(no subject)

[lazy_but_loyal]

Pam is getting restless.

She and Eric haven't gone back home in a while, but now she's feeling the itch, even if she's not looking forward to what awaits them. A giant pain in the ass, is what.

But she isn't leaving without Eric. When he says it's time to go, then they'll go together. She just hopes he's had enough time to come up with a plan. And it's not like she's been completely idle, she's been wracking her brain trying to think of something, too, but how to kill a 3,000 year old vampire isn't in her field of expertise.

So what else can you do but sit at a table with a laptop and compose a very long and detailed email to your personal shopper in Chicago about overhauling your entire wardrobe.

She's not very botherable and never really has been, ever. But she won't bite your face off. This time. Probably.

Comments

[lazy_but_loyal]

She leans back in her chair and crosses her arms, looking him up and down with a slow flick of her eyes. Her expression remains mostly unchanged except for a faintly raised eyebrow.

"Trying to blend in, huh?"

[athelstanthescribe]

"Successfully, I hope", he says with a nod, turning fully to face her. "Since it seems likely to be my home for the rest of my life."

[lazy_but_loyal]

"Well, you know what they say. When in Rome, do like the Romans do."

That's...probably not a saying in his time, but anyway.

"Don't you want to go back home?"

[athelstanthescribe]

He gets the gist, anyway, and shrugs to her question.

"My home was Lindisfarne and it burned", he says simply. "My brothers there were killed, my parents and siblings died long ago... I have little to go back for."

His tone is matter-of-fact. He's not telling her this out of any self-pity, just explaining the situation.

[lazy_but_loyal]

"Oh."

Sympathy in 3...2...1...

"Sorry to hear that."

Well, it's a thing to say.

"Guess you might as well start a new life where you are now. But wouldn't it be easier, y'know, among your own people?"

[athelstanthescribe]

"It might have." A crooked smile. "If it had happened sooner, when all I knew was the life of the cloister or a halter around my neck."

It would be much harder to go back to a monastic life now, when he's had a taste of paradoxical freedom.

[lazy_but_loyal]

A halter around his neck? She raises an eyebrow at that.

"Well, whatever floats your boat, kiddo. You probably weren't meant to be a monk forever."

[athelstanthescribe]

"I was a slave", he says to the unspoken question. "I am a slave, by their laws, but treated with more respect than most these days. And I've come to believe you're right."

[lazy_but_loyal]

"Huh. All things considered, you're pretty lucky, then. Don't you think? Trading in one way of life for another."

[athelstanthescribe]

"Very lucky." He doesn't have any illusions about that. "And all because it was Ragnar Lothbrok who found me hiding that day, else I would already be dead."