OPEN THREAD PROMPT
[SHOP PURCHASE 3/5]

Ji-Yeon Denari wakes up in a jail cell with… a new friend?

---

J

i-Yeon slowly began to drift into consciousness. She refused to open her eyes just yet, hoping that she may yet fall back into a deeper sleep.

Gradually, she became aware of an awful ache in her head and the discomfort of the bed she was sharing. "I'm getting you a new mattress," she grumbled. She didn't remember it being so bad before, but there was definitely something wrong with it now.

Blindly and lazily, the pirate lord’s hand searched for a blanket, feeling a little cold without it and without a shirt despite the summer month.

‘Goddess, my head…’

She soon gave up on finding the covers, opting to roll over instead, and drawing them close to her. "You kicked off the blankets again..." Ji-Yeon murmured, pressing her lips to the base of her lover's neck where it sloped into their shoulder, then nuzzled her face into their hair. Eyes still closed, her brows furrowed a little. "You smell… different. What are you wearing? And your hair… feels… wrong."

Ji-Yeon finally peaked open her eyes and became swiftly aware that she was not, in fact, in a familiar bed with a familiar lover. She swore in a foreign tongue. Then, pushing herself away, the captain promptly found herself thudding onto the hard floor. "Oof!"

Ji-Yeon sat up and rubbed her aching head at the temples. "What are you–" The words stopped as soon as she looked up, realizing at last where she was. "Wake up,” she snapped, “Right now.” Ji-Yeon hit her cellmate’s arm with a hard, stinging slap. “What the hell is going on?"

---

tag: open

Nymeria slept soundly, dreaming of better days when she was in her own warm bed, instead of a cramped bed inside a cell. Her time in Thisbe hadn't been long, but it had been very exciting just after she arrived in town. Still under the tutorage of the elven mage Avallon, his young apprentice had taken a break to enjoy the Midsummer Solstice. It was an exciting event and something she was looking forward to enjoying.

The little mage ventured into one of the taverns for a drink and good food. When she arrived, she came into an interesting sight. A young man with brown hair was in a confrontation with three people dressed in animal furs. The young man was dressed in a uniform, she'd seen others in the city dressed in the same outfit from Nora who worked as couriers. The man looked young, close to her age but she saw something in his eyes that said something was very wrong.

The taller man with brownish hair among the three seemed to be the one in charge and it was he who grabbed the boy by his shirt and pushed him against the wall. The man to his right with redish hair was shorter, held a very big and nasty looking knife and he grinned through his crooked, brown teeth. The third among them was a woman, she was tall and lean with hair like the shorter man. On her back she carried twin blades and stood with her arms crossed as she watched them.

"Alright little man, games over. It's time to pay up." Said the tall man.

"Pay you? B-but you cheated. You both cheated, I'm not paying you anything!" cried the young man.
"Aye Agon? Dis boy just called ya a liar. Her that?" said the shorter smellier man.

"Boy, ya don't know who u be missin, so I warns ya. Pay up now before ya lose a limb."

From what she could tell standing near the doorway, Nymeria figured the men had cheated at some game. They knew or assumed the courier had money or else this wouldn't be happening. With that thought in mind, she decided to take a stand. Armed with her trusty curved daggers strapped to her slender hips, she moved further into the room and stood by the table where the men's game had been played.

"Pee-Yew! Have any of you lot ever heard of a bath? If that's what you need money for then I shall be more than happy to toss you a few coppers."

Agon slowly turned around, and he craned his neck as she stared down the mage. "Has anyone ever told you that little girl's shouldn't dress like harlots unless they want to be treated like one?"

Nymeria's eyes rounded, her brow furrowed, and she stamped her foot against the floor. "What did you just call me? I dare you to say it again!"
At her word Agon stamped towards her and she thrust her hands out in front of her and sent a powerful gust of wind directly at him. "Blauss aussaucr!" The air blew him backwards and sent him crashing into a table. At that moment, his comrades became very pissed and they attempted to flank the girl.

Nymeria started to swing her arms around in front of her causing the wind to pour in through the windows and through the doors that swung back and forth wildly. "Whorlonj llossaurk!" A burst of wind erupted from around her and separated into two small tornado like gusts that captured and tossed both man and woman across the room. The man crashed into another table and the smaller woman went right through a glass window.

As in the classic cases, the guards arrived after the trouble was over and they arrested Nymeria for using magic in public and causing destruction in the tavern. The courier might have saved her the trouble, but he ran off as soon as the fighting started. The only one left was the tavern owner who was pissed off and wanted someone to pay for the damage.

Justice in these lands were a joke, the mage thought as she tried to go to sleep, hoping that she would be released early the next morning after the guards were finished investigating. In the mean time she thought she would at least get a good night's rest. A gentle kiss touched her neck and she smiled in her sleep, murmuring to herself as someone gently nuzzled their face into her hair.

SLAP

"Ouch! Hey! I said I'd do it!" she quickly exclaimed holding her arms over her head to defend herself. It took only a moment for reality to hit and she realized that she wasn't back at camp with her mentor. Nymeria slowly lowered her arms as she glared up at the woman. "What's your problem? Hey, if this is because I got in the bed, sorry. I didn't feel like sleeping on the floor."

---

J

i-Yeon was not one to imbibe often. Nearly every time she did, the aftermath was a potent reminder of why sobriety was a virtue worth upholding. Her current circumstances had quickly proved to be further evidence of that - even if solely accounting for the dry mouth, nausea, and throbbing temples.

She groaned at the volume of her cellmate’s voice but was also a little irritated that her question had been ignored. Ji-Yeon blinked, annoyed. “Well, if you mean to stay, please, consider the bed my parting gift to you.” Her tone was almost friendly-sounding, but the smile plastered on her mouth was a wry, borderline sneer.

Between winces, the pirate captain looked around the cell, assessing the small room for weaknesses or anything that might be helpful in some way. “I don’t suppose you have anything useful on you? A lockpick or a knife, perhaps? Magic?” Her shirt was crumpled in one corner. When she picked it up, it became immediately apparent that it had been torn nearly in half and had a small spattering of blood across it. It was then that the pirate lord noticed soreness in her hands and spied the scrapes and splits across her knuckles. She wondered if that had anything to do with why she was where she was or if it was merely coincidence.

“Did we arrive here together?” she asked as she busied herself with the tattered garment. Ji-Yeon tore two small strips off of the shirt to wrap around her tender hands, then tied the rest around her chest. It was a matter of practicality more than modesty. Jailbreaks, in her experience, rarely went without detection. Though sometimes a useful distraction, flopping breasts tended to be a liability in a fight and uncomfortable while running. “Or was one of us already here?” The answer was not of much consequence, the pirate supposed. The end result was the same: a cell.

---

tag: Nymeria Liao

"If I mean to stay? What are you implying?" Nymeria asked, she was still sleepy and too out of it to deal with rhetoric. The sneer on the woman's face didn't give her any warm fuzzies either. She curled her legs beneath her, sat in the middle of the bed, and watched the woman.

The other woman looked injured, which wasn't an uncommon condition to find of someone in a jail. The young mage could have been injured as well, had she not been gifted with magic. "Planning an escape are we? You won't get far. As for me, it was all a misunderstanding and I shall be set free very soon. I think I'll take my chances here and wait a bit."

Nymeria watched the woman closely, her oddly colored eyes following her every step. She was quite the busy body and it was plain to see that she mean to escape at once. If she could escape was another matter which the mage was interested to witness. "No, we did not. When I arrived here, you were already here fast asleep. I imagined you'd been here a while."

Another look around the cell, it looked like an average cell with no magical wards or special steels to make it impossible to escape. "I suppose now it's time for the question of the day. What are you in for?" Nymeria leaned back on her elbows and crossed one leg over the other.

---

J

i-Yeon sighed. Repeating herself or having to spell things out for someone were pet peeves of hers. Something that only served to agitate her hangover migraine. “I meant,” she ground out, “that if you did not mean to leave when I do, you may be pleased to know that you will have the whole place to yourself before long.”

"Planning an escape are we? You won't get far.
As for me, it was all a misunderstanding and
I shall be set free very soon. I think I'll take
my chances here and wait a bit."

The pirate lord halted her inspection of the room to give her cellmate an incredulous look. “A misunderstanding?” She let out a disbelieving bark of laughter. “And this…” she rolled her hand to gesture around the small room, “will all be cleared up? Just like that?” They were rhetorical questions. Either this woman had friends in high places or this was the most benevolent jail Ji-Yeon had ever landed in. “My, how wonderful for you.” She supposed more peculiar things were true in the world, but she wasn’t about to take the stranger’s word for it. And, in any case, it didn’t really do the pirate any good one way or the other.

“Where I’m from…” she looked away from the woman and cast a lingering look at the barred door, “nearly every jailable offense can end in a death sentence.” Ji-Yeon took to meticulously scanning every nook and cranny of the cell, starting from the righthand side of the entrance and working clockwise. “Keeps food costs more economical and wardens get to pocket the rest. So, I do not make it a habit of taking my chances in places like this, whenever possible.”

“No, we did not. When I arrived here, you were
already here fast asleep. I imagined you'd been
here a while.” …. “I suppose now it's time for the
question of the day. What are you in for?”

The pirate made a soft sound - thoughtful and vaguely disappointed. After a moment, Ji-Yeon shrugged. “If I knew that - or even what country we are in at present - I would know just the sort of trouble I’m in.” She paused and pressed her throbbing forehead into the cool stonewall for a moment. “Alas,” she drawled, eyes closed, “I haven’t the faintest idea.” She groaned a little when she lifted her head and reopened her eyes. “Be a dear, now, and help me locate a sharp edge on something.”

---

tag: Nymeria Liao

"Pleased? No, there is nothing pleasurable about being locked behind bars. Regardless of where you are, this is still a musky cell and the sooner that I'm out of here, the better." Nymera stretched her arms above her head again. Odd as it seemed to her, she had been sound asleep before the interruption by her cellmate. As that thought coursed through her mind, she remembered something else that seemed strange. A kiss.

"You jest, but I speak the truth. I'm a not a criminal, and I harmed no one. Well...maybe a few bumps and bruises but in the service of doing what was just, that sort of thing can be over looked." Nymeria started to question herself now that she thought back over what had happened. if the people believed her to be in the right, why did they lock her away?

"That all sounds very aggressive and excessive. Where are you from?" Nymera was not a scholar, but she knew of a very few places that were as brutal to their criminals as what her cellmate had just described. As far as she knew Thisbe wasn't as bad, but then this wasn't a place that she visited often either.

"This is Thisbe." she answered the woman's question. The young mage was skeptical of what she had been told by the woman. "If that's the story that you're sticking with then it needs a lot of work I'm afraid. It's quite unimaginable." Nymera slid off the bed and crossed the very short distance between them. "If you want my help then you're going to have to be honest with me. Do you have a name? Who are you?"

---

“O

n that we can agree,” she said of wanting to be out of their cell as swiftly as possible.

Ji-Yeon laughed heartily at the other woman’s defensive explanation. “Well, it seems your quest for justice has not been met with understanding, agreement, nor support, otherwise you would not be locked in here with the likes of me,” the pirate pointed out. Ji-Yeon was confident that, whatever she had gotten up to the night before, it was most assuredly not morally just.

“Not as much of an exaggeration as it ought to be…” Ji-Yeon murmured, purposely neglecting to answer where she was from. It didn’t matter anyway. Nor was it something she wanted to think about more than she already had done today. Bringing it up was a mistake that only served to add to her hangover pains. “Believe what you like.”

The pirate thanked her cellmate by way of a grateful nod for answering the question about where they were. “Thisbē…” she repeated quietly. It didn’t mean much to Ji-Yeon yet. Due in large part to having too much of a headache to strain her memory for details of the previous night, let alone the last few days. She was also still learning Giralda but had a vague notion of being south at least. “Right.” Or maybe it was east?

Her brows raised in mild curiosity as the woman got up and crossed over to her, demanding honesty and introductions. The corner of Ji-Yeon’s mouth twitched as if to pull into a half smile but never quite got there. She blinked and did not reply right away, biting back a sarcastic response listing every name she had been called from commander to whore. “Very well,” she agreed, “if that is all you require to be of some sort of assistance.” The pirate made an effort to form a vaguely polite smile. “You may call me Ji. I am a foreign merchant and occasional smuggler looking to expand to Giralda.”

“And who might you be?”

---

tag: Nymeria Liao

The sounds of hustling and bustling died down the further he walked from the market. A set of amber iris's caught the light as it fluttered in from a torch through his metal helmet. Upon arriving at this island known as Thisbē he had opted to keep the helmet on. It was the unknown which killed a man and while these lands remained strange, he'd keep his face concealed.

Though the looks of judgment fell upon him, they were ignored. The black silk robes draped over his shoulders concealed nipples upon his caramel colored torso. They too moved as he walked lazily down a back alley, almost near stumbling. The feelings of the sea returned to his legs and despite being tanked; his balance was nearing perfection. -Few more.- A single thought running through his skull, like a bleeding whisper beckoning him onward.

The alcohol was meager and mostly watered down. Damned pubs. In his right hand a massive black tankard was held loosely, upon the metal accents was the same mark burnt into the flesh just beneath his right eye. A -VR- Combined into one character, yawning as he stepped up six stairs in two steps. The leather of his pants cracked at the longer stride. In his hurry to walk up the stairs he had bumped into a stocky individual.

"Hey!"

The words never reached his ears as the tankard kissed his lips, liquid gold rushing down and burning his throat. The sound of metal sliding across metal, a metallic twang rang in his ears. The titan knew the sound of a short sword when it was drawn. His upper body merely turned to look at the shorter man, rushing at him now. "Blya?" -The fuck?"

It was the sound of a blade colliding with his helmet that made his instincts kick in. The robes fluttered as the muscles within his back and arms rippled like ocean waves. He slapped the blade away with the tankard and it splintered in his hand, instantly spiking his blood; for now his cup was both empty and broken.

Through the mist of alcohol and wood his right hand snapped, fist colliding with the unknown assailant's helmet. Oh this would definitely fracture something within his fist,but the mixture of liquid in his blood numbed it all. The sounds of struggle mingled with the silence in the air as his right hand palmed the man's head.

The set of amber eyes looked around at the blurry landscape as his grip slipped slightly, finding the attacker's throat he moved with a force. A solid wooden door behind this stranger, slamming him into it. A heavy boot following was practically put into this man's lightly armors chest, denting the thin metal. The door exploding from rusty hinges as it and the guard fell to the floor.

However, the rage didn't end there.

No, his night had been ruined.

"Valik. Razberites' so svidetelyami." -Valik, deal with the witnesses.-

The anger in the tones of his throat was cold, almost as if he couldn't be bothered. The blurry individual was still lying there rolling onto his side. A very short doorway caused him to have to fully duck down about a foot to step inside. He pulled the black silk from his body, moving through the room almost in near silence. Now, he didn't know who else was in the room nor did he care.

The figure on the ground had tried to kill him, he'd reach over the man's head, ripping the helmet from his face. Before, nailing him with it. Over and over. Blood raining down over stone and flesh. It seemed like he'd been beating on the man for minutes, but in reality after four thuds the lad stopped moving. Yet, the onslaught continued. Until he decided enough was enough. Holding the man by his chest armor, which in turn kept his upper body and now mangled face off the ground.

"Ty dolzhna mne vypit', suka." -You owe me a drink, bitch."

Whether the man was dead or not didn't matter, looking down at the beaten…. Was he dead? Surely not. The body twitched indicating some form of life, maybe. He'd stay looking down at the well reprimanded man. Valik was sure to cater to anyone else.

It had been a rather calm night. The drinking had been a beautiful calling, extending the entertainment on this fine weatherless evening. Now; he too made his way down the alleys, far more tolerable than his blood of alcohol. He walked silently behind Vaddix. The order to keep their helmets on had been given and the brute wasn't too keen on breaking it.

While Vad had black robes donned over his shoulders he himself had opted for white robes. They were see through so neither his bronze flesh, nor his tattoos were hidden. A gust of wind carried the fabric off his skin for a brief moment as his older Blood stepped up a flight of stairs.

-Hey!-

That shout caused the warrior to stop and look up. A man was yelling at Vad to stop right there. Like normal, his older Blood ignored the man and that's where things went sour. His lightning blue orbs shrouded in the metal helmet watched as this man drew a blade. Well, how premeditated.

The blade was poised to strike the small of Vad's back and he wasn't about to watch his flesh and blood die. So he kicked the charging man, wrapping his own foot around the man's back foot. This threw off the guards aim and now the sword slid along the outer edge of Vad's helmet.

He remained silent.

Watching as the two scuffled….no. He watched as his older Blood fully lost control, putting the man through a door. He'd follow as a command to kill the witnesses was given, and he too had to fully duck down to step inside the room. His foot landed on an item cart , snapping one of the little wheels as he entered the room.

The two long horns that sat atop his helmet scraped the stone ceiling as he approached what appeared to be cells. -A jail.- The thought crossed the Titan's mind, as he looked at a few empty ones. The white lashings of his helmet bounced upon his bare back, looking down inside the final one.

-Women.-

Surely, he wasn't about to kill two women because his brother went on a tangent. This room was cramped and he hated it, having to crane his neck down so he could walk freely. The warrior grabbed the cell door with his left hand, looking around it as he gently rattled it. It was as if he were an animal studying a trap set by the hunter.

A single loud exhale bled through the helmet and he shoved a long dagger down the hinge of the door. He'd put his left hand on the upper left corner of the door, his right hand grabbed the knife. Through the helmet his vision stared at the women inside, kicking the bottom of the door as his muscles seized up and he broke a hinge. The door being ripped away and discarded, dropping the now broken blade as well.

A single deep word spilling through the helmet as he stood before them.

"Who?"

"Tis true, I can not deny that the denizens of this city haven't been cooperative or friendly. Their skepticism and prejudice of foreigners is staggering, not to mention baffling. Even so, as a skewed as their sense of justice may be, they will have to see the truth eventually. By eventually, I mean by the rising of the sun." If it took any longer she was going to take matters into her own hands.

The other woman was right about being trapped in the cell with the likes of her. "Likes" meaning criminal of a sort. The guards in Thisbē didn't seem like the brightest in the lands nor did they appear to have good judgement. "I think most people prefer to believe what they like. I on the other hand prefer the truth whether it's agreeable or not."

The woman's story sounded suspicious and it was hard to believe that she didn't know where she was. Thisbē wasn't a place that one simply wandered into, at least not without knowing of the place before. Nymera demanded answers, and she wasn't going to do a thing to help until she got an answer that made sense. Ji's explanation sounded more believable and gave her an idea of why the woman was in the cell.

"A merchant and occasional smuggler? You know, I get the feeling that was phrased with the latter to the formal instead of the other way around." She tapped her cheek then shrugged, at least she had an answer now. Nymera was about to introduce herself when there was a sudden clamor at the door. From where she was, the young mage couldn't see the door and who had come in. However, the cries of pain and sound of metal bashing into flesh and bone was as gut wrenching as one could imagine.

"What is going on?" she asked softly looking at Ji.

Suddenly heavy footsteps echoed, and became louder as someone drew near. Nymera stared out into the room at a huge man who was as tall as the cell itself. "Friends of yours?" she asked Ji. It seemed she had the right of it as the new stranger loudly and violently tore the cell door off the hinges. "Oh dear. He's a violent one isn't he?"

---

A

hh, the arrogance of youth. The pirate smiled in a vaguely condescending way at the young halfblood’s blanket statement and the way she proclaimed her commitment to the truth in all things. Ji-Yeon guessed her to be in her early twenties - or whatever the equivalent was for her kind; intelligent and proud, but also far more inexperienced than she was self-aware of yet. In many ways, Ji-Yeon had not been so different in spite of having to grow up more swiftly than most.

“It was phrased as I meant it. I have yet to break any laws here.” In a beat, she realized the stupidity of the latter statement given where she was and stifled a laugh. Then, amended, “To do with smuggling, at any rate. Clearly, I may have… misbehaved a little last night.” Whatever the captain had done under the influence of the gods-only-knew-what spirits, she just hoped no one had ended up dead by her hand. It had been Ji-Yeon’s intention to keep a relatively low profile while she surveyed the lands and seas of Giralda for its potential. So far, it had been a rocky start. Something this unfortunate incident only served to bolster.

“As I said, I’m looking to expand various trades here. That first requires having an intimate understanding of the market. Research takes time. I have only just arri–” She was interrupted by loud crashes and bangs beyond where they could see out the small slotting on their cell door. Commands were given, though she could not make them out. Short-lived screams followed not long thereafter, and thuds and sickening squelches echoed through the corridor loud enough that the pair could hear them in the cell.

Ji-Yeon stayed silent as if it would somehow help hide their presence. She shook her head and shrugged in reply, giving her cellmate a look of grave uncertainty. Whatever was happening out there had not been orchestrated by her.

The pirate lord was not afraid exactly. Quite pragmatically, she simply did not like her odds and always pictured a more honorable death than being slaughtered in a box, half-naked and hungover. Ji-Yeon huffed a contemptuous sigh and began undoing the strip of fabric from around her breasts. There was nothing for it. She had precisely two known advantages: being a cornered animal and a little bit of magic. The ends of the torn shirt were then wrapped around her hands, a makeshift garrote her only available defense. If this was where the Moirai intended to sever her thread, Ji-Yeon would not make it easy on her death-bringer.

A horrible scraping sound drew nearer and yet was somehow above them. Their door was soon ripped from its hinges. The helmeted colossus responsible cast it aside as easily as an empty bottle and blocked the way out.

In a moment of adrenaline-induced clarity, the pirate lord felt a spark of recognition. The tension in her muscles eased a little when he briefly spoke and she was granted more time to study him. “Are you…a Denari hellhound?” she ventured, eyes sparkling with a strange eagerness. Ji-Yeon was sure he must be. They had never met but the twins’ reputation had preceded them and impressed her. “My… Rasvadian wolf?”

---

tag: Nymeria Liao , Valik Rasvadian, Vaddix Rasvadian

It was the sounds of metal scraping along wood that brought the colossus from his rage induced reality. The loud screaming of wood as it snapped under a weight that was surely his little brother. His left hand held in place as his fingers curled beneath the armor of the dead soul below him. There were words being exchanged in the other room when there weren't supposed to be. Vaddix stood up to a position more befitting of his status, still remaining heavily hunched due to the small room. "Are you….a Denari Hellhound?" Now there was a term he hadn't heard in quite some time.

"Captain."

The sole word stung the air like a wasp and held itself amongst the room, strangling the silence as he drank in the moment. Dark lips pressing together in preparation for more words to follow. His shining red eyes glowing as the light of lanterns struck the iris, dragging the mutilated guard across the floor slowly.

"Ji-Yeon. Denari."

His left hand slapped softly down against Valik's right shoulder, looking down not only at him, but at the two women within the cell. A dark chuckle splitting from his chest as she called them her Rasvadian Wolf. "What a sight." The dark skinned man gestured to her freely set breasts, drinking the toned feminine form in full.

"Do you desire freedom? Captain?"

The corpse in his grasp fell apart as its jaw splashed across the stone floor, looking down at him with only a grin of satisfaction. "We were planning a dispatchment. Net, a rescue. So." A long inhale caused the backs of his shoulders to press against the ceiling. "It comes with a price."

His Demonic crimson gaze never left the captain's body, except to glance at the other woman within the cell. Both were far two exquisite to be contained in a shitty prison. "Being a gentleman. Surely you won't deny my request for. Negotiations aboard Hell's Tundra. What say ye?"

"Of course you haven't." Nymera responded looking down at her nails. She'd never heard of or met a criminal that admitted to doing crimes. To admit such a thing was a sure way to land themselves in a jail or in the least, under suspicion. "Misbehaved. Now there's an understatement." she teased thinking of how she had awoke to being kissed and groped by that very woman. The claim of being a merchant of "various" items seemed very unlikely but a likely story for a smuggler to use in order to escape capture.

The conversation was cut short by the loud crash and the noises that followed. It sounded like a break-in and dispatching of guards but who in the heavens would bother to rescue them? Had it been a mage there to rescue Nymera, it would have been done in a more subtle way to appear normal and as if everything was in order. The young mage didn't know what to think of this or her cell mate who suddenly started to remove her shirt.

"I highly doubt that offering yourself up to whoever that is will get you the freedom that you desire." She would have said more, but the woman started to wrap her knuckles in the straps seconds later. "I suppose every little bit helps." The stranger had the same thoughts that were coursing around inside her head which was that they would have to fight their way out to freedom.
Or so she thought.

Nymera stood silent as she watched the conversation between the two criminals and she bit back a remark about Ji-Yeon's claim of being a merchant. There was a story here between them, much wasn't clear but they knew each other without a doubt. "Looks like you found your way out after all."