22 Portrait

The rain stopped, but the rain clouds in the sky did not immediately dissipate.

In the distance, at the boundary between the sky and the sea, golden sunlight shone through, dyeing both the sea and the clouds with golden edges.

Castleton Harbour was also bathed in the sunset at this moment.

Roy walked on Brown Street, this time he didn't feel like he was being watched, and he didn't stop when he passed the apothecary...

But he did meet Sabrina coming out of a long carriage.

The long-legged Elf beauty didn't wait for Roy to join her, but walked ahead along the street.

With no one watching, Roy didn't want to force himself to Sabrina's side, but followed far behind, watching Sabrina's model-like figure, illuminated by the sunset into a clear outline, her shadow stretched long on the road.

The ground of the long street was still wet, and the drainage ditches were still full, with a large amount of standing water flowing from the ditches into the Great Sea.

Back home, Roy first took a shower, then changed into a set of dry clothes, washed the set he had been wearing, and hung it on the clothesline on the terrace.

Moira hid on the terrace, her forearms propped on the terrace railing, quietly watching the sun slowly sink below the sea.

She left Roy with a graceful back view.

Ms. Belinda still hadn't returned before dinner, Roy ate a fried Horse Mackerel by himself, he didn't eat the last two Croissants, saving the best for last.

"Roy, do you have time now?"

Roy had just finished dinner when he heard Sabrina calling him from outside the courtyard wall next door.

He quickly walked out of the house.

They had agreed to paint portraits for the Sailors tonight, as requested by Ms. Jillian. Roy didn't hear the specific reason, but he felt it was related to Moira.

"Yes, at your place, or mine?" Roy replied loudly at the door.

Sabrina's tall figure stood behind the low wall, her hair still wet, wearing a loose linen dress.

"Come to my place, I've prepared three candles..." she said.

"Okay!"

Roy finished speaking and walked towards the low wall, directly crossing it and jumping into Ms. Jillian's yard.

Ms. Jillian wasn't home either. The fish market at the pier had closed long ago, so she should be waiting for the fishing boats at the pier.

Roy rarely came over, so he was quite curious about the furnishings in the room.

The house was no different from Roy's, with a living room, bedroom, and kitchen on the first floor, and bedrooms and a terrace on the second floor.

This bedroom on the first floor should be where Ms. Jillian lived, while Moira and Sabrina lived on the second floor.

Moira was already waiting in the living room, sitting in a single sofa, with an easel standing beside her. A piece of parchment covered the drawing board, a paint palette was placed on the coffee table, and a tin bucket filled with clear water stood next to the easel's legs, with several paintbrushes soaking inside.

When Roy walked in, Moira didn't greet him, she seemed to be staring at the easel in a daze.

She was always like this, always immersed in her own world.

A trident-shaped candlestick was placed on the coffee table.

The candles hadn't been inserted yet. Sabrina asked Roy to sit on the sofa next to the easel, while she sat on a high stool in front of the easel, her bare feet resting on the stool's crossbar.

Both she and Moira exuded a faint scent of lilac, which smelled very nice.

"I'll paint a portrait of Jefferson first, you can watch my painting steps, and then you can describe the Sailors' appearance and clothing, preferably in as much detail as possible." Sabrina said coldly to Roy.

Roy quickly averted his gaze from her chest.

There was no way around it, the linen fabric clearly showed a bit of an outline.

Sabrina had just taken a shower, and originally thought that the loose dress would be able to conceal it, and since she had to focus on painting, her gaze would inevitably be concentrated on the drawing board.

Obviously, she had thought a little too simply.

"Oil painting? Not a sketch?"

Seeing the brushes, oil paints, and palette, Roy asked.

Sabrina tried to keep her breathing steady, and then replied, "I know what Jefferson looks like, so I'll just use oil paints directly. For the Sailors, I'll sketch them first, which is easier to modify. After we've confirmed everything, I'll paint them into oil paintings..."

Roy was watching Sabrina paint for the first time. The brush in her hand was like a small broom. She held the palette with one hand, the brush rubbing against the dyes on the palette, and then large swaths were applied to the canvas.

First, she applied a thick layer to the background, without outlining any lines or contours at all.

She just applied layers of color, and gradually, a blurry figure emerged little by little from the accumulation of colors.

The figure gradually became clearer, and the colors made him more vivid.

Jefferson in the painting had a slightly red face, holding a wine glass in his hand, with a hint of drunkenness in his eyes.

The Dark Moon Elf's gray skin and the gloom in his eyes were clearly depicted.

The dyes on the palette blended together, and Sabrina's brush hardly paused, as Jefferson's portrait clearly appeared on the paper.

This kind of live painting gave Roy a strong sensory enjoyment. It wasn't like a printer directly depicting a clear picture, but more like a high-definition camera constantly focusing, gradually becoming clearer from blurry, and finally leaping onto the paper...

Perhaps it was seeing Jefferson's portrait gradually become clearer.

Under the flickering candlelight, the candlelight in Moira's eyes became blurred...

Her voice was tinged with sobs: "He always said I had a talent for becoming an assassin..."

Moira was the kind of petite and delicate Elf. Her collarbones were beautiful, and at this moment, sitting on the sofa wiping her tears, she was even more pitiful.

"If he hadn't insisted on you accepting the Elf Dark Hall's training, Ms. Jillian probably wouldn't have fallen out with him."

Sabrina sat on a high stool and sighed.

"Sister, do you think I was born to enter the Dark Hall?" Moira murmured.

"Don't always think wildly. You are you. We are all working hard for our ideal lives, and you should too."

Sabrina touched Moira's forehead, and then helped her wipe the tears from her cheeks.

"Are you like that too? Roy." Moira looked at Roy pitifully.

"On the premise of filling my stomach, having a small ideal isn't a bad thing." Roy rubbed his nose.

"Okay, stop thinking about this. He walked out of our lives a long time ago."

Sabrina gently stroked Moira's soft golden hair.

Moira nodded and sat aside without saying anything.

Sabrina took the painting off the easel, then put another layer of drawing paper on it. This time, she took a quill pen dipped in ink.

Roy quickly began to describe the clothes and appearance of the Sailors. His purpose in coming here tonight was to describe the Sailors' appearance characteristics in words.

It must be said that Sabrina's painting skills were almost master-level. A pair of eyes could be constantly changed under her quill pen until Roy felt it was very similar before she would stop.

When painting these Sailors, the atmosphere in the room gradually became relaxed.

Moira's mood gradually calmed down, and she even chatted with Roy:

"Is the Elf Academy interesting?"

"It's okay, but my day was quite thrilling. This morning, a group of Silver Moon Elves chased me down the street." Roy's tone was a bit exaggerated.

Moira widened her watery eyes and asked curiously, "Did you have a conflict with someone as soon as school started?"

"I didn't want this either. Actually, I was implicated by a bad friend. There's no way around it!"

Roy said very helplessly.

During the conversation between the two, Sabrina also asked various questions: "Is that so?"

Roy immediately began to examine, trying to make the picture in his memory clearer. After careful comparison, he said, "The eyebrows need to be drawn heavier, and he has a scar here."

"They all have a very strong aura, that kind of dangerous feeling..."

Listening to Roy's description, Sabrina frowned and asked, "How did you get mixed up with them?"

In fact, Roy didn't know how many times he had answered this question.

"I just wanted to inquire about news from the human world on the other side of the Great Sea. They wanted me to take them to find a cheap and clean hotel, and then find a tavern for a drink. I didn't expect this to happen."

In the midst of the chat, Sabrina's second painting was completed.

Not everyone was necessarily very similar, but the Sailors in the painting retained their appearance in the tavern. At least the characteristics of the main people were clearly depicted.

If any of them were to appear alone, perhaps he wouldn't be able to recognize them with just the painting, but as long as they appeared together, Roy was confident that he could identify them with the painting...

"Alright, I'll press them under the box."

Sabrina peeled the second painting from the drawing board, shaking her sore hand as she spoke. This painting was much more difficult than the first.

"Now it's your turn, Roy, who do you want to draw?"

Sabrina asked as she laid out the third sheet of papyrus paper.

The base color of this papyrus paper even had a hint of light green, and it wasn't easy to preserve. It easily grew mold in the humid summer...

But it was cheap! Roy didn't plan to keep this painting for too long. He just planned to take it to the tavern and show it to those well-informed elves.

So, once Sabrina had laid out the paper, Roy began to describe the elven thief.

He first saw him at the entrance of the Temple, where he happened to see his disheveled figure. Later, he saw his face at the entrance of the Brown Street tavern:

"He's a thief, somewhat thin, about the same height as the apothecary owner, with messy, greasy hair, slightly sunken eyes, light blue eyes, and probably two wrinkles on his forehead. He tends to clamp his right arm when he walks..."

Sabrina carefully depicted the elf Roy described on the paper.

Modifying and correcting.

Roy didn't really remember so many details clearly. The most vivid memories were his greasy hair and the right hand clutching the package.

As the portrait became clearer, Moira stood beside him, covering her mouth and exclaiming:

"The elf in this portrait looks like Pelius, Roy, are you trying to find him?"