September Open + 2 Closed

[somebodychildofanyone]

Who: River la Croix and YOU
What: Blacksmith open for business, sword practice, crippling coffee addiction, tailoring a cloak, & laying the dead to rest
When: [waves hand like a magician] September
Where: River's forge, Annabelle's tailoring shop, the festival green, the woods, Oak & Iron
Warnings: Likely discussions of death & necromancy, River's general bluntness about death, injury, and maiming, and I dunno about the woods thread, that's Dara's party


Glory to the Secondborn [Open | River's Forge]

River spends most of the time after her arrival in August getting her forge ready to go - all smiths need to ensure their workspace is just how they like it - but now she's completely open for business. The sign hanging out front proclaims INFERNAL ARMS AND ARMOR, with a second, smaller sign hanging beneath it: Custom Work Accepted.

Find River here five days a week, laboring over her anvil and forge. A smith's work is never done, and right now a great deal of her own is in the little things a town blacksmith does - helping the overall owner of the forge make nails and rivets, hammering out wire, repairing pots, pans, and tools, melting down broken equipment to either reclaim the metal or make into new tools, and the like. But she's eager to work on other things. River didn't train much as a traditional smith. She's an armorer, and the night, it is so very dark, isn't it?

River works with a faceplate on, a blank bit of steel with a slit so she can see, so if you come up on her in the middle of a project odds are good that her hair is tied back and her face is not immediately visible.

The sigils on her bare arms burn with a light that matches her forge, which is curiously free of coals despite the heat coming from it.

Best Practices [Open | Festival Green]

One can find River in the evenings at the festival green, while the sun is setting, training with her spatha. Her style has a curious quirk; she fights dirty and mean, yes, but mixed into the more usual moves of her two-handed stance are light, quick touches, as if all she intends to do is make brief contact with an opponent. She could use a sparring partner.

Black As Night, Sweet As Sin [Open | Oak & Iron]

From the studio that brought you the last 'come bother me' prompt, a second one: find River in the mornings at Oak & Iron, carefully measuring out her budget for a daily cup of coffee. You can almost see her transformation from 'I'll fight God if he so much as looks at me' to 'eager and curious about all these new people' as the cup drains. She is not a morning person by inclination, merely by habit.

Anyone who feeds this girl something she doesn't have to cook herself may have an instant friend.

Custom Order [Closed to Annabelle | Annabelle's Shop]

With weather being a thing on the island, River is making her cloak a priority...quite aside from it being an excuse to talk to Miss Whitlock again. She comes in with a heavy cloak in deep green folded over her arm, her ears twitching curiously as she looks around and takes in the ambiance. River wouldn't dream of expecting special treatment as a client here; she can wait for the sticheress to be ready to serve her, especially when the measurements might need...

...Privacy.

The Family Business [Closed to Degas | The Woods]

"Thank you for agreeing to this," River murmurs. "...I know there's misgivings, but I want to stress again that my primary goal here is to get the deceased laid to a proper rest and provide closure to their families. If there are none who might be willing to see their earthly remains used to protect the community, that's fine. Not ideal, but fine, I can't expect or demand anything."

River's here, she's ready, she's at the edge of the woods. She's come armed with her sword, but to be frank if a monster attacks her job is to make sure that Degas can get away. Cold as it is, the dead will wait for a return trip, but the Temple needs its minister.

Comments

The Shop and its Blessings

[witheredpeonies]

Annabel Lee is alone in the shop when River arrives, working on one of the patches for Gerry, as you do. The rats tied at the tail, the coffin. The symbols of punk and fear that she hardly understands, but can make of thread and fabric. Still, she looks up when the bell above the door jingles.

"Oh! Welcome." Startle turns to an easy smile.

[somebodychildofanyone]

River smiles back, relieved to see the lack of a prior client. A prior job, certainly, but still. "Good afternoon, Miss Whitlock. I see business is already coming in."

[witheredpeonies]

"Slowly, but surely. Enough to keep me fed, and enough that I'm making friends with others here. One of the girls who performs--singing--asked me to pretty up her outfits for shows, for example."

But that isn't the point. Annabel Lee sets aside the work she's in the middle of, gesturing for the cloak. "So, let me see?"

[somebodychildofanyone]

"If I'm not interrupting," is what River's mouth says, but there's no bite to it; she approaches and offers the heavy cloak. It's deep green in color, and thick - a winter cloak, maybe a touch too warm for fall, but it's a hardship River's used to. "I'll confess that I'm eager. I feel...not naked, but certainly not myself, without a cloak."

[witheredpeonies]

"You aren't interrupting." Annabel feels along the edges, gets to know the shape of the cloak. "Put it on so I can mark where the earholes will go on the hood?"

And perhaps so she has the excuse for a little more direct touching. Shhh, two women alone in a shop like this, nothing's going to happen.

Right?

[somebodychildofanyone]

Riiiiight.

What's happening now is the faint wilting of the River. "This is the part I was hoping to avoid," she confides. "... Alright."

Shake the cloak out, sweep it around the shoulders. The clasp is a simple pin, for now, but that will change; River closes it, and then with a sigh, raises the hood. Her ears make peaks within it, followed immediately by a pained and uncomfortable look on River's face.

She's trying very hard not to squirm.

[witheredpeonies]

"I'm afraid I'm going to need to touch to mark those spots with chalk." She is genuinely apologetic for how this is going to feel, like someone measuring a modern woman for a bra or other intimates.

[somebodychildofanyone]

Through gritted teeth: "Miss Whitlock, even if you had amorous intentions right now the weight of the cloak on my tips is difficult to describe. Speed would be extremely appreciated and rewarded with no questions about the further measurements of my ears."

[witheredpeonies]

Annabel Lee doesn't dignify that with a verbal response, simply making haste about her work before lowering the hood of the cloak to save River even an extra second of the unpleasant sensations.

"There you go, pet."

[somebodychildofanyone]

Relief. River's ears relax, and one hand comes up to massage her right ear with an expression not dissimilar to when the Q-tip hits juuuust right. The elf groans softly. "Thank you," she murmurs, in a bit of a daze. "Wren's tits but my life for a masseuse...it's... imagine being trapped under a mattress wrapped in sandpaper."

[witheredpeonies]

"I'll get this done as quickly as possible, then, so you don't have to deal with that feeling ever again."

Annabel Lee looks River in the eyes and offers a polished smile.

"I'll take good care of you."

[somebodychildofanyone]

That blush again, Annabelle; River's ears twitch like mad things, and she makes a Noise that might be agreement and might just be trying to cover up for the one-two blow of 'pet' followed by, well...that. "I - thanks, it's...yeah. Quartermaster always insisted he had to measure my ears out from base to tip for a proper fit..."

Beat.

"Goddamnit he was just trying to touch my fuckin' ears wasn't he."

[witheredpeonies]

"Almost certainly, I'm afraid. You know how men can be." Her tone is apologetic; she knows what harassment looks like.

[somebodychildofanyone]

"Mercs more like," River grumbles. "Can't just hit up the brothels like a normal person, nnnoooo. Glad he's fuckin' dead at least." She sighs, shrugs. "...Sounds like you've had your share too."

[witheredpeonies]

"Every woman in every world has, I'm sure."

Not a pleasant topic to dwell on, truly. She casts about for something else, before her gaze lands solidly on River herself.

"Things might be better, here."

[somebodychildofanyone]

"Seems like they were, before -" River gestures to Outside in a vague way, "- something twisted all the death up. Not to insult your worldliness, Miss Whitlock, but a society without a need for mercenaries is a good sign. Swords for hire are like a bad cough; the problem runs deeper." She grins, guiltily; River's attacking her own position and she knows it. "Makes me wonder though...say we finish the task before us, yes? We earn our ticket home, and we go. Wonder what happens to this place when all that extra labor just goes up in smoke."

[witheredpeonies]

"I'm not certain. Though here's a question: do we all have the chance to earn that ticket, or is it only a limited number of us who get to return to living?"

Not that she's dealt with that question, before, right?

[somebodychildofanyone]

"...I doubt we're in that kind of trouble," River muses. "Death is fair. It's the shitty kind of fair where it doesn't care about your circumstances or justice or if you've been cheated, but it's absolutely, completely fair. I'm not sure the white-haired lady could cheat us if she wanted to. Psychopomps don't lie."

[witheredpeonies]

"Maybe not where you're from." Her voice is very, very soft there.

[somebodychildofanyone]

On nameless instinct, River reaches up and cups Annabel's cheek in just her fingertips. Her expression is gentle, but her eyes are hard and determined. "If anyone tries to force you to go, or to stay, I will smite their ruin into the sea and feed their bones to the dogs. It will be fair."

[witheredpeonies]

Annabel’s breath catches in her chest, but she doesn’t pull away from that so, so gentle touch.

“You…really mean that.”

[somebodychildofanyone]

"...We are all of us condemned to live, and then cursed to die," River murmurs. "Yes, Miss Whitlock, I mean it. And I'd mean it no matter what else happens between us, or between me and the others. When I took up this name I took responsibility for the damned, the unwanted, and the down-and-out, but..."

She dares further, laying her palm against Annabel's cheek, taking a deep breath to mask how her heart's racing. "...You've had injustice enough. Not one penny more on the scales, not if I can right them."