Today’s snippet, titled “Nîda: Tears, pt VI”, is a piece I wrote about my PC in Mark’s new (Good) Pathfinder Campaign.
      Be forewarned, there are mature themes and naughty language below.
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      Nîda was not a rebel.
      She realized this about herself long before she stripped off her white garb and wimple, as instructed. Long before she pulled on dingy brown trousers and a blue linen blouse, stepped into pale green slippers with scuffed soles, and tied her hair back in a single braid so long it brushed the tops of her thighs. Even before she first accepted the silver-dragon staff and made her oaths. The only real rebellious moment of my life, she reflected, holding a cup of steaming rosehip tea to her lips, was the day I told my parents that I would be staying in Kenabres. Every day since, I have done what I am told, what I am expected, what duty orders me to do. Even right now, my stupid, obedient body is sitting here in The Gossamer Wind just as I was directed, but I can feel my heart straining to do what it wants.
      “More tea, Goodwife Lancaster?”
      Shaking her head, Nîda closed her eyes and looked away. “No, thank you.”
      “As ya like,” the pretty young woman gave a perfunctory bend of her knees and moved on. The tap room, such as it was, was crowded, yet quiet. There were six tables of varying sizes crammed into a room that only measured twenty feet by perhaps twenty-five feet. Two walls were lined with bookcases, buffets, glass-doored cases, and shelves; each of these was bursting with a variety of beautiful tomes, trinkets, fancy mis-matched pieces of porcelain, and figurines in a dozen materials. A third wall wall consisted of windows from one edge to the other, heavily curtained, but presently open so that patrons could look out into the bustling street. The fourth was thick with paintings, from tiny portraits to hulking landscapes, with a great slew of interesting subjects. The door in the center of that wall was a wound in the clutter, and though it was wide enough for two large men to pass through shoulder-to-shoulder, it seemed much smaller and more cramped due to the frames that overhung the jamb.
      She sat at the smallest table, in the dimmest corner furthest from the windows. Nîda watched the flame on the delicate, blown-glass lantern as it danced on the flat woven wick. There was a heat in her loins that seemed to tingle in rhythm with the little orange light; it was a sensation she had often read about, but never truly experienced. A longing, a yearning… desire.
      Desired-but-Untouchable, she thought with a frown. Why didn’t he ever say anything? Why didn’t I?
      “…white flowers in their hair.”
      “…whole gaggle of them at the celebration tomorrow.”
      “…think Terendelev will be present?”
      Snippets of conversations drifted toward her and she tried not to eavesdrop, sipping her tea. Her ears and eyes had always been more a curse than a blessing. Their appearance set her apart from most other students and teachers in Kenabres, a heavily-human populated city, and their extraordinarily keen abilities often forced her to see and hear things she would rather not. Master Sorvanir had told her that she should embrace the gift, and had sent her to train with a shadow-dwelling rogue of the Silver Legion. She learned to spot things in the dimmest light, things not even those who, like her, was possessed of low-light vision, could see. It was a talent that would be useful to the Legion, but to her personal life, it had not helped her see the things she needed to see in time.
      The evening wore on, the activity on the streets outside dwindled, and the chatter of her fellow patrons quietly fell off. Alone in the corner with a cup of tea gone stone cold and a book open and unread before her, Nîda was lost in her own mind. Over and over she asked herself why and how and what in all the Hells was wrong with her? What kind of idiot first falls for one man, then for his grandson?
      “Practically… incestuous,” she muttered, flipping a page angrily, though she had not read a single word. “What is wrong with me?”
      “Not a single thing, Nîda.”
      She gave a start, clattering her cup upon the delicate, mis-matched saucer.
      “What are you doing here?”
      Jovi climbed into the chair opposite her. “I passed my exams.”
      “C-congratulations.”
      “Thanks.” He started to speak again but paused as the proprietress returned to the table with a kettle of hot water and two ribbon-tied sachets of tea. Once she had all but molested him with her eyes, the young woman cast a disgustingly overt invitation with nothing but her lips and sashayed away. Her hips rolled obscenely and Nîda’s frown deepened. Jovi looked to Nîda, then to the departing woman, and back. He sighed.
      “Nîda, I am taking my vows tomorrow.”
      “I know.”
      He stretched his arm across the table and laid his hand upon hers. “But… that’s not for hours and hours yet. We… we’ve got tonight.”
      Nîda tried to wet her lips with her tongue, for suddenly her mouth was dry as the wastelands of Sarkoris. It all happened so fast after that. They abandoned the streaming kettle and climbed the narrow steps to Nîda’s pitch-roofed chamber in the attic.
      Her threadbare commoner garments hit the floor in a whirlwind of color, joining the lurid purple tunic and charcoal trousers Jovi had borrowed for his trek outside the Legion’s headquarters. A million questions and protestations swept across her mind, gone with the first touch of his warm breath on her throat.
      Nîda had never before been as the Gods made her before a man, but she felt no shame or hesitation. There was hardly a cohesive thought in her brain now; lost in the sensation of Jovi’s lips upon hers, his sensitive, agile fingers stroking all the secrets parts of her body until she was quivering in his arms.
      He was well-formed and gracefully proportioned, for all that he stood less than four feet tall, and Nîda let her fingers travel across his warm, tanned flesh. As if she was attempting to memorize every curve, every ridge, every mole or blemish or scar, she caressed him with her eyes as well.
      Jovi hardly said a word as he guided her to the bed and buried himself in her unbound hair. He murmured something about it being her glory and wrapped it around them like a diaphanous blanket. The shimmering light reflecting from her locks dazzled her and when his mouth found the secret treasure between her thighs, she arched and cried out in a rapture of all her senses.
      They made love half the night, occasional bursts of activity punctuated by long stretches of leisurely touching and kissing. If there were professions of eternal love and devotion, they were whispered so softly that not even Nîda’s exquisite ears could hear them.
      The earliest rays of dawn were on the horizon when she was stirred from a love-drunk sleep by movement on the bed. She rolled over, nakedness modestly covered by her hair cascading over her shoulder and hip, and smiled lazily at him.
      “Where are you going?” Nîda chuckled. “It is too early yet, for bagels and coffee.”
      “No, comychéile, I have to get back.”
      Frowning, she sat up. “Get back. To the Legion Hall?”
      Jovi hopped on one foot, yanking up pants that were a size too small. “Aye. It’s graduation day.”
      “Well, yes, but-”
      He stopped trying to button the trousers and climbed up beside her. “I have to go to Nerosyan, Nîda. You know that it’s true. I’ll train to be a Theurge there, and you will study your echelons here.”
      “Jovi,” she began, her brows knit in frustration. “Tell me you love me. Tell me that we’ll leave Kenabres together. Tell me-”
      “I can’t do that, tiada, you know I can’t. I mean, I do love you. And last night was the best night of my life. I’ll never forget it, forget you. I mean, you have been my dream girl, right?” He lifted her chin, meeting her gaze. “But its never going to work the way you imagine, is it?”
      Nîda turned away from him, pulling the blanket up to cover herself. Suddenly she felt exposed… dirty.
      “Look, it isn’t fair to either of us to pretend. Is it? What kind of life would that be for you? I’ll only stay hale and virile for thirty or so more years. Then I mean, I’ll be old and I’ll die and you’ll have to stand by and watch, never aging a single day.
      “And then there’s the fact that most hin-human or hin-elf relationships are barren, and you elves aren’t especially fecund anyway. I dream of a big family, Nîda. Lots of children, noisy and boisterous… all the things I never had growing up.”
      “I can’t give that to you so you’ll just shunt me aside? It is my choice to spend those years with you, why should you have all the decisions?”
      “Well, but-”
      Nîda felt indignant anger bubbling up in her chest. “Jovi, damn it, there are so many things you did not even consider! You are a selfish little man. We live in Kenabres – a city uniquely at war with unknowable evil. There are thousands of orphans created every year. We could adopt any-”
      “It ain’t just that. I’ll have to watch myself getting all wrinkled and grey while you stay perfect!”
      She narrowed her eyes.
      “It just, Nîda… it just wouldn’t work.” He slid to the floor, turning his focus back to dressing. “But hey, we had this incredible night, didn’t we? We’ll always have tonight.”
      With more physical rage than she had ever even thought herself capable of, Nîda slapped him squarely in the face. She felt the crack of the cartilage and felt the spurt of hot blood as it gushed from his broken nose.
      “You know what, Jovi? Fuck you.”
      Swooping down, she scooped up her borrowed clothing and, clad only in the heavy veil of her hair, Nîda stormed from the room. Humiliated tears mingled with furious ones upon her cheeks. She paused at the door long enough to step into her shoes and pull on the tunic, then stormed out of The Gossamer Wind.
      With a rebellious chord sounding in her heart, Nîda returned to the Legion Hall. Fuck Jovi. Fuck Harry. Fuck them all! I’ll do as I wish from here on out and bugger the rest.

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Note: Image is “King Jagiello Statue Central” by (Mulligand) from SXC.hu; edited by me