The central tower is quiet and still. There’s just enough of a night breeze to stir and ripple a tapestry over old stone, drawing the coin slot pupils of a lanky black cat. She’s seated alone in the hall where division heads are housed, all velvet hide and bone. She is supposed to be keeping watch.
But she’s been keeping watch all night, and this flutter of faded thread in the sconce lit shadows tickles at something between her ears, behind her wide green eyes. The wind whispers, the tapestry sways.
Thot chatters to herself.
A ways behind her, the door to Byerly Rutyer’s quarters is slivered open, coal dark inside. There’s a muffled scuff from within.
She doesn't like to deal with the division heads, often or at all if she can help it. Having never been in a structured organization like this before, her first instinct is to keep her head down, and nothing has proven that maxim wrong yet. When she has reports to file, she sends them in when she won't be noticed. Doing it when most are away seems like the best idea.
She sees Thot clicking her sharp little teeth in the hall, hears the odd noises the creature makes. Ever fascinated by this odd, magical creature, Jone repeats the noises back as best she can, hand out to pat its head. She has time. It's late, and...
But it's late, and why would Si let the creature caper around unwatched? Jone bites her lip, thinking, remembering.
Pulled from a dream, she lets out a signal whistle once shared between her and a traitor, when the creature before her had more feathers to it.
Thot pauses with her teeth parted and her claws curled, her eyes flipped like mirrors to Jone’s whistle.
In the darkness, half-beneath Rutyer’s bed with his hand braced flat against a locked chest, Silas pauses also.
He appears behind the door a moment later, disheveled and not quite as narrow as the crack. Dust is stamped in lines across the cut of his vest where he’s been on the floor and under furniture over the last several hours -- ferreting in hidey holes and drawers and journals. Upon seeing that it’s just her, he lets himself out into the gape of the hallway, lever and pick in hand.
A second look and a lean confirms that first impression.
Just Jone. And his cat, now looking intently away from the towering evidence of her poor performance as a lookout.
"I hope you’ll keep this between us," Silas says, as he turns to finagle the lock behind him. "Or I'll never hear the end of it."
Jone chuckles, careful and quiet enough not to echo through the halls. She leans in, conspiratorial, her attempts to play with Thot forgotten.
"But did you find anything interesting?" Her tone suggests a teasing temperament, light. She can't imagine why Silas is doing this, and she'd like to know, but it's been her experience that he'll endure light prodding.
“As if there could be anything interesting about Rutyer to find.”
The thought easily banished, Silas turns the bolt back into its socket with a roll of his wrist and a muffled click, his tools neatly away by the time he’s turned back around to face her. A sweep at his shoulder displaces some of the dust there.
“On the other hand, I’m sure it would come as no surprise to anyone that Madame de Cedoux maintains a meticulously kept record of her sexual activity.”
At the color in Jone’s face, there’s a distinct catch in his study of her, curiosity trained in to rake around after other clues in her posturing back at him. Goodness.
“It’s best to keep an open mind when rummaging in another man’s trunk,” he says. “If you’re only looking for one thing, you’re likely to miss other artifacts of note where you might not have thought to investigate.
”The good madame’s journal is among my better finds this evening,” he continues, all without whispering back, although he is careful to keep his voice quiet between them. “One of our arrivals from within the last year, I believe her name is Ellie, has several detailed illustrations of the one who is called Abby.”
Jone stows this information away for later, not really sure it'll ever be of use. Still, it's all worth having, if she can actually remember it in this addled head of hers.
"So, this a hobby, or a professional touch?"
She's always fascinated by Si. Just when she thinks she knows him, there's a new layer to see, and he seems, generally, to trust her with that information once she's found it.
Not everyone in Riftwatch is attending an 18 year old’s elite ballroom birthday celebration, but enough of them are that the Gallows halls are quieter for their absence.
The dining areas, the offices, the courtyards and hallways and stairwells all see reduced traffic.
In one such stairwell within the central tower shortly after dinner, Richard Dickerson has gone stock still to the sound of ringing in his ears. He’s lean and severely groomed and balding in back -- his left hand is braced to the wall, his foot fixed one stair shy of the second floor landing. Cold sweat blots at the back of his collar of his vest, creeps shiny at the bristle of his chops.
A leggy black cat peers expectantly up at him from the landing. She’s strange all on her own, goggle-eyed and narrow, with bat-like ears and fangs that poke.
It’s hard to say how long Mr. Dickerson has been here, but the cat is reaching politely to tap his shin.
An empty Gallows is a decidedly disconcerting Gallows, too much hollow space and too thin a Veil to fill with anything but a melancholic and ominous mood. This suits him well enough, until it doesn't, and Thranduil leaves his room for-- wine? a change of scenery? something worth justifying the quick walk down the stairs, one-two with leather boots that barely make any noise at all. He turns the corner, notices the cat before the man, and pauses, hand out to catch the railing.
"Are you unwell?"
The empty starwell, all sturdy rock, throws his voice, changes the timbre. He takes another step down, then two. The candlelight is especially good at picking up the sickly sheen of sweat.
The man in the stairwell flinches like a snake, glances of candlelight flashed gold off the backs of his retinas when he whips alert. Defensive accusation furrows his brow, tucks his chin -- he looks to the stairwell behind him and the alcove to the chantry just ahead. Disoriented. Rat in the garbage, cat in an alley.
Speaking of: Thot has managed a 180 flop on two axes, tail over snout and belly over back, so that she’s ready with eyes wide and goblin claws out.
"Yes," he says by default, only to follow with a more concrete, "no."
No, he is not unwell.
"I’m -- " this is Thranduil, tall, elfy, eloquent, important, recently separated, “hungover.” How embarrassing. And human. And unremarkable.
He looks, cat to man to cat, and thinks of a mostly hairless kitten and a very hairless nug, both far away. This does not improve his mood.
"Are you?" he asks, lilting disbelief. "This late."
Nearly all of Riftwatch at the de Coucy household, eating and drinking at Romain's expense. He does not voice the obvious, being that it has been voiced for him-- 'my wife expressly forbid me from the estate, what reason do you have', but it's there in the intent gaze, the calm stare.
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JONE.
But she’s been keeping watch all night, and this flutter of faded thread in the sconce lit shadows tickles at something between her ears, behind her wide green eyes. The wind whispers, the tapestry sways.
Thot chatters to herself.
A ways behind her, the door to Byerly Rutyer’s quarters is slivered open, coal dark inside. There’s a muffled scuff from within.
no subject
She sees Thot clicking her sharp little teeth in the hall, hears the odd noises the creature makes. Ever fascinated by this odd, magical creature, Jone repeats the noises back as best she can, hand out to pat its head. She has time. It's late, and...
But it's late, and why would Si let the creature caper around unwatched? Jone bites her lip, thinking, remembering.
Pulled from a dream, she lets out a signal whistle once shared between her and a traitor, when the creature before her had more feathers to it.
no subject
In the darkness, half-beneath Rutyer’s bed with his hand braced flat against a locked chest, Silas pauses also.
He appears behind the door a moment later, disheveled and not quite as narrow as the crack. Dust is stamped in lines across the cut of his vest where he’s been on the floor and under furniture over the last several hours -- ferreting in hidey holes and drawers and journals. Upon seeing that it’s just her, he lets himself out into the gape of the hallway, lever and pick in hand.
A second look and a lean confirms that first impression.
Just Jone. And his cat, now looking intently away from the towering evidence of her poor performance as a lookout.
"I hope you’ll keep this between us," Silas says, as he turns to finagle the lock behind him. "Or I'll never hear the end of it."
no subject
"But did you find anything interesting?" Her tone suggests a teasing temperament, light. She can't imagine why Silas is doing this, and she'd like to know, but it's been her experience that he'll endure light prodding.
no subject
The thought easily banished, Silas turns the bolt back into its socket with a roll of his wrist and a muffled click, his tools neatly away by the time he’s turned back around to face her. A sweep at his shoulder displaces some of the dust there.
“On the other hand, I’m sure it would come as no surprise to anyone that Madame de Cedoux maintains a meticulously kept record of her sexual activity.”
no subject
At the mention of Cedoux, Jone's face colors. She narrows her eyes. "Don't think you can get me on the sly, mate. What were you trying to find?"
That question is, of course, hushed, a stage whisper against suspicion.
no subject
“It’s best to keep an open mind when rummaging in another man’s trunk,” he says. “If you’re only looking for one thing, you’re likely to miss other artifacts of note where you might not have thought to investigate.
”The good madame’s journal is among my better finds this evening,” he continues, all without whispering back, although he is careful to keep his voice quiet between them. “One of our arrivals from within the last year, I believe her name is Ellie, has several detailed illustrations of the one who is called Abby.”
no subject
"So, this a hobby, or a professional touch?"
She's always fascinated by Si. Just when she thinks she knows him, there's a new layer to see, and he seems, generally, to trust her with that information once she's found it.
THRANDUIL.
The dining areas, the offices, the courtyards and hallways and stairwells all see reduced traffic.
In one such stairwell within the central tower shortly after dinner, Richard Dickerson has gone stock still to the sound of ringing in his ears. He’s lean and severely groomed and balding in back -- his left hand is braced to the wall, his foot fixed one stair shy of the second floor landing. Cold sweat blots at the back of his collar of his vest, creeps shiny at the bristle of his chops.
A leggy black cat peers expectantly up at him from the landing. She’s strange all on her own, goggle-eyed and narrow, with bat-like ears and fangs that poke.
It’s hard to say how long Mr. Dickerson has been here, but the cat is reaching politely to tap his shin.
no subject
"Are you unwell?"
The empty starwell, all sturdy rock, throws his voice, changes the timbre. He takes another step down, then two. The candlelight is especially good at picking up the sickly sheen of sweat.
no subject
Speaking of: Thot has managed a 180 flop on two axes, tail over snout and belly over back, so that she’s ready with eyes wide and goblin claws out.
"Yes," he says by default, only to follow with a more concrete, "no."
No, he is not unwell.
"I’m -- " this is Thranduil, tall, elfy, eloquent, important, recently separated, “hungover.” How embarrassing. And human. And unremarkable.
dw ate the notif my bad
"Are you?" he asks, lilting disbelief. "This late."
Nearly all of Riftwatch at the de Coucy household, eating and drinking at Romain's expense. He does not voice the obvious, being that it has been voiced for him-- 'my wife expressly forbid me from the estate, what reason do you have', but it's there in the intent gaze, the calm stare.
"Do you require an escort to the infirmary?"