Your conversation is interrupted as two soldiers from Ganz burst through the door with a bound and gagged woman. She is bruised, wearing a torn military uniform covered in mud, blood and grass. They roughly toss her into a chair and one of the soldiers goes to the bar.
Orym raises an eyebrow as the soldiers bring the battered woman in. He gives his tablemates meaningful looks "What's goin' on with that?" he asks in a quiet voice.
She gets an angry look on her face, "I don't know but I sure as hells intend to find out."
In her own military uniform she gets up and strides purposefully over to the soldiers. "Excuse me gents, but just what is going on here?" She has her hammer slung over her shoulder, almost in a carefree posture.
"We're taking that traitor back to Ganz," the soldier replies, turning to face Derika. She can see he has a black eye.
She looks at him as she narrows her eyes a bit, "And just what is it that she has done to be labeled as such?"
"She tried to run off during training exercises. Then she beat up her commanding officer. Then she set fire to an expensive ballista. Then she attacked us before we could subdue her," the soldier grunts.
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She looks at them with doubt in her eyes, remembering how some could get. Looking from the woman to the soldier talking she says, "Remove that gag soldier, Id like to hear her side of the story."
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"Negative, ma'am," the soldier replies. "Lieutenant Gath has ordered that she remain gagged until her trial. I'm not about to disobey a direct order."
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She takes a step forward, "I don't care what he said. I am Derika," She raises her hand as her claws slide out easily as she flexes her fingers, "I will not accept your explanation . If that bastard gave that order it most likely to keep her from talking about whatever vile thing he did to her himself. You undo it this instant, or you'll have a helluva lot more to worry about than that shiner. I'm sure you're aware of who I am and how bad of a temper I can have. Now....and I might let you walk away with all your bones intact." She gives him her famous smirk as she brings her warhammer into a more.....useful and ready position.
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Missea stand up quietly and places a hand on Derika's shoulder and shakes her head.
"Let me ask."
Turning to the guards, she smiles.
"Please do as she asks. We are not asking you remove her binds, just her gag. If nothing else she will need to get something to eat and drink... even the condemned are granted that much kindness."
Derika retracts her claws, but keeps her weapon at the ready. She says nothing, but she doesn't have to. The furrow of her brow, hard set line of her mouth, and steely look in her eyes says enough.
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The soldier that had been speaking looks to the other, who simply shrugs. The soldier yanks the gag out of the woman's mouth.
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Orym sighs, not expecting Derika's response to be quite so forceful. He goes to join Missea and speak with the soldiers. "Surely you can spare her a moment t' eat, no?"
Missea nods in thanks, and smiles at Orym.
She approaches the bound woman.
"May the blessings of the Dawnflower be upon you. My name is Missea Reinobese. Water and food will be her shortly." She smiles warmly and leans in to whisper to her.
Derika stares down the two soldiers, as if daring them to touch the young woman again.
The woman gives Missea a hard glance. "Seeing how we're just makin' a new acquaintanceship, I'll politely tell you that I ain't much for religious airs. And when I say 'not much', I mean not at all. And, no, I ain't falsely accused. I did everything that sodding meathead said...and then some."
"Oh, I'm Jerrica DeLamis, by the way, former scout for the glorious army of Ganz," she adds, a bit sourly.
Missea merely nods at this revelation. "At least you are honest about it. Why would you do such things if you don't mind my asking?"
Missea sits across from Jerrica. "When your food and water get here I can help you with them. I doubt that your guards will grant you use of your hands, even if I did manage to convince them to grant you use of your mouth." She smiles politely. Remember what Sarenrae told me... no one is beyond redemption until they refuse to seek it... and even then, if you can make them SEE why they should seek it they still might have a chance....
Derika looks at her closely and steps forward, a concerned look on her face.
"Listen Jerrica...." She tries really hard to keep the smirk off of her face, "I have no doubt that you are fully capable of doing everything they said....and more, but what I would like to know is how it all started. What caused you to do what you did? You must have had a reason for attacking the no necks....." At this slang term she uses for the mindless cretins that just blindly follow orders without any regard for truth or justice, she jerks a thumb to the one with the shiner.
"I mean...." She hunkers down in front of the woman, "I know how things can get in Ganz, so please....just tell me what happened. There had to be a reason why you tried to run right?"
"Let's just say we had a difference of opinion when it came to how I should unnecessarily sacrifice my life," Jerrica says with a wry grin. She appears to be more of a girl than a woman upon closer inspection.
Lynnie brings a plate of bread and cheese along with a pitcher of water, setting them on a table next to Missea. "Here you go, Miss."
She shakes her head, "You're a soldier, that's part of it. Can you explain the "unnecessarily" part? I need a little more information than that." Her tone isn't accusatory, just serious. "I just need for you to be really honest with me right now okay? Would you do that for me? I'm trying to understand where you're comin from."
Missea holds up a hand to Derika politely.
"Perhaps she could use a minute to think about that while having her breakfast. We both have had ours already, after all, as well as a good night's rest... both I doubt she had."
Missea smiles to Derika, picks up a bit of bread and cheese, and turns to Jerrica.
"Do you mind if I feed you?"
"Ah, I don't mind speaking my piece first. I'll spare ya the sob story and just tell you I joined the military because my family needed the money. It's not like the gods were giving handouts," Jerrica says, sniffing derisively. "I'm young but I ain't dumb. I don't wanna spend my life by taking other people's lives away. And that'd be if I were lucky. More'n likely I'd end up with a sword in my gut or a bloody arrow in my head."
Jerrica sighs. "The lieutenant wouldn't take 'no' for an answer, so I made him. O' course this means the gallows for me, but I'd rather die with clean hands than doing someone who didn't deserve it harm."
She looks at Missea. "I suppose I don't have much of a choice if I wanna eat."
Missea smiles to Jerrica warmly. "Young lady, you always have a choice... in this instance you could choose to ask someone else feed you, or to try to eat without your hands. Which is why I ask."
Taking the bite of bread and cheese she holds it on the middles of her fingers close to the young woman's mouth.
She shakes her head, "There are always choices Jerrica. So, they were just asking you to kill without reason?"
"I don't think it'd make much o' a difference who fed me and, while I'm a bit rough 'round the edges, I don't eat like a pig," Jerrica chuckles, taking a bite of the bread and cheese.
The soldier sporting the black eye walks back toward the three women. "I think that's enough questions. We were just doing training exercises outside of Aravel when she decided to act out."
She laughs ever so slightly before catching herself and stopping. She and Missea seemed to be thinking very similarly. Derika was part of the Ganz army, but she knew how some of the officers operated which is why she herself couldn't be forced to take their orders blindly. Looking back on things now, it could have been her in Jerrica's place. Instead, Captain Jozeph had chosen to send her on this mission without an escort, which meant he considered her of sufficient rank and experience to be out on her own. This young woman hadn't been given that chance.
There had to be more to the story, but she didn't want to press her too much right away. She looks at Missea apologetically, "Sorry, I can't seem to help myself. I wasn't very popular with many of the commanding officers at the Academy either. They don't like it when we refuse to conform to their way of thinking and have a mind of our own."
She gives him a look that says, 'come any closer and you'll lose something important to you'. "I'll thank you to shut the hell up now and I'll be the one deciding when we're done with the questions and you'll keep your mouth shut until I say so. Got it?"
Taking a step closer to him she says, "Since when did "training exercises" include giving orders to kill people without just cause? See, I have a real hard time believing you, so I'll ask whatever the hell I please once she's done eating. If you don't like that option you can try to get home with two broken legs. How does that sound?" She doesn't raise her voice, but it holds a very menacing tone to it.
The soldier is sufficiently cowed and takes two steps back. "Honestly, ma'am, we were just conducting our yearly exercises. We wouldn't wage war against our own countrymen."
Orym rubs his temples, feeling a headache coming on. "You're all leavin' out the important parts. Jus' spill it, already, because all this gabbin' with no substance is starting to grate on me, yeah?"
"They don't know anything," Jerrica says after a swig of water. "They didn't see what I saw. All the more better for my sentence to stick."
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"And she hasn't said anything about what she supposedly saw," the soldier huffs. "Now, if you don't mind, we have a ways to go..."
He casts a glance at Derika.
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She sighs and puts a hand up to her forehead, "Maybe you personally wouldn't....but there are those...." She lets her sentence trail off for a moment. "Why the hell should she tell you anything? No, you may not leave. You're gonna be here a while so you might as well sit down and shut up."
"People tend to ignore those they don't understand, when they're not too busy ridiculing them. Being ignored, I can deal with....it allowed me to hear things that maybe they thought I was too young to understand. I grew up in that Academy. I saw a lot of abuse of power, when some believe that they are more than others....that they deserve more than others and they don't care how they get it...."
Realizing she's about to lose control again she stops herself, after taking a few breaths she looks back at the soldier. "Go get something to drink and eat, you're gonna be here a while because despite what commanding officer *mumbles something unkind* said, I highly doubt it's as cut and dry and he makes it out to be. Even if her actions came after the fact." Rubbing her temples again she says, "Just....go eat. Go and be glad I have friends to keep me from completely losing my temper, even though it may not be directly your fault. I will decide that for myself though after she's had a chance to eat and I get the whole story from her. Are we clear?"
She glances back at the others, "I'm sorry....I just....I can't let this go right now. There are things....I'll try to explain them later. All you need know for now is that I have my own reasons for believing her over them."
Missea just shrugs and continues to break off pieces of bread and cheese to feed to the young lady. Occasionally she picks up the cup of water and allows her to drink from it, being careful not to pour too much into her mouth or have it at too sharp an angle.
Orym shrugs at his fellow half-orc. "I can't tell you what you should and shouldn't believe, lass," he says, trying to calm Derika. "Just try not t' do nothin' we can't make up for. We've still got th' Keep t' worry 'bout, and I'd rather not get thrown outta town."
She nods, "Ill send a message to Captain Jozeph and explain the situation. I'm sure he'll have some questions of his own to ask some of his officers." She looks a little annoyed at the soilders, but calm enough that she won't try to crush their bones just yet.
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The soldier folds his arms. "It would take weeks for a reply and we aren't waiting that long, no matter your rank."
No. You aren't waiting. You're leaving. We'll take custody of this woman.
You've quitted yourselves well, and saved yourselves from an overwhelming force. Relinquish her, and go. Your superiors won't question your story, if you tell it right.
Telsyn looks to his compatriots, knowing that this could go wrong.
The soldiers look at the elf and can't help but laugh.
Vishanti studies the interactions, looking at the girl and seeing... .something, completion perhaps.
She will not be going with them when they leave
"It's awful nice of you to stick up for me though we don't know each other," Jerrica says, finishing her meal. "But you don't need to put yourselves out on my account."
Telsyn says one last thing to the soldiers. Don't talk to me. I'm not your problem.
The soldiers merely shrug and pick Jerrica up off the chair. "Wench! You got that food ready?!"
Lynnie runs up with a sack in her hand. "Here you go. That'll be five silver."
"You can charge it to Lieutenant Gath. He should be by this evening," the soldier says.
"You are not leaving here without paying for what you take." Vishanti says, with almost no inflection in her tone, almost as if simply stating a fact.
Without speaking, Derika cracks the fowl mouthed soldier across the face hard. Enough to ring some bells, but just shy of cracking his jaw. In a voice that seems to growl she says, "Don't you ever speak to a woman like that in my prresence again. Secondly...." She grabs Jerrica out of the stunned soldiers grasp and pulls her behind her, "I am hereby relieving you of duty. Get the hell outta here while you still can." She arches an eyebrow at them as her claws extend. There is no question either in her voice or her eyes. She means to kill them if she has to.
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"And I said she can get her money from the lieutenant," the solider retorts, holding his jaw and drawing his sword. "You're gonna make a bad enemy out of the army, rank or no."