The coins slide across the table, clinking gently against the table as Tatiana mechanically sorts through them. She lets one roll between her fingers, testing the weight and feel of it—after years of this work, it is second nature to tell if a coin is good or not. Finding it clear, she lets it clatter onto the table, drawing out a thin sheet of paper. Deftly, she stacks a long row of coins, encasing them in the crackling paper, and draws the ribbon around it.
The baker's daughter had come by earlier. With a flourish of her scarf, red and white checkered, she had revealed a mound of doughy cod pies, still steaming in their golden crusts as the other counters crowded around her, eager for a hot bite to eat. The girl had left, her pocket bulging with clinking coins, the chattering groups dispersing back to their long tables.
Tatiana was left, half shadowed in the back, forcing herself to stoically count even as the sounds of laughter and conversation reached her ears, and her stomach moaned piteously.
You don't want it. She had told herself sternly. But she had. She wanted it so bad.
All she had had to eat that day was the crust of a loaf of bread, too battered and burned for even the stingy baker two blocks down to sell at market price, and more mint tea than she could stand. Day after day she drank it, but could never fill the hollow that raged and coiled in her stomach, and she'd be forced to root for nettle in the cracks between pavement stones to fill her. The wild nettle tore at her hands when she pulled it from the ground, but she would dig and dig until there was none left, and spend hours sweating over their battered little pot, long after her siblings had gone to sleep, desperate for some relief from that aching need.
She dreamed of the day where she would think nothing of devouring a cod pie, or two or three, one after the other, just like that. To break the crust, the filling still steaming in its golden shell, to sink her teeth into the tender flesh. She had dreamed of it so long that she felt she would die from the want of it.
She stares down at the coin roll, fat and gleaming on the table, the plum colored ribbon hanging limply down to the side.
Gold, what a ridiculous notion. The steaming golden brown of a shell of pastry filled with meat stirred her heart more than every glint of gold on this wretched table. But it was coin that ruled people. It was 2 regals for a cod pie, a third of what Tatiana spent every day to keep her family fed and with a roof over their head.
The numbers were always in her. They rattled in her brain while she stared out the broken hole in their wall at night, they coiled in her stomach, leaden and heavy, as she swallowed another gulp of foraged tea, and tore burned bread apart with her teeth.
25 regals per long roll of coin, wrapped in paper and bound with a little ribbon to keep them from sliding out, 20 rolls per layer, 4 rolls stacked high. Carefully stacked in heavy chests, and hauled away by grim faced men to vaults cut deep into stone, 2000 Regals, more than Tatiana could think to spend in a lifetime.
They would not miss one roll.
The wild, fierce thought springs into her head, and she's so surprised she jolts, bumping her knee painfully against the underside of the table, coins clattering from her hand. The other counters cast surprised looks her direction, and she flushes, ducking her head and focusing on plucking the coins off of the floor.
Yes. She says firmly to the insidious little voice, pointedly scooping them back into their places as she retakes her seat and buries her head in the ledger.
Yes they would.
The Maester was in his cups as often as he was out of them, and the wealth he had accumulated would not notice the loss of a single roll of regals. He spent more on that on his breakfast, by the Spirit, he had no care for such matters.
But his flint eyed Steward was. He would not hesitate to sack someone on even the slightest suspicion of theft. People were desperate, in these parts, and even with the menial pay and poor treatment, counters were hired as soon as they were sacked, the same looks on their faces.
She saw the same every time she caught a glimpse of herself in muddled puddle or trough—Pale. Sunken. Desperate. Desperate enough to have worked here for 4 long, painful years—longer than any other counter had lasted, double—toiling and slaving away, desperate to make herself needed. Far too desperate to steal.
Or just desperate enough?
With her time had come greater responsibility on her shoulders, the Steward happy to pass duties onto her to go flatter the Maester, but no extra coins to show for it. The one boon the Steward had given to her was to teach her to read—and only then, so she could read the logs and do his work for him. He knew how badly she needed to support her siblings, knew that she could not bargain. What she had thought was pity for an orphaned girl when he had allowed her to take up a position was truly greed.
Why should he be the only one who gets to be greedy?
Waning candlelight draws her eyes to the glint of gold—a fat roll of regals, no longer than the palm of her hand to the tip of her finger, no thicker than a span of her wrist—could feed her and her family for five wonderful days. A week, even, if they stretched it thin.
What's more important to do with those Regals? Feed five hungry children and yourself, or lock it away in a vault for some rich person to use to pay for wine?
She always stretched it thin. What she could do with that roll of coins.
Aren't you hungry?
She could buy a loaf of perfect bread, and a choice cut of meat, and a little tin of sweet tea.
Aren't you scared?
Lanfrey hadn't been able to find much work, malnourished as they all were. She needed to make sure if she took sick, they would be provided for. Maybe she could secure an apprenticeship for Lanfrey with that one roll of coins.
Aren't you tired?
She was tired of smelling like mint and stinging nettle because tea was the only thing they had left. She was tired of burned bread. She was tired of table scraps.
Aren't you angry?
She was angry. Her fury grows with the shadows on the walls, warping and coiling in on themselves in blazes of wrath. She had been angry so long that she had forgotten what it felt like to not be.
She worked harder than anyone here. She was here long after the shadows lengthened on the wall and the others had abandoned their tables, counting out coins by the last spluttering light of the candle. She slaved over parchment, with numbers that could keep her family in bread for a century, spent in a single day by a noble with a taste for Qadirish wine or Sihai sea-silk. She had done this uncomplainingly, unflinchingly, from a time where she was too small to even lift the heavy boxes of coins and had to ask an older counter to do it for her. More money slipped through her fingers each day than she could spend in a lifetime, and she had seen nothing.
Nothing of her efforts. Nothing of her work. Just a grind, day after day, for even the barest scrapings of survival.
No-one will ever have to know.
She would not be blamed. She had been too loyal, too dutiful for too long for the suspicion to be placed on her. Always kept her head down, always did the math right, never a cent out of place. And it terrifies her, the desperate desire that claws at the back of her throat, begs her to do it, they'll never know, you need this, you want this-
She was so hungry.
She thinks of her mother before the sickness took her, how gentle and kind she was, how she clasped her hands together in prayer even as her palms cracked and split from the harsh soap she used to scrub clothes. Her father, who once a blue moon could scrape together the coins needed for a small fruit tart, lopsided and bruised, but delicious when you sliced it eight ways. How they had taught her piety, kindness and honesty.
Tatiana is not so pious as her mother or half so kind as her father, so she offers no plea for forgiveness, no cry to a higher power, as she slips the roll of coins into her pocket.
OOC: In honor of Tatiana getting approved, I decided to write her big character defining. moment
. I like it, but I'm sure I won't like it in a week lol so I may rewrite it at some point. Also she's not possessed or anything she's just ready to snap xD.
The baker's daughter had come by earlier. With a flourish of her scarf, red and white checkered, she had revealed a mound of doughy cod pies, still steaming in their golden crusts as the other counters crowded around her, eager for a hot bite to eat. The girl had left, her pocket bulging with clinking coins, the chattering groups dispersing back to their long tables.
Tatiana was left, half shadowed in the back, forcing herself to stoically count even as the sounds of laughter and conversation reached her ears, and her stomach moaned piteously.
You don't want it. She had told herself sternly. But she had. She wanted it so bad.
All she had had to eat that day was the crust of a loaf of bread, too battered and burned for even the stingy baker two blocks down to sell at market price, and more mint tea than she could stand. Day after day she drank it, but could never fill the hollow that raged and coiled in her stomach, and she'd be forced to root for nettle in the cracks between pavement stones to fill her. The wild nettle tore at her hands when she pulled it from the ground, but she would dig and dig until there was none left, and spend hours sweating over their battered little pot, long after her siblings had gone to sleep, desperate for some relief from that aching need.
She dreamed of the day where she would think nothing of devouring a cod pie, or two or three, one after the other, just like that. To break the crust, the filling still steaming in its golden shell, to sink her teeth into the tender flesh. She had dreamed of it so long that she felt she would die from the want of it.
She stares down at the coin roll, fat and gleaming on the table, the plum colored ribbon hanging limply down to the side.
Gold, what a ridiculous notion. The steaming golden brown of a shell of pastry filled with meat stirred her heart more than every glint of gold on this wretched table. But it was coin that ruled people. It was 2 regals for a cod pie, a third of what Tatiana spent every day to keep her family fed and with a roof over their head.
The numbers were always in her. They rattled in her brain while she stared out the broken hole in their wall at night, they coiled in her stomach, leaden and heavy, as she swallowed another gulp of foraged tea, and tore burned bread apart with her teeth.
25 regals per long roll of coin, wrapped in paper and bound with a little ribbon to keep them from sliding out, 20 rolls per layer, 4 rolls stacked high. Carefully stacked in heavy chests, and hauled away by grim faced men to vaults cut deep into stone, 2000 Regals, more than Tatiana could think to spend in a lifetime.
They would not miss one roll.
The wild, fierce thought springs into her head, and she's so surprised she jolts, bumping her knee painfully against the underside of the table, coins clattering from her hand. The other counters cast surprised looks her direction, and she flushes, ducking her head and focusing on plucking the coins off of the floor.
Yes. She says firmly to the insidious little voice, pointedly scooping them back into their places as she retakes her seat and buries her head in the ledger.
Yes they would.
The Maester was in his cups as often as he was out of them, and the wealth he had accumulated would not notice the loss of a single roll of regals. He spent more on that on his breakfast, by the Spirit, he had no care for such matters.
But his flint eyed Steward was. He would not hesitate to sack someone on even the slightest suspicion of theft. People were desperate, in these parts, and even with the menial pay and poor treatment, counters were hired as soon as they were sacked, the same looks on their faces.
She saw the same every time she caught a glimpse of herself in muddled puddle or trough—Pale. Sunken. Desperate. Desperate enough to have worked here for 4 long, painful years—longer than any other counter had lasted, double—toiling and slaving away, desperate to make herself needed. Far too desperate to steal.
Or just desperate enough?
With her time had come greater responsibility on her shoulders, the Steward happy to pass duties onto her to go flatter the Maester, but no extra coins to show for it. The one boon the Steward had given to her was to teach her to read—and only then, so she could read the logs and do his work for him. He knew how badly she needed to support her siblings, knew that she could not bargain. What she had thought was pity for an orphaned girl when he had allowed her to take up a position was truly greed.
Why should he be the only one who gets to be greedy?
Waning candlelight draws her eyes to the glint of gold—a fat roll of regals, no longer than the palm of her hand to the tip of her finger, no thicker than a span of her wrist—could feed her and her family for five wonderful days. A week, even, if they stretched it thin.
What's more important to do with those Regals? Feed five hungry children and yourself, or lock it away in a vault for some rich person to use to pay for wine?
She always stretched it thin. What she could do with that roll of coins.
Aren't you hungry?
She could buy a loaf of perfect bread, and a choice cut of meat, and a little tin of sweet tea.
Aren't you scared?
Lanfrey hadn't been able to find much work, malnourished as they all were. She needed to make sure if she took sick, they would be provided for. Maybe she could secure an apprenticeship for Lanfrey with that one roll of coins.
Aren't you tired?
She was tired of smelling like mint and stinging nettle because tea was the only thing they had left. She was tired of burned bread. She was tired of table scraps.
Aren't you angry?
She was angry. Her fury grows with the shadows on the walls, warping and coiling in on themselves in blazes of wrath. She had been angry so long that she had forgotten what it felt like to not be.
She worked harder than anyone here. She was here long after the shadows lengthened on the wall and the others had abandoned their tables, counting out coins by the last spluttering light of the candle. She slaved over parchment, with numbers that could keep her family in bread for a century, spent in a single day by a noble with a taste for Qadirish wine or Sihai sea-silk. She had done this uncomplainingly, unflinchingly, from a time where she was too small to even lift the heavy boxes of coins and had to ask an older counter to do it for her. More money slipped through her fingers each day than she could spend in a lifetime, and she had seen nothing.
Nothing of her efforts. Nothing of her work. Just a grind, day after day, for even the barest scrapings of survival.
No-one will ever have to know.
She would not be blamed. She had been too loyal, too dutiful for too long for the suspicion to be placed on her. Always kept her head down, always did the math right, never a cent out of place. And it terrifies her, the desperate desire that claws at the back of her throat, begs her to do it, they'll never know, you need this, you want this-
She was so hungry.
She thinks of her mother before the sickness took her, how gentle and kind she was, how she clasped her hands together in prayer even as her palms cracked and split from the harsh soap she used to scrub clothes. Her father, who once a blue moon could scrape together the coins needed for a small fruit tart, lopsided and bruised, but delicious when you sliced it eight ways. How they had taught her piety, kindness and honesty.
Tatiana is not so pious as her mother or half so kind as her father, so she offers no plea for forgiveness, no cry to a higher power, as she slips the roll of coins into her pocket.
OOC: In honor of Tatiana getting approved, I decided to write her big character defining. moment
. I like it, but I'm sure I won't like it in a week lol so I may rewrite it at some point. Also she's not possessed or anything she's just ready to snap xD.
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