Isulril reclined across the soft grass that stuck through the cracks of the old ruin above the town of Bree. She looked up at the daytime sky, smiling faintly. Indeed, her mood was like the sky itself. Sometimes sunny with fluffy white clouds flitting about as now, but sometimes the clouds obscured the sun, or the sun was gone altogether and one might scarce see a star. It was not something she enjoyed, but it was, she knew, something that those closest to her knew was her flaw. Her main flaw, perhaps, these mood swings.
But it was of no matter now, she mused to herself, looking across the town as she viewed it from above. She remembered the cheerful woman taking her there at one point, and remembered how that woman had told her perhaps it was a watchtower, this ruin, but that no one would ever know the truth of what it really was. The thought did nothing to spook her, but merely comforted her.
She lay on her back now, closing her eyes. Thoughts of a few evenings prior came to her mind. The odd man. No, the very strange man. She remembered his mannerisms, his devotion to manners and the social mores. But his questions were less so, and the way he subtly commanded her by his presence intrigued her. It piqued her attention. The way he watched her and looked her over was more than mere leering, she thought. She had been leered at many times before, but it never felt like she were being forced to bare her very spirit in such a look.
She shivered a little, remembering the crude yet calculating look-over he had given her. She had thought their conversation was about to hit a crescendo, as he questioned and questioned her, making her squirm in her seat. But sadly the sadistic woman had to interrupt, the eavesdropper had been eavesdropping again. She cursed the woman's name, silently.
She couldn't admit it to anyone, but she liked the vulnerability that such questionings gave her, liked feeling objectified in a sense, had begun to enjoy being picked and peeled apart like some boiled vegetable one might eat. Perhaps it was a sort of conditioning that had made it so, but when he asked, though she was not eager to answer about her past, she was intrigued. And he seemed legitimately interested beyond a clinical curiosity.
She settled her hand to her belly as she lay there among the stones and the verdant grass. The black of the skirts of her dress spread around her, and it made an appealing contrast against the white of the stone parapet, as well as an interesting contrast to her pale skin. She yawned to herself, covering her mouth. Soon she would have to get up and attend to the tasks of the day, but here she could think privately, quietly, and without interruption. She liked that.
