Private [M] The Carousel of Hearts

[Osytha]

“… He’s playing a game that no-one can win unless they cheat.”​

“We have to cheat!!”​

… and that summons up a memory, of their chance midnight encounter a sovereign moon past: how he’d dangled that tender hunk of flesh just in front of her face, rich glaze of soft cheese and herbs unable to truly mask what it was, though who shall ever be a mystery to her. Had that been Osytha’s sole interaction with Taani? Indirect as it was, and though she hadn’t realised it at the time. But, whoever cooked it up, it had been Rois who took that morsel and proffered it forward, goading her from beneath his half-lidded eyes:

“… could you lower yourself to the level of the people you are supposedly sworn to protect… or are you too proud, knight?”

No; Osytha had not been too proud. She hadn’t quite been able to tell what sort of line was crossed from biting down on that perfectly-seasoned meat, which the other grim deeds to her name have not already gone well beyond. So, bite she had. Made sure to hold it long enough to properly taste, that the understanding could really sink in. Only then did she let herself swallow it down.

Rois had not expected that reaction. But it had opened something up between them, she feels like.

The sight of Alaera’s hand in hers momentarily captivates Osytha, as Feliene’s also had before. Alas, she is afforded little time to fully appreciate such a gift — the twins are leading, leading, leading her down to the foyer, so Filly sets her eyes on where they’re going instead, lest she take a tumble in her distraction. Wouldn’t that be one for the reports: Syr Osytha of Dusk, and her neck, claimed by her oath when she fell afoul of some stairs. No thanks. She’s in no hurry to meet her maker, for one thing. And she reckons she can do a lot better than that when the day does come, for the other. So she just focuses on letting the twins tow her along for whatever scheme they have cooking up. “We have to cheat!!”

Has that been her mistake, here?

“I guess a part of Rois might enjoy that,” muses Osytha. “If I, sort of, got down from my high horse for a bit…”

If I fell, in other words. If I broke my morals and went against what I stood for. More than that. If I had to truly, thoroughly, dirty my hands with the kind of filth that no good deed can wash away. Sooner or later… will you want me to pay that price, Rois?

Whatever. For the time being, Osytha has given up the reins to the twins entirely. It still feels wrong, but therein lies the rub, doesn’t it? The rules of ‘normal’ don’t really apply here in Sinclair’s Meat Market. Trying to do what’s right hasn’t really earned her much thus far.

So, that's how she ends up standing before Rois’ bedroom. That’s how she discovers the man is a messy sleeper (though no surprises there), glimpsing his prone, drooling form in monogrammed sleepwear (again — hardly a revelation) before Fel and ’Era shut the door on their antics. And that’s how, with the twins’ shock assault on Mr Crocodile still clamouring in her ears, Osytha abruptly finds herself staring perplexedly down the length of an accusing black talon.

“— You.”​

Her gaze slides up past that digit, past the ostentatious silk gown, into Rois’ sanguine glare.

“Er…”

“Us, actually! You’ve been really mean and we don’t like it.”​

“Yeah, we shouldn’t be horrible to guests…”​

“Well, I don’t, um, know I’d go so far as to say ‘horrible’…”

“So, we decided we’re going to hold allll your cigarettes hostage until you’re nice to syr Osytha.”​

“You can’t do that! You know I need those?!”​

“… except when he got a bit— a bit handsy for a second there, that wasn’t very nice…”

“Well, this is what happens when you’re being horrible.”​

“I wasn’t being horrible!!”​

“… and I know the colour’s not great on me, but calling it ‘ugly’ did kind of hurt…”

“Actually, Safya told us you were!”​

“That bi…rdddddd.”​

“… I do feel ‘animated as a corpse’ was uncalled for…”

“We’ll let you smoke… If you give syr Osytha a hug and say you’re sorry.”​

“… even if it don’t mean as much as you think it does, where I’m from— ee, what now?”

Osytha blinks up at Rois. The man is standing there like an again-walker frozen in mid-lurch; those outstretched arms seeming more a threat than anything else. And, yes — oddly enough without his head wraps. That alarms her for a second, until she realises no one else seems to be at all concerned. No, what’s truly alarming are the next couple words to emerge from Sinclair’s mouth.

“Come here.”​

She looks at the twins. She looks back to Rois. Did she actually hear that right? A hug?

… fuck it. Why not?

Filly rolls up her sleeves for dramatic effect. “Let it be known: I did not ask for this,” she declares… before a big, evil smile lights up her face, “but by gum, I en’t about to complain neither.

“Let’s make it a good one, aye? We don’t want to disappoint your girls now.”

Burgundy-sleeved arms flung wide, her silhouette dwarfed against the hulking beast in open scarlet silk — Osytha steps forward to meet her fate. Enthusiastically, and with a nice, snug, face-squished-right-to-his-chest proper hug.

 

[Rois Sinclair]

‘Let’s make it a good one, aye? We don’t want to disappoint your girls now.’​

The expression she sees before her view is overtaken by red and tan is incredulous. So much so that it actually surpasses the spark of surprise within his mind that she’s actually playing along (her, Osytha, engaged in silliness), what did she mean by that? A ‘good’ one, a logical doubt in his softness, oh, the shift of amazement from himself to herself was going to be delicious, three hundred and twenty pound giants composed of iron-wrought muscle and unchained strength were capable of the tenderness of littler men if they wanted to be. Did she think about the simple fact that those arms could snare and shatter spines, break ribs into powder with uncanny force, effectively crushing her to a messy death without fanfare-- or had the knight reached a point where such an action would be impossible to even imagine? The violence always occurs to him mentally, just a fleeting point, just an unspoken note, an unacted reminder. Impossible indeed.

To be gentle does take any effort on the butcher’s part. Rois is simply a master at this sort of thing due to the absence of stodgy emotion most men would feel in this situation.

With concepts of lust, desire and shame, it would be easy to imagine other males shoved into such a scenario as bashful creatures actively pushing down ideas about flirting whilst being unable to rid the red from their faces at the ferocity of her engagement. Osytha is beautiful after all, and this is the closest the unlikely pair had ever been, a common and simpler man would no doubt melt and fumble and have to search for words amongst the warm mist settling against their skulls (it’s lovely, it’s so so lovely, please don’t let go). Not he, the pressure does not phase the half-beast what-so-ever as arms ensnare the woman’s smaller form without hesitation, no staggering, no static, no jittering movement.

And he makes sure it’s just as snug, if only to see if it freaks her out. He wants to see if she panics. Lechery does not possess the strange man but violence still mentally does, I could… if it were any tighter, you wouldn’t be able to breathe…

… Smells like the faint, bitter remnants of cigarettes with the musky pepper of some (no doubt) lofty, imported cologne clinging to the fabric, the salt-sweat is sweet and new, the sort of thing that comes hand-in-hand with the radiating of abnormal warmth that seeks to flush the snow-white stretches of her skin pink. That heat… everywhere. The sensation is not as fire burns but as sub-boiling water comes to seep into tired muscles, a numbing, soothing glow like accumulation one goes through when partially submerged in the rolling mists of a hotspring. Someone is very popular in winter. Tangled ribs cast hearts against each other but his does not dance or stutter with affectionate sweetness, the rhythmic, wave-like shift of skin accompanying every beat seeks to brand itself against her cheek; the slight elevation of its speed is annoyance and nothing more. That same vexation is present when Rois speaks, baritone akin to the diesel-like purring of a greater cat come to shake your bones with its deepness, its underpinned by that come-again second voice growling in the depths of his throat,

“I am sorry.” Blatantly sardonic, the rush of air stirs the hair of her crown with pleasant warmth, “... Also, to say the colours not great is an understatement--”

“Hey!” Feliene saddles up to them with a raised hand, eyes flashing--

“What!” A higher pitch, careful not to let the emotion cause nail-points to dig into the knights spine, in their pointedness they are felt as pressure but not as pain, “I apologized! So, reward now.”

“Let go first-- she has a boyfriend, you weirdo.”

Poor Hector had gotten demoted from husband to boyfriend within the span of a three-quarter hour… and ‘reward now’ is a very interesting phrase! It’s like if human speech was gifted to a dog and it had just finished a trick, now demanding instant payment for such effort-- Rois peels Osytha from him by way of unwound arms (gently) catching her shoulders and puuuuuushing her afar with a conscious step back,

“How has it come to be that I am the ‘weirdo’ when this is the task you gave me--”

…………… The reflexes of an actual rock. One of those inky-black papered cigarettes bounces off of his head silently and claws raise probably an entire second too late to catch it-- with a low stoop to pick it up from the damned floor the red-head’s eyes are blessed by pleasant sparklings and widening diamond pupils, the sort of thing that happens when spying something you love, success. Like the addict he is Rois jams it between his teeth and lights it with a deep, shuddering breath in and a sneer in the general direction of the girls,

“I will be getting the rest back.” The dragon in a flurry of glorious red amidst the grey of nicotine smoke slinks back into the darkness of the room and closes the door in a somewhat-bang. The movement might seem like a stroppy ‘I am going to sulk now!!!’ but it is actually--

“... Ssssahahahaah!!” An explosion of squeaky giggles,
“Shshsh-- quick-- quick--” Rushed words with an almighty grin.

Osytha is no doubt used to being dragged by now, Feliene is tugging her with both hands to the knights one away from the door so that their efforts to whisper would not be heard by the brooding male within--

“W-Where do we hide the box.”
“We have until he’s finished doing his hair.”
“Can’t let him get them till the game is over, right??”

Alaera holds the box snug against her chest and begins looking around dramatically, but it is very clear that they have gone to Osytha for help because adults possess a greater sense of stealth for such a task. If it was left to them it would end up behind one of the lonely plant-pots scattered around, aka, the most obvious place of all.

---

★ Rois thoughts on hugging Osytha; 'She is indeed a human woman.'

 

[Osytha]

It’s a good one, alright.

Rois closes around her like a beartrap sprung, and the world near disappears from Osytha’s sight. Bar for a vague hint of shimmering red silk, there’s naught but darkness to be found pressed into this big, broad chest, while his curled arms blot out the sky. Space itself seems to have been wrung from existence; there are no dimensions — no up nor down, no forward nor backward, no side to side. Only blackness, and a pressure like the universe being compressed into a single pinpoint.

Osytha clings on best she can, riding it out. Her own arms barely reach past one another around Rois’ back. One of her hands gives him a few encouraging pats against a bulging trapezius, capping off with a comforting little rub. ‘Top-notch hug here’, she ought to tell him. ‘Ee, that’s the ticket’, or similar.

“Urk,” says Osytha.

That feeble little noise doesn’t even escape past his pecs. It’s swallowed up by the steady, concussive thumping of a mighty heart behind a mighty, muscular breast. Lost in the cloying cocktail of salt, stale smoke, and some residual, sumptuous scent.

And the heat.

Everything else seems to ride that warmth, saturating, until what small pocket of air lies here in the dark feels thick enough to drown her. And yet, there’s an oddly peaceful sensation to it. A mind-numbing sort of effect from the heat flooding through her melting body, even as her lungs struggle for breath…

“I am sorry… Also, to say the colours not great is an understatement—”​

“Hey!”​

There’s a strange, dual effect to conversation rolling around Osytha. Fel’s bright voice sounds so muffled and distant, like she’s listening from underwater, while Rois’ great, cavernous rumblings vibrate right out his chest through her head. It’s kind of… nice. She doesn’t even pick out individual words, just, allows the formless shapes of their voices to become one more thing swallowing her up…

When Rois finally starts peeling away, Osytha proves rather reluctant to let go. The woman’s arms don’t make any move to disentangle themselves from around him, and her head continues to loll happily against his chest, eyelids drooped shut, cheeks flushed rosy, and with a sleepy smile across her face.

“… Warm…” she mumbles, dreamily.

… Only to be left blinking groggily when Rois keeps on cruelly pushing her away, forcing the (relatively) cold, bright foyer to all come crashing back into view.

Resignation sets in. Osytha steps back to let the rest of the scene unfold, taking it all in with big, sad, grey eyes.

Very, very suddenly, she wants to be home.

Not to go home. Osytha wishes she were already there, right now, wishes it so strongly that just thinking of the long and arduous journey back feels utterly unbearable. That’s what that hug just now has made her realise. She doesn’t want to be here in a strange town, with unfamiliar, distant, strangers. She wants to be home amongst people she’s allowed to just reach out and touch. Osytha wants… she wants to be able to hug Leo, to let him cling onto her the way he had when they were children. She wants dad to put an arm around her shoulders and give her a jostle like he does when he’s proud of her. She wants mum to hold her close, to stroke her hair and softly hum until she falls asleep. She wishes it were Hector she could throw her arms around right now, and press herself into. She wishes—

—she wishes she had never let him go. That she had followed him, that tender-hearted man, so they might have held each other just as often as they had ever desired to…

A sharp burst of girlish laughter snaps Osytha from her conflictions, back into the present.

“W-Where do we hide the box.”​

“We have until he’s finished doing his hair.”​

“Can’t let him get them till the game is over, right??”​

“I s’pose there’s a couple of ways to do it,” Osytha says, strolling up to inspect the case in Alaera’s arms. She gives it a thoughtful look, hoping that she’s quelled back the fresh shimmer of tears enough that Fel and ’Era don’t notice. “Could find somewhere inconspicuous, of course… but it’s pretty bulky. Maybe on top of a rannel-balk¹, if there’s one tucked up inside the fireplace? Though getting covered in soot will give the game away. Hmm.”

The foreboding doorway to Rois’ room draws her eye. How long does he take to do his hair, she wonders? Osytha leans in a little closer to the twins, dropping her voice to a careful hush.

“… Then again, you can always try hidin’ it in plain sight,” the badger confides. “If one of you slips in there after he comes out lookin’ for it, well… if he thinks it’s been stolen, then he’s not likely to go searchin’ amongst his own things, aye? Might be enough to keep him runnin’ around for a while. But the best part is, technically, you’ve already given it back. Can’t get mad at you for doin’ the right thing, can he?”

She knows it’s a rhetorical question. Yes, he can; Rois can probably justify getting angry at anything he wants to, and it seems as though he often does. But at least the twins seem to be safe exceptions to his ire, and what’s more, that technicality will also permit them the smug satisfaction of inculpability.

---

¹ ‘Rannel-balk’: a beam set up a fireplace flue, from which chains and hooks could be anchored to hold cooking pots over the fire.