• Closed • Sweat-Stained Nights

[Oliver]

"They call me Peace"

3rd Saun, 717
The Bronze Boar

An unspoken barrier divided the two men from the rest of the crowd circling the fighting ring. The confined space pressed the men and women close together, the air heavy with the sweat-stained bodies and spilt alcohol. For that alone Oliver welcomed the island on which he stood, inhabited only by his soon-to-be adversary. Granted, he too radiated a similar odor from across the space, one which Oliver would have no respite from once the fight began, but this was the price he paid to exit this abode called Anonymity.

No tournament was scheduled tonight at The Bronze Boar, which meant the floor was open for any looking to test their mettle against their fellow compatriots. Oliver had lingered on the edge of the ring, waiting for someone, anyone, to step forward and issue a challenge. It didn’t take long. The man was nondescript, several inches shy of six feet and his body a product of trials spent working in a warehouse or on the docks, just another man on the street who equated brawn with ability. That was not to say that Oliver underestimated the man nor thought he had an easy fight ahead of him; he just had a good idea what to expect from him.

Oliver watched his opponent throw back one last shot of whiskey handed to him by a friend in the crowd. This was his last chance to pinpoint any openings to exploit before the fight began. It didn’t take much to see that the man was drunk on his feet, face flushed with confidence drawn from the warmth coursing through his veins. He very nearly tripped himself when he handed the shot glass back to the awaiting hand, and it was in that moment that Oliver learned what he needed to. His opponent was favoring his right leg. Perhaps the injury to his other leg was old or maybe it had just happened after that most recent exchange. Regardless, Oliver couldn’t help but feel that this would prove significant before the night was over.

The two men’s pre-fight rituals compete, they stepped closer to one another in the ring. The laborer fell into a boxing stance, his right leg used as his planting foot; his left foot barely touched the ground. He looked like a dancer poised. A cloud of sweat and alcohol seemed to strike Oliver across face, but he forced himself to inhale it in. There was no going back now.

He fell into his own stance and began to sway.

[Zana]

[img]/gallery/image ... ge_id=9269[/img]

"I hate you right now," Zana said with a sweet smile to Theo. Her face was angelic and her nails dug into his arm as they looked at the sign. "The Bronze Boar? Theo, I don't care that you heard of a place that served good food. I no longer believe it exists. Fine, we'll eat here." Zana's distaste for the Earth Quarter was not something that was new to Theo, she'd mentioned it just once or twice. Or, possibly a few more times than that.

"You need to learn to cook," she said, smiling at him sweetly and trailing a finger down his cheek. "I already do all the work where someone has to get hot and sweaty and handle raw flabby meat. It's definitely your turn, dear heart." Her nails were sharp, she thought. Could she just nick that pulse in his neck and watch him bleed out? Zana sighed and stepped into his arms, close to him and held against him, her hands entwining behind the back of his neck and she kissed him. "I hate you. Truly. Look at what you've made me become." Gesturing with her eyebrows, she motioned towards the place. "Willing to settle for that. I'm very angry at you." Her grin was wicked as she said that remembering the last time she'd said it to him.

They walked up the rickety stairs to the second floor, reasoning that this was where the restaurant was likely to be. Even as he said that, Zana knew that neither of them believed it, but then it was worth a try. And so, they entered the Bronze Boar. The woman who walked in with Theo was blonde with ice blue eyes. She wore a white cotton cropped top and a floaty white skirt. Her clothes were of good quality and her hair and make up was impeccable. Looking at the place, Zana smiled in delight and her nails in his arm dug in harder. However, they were both hungry, they'd been lost (although he denied it) for over a break now and her high heel shoes really didn't suit the place they were walking.

A number of seats were free and as they moved over to somewhere to sit, Zana looked at Theo and smiled. "I am not sitting on those flea-encrusted mange-filled excuses for fur. Burn the fur, or put your jacket down for me, darling, would you?" Preferably, then he could burn the jacket later. Stealing a glance at the menu, Zana smiled. "Oh look. With meat or without. And stew too. Excellent."

There was a fight just about to happen and Zana glanced that way, watching and visualising that, whichever one of them was about to get pummeled, had Theo's face.

First we're gonna fight, we do it every night.
Baby, when you scratch, you know I'm gonna bite.

[Theo Nji'Ryn]

"Do you now?" Theo responded nonchalantly as he and Zana stepped into the Bronze Boar and a wave of odors washed over them and spilled out into the streets. The stench of stale booze, unwashed bodies and questionable food made for a powerful combination. At least for someone who'd become accustomed to much finer things. Or at least intended to. The atmosphere wasn't an unfamiliar one. In fact, considering he'd been born and raised in the Dust Quarter, he'd seen and smelled far worse than this. "Hate me now, love me later," he told her dryly. "But tonight we'll eat better than under-cooked potatoes and stale bread." Only mildly better, but their last attempt at cooking for themselves had been an exercise in futility.

They were both of them dressed far better than anyone else in the place. They were certainly cleaner. And if that wasn't enough to set them apart from the usual clientele, Zana wouldn't have gone unnoticed in even the most exclusive of places. A rough looking miscreant veered too close on their way up the stairs, much too close to Zana with a leer on his face and a wandering hand reaching out for a touch. Having spotted the drunk's intentions already, Theo gave the man a shove and sent him stumbling down those last few steps to the landing. They might eat, but having Zana on his arm wasn't exactly conducive to an evening of relaxation. He'd be lucky if he avoided becoming one of the combatants that evening, if not by his own choosing.

"You're not exactly an easy keeper you know," he grumbled under his breath as he shrugged out of his coat and draped it over a chair for her to sit. So, the choices were meat, or no meat. He'd opt out of asking just what kind of meat they spoke of. With meat, a beer and whatever the lady wanted, he'd say when anyone bothered to ask, and he turned his eyes to the platform where one hopeful was waiting on his adversary. "Beware the drunk," Theo said after sizing them both up. "They may be full of bravado, unsteady on their feet and impulsive. But the alcohol tends to relax them." Better to roll with punches that might end a sober man's efforts, "and makes them less predictable than others." The other looked capable enough however, and Theo was curious to discover which might prevail. And since his thoughts were never far from business these trials, he might be looking for more as well.

[Oliver]

"They call me Peace"

The man charged head on.

The expected response, most likely, was for Oliver to meet him in the middle of the ring, fueled by his own adrenaline, but the young restrained himself. Squaring his feet, Oliver waited until his opponent was nearly upon him before side-stepping to his left. The laborer surged past him, and Oliver pressed an palm on the man’s back to show him where his opponent had gone. Spinning, the laborer threw a punch that struck empty air as Oliver, stumbling back his forced drunken stupor. The laborer strides forward, hoping to capitalize, but in a burst of speed Oliver drops into a crouch and springs forward to slam the top of his head into the chest of the laborer, who stumbles back, stunned. Bursting up, Oliver levels the man under the jaw with a stiff uppercut that staggers him. The laborer backpedals out of Oliver’s range, so the youth widens the gap and, for the sake of the crowd, took a sip of an invisible mug he clenched between his outstretched arm.

Mocked. Oliver was sure that was how the laborer felt. This upstart child belittling him in front of this crowd of rowdy spectators. He knew people in this bar, probably called a few of them friends, and they were all watching him head-butted like he was an incapable farm hand. He could see it in the man’s eyes, a fire that didn’t like to be played with, but Oliver stoked it anyway. Oliver wanted to be inside his head, because once there, he could better control the pace of the match. Still, it was a dangerous line to tread, especially when the opponent was not in a sober state himself.

Hoping to keep the opponent reeling, Oliver shuffled forward, his hands falling to his side. The laborer righted himself in time to see Oliver swiping at his head with his right palm. The blow was light, little more than a feint to forced the laborer to duck—which he did, allowing him to throw his left hand up, forming a hammerlock with his two fists. The laborer threw an inside jab aimed at Oliver’s stomach, but didn’t see the hammerfist flying down to swat the hammer fist away. Releasing his grip, Oliver used both hands to shove the laborer backwards. He was hoping it would be enough to send the man to the ground.

Boy was he wrong.

The first hook caught Oliver on the right side of his face, the second his left. Oliver forced himself in a back pedal before the laborer could land any more open blows. Then, falling backwards, Oliver landed hard on his shoulder and tumbled into a backwards roll. It wasn’t pretty, and his shoulder was numb from the impact, but Oliver found himself in a crouch to meet the charging laborer. Planting both palms to the floor, he kicked with both feet into his opponent's good leg, hyperextending the knee. The laborer tried to shift his weight, but his bad leg gave out beneath him and he ragdolled to a kneeling position. Gritting his teeth against the pain in his back and head, Oliver springs upward, driving a knee between the eyes of his downed opponent. A sickening crunch sounded through the crowded room followed by the dull thud of an unconscious body hitting the hardwood underneath.

Oliver had won, but it was anything but pretty.

Wiping a line of blood running down his chin with the back of his palm, Oliver caught the eye of the bartender across the room from him. "I think I'm going to need a beer," the youth shouted, stepping out the ring while a pair of men stepped past him to help out there friend who was just coming to.

[Zana]

[img]/gallery/image ... ge_id=9269[/img]

"Oh, and I was trying so hard to be, too," Zana replied with a smile at him as Theo put his jacket down for her. Her expression was beyond sweet and not even vaguely honest. Her experience of life, thusfar, did not take her to places like this and she was more than uncomfortable. Perching on the edge of the seat, Zana looked at the menu and sighed. "I'll have the with meat and a glass of Moseke's Harvest, please. Thank you so much." Zana's expression to the person who had, eventually, come to take their orders was friendly and positively charming. As soon as they'd gone, though, she sighed slightly and glanced around.

"Theo, if it's greasy, I can't eat it," she said, nose wrinkled at the mere thought of it. Her inability to stomach greasy or stale food had been evident many times, and she looked at him then raised an eyebrow. The mortalborn woman had grown to know her handler and she looked at Theo and where he was looking.

"What are you thinking?" Zana asked, watching him. Keeping one eye on the fight Zana watched around. The drunk man had friends and she watched them, whilst appearing not to. "I would suggest," Zana said quietly, her hand moving to Theo's arm and her tone gentle, soft and yet ever so slightly nervous, "that the knee to the face probably wasn't the best move. Longer term, that is." There were a number of friends, two of whom went to collect up their friend but she could see that there were quite a few of them, men in a group and they were watching.

"They seem a little put out. Those who aren't thinking that the way they could alleviate their shame is by pounding you," she smiled at him and raised an eyebrow. "With the aim, of course, of showing me how a real man looks after his woman. Greasy food and thugs?" Zana sipped at the glass of wine which had arrived, at least and she looked at Theo with an unwavering gaze. "I hate you, I truly do. But I love you too or, more precisely, love myself and wish you to keep me alive. We might need to act, Theo." She motioned to the man who had first won and then shouted like some kind of barbarian, then spoke quietly to Theo again "and we might find a friend with a mutual enemy. Or six."

Hopefully, they were just young men who were being brash and nothing would come of it. However, that was a hope and she wasn't prepared to rely on it. "I have the gift you gave me strapped to my thigh and the gifts I gave you secreted around me in various interesting places." How, frankly, was a miracle. "Plus one more normal variety of those. I get the feeling, though that would escalate things, somewhat?" She kept her hand on his arm and her expression calm and informal, like she was chatting. "You may not have noticed, since I hide it so well, but I really am not entirely used to this environment. I'll take my queue from you, dear heart."

If they both survived this experience, including the food, Zana determined there and then that she and Theo were going to have a talk about him learning to cook. Billie would teach him, she was sure and there was an evident need for it.

Mirror, mirror, on the wall... who's the fairest one of all?

[Theo Nji'Ryn]

The young man on the stage with all his bravado, Theo thought as he looked on, might entertain the crowd, but he was unlikely to make many friends in the process. At least not among those who supported his adversary. And there seemed to be a handful at least. "Better for his health if it's not all show and bluster," Theo said to Zana under his breath. Otherwise when the younger man left at the end of the night, he might find his opponent's friends waiting outdoors in the shadows. Or, they might not wait that long. Other sets of eyes looking Zana's way didn't pass Theo by either and he thought that maybe he ought to have sprung for a more expensive meal elsewhere. He wasn't exactly looking for a fight himself that night. But with Zana? There was bound to be trouble.

She was right though, he thought, about the knee to the face. "He's not exactly playing the long game is he?" A reminder there, of a previous conversation but it didn't apply only to the business of managing influence and reputation. "I'm thinking," he said when she asked, "that it might be a good idea if we found some extra muscle for the lady. Clayton will do well enough, but we could use more." But he was also thinking, Theo told her then after their drinks and food were delivered, and with a dry delivery, "that you're inviting more than enough trouble just by being here and looking like...you." Did she need to seek more by shouting out an open invitation?

You didn't grow up in the Dust Quarter without learning to fight, and he could hold his own fairly well. But against six or more thick necked laborers? Not likely, not for long. They might need a friend after all. "I'm the face of the Lady Liberty," he uttered. "I'd like to keep it pretty and not reduced to minced flesh." And bolts fired or knives thrown in close quarters were bound to make him even fewer friends in this place. Tapping the waiter again as he passed by, Theo gestured to the young man who'd just won his fight. "Tell him the beer is on me, and there's another one waiting in the wings if he cares to join us," he said.

[Oliver]

"They call me Peace"

A mug of beer, pale foam leaking down one side, was brought to him by a waiter not much older than Oliver. A pale scar ran across his chin like a crescent moon. Perhaps it had been given to him by one of these very men in the room, a reminder that haste was necessary in this line of work. Oliver had no intention of giving him a second. Grinning at his arrival, he accepted the mug with both hands and took a long sip from the mug. The ale mixed with the faint traces of blood of his mouth, giving the hops a slightest taste of iron. Still, it was refreshing. “How much?” Oliver asked, looking the waiter in the eye.

“Nothin’, sir,” the waiter replied. “That man over there said the drink was on him.” The waiter turned and pointed to a pair, a man and woman, sitting across the room. The woman was glancing around the room, and the man . . . well he was staring at Oliver. Intently. “He said there was another one waiting in the wings for you if you joined him.” The waiter stepped back and was quickly enveloped by the crowd again. Taking another sip of the beer, Oliver began to weave through the crowd. If there were any hard glares at his back as he made his way over to the pair, the young fighter was completely oblivious to them.

In the few moments it took Oliver to come up beside the strangers, he tried to draw a better assessment of them. The woman was, simply put, beautiful, and not the kind of woman he would’ve expected to see in a place like this. Her clothes alone marked her as someone who preferred to frequent cleaner haunts than this; Oliver wondered if she realized just how bad those fur throws were going to stain her nice white skirt. The man was of plainer stock, but just as impeccably dressed. There was something, though, behind his eyes that suggested to Oliver that this wasn’t his first time in a place like this. The way that his gaze wandered around the room after he had seen that the invitation had been accepted. He was a cautious man, Oliver surmised, but of what he hadn’t really a clue. Regardless, a kindness deserved the same sort of response.

“Thank you for the beer, sir, miss.” Oliver said as he drew up beside the pair, nodding his head to each of them. "I’ve just arrived to the city and I appreciate the kind reception.” Glancing around, Oliver selected a chair to the left of the man to sit in. He sat on the edge, elbows resting on his knees, before continuing his thought. “Oliver’s my name. Oliver Branch. I assume you just saw my fight?”

Oliver let his voice fall away at that. Truth be told, he didn’t know why he had been called over. He figured one of them—probably the man—would tell him soon enough. So, his initial question hanging in the air, Oliver settled back and took another sip from the mug. A fine gesture indeed.

[Zana]

[img]/gallery/image ... ge_id=9269[/img]

"How likely is it that things are going to get unpleasant, Theo?" Zana asked with a raised eye. "In here I mean." When their food came Zana looked at it and sighed. "Now, I hate you again," she said and looked at Theo with icy blue eyes which held just the right amount of disdain. "All the work I do, you think you'd take me to a decent restaurant."

But she knew Theo well enough to know that his mind was ticking over, thinking, considering, weighing up odds and she listened to him when he said what he was thinking. When he said that she was inviting trouble, though? Zana looked at him with a level gaze, "would you rather I looked different, dear heart? Or is the trouble you see in your crystal ball due to the environment we are in? If the latter," she pointed out, "then please try and remember that it wasn't me who brought us here."

She picked at the food before pushing her plate away and raised an eyebrow at him. "Your face?" Zana was less and less impressed with this situation, and with Theo specifically for creating it and then somehow it being her fault, by the bit. He was looking for muscle for the Lady Libertine? "Is that why you brought us here?" She more or less hissed that last bit as he spoke to the waitress. But then, along came the man who had just won his fight and Zana got the chance to look at him upclose.

He looked like he belonged on a farm.

Zana smiled sweetly at the man who introduced himself as Oliver Branch. Oliver Branch? Evidently, the farm boy had parents and they hated him, she considered and her ice blue eyes trailed slowly over his form. Zana was openly appraising of him, looking at him with interest as he said that he was new to Rharne.

If he was new here, why come to this place, she wondered.

"Nice to meet you, Oliver," she said with a smile and a continued appraisal of him. Zana motioned for him to sit if he wished it. Then, however, she kept quiet and waited for the two of them to have whatever conversation they were going to have. Having picked at the meal and eaten what she could, Zana maintained physical contact on Theo. Currently, she was leaning against him and had one hand on his arm. That, Theo might note, had only happened since Oliver had moved over.

Don't call my name, don't brush my cheek like that. I curse the day that I found you
Don't touch my skin, don't dance around like that. I feel damnation all around you

[Theo Nji'Ryn]

"On a scale of one to ten?" Theo quipped dryly when asked the odds that their visit to the Bronze Boar would lead to trouble. Lucky for him, or maybe not, their food arrived before he could answer. It was as likely as not, all the same. The food in general struck him as oddly gray and vaguely edible. Zana wasn't accustomed to it and probably never had been. As for him, there was a time when he'd have recognized it for a feast even while swearing that one trial...never again.

"It was too late in the evening when we decided to give up on our own cooking," he reminded Zana. All the other places had been booked or required a reservation in advance. That would change too, once the Lady Libertine established itself, and them with it. Those places would be bending over backwards then to accommodate them. Still, it wasn't why he'd brought them here. It was because this late in the evening it had been their only option. But so long as they were here, he might as well consider the talent, and what they might make use of themselves.

When the man joined them and thanked him for the beer, Theo nodded in response and gestured to the empty chair at their table. "Welcome to Rharne then," he said when told that Oliver was a new arrival to the city. "You held your own quite well, and he didn't go down easy." Confirmation that, yes, they'd indeed witnessed the fight. "This is Zana. My name is Theo Nji'Ryn." Pushing his half emptied plate into the waiter's hands when he wandered by, Theo ordered another round of drinks for them all. "If you're new to the city, I take it you haven't yet found employment? Or, is this how you make your living?" he asked, referring to the fight they'd just witnessed.

[Oliver]

"They call me Peace"

The man—Theo, he named himself—had indeed seen his fight. Oliver would’ve been satisfied by that alone. He had feared that the fight would have gone unnoticed by the patrons. But this man, at least, had seen and appreciated the young fighter’s efforts. The woman . . . well she seemed to communicate through physical gestures. Smiles and gentle touches on the man’s arm. Oliver had to admit it was a lulling experience that brought the a flush to his cheeks. Granted, of course, it could be the beer he was drinking on an empty stomach. He couldn’t rightfully tell.

Regardless, it appeared this Theo was going to be doing the talking while the girl, Zana, listened. A waiter appeared in the crowd and the man handed off he and Zana’s plates, so Oliver followed suit with his mug, which only held a thin layer of beer left in the bottom. There was another round on the way, courtesy of the stranger, so he wasn’t too worried about getting every single night.

Theo asked of work after the waiter disappeared into the crowd again. Oliver began to feel that this encounter had a hidden motive behind it and Oliver couldn’t help but think of the very thing he had been hoping for since he arrived in Rharne a few days ago: a sponsorship. He had been told that taverns and private individuals sponsored fighters in this city in the various tournaments throughout the arc, and Oliver was hoping to secure one for himself. He had money now to pay the entrance fees, but he knew that it wouldn’t last long, especially if he didn’t find work to supplement. Just maybe . . .

Oliver leaned back into the chair, staring at Theo. “Your first assumption was the correct one. No one has hopped out of their chair to start paying me for my fights quite yet. Though,” Oliver said, a small grin forming on his face. “I don’t think you invited me over for my company. As in, you’ve yet to offer me that free arm of yours to slide in under.”

He bit his lip, his nerves getting the better of him. He didn’t even think that sounded smooth in his head, but the alcohol had frayed his filter a bit. Sighing, Oliver continued. “In other words, sir, if you had an offer to make me, I’d love to hear it. Truly.” He hoped that that was enough to amend any offense he had caused by his ale-soaked words, and waited.