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The evening had started out pretty much as Antje had feared, when Jean arrived in full armor, with a crossbow hanging from his belt. Typical jean, it matched his armor and both looked like they’d cost a fortune. Enough to sustain Antje for a long time, surely.
The thought of their shopping trips in the past, made something in her heart sting and ache. When things were good… before she ruined it all.
Neither Antje or Alicia wanted to stay around the family for more than they had too, so they quickly retreated into the garden with a bottle of stolen alcohol. But when the dinner bell sounded they both knew they couldn’t avoid their hosts any longer. Returning to the party they both looked like they were going into battle. They had no idea how correct they were about that.
It became clear that they were in for a bad time, when all conversation soon ended replaced by a tense awkward silence. The only one that didn’t seem bothered, was Alicias brother, Marc.
Marc leaned in over the table, his glass filled with wine, held between two fingers as he looked over all the individuals by the table, looking uncomfortably smug. Making an exasperated noise he leaned back in his chair.
“So since no-one else is talking, let discuss the dragon in the room. Jean is sleeping with the emperor, which i am sure is gonna end well. Don’t look at me like that, It’s not exactly because you are making a secret of it.. All the court knows the emperor is a having an affair with a half-rivaini bastard.”
You could almost feel the tension in the room. To Antje it was clear it was not the first time Jeans parentage had come up, and the outcome previously had not been good. She knew that Jean would have nothing to do with her, but still felt a hot ball of anger in her stomach. Curbing her usual tendencies she looked down and stabbed her weird human-bite sized food-stuff. She had no idea what it was, but better to stab that than the table or the smug bastards hand. It was no longer her job to protect Jean, he had a new patron. That only made her want to stab the smug son of a hurlock even more for reminding her.
“And dear Alicia, after getting sent away, forcibly, on leave, decides to bring an assassin to our table, even sharing her bed with it. The same assassin that tried to kill poor Jean, clearly doing a terrible job of it, but what could you truly expect, hiring a qunari.”
Now Antje could also feel Alicia tensing beside her, all tightly wound muscle and anger forced into a dress she didn’t belong in. She belonged on the battlefield, all blood-lust and a fiery beauty.
Knowing Alicia, she’d turn this table into a battlefield soon, if she wasn’t stopped. Moving one of her hands from the table, she placed in on the warriors thigh, tracing slow patterns over her dress, trying to be discreet in calming her lover. The qunari wasn’t untouched by the insufferable man’s speech, feeling the heat rising in her cheeks from the pit of anger in her stomach as his every word stoked the flames.
Jean and Alicia.. She loved them both, and after daring to cast a look at jean, who was looking almost as angry as Alicia felt, in spite of his attempts to hide it, she knew that she couldn’t let him continue. She didn’t belong here anyway.. Jean wasn’t gonna forgive her, they weren’t.. anything anymore, but she would not let this.. slug insult him and his sister.
Letting go of Alicias thigh, she felt the Cirerons around her turn to look as her fancy chair scraped harshly across the marble floor. The slug didn’t turn to look, he was too preoccupied with his newest victim, Éuduarde to note the tall qunari standing up and slowly but surely making her way towards him.
Marc only noticed when it was too late, and then Antje’s hand was around his neck, quickly ripping him from his chair, and almost lifting him of the ground. She didn’t notice the shouting and sudden noises from the rest of the family as she dragged his face up close to her own, mere centimeters away from hers, close enough that he could feel her hot breath on his cheeks.
Antje didn’t exactly know what she was looking for in his face, maybe some kind of redeeming feature or regret, but she didnt find it. Before she even thought it through she felt her first connect with his groin, watching as the pain bloomed on his face and then abruptly dropping him to the ground with a sneer.
Realizing that this had probably been a mistake, the tall mage cursed internally, looked over the faces at the table, without really seeing any other than Alice and Jean.
Jean looked as shocked as the rest, straining to stay stoic, but Alicia had almost a look of amusement, even if it was just for a split second, before she went back to eating her dinner. Straightening her back, without uttering a word, she marched out of the dining room, adrenaline making her hands shake.