Mistakes Were Made

[Tarq]

Her name was Elaine, or perhaps Alayne; he never learned her husband’s name. Her hair was a color somewhere between honey and the floor’s wooden paneling, and in her elaborate shoes she stood near as tall as he did. When he got close enough, her gown let him see the sort of statuesque figure that would have overflowed without regular exercise. “I keep my husband’s horses,” she answered to his compliment, with a small and dangerous smile. “I ride as well, I’d bet you, as any woman you’ve ever met.”

Her husband (whatever his name) was a captain, knighted for valor in the deserts of Silithus, now serving with the Second Legion up north. “He returns when he can, by ship or mage, but he’s rarely given leave – and rarely asks for it. It’s best to show willing, he says, and not appear an idler, if he wants to hold a true command and make a better life for us.”

“I’d sich a wife back home,” he lied easily, “I’d be clawin’ at the gates fir leave. First in line at the adjutant’s tent. Hell, might be I’d ha’ my brithers break an elbow an’ get me sent ashore.” She blushed prettily, but he saw the question in her eyes. You had such a wife, didn’t you?

Her name was Elaine, and she read the papers and knew well who he was. She was clever enough to pretend she didn’t know what that entailed, and hungry enough to let him see she was pretending. When she asked for news of Genise, he put her off with evasions and a half-raunchy story about the famous painting that hung in Genise’s now-empty office.

“I’ve been to the Feather thrice,” she confided, “and I was hoping to have a membership from my husband. But I’m not sure that’s wise until we know where the money will be going to. Those Estertons, they’re snakes, everyone knows it.” He nodded approvingly, said something cutting and wordly and whiskey-scented to make her laugh and glow. “So I come here to the Laughing Lion instead, to pass the time. I’m here alone.”

She said it significantly. He wondered how many other women of her age and status were “here alone.” He’d seen her pass looks to two already. He got her and himself more drinks, asked her about her horses, and responded with a story about Bastard. You never really lost your touch for this, and he was old enough to admit without shame that there was little enough difference between charming Elaine the knight-captain’s wife and winkling Lenny Bends out of a dock tariff. It’s all in what tools you use.

Some brawny boy who also read the papers sealed the deal by giving them long and lingering looks from a table across the way. He had a sneer below his rat-tail moustache and a lieutenant’s pips on his shoulder, and when he finally drank enough courage to lurch to his feet and come swaggering across the floor, Tarquin whispered a prayer of thanks. “What are you doing, drinking here?” the young lieutenant demanded.

“Exactly, mate,” he replied urbanely, and smiled to answer the complete incomprehension on the boy's broad face. “Yeh care fir ta join us?” Elaine crinkled her face in a scowl before she looked at him and caught the patent falsity of his grin.

The bully-boy caught it too, looming closer to block out the light of the social club’s many lanterns. “I know who you are,” he said, brassily menacing. It was too perfect.

“Hnh.” He turned to Elaine. “D’yeh see aught wrong wi’ my nose, lass?”

“Your nose? It looks fine, darling.” She couldn’t quite hide her grin, knowing something was coming. A clever woman, alright.

“Funny. Cos’ the lad here says he kens wha’ I am, but I dinna smell any piss at all.” He turned the bright malice of his smile up at the boy. “Mus’ be the drink, ay?” He waited for her laughter – a full, chortling belly laugh, not a silvery society giggle – and then as the lieutenant’s face reddened and his fist rose, Tarquin clamped strangler’s fingers around his beefy wrist and wrenched back his thumb like a chicken wing.

Five degrees off of true, he remembered Osborne saying, before things start to break. There was too much whiskey in front of his eyes for geometry, but he hadn’t heard a crack yet. He showed a few more teeth to the wide-eyed pomegranate occupying the air above him. “Drop yir hand.” The ham-heavy fist lowered. “Barry. When I gie yir thumb back, yir gonna use it ta pay fir yir drinks an’ then yir fuckin’ oaf outay here.” The lieutenant opened his mouth. “Dinna talk. Dinna haver oan at me, an’ dinna but glance at the lady. Pay an’ walk.”

He twisted just a bit further, then let the boy go, wondering if he’d misjudged him and was about to have more than he’d bargained for. But he kept the hungry smile on his face, and the lieutenant turned and paid and walked.

There was another pair of drinks, another half an hour while Elaine sent significant looks to another handful of officer’s wives, but that was all formality. He didn’t recall what excuses they made to each other and to the ghosts hanging over their shoulders, but soon he was outside with a tall, honey-haired woman with half a name on his arm, calling for a carriage.

************************************

She had skin as soft as pastry, but true to promise, her legs coiled like rope. A maidservant, doing her best impression of a deaf, dumb and blind woman, had left a lantern burning, but he'd snuffed it and silenced Elaine's question with his mouth. Now, as she rose and fell dimly above him in the moon-rimmed black, he could almost believe the lies that the slap of skin on skin whispered in his ears.

"Didn't I tell you?" she purred when her breath came back to her. "I ride as well as any woman you've ever met." A hundred men might've sworn the truth of that, but not him. Never him. He traced the shape of her jaw with his finger, as gentle as he'd ever been, and then cupped her neck and pulled her down.

Later, sweating out the whiskey haze, he tangled his fingers in her short straight hair and wondered at how well-kempt it was for a foolish moment. Her whispers and groans had begun to irritate him; they stank of performance, even if the lust behind them was real. Look at me. Look at what you do to me. Her fingers scrabbled at the headboard. We're something to each other. We are something. The more I pant and arch, the harder you push, the more we prove it.

He closed his eyes, tried to find what was left of the cloud that had carried him here, and proved. It was almost enough.

Later still, he waited until her breathing had grown regular and then slid from the bed. He searched his rumpled clothes until he found a match, and lit both a cigarette and the lantern. Sitting in the half-shuttered light, he looked around the room with a professional eye, noting distantly the furnishings, the jewelry, the marks of a woman who had done well for herself. It took him some time to realize he was sizing the place up for burglary, and some more time to realize he couldn't think of a good reason not to.

After a few hours of fruitless circular thinking, he extinguished the lantern and made his careful way through the mid-morning black, into a stranger's bed. She turned in her sleep and nestled against him, and he claimed his treasonous eyes shut and prayed for sleep to come swiftly.

**************************************

It was past dawn when Tarquin awoke. He cursed himself for sleeping in, but wonder of wonders, she was still there, asleep. He smiled, immediately grimaced at the taste of last night's whiskey, and turned to shift her possessive arm and ask her what the hell they'd been thinking last night when they -

Her name was Elaine, and her arms were soft and yielding, her naked skin golden-pink like apricots. Tarquin stared at the ceiling until it made sense to him and then slipped from the woman's embrace and found his clothes. He dressed carefully, concentrating on each clasp and button and nothing else. Smallclothes, trousers, tunic, vest, belt, coat, boots, cloak, hat. Lastly, he reclaimed the knife he'd secreted beneath his pillow and sheathed it in his boot. When he looked back, her eyes were open.

"Leaving so soon?" Elaine murmured sleepily.

"Na rest fir the wicked," he said, and winced inwardly at the cliche. Like a fucking Lovelace book. "An' I dinna wager yeh'd like ta rely oan yir neighbors fir the sleep in much further'n thon."

She pushed herself up, letting the blankets fall to her waist, with the same smile she'd had when they were speaking of something that certainly wasn't horsemanship. "Then I owe you breakfast. When can I see you again?"

Oh fuck. "No' sure thit's wise, lass," he said, with the thimbleful of kindness that he'd woken up with. He ought to leave without another word, but he wasn't. If I tell myself I'm just enjoying the view, will I believe me?

Elaine certainly didn't. "Not wise," she said, her eyes narrowing. "Of course not. Wise isn't the point of this. I'm not some foolish girl."

"No' hardly." He averted his eyes slightly, looking at a point somewhere past her bare shoulder. "Yir a woman wed, wi' some kind ay bright future 'head ay yeh, fir certain. An' I'm..." A fucking tosser. "...a man o'erstayin' his welcome in some ither punter's world." He pulled off his hat and bowed low. "Dinna mistake me, Elaine, wis all sorts ay fun. But the sortay fun best remainin' a happy mem'ry."

His hand was on the door-handle when she spoke again. "Before you go, I thought you should know." He heard the note of danger in her voice, and knew he should open the door and keep walking. But he'd always been an idiot for a pretty face, and to be sure, there was one staring sweet poison at him when he turned. "No matter what you might say, Master ap Danwyrith, my name isn't Ceil."

That one hurt, deep in the belly - likely as much as it had hurt her last night. It was on his lips to apologize, to offer half an explanation and perhaps the truth that he didn't even remember saying...saying what he'd said. But she was looking at him with scornful certainty, like every man and woman in Stormwind who thought they knew who he was. Like Marcus Abbendis, like Shael O'Connaugh, like Mathias Shaw.

Like his father.

So he put his hat back on and let his eyes travel down and back up her once-pliant body, until she flushed and pulled the blanket to her neck. He smiled, then, wide and white and cruel. "Nah," he said. "Thit, it virra much is'na." He let the wound show on her face, as raw and open as if his knife had made it, and then opened the door and walked away.

[Threnn]

Farley had sent for her, late in the day.  The Pride's latest sensation had gone and caught herself a bad case of minstrel's finger -- which was a polite way of saying she'd spend the majority of her set clawing at the itch in her nethers if they put her up onstage -- and that would never do.  So wouldn't she please come and save him, just for one night?  Drinks on the house, double her old pay, anything, anything, just come and sing.

And so she had.

The inn hadn't changed since the last time she'd performed here.  The patrons hadn't changed all that much, either -- soldiers, farmers, minor nobles, travellers passing through -- though they wore different faces.  But even that was another example of all that had stayed the same.  She wondered if maybe she was still the same, too.

Her eyes roamed over the crowd, gauging their mood, choosing the songs that would draw them out, make them call for more ale, make them drop coins in her lute's case between ballads.  She strummed the instrument idly, her fingers picking out a lilting little nothing-melody to get their attention.  It worked like it always had:  the hush spread through them like ripples on a pond, quieter and quieter, until all eyes were on her.

Then the notes trailed off, too, her fingers gone still upon the strings.  Her head was bent, eyes on the floor.  The anticipation grew until it was near-palpable.  Some of them leaned ever so slightly forward, as though they couldn't exhale until she gave them permission.  Then she lifted her chin and threw them her bawdiest smile as she launched into the first verse of "Redridge Lasses."

It came back so easily.  Eye contact, of course, was extremely important for a bard -- give this one a grin, that one a wink, make each person in the crowd think she was singing for a party of one.  A coy look for that one, let your eyes linger a full measure on that one -- within three verses, they were hers. 

Then there was the one in the front row.

He sat dead center, long-fingers curled around a glass of bourbon.  His cotton shirt likely doubled for Sunday best or a night on the town.  Bits of mud still clung to the bottoms of his boots despite the brushing he'd clearly given them.  A farmhand, then, someone who had cleaned up for an evening of leisure.  And cleaned up nicely, at that.  He stared up at her with eyes the color of the earth he turned day in and day out, and when he was sure he had her attention, he let them travel down, then up again.

She knew how this dance went.  She hadn't moved through its steps for nearly two years, but she remembered every single beat.  Lower the lashes, find a smile that's just for him, now turn away and smolder at someone else.

But only burn when you look at him.

That came back easily, too.

---

If you do this, there's no going back.

During her break, he came to her in the kitchen.  She pressed coins into his palm, enough for a room on the quiet side of the inn, and pointed him at Farley.

If you do this, you're every inch the whore he tried convincing you you weren't.

When the singing was done, when she'd finished making them howl with laughter and weep with songs of the frozen north, when they'd gone hoarse from shouting back the chorus of "The Fox and the Cocks," she packed her lute in its case and made her bows.  They begged for one more and she gave it to them, unaccompanied.  A lover's song.  She closed her eyes as she sang, her voice gone hushed and husky.  She tried not to remember the feel of golden hair beneath her fingertips or the smell of the sea, where she'd been when last she'd sung this song.  When she'd sung it for him and him alone. 

When she opened her eyes, she saw her new conquest ascending the stairs.

She followed.

If you do this, you're not worthy of him.

She couldn't tell if she was dragging him backwards while he kissed her, or if he was the one in charge, driving her forward in his enthusiasm.  Either way, her back slammed into the door hard enough to make it rattle in its frame.

Fin would have stopped, asked if she was all right, eased back in.  Her new companion didn't even seem to notice.  She was glad for it; she didn't think she could bear even that small kindness tonight.

I was never worthy.

---

"I... I sometimes find myself thinking about your past relationships.  What... what you told me.  And I know I shouldn't! I really do.  I don't care about them.
 
"But, you know. I grew up in the country. I haven't...  I found Johanna when I was young, and that was it. After the plague, working for the church doesn't leave much time for a social life, aye?  I'm just sayin' for various reasons I haven't... I haven't been with many women."  Fin looked down, embarrassed.  "You were likely expecting a more... worldly man."

"Fin, look at me."

He did, reluctantly.  She took his hand and moved in closer.

"I'll bet you knew every curve of Johanna's skin.  And what kind of day she'd had by how she kissed you.  Walked into a crowded room, and you could find her by her laugh."

His grin was tinged with memory.  "We were still young, but aye. I knew her well."

"I had to start from the beginning.  Every time."

---

For the third time, she guided his hand to where she wanted it and for the third time, it felt good until he got caught up in what she was doing to him, and he forgot all over again.

She'd been patient about it, once upon a time, willing to let them figure it out as the candles burned lower and lower.  But it had been so long since she'd had to to that at all, she was surprised to find herself contemplating throwing out some verbal directions. 

Fin would have known. 

He would have known that when she gasped like --this-- he was getting something very right, and shouldn't stop.  Or that when she moved --so-- it was her way of telling him to slow down, to give her a moment to catch up to him, because they moved together so beautifully, so perfectly when one was right there with the other, when their breaths came in ragged sync and every move was harmony.  Fin had learned those things even during their first awkward night together, when they were still shyly learning the nuances of each touch.  He'd picked up on it and never forgotten.  And she could get there now, she could, if he'd only slow down a moment, if he'd just hold back a few more seconds, if he'd just wait, if he'd just slow down, if he'd just

"...wait, wait, please..."  But it wasn't Fin straining away above her, tonight.  He took her whispers for encouragement and upped his pace.  He groaned into the curve of her neck, shuddered, and lay still as she ached beneath him.

---

The second try was better.  She took what she wanted, sparing little notice for the things she'd recognized the first time around that signalled his pleasure, concentrating solely on her own.  She set her own rhythm as she moved atop him, let her fingers roam to wherever felt best.  Her cheeks colored with the wantonness, the pure carnality of her actions.

But her bedmate didn't seem to care; in fact, it only spurred him on.  She finished seconds before he did, but none of the hoped-for consonance came with it.  They were two people who had finished similar tasks at a similar time, nothing more.

He gathered her into his arms after, nuzzling at her neck and asking quiet questions as their breathing slowed.  She answered politely, pretending she hadn't had this same conversation with a hundred men before him. 

(A hundred men save one.)

(Shut up.)

Her replies slid from her tongue like a song she'd memorized long ago, one that had faded in her memory, but one she could never fully forget.

It all came back so easily.

---

She drew her knees up to her chest in the pre-dawn light, wondering why she felt so cold despite the blankets that covered them both, despite the warm body at her side.  She thought about waking him up again, for one more fuck before the sun rose.

But it would be just as fruitless as the first two times.  Fin had gotten under her skin -- she'd let him get there, let him dig down through her muscles and settle deep into her bones.  No matter how hard or fast or deep the man beside her might thrust, it wouldn't drive out love, or hurt, or loneliness.

And she knew, even though she didn't dare face it yet, that when she got home, no matter how hard she scrubbed at her skin, she'd find she'd done the irrevocable.  No amount of soap would wash away this betrayal. 

We're over.  I went to him and said as much, and in the end, he let me go.  I can bed whoever I want, and so can he.

I hope he's fucking a camp follower, right now.

I hope he's fucking some woman from the Silver Hand, or the Kirin Tor, or whoever else he takes a fancy to.

It was a lie, but she repeated it to herself anyway.  She pictured it, too, for good measure, conjured up women both real and imagined writhing above him, and pretended it didn't bother her.

"Fuck," she muttered, and threw the covers off.  She dressed hastily; they hadn't bothered with a fire last night, so now her skin prickled with gooseflesh as she yanked her dress over her head.  Something else had come back, too, the mantra that rattled around in her head at times like this:  men leave.

Men left.  Even Fin, with all his good intentions, had left her behind.  She had no delusions that this time would be any different.  So she did what she'd taught herself to do long ago:  she gathered up her lute and her cloak, found her underthings, and started for the door.

"We were good together," he said from behind her.  She paused at the door, but didn't turn.

We were, Fin and I.  But that's over now.

"I could make you happy." As though she hadn't heard that before, either.

"No," she said, gently as she could.  "You couldn't."

[Beltar]

((I read these two awesome posts and this song immediately popped into my head...

Robert Earl Keen, "I'll Go On Downtown"

I've got clothes in my closet and new shoes to wear
All that I wanted I've more than my share
And the woman who loves me she's more than a dream
So why am I feeling so low down and mean

Well I gave up on smokin' two years ago
And I ain't been drinkin' for a month now or so
And I tell everybody that I've nothin' to hide
While I keep the devil locked deep down inside

But tonight I'll be out there runnin' around
Tonight by the light of the moon on the ground
Tonight while the neighbors are sleepin' so sound
Tonight I'll slip off and I'll go on downtown

We used to get crazy and jump in our cars
We'd burn up the highways and close down the bars
But now we're all married and some moved away
And when we get together there's nothing to say

But tonight I'll be out there runnin' around
Tonight by the light of the moon on the ground
Tonight while the neighbors are sleepin' so sound
Tonight I'll slip off and I'll go on downtown

The lights are all down and the moon's hangin' high
And the stars are all shining way up in the sky
And if anyone's askin' where I'll be found
It's home in the mornin' but tonight I'm downtown

And tonight I'll be out there runnin' around
Tonight by the light of the moon on the ground
Tonight while the neighbors are sleepin' so sound
Tonight I'll slip off and I'll go on downtown

Yes tonight I'll be out there runnin' around
Tonight by the light of the moon on the ground
Tonight while the neighbors are sleepin' so sound
Tonight I'll slip off and I'll go on downtown))

[Tarq]

((The soundtrack to writing my half of this post was actually "Minutes On A Screen" by the Tossers. I unfortunately can't find a Youtube upload of it or anything, but it's frigging awesome. Go listen to it.))

[Bricu]

(I need to hear this one, because I might actually know who this is bout....)

[Threnn]

(("Sweet Magdalena of My Misfortune," Cracker:

I have lost the one I love to someone else
She lies beside me, but she's not here, she's far away
She's walking softly, she's talking sweetly about a dream
Sweet Magdalena of my misfortune, where are you now?
Things I lost, left behind, or threw away
They gather in the dusky light of reverie
Always with me, where I go, sweet company, or is it misery?
Sweet Magdalena of my misfortune, where have you gone?
So many ways to go and lay your burdens down
Yeah, so many hours from now to the dawn
Yeah, so many words I never found to make you stay just one more day
Sweet Magdalena of my misfortune, where have you gone?
Yeah, so many words I never found to make you stay for just one more day
Sweet Magdalena of my misfortune, where are you now?
Yeah, sweet Magdalena of my misfortune, where are you now?))

[Rouba]

Pretty sailors with broad, tall bodies and easy smiles are a dime a dozen at port. Robert is also young, straight out of Westfall. She would put money on it. Farm boys with a way of speaking plain and hardly a chest hair have no business being out in the heart of the Cartel's dealings, but they run off to do it anyway, thirsty for more adventure than they can find behind a plow. In this case, he hasn't even had time to experience his first shore leave. She is doing him a favor, taking him away from his scurvy-ridden mates and sparing him the inevitability of a bored pay-fuck for one more weekend.

He's inexperienced, and it shows. He fumbles more than once, but she helps, and he's eager. No doubt she's teaching him skills for the future free of charge, and she's okay with that. She doesn't expect much else from him, and when she crawls out of bed in the morning she is profoundly unsurprised to find him still beside her, arms curled around her naked body as he sleeps. The washroom is cold, so she cleans up quickly in the grey early morning light.

Coffee perked, she pours a cup and cracks a few eggs into a bowl. Barefoot, she scrambles them over the stove, spatula in one hand and cigarette in the other, dressed in a pair of sturdy, hip-hugging canvas pants and a warm sweater. When he slips his warm hands around her waist, she's not caught off-guard; nor does she flinch when he kisses the side of her neck. She cuts the eggs in two with the spatula and sets the bigger portion on a plate. "Toast's on the hearth," she says, nodding toward the grate. He kisses her again, hands sliding up over the flat plane of her belly under the soft knit of her shirt. She resigns herself to the prospect of a cold breakfast, takes the skillet off the heat, and grabs his wrist, dragging him past the fireplace (she simply moves the toast-trap to one side of the hearth; it'll warm later).

She lies quietly for some time, watching the dawn turn the walls of her tiny bedroom red, then gold, pale arms folded behind her head while he sleeps sprawled over her. He's warm, and his weight is comforting, but it's wearing thin fast. She nudges him, shifting her body and looking down into his groggy and handsome--if boyish--face.

"A'right, git."

"What?" Blue eyes flecked with hazel and awash with bewilderment greeted her. "But..."

"Y'got yours, didn't ya? Go on. Breakfast's portable, an' I've got shite ta do." She wiggled out from under him, easily dodging his attempts to pull her back into bed, hauling her faded pants up over her narrow hips and fastening the buttons one after another. She tossed his shirt and pants at the bed and they smacked into him, a loose sleeve blocking his view of her bare breasts for an instant before he pulled it off of his face and gaped at her, confusion giving way to hurt.

"Can I see you again?"

"Wouldn't count on it, sugar." She pulled on her boots, tucked her pants into them and buckled the straps, fastening them snugly at her ankles and up her calves. Then her dark eyes were on him. "Better get dressed, darlin', or ye'll be vacatin' in yer skivvies."

She pulled her sweater over her head and stalked off to the kitchen, returning the toast to the coals and sucking down cold coffee with a grimace. Her sailor appeared just as she was stacking cold eggs on warm bread, cigarette dangling from the corner of her mouth. She pressed the sandwich into his hands without a word, buckled his belt for him, and tucked his wallet back into his pocket. "Wouldn't want t'forget this, eh." The poor boy looked shell-shocked, sandwich grasped in one large hand, forgotten. She herded him out of the apartment, shrugging her long jacket on over the belt with holstered knives she wore low and snug on her hips.

"But..."

Skulley swiftly reached up and put a hand on the back of his neck, pulling him down to stop his protest with her mouth before it could properly begin. A long moment later, she released him and locked her door, clearing her throat as she did so. "S'enough a' that, never leave th'house at this rate."

She patted his backside as she passed and headed down the common stairwell, calling up over her shoulder at the dazed young man. "Ye've got a fine arse, Bobby. Never let anyone say different."