![Image](https://i.imgur.com/2thjxEq.png)
The rain in Anaxas meanwhile was simply miserable. It was intermittent, and it was indecisive. It came, and it went, and it returned, changed it's mind, left, returned again in greater force, and then disappeared again for two days of blissful sunshine before resorting to the same old misery. It was with no fondness at all that Oisin remembered the rains in Old Rose Harbor, the waterfall cascades from the tired old roofs he'd huddled beneath, the pools of liquified filth that soaked through worn boots, the drenching, bone-cold rains at night that chilled you to your very core. For some, it was merely an inconvenience, a talking point to help bolster the necessary pleasantries of benign conversation. For the working man - or working child, as Oisin had been - weather was merely something you endured. For those working at the bottom of the barrel, there was no such thing as stopping on account of rain.
Of course, even the worst aspects of nature could have their uses, if one was resourceful enough. Oisin was no farmer, but he knew the value of watering the crops. In this case, those crops were the people of Vienda, and like plants and flowers they too responded to the rainfall in different ways. For the wealthy, it was an opportunity to flourish: a chance to show off fashionable raincoats, to pull on fine-crafted rainboots, and stroll unhindered beneath the protective shade of an umbrella, a highly visible display of the ways in which wealth and status could shield you from the hardships endured by the common man. Even unfurled, those with umbrellas walked with greater purpose, umbrellas tucked between arms or swung like walking canes, as if the weather permitted them to walk through the streets armed like a conquering hero.
Beside them, or behind them, or rapidly in front of them in order to stay out of the way, walked the rest of Viendan society, hunched and huddled against the cold and the wet, bustling along from place to place as quickly as their feet would carry them, weaving between puddles, vaulting the streams of rainwater that meandered across the streets in places, seeking shelter from whatever winter coats, convenient overhangs, and repurposed newspapers they had been able to get their hands on. Some even surrendered to it, resigned to their waterlogged existence, shuffling along with more focus on staying warm than any futile illusions of staying dry.
Oisin counted himself among the latter, though found himself wondering which kind of person his quarry would be. Several days had been wasted on this particular endeavour, several rain-sodden days lying in wait outside the man's home, hoping to catch him discreetly on his way to or from work. Imagine Oisin's surprise then, to discover that the man never approached the entrance over which Oisin had kept such careful watch. Imagine his surprise to notice that the apartment seemed largely undisturbed, that the slight hitch of the drapes in the window of what Oisin presumed was the bedroom hadn't been corrected for days. Oisin had, after far too many visits to the dsoh shop beneath, even enquired of the whereabouts of the apartment's occupants, but that had proven singularly unhelpful. Oisin's stomach growled, squirming in protest at the thought of Hoxian cuisine yet again.
The journalist sighed, tugging out his pocket watch, and glancing down at the time. At least it was a convenient location to keep tabs on, here on the Kingsway, not more than a few minutes' hussle from the Post's offices, and the welcoming fire that would hopefully be waiting within to warm him dry.
Oisin turned his eyes skyward, squinting at the clouds, as if he could somehow disapprovingly glare the rain into submission. Of course the rain today was the worst of all: of course that was the case when he'd decided to await Rhys Valentin a little further up the Kingsway and closer to the headquarters of the Seventen, rather than inside the dsoh shop, or in one of the relatively sheltered vantages that he had managed to find on previous days. Of course it was today, as his patience wore thinner, that nature would see fit to test it more severely. He let out a sigh, feeling a bead of rainwater escape from an eyebrow, cascading into a rivulet down the side of his nose. "Alioe give me strength," he muttered quietly to himself, as the pocket watch clicked closed, and disappeared back into his sodden waistcoat.