There were worse fates than death, and this she knew all too well. She had never expected to find herself in a place like this...well, ever. This was a place even the commons did not approve of working in, and so it was little wonder that it was the only kind of work she could find, or more to the point it was the only place that would take her.
Dornoch was indeed a matriarchal society, and so generally women occupied most of the upper echelons of that society. But even in a society where women had the leg up, some would fall through the cracks. Some would be
stuffed into the cracks, pushed beyond where the light of day had ever nor would ever reach.
What passed for a kitchen in this particular dive smelled heavily of spices, which was all well and good because it covered the malodorous stench of the sink and the refuse-ridden alley just out the back. Steam haunted the dark place, the cook a particularly vicious demon in a particularly dark and damp hell. Lyssia, dressed in a shapeless sack of a dress with a worn and stained apron tied over it to keep it clean (something that was laughable at best) scurried along as quick as her short legs could carry her. Not quickly enough for the cook, though, and she earned herself another heavy blow across the rump for being too slow.
"We got people t'feed, you wretch! Hop to it! Hop to it!" The vicious delight she seemed to take in pushing her latest charge around merely twisted the diminutive
Sidhe's heart in her chest. She deftly dodged the second blow, taking a plate upon in one slender, callous-free hand and rushing through the door with the chicken held high enough that it likely wouldn't get contaminated with anything else the kitchen offered, which included roaches.
Amazing that such a place could exist in the home of the Dynast, in the seat of her power. Fair and even handed (if harsh) law kept most of the worst of society from sticking around, and most were well off within the city proper. But there were always places like this in every city, no matter how affluent. There was always crime in every city, too, no matter how strictly the laws were enforced. And where people gathered, the high and the low quickly separated like oil and water, unable to properly coexist.
And so I end up here, a singular mote of oil awash within the sea of water. The piss of humanity, she thought to herself. Was there a touch of bitterness there? So what if there was. In the span of a year she had been cast from very nearly the pinnacle of this society to a place that did not technically exist. To go from privilege to a place where casual abuse was not remarked upon, simply because she was
daughter to a traitor. It was a stigma that could not be cast aside, shirked hidden; all that lived within Dornoch revered the Dynast, and any that would harm her...well...
"Its about goddamned time you got that out here," the woman that ran the bar snarled at her, snatching the plate from her to give to a waiting patron seated at the bar. "Its no wonder you haven't got a dime to your name." The tone of voice suggested she was enjoying herself, which was quite likely. It was known who she was, after all.
Lyssia D'avore. Daughter to the late Bursar, Lady of Erdilynn, the one in line to take over the affairs of D'avore...if the house still stood. If the Lady had not been hauled off in the night to the Courts, stood trial for treason against the Dynast and been found guilty and executed. Her father exiled and dead, her brother dead in her own arms trying to track down who had really made the attempt on the Dynast's life.
The few in the common room that payed any attention at all - few at this time of night, and in this place - could only give her dark, disdainful looks if they were not outright hostile. Even common thieves, cutthroats, and brigands felt themselves above her.
The keeper turned from Lyssia to her customers, and Lyssia took the opportunity to head out into the common room. The stink of sour beer and wine was heavy in the air, and no matter how long she was here she could never seem to stop smelling it. She went to go clean tables, as if that was a thing that mattered in a place like this.
"Stranger, are you maligning my establishment?" The keeper eyed the young lady to whom the rather uninteresting looking fellow was speaking to. "I'll not have you speaking ill of my place, or you can just stand up and walk right back out the door you came in." She shook her head. "Outlander men," she muttered under her breath,
