Wide eyes considered Zakroti as he stirred from sleep. He seemed none too pleased for having been left asleep, mumbling what Miry imagined to be a curse in his native tongue. It was vaguely familiar, though she still couldn’t place which of the drakken tongues it was closest to, and the meaning (or even a possible-maybe-perhaps guesstimeaning) entirely eluded her tired mind. 

She flashed a nervous smile, pressing her needle through the silk ribbon she worked on so she wouldn’t lose it as she signed. [i]Half a sweep, I’d guess?[/i] Calculating, she ran her eyes over the length of the ribbon that she’d worked, scrunching up her face in consideration. It seemed about right. [i]I’m sorry I didn’t wake you, my lord. It won’t happen again.[/i]  She didn’t dare meet his gaze with the comment.

Smooth skin caught her eye as the lord extricated himself from the bed, and she did her best not to stare as she busied herself organizing the threads of her project back into their satchel. A faint wash of color crept into her cheeks as she imagined again the night before, and above all how loved – or if not loved, as love was a tricky thing to quantify, at least cared for – she’d felt in the moments between such doings and falling asleep. 

[i]Of course you should be so lucky. Your sisters are far more deserving of love and they are suffering, and you are here daydreaming about the man you’ve been sold to. Selfish. Disgusting, even. Your mother should be glad she gave you up when she did.[/i]

She winced and visibly shook the thought from her mind, rising to her feet and gathering up the lord’s discarded nightshirt from the previous eve. She placed it, neatly rolled, into her own bags – hopefully she would remember it was there and there wouldn’t be any awkward statements or questions later in the night. As the lord put on his gambeson her gaze was drawn to the bruise on his neck, which was only a slight discoloration but might have been noticeable enough. She withered, glancing away and signing something to the effect of a fleeting apology as she shouldered more bags than she should have been trying to carry, wobbling to the door to leave the chambers and rejoin the group downstairs.

=-=-=-=-=-=

Nenra, meanwhile, was quite enthusiastically dipping into the meal and doing her best to ignore the curious guardsman, something made easier by not understanding a word that was spoken.  She flashed a concerned glance to Kzaar, a flash of sympathy rising as his comrades seemingly teased him about something. Likely his size, given that it was the most obvious trait of the man. She could empathize with such awkwardness, having stood head and shoulders above nearly all of the others in her village and teased often for it in the most vulnerable years of her adolescence.

The guardsman seemed persistent, curiously staring past the retinue to size Nenra up. At the shift in the tone of his words, she stiffened, some of the weeds which sprouted between the cobblestones shivering and nodding towards her until she got a grip on her temper. She raised the mug of tea to her lips, giving Gaikus an appreciative smile and letting the flare in her anger fizz away. The herb blend was very nice, and she felt a buzz of energy already beginning to fill her limbs as she sipped on the drink.

She then choked on the aforementioned tea as Gaikus spoke in her native tongue, to clarify what the other guard had inquired. Giving the guardsman an incredulous look, she waited for him to finish formulating the thought, her mind racing. For a Drakkan, built as far as she could tell on a mannish frame and with similar structures by which to speak, he did an admirable job of pronunciation of their tongue… it was no small curiosity to her that he spoke the language so well, with flawless grammar and nearly as good of a grasp of the inflected portions. Even the human historians she’d met in the capital, during the convoy’s brief stayover there, struggled to formulate words with half the grace that these Drakken men did. When Aurien spoke, too, her head swiveled to him, her thoughts tumbling over each other even as her body laughed heartily at his comment. Surely the lord did not mandate that his soldiers be proficient in the tongue, for all it seemed the rule rather than the exception… 

Turning to give the unknown guardsman a look, she strongly debated answering in the Gemmenite tongue, which she could make freely flow from her lips. The man had not afforded her the courtesy of using the common language, which she could understand well enough, though she’d certainly demonstrated her unease with responses rendered in it, what with her wordy and awkwardly constructed phrases. It had driven Miry half-mad on the ride from the capital to Shadow Wroth, for certain, though the younger girl had tried to help her form her words all the same.

“I’m not some delicate girl-child,” she replied laughingly, the Gemmenite trills easy and flowing from the point of her tongue. “And as I said last night, I care little for feather beds and silk duvets.” She refocused her attention on her mug of tea, though it was soon drawn by the quiet voices of the lord and his chosen man. The trio had arrived quietly in the courtyard and were helping themselves to the breakfast fixings the party had set out.

Miry placed the saddlebags with the others to be loaded on the mounts, though she darted away from the lord’s side for only a moment. The younger bride seemed to be clinging uncomfortably close to Zakroti, picking out a seat directly beside him, so close their legs were touching. She seemed entirely engrossed in the lord’s doings, scarcely tearing her eyes from him, even though Nenra tried to get her attention. The tall bride stifled a flash of annoyance, moving to sit on the cobblestones nearer the two with a decidedly ungraceful plop, her long limbs flailing. “Good morning, my lord,” she said simply, the common words reedy and unclear and entirely foreign in her mouth.

The logical part of her knew Zakroti surely spoke their tongue, but it didn’t stop her from asking Miry, quietly and under her breath, how the night had been. The smaller bride’s face colored, and she signed that it had been a pleasant enough night, though she drummed her fingers on the edge of her speaking screen anxiously and glanced to the lord out of the corner of her eye. Nenra did not have to be particularly astute to fill in the blanks on that… The tall bride shivered lightly, glancing sharply to the lord and drawing her arms in tighter around herself, discomfort written all over her face. Miry seemed unperturbed at least, flashing an apologetic smile to Nenra and returning her attention to Zakroti's ramblings. She nibbled on a piece of salted meat and bread, and drew her cloak tighter around her shoulders in the morning breeze.