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Post by Vanitypirate on Aug 10, 2018 20:38:10 GMT -8
Tilly smiled, and her mouth opened a tad before she closed it again, on the very precipice of what she needed to tell Courcy on the subject of extra persons and assassins and all.
She ran her thumbs nervously beneath her lapels, needlessly smoothing out the wrinkles of the patchwork.
Already she felt safe with Courcy's halberd in tow. She contemplated, as she walked, that Courcy would very well be the extra person she'd need to hire.
--- [And now they walk!] ---
It was a terrible mistake to forgo her nap in favor of a long trek in the early summer sun.
The walk to the edge of the Hamlet was mercifully pleasant and breezy, on account of its coastal location. While it was the cause of the gloomy overcast over the village most days, this was the occasion that Tilly was grateful for it. She felt overly warm beneath her many layers.
After some time, the cobbles scattered and dissipated and turned to clinging mud and tufts of damp grass. The distant, lazy babble of flowing water was faintly audible even from the cobbles. It grew stronger as they walked on, and as the two skirted about a thicket of drooping trees, it was just upon them.
Somewhat shallow with a hospitably slow current, this was the stream Tilly spoke of.
This was further evidenced by her triumphant "Aha!" as they came upon it.
"There it is. Lovely, pleasant thing, isn't it?"
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Post by black379 on Aug 10, 2018 21:50:59 GMT -8
Coming up behind Tilly, Courcy exhaled a content sigh when they reached the river. She looked up and down the stream to find it remote and, in fact, quite pleasant. She set down her things by a tree nearest the shore and leaned down to undo her boots.
“This looks just perfect.” As she tossed her shoes aside, Courcy looked up to her friend. This was almost like the trip to Rampshire, minus the man in bear skin. Her stare went blank for a moment as she recalled Fenrik.
“So... back at the beach. I didn’t know you and Blood were... lovers.” She cleared her throat and averted her gaze toward the steadily flowing water.
“I wanted a fuck and- I thought he was into me, how he was talking. He acts like he’s some kind of devil with women, doesn’t he?” Courcy chuckled and shook her head.
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Post by Vanitypirate on Aug 10, 2018 22:24:57 GMT -8
Tilly plopped herself down to rest on a fallen log a clear four yards away from the riverbank, allowing her satchel to fall along her side and rest in the dirt.
It was nice to sit.
"Don't you know the poor thing's a bastard? He hasn't got his father's blood." Bending an arm to rest her chin in her hand, she rose a brow at Courcy.
"Of course, that hardly matters here-- our lot's just a band of cripples, bastards, broken things and all that sort. But everyone outside this little village knows what that means: no titles, no land, no inheritance; a violent temperament and... loose morals. The bastard of the family hardly commands more respect than the family hound."
She paused to yawn, stretching out her legs.
"He's a sweet-heart, really; a romantic at heart. But he calls himself Blood and acts that way, acts like he doesn't care, because that's what everyone expected him to do. While he's living up to his expectations, nobody can hurt him then. But he's never just... 'wanted a fuck,' else the brothel would know him well."
Shrugging out of her satchel strap, she added in kind,
"You'd do well not to let yourself be swept up off your feet by every man who talks sweetly to you. Not every man has as kind intentions."
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Post by black379 on Aug 10, 2018 22:59:02 GMT -8
“What do they talk sweet for, then?” Courcy scoffed and wore a tilted smirk. She started working on her buckles next.
“He is sweet. Makes me wish I’d met him sooner. Before you did.” Shrugging, the redhead pushed the leather straps from her shoulders. “But really I wish that Baignard-“
She scooted closer to the river, until her feet were just in the mud. Courcy stretched and peeled off her top. It was dirtier than she had realized, and she thought to be embarrassed if Tilly had noticed.
“So, is he a devil?” The hellion turned a wry smile over her freckled shoulder. “He’s having you, isnt he?”
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Post by Vanitypirate on Aug 10, 2018 23:41:46 GMT -8
"The ones with the bad intentions? You'd like me to lay it out for you? I've seen it happen to other, poor girls on the street." Tilly cast her gaze to the sky, both out of some pre-story-telling gravitas and out of respect for Courcy's transient nudity before she stepped into the river.
"Men come by to these sweet girls out of home. Those men give them gifts, trinkets, bread when they've not eaten for days. The girls... tend to show their gratitude with what little they've got. But the men? The gifts and bread were just a small pittance to get the girls to open their legs. And when they've put a little bastard baby in them, they run for the hills and leave them to beg on the street."
It was a bawdy story, but she couldn't help but find a sort of rebellious rush from it all. It wrought fond memories of hushed gossip over tea-cakes.
And perhaps it might help Courcy. She didn't seem to have the luxury as a child of a governess to teach her rightly.
"I knew Lekalis was the one to marry-- 'have me', if you will-- when he wasn't hounding over me and saying vile things. When I was at my lowest, after Roderick... went mad and died and all, he just made sure I had someone to talk to when I needed and a shoulder to cry on. He watched me for days and didn't mind a bit. That's how I knew that his interests were beyond bodies-- that he, in fact, is not a devil after all." She grimaced and rubbed her brow.
"If you don't wait, and don't know when to tell a man 'no', and fall to sweet words and little tokens, you'll wind up like those girls. It's a miserable, deadly spot to be in."
She grew tired of staring at the side, and instead made to slowly tend to her buttons, hesitant to shed all of her clothing...
"Nevermind Baignard. Nevermind Roderick, either. I've robbed enough of the dead to know that they don't give a damn about anything we do." She flaffed a half-gloved hand. "You just hurt yourself more the longer you pine over a corpse."
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Post by black379 on Aug 11, 2018 15:50:35 GMT -8
“You told me before he’d want me to be happy. Now he doesn’t give a damn?” Courcy faced ahead and pushed her corset under the water. She felt rather like she was smothering it, to remove the stains, Blood and otherwise.
“But you’re right. At least almost...” When her top was thoroughly soaked, she gave it a good scrubbing before laying it out on the edge of the stream. The ginger stood, and stepped out of her pants to give them the same treatment. But now she waded into the river.
“It’s too easy to get between my legs. Just earlier, two men had me at once.” She admitted, almost boastfully.
“But I never had a kid. And I’m begging anyways.” Courcy wasn’t fully submerged, but she turned toward Tilly to look her in the face.
“D’you think a woman needs a man - a good one - to get by?”
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Post by Vanitypirate on Aug 11, 2018 16:14:00 GMT -8
"He'd want you to be happy if he was alive. But he's not. Same as Roderick." Tilly shrugged indifferently, head tipped back with her eyes on the sky. "A corpse can't want anything, though. You could toss one corpse in a ditch, and hold a royal funeral for the other, and it'd be all the same."
With another yawn, her slender fingers untucked her sleeves from her long gloves, letting them flow free for all the moments before she removed the coat altogether.
"You don't need a man. You do need, though, to protect yourself from them-- and you have to work twice as hard as they do to get by." She slipped deftly out of her coat and turned to bundle it at the base of the log she had sat on.
"Why let those men treat you like a common whore? They'll ruin you if you let them."
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Post by black379 on Aug 11, 2018 17:28:43 GMT -8
“Am I not a whore? I’ve heard it enough.” She retorted with a nod. Courcy washed her trousers and tossed them on the shore with her top. Briefly she sank beneath the water, then came back up with damp hair clinging to her neck and shoulders while she pulled apart her braids.
“I’ve heard enough, too, that love is more than just fucking. I know it.” It seemed her shame was discarded with her clothing, and she gathered handfuls of water to pour on herself, to make her body glisten.
“But I want a man who wants to fuck me.”
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Post by Vanitypirate on Aug 11, 2018 17:50:25 GMT -8
"Would you like to be?"
Tilly eyed her sidelong, lacing her fingers together over her knees. Her eyes were strictly above the collarbone.
There was a small desire to sink into the river, as well, and wash up, herself and her clothes. It was foolhardy.
"By all means, go on and be the whore you'd like to be. You could join the girls at the brothel and get paid for it at least, have a silk bed, a warm room, three square meals, no near-death experiences if all goes well..." She shrugged and looked upwards, at the sky and the canopy, again. "...And all the men of all colors who'd love nothing more than just to fuck you. And you won't get anything more."
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Post by black379 on Aug 12, 2018 8:13:11 GMT -8
"Is that a joke?" The ginger cocked her head, eyeing Tilly sharply, though her lips turned up into a smirk in the event that her friend was just being funny. She moved deeper still into the water and waved her hand to beckon Tilly to join her.
"What if I did it? For the money, for the sex, or any of it?" She caught strands of copper hair in her fingers to wash and to wring out. "You wouldn't be friends with a whore? You wouldn't still love me?"
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Post by Vanitypirate on Aug 12, 2018 9:16:29 GMT -8
"I've had worse friends: thieves, murderers, and all..." Tilly shrugged indifferently, catching glimpse of the beckon.
Conflicted, her hands began on the first button of her jerkin before deciding to peel away her boots from her legs instead.
"About time I've made a whore-friend, I suppose." With her feet freed, she waggled her toes in the breeze before setting her boots aside.
Her hands hovered indecisively over her jerkin buttons, again. Her brow furrowed and she committed,
"I've... got something else I've been meaning to tell you." She rubbed her brow. "It's actually quite a lot to say."
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Post by black379 on Aug 12, 2018 18:43:57 GMT -8
The smile fell from Courcy's face and she looked dazed instead. She was half hoping for a scolding from her friend, or some vote of confidence that she was better and worth more than to become a prostitute. But it sounded like genuine advice, enough to make Courcy consider it. Courcy knew she could make money with her body, but had never before dreaded stooping so low.
"Fuck, Tilly..." She sighed before ducking beneath the stream once more. But this time, when she resurfaced, only her head and shoulders came up from the water. The rest of her remained obscured beneath the steady current. Shaking her head, as though to pitch the thought from her mind, she looked up to Tilly. Her eyes flickered between the woman's pointed nose and her bony fingers.
"What, uh... What have you got to say?"
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Post by Vanitypirate on Aug 14, 2018 21:43:21 GMT -8
Tilly frowned, cupping her chin in the hand that once pawed at her eyebrow. She wore a severe expression for all the brief moments before she closed her eyes and shrugged, as if enduring rain.
"I've angered quite a few people in picking Lekalis as a husband." She explained slowly, with a little smile once she opened her eyes.
"There's folk out there who don't want him to own property, marry, or make heirs so badly they'd sent assassins after us. Which is understandably unfortunate." She curled her fingers underneath her cheek and watched Courcy, silently anticipating some form of alarm...
"I've already taken care of one assassin, but we'll need guards after the wedding at least. So if you find my company more entertaining than the brothel..." She proposed with a hopeful smile, "...maybe you'd like to work for me, instead?"
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Post by black379 on Aug 19, 2018 9:07:49 GMT -8
Courcy listened intently, though the previous topic was scarcely gone from her mind. At first she couldn't imagine Tilly had any worries, if she wasn't having to resort to selling herself. As it was mentioned, the redhead thought to include herself in the people upset by her engagement with Lekalis. Though her arguments were more personal, rather than to keep the ex-Lord, or Tilly for that matter, away from love or home or offspring.
She quirked her eyebrow as the woman continued. She never knew anyone to hate Lekalis so much, to want to destroy everything he could own. Though she never really knew any of his business either, nor much of his past. And Tilly certainly wasn't deserving to be attacked just because Blood loved her. The robber had a knack for taking care of herself, but dealing with assassins was completely different.
"They want to kill you?" It was quite a lot of information to digest suddenly. Courcy scratched her scalp as she combed her wet hair. "Wait. Is it the Ravens? The Gunsche?" She wasn't inclined to end up looking like Taas, but she couldn't let Tilly either.
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Post by Vanitypirate on Aug 19, 2018 16:30:20 GMT -8
"Ah... yeah, the Gunsches. How'd you know?" Tilly eyed her, momentarily puzzled, before concluding that she must have heard it from someone else.
It was hardly private info at this point, she supposed...
Now it was onto the next thing she was about to make a tad less private.
"At anyrate, normally I'd be comfortable taking them on. They're not especially talented or skilled..." She made to look nonchalant when her heart was in her throat, glancing off aside.
It was uncouth to speak of such things openly; most ladies she knew stayed covert up until they were entirely unable to.
"As it were, the heir bit of that is already underway, hence my bout of... poor health and retirement and all. I can't be fighting for much longer." She shrugged with a pained frown.
"Elsewise I wouldn't have needed to ask at all."
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