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 Posted: Fri Feb 08, 2013 2:20 pm
Little Brother hardly needed an invitation. He had slunk up and stuck to Patia like a burr, shadowing her every move with bright eyes watching the flopping fish with uncharacteristic concentration - of course he would serious when he came to food. It was the only time all tricks and antics went out the window with the grimalkin. An earthquake could shatter the ground beneath his feet and he would still hardly realize it.
Patia had barely dropped the fish into the basket when Little Brother pounce, tipping it to snag the fish with claws and teeth.
Paoma grinned and shrugged helplessly. "You don't have to ask him twice," she said, settling down next to Osa as Patia returned the hook to the water.
"Do you just fish?" She added. It seemed an awful lot of work, but then again, the people of Palisade had a taste for riverfood and Oldcastle was far from the water. It was probably more profitable a trade than flowers, in any case.
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Posted: Mon Feb 11, 2013 7:31 am
Osa rested his head on Paoma's and snorted into her hair warmly as he watched his Chosen move,
"Mmm, yes. When I was younger, my husband and I would hunt, but it is harder to do that at my age." She chuckled and looked down into her hole then wrinkled her nose and jiggled the hook a bit. When she felt satisfied she stuck the pole in the ground and wandered back to her pack.
She pulled out a sandwich and offered it to the girl. "Breakfast, littl'ne?" She offered.
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Posted: Sun Feb 17, 2013 1:09 am
"Oh, I would!" Paoma replied eagerly, accepting the sandwich. "This must be our lucky day," she added as she bit into it. Most days, she would have waited until most of the flowers had been sold before approaching a street vendor for a small bun, and Little Brother would have had to wait until they were home before he disappeared on a hunt. They were both more than capable of feeding themselves, but on their own, they subsisted on the bare minimum to conserve their stockpiled rations.
"What does your husband do?" Paoma asked between bites, forgetting that it was likely Patia's husband had passed away. The girl wasn't used to tiptoeing around the subject of death. Everyone within a mile radius of her home was aware that both her parents had mysteriously drowned years ago so there had never been the need to beat around the bush.
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Posted: Sun Feb 17, 2013 10:45 am
Osa's head tilted up at the question. Not many have asked her about her husband before as most just considered her the old crazy gypsy. Patia's smile seemed to soften a little. "He was a great hunter... he brought in meats for Old Castle and helped if anything tried to get at live stock... He was killed by a boar when we were young." She hummed a moment and looked at the child, then she patted the girls head gently. "All that matters is that while he was alive, we were happy.... And all that matters now is that Osa has been my companion since."
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Posted: Sun Feb 17, 2013 12:21 pm
"Oh." She reached to give Osa a scratch. Perhaps, despite their vastly different ages, she and the old woman weren't so different after all. Paoma could understand that sort of loss and the gradual ability to cope with it. Her parents, too, had left her rather suddenly and Little Brother's company had done much and more to reassure her that life would still go on without them. And she coped just fine now, continuing her mother's legacy in the garden.
"I'm sorry he was killed, ma'am," the girl added. "But I'm glad you have good memories of him. That's important." She smiled that shy little smile of hers and thought back to her younger days, traipsing about through the flowers with her mother or running out after her father when he went hunting. The little things that made her smile still.
"And Osa's a good boy, aren't you?" She rubbed the buck's face fondly. "Just like Little Brother." At that, the grimalkin looked up from the fish he had all but devoured and meowed.
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