The air felt like soup. Thick, warm, and muggy. No breeze caressed the rolling fields and humble hills of Bree-land on this night. Even atop the high crumble of ruins behind the Prancing Pony, lofted above the streets and treetops, there was no hint of wind. She had climbed here in hopes of a puff of air to cool the sticky-hot strands of fiery hair that clung to her brow and temples. And also for a mete of privacy to speak with the dark-eyed man who had been lurking about the tavern, with his pale, twitchy fingers and velvet-soft voice.
They stood next to each other, gazing out at the evening sky. The far horizon was hazy and muted with the moisture that hung over the landscape. The huntress was like a quiet flame with her copper-bright hair and pinked cheeks smattered in freckles. In contrast, the man somehow always seemed to look cold to her. His pallid face only got more pale under the summer heat, with beads of sweat sitting on his brow like tiny, frozen crystals. She imagined that the sodden bits of raven hair on his head were somehow chilly rather than warm, as if he'd been doused in an icy bath.
"A week it would be," the man was saying now. His arms were folded, but she sensed those hands were still fidgeting, even unseen. His voice was calm and smooth, unlike his fingers. "No longer."
"I don't do that anymore," she mumbled her reply.
He turned and regarded her. The moment stretched out long. So long that she began to squirm in place, adjusting her feet, refusing to look back at him. "Then let this be your re-entry into it," he said.
"Nay," she answered.
"Why?" he asked, and he turned his whole body towards her, facing her square-on so that even with her eyes averted, she had less opportunity to elude his attention.
"Because I prom..." she started, but the words failed almost immediately on her tongue. It sounded weak, and she knew it, and she hated it. Even as she spoke, she understood the idiocy and childishness of it all. The promise was an old one. Ancient. Forgotten by the one who'd made her utter it, no doubt. Her mind flipped onto a new arc as quickly as she could manage it. "I just don't do that anymore."
"It could line your pockets so much as to make it worthwhile," he countered, and one of the white hands popped out into view, drumming its fingertips over his arm. Ta-da-dum. Ta-da-dum.
This brought a sudden laugh from her throat, and the sound was sharp and bright like gleaming steel under the setting sun. "I have no need for coin! I've more than enough and nothing at all that would make me want more of it."
The man sucked on his teeth briefly, then ran his pale tongue over them. "What do you value then? All Men desire something." He angled a shoulder towards her, as if meaning to close the gap between them. A pause followed, and she sensed his eyes inspecting her closely. "Those are fine, black arrows. But you only have two."
"Hmm," she hummed idly, shrugging her right shoulder. "Aye. I had more, but I gave them away."
"Peculiar woman, you are," he chuckled darkly. "Giving away treasures and leaving yourself with none. What if you could fill your quiver with more of them? So many that you wouldn't need any others?"
She turned now and fixed her turquoise eyes on the man while he loomed over her. One copper brow was arched high, and her lips pursed. "I wouldn't even know where to go to get more of them. They were a gift."
The black eyes squinted, and there was a drawn-out silence. "And if you were assured that you could have all that you wished?"
"M'not doing it." One toe tapped irritably against the ancient stone beneath them.
The man reached a hand forth. She did not recoil, but turned her face sharply to follow his movement. The hand went downward, to the quiver strapped to her hip. The long, pale, cold-looking fingers caught the shining, ebon head of one of the black arrows. She felt an impulse to jerk away from that contact, or to strike his arm.
"Pity," he said coolly, taking his hand away before she could react further. He turned then, lacing his hands behind his back and strolling back towards the path they had taken up the hill. The hazy air seemed to envelop and swallow him as he went. "Such fine arrows."
The huntress' face twitched as she glared after him.
