An interlude out of Eddion...
In a cheap roadhouse, somewhere in Rangenland, Arkady was arguing with Moira. She was his new traveling companion, or he was hers. They'd come to sharp words over how he'd only been able to get the Innkeeper to give them a one-bed room, in spite of the two of them most definitely NOT sharing bedspace, when she collapsed...
"Moira-! Are you-? Easy there, let's get you to the floor- You're fainted dead away, aren't you? Of course you are. After I told you not to exhaust yourself in all this heat, you just had to stay on watch all night too... Not even going to stay awake to hear me say I told you so. Tch!" He lowered her carefully down to the rush mats on the stone floor, and she- well, she didn't seem to hear a word, sunk into the sleep she'd been evading for days.
"Well, you're breathing, so let's get this armor off. Excuse me for this." Arkady had seen what Moira did to people she considered to be taking liberties with her person, but for her own health, he had to get her out of her jack and mail.
Moira made a sound when she was hoisted upright as Arkady picked at the lacing of her armor. "Nngh.. 'kady?"
He sighed in relief at hearing her beginning to come around. "By all my Fathers, Moira, never scare me like that again. You dropped all of a sudden, and I just-"
She was tired but her voice was meek. "You w're worried f'r me?"
"Well... Yes. Now, try and sit up while I get these laces undone. You're overtired and you need to rest."
"Does your mail shirt lace up the back as well?"
"Mmhm," murmured the warrior, unconcerned in her drowsiness.
"You're just going to let me do all the work, aren't you?" he said, pretending offense.
She merely mumbled something unintelligible as he helped her out of the rest of the armor.
"What was that you said?" Arkady asked her after setting the heavy gear aside.
"Shirt, too. Hot," she insisted, pawing at the damp linen that stuck to her skin.
Arkady averted his face when she sat up and dragged her shirt off. "Moira!"
"Whassa matter, you never seen girls before? I'm not exac'ly nude, Arkady."
"Given how you defend your dignity most of the time- with steel- I think I'll just avoid potential offense and not look."
"Are you saying I shouldn't defend my dignity?" she asked archly.
Arkady considered his reply very carefully before giving it. "I think I do not wish to be the one giving offense. No woman deserves to be stared at unless she wants to be stared at."
She smiled. "Wise answer." She dragged her boots off one at a time. "Still, you needn't go to such lengths to avoid seeing me at all. This room is probably too small for us to avoid each other. I trust you not to leer."
Arkady picked up her belt from the rush mats. "I'm honored by your trust," he said more seriously. "I assume, though, that you'll still insist on sleeping with your knife at hand?" He held it out to her.
She accepted the belt and sheathed blade from him with a grave nod. "Always."
Before Arkady had finished dressing down for rest himself, Moira had fallen back to sleep. She clutched the knife in her hand like a child taking comfort from a favorite toy. He watched her resting for a few moments, then settled down on the mats at the foot of the bed.
"Won't even sleep without a ready defense," he mused. "We're not so different, you and I."
Arkady is a modded Fairyland Minife Mir/ka in Tan Skin.
Moira is a Minifee Mirwen on a modded formerly male A-line body.
Eddion, Rangenland, Moira and Arkady are from an original story idea of mine and these are little bits of their stories.
