Umbertiel

[Drusia]

Then Harker walked up.

"Hey, you two. Innkeeper says he's sorry, but they miscounted the number of available rooms. Look like you two'll have to bunk up. I'll sleep in the wagon. Later."

OOC: **slowclap.jpg**
I heartily approve. ^^

[Graybeard]

Sister Rose's blush, from the moment she realized what she'd "said," left her resembling a berobed, green-eyed tomato, and it just kept getting deeper. "I ... you ... we ... no ... just ... I mean ... joking ... but ... us ..."

And then Harker passed his bit of news.

Rose could stand it no more. Her eyes rolled back in her head, as (ironically enough) had Brad's on so many other similar occasions, and slowly, almost daintily, she settled to the ground in a faint.

------------

For a while, Brad couldn't think of anything to say, so he simply held Lillith in the embrace, tightened it just a bit. Then he tried to say something.

"I -- I'm confused, too," he got out. "Confused, and maybe even a little bit scared -- just a little bit." He tried to smile bravely, not sure whether he was succeeding or not. "Not -- not everyone in our church is nice, for sure. I just -- hope you know that we're not like that. I'm not like that. There are people everywhere who aren't nice, sweetheart. All we can do is be -- ourselves. Be what we should be.

"Be loving." He tightened the embrace another notch...

... And then there was the soft thump in the hallway, as his cousin hit the floor.

[Drannin]

Argus yelped and fell to Rose's side.

"Uh... Rose! Are you all right? Wake up?" Argus went to shake her, hesitated, then swore and grabbed her shoulders anyway, lifting her torso gently off the ground...

Which promptly caused Rose to slump forward and fall into Argus' chest, with his arms partially around her. It was pretty obvious what it looked like to passersby, of which there were thankfully none.

This also caused Rose to come around. Partially in Argus' arms.

Awkward.

(OOC: CHALLENGE! How badly can we mortify Argus and Rose? )

[Graybeard]

Sister Rose was still blushing furiously as she regained consciousness. "I'm so sorry, Argus," she said as she tried to regain her dignity. "I don't know what I was doing, using that as the test message for getting the telepathy back. I'll never do that again." She gestured emphatically to make her point ...

... Overlooking that her hand, and her sleeve, had become tangled with a belt loop on Argus' pants while she was unconscious and in his arms.

After that, things went from bad to worse.

[Sareth]

"What was that?" Lillith jumped from the arms she had just snuggled into. She hurried to the door in a rush of skirts. She darted out the door, very closely followed by Brad, then abruptly stopped. Brad plowed into her from behind, knocking her forward. Before she could fall over Brad's arms shot around her, halting her forward decent.

Lillith giggled, then clapped her hand over her mouth. After a moment she regained her composure. "Father, Rose. I am sorry for interupting." She started to turn away, but a shocked Brad was still holding her tightly. "Um, Brad? You can let go of my breast and go back to the room now."

"Wagh!" Brad let go of Lillith like her chest was a super heated boiler. "Sorry!" he darted back into Lillith's room with alacrity.

"Let go that fast and I might start feeling insulted." Lillith backed through the door, then stuck her head back out just long enough to give a quick, "Have fun!" then shut the door.

Back in the room, Lillith gave Brad a smile.

Brad was beat red, staring at his feet. "Um, sorry. I mean, you're all vulnerable and then I grab your"

"Brad..." Lillith grabbed Brad's hand and pressed it over her heart. "It's just a breast. You're a sweet man, but if you want to be with me some day you're going to have to get used to the thought that you're going have to look and touch. It doesn't have to be today, but stop apologizing every time you rediscover I'm a girl."

[Graybeard]

Brad's mouth worked, and he blinked several times. Then he finally got out one single word -- "Okay" -- and pulled Lillith to him, to resume the embrace they'd been in before Sister Rose hit the floor.

-------------

Speaking of whom, Rose was disentangling herself from Argus, thankful that nobody had seen what appeared to be her attempting to remove Argus' pants, other than Lillith, with whom it could all be worked out (she hoped), and Brad, who probably hadn't noticed.

"I'm so sorry," she mumbled. "Let me go out to the wagon and get my bedroll." Without waiting for an answer, she headed down the hall.

[Drannin]

Argus sighed. It had been such a day...

[Graybeard]

Sister Rose returned minutes later with her bedroll, her dignity largely restored. (She'd had to endure some snarkage from Harker when she picked up the bedding, but there were worse things to deal with.) As she thought about it, maybe it wasn't such a bad thing to get a better sense of the way Argus lived, under purely platonic conditions. (At least I think they'll be platonic, she thought.)

"Well, I don't snore," she said as she unrolled the bedding. "I'll also hold off on the limited rites that our church does in the evening and at sunrise." She smiled ruefully. "I think over the next day or so, I'm going to be having more problems with an excess of our church's rituals than with their absence. And oh, by the way, one other thing... the magical glow in the temple isn't there any more."

[OOC, to Argus: If you want to retrospectively play that snarkage for Harker, feel free, you know what Rose is like...]

[Sareth]

Lillith tucked into the enfolding arms Brad was wrapping around her. She lay her hands on his chest and rested her cheek on his shoulder. "Thank you Brad."

[OOC] I'm back. Also, I'm thinking I'll let Lillith and Brad face out here. But please feel free to play out as much of the night as is needed. I'll keep.[/OOC]

[Graybeard]

Brad held Lillith tight. "I love you," he said simply, and that was that.

[OOC: OK with moving ahead to morning, and a new thread? Or does Argus want to say anything about the sleeping arrangements first, as a parting shot?]