janie_tangerine (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
janie_tangerine) wrote2018-01-23 12:28 am
janie_tangerine) wrote2018-01-23 12:28 am
Entry tags:
cowt 8 settimana 2 (headlock): got your heart in a headlock (the dinosaur lords, rob/karyl)
It’s strange, Rob has found himself thinking more often than not lately, how you feel like you know someone after singing about them for years, and then it turns out you were both wrong and right at the same time.
If anything, the ballads, both his own and others’, hadn’t exaggerated when it came to the man’s dedication, or the fact that he preferred deeds to words – Rob’s fairly sure that in the week they’ve traveled together, he’s been the one running about all of the conversation.
Then again, it’s also possible that Karyl doesn’t trust him enough to actually engage in a conversation with him, which is fair – he was the cause of the man’s downfall and death, at least if you hear him out, and even if Karyl doesn’t seem to hold it against him, he can believe why he wouldn’t choose to engage in the aforementioned conversation.
Still, that was accurate.
The rest – eh, the rest is up in the air, but surely none of the songs he wrote mentioned the man’s horrible sleeping habits (insofar as you can call sleeping habits having night terrors), nor how, at first sight, he doesn’t cut an imposing figure (on closer observation, though, he does, or so Rob thinks anyway – no one would not think the man imposing after having seen him do away with those three brigands at once, and that only counted what Rob saw up close, and not what he saw in battle, and doesn’t he perpetually feel ashamed of that, regardless of how Karyl feels or doesn’t feel about it); then again, no songs ever predicted a future in which the famed mercenary would be traveling on his almost lonesome towards Providence without his dinosaur, without his sword hand (even if that might come back) and with him for company.
Sometimes, as they walk and Karyl says nothing, just scratches at the bandage touching his wrist (never at the stump of his hand, though), Rob thinks, what if I really did write a ballad about this. The famed but disgraced mercenary heading for a pacifist colony to defend it along with the likes of a lowborn dinosaur master with a knack for singing and a head for at least basic war strategy.
(According to Karyl, it hadn’t been. Rob might have felt entirely too elated at that. Look at him feeling elated because the hero of his ballads complimented him on a strategy that cost Karyl a hand and almost his life. That probably is a good reason why the man’s not completely right in the head, most people would say.
Most people. Not Rob, not for now.)
He doesn’t know if anyone would want to hear it. He doesn’t know if Karyl would – given the man’s opinion of music in his army, maybe not. Or maybe Rob could have him change his mind on the way to Providence. Who the hell knows.
He thinks of how he’d start it.
Something like, a different pair, doing something out of step, maybe. That would work. Maybe not in the beginning, but it would work – they are a very much different pair and they are doing a lot of things out of step. Fighting for a bunch of pacifists, for one, if they actually get properly hired when they’re there.
Maybe he’d talk about where they’re going. It’s nice in Providence, for sure. At least, the road has become greener the more they marched. Something like, greener scenery, distant flickering, or maybe he could turn those around, and this weather’s bringing it all back again. That could work, he thinks. Maybe added with the above verse.
Why the hell not. He’ll see to remember it – at least being good at such a job means having a good memory.
He doesn’t know if Karyl would appreciate, though.
The ballads they sang about him – that Rob sang about him – never specified such a thing. Before, from what he deduced, he wouldn’t have.
“You know,” he tells him one day as they walk – Nell’s trudging behind them – “if this goes right, it could make an interesting song.”
“Really,” Karyl deadpans, not giving a hint of whether he likes the prospect or dislikes it.
“Sure. I mean, I know most of the repertoire and I can assure you there’s nothing about the likes of a legendary hero and the present company being hired to defend those who cannot defend themselves.”
“Hm,” Karyl concedes, after a lengthy pause. “I suppose I should hear it first. Then again, we should maybe defend those people first.”
“Probably,” Rob concedes. “But the point of ballads was never sticking to the truth.”
“And how would you write that if we have never even been there?”
“Maybe it could be about getting there.”
“I am afraid nothing of much import has happened so far.”
Rob shrugs, entirely bent on not letting Karyl’s negative mood sour his new project. “You disarmed three people on your own and magic is giving you your hand back –”
“It’s not –”
“It is and we both know it, and no one’s killed us yet and you’re still alive after, well, we know what. Seems to me like there’s more than nothing of much import.”
Karyl shrugs. “You’re the bard,” he finally says. “I suppose I’ll hear it.”
Well, that was more than I’d have hoped for, Rob decides. It’ll do for now. It’ll do.
--
Thing is – you can’t fault the man for his attitude. Rob has a feeling he never was the most open person and after what he’s learned on the way and how Karyl ended up there, and given how badly he sleeps at night, it’s… understandable, how he is.
He thinks if he should put in that song, something like you look dead half of the time, or maybe no, he looks dead half of the time. Then again, it’s an improvement – when they met, he used to look dead all of the time.
Rob’s not going to tell him that piece of information. Maybe he should scrap that line. It’s unfair to call him out on that.
Especially when fuck him sideways, Rob does like him.
He’d never thought he’d like a noble in his entire life except when one of them paid him, and look at where he is. He steals glances along the road, and while they dine in silence, and while Karyl stares down at his hand, with a face that for anyone else would look impassive but that Rob feels on him looks worried.
He always tries to look as unassuming as he can.
You know you’re better than this, Rob wants to tell him.
He doesn’t.
It’s nothing that would go in a ballad about knightly quests.
They are words that might go on another kind of ballad, and Rob has a feeling it’s the kind of words people would expect from one concerning Lord Jaume, not Karyl.
Maybe he’ll compose that other one for himself, and no one will have to know.
--
There are things about how badly his travel companion sleeps that worry him.
Not just that he has night terrors or that he sleeps badly.
That he knew, and that’s how one night he slips into Karyl’s room to check if there’s anything he could do.
Thing is – he stands there and watches, and the man doesn’t wake up during the entire thing.
At all.
It happens twice before he even can muster the courage or force of will or what else to even do something about it, because what could he do?
Well, all right, he could wake Karyl up, but who knows how he’d take it? People like him usually don’t take it too well when they learn that someone has seen them in a moment of weakness. Rob likes to think he’s above such pettiness, but then again, would he care? He thinks not much – it’s not as if people ever had such a high opinion of him that showing them weakness or not ever changed anything.
Anyway, he doesn’t want to risk that, so he doesn’t, but on the third time it’s bad enough that he slips inside the room and dares put a hand on Karyl’s arm, feeling the wry, tense muscle underneath – all muscle, not a bit of fat, not any patch of skin that gives a little bit – and clasps, and Karyl doesn’t wake up but he does calm down a bit, even if he keeps on looking distressed under his meager blanket.
Rob remembers that sometimes his sister would sing to him after his mother stopped.
He sits with his back up against the wall, his hand still there, as he hums softly whatever else he came up with for that ballad he might really never share with anyone (or that he might rework to be something about Jaume’s guard – that might work, as sad as it sounds and with all the implications of the case).
It’s all disjointed verses, of course.
I’ve been walking, you’ve been hiding, and you look half dead half the time.
You’ve still got it, I’m just keeping an eye.
You know you’re better than this.
Mixed with what he has above, it’s – honestly, quite a mess of a song. Or a ballad. He’s not even sure it’s either.
It’s really ridiculous that it would work if he ever wanted to join Jaume’s Companions, most probably, and up until this month he never really thought he shared those proclivities.
Up until this month.
Whatever. What matters is that even if it’s a horrid excuse of a ballad and he’s not even singing it well and he’s actually doing everything he can so that others don’t hear him, Karyl does seem to settle down.
And he hasn’t woken up once.
Rob slips out of the room willing his heart to not thrum as loud as it’s doing right now, wondering if he actually helped any or if it always works out like this, but then he hears nothing else during the night, and usually those night terrors last a whole lot longer.
All right then.
All right. After all, if it’s two of them doing this, and if he can do anything to make the man’s life somewhat more bearable, he figures that it can’t hurt, especially if Karyl doesn’t even realize he’s there.
--
So he does it again. And again. He hates how he can’t seem to work that I’m just keeping an eye properly into a cohesive stanza, and he just drops it from his skeleton of a song because it feels somehow too intimate to actually say it in front of Karyl, whether he’s awake or asleep or both.
He doesn’t think he’s ever going to finish it. Also because they’re edging closer to Providence with every passing day and at that point when they get there he doubts they’d be sharing rooms or anything of the kind. Maybe he should stick to turning it into a ballad about the two of them going to Providence and hopefully being successful at their job.
Maybe. Honestly, the idea that maybe Karyl might appreciate it makes him kind of want to try it just for the sake of it and to see if now he’d appreciate music in his camp, or music written about him, though maybe not his Companions-worthy ballad.
He stands up, squeezing the man’s shoulder just a tiny bit as he hums his last few verses and leaves the room, making sure he’s silent and that he won’t wake up his… friend? Mentor? Hero? Who even knows anymore.
Maybe I should write it in Anglès, he thinks. At that point it’s not a given half of the realm would understand it. Actually, most wouldn’t.
Karyl would, though.
He doesn’t know if it’s anything that should make him want to finish that song or not.
--
He eventually does split it in two – he still doesn’t dare singing either, not even after they start winning battles. It feels somehow wrong to put himself into anything he sings, especially when the other half of the pair is Karyl, and he’s just – not a legendary warrior or a legendary anything, especially not a minstrel, either.
Still, he doesn’t forget it. He doesn’t even need to write it down. And good thing that it apparently seems like Karyl isn’t having that many nightmares anymore.
--
And then he invites Karyl to join him for drinks after that bullshit about not having easy facility with others, or about lacking easy camaraderie skills – which fine, he does, but that’s not the point.
I fear more than I hope you ever know, Karyl says, and turns his back to him, and Rob does think, he’s the loneliest thing I’ve ever seen –
And then he remembers that time Karyl told him, what was that even, you brought a spark of joy in my life, and the Fae be damned if he’d ever forget that damned line, and he feels like utter shite at the prospect of just letting him go.
“Fine,” he says, walking up behind him, “then I’m not going.”
“You should,” Karyl deadpans, as usual. Of course. He’s still staring at Rob with those black eyes of his and Rob almost feels his legs faltering. Almost.
“You don’t need a gift to be around people who want to be around you.”
“They wouldn’t want to, if –”
“Be done with that already. And maybe I don’t know how much you fear, but what if I didn’t want to be with other people right now?”
“You’d want to be with me? I’m poor company, Rob. Very poor company.”
“Let me be the judge of that,” Rob replies. “I’ve stood it for months, yet. It’s been fine enough, all things considered.”
They stare at each other for a long moment. Karyl says nothing, barely even moves. Rob feels like they’re caught in a darned headlock and he’d like to know who is losing out of the two of them.
Then he shakes his head and takes a step forward.
“As the person who, according to you, ended up bringing a spark of joy to your life even if I actively was part of the reason why you seemed to have lost it, can I just tell you something?”
“Do go ahead,” Karyl goes on.
“You,” Rob starts, and that part of the song he’s never going to share with anyone else comes back to mind. “You know you’re better than this, Colonel, and I don’t believe any of that not having a gift shite. If you don’t want to come, fine, but you deserve something nice once in a while. And you’re not bad company nor you ruin everything you touch, if you ask for my humble opinion, but just – think about it,” he says, and then –
He takes a risk and moves forward, not daring too much, but he brushes his lips against Karyl’s the way he’s sure he’s sang about entirely too many times when the subject were the darned Companions and their battle rites. He doubts that they’re the same where Karyl comes from, but at least if it’s not what Karyl wants, it can be taken for a wholly friendly gesture.
It might.
It can, because he doesn’t give in to the instinct of kissing him for real – just their mouths brushing together, once, and then he risks ghosting them over the side of Karyl’s head, just once.
“You’re better than that,” Rob says again. “And now if you really want me to go, I will.”
Karyl just stares at him.
Then –
“Were you going to sing for whoever would drink with you?” He asks, in a small voice. Entirely too small for the likes of him.
“Probably. If they ask.”
“Would you – but in my tent?”
Rob can’t help it – he cracks a smile. “You want to hear about your deeds, Voyiod?”
“Maybe I want to make sure you’re not exaggerating things too much.”
“Exaggerating is our trade, but when ever are you going to ask me again? Fine enough. I’m coming,” he says, grinning still, and Karyl grins back ever so slightly, and he doesn’t know who is winning that headlock out of the two of them, but maybe it’s both and maybe it’s neither, but for now –
For now it’s good enough, and if it means that at some point he’ll come out a winner and stick in Karyl’s stubborn head that he is way, way better than what he thinks he is, then it’ll be even better.
End.
If anything, the ballads, both his own and others’, hadn’t exaggerated when it came to the man’s dedication, or the fact that he preferred deeds to words – Rob’s fairly sure that in the week they’ve traveled together, he’s been the one running about all of the conversation.
Then again, it’s also possible that Karyl doesn’t trust him enough to actually engage in a conversation with him, which is fair – he was the cause of the man’s downfall and death, at least if you hear him out, and even if Karyl doesn’t seem to hold it against him, he can believe why he wouldn’t choose to engage in the aforementioned conversation.
Still, that was accurate.
The rest – eh, the rest is up in the air, but surely none of the songs he wrote mentioned the man’s horrible sleeping habits (insofar as you can call sleeping habits having night terrors), nor how, at first sight, he doesn’t cut an imposing figure (on closer observation, though, he does, or so Rob thinks anyway – no one would not think the man imposing after having seen him do away with those three brigands at once, and that only counted what Rob saw up close, and not what he saw in battle, and doesn’t he perpetually feel ashamed of that, regardless of how Karyl feels or doesn’t feel about it); then again, no songs ever predicted a future in which the famed mercenary would be traveling on his almost lonesome towards Providence without his dinosaur, without his sword hand (even if that might come back) and with him for company.
Sometimes, as they walk and Karyl says nothing, just scratches at the bandage touching his wrist (never at the stump of his hand, though), Rob thinks, what if I really did write a ballad about this. The famed but disgraced mercenary heading for a pacifist colony to defend it along with the likes of a lowborn dinosaur master with a knack for singing and a head for at least basic war strategy.
(According to Karyl, it hadn’t been. Rob might have felt entirely too elated at that. Look at him feeling elated because the hero of his ballads complimented him on a strategy that cost Karyl a hand and almost his life. That probably is a good reason why the man’s not completely right in the head, most people would say.
Most people. Not Rob, not for now.)
He doesn’t know if anyone would want to hear it. He doesn’t know if Karyl would – given the man’s opinion of music in his army, maybe not. Or maybe Rob could have him change his mind on the way to Providence. Who the hell knows.
He thinks of how he’d start it.
Something like, a different pair, doing something out of step, maybe. That would work. Maybe not in the beginning, but it would work – they are a very much different pair and they are doing a lot of things out of step. Fighting for a bunch of pacifists, for one, if they actually get properly hired when they’re there.
Maybe he’d talk about where they’re going. It’s nice in Providence, for sure. At least, the road has become greener the more they marched. Something like, greener scenery, distant flickering, or maybe he could turn those around, and this weather’s bringing it all back again. That could work, he thinks. Maybe added with the above verse.
Why the hell not. He’ll see to remember it – at least being good at such a job means having a good memory.
He doesn’t know if Karyl would appreciate, though.
The ballads they sang about him – that Rob sang about him – never specified such a thing. Before, from what he deduced, he wouldn’t have.
“You know,” he tells him one day as they walk – Nell’s trudging behind them – “if this goes right, it could make an interesting song.”
“Really,” Karyl deadpans, not giving a hint of whether he likes the prospect or dislikes it.
“Sure. I mean, I know most of the repertoire and I can assure you there’s nothing about the likes of a legendary hero and the present company being hired to defend those who cannot defend themselves.”
“Hm,” Karyl concedes, after a lengthy pause. “I suppose I should hear it first. Then again, we should maybe defend those people first.”
“Probably,” Rob concedes. “But the point of ballads was never sticking to the truth.”
“And how would you write that if we have never even been there?”
“Maybe it could be about getting there.”
“I am afraid nothing of much import has happened so far.”
Rob shrugs, entirely bent on not letting Karyl’s negative mood sour his new project. “You disarmed three people on your own and magic is giving you your hand back –”
“It’s not –”
“It is and we both know it, and no one’s killed us yet and you’re still alive after, well, we know what. Seems to me like there’s more than nothing of much import.”
Karyl shrugs. “You’re the bard,” he finally says. “I suppose I’ll hear it.”
Well, that was more than I’d have hoped for, Rob decides. It’ll do for now. It’ll do.
--
Thing is – you can’t fault the man for his attitude. Rob has a feeling he never was the most open person and after what he’s learned on the way and how Karyl ended up there, and given how badly he sleeps at night, it’s… understandable, how he is.
He thinks if he should put in that song, something like you look dead half of the time, or maybe no, he looks dead half of the time. Then again, it’s an improvement – when they met, he used to look dead all of the time.
Rob’s not going to tell him that piece of information. Maybe he should scrap that line. It’s unfair to call him out on that.
Especially when fuck him sideways, Rob does like him.
He’d never thought he’d like a noble in his entire life except when one of them paid him, and look at where he is. He steals glances along the road, and while they dine in silence, and while Karyl stares down at his hand, with a face that for anyone else would look impassive but that Rob feels on him looks worried.
He always tries to look as unassuming as he can.
You know you’re better than this, Rob wants to tell him.
He doesn’t.
It’s nothing that would go in a ballad about knightly quests.
They are words that might go on another kind of ballad, and Rob has a feeling it’s the kind of words people would expect from one concerning Lord Jaume, not Karyl.
Maybe he’ll compose that other one for himself, and no one will have to know.
--
There are things about how badly his travel companion sleeps that worry him.
Not just that he has night terrors or that he sleeps badly.
That he knew, and that’s how one night he slips into Karyl’s room to check if there’s anything he could do.
Thing is – he stands there and watches, and the man doesn’t wake up during the entire thing.
At all.
It happens twice before he even can muster the courage or force of will or what else to even do something about it, because what could he do?
Well, all right, he could wake Karyl up, but who knows how he’d take it? People like him usually don’t take it too well when they learn that someone has seen them in a moment of weakness. Rob likes to think he’s above such pettiness, but then again, would he care? He thinks not much – it’s not as if people ever had such a high opinion of him that showing them weakness or not ever changed anything.
Anyway, he doesn’t want to risk that, so he doesn’t, but on the third time it’s bad enough that he slips inside the room and dares put a hand on Karyl’s arm, feeling the wry, tense muscle underneath – all muscle, not a bit of fat, not any patch of skin that gives a little bit – and clasps, and Karyl doesn’t wake up but he does calm down a bit, even if he keeps on looking distressed under his meager blanket.
Rob remembers that sometimes his sister would sing to him after his mother stopped.
He sits with his back up against the wall, his hand still there, as he hums softly whatever else he came up with for that ballad he might really never share with anyone (or that he might rework to be something about Jaume’s guard – that might work, as sad as it sounds and with all the implications of the case).
It’s all disjointed verses, of course.
I’ve been walking, you’ve been hiding, and you look half dead half the time.
You’ve still got it, I’m just keeping an eye.
You know you’re better than this.
Mixed with what he has above, it’s – honestly, quite a mess of a song. Or a ballad. He’s not even sure it’s either.
It’s really ridiculous that it would work if he ever wanted to join Jaume’s Companions, most probably, and up until this month he never really thought he shared those proclivities.
Up until this month.
Whatever. What matters is that even if it’s a horrid excuse of a ballad and he’s not even singing it well and he’s actually doing everything he can so that others don’t hear him, Karyl does seem to settle down.
And he hasn’t woken up once.
Rob slips out of the room willing his heart to not thrum as loud as it’s doing right now, wondering if he actually helped any or if it always works out like this, but then he hears nothing else during the night, and usually those night terrors last a whole lot longer.
All right then.
All right. After all, if it’s two of them doing this, and if he can do anything to make the man’s life somewhat more bearable, he figures that it can’t hurt, especially if Karyl doesn’t even realize he’s there.
--
So he does it again. And again. He hates how he can’t seem to work that I’m just keeping an eye properly into a cohesive stanza, and he just drops it from his skeleton of a song because it feels somehow too intimate to actually say it in front of Karyl, whether he’s awake or asleep or both.
He doesn’t think he’s ever going to finish it. Also because they’re edging closer to Providence with every passing day and at that point when they get there he doubts they’d be sharing rooms or anything of the kind. Maybe he should stick to turning it into a ballad about the two of them going to Providence and hopefully being successful at their job.
Maybe. Honestly, the idea that maybe Karyl might appreciate it makes him kind of want to try it just for the sake of it and to see if now he’d appreciate music in his camp, or music written about him, though maybe not his Companions-worthy ballad.
He stands up, squeezing the man’s shoulder just a tiny bit as he hums his last few verses and leaves the room, making sure he’s silent and that he won’t wake up his… friend? Mentor? Hero? Who even knows anymore.
Maybe I should write it in Anglès, he thinks. At that point it’s not a given half of the realm would understand it. Actually, most wouldn’t.
Karyl would, though.
He doesn’t know if it’s anything that should make him want to finish that song or not.
--
He eventually does split it in two – he still doesn’t dare singing either, not even after they start winning battles. It feels somehow wrong to put himself into anything he sings, especially when the other half of the pair is Karyl, and he’s just – not a legendary warrior or a legendary anything, especially not a minstrel, either.
Still, he doesn’t forget it. He doesn’t even need to write it down. And good thing that it apparently seems like Karyl isn’t having that many nightmares anymore.
--
And then he invites Karyl to join him for drinks after that bullshit about not having easy facility with others, or about lacking easy camaraderie skills – which fine, he does, but that’s not the point.
I fear more than I hope you ever know, Karyl says, and turns his back to him, and Rob does think, he’s the loneliest thing I’ve ever seen –
And then he remembers that time Karyl told him, what was that even, you brought a spark of joy in my life, and the Fae be damned if he’d ever forget that damned line, and he feels like utter shite at the prospect of just letting him go.
“Fine,” he says, walking up behind him, “then I’m not going.”
“You should,” Karyl deadpans, as usual. Of course. He’s still staring at Rob with those black eyes of his and Rob almost feels his legs faltering. Almost.
“You don’t need a gift to be around people who want to be around you.”
“They wouldn’t want to, if –”
“Be done with that already. And maybe I don’t know how much you fear, but what if I didn’t want to be with other people right now?”
“You’d want to be with me? I’m poor company, Rob. Very poor company.”
“Let me be the judge of that,” Rob replies. “I’ve stood it for months, yet. It’s been fine enough, all things considered.”
They stare at each other for a long moment. Karyl says nothing, barely even moves. Rob feels like they’re caught in a darned headlock and he’d like to know who is losing out of the two of them.
Then he shakes his head and takes a step forward.
“As the person who, according to you, ended up bringing a spark of joy to your life even if I actively was part of the reason why you seemed to have lost it, can I just tell you something?”
“Do go ahead,” Karyl goes on.
“You,” Rob starts, and that part of the song he’s never going to share with anyone else comes back to mind. “You know you’re better than this, Colonel, and I don’t believe any of that not having a gift shite. If you don’t want to come, fine, but you deserve something nice once in a while. And you’re not bad company nor you ruin everything you touch, if you ask for my humble opinion, but just – think about it,” he says, and then –
He takes a risk and moves forward, not daring too much, but he brushes his lips against Karyl’s the way he’s sure he’s sang about entirely too many times when the subject were the darned Companions and their battle rites. He doubts that they’re the same where Karyl comes from, but at least if it’s not what Karyl wants, it can be taken for a wholly friendly gesture.
It might.
It can, because he doesn’t give in to the instinct of kissing him for real – just their mouths brushing together, once, and then he risks ghosting them over the side of Karyl’s head, just once.
“You’re better than that,” Rob says again. “And now if you really want me to go, I will.”
Karyl just stares at him.
Then –
“Were you going to sing for whoever would drink with you?” He asks, in a small voice. Entirely too small for the likes of him.
“Probably. If they ask.”
“Would you – but in my tent?”
Rob can’t help it – he cracks a smile. “You want to hear about your deeds, Voyiod?”
“Maybe I want to make sure you’re not exaggerating things too much.”
“Exaggerating is our trade, but when ever are you going to ask me again? Fine enough. I’m coming,” he says, grinning still, and Karyl grins back ever so slightly, and he doesn’t know who is winning that headlock out of the two of them, but maybe it’s both and maybe it’s neither, but for now –
For now it’s good enough, and if it means that at some point he’ll come out a winner and stick in Karyl’s stubborn head that he is way, way better than what he thinks he is, then it’ll be even better.
End.