Tuktu Weir queen of numbers - Printable Version

"To whom it may concern: I have recieved letters and telephone messages from men which have annoyed me very much and I take this occasion to ask them publicly, please do not annoy me. I, Mme. St. Clair, am not looking for a husband or a sweetheart. If they do not stop annoying me, I shall publish their names and letters in the newspaper." - Stephanie St. Clair

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he wakened, feverish. the oxidized metal that ligatured his neck had rusted at its hinges and no longer yielded with posture adjustments. grafts of flesh and matted fur stuck to its links and ripped open any scabs that had begun healing-- the ore would soon poison his blood if he was not slackened from its noose. he would painfully succumb to sepsis.
the guttersnipe may as well already went the way of flesh and bone the way his sloughed sickly beneath his skin. he loped in a strange, splaying manner, tail wicking the air with the beat of his trounce. for a man indisposed as he, absalom did not show it in his gait. it was almost jolly in manner, though death's winged pestilence circled him overhead.
until he saw the mottled girl ahead. he slowed his roll to a slouching pitiful state and for a short time, watched her from a distance. she would likely discern his approach as she lifted her snout, the spectral color of her eyes drawing his attention--and what comely features for her to boast.
his legs carried him to the opposite side of the water with a limp that was entirely, if not expertly, feigned. standing across from her, it appeared if he were to move an inch further his bones would clatter to the earth like a misassembled skeleton. "i have vultures but i need aloe vera." he rasped plainly--as though it were the most conventional thing he could possibly utter.

absalom did not flinch at her susurration--ew summarized the unthrifty man in every way, but he lacked the ability to reflect on himself in a way that would derive insecurity. "i was attacked." he responded. the girl lent a demure appearance that was not consistent with the oath on her tongue--she seemed more assured of herself, and his inclinations sought a softer touch. "in the bog. by a red wolf." he elaborated, his face awash with angst. "he tried to strangle me."

"what makes you think i didn't?" he served back, commanding his body into grueling movement once more to slink a hair closer to the merle dryad. there was a distinct lack of concern behind her questioning and he parsed she was the judicious type--suspicious, but not to any neurotic extent. in the privacy of his mind, he turned over whether this one was more thorn than petal.
"he found me, in my piteous, weak state, and showed me mercy by leaving me only slightly worse for it." absalom explained, exaggerating limpness as he shifted his weight.

he stopped his ambivilant advance toward her, taking the snarl as a tacit demand. he hid the smirk that begged to twitch on his lips, and backed away courteously. "do you think you are impervious?" he asked in response to the insistence that he hadn't fought hard enough against his alleged assailant. would she say the same if he were a violated woman? had indra fought hard enough for her life, he wondered?
queenie openly examined him, and he invited it; if she wanted to look upon his haggard frame and paint illness as self-pity, he was her canvas."the most useless of emotions--i wouldn't subject myself." absalom slowly lowered his belly to the rimecrusted ground and began to lap at the water adjoining them, a loss of interest scouring his focus.
when he was finished, he simply rose and left the woman where he found her, not intending to see her again. he picked up quickly which rosebushes had thorns, and the one in his rearview was most certainly willing to prick his finger.