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Speech | Winter 6, 515 AV | Thoughts
Speech | Winter 6, 515 AV | Thoughts
Praise had been sung all morning long for the success of the night's performance, with the anxiety of the City of Illusions being lifted, at least, according to the performers, successfully.
“Naia, liar,” the Svefra rolled her eyes as she let her ears find the source of her name calling, not bothering to guess the name of the perpetrator, the deck hand’s gaze far more centred on untying the ropes before her – they had a substantial amount of cargo to move that morning, and not much time to do it. The knot in particular wasn’t too great of a difficult one, though the fact that it was a knot usually used in sailing itself, though she supposed it worked well enough to hold the half dozen wooden barrels in place. “This is a…” she glared at it and worked her memory. The knot had a name, and a proper manner to which it should be undone. “Sheet bend? Is it?”
She pressed her lips and searched her tired memory, the eureka moment striking only when she fiddled with the form of the tight knot, and realising that she’d been in wrong in initial thoughts – the knot before her was a square not, not the ‘sheet bend’ she’d somehow managed to mistake it for. No, she knew exactly why she mistook it. Square knots were infamously weak holds when not under load, she’d made the error of assuming whoever it was that secured the cargo knew such a thing. She thumbed the knot once more, and then stood up, taking a walk around the barrels to find another knot point, or source a barrel she could loose to weaken the knot enough to bring the load free.
“Liar, Naia,” She had almost forgotten that she was first called, and the man the second time around was perhaps a little more firm than he’d intended, and the brunette whipped her head around to meet a rather stressed expression tight across Klaus’ face.
“What, what?” she gave a vague gesture to the pack before her. She didn’t have the most time to sit and gossip, though the distraction was not usually skipped, had it not been for the lack of work she'd committed herself to the day prior, she would have jumped at the chase for laziness. “I’m busy, get Mort-”
“Morty is busy,” he responded with a gesture of his own far more wild to Naia’s as she drew attention to a rather large crate, two other men diligently waiting further direction. Although the chain of command was not in any way official, a ‘pecking order’ of sorts was established on deck, and it seemed like Klaus needed one more hand to move his particular cargo box. “I’ll help you if you help me,” He gave a short, crisp, pause, narrowing his gaze. "Maybe.” It was never wise to make a promise, not to Naia, at least.
Still, the look that she shot the older man was foul, but unsurprised, and she dropped the rope she’d hooked around her thumb and took to the opposing side of the man, a much larger, stronger – or so he looked – man to her left. It was quite obvious that Klaus Boffard was the one running the little show, and that it was no accident that the couple of young labourers at his disposal appeared on the stronger side, “On the count of three, now.”
There were a couple of ways that she'd thought that the little exercise could have panned out.
The man to her left doing absolute squat to bear the weight of the crate appeared in only one of them, missing the apparent, and very loud, cue to lift, the rush that then took him to grasp the box having him recoil in pain for whatever reason. “Shyke, you right?” The words were quick, and chopped past gritted teeth, and Naia sincerely hoped the man would pull himself together enough to help ease the weight, and quickly, her fingers shooting in pain, and grating against the rough of the wood.
"Ahhyeah sorry," by the time the man took his share of the weight, Naia was on the brink of dropping it herself, "Splinter."
He took his share of the weight, and then some, and though Naia was not per se useless as they then shuffled towards the gangplank, there was little enough weight relying on her own two hands that she could deviate between the use of either hand, a useful thing indeed when they were still radiating pain.
