Duscan folded his arms behind his head, using it to prop it up to watch her work at pulling off his trousers. He knew how to warm up to such a dance, lifting his hips when her fingers curled around the waistline of the cloth and pulled it down to his thighs. The air was colder, but that did not hinder how eager he was for her eyes to roam over his bared canvas once she had rid him of trousers.

There was no more argument of who was being more unfair, that didn't matter anymore. Not when he knew he had a role here. He was her muse, a role he wanted to fill however best he could. What good was life if one wasn't going to look at the beauty residing in it?

Because his eyes fell to her fingers working at the hooks of the bustier that covered her. Puppetry, or perhaps practiced fingers plucking at strings, the bard knew how to captivate an audience.

"Fuck." He breathed through gritted teeth, lifting his torso from the bed the moment her hand went to work his length at a similarly slow pace as the hypnotising unhooking. Duscan chuckled wryly, moving his hands to hold up himself.
"I am afraid to admit how much I am enjoying you dragging this out." Teeth bit down on his bottom lip, sinking deeper the moment she pulled her shirt off her body.

He wanted to reach for her, to push her back down amongst the pillows and let his tongue and teeth explore every plane of her. Had it been any one else, someone he merely used to rid himself of his frustrations a hand and imagination could not quench, Duscan would have been a fiend.

The bard knew what she was doing to him, knew just what to do in order to evoke inspiration from her muse.

"Come on now, bard. You should be as bare as me... I don't want those skirts obscuring my view as you mount me."
 
Anira’s fingers had just found the buttons on the waistband, when something shifted. Not in the room, but in the air. There was a rhythm to Anira’s home. She knew it like a favorite song. And that... that was the part where the tempo shifted. The creak of the third stair.

Her hands froze over the buttons. She tilted her head, listening. "Wait." she murmured. Her hand clamped over the bastard's mouth, firm but not unkind. A heartbeat passed. Then another.

There. The sound again, faint, familiar.
A step on the landing. Then her eyes snapped wide.

No, no, no, no, not now…

“Shit!” She swore under her breath and scrambled backward, silk and limbs and tousled hair a flurry of sudden panic. Casting a frantic eye over the scene of recent sins and rapidly cooling lust. She tossed him a shirt, his? hers? a curtain? It didn’t matter. “Get up! Hide!” she hissed at Duscan, already halfway into her own bodice with fingers fumbling like drunk spiders.

Her patron. Her uninvited, unscheduled patron. Likely fresh from a wine-soaked supper and possessed by one of his spontaneous whims, like... oh, say... popping by to see his favorite bard without so much as a knock. The lights were on, after all.

She sprinted into the front room just as the door creaked open. “Anira?” came the voice, rich and just a little confused. The bard threw herself into view with the flourish of someone who’d definitely not just been naked in the company of a rogue barkeep. “My lord!” she exclaimed, breathless, cheeks flushed with what could, if one were generous, be interpreted as excitement. “What a surprise! How unexpected! And unannounced! How utterly spontaneously of you!”

“You weren’t alone, were you?” His voice was calm, almost polite. But the edge beneath her patron's voice had a sharp cut.
 
At first, he didn't think she was being serious.

"You cannot be shy now, not after I had my mouth down th—" his words turned muffled as her hand that had been slowly pleasuring him now smothered his mouth to stop. His brows furrowed, confusion plainly and clearly as he watched the bard still and listen.

There was a knock at the door, and he quirked his brow. Wondering who the fuck would darken her doorstep at this hour, as if he hadn't done the same already this night. "Hide?!" His voice hissed back, watching her fumble to dress herself again. "Anira!" No more talking, for the bard hastily did up those hooks she had taken great care in unlatching moments before. "Bard!"

Duscan was already trying to locate his toursers. He had thought she simply dropped them to the floor, but there, in the open doorway, one leg turned inside out and of which he had been unaware of until the other leg was pushed into the other. An awkward dance of trying to put his trousers the right way, and he heard the door open. The front door.

"Are you kidding me?!" He muttered darkly, incredulous that he was mere minutes from burying himself into the bard before this shit happened. Duscan hit the door to close, not realising the hinges were well oiled for the door hit the frame and slowly swung back open. He had his back to the doorway, his arse the last thing to be seen before he pulled trousers up and began to fasten the lacing. If he stood still, would his presence be less obvious?

He glanced down at the shirt Anira had thrown at him. Saw how small it was in comparison to what he usually wore. At least this one was clean.

Duscan chanced a glanced behind him, saw the back of Anira and the obviously too large shirt she wore beneath the bustier. His last clean shirt.
 
He took another deliberate step forward, boots hitting hard against the floor. Eyes flicking toward the empty goblets and the swinging door to the side room. Anira’s pulse raced, cheeks warming.

"You’re flushed," he murmured. "Am I?" she cooed, breathless but bright.

Behind her, the shuffle of limbs, fabric tugged the wrong way, laces half-fastened, the soft rustle of someone trying very hard not to be seen and failing utterly. She didn’t need to turn around to know Duscan had been caught mid-repair, a sharp intake of breath. Then: “Who the fuck is that?”

She stepped forward, intercepting Ulrich before he could close the distance further.

"Ulrich..."
“Don’t you Ulrich me.”

He shouldered past her, fury barely leashed, and stopped in the doorway to her bedroom. His gaze swept the room, took in the mussed bed, and the not-quite-dressed man who looked both smug, guilty, and amused at the same time. “Please… please don’t be angry... you can't be mad! ” she murmured, voice low and soft.

"Unbelievable,” Ulrich muttered. “Truly. The fucking gall, bard!” Ulrich turned to her now, jaw clenched. “I gave you everything. Sponsorship. Connections. You used me!!"

"I...oh, I swear, it isn’t like that. I..”
 
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Duscan had wished he did hide, but there was not so many options in the bedroom for someone of his height. He turned, sighing slowly as he beheld this Ulrich.

He hadn't thought to wonder if she was married or seeing someone, then again, it never bothered him in the past. With the bard, he did care if he was lured here. If she spoke of lies in the form of song, but Duscan knew this surprising encounter had nothing to hinder what had happened between them.

The barkeeper crossed his arms, leaning his weight to one leg as he appraised the stranger. "Who're you?" His face scrunched, as if the mere presence of the man brought a staleness to the home.

Really, Duscan ought to return home. Take the loss and see himself out, but he was a fool. A right idiot. Too eager to see the bard again, Dusc didn't want to leave so soon. There was a presence making itself known in his trousers, a shirt unable to hide it. This Ulrich fella, however...

He could look back in the past, see what sort of relationship the two had. It would take only a few seconds.

Alas, Duscan kept his weaving at bay. He had sworn to himself not to use it. To save himself the heartbreak. That's what the Lady Arness made him do, to relive her horrors. To take him places to see what happened to Weavers or bastards.
 
Ulrich stood in the middle of the doorway, tall, broad and jaw tight enough to slice cheese. The vein in his temple pulsed in tempo with of a highly unromantic waltz of rage. With his arms crossed over his chest his gaze swept over Duscan. A commoner. A stranger.

“Who am I?” Ulrich echoed, voice smooth but taut as a drawn bowstring. “Who am I?” Ulrich took a slow step forward, nostrils flaring. “I am Lord Ulrich of House Arellian, benefactor of the Bardic Arts and...until three minutes ago...” the words trailed off into a hollow laugh.

He turned one shoulder toward the minstrel, not taking his eyes off Duscan, and addressed Anira with the incredulous venom only a jealous man could summon. “You told me I was your darling patron. That every poem since Sitha’s Day was about me!”

Anira’s cheeks warmed, though not with shame at her own desires, rather, with the comic absurdity of the situation. She had always known her patron to be a creature of pride and temper, and now here he stood, a noble scorned. She couldn’t help the twitch of a smile, the tiniest curve of her lips, even as she tried to appear earnest.

“They were!” she said, voice rising, hands fluttering in protest. “Well, mostly. Some of them. The one with the cherries definitely...” A silence fell.

“I believed in you. Funded you. Elevated you. And this... this is how you repay me? Some nameless bastard with no shirt?”

“Nameless?” she interjected. “He has a name! That man, that glorious, shirtless beast of a man, is Duscan! Wolf of Weaving, breaker of chains." Her eyes flickered over to Duscan. She could almost feel his every glance, every brush of memory against her skin.

“I never lied to you, Ulrich, my dear, I never promised anything more than amusement.” She straightened. Anira tilted her head, arms folding slowly across her chest, to brace for the storm of wounded pride she’d weathered more than once before. A sigh slipped past her lips, not quite apologetic, but far from cold. “You funded me because you fancied yourself a patron of the arts. You elevated me because I am brilliant... and let’s not pretend otherwise.”

Ulrich took a step back, furious but wounded. “Fucking bards,” he muttered, bitter. "We’re done. You’ll have to find patronage elsewhere, Lady Lark." He turned to leave.

“Wait, wait, wait..!” Anira darted after him, she reached out, sudden and desperate. “I am… terribly sorry you had to see this. Truly. But you must understand, this was never meant to endanger your good favor... Don’t be cruel. You know how hard it is to secure funding in this city!"
 
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Duscan used to ridicule any man that puffed out their chest, a smug smile on their face before they began strutting about, but now he was that man. He felt good about himself, to have the bard defend his honour and defend his name. It was the first thing he got that was his in this life.

"Amazing that," his hand rose, thumb and forefinger gripping his chin, "someone rich with means of supporting the arts and being a patron would fold so quickly before a shirtless man." Duscan lowered his arms, hands now bracing at his hips. Showing off just how shirtless he was.

"Lord Ulrich of House Avellon?" He got the name wrong, with sheer bastardry purpose. "Don't worry, darlin'! This Wolf of Weaving knows a good few names that belong to more decorated Houses."

That was no lie. Each and every name resided in Veya, but Duscan wanted to chink away at Ulrich's ego.

He made sure to speak loudly, as if to threaten that anyone awake at this hour may overhear.
 
"Lord Ulrich of House Avellon?"
A pause.
"Don’t worry, darlin’. This Wolf of Weaving knows a good few names..."

Ulrich had made it halfway to the door. His boots struck hard against the floor as he crossed back with a few swift steps. Anira raised a hand, but the lordling shoved past her, not cruel, but careless, as if she were a curtain in his way. She hit the wall with a gasp.

But he stilled himself at the threshold of the bedroom and Ulrich’s eyes narrowed, the faintest curl of a sneer twisting his lips. He would not let some shirtless rogue force his hand. Letting his gaze sweep over Duscan from head to toe, measuring the man’s height, stance, and the audacity in his eyes. “Avellon, you say?” His voice was ice, a subtle tremor of barely contained irritation passing through him. “Do not to mistake my House for a jest, or your tongue for cleverness, Bastard."

He would not stoop so low he would brawl another man over a bard.
“She’ll flatter you, bastard. She’ll sing your name sweet and low. She’s clever like that.”

He didn’t smile.
“But remember, she sang to me too.”

The lordling turned again, a look on his that said he couldn’t bear the smell of the room any longer. Ulrich cast a final glance at the still-gasping Anira, then, with a stiff tilt of his chin.

" Enjoy the night, bard.”

And with that, he left. The door slammed shut behind him like the lid on a crypt.

“Well, I was not expecting an ambush, were you?” Anira murmured, a wry little smile tugging at her lips. She sagged against the wall.
 
Ulrich was wrong. His tongue was clever, although Duscan knew the talents for other activities than to make jest on a noble House.

Duscan bowed to the man as he took his leave, lingering at the threshold of the bedroom. He leaned there in the frame, eyes falling on the bard. There was amusement in his blue eyes, a twitching at his lips as he tried to keep a straight face. "So... that's your patron? You secretly a siren, Lady Lark? The man seemed so distraught this shirtless bastard was in your bed!" Eh, fuck it. Let the smile win. Duscan could not contain his laughter at the idea that this guy walked in on them almost getting to it.

"Another drink?" He moved into the front room, finding their discarded cups and going to fill them with the mead she had been pouring earlier.

Duscan crossed over to where she sat against the wall, offering the cup to her. "If I knew where you kept the stronger stuff, I'd pour you that." He said in a soft voice. "Feel free to leave that interruption out of the saga you are writing in my honour. Unless you are going to sing of how my abs scared him off."
 
The minstrel took the cup from him with a breathless little sigh. Half a thanks, half exhaustion. She leaned her head against the wall, hair mussed and cheeks still flushed, and raised her brows as she looked up at him over the rim. “A siren? Please. I barely hummed.” Her lips curled in a wry smile before she took a sip.

It was always the same song, wasn’t it?

Anira smiled, laughed, poured the wine, and turned her gaze just so, and people gave. Their coin, their secrets, their hearts. And she told herself she was nothing like her father, not really. She didn’t mean to be like her father. The grand manipulator with his sly hands and slipper-tongued lies, charming duchesses out of jewels and poor folk out of bread alike.

Anira groaned softly and tipped her head back against the wall with a hollow thunk, cup cradled loosely in her fingers. Mead sloshed but did not spill, a minor miracle. “Oh, gods,” she muttered, then squinted one eye open toward Duscan, who was very much shirtless, very much smug, and very much not the problem.... and, simultaneously, the entire problem. “Yes. Yes, that was my patron."

She paid her debts, didn’t she? She didn't lie and she made no promises. She never even promised a morning. She was a bard and she saw it in people's eyes. That hunger. That belief. The sweet ache of wanting to be wanted. She told herself it was different than her father. That what she did was art. Inspiration. A flame that people gathered around, knowing full well they might get burned. The thrill of it. The attention. The way people looked at her, as if she was magic incarnate. Not just playing the part. And she was rather talented at letting other people fill in the verses themselves.

“You know how it is, Duscan. Toss a smile, get a patron. Wink twice, end up someone's bard-mistress-possession.” She pulled a face. “The noble ones are always the worst. Used to getting everything they point at. And when they don’t?” She mimed an explosion with her fingers and made a quiet pfft.

But there were broken hearts in her wake. Many. Lovers who’d thought they were the one she’d write her last song for. Patrons who thought coin bought something more than performance. Friends who fell harder than she ever meant to let them.

The minstrel let the mead settle the flutter still dancing under her ribs. If she were him, truly, she would have walked. Out the window, even. Shirtless and barefoot and furious. But Duscan had stayed. Even after the shouting. The slamming door. That... surprised her. Anira tilted her cup to her lips again, letting the warmth of the mead chase down the tightness in her throat.

“But I’m sorry you got caught in it.” she said more softly now, glancing at him. “Truly. You didn’t deserve that."

She didn’t mean to hurt anyone.
She really didn’t.

But her love was a mayfly.
 
Duscan exhaled and moved to sit before her, his legs crossing awkwardly until he changed his mind and propped up his knees so that his arms could rest upon them. He gave her an equally grim smile, turning into a wince as he lifted his cup to his lips. "And when they don't, they make you feel as if you were in the wrong from the start."

He leaned forward enough to lightly knock his cup to her own. "If you think that sort of shit would have me running, then I am no true bastard at all." The grin returned, easy and comforting. "I'm only sorry that Yulewick had no pearls he adorned to clutch seeing my arse."

Even if the bard kept many other lovers on hand, Duscan didn't truly fixate on that. He never had means to settle down, nor fancy anyone enough to stay faithful to them. His heart wanted everything, wanted to feel that love and adoration, to have the quiet and the loudness.

"You said I am your muse. Can't make things difficult and have you chase me." The bastard winked.
 
"I may have just bartered away my winter income for one very nice view of a bastard,” Anira said while knocking her cup against his. Ulrich would recover after he was done rearranging the entire city to make sure she would never play a noble hall again. That’s one bridge thoroughly and spectacularly burned. Duscan was a disaster, exactly the kind she would write songs about and then immediately regret.

She tilted her head back against the wall and let out a half-laugh. Her eyes drifted toward the closed door. “Do you have any idea how long it takes to charm a patron with deep pockets and deeper delusions? Weeks! Months! And I’ve undone it all in a single evening because the sight of you shirtless is apparently my downfall.”

The minstrel shot him a look. Her fingers toyed absently with the stem of her cup, gaze drifting toward the window before returning to him again, slower this time. Weighing. “Which is to say, thank you for staying, Duscan." Any man with a hint more sense would’ve run faster than a debt collector on payday. She nudged her knee against his. "You don’t want to be difficult? Elusive? To hide and leave me chasing your echoes? What sort of muse are you?”
 
"I'm a cocky bastard at the very least, Anira Verseheart." Fuck, he should have saved his wink for this moment. Duscan shrugged a shoulder lazily. "How about I make it up to you? Help you find a new patron. Bozzy knows a lot of people, I know people that know people..."

His face fell into something serious, sober. All that work she had put into securing connection and shelter, only for his mere presence to shatter all of that... it didn't sit well with him.

It reminded him of home. The brothers he made, and the sisters he helped. Duscan found ways to keep everyone fed and sheltered, to learn skills enough to find jobs that weren't being indentured. He had done so much, had to sacrifice a lot of the innocence he tried to hold onto in order to keep others alive.

"You need a noble house's backing or just any one with rich coffers would do?" He lifted a brow, inquisitive. "Give me a reasonable deadline... say... two days, and I will have that person for you darlin'."
The cup lifted to his lips, hiding the wry smile there. This may not be his city, but the Bastard knew how to find things. How to use memory against someone.

He didn't need to divulge that to the bard.
 
"That’s terribly generous of you,” she said. Anira laughed softly, not unkindly, more amused, more fond. It’s not quite as simple as finding the richest person in the room and curtsying until they toss a purse her way. Yes, connections matter. But a bard’s patron was not just a coin-purse on legs. It is... a relationship. A balance.

She set the cup aside, leaned her elbow on her knee, and cradled her chin in her hand as she regarded him. “But it’s not just about the coin. It never is. A patron means more than paying for supper, it’s a partnership." She did not want a master or a mistress; she wanted someone who believed in the art she made. Someone who sees what she is, what she could be, and chooses to invest in the music ...and the mess of it.

"A good patron gives you the means and space to perform, to create and they give you the opportunities to bring visions to life... "She glanced over at Duscan, voice growing warmer, more reverent as she spoke. The idea of this ideal patron brought some kind of comfort to her. “But of course, if you know someone like that... filthy rich, terrifyingly tasteful, and in desperate need of a bard, I’d be a fool not to accept an introduction.” She smirked.

Anira tilted her head and reached out, sliding her hand into his. “Duscan, you don’t need to fret yourself over finding me a patron,” she said, sincerely. Her thumb brushed against his knuckles. “Really, I’ve lost patrons before. Many, in fact. It’s part of the trade, they come, they go… and we keep singing." Some left with a sigh, some with a storm, and some she simply outgrew.

"And I don’t blame you. Not a bit.” She lifted his hand to her lips and kissed his knuckles. All four of them.
 
Duscan did know those kinds of people, the ones that thrived on putting their money into someone.

Only thing was, you got more money for being a Weaver. For being stupid enough to fall for a life indentured, to barely scrape by when you realise the pittance of money those patrons paid for you was the only time you would see such a sum. Shelter came in the form of being given a room to share with five others...

Unless you sold yourself further and gave into the performances they directed you through.

"Alright then." He gave a a wry smile, hiding his own bitterness at the reminders his own weaving didn't have to show him. No, that was all in his head, with no cost of strain at seeing. "So perhaps a new song will get you a new patron. I believe you were onto something... wolf... something, something... weaving and charming? Handsome? A great lover, although, you cannot make comment on that yet." Why had the simple action of taking his hand distract him so much? Perhaps it was the memory of how her hands felt on him before they had been interrupted.

Duscan grinned. "Good gods, Lady Lark. You're a dangerous sort." He remarked as her lips pressed gently to each knuckle turned to her. The bastard was sure he did this trick plenty of times when he was younger, when he had the looks and charm, but he would not be able to hold a candle to the skill in which the bard captivated him now. Dusc began to realise that this was all part of her performance, not only by song, but the way she played people like instruments.

It was not a negative thing, not when someone that knew how music worked could made such art with the people they surrounded themselves with. If he was a muse, it didn't cut him deeply as it would have the pompous patron that left here in such a huff.
 
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