Terpsika and Bashikki try to keep the truth from Iskshu

From FiranMUX

Background: Always inclined to get herself into trouble, Sika dragged Bashikki, into the old city to have Madame Nestanina the Seer read their fortunes. On their way back Sika (as usual) took a wrong turn. They ended up in a dangerous part of the old city. Bashikki was nearly abducted, and ended up being mugged, and injured. After getting Bashikki mostly healed in the temple of Unot, they sort of implicitly agreed not to tell anyone about the episode.

Summary: This log contains their first attempt to actually hold up that agreement. It failed miserably. Ikshu was horribly evil. The truth came out.

==========================================================

Anarinuell: Rising Sun Ticanee Huts -- Hut Six

A medium sized hut, big enough for a small sized family. There is a woven rug on the floor, and several cots set up in it for sleeping. A small wooden table and some chairs complete the look of a modest apartment. Daylight filters in through the two small windows on opposite sides of the room.

Contents: Ikshu Terpsika <Other Contents Snipped> Obvious exits: Out <O>

A knock sounds on the door leading to Anarinuell: Ticanee District -- Rising Sun Huts.

Terpsika gets up from where she is sitting, by the fire (really), and moves over to unlock the door, shouting, "Come in!"

Bashikki steps through the doorway into the hut. Bashikki has arrived.

Bashikki limps in and finds herself a place to sit, obviously favoring one ankle. Her mood is somewhat subdued, though she still offers a smile for the two. "'Evening."

Terpsika seems a little nervous, somehow, as Bashikki moves in, though she gestures the other woman to a place by the fire, "Evening, Bashikki," says the green-eyed woman. "Please, sit down, have something to eat." She seems pretty darn solicitous.

Ikshu looks up from the scroll he had been working on, sitting by the fire. He puts the scroll into his saddle back as she enters and he offers a smile, "Greetings.", he echoes her own, before he frowns slightly. "You're hurt?", he asks, looking from Bashikki to Terpsika, then back. This certainly isn't the woman he won the Relay race with.

Terpsika shoots a look toward Bashikki, which Ikshu may or may not well catch. Then she moves over to the pantry, to take out some stuffed meatballs, which she brings over to the woman, setting them down within easy reach.

Bashikki shifts a little closer to the fire and holds her hands before it as if to warm them. An unconsious glance is aimed at 'Sika before she turns her attention to Ikshu, and nods with a slight frown. "I.. uh, slipped on the stones in the rain the other day." To Terpsika, she aims a quick enough smile and gestures back toward where her own hut may be. "I'm already stuffed, but thanks."

Ikshu tilts his head slightly, watching the silent communication between the two women for a moment, before he offers a weak smile to noone in particular. "Well, you seemed of more sure footing at the Olympics. Seems you had really bad luck then.", he says, looking at Terpsika as she brings the food, his eyes resting on her, trying to make eye contact.

Terpsika is, rather shockingly, avoiding that very thing (eye contact). She busies herself with making sure the meatballs are within Bashikki's reach, in spite of her insistance that she wants none of them. Then she picks up a wineskin, and moves it over to where Bashi is sitting. She adds, to Ikshu's comment, "It must have been very slippery."

Bashikki nods and begins to daintily pick at a meatball, more a fussing with it than any real amount of eating. She nods again, still unusually quiet in comparison with her usual demeanor. "It was, but I was being unusually clumsy." Her lips curl almost into a frown before she seems to catch the gesture, and aims a quick glance at Sika.

Brown eyes keep zipping quietly between the two of them, while Ikshu smiles a bit more, then even chuckles at a word-play in Firan that comes to his mind. Something about bashful lieing. He just crosses his arms, and for now, seems to enjoy the disconfort his glance, and propably worse, his silence is obviously causing the two women.

Bashikki seems to roll the meatball around the plate just a little faster while studiously avoiding even glancing at Ikshu, let alone meeting the man's gaze. She mumbles quietly, her attention on the food she's not eating. "It was... silly of me."

Terpsika, after spend an inordinate amount of time working on the arrangement of meatballs and wineskin, takes a seat beside Bashikki. As she does so, she glances up at Ikshu. Her complexion pales slightly at the look on his face, and she fumbles the words as she says, "W..won't you join us, Ikshu?"

Ikshu does indeed. Or at least it seems so. Uncrossing his arms, he opens the saddle back, reaching inside, and retrieving his closed fist after a while. Coming to his feet he walks over the little distance towards Terpsika, keeping quiet all the time, circling around Sika to come up behind her back, reaching out and opening his fist, letting the tiny pendant of the necklace swing a moment before her eyes, before he chuckles again. "You asked me what the Gods mean to me, Terpsika, didn't you?", he asks, his voice quiet, as he opens the coord to slip it around her neck, gently tying it at the back. "You know what Eesha means to me? The Godess of Love, honor and Oaths? The godess of knowing between right and wrong. The Godess of honesty?".

    A tiny bone pendant hangs from a leather cord. The pendant, no longer
    then a fingertip, is is capped at either end with a hardened lump
    of beeswax, and covered entirely with a thinner coating of wax to
    prevent the brittle bone from exposure. A snake is carved into the
    bone, forming the shape of a double-S with it's body colored red
    with special powder.

Ikshu gave you Bone Necklace with snake-carving. Ikshu sets down the bone necklace. You pick up the bone necklace. Terpsika puts on her Bone Necklace with snake-carving.

Bashikki relaxes a measure as Ikshu does /something/ at this point, anything. Perhaps the mention of Eesha, Goddess of Love after all, lulls her into some sense that the worst is over. She actually takes a little bite of the meatball she's spent all this time rolling about the plate in hopes that no one would notice she's hardly eaten a bite. Until the man finishes, that is. She blushes bright crimson and nearly coughs at that very last statement.

Terpsika's eyes widen a little. Okay, a lot. Her reaction is rather opposite of Bashikki's -- the remaining colour rather drains from her face, and she reaches a hand up to touch the pendant. Deception is not one of Sika's stronger talents, and this more than she can handle. She twists her position to look up at Ikshu, suddenly being very studious about avoiding looking at Bashikki, for some strange reason. "Alright, alright!" she says, "I can't take it! I did it! It was my fault, I did it."

Ikshu turns to look at Terpsika again, after his gaze had turned to Bashikki for a moment, and he rises his eyebrows. "Did what dear?", he queries, crouching in front of her, his eyes now turning away from the cruel calmness, the malicious gentleness that only kept twisiting the knife in Terpsika, to a weaker, and more genuine gentleness, more worried, and he reaches up to touch her cheek.

Bashikki abruptly stops her meatball rolling with a jerk, and chews at her lower lip as she looks over at her friend, wincing slightly. "It's not your fault." she asys quietly to Sika, eyes flitting to gauge Ikshu's reaction as best as she can.

Terpsika turns away from Ikshu's question, a little relieved that Bashikki's protest gives her a moment's reprieve. She shakes her head vehemently, and counters, "No, no...it was my fault. I dragged you across the city. You said yourself that you weren't sure you wanted to go."

Ikshu glances from Terpsika to Bashikki, then back again, and then can't help but to laugh. Really laugh, not only a snicker but a wholeheartly laugh at the two women, and he drops back from his crouch to sit down. "And you wonder where your kids have that from, Sika?", he says, after a while, wiping a tear out of the corner of his eyes. "I bet Abayos and Lester have had a similar discussion in front of you.", he says, and then mocks them a bit "No, I did it.".

Well, actually, Bashikki didn't get a chance to say whether or not she wanted to go, given the haste with which she was tugged out of the encampment. "It still wasn't your fault." There's no trace of duplicity in her statement, not at all.

Terpsika wrinkles her nose toward Ikshu, "It's not the same at all." Okay, so it's exactly the same....and she knows it. But admitting it, well, that's another matter entirely. Still, she seems content to leave the matter, rather having Ikshu laugh at the whole situation than stand there stoicly. When she next speaks, her voice is quiet, "Anyway, she's okay now, so it doesn't really matter now, does it?"

Ikshu chuckles at Terpsika still. "Would you Abayos get away with this?", he asks her, crossing his arms demonstratively, and looking at her. "Now what happened and is so important that you two try to cover it up with slipping on stones?", he asks, alternating his glance between Sika and Bashikki.

Bashikki's eyes move between Ikshu and Sika, and then to her own ankle which she flexes slightly with a wince. She quickly protests, "But I'm fine, really. It's only a bruise, now mostly gone. Does it really matter, now?" Perhaps it's just embarassment, the girl's cheeks are certainly bright enough to bear that out.

Terpsika's gaze turns to Bashikki, to regard her steadily a moment. She notes the colour in the other woman's cheeks, and she slumps back a little, looking down. She inhales deeply, and shakes her head, finally answering, "No, I wouldn't. We were kind of well....in a manner of speaking there were these..." It seems, she can't find a way to say this. Finally, she just out and out says, "Someone tried to grab her."

Ikshu looks at her amusedly while she stumbles and stutters for the right words, but at the last words his smile fades. "Tried to grab her?", he asks, turning to look at Bashikki for confirmation and elaboration at the same time. "What do you mean, they tried to grab her? And who?". His voice is turning more seriously.

"But they didn't." Bashikki adds quickly, her eyes widening somewhat with the woman's admission. She doesn't offer much more of an explanation, instead glancing unconsciously in the direction where her own hut, and hence, where her sleeping sister would lie. She chews at her lower lip as she meets her Sika's eyes, not daring to look at Ikshu lest she make this even worse.

Terpsika nods, in acknowledgement of what Bashikki had said, still not looking up, at either of them, "We don't know who it was -- it was getting dark, and they kinda came up from behind, and well, I kicked them, and Bashikki fought too, and they only well...got away with a few stenis, in the end." She bites her lip a little. Maybe she shouldn't have mentioned the stenis.

Ikshu narrows his eyes slightly, shaking his head. "Where?", is all he asks. Intead he get up again, to his feet, and heads over to spear leaning against the hut's wall.

Bashikki shakes her head, her level of alarm growing with each step Ikshu takes nearer to the spear. "I don't remember exactly where, it all happened so fast." Well, she blurts that out rather quickly, as well.

Terpsika stands from her spot, as Ikshu moves over toward the wall. Her expression is concerned, and also, perhaps oddly, a bit drawn. "Please, Ikshu, sit down. We knew we shouldn't have been there, and we got...well, lost, which just made things worse. It was stupid, and we learned it the hard way."

Ikshu takes the spear into his hands, before he turns to face the two. His eyes remain calm as they usally seem to be. "You weren't supposed to be there?", he asks. "Where weren't you supposed to be?", he queries quietly.

Terpsika fiddles with some of the beading on her skirt, as she tries hard to keep looking at Ikshu, and to keep her voice level as she speaks. She meets with only marginal success, on both counts. "We were on the edge of the Old City, and we ... well, it was dark, and we made a wrong turn. We were just retracing our steps....when it happened."

Ikshu sighs slightly. It is no news for him that Terpsika easily looses her bearing outside the city, especially at night. "The Old City?", he asks, looking at Bashikki and Terpsika. "Indeed you weren't supposed to be there, even less at night.", he scolds mildly, although his voice keeps even.

Bashikki stands as well, though she makes no motion closer to the two. She quickly attempts to explain, her gaze fixed on Terpsika. "It was day when we left... we must have lost track of time... and it didn't look too bad until we made that turn..."

Terpsika nods slowly toward Ikshu at what Bashikki said. She lifts her arms to wrap them around herself a little, obviously feeling very responsible for all of ths, "We stayed longer than we should have, and the sun was beginning to set. We ran into a Sentry, when we got back to the Palace District, and he helped us to the temple of Unot. Priestess Fidelia was there -- she said Bashikki would be fine, that she just had to be careful of her ankle for a bit."

Ikshu casts his eyes down at the ground for a moment, slightly frowning at this, before he nods, and turns to lean the spear back against the wall, before he steps closer to Terpsika and Bashikki. Only then does he look up. "You won't go there alone again, won't you?". Who knows if Unot will keep an eye for them the next time.

Bashikki loses a little color as Sika mentions the temple; in fact, she even looks somewhat pale. Grateful that the subject did not linger there, she shakes her head emphatically. "One beating was quite enough, I should think."

Terpsika shakes her head at this, without hesitation, "No, not again. It was very frightening -- I barely managed to get Bashikki back to the city, I was so nervous. Sentry Tamund took us both to the temple." Back to the temple again, Bashi! "He was very kind."

Ikshu nods. "If I was only a bit like you, Terpsika, I guess I would lock you in the hut for a long long time, hmmm?", he says, only half-joking, and still frowning slightly. "To head to the Temple was a good idea though.", he says.

Bashikki blanches again as the temple is mentioned, but she nods nevertheless. "Sentry Tamund saw us there, and stayed until the Priestess gave us leave to go." Her words are controlled, and in a single, unvarying tone.

Terpsika smiles at Ikshu's comment, if a bit nervously, "Very funny, Ikshu." She says, watching his expression to ensure he's pulling her leg. "We thought...it would be a good thing too. I felt much better after offering a prayer to Unot, and Bashikki's ankle was much better when we left, too."

Ikshu offers a smile in conjunction with a sigh. "At least you two were able to leave the Temple. And not by means of being burnt.", he says, glancing at the two. "But enough of this. What happened, happened.", he says then, more forcefully, and sitting down again next to the so carefully placed plate.

Bashikki lets out a long-held breath in relief, her gaze traveling toward Sika. "It won't happen again."

Terpsika returns to sit next to the fire as well, looking rather relieved. The colour seems to be returning to her face, and she moves to add another log to the fire. "It was all...a big mistake, from beginning to end." She reaches across, for one of the meatballs, tearing off a piece to eat. She reaches up again then, to touch the pendant at her neck, venturing to offer, "Thank you, Ikshu. It is....lovely."

Ikshu looks up at Terpsika, and shakes his head. "No, it just fits the wearer.", he says, and then offers a faint smile. "So, apart from running around in the Old City, what have you been up to?".

Bashikki nods as she stifles a yawn with a hand, and glances back at the door. Standing, she yawns once more, this one missed. "A very big mistake, not to be repeated. But mistakes aside, I'm getting tired and should try and get some sleep."

Terpsika looks about to say something in response to Ikshu, but she nods to Bashikki, "If you must....but I hope you will return soon. Take care of yourself, and your ankle, Bashikki."

Ikshu nods at Bashikki. "At least you can sleep.", he saysm with a small smirk, and then nods. "Take care.".

Bashikki winks at the other woman, her mood considerably lighter. "It's not as if I'm going all that far, I'll see you two in the morning." She nods at Ikshu and aims a mischevious wrinkle of her nose at the man. "Yes. I can settle down among the stacks and stacks of barrels at home."