Barrow is right. This isn’t how feigned combat is meant to be done, and Gabranth can’t confess to treating any of his other sparring matches even faintly the way he does with Jone. There’s something there each time that sparks in him a terrible, long suppressed habit. Competitiveness, or—
He clicks his teeth, fitting his helm back into place and letting that serve as a dampener for his own racing pulse. His swords are sheathed, every action careful, vying for more time. More peace.
There’s no request for forgiveness this time. He finds he cannot bring himself down enough to even offer false sincerity.
Because she cannot admit to Barrow's face that he is right, and she cannot either bring herself to lying in this moment (the pain makes everything true), she just stares off into the distance between them. "What the fuck do I have to do, to get people in this place to believe I'm a professional..."
She turns to get herself to a healer, walking slowly, but otherwise refusing to show weakness. She'll get her poleaxe later. Fuck it.
"Jone--" Barrow begins, but ends it with a scoff as she paces away; he knows full well what will happen if he pushes her, and none of them are interested in it going that way. He'll check in on her later, when she's had time to cool down.
In the meantime, he turns on Gabranth to fix him with a look that's downright stern; he's seen his face now, and, at least to his mind, knows the type.
"Got anything to say?" Barrow demands. For once, he's not fucking around.
“What would you have me say?” He snaps back, echo granting more purchase to a growl that settles low in his throat, as if Barrow were an undesired intrusion— and in some small way, with his hackles raised and his blood yet running hot, he is.
This, right now, is no place for a man without rank. Without strength.
"For one thing, 'sorry I near killed a woman in the middle of the fucking courtyard', maybe," Barrow replies, his voice raising into an authoritative boom as he steps forward, peering into the eyeholes of Gabranth's helmet. "For another-- 'you're right, mate, maybe I'll show some fucking decorum while I'm claiming to spar, and not be a stroppy piece of shit about it when I'm called off', shall I keep going?"
It's a side of Barrow few have seen, and fewer still have experienced themselves: he cuts quite a formidable figure when he's angry, broad and tall enough to loom over Gabranth without a scrap of armor on him.
Who is he to demand apology? To demand decorum? Who is he, but a ghost of a man stretched thin across the canvas of his life? Let him paint himself with authority, let him challenge a Judge Magister—
They both know how poorly it would fare.
“Go lick her wounds if you are so faithful, hound.” He meets that stare through the metal of his own helmet, fierce-wrought lines a picture of unfeeling iron. Unyielding in its defiance.
“I’ve no desire to hear you prattle, nor do I care what you think of me.”
Barrow opens his mouth, then closes it again. He opens it once more, takes a breath, pauses, smiles strangely, and looks off to one side, like he can't quite believe what he just heard.
It's not that no one has ever disrespected him before: that's par for the course. He deals with it every day. His friendship with Jone is nigh built on it.
But such contempt only comes along once in a blue moon(s). Giving an absent nod, Barrow chews the inside of his cheek for a moment before turning his gaze back on Gabranth, shrewd and piercing.
"You might not have chosen to be here, mate," he says in a low, quiet voice, "but you're sure as shit here now. And you'd better find someplace useful to stick that attitude." He rolls his shoulders to step away, going to pick up Jone's poleaxe, which has been lying on the cobblestones since she left.
"Not doing any favors stuck in your mouth, as it is," he adds, his smirk icy as he straightens and scoffs, "Judge Magister."
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He clicks his teeth, fitting his helm back into place and letting that serve as a dampener for his own racing pulse. His swords are sheathed, every action careful, vying for more time. More peace.
There’s no request for forgiveness this time. He finds he cannot bring himself down enough to even offer false sincerity.
“See her to a healer.”
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She turns to get herself to a healer, walking slowly, but otherwise refusing to show weakness. She'll get her poleaxe later. Fuck it.
"Goodnight, you two."
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He'll check in on her later, when she's had time to cool down.
In the meantime, he turns on Gabranth to fix him with a look that's downright stern; he's seen his face now, and, at least to his mind, knows the type.
"Got anything to say?" Barrow demands. For once, he's not fucking around.
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This, right now, is no place for a man without rank. Without strength.
That much he aims to make clear.
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"For another-- 'you're right, mate, maybe I'll show some fucking decorum while I'm claiming to spar, and not be a stroppy piece of shit about it when I'm called off', shall I keep going?"
It's a side of Barrow few have seen, and fewer still have experienced themselves: he cuts quite a formidable figure when he's angry, broad and tall enough to loom over Gabranth without a scrap of armor on him.
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They both know how poorly it would fare.
“Go lick her wounds if you are so faithful, hound.” He meets that stare through the metal of his own helmet, fierce-wrought lines a picture of unfeeling iron. Unyielding in its defiance.
“I’ve no desire to hear you prattle, nor do I care what you think of me.”
no subject
It's not that no one has ever disrespected him before: that's par for the course. He deals with it every day. His friendship with Jone is nigh built on it.
But such contempt only comes along once in a blue moon(s). Giving an absent nod, Barrow chews the inside of his cheek for a moment before turning his gaze back on Gabranth, shrewd and piercing.
"You might not have chosen to be here, mate," he says in a low, quiet voice, "but you're sure as shit here now. And you'd better find someplace useful to stick that attitude."
He rolls his shoulders to step away, going to pick up Jone's poleaxe, which has been lying on the cobblestones since she left.
"Not doing any favors stuck in your mouth, as it is," he adds, his smirk icy as he straightens and scoffs, "Judge Magister."