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original: Thick As Thieves (chapter 2)
Title: Thick As Thieves: chapter 2
Series: Originalretarded homoerotic thieves fantasy parody
Rating: a very hard PG-13 for now, it’ll probably hit R-NC17 by the time I’m over, considering whether I do fade-to-black or not.
Word count: 3,527
A/N: I usually f-lock original stuff, but this was a present for M and stuff. ...plus I really can’t see myself ever publishing this. Uh. Really.
Anyways, this is for M as always, as well as for Saaski’s birthday! (a bit late) At least until I get enough $$$ to send her some books. As this is actually a present for my beta, there was no betaing. So uh. Tell me if I missed something? I did try and look it over..
Also for![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-community.gif)
52_flavours / (new) 27 ) Tales of manly perseverance. Or the lack thereof. / (old) 15. On purpose to confound this scoundrel’s pride
Prologue & chapter one
–Two: like stealing candy from a baby–
Avey met Hadri earlier that day, before the thieves came out from their caves and cracks to pace about the streets, looking for their latest victims. It wasn’t quite dark enough to hide in the shadows with the other pickpockets and fingersmiths. Still, the back alleys were a decrepit thing with peeling pant and broken masonry. Chinks in these blocks would never get fixed, even generation after generation.
Even with the early hour, that didn’t stop someone like Hadri. The Rust Bucket’s Tavern Keeper’s little bratling was at the side of the street, licking at a bit of molasses candy.
Hadri took one look at the child, the candy, and while Avey watched on, he bent down and talked to the child. He pulled the easiest trick in the book, that only a child could fall for – the ”Look over there!” trick. The minute the bratling’s head was turned, Hadri swiped up the cube and pipped it in his mouth.
Then, just to rub in the fact that the bratling and he had approximately the same amount of maturity, he stuck his tongue out and did a mocking Nyerrr nyeeer nyeeer
Avey couldn’t say he was particularly surprised, but that didn’t stop him from facepalming.
“Hadri, you just stole candy from a baby.”
“Easiest steal I ever made,” Hadri said. He smacked his lips and was about to say something more when the child began to bawl. Loudly. This brought forth a stout giantess of a woman with a near as big as the child itself. She cooed and asked something, and the child pointed to Hadri.
“What? Oh shi– We better get out of here–”
And that was about the last thing Hadri said before the giantess was upon him.
The giantess swung her giant purse at his head. Hadri dodged the first, sidestepped the second and jumped over the third. It was just enough to make him cocky. Cockier.
“Is that all you can do? Catch me if you–”
She whacked him right on his jaw, effectively cutting off whatever smug retort he’d been saying. Hadri stumbled back as she assaulted him, hitting his chest and arms and face. He could do little but cough and scream as the impacts hit him, steady and unrelenting. The woman was a harpy, a monstrous beast of a thing that would kill him before this was over.
Avey, being the good friend that he was stood aside and watched his friend get his just desserts. He even pointed and laughed, because he was just that good of a friend.
“What are you carrying in that thing? Bricks?!” Hadri shrieked. He screamed as the purse made contact again and again.
“I could use a little help over here!” Hadri said.
“What, children aren’t enough for you, Hadri? Now you have to be beat up by a woman?” Avey called back,“It serves you right.”
“A great friend you are,” Hadri muttered. He ducked a blow with more grace this time.
“I-It’s a good thing Averyl isn’t here– s-she’d kick your ass for implying that women aren’t liberated and kickass and all that shit.”
“She would. She’d kick your ass too. And this woman’s.”
“Besides, she’s no mere woman – she’s a beast–”
He was cut off as the giantess gave a scream of rage and charged at him. Hadri fled up the alley and turned a U turn to run towards Avey. The beast of a woman changed right behind him.
“A little help here!” Hadri said, his voice hitting a high note at the giantess gained upon him with seemingly every step.
“Oh, the poor damsel needs a hero to save him?” Avey laughed. “You scream like a girl.”
“You’d scream if you were pelted by a madwoman with a bag full of bricks too.”
The child began to laugh and as if that was the atonement for Hadri’s crimes. The giantess stopped in her carnage for a moment to coo at her child. Avey made his move. He approached the giantess and tapped her on the shoulder.
“Excuse me miss, would you like to buy some Girl Scout cookies?”
“Whuzzat?” The giantess said in a gruff voice.
“S-snafu-! Or is it sh-azaam?” Hadri said.
“Run, you bastard! This is no time for catchphrases!”
With that they fled into the coming dark. Their lungs were bursting from laughing and running and the giddiness of it all.
--
She’d pounded on him senseless. He’d be covered in bruises before morning. Of course, he’d lie his way into saying it was from a bar fight which he won, instead of the truth of he matter.
“If only everyone knew what a strong brave man you were, Hadri,” Avey said. He pressed his hands to his chest in a dramatic damsel-like pose. “Oh save me, strong prince! Some small children might hurt me!”
“Mock all you want, but children are the embodiment of evil. One of those little fuckers bit me once,” Hadri said.
“That’s why you don’t steal their food, you idiot. Besides, you could get their cooties and then their innate evil could rub off on you – woooooo, boooga boogaboo~,” Avey said, aping the sound of a bogeyman, complete with hand gestures. Hadri just rolled his eyes. “Cut it out, Ave. Can’t you see I need lovin’ and no more beatin’?”
“Well sorry, you’ll have to do the beating and the loving by yourself. “
“Got plenty of practice with that,” Hadri sighed.
“So says the ‘dead sexy amazing thief’,” Avey said in his most mocking tones. He poked Hadri in the ribs only to have Hadri catch him and twist him close in an armlock until they were both laughing again, and Avey was caught tight in Hadri’s arms.
“You know...” Hadri said in a soft whisper just for his ears, “I should make you pay for that.”
“Make you p-pay for saving your sorry ass?” Avey said.. He sounded nervous and off even to his own ears. He felt the rush of Hadri’s breath against him, hot and sweet.
“You know how I work,” Hadri said. He was so close, so very close. Hadri was tilting down, their lips close enough to touch...
“Hey, go get a room!”
An old drunk sat huddled in the alley. An empty bottle dangled from one arm, his other hand was used to point in the most self-righteous way possible.
“If I had enough gold I would!” Hadri shot back, “Care to lend me some good sir?”
Avey broke away. “Forget it, let’s just go for a bit of brew,” he said.
He rubbed at his cheeks and attributed the redness to the leftover adrenaline of running from the giantess of a woman.
“Brew you say? I’m always up for a bit of that. Where too, sweet lady?” Hadri said.
“With you having the brilliant idea of trying to steal from the Innkeeper’s child, I think we’ll have to find another tavern to frequent for a while until this settles down,” Avey replied.
“I hear the Boar’s Head is a good one,” Hadri said.
“No, my father owes money there. If I went in there, they’d try to stick me with his bill.”
“The Brown Fawn?”
“That one too.”
“The Fish Eye? The Easy Mermaid? The Constipated Dragon?”
“Those too.”
“The Drunk Lass Who Gives It To Anyone Who Asks? The Whore’s Lore? The Place Where Old Men Go To Die?”
“...And those as well.”
“Is there ANY place that your father hasn’t incurred a debt at?” Avey said, exasperated.
“..well, this is my father we’re talking about. There might be a place in the Forbidden Islands of Laz’da, though I wouldn’t bet on it.”
“Screw this, we should just go and get a bottle and take it out. I’ll buy it. You’re killing my reputation with your heroness anyways. At this rate people will think I hug kittens and help orphans in my spare time.”
Avey raised an eyebrow. “And you don’t?”
“Shut up.”
--
It wasn’t far to The Easy Mermaid, but Hadri could never leave a bar quickly – unless someone was chasing him with a broken off bottle or knife.
Avey sat on the cold ground, dark almost there. He wrapped his arms over his knees to shut out the chilling breeze.
“There you are, friiiend!” Hadri said, his voice already slurring.
“You’re late. Did the women keep you?” Avey sniffed.
“...Oh, don’t be so cruel, I’m an injured man. I had to rest my weary bones in there and get a bit of wine. It would be an insult to some perfectly fine whores if I didn’t chat a bit–”
“How much wine have you had?”
“I’m drunnnk on love, baby.”
Avey elbowed his friend in the ribs.
“Ok, ok, one and a half, but just to take the edge off the pain. I’m surprised she didn’t break something,” Hadri said. He coughed and clutched at his ribs theatrically.
“I know for a fact that it takes more than one bottle to get you drunk.”
“It’s enough to make me try and grab your ass.”
“You do that when you’re sober,” Avey replied testily.
“Well, yeah. It is a fine ass. What do you expect? It practically screams ‘grab me, for I am supple and just waiting to be grabbed–”
Avey cleared his throat. “Moving on—”We should get out of this town.”
“Damn, I liked the topic of how hot your ass is. Hmmm. And where would you suggest?”
“The glen where they keep the cows?”
“Seriously? Cow tipping? That was old when we were twelve. Mmm, s’been years since we went down to the Äĵ’ìéqûĩ river,”Hadri said.
“You can hardly call that teensy little stream down the Miz’zupa woods a river,” Avey replied. “And I thought they’d the Gjklkfsl river, after the hero Fa’la’la’laa Gjklkfsl.”
“Huh. Maybe. Who the fuck is naming these things? And these people? How drunk were his parents. Or maybe it was a prank. If I ever have children, I’m going to give them the most scarring names possible. It’ll haunt them all their lives. Something like...Fuxly McKnickerbottoms or some pansy, prissy bitch name like Avey.”
“If you ever have children, the world will implode. And for your information, my name is from a great-great-great-grandfather who happened to be a hero.”
“Yeaah, an Elvdrakenfae one. And you know what they say about Elvdrakenfae men. And women.”
Hadri winked and made a lewd gesture that only the most innocent of children could mistake.
“..Is it physically possible for you to not end a sentence with some sort of insinuation?”
“Well, sometimes I start with one,” Hadri said.
“Forget I asked.”
“The guild will dock me points if I’m not sexy and roguish enough. You’ve no idea how cutthroat they are in there. Once, a whore came forward and revealed that one of our highest ranking thieves had a tiny shroom of a cock and couldn’t get off unless the whore yodeled while they fucked. Took him down a notch, that’s for sure.”
“Indeed... It’d be a shame for them to know you’ve been stealing candy from a child. It’d really put a damper on your reputation of being a legendary thief”
“Hey, don’t forget your father’s gambling debts!”
“For your information that’s booze debts.”
“Oh come now, I’m sure he’s thrown a dice or two... or a woman. No bout of serious drinking would be complete without a whore.”
“...let’s not go there. I do not want that image in my head. It’s not something I can unsee,” Avey sighed.
“Oh? Then picture me naked. That’ll help make it better.”
“...You bastard,” Avey muttered.
Because that was an image that just could not be unseen. Even if he wanted to.
--
Hadri breathed in the raw air of the countryside. He swore everything was fresher here, the water tasted cleaner and the sunlight seemed warmer.
“It’s been ages since we went hunting like this,” Avey said.
“I didn’t think it’d been that long, but come to think of it..” Hadri trailed off. “I guess I didn’t think of it as it’s been so long since I since I came here with you.”
“Confusing me with your milking maids now?” Avey said drily.
“Pshaw, You’re one of a kind, my friend.” He cuffed Avey on the shoulder and they both laughed.
“Besides, If I wanted to seduce you, I’d have long done it,” Hadri said in his slowest, made of sex and honey voice.
“Yes, yes, I know about your ‘sex god’ powers.”
“Oh you wish you knew about my sex god powers.”
“So you, say, Hadri. So you say,” Avey said.
“I didn’t come here just for hunting. It’s been too long since we did some serious sparring,” Hadri said. He grinned, his same cocksure way and fingered the hilt of his sword in a highly suggestive manner.
“You’re right, it’s about time our swords crossed. I believe we have a score to settle,” Avey said.
“Oho, heroboy, let’s see some action to go with that pretty talk of yours of yours.”
Avey drew his sword. It was a long, thin blade with metals so refined it looked whitish in this moonlight. The hilt was golden in color, with a handle and coiled upwards.
“Oho, aren’t you fancy. I haven’t seen ladysilk in quite some time!”
“It’s called ‘Moonsong’. It’s Elvdrakenfae in origin,” Avey said.
“Whatever you say, ladyslayer.”
Hadri’s sword was thicker and longer than the graceful Moonsong. The metal the dark grey of stormclouds. He’d not inherited it, but had gotten lucky with a strange traveler who resembled him more than a bit. After following man to the latest bar, he’d won it from the man who may have been his father (but then, knowing Hyssop, who really knew?).
He’d named it Stormbringer, for all true swords needed names just like steeds and companions needed a name, even if they were simply a sobriquet.
“Prepare yourself!” Avey cried.
“That’s the lamest line ever, don’t you got anything better?” Avey shot back.
“Shut it!”
The first blow sent a crushing resound through the air, the second was so quick, Hadri barely dodged it. The third he pressed back until Avey was strafing and waiting.
“You’ve gotten a bit stronger after all, Avey! But not enough!”
Avey lifted his sword and pointed it straight towards Hadri’s heart. “I’ll wipe that smirk off your face.”
“Them’s fighting words, moonfae.”
Avey slashed again and Hadri parried. They stood there, caught against each other’s force of wills. For all Hadri’s teasing, Avey had a lot of strength in that wiry frame of his. Stormbringer crackled in his hands, and when it met against Moonsong, the blades made a singing noise, as if two lovers welcoming each other’s return.
Despite that first blow, Avey’s style was a defensive sort. Hadri knew if he could get his friend from strafing and make him stay still long enough, Avey would eventually run out of ways to dodge his advances. In more than ways than one. As Avey couldn’t take him down in sheer force, he was tiring him out. Moonsong was as light as air, and took no force to wield. Elvdrakenfae weapons were like that.
That just meant Hadri would have to chase a little harder.
Hadri swung low and Avey jumped back, the blade a disappointing distance. Avey twirled past spinning on one foot beyond his jab.
“This isn’t a dance, twinkletoes.”
Avey smirked. “I’m just using my brains instead of my brawn.”
And Hadri noticed it too – Stormbringer had grown as heavy as a lump of iron in his hands. Hadri had begun to breathe heavier, but still he slashed back, even as his arms began to burn and ache.
Avey moved like some spirited, fae thing dancing at the edge of his blade. It wasn’t long before Stormbringer’s tip tilted to the ground while Hadri gasped in exhaustion. Avey pointed the tip of Moonsong at Hadri’s throat.
“It’s true brains do win over...lasciviousness.”
“What, I don’t have brawn now?” Hadri lifted up his shirt pointedly to reveal his taut chest and abdominal muscles.
Avey looked away. “Want to take a booze break?”
“Sure, I’m game,” Hadri said. He sheathed his sword and Avey did the same for his little pansy moonsilk sword.
They laid back on the soft grassy ground, drunk on wine and fencing and each other.
--
Unlike the rest of his family, Alastair kept to his books. They were a family of heros and he tended to follow after the woman that a great grandfather had brought back with him. A sorceress from the hills of Venon. He wore the forest green robes of a scholar with slate blue pants. His spectacles gave him the appearance of someone much kinder than he actually was.
Ebony colored hair was pulled back from his face with a leather tie. His lips were a thin, grim line as he read over the Ars Arcania. The secrets of the world lay before him, unaccountable power, to be taken. This land was land of fools. Alastair considered himself above them, some trace of blood had given him intellect in a place worse than apes. A gift from heaven, surely.
He wanted to find his ancestors and thank them personally for the gift of their genetics. And to think, he could’ve been a useless fop like Amos or whining halfbreed like Avey.
A soft knock came to the door and he turned.
“Aubrey,” he said, his usual flat tones.
She came in the door, all grace and fire. She was the female half of him. While not identical, her perfection was quite close and far more suitable thasn most of the other vapid females. Her hair was a chestnut brown instead of his black, and her eyes held more of an almond’s slant than his, but the shape of their faces were similar. Anyone could tell that they were closer than any other in this family of buffoons.
Her genetics were more pure, less tainted by the rot that had eaten away at the Havinshel family.
“I brought the scrolls you requested. It took some persuasion to get them out of the head Professor’s sight but I think you’ll find them just to your liking,” she said.
She laid them on the desk before them and even though he was tempted to rip them open immediately, he let them be. Patience. With time he would find them out. Quo Pro Quo, a gift called for equal payment.
“Thank you,” he replied.
He took that thin, bony, beautiful hand in his own and kissed just below her knuckles. It was a slow, heated kiss and he felt the warmth of her skin under his lips.
She still flushed at such gestures. Of course she’d locked the door before she came in. Everyone knew that Alastair needed his time for studying.
“Brother...” she breathed.
“Let me thank you personally for your services.”
He patted his lap and she sat upon him, first as a genteel, more ladylike twist with her legs together, then the far more vampish spread over him. That was just like her. A lady’s mask upon a whore. Oh for all her politeness she was a cunning bitch underneath it all. If she hadn’t been so infatuated with him, she’d have made quite an enemy. A woman like her would smile and make pleasantries then stab a person in a back.
Literally. More than once that trait had turned out particularly useful. She was quite useful to his ends.
He stroked her hair and she softened – her gaze, her body, even her insides readying for him. Her undergarments were probably wet and waiting for him already. Aubrey was always so easy for him. It was almost boring what little fight she put up. She was too fond of the perverse to even take a sort of sick glee in their sin. She merely accepted it and him as a different shade of normal, one that might need to be hidden, but was normal just the same.
What a poor fool of a girl.
She was eager – too eager as snuck his hand beneath her skirts. When he kissed her, he could still smell the scent of the last man on her.
--
Series: Original
Rating: a very hard PG-13 for now, it’ll probably hit R-NC17 by the time I’m over, considering whether I do fade-to-black or not.
Word count: 3,527
A/N: I usually f-lock original stuff, but this was a present for M and stuff. ...plus I really can’t see myself ever publishing this. Uh. Really.
Anyways, this is for M as always, as well as for Saaski’s birthday! (a bit late) At least until I get enough $$$ to send her some books. As this is actually a present for my beta, there was no betaing. So uh. Tell me if I missed something? I did try and look it over..
Also for
52_flavours / (new) 27 ) Tales of manly perseverance. Or the lack thereof. / (old) 15. On purpose to confound this scoundrel’s pride Prologue & chapter one
Avey met Hadri earlier that day, before the thieves came out from their caves and cracks to pace about the streets, looking for their latest victims. It wasn’t quite dark enough to hide in the shadows with the other pickpockets and fingersmiths. Still, the back alleys were a decrepit thing with peeling pant and broken masonry. Chinks in these blocks would never get fixed, even generation after generation.
Even with the early hour, that didn’t stop someone like Hadri. The Rust Bucket’s Tavern Keeper’s little bratling was at the side of the street, licking at a bit of molasses candy.
Hadri took one look at the child, the candy, and while Avey watched on, he bent down and talked to the child. He pulled the easiest trick in the book, that only a child could fall for – the ”Look over there!” trick. The minute the bratling’s head was turned, Hadri swiped up the cube and pipped it in his mouth.
Then, just to rub in the fact that the bratling and he had approximately the same amount of maturity, he stuck his tongue out and did a mocking Nyerrr nyeeer nyeeer
Avey couldn’t say he was particularly surprised, but that didn’t stop him from facepalming.
“Hadri, you just stole candy from a baby.”
“Easiest steal I ever made,” Hadri said. He smacked his lips and was about to say something more when the child began to bawl. Loudly. This brought forth a stout giantess of a woman with a near as big as the child itself. She cooed and asked something, and the child pointed to Hadri.
“What? Oh shi– We better get out of here–”
And that was about the last thing Hadri said before the giantess was upon him.
The giantess swung her giant purse at his head. Hadri dodged the first, sidestepped the second and jumped over the third. It was just enough to make him cocky. Cockier.
“Is that all you can do? Catch me if you–”
She whacked him right on his jaw, effectively cutting off whatever smug retort he’d been saying. Hadri stumbled back as she assaulted him, hitting his chest and arms and face. He could do little but cough and scream as the impacts hit him, steady and unrelenting. The woman was a harpy, a monstrous beast of a thing that would kill him before this was over.
Avey, being the good friend that he was stood aside and watched his friend get his just desserts. He even pointed and laughed, because he was just that good of a friend.
“What are you carrying in that thing? Bricks?!” Hadri shrieked. He screamed as the purse made contact again and again.
“I could use a little help over here!” Hadri said.
“What, children aren’t enough for you, Hadri? Now you have to be beat up by a woman?” Avey called back,“It serves you right.”
“A great friend you are,” Hadri muttered. He ducked a blow with more grace this time.
“I-It’s a good thing Averyl isn’t here– s-she’d kick your ass for implying that women aren’t liberated and kickass and all that shit.”
“She would. She’d kick your ass too. And this woman’s.”
“Besides, she’s no mere woman – she’s a beast–”
He was cut off as the giantess gave a scream of rage and charged at him. Hadri fled up the alley and turned a U turn to run towards Avey. The beast of a woman changed right behind him.
“A little help here!” Hadri said, his voice hitting a high note at the giantess gained upon him with seemingly every step.
“Oh, the poor damsel needs a hero to save him?” Avey laughed. “You scream like a girl.”
“You’d scream if you were pelted by a madwoman with a bag full of bricks too.”
The child began to laugh and as if that was the atonement for Hadri’s crimes. The giantess stopped in her carnage for a moment to coo at her child. Avey made his move. He approached the giantess and tapped her on the shoulder.
“Excuse me miss, would you like to buy some Girl Scout cookies?”
“Whuzzat?” The giantess said in a gruff voice.
“S-snafu-! Or is it sh-azaam?” Hadri said.
“Run, you bastard! This is no time for catchphrases!”
With that they fled into the coming dark. Their lungs were bursting from laughing and running and the giddiness of it all.
--
She’d pounded on him senseless. He’d be covered in bruises before morning. Of course, he’d lie his way into saying it was from a bar fight which he won, instead of the truth of he matter.
“If only everyone knew what a strong brave man you were, Hadri,” Avey said. He pressed his hands to his chest in a dramatic damsel-like pose. “Oh save me, strong prince! Some small children might hurt me!”
“Mock all you want, but children are the embodiment of evil. One of those little fuckers bit me once,” Hadri said.
“That’s why you don’t steal their food, you idiot. Besides, you could get their cooties and then their innate evil could rub off on you – woooooo, boooga boogaboo~,” Avey said, aping the sound of a bogeyman, complete with hand gestures. Hadri just rolled his eyes. “Cut it out, Ave. Can’t you see I need lovin’ and no more beatin’?”
“Well sorry, you’ll have to do the beating and the loving by yourself. “
“Got plenty of practice with that,” Hadri sighed.
“So says the ‘dead sexy amazing thief’,” Avey said in his most mocking tones. He poked Hadri in the ribs only to have Hadri catch him and twist him close in an armlock until they were both laughing again, and Avey was caught tight in Hadri’s arms.
“You know...” Hadri said in a soft whisper just for his ears, “I should make you pay for that.”
“Make you p-pay for saving your sorry ass?” Avey said.. He sounded nervous and off even to his own ears. He felt the rush of Hadri’s breath against him, hot and sweet.
“You know how I work,” Hadri said. He was so close, so very close. Hadri was tilting down, their lips close enough to touch...
“Hey, go get a room!”
An old drunk sat huddled in the alley. An empty bottle dangled from one arm, his other hand was used to point in the most self-righteous way possible.
“If I had enough gold I would!” Hadri shot back, “Care to lend me some good sir?”
Avey broke away. “Forget it, let’s just go for a bit of brew,” he said.
He rubbed at his cheeks and attributed the redness to the leftover adrenaline of running from the giantess of a woman.
“Brew you say? I’m always up for a bit of that. Where too, sweet lady?” Hadri said.
“With you having the brilliant idea of trying to steal from the Innkeeper’s child, I think we’ll have to find another tavern to frequent for a while until this settles down,” Avey replied.
“I hear the Boar’s Head is a good one,” Hadri said.
“No, my father owes money there. If I went in there, they’d try to stick me with his bill.”
“The Brown Fawn?”
“That one too.”
“The Fish Eye? The Easy Mermaid? The Constipated Dragon?”
“Those too.”
“The Drunk Lass Who Gives It To Anyone Who Asks? The Whore’s Lore? The Place Where Old Men Go To Die?”
“...And those as well.”
“Is there ANY place that your father hasn’t incurred a debt at?” Avey said, exasperated.
“..well, this is my father we’re talking about. There might be a place in the Forbidden Islands of Laz’da, though I wouldn’t bet on it.”
“Screw this, we should just go and get a bottle and take it out. I’ll buy it. You’re killing my reputation with your heroness anyways. At this rate people will think I hug kittens and help orphans in my spare time.”
Avey raised an eyebrow. “And you don’t?”
“Shut up.”
--
It wasn’t far to The Easy Mermaid, but Hadri could never leave a bar quickly – unless someone was chasing him with a broken off bottle or knife.
Avey sat on the cold ground, dark almost there. He wrapped his arms over his knees to shut out the chilling breeze.
“There you are, friiiend!” Hadri said, his voice already slurring.
“You’re late. Did the women keep you?” Avey sniffed.
“...Oh, don’t be so cruel, I’m an injured man. I had to rest my weary bones in there and get a bit of wine. It would be an insult to some perfectly fine whores if I didn’t chat a bit–”
“How much wine have you had?”
“I’m drunnnk on love, baby.”
Avey elbowed his friend in the ribs.
“Ok, ok, one and a half, but just to take the edge off the pain. I’m surprised she didn’t break something,” Hadri said. He coughed and clutched at his ribs theatrically.
“I know for a fact that it takes more than one bottle to get you drunk.”
“It’s enough to make me try and grab your ass.”
“You do that when you’re sober,” Avey replied testily.
“Well, yeah. It is a fine ass. What do you expect? It practically screams ‘grab me, for I am supple and just waiting to be grabbed–”
Avey cleared his throat. “Moving on—”We should get out of this town.”
“Damn, I liked the topic of how hot your ass is. Hmmm. And where would you suggest?”
“The glen where they keep the cows?”
“Seriously? Cow tipping? That was old when we were twelve. Mmm, s’been years since we went down to the Äĵ’ìéqûĩ river,”Hadri said.
“You can hardly call that teensy little stream down the Miz’zupa woods a river,” Avey replied. “And I thought they’d the Gjklkfsl river, after the hero Fa’la’la’laa Gjklkfsl.”
“Huh. Maybe. Who the fuck is naming these things? And these people? How drunk were his parents. Or maybe it was a prank. If I ever have children, I’m going to give them the most scarring names possible. It’ll haunt them all their lives. Something like...Fuxly McKnickerbottoms or some pansy, prissy bitch name like Avey.”
“If you ever have children, the world will implode. And for your information, my name is from a great-great-great-grandfather who happened to be a hero.”
“Yeaah, an Elvdrakenfae one. And you know what they say about Elvdrakenfae men. And women.”
Hadri winked and made a lewd gesture that only the most innocent of children could mistake.
“..Is it physically possible for you to not end a sentence with some sort of insinuation?”
“Well, sometimes I start with one,” Hadri said.
“Forget I asked.”
“The guild will dock me points if I’m not sexy and roguish enough. You’ve no idea how cutthroat they are in there. Once, a whore came forward and revealed that one of our highest ranking thieves had a tiny shroom of a cock and couldn’t get off unless the whore yodeled while they fucked. Took him down a notch, that’s for sure.”
“Indeed... It’d be a shame for them to know you’ve been stealing candy from a child. It’d really put a damper on your reputation of being a legendary thief”
“Hey, don’t forget your father’s gambling debts!”
“For your information that’s booze debts.”
“Oh come now, I’m sure he’s thrown a dice or two... or a woman. No bout of serious drinking would be complete without a whore.”
“...let’s not go there. I do not want that image in my head. It’s not something I can unsee,” Avey sighed.
“Oh? Then picture me naked. That’ll help make it better.”
“...You bastard,” Avey muttered.
Because that was an image that just could not be unseen. Even if he wanted to.
--
Hadri breathed in the raw air of the countryside. He swore everything was fresher here, the water tasted cleaner and the sunlight seemed warmer.
“It’s been ages since we went hunting like this,” Avey said.
“I didn’t think it’d been that long, but come to think of it..” Hadri trailed off. “I guess I didn’t think of it as it’s been so long since I since I came here with you.”
“Confusing me with your milking maids now?” Avey said drily.
“Pshaw, You’re one of a kind, my friend.” He cuffed Avey on the shoulder and they both laughed.
“Besides, If I wanted to seduce you, I’d have long done it,” Hadri said in his slowest, made of sex and honey voice.
“Yes, yes, I know about your ‘sex god’ powers.”
“Oh you wish you knew about my sex god powers.”
“So you, say, Hadri. So you say,” Avey said.
“I didn’t come here just for hunting. It’s been too long since we did some serious sparring,” Hadri said. He grinned, his same cocksure way and fingered the hilt of his sword in a highly suggestive manner.
“You’re right, it’s about time our swords crossed. I believe we have a score to settle,” Avey said.
“Oho, heroboy, let’s see some action to go with that pretty talk of yours of yours.”
Avey drew his sword. It was a long, thin blade with metals so refined it looked whitish in this moonlight. The hilt was golden in color, with a handle and coiled upwards.
“Oho, aren’t you fancy. I haven’t seen ladysilk in quite some time!”
“It’s called ‘Moonsong’. It’s Elvdrakenfae in origin,” Avey said.
“Whatever you say, ladyslayer.”
Hadri’s sword was thicker and longer than the graceful Moonsong. The metal the dark grey of stormclouds. He’d not inherited it, but had gotten lucky with a strange traveler who resembled him more than a bit. After following man to the latest bar, he’d won it from the man who may have been his father (but then, knowing Hyssop, who really knew?).
He’d named it Stormbringer, for all true swords needed names just like steeds and companions needed a name, even if they were simply a sobriquet.
“Prepare yourself!” Avey cried.
“That’s the lamest line ever, don’t you got anything better?” Avey shot back.
“Shut it!”
The first blow sent a crushing resound through the air, the second was so quick, Hadri barely dodged it. The third he pressed back until Avey was strafing and waiting.
“You’ve gotten a bit stronger after all, Avey! But not enough!”
Avey lifted his sword and pointed it straight towards Hadri’s heart. “I’ll wipe that smirk off your face.”
“Them’s fighting words, moonfae.”
Avey slashed again and Hadri parried. They stood there, caught against each other’s force of wills. For all Hadri’s teasing, Avey had a lot of strength in that wiry frame of his. Stormbringer crackled in his hands, and when it met against Moonsong, the blades made a singing noise, as if two lovers welcoming each other’s return.
Despite that first blow, Avey’s style was a defensive sort. Hadri knew if he could get his friend from strafing and make him stay still long enough, Avey would eventually run out of ways to dodge his advances. In more than ways than one. As Avey couldn’t take him down in sheer force, he was tiring him out. Moonsong was as light as air, and took no force to wield. Elvdrakenfae weapons were like that.
That just meant Hadri would have to chase a little harder.
Hadri swung low and Avey jumped back, the blade a disappointing distance. Avey twirled past spinning on one foot beyond his jab.
“This isn’t a dance, twinkletoes.”
Avey smirked. “I’m just using my brains instead of my brawn.”
And Hadri noticed it too – Stormbringer had grown as heavy as a lump of iron in his hands. Hadri had begun to breathe heavier, but still he slashed back, even as his arms began to burn and ache.
Avey moved like some spirited, fae thing dancing at the edge of his blade. It wasn’t long before Stormbringer’s tip tilted to the ground while Hadri gasped in exhaustion. Avey pointed the tip of Moonsong at Hadri’s throat.
“It’s true brains do win over...lasciviousness.”
“What, I don’t have brawn now?” Hadri lifted up his shirt pointedly to reveal his taut chest and abdominal muscles.
Avey looked away. “Want to take a booze break?”
“Sure, I’m game,” Hadri said. He sheathed his sword and Avey did the same for his little pansy moonsilk sword.
They laid back on the soft grassy ground, drunk on wine and fencing and each other.
--
Unlike the rest of his family, Alastair kept to his books. They were a family of heros and he tended to follow after the woman that a great grandfather had brought back with him. A sorceress from the hills of Venon. He wore the forest green robes of a scholar with slate blue pants. His spectacles gave him the appearance of someone much kinder than he actually was.
Ebony colored hair was pulled back from his face with a leather tie. His lips were a thin, grim line as he read over the Ars Arcania. The secrets of the world lay before him, unaccountable power, to be taken. This land was land of fools. Alastair considered himself above them, some trace of blood had given him intellect in a place worse than apes. A gift from heaven, surely.
He wanted to find his ancestors and thank them personally for the gift of their genetics. And to think, he could’ve been a useless fop like Amos or whining halfbreed like Avey.
A soft knock came to the door and he turned.
“Aubrey,” he said, his usual flat tones.
She came in the door, all grace and fire. She was the female half of him. While not identical, her perfection was quite close and far more suitable thasn most of the other vapid females. Her hair was a chestnut brown instead of his black, and her eyes held more of an almond’s slant than his, but the shape of their faces were similar. Anyone could tell that they were closer than any other in this family of buffoons.
Her genetics were more pure, less tainted by the rot that had eaten away at the Havinshel family.
“I brought the scrolls you requested. It took some persuasion to get them out of the head Professor’s sight but I think you’ll find them just to your liking,” she said.
She laid them on the desk before them and even though he was tempted to rip them open immediately, he let them be. Patience. With time he would find them out. Quo Pro Quo, a gift called for equal payment.
“Thank you,” he replied.
He took that thin, bony, beautiful hand in his own and kissed just below her knuckles. It was a slow, heated kiss and he felt the warmth of her skin under his lips.
She still flushed at such gestures. Of course she’d locked the door before she came in. Everyone knew that Alastair needed his time for studying.
“Brother...” she breathed.
“Let me thank you personally for your services.”
He patted his lap and she sat upon him, first as a genteel, more ladylike twist with her legs together, then the far more vampish spread over him. That was just like her. A lady’s mask upon a whore. Oh for all her politeness she was a cunning bitch underneath it all. If she hadn’t been so infatuated with him, she’d have made quite an enemy. A woman like her would smile and make pleasantries then stab a person in a back.
Literally. More than once that trait had turned out particularly useful. She was quite useful to his ends.
He stroked her hair and she softened – her gaze, her body, even her insides readying for him. Her undergarments were probably wet and waiting for him already. Aubrey was always so easy for him. It was almost boring what little fight she put up. She was too fond of the perverse to even take a sort of sick glee in their sin. She merely accepted it and him as a different shade of normal, one that might need to be hidden, but was normal just the same.
What a poor fool of a girl.
She was eager – too eager as snuck his hand beneath her skirts. When he kissed her, he could still smell the scent of the last man on her.
--
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Also
“..Is it physically possible for you to not end a sentence with some sort of insinuation?”
“Well, sometimes I start with one,” Hadri said.
“Forget I asked.”
My friends asked if you'd based him on me when I quoted just that part.
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Though I hadn't actually READ Nightrunner series yet by then...
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Never read it...
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You should! It starts out with this professional thief picking up a boy and saving him and then taking him along. Eventually they fall in love and end up together, though that takes a volume or two to get there. It Is Epic XD
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I suppose now would be a good time to get to your reading when you're not working, eh?
Oh yeah, not to pimp my own stuff, but this (http://measuringlife.livejournal.com/426176.html) has a bit of KieranOscar which I thought you might like. Anything I can write/do for you to make it better? D:
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