Private Tales Your Money or Your Life

[Rob Yew]

Rob's head tilted to the side so he could better study her with his good eye. She leaned against a tall pole, arms crossed. Trying to get a reaction out of him with this new information. His lips pursed firmly and he placed a hand on the pole, just above her head, and leaned forward until he could practically smell the jasmine on her.

"Why's he doing that, eh? Not supposed to be fixing any Belgrathian safes until he hits Alliria..." The words came low and sibilant.

Yew did not smell like jasmine, or any fine perfumes. Not he, an elven brigand who spent all day in the woods chasing passing carriages. The smell of damp soil and decomposing leaves and wood resin clung to his clothes. His skin smelled as of sunlight baked-in after so many hours outdoors and unsheltered, warm and slightly salty.

As he leaned against the post and spoke to her, their faces so close, the fingers of a hand came up, reaching toward her hidden pocket where he'd heard the crinkle of paper earlier. Elven fingers, famously dexterous, could easily pick a pocket should they so deign to stoop. And oh, did Rob deign.

But the senses of a fae-blood assassin, so finely honed, might pick up on those fingers even as they sought to slip in and retrieve the bit of parchment.

Lyria Killoran

 

[Lyria Killoran]

His close proximity only earned him a light furrowing of her brows, but it remained when he asked her the question. One brow twitched, deepinging the scowl only a moment. "Maybe you can find that out when you read the second page." Her eyes bore into his single gaze, unperturbed.

A moment of stillness between them, Lyria began to crook a smile. It started small before it grew to something wicked. "A question for you, Rob Yew." Lyria's hand shot out, holding his wrist to keep his hand from withdrawing once she heard the crinkle of parchment move beneath his fingers. "Do you speak Gildan? Or Old Parianese?" She kept him there, inches from her. Lyria's smile was amused. "Because I hope you can read my writing."

She knew many languages, having been taught a handful of words and phrases in order to craft messages in confusing ways. Dontae had encouraged her to always mix two languages, as she had done on that second page.

Her tongue clicked, and the assassin shook her head slowly at him. "You will need me to the end. Only I know the intentions used to write that page you are trying to steal."

 

[Rob Yew]

The pull on Rob's wrist brought them nearly nose to nose. Rob went the extra inch to make it true, 'til his one good eye stared into the depths of one o' hers.

"Clever girl," he grinned wickedly.

He did not in fact speak either. Some elves bothered to learn other languages, but many found the effort beneath them. Why learn anything but the perfection of the eldest tongue? Maybe he needed to start. Aside from elvish and dwarven he knew common - obviously - and a smattering of Steppe Orc and Anirian. But those two she mentioned were not exactly common languages.

"Probably wrote it backwards so you can only decipher it in a mirror too, eh?"

Yew's wrist moved suddenly as he sought to maneuver his hand up over, then under the hand grasping his wrist, break the hold, and pin the offending hand on the pole up above her head.

"Fine. We'll wrap this shopping up and then what, you gonna host a party and we snatch him at your estate?"

Lyria Killoran

 

[Lyria Killoran]

This felt like a dance between them, one she far more enjoyed than those she had danced before at society balls and galas. Perhaps it was the dangerous edge to him that got her excited someone was finally making this far more interesting, but the way he loomed closer and spoke softly, Lyria knew they perhaps were cut from the same cloth even if they were dyed and made into different pieces.

She let him turn around who held the power, a soft giggle leaving her lips as he pinned her wrist above her head that rested against the pole to give some excuse for space from his face nearing her own.

"A party means too many witnesses. You are already demonstrating that you like to disarm me, so why not make it look as if you are laying a trap?" Her smile was sharp, just as her blue eyes were daring him. Everything about the woman before him was a reminder she was trained to be this methodical with her work. She was always prepared, and if she had to improvise, then she could rely on her instinct and quick thinking.

Lyria made no move to break from him light prison he held around her, blocking her way out from leaning against the pole or even breaking free from his grip on her wrist.

She brought a leg up, making sure it brushed the side of his and stayed there as she bent it and rested the sole of her boot against the pole. "The names on his route after the Killorans are three members of Allirian aristocracy that was are also the wealthiest of this side of Epressa. You make it look like you have been waiting for him, to make him show you how to work the locks and all that security at my family's estate... I can act, you know? I can cry and plead for help, plead for him to do as they say so that I may not die at their hand." Lyria smiled, and it felt like a promise. "I can demonstratge right here, before the entire Alley of Glass."

Lyria's eyes changed. For the first time that he would see, her eyes turned soft, impossibly so. Her expression changed, appearing fearful and trying to be brave at the same time.

"I will do it, you know? I can make them all pull you away from me in hopes they make some coin from a noble woman unable to defend herself." Tears welled up in her eyes, and after a blink, the barrier broke and let silver traces fall down her cheeks.

 

[Rob Yew]

Rob's one good eye watched the false tears tracking down her face, her lower lip trembling as if in terror of his presence. Such full lips. Very plump. She'd probably had plenty of suitors after a kiss. Or a bite.

Her plan wasn't a bad one. The first one, but as for the second. . .

He covered her mouth with one hand, grimacing at the feel of her lips against his palm and the skin of her face surprisingly soft. He stared into her blue eyes. Gods. She did look pretty when she cried. They'd come running to save her.

The brush of a warm limb against his leg made him glance down to where her knee rested against him, foot propped up on the pole behind her. Yew snorted softly and leaned forward even further so that her knee brushed higher and their bodies practically pressed together.

"That right?" he hissed, "You going to beg and scream?"

His hands shifted, one pinning her wrist above her head to the pole, fingers wrapped around both, while the other moved from her mouth to settle on the thigh she'd propped up. His fingertips stippled the fabric of her pants with a grip on her thigh strong from decades spent pulling back bows and gutstring.

"I think I'd like that," though the harsh slash of his rising mouth seemed to mean a different sort of screaming altogether.

Lyria Killoran