After a good, five hour power nap, Sharimara had mostly recovered from waking up so early that morning. She and Centrius had ended up spending a few hours at the breakfast table, thankfully discussing lighter topics that helped her to take her mind off of the occasional anxiety when the question of 'them' popped into her mind. Minor details of his life on the island of Feathermoon were of great interest to her; like his daughter, she was bothered by the notion of him fighting at a colosseum even if the matches weren't supposed to be fatal, and approved when he said that there hadn't been a league set up for men yet. Indirectly, she'd pried about his social circle enough to discern that he was either single or, if he was with somebody, not very attached.
The latter prospect bothered her more than she liked to admit, and because she felt too shy to simply come out and ask him, she resigned herself to tempting him enough that evening that asking him if he had somebody waiting at home would feel more appropriate. How, exactly, it would suddenly feel appropriate later when it already didn't at the breakfast table with him was beyond her, but she felt at least capable of waiting this time. Considering the fact that they would have more than a weekend together before he had to leave town for his temporary job (which was on the same island anyway), there wasn't the sense of urgency she'd felt during their last tryst.
Conversely, he seemed fascinated by her comparatively boring life on the island of Chi-Ji. To her, she way she was living felt a bit embarrassing; she really had spent every weekend alone for a very long time - longer than twelve years. For elves and half elves, maintaining the same habits for long periods of time didn't carry the monotony and boredom it might for the younger lived races, but even they had their limits. Though she could have carried on living as a ghost for even longer had she been left alone, talking about her social life with Centrius caused her to feel a measure of that self pity again. Faking her answers in a way that felt unnatural, she exaggerated a few details, referring to her doctor as a friend (she wasn't) and talking about her occasional walks by the pier in a deceptive way that made it seem as if some of her coworkers would join her (never happened). All the while, of course, she tried to drop subtle hints that she wasn't in a relationship or even interested in anybody else.
Her skills must have rusted significantly, however, as Centrius didn't seem to take the bait and push her on that topic before the two of them began to feel drowsy from lack of sleep a well as the sizeable breakfast they'd eaten. Before he retired to his room at the inn, she'd waited to see how he would bid her farewell. He settled for hugging her again, less tightly than when they'd met but...softer, in a way, and a wild mental image of him sucking on her earlobe worked its way into her brain. Fantasies aside, the hug felt a little more tender, and had she not been so worried that she was overanalyzing and reading too much into his actions, she might have tilted her head up a little more than necessary to see how he reacted to the sight of her exposed neck.
Technically she'd arrived back at her apartment with more than five hours to spare before she needed to check in at work, but that hug lingered in her mind for just a little bit too long. Initially falling asleep had been a chore, and when she did wake up she was shocked to find that it was already five o'clock; she had three hours and began doing a mental chalkboard full of math to figure out what she needed to do to get ready and how much time she'd have to do it.
Throwing on a generic kimono from the dozen she had hanging in her closet, she set out toward the loan office, walking slowly so as to keep herself calm and relaxed in the hours before she and Centrius could finally see each other at a time when neither of them felt sleepy or seasick. The walk over to the office was relatively quiet; even the hallway was empty, and it seemed that for once everybody was actually at their respective workstations.
When she walked through the door, however, that silence was broken.
"Shari! Did you bang him yet?" Dilly laughed out loud the moment that the warden stepped inside.
Blindsided and caught off guard, Sharimara couldn't do anything except scowl when she realized that Dilly had made a dirty joke with Hardinger, the only male coworker of theirs, present in the room. He sat next to Lashka and pretended that he didn't hear the comment, but the way the orc stifled a laugh implied that they were not only aware of the joke but probably whatever parts of the reunion that Dilly had witnessed.
Scowling at Lashka for a few seconds, the warden gave the secretary a rather acrimonious reply. "We had breakfast and then needed to sleep." Her head snapped toward Dilly when she heard the woman's little mouth open in a gasp. "Not together. We had a happy reunion after being separated for a very long time. That is all."
"That's all?" the goblin asked disappointedly.
"Well...for this morning. We've both rested and I have to meet him to go out for the evening. There are only two...almost three hours left, so I need to check with Mao Mao about taking the night-"
"Oh, you're going on a real date tonight!" Dilly cried while leaping from her chair onto the floor in front of her desk. "We need to get you ready!"
Shock and pressure caused Sharimara to stutter. "Wha...no, it's just a fun night out with a-"
"Are you really going to call him 'just a friend,' Shari?"
"Why does it...I don't have to label it!"
Lashka stood up, stepping away from her desk as well. "I can call in another favor from Swansong " the orc offered while walking toward the door without even asking for consent. "You're completely stressed out and need to loosen up."
"I'm not...you guys are stressing me out!"
"You should get your hair done!"
Everybody fell a little quite when Hardinger spoke. The human was only trying to be helpful, but he'd entered into territory that was a danger zone for him. Sharimara bared her fangs and the man shrank, though only for a short enough time for Lashka to take notice, grab him by the arm and pull him out into the hallway before he got himself hurt. Lashka didn't even bother looking back at the irate warden before she shouted back over her shoulder from the hallway.
"I'll have Swansong here in about half an hour...just me and her," the orc shouted, obviously reassuring Sharimara that Hardinger would be staying out of the office that night.
Before she could even react, she jumped at the sensation of a short person tugging at her belt pouch. She looked down to find Dilly casually stealing her apartment key from her. Not an ounce of fear shone in the little goblin's eyes despite the fact that she was committing an act for which Sharimara had literally murdered people over on prior occasions.
"What the...what's going on!"
"The office is becoming our little workshop for tonight!" Dilly chirped while casually slipping the key into her pocket with absolutely no shyness at all. "While Lashy brings Swansong, I'll go pick something nice out of your closet and bring it here. Mao Mao knows how to braid hair."
"Wait!" Sharimara yelled as Dilly began to run away, but to no avail.
"Don't worry Shari, we'll get you taken care of!"
Though Dilly had short legs, those little goblin limbs carried her quickly in enclosed, cramped spaces, and the little green woman rapidly rounded the corner down the hallway and spin through the door outside. While Sharimara considered blinking through the wall to reach her, the voice of their boss startled her even more.
"You're quite lucky to have people who care this much about helping you."
"Gah!" Sharimara yelped, her anger rising at having been snuck up on when she was the one who usually did the sneaking. "How long have you been standing there?"
Old auburn eyes looked up at the giantess calmly. Though Mao Mao was only a third of Sharimara's age, she appeared much more ancient due to the shorter lifespans of pandaren. Though the woman never typically displayed any interest in the personal lives of her employees, she did regard the large halfbreed with a certain curiosity.
"Long enough to know that you lose your hard edge when caught in surprising social situations," the second in command replied. In other circumstances the remark might have been taken as an insult, but she knew that Mao Mao was above that; a simple observation, but s very astute and undeniable one. "Warden Hearthglen...if I may."
The pause let Sharimara know that Mao Mao wished, for the first time ever, to speak off the record. It was as rare for the woman as it was for her; at the root of their personalities, they weren't that different. Sharimara had killed many people due to her profession; Mao Mao had ordered many people killed. Although a part of the warden wanted to believe that her ethics weren't as grey as those of the old pandaren, she also knew that their colleagues might debate the point.
Out of respect for the fact that her boss had never wished to talk with her on an explicitly personal level before, Sharimara nodded in assent.
"Thank you. I just wanted to say...that for eighteen years, you've been on this island. You haven't worked for us for all of them, but rest assured that I knew who you were the moment you set foot here; nobody comes to Chi-Ji without my brother and I finding out. I feel that I can say with confidence that you're cunning, resourceful, powerful and independent. My informants told me you arrived here wearing your armor and carrying a bag of soaked clothing when you washed up on the southern shore after the ship you and a group of other shady characters had commandeered hit a reef."
Sharimara's eyes widened. "Nobody...for eighteen years, nobody has ever realized that," she murmured, her respect for her crafty boss shooting sky high.
"We did; we know all that happens here. We knew that the rest of the pirates you'd been sailing with drowned, just like how we knew that you didn't try to save them, just like how we knew that you intentionally lured a mugger to follow you on your very first night here so you could justify running him out of town and claiming his shack in the slums so you'd have a place to sleep and set up shop...you're a survivor, Hearthglen. It's in you. But...there is a difference between just surviving and actually living. And even now, despite the fact that you're gainfully employed and financially stable, you still aren't living. I don't need to have drawn out discussions with you to know that; I can see it in those glowing green eyes of yours.
"You are such a hard worker...smart, dangerous, skilled. But you deserve to finally rest your mind, and to live. Despite the youthfulness in your face, I can see in your movements that you're world weary; you aren't young anymore. And as jaded as this old heart can be, I do feel a little sad when I see you going back to your lonely little hole every weekend without somebody to keep you company. No matter how bad of a person you might think your past makes you, understand this: my brother and I have done far, far worse things than you have despite our shorter lives...yet we still let ourselves live. You deserve that as much as we do."
A bit uncomfortable under the scrutiny but flattered all the same, Sharimara smiled awkwardly for a moment and folded her hands. "You...know me much better than you ever let on," she said quietly while returning the old woman's strangely wistful expression.
"There's a reason that, when you fell out with the opium den employing you as an enforcer, we had Hardinger recruit you the very next day. You're the best at what you do...but even the best needs to relax. The fact that the entire office is so excited over helping you do so should be a sign that you're long overdue for a little bit of bliss in your private life."
"So...you're saying I should let everyone fuss over my personal business and try to dress me up like some gigantic doll?"
A cynical smile combined with humorous eyes marked the furry face of a woman who'd seen so much that any sort of laughter had to be accompanied by a twinge of that negativity. "Yes...that's exactly what I'm saying," Mao Mao replied.
The wait with Mao Mao was rather pleasant; the woman knew more about men than Sharimara did, and not in the sort of raunchy way, either. Despite the ruthlessness of the family, the half hour conversation during their wait left the warden thinking that her boss, however violent when it came to people owing her money, was capable of being quite lovely in her private life. When Lashka initially arrived with Swansong in tow (and Hardinger nowhere to be found, thankfully), the warden had more or less warmed up to the idea of accepting help.
The younger pandaren was wearing plainclothes and looked enthusiastic, though less so than Lashka. It made sense, considering the fact that she and Sharimara hadn't known each other that long. "I hear somebody is getting ready for a big night tonight?" she asked.
"Don't add pressure," Mao Mao told her younger compatriot. "She's going to enjoy herself tonight and that's it."
"Alright, alright," Swansong replied deferently. Turning to Sharimara, she cracked her little knuckled. "Take a seat, Shari. I'll have those shoulders loosened up in no time."
"I...don't know what to say...how much-"
"Free!" Lashka blurted out while pulling up a chair behind her. "You won't find a better massage in town, either."
A door slamming shut awkwardly signaled that Dilly had arrived, and a bit later than expected. "Sorry guys, carrying clothes for people with such odd proportions without letting them touch the ground is precarious work!" she panted as she ran up the hall.
Sharimara almost blushed. In her hands, Dilly carried a pandaren style mandarin dress that must have been buried even further back inside her closet than the gaudy pirate outfit. A custom made garment featuring floral patterns and a cloud serpent winding around its entire length, the gown was the same shade of indigo as the warden's hair, having been designed about five years prior. Ordering it was one of those spur of the moment decisions that she later regretted; unlike the looser, more conservative kimonos she'd brought with her from Kalimdor, the mandarin style of Pandaria tended to be much, much tighter when it came to female clothing. Of course, the way the night elves dressed outside of cold climates or official functions was even skimpier than that, but considering how often she either wore armor or a kimono, Sharimara had grown unused to revealing too much skin in front of others.
Unfortunately for her, the sandals that Dilly had also picked out matched the dress perfectly, plus everyone had already gathered there and she didn't want to appear ungrateful for all the help. And even if she did reject their kindness and leave, she didn't know how long it would take her to get ready in her own anyway.
Finding no other options, she smiled and closed her eyes. "Alright...I'm ready," she laughed, partially at herself for how many of her rules of non engagement she'd broken, and for how low she'd pushed down her internal walls.
For over an hour, the group that might slowly have started to change from acquaintances to friends have Sharimara a level of care she hadn't afforded to herself in a very long time. Of course, she was still half elf, and there was a certain measure of hygiene that would always remain; she brushed her teeth after each meal and, as a part of the sole religious ritual that she hadn't entirely abandoned, she still washed her hands, face and feet three times a day even if she didn't have time to take a shower. Beyond that, however, she never particularly cared how she looked unless she had to shake down a debtor (in which case she cared about looking scary, not attractive).
Much of the concessions she made to her friends felt frivolous. Mao Mao carefully braided her hair for her after she'd put the dress on, finding it to be a rather easy job due to the more trollish texture of Sharimara's mane. Swansong actually massaged Sharimara's feet for her despite her initial protests, and Dilly and Lashka basically forced indigo mascara on to her (though she did put her foot down about not accepting other types of makeup or lipstick). When they were all finished, she felt like an egg: unstable on her feet due to the tightness of her dress and constantly worried that the slightest breeze would disrupt the plait that Mao Mao had carefully secured her braids with.
Once they were all finished cooing over and thoroughly embarrassing the warden who was trying to live like a normal person for one night, they all took turns bombarding her with unsolicited advice on completely random, unrelated aspects of dating. Except for Mao Mao, of course, who proved to be a goddessend when she reeled the others in and prevented Sharimara from being entirely overwhelmed. Sending Swansong with her despite the fact that the younger pandaren wasn't actually an employee, Mao Mao saved her a measure of further nervousness that would have spoiled the work that the medical practitioner had just completed.
The choice of companions turned out to be for the best; as a pandaren, Swansong knew very well how to move in that style dress and spent much of their walk over to the hotel district showing Sharimara how to properly move without ripping the dress or tripping over her own feet. It was a laborious task that she wasn't used to; the two of them ended up spending more than forty minutes walking across town, and it was only Swansong's idle, more subdued banter when compared to that of Dilly or Lashka that the warden found herself able to maintain her sense of calm.
Once outside the inn where Centrius was staying, Swansong didn't linger or fuss. "Just remember what I told you - walk straight and try not to let your hips sway too much," the sudden pandaren dress expert said.
"Trust me, I will. I feel like I'm a piece of glass when I wear this thing."
"Think of the dress as being a piece of brittle glass. Except it won't cut you if it shatters because the pieces won't be sharp. It also won't make a loud cracking sound if it breaks, it will just be a rip like regular silk, but glass..." Swansong paused for a moment, her eyes darting upward momentarily as she considered her own words. "I'm not very good at analogies."
"Don't worry about it, the message is loud and clear," Sharimara chortled good naturedly. "And thank you so, so much for all the help."
"I really had fun, actually. Thanks for letting me give you a free massage!"
For a few seconds, she watched Swansong walk up the street of packed, relatively tall buildings housing inns and restaurants until disappearing from sight. "In no other context would thanking someone else for you giving them a free massage make sense," she laughed to herself quietly.
The sidewalk next to the inn granted a clear view to the pier where the Theralion was docked, and beyond that the open expanse of ocean leading toward the South Pole. Unlike the continent of Northrend, the island of Chi-Ji wasn't close enough to that pole for the magnetic fields of the planet to be visible, nor was the winter particularly cold during that time of year. Knowledge of how far they were from everything as well as the way the stars of the early evening reflected on the ocean granted a sort of ethereal feeling to it all, and Sharimara sucked in a deep breath of fresh air before walking inside.
She was a bit early arriving, and had originally planned to wait for a few minutes in the lobby before she spied Centrius there. He sat on a couch reading a local gazette printed in Common, having also decided to wait early for her arrival. From behind the newspaper, it was difficult for her to get a look at what he was wearing, but she could see that he was wearing the sort of baggy pants tucked into high, two toed leather sandals that trolls of all varieties often wore in colder climates. Eager to see him, she walked a little bit closer before clearing her throat.
When he looked up, his jaw dropped and he tossed the gazette to the side in a reactionary fashion, hitting another guest in the face by accident but not caring in the least. Sharimara looked down and grinned demurely, flattered by his reaction.
"Hello, Cent," she said, almost laughing at herself again for how shy she suddenly felt.