Post-Battle Girl Talk

“Stew?”

 

Famke looked up at the proffered bowl.  It looked tiny in the hand of the Targ woman holding it.  Famke nodded and accepted the wooden bowl.

 

“Thank you, Torvi,” Famke said.  “I do find myself a bit hungry.”

 

Torvi nodded and sat tailor-fashion on the deck beside Famke.  The bard noticed she did that often, sitting in that fashion.  She hid a smile when she thought of how many chairs the 7’8” warrior might have broken in her time.

 

The supernatural storm had finally passed, along with the torrential rain it had produced.  The northerly winds were still strong, though, making it grey and overcast, and bitingly cold.  Famke pulled her cloak closer about her.  The Targ woman seemed to not notice the cold at all. 

 

“We had a tradition in my tribe,” Torvi explained.  “After a battle, the warriors ate first.  If there was any food left after, the weak could squabble over the scraps.”

 

Famke shook her head and gave a small chuckle.  “I’m no warrior.  I’m a whore.”

 

The giantess shrugged.  “You didn’t fight like a whore.  I saw you.  You jumped into the fray with those jeweled gauntlets of yours.”

 

Famke looked down at the bronze gauntlets she wore.  At first glance, they seemed decorative, almost ostentatious.  But a flick of a finger could cause spikes to pop out next to the knuckles:  vicious spikes that could cut and rend flesh when she attacked a foe, or deliver poison to the unlucky recipient.

 

“A creation of my own design,” Famke bragged.  “I came across something similar in my travels.  But they were more obviously weapons, and were crudely made.  I needed something subtle.  Something unobtrusive.  It was then a simple matter of finding a metalworker to make my vision a reality.”

 

“You are not like any whore I have ever known before,” Torvi admitted.  She gave a snorted laugh.  “Not that I’ve known very many whores.”

 

Famke regarded the young giantess before her.  She was tall, of course.  Very tall.  And well-muscled.  But there was also a beauty and vulnerability in her face that seemed almost incongruous with the image of the barbarian warrior she portrayed.  Her hair was a dark brown, long and barely tended.  Feathers, beads and jewels adorned her long hair, giving a soft rattle whenever she turned her head.  The young Targ still wore streaks of blue war paint on her face in a swirling, asymmetrical pattern. 

 

Torvi seemed serious at most times, almost stoic.  But this day she was unusually talkative, almost happy, in Famke’s opinion.  That thought spurred Famke to be bolder with the young giantess than she might normally be.

 

“You have a beautiful face, you know,” Famke began.  “I know of many men who would pay good gold coin to bed a strong, confident woman like yourself.  I could make inquiries on your behalf, if you wished.”

 

If Torvi was offended by the inquiry, she didn’t show it.  She simply frowned and shook her head.  “I know of such men.  Weak men who want to be controlled, and taken, and forced to do what they are begging for anyway.”  She spat on the deck, looked around and leaned towards the bard in a conspiratorial fashion. 

 

“I have partaken of such men, when the need was great and no other options presented themselves,” she whispered.

 

“Really?” Famke whispered back, her eyebrows rising in surprise. “Well, don’t keep me waiting.  What was it like?”

 

“It was always a disappointment,” Torvi sneered bluntly.  “And I felt…unclean afterwards, as if their mewling weakness had stained me somehow.”     

 

Famke nodded in understanding.  “I felt much the same after my assignations with such – I was going to say ‘men,’ but that does not seem to be the correct term.  Regardless, I’ve taken to charging such creatures double whenever they come around.”

 

Torvi gave her a wan smile.  “At least you got coin out of it.  I got nothing.  And they would always try to follow me around afterwards, begging me to take them, control them, hurt them. One of them was particularly persistent.”

 

“How so?”

 

“He followed me everywhere,” Torvi explained.  “I cursed him, threatened him, publicly humiliated him, but that only made him more determined.  I even beat him unconscious on several occasions, but he would always come back professing his love and devotion.”

 

“How did you get rid of him?” Famke asked.

 

Torvi shrugged.  “I broke both his legs and threw him down a well.”

 

Famke choked as she had just taken a sip of wine, spewing some of it on the deck.  She coughed and laughed, trying to catch her breath.

 

“Really?” she choked out through the laughter.

 

“I just wish I had thought of it sooner,” Torvi stated.

 

“Did he die?”

 

“No, unfortunately” Torvi proclaimed.  “As I walked away, I could still hear him calling to me, begging for forgiveness, begging me to hurt him again.  Still, it gave me time to leave town and get away from him.”

 

Famke’s laughter faded and she gave a sad shake of the head.  “Men are so simple, so…basic in their wants and desires.  It makes them controllable, malleable.  Women should be able to make them dance to our whim.  But most times we don’t, or are afraid to try.  For this is still a man’s world.  They are too strong, too violent, too willing to hurt or kill us to get what they want.  When they even know what it is that they want.”

 

“I envy you your strength, Torvi,” Famke told the Targ giantess.  “I envy you your power.  The power to meet men’s violence, or surpass it.  To feel safe in a world of men.”

 

Torvi sighed and sat down her bowl of stew, uneaten.  “I don’t think anyone has ever been envious of me before.  I’m an outcast, a widow, and the mother of a dead child.  And this strength you think you see keeps even the good men away.  It’s a lonely way to live.”

 

Famke smiled.  “Perhaps a partnership between us, then?  With you next to me, I will feel safer in this fallen world.  And with me next to you, the loneliness will be kept at bay.  We both benefit, no?”

 

Torvi nodded and smiled.  “I think I would like that.”

Comments

    • Chris Snevets

      Famke further apologizes and then even further boasts of Torvi's brass beauty, "and I wasn't trying to recruit you to the red! Your combination of natural beauty and brute force could get you out of any situation that did not favor, either the red fair crew or the suitors. Hell, maybe you'll find women with more intestinal fortitude? Haha!"

      Torvi gives Famke a cross look.

      Famke yells in defense, "I wasn't recruiting!"

      Torvi laughs and laughs.