Vaiva was like a moving part of the background, without further problems she entered places that were otherwise restricted. There were those who could walk into a room and immediately get everyone's attention, without even doing anything. There were those that were so beautiful that people wrote songs about then. There were those that would have you turn to on the street or that you would never forget. Vaiva was not one of them, instead she was exactly as invisible as a good thief needed to be. People forgot her name, her face blended in with the crowd and no one could tell what color her eyes were. Her eyes were perfectly non-ordinary. This time the thief was sitting behind a screen, near one of the bubbling springs in the bathhouse. In Bergast the bathhouses played an equal important social role as its hygienic benefits. The city's inhabitants came here to relax, merchants came to discuss investments and for sure and some more murky dealings were planned behind a curtain of steam. The best place to eavesdrop in a world, here a lot of options was changing and power constantly switched hands.

With its stone interiors, columns, arched vaults, tanks with warm or cold water, with a bunch of smaller pools sunk into the floor and a larger pool in the center of the room, sure, it was a place one would need to visit to really understand what it was. A soft light from candles and torches illuminated the space. There were also pools or tubs placed in recesses in the walls, with curtains or screens for privacy. Sometimes she leaned forward to peer through the cracks in the intricate screen, to see if any new guests had appeared in the bathhouse. Anyone who was paying attention would perhaps see a gray iris in the holes on the screen. But it was rewarding to listen to the gossip of the servants as well.

She was dressed like the other servants in here, but she was on serving duty and therefore did not help with the other chores that kept her colleagues busy, like scrubbing the floors in the tepidarium. Mostly she saw people having an affair with another and the bathhouse was the place for their rendezvous. Sure, there were more fun things to do than spy, but it paid well if Vaiva were to find their partners and tell about the affair... and she got to spend some time inside the bathhouse, without having to pay for herself!

Vaiva sighed, in front of her stood her supervisor. The thief quickly she got to her feet. "Why are you sitting here?! Go, get to work! Wine and grapes to the guest over there!" suddenly Vaiva finds herself holding a silver tray. On it she balanced a carafe filled with that white and bubbly wine from House Belsante's wineries and a bowl of red and green grapes. The older woman almost slaps Vaiva in her face with a towel. Spurred on by the chief's annoyed harangue over lazy workers, Vaiva hurried off towards one of the private pools to serve the guest.

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inspiration 1 | inspiration 2

T

his was not the first time they had visited the bathhouse. It had, of late, become something of a regular fencing place in Cricket and Pearl’s rotation. The clientele that frequented it were often highborn or wealthy or both, presenting convenient opportunities for expensive items to go missing. Pearl was not a part of the fencing operation this time, however. Instead, she was sitting fully clothed in one of the private pools.

Pearl was not a stupid person. She knew how to bathe properly. What did not make sense to her was a luxury bath. It was not something done to clean oneself. In fact, there was no practical purpose to it all, as far as she could tell. It made her feel quite bored and awkward. Goddess bless it. How was she to know the bath was at its end when she was clean enough already and the waters never cooled?

She leaned back over the edge, trying to peer past the screen into the wider room, hoping for a glimpse of Cricket coming to retrieve her.

Occasionally, one of them got it into their heads that their marriage was malfunctioning in some way. That they were doing things wrong. Not because there was any impediment or because they had argued, but simply because their relationship did not always ‘look’ like others did. They did not have the epic sort of romance as the ones in books or shared by bards. In many ways, they did not seem to make any sense together but turned out to be perfectly fitting puzzle pieces anyway. For whatever reason, her husband had arranged this luxury bathing situation as some sort of romantic gift.

It was unnecessary - there was nothing broken to fix between them - but she, regrettably, had chosen to humor him anyway. Pearl huffed a sigh and attempted to amuse herself with creating different ripple patterns by dipping her fingertips into the water. It was… underwhelming entertainment to say the least.

At the sound of footsteps approaching, she whirled around, smiling. Thinking it was finally time to leave. When her eyes set upon someone unexpected, her features were swiftly set into a rather perplexed expression. “Vaiva?” Though surprised to see her sister thief at the bathhouse, Pearl at least had enough sense to keep her voice down. “What are you doing here?”

TAG:     Vaiva Nine Lives

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