[OPEN] falling through what's left of the fractions

[esquive]

WHO: Marcoulf & YOU
WHAT: Keeping busy and getting re-acquainted with Kirkwall's hot goss
WHEN: Early Bloomingtide
WHERE: All Over Kirkwall
NOTES: Can be before or after phylactery shennanigans.

I. JUST HORSIN' AROUND - THE STABLES

Tang! The sound of a hammer on iron rings in the courtyard.

Early on, Marcoulf had made the mistake of refitting one of the roan mare's shoes in sight of someone with a keen eye for putting new faces to work. Meaning his afternoon has been filled with putting bits of metal on an whole assortment of hooves - a number of which belong to animals not half so patient as the roan he'd ridden in on. The struggle to keep his subjects still has begun to plant an ache in his lower back and bruise the inside of his knees. The muggy pending-thunderstorm heat has the whole yard sweating.

Tang! He twists the cold shoe on the anvil horn and wails on it once or twice more, allowing himself to be purposefully finnicky over the shape. Anything to delay putting the nearby horse's leg up between his again. A moment ago the stupid animal had tried very hard to pull away while Marcoulf had been driving nails and nearly put its foot where it emphatically didn't belong. When he can put it off no longer--

"You." Yes, you. "Hold his head a moment." Marcoulf gestures to the horse with the hammer and jams a few nails between his lips.

II. GUARD DUTY - WHEREVER THAT HAPPENS

The rain falls so thick that come evening, visibility relies entirely on pools of barely sheltered lamplight. The weather's so heavy that it's surely driven even the most dedicated Inquisition sentries have retreated into doorways and into whatever shelter can be eked out of the shadow of Kirkwall's imposing walls.

Marcoulf certainly has anyway. His cloak, once waterproofed, has become sodden enough that the damp has begun to penetrate and the rain is so bad that he can't imagine anyone would choose tonight to cause trouble. No need to make themselves more miserable than necessary.

At some point, he produces a paper packet from a pocket. There's cheese in it. He offers it wordlessly to his companion. Sharing is caring.

III. A LONG LIST OF TO-DOs - MISC.

He sits poorly. Marcoulf can be found in a variety of Kirkwall's corners, quietly fussing over some task or another. He has a sword in need of sharpening, a pittance of coin in need of spending (new shirts, please and thank you), and some good old fashioned gossiping to eavesdrop on. The city's rife with talk and he intends to take in some part of it.

Need a note run? A sparring partner? Looking for an escort through shady back alleys at night? Despite what the scraggly appearance might suggest, you could pick worse.

((ooc: I'm good for whatever, but if you're thinking of something in particular that you want a starter for just shoot me a PM and I'll scrape something together.))

Comments

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The horse digs his heels in fantastically, but somewhere between the pressure applied to the headstall and Marcoulf clamping down on every available joint, the nails are driven in. After quite a bit of scuffling and pulling and misbehavior, the shoe is secured. Marcoulf releases the animal's foot with a heavy thunk. The horse immediately shifts his weight forward and turns his head to nudge Alacruun's arm and lip expectantly at his clothes.

With a hand to the small of his back, Marcoulf straightens. "Someone's spoiled him rotten." Still, he pats the horse high on his neck and flips a few handfuls of mane back to the right side. He also glances to Alacruun and nods in apparent approval: 'Good enough.

[coiledscales]

"I wouldn't know. He's certainly not mine," Alacruun replies with a frown as he's finally freed from the onerous chore of holding a horse and gives the horse a little nudge with his arm. Don't bite his clothes, horse. He doesn't have anything for you, so you'll have to deal with being shoed without a treat. "

I usually don't ride one, anyway. Unpleasant creatures..."

To be fair, he's also usually the size of a house and can fly. That makes riding horses sort of hard. Even here, he's a qunari - he needs a large horse.

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The books he'd been carrying under the arm are one thing. Calling a horse, even one as silly and rotten as this one, unpleasant? That warrants a distinctly unimpressed sidelong glance. Marcoulf gives the horse's neck a thorough scratching there at the base of its prickly mane as if to say, 'Don't listen to him. You're perfect, you dumb animal.'

"A shame. They can be good at their jobs when shown it properly."

If there's a pointed parallel being drawn between a horse's performance and Alacruun's recent accomplishments as a farrier's assistant-- well, surely it's only a coincidence.

[coiledscales]

Impressed or unimpressed, Alacruun doesn't particularly care. As far as he's concerned, Marcoulf is... a stable-hand. Or might as well be. He takes a step back and dusts off his robe with a little sigh. He just had this washed and now it's going to probably smell like a stable or something. He'll probably have to burn it.

Or just stop being melodramatic, but where's the ufn in that?

His eyes lift and fix on Marcoulf when he makes his comment and his eyes flash for just a moment, but he doesn't give any other sign that he might have picked up on that subtle little dig. Instead he shrugs and spreads a smile on his face, one that doesn't quite reach his eyes. It's cold and sharp-edged and maybe, maybe too wide.

A predator's smile.

"I find that's true for many people and many beasts. Not just horses."

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There's some answering flicker in Marcoulf's face, a calculated cognizance of the lines of Alacruun's expression and what it could mean. The recognition is visible there in how he looks back, in his fingers insistently righting the angles of the horse's mussed mane, and how his other hand absently reasserts it grip on the hammer. But what Marcoulf says is perfectly bland. He sees that wide, wide smile and is modulated to a fault in return:

"You don't say."

There's more work to be done to finish off the job at hand. The horse will have to be coaxed to put his foot up again where a file can be taken to the toe. The hoof needs to be shaped to the steel as well. But he can recruit someone else for the work.

Marcoulf draws his hand from the horse's neck. He tucks the hammer under his arm. "Then I wouldn't like to keep you from it. Your work."

[coiledscales]

Good, they understand one another. Alacruun lifts his hand in a lazy sort of wave, slef-assurance returning as the smile drops back into something more polite and rather more normal. The little pieces of reaction that he earned were enough for him. He doesn't particularly feel the need to try and turn this into anything more than a few barbed words. Getting into fights like this has never been his real goal.

"I probably should be getting back to it, shouldn't I?"

He makes a low 'hum' sound under his breath and then steps back to retrieve his books.

"Best of luck with your horse."