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Post by black379 on Apr 6, 2018 8:52:15 GMT -8
Courcy nodded slowly. She raised her face and wiped her eyes dry. She wanted to be done with weeping for today.
"Baignard too... But what have I done with it? I don't have anything. I'm not anything."
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Post by Vanitypirate on Apr 6, 2018 9:21:23 GMT -8
Tilly made to lean on the table, but stopped short with a wince when it creaked loudly in protest.
She shrugged instead,
"Everyone here starts with nothing. It's not the worst thing in the world." She smiled and nudged her shoulder, "Just means that the only way things can go is up from here."
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Post by black379 on Apr 7, 2018 10:48:53 GMT -8
Courcy forced a smile in hopes that it could be genuine. Tilly was rather excellent at cheering her up. She only wished not to be so miserable in the first place. Still straddling the chair Courcy straightened up and drummed her fingers on the back of it before standing.
"Thank you. For keeping me around... For letting me here." With a shrug, her arms gestured to the cozy, if not a bit run-down, home of Tilly's. It was true enough that things could only get better for her, so long as she was at least on her feet.
"I don't want to be a burden."
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Post by azmoham on Apr 7, 2018 13:12:03 GMT -8
[In a town, several miles south of The Hamlet]
The morning light lilted playfully through the air, casting itself against the walls of a small, somewhat rundown looking cottage sitting on the far edge of an equally small if less rundown looking village. Birds nested in the large, leafy trees and evergreens that stood with stately silence in a large oval around the town, with small animals skittering about the undergrowth. It was the hour when people just began to awaken and begin their daily toil, with men and women already travelling up the gravel path that snaked through the middle of the little settlement. The church bells rang, striking six, and one of the occupants of the cottage glanced towards the open window through which a beam of sunlight streamed through. Having been awake for several hours at this point, he was not surprised when the church bells rang, announcing the arrival of another day. What /did/ surprise him however, was the knock at the door. They rarely had visitors, and even more rarely did they receive them at such an early hour. One part curious and two parts cautious he stood from the high back wooden chair he’d been slumped in, setting aside the yellowed tome he’d been paging through, and went to answer. When he did so, a thin man with a tall peaked cap pushed a bit of parchment into his hand, gave a quick nod and mumbled a weary ‘Light ‘pon you’ and departed as rapidly and as unexpectedly as he had came. Jacques stood there for a second, squinting against the early light as he puzzled over the envelope. Who had bothered to send them a letter? Why? He frowned, expecting some trouble, and stepped back inside the cottage, shutting the door behind him and then returning to the chair.
Opening the folded bit of paper up revealed a tidy scrawl of perhaps four or five lines, certainly a very brief note, and he began to read. About thirty seconds later, his fingers clenched hard enough to wrinkle the parchment, malforming the smooth paper into a jagged mess. He forced his hand to release the letter and he stared hard at the words, reading and rereading them.
“What the devil…?”
He stood up, crossing the room to his sister’s bed which was pushed against the far wall, and nudged it roughly with one foot. The woman stirred a little, rolling over to offer her brother a groggy glare. He ignored it, crouching down to shove the bit of paper in her face.
“What do you make of this?”
He asked. She took the sheet, and still looking fairly unhappy to have been disturbed, scanned the lines. After a few seconds she snorted loudly and tossed the parchment away, it fluttered in the air like some strange insect for a moment before drifting back down to the floor.
“It looks like bullshit.”
She answered plainly, and made to return to sleep. He was tempted to ask again, goading her into something he hoped would be mildly more constructive, but at such an hour the idea was moot. He sighed and retrieved the letter from where it lay, and once more took his seat.
“Indeed.”
He said to nobody in particular as he studied the text again.
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Post by Vanitypirate on Apr 7, 2018 14:18:16 GMT -8
"Ah, no." Tilly flapped a hand dismissively, as though to wave away any fret, "It's no matter." She smiled and leaned her back against the wall, cozying up again. It was sorely temping to just sleep there.
She pointed a finger in Courcy's direction and made to stand, too, eyeing the front door; she reckoned it was a nice enough night to nap outside. Tilly spent half her life sleeping on the ground, anyways...
"Just means you're formally, officially obligated to come to my wedding and have the best fun of your life."
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Post by black379 on Apr 7, 2018 14:40:49 GMT -8
She grinned wide, reluctantly showing her teeth. While Courcy was used to being penniless and squatting in sheds, or accompanying a man to his board, it was an odd prospect to live in with a friend. She tried not to think about paying Tilly back now, without any means to do so.
"I am happy for you. I bet it'll be lovely." The ginger raised up her shoulders and tucked her hands behind her back, teetering on her feet. In another moment she tugged at the vibrant cloak again, tempted to pull it off, excepting to offend Tilly.
"Is it really that big a deal? To... cover up?" She questioned curiously as she adjusted her top.
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Post by Vanitypirate on Apr 7, 2018 18:19:02 GMT -8
Tilly looked her over and slowly nodded, leaning back against the frame of the door.
"It might not seem so-- but it does! How you look and what you wear tells other people loads about you without you even opening your mouth." Her brow furrowed momentarily, and she rubbed her jaw as though to chew on what she was to say next: a valuable life lesson she was grateful to have been taught early in life by her Margerie.
"See, what my governess told me is that men are like keys, and women are a lot like locks." Tilly held up two fingers off of one hand, pressed close together to resemble a key, and held up the flat of her palm on the other hand, respectively. "So a key that opens every lock it comes across is a master key, right? But a lock that opens to every key is a poor lock." She pressed the key-hand onto her palm, "That's not to say a good lock can't open at all-- it just has to be choosy about which special key does it."
Both key-hand and lock-hand resumed to their normal poses and worked in tandem to smooth the lapels of her coat.
"Keep in mind you're showing an amount of skin on a woman most men only see when they've lain with 'em--" She motioned to Courcy's bare knees, arms, and collar. "--and keep in mind, most of them are looking to be master keys. So if you look like you might be an easy lock, that's how they'll expect you to act, and that's how they'll treat you, even if you're actually a sweet, honest woman."
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Post by black379 on Apr 7, 2018 20:10:46 GMT -8
Courcy's brow knit together as she listened, though she cocked her head and rolled her eyes at "sweet" and "honest". If Tilly's figure of speech wasn't a euphemism for sex, she couldn't know what was. The hellion almost interjected that she didn't really mind - she quite liked sex. But, admittedly, she wanted more than just to lay with any man.
She leaned back to sit gently on the edge of the table. Her hands clasped and drummed on the side of it. The metaphor wasn't totally clear to her. Neither was the idea that the "mystery" of her body would help find her proper 'key', or partner rather.
"What about Lekalis? He wouldn't even-" She held her tongue, and instead poked it into her cheek for a moment. "Or Baignard? ...I never knew he was into me, until just before..." Courcy huffed and flopped her arms in defeat.
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Post by Vanitypirate on Apr 7, 2018 20:25:19 GMT -8
Tilly shrugged haphazardly, "S'what I mean by 'good men'; they're out there. They're just as selective as they'd like their lovers to be. Those are the kind of fellows you oughta be looking for. But most men? There's a reason the brothel's so sodding lucrative."
She smiled somewhat sheepishly at the openly salacious talk.
"Baignard had the advantage of knowing you as a friend, first, so it didn't matter so much what you wore. But the first thing anyone learns of you, before they get to talk to you, is what you look like. So it helps to dress up to match who you are when you want to attract the nicer men."
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Post by black379 on Apr 7, 2018 20:57:36 GMT -8
Sporting a frown, Courcy crossed her arms over her chest. She had all but given up caring who would have her, so long as someone would. But it only landed her in worse trouble and heartache than in a meaningful partnership. There was no telling where exactly she stood with George, but it was obviously not love.
"He... came back before, you know?" Reaching up to her neck, the ginger tugged again at her undone braid. She pondered if there was any worth trying to find a friend that matched Baignard. "D'you think he might... I might see him again?"
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Post by Vanitypirate on Apr 7, 2018 22:13:19 GMT -8
There was a rule that Tilly had come to know in this Hamlet:
A resurrection once was plausible, definitely. It had happened at least once with Baignard, if not twice with Roderick-- or perhaps the crusader simply willed himself alive after stewing a couple of days in his coffin.
Regardless, it was proven.
But twice? That seemed to be pushing it.
She grimaced, "In this life? I wouldn't count on it; folks have a habit of staying dead, else I wouldn't have had a job before I came here." But then she spent a moment tapping a serpentine finger on her chin and momentarily continued, "Maybe when your time comes to join the Light-- but definitely don't hurry it, you know? You've still got plenty of life to live yet."
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Post by black379 on Apr 8, 2018 9:04:04 GMT -8
Courcy held herself tighter, as though she was cold. She glanced toward the bed, but even if she would have liked to lay down, it still seemed intrusive. Instead she took the table seat again and poked at the soup with a spoon. It wasn't warm anymore, and she still wasn't particularly hungry, but she took a bite so as not to waste Tilly's kindness.
"I don't really want to die... I'm sorry for saying that." The hellion was slouched in the chair and barely cast her eyes over toward her friend. "I'm scared that... what if I don't join the Light? Or, if I do, what if he's not there? He let a demon in him..."
After another bite of chicken, she turned in the seat to face Tilly and leaned on her knees. "Maybe I could find a way, like he did. To get him back."
Courcy wouldn't even know where to begin. And she was still bound to her debt for a while longer. There was the wedding too, she couldn't miss to finish her expedition. She looked the other woman in the face, wondering if she was keeping her from her own plans.
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Post by Vanitypirate on Apr 8, 2018 9:33:00 GMT -8
Tilly shrugged her shoulders.
She'd never been in this position of religious guidance-- save for that brief bout of Tillianism, which in hindsight was an utterly sacrilegious stunt to pull.
Funny how she'd gone from digging up corpses without thinking twice on the spirit's mind on the matter, to assuring someone that their ghost was waiting contentedly in the Dawn.
"In places like this, I think the Light ought to be rather merciful towards us, no matter our mistakes. Long as we always act our best, you know, and always try to be a good person." Her hands rested in her pockets, again.
She frowned, and thought on Doctor East and his monstrosities.
"That's necromancy-- and no good person has business with that. That opens up and welcomes a whole lot of evil into you."
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Post by black379 on Apr 8, 2018 11:18:33 GMT -8
"Maybe." She groaned emphatically and rested her forehead in her palms. Courcy was exhausted and her ceaseless questions must have been grating. But she needed guidance - her stubborn pride and spunk failed, and Tilly seemed to think that beneath all that was a darling woman.
"Then what if I make a life with someone else? What will he think of me, when I die and I see him again?"
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Post by Vanitypirate on Apr 8, 2018 12:08:47 GMT -8
"If he loves you, he'd only want you to be happy and to live your life. I reckon it's why he went through all that effort to save you." Insisted Tilly with a small bob of her chin and a waggle of her elbows.
"Nobody dies for someone with the intent to have them die with 'em, you know?"
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