(1866-12-05) A Man With A Plan
A Man With A Plan
Summary: Two people trapped in Rikton renew their acquaintance. One of them has a genius plan!
Date: Decembre 5th, 1866
Related: A sequel of sorts to this.
NPCs: {$npc}
Players:
Agnes  Ramiro  

Various streets in Rikton.
See scene.
Decembre 5th, 1866

The hours Lady Agnès Gwynain has passed alone in the last week, variously sulking and smouldering and covering both sides of sheet after sheet of parchment in deliberately tiny writing with scarcely enough room between the lines for her to fit in her inevitable corrections, have resulted not unnaturally in a dearth of those items necessary to her continuing literary labours. Thus she has girded herself with brigandine and sword-belt and satchel, stabbed pearl-tipped pins into her hair with grim intent, and set forth with her ever-lightening purse to bargain for reinforcements.

The pleasure of stretching her legs after so much sitting is acute: she makes her walk longer than it needs to be, feeling the warmth of exercise if not of sunshine, her stride lengthening and her cheeks turning faintly pink as she marches up one street and down another, her eyes peeled for the sight of parchment or quills. If she finds a different merchant, she can use the same lie about writing to her absent children — if she doesn't, well, she'll try a new lie. There must be something that would answer.

Most of the other denizens of Rikton out and about this — morning? Afternoon? How would one know? — have the sense to get out of the way of an armed noblewoman who looks as though she knows where she's going. One, however, as absorbed in his own thoughts as she in hers, chances to jostle her and receives in answer a snapped "Look where you're going—!" as she whirls to face him, her gauntleted hand on the hilt of her broadsword.

A man dressed entirely black IS hard to see in the all-consuming murk of Rikton, but even so, the collusion makes him snap "Goes for you too" at the woman, who's just turning around to face him. He narrows his eyes when he recognizes her. "It's you. The lady from the pub." Ramiro realizes. The young looking grumpy as ever, both hands now clutching a leather satchel as if defensively.

In that moment recognition is mutual. "It's you," she echoes in a drawl, "the expert on women, with the tea that tastes like dirt." Her hand falls away from her sword, for he's really not much of a threat as long as you don't drink anything he tries to foist upon you. "How's your mood these days?"

"Just splendid. The same as yours, I would predict.", Ramiro replies, voice laden with sarcasm, "And my tea may not be to your taste, but it is certainly healthy. What brings you here?", he asks, meeting her eyes for a brief moment before focusing them vaguely on the stall's offerings nearby.

The same as hers. Hah. Lady Agnès lets out a small humourless snort at that thought, even whilst reflecting that it makes them companions in misfortune. "Very little," she admits; "I begin to think you and I are the only people here who are angry and too idle instead of frightened and too busy. And as for my mood, it would be a damned sight better if half the men in Rikton didn't try to knock me down every time I set foot out of doors." She presses her finely-shaped pale pink lips together and then parts them to let out a reluctant sigh. "Parchment. Have you seen any for sale? I don't want to go back to the man in the main square."

"I have been getting parchment from the monks.", Ramiro admits, "I've been spending time exchanging knowledge with them and they have been as generous with their parchment as they have been with their wisdom." He pauses for a looooong moment, before he adds rather reluctantly: "How much would you need? I could spare a few sheets, probably."

Deep-set blue eyes regard him with wary curiosity, as though they were two cats rather than two nobles circling one another in this narrow street. "… If you could spare it," she suggests, flicking her gaze away to a shop in the middle distance, then back to his face, torn between her concern for being beholden and her equal concern for her finances. "Which monks?"

That question surprises him. "Which monks? The town is awash in them in case you haven't noticed. I have a room at the Monastery of Saint Constantine." Then he seems to feel that he has already revealed to much as if perhaps scared she might stalk him to his bedroom. "I could spare it. Would you feel like taking a walk with me? I'm sure they'll also have some honey mead to spare for you. Since my tea is not to your liking.", he snarks.

At this revelation the lady appears somewhat taken aback. "Well, I can't say it's out of my way," she allows, with a slow shake of her elegant head, "though you'd best not tell your monk friends what you do with their parchment. They already think I've taken more than my share." And she half turns, in the well-remembered direction of the monastery which is her own temporary home, ready to fall into step with him and his suggestion.

"Oh?", Ramiro asks as she begins to walk into a direction apparently known to her, "Have you spent time with them? You did not strike me as a person interested much in…. religion.", he says vaguely, "Yet, they preach Loveth Thy Neighbour, so I would assume they could not object to me helping out a lady in need. What do you need the parchment for?" It seems a question born out of true curiosity, rather than pondering her wastefulness.

Standing together, walking together, she has proven to be of a height with him; her strides are long and confident, at least when persons stopping to examine shop windows or browse through the offerings laid out upon market stalls can manage to keep out of her way long enough for her to build up momentum. "I'm writing an epic romance," is her reply to his most recent question, uttered with a sarcasm as intense as his own yet more arid. "Are you so religious, then, lodging with monks and militants? Do they let you commune with their flowers and their bees?" This a teasing reference to his Communion with Nature. "In that case I'm surprised we haven't met more often."

"The monks are keepers of great ancient wisdom, acquired in hundreds of years of study. I am grateful for them sharing their knowledge with a humble student like me.", Ramiro explains somewhat pompously, but in earnest. He pauses for a long moment, perhaps assessing the risk of the statement he is about to make, but then makes it anyway. "I don't give a rat's ass for religion. Do you, Mylady?" The information of romance writing filed away for now. He might tease her about that later."

The lady's eyes remain on the street ahead of them, which has begun to slope up in the direction of the palace and its adjacent monasteries. "I'm in love with a priest," she utters in a deadpan voice.

This at least warrants a steeply pulled up eyebrow from Ramiro. "Are you now? Pouring your heart and soul into your epic romance to write into existence what cannot be? I admit, Mylady, I had not expected that coming from you. I am impressed."

Lady Agnès has laughed before at Lord Ramiro, in rather a pretty soprano. This time however there's a quality warm but also pitying in the tone of it, as she glances quickly in his direction with the air of an initiate into secrets he cannot possibly fathom. "That wicked, cruel, thoroughly vile husband who drives me to drink," she explains gravely, "is the priest of whom I speak."

"I see.", Ramiro replies evenly, "So your husband is a priest here at the monastery? You're actually staying together there?" Another thought makes him frown but he keeps that one to himself. For right now.

"Seldom a priest here — but at the moment, yes. Why else would I have come to this bloody place?" the lady inquires rhetorically, shrugging her black brigandine'd shoulders. The armoured coat, the gauntlets, the broadsword at her hip may seem a little at odds with the swirling blue-grey skirts which brush the tops of her boots; but then, the unsettled state of the city… A cool wind seems to insinuate itself down the back of her neck, despite her borrowed woolly scarf, and she looks about her with a more critical eye.

"I see.", Ramiro repeats. Which may not be the cleverest thing to say but it's all he can offer. He falls silent as they pass by a group of said monks just approaching from the direction of the monastery, then cuts a quick sideglance to the lady. "We could run away together. You and me.", he suggests simply, as if suggesting buying a snack from the vendor who has set up stall on the street.

For the next few paces the other half of the conversation consists only of silence. Is she actually thinking about it? Or is she only thinking how best to ridicule it? "… You," she drawls at last, "and me." A pause for effect. "The miracle is, you can say such a thing stone-cold sober. Perhaps I ought to have persevered with that tea of yours—?" she inquires of him in a lighter vein, nodding in passing to a man on his way down into the city in a red tabard the white cross upon which marks him as one of the Order of the Knights Reliant. (He returns her nod with an air of mild surprise.)

Ramiro shrugs slowly. "I don't see why not.", he explains simply, apparently not considering the possibility that she might be mocking him. "You are not happy here, I am not happy here. Neither of us is inclined to sit here like scared chicken in a henhouse while the fox is on the prowl. You know how to handle a sword apparently -" A nod given to the sword she wears on her side, "I know how to handle a sword."

For which assertion he receives a look up and down, almost implying that his new acquaintance doubts it. "Well, you seem to have quite the plan," laughs Lady Agnès, who having not been asked her name still has yet to volunteer it. She's never in a hurry to do that. Why admit it at all, when it tends to result in such a change in the way people look at her? "Tell me, where do you suppose we'd go, when axes can't break down the city gates and anyone who tries to swim beyond the chain in the harbour becomes supper for the fish?"

"Tunnels.", Ramiro replies and shrugs. "I don't know. Just trying to make a plan makes me feel better about myself, not just sitting here like lambs waiting for the slaughter. This began somehow, it must end somehow." The monastery finally comes into view and he pauses. "Since you are staying here yourself, should you not have access to your own parchment here?", he asks directly.

The monastery gates are in sight; is it at them the lady sighs, or at his hare-brained scheme? Surely the former. The latter would hardly occur to him. "I've been getting through fifteen or twenty sheets a day," she admits, "and after a few weeks of that helping with the bees to earn my keep doesn't seem to cover it anymore. I'm tired of being looked at that way simply for taking my mind off the situation we're in."

Now that DOES surprise him. "Twenty sheets a day.", he mutters, "Now that's some epic novel indeed. I've not used twenty sheets in a week." Looks like he's changed his mind about helping her out on the parchment. "Thank you for walking with me, Mylady. Good luck on your endeavours and, seeing as we are practically neighbours, perhaps our paths shall cross again?", he wonders. There might be a hint of hopefulness in his voice even.

Lady Agnès inhales sharply. "… So you've changed your mind about ladies in need, now that you've had me walk all the way back here empty-handed? One above!" she exclaims, so struck by the perfidy of mankind that she can hardly find words by which to express it. She executes a swift about-face, her skirts swirling and her head shaking, intent once more upon the marketplace. Sellers of parchment, beware!

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