Light of the Spire [Selene/Jule]

[Deleted]

"And why are you two idiots following me like a pair of lovesick puppies?" Her words were as harsh as her tone, but secretly Selene was smiling as both the blue-clad sailors trailing along after her panicked and snapped to attention, one of them saluting, a gesture the other followed up on belatedly after sneaking a glimpse at his counterpart. "Ma'am! ....Er, Sir. Acting bodyguards for-" She ripped the sailor in half with an impassive glare, one hand resting on the hilt of her sword as he visibly wilted under her stare. "I don't remember asking for company." "Naval base operating procedure, ma'am. COs should always be accompanied by at least two personnel-" "And said commanding officer is politely requesting you to belay that order because I can goddamn take care of myself."

The two men looked at each other, uncertain, and Selene almost felt a little bad for coming down that harshly. She had meant to mess with them, but... damn, these guys were friggin' terrified. But it was so FUN to screw with them. She almost hesitated - almost - for a second before carrying on, now smiling. "Besides, you'd be bored to death, and I sincerely care for your well-being too much to sentence you to such a horrific death." Whether it was a friendly smile or one signaling impending doom... neither of her companions seemed to have any idea. They exchanged another glance, then one of the two, apparently slightly braver than his compatriot, hesitantly spoke up. "And why's that, ma'am?"

Man, she had barely even baited the hook that time. Her tone as innocent as a schoolgirl and twice as clueless, Selene answered promptly. "Why, underwear shopping, of course!" The guy's eyes bugged out a bit and she smiled sweetly. Or at least that was the plan - with the scars and her usual facial expression it looked more like a homicidal nun or something. "Much too frilly, you boys wouldn't find it interesting at all." Both men took a step backwards, so perfectly synchronized that she could almost imagine them planning it, looking at each other again with blank looks on their faces. She wasn't dense enough to not know what some of her sailors fantasized about when they thought they were alone, but rather than worry about it, she didn't mind using it as a tool sometimes. "Shoo." Selene waved her hand vaguely as if to accentuate her words. "Away with you!"

One last shared glance and they finally broke, beating a hasty retreat as men usually did when faced with such bastions of femininity so far out of their comfort zones. Maybe she had missed her calling as a politician! Or common whore. Chuckling harshly to herself at the black humor, Selene pushed the well-meaning idiots from her mind after deciding to come up with something to reward them for tolerating her willfulness, turning away to survey the unending array of shops and stalls among which her prey awaited. Hopefully.

[Jule]

"Eh..excuse me, have you - !" "Ma'am, have you seen my friend, she's a - " "No sir, I do not want a new coat!!"

Jule slid down to the gravel near exhausted. It was about lunchtime for her, and she thankfully had enough to pay this time without her friend's help. Karen had gone off to Gaea-knows-where-and-why sometime in the early AM without so much as a note. And though there was probably no point in hindsight, she spent all morning and half the afternoon looking through half of the city for her. And now here she was, a little lost and confused in the market square. Her tummy's sudden rumbling spurred her up, to find a bite to eat, and then try to get her bearings. She just hoped no one would mind a person like her scrambling across the rooftops. There were quite a few people who had open-climb second stories that led to more shops after all. One of the benefits of having such structurally sound houses, she guessed.

And so she stumbled through the stalls, following her nose's catch on the scent of food. Etruria had a lot of new and exotic food. It was on the other side of the country though. Still, where else could you find delicacies like freshly roasted squid eggs on a stick, or hickory-smoked goat meat made into little balls? Or, or. . . gah, it was all so new! So exciting! So delicious. Jule wanted to try everything, but a gut feeling told her if she did that she'd pop like a bubble. Hers would be the noblest of deaths.

She settled on something she had definitely seen before in Ostia; a crocket? Croquette? She didn't remember how to pronounce it. Two bags of them would fill her for now, along with something she'd never had before; cordial. It was a little fizzy but oh god it made everything go down so smooooth

When she stood up and finished licking her fingers, Jule realized that she was hopelessly lost even more now. It seemed to be where all the clothes were, or most, anyway. There was hardly rhyme or reason to what went where around here but the clientele moved like clockwork in and out of stalls; amazing. "Hmmm..." she scoped out the corridor; shirts, hats, pants, cloaks; pretty much anything under the sun you could wear outside, and then some. "Wait, where's my new cloak?" she reveled. Her coat made of patchwork was the one she took with her out that day; did she leave the one Karen bought at home? She left it back in the shop, stupid her. At least she didn't have to pay for that one. With a sigh, she decided to buy another white cloak and call it quits for today. She was worried about Karen, but to her, Jule > anyone else.

She stopped when a huge woman walked by her with two men in tow. She wasn't that big, but her presence had Jule already starting to quake in her boots. What Jule was really interested in was the conversation. It was simply enthralling:

"Why, underwear shopping, of course!"

What really sealed it was how the men looked at each other with such fear in their eyes. If their eyes got any bigger they might've fallen out. Jule started to giggle like a hyena, wanting to see the end of the conversation. Would they flee? Or press on for the sake of ...whoever she was. So without thinking, she tagged along with them through the stalls for the last bits of the conversation. And what a letdown that was! The muscular woman just shooed the guys off with less than a full sentence! Aww. Guess it was time to get going before the woman told her to shoo as well.

[Deleted]

The minor side issue that she had literally no idea where to look and had too much pride to ask anyone for help occurred to her after an awkward moment of silence. It wasn't like she'd gone shopping for that kind of thing before, or knew where you even... bought that kinda stuff. SOMETHING in this damn city there seriously had to be a shop that sold them. The icy admiral breathed out, sort of hoping that the simple act of breathing would give her an idea of where to look.

Unsurprisingly, it didn't.

Also, there was some grubby little midget staring at her. In what was, quite franky, the LEAST fashionable and stylish outfit Selene had ever seen - and she was used to seeing half-naked dudes who smelled like death and were twice as ugly. Either an orphan or... actually she didn't want to think about the alternative, the possibility that there were parents who would actually DRESS THEIR CHILDREN THAT POORLY was abhorrent even to the generally fashion-insensitive admiral. Not that she didn't make an effort to look half decent herself, obviously, but usually she didn't much care what other people looked like.

Turning to face the hooligan head on with one hand on her hip, Selene speared Jule with a glance. "So... did you dress yourself like that, or is this child abuse?"

[Jule]

Jule looked side to side, half-hoping there was some taller, uglier street rat behind her. No dice, this noticeably contemptuous face gave Jule a look she felt had been practiced to perfection by now. "It's..it's comfortable," she mumbled at a just barely audible tone. And it was. God her coat was soft. Admittedly, not as soft as the one she left behind, but it was pretty decent work despite being worn well past its prime. The only parts of it that were still useable was the hood and the surrounding area. Unbeknowst to her, the only reason she didn't get many funky looks from passerby were because they were too arrogant to waste time on a peasant like her, or because they were wearing equally repulsive clothes.

Having very well nothing to lose, she countered defiantly. "You.. you don't look like any prize either." Well, A+ for effort. "Do you want something from me?" she meekly asked the scary looking nun who seemed to be considerably more attractive at second glance. Damn, even with scars she was still beautiful.

[Deleted]

"I could ask you the same question, young lady." With a wolfish smile, Selene sized up the mouthy little shi- brave teenager while looking for all the world like she was about to eat her. Maybe literally. "You've been following me for a little while now, haven't you." It was a statement, not a question, and nothing in her tone suggested otherwise. She didn't sound angry, but roughly as serious as the Ending Winter as she tilted her head a bit, hand still on her hip. "Generally, that means you want something. You're not competent enough to be trailing me, which means you're probably either a street urchin looking for coin, or- well, have you ever heard of an old saying - it's a favorite of mine - something along the lines of 'curiosity killed the cat?'"

...Damn, she was feisty today. Maybe it was all the meetings driving her to madness and the abyss. Seeing the kid react would be truly magical, though, like putting Thoron in a bottle. "As for me..." Selene slowly began to walk towards Jule, not TRYING to look threatening, but the movement was eerily reminiscent of a shark on the hunt. Which was, albeit not quite as grisly in intend as the metaphor might imply, surprisingly apt. "There are many things I want, and a whole load more crap I don't give a dragon's ass about. But you're less afraid of me than those two wusses, and that makes you interesting. You got a name or something?"