|
Greasha Torwold's page
30 posts. Alias of Laithoron.
|
The faintest hint of a blush arose on Greasha's cheeks at Darvesch's compliment, but she in no way interrupted him as they turned east along Trade Street. Even at their height, the uppermost reaches of the great coliseum beyond could be seen above the gatehouse dividing New Viamaré from Colossineum. Although it fell out of view the moment they turned the corner, her lover's words turned her head back in the direction of the Palace.
"Is this one of those dark places then, this city?"
Thinking back to the scene she had witnessed atop Arrowhead from the deck of the Zephrys, she laughed at herself and shook her head. "I'm just saying, aside from the devils and demons and evil wizards it doesn't seem like such a bad place. Why, you should have it all cleaned up in no time."
Perceptive as he was, it wasn't difficult for Darvesch to note a tinge of melancholy in Greasha's voice at the thought of him being tied to the jungle city. Still, for now at least, she seemed content enough with the time they were getting to share with one another.
"Do I enjoy my work...?" Darvesch's question gave Greasha pause. "Ship's cook is an honest job and I'm good enough at it. Mother and I get along well enough too, but when the bardi tell their tales, you never hear about the ones who saw to it that the heroes' bellies were full."
She gave a shrug. "I'm not one to look for trouble, but an old dwarf ought to have at least a few tales from their youth to tell."
Grinning, she checked Darvesch's pauldron with her shoulder. "Bet your Frænka could sing quite the lay of your deeds."
Darvesch wrote: "What is your dream?" "Oh ho ho!" She shook her head, dark sapphire eyes thoughtful as she looked at the clouds above. "I'd fancy a chance to fly... not with a spell, but really fly, like on a griffon or an eagle. Maybe take down a dragon and open a tavern where I could rub elbows with other heroes..."
Waving a hand as if to shoo a fly, she said, "Gah, listen to me going on like a little girl. What about you on both counts: work and dreams?"
Greasha gave Darvesch a broad smile and made a show of hooking her arm with his the way the human women were apt to. "My ears aren't quite pointed enough, but I'll do my best to keep up. Lead on!"
After giving two quick curtsies and a kiss on her daughter's cheek, Greasha merely raised her eyebrows and shrugged her shoulders at the ruckus her mother made, swatting taller folk out of the way with a large stick of salami as she vanished into the market.
"So," Greasha said, rocking her hips from side to side as she smiled, "about that shopping trip you mentioned..."
At the last thought, the dwarf had to do a double-take when he saw Greasha tug on her mother's sleeve and point excitedly in his direction.
"Wonder if there's somewhere around here we could slip off to for a romp..."
Putting two fingers in her mouth, the dwarf's lover gave a loud whistle and waved, calling out loudly enough enough for those in the vicinity to hear, "Show some respect, you tall lot! Don't you know a Knight and a hero when you see one?"
"Ha, knew I could make him blush!"
Even as Giles quirked an eyebrow as the youthful knight doffed his bathrobe in the middle of the formal gardens, Greasha smirked and asked coyly, "Which 'this' are you talking about, your arming jacket, or your dirk?"
Somewhere in the distance, Tiniel could hear Councilor Eluchil gasp, but the dutiful intelligence officer merely remained quiet as she accompanied the Princess back to her chambers. For such a supposedly stoic race, the young elf was finding that dwarves were certainly full of surprises...
"Nice meeting you too, Alis!" She replied enthusiastically, giving a short bow as the Princess headed off to get changed.
When Giles set the tray down and stood by at Darvesch's leisure, she leaned closer and whispered, "I should head back to the ship to talk with Mother about what your Frænka said. The harbor looks like it's on the way back from that island though. If you can stop by on your way back, I'll take you up on that shopping trip! Sound good?"
"If it makes you feel better, Princess," Greasha responded, sweeping her damp bangs to the side, "it is quite a sight better than looking like a drowned rat like I must."
Greasha shifted in her seat with some surprise as much from the news as at the fact that the honey-tongued Princess spoke Dwarven in such a straight-forward and efficient manner. She spared a momentary glance at the warrior beside her and replied, "Princess, I can inform Lord Tyralor about this, but he may want to hear it from you yourself."
Hesitating as she thought back on the question from a moment ago, she said, "If we don't return to Aramol, or set out for Wildethar then I would rather wait things out on solid land, yes."
"Heh, you don't pull any punches, do you Princess?" There was a definite rosy hue to Greasha's face at Alis' ribbing. Even if the elf's words were full of double-entendres, there was an unshying mirth in those purplish eyes that a dwarf could appreciate.
"To be honest, I hadn't thought that far ahead. I am duty-bound to Prince Amthyrian's service though, so it isn't really my place to fancy reneging on a deal like that."
"Aaah, a lass could get used to this!" Greasha gave a satisfied sigh and leaned back in the soft white bathrobe Tiniel had located for her.
'Sweating and getting doused with oil?' She had exclaimed with some surprise when a human servant had offered to help the two bathe. 'Sounds great for quenching steel, but we want to get that stuff off, not make it worse!'
Thankfully, Darvesch's Frænka had been nice enough to allow the two dwarves the use of her personal tub when the dark-haired cook balked at the description of a Malatestan bath.
Now, she and Darvesch were just finishing up a pleasant enough breakfast with Alis, the trio seated in a small gazebo within the peristyle garden. Across from her, the Princess was dressed comfortably in a diaphanous white-silk robe which she wore over an opaque nightgown of amethyst-hued satin. She was still eating some fresh fruit, taking a bite here and there when she wasn't doting upon the hungry mother fox in her lap.
Shaking her head slightly, hair still damp, she remarked, "She's a pretty little thing, but I don't know if I'd quite call her coat golden, Princess."
After the elvish maid-servant had taken her leave and flitted off, Greasha threw back the sheets and hopped out of bed, enjoying the knight's appraising glance as she fetched her clothes from where they'd landed on the floor last night.
"So what's this about tiny golden foxes?" Joking she added, "You're not setting up that poor girl to tease your Frænka for you are you?"
Tut-tutting, she began getting ready but then paused, and said, "I think the old butler would have said if I wasn't welcome to stay the night. Think anyone would have a problem if I washed up here instead of the public baths across the way? An estate of this size is bound to have their own, right?"
Winking at her lover, she confessed, "I don't mind a good sweat, but I don't have a Princess with fancy friends for a Frænka either."
Savvy as he was, it was not difficult for the dwarven knight to glean from Tiniel's guarded words that brunch and a clothes-fitting was merely a cover for the true nature of their meeting — a debriefing session about the state of the country. Nearby, Greasha merely shook her head.
"Nobles and their clandestine meetings," she whispered with a shake of her head.
"Breakfast and shopping, huh?" Greasha planted a fist atop where the bedsheets draped over the curve of her hips. "I don't know, you drive a hard bargain, Sir. Why a girl–"
The sudden, insistent knocking on the door, accompanied by Tiniel's voice caused her to hesitate, grimacing slightly as she tried not to laugh. "Oh, he's better than decent," she whispered just loud enough to catch the other dwarf's attention.
With a shrug of her shoulders, she held up a hand to her new-found lover as if to say, 'All yours.'
LK Calendar: Uniens 23, 4210 — Lansday
Time: 0:00db (daybreak, 6:00am)
Theme: Morning Muse
All across the city, dreams gave way to yawns as bells from the pantheon rang in the new day. In New Viamaré, in a private suite on the upper-most floor of the city's most exclusive nightclub, bare limbs were slow to disentwine, a statuette of a nymph serenading man, woman, demoness, and monkey alike. A mile further south, along the harbor, the bells of a departing ship accompanied the sensation of a pounding hangover and ache of having fallen asleep face-first on a beer-stained bar.
In a small house, near the south end of The Flats, it was the sound of a large warrior snoring softly, whetstone still in hand, that roused a woman who woke to her first morning as a knight. Not far away, it was a young guardswoman belting on her armor for her morning patrol that roused a pair of large black cats from their slumber, a familiar hand scratching behind their ears as they stretched.
Further north, within the high walls of Monument Green, it was the sensation of tiny, cream-colored fox kits nestling between mother and maiden that caused a Princess to awaken with a sigh of contentment. Last, but certainly not least, it was the feeling of a woman's finger's stroking the black hair of his chest that brought a stoic warrior out of dreams of hearth and kin. "Good morning, Sir," were the words that greeted him as he opened his eyes to the sight of a curvy dwarven woman hugging their bedsheets to her.
"Sleep well?" she asked.
The sound of a woman chuckling, turned Darvesch's head, and he found Greasha standing there. Rather than wearing a demure dress or the stained apron of a kitchen wench, her curves were now accentuated by a form-fitting, sleeveless coat of polished scale mail that glittered like diamonds in the sunlight. Beneath it, she wore a shirt of deep crimson, its broad, bell-shaped sleeves came down to her elbows and were partially open on the outside to show off her fit arms and keep her cool. Her knee-length pants-skirt was in the same style, and both were decorated with silver crewelwork in the same motif of House Amthyrian — a gnarled tree forming a firebird beneath Brightpool.
Although the tassets she had mentioned a few days ago were now absent, there was a sturdy mace slung on her right hip and a buckler on her left. The Lightbringer could also make out greaves on the front of Greasha's dark brown boots, and the glint of metal studs along the knuckles of her matching, long-cuffed gloves.
"We dwarves do have our secrets, your Highness, it's true. But I may have had some help this time."
Looking to Darvesch, a mischievous sparkle in her dark blue eyes, she gave a slight curtsy which caused her braid of thick, black hair to slip forward, the faceted silver ring at the end sparkling as it swung back and forth. "It's good to see you again, Darvesch. A little birdie told me you and your Frænka have some wild times when you're out on the town, so I figured a girl had best dress appropriately."
A sigh of contentment escaped Greasha as she lost herself in Darvesch's strong embrace. When he asked, 'How was that?' she looked up at him and smiled. "I'm no expert, but I'd like to practice that more when you have the time."
The blushing dwarf girl gave a light tug on his beard to pull him close enough for another kiss, and Darvesch realized he was starting to feel quite warm indeed in spite of the endure elements spell upon him. When the sound of Tiniel clearing her throat reached the two, Greasha laid a hand on his breastplate and said with a playful gleam in her eyes, "I'd better let you get along, Darvesch. For such long-lived folks, elves can be funny about their punctuality, can't they?"
As she turned to go, Greasha caught sight of the dwarven hero's Frænka approaching, and she gave a polite bow of respect. "Your Highness..."
With that, she gave Darvesch a wave and began to leave the way she had come in with the guard who had escorted her.
"Good to see you again, Darvesch," Greasha smiled at Darvesch's enthusiasm, giving his pauldrons a solid thump as she hugged the armor-clad warrior.
"The Lieutenant has been letting the crew take their shore leave in shifts. This is the first break Mother and I have had from getting the larders restocked."
Motioning to workers bustling about on scaffolds, and the small mob of ministers buzzing about the Princess, she commented, "Looks like you and yours have their hands full too. You know, that must have been some kiss your Frænka gave the Prince. The Master didn't even know what month it was or what sea we'd just sailed."
Although Darvesch could tell that Greasha was doing her best to keep a straight face, he couldn't help but notice her smirk as she asked, "So does being Frændi to a Princess let you do the same thing too?"
There was little doubt in the inquisitor's mind that Ms. Torwold was of a mind to have her curiosity satisfied.
As all of you begin girding yourselves with whatever magical protections you require (flight spells from Ieana, invisibility spells from Gelik, etc.), Darvesch feels a tug on his weapon arm as he adjusts the straps on his shield. Turning to see what it is, he finds Greasha standing at his side dressed in cuirboilli, and tying a strip of blue cloth around his bicep — it that matches the dress she wore last night.
"Come back with your shield or on it, Darvesch."
She then offers him a tankard of pale liquid that seems to glow with an inner light.
NOTE: Please list whatever spells you intend to buff yourselves with. Right now, everyone is a little more than half a mile from Arrowhead Island (Gold #7 on the city map). Moving at top speed, it will take about 20-30 rounds (2-3 minutes) to reach that spot, so long-duration buffs will be best.
A gentle hand stroked Darvesch's hair, rousing him from slumber. Even as his eyes opened, he could feel the hard wood of the ship's deck beneath him and the balmy breeze coming off the bay upon his face. Beside him, sat Greasha raking out her braid with one hand while coaxing the hero back to wakefulness. The two were both still appropriately attired, but had evidently fallen asleep gazing at the scintillating band of stars ringing Elsemar's equator.
"I'd wager you could forge a hauberk that would be the envy of an elf king if you had a net long enough to sweep up some of those diamonds in the sky."
She smiled and leaned down to give Darvesch a kiss on the cheek. "You're a fine dwarf, Darvesch. I'd like to hear more about what your plans are for the Lightbringers when you have the time. Unfortunately, this young lady needs to get to bed, and you've got a midnight council to attend by the sounds of it! I'll see you at breakfast."
With that, she hopped to her feet, affording the warrior a pleasant enough view when she remembered to gather up the depleted cask of hirschblut and the stone tumblers.
"Your axe?" Leaning to the side a bit, Greasha notes that he still wears the same formidable weapon she spied earlier. She looks ready to ask another question when the expression on his face says it.
With a heavy nod, the woman pushes herself up and heads into the kitchen, looking for something. Not long thereafter, she returns with a dusty, oaken cask under one arm, and a three small stone mugs in her other hand. Expression stoic, she fills all three with thick, nearly black hirschblut, hands one to Darvesch, and keeps one for herself. Holding hers up in toast towards the hero before her, she says, "To blood shared, and for blood spilled... "
"Now granted," Greasha frowns a bit, brow knitted as she rubs a thumb across her lips, thinking equally on what Darvesch did and did not say, "most of the men were either jawing about this lass or that, but that was before the fight. After, I didn't hear tell about any more of our kind in your group. You were all stuck together there, on that island, right?"
It takes some time before the two remaining dwarves manage to reach their limits, but eventually it's Greasha who throws in the towel first. "Alright, I know when I've met my match! You bested me fair and square," she laughs.
Leaning back and taking a draught of ale from her tankard, Greasha asks, "So I couldn't help but notice the etching on your cuirass, you're a... Torchbearer? Is that right? What has you so far from home?"
Presently...
Mere moments after the tall warrior and the white-haired priestess had left the Zehrys, Darvesch returned below to find a veritable feast. Evidently when Darvesch had said, 'I'll just have whatever is already made up,' Greasha's mother had interpreted that as, 'I'll just have everything that's made up!'
From the kitchen, Darvesch could hear contented humming and the sound of Maasha cleaning up dishes. Yet it was the woman standing near the spread that caught his attention. Greasha had evidently taken the opportunity to change into a clean set of clothes — a dark-blue dress, off-the-shoulders with short, lace-capped sleeves, and a black underbust corset accentuating her figure. As she moved to greet him, the perceptive warrior noted that the dress was actually split in the center to allow greater freedom of movement, almost like a pair of billowing, widely-flared pants.
Acting as if nothing had changed, even though her wavy hair was now down and the sparkle of silver and garnet drew attention to the drooping necklace around her neck and the studs in her ears, Greasha said, "Thought about showing you my armor until I remembered what a pain it is to sit down with tassets on. Anyhow," she waves a hand toward the prepared feast, "see anything you like, Darvesch?"
Earlier...
Darvesch wrote: Darvesch can't help but be amused by Maasha's enthusiasm and clattering about. "Is she always this excited?" He smiles to Greasha. Greasha shakes purses her lips and shakes her head. "Oh no, not at all." She leans forward and whispers with a wink, "Pretty sure this is your doing!"
Greasha smiles and shakes her head at her mother's doting, noting with irony that she still doesn't know the man's name. "Darvesch, mother, his name is Darvesch!"
Darvesch wrote: "It seems I'm hungrier than I had anticipated. Would you mind if I accompanied you?" Greasha turns when she hears the soles of sturdy boots tromping hurriedly down the stairs behind her. When she sees the dwarven hero appear she grins and waves a hand for him to follow. "Not at all, come on."
She leads him down a short hallway towards the back of the ship, knuckles drumming a tune on the bowl of her ladle. A few sailors pass you as you go, and you she greets them affably, proudly boasting, "You lads better show some respect, got a dragonslaying nobleman visiting my kitchen!"
At her words, the wide-eyed sailors snap to attention and salute Darvesch, waiting until you've passed before they hurry back to their posts, talking amongst themselves. With them gone, Greasha bumps open the door to the galley with her hip and extends a hand for the warrior to enter. Inside, there are two long tables running the width of the ship flanked by benches — room enough for at least forty men to eat at once. There are still a few off-duty hangers-on playing cards at the far end.
"It's not as posh as the master's dining room, but everything still gets cooked in the same place." She nods to an elf exiting the kitchen past you then calls out in dwarven, "Oh mother dear, you'll never guess whose come to inspect our dessert preparations!"
Greasha smirks at Darvesch's compliment and comments, "Frændi to an elf, and he's still impressed by a kitchen wench in all her regalia. Now that's a lad with both feet on the ground!"
"Well Darvesch, I'd best get back to help mother with the pastries — uppity-ups will be expecting desert after they get done singing. When you get hungry, the kitchen is at the back of the boat and a level down from the main deck. I'll fix you up something else if fish doesn't suit you. Come down and give me a holler if you like."
Before she turns to go, the straight-forward woman squints at the workmanship of the warrior's pauldrons and gives them a rap with her knuckles. She gives a long, whistle, and nods approvingly. "Nice kit, my man! Nice. Kit..."
Greasha juts her jaw a bit as she nods, clearly impressed. "Frændi and Frænka, huh? Well good on you! Truth is, mother kicked me out of the kitchen when she heard there was and I quote, 'a strapping dwarf lad' aboard."
She gives a hearty laugh and shakes her head. "The men should have told her you were cousin to royalty. I'd have doffed my 'armor'," she waves a hand at her apron, "for something a bit more impressive." She flips a ladle into her hand and raps on Darvesch's breastplate with the handle.
As the sound of singing wafts from the aft hallway, she snickers a bit. "So dragons and pirate captains hold no terror for the hero but the Prince's parties?" She gives a knowing nod, "Yeah, I can can see it..."
Just as the dwarf wonders where he might put up his boots to grab some shut-eye, the admonishment of a woman reaches him. "Typical dwarf, completely lost without rock beneath his feet or a skull to crack."
When the sturdy warrior turns to see who it is, he finds a not unattractive woman leaning against a railing below and to his right. She is perhaps an inch or two shorter than himself. Her long black hair is pulled back into a neat braid while her straight bangs have been chopped at the level of her brow. She is dressed simply in a sleeveless leather jerkin that reveals smooth yet toned arms. A stained apron hangs from her squared shoulders, tied about the taper of her waist. From her broad hips hangs a belt with several knives and other implements on one side; on the other, a pair of spoons are seated in iron rings the way Darvesch carried his axe.
Grinning a bit at surprise evident in Darvesch's eyes at getting ribbed by a fellow dwarf, the woman pushes herself off the railing and jogs up the steps. When she approaches the warrior a moment later, she nods and extends her fist to him in greeting*. "Torwold, Graesha Torwold. You must be one of the Princess' companions."
She grins and asks, "You standing guard, or just not like my cooking?"
* Unlike humans who typically clasp forearms, shake hands, or embrace, dwarves typically bump knuckles with one another. A practice necessitated by the fact that getting dust from a mine or forge on the hands of your better is unacceptable.
|