The Baker's girl - A tale of Gradzlata

[siobhancan99]

"Fucking street rat" She heard the muttering from a woman dressed as a lady's maid. The others had the presence of mind to freeze, save one. A large man stood behind a table, cutting onions with a wickedly sharp knife. On his powerful arm was a tattoo, a blade with a snake coiled around it. The tattoo she knew, the symbol of a now-defunct but once vicious street gang that had ruled the basin with an iron fist. On his hands were two brands, showing he'd taken the duke's pardon, which meant he did something... or someone... in exchange for his freedom.

"Don't sass the girl with the gun, Mira." He said with a sigh "Your blood's no bluer than hers." He kept chopping, as if this were not the first time he'd had a gun on him. She could read the tenseness coiled in him though, like a spring. A few of the other kitchen staff shrank behind him as he worked "Mind that pan it's burning" he barked at one, not looking away from Ziva. "And what is it, you need then little thing? Not that I can't guess."

 

[DramaNerdette]

"I appreciate the professionalism, sir." She said with a nod. "I'll try to be quick and get out of your hair. A friend of mine and I recently did some work for a client, but he decided rather than pay us, he'd prefer to just kill is and leave us in a ditch. He's got my friend somewhere in this place, and I'm willing to wager you guys know where that might be, seeing as how someone probably had to prepare some food for the guy. Anyone willing to give a girl some directions? I promise if you do I won't put any bullets in any of the household staff, so long as they don't ask for it."

She mainly addressed this to the 'reformed' street tough, but she also kept an eye on the other people in the room, waiting for one of them to try to slip out and raise the alarm, hoping none of them were dumb enough to try it. The big guy was a problem. She'd been hoping to maybe take one of the kitchen staff as a guide, as well as a hostage to ensure good behavior, at least for a few minutes. Somehow, she didn't think the man with the knife would let that pass. Worse, he might try to make himself a hostage. Anyone dangerous enough to need, and then earn, a pardon was not someone she wanted along to complicate her already tight timetable. "Quickly now, we all have places to be, and I'd like to get this done before the rest of the crew decides I've screwed it up and they ditch finesse for violence. If that happens, the chance for mishaps is going to go through the roof," she finished, meeting the cook's eyes.

 

[siobhancan99]

The man nods "I haven't made so many schnitzels since my first job as a cook." He keeps chopping, then swipes the veg aside with a quick move of his knife across the board "there's a stairway, just to the left off the kitchens. It goes to the second floor. You'll exit, then youll make a right, at the end of the hall is a door. Behind the door is a stairway to the attic. Your man is in the attic. Be quick, and be quiet. The lord is putting on his armor... which takes a pretty good amount of time and a team of men to do it. Still, you aren't going to want to find yourself face to face with him or the young master. Not fully armed. Not a little bit like you." He picked up a slab of beef and slammed it down with one hand, making the kitchen staff jump, then started to carve it "or youll end up looking like this thing. Pistol or no. Now get out of my kitchen you'll make the staff jumpy."

 

[DramaNerdette]

Ziva gave a little salute to the cook with her firearm, before cracking open the door to check the hall. Still empty. She slipped into a run. The man could have been honest or he could have been lying, but the plan always called for haste. The stairs were right where the cook claimed, and she took the steps three at a time, thrilled by the smoothness of her motions and the surety of her feet. She was halfway down the next hallway when a man, a butler perhaps, stepped out of a linen closet directly into her path.

Rather than try to dodge around him, she ducked low and drove her shoulder into his stomach, launching them both right back into the closet, the door swinging closed behind them. She whipped a dagger out against his throat and hissed, "One sound and you die." She stood still, listening desperately to the hallway. ten seconds. Twenty. Nothing. She let herself breath again. "Ok. Good man. Stay in here. Make no sound. If I see you in the hallway, I will shoot you." She held up her pistol where he could see it, and gave him a long moment to register the threat before she carefully raised herself off the man, and left the closet. Down to the door at the end of the hall, and through. Stairs, thank gods. She went up, as silently as she could, but when she cleared the landing, there was a guard, and he was facing her.

He drew breath, and she did something she'd practiced dozens of times on her little rooftop. She threw her dagger straight at his face. And sure enough, as she'd learned practicing with the dagger, it's REALLY hard to make the damn thing actually poke into someone when you throw it, but it's IMPOSSIBLE to focus on silly little things like yelling for help or defending yourself when there's a freaking dagger flying at your head. His call for help turned into a little yelp, and he leaned away, throwing his hands up to block the tumbling bit of metal. It bounced off his forearm harmlessly, just as a foot of black steel slid up under his guard and into his lungs. Ziva had drawn and lunged the moment the dagger left her fingertips, and THAT little move she'd practiced hundreds of times. She stepped back out of the man's reach as he tried to speak, and was surprised to find he couldn't. In his surprise, he was still fumbling for his blade when her second strike went through his eye. He stiffened, and she grabbed him, lowering him down to the floor. She holstered the pistol and plucked her dagger from the floor, before entering the room.

 

[siobhancan99]

When she got to the attic she found another room. A small window showed her how the fight outside was going, and it was... mixed. One of the Volks lay still in the grass in a pool of blood. Yvginy had clearly summoned some bears, who were fighting one of the two nights, and Ulricha and Astrid the other. The advantage of horseback, armor, and superior strength though were keeping the fight a standstill. Ibrahim was kneeling over the badly wounded Volk, doing something. There was another door, and of course it was locked. She set about starting to pick it when the sound of a cleared throat stirred her. She turned to find a man, about 19, unarmored but not unarmed. He was dressed well, and had the good skin and teeth of a man born to money. His curly dark hair fell back over his shoulders, and he leaned against the doorway "So all this WAS a distraction." He shrugged, "I took advantage of the fracas as well to discover what it is my host had hidden up here. I confess to being a bad guest, but not so bad a guest I can let a girl ... no matter how pretty.. steal his precious treasure away. Whatever it is." He straightened a bit, resting his hand on the hilt of his rapier "So, what is it that brings you to the manor? Gold? Jewels? grain futures contracts? The last are the best or so I'm told. "

 

[DramaNerdette]

Ziva gave the fellow her most winning smile, and straightened up, stretching a bit till her spine gave a little crack. "Stealing implies I'm taking something that belongs to the man. I'm not." She gestured over her shoulder with her thumb. "You're not the only guest of the manor. You're just one who can leave if he wishes. My friend did a job for them, and getting locked in that room was his reward for a job well done. My friends and I take offense to that kinda thing, so I figured I'd let him out and we'd be on our way."

Ziva stared the man in the eyes. Cute. Gods she didn't want to cut him. Gods she REALLY didn't want him to cut her. She picked up the black bladed rapier from the floor, letting the tip trail along the wood. "I'd really prefer we didn't do this. Maybe we escape, and you have to come chase me around the city. I know some REALLY fun taverns you could catch me at. Doesn't that sound better than us poking each other full of holes, and an innocent family man made to disappear to keep a rich prick's secrets?" she asked hopefully.

 

[siobhancan99]

The man shrugs "He's the vassal of my father and thus the law. If there's a man locked in there how do I know he's not a dangerous murdering psychopath?" He drew his rapier in a fluid motion and circled. Where Ziva had picked up her fencing on the street he took the formal posture she saw from salle trained bravos in the street. He'd been formally trained, and the casual drop of "father's vassal" implied he was the count's son, as Kazimir didn't have a boy of that age. He likely knew how to use the blade. He slid in, graceful, fluid, batting her sword with his quick as a flash, not enough to disarm her but enough she wasn't pointing it straight at him. When she recovered her stance he circled, toying a bit "So. Tell me. Is the baron's guest a murdering psychopath? has he eaten the flesh of the innocent and made pacts with devils?" His tone was light, polite, inquisitive, but he didn't seem inclined to give her the opportunity to stab him, so despite talking he was focused on the swordplay.

 

[DramaNerdette]

She drew a dagger in her offhand, and idly twirled it in her fingers as she circled the man. "So, I gotta ask, how much did daddy pay for the..." She stepped in, feinted at a stab to the chest, but slipped low instead, slashing at his shins. He barely skipped back in time to save his legs from the cut, his counter-thrust barely turned aside by the dagger before she drew back out of his reach. Reach was the problem. His was longer. And he was clearly better with the sword. But she was faster and, she suspected, far more willing to cheat. It was an even match, and that was a problem because she was in a hurry. "...fencing lessons." She finished quietly, relaxing out of her fencing stance. "Seriously though. No, he's not a murdering psychopath, he's a priest. He's probably locked up in there, so if you'd just let me open the door, I'd be happy to prove it to you."

The young man paused for a moment, as if in thought, before dashing forward, his blade moving like lightning. She had to give ground to prevent being skewered, and even then it was a close thing, only possible because of the potion she'd drank. It was probably seconds, but felt like minutes, when they disengaged, both breathing heavily. She'd lost her dagger, and a slight pain with each breath told Ziva he'd scored a grazing touch along her ribs. For his own part, the man had a trickle of blood oozing down his sword arm where she'd somehow tagged him in the shoulder. Still, a losing trade. "There, honor upheld. Why don't we both head back to our rooms and take a break for a few hours, huh?" She gave him a hopeful grin, and then sighed when it was clear he wasn't backing down. "Listen, it's not that I want to die here, ok? But they came after his wife. His kids. You just don't do that, no matter what problems you have with how a job was done. Plus, I owe him for keeping my name out of it."

 

[siobhancan99]

The man nodded, and then with a flick of his wrist and a twist of the blade, he disarmed her and stepped in, wary of the dagger. He kept out of stabbing distance and pointed the tip of his blade at her "I should kill you for cutting me. It's my right. I'd rather though hear why my future father in law has a priest in his attic and a street rat to save the priest. Color me intrigued. Also color it faster because while it does take ages to put on plate it's... been ages and they have a whole crew to help them. I'm going to guess that this is their destination." He shifted his weight, keeping his cut arm behind his back and out of her range "So, it seems more efficient if you work on the door while you talk. If you're willing to turn your back to me."

 

[DramaNerdette]

She paused, for just an instant. It was so tempting. He didn't realize he was too close. She could turn like she was going to work on the lock, complete the turn, cloak in his face, lock blades with the dagger, free hand fires a bullet into his elbow, bludgeon unconscious with the stocking of coppers on her hip. It'd take twenty seconds. She let out a slow breath. Turned. And started working on the lock. "You know, this is why no one likes the rich kids, in the city. It's all 'Street rat' this, and 'I should kill you for cutting me' that. Like your silver spoon gave you all paper thin skin to go with it." She turned and pointed her dagger at him, like an accusatory finger. "It's not scary, it just makes you look kind of like a jerk." She went back to the door and worked silently for a moment. Then she gestured without looking. "Hey, kick my blade over, please? Some of us don't have the spare coin to replace the things if we lose them, and it's not like you can't just take it away from me again if you need to." The first bolt on the lock clicked, and she started working on the second.

"Your father-in-law hired the priest, and some friends, to retrieve blackmail that was being used on him. Blah-blah-blah, mistress, blah-blah-blah, I think he wanted to murder her and get the blackmail she was holding on other clients of hers. But she ran. Escaped with everything but what he paid for. This is all guesswork on my part, but it lines up with the fact that my buddy in there went to get paid for a job well done, and his men kidnapped him instead. We got lucky because his wife and kids escaped the B team that was sent for them. That's her, out there, being all distracty. The plan is to get him and get gone. Jens-Dieter and his family will probably have to flee across the border, which means I'll likely never see my friend again, even if this goes perfectly, so please forgive my fucking foul mood." The second lock clicked open, and Ziva stood, pushing the door inward as she stowed her lockpick, pulled the sack of gear for the priest off her back, and quietly drew one of her pistols, keeping it hidden under her cloak.

 

[siobhancan99]

The boy shrugged "interesting. Though incomplete" he pulled up a chair and sat, dragging her rapier over with a foot and keeping it on the blade "I'm afraid I'm rich, not an idiot so no you can't have your sword back yet. Also the way your cloak is shifting I'm going to have to insist that you not do whatever it is you're doing. Largely because you're not close enough to stab me and if you shoot me you'll likely die horribly after. They make a sound you know. Guns." he fished something from his purse, and drank it, the wound closing on his arm "As for the... I should kill you. That's not like when you take the piss out of your drunk mate and he says 'I'll do you for that' like he hasn't gone to school and he's some dock worker. I really am supposed to do you in for that. It's the law. You can't attack a noble and live in Gradzlata. Or really anywhere. It isn't me being a ponce, it's me just stating a fact. You're supposed to hang for it."

He kept his relaxed state "I am curious about all this though, so why don't you use both hands to do what you're doing and slow down. Details please. What sort of authentication was there to show whatever letters or whatnot really belong to the baron? Keep in mind I'm marrying into the family in a few days and well... if it's something truly awful I do believe I need to know about it. Also while I'm not his liege I'm his liege's heir so... maybe if you aren't completely unpleasant I can assist you with your troubles."

 

[DramaNerdette]

Ziva looks at him like he's insane, "I'm raiding the man's house, and killed one of his guards in the process. We passed 'you're supposed to hang for what you've done' territory a while back." She shook her head. "People get killed in Gradzlata for stealing a loaf of bread so they don't starve, though, so perhaps my scales on the subject are a bit skewed. For the record you can absolutely attack a noble and live. You can't attack a noble, allow yourself to get arrested, and live. That middle bit's the really important part."

She reholsters the pistol and gets back to work. "But to answer your question... if the blackmail wasn't his, then the lock of hair attached to it really shouldn't have led us right back to his home, should it? Wizards man, aren't they the best? Here's hoping that whatever skeevy details were in the letters doesn't end up sticking to you, you know, once you're all hitched and everything." She stands up. "All done. And yeah, I get the die horribly for shooting you thing, but fair IS fair. My life might not be worth as much as yours does in your eyes, but since I have the guns, I'm allowed an opinion on the matter too. If I'm stuck here when the fabulous clanky asshole shows up, I might as well go meet the gods with some company, right?" She grins, shaking her head, just unable to hold on to her ire. "Seriously, I think we're at shit or get off the pot time. Wanna see if I'm lying about the preacher? He's right inside, and I've got a holy symbol with his name on it in here." She shakes the pack a little. "Heck, let us go and I'll be happy to throw in some free work next time you're in the rise and need a hand with something. Tata raised me not to hold a grudge for little things like a blade on my ribs."

 

[siobhancan99]

The man keeps his foot on the blade. "The baron, is bald as an egg. There are lots of people that live in this house. One in particular has been very ill for a few months. It delayed the marriage. Was the hair chestnut? and if it was was it curly or straight? I'll wager it was straight." He stood and kicked the blade over. "The reason for the baron's need for secrecy will be over in a few days. Also his desperation, if I'm correct. I rather think that I am. He's a man who's afraid some lowborn churl has ruined his daughter for marriage. It's a hard enough lot being a woman in this world, but despite all your disdain for the highborn, its worse for them. They generally aren't even allowed any sort of useful occupation. They're kept under watch because their virtue means that some boy like me can be sure his kid is his kid, and that for whatever reason there's an unbroken line stretching back to some bandit that decided building a stone house turned his banditry into taxes, and his thievery into governance."

He kept his rapier at the ready "And so they're stifled. More to the point when they lose that virtue, they lose their value and so they become another worthless mouth to feed in the eyes of some. While divorce is an option if I were to find out after the fact well... it usually isn't done. Wizards. They can tell if your boy is your boy or not. I'm not going to drive some poor girl into spinsterhood because she had the audacity to sleep with someone before me. Take your friend and go. Lay low a few days. When the wedding is over..." he shrugs "I mean you have to trust me a bit but given that I could just scream for help I think I've earned it."

 

[DramaNerdette]

"Deal." She stands, and steps toward him, holding out her hand to shake on it. "I will admit, you're a good bit more reasonable than most of the folks I've met on this gig. I really am not here to spike your situation, and the offer of a favor for this favor still stands. Stop by the crimson hen at some point. Have some breakfast." She pauses for a second before shrugging a bit with a grin, "Can't blame a girl for trying to drum up some work, right?" The Hen was the nicest inn that the bakery delivered to, practically upper middle class. Their owner was a cheerfully round retired banker, and also horribly addicted to their baklava. If the young nobleman showed up for a snack, she'd be able to spot him from the servant's entrance.

The young man stared at her, then her hand, then back up again. "You're crazy, even for a street rat." He shook his head, and kicked the blade up, caught it, and handed it over. She sheathed it, sketching a quick bow that bow that somehow felt sarcastic to everyone involved. Then she turned and pushed through the door. She was, after all, in a hurry.

 

[siobhancan99]

The man shrugs when she calls him reasonable and kicked the blade over with a quip. When Ziva made it through the door she found a clenched fisted Jens-Dieter watching the battle below through a small window. He spun, then relaxed when he saw Ziva "you of all people should not have come." He sounded glad she did though. he wrapped her up in a bear hug and as he did she saw that his captivity hadn't exactly been in discomfort. The trappings of the room were rich, and there was a plate of food nearby with a gallon of beer. He shrugged himself into the hauberk and took the dagger, then the holy symbol. He started when he saw the count's son, who shrugged again and stood, gesturing for them to go ahead.

When they made it to the second floor, two men in chain, the knights squires, ran up the stairs. Jens Dieter froze them in place with a muttered prayer, and the trio made their way down and out the servant's quarters. There, in the field they saw one knight tangling with a set of summoned monsters from the wizard, while the other squared off against a huge Ibrahim, standing 12 feet tall and laying about with an enormous kopesh. Astrid and Ulricha were off to the side, wounded, and one of the Volk seemed dead or dying. The Count's son shouted "Enough Borja. Enough." and the knight fighting The huge cleric started a calculated withdrawal.

 

[DramaNerdette]

Ziva kept low and ran alongside Jens-Dieter as he angled towards Astrid's position. She kept her blade in one hand, and her pistol in the other, watching as the two groups of combatants separate. "We need to get out of here. The heavy hitters should be just about to show up. I'm sorry I took so long, I was held up by a very talkative young nobleman." She looked down and winced as she pressed her hand against her side. It came away smeared in red. "Oh, that's not great." She wiped her hand dry on her thigh while keeping an eye out for any aggressors trying to approach as Jens-Dieter fussed over his wife.

 

[siobhancan99]

"you mean more heavy hitters." Jens-Dieter gestured at their wounded, though the other combatants besides the knights were all dead, and the knights themselves were moving slowly and there was a trail of blood leading away from them as they retreated from the melee. Jens Dieter muttered a spell, closing a particularly nasty looking wound on his wife, and the group made their way slowly down the hill away from the manor. When the two new armored figures emerged, the count's son raised a hand and walked over "stand down, baron. Stand down. Your motive for chasing these people is no more."

battered and bloody, the group made its way through the foothills and among the trees. They stopped after a bit, and Ziva's blood loss began to take it's toll. Ibrahim muttered a few words and the wound stitched itself closed. Yvginy sent the raven around "there's some peasant levies out looking for us, but not hard. They're keeping well clear of the treeline. They're being seen looking without really looking."

After the brief exchange, they camped without a fire. The last light of the day was gone. "the boys are in the tower." Little Jens and his brother Rolf were 8 and 6, but Jens knew how to tend the fire and they would have to be ok by themselves. They'd been left food that didn't need to be cooked, and plenty of water. They were infinitely safer than the group.

Yvginy summoned another globe, and the temperature was at least reasonably comfortable, if the ground was cold and hard. Also, there wasn't much space, so they all slept mostly sort of sitting and on top of each other. When morning came, they were all stiff, hungry and cranky, but they had to press on.

The pace was more relaxed on the second day, and Ziva could finally take in the last of the resplendant fall colors that dotted the valley. From the wall, or along the Demonska Planina, you could tell it was fall, but down in the basin there weren't any trees. Being out here was like a whole new world. None of them seemed perfectly at home in it, except Astrid and their Volk allies, who disappeared into the brush silently, here and there, to scout ahead.

 

[DramaNerdette]

She kept scanning around, looking behind them every minute or so, checking for the telltale dust cloud of horsemen on their trail. After a while, she snorted a little laugh at herself. Ulricha looked at her, a question in her eyes. "Just... This is so unlike the city I think it bothers me. I've never seen this much sky in my life, and the horizon is... it's a lot. It's beautiful, but also so very empty of people. It doesn't feel... alive." They walked along in silence for a few minutes, and Ziva kept her eyes in front, just to see how it'd feel. Turns out, it just made the spot between her shoulder blades itch. "Yeah, nope, this place sucks. It even smells wrong. Like... the air is too thin. I can't tell what time it is by how far along the street kitchens are in their cooking, or how recently it rained by the stink off the gutters." She shook her head. "Ziva Nowak, city girl to the blood and bone, that's me. You know what I dream of though? Seeing other cities than Gradzlata one day. I love my home, but I want to know. Are other places like it? Do they smell the same? Do they have the same noises at night? the same flickering shadows, and echoing laughs from nearby taverns? How does the food taste? How do the boys dance? It would break my fathers heart if he heard me ask such questions, but... I think he knows that I wonder."

They walked in silence for another minute, and Ziva went back to scanning, checking their trail. The tightness in her shoulder faded. "Ulricha... tell me about where you're from? I mean... if you don't mind my asking."

 

[siobhancan99]

Ulricha had returned to form, using some pretty awfully accented Gradzlatan to indicate they'd talk in a bit. She scouted ahead a few minutes, then collected Ziva when the party stopped for lunch.

"Men" She started "will always be threatened by a woman that they perceive as their equal. You are small, so you get to be clever. I am not small, and so they will always feel more at ease around me if they think that I am stupid. It makes life easier. Also people that think you don't speak their language will say the most wonderful things around you." Her Gradzlatan was clear, if crisp with a bit of a clipped accent. "I am from a place like this" she gestures around "Die Nordmark. It is on the Ludowy border. My people are not ethnically Volk or Ludowy, but one side or the other has lain claim to the land for a long time. It is a land of Fjords and cold and mountains. It is quite beautiful" She fished some apples and cheese out of her bag, sharing. "And empty. It is too empty. So I left. I went to Grunstadt, the capital. It is exciting there! It is a new city. It is also along a river, but it is on a plain. you know what i mean by this? It is flat. It is flat all around, and so when the City is built they could plan. All the streets are straight and wide so there are no dark alleys. It is also small. There are 100,000 people in your city? Grunstadt has ... maybe 50,000. Mostly it is people who work for the king. Nobles who have houses to be at court, or businesses that surround such things. Servants for the rich, and of course taverns and such. Grocers. In some ways, one place is very much like another. In others not so much. The food is different so the smells are different. Less smoke in the sausages there, more beer than wine. There's less stink of people too in the crowd. Everything is more ..." she makes a gesture with her hands to indicate space "separate. Also new. everything is so new there. The City is maybe 50 years old."

 

[DramaNerdette]

Ziva stared up at at the ice blue sky, biting off a small piece of apple. "I'm having a weirdly hard time picturing it. An open city. How does one even rob a place without alleyways to hide in. I'd be totally out of work!" she laughed, a joyous wonder bubbled up from inside, and she flopped over onto the cold ground, looking up into the sky. "You know, Gradzlata is open too, you just have to know where to stand. I started, you know, stealing stuff because I needed the money. I think I kept doing it because of the first time I jumped from rooftop to rooftop on the rise. All the homes are so close together it's like a street all on it's own, above the noise of late night deliveries and people heading home from the pubs. It's not FLAT, not by any stretch of the imagination, but it still feels... free." She paused, before rolling over to her stomach. "Know what sucks about being clever? It's still a dance." She pushed up with her arms, and then kicked her feet into the air, into a handstand, then tumbling backwards onto her feet.

"See, I can get away with being clever, but I also have to be cute. If I get angry, it's cruel. Vindictive. Spiteful. Petty. A girl can't just get justifiably mad. There's always an ugly undercurrent." She sighed, squatting back down, wrapping her arms around her knees. "I don't mind being cute. It helps, in the same way you acting dumb helps. Give me an extra second. Two extra seconds. If I'm quick, that's all it takes most of the time. There was a noble boy back there... well, I mean he was probably my age but... he had me dead to rights. Could have killed me. Threatened to. I kinda regret not shooting him, kinda happy I didn't shoot him. But the part that bothers me is wondering if the only reason he let me live was because he thought I was safe." Ziva looks up at the blond warrior. "I don't like the idea of being safe. Isn't that messed up?"

 

[siobhancan99]

Ulricha laughed brightly "yes! yes. And if a man doesn't show his emotions he is strong! Stoic! When a woman doesn't cry or laugh or wear her heart on her sleeve she is cold and a bitch." She bit into her apple "It's all so incredibly stupid." She rested her back against a rock and looked over the trees. "as for... you have to know where to stand. I think that's profound. I think it applies to every environment and everything you do in life. It's all a question of finding your footing. I like that."

She took another bite of her apple "Being viewed as less harmful is a double edged sword. Sometimes, you don't have to fight because you are discounted. Sometimes it means a weak man will want to fight you because he feels like he can win. Sometimes it lets you get in close to do the killing blow... but sometimes it makes it hard to get respect. Being a shieldmaiden, you have to kill twice as many men as a man to be considered a warrior. You have to fight harder and longer. You have to do the impossible every week. It's exhausting." She looks over at Ziva "sometimes, I wish I was cute and clever. I think we all want that eh? We all think life would be so much better if just one little thing was different, but its not. Not really. You're just buying a different set of problems."

 

[DramaNerdette]

Ziva barked a laugh, "Finding my footing. I like that. Recently every day has felt like tap dancing on an ice slick roof, even if there have been a few benefits. A little romance. Made some friends..." She held out her apple, dinking it against Petra's. "...but It would be nice to feel a little more steady for once. A little less like I'm soon to be hunted down like a dog. Ugh, and certainly less being called 'street rat'." She looked at the other woman for a moment, then scooted over, facing her. "Let's make a deal. I hereby promise to recognize that you are, in fact, both cute and clever. Clearly. In exchange, you recognize that I'm strong and dangerous. That way no matter who we have to pretend to, we know at least SOMEONE gets it, right?" She took one final bite of the apple and chucked it over her shoulder, before wiping her hand on her leather pants and holding it out to shake on the agreement. "What do you say?"

 

[siobhancan99]

Ulricha took the offered hand with a grin "To Ziva the dangerous" and her voice had a playful mock to it, but she nodded "you are deadly, and I am clever. At least now, someone else knows nein?" She stood, looking down at the diminutive fencer. "I'm sure you're very good with that blade. Many people mistake size for power. Speed is its own weapon" She wrestled her coif back on, then picked up her pack and finished her apple, tossing the core on the ground for the animals "come. We have a long march till the family is reunited."

And a long march it was. Ziva walked more in the days surrounding the raid than she had in forever, and over uneven ground. It tested muscles she wasn't aware of in ways she didn't know they could hurt, but finally as evening fell, the group was at the guardhouse. A cheerful fire was lit, and a stew was being made of a brace of rabbits and some tubers from everyone's pack. Though there was no wine, there was a bit of cheer and the pleasant company and the fire kept out the pervasive Autumn chill.

Yvginy returned to being aloof, and Ibrahim seemed a bit embarassed if friendly. Ulricha made room next to her at the end of the night, near enough the fire to be warm without roasting, and the group fell to slumber easily.

During Ziva's watch, the alien nature of the sounds of the wider world and the pervasive oppeness of it was unnerving. A few days later, as the group found themselves at the North Gate, everyone visibly relaxed. They were home. For now at least.

 

[DramaNerdette]

Ziva gave each of them a warm hug at the gate, finishing with Jens-Dieter. "Better client next time, eh?" She said, adding a gentle smack upside the head. The she grabbed him again for another hug, "Send word if you need me, always up for more work." Then she stepped away and turned down an alley. She circled back, once the other's cleared out, and watched the gate from a shadowed balcony nearby, waiting patiently. She had enough food for one more day, and the apartment was abandoned. Her father wouldn't get MORE nervous for the delay, so she watched, stretching each hour to keep limber, looking silently out from the dark, waiting to see who might come rushing up after them.

Two days watching was all she could afford, but she didn't regret the time. She wanted to do some thinking, and for a thief, a little bit of patience when scoping out a place for an invaluable skill to nurture. An hour before her father would normally be up on the third day, Ziva turned her back on the north gate and picked her way across rooftops till she came back to her old neighborhood. Soon she was changed, slipping silently back into the small room that was the home she had been raised in. It had seemed tight after she began to love the freedom of the nighttime rooftops. It seemed even smaller now that she had see the endless expanse of flat scrublands, and endless blue sky. She changed, and slipped out of her room, heading downstairs to start the morning dough. Not long after, her father came downstairs, and froze when he saw her. "...Ziva?"

 

[siobhancan99]

Milan stops, having a look on his face that said he expected her to be dead. He swallowed, then moved over as swiftly as he could on his badly healed leg. he wrapped his arms around her "Ziva. Ziva I..." he pulled back, turning his face away. he wasn't normally very expressive, certainly not since her mother passed. He inhaled and exhaled "I ... thought I would never see you again" He let out another long slow breath. "So like your uncle. My brother." he put his hands on the counter to stop them from trembling "He ... He didn't want to stay here. He went off" he waved his hand vaguely south "To Sewochan." he turned and looked her over "I thought you were gone like him. I... I am glad you are safe and you are home. For now."

The last bit said with a sad resignation. "I am happy you are home for today. Come, we will make some bread. The bakery didn't stop operating because you were off having adventures."