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Twice-Blossomed Sakura	"Sir, are you -aware- that I -designed- and -built- this restaurant when I was starting my career?" "... Ma'am, this restaurant has here for well over sixty years, and you don't look Looks-" "Yes, yes, I look different now but it simply -is- the case and if your establishment's -owner- is still around I am certain I can clear this up. I mean, of all the silly and senseless laws to adhere to so strictly..." The bickering outside a well-to-do establishment in an upscale sort of neighbourhood seems to be quite the kerfuffle, that ultimately ends in the tall, pink-haired woman in the fanciful clothes and the white, subtly-feathered cloak turning away with an aggravated huff. Whoever heard of stopping such an upstanding citizen of the River Provinces from dining where, when, how, and with whom she does or does not please. She's famous, you know! Okay, sure, not in the circles that a restaurant host likely runs in, but famous all the same! Mathematically. And in a previous life, in a manner of speaking. But bully to all that, she's mad. Pausing a moment, she starts scanning the passers-by, searching with narrowed eyes for... something.
Nocturne Phoenix	It's at about that moment when a young lady can be seen walking down the street. It's a nice night in Nexus, relatively speaking, and there's not that many places in Nexus that are that safe for a young lady alone at night. Still, she walks...if not arrogantly, at least confidently, head not hunched forward like so many others in this Gods-forsaken city. Looking up at the various storefronts and wooden merchant shingles, she brushes back her deep, black hood and gives this particular shingle a satisfied look. Just as she turns towards the door, the sounds of angry arguing start to make themselves known. She gets a bit of a wry look and moves to turn away, but she's already less than twenty feet away...
Gloaming Starlight	It may or may not be what the argumentative woman is looking for as she scans the passers-by, but someone does break away from the normal press of traffic going up and down the road and comes heading right toward the restaurant. She's a tall woman with the bark-brown skin that gets more and more common the further east that one goes, with her silky black hair tied into a long, sensible braid that she has pulled over one shoulder. Her clothing suggests that she has some money to spend, all nicely tailored silks that accentuate her figure quite well, but like her hair style they're also sensible. And covered in the fine road dust that tends to accumulate on people who have been traveling for a while. There's a sort of careless nonchalance about her, like she's totally at ease and in command of the situation, whatever the situation might be. It seems like she may have overheard some of what was being said before she actually arrived at the restaurant, but then, so probably did half the block. When she slips out of the crowd's press she pauses, takes the strange woman and the staff member in with a quick glance, and then flashes a brilliant, pearly white smile that makes it clear that she's a distractingly gorgeous woman, despite the somewhat worn appearance. "Having trouble with that pesky law against dining alone afer dark?" she guesses, probably based on the fact that Sakura happens to be just one person, and not two. "I have to admit, I always liked it. It gives me an excuse to strike up conversations with strangers." And since she heads right toward Sakura, that's probably what she plans to do. Well, do more of.
Twice-Blossomed Sakura	Almost before Gloaming can start speaking, Sakura has pointed squarely at Nocturne, speaking up again to be heard. "You there. Turn back around and come he--" and then she pauses as Gloaming starts to speak to her, and simply nods. Whirling back about- immaculately clean but somehow levelling one of the dirtiest looks in Nexus history at the host, she speaks quite bluntly. "Ah yes, these would be those two friends that I -told- you about, as I'm -sure- you remember." She gives him a meaningful look with her head tilted down. "And now I -assume- that we are quit of this and we can be amicable friends now." There's a curious stress on the word 'assume', almost a rolling quality, booming somehow despite her low voice. But it seems to do the trick, as the woman and whomever decides to accompany her are shown a... remarkably nice table towards the corner of the place, despite the antagonism. "So, my longtime and very close friends, I am Sakura as I have ever been, Twice-Blossomed if you must," she offers as she whirls with remarkable grace, poise, and calm for a woman who was just borderline threatening a hapless host. "And dinner will be my treat tonight, of course. If I recall correctly- and I always do- unless the place has changed in the past... ten or so years," she adds, despite hardly looking a day past twenty. "The house white pinot is fabulous and pairs quite beautifully with one of their richer smoked fish dinners."
Nocturne Phoenix	It's fair to say that the redhead in the hood looks a little bewildered at first, but let's face it. She was already eyeing the sign--and smelling the offerings from the kitchen--hungrily. It doesn't take a lot of cajoling to get her to follow Sakura's gently phrased request and allow herself to be shown to a table. In fact, she can't help but smirk a bit when she does so, partly for herself and partly for Sakura. She gives her fellow shanghai'ed-for-dinner lady a cheeky grin before looking at the pink-haired woman. "Now that wasn't half bad. Worth the price of admission just to see you in action, but don't think I didn't hear about the offer to pay." Her banter is witty enough, at least, but her mannerisms are precise, polite, and perfect. A little too perfect, if anything. As she looks at the dark-skinned woman again, she offers her a bit more of a smile as she folds her napkin just so. "I...admit, I didn't know about that law. I'd say I was lucky, and that was before I met someone with eyes like yours. Have you been in Nexus long?
Gloaming Starlight	Gloaming Starlight watches with barely concealed laughter as Sakura turns on the restaurant host, and to be fair. It's honestly not even barely concealed, she might as well be laughing, it's just all in her facial expression and not in sound. Her eyes, strikingly bright in her dark face, are all but dancing with it. "Yes, yes, Twice-Blossomed Sakura. I wasn't sure if you were you or someone who often gets mistaken for you," she says, while turning to just shrug a little helplessly in the direction of Nocturne Phoenix. Then she asides, hand cupped around her mouth but not making any attempt to quiet her voice, "have they ever actually cared if you knew the person you were sitting with, as long as you weren't alone?" she asks. And then she turns back to Sakura and says, "I do love a richer smoked fish dinner. In fact, that's my favorite. At least, it is tonight. Especially when it's seasoned like dinner this evening will be, with the delicious taste of being on someone else's tab." Not that it looks like she'd have any trouble paying for the meal herself, judging by her clothing, but there's no sense in passing up an offer. "By the way, in case you're mistaking me for my non-existant twin sister, I'm Gloaming Starlight, and not her." All the last is said as she strides boldly to Sakura's side and acts like they're long time friends, despite the fact that they're total strangers. She's happy to get shown to a table with the others, and to answer the question from the rredhead. "A couple of hours. I just got into town earlier and made a delivery, and then I decided that since I hadn't eaten anything since this morning it was time to get a bite to eat. What about you?""
Twice-Blossomed Sakura	"You know, there was a time when someone like me would hardly have to worry about it," Sakura says with... an amount of huff. There's an amount. She can be a very subtle woman, but tonight is not that night. She waves it off, shaking her head and settling into her seat further- and yet with perfect propriety. Like some sort of switch has been flipped. She looks over the two of them, face suddenly a rather mild mask of amicable interest. "In point of fact, however, they have not. But, of course, in certain circumstances one must make a display to send the correct message when one is re-establishing one's position, no?" She's quite thoroughly conversational now, placid as can be.
Nocturne Phoenix	The redhead runs her fingers through her hair, chucking quietly as she flips open her menu. "Of course," she replies. "You certainly put him in his place, and it could not have been for a greater cause. I was going to come here anyway, but a little company is welcome. I haven't been in the city for too long myself, but of course I'd heard the stories. Pity none of them were about this peculiar law." As she peruses the menu, the readhead looks up again and adds, "Oh. Right. Please, call me Nocturne Phoenix. Nice to have been long-time friends with you both." She grins again and considers the menu some more. "How's the steak?"
Gloaming Starlight	"That raises a particular question, my new friend Twice-Blossomed Sakura," says Gloaming STarlight as they take a seat at their table. She flicks her braid over her shoulder so that falls down her back, billows her cloak out behind her dramatically as she takes a seat, and then places herself upon it in the Utmost Leisure Posture, like it's a throne and she's used to sitting on it. Even though it's a wooden chair that her fine bottom has never touched before. "What kind of someone are you, then?" she queries with a widening smirk. "I myself am the sort of person who does love to send a message," she continues before turning to give Phoenix a wink. "Or the sort of person who loves to deliver one. I'm a courier, so more often than not it's someone else that's sending it, and I'm the means of delivery." The question about the steak makes her glance around the room for just a moment, then she leans forward and rests her elbows on the table as she points surreptitiously at another table. "The guy over there seems to be enjoying his steak, and it looks reasonbly good. I've never been here before, though, so I can't speak from experience." She leans back again and shoots a look Sakura's way. "I'm suddenly craaving some fish, though."
Twice-Blossomed Sakura	"My late husband quite liked it," answers Sakura to Nocturne, nodding with a faint, pleasant smile. She thinks a moment, before adding; "Though you may wish for a wine list with that, I never tried the pairings for that particular dish. I do, however, recall a waiter mentioning southern cattle involved, which should speak to quality." She then turns her head, tilting it as she considers Starlight for a moment as she asks her question. "I am an architect, my dear, of considerable repute." She pauses to scan the pair again, considering. "In short, I devised certain mathematical principles and theorems that advanced that field and the fields of design in tandem published... sixty three years ago."
Nocturne Phoenix	Nocturne pauses and peers over her menu at Sakura, one eyebrow arched high. "That's...quite a thing to admit to, Twice-Blossomed Sakura, if you'll forgive my saying so. I just hope the wrong people don't hear that kind of thing. I won't breathe a word, but you never know who--or what--is out there." With that comment made, she looks at both ladies and chuckles again, quietly. "Maybe I should go for the fish myself, on second thought. I confess, I'm nowhere near as notable as a famous architect, though. Aside from here, what have you built?"
Gloaming Starlight	"Is that so?" asks Gloaming Starlight, giving Sakura a look that's more dubious than alarmed. "I hope that you'll take this as the compliment that it's meant to be, but you don't look like someone who published something sixty three years ago. Or who was even alive, then," she says, in a voice that doesn't carry beyond the table, at least not to anyone with hearing that isn't of a supernatural nature. Then she shrugs and admits to Phoenix, "not that I know anything about the topic, when it comes to mathematics." Then back again to Sakura she sasys, "I can make change if someone leaves in charge of a store, and I could probably put up a tent that wouldn't fall down even in a strong wind." Then she looks around the table and tuts softly. "We can't all order the fish. That just makes it seem weird," she protests.
Twice-Blossomed Sakura	"It's not an uncommon table order," says Sakura, smiling faintly. "Though I was not planning to order as much myself, anyways- simply a recommendation. No great matter, in either case." She shrugs it off. "Now, as to the matter of my appearance- within the past month you may well have seen me quite differently. But then, I likely would have scarce recognized such grand old friends of mine." "As for structures... admittedly, most were in... Thorns," she says with a helpless shrug. "But the palace of Prince Dyren of Joras, this very restaurant, the tower-library in the sacred grove tended by House Morag in Great Forks, and some others. Those still stand unsullied." She waves that off then, leaning forward just slightly but still impeccably politely. "Do please tell me about yourselves," she questions, nodding to Starlight to take the first bout thereof.
Gloaming Starlight	"When our server comes by, I think I'll ask about whatever rosemary dish they have cooking in the back. I think it's a fowl of some sort," Gloaming Starlight muses, on the topic of what they might dine upon. "I haven't seen it on anyone's plate, but it smells absolutely mouth watering." She doesn't seem to have been looking around that thoroughly, but she seems to have a pretty keen idea of what's going on, and a keen nose as well. She regards Sakura with a more interested eye when she mentions the tower-library of House Morag, then lets out a soft whistle. "That's a grand structure," she says. "I've seen it, when I was making a delivery, but only from a distance. I've been to quite a few places across the East of Creation, and seen quite a few things, since I more or less travel professionally. I'm expecting that I'll be in Nexus for a few days, and then off to who-knows-where." She turns her hands over in a casual shrug, then reaches up to free the brooch that holds her dusty cloak pinned around her shoulders. With a few careful, elegant gestures she removes it and leaves it draped artfully over the back of her chair. "That's what interests me the most, at least right now. Seeing places, meeting people. Building a reputation as someone who can get things where they need to be."
Twice-Blossomed Sakura	"Well, I have seen a great many things myself, over the years," notes Sakura. "And remember a-- well, very nearly all of them," she adds, smiling with that. "It is a very worthwhile endeavour, work-related or no. Creation is quite a wondrous place- something I wish I had appreciated more fully in my... first youth?" She shrugs, upturning her palms. She finds it strange herself, really. So do you deliver for some grander company or do you work independently in some fashion? Perhaps a member of a court?"
Gloaming Starlight	"I think you have more than twice the years behind you that I do," Starlight point sout, with a casual indifference to the supposed age of Twice-Blossomed Sakura that suggests she just doesn't believe it but isn't going to say so, or that she's encountered much stranger things. "I grew up in Greyfalls, hearing constant tales from people who stopped into the shop my family owns about the things that happened in the various places that they had been. I suspect that many of those tales were wild fantasy, but I've always been intrigued," she explains a bit. "So I set out to see the world as soon as I could afford my first horse. And convince my parents not to disown me for leaving town against their wishes," she adds with a laugh, unrestrained and unapologetic. "I'm independent, for the time being. Whoever has something they need delivered by someone with a proven track record of reliability and promptness. I've never been late and never failed to make a delivery. Even when I had to bring a basket of fruit from Nechara to Lookshy. Yes, I know, that seems absurd. I didn't ask."
Twice-Blossomed Sakura	"This is a world in which there is a nation far to the east and south wherein the entire ruling class boasts sorcerous power," Sakura reminds, smiling and laughing just lightly. "Do not discredit stories that seem incredible simply because it feels outside of our experience. Great Forks itself is considered quite the marvel by many from elsewhere. It is among my favourite cities, architecturally, for one." She considers for a long moment, purpose of it rather inscrutable for the time being. "That seems like quite the singular business. So much travel for such individual clientele. How does such a repute form with any rapidity?"
Gloaming Starlight	"Oh, I don't doubt that there are marvels to behold," Gloaming Starlight says with another burst of bright laughter. "Only that as much as even half of the particular stories that travelers told were true. It's not that I think the thing that were described are impossible, since I've seen things many would claim are just that. It's more that I know how inclined people are to make up stories." She winks and adds, "myself included, from time to time. Some time, remind me to tell you the one about someone trying to teach a tyrant lizard how to swim, and you can guess if that one is realy or not." "As for the business? A talent for persuading people of my capability, a few local jobs, word of mouth from satisfied clients, and more silver-tongued persuasion on top of that," she explains as if it's normal to just, you know, talk everyone into doing whatever you want them to do, like hire a perfect stranger to carry an important missive a thousand leagues across Creation. "You said you've been to Thorns, before all the... you know," she says, leaning forward and looking interested. "Can you tell me about it?"