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 Posted: Sun Jun 23, 2013 8:49 pm
Why do they fight me? Why do the distrust me so? Don't they see I only mean to lead them down a different path? One not paved by fools...She asked herself these things knowing full well that she didn't want the answers. Well, answer. It truly all came down to one thing, and one thing only. Rajani had warned her when she started on this insane venture. 'They will distrust a non-chosen as a leader. They will fight you.'Soibhan grumbled and slammed her palms hard on the well-worn wooden door, sending it crashing inward with more force than necessary. No one noticed how it hit the wall however, the patrons within the establishment too focused on themselves or the tankards of ale in front of them to care about the noise. The alehouse was less-than-ideal, but she had been in worse places, and at least it was well lit and held almost a jovial air, as if not everyone here hated themselves or this city. A group of happy drunks were even dancing in an open space left over by the haphazardly jumbled together tables and chairs in that corner of the building. Fingering the coin purse at her belt, she slid onto a grooved stool before the bar, eyeing the keep behind the counter. A burly, no-nonsense sort of man, he looked as if he'd lived and breathed here his entire life. He eyeballed her much the same way, and after a moment, a massive, missing toothed smile broke over his face. "What c'nye git ya, pretty gal?" he asked, voice booming over the noise of the dancers. She placed a handful of coins on the counter and pushed them towards the barkeep, her sour mood lightened by his smile. "Ale. Lots o' ale."He took the coin and filled the space it left with a brilliantly clean mug, filling it to brimming with a dark, richly ambered ale, the top thick with foam. "I'll keep 'em comin'," he reassured her before shuffling down the bar to the other patrons. She took a gulp of the liquid, hissing at the feel of it biting at her tongue, before she slumped in her seat and began surveying the rest of her surroundings. Despite the normally busy hour, the alehouse still had plenty of open spaces, especially along the bar, much to her surprise. Only four others graced the long wooden counter, each well into their cups. Three of them were grouped together with a cup of dice between them, but the fourth sat to himself, staring into his mug. Dismissing him, Soibhan downed her first mug, reaching for the other the barkeep slid down to her from farther down the bar, giving the man a gracious wink. She wasn't used to men treating her like one of them, but her less-than-ladylike appearance should have given most a clue as to her wild, mannish nature. Appreciating the barkeep more, she leaned over the bar and stuck a few more coins down where he would find them later; she had made enough coin playing for Rajani that a gratuitous tip was an easy thing to make back later. How will I get the louts ta listen ta me? Macaire believes they will just follow me when I prove m'self, but tha's the kicker, i'n't it? Provin' m'self. She took another long pull of the ale. Build an army, I said. It'll be easy, I said. Ha! Easier ta bathe a cat in a tub o' salt water...
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Posted: Sun Jun 23, 2013 9:26 pm
Some people would take a look at Henry, with his tired gaunt face and bloodshot eyes, his loose fingers and easy tips, and think him easy to swindle. They would be mostly right. Except that swindling requires that the other person fall for your act, or keep money in a place where if they were swindled, they would notice. Unfortunately for potential thieves, neither of those were true of Henry. He wasn't in any state to believe a thief's lies, his perpetual haunting left him inhospitable to most talk and he now recognized the too bright eyes of those who meant him harm, and he kept his money close, so twitchy that the slightest brush startled him into defensiveness. All of this led to him being left alone most of the time despite his clothes, too nice for this establishment, and his obvious money. His gaze was unsettling and when he did talk, he spoke of garbled violence. As it was, he would soon be moving to the next bar that had yet to suffer his presence soon enough. For now though, he slumped at the bar, barely twitching in scandal at a woman walking into the bar. If he were his old self, he would have offered to escort her home even though she obviously wasn't a lady that cared at all for society. Now, he simple waved his hand at the barkeep, spilled a few coins on the counter and gulped down the rest of his beer.
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Posted: Mon Jun 24, 2013 7:16 pm
It took only a short amount of time before she started to wonder if the kindly barkeep had slipped her something stronger than normal ale. She'd downed three mugs in short succession, all while watching the other patrons of the alehouse. Her gaze kept flickering back to the single man at the bar, however, her curiosity a strong thing. He was well-dressed, too well-dressed for the environment, and everyone seemed to be avoiding him as if he had the plague. Given that she could see nothing outwardly wrong with him, she squinted, drunken gaze blurry at this point. Tapping her fingers on the bar in thought, she finally grabbed her newest mug and slid from the stool and into one beside him. "What's wrong wit ya?" she asked, gazing pointedly at him. He wasn't terrible to look at, though he was also somewhat unremarkable. Something about him unnerved a small part of her, however. Something in his eyes... She continued, "Yer sittin' all by yerself and people keep givin' ya odd looks. Why?"
She was drunk, and her mouth went around uncontrolled even at the best of times.
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Posted: Mon Jun 24, 2013 10:45 pm
The barkeep carefully set down a beer by Henry's hand as to not slosh any of it out of the glass. Henry didn't immediately set out to drink any of it, instead he stared hard and long at the glass as if he could decipher some strange future out of its slowly moving contents before finally taking a small, unsteady sip from the top. He promptly slumped over. At first he seemed not to react when the woman sat down next to him, not even bothering to look up and not moving except to breathe. One long breath in and a long whistling breath out. He seemed overly fascinated with the way his breath fogged the counter on its way out. But then, then he unfolded, somewhat, and turned his too bright eyes on the woman, staring right at her. At one point of time, those eyes had been what people identified as handsome about him amongst his otherwise unremarkable features, but now, set in his gaunt face and combined with the swirling chaos that dominated his mind, they only betrayed his madness. He didn't answer her, instead he laughed, getting louder as he went on, and he laughed, and laughed, until his breath tapered off and then he took a giant gulp of beer before falling silent, a slightly unhinged smile drawing his lips back in a grimace.
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Posted: Tue Jun 25, 2013 7:03 pm
She grimaced, taking another sip of her ale. "So yer mad, then? I shoulda figured. I can see it in ya," the drunk woman murmured, leaning in towards him to see his eyes again. Her curiosity changed a bit, now that she knew the basics of what lay beneath this odd man's exterior. Why was he mad? Had he been born that way? If not, than what had changed him? Corrupted his mind? Something niggled at the back of her mind, but the drunken haze seemed intent on keeping her from focusing on it. Reaching over, she clinked her glass against his. "Some think I'm mad too, but not the same way ye are." She spun so that she could lean her back against the bar, elbows on the wood. "Tryin' ta lead an army o' Chosen without one o' my own. Ha!" The laugh was cut abruptly short as she tipped her head back and drank deep, the ale drowning her personal disappointment in herself. "Speakin' o' Chosen. Are ye part o' them elite deer riders? Are ye a Warden, mad boy?"
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Posted: Mon Aug 05, 2013 11:28 am
He turned away from her, facing his beer with a morose kind of acceptance of his fate. Alcohol did little to make him presentable, sane, or lucid. At least when he wasn't drunk beyond coherence, her was aware of his madness, like a little lost boy trapped in a prison of his own making. But it was easier not to know and to remain unaware; that's why he was drunk so often. His facial muscles, his whole being, was relaxed enough that he didn't react to her words. Sober, or even less drunk, he would have visibly cringed at the mention of Chosen and deer. He was haunted enough by his personal set of sharp antlers, by images of the hunt and the kill. He didn't need to be spending time with other people bent of killing. An army. At one point of time, it didn't seem too bad, before he was Chosen, though he wasn't cut out for it. Now, it all seemed much too brutal. He made his displeasure known in a sharp bark of a laugh, "An army? The Queen's is already far too much for me."He looked at her sideways, and drunk as he was, he was still capable of a fair amount of speech. His breeding would never allow him otherwise even as his manners deteriorated. "The Warden, glorified killers, the lot of them. So no, I'm not a Warden."And it was true, as far as Henry was concerned.
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