A Crack In The Path

Tales of S'jira and others from the barbaric lands of Llothgar and beyond.

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S'jira
Seasoned Adventurer
Seasoned Adventurer
Gentle Shadow

Posts: 403
Joined: Sun Apr 28, 2019 2:26 am
Location: RhyDin or Llothgar

A Crack In The Path

Post by S'jira »

(Posted: Sat Jan 12, 2013 3:08 pm)

[S'jira's Post]

The weather had warmed, but it was still cold outside. Wind howled and threatened to get into the rooms that she and Panther shared when at the inn.

Her dreams were as restless as form was. Just as the sun was starting to cast the early morning in a pallid, ghost-blue light, s'jira woke and lay there in the bed for a while. She listened to Panther breathe and then slowly, she turned over onto her side. There was an urge to reach out for him. To see just how much he was or was not hurt by the previous night's happening.

Some matters could easily surprise her and this had been one of them. She had not expected Kruger to come into the inn and do everything within his power to taunt and pull Panther into fighting him. There was talk of honor, of standing accountable, of Panther abandoning her.

Panther refused to fight the blacksmith, but actions had been taken to block and keep Kruger from doing true harm. S'jira had told him of that past relationship, that it had not worked out since her heart would not ever let go fully of Panther, and even when she went for months to Llothgar to seek out her sister. Even of Kruger finding a love a few months later to ease the pains she must have put at the blacksmith's feet.

But to seek out a fight, it had surprised her. She had listened and even found the courage to speak up at times as Kruger's words berated and sparked with upset at Panther. Panther had been gone, but it had not been his fault. No more than it had been s'jira at fault at being gone too long in her homeland without word to Kruger -- but not all of that tale had been told to either of them, or the reason it had taken almost four months to make it back to RhyDin.

And he had called s'jira a little girl at one point when trying to draw Panther into a fight. Little girl. S'jira breathed and sat up very carefully on the bed, trying hard not to jostle it and wake the one next to her.

The small woman could not think of five times, in her entire life, that her anger had been so stirred. She was not a child. And the upset faded away to watch Panther sleep. A smile gentled and gaze endearing. She could have wept to have him back and so very near to her.

What perhaps worried her more were two other things: Kruger kept talking to a bronze bust of Talitha Lee, The Watcher, some called her...and that he seemed to want the fight with Panther so badly.

Then thoughts turned again, of Panther. He rarely spoke of them, but he wondered if he thought of Mika and his children in the missing of them as she had of Panther when he was gone. A heart was not at all jealous. She knew better, but knew that he must have still held love for them all in his heart.

Surely, though, both Kruger and Panther had not come out of the altercation without some kind of bruises or else. Her smile slipped away even as she left the bed. Flesh was clothed by nothing and the room's chill gripped her swiftly.

As soon as toes and the balls of her feet met with the flooring, she pushed her hair back over her shoulders and headed for where she kept a few of her dresses. Cold as the day might be, she put on two layers with one of white and dark, heavy green over that. Her belt was buckled and she brushed her hair.

There was need for food, drink, and a few other things from the area of the bar, the kitchen, and one of the storage rooms in the back hall's way downstairs.

In quiet, she closed the door to those rooms they kept there. She would not be gone long.

[Panther's Post]

He was still in that hazy world, somewhere between sleep and wake. He had not truly stirred yet, but he was just awake enough that he could tell she was no longer in bed with him, and just awake enough to hear her footsteps moving about the room.

He was about to roll to his side, about to open his eyes and bid her a good morning when he heard the door click shut. A part of his was almost glad that he would not have to rise for a bit longer.

He was sore, and loathe to move just yet. The smith, having swung those hammers for so long had arms with muscle nearly as firm as the iron he worked. The cut inside his lip, the stiffness in his jaw, and the bruise on his chest. He could feel them all as he lay there.

He still was not entirely sure why he did not strike back. There had just been something in the actions of Kruger that made him feel things were not quite what they seemed. But he made an oath to himself that the smith would not be given such quarter again.

He raised himself up on his elbow, blinking a few times to push some of the last bits of sleep from his yes, then inched up the bed a bit to sit upright with his back against the headboard. Yes, this would be a day of taking things a touch slower than usual it seemed.

And as he was contemplating actually setting foot outside the bed, the door to the room opened once again as S'jira returned. And she had food.

[S'jira's Post]

The cloth sack that she often took with her, too and from the markets, was over her right shoulder. She was creeping in, as quietly as possible. Gaze was upon her hand where it met with the handling of the door to the rooms they shared there. She held the door aside, just enough to get the trayful of food, an earthy decanter of juice that was brightly painted and a glass jug of water she had flavored with slices of sliced strawberries, raspberries, and mint. Toast, meats of various kinds of ham and pork were at one side with bread and butter were there as well. A very simple gathering of food, but enough to keep them having to hurry downstairs before there was true need for it.

As the door was closed, as quiet as she could, she turned and smiled to find him with eyes open in the pallid, cold morning light. Brows lifted and her smile was there without question. The door had been closed and secured before she crossed the room to him and put the platter of things down. Mugs kept in the room were taken with her into the bathing room that adjoined and washed them well.

She emerged, drying one mug and had the other empty one tucked up against her clothed side and pinned there briefly with her elbow. Then stood that short time in the door?s way of the bathing room, looking to him from with gentle distraction, as if in half-remembering when the room was without him. When much was without him for so long.

?You are awake.? Words were not those of complaint, but soft and reserved jubilee. ?Do you hunger?? The mugs were put down next to the platter of food and turned her back just a little towards him while she filled one of them with the flavored, sweetened water. Then , some of everything put on each of the plates. Much on the mind even as she made certain his plate bore more food than hers to it and headed for the bed with it and a cloth.

[Panther's Post]

That smile. That smile she had was warming, loving, soothing, uplifting and more... all at once.

He watched her as she set the tray of food down and slipped in to the other room to wash their mugs. A glance to the food tray was had while he waited. He hoped the meat was tender, he wasn't sure how much chewing his jaw was ready for.

She returned, asked if she was hungry and then turned to pile some plates with the food even before he could answer. Then she turned back and offered him one of the plates, seeing the amount on his plate he could not help but give a soft chuckle.

"I guess I am."

He plucked a piece of the smoked ham from it and took a tentative bite, but his eyes remained on her, she seemed a bit distracted. Chewing was not as painful as he thought it might be, but an effort had to be made to keep from wincing as he did so.

After the first couple of bites were finished with, he reached for one of the mugs of water. "'jira, is everything ok?"

[S'jira's Post]

"Yes. So very much so now.. and yes, again." When he accepted his plate, she drew up onto the bed, moreso the end of it. The post of it was met with the line of her back and skirts of unbleached white and green of her dress were absently arranged to cover her feet as she curled her knees up into a comfortable sitting there.

"Thoughts.. are of what happened, between you and Kruger." She did not frown completely, holding onto her smile that a heart so acutely felt when around him. "I was greatly worried for you." Soft, there was hesitance. "And for Kruger. He seemed to want to have harm brought upon him so much...and so definitely." She swallowed some of the fruit flavored water. "So much so that ...I feared he might try to kill you. To truly... kill you."

Guilt lilted in her words, that in some way it must be her fault. She leaned back a little more against the bed's foot post and watched him. "And there is worry that..." S'jira could not find the words easily enough and cast gaze to her mug and back to him again in soft frustration. "For you...it has not felt like any passage of time and for me...it has been years." Eyes sought his face out. "There is...a feeling that you will not care for me to know that ..that I did not wait for you longer, that I cared at all for anyone in your absence...".

There was with her a great worry and had been in the recesses of her thinking for a very, very long time. Still, she watched him, watching how he was eating and even listening to the sounds of his breathing and wondered at his thinking on all of it.

[Panther's Post]

He listened to her as the words seemed to pour out. He thought he had put her fears on at least some of this to rest. There was no way he could, or would ever blame her for the things that happened while he was gone, let alone what happened last night.

He set the plate aside and pushed away from the headboard, he moved out from under the quilt that still half-covered him and crawled down to the foot of the bed where she was sitting, speaking to her as he did so.

"'jira - while I was not going to fight him, I was also not going to let him seriously hurt me or anyone else. I do not know what was going through his mind, I guess I hoped he would see the folly of his actions."

He rested a hip on the bed along side her, propped up on one hand, the other moving to rest on her knee.

"And I do not blame you for last night, nor for anything that happened when you thought... well, when I was gone. As much as the thought of you being with someone else pained me when I learned how long I was gone... " He paused and took a deep breath, slowly letting it out... "to expect you to wait, not knowing. No, should something like that happen, I would not want you to .. " words were failing him in expressing the thoughts in his mind.

"I know what the waiting is like. To know I put you through that pains me more than the thought of you with another."

[S'jira's Post]

Her empty hand eased up to grace against his cheek and linger at his jaw with the barest of touches. "It must be known.. that even though a path was tried twice with others, it was your footsteps, in your shadow that ...that I so wished to be in." There were many ways for lips to say they loved another and in this, she was telling him again.

The small one eased in against him, taking care not to spill her drink. "I love you, Panther." As if it might not be known already. And smiled all the more in the wake of her own words. Then leaned well across to put the mug down on the table beside and sit back up.

"And, if there is understanding in it all, then a heart will take ease in it." She would truly try. And offered to him that smile again and rested in against him comfortably.

"What is wanted to be done this day? Are you well enough for riding? Or perhaps make a way through the city? There is thought much changed since you have been gone... " One hand curled loosely against his forearm.

Worries were still there, that he might take that other of his familiar forms and not be able to turn back. A heart simply could not help it. But again, she was trying.

"Some of the shops at the markets, they have come. And...and it is thought remembered that a fire was in one of them and it was rebuilt." Prattling on, she felt, but wanted to share so much with him and shifted with a sudden need to tell him, her smiled unveiled and warm; darkly colored eyes glinting.

A whisper was there. "A bow has been practiced with more than a few times now, until this hand was welted and bruised. And Conner McKensie gave to me a set of flute pipes to play, but ...the tunes are terrible and I have no talent for it." She sought out her own, right were with a touch of fingerstips. "Notes hurt the ears..." And laughed aloud. So much more to tell him.

[Panther's Post]

It is an odd feeling.

A mix of remorse and joy. Hearing that someone you love sought the comfort of another and could not find it because of their feelings for you, while knowing all the while it also caused them such sorrow.

That is exactly what was coursing through him to her her speak of footsteps and shadows. And of course the use of being in his shadow left another pang of... guilt? Given how they met, how their relationship first started. The last thing he wants is for her to think of her being in any way subservient to him.

But that was the life she grew up in, and it was not something that would change in the relatively short time they had been together. She had continued to change, to grow in his absence.

Buying the cottage, and she was speaking of taking to using a bow and more. Her words were slightly more than half-heard as he shifted his weight and lay on his back beside her, his head just short of bumping on the frame at the end of the bed. His arm had moved to drape across her lap as the other hand stole a piece of bread off her plate.

"I think... " he took a bite of that bread and chewed... "I think we should take our time with this meal. Perhaps another warm bath? Then maybe we can go to the glen or somewhere that you can show me your skill with your bow."
ڿڰۣ-ڰۣ ڿڰۣ-ڰۣ ڿڰۣ-ڰۣ

~S'jira~
Much can be said without saying a word.
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