[crow]

Kitzu was bored.

There wasn't any particular reason that she was bored; it was simply that there was nothing to do. Rhodes was, as he always seemed to be, busy with something. Sivvy was on one of his sulky fits of absence again. The both of them seemed to agree on the idea that she had no idea what she was doing in terms of running the Estate, so she wasn't allowed even a bit of fun in that regard... Heck, Rhodes had shooed her resolutely away when she volunteered to help him with his mountain of paperwork. That was saying a lot too, considering how the cat griped about his workload...

[crow]

She supposed she could take a walk on the grounds, but she'd been around long enough that that didn't interest her anymore. She'd been here, what, a decade already? Something to that effect; she would ask Siv when he got back, as he was better at counting the days, despite the fact that he'd been alive much longer than she had. Maybe he'd just worked out a system along the way... At any rate, she'd been around long enough before the residents came to know every corner of the location, and today most of the people she wanted to visit would be busy too.

[crow]

With a sigh, she resigned herself to wandering the house instead. There weren't any new books, and she was too restless to keep rereading old favorites. It was funny: the main building on the estate was remade from a castle that had been here when she and Siv arrived. It was the only building here that hadn't been built from scratch. When she was still new to the home, she'd taken to exploring it, and despite all of Sivain's assurances to the contrary, she'd been certain there were parts of it she hadn't seen yet... She recalled discovering at least one secret passage, though perhaps that had been a particularly vivid dream.

[crow]

Kitzu ran her hand along the wall as she walked. The stones had long since been smoothed, whether by the elements or by some magic or the tools of renovation. There were, somewhat stereotypically, tapestries up on the wall... But those were all new, or else they would be in tatters now, wouldn't they? She stopped at one and stared at it for a while. It depicted a scenic view of a meadow... Probably one of Kenric's; nobody else had a taste for anything that bland.

[crow]

Sighing, she decided to keep going. Nothing to do but wander. But it did occur to her that this was the third floor; she was fond of heights, so this area and the loft above were thoroughly known to her. If there were any secret passages, either she would have found them already or they were well-hidden enough that she probably wouldn't... Not today, anyways. The basement, on the other hand, she was less fond of. Perhaps if she wanted secrets, she'd best start her search there instead...

[crow]

As she arrived at the stairs, Kitzu decided to have a little fun. With Rhodes occupied and Sivain elsewhere, she was almost entirely unsupervised as long as she wasn't excessively loud. This fact was not lost on her, and she immediately hopped up on the banister and slid down. Of course, she couldn't shout 'whee' as loudly as she liked, but it was a small sacrifice. The ride down from the third floor to the first was, as she'd always suspected, thoroughly exhilarating (and not at all risky like she'd always been told).

[crow]

The walk from the first floor to the basement was decidedly less entertaining. For some reason, she'd always gotten a bad vibe about the place, and usually she refused to go down there. Sivain was less affected, but of the few times Rhodes had been required to venture in, he hadn't seemed particularly fond of it either. The sets of stairs leading down to it, though there were many, were all in some state of disrepair. Oh, they were perfectly safe, of course--- they just didn't look nice, since nobody ever bothered with the basement except for storage...

[crow]

The eerie sense of foreboding had already begun as she approached the nearest stairwell. It was one of the better-maintained ones, being so close to the main stairs, but the chipped paint and uneven spacing of the actual stairs were still enough to be unsettling. She crept down them carefully, making sure to check for broken steps. She didn't think she'd find one here, since it was actually used often enough, but all the same... It would be bad if she fell into the basement. She didn't even want to contemplate that.

[crow]

When Kitzu made it into the basement itself, the first thing she did was fumble around for the light switch. Then she remembered that it wasn't a switch so much as a string she pulled on to turn on a bare bulb... Strings, incidentally, were much harder to fumble around for in the dark. In her current state of keyed-up caution, it was enough to induce near-panic before she located it and pulled. The light, however harsh it was, still helped to calm her. At least she could see where she was now.

[crow]

Taking stock of the room, she saw that there were a lot of boxes, some piled all the way up to the ceiling. They were haphazardly labelled in a scrawling script that was likely Rhodes' when he was absent-minded. The effect was not intentional, but it lent a hectic feel to the otherwise dank and dark area, which didn't help in the slightest. Kitzu repressed a shudder and took a few steps forward into the labyrinth of boxes. "Hello, anyone there?" she asked, laughing nervously to herself.

[crow]

It wasn't as if she expected a reply, of course. In fact, that would have been downright spooky. She probably would have bolted if someone actually replied, so thinking about it, voicing a greeting had been a really dumb idea... It was good that there wasn't anyone down here. Otherwise Kitzu might have suffered a heart attack long before her time.

[crow]

Long before her time... No, that wasn't quite right, was it? By now she should have been old, if one counted by years and not by one's physical state. By now, for she had a hard time with time these days, she may have been old enough to die. She might be old enough that, had she remained as she was--- a mortal girl, whose fate was in no way special--- she would have turned to dust beneath the soil. It was a little strange to think about, for she didn't feel that way at all. And when she looked in the mirror, the face that stared back at her was more or less the same as it had been the day of the sacrifice...

[crow]

She refused to think much about that day, though, and persistent conditioning drove the thought from her mind. There was exploration to be done, and secret passages to look for. She tried to make her way to a wall, but soon found that boxes were lining them all as far as she could see. No luck there, then... Maybe she wouldn't find any secret passages after all. So much for adventuring diversions today...

[crow]

But there were the boxes, and the basement was still a maze. With enough imagination, she might turn this into an adventure. Besides, who knew what sorts of goodies Sivain had hidden away in here? For that matter, she might find out something interesting of Rhodes' too. She couldn't imagine what kinds of things Rhodes would think to hide, but a lot of things about Rhodes puzzled her.

[crow]

With her mind now firmly set on boxes, she set about examining the ones closest to her. There wasn't much of a chance that this was where the good stuff was, but it was worth a try... Old clothes, read one of the boxes; records, papers, unused documents and other such nonsense. None of it worthy of inspection, as she wasn't inclined to legal readings or number lists... Time to venture deeper in, she supposed.