[She doesn't think she needs to remind him that he should know better than anyone that affection can be bought and sold, but outside the walls of the House she really wonders how she is meant to feel about him.]
[He doesn't think of himself as a whore. It's a role necessary to his greater goal, although what that makes him is something he can't put a name to. But this girl knows him as a whore, and so he plays his part - even outside of the House, his interactions have influence. In fact, he shouldn't be talking to her at all without coin crossing palms first.]
[Her visits there were strange. Her mother had chosen this boy, had all but forced her to it the first time she brought her daughter to the House. Maybe it was punishment. Maybe it was just control, but either way Cassandra knew where she was expected to express herself sexually until her mother found her a suitable husband. Handpicked toys. She considers quietly. He is good enough to her that having him nearby makes her burn pleasantly, but the relationship is... perhaps just another lesson in trading. Money, fluids, and heat. He's still only asking because it's expected of him.]
I suppose so.
[He was the closest thing to a friend that she had. The only familiar contact in between endless hours of study and business meetings where she sat at her mother's side watching every sickly simper that crossed the other trader's faces. She might as well have worn a shackle around her ankle that tied her to her mother. She was always watching.]
[A half truth. It's nice to have some clients who have nothing staining their hands, that he doesn't have to pretend to be kind and good to. But he is not stupid, none of the House's whores are, and he knows Cassandra doesn't come to him of her own free will, knows there are far more complex things going on beneath that he, as a mere whore, has no place to ask after.
He satisfies her, and he is paid, that is the deal in place, but there is too much love in his family for him not to know of it, to be left nothing but imagination.]
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Calling it that implies it could be bought or traded.
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It can be. Though I imagine some loves to be priceless.
[Not all.]
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Will you be returning to the House soon?
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I suppose so.
[He was the closest thing to a friend that she had. The only familiar contact in between endless hours of study and business meetings where she sat at her mother's side watching every sickly simper that crossed the other trader's faces. She might as well have worn a shackle around her ankle that tied her to her mother. She was always watching.]
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[A half truth. It's nice to have some clients who have nothing staining their hands, that he doesn't have to pretend to be kind and good to. But he is not stupid, none of the House's whores are, and he knows Cassandra doesn't come to him of her own free will, knows there are far more complex things going on beneath that he, as a mere whore, has no place to ask after.
He satisfies her, and he is paid, that is the deal in place, but there is too much love in his family for him not to know of it, to be left nothing but imagination.]
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I'm sure you say that to all of us.
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That doesn't make it less true.
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That's kind of you to say.
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