heorte | when i go towards you it is with my whole life.

"Which state is that?"

His mouth remains at her wrist while his hand finds her waist, only lifting once alternately anchored. Ellis looks her over, smiling a little at finding her face so flushed.

Once, he'd told her exactly how much he missed her when their work takes them in opposite directions. He's thinking of it now, of all this time with her letters and her voice on the crystal like a tether, stretching thin between her in Kirkwall and him here, in this cavernous estate. He thinks to say it again, and does, soft against the palm of her hand:

"I missed you."

Which state is that, he says, which is outrageous. Him with his hand at her waist and the affectionate little things her breathes into the round curve of her palm knows very well to what state she refers. It is unbearably rakish. She would do well to insist now on how poorly it suits him, particularly when viewed so up close. To that end, the edge of her thumb moves as if to silence him by pressing against his lips. It turns tentative only at the last instant, soft at his lower lip. The impulse to press timidly there toward the edge of teeth and his warm breath is—

interrupted by the FHWUMP! of a calico cat leaping down into the covered chair from the shadowed heights of the top of a nearby wardrobe. Wysteria squawks. Her startled jump sends a delicately pressing thumbnail slashing up across Ellis' cheek.

There's a pained shout for the dig of her thumbnail, a crucial moment of distraction in which the cat continues it's descent, leaping down to skitter across the floor. Ellis' hand tightens on Wysteria's hip, before immediately pivoting to try and head off their fleeing quarry.

"Make sure that door's closed!" Ellis calls to her. The level of urgency in his voice is slightly ridiculous in this setting; it's previously been reserved for rifts and active threats.

Yowling, the cat slides across the hardwood. Perhaps on target to vanish under the armoire, should it's exit strategy be denied.

In a monumental display of the sort of self discipline and teamwork forged by the fires of three years of dangerous field work, Wysteria leaps for the door as commanded. It is only when she has slammed it decisively shut with a walloping crack that she marks the blood under her nail.

The cat screams. It veers off and slides under the armoire with an audible thump in the same moment that Wysteria whirls around shrieking, "Have I cut you?!"

Somewhere below them, the reclining Lady Paget's heavy-shadowed eyes roll upward to mark that muffled shriek, and gestures to the harpist to Go on, won't you? And drown that out.

Meanwhile, Ellis' momentum has brought him thudding into the armoire as the scritch of Pouncival's claws mark his progress towards the farthest corner beneath the comically heavy armoire. Ellis' bend towards the floor is stalled by Wysteria, which freezes him half-stooped between the immediate potential for capturing his quarry and Wysteria's distress.

"Aye?" posed almost as a question, before Ellis spares on hand to touch his mouth. "Don't worry over it."

The muddle of delayed intent is truly more unsettling than the scratch rising on his face. There'd been a split second where she'd been looking at him, her finger set just so—

It's a wrench to have been interrupted. Ellis turns that aggrieved emotion down towards Pouncival.

"Don't worry over it," is wailed back to him, all misery as she descends upon the near side of the armoire. Sorry, were you perhaps considering shifting this very heavy piece of furniture Ellis? "What if it leaves a scar? Oh, there is blood here under my nail. It's monstrous. After all this effort to come fetch you and effect a rescue!"

From under the armoire, Pouncival greets Ellis with a murderous spitting. All the cat's hairs have stood on end, tail bottle brush wide and paws sucked up into her body in an attempt to make the parts of her which might be manhandled as small as possible.

Edited 2021-09-08 07:16 (UTC)

The dilemma is as follows:

While Ellis is compelled to reassure Wysteria that a minor scratch to his face is hardly remarkable enough to hold his notice in comparison to all other injury he's survived, he is also aware this is the closest he's been to having captured Pouncival after hours of pursuit.

It's a difficult decision.

"It's unlikely there will be a scar," is said as Ellis lowers himself further, all the way onto his belly. One hand absently squeezes her hip on the descent. "I will wash your hands of the blood once we've seen to Pouncival."

Because in spite of his advice, Ellis seems determined to put his face directly down to that cat.

"Stand along the side please?"

Surely that's a decent trick, yes? Trick this cat into thinking there's a second opponent in the room, despite Wysteria's inattention to the matter.

Despite her distress, she moves to follow his direction—or rather, takes a step toward it and then pauses.

"Wait, Mister Ellis. Didn't you say that you were warned by one of Lady Paget's maids of the cat's unpleasant disposition?"

See, she is indeed a very attentive listener. So keen are her ears that she can recall little vital details such as these even in moments of crisis!

Anyway, obviously Pouncival chooses this moment in which to make her attack.

A necessary sacrifice.

Surely this will be a comfort to Wysteria, if her own scratch to his face is utterly dwarfed by Pouncival's claws.

There is some blood, the origin of which is not immediately discernible due to Ellis' beard. What's more important to Ellis is the moment in which he has both hands gripping Pouncival around the middle as she thrashes in his grasp. Still stretched onto the floor, Ellis is not in the ideal position for leverage, but surely—

No. When Pouncival's claws swipe across his knuckles, it loosens his hold and the cat is free.

Bad news for Ellis, still on the floor, and Wysteria's hem, in convenient swiping distance.

The clatter and spit of the cat's assault, largely invisible to her beneath the edge of the armoire is enough to make her jump, to say nothing of whatever blood and pained replies Ellis might have for his attacker. So when the claws come swiping in her direction, she is primed to leap back with a squeal of dismay—wrenching her skirts sideways in an effort to avoid them being shredded. Which would be a fine idea, had Pouncival's claws not latched onto her hem.

The cat is dragged out from under the armoire still clinging to the fabric. The moment it is exposed to the open air, it transforms into a whirligig of claws and spit and flying fur as it attempts to detangle itself from Wysteria.

Two of Riftwatch's finest, outmatched by a cat.

The momentum carries the cat onwards, and the spinning pass only narrowly avoids Ellis' face, enraged furry blur passing just centimeters from his cheek. He rolls further, tries to assess how best to grab hold of the beast, but the flurry of movement makes it impossible to discern a clear entry point.

"Wysteria!" is just aimless protest, frustration as Pouncival caterwauls. The weight of the cat is beginning to rend small tears in the fabric of her skirt, which will likely become large tears if left unattended.

"Don't let it back under the furniture!" is the sole instruction as Ellis scrambles to his feet to go yank a drop cloth from the table.

Somewhere, a harpist is plucking all their strings remarkably hard in an effort to make the notes resonate as loudly as is possible.

Here though, Wysteria is attempting to both back up from the thrashing cat and avoid the further destruction of her skirts (She has to attend dinner tonight) which is resulting in a comic dredging of the animal and the distinctly increasing distance between Pouncival and Pouncival's would be captor. It takes a full moment of wiping the floor with the cat (literally; there is a trail of gently settled dust which has been swept up by the cat's floundering backside) for good sense to finally reach her. With a cry of frustration, Wysteria crouches abruptly down toward the slavering beast. In a swift motion, she closes the bulk of her skirts about the squirming cat.

"Quickly! I have him!"

A raking paw punches free, swiping murderously at the air.

The urgency of the situation means there's hardly a split second to consider the appearance of ankles and calves.

Instead, Ellis crouches, dust cover in hand, to sweep the layers of cloth over Wysteria's skirt. Pouncival's desperate, furious bids for freedom are stifled. Hopefully for good.

"Let go," Ellis instructs. "You should be able to draw your skirts free without taking him with you."

Theoretically.

Yes, in theory she should be able to draw her skirts free. In practice, this requires delicate maneuvering and the eventual final detachment of a cat's snarled paw from the mutilated hem of the dark blue garment. But afterward, miraculous unscathed, they are left with an ominously murmuring make-do bag, both of them crouched around it where it sits on the floor, and—

"Oh."

There is blood beading in Ellis' beard. Wysteria reaches out, but doesn't touch him. Her hand instead dances around the prospect of touching his face and then falls away. She looks down to regard the thing trapped between them.

"Perhaps this will win you your freedom."

A special dispensation for dangerous services rendered, surely.

Can cats growl? This one seems given to it, considering the sound rumbling from within the layers of fabric.

"Perhaps I should bargain with her for a new dress for you," is not a vote against Wysteria's ability to repair the garment. (Or Ellis', if it comes to that.) But more a sense of how much is at the Lady Paget's fingertips and that perhaps some of that largesse should be parceled out to Wysteria.

The collection of scrapes have not drawn his attention. Wysteria's faltering hand is caught up again.

"I'll be sure to explain to her how you captured her pet."

In glowing yet delicate terms, surely. Ellis has yet to work out whether or not he might present the bundle to Lady Paget or if he will have to find a way to extract the cat for presentation.

Across from him on the other side of the snarling cat in a bag (more or less), Wysteria suddenly bristles. She scoffs.

"I have no need of the Lady of the house's charity. I am perfectly capable of doing my own mending. And furthermore"—has the sound of a thing spinning up toward full speed; a great monologue's threatening presence rising over the horizon. "If we are to broker for your freedom, it seems prudent to give you all the credit. Particularly when you were wounded in the process. In fact, I should like no part of this attributed to me including that mark I have left on your cheek. You may say it was Pouncival, and we will hope that it elicits some further sympathy from the Lady."

She will be damned if she accepts some garment from the woman who deemed her wardrobe so lackluster.

The vehemence of it takes Ellis by surprise. His eyes widen at her, thumb pausing in it's mapping of her knuckles.

Tempting fate, Ellis puts his free hand on the squirming, venomous bundle as if that might quiet Pouncival and leave him in a far better position to parse Wysteria. (It does not quite Pouncival. It does inspire some lashing movement within the wrappings, that does not dislodge Ellis' hand.)

"I thought you'd like a new dress," is said slowly. Ellis has the sense the dress is not necessarily the objectionable part of all this.

He turns her hand over in his own, examining for traces of blood as he continues, "Or to have some recognition for helping me accomplish what I'd spent most of the morning failing at."

Eventually, if prompted, Wysteria will come out with the heart of the grievance. Or so Ellis assumes.

"Not from the Lady Paget, thank you." The blood—his blood—is contained to under her thumbnail. There is only a trace of it. "I am perfectly content without either her accolades or charity. If she is capable of doing me any favor at all, it will be to grant your early release from her custody so that we might return to Kirkwall together."

Wysteria's attention flicks to the thrashing lump under his hand. She makes then to extract her fingers from his examination as if this will close the topic to all further debate or inquiry.

"Come now. Where must Ser Pouncival go now that you've successfully apprehended him?"

Ser Pouncival must go to the drawing room, trussed in a dust cloth to be opened by the lady of the house, at her own peril.

Ellis might say this. A straightforward answer, to be buffered by the query of whether Wysteria should like to accompany him in, or if she would like to retire to the suite of rooms Ellis has been allotted to wait for him there.

Instead, his hand tightens around hers to stall against escape as he asks, "Did Lady Paget offend you?"

His hand tightens about hers. It halts her escape.

"No, don't be ridiculous," sounds Yes, she's dreadful.

And that grip doesn't falter. The slight impulse towards reeling her in is stalled by the obvious obstacle dividing them.

"Tell me what happened," is very tender, considering the murderous snarling from the makeshift trap sitting between them.

"Nothing happened. Lady Paget was perfectly cordial," says that Lady Paget is a beast who has done something Wysteria will never forgive.

Between them, The Bag rumbles ominously.

"Indeed she was quite sympathetic to the state of Riftwatch's affairs. Particularly in the sense where I was representative of them."

A hand returns to The Bag, tempting fate. Unsurprisingly, the second attempt does not soothe the vocal displeasure radiating outward.

If he could, he would put a kiss to her palm. As it stands, his thumb draws lightly across her knuckles in familiar motion as he studies her.

"What did she say?"

No sympathies had been expressed in Ellis' hearing, but is that such a surprise? Their conversations had tended towards other matters, such as the crates in the attic that must be relocated or the creaking hinges on the doors leading out to the veranda.

Her spare hand slaps the back of his. It's a small thing. Not delicate, just a brief crack like a snap of fingers. Stop that.

"She said nothing at all." And also, "I believe she doesn't care for my dress."

Thump, thump, says the bag as Ser Puncival pummels Ellis' hand from inside the canvas.

This is not much information. It could be mistaken for a small thing. But it had been jealously guarded. Having had to expend so much care teo draw this minor aspect of the conversation from Wysteria, it become more minor turn of conversation.

There are too many layers of cloth between Ser Pouncival and Ellis' palm, but the determined prick of claws makes a ghostly impression. Ellis lifts his eyes to Wysteria, eyebrows raised for the slap of her hand, and then draws her up with him.

"Lady Paget has bad taste."

How much weight does such a declaration carry when made by Ellis, who knows next to nothing about what is and isn't good taste? (Maybe a good amount of weight, considering the majority of what he hears regarding good taste comes from Wysteria.) He keeps his hold on her hand even as he bends to lift the bag containing the loudly objecting cat.

"Come with me."

Presumably to deliver the cat.

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