who was clearly not used to a head-on fight. Faylen was gaining ground on him on the small porch and cuts were starting to accumulate on Gerard's arms. Seeing his options were limited he turned and ran, hopping over the small fence that separated the porch from the street. "There's no running away from me!" Faylen declared and swiped at the man's legs causing a large gash to open on his calf. Gerard cried out in pain as he fell onto the street and rolled into a ball in pain.

"I yield. You've won!" Gerard pleaded, hoping he wouldn't suffer any more pain from the Half-Elf's silver sword.

"Good job Faylen," Keyleth cheered. "Let's check on Rh-" Keyleth's words were stopped by her surprise at the scene before her. Faylen had casually walked over to the groveling man and stabbed his blade through the man's heart, killing him without any show of remorse. "Faylen! What's wrong with you!"

"Monsters don't deserve a second chance," Faylen replied and flicked the blood off his blade. "Look at his true form Keyleth." He said and pointed at the corpse at his feet. The man's features had begun to change, and his face had shifted from smooth, tanned skin to grey and wrinkled. His face structure changed showing a wraith-like appearance that didn't look like anything Keyleth had seen before.

"What is he?" Keyleth asked.

"He's a Changeling." Faylen explained, "They are creatures who can change their form and look like anyone they please. They often use this ability to get away with doing awful things to people and then change into someone else or pin the blame for their crimes onto others. They are despicable creatures. I should have been more careful." Faylen said as he looked toward James, "He wouldn't have gotten hurt if I had activated my eye's ability earlier."

"Your eye's ability?" Keyleth questioned, she was beginning to realize there was more to Faylen than he let on. Faylen opened his mouth to reply to her question when they both heard Rhen call from inside the house.

"Uhh, guys. A little help!?" Rhen requested.