(122-12-29) Proposal for the Past
Proposal for the Past
Summary: Hellan and Desmond encounter one another again, and Desmond has a request.
Date: 29/12/2015
Related: Mare, Walk of Shame
Players:
Hellan..Desmond..

Old Street - Oldtown

This street cuts through the older areas of the city. Many of the buildings here look a little dilapidated. The timber overhangs that many of the stone structures have atop them lean against each other, and out over the pavement. There is a runnel down the center of the street where rain and a certain amount of liquid refuse runs down to drain into the canals that criss-cross the city. The cobblestones here are worn quite smooth by years and years of people treading upon them.

To the West the Honeywine River awaits. To the east stand the arches to the Oldtown Square. The less respectable guild-halls of the city can be found here. The Weirwood Manse, one of the city's oldest residences, is here. Every few months some wit paints a red face on the weirwood tree depicted on its facade, and pious followers of the Seven scrub it off soon after.


The day in Oldtown is darkening, wet and heavy but yet to cool. Drizzle makes the cobblestones slippery and collects in the canals and down the runnel in the middle of Old Street, carrying water and sludge. Down at the Weirwood Manse, lights warm a few of the mismatched windows of the upper stories, but at least one of its residents is out of doors, emerging from the stables used by the Starks and pulling her fur-trimmed hood up atop her black-haired, silver-streaked head.

Desmond comes plodding down the street, hooded against the rain. There's no point in the man hoping to conceal himself. At seven feet and some inches, he is perhaps the most easily-recognizable man in Oldtown. He slips and reaches out, grabbing at a hitching-post just outside the stable. It brings him right down to Hellan's level as she steps out. The huge man stares at the Stark woman for a moment before clumsily offering a bow, nearly slipping again on the cobblestones.

If Hellan thinks there's something funny about a giant man slipping on the cobblestones and almost bowing clumsily, well … in fact, she expresses it freely and obviously, first with a huff and then one barking laugh. She comes to a halt, folding her arms, hands half-hidden within the volume of her sleeves. The Stark lady is in a different sort of shape than when Desmond saw her last: she stands firmer, for one. Her eyes are still red-rimmed and hollowed by tiredness, yes, but her eyes are clear and sharp when they criticize him. "There's the big fancy knight now," she derides.

"There's the drowsy noblewoman herself," retorts Desmond, allowing his full northern burr to come into effect as he straightens. "I've not seen you since I.. found you out on the road." He looks down on Hellan assessingly, head tilting to one side. And then, in a tone of genuine concern, "You look as though you're feeling better since last I saw you."

His retort earns half of another laugh, though it's just as derisive — verging on a reply of her own, but he gets off the hook, barely. His concern is ignored, as well, for the most part. Hellan considers him coolly and gives a nigh imperceptible movement of one shoulder, contained further by the sharp angle of her plain, grey-blue dress. She pulls the remainder of her cloak over it a moment later. "Seems you've been busy since I saw you last."And she has something to say about it, sounds like.

"Yes, well. I couldn't sit around and let a dragon land on the King, could I?" But Desmond has the grace to look a little sheepish. "It was only ever you who called me a faithless sellsword piece of shite, you know. And that stung deeply." He keeps his voice pitched low, his eyes on Hellan. And with a slight, sardonic, smile, he says "Especially from you." The huge man eyes Hellan for a moment. "Let's fetch a drink, Lady. You can insult me for hours over something strong. I've a favor to ask of you. I think you'll be amused."

One of the woman's dark eyebrows begins to lift, a sardonic match to the giant's smile. She eyes him with unabashed skepticism, but in the end, can't help but ask, "A favour?" She seems amused by the idea of Desmond asking a favour, at the very least. "Do you enjoy pressing your luck?" she asks with a bite to her voice — rhetorical. "There's drink enough inside," she says, turning her shoulder away and heading to the door of the manse. "Come on."

Desmond chuckles softly as he follows Hellan. "What a memory you have," he retorts. "Pressing my luck. I protected you for two days and nights and asked for not a groat in return. Besides, I think you'll be intrigued, Lady." He follows the woman toward the manse. "By the way," he asks after a brief pause, "Do you often find yourself bored?"

Hellan blatantly ignores Desmond's (sound) logic as if he were just the wind blowing through the rain. She pauses at the door beside the weirwood mosaic, long enough to give with a queer look over her shoulder, half behind the fur of her hood. "What manner of question is that?" She enters the manse, the old, heavy doors giving way to the single hall. It's dim, in the transitory hour between needing to light the candles and using the scant light from the windows. A fire burns in the hearth. Hellan immediately snaps at a servant knowingly awaiting her entrance. "Strong drinks," is all she need command. She moves toward the end of the empty trestle table.

"A relevant one," Desmond replies. His diction seems different — more polished, more like one might expect from a knight, not a sellsword. He smiles toward Hellan idly. "By the by," he asks, "Did you ever write my father? As you promised?" The huge Northerner doesn't wait for an answer. He ambles around the room, gazing at the mosaic and other set-pieces. "Or did you forget?"

Hellan sits slowly sits, gripping the edge of the table on the way down. It is a tight hold, one she covers. "Do you insult my memory, too?" she asks, the faintest evidence of a struggling breath in her voice; there and gone. "I wrote it. I have half a mind not to send it."

Desmond seems to forget his arguments, walking over to the table and gazing at Hellan. When he speaks, it's in his sellsword's jargon, the way she first met him. "You dying?" He drops into a chair alongside Hellan, not across from her, without waiting for permission. "Bran the Builder came to Oldtown to build the Hightower," the man continues in an apparent non sequitur. He glances aside at the woman, absently reaching over to — if he is allowed — brush back a damp lock of hair from the woman's ear. It's a bold, and obviously inappropriate, gesture. "Tear up the letter to my father. I'd like to offer a new proposal."

Desmond's abrupt change of subject from her presumed dying to Bran the Builder, of all things, allows Hellan the opportunity to utterly ignore him again. What she can't ignore, however, is the touch of her hair. His fingertips merely graze the strand of black before her forearm knocks sharply into his wrist and remains up, a barricade, her fist tight. She stares hard at him, cross and unyielding. "The only proposal you are warming me to is tearing you up, Snow, if you continue as you are."

Desmond smiles slightly. "Oh, now I got your attention." He carefully draws back his hand. "I dunno what it takes to earn your trust, Mare." A not-subtle reminder. "But I'm not out to hurt you, nor to bed you." His voice is rough, low, guttural. All pretense at finesse and proper diction gone. He is just the way she met him, coarse and blunt. "You want to accuse me of selling myself. To the King, to the Targaryens. Abandoning my own people. Go on." His voice is harsh, but pitched very low. "I swore to serve my king. If that irks you, might be you could've said thankee for what I did for you." There's real rage there, his eyes flashing. He grits his teeth, staring down at the table. "Will you listen? Just once? Y'can have me killed, after. And tear up the letter, both."

Hellan lowers her barricade, crossing her arms across her chest and sitting stiffly against the back of the chair. Her stare is unwavering — she hardly seems to blink — and, beyond a flash of ire, becomes inscrutable. Into this hard silence in the wake of Desmond's words, the servant inches into view, setting a tray onto the table in front of them with arms stretched as long as possible. A variety of "strong drinks" and cups are laid out, from good strong brown ale to dark red wine, a sure testament to having somehow wronged Hellan with every choice before. "Say what you will," she prompts Desmond without looking at the drinks.

Likewise without looking away, Desmond grabs a tankard of dark, dark, ale and takes a swig. Foam runs down his chin. "Bran the Builder came south to build the Hightower. He was a Stark king." Obvious facts. The huge Northman seems to be still quite angry. "My Family were Kings before we bent the knee to the Starks." His family. "They would'a come with him. And I think one died here. I want to find his tomb. For my father." He grits the words out. "Help me. Help me find him. You can hate me, can even still have me killed. But y'won't be bored."

No sign of interest marks Hellan's face as Desmond goes on, but her eyes do narrow, measure by measure. After he's said his piece, she looks away casually, taking a cup of wine for herself. She takes a swallow. "A great search for an ancient Umber tomb, hmm?" She says, and while her tone could easily make fun of the plan that seems to mean so much to the man, she shifts her jaw from side to side and truly considers. "It would be interesting," she takes a slower drink, "to unbury. It makes sense enough that Umbers would have followed Bran the Builder south."

"I thought so too." Some of the livid anger seems to leave the huge Northman as Hellan gives the theory actual consideration. He's careful not to show gratitude, or any sign of pleasure, when she gives credence to his idea. "I'm just too fuckin' stupid to know where to look." And for a moment, the huge man looks indescribably pathetic - damp from the drizzle, lost, and dull. Perhaps it's the way his jaw slackens, face softens. He drinks more ale. "I could do with help."

"The Citadel." Hellan takes another drink, sets the cup upon the table, and taps one finger against it. She glances once and Desmond and not again, finding focus on his theory. "They have more books than any place in Westeros. Most of them are age-old, and some of them are bound to account the tales of the First Men, although no book can say who first King of Winter was. Or if he lived at all."

"And some claim that the Night King was an Umber. A lie." Again, the pride he takes in the House that refuses to acknowledge him. "Yeah. I'd been thinking of the Citadel." Some relief is evident in Desmond's voice, in the ability to relax his words, not guard his tongue. "But where does a man start? And will they even let a bastard-born pig-ignorant northerner inside their fuckin' library?" For a moment, there's anger again, frustration. "Especially now. With what they say. What I figure you been wanting to say to me." He bites it off, clearly swallowing some other word. "Anyway. This ain't a war to plan. But if you help me, I'd take you with me to see it."

Hellan's mouth gradually pulls into a line, but she says nothing of the things that spark Desmond's ire, when she could so easily inflame it further. "I can see about the Citadel," she says, slow and low, considering and confident — almost to the point of reassuring. Almost. Not quite.

Desmond closes his eyes, just for a moment, sagging his chin forward. "I would owe you a favor. A much larger'n than the one you still owe me. If you'll help." He glances sideways at the woman, measuring her, head tilting a bit. "You think I sucked cock to get knighted?"

Just as Hellan is about to respond to such things as favours and her potential help, Desmond asks his question, and she looks at him though he's leaking his brains out his ear, pressing her dark brows down and grimacing. "It can't say it crossed my mind," she says — bitterly, for now it has. Not every scrap of gossip makes its way to her knowledge. "Metaphorically, now that is a possibility," she adds offhandedly, turning from his gaze to take another drink.

Desmond flinches faintly and nods. "I needed to hear it from someone who hated me," he says quietly. "They're all saying it. Men I never met, they're saying it. Like I never stood in front of that mob. It's like I never accomplished nothing myself." For a moment, the self-pity has full reign, but then he tamps it down, straightens. "So you'll help me, then?"

She lets him talk and pity himself without interruption and she doesn't say a thing about it afterward. Hellan's own opinions stir in her eyes, a bit of dark in the ice, but she does not bother to speak them."If there's something to be found." It is not the most ringing of endorsements, but she nods her head slowly: it's an agreement.

Desmond rises to his feet, then. "Then I'll be looking for you, Lady. If there's anything you need of me, ask it. So far's I'm concerned, I'm in your debt." He drowns the rest of the strong brown ale from his tankard, setting it down atop the table. "And thank you for the hospitality. And the rest."

"Don't start thinking me too generous," Hellan retorts. A vague flicker of a smirk exists at one side of her mouth; a joke, perhaps, a reference to her similar words the last day she met when she was rather less generous than today, in fact. If she remembers it at all.

As he makes his way out the door, Desmond can be heard laughing. "I shall never make that mistake," he throws over his shoulder.

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