Sly as a Siren

Part 7

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"You might want to slow down there sweetheart or your just gonna rolph all that up?" Pip was looking on with a strange fascination at the amount of food she was packing away. In reality, it wasn't all that much, but she could admit that perhaps she could slow down just a bit.

Having lived on minimal rations for too many months left everyone in the 'battle fodder' unit guarding and horking down their food like wolves. That fact that she had in fact slept for three days without nourishment just meant she had that many more meals to catch up on.

"Well, well here are the mighty warriors, blessed by the God's"

Rayvn tensed up immediately, but it took Kasi a moment to realise that the sarcastic voice was talking to them. None of them swivelled on the bench to see who the speaker was, attesting to the desire all three of them had to blend into the table top and disappear. Kasi wished that Rock was with them, at least then one of them wouldn't look like some half-grown kid soldier wanna-be.

They had only officially been a part of the Prince's battalion for a day, and these were not the first mocking words they had received. It was however the first time they had been officially engaged.

As the man and his friends plunked down across the table from her and Pip, sitting on either side of Rayvn she deliberately slowed her eating and kept her attention strictly on her food. Her mother's words coming back to her 'keep your head down Kas, men can't defend against what they can't see coming'. Was it too late to keep her head down? Probably. Did that mean she should come out strong now, she didn't see that being a wise course of action unless she wanted to blow whatever cover remained to her.

She looked at the newcomers out of the corner of her eye and almost groaned. Noble born snobs, of course, no wonder Rayvn was so tense. Her body went deadly quiet when another settled on the bench beside her, straddling it so he was facing her fully. She was seriously reconsidering the coming out swinging option. Men like this would only ever see her as a whore, no matter what her actual background. To them it was a question of how a woman could be in the army and be anything other then a wench of some kind. Unless of course it was one of their precious registered mages, those women they held to a different standard for some undefined reason.

"So, I'm curious as to how you managed it," the first one started in, pushing into Rayvn's space in a deliberate display of testosterone meant to aggrivate. "Do tell little cousin, how you managed to go from shamed distant relative to the prince to a sudden favorite over night."

Crap, Rayvn knew these guys. She cast a glance over at the tense fire mage, assessing the anger and gauging the way he braced himself for humiliation. He had done this song and dance before, had resigned himself to being the butt of every joke. She hated to see anyone give in to the abuse of bullies, though she herself had used the same tactic he was now seeking to employ many times.

"It wouldn't have anything to do with the miraculous way in which we find ourselves suddenly in possession of the Shihon city and all its precious secrets after so many months of useless siege would it?" it was the man sitting next to Kasi who spoke this time, leaning in to invade her space. It was a redundant statement, she rolled her eyes.

"Nope, nothing to do with it" she spoke up, trying to keep her voice nonchalant.

Men tended to overlook you when they saw a nosey little sister figure, she wasn't really sure if that stereotype applied to nobles but she was willing to give it a shot. Carefully spooning in another bit of soup was just an effort to keep up the act, in reality she had totally lost interest in eating the moment the three of them had become the centre of attention.