Author's Note: Just a heads-up, Sapphire's backstory appears here, and a general conversation revolving around it. It's nothing too graphic, but given the nature of said backstory… I felt a heads-up was justified.
Also, thanks to 16DarkMidnight80 for going over this chapter.
-K-
"Ugh!" I groaned, looking down at my armored form. It was true that the leather fit like a glove, but I had no range of motion and could barely bend at the waist, let alone bend over or contort into any meaningful position. The boots were too heavy and made me feel clunky—I wouldn't be scaling any walls in them, no way, no how.
These guys must expect a lot of fighting. Isn't that kind of counter to what we're into? I thought that was the point of the Thieves Guild: we don't do a lot of fighting because we don't get caught!
There was only one thing to do: I went straight to Bryn as soon as I got into my leathers—which had been a pain, I swear you have to pour yourself into these.
"What do you mean he's sending that little brat?" Vex—a blonde woman who was Sapphire's biggest competition for Resident Bitchy-Britches—demanded, a flush of anger in her pale cheeks. With her hair and her pallor, she seemed to glow in the dim lighting of the Ragged Flagon. It wasn't a flattering look.
"It's the plan Mercer thinks is going to work. He doesn't want you trying again if your leg's still bothering you—and I can see that it is, don't think I can't," Bryn added, half censuring, half concerned.
It was odd to see Vex, who was obviously older than Bryn, corrected as though this wasn't the case. A faint smile played around her ivory face… and then she saw me. The indulgent smile vanished and her lip curled. "They're going to murder you," she sneered, her eyes glittering like chips of glass.
"Oh, there you are. Looks good," Bryn nodded.
"I can't move!" I squeaked. "Look at this!" I tried to turn a summersault and had to abort it or crash in a heap. "I can't climb!" I looked at my clunky boots to draw attention to the bad design of them. "Bryn, I'm serious," I put a hand on his elbow to emphasize the point. "I've gotta put off this Goldenglow thing. I appreciate the special order and all—you're right, I'm skinny and I have no ass—but I can't move! She's right: at this point, they'll murder me without trying. I just need a little time to steal some stuff, fence it, and find a decent alternative. Please don't make me do this improperly equipped! Especially if she got hurt. I can see she's good at what she does."
I'm not above schmoozing (as the twins called it) to keep things friendly. And Vex did strike me as being a very competent woman. I put on the big kitty eyes for good measure.
"Box it up and ship it, sweetheart," Vex responded with a rude hand gesture.
"Who spit in your breakfast?" I retorted, glaring at her. She called me sweetheart, so I guess at least while there's life, there's hope.
"Here, now," Bryn intervened. "Just don't try to fence your leathers, that's all I ask. Tonilia's head will explode and I'm partial to keeping it where it is."
"Really?" I brightened immediately, ignoring the comment about Tonilia's head.
"That wasn't a challenge. I'm going to talk to Mercer when he's in a better mood, so off you go; do a big haul, take what you need for what you need as your cut, then the rest comes to the Guild," Bryn declared, tone indicating he felt this was more than generous.
I expected something like that: a percentage cut, which encourages the Guild members to go big or go home.
"You're the best!" With this truthful statement I bounded off… or tried to, ending up shuffling a little in my too-heavy boots to the loud amusement of Vex and the stifled amusement of Bryn.
Beh. I hate them both.
-K-
"Better be careful with Bryn," a sneering, sarcastic voice warned.
Ah, charming, sweet, good-tempered, optimistic Sapphire. I turned to see the brunette standing, weight sunk into one hip, glaring at me. Sapphire was pretty, with her dark hair, finely chiseled features, and deeply blue eyes. But she had a hard look to her, and wasn't known for getting along with anyone.
Except Bryn; he got fewer of her prickles. But Bryn tends to be a special case or a class by himself around here. If we chose our Guildmaster based on popularity, Guildmaster Grievous would be out on his ear in a snap, and Bryn would be in.
Nevertheless, news that Bryn was not actually unattached came as a bit of a surprise. I don't know why. Maybe it shouldn't have.
"Oh… with you, then? You don't—"
"Not me," she grimaced as though she found the suggestion highly distasteful.
Aw, come on. He's not that bad. Compared to Riften in general he's the best thing I've seen this week, when he's not looking like a snake oil salesman. And those leathers do amazing things for an already notable backside, let me tell you!
"Tonilia. The tough one? Carve you up like a goose if you cross her? That one," Sapphire declared acidly.
"Oh." That's more reassuring than one might think—Tonilia's not one to be cheated on, even if there was that concern, and Bryn struck me as a one-girl-at-a-time fellow—even if it ends up being a series of one girl at a time. No take-backs, no returns.
…which makes his comment earlier about being partial to her head staying on her shoulders make a little more sense, now that I think about it…
Well… I suppose this means I don't need to go 'eep' when he cuts up with me, which he's backed off on doing anyway. He's just gone from being the kind of person I don't avoid in life to being as safe as guild-mates can be. It also explains the hair ruffling. I'm cute… but in a young brother or very tomboy sister kind of way.
Sigh. Ah, well. You've gotta endure what you can't cure. I wasn't really looking for someone anyway.
Still, at least none of this stops me from appreciating the view.
And Tonilia can rest in peace, because while I might filch small valuables, I leave people in their places.
I beamed at Sapphire to hide a shadow of disappointment. The ones with potential are always taken. "That's fine. Even if there was something, he'd get bored with me so fast it wouldn't even be worth my stripping down. I have, as you may have noticed, no ass." I slapped my hip. "And that seems to be a requisite for most men, that the lady have a decent—"
"Uh-huh."
I shrugged. Don't believe me if you want. "I'm Kitty." We'd never actually been introduced. As I said, she was the mistress of alienating her guild-mates. I thought Vex of the Nasty Looks was friendlier. At least she had a reason to not like me—thieves, apparently, don't like it when their turf gets stepped on, and Goldenglow was Vex's job before Guildmaster Grumps redirected it to me.
"What do you want? A medal or a chest to show it on?" she asked sardonically.
"No need to be bitchy like that," I answered, a little hurt but not really offended. Circus people tend not to get offended easily—there are always plenty of people who have nasty things to say to or about you. "Although if you've got an extra chest lying around, I wouldn't say no." I could use the help, but I consider myself above strategic padding in my clothes. Mostly because I'm used to certain dimensions, and the extra padding would mean I keep knocking into it. I don't need that kind of trouble.
"I'm not bitchy," Sapphire growled.
"Then what's your problem with me?" I demanded, stepping towards her.
"I don't have a problem with you. Trust me, if I did you'd know."
I hate it when people say that. I cannot say how much I hate it when people say that! Because to know, I'd have to know them in the first place, so I'd know what 'normal' was! "Then what's your problem in general?" I snarled, getting up in her face until we were almost nose to nose.
She told me, snarling out the whole, horrible story and jabbing it into my chest like so many knives. My heart slipped to my stomach, then both slipped to my feet. 'I'm so sorry' didn't seem to cover it.
"You're right, you're not bitchy," I relented, stepping back and slouching at the shoulders. "I was wrong to make you relive that." My jaw trembled. I'm a soft-hearted person, but I wasn't sure that showing it would be a good idea. I didn't really know what to do or say. My standby—a big hug—didn't seem at all appropriate… or wise. "And thank you for the warning about Bryn—Brynjolf—and Tonilia. I appreciate it. There's nothing there, he's like a big brother, but… thanks for telling me about them, all the same."
Sapphire suddenly snorted, then threw herself down on my bed, hunched over, her head in one hand. "It's fine. I had to tell someone, sometime I suppose." She didn't mean about Bryn—Brynjolf—and Tonilia. She even sounded a bit surprised that she'd spat it out at me—that's not the sort of thing one just shares with anyone.
I chalked it up to having one of those faces. That, and I'm about as harmless a person as you can find in a day's walk.
Hesitantly, I sat down beside her, refraining from bouncing my feet. I have trouble holding still, unless there's a legitimate reason to do so. Not annoying someone because I'm fidgety isn't, apparently, a good enough reason.
"Carrying around a weight like that… it hurts after a while. Cuts you inside like a dagger to the heart."
"How did you get out?" I asked in a small voice. I couldn't let the story stop with her… there. In that awful situation. My eyes stung at the thought, my insides felt cold and leaden, trying to cramp. The effort needed not to hug her, or throw an arm around her shoulders increased.
Sapphire swallowed and let out a deep breath. "Over time, I managed to gain their confidence. Then one night I grabbed a knife, waited until they fell asleep and cut their throats. I never returned to that pig farm you know. There was nothing for me there."
Hmm. I wondered—I wouldn't have been surprised if she'd gone back and killed the people who let her fall into the hands of evil men without a fight. I hope something equally horrible happens to them.
"So that's my sad story. What do you think?" the snide acid was back… but I thought it might be there as a self-protective thing this time. Maybe it always had been.
I paused for a moment, thinking hard. "I think… that you weren't worried about me or Tonilia. You were worried about Bryn—Brynjolf, I mean—being inconvenienced by trouble with Tonilia. He's the one who brought you in. Isn't he?"
She looked genuinely startled and the open expression took about ten years off her age. It was gone in a blink, but my heart ached viciously: she didn't look much older than I am. "Just call him Bryn—everyone does." She pursed her lips, which I took for a resounding 'yes.'
"I think that you're very strong. And…" I took a deep breath, infusing all the confidence and enthusiasm I could muster into my voice, not the least because my eyes were stinging and if I didn't do something fast, my face would start going red and blotchy. If that happened, it was only a matter of time before the tears came. Those couldn't possibly help anyone. "And I think we should go steal something! Together!" This is the Thieves Guild, after all. When in doubt, when put out, be enthusiastic and excitable! Sooner or later you get caught up in your own energy and others get caught up in it not long after!
"I beg your pardon?" Sapphire asked blankly.
"No, really!" I felt that the only thing to do was what I usually do: be cheerful and hope the one getting the full blast of it gets caught up with me. "We'll go to Solitude—girls' road trip—find something ridiculously expensive and heavily guarded and—oh, no, better yet!" I jumped to my feet then climbed to balance one-footed on the bedpost. I felt horribly unstable in that clunky boot, the weight of the other one interfering with my stability. "We'll each pick a target—whoever Tonilia pays best wins!"
"Wins what?" Sapphire asked, slightly curiosity moderating the skepticism in her tone.
"Most of the other's share of course! I need new armor. It'll be great! Please? It'll be fun!"
"Why?" Sapphire snapped. "Why do you care so much anyway? It's not like we're family. This is a business."
"Then let it be a business thing! Just come with me! Besides, you like shiny things and I like shiny things—there's got to be a couple of shops that handle jewels! Shiny things, Sapph!" I declared, hopping to the other foot with a wobble. "Whoa!"
Sapphire scowled at me, but the line of her mouth was just a little less severe. "How do you know I 'like shiny things'?" she asked suspiciously.
Oops.
"Ummm…" I drummed my index finger against my mouth for a moment, before fessing up. "Bee-cause… you've got a lot?"
"You went through my trunk?" she demanded, getting to her feet.
I made as though to turn a summersault off the bedpost, but chickened out, hopped down, and backed up a few feet waving my hands as if to appease her. "No! I just took a little tiny cursory peek! It was kind of open! I swear didn't pick the lock—it looks like a real bitch anyway—I'd never pick a fellow guild-mate and you know that picks aren't really my—waah!"
Sapphire, her face full of something that was hard to read, grabbed my pillow and lobbed it at me. "You!"
"Waah! Wait, I promise I didn't touch anything! I didn't sift it or jiggle anything to see what was under—"
"You loony!" She grabbed her own pillow and flung it at me.
"Damn, you've got a great arm, but if you'll just let me—whoa!"
"Jumpy clown!" she darted for the next bed, and the next pillow.
"Whaa!"
"Freaky little uh-oh—"
"Eep!"
This last because, in my dodging, I'd hopped backwards and slammed into someone. I automatically threw up my arms so as to slide out of his hold and ducked the last pillow, landing hard on my backside. Sapphire's look of horror told me it was Bryn behind me. The pillow smacked him square in the face, dropping to land right on the top of my head, before slipping off onto my shoulder, then the floor.
"Well… you got me. Are we square now?" I squeaked, as Bryn's hands descended on to my shoulders.
"No," Sapphire hissed… but I rather thought we were. She looked a lot less severe, anyway.
"Well, this looks like fun," Bryn noted as his hands slid under my arms to help me scramble to my feet.
I was grateful for the assist. "I'm really sorry about the pillow. She's got a ridiculously good arm. Hey, Sapph! You could kill someone with a pillow like that!"
"There are more in reach. Just hold still a minute," she hissed… but this time definitely without venom, as if she was unused to being caught up in someone else's fun and wasn't wholly opposed to it… even if she mistrusted the levity.
"If you've got this much energy, Kitty-lass, hurry up and go steal something before it wears off," Bryn encouraged.
"I'm trying! But she won't come with me!" I whined with the exaggerated gestures that indicated for the world that I was only half-serious. "I thought we could run side-by-side bedlam jobs! I even volunteered most my take if she won!"
"Technically that's Guild property," Bryn put in mildly, but with the air of adding grist to a mill rather than correcting an over-exuberant pup.
"What more do you want?!" I cried, ignoring the comment, theatrically throwing my arms into the air.
"A little less volume might be nice, Kitty-lass," Bryn suggested, reaching out to ruffle my hair. I ducked out from under his hand, finger combing the fluffy locks back into place. "You'll be pulling a Dragonborn if you keep that up."
"I didn't say I wouldn't go—" Sapphire grunted, looking surly… almost… yes, almost petulant…
I'll take it.
"Yes! Just let us pack and we'll be off, Bryn. Fresh coin for the coffers and a bet to be settled! Don't worry, I'm good for it!" I cheered.
"Ugh," Sapphire grunted with a roll of her eyes. Then, she moved over to pull her backpack out from under her bag. Her whole body conveyed stiff disapproval and disbelief that she was actually going to get involved with this… but if she didn't want to, she wouldn't have. I knew that much about her.
Bryn's eyes glittered as he looked from me to Sapphire, who was hissing to herself under her breath. He didn't say anything, but the pat on my back as he passed said enough: good girl, Kitty-lass.
I can't fix what's broken. But I can help… even if it's just to provide a distraction from bad memories (and probably worse nightmares) or to never treat her like she's wounded or damaged. If I don't want sympathy for Mother… there's no way she'll want it.
-K-
"So, what's your sob story?" Sapphire asked, when we were well out of Riften, taking the carriage to Whiterun.
"Sob story?" I asked, blinking at her.
She narrowed her eyes at me and I realized, in her own way, this was extending a hand to test the waters. I didn't need to be in the Guild long to have noticed she hadn't really connected with anyone.
"Oh… you'll laugh. It's not that tragic."
"Then you won't mind telling it."
I took a deep breath. "I grew up in a circus. One of the acts was my mother and me. We did this acrobatic thing up near the roof of the tent. And she was good. You'd have thought she was dancing and prancing around on the floor, she was so steady.
"One night, I was feeling really, really good about the routine. I'd never felt so confident, even if I'd done it about a hundred times before. I turned my back, because it was the part where we faced away from each other… and she screamed. I grounded myself, because you never ever just move when you're that high without grounding yourself. I turned in time to see her hit the ground and hear the crack as her neck broke. She was looking right up at me as she fell."
I swallowed hard. "I… fell apart after that. Would have drunk myself to death, I think, until Shamar the Strong Man pulled me aside in one of my more sober moments. He said that maybe I should leave, even though the circus was all I knew. 'Cats have nine lives, Kitty. I just don't think you can live this one here.' I asked him how he thought I'd survive in the world if I couldn't do it in the circus and he said 'Because you're curious like your namesake. You need distractions. Not reminders.'
"So… I left. I left the patchwork family I had with most of the troupe members and my steady boyfriend and just… drifted. And Shamar was right—things did look up once I was out and had to keep my wits about me. Eventually I decided it was easier to pretend to be happy and enthusiastic and cheerful. Maybe I'd start to believe it. It wasn't as though I'd never done acting before. Imagine my surprise when I discovered that, sometimes, people want to be drawn into that lie… and that it got easier and easier to believe in it myself until even people who didn't really care to believe the lie sometimes got caught up in it. You can take the girl out of the circus but you can't take the circus out of the girl, I guess."
Then, in the silence that followed. "I still hear the snap in my dreams. And her scream. And sometimes I'm the one falling and landing with a snap." I snorted. Still not as bad as her story.
"Well… shit." Sapphire sighed then, to my surprise, leaned against my shoulder in a fashion… kind of commiserating, kind of reassuring. "We're a couple of screwed up bitches, aren't we?"
"I think we're just too tough for life to kill," I answered, though it lacked a great deal of pep and spunk.
"There you go. You and that… attitude."
But I got the impression she'd rather have it than not.