Keeping pace alongside Tenran now, Trillium looked sidelong up at him after his surprisingly candid description of his own service. The girl was curious; it seemed as though Tenran might be more than just a grumpy old bounty hunter after all. But Trillium was gradually deciding that she liked him - despite, or perhaps because of, his dismissive gruffness - and she decided not to press the issue. Instead she carried on next to Tenran in silence, mostly looking at the ground and thinking her own thoughts..And those thoughts, at the moment, were mostly concerned with what a sad old man Tenran was, and how good it would be of her to stick around and help him out and make him a bit less pathetic. After all, the more she thought about it, the more romantic the idea of being a bounty hunter became. (This was greatly aided by her general ignorance of the reality of life on the road, or general combat, etc.) Knights had to follow rules, rules, rules. Rules about honor, rules about behavior, rules of combat, rules about sex. But a bounty hunter surely made their own rules! Lived dangerously! (Living dangerously, in her young mind, was of course immediately equated with ‘sexy.’) It wasn’t what she’d dreamed of, obviously: being swept away by a knight or an earl or a duke. But all things considered, surely it would be better than life as a Knight.
She kicked a stone that jumped up off the ground and hit Bonacher squarely in the buttocks.
“Watch it, girl!” the old man growled, looking back and baring his teeth at Trillium. “Don’t make me hurt you!”
Trillium shook her head, then said to Tenran, “He really is a scumbag, isn’t he?” In response, she gave Bonacher another sharp kick, this time mercifully just his ankle, not his groin. “And I hope that comment about ‘horses asses’ wasn’t directed at me!” The way she said this was so devoid of her prior sassy pride that it would be hard for Tenran not to think that the girl was, perhaps, taking a bit of pity on him. Trying to manufacture harmless banter to ‘lighten the mood.’ “Obviously I’d have to slice your head off with my Very Dangerous and Impressive swordsmanship skills for the insult if it were!”