What's the point of fighting to survive if you aren't going to live your life to the fullest?
Sophia's words echoed in Cricket's ears as they made a mad dash through the streets of Morya. Cricket had only ever survived before, and had never really bothered imagining a life where she got to live instead. What did that mean? What did it look like?
Currently, it meant antagonizing and running away from slavers while ignoring the ugly feeling she got at the idea of Velstadt advising Abel to live more while spending time in a brothel. She was able to think such complex thoughts because escaping danger through busy streets was second nature to her. The former thief tugged at the latch of an oversized wagon--releasing the opening to the back and sending a cascade of barrels 'barrelling' towards the advancing men, in the meantime, she moved up rather than through--climbing up a rafter to begin running atop rooftops, keeping her focus on Sophia. At the first opportunity, she dropped a laundry line down in front of the running woman.
"Up here!" she called out.
“Hah! Forget field training, Cricket! You’re masterful!” Sophia leaped up as high as she could, snatching the line with both hands. She tilted her hips and raised her knees, to gain height and speed as the barrels rolled and crashed into the two pursuing men. While she got close to the wall below Cricket, her leather boots ran alongside it until she leaped up and rolled onto the roof to run to Cricket's side.
Sophia raised a hand to her, a gesture for a high five.
Sophia complimented. “If only I had met you sooner. You'd run circles around everyone in Seta.”
Cricket blushed a little under Sophia's words, not used to such praise, and found herself once again under the compulsion of Sophia's pure charisma. She glanced away, embarrassed by her willingness to participate in the high five, but clapped her hand against Sophia's nonetheless.
It was serious, of course. They were running for their lives after all. But something about Sophia made it....fun. Cricket actually let out a laugh as they lost them.
Sophia smiled admiringly before nudging her head to the right to signal a turn.
“The Pleasure District is down this way.” Sophia made a sharp right turn and leaped across a building, sliding off the slope of a roof to land on the rooftop of another. After traveling over several gaps, Sophia hopped down onto a sturdy market stand and then softly landed on the ground.
“Looks like we lost them. Good.” Sophia dusted off her pants and glanced around to see if anyone was near.
“Hopefully, it puts those low lives out of business.” Once Cricket finally hopped down, a large burly man from the shadows grabbed them both with a large embrace, pinning them both together and restraining them with steel-like biceps.
“Got you!” It was one of the men that was stopped by the guards earlier. “You both are going to pay twentyfold for the shit we've been through.”
Sophia’s nervous laugh came out, surprised that one of them managed to find them. “Cut us some slack; maybe we could trade?”
“Sure! Your lives for our lost coin!”
A figure stepped into the alley, his sword tapping against the stone to gain the attention of the three.
“Let them go.”
“Now hold on—“ The large man was interrupted by a pouch of coins that smacked onto his face.
Quickly, his arms let go of the two women, and he caught the small bag before it hit the ground.
The man was one Cricket would recognize. The snobby, high, and mighty squire from just yesterday. He was fully clad in silver armor save for his head, his mid-length blonde hair being pushed away from his face.
Angered but accepting, the large man left the three in peace. The squire approached Sophia, kneeling to her.
“You are the fairest woman I’ve ever seen—“ The squire stopped and squinted at Cricket, realizing she was the same woman from yesterday.
Cricket's face was a blank stone. He flirted with Sophia in the same way he'd tried to do with her the day before.
“Sorry, boyo! We’re in a hurry! See you never!”
A palm pushed onto the squire’s head while another grabbed Cricket’s wrist, guiding her out of the alley and towards the Pleasure District.
“Whew…sometimes us girls have our perks, hm?” She laughed, walking at an average pace until they stopped at the heart of the district—a large stone fountain.
“Velstadt mentioned a place around here. Damn, what was the name?” She tapped her foot and closed her eyes in thought, not realizing that Abel and Velstadt were right across the fountain at the entrance of a place named Revelare.
“Look, all you have to do is lie with her. She’s all over you, kid.” Velstadt explained to a visibly annoyed Abel, whose arms were crossed. “Come on, mate; it’s not difficult. What are you scared of?”
“I can’t believe we spent all morning searching for this woman for a screw-up you won’t even tell me about.” Abel shook his head.
“Argh! Why is not important. I need a few minutes. What is with you, anyway? Is it the size? It's why you won't with any woman, right?”
“You’re an idiot, and I’m leaving.”
“Okay! Okay! Hold on, dammit.” Velstadt pinched between his brows, trying to think of a way to convince Abel otherwise.
Abel’s eyes looked over towards the fountain, spotting Cricket and Sophia approaching them.
Right away, Abel could feel the irritation radiating off of Cricket which made his gaze harden at Velstadt.
Cricket told Abel with her body language all he needed to know, though he was still confused about why she was angry at him too.
Cricket crossed her own arms. "Sophia thought you two might need some help. Clearly, you are fine."
And it was with all the youthful, irritable, over-emotional passive-aggressive behavior in the world that had her whirling around and storming off.
"Let's go, Sophia."
Velstadt gestured a shooing motion to Cricket which caused Abel to nudge him angrily.
“What?” Velstadt asked genuinely.
After a small silence, he sighed, frustrated, and ran toward Cricket and Sophia to block their way.
“Hey! Hold on, we are actually not fine. I know I stole your friend, but it was essential.” He put up his hands in an attempt to calm her down.
“It’s a long story; I got drunk and got something taken away. Yes, very sad...But the twat tricked me, and I need it back.” He looked at Sophia, urging her to convince Cricket, but Sophia’s hands went up, and she looked in another direction to indicate that it wasn't up to her.
“Come on!, Why can't things ever go my way?” He outbursted, the frustration pushing his need to use every swear imaginable. After calming down, he decided to explain himself since he knew that if Cricket left, Abel would abandon him too.
“Listen, Cricket,” Velstadt said hopelessly. “She has the only thing I have left of my family. I know we got off terribly, but please. I need you all to help me here.”
Velstadt looked at Abel, far behind the girls, gesturing for him to come down. But Abel only shook his head, watching from where he stood. “Argh.” He pinched his brows yet again.
Crossing her arms over her chest, Cricket was not happy or willing to engage with Velstadt's nonsense. The expression on her face clearly said as much as he began to go on about how he screwed himself over by drinking and possibly gambling in the pleasure district.
"We were each given a sack of money, if that's how you chose to spend it, it's on you." She wanted to go back to storming off--she and Sophia had more training to do, there was a war in front of them! They didn't have time for this. She didn't want to feel for the man who called her 'mud princess'. She didn't want to show him any sympathy or compassion.
Especially when he'd taken Abel to a brothel, and who knew what they'd already spent the morning doing? But.... Cricket didn't have any family either. And if she'd had something to remember them by......
"What exactly do you need us to do anyway? You think if we ask nicely she'll just give whatever it was back to you?"
Velstadt sighed, looking over to the entrance where Abel stood. Cricket’s words about his money cut him deeper than he would imagine, but his desperation took precedence over his pride. He tried to hide his shame behind, now Sophia and Cricket, his teeth gritting with frustration.
“I didn't spend my coin, my damned ring was taken. And taken unfairly, I may add.” He corrected Cricket, watching her with an upset but softened gaze. “In my younger days she’d die on the spot for pulling something like this.”
Sophia leaned over to Cricket and leaned into her ear. “It would be a good idea to help him out. I work very closely with Velstadt because our roles in the wolves are aligned.”
She explained. “He can train you with skills of his own that I can't. Just a suggestion.” Sophia’s eyes looked over to Velstadt and she smiled sinisterly.
“And the best way to piss him off, if you wanted to, is to have him owe you a favor.” Velstadt eyed them both with an annoyed scowl, knowing Sophia was correct on how to piss him off.
Cricket’s question on what he needed the ladies for had finally caused him to strike a smile on his face, almost as if he had won Cricket over already.
“Well the good news, for me, is that I already managed to take the ring and hide it in one of the rooms before getting thrown out. If prince charming over there had followed my plan, I would have already been long gone with it.” Unbeknownst to the three, Abel had already walked over and was standing beside Cricket. “Your plan involved me taking one of the girls and--”
Velstadt quickly interrupted in an attempt to not upset Cricket any further, speaking through his shut teeth. “I just need Cricket to be under the guise of one of the girls and Abel to take her to said room.”
Sophia’s lips quivered, doing all she could to hold back her laughter.
“Sophia and I will distract pretty much everyone in the vicinity while you two go inside and nab my ring. Simple as that.” Velstadt pointed to a shop on the other end of the fountain, tossing Sophia his pouch of coins. “Go over there and get Cricket dolled up. Then meet back here so that we can set things in motion.”
Abel blinked blankly.
Cricket supposed that if she were going to stay with the wolves throughout the raid on Fort Allum, then forming stronger allies would be a boon. And if there was anyone within the wolves that she wasn't afraid of forming a bond with, it was Velstadt.
"If I do this..." Cricket began carefully, slowly, "You will owe me. Big." She said, pointing a finger at him. "But it's a shit plan. What kind of brothel doesn't know who its working girls are? And if you and Sophia are going to distract everyone, why can't Abel and I just break in the normal way?"
She'd already played dress up at the ball when she'd worn the dress the Queen had wanted her to. Was she about to do so again for Velstadt?
The amount of frustration that appeared on Velstadt’s face caused Sophia’s quick laugh to slip out of her fingers. Velstadt opened his mouth but then quickly adjusted it to an enraged smile.
“My plan is not shit young amateur. I can see from one look in those blues of yours that you used to be a thief once. And as an ex-leader of one of the most infamous thief guilds in the world, my plans only fail because my faith in others to follow them seems to get the best of me much more often than I'm used to. I suppose it's just this blasted new generation.”
Velstadt's smile was met with Cricket's glare. "You are trying to tell me you used to be the leader of The Hollowed Key? No way that's true. The leader of a group like that would be sipping cocktails on his pile of gold right now, not begging for allies to break into a brothel for him." She finally smiled back, just as vicious as his. New generation indeed.
There was a slight reflection written on Velstadt’s face. Her words surprisingly had not angered him, but instead, he gave a few words of his own.
“I suppose you’ve yet to see a pattern from those you have met within The Wolves. Those who are with us are either purposeless, fallen, or have no other place to go. The lives we lived, the lives we had, are almost always snatched away from us in tragedy.”
Cricket glanced back at Velstadt, a bit haunted by the explanation. Purposeless, fallen, or have no other place to go. It certainly fit her, and Abel. And now that she knew of Sophia's background, it clearly fit her as well. Cricket had kept her distance from the rest of the wolves as much as she could on purpose. Afraid of getting too attached and forming bonds that couldn't be undone.
But Velstadt was, strangely enough, shaking her up enough to realize that maybe she was missing out on a great deal by living that way.
He waved off the subject and crossed his arms as he began to explain. “The assistant so happens to be a new lass, who's expecting the arrival of Polly Bluefield. Polly is one of the newer girls who just so happens to have traveled to Morya from Twinrook. Fortunately for us, most of the women have no idea what Polly even looks like. As long as you avoid the veteran girls, you’ll be fine.”
Velstadt leaned forward. “And good luck trying to break in the normal way. Revelare is a very popular and expensive establishment with visitors who come from all over the land. Their vault holds heaps of gold and as a result, the place is riddled with some of the toughest, meanest security you will ever see. But if you want to get a few teeth knocked loose, be my guest.”
“They can try,” Abel murmured.
“We are not trying to spend years locked away, so I’d like to avoid whatever conflict you’d cause, Prince kill-a-lot.” Velstadt pointed vindictively. His eyes went over to Cricket again, impatient.
“Now are you going to help me? Or are you going to criticize and ask six hundred questions, Princess?”
Sophia grabbed Cricket’s bow and aligned it with Sophia’s own, slipping an arm through the bowstring and resting it along her torso.
“Come on, I’ve got clothes for you after all this anyway. Got some just in case your training did a number on them.”
She grinned and took Cricket’s arm in hers.
Velstadt watched with patience. “Just hurry up and meet us back here when you're done. The sooner we get my ring the sooner we can forget this mess.”
And with that, Sophia finally led Cricket away.
"The brothels in Nadia are traps. Any girl with a halfway decent face can walk in, and they'll feed you, clothe you, give you a bed---but the charges on the food are huge, the clothes and bed are rentals--they have girls in debt up to their ears before the first customer...."
She paused in her scowling and an actual nervous look spread on her face. "If Abel and I get stuck in there, don't leave us behind." A moment of vulnerability.
As they crossed past the fountain to enter the large clothing shop, the redhead sighed and turned to Cricket with a smile again.
“Don’t worry, Cricket. No one is going to leave you behind. I know you and Vel aren't exactly best friends but I can tell you that when it comes to things like this, I wouldn't have anyone else in his place.”
Sophia began going through some of the dresses, holding them up to inspect them.
“Oh! Abel will love this one.” She pulled out a red dress that revealed more skin than Morya’s queen. A red dress that went down to her navel.
"I think that's more your style than Abel's." Cricket said dryly, which of course then made her try to figure out which dress was to Abel's taste. A challenge that all the dresses seemed to fall short of.
“No? Really?” Sophia pursed her lips and fished around some more until she pulled out two more.
“….”
“Come on, Cricket, you’ll say no to everything I pull out...you’ve got to look the part! Just choose one of these already!” She practically grabbed a random dress and pulled it into a changing room.
“It’s not too small, it'll fit. Wow, it hugs nicely. No, no, it's perfect. Don’t be such a kid!” Sophia had a mad grin, pulling Cricket out of the small changing room and tossing several coins of gold onto the counter to purchase her dress and shoes.
When the two ladies made their way back to Abel and Velstadt, Abel seemed to have been frozen in place with their arrival.
“Hi," Cricket greeted shyly as she toyed with a loose curl of her hair--she'd undone her normal blonde braid when she'd changed into her...' disguise'.
A sky blue dress that complemented both her eyes and necklace.
She felt a thrill of victory when she saw that Abel couldn't move a muscle.
“Alright, good.” Velstadt nodded, looking over to Sophia.
“Ready?”
“Of course!” Sophia raised a fist and revealed a hexagonal die.
“You?”
“No. But go.”
Sophia dropped the die, looking at it spin until a picture of a lion was the result.
“Hehehe.” Sophia picked up the die and tossed it to Velstadt with a triumphant smile.
Velstadt, rolling his eyes, caught the die and dropped it, spinning until a picture of a snake was facing up toward them.
“Gah!” Velstadt kicked the die angrily, a frustrated sigh escaping his lips as Sophia jumped up a few times with victorious giggles.
“Can't believe this shit.” He murmured.
Cocking a hand back, Sophia screamed a high-pitched distressing scream, promptly slapping Velstadt across the face with the most vicious slap one could see, causing Velstadt to stumble a bit.
With tears on her face, she began to announce to everyone around them:
“You damned pervert! How dare you grasp my chest and bottom! Someone, please help!” Velstadt took a solid punch in the face from a complete bystander and a shove onto the ground from another, angered eyes beaming at Abel and Cricket for them to get moving.
Abel, dumbfounded, looked over to Cricket and began to step back as some guards and civilians joined in the chaos.
Cricket hooked her arm in with Abel's as she began to lead the way into Revelare.
"How can they seem so smart and so stupid at the same time?"