(Untitled)

[accusedjonah]

DATE: December 1st, night [backdated]
CHARACTER(S): Jonathan Hollom and OPEN
SUMMARY: The wagons are circled, watches are being kept, and one man is greatly disturbed.
LOCATION: Around the campfire.
WARNINGS: Sad, sad little mouse inside.
FORMAT: Whichever.

Comments

angst. not on this boat - i mean wagon.

[willturntides]

Tom is not off watch but he doesn't want to let Jon get cold. Or anyone for that matter. And he's not close to the fire. So here, Jon, have a blanket from inside.

"Thought you might be cold."

It's definitely not one of your own though.

And he seems to think that taking up his post anew next to the former midshipmen.

[accusedjonah]

Hollom looked up at the voice. For a moment, he seemed startled. He hadn't worn a look like that since he'd first seen Pullings in Independence and had seemed worried he'd be scolded for not being at his station. When the words registered, he nodded his head once politely.

"Thank you, sir, but I'm fine."

He watched as the man remained and swallowed hard. How long before he said something? Before Pullings referenced the misfortunes of the wagon party and made it clear he knew exactly who was to blame? Not long, Hollom was sure. He had to know. Everyone on Surprise had known.

...Even Captain Aubrey had known...

[willturntides]

Tom glances over at him now and then. He was still on watch after all.

"Very well. No harm in keeping it though."

He was going to get to the bottom of your ... mood, Jon. One way or another. He hadn't yet made the connection but he did remember seeing you dart about the ship with a similar look about you before....

Before they got their wind back.

"That bear is going to last us a good long while."

[accusedjonah]

"It should, yes, sir."

Speak when spoken to, answer what was said, offer nothing more. Those were the unwritten rules that a midshipman learned to surviving life with superiors. Particularly those who considered them nothing more than a burden... And Hollom knew that was what he was.

He kept his eyes down, his gaze no longer rising to meet Tom's, as it had begun to do during the last week or so.

[wolfinthesnow]

There's a wolf - enormous, much larger than a normal wolf, white with red eyes, pacing nearby, turning and watching Hollom. It doesn't look like it will attack, but it's eyes are fixed on the midshipman with an intensity not common to many animals.

Jon Snow himself blends better with the night and less with his namesake; he's wearing black leather and with his black hair and his slight beard, it's hard to make him out in the dark. But it is Ghost who approaches first, not in a sign of friendship but because the wolf is drawn to the fire. He keeps his eyes on Hollom even as he keeps his distance.

It's another moment before Jon speaks. "He wants to be close to the warmth."

[accusedjonah]

It is a beautiful animal, seen closer than he has gotten to them before, though the midshipman does not let himself fully relax around it. He looked up at the sound of Jon Snow's voice, startled for a moment, but he calms quickly enough... as much as he will calm.

Anyone is likely to make him uneasy just now.

His eyes fall to the animal again. "He's welcome to get as close to it as he would like." Then, seeing an opportunity to maybe be able to do something even slightly useful, he shifts where he sits and offers, "Would he like a blanket? Either to lie on or under?"

[wolfinthesnow]

Ghost settles with the ease of something that knows there is no danger across the fire from the man, his head on his paws. Jon smiles at that sight, because there is something in him, too, that relaxes, and he moves to sit next to Hollom.

"It's not so cold as that," he says with a slightly wry smile. "We're winter folk, it's the heat that we endure."

[accusedjonah]

"It will get hot. Though we may reach our destination by then," Hollom replied quietly. He kept his gaze down and stiffened ever so slightly when Jon sat beside him. He wasn't used to friendly company. He was the one who blended into the background, not someone others truly cared to sit and talk with.

[practiced]

With the wagon train beset with ailment and injury and misfortune there was much worry about. Sansa could sense it in the way people stooped low over their meals and moved back and forth between one wagon and the next, bringing water to the sick and salve to the wounded. Bears and bees and venomous snakes; fever; ill-tidings were all around and Sansa did not know what to do save watch with a secret worry and pray that whatever shadow had befallen the group had no mind to grace any of her siblings

[accusedjonah]

"Miss Sansa."

Much as he wanted not to be seen, he could not bring himself to pretend he had not heard her, to hope that she would ignore him if he did not answer. Instead, he rose to his feet and offered a slight bow at the waist.

There had been too much misfortune, and he knew what it was to be a Jonah. Because of him, the five men of his gun crew had been killed, while he had received only scratches. Because of him, William Warley had been on the mizzenmast when it broke, and he had fallen into the stormy sea. Because of him, his shipmates had been relentlessly pursued by an enemy ship that found them unguarded. Because of him, the wind had abandoned the Surprise and caused whispers of mutiny.

"Are you well?"

[practiced]

Sansa knew that her sworn guardian was craven - he had admitted as much to her early on in their travels together - and although she had first considered him with disdain and then with pity, she never once encouraged him to relinquish his oath nor did she ever absolve him of it. Why this was precisely, she could not say, but perhaps it had something to do with the guilt that lingered in his posture and in his face. The specifics to that guilt, she did not know, but Sansa understood what it was to live with regret. She herself had a surfeit of it, being a little bird among wolves, the daughter that survived when other - more deserving and more innocent - Starks fell to blade after blade. So perhaps there was a part of her, however slight and hidden from sight, that saw something of herself held within shipman Jonathan Hollom; and perhaps in looking for her own absolution, she looked to provide him with his own

[accusedjonah]

"I am not used to anyone seeking me out for company," Hollom replied softly.

He had begun to adapt to this life. He had started to smile more, to enjoy the company of those about him. He could understand it now, that he had felt the same way on every new ship he served on. Every time he thought perhaps he could put everything behind him, he was reminded that he was nothing but a coward and a Jonah.

"But... Please. If you'd like. Join me."

[deusextaserina]

One thing Darcy should have- she really, really should have- counted on was the fact it was going to be cold in December. She'd always rationally known that, of course, even growing up in the desert it got cold. But she'd always had heat before. Even when traveling long distances, the car was heated, the gas station was heated, everything had heat.

And now that was gone.

So she'd grown super fond of sitting as close to practically in the fire as she could at nights. Just to survive, pretty much. But when she spotted Jon, the bringer of foods and quiet awkwardness, huddled up away from the life giving fire, she forced herself up and away from the warmth. If something was keeping anyone away from the heat, it had to be bad as far as she was concerned. With the outbreak of snake bites and illnesses around, it could be even worse than that.

So she wandered the way over to crouch down in front of him.

"Hey."

[accusedjonah]

"Miss Darcy," Hollom said as he sat up quickly.

He removed his blue coat without a thought, and he held it out to her. "You must be cold. Please. Put this on."

[deusextaserina]

She scrunched up her nose a little at that, and reached out and hand to push the offered article of clothing away.

"Yeah, frostbitten sailor boys are so last century. If you want to warm me up, you can come back over where it's toasty."

[accusedjonah]

"I'm not cold, Miss Darcy. I'm used to this-- worse."

Winters in the middle of the ocean were harsher than this, and there were proper fires here.

"Are you well? Injured? Ill?" There was too much misfortune lately.