Dalliances By Shadows Riven
Twenty-First Day of the Eighth Month 293 AC
Amarei let out a breathy giggle after tumbling back in her feather bed's sheets, and Gods was she blessed when she came to the Deep, not in good fortune alone, to have good friends and better custom, even patronage by Lady Drekelis herself and lessons in matters of economics and finance as much as courtly affairs and gossip making her services much sought after... she would be much busier driving that nasty Frigge up the wall with the success she's been having being more than just a whore who got lucky, being her own woman besides and lusted after and offered gifts by half the men in the city. That is, if she hadn't completely booked up her time up 'til the end of the month after the man she was still holding a bit of a candle for, ever since he came prowling up to her door that first night... "Why are you slaying maidens like me and not some beasties in the Circle, or winning some glory for your King? Showing the flag!"
"He shows it well enough, I'd say," Richard Lonmouth said as he yanked up his breeches and stretched out, the muscles on his back on display like cords of iron or the sinews of some jungle cat, all trim and deadly. Amarei knew the Knight actually valued being circumspect and had a fierce love for peace and quiet, which is why they didn't do much chatting after all was said and done, he more than happy to warm up by the hearth and oil his sword, for all that it didn't really need such regular upkeep, and her more than happy to get a few hours of freedom from some of the girls coming in doe-eyed and besot, asking after this lordling or that.
No one even knew she was regularly seeing the King's Champion himself to tend to his
needs... the lengths a woman is to go to! Still, someone had to put up with the man, and she was blessed with a well of patience deep enough--and a purse large enough--to be able afford the headache.
Well, it wasn't
all bad. Half the reason her chambers were so opulent was his patronage, the other half being that she and he had both invested heavily in measures to keep their little dalliances secret, some of which happened to involve hiding a ward or trap with clever placement of fey-wrought stonework, not so much because he was embarrassed for her custom but because as he said it, there was always the chance for some calamity to befall the city and he would prefer people not to know that his session with a courtesan was interrupted by having to slay a demon or a dragon, or a demon dragon, for the King at the drop of a hat--not that he ever deigned to utilize her... various
services while he was still 'on duty', as the case may be. Seven Hells!
Or she supposed it was
nine, now, wasn't it? Its not as if he was wearing a white cloak and thus sworn to shit standing if it came to the King having no other protections available, and the Gods alone know Viserys Targaryen is the one King in history who didn't need seven men in white armor standing around his throne all day, little used since the dragon practically ruled his realm out of the proverbial saddle if the tales were true. Well, if the saddle were some chariot of light that some flowery Essosi lords and ladies fancied he rode around the world in. She could just laugh!
The thought that the vagabond King, twice exiled from his home, was forced more often than not to walk the land as he went about his business set her to
giggling fiercely, which gained her no more than a raised brow from Lonmouth. She didn't know if she should call that thoughtful or cynical of him to be that aware of how often his services were required to deal with the
unusual as much as in service of fighting it.
"I suppose he does at that, doesn't he? Did he tell you he was going to replace that banner with a real looking magic dragon? Which might leap out at the crowd and burst into flame and fang at any moment!" She snorted with laughter again, feet kicking as she rolled onto her stomach. "I heard a Westerman
scream like a perfumed lady the first day!"
Richard briefly looked heavensward, not able to keep a twitch of a smile from touching his lips. "I have learned not to expect more than the usual amount of abnormality, when it comes to the King."
Hardly, Amarei thought,
hell, I sometimes feel like I know this lug better than the King if he can't even figure out that his sworn sword can't sleep without a sword within arms reach at all times. No one else knew that he recited small catechisms as he scribbled in a journal and sketched out a better way to skewer flying monsters near enough as to be in his sleep, or how he would twitch
just so and his eyes would dart to one side if the door wasn't shut all the way and the air blew it in.
She had learned to move nice and languidly, in full view, and had only once tried to surprise him when she'd bought some new dresses. He apologized for the blackened eye so profusely she had to find other ways to shut him up, ones that didn't involve fetching a healer and maybe emptying half his purse to keep them quiet over what was sure to be a stupid misunderstanding that he didn't deserve trailing him around like a heavy stormcloud.
Is that all even really necessary...
She glanced up, an errant breeze working its way into her rooms and the silk curtains fluttering in the wind, and the fire in her hearth sunk low for a moment, adorned with his Dragon banners and cute busts and statues gaining a fearsome mien in the changed lighting. "That's odd... weren't the storm clouds blown off course for the tourney?"
There was a creak... a dropped vase. Her heart hammered in her chest and a word of command and intent was barked,
reveal, and suddenly Richard had leapt up in the path of a black-edged blade dripping
something... something foul,
poison. The thing had no discernible face like one would come to expect from a sorrowful man, bar the blood-stained lipless mouth with squarish teeth pressed into a sneering grimace, yet its manner and the arch of its grey-skinned shoulders suggested an easy playful malice and its chest shook with amusement... its red eyes blazed with hatred that nearly skewered through Amarei then and there, that is before the dagger found its way sunk right back into its chest and the Stormlander took up its attention--the Knight had drawn his sword and cleared half the room without even bothering to finish buttoning his shirt, Oathkeeper ablaze with seething flame.
"Your little
whore doesn't want to see the rest of this," it whispered almost in a macabre mirror of her earlier seductive tone.
Of that, Ser Richard Lonmouth seemed to agree. "Under the bed!" Amarei broke out of her horrified stupor and leapt out of her sheets, diving away from certain peril and barely missing the second dagger aimed for her head--though it didn't miss her pillow.
Bastard.
She saw moving feet and a tearing scream that sounded like metal scraping bone, and the sizzling black blood of fiends boiled upon her Myrish rug.
A moment later the thing's grey head rolled by. Shakily she crawled back out, and while she wanted to clasp her arms around herself and shrink away from the wispy corpse, she instead aimed a barefooted kick and sent the thing sailing right into the fire. Richard snorted. "Guess I don't need to ask if you're alright." Despite the jest, he did sound concerned.
"How much do I need to pay to get arcane protections to keep things like that climbing back in here?" She'd pay
whatever price, and like hell she'd be sent crying back to Lady Selyse asking for guards, either.
Richard pressed his mouth into a thin line, likely already thinking about the report he'd have to make back at the Keep. "I'll see to
that," he said, gesturing to both the Devil's corpse, and likely the rest as well.
Maybe I need to get some magic of my own, she thought,
if this is going to keep happening.
For all the higher powers listening, please allow her to set that leadened thought aside for another day.
