@northsrose, continued from here.
' hm ––– ' as in so it does, as in so it is. thoughtfulness sews itself into the spirit-flushed red of his cheeks; for a moment, he’s back to being the boy who grew up at the seams of a forest and its pines. firefox rubs at a dull ache in his elbow. ' if i ‘ad to reckon a guess, i’d say you didn’t learn about lumber from the free cities and their gods-forsaken love of palms. ' just yesterday he’d seen a man clamber up the trunk of one such sprawling tree. the leaves stuck out wildly as if in alarm, but the climber didn’t seem at all concerned. he swatted at the brown-haired fruits hanging around the base with equal confidence ––– and then promptly fell to the cobblestoned ground. the coconut came tumbling down after him, bouncing off his skull like a rock on water. the man did not get up again. ( stupid city and its stupid palms. )
he catches himself reacting outwardly to the fantastic slew of his thoughts, brows creased / upper lip tensed into a sneer. he blinks himself free from this trance and, remembering his original line of questioning, wags a finger lazily at the tree-knowing barkeep. ( she, who was most certainly not born along the coast of essos. ) he sits himself on the table she’d only just wiped down, foregoing the stools lined up neatly around it. ' what is it, then: vengeful husband? disappointed father? cock-whet lord who wouldn’t take no for an answer? ' something brought her here, and he'd stake the length of his right arm on the fact that it wasn't a love for drunks and hooligans.