This is my second time writing for The Three Musketeers, and my first attempt at Whorthos, I've been working on this for a while now but have only now been able to post it. So please, enjoy and let me know what you think! :)
Set after Milady's betrayal.
Disclaimer - Everything from The Musketeers belongs to Alexandre Dumas and Paul W. S. Anderson. I own nothing but Giselle.
She was positively vulgar, the very image of depravity in the eyes of the higher classes of Paris. With ringlets of dark brown hair, and a tight yellow dress exposing much more than any proper lady ought to reveal.
When they first met Giselle had been struggling against the determined hands of a particularly unsavoury Frenchman, and he had respected what little dignity she had left, persuading the man with a mild threat and the unsheathing of his sword
She had asked for him to escort her back to her home, during which she was quick to realise how cold and unfriendly, albeit gentlemanly, her saviour had been. And although the alcohol was not strong she could smell the ale on him.
Once they had reached her door, she had offered herself as her own way of thanking the stranger for intervening. Taking him by surprise by her distasteful profession as she tugged at one of the lapels of his ragged jacket, pressing herself against him as she lowered her hand to unbutton his breeches.
But she also happened to be exactly what he needed at the moment. And so he allowed the young prostitute to remove his feathered hat, and take his lips in an experienced kiss.
Giselle paid no mind to the lingering taste of his drink; she'd become much too used to the added flavour long ago, unable to even remember when it had bothered her.
He was much gentler than a lot of her customers - despite his dishevelled appearance being no better than others - and less domineering, however still with his own edginess. And though she would have preferred her bed without the feint stench of ale she let him be until the poor bugger was able to stand upon his own feet. To which he then left with a bow of his head and a genteel kiss upon her knuckle, calling back over his shoulder a name when she asked, while staggering on his way to his own quarters.
"Athos."
Giselle warned herself against becoming attached, quite often, it was her one strict rule. She'd had few others that she would break on occasion, and certain exceptions, however attachment led to nothing but hurt for a working girl. The quality don't marry whores, not even the most expensive harlots. They married pretty women, who could afford to eat three meals a day, without having to work or steal, who could bathe every night, and wear clean dresses every day. Women who spoke fancy.
The man, Athos he said his name was, returned that following evening, sober and cleaned up in his lavish clothes, much neater than the last she had seen him, his bearded face perfectly visible. He was a handsome man, at least a decade older, and when he talked of his uncertainty over why he'd come – a question in which Giselle was also confused – his deep voice no longer slurred, but was in fact rich and velvety.
He visited her most days. During his visits they would speak as if they were old friends, rather than a man who she had only just met not one week ago, who pays for intimacy and shares her bed for the night when he is at his worst.
She takes pride in saying how very much effort she put into not becoming emotionally involved with the fallen, broken man and his brazen charm. But oh, how her poor heart flies and her breath stumbles when she sees him at her door. When she hears his striking voice. When he leaves her with a courteous kiss upon the back of her palm, or if she were so lucky, upon her cheek.
As the weeks passed the nights where he would be completely sober grew less. He would seek her company if only to restore his waned trust, and while speaking yet again of his many issues with women he'd let slip of another woman's name, on more than a few occasions. Milady. It sounded a fancy name, one Giselle had not heard, fit for a woman better paired with Athos.
She never asked anything of the name, she was probably some proper lady with morals that Giselle clearly did not share, who probably went off to marry some aristocrat, forever out of unfortunate Athos' reach.
And still her heart grew.
Some nights it seemed he hit rock bottom, and he would arrive reeking of wine and ale and whatever else the lug had to drink until then, swaying dangerously on his feet and his face a mess.
"Oh, come here, you poor sod." she would say to him, laying him flat on his back upon her bed, and placing a wooden bucket within reach should his drink choose to wretch from his gut, to clean him up with a wet cloth.
It was these moments where she would show true care to look after him so, which had regained his expectations concerning the opposite sex.
"Why do you do this?" he had asked once, "Why do you care so much with me?"
"Why do you care to visit so often?" she'd returned, calmly, moving long strands of brown hair from his face.
"I'm just a drunk," it was a grumbled slur, but still faultlessly audible to the two. And she smiled sadly, laying a comforting hand upon his shoulder when he lurched over to hurl more of the unsightly liquor. Her meaning never to be understood by him.
"I'm just a whore."
"No..." that final strained word being the last thing Athos had spoken before seeing black.
When he had awoken it was dark – the only light coming from a full white moon – and still he was drunk. It was not the first time she had angrily thrown him out for some ill taken line, to slam her door and leave him to wonder at a loss what he had done to offend her so. But, thankfully, the occasion had not occurred often enough for it to become a familiarity.
Nonetheless, it mattered not to her how his thoughtless words stung, however temporarily. Giselle would still await his arrival, and forced herself to live with the pain of wanting someone so unattainably damaged.
Foolish girl. You've only yourself to blame.