apassingafternoon | hail of arrows

hail of arrows

To graduate from utter silence to the constant roar of Gilead was something else. Though she had been here for over a week now, and would stay for much longer, Kaine was not used to the constant noise. Even at night it felt as if she could hear every shuffle of bodies in sheets and night clothes, every fuck whether positive or not, and all those conversations that were never suited for daylight. It all made sleeping outside difficult, but even lying beside Nariko didn't make it any easier to deal with the walls all around her. They were suffocating. At night and in the day, they threatened to drive Kaine out of her mind.

So she took to wandering around because there wasn't fuck else to do around here, not for her.

Which might have explained catching sight of him towards an edge, around a corner. The specifics weren't relevant, that Kaine saw Bert and spun on her worn down heel and followed him was relevant. It should have also been worrying for her, this unnatural and constant fascination that was tempered by the occasional bout of good sense felt odd. It was a ... Not a problem, but not exactly good. Crushes on men that you hardly knew, that hid the way Cuthbert did, that never let her finish talking the way Cuthbert did couldn't end well.

She followed anyway, and not with any real ounce of subtlety or control. Eventually one of them would have to say something and in her own way she knew he might take that responsibility first. So she followed, and even if Kaine happened to be wrong he was pretty interesting to stare at anyway. Maybe it was the hair.

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"You underestimate Roland's ability to explain," Cuthbert said gravely, but there was laughter dancing in his eyes again. "And his ability to get so wrapped up in honour and ka and the face of his father that he forgets little things like eating and sleeping. If you want care and kindness, he's not your man. If you want an hour-long lecture about how it's all meant to be, well..." He tilted his hand to and fro, laughing. "If he'd ever opened his mouth in philosophy lessons, I think he would have been Vannay's favourite. Come on, you owe me a cheese and chicken paneen."

Because when in doubt, the best thing to do was to distract.

Kaine wouldn't say so for the most obvious reasons, but she very greatly preferred Cuthbert to any long talks about honor and other shit. But at least the topic got him laughing, and by default that helped her smile, which made everything else much better.

"'Panini'," She repeated without any real weight, the hint of a grin in her voice as they came that much closer to the kitchen. She still had little idea of where it was so she was more than grateful for Cuthbert leading the way.

"Pah-nee-nee," Cuthbert repeated with exaggerated care, and snorted. "Better?" He, of course, had no trouble finding the kitchens - not only had he lived here his whole life, but, as he'd mentioned, they had been a favourite haunt of his as a child. He still rather liked them, in a nostalgic kind of way that had nothing to do with food and everything to do with childhood. He breathed in deeply as they approached, smelling the spices and freshly-baked bread. It smelled like home.

"Much better." And she even had it in her to sound-mock proud of him! Although it might not have actually been all that mocking since Kaine was the only true Queen of cultural differences. But one constant between all people, seemingly in all times, was the kitchen. Some of it was still a bit strange to her but she had been around long enough that orienting herself wasn't difficult.

"Okay ..." She looked around, thought to herself, and then got to work, idly throwing behind her shoulder: "Sit somewhere! This doesn't take long! Or at least it shouldn't."

Her push-bread thing needed electricity which, of course, her home had but not so much here. Well, she could figure it out.

"Yes, sai," Cuthbert said with exaggerated meekness, and hunkered down by the door with a grin, waving to one of the cooks. "Hile, Anis. Smells like miracles and magic in here."

Anis, a young woman of about his age, blushed openly and obviously, much to Bert's apparent amusement. Smirking, he settled back against the wall, draping his hands over his knees, and watched Kaine with some interest. He wasn't much of a cook himself - he could skin a rabbit and roast a bird if it came to it, but not much beyond that - so he was genuinely interested.

... Could they have been more clear about it? Kaine could be a little dense at times but to miss the way Anis blushed at Cuthbert would mean that she was blind. And to miss Kaine's very obvious pout, the telltale, sharp turn of her head as if she had seen nothing - but of course she had - would mean one must be blind, too. It bothered her enough to create a little crashing and banging, and Kaine refused to ask Anis for help, but she hardly needed it.

A kitchen was kitchen, you only needed the pattern. Besides, cooking was ... A relief. It wasn't exactly easy and she wouldn't claim to be particularly amazing, but it was a fun hobby that she could lose herself in without any trouble.

That didn't mean Anis didn't get a look or two. What was so great about her, anyway?

Cuthbert bit back his amusement. It was cruel to find that funny, and he knew it. It wasn't even as if he'd set out to flirt, exactly - it was just very hard to resist teasing Anis, when she made it so easy. He'd made the mistake of forgetting who he was with, in part because they'd fallen into conversation so easily for a while there. So he did have the decency to feel bad.

At the same time, though, it was funny, and he couldn't quite hide the little twitch of a smile.

Bert was free of any current reprimanding because Kaine was busy with her task, and if she did look up it was often to search for something she needed, stubbornly refusing to ask for any help even when it may have done her some good. Given another twenty minutes, and after some interesting banging (imitating a panini machine was difficult okay?) Kaine finished, and stared at the result critically, as if it was meant to save lives, not be eaten.

"... This isn't going to be as good as usual." But the chicken was fresh, all the herbs she had wanted were here, and the cheese wasn't made this morning but within acceptable bounds. Kaine handed him the meal on what she assumed was a plate that wouldn't be used anytime soon. Chicken and herb cheese panini on large pieces of folded bread without the marks she preferred to see, but there were gently crisped potato slices. She even made it look somewhat pretty. "But here."

So maybe he could manage to not look at Anis? Just an idea.

Bert looked down at the plate, smiling and very carefully not acknowledging the daggers Anis was staring at Kaine's back. "Looks plenty good to me," he observed, with a little shrug, and wiped his hands on his jeans before digging in. And that was a pretty appropriate term for it, given the gusto with which he ate. Halfway through, he stopped, looking a little guilty, and wiped his mouth on his sleeve. "...I should probably have checked. Are we sharing this?"

Oh, Kaine knew that look very well but she was far too old and deprived of a single fuck to give to anyone that wasn't Nariko, Cuthbert, and ... Well, hardly anyone else, actually! Her world was very limited and if someone had a problem with her, they could shove it up their ass! Especially since by all accounts it seemed that he enjoyed what she'd managed to come up with and that was ... Well, that was pretty damn awesome, and she couldn't help glowing with a bit of pride.

"I can make something else, have at all of it." Which was to say, yes, they were supposed to share but he really was hungry, and she had no reason to deprive him when, really, she was just fine. Though she lingered near for a few minutes her own stomach rumbled, so she got herself up again to go back to cooking, and hoped that Bert didn't catch the proud smirk on her face.

Nariko was always telling her to be kind to other women, but that was the last thing she wanted to do right now. Fuck everyone else's feelings, he liked her makeshift panini!

"That is delicious," Cuthbert called over, after a minute or two. He'd slowed down, and was starting on the potatoes now, with every sign of enjoyment. Picking up his plate, he got to his feet and sauntered over to her, leaning up against one of the heavy wooden tables to watch her cooking. "You need to teach me how to make these. I mean, I guess there's not much chance I'll be able to, given that I only cook on the trail, but still..."

He wasn't lying, either, although he might have been playing it up a bit. He'd caught that smirk, all right. He might not be Roland, but he was no slouch when it came to observation, either. It would have been lying to say that it didn't make him a little smug in turn, to have that effect. Besides, it was nice to see her happy. He'd got the impression that it didn't happen nearly as often as it should.

Anis, unsurprisingly, didn't seem to agree. With an audible "Hmph!", she went back to kneading the dough for the evening's bread, perhaps rather more violently than was strictly necessary.

"You never know, you might come up with a way to do it on the road, they're good for traveling. I used to take some out with me in the morning when I had to hunt, they lasted all day if they were made right." In some kind of manner this had to be happiness. Maybe it wasn't the right kind because she knew that there was no claim here. Bert wasn't hers. He had quite clearly stated that he wouldn't let it happen but he was still a man and as Nariko never failed to mention - men had needs just as surely as women. So it didn't make any sense for her to act this way. But even if he was playing it up a bit, or even just teasing, she felt appreciated, and even genuinely liked. That much had to be acceptable, right? She didn't want to let go of it just yet.

"Besides, they're easy, you just need bread," Which she held up in a like so motion, "Whatever you want inside," The same action here. "And then you stuff it in evenly. The machine I have works better, but …" She could settle for shoving one pan over the sandwich as it sat in a bigger ban and was slowly heated on one side and then flipped so that it would seal correctly.

Cuthbert watched, chewing on the last couple of mouthfuls of his own panini, and smiled. "Could work on the road, I guess. If bread and cheese were things we actually saw past the first couple days out of Gilead..." He was teasing, really. "But you need to show me the herbs and such. Really. This is amazing. Ah-muuz-ing."

And by is, he presumably meant was, since he'd just polished off the last of his sandwich. Licking his fingers, he put his plate to one side and smiled. "Do you want a cup of wine or something, while we're down here?"

"Seriously?" He was teasing but she wasn't. The only time Kaine had been so far away was when she had first arrived. Cheese and bread were relatively steady in Nariko's previous home, but it hadn't occurred to her that it was different anywhere else. "Well, you can make it with other things, as well." She just used cheese frequently because she really liked cheese! It was a guilty pleasure.

"I guess it can't hurt." Just one. Really and truly nothing more than that. In fact she wanted to tell him to smack her if she accepted more than a cup but then he might not give her any at all. And she was old enough to drink, and make her own decisions about it! Technically.

"Cheese doesn't keep well on the road. Smells too strong, you get rats in your pack if your not careful." Cuthbert looked back over his shoulder, levering himself away from the table to go and fetch a couple of pewter cups from one of the cupboards. "And bread... waybread's alright, but you stay away from home more than a couple days, real bread starts to go stale pretty soon. We live on jerky and whatever we find along the way, mostly."

He ducked into a storeroom, clearly knowing his way around every bit as well as the people who actually worked here, and came out with three cups of wine balanced in his hands. One, he put down in front of Anis with a little half-smile. "Tell Molly I'm sorry for taking her wine, and I'll drop her off another bottle tomorrow, alright? Also, if you'd stop glaring at sai Kaine like you'd like to set her on fire, I'd say thankya."

Blowing her a slightly sardonic kiss, he turned back to Kaine, handing her one of the glasses. "Too mean?"

"That sounds terrible." Jerky was good for emergencies, or if she didn't feel like cooking on a particular day or after a long week. It was not the mainstay for traveling. She shook her head at those ideas, suddenly grateful that she and Nariko had never been more than a day or two away from wherever they need to run off toward. While he flitted around she finished cutting the next set of potatoes and dumped them in the pan.

He reappeared and Kaine did her absolute best to refrain looking upset at the appearance of three cups rather than two. Would it have been rude to ignore Anis? Probably. Did Kaine really care about that when she felt her lightest in years? Of course not. That was the problem with emotions, some were so addicted that wanting more felt inevitable, and that was what had always terrified her.

"I think she'll be fine," And then she took her cup, with a lighter dose of satisfaction, but ti was there all the same.

Cuthbert half-smiled, a little ruefully, and raised his cup to her. "I'm sure," he agreed, taking a sip. "And for your information, it's not terrible. You get used to it pretty quickly. The terrible bit's the blisters and saddle sores when you're on a long sortie. That, and those nights when every time you lie down, new rocks appear to poke you in the back." He pulled a face, just as if he really minded things like that. Honestly, he'd never found that part nearly as difficult as he'd found it coming back to soft mattresses and pillows after a journey. "Although I guess you know that one, from that fairytale quest of yours."

"I ate fresh meat every day for every bright season. What you are talking about is a nightmare imposed upon reality." If there was anything that she happened to be just a tad snotty about then it was food. It was her reward for working hard, and there had always been something gratifying and innate about using her own products, taking care of her own animals, never wasting ... So, no, wandering around and living on jerky might as well have been its own death sentence.

"It wasn't so bad, one particular area aside. There's a lot of grass where come from, and then sand, and the swamp - that was a pain in the ass. Before I moved back into my house I slept outside all the time, in fact, it's kind of why I prefer sleeping outside here." She took a sip first then what could only be deemed a gulp and then, suddenly, half the cup was gone and she forced herself to stop. "Oh this is - Strong! Alright."

Cuthbert laughed, shaking his head. "Am I going to regret giving you that? Because I'm telling you now, I do not volunteer to hold your hair back later on if you can't handle it." Smirking, he took a long draught from his own cup - he drank stronger stuff most of the time; one cupful wasn't going to affect him significantly - and put it to one side. "Sleeping outside here's alright. It's woods that're the worst. Feels like every tree in the vicinity makes it its mission to stick a root in your shoulder."

"Really? That's horrible." She sounded as genuinely upset and moderately upset about that as she felt! Until it occurred to her that he might just be kidding. THen again, he could still be telling the truth. Her utter weakness to alcohol was no laughing matter, so she stared at her cup as if it might bite her back and she mournfully put it to the side for the moment.

"They weren't exactly made to be comfortable," She grinned, sautéing in an almost secondhand kind of manner. "Nothing beats not sleeping alone, though."

She tapped at the handle of the skillet and then forced herself to stop pouting. It was lonely, sure, but she had always been lonely. getting sort of kicked out wasn't supposed to be such a big deal. "

"Mm." He frowned a little. He agreed, but he wasn't about to commit himself to that, not when he'd already decided not to lead her on. This whole situation felt like it had turned very quickly into a minefield - which, in fairness, he should really have expected. It was his own fault for bringing beds and sleeping arrangements into the conversation in the first place.

"I miss the stars sometimes," he said at last, with a lopsided little smile. "When I'm home, I mean. There's a lot that's unpleasant about travelling, but if you've ever been out in the plains or the desert on a night, when the fire's down to embers and the sky looks like it goes on into forever... The sky's bigger out there. Sometimes I end up wandering out on a night and looking up, but it's not the same."

Cuthbert could think whatever his brain willed, Kaine was only thinking about how her life had been forced to change with Roland's very planned marriage. Bad he took her friend but now he got her bed, too? And he wasn't ever in it to begin with! It was horrible. But if she saw the change in topic for what it was, then it wasn't clear.

"You would probably love where I come from, then! We have two suns, a gigantic moon, and stars all over the place. In fact, I'm pretty sure we have more." It wasn't any matter of pride, she really happened to believe it. "In the low season, the shade lights come out, and they're kind of like ... A night rainbow. It's really beautiful."

And even though the images brought a smile to her face Kaine still didn't really miss the place, she only wished she could show it to Cuthbert. For pure, friend related reasons. But it was that thought that allowed her to take another drink as she finished her meal and plated it simply. "Granted, it's also pretty difficult to sleep through if you're sensitive to that kind of thing." And speaking of sensitive - It was no surprise that she colored easily, at even the slightest matters, in fact. A part of that was genetics, and her slightly pale skin, so there was no hiding the presence of it crawling up her neck and towards her ears. And that was just from one full drink!

"It sounds... strange," he confessed with a little laugh, following her lead and taking a mouthful of his own wine. "Wonderful. But bedamned strange, say true. Two suns? Shade lights? I can't even start to imagine it." He said that with another, rather self-deprecating, laugh, and pulled a face. "It must have been very odd, coming here to one sun and a little sliver of moon, if you say true."

And, frankly, not an experience he envied. Leave the wanderlust to Roland; Cuthbert would follow him where he was led, but he wasn't the one who longed for strange lands and different skies. Truth be told, he was tied too strongly to home for him to want to journey for its own sake. But, looking at the expression on her face, he thought maybe it might be worth it, in that case.

She cut her sandwich into two pieces, offering him one half while she bit into the other, listening, and then considering how to respond.

"It was terrifying." Not just odd, not even intimidating or concerning. It was absolutely terrifying and in very many ways that had yet to change. She couldn't seem to get a handle on how people spoke which was quite aggravating given how many books she had read and despite all the times she had daydreamed about going somewhere new and far away. "In fact, I was the one that nearly had a breakdown over the whole thing. To hear a story is one thing, to live even half of what has gone on?" She shook her head, "I think it almost drove me insane."

This was one of the very few matters that remained known but unspoken between herself and Nariko, who had accepted it all quite simply and with only the brief appearance of nightmares and sleeplessness. "I thought I would be so much happier if I was anywhere that people didn't know me, even if I could still see their fates."

He turned down the proffered food, shaking his head, and listened with a little frown. It wasn't an easy thing to hear, or to understand. Cuthbert was a man who cared very strongly for people, and always had; he thrived on company and attention. So, while he could see on one level why she would want isolation from people who knew her, on another, it was quite simply unthinkable. It wasn't a concept that fitted into his worldview, and that made it incredibly hard to know how to respond.

The almost being driven insane, though... that he could understand. He'd experienced it himself, in Hambry and since, that feeling that everything was out of place and couldn't possibly be real. How much worse to have that feeling in an entirely different world?

He took a long drink of wine when she'd finished talking, draining his glass. "...Can you?" he asked, after a moment. "Still see their fates?"

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jealous Kaine gives me life and I don't feel bad about it

i thought that might be the case. which is why i did that. so glad i was right. :p

Best idea :P!!!

:D

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that is the best closing sentence to a tag i have seen in a long time :p

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yes sure let's give the half-virgin wine around her crush. A+ idea (I approve)

i am going to continue torturing her with circumstances YOU CAN'T STOP ME

I cannot and it is great

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