P. Power - Knight Esquire

Without turning completely he whispered to her softly, not caring if he made sense.

“Leave Trice. Talk later. Be careful, someone’s watching.” Yeah, it was a risk. If he was gambling wrong, then Trice would probably kill him later. Then again, if he was really wrong she should have probably tried to do it already. That she came back for him when she knew that he knew she was there… that had to mean that she wasn’t trying to kill him at least. Maybe. That or it was one of those convoluted super-plans of the nobles. In that case, he was probably walking dead into the trap.

“Tor I…” She began her voice tremulous.

“No. Not here. Sneak into my place later?”

That gave her a way in if she needed to kill him at least. He wondered if she’d come at all? Probably not. Nodding gently, almost imperceptibly she backed away and found the shadows nearest them, somehow that he didn’t understand she managed to vanish almost instantly, blending in seamlessly, letting the night cover her. It was a good trick. Was it just skill or had she use a device for that? If he could make a light, could he make light leave an area too? It seemed likely.

Tor gave Kolb everything he knew, which wasn’t much, when he really just went over everything, and then headed back with four very large men guarding him. He appreciated the comfort, he told them, but he needed them to leave for an actual reason. They didn’t argue, but he could tell they all wanted too. Probably because they figured that if they stayed up all night guarding him they’d get out of kitchen duty the next day. He grinned and told them it didn’t work like that, which got a dark chuckle back at least.

Laughing, if hollowly, they pulled back as he went in. He didn’t know if they were planning on leaving or standing guard all night. He kind of hoped they left, because he was pretty safe in his hut. Short of a really big explosive of some sort being used he didn’t think a lot could touch him in there. Well, unless someone just walked in, but how likely was that? Just in case he kept the shield on and had Ursala and Sara do the same as soon as he could. Both sat at the table. Ursala with papers in front of her, the pen in her hand made it seem like she was writing, not just reading letters. Sara sat with some bead work.

That was interesting. Tor hadn’t known she did something like that as a hobby. The piece she worked on even looked pretty nice. Small shining yellow and amber colored pieces on a pure white background. He commented on it as he sat down, just after suggesting they get their shields on if they weren’t already.

“Tor? What’s wrong?” Sara asked as she slapped at the medallion around her neck.

“Someone tried to kill me. Again. The same person that kicked me down the stairs at school, pretty sure at least. If not, they at least know each other. Same dress and mask. Tried to stab me in the back.” He left out the pain device. That hurt, but if it was meant to be lethal it had failed horribly. He’d fill in that part later.

Gasping Sara stared for a few seconds.

“You don’t think… that it was Trice do you, because she isn’t-” Tor held up his hand.

“Same height, nearly the same build and wearing a skirt or dress. But really, unless she’s secretly been a man this whole time, it isn’t her. Not Wensa either, same rationale. So at the very least this is an outside player, but…”

But the eye’s. He knew he’d seen them before; he just had to make sure he was right. How could he check though? That was the hard part. The impossible part, probably.

“Anyway, I saw Trice. I told her to come here tonight, so…” Tor didn’t want them to leave, but would Trice come if they were there? They both thought that wouldn’t matter, so he let the issue go. They knew more about what she was up to than he did, that much was clear. Then Ursala was a sitting Countess. Odds were she knew a lot of things that Tor wasn’t privy to. Sara was… her best friend. Also in the camp of knowing a lot that Tor wouldn’t he bet. He could accept that.

After all, he probably knew a thing or two about Rolph that Sara didn’t. What that was he couldn’t imagine, but it was probably true at least.

Tor went behind his screen and started working, since sitting around aimlessly and waiting for someone that might not even come wouldn’t help anything. On the third set of shields for the night, just as he finished, big batches like he’d done earlier, he opened his eyes in the dim light to find he wasn’t alone.

Trice stood in front of him.

Lights were on past his divider, they shone through the white cloth giving everything a slightly diffuse glow. At least everyone else knew she was there. He’d decided to trust her, true. Tor even meant it. That didn’t mean that a few things didn’t stir up inside when he saw her again.

Anger.

A bit of fear. Longing for something that had probably never been real at all anyway and a few other things he couldn’t even name at the moment.

She just stood, dressed very similarly to how the ladies of the house dressed for work, at least from what little he’d seen of them. She had a tight bodice on that showed off her bust line and a bright purple, silky dress with black lace trim that wasn’t overly long. The boots she wore were high and jet black, going to her knees, over them in fact. The top part was scuffed from kneeling. It was what the girls he’d seen in the city had worn too. Given what he’d seen from the statue earlier, it made sense, after all the streets of the Capital were stone and it would hurt to be on them in some alley for too long. Kind of sensible really. For a few seconds he wondered if the boots had been gotten used or if she’d broken them in herself. Then he let that idea go.

After all, Trice had been willing to say the things she had about him to reach her goal, even knowing that he might not take it well. Given her culture and society, it was pretty close to as bad as you could get with words too. If she had to service some men to make everything work after that, he didn’t doubt that she would. For that matter, she may have had to, just in order to get into the house he’d had put in the back. It would be hard to blame her for that then, since it had been his idea in the first place. It wasn’t like she could hide from him in the kitchen, was it? Tor had found her there in what, two hours? Less?

He cleared the shields off his bed and patted it.

“Sit, please. If you want to I mean.” He tried to sound nice about it. Tor couldn’t tell for sure, but he’d though he’d done pretty well, even though she winced.

“Don’t worry, I just don’t have a chair back here. It’s not an invitation to ply your new trade.” Tor smiled and gave her a wink.

She took a deep breath, nodded and sat down.

“You know I didn’t mean that stuff I said, right? I mean the others have told you why? How I had to get close to the Wards so that I could find some evidence on them?” She looked nervous and he shrugged.

“Everyone’s mentioned something about it, but no one really bothered to explain why it had to be you, or why you didn’t just tell me first. Did you really think that I care so much about looking good that I wouldn’t help set a trap for killers? God Trice. I’d been willing to die for you, what, twice already by then, and you really… you didn’t have to marry me or anything, but… why didn’t you tell me?” He tried, mainly successfully, to keep the sadness out of his voice when he asked. She looked down at the bed anyway.

Silence followed for a long time. Several times she started to talk, then finally she just shook her head. “I can’t tell you Tor. But know that I didn’t want to do it the way I did, and that I didn’t mean any of those things. Well, except that your short and really your kissing could use some work-” She gave him a cute half grin, trying to be playful.