#me when. me when i want more human nightmare designs with skin creases and signs of aging.

[nashdoesstuff]

human crest. because i love this man and he has me in a chokehold

crest by me nightmare by jokublog

[capricornus-rex]

Two Sides of the Coin (3)

Chapter 3: Picking Up A Lead | Jidné Sheedra x Cal Kestis

Summary: Hell-bent on exacting revenge and retrieving the Holocron, the dreaded Darth Vader is now on the hunt for the young Jedi Knight, Cal Kestis. Under the assumption that he still possessed the artifact, while fueled by the intrigue of the boy’s strength and skill with the Force, the dark lord hires the bounty hunter, Jidné Sheedra, to track him down and have him delivered alive. However, the task becomes a trial for young Jidné, as she faces a conflict that tests her beliefs of a scarred past she had hidden for so long.

Also in AO3

Tags: Fem OC, Jidné Sheedra, Force-Sensitive! Fem OC, Bounty Hunter! Fem OC, Jedi! Fem OC

Chapters: Part 1 | Previous: Part 2 | Next: Part 4 | Masterlist

3 of ?

As Jidné got out of the castle, her stomach plummeted to her feet and her legs transformed into limp noodles—barely doing their job and instead dragged her along in every step. It was gradually sinking into her that the person who gave her the job was one of the most feared figures among the Jedi. She clutched her abdomen, crumpling the center of her jacket while waiting for the entry ramp to unfurl.

Not wanting to look back over her shoulder, she knew that she’d have the safety and privacy she needs within her vessel: a Dynamic-class freighter that she personally retrofitted and anointed the Crescent Scarab. It was a fine work of art that she greatly took pride in, so much so, that she has modified everything to her liking. She darted to the lounge of the ship, lousily putting down the canister and then splaying herself over the sofa.

Coming from the cockpit, an ID seeker droid acknowledged her arrival and greeted her. Its multiple claws on its tentacles flowed and twitched as its single eye panned left and right, scanning its owner.

“Hey, Eye-Dee Three,” Jidné greeted back.

The droid named ID-3, formerly Imperial property of another probe droid variant, is the only other passenger in the Scarab besides the pilot, Jidné herself. The droid chittered in its raspy, monotonous string of notes as it hovered closer towards its owner.

“Yeah, I’m okay, just… felt like jelly is all,” she brings her hand on the top of the black droid’s flat dome for a head.

The young bounty hunter detached the holster from her belt and set it down on the table, right next to the canister of credits. She stared at both objects for a good long minute, contemplating and pondering her strategy on how she’ll begin with this contract. Jidné reached out for her weapon holster first, taking it with both hands and then unbuttoning the flap—a polished, silver emitter pokes out of the lining.

She gently tilted the holster downward until an enough length of the weapon inside slid out. She caught the shaft before it could completely fall off. She rolled the hilt across her hand, feeling and tracing for the etchings, curves, and dips of the design. She held it high and proud, in the same way as she finished constructing it, the tassel that she knotted around the ring of her pommel caught her eye. Two strands, unequal in length, dangling at the very end of the hilt. The longer strand had seven turquoise beads, at the end of its thread is a cluster of feathers—three to be precise—though the wear and tear was very obvious; the short one had four beads of the same color but lacks a feather.

“Feathers are almost gone,” she hummed, fiddling the remaining tufts.

Her heart skipped a beat—it always does, even though she has done this many times. In her hand, the cold metal of the lightsaber’s sleeve stung the nerves of her palm. A small, somewhat satisfied smile curled along her lips—the weapon had brought her good memories, but also nightmares—and that smile became fleeting like a comet. Her thumb ran across the metal finish of the body and found the switch, the idea of igniting it was seductive—a temptation that she has no strength to fight back.

The snarl of the ignition took her breath away. A vibrant purple blade bore out of the emitter, its glow colored the paleness of her cheeks and reflected against the gloss of her brown irises.

“Jedi, huh?” she muttered to herself.

“Beeee-deee, trill?”

“That’s right, ID, we’re after a Jedi,”

Jidné sighed, and then switched her saber off before tucking it back into the pouch.

When her legs finally regained their strength, she walked to the cockpit and beckoned her droid companion—who still hovered close to her side—and joined her in the seat. As she put herself into work mode, she recalled the very helpful detail that Darth Vader gave. She breathed out a resigned sigh that drowned in the hollow hum of the Scarab’s engine revving up.

In a galaxy that stretched a thousand times more than the eye could see, how is she going to narrow down to finding a single Jedi?

“Say, ID, how likely are we to stumble into a redheaded Jedi on the run?”

“Beee… chirp!”

Jidné chuckled at the response, “I figured as much.”

With little base information she has, she knew she had to be resourceful. Lately, she’s picked up murmurs from Baz’s stronghold—as well as the gossips in the cantinas she frequented in Modala—that bounty hunters were also after a Jedi, solely for the bounty on his head, not because Darth Vader had hired others behind Jidné’s back or the other way around.

While gossip wasn’t exactly the best source material, she had to make do. The young bounty hunter swallowed her pride and entered the coordinates of her first stop.

Upon seeing the coordinates on the computer, ID-3 erratically chittered in protest.

“We have no other choice, buddy. They’re the closest we can get to the target,”

ID-3 lowed in disagreement, submitting to Jidné’s decision and continued assisting her in the ship, much to his chagrin. His owner sensed the disdain and petted its flat dome again.

“Don’t worry, you’ll stay close to me, right?”

“Beeep!”

Jidné smiled and boosted the ship’s throttle, following their course to Ordo Eris.

——————————————————–

Jidné piloted the ship with great care, evading the rock debris and asteroids that floated within the orbit. Her destination was dead ahead: one of the biggest rocks in the field, a needle of the infrastructure built within, a fiery orange glow encircled the central crater’s inner rim.

“I really don’t like this place,” she complained to no one in particular—except herself.

She slowed down the speed of the freighter until she got close enough to the outpost. A red blip flashed on her screen and vanished seconds after spotting it. There was a noticeable gaping crack of the arena’s ray shield wall that protects the outpost from the elements outside the planetoid, the young hunter added that to her list of questions once she lands.

The Scarab docked on the empty arena. It wasn’t entirely new for her see it devoid of animals and sentient creatures fighting for dear life, though it was a better sight than the deafening chorus of wild cheers mingling with animal roars. The Scarab’s landing gears disturbed the floor of the arena, creating clouds of sand around its pads, the exit ramp unfurled for Jidné and ID-3 to alight the ship.

A trio of bounty hunters approached her, there were more standing by the arena’s walls as well. Shortly after, they gave way for their Umbaran boss clad in silken, luxurious violet robes—he stuck out like a sore thumb around the orange light that filled his colosseum. For someone with sallow, prominent cheekbones and paper-white skin, he moved quite flamboyantly—contrast to his sickly appearance—perfectly matching up to the vibrancy of his rich, violet robes.

“We need to talk, Sorc,” the bounty hunter abruptly began, not having time for the dilly-dallying.

“Well, well,” he spoke in a singsong manner. He rubbed his goatee as he swayed. “It’s been way too long, dove. Come, come!”

Jidné didn’t come closer, even though Sorc beckoned her with his fingers covered in rings, so much so that the fingernails were the only ones exposed.

“Oh come on now, little dove, you act like we didn’t have history together!”

The bounty hunter rolled her eyes and shook her head, “Don’t call me that. Plus, that history was basically me being your delivery girl of animals and captives. It’s no big contract, just a sideline.”

“Ah, but you gave me a lot of good stuff for my arena! When you worked for me back in the day, I never ran out of customers—always looking for some mauling, goring, and all that crazy stuff!”

Completely uninterested of Sorc’s rambling about his business of arena fights between humanoids, humans or sentient beings against wild, senseless animals, Jidné cut to the chase.

“I don’t have time for stories, Sorc,”

“Of course, you aren’t. But, you know, intel—”

“Isn’t your expertise,” Jidné finished the sentence, even though that wasn’t exactly what Sorc was going to say. She put her hands over her waist, “But you’re the only one I know who could give me just that. Think of it as a compliment.”

The Umbaran pursed his lips, he opened his palm right in front of her. Fishing two gold chips out of her pocket and then tossing them to the hand, his fingers greedily caged the money into his fist and hurriedly tucked them into his robes.

“Always so hasty,” he rolled his eyes and smacked his lips. “Alright, what do you wanna know?”

“A boy. Redheaded Jedi.”

Sorc Tormo purred a long “Ahh” and wagged his finger at the girl, a mischievous grin stretching ear-to-ear on his pale white face.

“Handsome?”

Jidné’s eyebrows pulled together, creasing her forehead.

“I don’t see how that’s relevant, but okay, I guess?”

A throaty snicker rumbled from the Umbaran, still wagging his finger at the girl in a more teasing manner—it was almost childlike.

The surrounding bounty hunters subtly showed signs of hostility towards Jidné, her eyes already caught their movements with the slightest of side-glances: the ones standing closest to them were tightening their grips around their blasters, the ones who were a little far away but still within earshot had their hands slowly wandering towards their holsters.

She got the hint. Apparently, the Jedi was a prize indeed.

“Now that is an interesting subject—even for you, sweetheart!” Sorc Tormo guffawed, leaning to his knees while keeping his eyes on her.

She pointed at the damage with her thumb over her shoulder, without needing any words to make out the question, Sorc Tormo immediately has the answer.

“Ah!” he clicked his tongue. “We got a little… caught by surprise.”

“One hell of a surprise, if you ask me,”

“Oh honey, you don’t even know the start of it!” he swatted the air with his hand.

“He did that, didn’t he?”

Sorc Tormo’s boisterous guffaw startled the young girl as she awkwardly watched him laugh straight at her face. When he still hasn’t gotten all of the laughter of his system, he’s still chortling as he swings his arm at the air.

“Aww, ya shoulda see the baby go! Slashing away and getting chocked up by my pets and men. Crowd was wild, I had a full box that day!”

“You don’t know where he is, but you’ve seen him,” she insinuated.

Sorc got carried away with the compulsive need to tell it all, a force of habit, from the way she picked up his words, it was clear as the eye-straining color of his gaudy robes—the redheaded Jedi has engaged with the Haxion Brood.

“And you’re after him, too?”

“Hey, it pays the bills, sweetie!” he throws his arms to his sides, solely focusing on the topic of money. “Honestly, I could care less about the kid, but knowing the price on that pretty head of his, you really can’t blame us tryna make honest work, eh?”

“He’s mine!” she snarled, taking two steps towards Sorc.

Immediately, his bounty hunters became defensive of him, stopping her in her path by pointing the barrels of their rifles at her. That didn’t scare her, though, she takes another step close to the point that the holes of the blaster press against her body. She shot a dirty look at the pair of bounty hunters.

“If there’s one thing I hate: it’s competition.” She added.

Sorc chuckled, unintimidated and kept up his lurid façade, he gestured his hand in a circular motion that covered Jidné’s front.

“From what I could read in all this defensiveness, I strongly deduce that you have a contract out to get him.”

“Good job, man, do you want a prize for that?” she sardonically rebutted, keeping up with the Umbaran’s sarcasm with her own flavor.

There was no constructive reply from Sorc, other than another throaty chuckle. The girl’s patience is being stretched thin by the minute, not until she’s satisfied of filling the gaps that Darth Vader left in the job description.

Her sarcasm was quickly replaced with an imposing snarl through the clench of her teeth, “What else do you know?”

“He travels with that little gray grub that owes me a shitton of money!”

“A lot of little grubs owe you a shit-wad of money, Tormo, you’re gonna have to be much more specific.”

The syndicate boss sighed, often forgetting that this little bounty hunter was a persistent one—too persistent for her age rather. He shooed away his bounty hunters from being human barricades between Jidné and himself. They eased up, leaving a gap for Sorc and Jidné to converse with less distractions, but they still kept an eye on the girl—wary of her movements as she’s already starting to be aggressive.

“Alright, alright, fine! Your redhead is with the ship called the Mantis—it’s an S-161, you’ve been a mechanic part-time, right? You should know what that looks like. Now, for the grub that baby boy drives around with—he’s a stubby, little guy. Kinda old, wiry hair, bald on the top.”

“The companion—is he human too?”

“No, that grub is a Lateron. Stout, little thing. Four arms.”

Jidné tossed one last golden chip at Sorc, to which he skillfully caught into his hand; he fluidly slipped it into the inside pocket of his robes, making a soundless clink with the others, as he watched Jidné turn her back at him and walk away.

“Pleasure doing business with you, dove! Don’t be a stranger!”

“I plan to be!” Jidné clapped back before fully disappearing into the ship.

Sorc Tormo watched Jidné prep up the freighter, he even giddily waved goodbye at her to which she repaid with a fed-up rolling of the eye; she ignored him after that, focusing on the dashboard monitors of her ship as she eagerly flies the ship out of the rock. The freighter’s throttle blew at the entire arena—everyone’s capes and coattails flapped and smacked against their legs wildly as Jidné maneuvered the ship to face the gaping crack of the outpost’s wall.

“Are we gunna go after ‘er, boss?” one of the bounty hunters asked.

“Sure. It might be fun to have the baby boy and the baby girl together—they either kill each other or save each other, whatever and whichever works,” Sorc thought out loud, he rubbed his goatee with his ring-covered fingers and a grin stretched across his wrinkled, sallow face. “A ransom… no, a fugitive’s bounty on her head too! Yes, that would be very delicious. Go on now, SHOO!”

All of the bounty hunters dispersed, whooping in glee and greed as they gathered into their crude ships, bringing along the HURID-class droids for added muscle and brawn. Sorc Tormo stood idly in the exact spot he’s been staying in ever since Jidné came until she left, he listened to the barbaric laughter and chatter among his men; that greedy, coy grin never melted in his face—the only thing that ran around his brain was the idea of having sacks upon sacks of credits delivered to his private chambers, rewarded for the joint bounties of the Jedi and Jidné.

[azvolrien]

Clearing the Air

One night a week after Asta’s return to the broch, she and Roan have a little chat about their respective pasts. Mostly Asta’s.

TW for discussion of slavery, I guess, but nothing terribly graphic.

~~~

           Asta smiled to herself in the gloom of the bedroom and cuddled closer to Roan under the blankets. The fire in the hearth below had died down, but the room was still warm with its residual heat and that of the chimney, while a small golden witchlight hovering above them cast just enough light to see by. It wavered slightly in the air; when Roan fell asleep it would vanish altogether, but she wasn’t quite there yet. She lay on her back, watching the ceiling through half-lidded eyes, and without speaking she brought one arm up to encircle Asta and hug her in against her side. A faint frown creased the skin between her eyebrows.

           Asta brushed her fingers over her cheek, tracing the shape of the water horse tattooed there. “What are you thinking about?” she said, only just above a whisper. Even that felt loud through the silence.

           Roan’s chest rose beneath Asta’s arm as she took a deep breath. Idly, she lifted her other hand to caress Asta’s hair, teasing her fingers through the ink-black strands. “Two years since you left for Stormhaven. One week since you came back. Suppose…” She shook her head. “Suppose maybe I’m just not used to sharing my sleeping space again yet.”

           Asta turned onto her front and propped her chin on one hand, trailing the other down over Roan’s jaw and throat to investigate the more abstract symbols inked into the skin there, before her fingers finally settled on the designs on her chest: strange notched rectangles below each collarbone and just above her breasts, the one on the right crossed by a zigzag line like an arrow broken in two places, and a disc between them over the top of her breastbone. The linen tunic Roan wore at night was a little looser than her day clothes, and the collar was low enough to show the tattoos that were normally hidden. “That’s not what you were going to say,” said Asta, taking a moment to observe the difference in their skin tones – hers the warm golden-brown of her Hawk Steppes grandmother, Roan’s dotted with tiny freckles but otherwise so pale it was almost white. “Is it?”

           Roan took another deep breath and looked up to meet Asta’s eyes. “No. No, it isn’t. You see… You’re the closest I’ve ever had to a long-term relationship. I did go out with a few other girls, at school and at university, but…” She paused, working her jaw from side to side. “They called it off when they found out I was a berserker. Every one of them. Understandable, I suppose. Most people don’t want to get too close.”

           “And you’re worried I’ll do the same?” said Asta, circling the disc on Roan’s chest with the tip of one finger.

           “I wouldn’t say ‘worried’ is the right word,” said Roan. “Gods, you’ve seen me go berserk – none of the others had. If it scared you that much you wouldn’t have come back here. But… in the dark, at the back of my mind… Aye. I suppose there’s some wee bit that’s feart you’ll decide you made a mistake and go back to Stormhaven. Back to civilisation.”

           “I know what you’re capable of,” said Asta. “I’ve seen you fight, yes – but you’ve always been gentle with me. I’m not afraid of you.”

           “You’ve had enough rough treatment to last you a lifetime,” said Roan. She brushed one hand over the scars on Asta’s back, raised enough that they were clear to the touch even through her nightdress, in case there was any doubt as to what she meant. “If this is your home now, then…”

           Asta leant down to kiss her and lightly touched her forehead to Roan’s, then settled back down beside her, resting her head on Roan’s shoulder. “Civilisation’s overrated anyway.”

           Roan smiled. “So you’re not secretly terrified nature meant me to be some brutal killer?”

           Asta propped herself on one elbow again and studied Roan’s face intently for a few seconds. “Gryphons are obligate carnivores. I’m going somewhere with this,” she added when Roan raised an eyebrow at the apparent non sequitur. “They can eat plant matter, as seasoning or to bulk out a meal a bit, but they have to eat meat; a gryphon that tried to cut it out of their diet altogether would end up starving themself.

           “The head housemistress for the apprentices boarding at the College of Sorcery back in Stormhaven is a gryphon. Matron Inkfoot. All the students adore her – for many of them she’s the closest they have to a parent for most of the year. I was speaking to her one day, and I made a comment that the gryphons weren’t what I’d expected – how some of them were in careers like the military or the police, careers where they were more likely to see combat, but far more worked as messengers, shopkeepers, teachers, bankers, cleaners; almost any line of work where you’d expect a human, there were some gryphons who’d chosen it. Things I wouldn’t have thought would be in the nature of a huge carnivore. Inkfoot sort of cocked her head thoughtfully and said ‘Look at me. Nature built me as a hunter, meant me to fly out after prey, drop from the sky and rip it apart with my beak and talons. Instead I work here, caring for all the generations of children who’ve passed through the College.’”

           Asta paused to brush a loose hair out of Roan’s face. “The point she was trying to make is that… Only animals have to do what nature intended for them. A person,” she tapped the end of Roan’s nose with one finger, “has a choice. And I think, whatever nature intended for you, you made yours a long time ago – long before you ever came to live out here.”

           Roan smiled and pulled her back down in another hug, wrapping both arms tightly around her. “You’re quite wise, you ken.” Asta wriggled free and lay beside her, her head back on Roan’s shoulder. “My turn, then,” said Roan, brushing her fingers through Asta’s hair again. “What’s on your mind? I see you just… staring sometimes.”

           “Me? Nothing.”

           “As-ta…”

           Asta sighed. “Well, you were always perceptive. It’s memories that keep me awake at night, not worries about the future.”

           “Daro?”

           “He is where most of the nightmares come from,” said Asta. Roan held her a little tighter and nuzzled her hair. “But when I can’t sleep, it’s not just because of him. It’s… getting the news about my parents’ accident. Standing on the auction block at the slave market. Coming into Lady MacArra’s office that morning and finding her on the floor. Things like that.”

           “You’ve been through a lot. It’s no wonder it still needs some time to fade.”

           “It’s been years, though.”

           “Aye. And then, sometimes, it’s yesterday.”

           Asta stared unseeingly into space for a few moments before she nodded. “Exactly.” Another pause. “Can I… Never mind.”

           “Hm?”

           “Can I… can I tell you about the market?”

           “You can tell me anything,” said Roan. “Except,” she added more firmly, “that any of it was your fault.”

           Asta breathed a laugh and shifted her weight, laying her arm over Roan’s midriff. “There are a lot of slave markets in the Imperial City,” she began. “More than any other city in the Empire. Most of them are in the Great Market down by the shipyards at the river – you can buy anything there, and I really do mean practically anything – but there are others scattered throughout the city. Lots of different companies and auction houses, dealing with different types of people – different types on both ends of the transaction, the buyers and the bought – but all members of the Slavers’ League. People sometimes think the League is one big organisation, but really it’s a coalition of many different smaller ones.

           “I did a bit of research beforehand, looking at who the different groups were dealing in – I mean, I knew there wasn’t much point going to a company specialising in arena fighters. So I found an auction house that seemed promising, walked into their reception, and explained things. They were… not unsympathetic, in a detached sort of way. I’d already sold almost everything I had left, and had to sign everything else over to the slavers. Everything, right down to my clothes. The only thing I could keep was Pardus, and only because they couldn’t sell it; they still took it, but to pass on to whoever ended up buying me. They interviewed me, finding out things like my education, family background, skills and so on, and took me through to another room for a physical inspection by a healer. They gave me a shift to wear and took the rest of my clothes away. I assume they laundered them and passed them on to be sold, because I never saw them again. After that they just collared me and locked me in a cell at the back to wait for the auction. There were lots of them. Cells, I mean. Not a full prison’s worth, but enough for maybe thirty, forty people.

           “I remember… The walls between the cells were thin. Wood, not stone like the outside walls, though too sturdy to break through without tools. Not much furniture, though more than I’d expected – a bunk with a proper mattress and a blanket, not just straw on the floor, and a toilet in one corner instead of just a bucket. It was late Nivalis by then, just shy of the New Year, so it was freezing outside, but the window had glass in it behind the bars so it wasn’t that cold inside the cell itself. I lay down on the bunk and wrapped the blanket around myself.  

           “I started crying. Partly it was relief that whatever else happened, I wouldn’t have to worry about getting letters and, and visits from creditors any more, but mostly it was… other things. Grief – it was all still so recent, and I’d been so busy making all the arrangements that I hadn’t… hadn’t really had time to process things. Fear. Well, that one’s self-explanatory. Guilt. What right did I have to be scared, when I’d volunteered for slavery and some people get dragged off the back roads into it?” Without interrupting, Roan kissed her forehead and stroked her hair again.

           Asta fell silent, staring into space for a while. Roan just held her without prompting her to continue, and eventually she spoke again.

           “Somebody knocked on the wall behind me. There was a man in the next cell, quite a lot older than me by the sound of his voice. I never saw his face or learned his name, but… He spoke to me.

           “‘Hey,’ he said. ‘I know you can hear me through there. Focus on my voice, and breathe slowly and deeply. You’ll get through this.’ I did as he said and sat up, still with the blanket around me. I was still shaking, only a bit from the cold, but I could stop crying. ‘This your first time on the wrong side of the auction block?’ I nodded, before I remembered he couldn’t see me, and said it was. ‘Not mine. This will be my… sixth. I’m a teacher, you see; rich families buy me as a tutor for their children, then sell me on when the children outgrow the schoolroom.’ He paused. ‘This auction house isn’t too bad, as they go. They don’t sample the goods and they give you a private cell instead of shoving you in a holding pen.

           “‘The auction is tomorrow. They’ll assign you a lot number in the morning, then come and get you from the cell when it’s time for you to go up. When you’re on the block, stand up straight, shoulders back, chin up – this house doesn’t strip you for the block, but people still like to see what they’re buying. Keep your eyes on the far wall. Don’t make eye contact with any of the buyers – you never know how they’ll react.  

           “‘Once you’re paid for, well, slaves are beneath notice for most of them; keep your head down and do your work and by and large you’ll probably be ignored. Not much recognition for your work, but they likely won’t be doling out beatings every day either. If you’re unlucky… Learn how to read your owner. Whatever they do will be over more quickly if you give them the reaction they’re looking for.’ I just swallowed, and I heard him sigh. ‘As slaves, the only protection we have under the law is what our owners give us. We all have to learn to look after ourselves – whatever that involves.’

           “We talked for a bit longer, just sharing stories, until it got fully dark outside and we were too tired to keep talking. Somehow, I managed to go to sleep. I never heard from him again – he must have been an earlier lot, and was taken away before my number came up. I do wonder what happened to him sometimes. I hope he made it out somehow, but failing that, I just hope someone kind bought him.”

           “As far as you can use that word for a slave-owner,” muttered Roan.

           “Mm,” said Asta, and paused for another few seconds. Again, Roan just waited for her to continue. “They came to get me mid-morning. A couple of guards took me through to the auction hall with my wrists tied, but they undid the cuffs before they shoved me up on the block. They weren’t unduly rough, just… brisk.” Roan frowned and her arm tightened slightly around Asta, but she remained silent. “Most of the auction’s a bit of a blur – like the man in the next cell told me, I tried to just stare at the far wall and ignore the buyers, but I can still remember exactly what the auctioneer said. ‘Lot Thirty-Four: Kiraani female; twenty-one-year-old nulligravida, five feet and five inches in height and physically sound. Educated to university level; fully literate and numerate. We’ll start the bidding at five hundred zolots.’”

           “‘Nulli-’”

           “It means I’ve never been pregnant,” said Asta. She gave a rather small, hollow laugh. “Well, there was quite a bidding war. There were a lot of bidders at first, but Lady MacArra soon stepped in and kept driving the price up and up until it was down to just her and one other, then just her, and the long and the short of it was I ended up selling for quite a lot more than five hundred zolots. The auctioneer looked a bit stunned from it all – she clearly hadn’t expected that much interest. The guards took me down from the block and handed me over as Lady MacArra signed to finalise the purchase, then she just gave me her coat – to wear, not to carry – and swept out of the auction house.

           “It wasn’t just her and me – she had her… her bodyguard-assistant with her, this very big, very quiet man called Angus – but he never said a word I could hear the whole time. We all went over to this restaurant not too far from the auction house.

           “She got us a table and waved for me and Angus to sit down. Handed me a menu and said to order whatever I wanted. ‘You look as if you haven’t had a decent meal in a good few days,’ she said, and sat down across the table from me. Daro must have got his eyes from her – they were this very bright, piercing blue, but they weren’t… they weren’t cold on her like they were on him. The waiter came to take our orders, and once he’d gone she kept talking. ‘My family believes I never buy slaves,’ she said. ‘In truth I buy them quite frequently – I buy them, and then I release them immediately, no questions asked.’ She must have seen the panic on my face, because she went on to say, ‘If your freedom is what you want then it is yours,’ and looked at me very carefully.

           “And… Well. If I was some heroine in a novel I’m sure I would’ve taken it, but when the alternative was sleeping in an alley in Nivalis with nothing but a linen shift between me and… anything… Some vague ideal of ‘freedom’ didn’t seem too high a price to pay. Don’t judge me,” she added, half pleading and half defensive.

           Roan just stroked her hair again.

           “So instead Lady MacArra nodded and said ‘Then I will make you a different offer. It seems I am in need of a secretary. Come back to Duncraig with me. I shall provide you with a stipend for your personal use, to save or to spend as you see fit, on top of full room and board. Five years, or until my death; whichever comes soonest. That should give you time to get back on your feet.’ And… I just started crying, but she realised immediately that it was from relief and just nodded again. ‘We have a long journey back to Duncraig ahead of us. We shall need to find you some proper clothes.’

           “And… That’s kind of where the story stops being interesting. We went to a shop and got me enough clothes to get me back to Duncraig, stayed one more night in the Imperial City – she’d booked rooms in a hotel, enough for all three of us – then got in a coach and started on the road back to the Sea Lochs. It took a while, but nothing much happened on the way.”

           “Five years,” mused Roan. “You said you lived with her for five years, back then.”

           “Just short of it, really,” said Asta. “As I said – she bought me in late Nivalis of 2732, and she died in mid-Gracilis of 2737.” She gave another hollow little laugh and cast her eyes down. “If she’d lived for just one more month, I would have been free and Daro would never have been able to do anything about it.” She sighed. “But then I would never have met you. A lot of things have happened that I could have done without,” almost unconsciously, she reached back over her shoulder to touch the scars, “but that isn’t one of them.”

           “Good to know.” Roan rolled onto her side so they lay face-to-face and ran one hand slowly over Asta’s back again, gently exploring the scars with her fingertips. “Have you ever thought about getting a tattoo?” she asked.

           “A tattoo? Well… My grandmother on my father’s side had some, but she was from the Hawk Steppes; they were tribal markings. They’re not really a Kiraani tradition. They’ve become rather fashionable as Prince Zarannon became more prominent – his mother is Yaigan, one of the Steppe tribes, though not the one Grandma was from – and even more so now he’s the Emperor, but a lot of the older generation still look down on them. Why do you ask?”

           “When I was getting the seal on my back done, I wasn’t the only customer in the tattoo shop,” said Roan. “One of the other tattooists was working with a man who’d been caught in a house fire; one arm and half of his face was covered in scarring, and maybe more I couldn’t see. But once the burns had healed, he’d decided to get them covered in tattoos – not to disguise them, but to turn them into a work of art. My tattooist explained that they get quite a few people like that – people who’d been attacked, had accidents, or just otherwise had something big happen to their bodies against their will. She said it was a way of taking back control, of going ‘this is mine, and I won’t let what happened change that.’”

           “I wasn’t raped,” said Asta quietly. “I’ve told you that.”

           “I know, and I’m glad you did, because I don’t know if I could bear to ask if you hadn’t. But there’s more than one kind of violation. Maybe it would help you… I don’t know. Just forget I said anything.”

           Asta drew in a long, deep breath and slowly let it back out. “Well,” she said, stroking one finger down Roan’s nose from the bridge to the tip, “I wouldn’t want to copy your style.”

           Roan gave a small smile, and her chest quivered slightly with a silent laugh. “I take it that’s a ‘no’.”

           “More of a ‘perhaps, I’ll give it some thought’,” said Asta. She reached up and tugged one of her ears. “But then, maybe I’ll just get another earring instead. This might surprise you, considering everything else, but I don’t know if I have the pain threshold to sit still long enough for a tattoo.” She paused. “So, your tattoos…”

           “Don’t have any tragic stories behind them,” Roan assured her. Her smile broadened into a grin. “Though some of them were pretty sore to have done.”  

           “What was the worst?”

           “It’s probably a toss-up between this one,” Roan touched the crescent on her forehead, “and this one.” The disc above her heart. “Close to the bone, you know. Where there’s more flesh to cushion the needle it just feels a bit like this.” She found Asta’s shoulder under the blankets and scraped a fingernail across her skin, raising goosebumps in its wake.

           “I suppose you are practically a living pain chart for tattoos,” said Asta with a grin.

           “You’re not joking as much as you think you are.” Roan turned her face aside for a moment, yawning so widely her jaw clicked, and laid one arm over Asta to hug her close enough to breathe in the scent of her hair. Asta curled up against her, wriggled comfortably, and closed her eyes.

           “Any plans for tomorrow?” she asked without opening them.

           “We could take a walk up the coast, if you’re up for it. I’d like to show you the cave where I gather the chert for my arrowheads – it’s a couple of miles away, but the walk’s mostly on the flat.”

           “Mm, that does sound interesting.” Asta pulled the blankets more snugly around herself and hooked one leg around the back of Roan’s knee. “We can see what the weather’s like in the morning.”

           Roan chuckled softly and brushed one more kiss against Asta’s forehead. “Sleep well, love.”

           Asta didn’t answer. The last of the tension had left her body, and her breathing was deep and steady. Roan closed her own eyes, let the witchlight vanish, and followed her into sleep.

~~~

Roan is quite pale despite her generally outdoorsy lifestyle; partly because she lives in Fantasy Scotland, and partly because she’s one of those people who just gets frecklier and frecklier without ever really tanning.

[boylesharon]

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