inbox.

[staysail]

Comments

[staysail]

You're disappointed to be talking about your bulbous false nose with your husband?

[hassaran]

A purely hypothetical false nose. And 'disappointed' isn't the word.

[ In that voice again: ] I'm never disappointed to be talking to you.

[staysail]

[Caught off-guard by the expert deployment of that voice, Darras laughs again.]

Oh, now you're cheating, with that.

[hassaran]

[ In a different voice, closer to her own but still definitely not--same accent but pitched deeper, smokier, and with an almost sing-songy cadence-- ]

What are you going to do about it?

[staysail]

Come and put a stop to it. Now.

[hassaran]

[ Her laugh is her own, quick and pleased. ]

If only. I had to meet a contact on the other side of the city. I won't be back for at least an hour.

[staysail]

After all that? You can be back sooner. Half an hour.

[hassaran]

I can't make the distance shorter! As soon as I can.

Leave the stuff in the tub, I was serious about it needing a wash. There's a box on the shelf behind my desk with some other examples. If you want.

[staysail]

Personal cuffs in a box on the shelf behind your desk?

[hassaran]

It's all different kinds of locks, for practice.

[staysail]

It's so hard to believe you now that I know you went around soliciting and collecting unwashed sex cuffs and left 'em in our bathtub.

Can you not get a carriage to get back sooner? Run it, maybe? Horse?

[hassaran]

You make fun and then you want me to run back to you in the freezing rain?

They're for the class, I need enough examples for everyone in Riftwatch. They may be perfectly clean, but I don't trust them.

[staysail]

If I really thought I had some influence over getting you back here quicker, I'd do it. Or not do it, if that's what it took.

I could wash them for you. Instead of sitting here, looking at them.

[hassaran]

Thanks, that would be helpful. But it's not urgent, if you've other things to do.

And I am in a carriage, but it took me ages to get one because I refuse to share and be coughed on all the way across town. It's slow going in this weather.

[staysail]

Ah, then you were smart to wait. Tell the driver you've got something to get home for. See if that helps. You could try using your voice on them, but I think I want that voice saved for myself, now that I've heard it.

[hassaran]

[ She laughs. ]

Absolutely not. That's for a joke or work, nothing in between.

[staysail]

And Orlesian comedies. You forgot about those.

[hassaran]

I said work.

[ jokes ]

[staysail]

[That also gets a laugh.]

Told that carriage to go any faster yet?

[hassaran]

If you're really this keen on the idea you know you could have mentioned it before. [ (?) ]

[staysail]

Maybe I hadn't thought of it until now.

[hassaran]

And now are you thinking about me wearing them or you?

[staysail]

[A slight pause.]

I was thinking of you.

[hassaran]

So was I. But then I thought, [ a little pause of her own ] maybe both?

[staysail]

Both is good. [Or, well, more conservatively and less for the joke] I'd try both.