Dangerous Toys by Ejunknown [drabble #188 - Swing]
Title: Dangerous toys
Author: Ejunknown
Genre: Drama, Romance.
Warnings: none.
Summary: The beginning of an adventure that has been waiting in the wings for a while. A displaced noblewoman finds herself quite outside her comfort zone.
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Dangerous toys.
Her first memory when she awoke was of the smooth feel of metal against her fingers. The heavy, greased feel of it was tucked tightly within her grip, the smooth lacquer of the carved grip emanating soft warmth against her palm; accompanied by a sense of contentment, as if it was exactly where it belonged.
Snugly fitted tightly gripping, she lifted herself from the dirt that pushed against her cheek, her expression stoic as it steadily setttled on the weapon in her hands.
She recognised that carefully crafted. elegant design, ordered especially by her beloved grandfather, and gifted to her on last Birthday.
Her Derringer.
Her fingers relaxed their grip immediately as if a burning brand had been pressed to them, her heart skipping to double its pace as the weapon left her fingers and slipped to the ground, landing with a soft thump. She had resolved to only draw that weapon in the most extraneous of circumstanced. Just where was she, and why - the godforsaken question - why, had she no memory of what had delivered her to this?
For one thing, she was standing. She could feel the weapon at her feet - and for another thing; if it had hurt coming down, she sure as hell wasn’t dreaming. Searching for clarification, her fingernails lightly grazed of her arms. She was not dreaming, that was for sure.
Blinking, her eyes struggled to distinguish a shape, her eyes struggling to recognise any sort of light at all. Her pulse skidded to a thundering pacebeneath her fingers, as she groped blindly at stone, fingernails grinding unpleasantly against impersonal material.
And then warm, human skin.
Her hands froze, splaying fully across a live, beating heart within the comfortingly human confinements of skin.
Closing her eyes - what use were they to be open, anyway? - she cleared her throat, her voice wavering in the dark. “Pardon me… please. Would you explain to me who you are?”
A moment of silence followed, and indignant courage rose, pressing her most pertinent question against her lips. “Do you know what happened?”
She didn’t care if she confused whatever poor soul happened to be pressed uncomfortably against her - she just knew that this shouldn’t have happened. Clinging to the bravery that seemed to have risen in the thrill of the moment, she splayed both hands across the person on front of her, ascertaining that this was indeed a man.