⊰ aredrighthand ⊱

Intelligent, icy eyes swept over her in an analytical appraisal that missed nothing. It was imperative in his line of work to see people for what they were, as opposed to what they pretended to be. He did not know this girl woman, though something did seem familiar about her. Her accent perhaps, it was distinct. Even without being familiar, he knew much about her from that first impression alone. That accent, again, it was proper, educated. So she was from good stock, even if she tried to appear otherwise. And then her hair. The skin beneath the locks at her temples and forehead showed a fading brown stain, easily missed. Still, that didn’t tell him who she was exactly, only that she was hiding.

“I am Thomas. And I might have a moment. Depends on who’s this father of yours?”

          Alayne had tried to learn the dialect of others like her — clipped, lazy, letters and entire syllables left out in the interest of expediency —but her father hated the sound, authenticity be damned. Fished from an orphanage in her teens, she ought not know even half of what the society girls did. Any daughter of mine would be so clever, Petyr assured. Most certainly after I had found her. She swallowed her fears and trusted him, incapable of anything else. Baelish’s associates tended toward the gruff, after all, clever when it came to counting their payments but little else beyond. With so much of her time spent cloistered inside, locked away from the grime and disease of what streets lay below, Alayne risked little. Until now. Only her father’s confidence lifted a porcelain chin, tongue chirping out once more those well-bred syllables. 

             “Petyr Baelish. He has concerns about a shipment — ” Its contents a mystery to her. “ — and the delay in its delivery. He would have come himself, but…” Vaguely, she trailed off, allowing implications of the man’s demanding existence to blossom. “I was told you could remedy these problems.”