Private Finished Lock the clock outside and hide the key

The first thing Sean noticed on arriving at Professor Rotmoore's office and peeking in was the books. So many books, and artifacts, and things even he wasn't sure what their use was. The second thing was that the professor needed a maid. It wasn't that the office was dirty, but stuff was everywhere in piles. The god itched to organize everything. Of course he also really wanted to steal something. Plans for both were already forming in his head from force of habit, but he thought he should hold off on theft - at least until he had a better idea of the Professor's magical defenses.

It might actually be safer to plot stealing from dragons first, which was also admittedly a bad idea. But Sean was bored and scheming was in his nature. He never could deal with boredom - he needed a plan, a goal. At least theft on this island seemed like it would be more of a challenge. But he hadn't been here long and he already disliked the magic, the mythological creatures, all the new variables that he couldn't plan for and seemed to defy even his contingencies. He much preferred dealing with humans.

Yet here he was about to step into a lich's office. The first thing Sean had done as a secretary was go over the student records, mostly of the people he knew, but he'd kept notes on anyone who stood out. The next thing had been teacher's records, which were a little more basic. Now he was checking out some of his fellow staff members, both to gather more information and to connect with them. It was always a good policy to make friends with the people you were working with, see how they interacted, learn as much about them as possible.

"'Ey. Professor Rotmoore. Ye busy right now? 'm a new secretary, jest trying ta meet everybody."

@WorldDevourer

Sean resisted frowning at the professor as he crawled out from under the desk. The disorder irked him a bit - he may have been something of a trickster god, but he was organized. He distracted himself instead with trying to puzzle out what kind of skull the lich had just put in the drawer. He didn't find dead bodies useful himself, but he had a curious mind, and some people would buy anything.

"I guess I'm quiet. And m'name's Sean if ye wish first names." He kept his annoyance hidden for the moment, stepping a little farther into the room and hoping he didn't accidentally knock over something important. No need to antagonize the professor on the first meeting.

He considered the offer of tea, smiling a little at the timing. "Sure, why not?" He'd never allow one of his gang to make him tea, but he was pretty sure the professor wouldn't try to put honey in it without asking and there was nothing suspicious about declining it.

Quietly, the god took another glance around the office, pausing on some of the more interesting book titles. There were some languages here even he didn't know, and he debated asking Charlie about them. Sean never liked giving away information about himself - even the fact that he could probably read half of this library and really wanted to take a closer look at a few of these books.

Sean was a thief because he enjoyed schemes, lying and games, but he was rarely concerned about what he gained. Knowledge, though, that was something he'd keep.

Carefully, Sean made his way over the sofa. He knew from experience that it was easy to accumulate things over many years of life, although he had traveled so much that most of what he owned was stored in various banks, but he still didn't know how the lich could find anything in this chaos. It bothered him. He wondered how Charlie would even know that something was missing - the answer was probably magic. He hated this island.

"Exotic. Asian, right? Never spent much time there meself." He raised an eyebrow at both the choice of tea and the humorous mugs. Well - everyone had a few quirks.

Although he was sorely tempted by the offer, Sean managed to keep his neutral expression - at least until Charlie mentioned that his sarcophagus contained a chunk of the Library of Alexandria. Now there was a challenge. The god's eyes lit up.

"Just 'ow old are ye t'have done something like that?" He wasn't used to dealing with people older than him. He was young for a god but he tended to avoid them.

Sean was very good at keeping up appearances, masking his intentions. He was generally not overemotional either, although often flustered or annoyed around certain people. Somehow Charlie had managed to find the biggest sore point Sean had. Rhymien.

Now angry and possibly embarrassed (though he'd deny this) the god glared at the lich, swearing in a mishmash of languages, some of which were quite dead. In his stress, he switched to Gaelic, one of the closest things he had to a mother tongue. "Take that back!"

Part of the reason mentioning Rhymien struck a nerve was that he was another god. As far as Sean was concerned all gods were insane. And that one was one of the worst - there was a reason Sean stuck with humans. Plus Sean was the younger one by far. Two trickster gods with very different personalities, still a lot more in common than he'd care to admit.

Though he stuck to Gaelic for the remainder of their conversation, Sean's anger had lessened after his outburst. The apology pacified him - it wasn't like people were aware of his history with the blue menace. And if he had it his way no one ever would be. Hopefully, if Rhymien ever let anything slip it would be taken as a joke or he could deny it. "We've met." They'd done a lot more than meeting - there was a reason Sean had accepted a gift from the other god, and a reason he hastily took a sip of tea to hide the fact that he was starting to blush.

"But... what makes you think I'm divine?" Sean was aware that it wasn't exactly an answer, but he didn't think anything about himself gave away the fact that he was actually a god. Old or not, the lich shouldn't have recognized it from just one meeting. Perhaps his use of multiple languages was an indicator that he was more than a normal secretary, but there were humans with gifts and he hadn't sworn until after he'd been compared to the giant smurf.

He didn't really mind Charlie knowing, though - an ancient, powerful lich with a sense of humour who had never given his age. And something worth stealing. Sure the man had said Sean could borrow something from his library, but the god was getting restless already on this island. Until the boss gave him something bigger to scheme, plotting to steal from someone older than himself should be entertaining. He'd still have to be careful - it was possible to kill him permanently, and a powerful necromancer probably had enough tricks up his sleeves to do it.

But that just meant he could take his time. A god in his domain, Sean's sudden smile was radiant. "We should be friends. Where did you get that sarcophagus anyway?"

"Indeed... I never thought of that. As gods go, I must say I'm not particularly dangerous. Certainly not a warrior or concerned with death. Quite a few mythologies have divine heroes, humans approaching godhood - and even gods can die. Or change. You might be old enough to have seen gods become fae, at least the Irish ones." At ease now, Sean didn't bother switching back to English, Charlie seemed to understand him well enough, and honestly, he liked having the chance to use Gaelic.

Sean was what you got when you combined a trickster god and a god of learning and language. A scheming thief who wasn't necessarily after money. And he could certainly empathize with not liking gods. He'd lived a long time, but had kept to human society for the most part. They were all over the world. He'd perhaps had some encounters with the fae, but he tended to want to fade into the background. Magic went against his carefully laid plans even more than humans' emotional unpredictability.

"You made it? That sounds like an interesting story... Is it like a pet? It seems to have a mind of its own - a trick of yours?" Sean didn't bother to disguise his curiousity. Even gods didn't often see walking sarcophagi that apparently contained another, small, dimension. "People can survive in there? I'm guessing that you'd need to keep the door open for them to get out again..." Sean went quiet for a moment, attempting to sort everything out in his head. He had some notebooks tucked away in his pockets, but he intended to talk first and write everything down later. Not that any of what he wrote would be obvious - as old as the lich was, he would not be able to decipher Sean's code-mixed shorthand. The language was his own invention and he was still a god.

"A kitchen and a billiard room. Seems you've got your own convenient house. Would have been quite convenient to have one of those at certain points of my life. Fortunately, I found some good banks." Sean resisted glancing at the disorganized surroundings at this point, probably the interior of the sarcophagus was just as chaotic. He also refrained suggesting the lich get a maid.

"So do you play billiards or is the room just for show?" Sean might have seemed uptight to some, but that was mostly because of his need for order. He did relax sometimes, and billiards was a game he was quite good at - natural dexterity and a calculating mind came in handy for that game. The fact that the people he played with were generally drunk didn't hurt, though he was fairly certain that would not apply to the lich.