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perfectworrytitle: Out of Place, Out of Time (suggested by ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
bonojonovi )
'verse: People's Republic of Heaven
community:![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-community.gif)
writerverse + ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png)
originalfic100
prompt: Phase #03: Challenge #10a: Title This + Table A - 025 Strangers
characters: Jude & Salomé
rating: K
summary: Jude introduces himself. Salomé isn't buying it.
After a hot shower, Jude found her still sitting in the kitchen. She was drinking another cup of coffee; more slowly this time, taking the occasional sip as she shuffled a deck of what he first thought were tarot cards and later realized were research notes laid out in elaborate patterns. He couldn't tell what she was trying to divine from them, and she swept the spread of cards into her hands when she saw him standing in the doorway.
"Sit down," she said. Jude couldn't tell if it was an invitation or a command. He sat down.
"If you're here, it means you can't go home." Jude could feel her eyes on him, inscrutable but scrutinizing. He flashed a smile, and her eyes narrowed. He looked down at his hands, folded on the table and pruney from his long shower. "I don't know what your story is or why you're here; I don't care." This time, Jude smiled a little more honestly. "Don't make my life harder than it has to be, and you can stay as long as you need."
So this was was a halfway house, and she was the innkeeper. Jude had heard of such people before, who paid off their debts to the universe by providing safe lodging for travelers and patrolling the borders between worlds for wraiths. He wondered what she had done to deserve it. She didn't ask where he came from or why he was running, so he didn't ask her about her secrets, either.
She did ask him his name.
"Call me Jude," he said. He looked up at her, eye to eye, and smiled. He offered a hand across the table. "Jude Tjäder."
She didn't take it, but narrowed her eyes suspiciously at his choice of words, but said nothing but "Salomé," before she nodded her acknowledgement and returned to her cards. If she had a surname, she kept it to herself, but Jude knew that these innkeepers were often mysterious folk. He didn't need to know her name to know that he was safe within these walls. The innkeepers responsible for these halfway houses in the spaces between worlds were duty-bound to defend those who stayed with them.
Jude wasn't trying to look, but he saw, upside down, Salomé's untidy handwriting: Jude Tjäder, and beneath that, in smaller print: He is not who he says.
bonojonovi )'verse: People's Republic of Heaven
community:
writerverse + originalfic100 prompt: Phase #03: Challenge #10a: Title This + Table A - 025 Strangers
characters: Jude & Salomé
rating: K
summary: Jude introduces himself. Salomé isn't buying it.
After a hot shower, Jude found her still sitting in the kitchen. She was drinking another cup of coffee; more slowly this time, taking the occasional sip as she shuffled a deck of what he first thought were tarot cards and later realized were research notes laid out in elaborate patterns. He couldn't tell what she was trying to divine from them, and she swept the spread of cards into her hands when she saw him standing in the doorway.
"Sit down," she said. Jude couldn't tell if it was an invitation or a command. He sat down.
"If you're here, it means you can't go home." Jude could feel her eyes on him, inscrutable but scrutinizing. He flashed a smile, and her eyes narrowed. He looked down at his hands, folded on the table and pruney from his long shower. "I don't know what your story is or why you're here; I don't care." This time, Jude smiled a little more honestly. "Don't make my life harder than it has to be, and you can stay as long as you need."
So this was was a halfway house, and she was the innkeeper. Jude had heard of such people before, who paid off their debts to the universe by providing safe lodging for travelers and patrolling the borders between worlds for wraiths. He wondered what she had done to deserve it. She didn't ask where he came from or why he was running, so he didn't ask her about her secrets, either.
She did ask him his name.
"Call me Jude," he said. He looked up at her, eye to eye, and smiled. He offered a hand across the table. "Jude Tjäder."
She didn't take it, but narrowed her eyes suspiciously at his choice of words, but said nothing but "Salomé," before she nodded her acknowledgement and returned to her cards. If she had a surname, she kept it to herself, but Jude knew that these innkeepers were often mysterious folk. He didn't need to know her name to know that he was safe within these walls. The innkeepers responsible for these halfway houses in the spaces between worlds were duty-bound to defend those who stayed with them.
Jude wasn't trying to look, but he saw, upside down, Salomé's untidy handwriting: Jude Tjäder, and beneath that, in smaller print: He is not who he says.
