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Description
This story was written as a gift for the unbelievably talented drpickelle . She requested a story involving her character Tocket and Tocket's friend Brando the giant space bug pirate . It was a challenge, but I was able to come up with a story that both I and drpickelle loved, and she was good enough to allow me to post it here with a sketch she drew.

Tocket and Brando are, and remain, ™ drpickelle, naturally

Tocket's Tale

If Tocket had known her first customer of the day was going to accuse her, she would have eaten a bigger breakfast.

The shop door bell jingled as a customer entered. It wasn't really a necessity, that bell; the shop was little more than a closet, with every inch of wall space taken up by overlapping watercolors and the sales counter, such as it was, being more of a place to hold an easel than a register.

But it was important nonetheless for two reasons. First, because when an artist was in the zone, they tended to be difficult to rouse except by sharp and sudden noises, and a starter pistol by the counter had resulted in noise complaints.

Second, because it helped the struggling and nascent art shop feel more like a real business and less like a shabby first-floor studio apartment with a bed, bath, and kitchenette hidden behind a screen out back.

Tocket was working on her latest project, a portrait of a by-mail client who had sent her a faded photograph as a reference, when the bell rand and she looked up.

An older lady dragon walked in. Her eyes had a steely patrician glare, and her dress was positively Victorian--the sort of thing a discerning woman deeply concerned for her reputation might once have worn but now thoroughly out of style. She wore a cameo brooch with a draconic profile, and her wings and tail were tightly bound with decorative silk cord in a way that all the older dragonesses had once done…but the younger ones were unanimously rejecting.

"Oh," the dragoness said. Her pose, ramrod-straight and upright, became even moreso. "You're a human. How utterly unfortunate."

"What?" Tocket said. She looked down at the pink hands holding her brush and did a double-take. "Oh, that. I'm sorry, let me take care of that."

With a sweep of her hands she discarded her disguising glamour, revealing her true feline self. Dark brownish-grey fur, complex interplay of black spots and lighter fur about her arms, and lithe bushy tail. Tocket's long ears flicked sensitively in the air; between them, the short curled hair she'd sported in disguise still dripped over her brow and down the back of her neck, different in shade and texture from the fuzz elsewhere.

"I was in Pinktown earlier, buying art supplies," Tocket said, brows furrowed apologetically over shining amber eyes. "It's best to wear a glamour over there, since as I'm sure you know humans can be rather xenophobic."

"Yes, I'm sure they can," the dragoness murmured, in a tone of voice that oozed with judgment. Just as she probably frowned on the young dragonesses with unbound wings and tail, she probably thought that a disguising glamour was unladylike as well. A job for one's husband, perhaps, but unbecoming a lady, who should not change appearances as often as she changed her clothes.

Then again, Tocket being a poor artist, she rarely changed her cloth boots and modern if embroidered jeans and shirts. Laundry was expensive and clothes even more so.

"What can I help you with today?" Tocket asked. "Miss…?"

"Lady," the dragoness corrected her testily. "Lady Xiyi. And you can start by confirming to me that this is in fact the correct artists' hovel." She thrust out a broadside in one papered, manicured, and painted claw.

Tocket took the sheet and looked it over:

Art by Tocket!
-Watercolor portraits
-Landscapes
-Inks and oils on request
-Reasonable prices!
42b Rue Fourrure
Tel. 555-789-36λ9

"Yep, that's my ad all right!" Tocket felt a thrill course through her; those broadsides and posters had been expensive to print, even with her friend at the printers giving her a good deal, and each was watercolored by hand (she still had hand-cramp nightmares). But it was essential for getting the word out on the streets, and with full-time artistry as her now sole means of support and outrageous Rue Fourrure rents to keep up…having a customer walk in bearing her ad, even a customer as haughty as Lady Xiyi, was gratifying. "What can I create for you today?" she said, using what she had decided would be her new professional catchphrase.

"You can start by telling me how long you were having an affair with my husband before he died," Lady Xiyi hissed.

"What?" Tocket's brush clattered to the ground. "Surely you must be mistaken, ma'am. I've never even had a dragon for a customer before."

"Your lies are as blatant as your manner is impudent," the dragoness snarled. She reached into her handbag and produced a worn piece of fine paper that had been folded many times and slapped it on the counter, scattering the tools that Tocket had piled there. "Look!"

Tocket took the paper and unfolded it, revealing a watercolor of a dapper older dragon in a waistcoat and tails, his wings and tail bound in the old-fashioned manner much like Lady Xiyi's. The style was lush and confident, and an unmistakable if faded signature was visible at the bottom: Tocket Art '13.

"Only a temptress would paint another woman's husband," Lady Xiyi said. "Now I will ask you again, 'madam,' what were the circumstances of your affair with my husband? I mean to have satisfaction in this matter!"

"There are some similarities of style, surely, but I've never painted anything like this in my life," Tocket said firmly. "Look at the walls! Do you see any watercolors like that? It's clearly a forgery that someone has signed with my name."

The enraged dragoness didn't even take a cursory look at the walls. "One would of course expect a more lush style for one's secret lover than what one makes available for the usual tramps and prostitutes that invariably make up an artist's clientele," she said. Tendrils of smoke were visible emanating from her nostrils and between her clenched teeth.

"Miss, look at my account book," Tocket said, pulling it from beneath the desk and offering it to Xiyi. "Every piece of art I've ever finished, with client and species. Even personal works. No dragons, and no portraits of dragons."

"Do you honestly expect me to believe that? Records are easily falsified, and honestly, what sort of strumpet would record her scandalous pornography for others to find? I am a lady of fine draconic blood descended from one of the city's greatest families of drakes, and I am no fool!"

"When would this have been?" continued Tocket. "I can get corroboration from my friends, other customers-"

"Enough!" Xiyi roared. A short, white-hot gout of flame bellowed from her maw, and Tocket had to frantically pat out a few embers on her desk. "I am asking the questions here! I do not know when you tempted my husband to betray his marital vows, but only a paramour would have her art stored in a dragon's personal safe! I found it in there when I opened it on his death!"

"I'm sorry, but if you won't believe what reasonable proof I can offer of my innocence, what else can I do?" Tocket said, raising her hands. She certainly didn't need her place of business burned down by a raging, irrational dragoness, even one of the smallish and humanoid sort. "Let me help you understand what happened, please."

Lady Xiyi sucked in much of the smoke that had filled the room. "Your guileless facade won't fool me," she said. "But I am a reasonable woman, and I know the bounds of propriety. My husband died last week; I will give you three days to produce a satisfactory explanation or admit your guilt, and then I will go to the magistrate. And do not test my patience further--I loved my husband dearly, and I will not hesitate to burn your ridiculous pornographery to the ground to protect his good name!"

A haze of smoky embers followed the dragoness out Tocket's door and down the street.

Once the last embers had been patted out, Tocket sat down to think. How could a signature that looked so much like her own, bearing that year's date, have appeared in an elderly dragon's safe? Clearly someone had seen one of her posters--which were all signed--and sought to blame her. But how to prove it, and where to start?

There was only one real answer to that question.

"Tocket, you little inkspot! How've you been?"

Brando, the immense and imposing arthropod scoundrel, and one of Tocket's oldest and dearest friends, was at his usual watering hole knocking back drinks so acidic that they'd burn through the esophagus of any mammal foolish enough to try them.

"I was hoping that your ship would be in port," Tocket said, sliding into the booth opposite Brando. "I need the kind of advice only a pirate can give."

"Pirate? Bite that papillae'd tongue of yours, miss. Privateer, soldier of fortune, doubloon emancipation engineer…there are any number of acceptable terms, and yet you go for the one you know to be the most wrong!"

"I go for the one most likely to get a rise out of you, you salty old sea bug," Tocket laughed.

"Am I that predictable?"

"Hmm…does an arthropod pirate always make a scene?"

In response, Brando unholstered his gun and fired it into the ceiling. "What's it take to get some service around here? Another Bromine Old No. 6 Ale, and keep 'em coming! And a bottle of Madame Silvestris for my friend here!" He replaced his weapon as the harried waitress rushed off to fill the order. "Does that answer your question?"

"Definitively," grinned Tocket. Many found Brando to be too overbearing or boisterous and took that to mean he was dangerous, but his friends knew that aside from an impulsive streak he was a fierce and loyal friend. "About that advice?"

"I'll see what I can do," Brando said. The waitress arrived bearing the requested drinks; Brando popped them both open with his mandibles and offered a generous tip.

"A dragoness--Xiyi--came into my shop claiming that I had an affair with her husband who died last week. She found a watercolor with my signature supposedly on it in his safe."

"Did you? Have an affair, I mean."

"Of course not!" cried Tocket. "You know I never would do anything like that."

"Had to ask," Brando said. "The Xiyis are one of the most respected dragon merchant families in the city, do business with everyone from the nagas to those bigoted humans in Pinktown. Power and money are the greatest aphrodisiacs, after all." He paused. "Well, aside from being named Brando, naturally."

"Very funny." Tocket unfolded the watercolor portrait and laid it on the table. "I didn't paint this, surely you can see that. And I need advice of how to prove that these charges are baseless in three days or less."

"I'm no art critic," Brando said, glancing at the artwork. "But I can offer some advice. First, try to duplicate the painting. Your failure to do so is a pretty good indication that you couldn't have painted the original. Second, look around the Xiyi estate over on Rue Écailleuse."

"While I'm already on Lady Xiyi's bad side?"

"You don't know much about dragons, do you?" Brando sniffed, his antennae twitching. "Once the deceased dragon's safe, or hoard, or whatever is opened, their estate, or cave, or whatever is ritually sealed. They'll set a date for the body's immolation, to give relatives time to arrive and mourners time to do their thing, and then divvy stuff up. Lady Xiyi committed a major draconic faux pas by taking that out of her hubby's safe, but then again I bet she was pretty angry."

"She almost set my shop on fire."

"Yep, pretty angry," Brando said, taking a generous swig of his toxic drink. "I'd try those two things. In the meantime, I'll talk to my friend the magistrate, who owes me a favor, and see what I can find out about Lord Xiyi from the usual sources. Meet here day before your dragon-lady ultimatum runs out, same time, same station. Deal?"

"You're an angel, Brando," Tocket said. "What do I owe you?"

"You know damn well I'm not," Brando countered. "And you know what I want. Inked and uncensored."

"Let me guess," Tocket sighed. "Caithari blossom maidens?"

"Am I that predictable? Well, a man needs to know what he wants." Brando said. He scribbled some stick figures on a bar napkin. "Two of them, in this position, if you can."

Tocket looked at the napkin and her ears flattened. "I don't think that this is possible given the laws of physics as we know them."

"It's possible in zero gravity," Brando said. "Don't ask me how I know. Little pitchers have big ears and I'd hate to corrupt you."

The next morning, Tocket set her current commission aside and spread out the watercolor portrait of Lord Xiyi. It wasn't really a salacious position, but it conveyed a real sense of power and nobility to be sure. If she could divorce her feelings about being falsely accused from her artist's eye, Tocket had to admit that it was very well-done.

"Well, let's show the world that I can't paint that well," she said. Selecting a piece of paper roughly the same size and consistency and her best brushes, Tocket set to work. Before long, she had fallen into "the zone" and didn't look up again or think another conscious thought. When she snapped out of it near nightfall, she looked at the watercolor with horror.

She'd actually been able to improve on it.

The colors that had been faded were vibrant on the Tocket version, and the smudging and mixing of colors that were signs of an artist who was a lot more avant-garde than she weren't present. And the signature was a spot-on match. Whoever had forged it had clearly done their homework.

"Well, so much for that idea," Tocket sighed. She roughly folded her facsimile and shoved it into a pocket. "Looks like this impostor isn't the only one who's good at art forgery."

There was no other option left but to try and sneak into Château du Xiyi on Rue Écailleuse, and Tocket didn't like the odds of her finding anything there. Consulting a map, she saw that the Château was at the confluence of three major roads that radiated outward: Rue Écailleuse, where most of the dragons and their allies lived; Rue Graisse, which marked the boundary of Pinktown where the humans congregated; and Rue Ley Ligne, which was where fortune-tellers, astrologers, and other mystics of every shape and persuasion tended to set up shop.

Worried about the xenophobes in Pinktown, and realizing that a disguise would be very useful in any breaking and entering, Tocket put her glamour back on to pass as a human. It was a complex incantation, easily dispelled, but one that was ever so useful in a city as polyglot as this. Tocket tended not to use it, as it was very uncomfortable for long periods of time. Seeing a pink mockery of her true features in mirrors and windows was bad enough, but part and parcel with the glamour was a kind of self-hypnosis. Tocket wasn't actually changing anything but how others perceived her, but in order to make the spell more potent and provide at least a little defense against psychics and skeptics, she had to believe it. So Tocket had to endure the discomfort of believing, even if only through hypnosis, that she had no tail, no fur, tiny useless ears, and ridiculous plantigrade paws (and no claws of any sort).

Even then there were telltale signs, like the faintest of speckling on her "skin," slight pointing of her "ears," and unmistakably yellow eyes.

Thus disguised, Tocket walked down Rue Ley Ligne toward Château du Xiyi. The annual Festival of Transubstantiation was going on, so the place was a noisy mess of would-be prophets and tarot readers. It did allow Tocket's glamour to go unnoticed to anyone that might have been watching, allowing them to think she was some human girl slumming from Pinktown.

"Boy, Brando wasn't kidding about this place being sealed," Tocket muttered, with teeth and lips that she was distastefully forced to believe were flat on the one hand and pink on the other.

Château du Xiyi was boarded up across all its windows and doors, and the gated were chained with a rusty padlock. Naturally, though, the defenses were designed by those completely ignorant of any intruders beyond the usual human vandals. With feline grace, Tocket scaled the fence and cartwheeled over it before slinking through what seemed an impossibly small gap between two boards. It was a good thing no one saw her, as it would have instantly broken the disguising glamour and revealed her true form for everyone to see (and Lady Xiyi to prosecute and/or burn to ashes).

Inside, it seemed that most of the Xiyi furniture had been covered up with heavy cloths, and the place was already thick with dust. "Guess Lord and Lady Xiyi were like most rich folks and barely using what they had even though they were anxious to get more," she muttered.

The safe was most likely upstairs in the master suite; Tocket climbed the stairs silently and crept about before discovering the proper room behind two ornate and ajar doors. The bedchamber looked as if it hadn't been slept in for many a year, though much of the dust had been disturbed recently. "Guess Lady Xiyi and her Lord weren't exactly acting like newlyweds," Tocket laughed.

Her laughter died once she saw the safe on the far wall; it was large, practically a walk-in closet. It was also empty. Lady Xiyi must have emptied the whole thing out, flaunting draconic tradition in her anger. "Damn it!" Tocket cried.

To her shock, she heard a yelp from behind her. "Aagh!"

"Who's there?" she cried. "Show yourself!"

"P-please don't hurt me," a voice said. "I'm sorry, I just…I needed a place to stay, and this looked abandoned…" A shadow emerged from behind the massive four-poster bed into the late afternoon light. It was a young feline male with tawny fur and a patchy, anemic black mane--either a very young leonine, or a very malnourished, scraggly one. Perhaps both.

Tocket relaxed. "Don't worry," she said. "I don't work for anybody. I'm actually here to rob the place."

"T-take whatever you want, I won't tell!" the young leonine man said. "Just please, don't hurt me."

"I'm not going to hurt you," Tocket said irritably. "And what I came for is long gone to judge from that empty vault."

"W-what were you looking for?" The man approached hesitantly, and Tocket saw that he clothes were shabby, dirty, and patched. He had no shoes, and ribs were visible when he shifted position.

Tocket unfolded her facsimile and threw it on the bed. "The crazy lady who used to live here thinks that I had an affair with her husband because of a painting."

"T-that's crazy," the leonine said. "Just because you paint someone doesn't mean you're…you know. That's the life of an artist."

"Glad somebody agrees," Tocket said, leaning against one of the bed posters. "Who are you, and what are you doing here? You know that crazy old coot will probably haul you before the magistrate if she finds you here."

"Oh, I've been before him many times, mostly for vagrancy. I'm not afraid. And if she won't use this nice place, then she ought to let someone in need do so." He paused. "N-name's Nyoy."

"So you're squatting here while no one's home? I think I like that. Stuffed shirts that own the place could probably use a little unstuffing," said Tocket.

"Just until I can get a fresh start," Nyoy said. "Everything will turn around once that happens."

"I've heard that before," Tocket sighed. "From myself, most recently, when I quit my job and decided to become an artist full time."

Nyoy picked up the watercolor. "It's an…exquisite likeness," he said. "Very commanding, very powerful…this dragon knows what he wants and means to take it. You painted it?"

"No!" Tocket cried. "That's the whole point of this whole thing!" She paused. "Well, technically, I did paint that one. I was trying to show that I couldn't have made or signed it, and I wound up improving on it."

"It's lovely," Nyoy said. "I tried to be an artist once…never could paint people, but I was rather good at landscapes and buildings. Not enough to make a living, but…but I like to think I can appreciate good work when I see it."

"You should see my real work, in my shop," said Tocket. She had to admit, Nyoy had a certain inner fire that she found compelling, and he was kind of cute behind the stench and bedraggled look of a transient.

"I'd like that very much, once I am able to turn things around and get my new start," Nyoy said shyly.

"I'll look forward to it," Tocket smiled. "Word to the wise, though: the owners will be back once the mourning period is over in a few days. If I were you, I'd be long gone by then."

"T-thanks for the advice," Nyoy said. "It's been a long time since I've had a kind word from anybody."

Looking him over, Tocket felt a great swell of pity. She reached into her bag and pulled out a sandwich she'd been saving, and laid a few coins from her most recent commission atop it. "Here," she said. "I hope this is the first step toward turning your life around and getting that new start you want."

A grateful smile lit up Nyoy's face. "T-thank you!" he babbled. "Thank you, thank you!"

"At least one of us got something out of this fiasco," Tocket said. She turned to leave.

"Miss? Allow me to express my thanks."

Tocket turned, and before she could respond, Nyoy had caught her hand and kissed it in a dainty, gentlemanly way. "I hope you are able to clear your name."

"Thanks," Tocket said, blushing. "Look me up at my shop sometime."

She left the way she came in, and was halfway home before a series of unfortunate realizations struck her. "Goddammit," she said, slapping her forehead. "I didn't tell him my name, or my address. And I had the glamour up that whole time, so he'll be looking for a human girl instead of the real me!" A sigh. "So much for seeing him cleaned up and successful and cute at my door in the near future. This week just keeps getting better and better doesn't it?"

The next day, Tocket met Brando at the same booth as before; she arrived early because the Festival of Transubstantiation was over and there were no mystical types to impede her.

"Well, I'm afraid your advice didn't get me very far," she said. "I was able to copy the art exactly, and the mansion was deserted…oh crap! I left my copy of the drawing in the mansion!"

"Yeah, about that," Brando said sheepishly. "It's a good thing you weren't caught. I forgot to mention the Draconic Honor Guard that ritually patrols sealed houses and keeps the lights on during the ritual mourning period. Mostly because I've never seen an actual mourning house and just read about it."

"Huh?" Tocket said, cocking her head (now once again in its un-glamoured feline glory). "There were no lights, and certainly no guards."

"There certainly were," Brando shot back. "I walked past the place on my way home. I even lingered there to warn you away!"

"It was boarded up and all dusty inside, like no one had lived there for years," Tocket countered.

"That's ridiculous," Brando said. "The Xiyis had a household staff of 30. They kept the place immaculate. I chatted one of them up yesterday!"

"…that doesn't make any sense," Tocket said. "But it doesn't matter, I suppose. What did you find?"

"Well, I have good news and better news," Brando said. "The magistrate says that by opening the safe and removing that artwork, Lady Xiyi, by the law of her own kind, forfeited the right to take legal action. Apparently it was a bigger faux pas than I thought."

"And I still have the original at my shop, with her fingerprints all over it," Tocket cried. "That's great. What's the better news?"

"Oh, nothing with any bearing on the facts of the case," laughed Brando. "Just some gossip that a lot of pockets have been lined trying to keep quiet. Seems that Lord Xiyi came from very humble origins."

"How humble?"

"Well--and this isn't common knowledge yet--he was actually born a leonine. Underwent a Major Transfiguration to become a dragon and married into his crazy wife's noble family…and managed to keep the whole thing secret for well over fifty years."

The bottom fell out of Tocket gut. "I…I met a leonine in the mansion, when it was but shouldn't have been abandoned," she whispered. "Nyoy. His name was Nyoy."

"Really?" Brando pondered for a moment. "You know, 'Xiyi' is a Caesar cipher for 'Nyoy.' Shift each letter 6 places in the alphabet--one for each letter of D-R-A-G-O-N, I suppose--and you convert one to the other."

Tocket, speechless, stared blankly ahead.

"My contact also said that Lord Xiyi specifically bought that mansion despite better digs elsewhere," Brando continued, his voice quiet. "It had been owned by an old draconic family and abandoned for many years, and he insisted on making it his own even though it abutted Pinktown."

"Maybe…maybe because it abutted Pinktown," Tocket whispered.

"Well, he was a known patron of the arts, especially in Pinktown," Brando said. "That look on your face, Tocket…you need to spit out whatever it is you're thinking of."

"It…it was me, the whole time," Tocket whispered. "I wandered through the Festival of Transubstantiation…I must have somehow wound up at the mansion when Nyoy--Xiyi--squatted there, before the 'new start' he was talking about. I must have…somehow…given him the template he based his new life on, in the form of that picture. No wonder he treasured it. And no wonder he patronized Pinktown artists…I had my glamour on when we met. He was probably looking for me."

"Whoa," Brando said. "That makes my head spin like a belt of old No. 6 Alkaline gut-juice. Are…are you going to be okay?"

"Yeah, I think so," Tocket said. "I think so. Say what you will about Lord Xiyi, but…well, he was my very first customer, wasn't he?"

END

Description
This story was written as a gift for the unbelievably talented drpickelle . She requested a story involving her character Tocket and Tocket's friend Brando the giant space bug pirate . It was a challenge, but I was able to come up with a story that both I and drpickelle loved, and she was good enough to allow me to post it here with a sketch she drew.

Tocket and Brando are, and remain, ™ drpickelle, naturally

Tocket's Tale

If Tocket had known her first customer of the day was going to accuse her, she would have eaten a bigger breakfast.

The shop door bell jingled as a customer entered. It wasn't really a necessity, that bell; the shop was little more than a closet, with every inch of wall space taken up by overlapping watercolors and the sales counter, such as it was, being more of a place to hold an easel than a register.

But it was important nonetheless for two reasons. First, because when an artist was in the zone, they tended to be difficult to rouse except by sharp and sudden noises, and a starter pistol by the counter had resulted in noise complaints.

Second, because it helped the struggling and nascent art shop feel more like a real business and less like a shabby first-floor studio apartment with a bed, bath, and kitchenette hidden behind a screen out back.

Tocket was working on her latest project, a portrait of a by-mail client who had sent her a faded photograph as a reference, when the bell rand and she looked up.

An older lady dragon walked in. Her eyes had a steely patrician glare, and her dress was positively Victorian--the sort of thing a discerning woman deeply concerned for her reputation might once have worn but now thoroughly out of style. She wore a cameo brooch with a draconic profile, and her wings and tail were tightly bound with decorative silk cord in a way that all the older dragonesses had once done…but the younger ones were unanimously rejecting.

"Oh," the dragoness said. Her pose, ramrod-straight and upright, became even moreso. "You're a human. How utterly unfortunate."

"What?" Tocket said. She looked down at the pink hands holding her brush and did a double-take. "Oh, that. I'm sorry, let me take care of that."

With a sweep of her hands she discarded her disguising glamour, revealing her true feline self. Dark brownish-grey fur, complex interplay of black spots and lighter fur about her arms, and lithe bushy tail. Tocket's long ears flicked sensitively in the air; between them, the short curled hair she'd sported in disguise still dripped over her brow and down the back of her neck, different in shade and texture from the fuzz elsewhere.

"I was in Pinktown earlier, buying art supplies," Tocket said, brows furrowed apologetically over shining amber eyes. "It's best to wear a glamour over there, since as I'm sure you know humans can be rather xenophobic."

"Yes, I'm sure they can," the dragoness murmured, in a tone of voice that oozed with judgment. Just as she probably frowned on the young dragonesses with unbound wings and tail, she probably thought that a disguising glamour was unladylike as well. A job for one's husband, perhaps, but unbecoming a lady, who should not change appearances as often as she changed her clothes.

Then again, Tocket being a poor artist, she rarely changed her cloth boots and modern if embroidered jeans and shirts. Laundry was expensive and clothes even more so.

"What can I help you with today?" Tocket asked. "Miss…?"

"Lady," the dragoness corrected her testily. "Lady Xiyi. And you can start by confirming to me that this is in fact the correct artists' hovel." She thrust out a broadside in one papered, manicured, and painted claw.

Tocket took the sheet and looked it over:

Art by Tocket!
-Watercolor portraits
-Landscapes
-Inks and oils on request
-Reasonable prices!
42b Rue Fourrure
Tel. 555-789-36λ9

"Yep, that's my ad all right!" Tocket felt a thrill course through her; those broadsides and posters had been expensive to print, even with her friend at the printers giving her a good deal, and each was watercolored by hand (she still had hand-cramp nightmares). But it was essential for getting the word out on the streets, and with full-time artistry as her now sole means of support and outrageous Rue Fourrure rents to keep up…having a customer walk in bearing her ad, even a customer as haughty as Lady Xiyi, was gratifying. "What can I create for you today?" she said, using what she had decided would be her new professional catchphrase.

"You can start by telling me how long you were having an affair with my husband before he died," Lady Xiyi hissed.

"What?" Tocket's brush clattered to the ground. "Surely you must be mistaken, ma'am. I've never even had a dragon for a customer before."

"Your lies are as blatant as your manner is impudent," the dragoness snarled. She reached into her handbag and produced a worn piece of fine paper that had been folded many times and slapped it on the counter, scattering the tools that Tocket had piled there. "Look!"

Tocket took the paper and unfolded it, revealing a watercolor of a dapper older dragon in a waistcoat and tails, his wings and tail bound in the old-fashioned manner much like Lady Xiyi's. The style was lush and confident, and an unmistakable if faded signature was visible at the bottom: Tocket Art '13.

"Only a temptress would paint another woman's husband," Lady Xiyi said. "Now I will ask you again, 'madam,' what were the circumstances of your affair with my husband? I mean to have satisfaction in this matter!"

"There are some similarities of style, surely, but I've never painted anything like this in my life," Tocket said firmly. "Look at the walls! Do you see any watercolors like that? It's clearly a forgery that someone has signed with my name."

The enraged dragoness didn't even take a cursory look at the walls. "One would of course expect a more lush style for one's secret lover than what one makes available for the usual tramps and prostitutes that invariably make up an artist's clientele," she said. Tendrils of smoke were visible emanating from her nostrils and between her clenched teeth.

"Miss, look at my account book," Tocket said, pulling it from beneath the desk and offering it to Xiyi. "Every piece of art I've ever finished, with client and species. Even personal works. No dragons, and no portraits of dragons."

"Do you honestly expect me to believe that? Records are easily falsified, and honestly, what sort of strumpet would record her scandalous pornography for others to find? I am a lady of fine draconic blood descended from one of the city's greatest families of drakes, and I am no fool!"

"When would this have been?" continued Tocket. "I can get corroboration from my friends, other customers-"

"Enough!" Xiyi roared. A short, white-hot gout of flame bellowed from her maw, and Tocket had to frantically pat out a few embers on her desk. "I am asking the questions here! I do not know when you tempted my husband to betray his marital vows, but only a paramour would have her art stored in a dragon's personal safe! I found it in there when I opened it on his death!"

"I'm sorry, but if you won't believe what reasonable proof I can offer of my innocence, what else can I do?" Tocket said, raising her hands. She certainly didn't need her place of business burned down by a raging, irrational dragoness, even one of the smallish and humanoid sort. "Let me help you understand what happened, please."

Lady Xiyi sucked in much of the smoke that had filled the room. "Your guileless facade won't fool me," she said. "But I am a reasonable woman, and I know the bounds of propriety. My husband died last week; I will give you three days to produce a satisfactory explanation or admit your guilt, and then I will go to the magistrate. And do not test my patience further--I loved my husband dearly, and I will not hesitate to burn your ridiculous pornographery to the ground to protect his good name!"

A haze of smoky embers followed the dragoness out Tocket's door and down the street.

Once the last embers had been patted out, Tocket sat down to think. How could a signature that looked so much like her own, bearing that year's date, have appeared in an elderly dragon's safe? Clearly someone had seen one of her posters--which were all signed--and sought to blame her. But how to prove it, and where to start?

There was only one real answer to that question.

"Tocket, you little inkspot! How've you been?"

Brando, the immense and imposing arthropod scoundrel, and one of Tocket's oldest and dearest friends, was at his usual watering hole knocking back drinks so acidic that they'd burn through the esophagus of any mammal foolish enough to try them.

"I was hoping that your ship would be in port," Tocket said, sliding into the booth opposite Brando. "I need the kind of advice only a pirate can give."

"Pirate? Bite that papillae'd tongue of yours, miss. Privateer, soldier of fortune, doubloon emancipation engineer…there are any number of acceptable terms, and yet you go for the one you know to be the most wrong!"

"I go for the one most likely to get a rise out of you, you salty old sea bug," Tocket laughed.

"Am I that predictable?"

"Hmm…does an arthropod pirate always make a scene?"

In response, Brando unholstered his gun and fired it into the ceiling. "What's it take to get some service around here? Another Bromine Old No. 6 Ale, and keep 'em coming! And a bottle of Madame Silvestris for my friend here!" He replaced his weapon as the harried waitress rushed off to fill the order. "Does that answer your question?"

"Definitively," grinned Tocket. Many found Brando to be too overbearing or boisterous and took that to mean he was dangerous, but his friends knew that aside from an impulsive streak he was a fierce and loyal friend. "About that advice?"

"I'll see what I can do," Brando said. The waitress arrived bearing the requested drinks; Brando popped them both open with his mandibles and offered a generous tip.

"A dragoness--Xiyi--came into my shop claiming that I had an affair with her husband who died last week. She found a watercolor with my signature supposedly on it in his safe."

"Did you? Have an affair, I mean."

"Of course not!" cried Tocket. "You know I never would do anything like that."

"Had to ask," Brando said. "The Xiyis are one of the most respected dragon merchant families in the city, do business with everyone from the nagas to those bigoted humans in Pinktown. Power and money are the greatest aphrodisiacs, after all." He paused. "Well, aside from being named Brando, naturally."

"Very funny." Tocket unfolded the watercolor portrait and laid it on the table. "I didn't paint this, surely you can see that. And I need advice of how to prove that these charges are baseless in three days or less."

"I'm no art critic," Brando said, glancing at the artwork. "But I can offer some advice. First, try to duplicate the painting. Your failure to do so is a pretty good indication that you couldn't have painted the original. Second, look around the Xiyi estate over on Rue Écailleuse."

"While I'm already on Lady Xiyi's bad side?"

"You don't know much about dragons, do you?" Brando sniffed, his antennae twitching. "Once the deceased dragon's safe, or hoard, or whatever is opened, their estate, or cave, or whatever is ritually sealed. They'll set a date for the body's immolation, to give relatives time to arrive and mourners time to do their thing, and then divvy stuff up. Lady Xiyi committed a major draconic faux pas by taking that out of her hubby's safe, but then again I bet she was pretty angry."

"She almost set my shop on fire."

"Yep, pretty angry," Brando said, taking a generous swig of his toxic drink. "I'd try those two things. In the meantime, I'll talk to my friend the magistrate, who owes me a favor, and see what I can find out about Lord Xiyi from the usual sources. Meet here day before your dragon-lady ultimatum runs out, same time, same station. Deal?"

"You're an angel, Brando," Tocket said. "What do I owe you?"

"You know damn well I'm not," Brando countered. "And you know what I want. Inked and uncensored."

"Let me guess," Tocket sighed. "Caithari blossom maidens?"

"Am I that predictable? Well, a man needs to know what he wants." Brando said. He scribbled some stick figures on a bar napkin. "Two of them, in this position, if you can."

Tocket looked at the napkin and her ears flattened. "I don't think that this is possible given the laws of physics as we know them."

"It's possible in zero gravity," Brando said. "Don't ask me how I know. Little pitchers have big ears and I'd hate to corrupt you."

The next morning, Tocket set her current commission aside and spread out the watercolor portrait of Lord Xiyi. It wasn't really a salacious position, but it conveyed a real sense of power and nobility to be sure. If she could divorce her feelings about being falsely accused from her artist's eye, Tocket had to admit that it was very well-done.

"Well, let's show the world that I can't paint that well," she said. Selecting a piece of paper roughly the same size and consistency and her best brushes, Tocket set to work. Before long, she had fallen into "the zone" and didn't look up again or think another conscious thought. When she snapped out of it near nightfall, she looked at the watercolor with horror.

She'd actually been able to improve on it.

The colors that had been faded were vibrant on the Tocket version, and the smudging and mixing of colors that were signs of an artist who was a lot more avant-garde than she weren't present. And the signature was a spot-on match. Whoever had forged it had clearly done their homework.

"Well, so much for that idea," Tocket sighed. She roughly folded her facsimile and shoved it into a pocket. "Looks like this impostor isn't the only one who's good at art forgery."

There was no other option left but to try and sneak into Château du Xiyi on Rue Écailleuse, and Tocket didn't like the odds of her finding anything there. Consulting a map, she saw that the Château was at the confluence of three major roads that radiated outward: Rue Écailleuse, where most of the dragons and their allies lived; Rue Graisse, which marked the boundary of Pinktown where the humans congregated; and Rue Ley Ligne, which was where fortune-tellers, astrologers, and other mystics of every shape and persuasion tended to set up shop.

Worried about the xenophobes in Pinktown, and realizing that a disguise would be very useful in any breaking and entering, Tocket put her glamour back on to pass as a human. It was a complex incantation, easily dispelled, but one that was ever so useful in a city as polyglot as this. Tocket tended not to use it, as it was very uncomfortable for long periods of time. Seeing a pink mockery of her true features in mirrors and windows was bad enough, but part and parcel with the glamour was a kind of self-hypnosis. Tocket wasn't actually changing anything but how others perceived her, but in order to make the spell more potent and provide at least a little defense against psychics and skeptics, she had to believe it. So Tocket had to endure the discomfort of believing, even if only through hypnosis, that she had no tail, no fur, tiny useless ears, and ridiculous plantigrade paws (and no claws of any sort).

Even then there were telltale signs, like the faintest of speckling on her "skin," slight pointing of her "ears," and unmistakably yellow eyes.

Thus disguised, Tocket walked down Rue Ley Ligne toward Château du Xiyi. The annual Festival of Transubstantiation was going on, so the place was a noisy mess of would-be prophets and tarot readers. It did allow Tocket's glamour to go unnoticed to anyone that might have been watching, allowing them to think she was some human girl slumming from Pinktown.

"Boy, Brando wasn't kidding about this place being sealed," Tocket muttered, with teeth and lips that she was distastefully forced to believe were flat on the one hand and pink on the other.

Château du Xiyi was boarded up across all its windows and doors, and the gated were chained with a rusty padlock. Naturally, though, the defenses were designed by those completely ignorant of any intruders beyond the usual human vandals. With feline grace, Tocket scaled the fence and cartwheeled over it before slinking through what seemed an impossibly small gap between two boards. It was a good thing no one saw her, as it would have instantly broken the disguising glamour and revealed her true form for everyone to see (and Lady Xiyi to prosecute and/or burn to ashes).

Inside, it seemed that most of the Xiyi furniture had been covered up with heavy cloths, and the place was already thick with dust. "Guess Lord and Lady Xiyi were like most rich folks and barely using what they had even though they were anxious to get more," she muttered.

The safe was most likely upstairs in the master suite; Tocket climbed the stairs silently and crept about before discovering the proper room behind two ornate and ajar doors. The bedchamber looked as if it hadn't been slept in for many a year, though much of the dust had been disturbed recently. "Guess Lady Xiyi and her Lord weren't exactly acting like newlyweds," Tocket laughed.

Her laughter died once she saw the safe on the far wall; it was large, practically a walk-in closet. It was also empty. Lady Xiyi must have emptied the whole thing out, flaunting draconic tradition in her anger. "Damn it!" Tocket cried.

To her shock, she heard a yelp from behind her. "Aagh!"

"Who's there?" she cried. "Show yourself!"

"P-please don't hurt me," a voice said. "I'm sorry, I just…I needed a place to stay, and this looked abandoned…" A shadow emerged from behind the massive four-poster bed into the late afternoon light. It was a young feline male with tawny fur and a patchy, anemic black mane--either a very young leonine, or a very malnourished, scraggly one. Perhaps both.

Tocket relaxed. "Don't worry," she said. "I don't work for anybody. I'm actually here to rob the place."

"T-take whatever you want, I won't tell!" the young leonine man said. "Just please, don't hurt me."

"I'm not going to hurt you," Tocket said irritably. "And what I came for is long gone to judge from that empty vault."

"W-what were you looking for?" The man approached hesitantly, and Tocket saw that he clothes were shabby, dirty, and patched. He had no shoes, and ribs were visible when he shifted position.

Tocket unfolded her facsimile and threw it on the bed. "The crazy lady who used to live here thinks that I had an affair with her husband because of a painting."

"T-that's crazy," the leonine said. "Just because you paint someone doesn't mean you're…you know. That's the life of an artist."

"Glad somebody agrees," Tocket said, leaning against one of the bed posters. "Who are you, and what are you doing here? You know that crazy old coot will probably haul you before the magistrate if she finds you here."

"Oh, I've been before him many times, mostly for vagrancy. I'm not afraid. And if she won't use this nice place, then she ought to let someone in need do so." He paused. "N-name's Nyoy."

"So you're squatting here while no one's home? I think I like that. Stuffed shirts that own the place could probably use a little unstuffing," said Tocket.

"Just until I can get a fresh start," Nyoy said. "Everything will turn around once that happens."

"I've heard that before," Tocket sighed. "From myself, most recently, when I quit my job and decided to become an artist full time."

Nyoy picked up the watercolor. "It's an…exquisite likeness," he said. "Very commanding, very powerful…this dragon knows what he wants and means to take it. You painted it?"

"No!" Tocket cried. "That's the whole point of this whole thing!" She paused. "Well, technically, I did paint that one. I was trying to show that I couldn't have made or signed it, and I wound up improving on it."

"It's lovely," Nyoy said. "I tried to be an artist once…never could paint people, but I was rather good at landscapes and buildings. Not enough to make a living, but…but I like to think I can appreciate good work when I see it."

"You should see my real work, in my shop," said Tocket. She had to admit, Nyoy had a certain inner fire that she found compelling, and he was kind of cute behind the stench and bedraggled look of a transient.

"I'd like that very much, once I am able to turn things around and get my new start," Nyoy said shyly.

"I'll look forward to it," Tocket smiled. "Word to the wise, though: the owners will be back once the mourning period is over in a few days. If I were you, I'd be long gone by then."

"T-thanks for the advice," Nyoy said. "It's been a long time since I've had a kind word from anybody."

Looking him over, Tocket felt a great swell of pity. She reached into her bag and pulled out a sandwich she'd been saving, and laid a few coins from her most recent commission atop it. "Here," she said. "I hope this is the first step toward turning your life around and getting that new start you want."

A grateful smile lit up Nyoy's face. "T-thank you!" he babbled. "Thank you, thank you!"

"At least one of us got something out of this fiasco," Tocket said. She turned to leave.

"Miss? Allow me to express my thanks."

Tocket turned, and before she could respond, Nyoy had caught her hand and kissed it in a dainty, gentlemanly way. "I hope you are able to clear your name."

"Thanks," Tocket said, blushing. "Look me up at my shop sometime."

She left the way she came in, and was halfway home before a series of unfortunate realizations struck her. "Goddammit," she said, slapping her forehead. "I didn't tell him my name, or my address. And I had the glamour up that whole time, so he'll be looking for a human girl instead of the real me!" A sigh. "So much for seeing him cleaned up and successful and cute at my door in the near future. This week just keeps getting better and better doesn't it?"

The next day, Tocket met Brando at the same booth as before; she arrived early because the Festival of Transubstantiation was over and there were no mystical types to impede her.

"Well, I'm afraid your advice didn't get me very far," she said. "I was able to copy the art exactly, and the mansion was deserted…oh crap! I left my copy of the drawing in the mansion!"

"Yeah, about that," Brando said sheepishly. "It's a good thing you weren't caught. I forgot to mention the Draconic Honor Guard that ritually patrols sealed houses and keeps the lights on during the ritual mourning period. Mostly because I've never seen an actual mourning house and just read about it."

"Huh?" Tocket said, cocking her head (now once again in its un-glamoured feline glory). "There were no lights, and certainly no guards."

"There certainly were," Brando shot back. "I walked past the place on my way home. I even lingered there to warn you away!"

"It was boarded up and all dusty inside, like no one had lived there for years," Tocket countered.

"That's ridiculous," Brando said. "The Xiyis had a household staff of 30. They kept the place immaculate. I chatted one of them up yesterday!"

"…that doesn't make any sense," Tocket said. "But it doesn't matter, I suppose. What did you find?"

"Well, I have good news and better news," Brando said. "The magistrate says that by opening the safe and removing that artwork, Lady Xiyi, by the law of her own kind, forfeited the right to take legal action. Apparently it was a bigger faux pas than I thought."

"And I still have the original at my shop, with her fingerprints all over it," Tocket cried. "That's great. What's the better news?"

"Oh, nothing with any bearing on the facts of the case," laughed Brando. "Just some gossip that a lot of pockets have been lined trying to keep quiet. Seems that Lord Xiyi came from very humble origins."

"How humble?"

"Well--and this isn't common knowledge yet--he was actually born a leonine. Underwent a Major Transfiguration to become a dragon and married into his crazy wife's noble family…and managed to keep the whole thing secret for well over fifty years."

The bottom fell out of Tocket gut. "I…I met a leonine in the mansion, when it was but shouldn't have been abandoned," she whispered. "Nyoy. His name was Nyoy."

"Really?" Brando pondered for a moment. "You know, 'Xiyi' is a Caesar cipher for 'Nyoy.' Shift each letter 6 places in the alphabet--one for each letter of D-R-A-G-O-N, I suppose--and you convert one to the other."

Tocket, speechless, stared blankly ahead.

"My contact also said that Lord Xiyi specifically bought that mansion despite better digs elsewhere," Brando continued, his voice quiet. "It had been owned by an old draconic family and abandoned for many years, and he insisted on making it his own even though it abutted Pinktown."

"Maybe…maybe because it abutted Pinktown," Tocket whispered.

"Well, he was a known patron of the arts, especially in Pinktown," Brando said. "That look on your face, Tocket…you need to spit out whatever it is you're thinking of."

"It…it was me, the whole time," Tocket whispered. "I wandered through the Festival of Transubstantiation…I must have somehow wound up at the mansion when Nyoy--Xiyi--squatted there, before the 'new start' he was talking about. I must have…somehow…given him the template he based his new life on, in the form of that picture. No wonder he treasured it. And no wonder he patronized Pinktown artists…I had my glamour on when we met. He was probably looking for me."

"Whoa," Brando said. "That makes my head spin like a belt of old No. 6 Alkaline gut-juice. Are…are you going to be okay?"

"Yeah, I think so," Tocket said. "I think so. Say what you will about Lord Xiyi, but…well, he was my very first customer, wasn't he?"

END