sigyn + diya // in which he should call peta
Who: Sigyn & Diya
When: After this thread.
Where: Diya's rooms in the Hold
Rating & Warnings: PG-13?
She shouldn't be at the Hold. That much was clear as she scrambled up the steps to Diya's tower. Her breath was short after only three-fourths of the way, but she kept on until his door spiraled into view. "Diya!" she shouted and threw a fist against it, scowling. She shouldn't be here. She shouldn't have spoken to him at all. The Tartessian brat was a rich moron who didn't even know how to spell tact, let alone practice it. Everything that didn't involve getting fucked or getting drunk was an overreaction to him.
How could he not see he could ruin her life with a few simple words? It didn't matter what she'd actually done. Cita was not as forgiving as the King. "Diya!" she growled again and kicked a slippered foot against the door, panting. "Open the door!"
He jumped at the first pound against the door; Baayot leapt down from his shoulders to screech at it, yellow teeth bared. Flowers. She'd really come? "Fuck," Diya muttered. He rose from his chair and swept the monkey aside impatiently with his boot as he walked to the door, wincing every time it shuddered. She couldn't possibly force the lock... could she? He hesitated a foot away, then leaned forward to shout, "Make me!"
Why let her in? It was clear she'd come to hit him, or knee him again, or something else equally unpleasant.
Make me? Make me? That's what he had to say? Sigyn briefly saw red. She threw herself against the door with a loud bang and silently cursed the pang in her shoulder. "You idiot!" she screeched angrily and took a step back, one hand rubbing her shoulder roughly.
"Do you even think about what comes out of your mouth!?" A lump in her throat rose as she thought of the answer she already knew: no. Diya didn't think. He didn't care. None of it would matter if he would open the door. She'd scratch him, slap him, shout at him until she felt better and that would be that. Until then, she only had her own frustration and angry tears pricking at her eyes. "Open the door!" Her voice cracked with the command, and she stepped back again and sank against the wall, hands at her face.
She hadn't come here to cry. She'd come here to hit someone. Why wouldn't he just open the fucking door?
His eyes narrowed. He knew that sound well enough in a woman's voice. He'd heard it only recently in Merena's. There was a brief hesitation; she could be tricking him, pretending to cry until he opened the door. He wouldn't put it past her, but... she'd never struck him as much of an actress, either. If Sigyn Flowers knew how to hide her feelings, it was a skill she never employed.
"Cita's balls," Diya muttered, and lifted the bar on the door. It swung open with a low creak, revealing Flowers slumped against the wall. He winced down at her, one hand going to scratch at the back of his neck. "Alright, alright," he sighed, guilt in his expression. "Come in." Hit me was on the tip of his tongue, but he doubted she needed the invitation.
She took the invitation inside without acknowledgement and ducked in under his arm. The stench of booze and animal that greeted her nearly knocked her past the threshold again. Dotted along most available surfaces were bottles in various states of empty. The monkey was around somewhere, stinking and diseased. She could hear it chittering. The sad scene almost inspired pity for him, until she remembered why she'd come in the first place.
"Moron," she hissed and took a clumsy swipe at his face when he'd barely turned around.
"Cita--" Diya hissed, then grunted when he ducked out of the way of her swing. Well, that was unsurprising. "Fuck, Flowers, you-- stop!" He caught her wrist and squeezed it warningly. There was a rustling around his feet, and then he felt four paws climb their way up his side and onto his shoulder. Baayot peered at Sigyn and screeched again, head tilting as it looked her over.
"Stop," Diya repeated, eyebrows raised. "Or I'll toss you out again."
"You stop!" She saw him holding her wrist through blurry eyes, Baayot nothing but a black, screeching blob next to his head. "Do you know what kind of trouble you could get me into?" How was she supposed to hide this if asked about it by Cita? Her mind was as open to him as the Citadel he controlled. He'd read her mind and given her a warning. Her burst of rage at the man in front of her had been fueled by equal parts fear as it had frustration.
Her head bowed as she swept her free hand across her eyes. "Let go," she mumbled and tugged at his grip.
Was it really such a big deal? Diya barely kept himself from rolling his eyes. She was paranoid. Understandable, he supposed, with all the killings going on, but it wasn't as if she was an Other. She had nothing to fear. What she'd done was frowned upon, certainly, but simply entering a whorehouse wasn't cause for execution...
"Are you going to hit me again?" he drawled, keeping a firm grip on her wrist until she answered. What was it with crying women lately?
Her wet, red eyes were narrowed when she looked to him again. "Are you sorry?"
A simple answer for a simple question. If he wasn't, she'd keep hitting him. She'd break bottles. She'd send his stupid pet sailing out of the window. Diya would understand. Her eyebrows raised as she waited for an answer, almost in challenge.
Exasperated, he sighed. "For what? I told you, you're overreacting. They're not going to kick you out for going to a brothel. You didn't even fuck anyone."
Even if she had, Initiates had a free pass, didn't they? His knowledge of the Citadel was dim at best. Baayot leapt over onto Sigyn's shoulder while they were both immobile, chittering and raising its paws to pick at her hair.
"Because-" Her shout was cut short by an outright scream of fear when the monkey jumped on her shoulder. Her body seemed to move of its own accord against the dirty little beast, her free hand slapping at it until she heard a thump and an angry chitter. She'd never liked the creature. Something with those sinister little hands and little beady eyes belonged in a cage, not let to roam free. The scuffle of little paws against the wooden floor and a tug at the hem of her robes made her jump. Another soft thud sounded as a slipper connected with the monkey's stomach, sending it rolling a few feet backwards.
"Make it stop!" The wrist in Diya's grip tugged again as she backed into him. How was she supposed to hide behind him for cover if he was still holding it?
His ears rang from her screams, and Diya stumbled and grabbed at her when she backed into him to keep them both steady. "Will you-- stop, it's a fucking monkey!" He let go of her wrist long enough to take both of them and pin them to her chest. "Cita's balls, Flowers, calm down." At their feet Baayot howled and screeched and scrambled up onto the bookcase, chittering angrily at Sigyn from the top shelf.
"Do you attack every tiny animal you see?" Diya asked, exasperated. "Honestly. He's as dangerous as a fucking squirrel." He peered down at the girl he held, one eyebrow cocked. "I'm going to let you go. You're not going to scream or hit me again. Alright? I'll pour you a glass of wine and you can sit the fuck down and talk, if that's what you want."
The press of arms around her made her choke with temporary panic. She leaned against Diya's arms, vision obscured by the hair that had fallen into her face. For a small, tense moment she felt herself hovering on the edge of total hysteria. She shoved back the urge to scream and thrash until her voice and limbs gave out from exhaustion and bit her tongue against another sob. When had her life gotten so out of her own control? Her shoulders shook.
"I don't want any wine, Diya," she ground out finally, and ducked her head to wipe her face against the hands pinned against her. Her skin was hot and wet with tears. "I want you to stop being such an ass."
Get in line. He swallowed that response and instead released her with a noise of disgust. His hands were wet from her tears, and he wiped them on his trousers before he turned and went to the desk to pour himself a glass. "You're overreacting," he said again as he uncorked a fresh bottle and looked around for a clean glass before he simply raised the bottle to his lips and took a tug. Flowers would be much easier to deal with if he was slightly drunk.
"And really, who are you to call someone an ass?" He looked over his shoulder at her. "I'm not the one banging people's doors down to hit them and kick their pets."
She stumbled forward when he released her and brought her own hands to her face, pressing the pads of her fingers into her eyelids. The room stunk and so did the company. The familiar clink of glass and pop of a cork gave away what he was doing. She frowned into her hands and let them slide away from her face, then took a deep breath to steel the nerves that threatened to explode when Diya spoke again.
"You little idiot!" It hadn't worked that well. She glared at him and his bottle, briefly considering taking it from him and cracking it over his head. The glass looked thick enough to put a dent in his skull. "It doesn't matter if people would have found out eventually, what right did you have to say something publically like that? You don't think about other people before you open your mouth! You're supposed to be my friend!"
He rested the butt of the bottle against his thigh, watching her seethe. This was a tirade he'd heard before from a hundred different mouths, and it hadn't interested him the first time. At the last, he arched an eyebrow. "Friends? Are we? You do nothing but insult me and ask for favours, Flowers. I like you, I do, but I wonder how it is you'd consider your behavior friendly."
A soft, squeaky yelp from the bed made him look over his shoulder. Gulliver had lifted his head, big black eyes blinking sleepily. Diya looked back to Sigyn, mouth quirked to one side before he took another tug from the bottle. "Got a puppy," he said, jerking his head towards the bed. "If you'd like to kick him too."
"That's not true!" She'd been friendly to him. "I have so!" She was sure of it. In the middling of puzzling out all of their interactions, she noticed the dog. The wrinkled face and big chops were undeniably familiar. Just like Bashirah and Asher. The sudden distant pang of longing for one of their owners only reaffirmed her anger. It was justified.
"The Citadel isn't safe anymore," she snapped, and rounded the bed to see the dog fully. You poor bastard, she thought at the animal. Your owner is a complete ass. "Even a blind man would know that!" The Citadel had at least one now. Pilgrims from outer cities had brought in all types of clergy. "You have no idea what my life is like!"
"Then leave," Diya snapped. "If it's so bloody dangerous there, leave. That's what half the Civitates have been doing, isn't it?" He made a noise of disgust before he sat on the edge of the bed and took another drink from the bottle. Kick in, he thought impatiently. Flowers was maddening to deal with sober, even moreso when she was angry and looking for a target.
He tapped the fingers of his free hand against the covers, and he heard the soft whimper and rustle of sheets as Gulliver stumbled over to him. His legs were too short yet to manage wading through the covers easily, and he tripped more than once before he reached Diya's hand and nosed at it, wrinkled head turning to lick at his fingers. "And perhaps," he drawled, watching the puppy, "If it was such a damning thing to do, you shouldn't have gone to a fucking whorehouse in the first place."
"Cita can read minds!"
She hadn't mean to screech it. His advice was unwanted, unprompted, and bad besides. Sigyn licked her lips and drew her hair over one shoulder and turned to the window out of embarrassment. "He did it to me the other day." He'd warned her to stop faltering, too. Her upper lip disappeared between her teeth nervously, and she threw up her hands. "Where do you even hide from someone like that, Diya?"
His eyebrows rose as he looked back at her. "Well, I'd expect so. He is God, isn't he? That's part of the whole..." He lifted the bottle in a helpless gesture, then shrugged. "God package."
It was a lucky thing he hadn't run into Cita on his trip to the Citadel, then. It'd been hard to keep his thoughts holy when the God's bride had turned around. Diya took another gulp, then set the bottle at his feet so he could scoop Gulliver into his lap. "You hide wherever you need to. Unless he's found a way to be everywhere at once, too." He frowned, eyes narrowing in a squint. "Isn't that part of the God package as well?"
She threw her hands up again in exasperation. Was anything she'd told him sinking in an ounce? It couldn't be that simple. It couldn't. If it was that simple she would have figured it out on her own instead of having some drunk, womanising brat downplay her issues while stroking a puppy. A hand went to her mouth as she looked at him, eyes narrowed. Yes, her life was totally out of control.
"It's not that easy, stupid." Another heavy, long suffering sigh huffed out as she dropped to sit on the bed next to him. "Does anything ever bother you at all?"
"Seems it is to me," Diya replied with a shrug, scratching behind Gulliver's ears, then his belly when the puppy flopped onto its side in his lap. It would be monstrously big and fat when it grew up, he suspected. Not a guard dog at all... but cute in its own way. Ugly.
He glanced up and over at the girl beside him, one eyebrow cocking. "They do. But not much. Especially when there's such an easy way out," he finished with a crooked smile. "Look, I'm not the best at giving advice and I'm a right fuck most the time but... you're really making this more complicated than it needs to be." A pause, and he scooped Gulliver up and deposited him into Sigyn's lap. "Here, have a puppy."
Sigyn stared down at the mass of Gulliver in her lap. It was already fat, and lazy besides. It reminded her nothing of Bashirah's energetic nips and wriggling when she was picked up. A poke to the small creature's side did nothing besides prompt it to stretch out. Even Wellington's dog showed more initiative, even if it was only digging itself into bags of flour and nuts.
"No thank you." She pushed the dog off of her lap, watching its little limbs windmill to try and find its footing again. It sniffed at the bottle that lay at their feet and raised a heavy paw to swipe at it, knocking it over. Her eyebrows raised with a surprised nod. Maybe the dog would be good for something after all.
"No, don't--" Diya sucked in a breath with a hiss and bent quickly to right the bottle, but most of it had already spilled out across the floor. Gulliver looked only mildly guilty before it sniffed at the wine and, intrigued, started to lick at it. "No, no," the lordling sighed, scooping the puppy up again. It wriggled and whined in his arms, and Diya tossed it back into the pile of blankets at the head of the bed. Why were his pets so unmanageable?
"You didn't kick it," he muttered, looking down at the dark spill on the floor. Should he clean it? No, no, the maids would get to it... He sat back down, careful to keep his boots out of the puddle. "That's progress."
She watched with interest as the puddle slowly stretched away from the bed. His words were distant to her ears, wrapped up in her own thoughts. There had been no galvanising reaction from him either way. Her situation was nowhere near as simple as he was making it out to be, she'd thought, but now she'd began to wonder. Could she just simply be going hysterical or was he just a right fuck, as he'd said? Not a week ago he'd been trying to seduce her.
A hand shifted to pat at his knee. "I'm going to go. Have fun with your dog and your.. squirrel."
His eyebrows lifted, and Diya grinned as he took her hand. "Sure you don't want to stay?" He expected to be slapped for that, or shouted at, but sometimes the shift in Flowers' face from neutrality to fury was too fun to pass up. "I'll have you praising Cita in no time."
And then Sigyn threw Diya out the window.
The end.
Her eyes widened as the intent of his suggestion sank in. The fury was there again in her face, fresh and hot as she drew her hand away from him. It snapped back a moment later, the back of it right across his face with a loud smack. "You are such a fuck!" she pat, and scrambled away from the bed to get out of his reach. "Fuck you!"
Even with his cheek stinging, Diya burst out laughing. He half-turned his head back to look at her, eyes bright despite the bright red mark across his face. It'd been a while since he'd been slapped like that.
"Do you ever stop being angry?" he asked, grin crooked. After a moment he stood up and brushed himself off. "Don't worry. By now I'm sure you've trained every cock in the city to run and hide at the sight of you." He stepped around her to pick up an opened bottle from a windowsill, sniff it, and then take a gulp. He hesitated a moment before he swallowed, satisfied. Still good. "Go on, then." Diya glanced over his shoulder, smirking. "See you at the wedding."
And then Sigyn threw Diya out the window.
The end.
Her face flushed with embarrassment. The closest thing to her was another bottle. It was empty and reeking, an almost vinegar-y smell wafting up from the neck as she took hold of it and flung it as hard as she could at him. Without waiting to see his reaction, she turned for the door and left it hanging wide behind her as she exited.
She hoped he fell out the window. It would be doing a favour to both her and his new bride.
When: After this thread.
Where: Diya's rooms in the Hold
Rating & Warnings: PG-13?
She shouldn't be at the Hold. That much was clear as she scrambled up the steps to Diya's tower. Her breath was short after only three-fourths of the way, but she kept on until his door spiraled into view. "Diya!" she shouted and threw a fist against it, scowling. She shouldn't be here. She shouldn't have spoken to him at all. The Tartessian brat was a rich moron who didn't even know how to spell tact, let alone practice it. Everything that didn't involve getting fucked or getting drunk was an overreaction to him.
How could he not see he could ruin her life with a few simple words? It didn't matter what she'd actually done. Cita was not as forgiving as the King. "Diya!" she growled again and kicked a slippered foot against the door, panting. "Open the door!"
He jumped at the first pound against the door; Baayot leapt down from his shoulders to screech at it, yellow teeth bared. Flowers. She'd really come? "Fuck," Diya muttered. He rose from his chair and swept the monkey aside impatiently with his boot as he walked to the door, wincing every time it shuddered. She couldn't possibly force the lock... could she? He hesitated a foot away, then leaned forward to shout, "Make me!"
Why let her in? It was clear she'd come to hit him, or knee him again, or something else equally unpleasant.
Make me? Make me? That's what he had to say? Sigyn briefly saw red. She threw herself against the door with a loud bang and silently cursed the pang in her shoulder. "You idiot!" she screeched angrily and took a step back, one hand rubbing her shoulder roughly.
"Do you even think about what comes out of your mouth!?" A lump in her throat rose as she thought of the answer she already knew: no. Diya didn't think. He didn't care. None of it would matter if he would open the door. She'd scratch him, slap him, shout at him until she felt better and that would be that. Until then, she only had her own frustration and angry tears pricking at her eyes. "Open the door!" Her voice cracked with the command, and she stepped back again and sank against the wall, hands at her face.
She hadn't come here to cry. She'd come here to hit someone. Why wouldn't he just open the fucking door?
His eyes narrowed. He knew that sound well enough in a woman's voice. He'd heard it only recently in Merena's. There was a brief hesitation; she could be tricking him, pretending to cry until he opened the door. He wouldn't put it past her, but... she'd never struck him as much of an actress, either. If Sigyn Flowers knew how to hide her feelings, it was a skill she never employed.
"Cita's balls," Diya muttered, and lifted the bar on the door. It swung open with a low creak, revealing Flowers slumped against the wall. He winced down at her, one hand going to scratch at the back of his neck. "Alright, alright," he sighed, guilt in his expression. "Come in." Hit me was on the tip of his tongue, but he doubted she needed the invitation.
She took the invitation inside without acknowledgement and ducked in under his arm. The stench of booze and animal that greeted her nearly knocked her past the threshold again. Dotted along most available surfaces were bottles in various states of empty. The monkey was around somewhere, stinking and diseased. She could hear it chittering. The sad scene almost inspired pity for him, until she remembered why she'd come in the first place.
"Moron," she hissed and took a clumsy swipe at his face when he'd barely turned around.
"Cita--" Diya hissed, then grunted when he ducked out of the way of her swing. Well, that was unsurprising. "Fuck, Flowers, you-- stop!" He caught her wrist and squeezed it warningly. There was a rustling around his feet, and then he felt four paws climb their way up his side and onto his shoulder. Baayot peered at Sigyn and screeched again, head tilting as it looked her over.
"Stop," Diya repeated, eyebrows raised. "Or I'll toss you out again."
"You stop!" She saw him holding her wrist through blurry eyes, Baayot nothing but a black, screeching blob next to his head. "Do you know what kind of trouble you could get me into?" How was she supposed to hide this if asked about it by Cita? Her mind was as open to him as the Citadel he controlled. He'd read her mind and given her a warning. Her burst of rage at the man in front of her had been fueled by equal parts fear as it had frustration.
Her head bowed as she swept her free hand across her eyes. "Let go," she mumbled and tugged at his grip.
Was it really such a big deal? Diya barely kept himself from rolling his eyes. She was paranoid. Understandable, he supposed, with all the killings going on, but it wasn't as if she was an Other. She had nothing to fear. What she'd done was frowned upon, certainly, but simply entering a whorehouse wasn't cause for execution...
"Are you going to hit me again?" he drawled, keeping a firm grip on her wrist until she answered. What was it with crying women lately?
Her wet, red eyes were narrowed when she looked to him again. "Are you sorry?"
A simple answer for a simple question. If he wasn't, she'd keep hitting him. She'd break bottles. She'd send his stupid pet sailing out of the window. Diya would understand. Her eyebrows raised as she waited for an answer, almost in challenge.
Exasperated, he sighed. "For what? I told you, you're overreacting. They're not going to kick you out for going to a brothel. You didn't even fuck anyone."
Even if she had, Initiates had a free pass, didn't they? His knowledge of the Citadel was dim at best. Baayot leapt over onto Sigyn's shoulder while they were both immobile, chittering and raising its paws to pick at her hair.
"Because-" Her shout was cut short by an outright scream of fear when the monkey jumped on her shoulder. Her body seemed to move of its own accord against the dirty little beast, her free hand slapping at it until she heard a thump and an angry chitter. She'd never liked the creature. Something with those sinister little hands and little beady eyes belonged in a cage, not let to roam free. The scuffle of little paws against the wooden floor and a tug at the hem of her robes made her jump. Another soft thud sounded as a slipper connected with the monkey's stomach, sending it rolling a few feet backwards.
"Make it stop!" The wrist in Diya's grip tugged again as she backed into him. How was she supposed to hide behind him for cover if he was still holding it?
His ears rang from her screams, and Diya stumbled and grabbed at her when she backed into him to keep them both steady. "Will you-- stop, it's a fucking monkey!" He let go of her wrist long enough to take both of them and pin them to her chest. "Cita's balls, Flowers, calm down." At their feet Baayot howled and screeched and scrambled up onto the bookcase, chittering angrily at Sigyn from the top shelf.
"Do you attack every tiny animal you see?" Diya asked, exasperated. "Honestly. He's as dangerous as a fucking squirrel." He peered down at the girl he held, one eyebrow cocked. "I'm going to let you go. You're not going to scream or hit me again. Alright? I'll pour you a glass of wine and you can sit the fuck down and talk, if that's what you want."
The press of arms around her made her choke with temporary panic. She leaned against Diya's arms, vision obscured by the hair that had fallen into her face. For a small, tense moment she felt herself hovering on the edge of total hysteria. She shoved back the urge to scream and thrash until her voice and limbs gave out from exhaustion and bit her tongue against another sob. When had her life gotten so out of her own control? Her shoulders shook.
"I don't want any wine, Diya," she ground out finally, and ducked her head to wipe her face against the hands pinned against her. Her skin was hot and wet with tears. "I want you to stop being such an ass."
Get in line. He swallowed that response and instead released her with a noise of disgust. His hands were wet from her tears, and he wiped them on his trousers before he turned and went to the desk to pour himself a glass. "You're overreacting," he said again as he uncorked a fresh bottle and looked around for a clean glass before he simply raised the bottle to his lips and took a tug. Flowers would be much easier to deal with if he was slightly drunk.
"And really, who are you to call someone an ass?" He looked over his shoulder at her. "I'm not the one banging people's doors down to hit them and kick their pets."
She stumbled forward when he released her and brought her own hands to her face, pressing the pads of her fingers into her eyelids. The room stunk and so did the company. The familiar clink of glass and pop of a cork gave away what he was doing. She frowned into her hands and let them slide away from her face, then took a deep breath to steel the nerves that threatened to explode when Diya spoke again.
"You little idiot!" It hadn't worked that well. She glared at him and his bottle, briefly considering taking it from him and cracking it over his head. The glass looked thick enough to put a dent in his skull. "It doesn't matter if people would have found out eventually, what right did you have to say something publically like that? You don't think about other people before you open your mouth! You're supposed to be my friend!"
He rested the butt of the bottle against his thigh, watching her seethe. This was a tirade he'd heard before from a hundred different mouths, and it hadn't interested him the first time. At the last, he arched an eyebrow. "Friends? Are we? You do nothing but insult me and ask for favours, Flowers. I like you, I do, but I wonder how it is you'd consider your behavior friendly."
A soft, squeaky yelp from the bed made him look over his shoulder. Gulliver had lifted his head, big black eyes blinking sleepily. Diya looked back to Sigyn, mouth quirked to one side before he took another tug from the bottle. "Got a puppy," he said, jerking his head towards the bed. "If you'd like to kick him too."
"That's not true!" She'd been friendly to him. "I have so!" She was sure of it. In the middling of puzzling out all of their interactions, she noticed the dog. The wrinkled face and big chops were undeniably familiar. Just like Bashirah and Asher. The sudden distant pang of longing for one of their owners only reaffirmed her anger. It was justified.
"The Citadel isn't safe anymore," she snapped, and rounded the bed to see the dog fully. You poor bastard, she thought at the animal. Your owner is a complete ass. "Even a blind man would know that!" The Citadel had at least one now. Pilgrims from outer cities had brought in all types of clergy. "You have no idea what my life is like!"
"Then leave," Diya snapped. "If it's so bloody dangerous there, leave. That's what half the Civitates have been doing, isn't it?" He made a noise of disgust before he sat on the edge of the bed and took another drink from the bottle. Kick in, he thought impatiently. Flowers was maddening to deal with sober, even moreso when she was angry and looking for a target.
He tapped the fingers of his free hand against the covers, and he heard the soft whimper and rustle of sheets as Gulliver stumbled over to him. His legs were too short yet to manage wading through the covers easily, and he tripped more than once before he reached Diya's hand and nosed at it, wrinkled head turning to lick at his fingers. "And perhaps," he drawled, watching the puppy, "If it was such a damning thing to do, you shouldn't have gone to a fucking whorehouse in the first place."
"Cita can read minds!"
She hadn't mean to screech it. His advice was unwanted, unprompted, and bad besides. Sigyn licked her lips and drew her hair over one shoulder and turned to the window out of embarrassment. "He did it to me the other day." He'd warned her to stop faltering, too. Her upper lip disappeared between her teeth nervously, and she threw up her hands. "Where do you even hide from someone like that, Diya?"
His eyebrows rose as he looked back at her. "Well, I'd expect so. He is God, isn't he? That's part of the whole..." He lifted the bottle in a helpless gesture, then shrugged. "God package."
It was a lucky thing he hadn't run into Cita on his trip to the Citadel, then. It'd been hard to keep his thoughts holy when the God's bride had turned around. Diya took another gulp, then set the bottle at his feet so he could scoop Gulliver into his lap. "You hide wherever you need to. Unless he's found a way to be everywhere at once, too." He frowned, eyes narrowing in a squint. "Isn't that part of the God package as well?"
She threw her hands up again in exasperation. Was anything she'd told him sinking in an ounce? It couldn't be that simple. It couldn't. If it was that simple she would have figured it out on her own instead of having some drunk, womanising brat downplay her issues while stroking a puppy. A hand went to her mouth as she looked at him, eyes narrowed. Yes, her life was totally out of control.
"It's not that easy, stupid." Another heavy, long suffering sigh huffed out as she dropped to sit on the bed next to him. "Does anything ever bother you at all?"
"Seems it is to me," Diya replied with a shrug, scratching behind Gulliver's ears, then his belly when the puppy flopped onto its side in his lap. It would be monstrously big and fat when it grew up, he suspected. Not a guard dog at all... but cute in its own way. Ugly.
He glanced up and over at the girl beside him, one eyebrow cocking. "They do. But not much. Especially when there's such an easy way out," he finished with a crooked smile. "Look, I'm not the best at giving advice and I'm a right fuck most the time but... you're really making this more complicated than it needs to be." A pause, and he scooped Gulliver up and deposited him into Sigyn's lap. "Here, have a puppy."
Sigyn stared down at the mass of Gulliver in her lap. It was already fat, and lazy besides. It reminded her nothing of Bashirah's energetic nips and wriggling when she was picked up. A poke to the small creature's side did nothing besides prompt it to stretch out. Even Wellington's dog showed more initiative, even if it was only digging itself into bags of flour and nuts.
"No thank you." She pushed the dog off of her lap, watching its little limbs windmill to try and find its footing again. It sniffed at the bottle that lay at their feet and raised a heavy paw to swipe at it, knocking it over. Her eyebrows raised with a surprised nod. Maybe the dog would be good for something after all.
"No, don't--" Diya sucked in a breath with a hiss and bent quickly to right the bottle, but most of it had already spilled out across the floor. Gulliver looked only mildly guilty before it sniffed at the wine and, intrigued, started to lick at it. "No, no," the lordling sighed, scooping the puppy up again. It wriggled and whined in his arms, and Diya tossed it back into the pile of blankets at the head of the bed. Why were his pets so unmanageable?
"You didn't kick it," he muttered, looking down at the dark spill on the floor. Should he clean it? No, no, the maids would get to it... He sat back down, careful to keep his boots out of the puddle. "That's progress."
She watched with interest as the puddle slowly stretched away from the bed. His words were distant to her ears, wrapped up in her own thoughts. There had been no galvanising reaction from him either way. Her situation was nowhere near as simple as he was making it out to be, she'd thought, but now she'd began to wonder. Could she just simply be going hysterical or was he just a right fuck, as he'd said? Not a week ago he'd been trying to seduce her.
A hand shifted to pat at his knee. "I'm going to go. Have fun with your dog and your.. squirrel."
His eyebrows lifted, and Diya grinned as he took her hand. "Sure you don't want to stay?" He expected to be slapped for that, or shouted at, but sometimes the shift in Flowers' face from neutrality to fury was too fun to pass up. "I'll have you praising Cita in no time."
And then Sigyn threw Diya out the window.
The end.
Her eyes widened as the intent of his suggestion sank in. The fury was there again in her face, fresh and hot as she drew her hand away from him. It snapped back a moment later, the back of it right across his face with a loud smack. "You are such a fuck!" she pat, and scrambled away from the bed to get out of his reach. "Fuck you!"
Even with his cheek stinging, Diya burst out laughing. He half-turned his head back to look at her, eyes bright despite the bright red mark across his face. It'd been a while since he'd been slapped like that.
"Do you ever stop being angry?" he asked, grin crooked. After a moment he stood up and brushed himself off. "Don't worry. By now I'm sure you've trained every cock in the city to run and hide at the sight of you." He stepped around her to pick up an opened bottle from a windowsill, sniff it, and then take a gulp. He hesitated a moment before he swallowed, satisfied. Still good. "Go on, then." Diya glanced over his shoulder, smirking. "See you at the wedding."
And then Sigyn threw Diya out the window.
The end.
Her face flushed with embarrassment. The closest thing to her was another bottle. It was empty and reeking, an almost vinegar-y smell wafting up from the neck as she took hold of it and flung it as hard as she could at him. Without waiting to see his reaction, she turned for the door and left it hanging wide behind her as she exited.
She hoped he fell out the window. It would be doing a favour to both her and his new bride.