"You can complain if you want," Derrica tells her, gently mopping her way across Athessa's chest. There's blood drying in tacky streaks, disappearing beneath the tear in Athessa's shirt. Her eyes flicker across the mess of it before Derrica refocuses her attention at the raw burn stretching across the jut of Athessa's collarbone.
"The beer is good, at least. If you want food I can probably ask them to bring me something while I work on this."
The noise from the tavern drifts up to them, conversations overlapping at increasing volume punctuated by the occasional shouted proclamation.
She shakes her head to decline the offer of food. She'll be starving in the morning, but for now the adrenaline from fighting six Venatori while also babysitting a noisy mud-pie of a human will be keeping her running for a while.
"There were fucking Stalkers in the trees, and he was running around like an idiot, yelling. Oh, wait, here—" Athessa sets the tankard down and untucks her shirt. It takes some care to get it off without the material rubbing against the raw skin.
But there's only a very soft sigh before Derrica swaps the bloodied slip of gauze for the cloth in her satchel. Ket's waterskin is close at hand, easy enough to make use of in the moment.
She has touched Athessa's skin before. (Her mouth has been here, trailing a line down from Athessa's neck to—) It should be easy to be clinical, but it isn't. Her fingers press lightly at Athessa's ribs, where a bruise is forming.
"You should have brought more than just one of their volunteers," Derrica tells her, relieved at sensing no broken bones. "It could have been worse than just a slash."
They could have cut your throat, Derrica doesn't say.
Luckily, Athessa already had the bones beneath that bruise repaired.
"It was one of ours," she says, covering the hitch in her breath at being touched by clearing her throat. "Edgard or something, I dunno. He was covering me with the longbow, I was flanking the two by the fire — there were supposed to be five in all, but there were six.
"Before I could get in place one of the Stalkers got the drop on me. If I hadn't taken this hit, her other dagger would've—"
Athessa gestures to the side of her neck opposite the tail end of the slash. She wouldn't have been alive to come here if it weren't for choosing the lesser of two evils.
"I can't tell if he's capable in a fight or not," Derrica says, trying to curb her own uncharitable anger at him. Her hand lifts briefly to cover the point at Athessa's throat where she'd indicated, as if to ward against any further potential for injury there. It might not be Edgard's fault entirely. Some fights are simple a mess from the start, with things going wrong that no one could have foreseen. Derrica reminds herself of this as she continues.
"He's a good shot with that bow, but he's..."
Casting about for the right word, drawing the cloth along Athessa's skin to mop away the streaks of blood along her chest.
"Erratic," Derrica finishes, reaching for the waterskin again. "If you go out with him again you should still have someone else along until he's more settled."
"He's a fuckin' moron," she corrects, though not without some humor. "I had to tackle him to get him to shut up, and to keep him from getting killed by the other Stalker in the trees."
Even without magic, Derrica's touch leaves electricity in its wake. All Athessa can do to try and keep attention off her pulse or her heartbeat beneath that cloth is keep talking. All she can do to keep from thinking about how close they are (how close they were) is look aside.
"It's not his fault there were more than the reports said but it's baffling how he's survived this long. When I put the knife into the fire, he asked me if I was cleaning it."
"Maybe he shouldn't be doing so much fieldwork if he's so untrained," Derrica hazards, though between them what can that objection really do? Derrica isn't Commander of Forces. She doesn't decide who goes where.
And she isn't so sure Edgard isn't entirely untrained. He was a good marksman. That wasn't something that someone comes by accidentally.
"I don't think I can get rid of the scar," she continues, drawing the damp rag back. Her hand closes a little tighter around it, setting against the lingering softness of Athessa's skin. She'd sponged away the blood along the slight curve of her breasts and didn't dare linger there. She focuses her gaze on the uneven burn, flushed cheeks balancing against the professional scrutiny. "Was Edgard hurt, or were you the only unlucky one?"
Athessa lets out a breath. She hadn't held out much hope of the wound not scarring, but it's still something of a disappointment.
"Figures," she says, lips quirking wryly. And she makes the mistake of looking at Derrica's face then, watching her examination of the mark across her chest.
"He got a scratch on his arm. The way he whined about me dressing it you'd think he'd lost all his toes or something. I told him to go to the infirmary tent, but he's also rooming with Colin, so he'll be sorted right. I might speak to the Commander about him, or at least let Yseult know that he's not suited for tagging along on scouting missions."
The soft flickering light from lanterns casts warmth and shadow across Derrica's face, so close, so lovely. Athessa's lips, slightly parted. The urge to reach forward and tilt Derrica's face towards her own is so strong, the desire to kiss her ever-present.
"Sorry," she says instead of giving in, though her head cants slightly to one side, she leans ever so slightly. Her fingers curl tighter against her bloody shirt. "This probably isn't how you wanted to spend your night."
"Don't apologize. I will always be glad to do this for you," Derrica answers. For a beat she is simply that close, eyes flicking from the wound to Athessa's mouth before she straightens, taking up the waterskin to douse the rag a third time before taking a last pass across Athessa's chest, soothing the reddened edges of the burn.
"But you're right to speak with them," Derrica continues, veering towards something less fraught than how she cared to spend her night. "I had just thought I should say something to the Commander, but...it feels that he has more than enough to attend to without me adding something else."
Even though this is theoretically Flint's job, something he might need to know. Derrica sighs, leaning back to look critically at the slash as she unfolds the damp cloth over her thigh. No, she doesn't think the scar will come out, but she'd like to erase it. Athessa's carrying enough scrapes as it is.
"Yeah, but... there's never gonna be a good time to add another problem to the pile."
Athessa doesn't look at the scar, just as she avoided looking at her face directly after Churneau. She's only just come to terms with the one scar, she'd rather not have to stare down another.
"He's annoyed with me by default, so I'll tell him. Better he hear about it before Edgard goes off being reckless with—" Someone who matters. "—anybody else."
Derrica hums softly, agreed with the sentiment. It's part of why what she'd heard of Artemaeus still rankles, why she frets over the balance of competency and incompetence from Edgard. People can be hurt. (Athessa has been hurt.)
"Maybe we leave him a letter," Derrica suggests, because at the least that seems to give the Commander the option to deal with evaluating Edgard at his leisure. Easier to field than having someone directly in front of him, pressing for action.
"Here," she continues, passing away from the subject. "I'm going to try casting something, and then you'll have one of my potions while I bandage it. If we're lucky, what's left won't be much of anything."
Considering recent concerns about missing correspondence, and that admittedly humorous situation with Matthias finding an unsigned note and suspecting a prank.
She nods to Derrica's plan; the spell, the potion, the bandage.
"Need me to do anything?" A silly question, asked for silliness' sake. She knows the answer will likely be to sit still. "Strike a pose, perhaps? Pray to some deity for a blessing?"
"Hold your breath, and ask my great-grandmother for better luck next time," Derrica instructs sweetly, before putting her palm carefully over the scorch-closed slash.
It has to be uncomfortable to have any kind of pressure over that wound. But the cover of Dericca's hand gives way to a cool rush of magic, flowing from her palm across Athessa's skin. The discomfort ebbs, eased into nothingness beneath the glow emanating from Derrica's hand.
When she lifts her hand away, the angry, raw red of the slash has faded into pale scar tissue. Derrica sighs over the lingering mark, running a finger along the scarring check her work.
She does hold her breath, even if she doesn’t know who Derrica’s great-grandmother is in order to ask anything of her. Athessa’s own will have to suffice.
They sigh in unison, though for Athessa it’s simply releasing that breath. The discomfort doesn’t bother her, not with the knowledge that it’s Derrica’s hand covering the pain and soothing it away. Tracing the newest scar in Athessa’s collection of mishaps.
“You’re amazing, you know that?” It comes out before she can think not to say it. But why shouldn’t she say it? She’d feel the same about Derrica’s skill even without the swarm of butterflies in her stomach.
Inspection having apparently satisfied Derrica that nothing more can be done, her hand drops. The critical set to her mouth lingers, softens into a slight smile at the question.
"Isaac might have done better," Derrica cautions. He's older, more experienced, and he does good work. He might be able to fix this still, though Derrica doesn't speculate. She shrugs a little over the question, compliment sufficiently squared away.
"Not properly," she answers, looking back down to the little assembly of cloth and bottles in her lap. "I'd heard stories. She was a healer, like me. I might have taken after her."
A twitch of a smile, as Derrica looks back up at Athessa to add, "From what I heard, she'd have scolded you much more than I did."
A wince, imagining the sort of scolding that'd be. Sorry, great-grandma Rivain. Next time, she'll beg forgiveness properly.
"Phew. I guess I'm glad to have been let off so light, then," she jokes, though somewhat apologetically. She'd beg forgiveness of Derrica, too, if she'd hear it. Athessa un-bunches her shirt from her grip, getting ready to put it back on despite the blood and tear.
"I was supposed to take after my grandmother, I think. Or expected to, what with the whole...skipping-a-generation thing. What was your great-gran's name?"
"Adila," Derrica says, in the same breath as, "No, Athessa, don't put that back on."
The shirt needs to be washed and mended. There's probably someone in the village who would do that for them, but that doesn't do much for Athessa in the meantime.
"Let me lend you something. Just for your walk back to wherever they have you sleeping."
She, rather comically, freezes when Derrica tells her not to put the shirt on. Like she can't figure what the alternative action she's meant to take is.
"It's fine, really," she says, shrugging one shoulder. If she borrows something from Derrica, it'll smell like her, and she'll think about that the entire time she's wearing it, and—
She shakes out the shirt, which looks...not fine, actually. It looks like a shirt she got off a dead body. Grim. No wonder Derrica was concerned.
"Ah. I see why Great-Granny Adila would've scolded me, now. It looks worse than I thought."
If Athessa had been able to see the mark, maybe she wouldn't be so surprised about the shirt. But Derrica just nods, eyebrows raised for a moment before she pulls her rucksack towards her.
"I have a tunic, you can just—"
A break, while Derrica huffs her way through the contents of her pack. They're nearly the same size, but the loose, soft material of the shirt Derrica's thinking about will be more comfortable than some of her other potential offerings.
"Just so you don't look like you've murdered or been murdered on your way back. And so you don't ruin all the time we took getting the blood cleared off you."
Delicately avoiding mentioning that the blood was smeared all across Athessa's chest.
All the time Derrica took, she means. Guilt pangs hollow in her chest. Another joke, then, to ward it off:
"The man boarding us would probably just think me another ghost," she scoffs, lightly. "When he's not mistaking me for a servant he thinks I'm his long lost niece and tells me all about how haunted the guest wing is."
She folds her shirt so the blood is contained and hidden beneath the cleaner layers, but keeps hold of it with one hand. A reminder why she's here, an anchor to keep her from drifting too close. (It doesn't stop that magnetic lean, the tilt of her head, the slight parting of her lips even as a smile lingers there.)
"Do you think that's better or worse than being mistaken for a barmaid?" Derrica asks lightly. She feels some prickle of anticipation. The awareness of moments like this, when she could simply lean forward just so and change the trajectory of the night, has never been worrisome.
But it's Athessa, and Derrica can't be so careless. Besides, this is a shared room anyway, a saving grace for both of them as Derrica pulls out one of her spare shirts.
"Here. Try this? It should be more comfortable than something stiff with blood anyway."
"Depends on whether or not barmaids get free drinks," she says. Between ghost, servant, niece, and barmaid, she'd pick the ghost.
Derrica's shirt is roomier in the chest on Athessa, but fits about the same everywhere else. It's comfortable, and most importantly it's clean and not torn or bloody. (And, sure enough, it smells like her.)
"How's it look?" Asked as she flips her hair up over the collar so it doesn't get trapped beneath the shirt.
For a moment, Derrica doesn't say anything. She looks at Athessa, expression softening into a smile.
"You look good."
Which can be diminished any number of ways, especially when Athessa arrived covered in blood. But the sweetness of Derrica's tone lingers before she draws a breath, then stands, contents of her satchel clinking.
"I can walk you out, if you want. I need to bring some of these tankards back down."
Later on, that sweetness will be the reason Athessa thinks of Derrica, not the Venatori when she traces the pale scar on her chest. When she's back at the senile old man's estate, alone in the too-large, overstuffed bed and replaying the memory of this over and over and over again, she'll lay the shirt over her pillow and fall asleep thinking of that smile.
"Alright," she says, standing as well and setting about collecting her field leathers. The idea of imposing on Derrica even more would have her denying the offer, but— "Since you've gotta go down there anyway. Need me to carry any of 'em?"
"The plate?" Derrica prompts, having balanced three tankards accordingly in her arm. "If you have a spare hand."
If not, the plate's lived in their room for a day, it can stay for another. She lets Athessa head down the stairs first into small alcove between the bar, main room, and small backroom where the makeshift kitchen lives. Trading off the tankards, Derrica touches Athessa's elbow lightly as she turns to go.
"See Isaac about the scar when you can. He might be able to do better than I did."
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"The beer is good, at least. If you want food I can probably ask them to bring me something while I work on this."
The noise from the tavern drifts up to them, conversations overlapping at increasing volume punctuated by the occasional shouted proclamation.
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"There were fucking Stalkers in the trees, and he was running around like an idiot, yelling. Oh, wait, here—" Athessa sets the tankard down and untucks her shirt. It takes some care to get it off without the material rubbing against the raw skin.
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But there's only a very soft sigh before Derrica swaps the bloodied slip of gauze for the cloth in her satchel. Ket's waterskin is close at hand, easy enough to make use of in the moment.
She has touched Athessa's skin before. (Her mouth has been here, trailing a line down from Athessa's neck to—) It should be easy to be clinical, but it isn't. Her fingers press lightly at Athessa's ribs, where a bruise is forming.
"You should have brought more than just one of their volunteers," Derrica tells her, relieved at sensing no broken bones. "It could have been worse than just a slash."
They could have cut your throat, Derrica doesn't say.
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"It was one of ours," she says, covering the hitch in her breath at being touched by clearing her throat. "Edgard or something, I dunno. He was covering me with the longbow, I was flanking the two by the fire — there were supposed to be five in all, but there were six.
"Before I could get in place one of the Stalkers got the drop on me. If I hadn't taken this hit, her other dagger would've—"
Athessa gestures to the side of her neck opposite the tail end of the slash. She wouldn't have been alive to come here if it weren't for choosing the lesser of two evils.
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"I can't tell if he's capable in a fight or not," Derrica says, trying to curb her own uncharitable anger at him. Her hand lifts briefly to cover the point at Athessa's throat where she'd indicated, as if to ward against any further potential for injury there. It might not be Edgard's fault entirely. Some fights are simple a mess from the start, with things going wrong that no one could have foreseen. Derrica reminds herself of this as she continues.
"He's a good shot with that bow, but he's..."
Casting about for the right word, drawing the cloth along Athessa's skin to mop away the streaks of blood along her chest.
"Erratic," Derrica finishes, reaching for the waterskin again. "If you go out with him again you should still have someone else along until he's more settled."
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Even without magic, Derrica's touch leaves electricity in its wake. All Athessa can do to try and keep attention off her pulse or her heartbeat beneath that cloth is keep talking. All she can do to keep from thinking about how close they are (how close they were) is look aside.
"It's not his fault there were more than the reports said but it's baffling how he's survived this long. When I put the knife into the fire, he asked me if I was cleaning it."
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"Maybe he shouldn't be doing so much fieldwork if he's so untrained," Derrica hazards, though between them what can that objection really do? Derrica isn't Commander of Forces. She doesn't decide who goes where.
And she isn't so sure Edgard isn't entirely untrained. He was a good marksman. That wasn't something that someone comes by accidentally.
"I don't think I can get rid of the scar," she continues, drawing the damp rag back. Her hand closes a little tighter around it, setting against the lingering softness of Athessa's skin. She'd sponged away the blood along the slight curve of her breasts and didn't dare linger there. She focuses her gaze on the uneven burn, flushed cheeks balancing against the professional scrutiny. "Was Edgard hurt, or were you the only unlucky one?"
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"Figures," she says, lips quirking wryly. And she makes the mistake of looking at Derrica's face then, watching her examination of the mark across her chest.
"He got a scratch on his arm. The way he whined about me dressing it you'd think he'd lost all his toes or something. I told him to go to the infirmary tent, but he's also rooming with Colin, so he'll be sorted right. I might speak to the Commander about him, or at least let Yseult know that he's not suited for tagging along on scouting missions."
The soft flickering light from lanterns casts warmth and shadow across Derrica's face, so close, so lovely. Athessa's lips, slightly parted. The urge to reach forward and tilt Derrica's face towards her own is so strong, the desire to kiss her ever-present.
"Sorry," she says instead of giving in, though her head cants slightly to one side, she leans ever so slightly. Her fingers curl tighter against her bloody shirt. "This probably isn't how you wanted to spend your night."
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"But you're right to speak with them," Derrica continues, veering towards something less fraught than how she cared to spend her night. "I had just thought I should say something to the Commander, but...it feels that he has more than enough to attend to without me adding something else."
Even though this is theoretically Flint's job, something he might need to know. Derrica sighs, leaning back to look critically at the slash as she unfolds the damp cloth over her thigh. No, she doesn't think the scar will come out, but she'd like to erase it. Athessa's carrying enough scrapes as it is.
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Athessa doesn't look at the scar, just as she avoided looking at her face directly after Churneau. She's only just come to terms with the one scar, she'd rather not have to stare down another.
"He's annoyed with me by default, so I'll tell him. Better he hear about it before Edgard goes off being reckless with—" Someone who matters. "—anybody else."
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"Maybe we leave him a letter," Derrica suggests, because at the least that seems to give the Commander the option to deal with evaluating Edgard at his leisure. Easier to field than having someone directly in front of him, pressing for action.
"Here," she continues, passing away from the subject. "I'm going to try casting something, and then you'll have one of my potions while I bandage it. If we're lucky, what's left won't be much of anything."
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Considering recent concerns about missing correspondence, and that admittedly humorous situation with Matthias finding an unsigned note and suspecting a prank.
She nods to Derrica's plan; the spell, the potion, the bandage.
"Need me to do anything?" A silly question, asked for silliness' sake. She knows the answer will likely be to sit still. "Strike a pose, perhaps? Pray to some deity for a blessing?"
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It has to be uncomfortable to have any kind of pressure over that wound. But the cover of Dericca's hand gives way to a cool rush of magic, flowing from her palm across Athessa's skin. The discomfort ebbs, eased into nothingness beneath the glow emanating from Derrica's hand.
When she lifts her hand away, the angry, raw red of the slash has faded into pale scar tissue. Derrica sighs over the lingering mark, running a finger along the scarring check her work.
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They sigh in unison, though for Athessa it’s simply releasing that breath. The discomfort doesn’t bother her, not with the knowledge that it’s Derrica’s hand covering the pain and soothing it away. Tracing the newest scar in Athessa’s collection of mishaps.
“You’re amazing, you know that?” It comes out before she can think not to say it. But why shouldn’t she say it? She’d feel the same about Derrica’s skill even without the swarm of butterflies in her stomach.
“Did you know your great-grandmother?”
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"Isaac might have done better," Derrica cautions. He's older, more experienced, and he does good work. He might be able to fix this still, though Derrica doesn't speculate. She shrugs a little over the question, compliment sufficiently squared away.
"Not properly," she answers, looking back down to the little assembly of cloth and bottles in her lap. "I'd heard stories. She was a healer, like me. I might have taken after her."
A twitch of a smile, as Derrica looks back up at Athessa to add, "From what I heard, she'd have scolded you much more than I did."
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"Phew. I guess I'm glad to have been let off so light, then," she jokes, though somewhat apologetically. She'd beg forgiveness of Derrica, too, if she'd hear it. Athessa un-bunches her shirt from her grip, getting ready to put it back on despite the blood and tear.
"I was supposed to take after my grandmother, I think. Or expected to, what with the whole...skipping-a-generation thing. What was your great-gran's name?"
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The shirt needs to be washed and mended. There's probably someone in the village who would do that for them, but that doesn't do much for Athessa in the meantime.
"Let me lend you something. Just for your walk back to wherever they have you sleeping."
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"It's fine, really," she says, shrugging one shoulder. If she borrows something from Derrica, it'll smell like her, and she'll think about that the entire time she's wearing it, and—
She shakes out the shirt, which looks...not fine, actually. It looks like a shirt she got off a dead body. Grim. No wonder Derrica was concerned.
"Ah. I see why Great-Granny Adila would've scolded me, now. It looks worse than I thought."
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"I have a tunic, you can just—"
A break, while Derrica huffs her way through the contents of her pack. They're nearly the same size, but the loose, soft material of the shirt Derrica's thinking about will be more comfortable than some of her other potential offerings.
"Just so you don't look like you've murdered or been murdered on your way back. And so you don't ruin all the time we took getting the blood cleared off you."
Delicately avoiding mentioning that the blood was smeared all across Athessa's chest.
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"The man boarding us would probably just think me another ghost," she scoffs, lightly. "When he's not mistaking me for a servant he thinks I'm his long lost niece and tells me all about how haunted the guest wing is."
She folds her shirt so the blood is contained and hidden beneath the cleaner layers, but keeps hold of it with one hand. A reminder why she's here, an anchor to keep her from drifting too close. (It doesn't stop that magnetic lean, the tilt of her head, the slight parting of her lips even as a smile lingers there.)
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But it's Athessa, and Derrica can't be so careless. Besides, this is a shared room anyway, a saving grace for both of them as Derrica pulls out one of her spare shirts.
"Here. Try this? It should be more comfortable than something stiff with blood anyway."
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Derrica's shirt is roomier in the chest on Athessa, but fits about the same everywhere else. It's comfortable, and most importantly it's clean and not torn or bloody. (And, sure enough, it smells like her.)
"How's it look?" Asked as she flips her hair up over the collar so it doesn't get trapped beneath the shirt.
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"You look good."
Which can be diminished any number of ways, especially when Athessa arrived covered in blood. But the sweetness of Derrica's tone lingers before she draws a breath, then stands, contents of her satchel clinking.
"I can walk you out, if you want. I need to bring some of these tankards back down."
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"Alright," she says, standing as well and setting about collecting her field leathers. The idea of imposing on Derrica even more would have her denying the offer, but— "Since you've gotta go down there anyway. Need me to carry any of 'em?"
put a bow on this pls
If not, the plate's lived in their room for a day, it can stay for another. She lets Athessa head down the stairs first into small alcove between the bar, main room, and small backroom where the makeshift kitchen lives. Trading off the tankards, Derrica touches Athessa's elbow lightly as she turns to go.
"See Isaac about the scar when you can. He might be able to do better than I did."
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