Beg Forgiveness [Closed] - Printable Version
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Beg Forgiveness [Closed] - Tindome - 12-01-2019
![[Image: forgiveness.png]](https://alonimi.net/misc/images/graphics/forgiveness.png)
Content Warnings: D/s Dynamics ❤ Boss/Employee ❤ Fucked Up Power Dynamics ❤ Size Difference ❤ Maledom ❤ Femsub ❤ PTSD ❤ Anachronistic Steampunk Outfits ❤ Really Shitty Coworkers
RE: Beg Forgiveness [Closed] - Tindome - 12-01-2019
"What the fuck."
Gareth put his hands to his head as he surveyed the damage. Somehow, while he'd been at work, the roof on the tower of his house had gotten a massive hole in it. The timing couldn't have been worse—they were due for a blizzard any day now, and it was going to be hard enough to get through it without having a hole in his roof. He left Nighthoof to graze in the yard and made his way inside, storming up the steps to check the damage.
He half-expected to find a cannonball sitting on his bed, from the way the roof looked. Instead it was just splintered wood and shingles. "Fuck me," he said, running his hands over his face. He checked that the birds were okay, but they'd all clustered together in the loft, looking extraordinarily round with their feathers all fluffed up. He looked back up at the hole in his roof.
If he threw a bit of sailcloth over it… but, no. This needed to get fixed, and fast. The weather witches were saying this was going to be an absolute bitch of a storm, and they were only wrong with significant magical intervention. If he pulled an all-nighter… it still wouldn't be fixed by the time he had work tomorrow.
Shit.
He made his way to the desk to write a note of explanation, letters tiny to fit on the small scroll. Emergency at home—won't be in tomorrow. Ask B. Corey to supervise library time for Ren as day off. Will update. —G.
"C'mon, Pudge," he said, coaxing the black homing fantail out of the loft. He held her against his chest as he tied to message to one fluffy foot. He'd taught them to travel between the castle and his home with the liberal giving of treats—which also meant that whenever one got out, it would immediately try to flee to wherever it wasn't out of sheer greed. The idea that they were only supposed to do this when they had messages hadn't penetrated. Still, it worked out more often than it didn't.
He let Pudge go, and she took flight through the hole in the roof. He sighed as he watched her go. He'd really been hoping to get to bed on time, tonight.
Colin didn't knock before he opened the door to Ren's room, because he never did. "You should pick out a good outfit for tomorrow," he said, sounding extraordinarily self-satisfied. "Sounds like Gareth was told not to bother coming in for a week or two."
He whistled a cheerful tune as he shut the door.
Gareth put his hands to his head as he surveyed the damage. Somehow, while he'd been at work, the roof on the tower of his house had gotten a massive hole in it. The timing couldn't have been worse—they were due for a blizzard any day now, and it was going to be hard enough to get through it without having a hole in his roof. He left Nighthoof to graze in the yard and made his way inside, storming up the steps to check the damage.
He half-expected to find a cannonball sitting on his bed, from the way the roof looked. Instead it was just splintered wood and shingles. "Fuck me," he said, running his hands over his face. He checked that the birds were okay, but they'd all clustered together in the loft, looking extraordinarily round with their feathers all fluffed up. He looked back up at the hole in his roof.
If he threw a bit of sailcloth over it… but, no. This needed to get fixed, and fast. The weather witches were saying this was going to be an absolute bitch of a storm, and they were only wrong with significant magical intervention. If he pulled an all-nighter… it still wouldn't be fixed by the time he had work tomorrow.
Shit.
He made his way to the desk to write a note of explanation, letters tiny to fit on the small scroll. Emergency at home—won't be in tomorrow. Ask B. Corey to supervise library time for Ren as day off. Will update. —G.
"C'mon, Pudge," he said, coaxing the black homing fantail out of the loft. He held her against his chest as he tied to message to one fluffy foot. He'd taught them to travel between the castle and his home with the liberal giving of treats—which also meant that whenever one got out, it would immediately try to flee to wherever it wasn't out of sheer greed. The idea that they were only supposed to do this when they had messages hadn't penetrated. Still, it worked out more often than it didn't.
He let Pudge go, and she took flight through the hole in the roof. He sighed as he watched her go. He'd really been hoping to get to bed on time, tonight.
Colin didn't knock before he opened the door to Ren's room, because he never did. "You should pick out a good outfit for tomorrow," he said, sounding extraordinarily self-satisfied. "Sounds like Gareth was told not to bother coming in for a week or two."
He whistled a cheerful tune as he shut the door.
RE: Beg Forgiveness [Closed] - SolitareLee - 12-01-2019
Things had been weird for Ren. Even she could tell she was unstable. She felt unstable. She vacillated wildly between extreme highs and extreme lows. Work was going well, except when it wasn't. She was happy with Gareth, except when she wasn't. She never considered drinking poison again, except when she did.
She was normally in a good mood by about halfway through her work day, less angry, less sweary. She'd finished her tribute for the King out of stubbornness, but it had been finished for weeks and sat untouched in her little hidey hole. It was done, but she had no plans to give it to him. She hadn't actually seen the King since the fall festival, and didn't really want to, except for when she did, except for when she woke up hot and cold and needing and terrified. Her nightmares had only gotten worse, her dreams of being chased now joined by cruel mocking words. Now, instead of ending when she was caught, the King always killed her, and she always fell into the a dark black void with a distant roar like fierce winds.
She was already dressed in her uniform, which she still hated, although it wouldn't be time for her door to unlock for another fifteen minutes or so, judging by what her rats were saying. She'd taught several of them to tell time. She was sitting at her desk, which she had now only because she'd been moved permanently into the bedroom in which she'd nearly died, probably at the King's insistence. She was staring blankly at a book she wasn't reading, wondering if the King would ever tell her whether or not he was going to approve her proposal, which had been sent in ages ago. He might have burned it out of spite. She hoped Gareth had had the good sense to make copies, because she sure hadn't.
Her door opened, but it was too early, and it wasn't a quiet latch click the way it normally was. It came with footsteps.
She spun around as any number of rats shrieked the alarm, both in her head and in the form of protesting squeaks from around the room.
She always felt like it was bold of Colin to come in here. There were a lot of rats, enough that she could have overpowered him, mere human that he was. But he always closed the door behind him, so she wouldn't have been able to get out, and killing him wouldn't do her any good other than to get her back to the headman's noose or delivered to Avi with an apple in her mouth. He knew that, and that was probably why he did it.
He didn't even come in this time, just gave her a two sentence message.
Good outfit for tomorrow.
Gareth not coming in for weeks.
Her mind hit full panic instantly, racing as she tried to come up with more possible answers for this combination of pieces of news. Good outfits could only mean she was going somewhere special. Special normally meant the King. It wasn't as though there was a judge and jury other than him for her, not anymore. And no one else would see her without Gareth. She wasn't even allowed to leave the complex without him, although he'd taken her out with semi-regularity lately, adding walks to their daily routine even as the air got steadily colder.
No matter how she puzzled it, there was only one answer that made any sense.
"I wouldn't kill you in front of him."
She felt sick with terror, like she always seemed to get in front of the King, sooner or later. What had she done wrong? It was her depression, wasn't it, the mood swings that left her unstable, the way she'd started snapping at anyone who touched her or even brushed up against her if they weren't Gareth. Or maybe it was her lowered productivity at work, though it had always been low. She and Gareth got distracted regularly and spent more and more time doing things that weren't work, things to help her 'recovery.' Maybe the King had just finally gotten bored, like he'd said he would.
Ren had worked on her escape plan over the last few months. She'd gotten the idea the very first time Gareth took her out of the complex, when she'd smelled sewage as they walked and remembered something very important about the city's drainage system. But she hadn't actually done anything about it. Because Gareth was here, and she was warm to him as often as she was cold, and he took her for walks and was making sure she got more food at lunch, though not enough to make the overnight hunger pains any less agonizing. He thought her dizziness was still from the poison, months later, a long-term illness caused by one mistake.
It had been a backup plan, the way drinking poison had been a backup plan. She'd been thinking maybe she could make it work.
Now she saw how wrong she had been, and how wise she'd been to make those backup plans.
When fifteen minutes passed and the door didn't unlock, she knew she was in here for the day. Normally, she would wait until the cover of night for this, but she'd rather start now. If the King had taught her anything, it was just how much of a head start she'd really fucking need.
Her hands were shaking as she emptied out her supplies of what little she'd regathered. She changed out of her uniform, movements stiff and robotic, and into stolen clothing. Mostly stolen. Under her cloak and over her clothes went the shawl Gareth had given her. It made her feel sick to leave him like this, but what could she do? She was dead to him either way.
Her back was tiny, more of a pouch, really, because she needed to be small. It was already prepared, for the most part, but she opened it up and added a few important things: her would-be tribute to the King, the remaining bottle of nightshade moonshine, and the dried herbs, deadly poison to the last. Her final backup plan for if... or when... the King caught up to her. Not for him, but for her. She would steal herself from him if it was the very last thing she did.
She tucked Phoebe into her pouch and apologized to Timothy. He'd have to stay behind; once they realized she was gone, hopefully not until tomorrow morning, he'd be in charge of raising hell in the castle. It probably wouldn't distract the King from his hunt, but she could hope. She kissed him on the head, knowing she would never see him again, and then placed one lead coin on her desk. It wasn't as though they wouldn't be able to figure out what had happened quick, when they checked on her and found her gone. This was just a more personal fuck you to the King that had ruined her life several times over.
The window hadn't been one that opened when she moved in, but you'd be amazed what one genius with an army of rats could do given a few months. She slid it open soundlessly and slipped out.
As she had with the King, she used the rats as a lookout, following the path she'd memorized a hundred times over into the courtyard, until she found the grate. It wasn't large enough for a person, not really. Maybe a child, which was probably why it was locked. She twirled the key between her fingers, held her breath as it went in, exhaled when it clicked. She'd been ready to pick the lock, but this was better. Less chance of being seen.
If this didn't hide her scent, nothing would.
She dropped down into the sewage pipe. It was disgusting, but largely unused. The King'd had the whole water system redone when he took over; it had been something like five years to get it all done and they hadn't bothered tearing out the old pipes because it would have taken even longer. That meant she was crawling through shit that'd had almost a decade to rot in an underground space with very little air. Fortunately, she'd learned, she was actually remarkably hard to poison by any means.
She crawled through on her stomach; it was horribly claustrophobic, but at least she knew it didn't narrow. She'd had Phoebe and Timothy tear through every inch of this thing so she could build a map; they were the only ones who could be trusted that far away from her influence. It was a long, disgusting crawl, but she doubted the King would want to follow her through a shit-filled pipe, even if he could somehow shrink down small enough to do it.
Call it a loss, she prayed to him silently. Call it a loss and just assume I died like the idiot I am.
By the time she came out, hours later, at a pipe that dropped into the river as it wound out of the city, she had a worrying number of rats with her, as many as she could force to follow her through the sewers. Far more than she normally traveled with, but she wanted some security. Too many times now, she had been caught without, and this time, there could be no holding back to try and placate the King.
She ditched her filth-covered outer layer in the river, checked for guards, and then hit the road, pulling part of Gareth's shawl up over her head to block against the freezing winter winds.
Farewell to Aeris, and farewell to her first foolish love, but she had a life to keep living.
RE: Beg Forgiveness [Closed] - Tindome - 12-01-2019
Colin waited an hour before checking back on Ren's room. He couldn't decide if he was jumping the gun or giving her too much time. Paranoia could err towards hastiness, but it could also mean she'd want to be extra-sure no one was checking on her.To his great pleasure, she seemed to have bolted almost as soon as he'd given her the news. Whose dumb idea had it been to give her a room with a window? At least Gareth couldn't have fit through the damn thing even if he'd broken it open. Obviously the little sneak could break out at a moment's notice. It was only the fear of dying that kept her put, so all it took was the fear of dying to send her running for the mountains.
He picked up the coin she'd left on her desk and inspected it, then set it back down with a smile.
Even with the time he'd given her to run, even with the time he was going to take before he left, he was going to have a head start. After all: he'd been a knight, once. And he still, despite it all, had a horse.
There was a horse approaching from the castle, and so Gareth took a break from fixing his roof to greet whoever it was. He had to assume it was important, if they hadn't sent Pudge back, and if it was important—As there be clouds above, let it not be Ren. Bridget was supposed to be watching her for the day, wasn't she? Ren wouldn't have tried something with Bridget watching, would she? She'd been so all over the place since the day she'd been poisoned—
—his poison, because he was a fucking idiot who couldn't clean up after himself—
—and he found himself worrying, often, if it could have done something to her that couldn't be fixed. If the sight of someone coming to meet him from the castle had him worried, it was with good reason. Particularly when it took hours to get to his house on horseback. That was why Gareth had Nighthoof, so he could live this far away without spending more than a couple of hours a day traveling.
Seeing that it was Colin didn't ease his anxiety, but it was tempered with a kind of angry confusion. "What the fuck are you wearing?" Gareth asked as Colin dismounted.
It was a stupid question. He could see very well what he was wearing. His old armor, his old sheathed sword. Gareth hadn't seen anyone wearing that armor in years. They didn't keep many knights around. The King was a fucking dragon.
Colin pulled off his helmet. "She escaped."
"What?" The wind was picking up, noisy through the trees.
"Ren," he said. "It looks like she escaped once she found out you had the day off."
Gareth's heart sank. That would explain a lot, wouldn't it? Why she didn't seem to know her own feelings, whether she hated him or not. If she wanted to escape, it'd be easier to hate him. Her freedom had always been important to her, more important than a roof over her head and whatever meager affection he had to give. He didn't know if he could talk Avi into forgiving this.
"I thought you'd want to be the first to know," Colin said, shifting in his armor.
For the first time, Gareth felt something like gratitude toward the man. The right thing to do would have been to report it immediately, but if he hadn't, then maybe there was still time…
To find her on his own, maybe. Or else to give her a headstart, and let her go.
Thick clumps of snowflakes started to fall, whipped against them by the wind.
Shit. Fuck. If she was out here in this, she was going to freeze. He couldn't count on assuming she'd have the sense to find shelter. Knowing her, she'd cover herself in some kind of fucked-up ratsuit and try to fight through it for the headstart it would give her.
"Will you help me find her?" Gareth asked.
"Of course," Colin said, with a firm nod.
That was something. That wasn't nothing. "Thank you," he said, holding out his hand. Colin took it for a proper manly handshake. "I can't tell you how much I appreciate this." He let him go, turning back toward his cabin. "I'll go get a coat, then we can figure out where to start looking."
The wind was loud, and maybe that was why he didn't hear it, when he'd once been so attuned to the sound. Or maybe worry and years of middle-management had made him sloppy.
There was a sudden, sharp pain in his everything.
He tried to take a breath as a reflex, but it hurt worse. The step he'd been taking failed, crumpling to his knees instead. He looked down at himself, and the dark blade jutting out from between his ribs.
Colin was already getting back on his horse, spurring it back down the road.
Gareth's exhalation felt torn out of him. His next inhalation was shallow. He touched the blade, and it felt hot against his skin.
"… hhhn. Don't like that."
RE: Beg Forgiveness [Closed] - SolitareLee - 12-01-2019
She'd had a long way to go, made shorter by the ride she caught on the back of a trader's wagon. He was transporting onions, which was even better. She sat in the back with them and maybe a hundred or so rats snuck in wherever they managed to crawl into while she distracted him with a lively barter for how much he ought to be paid for his trouble. He dropped her off outside the woods on the promise that she was off to visit her elven friend. That was a long time to think, and she'd spent most of it thinking about Gareth. Despite everything, she couldn't make herself believe he'd known. Hadn't Colin said Gareth had been told not to bother coming in? And for a week or two? The King wouldn't have told him, because if he had, Gareth would have made it a whole long drawn out process. He wouldn't have just handed her over and taken a vacation. ...Would he? Would he? How deep was his loyalty to the King?
She came to the conclusion that she would find out. And if the answer was just deep enough, well...
She hummed a tune to herself as she made her way through the woods towards the lake he called home. The haunting melody echoed through the woods for the second time in a few months, but this time, she wasn't playing the role of poor pretty Polly.
Despite all the time she'd saved taking that wagon, it was starting to get late by the time she managed to find her way to Gareth's cabin. It was only because of Byron that she found it at all; once she'd gotten close enough to feel him on the outskirts of her awareness, she'd honed in. He was full of news; she kept him out of all of hers. Rats like Byron, Phoebe, and Timothy, well, they had a mind of their own, and she didn't want him to give a warning. He'd clearly grown fond of Gareth.
Gareth had that effect on people.
She was creeping through the underbrush, trying to figure out the best way of doing this. Should she wait until nightfall? She needed every advantage, and probably also to spend the night here to have a chance of surviving this far into the mountains. She'd need supplies, too. She could wait til nightfall, rob him, and leave... The thought of confronting him made her feel ill. The thought of what she might have to do if he tried to contact the King made her feel even worse. Maybe she'd just hide and leave without ever knowing if he'd betrayed her utterly, or been betrayed.
But... no. She had to know. She would always believe he'd betrayed her otherwise; she knew herself. It was less painful, in some ways, then the alternative. If he was the monster he always claimed he was, she could write the whole thing off as Stockholm syndrome, erase all the good times from her memory... and make sure that when the King found her, he'd find at least one corpse that would make him regret.
She had just decided this when Byron shrieked the alarm in her mind, a blood-soaked scream that could only have been worse if it had ended abruptly. Unthinking, she charged forward towards the cabin, terrified that Gareth had been so different from the man she thought she'd known that he'd kill a piece of her just to be rid of the nuisance.
What she saw instead froze her more than the whipping winds ever could. Gareth was on his knees, a sword sticking out of his chest. There was a retreating figure, already climbing onto a horse and spurring it into action. As the figure mounted, she saw just enough of the profile of his face to identify him.
Colin.
If she moved very, very fast, ran herself to grab the horse's reins, she could perhaps have just enough time to keep it from galloping off. She had enough rats. She could see it in her mind's eye, and the rats surged forward already, reacting to her thoughts. They could swarm up the horse's legs, if she stopped it. They could get into Colin's armor. They could tear him apart. They could eat him alive, as slowly as she wanted.
Gareth was bleeding out on the ground.
Colin's horse took off into the other side of the woods as Ren bolted to Gareth's side, falling to her knees next to him. Rage and fear didn't just leak out of her, it poured. Every rat in the forest spilled from their homes to follow Colin like a black flood. She knew they wouldn't catch him; he was moving too fast. But it would have been more effort to stop them, frankly. She didn't care.
She wasn't even aware of the crows that would swoop at Colin's head as he raced through the woods, nor did she understand that up in the tower, Gareth's pigeons were losing their minds, clawing at their cages. All she could think about was Gareth, dark blood dribbling out of his lips, sword through his chest.
"No, no, nononono," she murmured, voice sounding small and broken. She gripped the sword, in shock, accomplishing nothing more than cutting her hand on it. "Gareth, no, no, no, what do I do oh god, no." She didn't know how to fix this. Rats couldn't fix this, machines couldn't fix this. What did she know of first aid? She wasn't a wizard or a healer. All she could do is kneel useless in the blood-stained snow, secure in the knowledge that one last time, she'd made the wrong choice.
RE: Beg Forgiveness [Closed] - Tindome - 12-01-2019
Gareth blinked as his eyes focused on Ren. Ren? "Hey," he said, softly, surprised. "You came here?" He smiled, reached up to touch her face. Here he'd been all worried, and she was just coming here. To see him. To warn him? "Did you know?" he asked. "It's—it's okay. I get it." He didn't quite have the words at the moment to convey his understanding, that sometimes life was hard and swords seemed like a good solution until they didn't.He looked down at the blade sticking out of his chest.
He… was probably in shock.
He swallowed. "That's not enough blood," he observed. He would know. "I should… I should definitely be dead." He couldn't figure out why he wasn't. Some kind of magic thing, maybe, some demonspawn thing his mother had never thought to mention because why would she. Or else it was an enchanted blade, meant to keep him alive until it was pulled out.
… no, it was definitely killing him. He was, just, extremely dying. He could feel himself slowing down, his blood a sludge of broken glass.
He looked back up at Ren. His eyes were turning a pale shade of grey.
"Could you… can you pull this out? It should be easier from the other end. Where the handle is. Not the sharp part. Remember? In the shop, you—you remember." It had briefly seemed like a funny story relevant to the current situation, but it felt less relevant the more he tried to breathe.
He didn't mention the possibility that it might kill him when she did it. Which wasn't fair to her. But he'd feel better about it if she could get it over with.
RE: Beg Forgiveness [Closed] - SolitareLee - 12-01-2019
"I didn't know, of course I didn't know," she blathered, tears spilling out of her eyes. "Please don't go, please don't go." How could she have thought it was okay to leave him? Would it have hurt him as much as it was hurting her? You, who wouldn't allow him his heart's desire if it were a sword through your ribs.
Right now she would have put the sword through her ribs if it got it out of his. How could she only now realize it? Why now, when it was far too late? His eyes were draining of color, turning into ash-paint on her walls. There was a void waiting for him, full of the roar of the ocean and nothing else.
"Pull it out?" she asked, panicking fully. "Won't you bleed more?" But he was already dying, it couldn't really hurt him. And he was a demon, maybe there was... demon... magic.
Or maybe he was asking her to end his suffering.
She leaned forward and kissed him with every inch of the heart she'd kept hidden from him. She tried to put all her secret feelings into it, but didn't know how. He tasted of blood and fire and nothing else.
"I'm so sorry. I love you," she whispered against his lips as she pulled back, then stood up and walked behind him. Her hands shook as she put them on the hilt of the blade. They were slippery with blood, but she gripped with every ounce of her limited strength. She had to make this quick.
What do you think you are, except a thing that happens to other people?
Ren grit her teeth, swallowing the scream that was clawing up her throat. Once she started, she wasn't going to stop. She put her foot against Gareth's shoulder for leverage. She needed to pull this out straight to avoid doing any more damage. Just in... Just in case.
With all the strength she had, Ren pulled the sword clean out of Gareth. It came out of him with a sickening sound, and she tossed it down onto the ground. It melted into the snow, sinking down. His blood was burning hot on her hands, but she barely felt it. She dropped down next to him again, holding him from behind, as if she could use herself to stop the bleeding.
"Gareth?" she whimpered. He was probably gone, but she was scared to look. "I don't know what to do. I don't know what to do if you're not here."
RE: Beg Forgiveness [Closed] - Tindome - 12-01-2019
As the blade slid out of him, Gareth burst into flame. Sort of. The roar of pain that came out of him burned, his eyes ablaze, back arching as fire burst forth from the hole in his chest. It licked less dramatically at his back, the force of it apparently focused forward. He collapsed forth onto one hand for support, clutching at the wound as Ren held onto his back. "Ow." His voice was hoarse, his throat felt charred. His eyes were black again.
It still hurt. It hurt exactly as much as getting stabbed always hurt, every movement pulling at cords of muscle that no longer met. But it didn't seem to be bleeding anymore.
"That's. Not usually what happens. With stabbing." He wasn't sure why it had happened now, either. He tried to take a deeper breath, but it still hurt, too many muscles involved in allowing his chest to expand and contract around his lungs.
The snow was starting to blanket the ground.
"We should... we need to..." If he didn't get up, he was going to end up buried in the snow. Ren might try to drag him inside, but he doubted she'd succeed. Stubborn, though. Might keep trying. Better to save her the trouble. "C'mon."
He staggered almost upright, and managed one step, the second collapsing to a kneel again.
"I got it," he muttered.
Before he could stand again, Nighthoof was nudging at his side. The elk had emerged from the stable, having kicked the door open. It had always been intended more to keep the snow out than him in. "Hey, buddy," Gareth sighed. He managed to drape an arm over Nighthoof's neck, and it lifted him up, supported most of his weight guiding him to the front steps. Nighthoof was large enough that he could practically lift Gareth onto the porch just by nudging behind him, but that was as far as he could help. Gareth fell again before the front door, and Nighthoof pawed at the ground, looking expectantly to Ren.
"Hey," Gareth said, pulling himself up enough to sit, leaning against the doorframe and struggling for air. "When you kissed me. Did you say—it sounded like you said—"
RE: Beg Forgiveness [Closed] - SolitareLee - 12-01-2019
The scream that Ren had been keeping in exploded out of her when Gareth's chest and back burst into flame. It was almost a banshee's screech, echoing across the lake. It was the first time she'd made a sound that she thought didn't seem human. She was still screaming as she held onto him, not caring about the fire or the way it singed the front of her shirt. She actually didn't stop until she heard Gareth say something, the sound stopping as abruptly as it had started. He was... Still alive? How was he still alive?
"Don't try t' move, you idiot!" she snapped frantically, although she also didn't try to stop him, confused and panicked and not understanding why he was moving and not dead. He had a hole in his body. She followed him like an anxious shadow, hands out and unsure of what to do. Thankfully, Gareth's... giant... elk... okay they'd talk about that later, whatever, what the fuck ever... came to help drag him to the door. Byron was too panicked to be helpful with information at the moment, most of the rats in the area were tearing after Colin despite the uselessness of their pursuit.
Gareth collapsed to the ground near the door, and Ren quickly stepped past him to open the front door. Unlocked, mercifully. She didn't think the deer would be able to get him in the front door. It was a large door, built for a man Gareth's size, but not that fucking large.
"Does that seem important right now?!" she yelled, tears still pouring down her cheeks, making her eyes burn. "Stop fuckin' talking oh my god! Hold still, I mean it!"
It must have been that hysterical strength she'd heard about, because Ren grabbed under Gareth's shoulders and pulled with every ounce of her strength, and to probably everyone's surprise, including her, she managed to drag Gareth through the door. It probably wasn't comfortable, and she was worried about hurting him, but she was more worried about him moving. Right then, she thought she might be able to fucking pick him up herself if it meant that nothing else would be touching him.
It felt like every nerve in her body was a live wire, raw and buzzing. She managed to pull him all the way through the door, and then stopped, breathing heavy.
"What do I do what do I do oh god I barely even know first aid oh god oh god oh fuck okay okay okay okay..." she looked around the house frantically for something to grab. Some way to help. "Gareth if you so much as try to move I'm puttin' you in a headlock jus' tell me what t'do!"
RE: Beg Forgiveness [Closed] - Tindome - 12-02-2019
Gareth was absolutely shocked when she managed to pull him through the door, and worried she was going to hurt herself. He wasn't really in any condition to take care of her if she hurt herself. He remained lying flat on the floor of his kitchen, warmer now in the vicinity of the still-burning woodstove. The heat from it permeated most of the first floor, the living room and bathroom to the right and the stairs to the left. There were small carvings in the windows, most of which were stained glass. The window seat and sofa were both nests of overstuffed embroidered pillows. There was a half-finished carving and a set of whittling knives left on the coffee table. "I think... it cauterized it." He struggled with his buttons. He'd only been wearing a simple shirt when Colin got here, because he'd been working and had the fire going in his bedroom fireplace. He managed to get it open to where the wound was in his chest, a black line over his heart. He couldn't bend to look at it, but cautiously brushed his fingers near the edge of it, wincing. "Yeah," he sighed.
Over the wind, he could hear the pigeons in their loft in his bedroom, kicking up a fuss.
"Clean towels in the second drawer," he said, pointing weakly toward the kitchen counters. "Maybe clean this up? A little. Good step one. Usually." Should they try to stitch it back together? Bandage it? How much good could that do him, when he'd been run through and wasn't bleeding? He hummed. "Love you."
RE: Beg Forgiveness [Closed] - SolitareLee - 12-02-2019
"Will! You!" Ren slapped his hands away from his chest, finishing unbuttoning his shirt herself. "Stop! Movin'! I will tie you to somethin'! I know y'have fetish rope in this fuckin' cabin you absolute nightmare you have been stabbed!" She wanted to sit on him and pin his dumb hands to the ground until he stopped moving around with a hole in his chest. But she couldn't, because he had a hole in his chest. Not like, a huge one, but she was very aware there was a hole and it went all the way through and that didn't seem survivable.
She stormed over to the kitchen, not even really registering her surroundings. She pulled the drawer out; it came out all the way and fell into her arms. She blinked down at it. Okay. Okay yeah she was definitely still panicking. She set it down on the floor and grabbed some towels out, going to the sink to get some water--hopefully warm but who knew what his set-up was here--on them, then headed back to Gareth.
She didn't really know what she was doing, but she had picked the softest towels, at least. She dabbed cautiously at his stomach, cleaning up dark blood and testing how much the sensation would hurt him, before moving it up higher on his chest. She might need more towels. Or a bucket of water. Didn't you always boil water in these circumstances? Did she have time? God, why wasn't she smarter about these things?!
"Yer delirious," she snapped. One couldn't see her blush through the blood; he wasn't the only one that needed to clean up. "Please just stay still an' don't do anythin'."
Her mind was racing as she did her best to clean him off. How had this happened? What the hell had Colin been doing here? Why had he been wearing armor? All she knew is that it had to have something to do with her escape. If Colin had come here to tell him, that would have made sense, but he'd come here to stab him. What could have possibly happened to cause that? Did people think Gareth was in cahoots with her? Had Colin freaked out when she escaped from under his nose right before a meeting with the King, and determined to pin the blame on Gareth to try and save his own hide?
She could piece his motivation out later. She could decide what to do when she had time to think. She could collapse into useless tears when this was settled, one way or another.
"I don' think it's safe to roll y'over. Also this floor can't be hygienic." She looked around, taking in her surroundings for the first time.
His bedroom was nowhere to be seen, possibly up the stairs.
She was not going to be able to get him up there.
"I'm gonna get some blankets and pillows," she decided. "An' then put some water on t'boil, and yer gonna tell me if y'need stitches and also how to do stitches." She actually had a fucking suture needle, as luck would have it. She'd figured out that was what the needle and 'string' she'd found were.
RE: Beg Forgiveness [Closed] - Tindome - 12-02-2019
He started to laugh, but it turned into a pained groan almost immediately, trying to catch his breath. "Ow, fuck. Don't make me laugh."He tried to focus on getting enough air with as little muscle movement as he could get away with, wincing as she tore through his kitchen on her quest for towels. Hopefully the fire under the copper would keep going on its own until he could tend to it again. This would be a bad time to run out of hot water.
"You said it first," he said, trying not to show discomfort as she mopped up blood. He didn't want to worry her. More than she was already worried. "I think. Might be delirious."
"My floors are clean," he said, offended. "Not… here, though. Boots. In and out." If he'd known he'd have guests he would have swept up better. "Might still be water in the kettle." It wasn't the whistling kind of kettle, and it ran dry often enough, so it wasn't always obvious if there was water in it. He tried to keep it full to keep the air from getting too dry in the winter. It didn't always make it to a full boil, but it'd be hot enough. Maybe she could make herself tea. He should have offered her some tea. Bad host.
He frowned as he tried to remember the circumstances for stitches. Sometimes it was better not to—so things could drain? He hadn't been stabbed in a while. If he had serious burns inside him—which it felt like he did, it was burning in the worst way and he wanted to shove it full of snow despite feeling cold everywhere else—there would definitely be a nasty pus situation as it healed. Didn't really want that sewed up inside him. Maybe just a few stitches, so it would have room to drain…
"I hate stitches," he complained. "I just won't move. It's fine."
RE: Beg Forgiveness [Closed] - SolitareLee - 12-02-2019
"Now is not the time," she said, sounding strained, "to talk about what I did or did not say." She'd thought he was about to die. It had been important at the time, but now that he wasn't dead, it was extremely unimportant. She had to focus on making sure he kept on being not dead, possibly forever. She hadn't figured that part out yet. She was busy by the wood stove, throwing window seat and sofa cushions a hopefully safe distance in front of it. She covered that with an afghan off the back of the sofa, and began piling more pillows strategically around it. She moved with sheer frantic energy and also the hawk-eyed focus of someone who spent their childhood building pillow forts that were marvels of modern day engineering.
She was going to need more blankets, probably from wherever the hell his bed was, but this would do as a base.
"I'm gonna move you one more time," she informed him. "First onto yer side so that I can clean off yer back, and then onto the bed." She gestured towards the makeshift mattress by the wood stove. "Then you don't hafta move. In fact you hafta not move. If you try t'move, I will make my next priority hogtyin' you. It'll be cathartic for me. Like therapy."
RE: Beg Forgiveness [Closed] - Tindome - 12-02-2019
Gareth smiled, his head turned to watch her. "I love watching you work," he announced. He didn't get as many opportunities as their jobs should have entailed. It was too rare for something to catch her attention well enough to keep her focused. It was unfortunate for him.He listened to her instructions, and nodded. He pulled at his sleeves until his arms were free, since his shirt was all bloody and charred anyway, and now it was getting in the way. Then, clenching his jaw, he forced himself to roll onto his side. He groaned with pain again despite himself. He'd thought it hurt before, but now it seemed like staying still had somehow lessened it, or else moving only made it so much worse. He grit his teeth and pressed his horns into floor until it seemed like she was done.
As soon as he could, he dragged himself toward the little nest she'd built for him, pushing himself across the floor with his boots until he was close enough to lay down in it. He sighed in something like relief, though he couldn't say if it hurt any less. It was the kind of hurt that was worse for its sense of consistency, like it would always hurt and nothing he did would ever make it hurt less and he just had to learn to live in it.
"I'm not the one who gets tied up, here," he managed.
RE: Beg Forgiveness [Closed] - SolitareLee - 12-02-2019
Ren almost shrieked with incandescent frustration as Gareth proceeded to do exactly what she told him not to do. She stomped her foot on the floor and would have kicked him in the head under literally any other circumstances. She had a sudden and intense flash of empathy with every doctor she, personally, had ever had. Still, she knelt back down to wash off his back, swearing loudly the whole time. The second she finished, of course, he was off again. This time she decided to try and help pushing him and supporting his weight as best as she could, then guiding him as he rolled over onto the bed she'd made. Then, matter-of-factly, she picked up the very softest, fluffiest pillow, lifted it up above her head, and smacked him in the face with it. She didn't do so very hard, despite her urge to smother him with the damn thing.
"I! Am gonna boil water! An' get more blankets an' pillows! An' find yer fuckin' rope, cause right now yer whatever I say you are, you fuckin' miserable, incapable of restin', workaholic moron!" She threw the pillow down to the ground much, much harder than she'd hit him with it.
Fuming, she stormed over into the kitchen to get a pot, at which point she noticed there was a kettle. It seemed to still have some water in it, which was good. There was a sound of clattering as she rummaged through his kitchen with all the care she normally showed in her places of work, which was to say none whatsoever. She poured hot water into a mug and then more cool water into the kettle and even more into a pot to go on the top of the wood stove. It wasn't as though there was a shortage; she could always just melt snow later. But she didn't want to need it and not have any. Boiling water just seemed like something one would need.
She managed to find her idiot boss' tea leaves, although she saw no sign of an infuser, only what she could only surmise was a strainer. She had never in her life felt richer than another person, but in that moment, when her only experience with tea was at a Duke's house, she felt it. Frustrated, she just put some tea in the hot water directly. He could deal with shitty tea; he'd need to get some kind of fluid in him. Then she began the arduous task of finding his bedroom.
By deductive reasoning, she wound up climbing the stairs, which were many and excessive and only spiral until they abruptly weren't. His half-wizardry normally only showed in his desire for things to be just so, but this was definitely some wizard bullshit. Fortuantely, at the top of the tower was his bed. And a desk. And an excessive, mansion-esque cage full of pigeons, which she probably should have heard and noticed before now. They were all staring directly at her. It was very unsettling. There was a fire in the fireplace, beginning to run a little low, and it was very drafty. She'd probably have to deal with that, at some point. She could hear the wind better up here, and it was beginning to howl in earnest. Snowstorm nothing... she was beginning to fear she had a blizzard on her hands.
She began grabbing for blankets and pillows, but paused as she grabbed one. It was embroidered... they were all embroidered, actually, but this one. This one looked identical to her own pillow in the room she'd moved into. The stitchwork was more even but the pattern was the same. She frowned down at it, then, slowly, shook her head. Gareth must get his pillows at the same place as the... as the King's Guard. Maybe they were even presents by someone who worked there or... Something. It wasn't important right now, just like so many things weren't important right now.
She threw all the pillows into a pile on the middle of the bed, then wrapped the corners of the comforter around it, twisting them up until she had a huge bag full of down pillows and embroidery. She dragged them down the stairs, having to take great care that they didn't roll over her entirely and drag her down with them. She was panting when she reached the bottom of the stairs.
"That," she told him, "is the dumbest possible place for you t'have put yer bed. The fuck d'you do when y'need to pee in th' middle of the night, you fuckin' idiotic nestin' half-wizard." She tossed the comforter pillow-bomb onto the ground next to his makeshift bed, and went to check on the tea. The addrenaline was still sailing strong, but she was starting to think a bit more now. She should get him a doctor. Or at least... tell the castle what happened. Tell them what Colin had done. But then they'd know she was here. Even if she didn't say it was her, they'd probably put two and two together. She'd be caught and killed.
Could she possibly hope to take care of Gareth on her own, though? What if he died because she was too much of a coward?
You, who wouldn't allow him his heart's desire if it were a sword through your ribs.
"Where," she said finally, voice quiet, "is yer message box for the castle." She just assumed he'd have one. He was Gareth, of course he'd want a direct line to work and to the King.