"I have every faith in your ability to make some choice on the matter," she says, adjusting the exacting angle of her hat. The ferry is visible now, cutting slowly across what is today a relatively placid stretch of water. "You'll have plenty of time to make up your mind."
And indeed he does. She spends almost the entirety of the ride to Kirkwall deep in conversation with the ferryman - her unreliable gut having evidently made her something of a sympathetic figure to the lad and the pair of them finding some common ground in the wealth of their gossip. No, who jumped the last ferry back last night? You don't say! and so on. Long has she held that steady conversation is the key to settled an uneasy stomach, and some combination of this and the relative easiness of the weather this evening sees her fresh as a daisy to the other side of the harbor.
From there it is a long, twisting walk into the belly of Lowtown where they arrive at a narrow little back alley public house identifiable as such by a sign in the window which simply says ALE. Inside it's standing room only, packed with all sorts of less than reputable individuals being waited on from behind the bar by a burly dwarf with a missing eye.
"Beragan!"
"Fitcher!"
--And so on, as if they are old friends. Evidently she is no stranger to the establishment.
"Now, take care of my friend here won't you? I'll be just a moment with the man upstairs and don't want him to get the impression I've brought muscle along with me. It's a poor look for a woman with debts to pay to drag around a lug like this one," she chatters, patting Barrow on the cheek for emphasis. To him she says, "Be good and keep Beragan company, won't you? I'll try to be quick about it."
And up the back stairs she goes, doffing her hat and tucking it jauntily under her arm.
It's a simple enough directive, and Barrow is willing to oblige her, if only as a means of getting back in Fitcher's good graces by maintaining a spotless record from this point forward.
He nods to Beragan with a smile, requests an ale, tips generously for it, and proceeds to while away his companion's absence by nursing it alone, pleasantly rebuffing the occasional proposition or challenge for a fight.
It takes less than ten minutes to have the papers out of her hat's lining, fixed into a cylinder, and the raven on its way from the the third floor window. After, Fitcher sits for some minutes in the narrow little secret room smoking from her pipe until it seems the requisite amount of time for bargaining with a fictional loan shark has passed. The ember in the pipe's bowl is squashed and capped, and the whole arrangement tucked back into her coat pocket. She makes her way down again, pausing only briefly on the stairs to remind herself to look faintly exasperated before clattering back out among the ground floor patrons.
Fitcher touches Barrow's elbow once she reaches him. She motions toward the door, the street, with an elaborate combination of head tilting and raised eyebrows.
"Beragan, has this scoundrel paid you yet?"
"Yes, ma'am."
"Good." She turns to Barrow. "Let's be off then before my luck turns, eh?"
She's calling him a scoundrel, he'll take that a good sign. Draining the last of his mug, Barrow tips a friendly nod to Beragan and rises to offer Fitcher his arm as they move toward the door.
She doesn't give his arm a look and so must be distracted enough by her upstairs dealings to simply take it, looping her hand into the crook of his elbow.
"Neviric is a gem. And in a perfectly reasonable mood today, I'm most happy to report."
He smiles in satisfaction at this, but tries not to be too obvious about it.
"Glad to hear it," he replies, "just-- well I know you're a very independent sort, but please don't hesitate to ask for help, or... just. Protection." He shrugs one shoulder as they walk. "I won't knock any heads you don't request by name, but you know better than I that things can be dangerous for women these days, so the offer's always open. No charge."
"Oh, that old dog wouldn't hurt a fly. But rest assured," she says, patting his arm as they weave their way through the house's patrons, passing under the door and out onto the cramped and dusty street beyond. "Should his bite rather than his bark reveal itself, I will readily avail myself of the offer. It may surprise you to hear this, but 'independent sort' or no, I have very little pride when it comes to avoiding a fight. A low tolerance for pain, as it were. Now, as for this antivan dinner you promised me - you must lead on, serah."
This answer seems to satisfy Barrow, and he nods with a little smile. "At your convenience, my lady," he replies, and seems content to leave it at that, especially since they're talking about food now.
"Ah, yes! On the steps to Hightown-- I've heard it's the most authentic Antivan in the city. This will be an excuse to try it."
He leads her along, his easy smile and confident posture quite the opposite of how he began the night.
And she is led most easily without so much as a glance over the shoulder, satisfied enough to leave their arms looped together as they make their way through the city. For a time, their conversation is indeed perfectly regular, as if he had not all but begged for the favor of her company and she had not been half so cold to him there on the docks. Perhaps this is simply the way of things - quick to bristle, quick to forgive when there is no real harm done.
For really, what wound was there? Certainly no real cutting blow.
It is only once they have reached this most authentic Antivan establishment that some of the old stiffness begins to overcome her again. The moment they receive their first course, something in her face thins perceptibly.
It's not that the owner isn't Antivan, it's just, one can't always account for the ingredients, the chef, and the cleanliness of a kitchen to give that authentic experience. Barrow, of course, wouldn't know the difference if it punched him in the mouth, so he is placidly twirling a clump of some manner of long noodle around on his fork, a trick he definitely learned only recently and was definitely looking forward to showing off to his lady.
Despite all appearances, however, he's not an idiot, and he's quick to notice that Mrs. Fitcher has neither touched her food nor looked at all interested in doing so.
"S'matter, love?" he asks, with genuine concern and at least a partially-full mouth.
It's not that she hasn't touched the food. Her fork has absolutely been in contact with it, else she wouldn't have been able to push it around the bowl quite so effectively.
"Hm?" Her eyebrows rise, but her attention is slow to follow it upward from the study of the dish before her. "Nothing. I'm quite content."
Scuff, says the fork against the well inside curve of the plate ware.
"Only I think we may need another bottle of wine between us."
"North," she supplies, most helpfully as she continues to carefully shift around the contents of her plate. It is hardly terrible eating - she has had much worse in her stint in Kirkwall, and yet there is a particular disappointment in expecting one thing and getting something altogether not that. "Treviso is best known for its fishing and textiles. There is some trade in oysters and pearls as well."
She glances up, making the industrious decision to trade her fork for her cup.
More observant than he's given credit for, Barrow has noticed that she isn't eating, but knows better (see? he's got manners) than to comment on a lady's habits around food.
"Not at all," he admits, "--Treviso, is that where you're from?"
Something in her expression flexes, the hint of a smile across the top of her cup.
"That's right, though it's been some time since I've been back there. I left as a girl, and much of my business - when I have done it in Antiva - has been in the Weyrs." She tips her head in the other direction. "And you? I seem the recall that the last time we discussed Ferelden, you dodged the question. Though I suppose it was specific to Crestwood, and not to the country in its entirety."
"Oh." He blinks at her, realizing he should have expected that this would fall back onto him, yet somehow having not seen it coming.
"Well. Yes. I'm from Crestwood." He smiles disarmingly, and pauses to take another bite of this enchanting 'spagetty' to which they have been treated. "It's something of a painful topic, you might say." But, his tone seems to imply, because we are becoming more emotional intimate, if it's important to you I would consider relenting.
"Understandably so." It should be the sort of thing to inspire some note of awkwardness - apologies, for dredging up things like dead friends and family -, but instead there is something which warms slightly in her expression, the look she gives him from across the table, as if she is glad to know it regardless of the weight tangled in the fact.
She sets her cup aside and braves the plate once more.
"What were you meant to have done before you ran off with the Templars? Baker's boy?" She glances up, squinting at him in assessment. "Goat herder."
He takes no offense from the look, instead mirroring the warmth in her smile as he takes a drink of his wine. His smile only broadens as she guesses at his background, and he gives a lazy shake of his head.
"Just a farmer," he replies easily, "nothing so exciting as a goatherd. Though we did have chickens."
He smiles and shakes his head. "Mum didn't like us naming them, seemed extra cruel since they'd just be killed. ...well. Except for Greta, kept her just for laying."
He twirls some more spagettys around his fork in anticipation of another bite.
"My sister Prudence and I worked on the farm until I went off to..." Be a Templar, but it's still not something he loves talking about openly. "...training. She's still back in Crestwood with our da."
"Prudence is such a fine name. Do she and your father still farm, or was the land lost in the whole business there?"
Is there a way to discuss someone's tragedy and their relations left in the wake of it without making it grim and sad simply in the pursuit of satisfying one's own curiosity? She's at least making some effort toward it, tone and temperament light as if to imply, You don't need to answer if you'd rather not.
This hit an unexpected nerve-- Barrow is the expert of lying by omission, but finds it much more difficult to speak an outright untruth to someone's face, especially someone whose esteem he values.
So, with a somewhat defeated air: "...no. We're not."
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And indeed he does. She spends almost the entirety of the ride to Kirkwall deep in conversation with the ferryman - her unreliable gut having evidently made her something of a sympathetic figure to the lad and the pair of them finding some common ground in the wealth of their gossip. No, who jumped the last ferry back last night? You don't say! and so on. Long has she held that steady conversation is the key to settled an uneasy stomach, and some combination of this and the relative easiness of the weather this evening sees her fresh as a daisy to the other side of the harbor.
From there it is a long, twisting walk into the belly of Lowtown where they arrive at a narrow little back alley public house identifiable as such by a sign in the window which simply says ALE. Inside it's standing room only, packed with all sorts of less than reputable individuals being waited on from behind the bar by a burly dwarf with a missing eye.
"Beragan!"
"Fitcher!"
--And so on, as if they are old friends. Evidently she is no stranger to the establishment.
"Now, take care of my friend here won't you? I'll be just a moment with the man upstairs and don't want him to get the impression I've brought muscle along with me. It's a poor look for a woman with debts to pay to drag around a lug like this one," she chatters, patting Barrow on the cheek for emphasis. To him she says, "Be good and keep Beragan company, won't you? I'll try to be quick about it."
And up the back stairs she goes, doffing her hat and tucking it jauntily under her arm.
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He nods to Beragan with a smile, requests an ale, tips generously for it, and proceeds to while away his companion's absence by nursing it alone, pleasantly rebuffing the occasional proposition or challenge for a fight.
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Fitcher touches Barrow's elbow once she reaches him. She motions toward the door, the street, with an elaborate combination of head tilting and raised eyebrows.
"Beragan, has this scoundrel paid you yet?"
"Yes, ma'am."
"Good." She turns to Barrow. "Let's be off then before my luck turns, eh?"
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Draining the last of his mug, Barrow tips a friendly nod to Beragan and rises to offer Fitcher his arm as they move toward the door.
"I hope everything went all right?"
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"Neviric is a gem. And in a perfectly reasonable mood today, I'm most happy to report."
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"Glad to hear it," he replies, "just-- well I know you're a very independent sort, but please don't hesitate to ask for help, or... just. Protection." He shrugs one shoulder as they walk.
"I won't knock any heads you don't request by name, but you know better than I that things can be dangerous for women these days, so the offer's always open. No charge."
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"At your convenience, my lady," he replies, and seems content to leave it at that, especially since they're talking about food now.
"Ah, yes! On the steps to Hightown-- I've heard it's the most authentic Antivan in the city. This will be an excuse to try it."
He leads her along, his easy smile and confident posture quite the opposite of how he began the night.
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For really, what wound was there? Certainly no real cutting blow.
It is only once they have reached this most authentic Antivan establishment that some of the old stiffness begins to overcome her again. The moment they receive their first course, something in her face thins perceptibly.
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Despite all appearances, however, he's not an idiot, and he's quick to notice that Mrs. Fitcher has neither touched her food nor looked at all interested in doing so.
"S'matter, love?" he asks, with genuine concern and at least a partially-full mouth.
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"Hm?" Her eyebrows rise, but her attention is slow to follow it upward from the study of the dish before her. "Nothing. I'm quite content."
Scuff, says the fork against the well inside curve of the plate ware.
"Only I think we may need another bottle of wine between us."
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Waving over one of the barmaids, Barrow requests another bottle of wine and puts down the money for it right there, rather than worry about it later.
Then, back to noodle-twirling.
"Where are you actually from, then? Antiva," he answers in advance, but is clearly hoping for further elaboration.
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She glances up, making the industrious decision to trade her fork for her cup.
"Are you very familiar with the country, serah?"
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"Not at all," he admits, "--Treviso, is that where you're from?"
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"That's right, though it's been some time since I've been back there. I left as a girl, and much of my business - when I have done it in Antiva - has been in the Weyrs." She tips her head in the other direction. "And you? I seem the recall that the last time we discussed Ferelden, you dodged the question. Though I suppose it was specific to Crestwood, and not to the country in its entirety."
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"Well. Yes. I'm from Crestwood." He smiles disarmingly, and pauses to take another bite of this enchanting 'spagetty' to which they have been treated.
"It's something of a painful topic, you might say." But, his tone seems to imply, because we are becoming more emotional intimate, if it's important to you I would consider relenting.
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She sets her cup aside and braves the plate once more.
"What were you meant to have done before you ran off with the Templars? Baker's boy?" She glances up, squinting at him in assessment. "Goat herder."
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"Just a farmer," he replies easily, "nothing so exciting as a goatherd. Though we did have chickens."
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Why is the sauce on this pasta grainy? It's fine.
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He twirls some more spagettys around his fork in anticipation of another bite.
"My sister Prudence and I worked on the farm until I went off to..." Be a Templar, but it's still not something he loves talking about openly. "...training. She's still back in Crestwood with our da."
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Is there a way to discuss someone's tragedy and their relations left in the wake of it without making it grim and sad simply in the pursuit of satisfying one's own curiosity? She's at least making some effort toward it, tone and temperament light as if to imply, You don't need to answer if you'd rather not.
There is little necessity in interrogating him.
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"I imagine they do."
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"You're not in contact?"
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So, with a somewhat defeated air: "...no. We're not."
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Far be it for her to assume that one might be lain on at the door of the other.
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