Where it Hurts

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Anaxas' main trade port; it is also the nation's criminal headquarters, home to the Bad Brothers and Silas Hawke, King of the Underworld. The small town of Plugit is nearby.

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Tom Cooke
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Tue Aug 27, 2019 8:50 am

A Room in Lossey The Rose
Too Godsdamn Late on the 17th of Roalis, 2719
It was quiet in the pauses between their words. Before she answered, Tom found himself drifting, waiting for the stove to heat up. In here, the crickets’ song was muffled; the loudest sound was the boards stretching and warping, creaking, as the wind crawled through. Tom was glad of the shelter, now. Mingling with lavender and must and old wood, dried blood reeked loud in his nose. Like iron, almost. He breathed in deep, then stifled a tiny cough.

He tried to think: he should do something about that, he reckoned. He sat still, looking at his hands on the table in front of him. Thick with shadows, the lamplight glistening softly in the blood. He shut his eyes, swallowing and wincing at the scraping in his throat. He hadn’t thought to pour himself any water; that’d be the next order of business, if he could push himself up on his unsteady legs. After he found the bandages, maybe. An image came into his head, unbidden, of Ava perched on the couch beside him, binding his hand. He thought –

Godsdamn, he thought, frowning. He opened his eyes. Across the room, Niccolette stirred, taking another small sip of water; his eyes came into focus on her as best they could. He couldn’t see her too well from here, but he remembered the way her palms’d left mant smears of blood and dirt all over his glass. And whatever else kind of laoso shit you picked up from the street in Lossey.

Too many thoughts. He pressed his fingertips to his temples, as if he could contain the whirl, as if he was trying to keep his skull from shattering. Couldn’t – too many. Plastered, he thought. (Again.)

The room was warming up a pina, but he wasn’t ready to part with his coat, so he just took his arms out of the sleeves and wrapped it around him. Meanwhile, Niccolette was talking; she’d been talking for a bit. He forced himself to focus on her voice, watching her steadily from across the room.

A smile curled his lip, twitching; it would’ve almost been soft, on anyone else. He reached up to wipe a tiny glisten away from his eye. “Love was sharp and dry,” he quoted, “unquenchable – no – desire the… storm… damn.” Gritting his teeth, shaking his head, knotting his fingers in a tangle of hair ’til he could still his head enough to speak again. “The way pez Hirtka wrote of love – painful, almost. Powerfully, beautifully painful.”

Tom couldn’t think of love; he couldn’t think of a man, not now. There was too much else to think of, and if he started, he wouldn’t be able to stop. He pushed himself up from the table, finally, hobbled over to the cabinets. Fetched the jug and another dusty glass. There was another scattered tapping as he spilled more water, another curse as he nearly dropped it. Leaning on the back of the chair, he put the glass to his lips and drank deeply, almost greedily.

It didn’t help the ache in his head, but it seemed to give him the strength to go on. He pulled the coat tighter around him, reaching to set the glass on the table.

“I don’t regret the man I was.” He sucked at a tooth, sighing. “Not really. That’s the thing, eh? The things I did – I’ve done godsawful things, but they’re done, and with enough of them, my hand was forced. I keep reading about how I’m supposed to repent, but I can’t go to the mona begging for forgiveness for a whole life. One I lived how I could. I don’t know how to make amends for that.”

The temptation to drift was unbearable. The rickety chair popped under his weight, wobbled from short leg to shorter leg, and he had to keep reminding himself he was vertical. He didn’t know how much time’d passed since he lit the stove, but it was warm, now, benny warm. A low hum’d started up somewhere behind him, a hiss of steam.

Then, a squeal. Tom jolted awake, shaking his head, shaking off shivers. He creaked and fumbled the short distance to the stove, sweeping the kettle off the stove and hissing as he burnt his fingertip on the metal.

He brought it over to where he’d left the teapot and the mint, getting out two little metal mugs. Thinking, as he did so. It was strange, hearing Niccolette talk about her backlash like he hadn’t been there – oes, but like he’d understand anyway, like he was a stranger golly and not the mung human muscle that’d knelt beside Uzoji while she casted. That’d picked the two of them up, limp and small and strangely weak after all that blood, and carried them inside and laid them down and called for a healer. He made to avoid the subject out of politeness, but being honest, if he said anything about it, he was afraid he’d give away he knew too much.

For what it was worth, she hadn’t looked like she’d regretted it at the time. He remembered the way the air’d steamed around her, sending the water back up, pulling it back down, sending it back up again. The way she’d held Uzoji’s hand to her middle, the way she’d pushed through the monite, clear and articulate. It wasn’t a rushed, angry cast; she’d known what she was doing. Seeing Uzoji standing in the doorway a month later, taxed but breathing, he didn’t doubt it’d been worth it to her.

And now, ’course, Uzoji… Tom frowned. He realized he still didn’t know how Uzoji’d died. He realized he still didn’t want to know; something about it stung.

It was the funniest feeling, scooping the little mint leaves into the pot, pouring the boiling water over in a cloud of steam. He still remembered her face, drawn and pale, eyes shut. After a moment, he shot a glance at her over his shoulder, then poured tea into the cups.

Carrying both would’ve been too hard, so he didn’t try. He turned and set one on the table, quick-like – too quick; he had to grab onto the table for support as he did – then took the other and walked it shakily round, stepping over loops of chalk, round stacks of books. It took him awhile to amble back over to Niccolette, and he tried not to wince as his porven stirred in contact with the living mona around her. But he set the battered mug down on the end table beside the armchair, leaning for a moment on the back of it.

Turning to the window nearby, he used the last of his aching strength to shove it open; it rattled and grunted against the frame. A cool breeze wafted in, crisp with the smells of the city, and a cloud of mint and old parchment wafted out.

“It’s been a hell of a long night,” he finished, leaning back against it. A pause. “Would you let me see to your hand? That’ll get infected.”
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Niccolette Ibutatu
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Tue Aug 27, 2019 10:52 am

Well After Midnight, 17th Roalis, 2719
Alongside pages, plots and poetry
Niccolette knew that if she opened her mouth, it would be sobs that would emerge, not words. She kept her face away from Vauquelin, her hands finding the fabric of Uzoji’s pants and gripping. Her palm sting, and she shuddered, looking down to see the bloody, dirty mess she had left behind against the pale fabric. At the edge of her gaze, she could almost see the dark stain of her blood against his white shirt.

More tears, then, and Niccolette felt her breath shudder and catch. Come then, she thought, daring the sobs onward. Come! Do your worst.

There was a faint clinking from across the room, mumbled curses from Vauquelin. Niccolette opened her eyes, fetched out the third handkerchief again, already stained and dirty but the best she had. She blew her nose into it, fumbling, and wiped at her face, leaving traces of blood and dirt smeared through the tears. But it helped; it helped, a little, and she left the wrinkled, bloody fabric on the table and took another drink of water, the last sip. She cupped the glass carefully in both hands and eased it to the table; it landed a little too hard, wobbled slightly, but it didn’t fall.

Vauquelin was speaking again, and Niccolette looked back at him. She was too tired for this, for any of this. It felt as if the last of her strength had trickled from her eyes with the tears, and she was not entirely sure what of her was left behind. Not her heart; that was long since gone.

She thought, fuzzily, that he sounded almost like a student - like someone first struggling to come to the mona, grappling with questions of right and wrong. No - no, that wasn’t it. What was he talking about then? Casting outside the noble uses?

Addiction? Niccolette thought of a politician, eager to rise; thought of whispered subtle perception spells, the tiny edge they might give him. Understood, for a moment, how conquest might become need. She thought perhaps she could see it in the squinting face of the frail man sitting opposite her, forsaken by the mona, alone with his secrets in the Rose, the perceptive conversationalist with clairvoyant circles traced onto his floor. The lover of pez Hirtka, who said love was powerfully, beautifully painful. Niccolette had thought she would feel scorn, had expected it, but it was not there.

“Then...” Niccolette was surprised to hear herself speak, or half-hear, at least. Her voice sounded distant over the buzzing in her ear. She shifted a little, and pushed through. “Then do not apologize.”

The Bastian closed her eyes again, settled back in the chair. The numbness at the edges of her senses was fading, and she felt almost warm. Uzoji’s coat was as heavy as a blanket, and infinitely more soothing. She thought she could see something distant through the close of her eyelids; she thought she could hear a voice calling her name from far away.

Niccolette woke to the brush of Vauquelin’s porven at the edge of her field. She shuddered, sniffled, blinked a few times. Unsteadily, she set her hands against the arms of the chair and shoved herself upright, sagging a little.

Niccolette sniffled again, inhaled through it; there was a little noise like a whimper caught in her exhale. She sighed, and smoothed the agitation from her field, reaching out to the mona and soothing them. Then - unthinking, she reached for the well of stillness within herself, the place deep inside that she had learned to touch in all her meditation. She drew calm from it, and let it spread out through her field; let it hover in the air, and tangle with Vauquelin’s field too. It was not an envelopment; that was too intimate, even for tonight. It was something like a caprise, perhaps, but it was as if, with whatever she had, Niccolette too was asking his field to quiet, just for a moment.

The air smelled like mint. Niccolette glanced at a small steaming mug to her side; she twisted, slowly, in the chair, and found Vauquelin at the open window, leaning into the breeze. The moonlight scattered over his face, casting him pale, freckles caught in sharp relief. The light seemed to sink into the wrinkles on his face, carving them deep into his skin.

He offered to see to her hand, and Niccolette nodded. She uncurled it from her lap; her palm didn’t hurt much anymore, only when she thought about it. “Your neck too,” Niccolette said, her voice a soft thread. She made a little grimace of a face. “And mine.” She sighed, slumping a little more into his chair. “Must I rise?”

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Tom Cooke
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Tue Aug 27, 2019 4:47 pm

A Room in Lossey The Rose
Too Godsdamn Late on the 17th of Roalis, 2719
Tom’d settled against the window, resting his head back against the cool glass. The breeze bit through his coat, but after sitting near the stove, it was a succour. Tonight was a night of extremes; in the exhausted stillness of his room, he tried to imagine the fighting fury that’d charged through him at Kendrick’s, and he failed. He’d hopped from clime to clime to clime, and the only thing common to all of them was his company.

There was nothing common about it, though. He’d expected her to draw her field back from his, but now, if anything, she was – his face went slack with something like pain, something like relief. His porven buzzed and buzzed at her caprise, but he felt the living mona as they mingled with it, and he thought he felt her reach out through them. Again, that ache rang out in his soul; this time, he didn’t push it down or put it to the side. There was heat behind his eyes, and shame, but he stood with it and held it. He tried to imprint the calm organization of her field on the frail fabric of his memory.

Now, he looked over at her. Blinked away just a little moisture. “Fair enough.” A smile, then another full, genuine laugh. He rested his head back again and let the laughter shudder through him; he tried to imagine the tension bleeding out with it.

Her hand, Tom reminded himself. Pushing up and away from the window, he ambled over, one hand on the side of the armchair as he peered over at her upturned palm. Bloody, laoso mess, was all he could think. At the mention of his neck, he frowned, scratching his jaw.

His fingertips crept down, brushing the raw line across his throat. He winced; he’d forgot all about it. When he took his hand away, there was a thin coating of dried blood on the pads of his fingers.

“You’re right,” he muttered. “Godsdamn. Hate to know what was on those knives.”

Wiping them on his trousers, he turned away, locating the sagging cot of his bed in the shifting shadows of a corner. Fair careful-like, putting his weight down on the mattress with a shaking arm, he got down on his hands and knees and fished underneath it. Wasn’t long ’til he pulled out a scuffed-up, misshapen bag; when he plopped it down on the bed, some jumble of somethings inside clattered and rustled. It took him long enough to get back to his feet, staggering on his aching hip with an exasperated puff of a sigh.

He brought the bag over. Settling his erse on the edge of the arm, he took out his glasses and perched them on his nose. Fluttered a few more blinks. “You don’t need to get up,” he said as he shifted to look. “Just – here.” He gestured hesitantly with the less bloody of his hands; if she let him, he’d take her hand – the one with the scraped-up palm – in his. He’d lift it a little into the light, bend to give it a closer look.

He grunted, rustling his bag open, scrambling through the mess of bottles and cloth. Tried to remember how the hell you did this. He reckoned this wasn’t the most sanitary of settings, but he didn’t think binding it himself’d do much more harm than leaving it raw and breathing in the Rose’s natural fumes.

Resting her hand on the arm of the chair, he took a moment to tip a little alcohol onto a clean enough cloth. As he took it back into his, he thought to warn her, but he reckoned she already knew what was coming. Gently as he could, he cleaned the scrapes, and if he felt her tense, he didn’t look at her.

He fished out a pad, settled it into place. Binding it up slowly, he cleared his throat. “I’ll worry about my neck later. I don’t think it’ll scar as is, but” – a soft snort – “imagine showing back up in congress with that. Maybe I could use a scar or two. Intimidate the hell out of those incumbents from Brunnhold. Hey, there we go.” He set her hand aside, then twisted halfway round, peering at her face over the rims of his glasses. “I’m not a living conversationalist, but I think that’ll do.”

He fished in his bag, then paused. He didn’t look at her, this time. “You could’ve left me back in Voedale,” he said, voice low but matter-of-fact, “to get gutted like a fish. I came out here ’cause I couldn’t stand Vienda anymore, ’cause I wanted to clear my head. Not to pick fights like a –” A mung? “Like a fool. So, uh – thanks.”

He tipped more alcohol onto a fresh cloth.
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Last edited by Tom Cooke on Wed Aug 28, 2019 6:14 pm, edited 2 times in total.
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Niccolette Ibutatu
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Tue Aug 27, 2019 6:41 pm

Not Quite Late Enough to be Early, 17th Roalis, 2719
Found in Lossey
Niccolette watched Vauquelin squint at her palm. He stumbled away, and she lifted it and squinted at it herself, shifting it carefully from side to side in the moonlight. She touched the fingers of her other hand to it. Tender, she thought, but not hot. Well, it was too early to know if there would be infection. Vauquelin was right that cleaning it off was a good idea; Niccolette knew better than to think of all she had touched tonight.

Niccolette didn’t hesitate to give Vauquelin her hand, matter-of-fact and almost perfunctory about it. She sighed, sleepily, and leaned the rest of herself back against the cushion of his chair. Her eyes fluttered closed; it was always best not to look. She could only half hear him anyway – the quiet grunts, the clinking of metal on glass. She heard the soft glug of liquid, and knew what was coming.

Niccolette clenched her teeth at the sharp pain through her palm; her other hand tightened on her pant leg again, but she didn’t draw her hand back from Vauquelin. Nothing sharp went through her field; there wasn’t the faintest trace of mirroring of her physical reaction. Niccolette sniffled, and found her breath, slow and steady, in and out in an even, rhythmic pattern, finding the count that had become second nature long ago, the pattern that soothed her, that connected her to the mona, that made her one with them. Not naturally, of course; there was no such thing. But through long repetition – now they all knew what she meant by it.

Niccolette fluttered her eyes open and looked back at Vauquelin as he spoke again. She felt a little calmer now, some of the tension drained out of her, and she smiled at his joke – then, to her own surprise, giggled. “A shame the fashion is for high necks,” Niccolette said, blinking away a few more tears.

Niccolette went quiet when Vauquelin spoke again. She pursed her lips softly; she had thought they had understood each other, that – that she had been clear enough that she did not wish to speak of whys. He was edging close to an explanation, and Niccolette still wanted none of it. She grimaced, and shrugged her shoulders, looking down for a few moments.

Then, with a little sigh, the Bastian lifted her unbandaged hand and shoved her hair back off her face again, tucking long strands off her neck as well. She shifted forward in the chair, arching slightly, and titled her head back, carefully, resting the top of it against the back of the chair, exposing the long white column of her throat, the smear of drying blood that ran down it to the white shirt, and the thin line at the top of it where her skin had parted.

“Well,” Niccolette said, after a moment. “Aurelien likes you, I suppose,” she shrugged again, shifted as if trying to get comfortable. Her eyes had closed; they opened again, and she glanced up and a little sideways at Vauquelin. “Perhaps he does not know you so well as he thinks.” She closed her eyes once more.

The alcohol was not so bad on this cut, although Niccolette still shivered. Her bandaged hand stayed curled and open, but her good hand dug into her pants again. A shallower cut, she thought. Well enough.

Vauquelin finished his work, and Niccolette shifted upright again. She sighed. Her head ached a little, but she set her good hand on the arm of the chair and forced herself upright, shaking. The room swam about her, and she swayed, reaching out and grabbing hold of Vauquelin’s arm for a moment, holding tight until she had her balance.

Niccolette let go, and held still for a long moment until she stopped swaying. She took another of his cloths – clean enough, she thought – and tipped a bit of alcohol on it. “Come,” she told him. “You shall only look foolish with your neck rotting,” she squinted at the cut, leaning over him. She wobbled a little, and her hands were not especially gentle as she pressed the cloth to his neck, mopping up the blood and disinfecting the cut beneath. She was, however, both experienced and clinical; it was nothing to her if he flinched or shuddered, and he could not quite escape her. So long as she was working, her hands were steady, and she cleaned the cut, pressed a clean pad to it, and used a bit of adhesive to hold it in place.

There was only so long she could stand, though, and Niccolette felt herself begin to shake again as she finished. She eased back into the chair with a noise much like a whimper, taking a deep, careful breath. “Last one,” Niccolette extended her hand to his, raising an eyebrow at his split knuckles. “You throw a good punch,” she told Vauquelin, examining his hand carefully, mercilessly dismissing any grumbling objections he might raise.

Sitting, Niccolette had strength enough to see it through. She was merciless, carefully probing his hand with her undamaged one, pressing the pad of one finger against the bones of his knuckles, lifting and turning to squint at the swelling. She did not cast; she did not need to. “Not broken,” she pronounced, and lowered it again. Once satisfied, she took a little more alcohol – another cloth to add to the pile they’d bloodied – and dabbed the blood from his knuckles. It did not need a pad, she thought, but she wrapped a length of cloth around it to be safe.

Niccolette released him, finally, and slumped back against the chair. Her head wobbled a little, as if even the effort to hold it up was too much, and she tucked it against the back of the chair, eyes half-shut. The Bastian sighed, rubbed her face once more, and reached fumblingly for the tea Vauquelin had made, cradling it in her hands and breathing in the scent of mint. She lifted it to her mouth, carefully, took a sip and set the cup back down on the table. She nestled her cheek against the chair again, already half-asleep once more.

After a moment, though, Niccolette shuddered – opened her eyes – looked at Vauquelin again. She hesitated, feeling oddly – she did not quite have the words to describe what it was she felt. Niccolette pressed her lips together, lowering her gaze, and summoned up the strength to sit up a little straighter and look at Vauquelin as directly as she could. She did not fight the shaking; she could not. “If – if you do not wish me to stay here, I shall not.” Niccolette said, finally. She drew herself up a little more, finding that straightness in her spine, and gripped the arm of the chair tightly, staring at him, chest shuddering a little with each aching breath.

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Tom Cooke
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Thu Aug 29, 2019 7:15 pm

A Dream in Lossey The Rose
Too Godsdamn Late on the 17th of Roalis, 2719
At her giggle, he let out another little snort. He thought of things he could’ve said to that, things about feeling choked in all that silk, about how every toffin in Vienda must’ve been hiding an impressive throat scar; his scattered head lost them. He didn’t do her the disservice of hesitating when he saw the fingers of her free hand dig into the arm of the chair – and when she offered him her neck, brushing hair out of the way, he finished with the cloth and set about cleaning that cut, too.

She spoke while he was taking out the gauze. He glanced back up at her face in time to meet her eye; one red eyebrow perked, and his lip twitched in something almost like a wry smile, but he didn’t say anything.

He felt a pulse of satisfaction when he’d done; he tucked away the rest of the gauze, feeling accomplished. Feeling like he’d done something responsible, for once, even though he reckoned it was only the equivalent of taking one step forward after ten backward. You had to start somewhere, hey? He tried to imagine Ava now, but the expression and posture of the Ms. Weaver in his head hadn’t much changed, so he didn’t let himself feel too good about the night.

Niccolette was stirring, suddenly; she was pulling herself straight, then pushing herself all the way out of the chair. Tom half-turned. He felt her fingertips curl into his arm, and he braced one foot on the hardwood as she balanced herself. At first, he hardly knew what she was doing. Was she going to leave already, stagger off back to the Fords like this? He didn’t have the time, or the presence of mind, to stop her taking the bottle and a cloth.

He realized, of course. Realized what she was doing, even if he couldn’t fathom why. He sniffed, a look of discomfort twitching across his face. Opened his mouth to say something, but then she spoke. It managed to elicit another little snort from him, a soft giggle he stifled almost immediately. He shifted on the arm of the chair, straightened, tried to shove the scowl back onto his face. He opened his mouth.

But by that time, she’d already leaned over. She was looking at his neck in a way that didn’t brook protest, so he shut his mouth and just ground his jaw. He grumbled and sighed, oes, but he gave in; he lifted his chin and shut his eyes.

Hurt like the hatchers, that sliver of blood – burned like a stovetop, for just a handful of seconds. A nerve around his left cheekbone jumped, and his eyelid fluttered. He clenched his teeth, and as she worked, a couple of winces spasmed across his face. Her hand wasn’t especially gentle, but, he reckoned, his’d been fair blunt, too; you didn’t want a drunk raen cleaning your cut any more than a drunk pirate. It was steady, and it was meticulous, and she didn’t hesitate a whit when he grunted in pain. He appreciated it.

Still, he couldn’t help wondering. He’d seen plenty of voo from her, but he’d never seen her take care of a scrape or a cut the proper, natt way. He knew now that was part of what they taught in Brunnhold. She was a living conversationalist, and that made him wonder if she’d trained as a doctor. She must’ve, but he’d never given it any thought, not even with all the, dze – anatomical knowledge – he’d seen her demonstrate. He tried to imagine her working at the hospital in either Vienda or Brunnhold or some far-flung Bastian place, all crisp in a uniform, and he failed. He couldn’t even begin to.

For once, he couldn’t think whether he’d’ve been happy with a life like that, either. Brunnhold-proper, a surgeon or an academic or – hell, something like that. If he’d been born to it. He couldn’t say.

She’d turned her attention to his hand, and he started in on the requisite grumbling, but her comment stopped him short once again. This time, he couldn’t help but laugh proper, and not even the press of her fingertips against the bruised skin and cartilege could wipe the smile off his face. He smiled, a wincing snarl of a smile, even as the alcohol burned. “Well,” he muttered with a note of pride, “now you know, eh?” He hissed in through his teeth.

It relieved him more than he could say that nothing was broken. Wasn’t that he couldn’t deal with a broken bone; he’d had plenty. But if he – if Tom Cooke – had broken his hand punching a kov, he didn’t think he could take it. He wouldn’t’ve been surprised, ’course, not with these hands, but it would’ve gutted him. Least he could say he’d busted that cheating laoso’s nose with his hand intact, if injured and aching.

When she finished up and sat back, taking her tea, he rubbed his eyes. He felt like he might be sobering up, but he was feeling a headache, and the room wasn’t getting less wavery. He didn’t think he’d keep his eyes open much longer.

He packed up the bag messily, getting to his feet with care and staggering anyway. Sighing deeply, he ambled back over to the bed, kicked the bag back underneath it – and then, suddenly, found himself sitting slumped on the mattress. He squinted through the shadows at Niccolette, blinked, squinted again. He realized he’d left his reading glasses on, so he took them off and let his eyes adjust.

She was sitting upright, and she was looking at him evenly. He couldn’t help but notice the shaking, and he felt a pang of something, but he couldn’t tell what. He was shaking his head before she even got done speaking.

“No,” he said sharply, waving a hand. “You – it’s – stay. As long as you need.” Tom tried to sound stern, but the effect was undercut by the slush and the stumbling. “It’s – hell, I don’t know. But I’m, uh…”

He was sinking further into his slump, nestling into his coat. There was something numbing about the pain in his neck and his knuckles and all his joints together. About the chilly breeze, and the warmth of the woodstove, in concert. He couldn’t even think about who was in the room with him.

“You can stay,” he slurred simply, finally, forgetting if he’d already said it. With that, he pushed himself up back on the cot, propped himself up against the wall. He managed to smile briefly, in a vague sort of way, but he wasn’t keeping his eyes open.
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Niccolette Ibutatu
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Thu Aug 29, 2019 9:31 pm

Late Enough to be Early, 17th Roalis, 2719
Lost Once More, or Perhaps Still
Vauquelin was trembling and mumbling, waving an unsteady hand at her from his bed. Niccolette held still and focused all her attention on him; she willed her throbbing headache to soften, willed the buzzing in her ear to quiet down, and locked her gaze on Vauquelin. No, he’d said - something else, something lost in the muddled room between them. A slur of words she couldn’t pick out from so far away.

Niccolette nodded, slowly, her ear twinging in pain, at his last words: you can stay.

Vauquelin was slumped against the wall now, something like a smile on his face. Niccolette did know not who he was smiling for; she did not think it was her. The Bastian shivered in the armchair, and drew her husband’s coat a little closer around herself. Moments ago, she had been as close to sleep as Vauquelin, and yet -

A faint drunken wheeze of a snore drifted across the room, barely loud enough for her to hear. Niccolette smiled a little. She reached down, slowly - she had to bend forward to reach her shoes, and it sent a spike of nausea through her stomach and sharp, throbbing pain through her head. She held still through them both, and the rush of acidic aching faded.

Carefully, fumble-fingered, Niccolette undid the laces on her boots, one then the other. It was a fool’s act; she would only have to lace them again, tomorrow, but there was a wonderful release to it. The Bastian slid aching feet from her shoes, and tucked them up onto the chair’s cushion. She covered the curve of her knees with Uzoji’s coat, small enough to fit beneath the confines of it.

Niccolette glanced one last time at Vauquelin. Dead asleep, she thought, and his neck would hurt in the morning. Niccolette shuddered, and didn’t fight the tears any longer. She wept against her knees, soft sobs that shuddered through her one by one, draining her a little emptier each time. Not frantic tears, this time, but steady and inexorable, rhythmic and unyielding, coming to claim her once more.

Niccolette felt the breeze from the open window against her cheek, cool against the wetness. She did not know if she had slept; she could not have said how long had passed. She felt no relief; she felt no more refreshed than she had before. She fumbled for the tea Vauquelin had left, and sipped it, cold now but still fragrant, the mint on her tongue as soft as the breeze on her skin.

The Bastian sighed, softly. She rested the edge of the cup on her knees - checked Vauquelin over the rim of it. He was as deeply asleep as ever; he had shifted a little, tilting sideways against the wall like one of those old trees on Bean Island, the ones that grew crooked in the wind. Niccolette could not have said why the sight made her smile.

The Bastian took another sip of cold tea. She must have slept, Niccolette thought, because there was a little light where there had not been before; there was a faint and distant chirping crawling in through the window. Niccolette drank the last of her tea and eased her legs slowly from the edge of the chair.

Yes, she thought - she had slept. Her legs ached, and they would not have it she had not been cramped for so long. She shuddered, and eased her feet back into her shoes. It felt like minutes since she had untied them, but her fingers were less clumsy than they had been, and Niccolette carefully tied her laces once more.

Slowly, unsteadily, Niccolette eased herself up from the chair. She stumbled, and caught herself two handed against the wall; the one Vauquelin had not bandaged left a scattering of flakes against the paint. Niccolette held there for a moment, and eased around the edges of the moony old galdor’s plots, not disturbing even the edge of a line of his chalk.

Niccolette wobbled as she walked, swaying slightly from side to side, but she made it out the door - down the stairs, too, clutching the railing like her life depended on it. She turned her face to the dawn’s faint rays at the bottom of it, watching color and light scatter through the sky, and shuddered.

Niccolette slid her hands into Uzoji’s pockets, feeling the comforting weight of her pistol against the edge of her palm, and began to walk. It was slow and unsteady, hard, dragging going, but she made her way back through Lossey, down pre-dawn empty streets, chin tucked down into the coat, never looking at anyone else.

The house was as empty as it had been the day before, if less dusty. It didn’t seem to help, Niccolette thought; the problem with it had never been dust. Niccolette left her boots in a messy heap at the door; she stumbled down the hallway towards her bedroom, stopping only to pick up something to drink. She took off Uzoji’s coat with shaking, gentle hands, and hung it up on the wall hook; the gun went into the nightstand. She undid the buttons on his shirt one by one, folded the fabric and settled it gingerly into the hamper. The belt was mercifully undamaged, and Niccolette coiled it and settled it into the closet. The pants next; Niccolette folded them with the same aching tenderness, and set them on top of the shirt. Her underthings she left in a pile on the floor.

Niccolette found a shift of her own, pulled it on over her bruised, battered body, the marks across her torso from the thug’s arm, on her legs and side where he had knocked against her as they fell - she did not look at any of them. She let the shift cover them, and sat on the edge of the bed. Niccolette did not bother with a glass; she drank the whiskey straight from the bottle in one long swallow, coughed and jerked the bottle down a little too hard, her eyes watering.

Niccolette left it there, and curled up between her sheets, smoothed her aching ear against her pillow. And there, as the dawn light trickled through the window and the Rose began to bustle once more, the Bastian cried herself softly to sleep.

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