"How are you feeling?" Mirlín asked Fyen, trying to catch her eyes which she kept averting.
The girl sat hunched on her bed, wrapped in a dry blanket. "I really need a bath but I'd probably fall asleep and drown," she chuckled and sighed.
Mirlín reached to feel the fabric of their tunics that were hanging close to the crackling fireplace. Her spare tunic was almost dry as it hadn’t gotten soaked in her sturdy leather bag whereas Fyen’s were still dripping wet. They really needed to buy her saddlebags as well since her flimsy sack didn’t hold any water.
Then she leaned back on her bed and sighed. Even though it was irrational to even think so, she felt responsible for everything that happened to Fyen earlier. I shouldn't have left her alone in that forest. It's different in places like inns and taverns, there's always someone sane enough to jump in when things get out of hand. I knew I wasn’t cut out for this guide thing. Might as well… but I can’t keep an eye on her all the time! I’m not her bloody mother!
"Do you want to be alone or should I stay?" the woman asked as she found her own presence somehow intrusive.
"I'm all right. I'll just go to sleep. No need for you to stay here and listen to me snore," Fyen said.
"Are you serious or just trying to get rid of me so you can slit your wrists or something?"
Fyen laughed but then noticed that Mirlín wasn’t joking. "I just want to bathe and sleep, honest. You go and have a good time. Drink one for me."
"I don't mind staying, really. I have my reasons to be worried... I left you in the forest and look what happened," Mirlín sighed although she felt that she should have just let it be.
She was hungry and tired and could have used a stiff drink. The mere thought of the upcoming night dragged down her mood. She didn’t want to go but she knew she had to.
"No, really. Besides, I'd just like to be alone, you know," the raven girl answered.
Mirlín stared at her, trying to detect deception in the girl's eyes but it was difficult to tell because she wouldn't return her gaze. "I'll do as you wish if you at least once look me in the eye, Fyen," she said. Finally the girl raised her eyes but it was as if she was looking at the wall behind Mirlín's back. The woman hung her head, stood up and changed into a dry, shapeless tunic and a spare pair of loose leather pants. They were so warm she would have just wanted to fall back on her bed and enjoy the soft, safe feel of the pleasantly heated room.
However, she pulled on her boots, grabbed her dirty-gray, woolen spare cloak, and stepped to the door. "You know, Fyen,” she started, “you have grown a hundred years within days. In a hundred years one learns many lessons, most of them unpleasant, but one should still look forward to the next day. I hope you are looking forward to-morrow," and with that she left.
When the door closed, Fyen reached for her sword, looked at the weapon, and felt the black still seething from it and into her. She put it on the bed beside her and sighed. The moon lit her silhouette as she sat on the bed, her hunched back shaking as she wept quietly.
Behind the door Mirlín fought back tears and prayed for Fyen to be stronger than the woman had been at her age. Then she shook off the wave of melancholy and headed towards the next room to ask whether the men had any plans for tonight.
"It's open," Reynaer's voice sounded from within after Mirlín had knocked. She pushed the door open and slipped in. "Oh, it's you. How's the girl?"
Mirlín looked around the room and raised her eyebrows. For some reason Desiderius had spread his socks all over his bed whereas Reynaer's shield, crossbow, quiver, and highwayman's sword were scattered on the floor. Must be a man-thing... Both men were dressed only in loose hose while the rest of their clothes were about to catch fire, still hanging by the fireplace.
"Uh, I'm not sure," Mirlín said. "She wants to be left alone. But... I think she's going to deal with this just fine. There's incredible strength in her. Someone weak couldn't have done what she did... to that maniac," she finished and hesitated for a moment, looking for a place to sit. She settled with the nearest bed which was not covered in socks.
Reynaer leaned on the wall and rubbed the stubble on his chin. "I think so too. She's a tough little thing."
The woman nodded, examining a bolt she had picked up from the floor though she couldn’t stop stealing glances at the scantily clad men. "Yeah... so, what are you two gonna do tonight?"
"Well, the boy is tired but I'm gonna go to the tavern. Smell the night air a bit, see what I can find, maybe some sucker to buy that extra sword."
"I'm gonna sleep. I'd rather avoid the spirits for a while," Desiderius muttered.
"Oh, right, well, I think I'm gonna... smell the night air, too. I guess it's good to spend some time alone too," Mirlín said with a gleam in her eye.
Reynaer smiled. "That's true. I think I'll do some soul searching as well." Mirlín put the bolt aside, got up with a wan smile on her face, and bid them goodnight.
She didn't hear it when Desiderius asked Reynaer: "Did you get a feeling that she kind of... didn't want to go?"
Reynaer raised an eyebrow while belting his sword and dagger. "What?"
Desiderius shrugged. "I don't know, I just got this feeling that even though she said otherwise, she really didn't want to go out alone tonight."
Reynaer shook his head and put on his tunic and gambeson. "I'm gonna go for a beer." With that the man left, his sword's scabbard hitting the door on the way out.
Mirlín went to the stables to fetch one of her saddlebags she had left there. At that time of the evening, there were only horses and a lone barn cat keeping her company. The woman slipped into Midwin's stall to change her clothes. She winced as the damp, cool fabric of a white dress stuck to her skin.
"Keep an eye on my stuff," she said to the gelding and patted his neck.
She felt nauseous about what was to come. The dress felt unfamiliar and the corset restrained her breathing. She placed a small, sheathed push dagger between her breasts and tied it to the corset with a short leather string. The weapon's hilt was made to look like a decoration. She wanted to take a deep breath but couldn't. The clothes made her feel vulnerable and stick out from the crowd and she didn't like attracting attention even though tonight it was necessary. What other choice do I have? This is a perfect opportunity, everyone else wants to be alone.
She rummaged her saddlebag until she found a mirror and a small, flat-bottomed pot with a decorated lid. The pot contained dark-colored powder Mirlín had once stolen from a foreign woman. She used it to paint her upper and lower eyelids. She also had a small jar of red ochre that she mixed with water and used it for her lips and cheekbones. She didn't have to bleach her face even though many women did that for a more youthful appearance. A marble-white complexion was a common trait of her race. All right, if you do it tonight, you don't have to do it again in a while. Let's just be done with it. Get your shit together. It’ll soon be over.
Once more a woman called Eleanora was born. She left the stables in a white dress and red corset, long ashen hair like a veil on her back and shoulders. She walked up the thoroughfare with a determined step. Other beautiful women were out there too and they looked at her from head to toe, sensing a threat entering their territory. There were more prostitutes roaming the streets than ever before. Not just in this village but everywhere in the country. She didn't look at them, it was enough to feel their eyes on her.
Suddenly she felt a jolt as she saw Reynaer walking up the street. She jumped behind a corner and as she peered out around it, she saw how the man bumped into a youth who had dashed out of a side street.
"Oi! Watch it, you cunt!" the intoxicated young man exclaimed.
Reynaer seemed to say something quietly, a smile on his face, and then, without any warning, smashed his right fist on the side of the youth's jaw. The younger man buckled like a ragdoll. Without looking down as he stepped over the horizontal figure, Reynaer walked on and into the nearest tavern. So he does have some nasty habits, Eleanora thought to herself and walked back to the thoroughfare.
She went to look for another tavern and found one a few blocks down. The place was crowded and many patrons were already on their way to drunken slumberland. Looks promising. Eleanora walked to the bar and ordered a cider. She always ordered a cider when she was on the prowl. Ladies don't drink ale.
Eleanora went to the far corner of the counter and scanned the premises. Many men were glancing at her. But who will be the one to take the first chance?
Finally a stout man stumbled to her, spilling his ale. "Hey there sweet tits, you blow for a copper?"
Eleanora laughed. "Be a dear and use that copper to buy yourself a glass of water."
The man swayed and squinted his eyes at her but seemed to end up glaring at a nearby flowerpot instead. "No whore is gonna tell me what to do," he mumbled and stumbled off.
Eleanora looked around and noticed a young man staring at her. He obviously hesitated so she gave him a generous smile and winked. The man looked around and walked over to her.
"Umm... that man bothering you?" he asked.
"Not anymore," Eleanora replied and tossed her hair.
"Well, good... mind if I join you?"
"I was hoping you would." She favored him with an alluring smile.
"Oh, well, that's good then. Um... can I buy you a drink?"
Eleanora glanced at her full glass. "Sure, why not!"
The man ordered another cider and an ale for himself. As the drinks arrived he drank half of his pint at one go. He seemed to be looking for some courage so Eleanora decided to help him a bit. These first-timers are quite adorable, actually.
"So, you know if the beds of this inn are comfortable?" she asked, trying to sound casual.
"I've heard they are nice. Wanna go and try one out?" he blurted, winked clumsily, and blushed.
Eleanora broke into a gracious laughter. "20 silvers, up front," she said in a more business-like manner.
The man nodded. "Agreed. Shall we?"
Eleanora grabbed his hand and led him upstairs. She pushed away the last fragments of Mirlín as they stepped into a damp and shabby room. The clank of the closing door froze her heart. She didn't want to turn around and face this young stranger. Squeezing her eyes shut and conjuring a smile, Eleanora finally braced herself. When she turned around, they heard steady thumping and a woman's exaggerated moaning starting in the next room.
The man laughed nervously. "Sounds like someone beat us to the punch."
Eleanora stepped forward and started to unbuckle the man's belt.
The whore had seen better days but she had a pretty face and she knew how to gyrate her hips just right as she moved on Reynaer's lap on the squeaking bed. He wasn't sure the worn piece of furniture could take another round without actually falling apart but he didn't really care if it did so he pushed the thought aside and grabbed the whore's breasts. After a far too short a moment he came and, sensing the climax, the woman screamed really a bit too loud for it to be even remotely close to realistic. He knew it was all smoke and mirrors anyway, but the whole acting thing was part of the fun.
As she thrust her hips forward, hard, Reynaer heard a new sound, a creak louder than before, and with her next thrust the whole bed shifted and its legs buckled, sending the bed and its two naked occupants crashing on the dusty floor. Later on Reynaer could have sworn he laughed all the way to the down. The whore laughed as well as she climbed off him.
"You sure know how to put up a dramatic finale," Reynaer said to her with a grin.
"Well, you know, I do what I do," the woman replied with faked modesty. They lay on the broken bed for a while before Reynaer reached over for his purse and started counting coins.
"Ten, was it?" he asked.
The woman nodded. "Yeah."
He handed over the money and looked at her as she quickly tucked them into her own purse. He hated these moments, the moments when something happened that reminded him that the whore was a person too, just like him and Mirlín and Fyen. He felt sick to his stomach.
"Listen, you were great but I gotta go, got some friends to see," he said and stood up.
The woman lay in the bed looking at him. "Sure."
He opened his mouth to say something but closed it instead. Then he put on his clothes, stopped by the door, again opened his mouth but then just said: "Take care now," and stepped out into the corridor while tying the front laces of his pants.
At the same time another door opened and a woman in a plain white dress and red bodice stepped out. He was still battling with his pant laces and she was counting silver coins but then their eyes met. Just as he was about to say something witty about putting his pants on he stopped. There was something familiar about the woman. Those eyes... It wasn't until after a few seconds that he realized who the woman was.
"Mirlín! What are you doing here?" The question was, of course, redundant, but he had to ask it anyway. There was no other way. The woman looked bewildered for a moment before regaining her composure.
"Reynaer!" The woman's eyes darted from the man's pant laces to the door behind him, then she looked up with a frown on her face. “Crap."
Realizing that they both knew just what they had been doing, Reynaer smiled, feeling a stab in his heart. "Listen, why don't we blow this joint and go for an ale to our inn? I feel like having a few, you know, just to blow off some steam." The words just slipped out before he could stop them.
Mirlín looked awkward but laughed nevertheless. "Sure, I guess we haven't been doing enough blowing for one night yet."
With that they descended the stairs and left the sleazy tavern. He had noticed her limp before but had refrained from asking her about it. Somehow he sensed it was related to a dark event in the woman’s life even though it might have just as well been a riding accident.
"I, um... you alright?" Reynaer asked as they walked through the thoroughfare.
"Uh... yeah. It's just that it's a bit weird, you know, having you see me dressed like this and all,” Mirlín shrugged.
He looked at her in a new way. "You know, you really do look beautiful all dressed up like that."
She glanced at him quickly and sneered to herself. "Thanks, I guess, but it's dangerous for a woman like me to look like this." Reynaer didn't quite understand what she meant but decided not to pursue the matter, the situation being uncomfortable enough as it was.
Mirlín looked at him sternly. "Listen, I wouldn't want Fyen to know about this. Or Desiderius for that matter. Wouldn't be much of a role model if she knew."
Reynaer nodded. "Your secret's safe with me. Besides, I kind of have trodden the darker roads myself so it's probably best if we leave some bits out for the kids."
They arrived at the inn and headed into the tavern downstairs.
"Two of your strongest ales," Reynaer said to the barkeeper with amazingly bushy moustache.
"Those are on me, I've got an extra twenty silvers now anyway," Mirlín said dryly.
Reynaer felt incredibly uncomfortable thinking about drinking away the money for which Mirlín had sold herself but thought it best to graciously accept her offer. The two sat in silence for a moment, both feeling very much ill at ease.
Then Reynaer raised his pint. “This is good ale."
Mirlín shot a frustrated look at the man. “You know, this is not something I do often, just when I have to get a lot of money quickly and I felt this was less dangerous than robbing someone now that I have Fyen to look after!" she explained, lifting up her chin as if trying to restore what little dignity she still had left.
Perhaps a little too hastily Reynaer raised his hands, nodding. “Of course, of course! I mean, I don't... uh, do that often either, just... you know, being on the road a long time and such." Immediately upon finishing the sentence he buried his face into his pint.
"It's all right. You know, when I left home I actually worked in a brothel for almost a year... er, I suppose it wasn't really one of my biggest ambitions but at least it was a steady income. And now that I have to stay alive alone on the road... women don't have many ways to earn money." Mirlín glanced up at the man, a sad expression on her face.
Feeling a surge of anger at the world and, most of all at himself, certain that if he could have stepped out of his body, he would have given himself the kind of a beating that would ensure he'd enjoy the rest of his meals in liquid form, Reynaer grit his teeth before meeting the woman's gaze. “I'm sorry you've had to lead such a hard life, Mirlín. I've known you only for a short while and already I can safely say that you're one of the best people I've ever met. No shit either," he said solemnly. “I hate that the world is such that women have to resort to... that just in order to stay alive."
Mirlín shrugged, her expression indicating she had resigned herself to a life of hardship and strife. “I worked as a stable boy for a while but got fired immediately when they found out I wasn't an actual boy in every sense of the word."
Reynaer nodded. “That's just..." Then he shook his head and let out an embarrassed laugh. “You know, I feel like the biggest asshole in the world right about now."
The woman glanced at him and actually smiled. “Well, if it wasn't for you, there'd be even less jobs for women out there." Then she slapped her palm over her face and groaned. “Sorry, that came out wrong!"
The man smiled a little sadly. “I deserved that. And probably a knife in the nuts and heart as well."
"Nah, I'm sure you are a good customer," she laughed, apparently trying to lighten the atmosphere.
All of a sudden a ragged and foul smelling man appeared before them. He held up a rock, almost rubbing it on Mirlín's face before turning to Reynaer. "Hey, this is from a monastery from six hundred years ago. You want to buy your wife something pretty? Then sell this here and give me half of what you get. I scratch your back and you scratch mine. What do you say?"
Reynaer looked at the man, his eyes narrowing. "You scratch my back and I'll knock your fucking teeth in. Now shift!" The dirty man's face creased into an undistinguishable expression and then he hurried off to talk to someone else, glancing over his shoulder.
Mirlín tilted her head back and laughed. "You can sound very scary if you want," she chuckled.
Reynaer shook his head. "For crooks to understand you, you have to sound like one, talk their language." Then he raised his tankard and smiled at the woman. "Thanks for the ale, by the way. A strange world, isn't it?"
Mirlín looked a bit perplexed. "You talking about that guy?"
Reynaer took a swig from his pint. "The way it all works, you, me, that guy, what happened to Fyen and her mother, all of it. If it made any less sense it would be like a fucking dream."
"You think there's no purpose to any of it?"
Reynaer shook his head. "There must be, I think, but that's just it: if there is a purpose, it sure as hell is mysterious judging by how messed up the world is."
"Uh-huh. But for everything I've done during the past few years I've had a good reason. At least that's what I like to tell myself when I go to sleep," Mirlín said, blowing froth out of her mug.
They sat drinking in silence for a while before Reynaer turned to her. "You know, we could work together."
Mirlín snapped out of her thoughts and raised an eyebrow. "Come again?"
The man moved closer and lowered his voice. "You do what you do to get money, I pretty much find some bastard whose face I don't like and take their money, right? So, what if we teamed up? You lure in the losers with the cash and get them into an alley and I take it up from there?"
Mirlín jerked back her head, her shoulders shaking with held back laughter but eventually the woman choked on a mouthful of ale she had just sipped. After much coughing and sputtering, she said, also lowering her voice: "In fact, that's a brilliant idea!" There was a fiendish grin on her face.
Reynaer returned her grin and laughed. "That's settled then! Next time one of us runs out of money, we'll rendezvous in the village tavern and... do business." Then he ordered two more pints before turning back to the woman. "It's a good thing Fyen's got all that money so she doesn't need to deal with this stuff."
"For some reason I've decided to keep her out of these... whore circles," she said dryly.
Reynaer looked at Mirlín, trying to read her thoughts. "It's funny how we're both... well, definitely people I would in no way call pure or innocent and yet we're here, trying desperately to keep one girl from drowning in the world, in all of the shit that's around in life."
"I wish there'd been people like us when I was her age. So that's how I know we're on the right track here.”
"I'll drink to that," Reynaer declared and downed the pint at one go, finishing with a loud burp that echoed through the ages.
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