No escaping yourself, François thought gloomily, pacing the long halls of Thiasa Keep. Drapery muffled the walls. It was uncomfortably stifling. And he was stone-drunk.

None of this was unusual; Thiasa was a hot country, hotter than northern Scalia. And the climate was only one of many things he disliked about this uncouth, barely civilized country. Exile. What in the name of Zeus was he supposed to do with that? He was well-supplied enough, but he'd landed in a hornet's nest. Out of the frying pan, into the fire.

He took out his flask and absent-mindedly wiped the rim of it on the sleeve of his black shirt. Maybe he'd be less overwarm if he forebore from wearing black. But it was just so flattering. It made it look as though his pallor and the sunkenness of his eyes were purposeful somehow, or, perhaps, scholarly, in a dashing kind of way. Or maybe he just looked like a clerk, which was his mother's opinion. That he walked with the awkward, gangling gait of a colt--unless he concentrated very hard--didn't help at all.

What he looked like--he passed a manservant, who gave him a glance--was out of place.

And now the household was bustling in preparation for this King's wedding. He could not have cared less if he'd pressed himself to do so. At least there would be wine.

He took a drink of gin. Efficacious, faster than wine, and it went to the head like no other.

Up ahead was one of those surprising alcoves in this labyrinthine castle, where lay a sitting room. Couches, tall glass windows--even bookshelves. Perhaps the Thiasans weren't so terribly backwards, if they could afford books other than the Bible. He had brought some of his own, but nothing like his entire library. At the moment, his head was spinning too much to read, or to want to read. A maid was dusting inside, and he came up behind her until he could feel the warmth of her body.

It'd be a diversion, anyway.

"You know, it'll only get dusty again tomorrow," he said in a low voice, setting one hand on her back.

The one thing the castle seemed to create more than anything was dust. Dust seemed to multiply inside the thick stone walls of Thiasa castle; it flew in from nowhere and coated everything in a soft, fluffy layer of heavy dust, that rose up in clouds when one disturbed it, got itself sucked into one's nose and mouth and before long one found oneself sneezing and coughing.

Worse of all was wherever the nobles kept their books. Books seemed to be a primary attraction for dusk, there were endless amounts of pages to wrap and coat and become a part of. No matter how thoroughly a maid would clean the library, the heavy smell of dust combined with the musty smell of old wood, paper and leather would forever be part of the room.

Sophie had realized that she preferred cleaning books than anything else. She knew to read a little, which was much more than anyone of the other maidservants knew, but this of course she kept a secret and wasn't the reason she liked cleaning books at all. It was just that there were rarely any people around the books and if there were, they kept quiet, absorbed in their book and wouldn't mind some maidservant tidying up.

Lately it was particularly nice to get away from the bustling preparations for the king's wedding. The castle's small library was so quiet compared to the rest of the castle that soon enough Sophie's mind drifted away and she was pleasantly daydreaming as she worked, whistling one of her father's tunes.

When among the other maids she made double sure never to whistle because all the tunes she knew were songs she heard from her father and were the songs her father and his friends would sing in the taproom on holiday evenings, they involved wine and all sorts of things that women should not sing about.

Sophie was so completely absent-minded that she didn't even notice when someone entered the room, and snuck up close behind her. When suddenly a hand touched her back she was harshly awakened from a nice dream and her reaction happened entirely out of impulse. She spun around in an instant and laid a ringing slap across the man's face.

She was not a weakling, she had strong arms for a woman and a slap from her was something to make the skin burn and the eyes to water, it was not the kind of slap men usually expected to receive, it was a harsh punishment – so harsh that some men in the past had decided never to mess with her again.

And after she had done what she had done, realization sunk its sharp teeth into her mind and there was a moment in which her eyes grew wide and stared into the man's eyes in shock and her heart jumped to her throat. He was standing very close to her, too close, and the smell of spirits on his breath made her head spin. She tried to back away, but her back met the bookcase.

She lowered her eyes quickly, staring at her shoes. "Lord, forgive me, Lord." She said breathlessly, trembling at the thought of what she had done and what might happen to her as a result. She didn't know this lord, she'd never seen him. He looked, smelled and dressed like bad news, like someone a maid wouldn't want to be caught with. Perhaps it was his cloths, perhaps it was just him, but he seemed dark and up to no good.

"Ow!" François recoiled, bellowing in pain, one hand against his reddened face. At least she hadn't broken his nose. He'd been through that particular experience three times already, and it never got any easier.

Still, he was a little amused that a maid would do such a thing. They weren't usually so protective of their virtue. And these maids wouldn't have heard of his rather sticky reputation, like those at home. His father'd had to dismiss enough of then after François had finished playing with them. He assuredly had some bastards running around, but no one back on the Buxton barony would want to acknowledge a child by him, not after the mud his reputation had been dragged through. And not undeservedly. He had killed someone. It just hadn't quite sunken in yet why that was wrong.

Who knew.

"I'm against apologies as a rule," he said at last, amused, lowering his hand from his reddened check when he saw how contrite and flustered the girl before him was. She had a wild mass of red hair; he'd always liked red hair, and seen it around often enough on Buxton, what with all the nearby Celts. "They always seem insincere, and the trick is being entirely insincere and sounding sincere, don't you know. I make a point of it. What's your name?"

Sophie had been sincere, she was pretty sure she had been, but now she wasn't really feeling sincerely sorry she had slapped this man as he drunkenly said something about apologies, she just couldn't make any sense of it.

What she wondered was if he was being sincere himself or if he was angry with her and this was his way of expressing anger, which meant that she had to risk a glance to see the state of his face. Even before she managed to argue with herself that this was a bad idea, her bright brown eyes glanced up on their own accord and then quickly back down to her feet.

His face had been red, particularly where she slapped it but his eyes, as far as she could tell, weren't angry, they were… mocking? Her real problem was that her eyes had revealed much more about herself than she had learned about him. From one glance it was easy to determine how proud she was and how fierce she tended to act, she had never been the sort who managed to mask themselves, but that had never bothered her until now.

"Lord, my name is Sophia, Lord." She said trying to keep her voice level.

"I like the name. It means 'wisdom,' a trait few possess and few, I think, even wish to posses. I myself tend to prefer knowledge. Wisdom is onerous, knowledge is light. Come, sit with me."

She'd follow a direct order. This approach always worked with servant-girls. They obeyed; it was their job. Was it manipulative? Yes, absolutely. He wouldn't have it any other way. "I daresay you don't get to experience these couches much. They're very comfortable. Have a seat."

He flung himself down haphazardly across one of them, one leg hanging over the arm of the cough, his arm dangling down over the back. With his limbs akimbo, in his dark clothing, he was quite aware the looked like a black spider or a praying mantis. One that lacked singularly for prayer. "There's room on this one, if you don't object to the company--and I do hope you don't. It would speak ill indeed of your taste if you didn't like me." His voice was faintly mocking, or self-mocking. Often even he couldn't tell.

She hadn't known that her name meant "wisdom", it was just a name to her, like any other name, she wondered briefly if her parents thought of this when they named her – she believed that they probably only liked the sound of it.

But, she was starting to get pretty annoyed with this so-called "gentleman" who was making it far too clear what he wanted. She was so tempted to give him a piece of her mind that before she sat down she looked up and opened her mouth, but then caught herself and closed it, casting her eyes downward again.

She tried not to stomp over angrily toward the sofa, but of course she paced a little heavily in that direction. When she sat down she was surprised to discover that it was indeed magnificently comfortable, like nothing she had ever sat on before. It didn't quite allow her to sit stiffly as she wanted to; it seemed to suck her body in, making her fall back comfortably, supporting her aching muscles.

But there was no time to marvel, she was terribly vexed and coldly turned her head to the other direction.

"So cold." François uncoiled himself bonelessly and moved closer to her, one arm sliding down to lie along her shoulders. "Come, now. I know I smell of liquor and am hopelessly uncouth in so many ways, but really, aside from that, what have I ever done to you?"

He leaned closer, so that his mouth descended toward her ear. "... Yet." He laughed quietly, his hand moving to touch a lock of her wild hair. His own was straight and lank. He loved a woman with curls--Lucy'd had them in profusion. In fact, Sophia evoked Lucy almost uncomfortably much.

"By the way, since you've failed to ask--my name. I'm Sir François Villon, at your service." He ducked his head ever so slightly toward hers. "I know, it's an uncommon name; it's Duanean. Apparently not uncommon there. But then, red hair isn't uncommon there, either. Here it is; which is a pity. I love red hair."

Sir Francois Villon? Where had she heard that name before? Maids talked so awfully much about anything and everything, apart from cleaning a maid's job was to gossip and spread rumors that grew so thick one might never find the truth. Wasn't he that young fellow who was accused of murdering his beloved's fiancée? He didn't seem quite so young to her, she turned her head to glare at him - she'd never spoken to a murderer before.

Something about him and his manner raised such a flaming ball of rage inside her that with every moment it was getting harder and harder to control. It wasn't her virtue she was protecting, of course, she had gone willingly with more than one young man, it was her pride, he couldn't possibly expect to treat her like that and she'd come jumping happily into his arms.

"Oh aye, I bet you love blondes and brunettes so terribly much as well." She said, it felt better saying that than simply acting meek, although what she really wanted to say consisted of calling him a number of names and choosing some very special insults. The way things were going it was very probable that it would come to that as well.

François smiled, which might have surprised her. However, for him, anger was as potent an aphrodisiac as the much-vaunted sparrow's brains--not that he lent much belief to that particular myth. Amazing, really, how religion and superstition walked hand in hand. What he liked to do was crush mythology with rage, to overturn placid convictions with the doubt and havoc of desire... and most of all, he wanted to make new a world in which something so pure as love could, finally, in some tremulous form, exist.

It was likely impossible.

In the meantime, there was love's false shadow, its pale counterfeit, its sneering döppelganger: lust. And he did feel it, though now, sodden with gin, he had to coax it forth, lingering over the salt-savory scent of the woman's skin and hair. Perfumes had never inflamed his senses so much as the honest warmth of flesh--and coy coquettistry had never spurred him on so much as the honest flame of anger.

"I love anyone who's worthy of it," François said, rather amused. The comment, in this context, had at least a double meaning. "But I have to say I'm particularly partial to the anger I see in you redheads, though generalizations ought not to be made hastily. Tell me, what general opinions have you so hastily formed of me? Not quite fair, not to tell me, when I've been so terribly open with you."

Yes, she knew that he was the sort of man who fed on a woman's anger, but that didn't stop her from glaring most fiercely at his smile. "You're a frothy elf-skinned knave, you're a whey-face and a scut, a milk-livered boar-pig and that's just my first impression."

In truth, women shouldn't have known such insults and it was more than likely that Sophie had just made part of them up out of her imagination. She also had a way of saying them in such a snake-like manner that it seemed as if she was pitting out poison. She was very artistic when it came to being angry.

By now her face was already a certain reddish hue, not quite the red of Sophie in her worst temper, but slowly getting there. She had not, during her insults, stayed sitting as closely to him as he wanted her to sit, she had backed away, little by little until she was sitting as far away from him as she could manage. She was certain that he was the type of man who was capable of forcefully making a woman bend to his will in addition with the fact that he was drunk – in that case she was ready to flee.

"Oho! I see we have a touch of sanguinity about us both," François said, winking. "The commend on my paleness I resent. I daresay I am no paler than you are, though at the moment your skin appears to be warring with your hair to see which can most closely emulate a flame."

Her flush didn't impede her good looks, at least not for him. Then again, François was so constituted as to find anger in any of its various multiforms aphrodisiac, and, moreover, to find redheads much the same. It was potent in combination. Not that almost anyone, male or female, would not have fallen prey to his advances. When drunk, he was either violent or sexual.

"As for my cowardice, that's a misapprehension as well. But I'll tell you what I think of you, Mistress Sophia. I think that as far as your name goes, it's a misnomer. There can be little of wisdom in one who so quickly forms judgments that are so very wrong, and moreover, since you seem not to like me, I judge you have bad taste in men to boot."