Should We Be Concerned? [OPEN]

[nineofswords]

Loud sounds were coming from Attolia's weyr. Shouting, getting increasingly loud, and increasingly infuriated. The odd swear was even able to be made out, which was odd coming from the usually poised, composed woman. The wher seemed to be intermittently broadcasting to everyone in the nearby weyrs as well, as if he was also enraged and unable to control his volume, but they were odd snatches of phrases that offered no further insight into the situation.

Then came a crashing sound, like something had been thrown. " --ridiculous!"

Would not have to be, if you --

Scrabbling sounds.

"Get back here, you forsking --"

-- claw walls!

Something was clearly going on in there, and no one was happy about it.

[FirebrandPhlox]

The commotion next door caused Chess to look up from the book she was reading. It was one of the ones N'ell had brought her, and though she didn't have much patience for the written word, being stuck in her weyr meant that she had absolutely nothing better to do than suffer through dull stories written on duller parchment.

Kichsk looked up from his napping spot too, his frustration of being awoken from his nap flooding Chess's mind. She pounded on the wall next to her head and shouted as loud as she could. Keep it down over there! Ah can't even hear myself think with that racket! If you don't shut up, Ah'll send my wher over there to make you shut up, I swear!" Kichsk snorted and glared at the wall where the noise was coming from, not offering any words of his own.

It was an empty threat, as both Chess and Kichsk were still confined to their weyr under house arrest, but she hoped her neighbor didn't know that and stopped causing a ruckus, whatever it was about.

[nineofswords]

The pair's attention snapped up at the sound of pounding on the walls as well as shouting. Attolia shot the wher a look. "We are not finished," she hissed, and stormed out of the room. Attolisk gave a lazy, luxurious stretch, and then followed along behind. "I don't need your help," she snarled at him.

Oh, not here to help, Attolisk assured her happily. Here for show.

Attolia heaved a sigh, then stopped at the door to her immediate neighbor on the side the banging had come from, startled to see guards posted at the door. Attolisk let out a laugh only he and his bond could share. Well well well. Look like you pissed off handler of wher who go rogue. Guess maybe you need my help after all.

Attolia grit her teeth, then raised her head to an imperious angle and flicked her hand dismissively at the guards. "Go stand at either end of the hall," she ordered them. "My bond and I wish to speak privately to your charge, and I will not have you listening in."

The guards protested that they weren't allowed to leave their posts and Attolia's eyes flashed. "Are you telling me that you're both so incompetent as guards that you can only keep a threat contained at its door, and cannot block its means of egress? Do I need to speak to the squadleaders about sending you back to the wherlingmaster to re-educate you in threat mitigation?" she asked in a voice like sharp ice. The guards rethought their position and moved off a ways as she'd ordered them to.

She rapped smartly on the door, more out of warning than courtesy, and swept into the other handler's room. Attolisk padded in after her silently, brushing against her as he curled his body protectively around her legs. Attolia's gaze was cool and steely. "I am curious how exactly you intend to have your wher shut us up," she said, her voice almost conversational but for a slightly hard edge to it. She smoothed the front of her dress. "It was an...interesting thing to hear from someone who is under house arrest for allowing her wher to go on a violent rampage through the lower caverns."

[FirebrandPhlox]

Chess sprung up from her chair as the door to her room opened. The commotion next door had stopped, but she didn't much appreciate someone barging their way into her room. She raised an eyebrow as a beautiful woman who looked like she had stepped out of a tapestry stepped into the weyr. Her wher was brilliantly colored, with a mix of pigmentation and patterns Chess had never seen on a wher before.

Damn, she knew how to make an entrance.

"Ah would have figured somethin' out!" Chess glared back at the intruder. Truly, she had made the threat without any plan or way to back up her words, but she didn't appreciate being made out to be a fool, like the woman seemed to be doing. She clenched her hands into fists. "And it's not like Ah wanted him to go off like that. We're still figurin' out this whole bond thing."

Kichsk let out a loud sigh as he rose to his feet and stood next to Chess. His eyes swirled with annoyance. He didn't care for the intrusion either, especially since the other handler had brought her wher with her.

"Who do ya think ya are, anyway? Makin' a big ol' racket then bargin' into people's rooms? Think yerself one of them fancy Holders or somethin'?" Chess sneered. The woman certainly looked the part, and Chess had no patience for Holders.

[nineofswords]

Attolia raised an eyebrow right back at Chess. The other woman hadn't come out swinging at the intrusion, which showed either a cooler head than Attolia had been lead to believe she possessed or else the woman was less quick to lash out when her private space was invaded than Attolia herself would've been. She'd remember that.

She kept her eyebrow raised at Chess's response. "So you didn't want him to go on a rampage, but you would have 'figured something out' for how to send him to shut us up? Have I understood that right?" She tilted her head at a slightly more imperious angle. "I should hope - for your sake at least, given the situation you currently find yourself in - that I have not understood you at all, as I do not take kindly to threats of any kind. I find them tiresome, as they are all too often overused. If someone is planning on doing something, it is better sense, I find, to simply do it." There was perhaps the implication of a threat in Attolia's own words, but phrased in such a way that Attolia felt rather confident that she could easily argue that she was being in no way hypocritical. "And perhaps if you find your wher so difficult to manage, you should be sent to the wherling barracks to refresh yourself on the basics," Attolia informed Chess with absolutely zero sympathy. While it was true that Attolisk was a handful, at least he didn't go on rampages, clawing at everyone in sight.

When Kichsk got up, Attolisk moved so that he was no longer touching Attolia and the large brown wher. Humans clearly in bad mood, he said conversationally. Why not let them yell, get out of their system and we take nap? Attolisk wasn't normally one for diffusing a situation, but he couldn't afford a fight in a room this cramped. Attolia would get hurt if it came to blows between him and Kichsk, and it wasn't worth it for Attolia taking her bad mood out on a neighbor. Attolia harmless. Might even be funny, watching humans try to solve fight without us.

"Silence," Attolia hissed at him, then turned her attention back to Chess. "I should think it'd be quite obvious that since I am in a Weyr with a wher, I am a threadfighting wherhandler. I am not resistant to the ways of the Weyr, but I have little patience for people trying to dictate how I live my life or issuing threats when they believe themselves to be safely anonymous." She had far more pride than to allow that, after all.

[FirebrandPhlox]

Chess didn't take kindly to being scolded, especially by fancy ladies who marched into other people's rooms like the owned the place. This woman knew nothing about what she had been through, or what it was like to suddenly become so isolated in a new place. And Faranth, did she like to go on and on.

No hurt Chess. The brown growled at the intruders. Not nap until gone. He tilted his jaw forward, indicating Attolia and Attolisk. He made no indication he was going to attack though, and stood next to Chess at attention.

Chess had enough. She stomped up to the woman, shoving her face mere inches from the shorter woman's. "Ya spit a lot of hot air and know nothin' about me. Ah don't take kindly to that. And my threats ain't empty." In a split second, she swung her fist at Attolia's jaw, hoping to catch her unawares.

[nineofswords]

It Attolia could've read Chess' mind, she would've laughed in the other woman's face. Attolia had been alone for so long, had long since lost her reason to trust others. Even Attolisk was someone she did her best to keep at arm's length despite his best efforts. She'd been burned a few too many times, and between the wher's literal flame pattern and his fiery temper, she was still not sure how far she could trust him with her heart.

What she could see, however, was a little girl, crying in her room and throwing temper tantrums because she had been confined to her room. It was not not something Attolia had any respect nor patience for. If she had acted in such a way, she would've been home still, miserable, stuck in a loveless marriage. So she radiated her contempt.

Attolisk sighed at Kischsk's proclamation. Oh well. Attolisk tried. He lay down at his mistress's feet, apparently ready to take a nap, even going so far as to mostly close his eyes. He looked for all the world like a feline half asleep. But he was sitting upright and his eyes were cracked open just the slightest. No matter how relaxed he might appear, he was not yet ready to completely let his guard down until the brown did as well.

The only thing you are trying is my patience, Attolia snapped at him silently. What happened to being here for the show? Or are we boring you already?

Is early yet. First ballad barely sung. Big number yet to come, you see. Know you. And girl is very upset. Will be very dramatic fight. And I have front row seat.

"Ass," Attolia hissed through gritted teeth, losing her control enough that she didn't quite realize she'd spoken aloud.

And then Chess punched her. At Attolisk didn't so much as flinch. Attolia's anger flared hot and fast. The child had dared to touch her! And Attolisk hadn't done anything about it, for all of his big talk.

You walk in her den and talk down and expect what? Cookie? Attolisk snorted at her. He spoke aloud to the room. Nice hit, for human. That your freebie, since we invade. Do again, I start take offense.

Attolia was seeing red. She had been punched in the face like this was some kind of common bar room brawl. There was only one real way to save face to such a grievous insult and still maintain her decorum, and it was by slapping this misbehaving child across the face. She shifted, beginning to do so, when Attolisk stretched out at her feet, looking for all the world like a languid cat, but knocking Attolia off balance as he did so. None that, he told Attolia. No provoke further. She angry enough, and would hate you to get another bruise. Your words more than sharp enough.

Attolia let out a noise of disgust at the wher, but turned furious eyes back to Chess. "Very well. So your threats are not empty. I will certainly keep that in mind." She slowly rose herself up to her full, uninspiring height, a height which was dwarfed by her sense of pride. "I hope you are aware, then, that I am not a woman who can afford to make empty threats either. I do not have the money, the status, nor the physical prowess or..." she looked Chess up and down with the most dismissive expression she could muster, "...the enthusiasm to make up for it in a fight. My wher is small by comparison to other such creatures. So when I say that I will not hesitate to bring your continued violence to the attention of the Weyr's leadership should you strike me again, know that it is no exaggeration, no hot air, but a reality as tangible as the bruise that will begin to develop on my face before long. So." She flared her skirts, then ran her hands down them, smoothing them. "Would you perhaps like to talk in a civilized manner, or shall I go and we continue shouting through walls like sailors in a storm?" She tilted her head. "You have perhaps...heard things I would be loathe to be repeated. You have done things I'm sure you would rather not leave this room. I happen to find it more pleasant when I know the nature of the person holding me hostage. As our hostage of each other is now apparently mutual, perhaps we ought to get to know one another a touch better?"

Attolisk radiated pleasure, though he was not so much a fool as to commend her for trying to make friends. He knew she would not take it well and would flee the room prematurely if he did.

[FirebrandPhlox]

Oh, it felt good to get a nice solid hit against Attolia's flapping jaw. Chess had put months worth of frustration into her swing, and it connected as well as she hoped it would. There was a feisty glint in her eye as she saw the fancy little lady go to retaliate, before her wher stopped her from swinging. Chess felt a cloud of disappointment that she wouldn't get to blow off more steam by fighting the intruder.

Careful. Kichsk warned. Fight much, get us stuck here longer. He was still eyeing the strange wher who seemed to not have a care in the world as the women fought each other. Kichsk didn't know what to make of the chatty fellow, but he seemed intent on not letting the violence escalate. Carefully, keeping his eyes on Attolisk, Kichsk settled into a seated position next to Chess. If his handler was going to blows with the woman, he wouldn't interfere in a human fight unless needed.

Kichsk's words, followed by Attolia's threats, made the reality of what Chess had done start to sink in with her. "Oh shards. Ah didn't think about gettin' into more trouble with all this," she said as she shook out her punching hand. Attolia had a solid jaw, probably from all her yapping. "Ah'll keep quiet about all this and won't punch ya no more if you keep this to yerself. That's what yer gettin' at with all the fancy talk, yeah?" Chess was trying to follow along with everything Attolia was saying, but Faranth could the woman go on and on.

"Ah'm Chess," she said, holding a hand out to shake, like her Daddy did when he met new folks. She tried to make her voice sound cheerful, but was cautious of the fancy lady and all her big words. "And that's Kichsk. Ya take a punch awful well..." she trailed off, waiting for the woman to give her name.