11th July, evening; A riverside bounty

He nodded. "Yes." That bruise and several others which, fortunately, weren't visible. Unless of course he removed his shirt - something he was not keen to do until they were gone.

Paol was silent for a moment, the tension of the past hour or so gathering into a helpless sort of anger. "You ain't hurt? I mean—" That was a monumentally stupid question. "Nothing that needs seein' to?"

And invite barbed commentary from Montreuil? Not so much. He'd had enough of that sort of thing already this evening.

"No," Jérémie told him in a remarkably even tone. Fortunately, the one-sided fight was broken up before it got that far out of hand.

Paol nodded. That was good. Or no, not good, just considerably less bad than it could have been. "S'pose we'd best find your pack," he mumbled after what felt like minutes. "Mathilde'll be wonderin'."

Oh right. His pack.

"Mhm," he muttered, not entirely liking the thought which had just occurred to him. "I'll get it. Might be best if you went to the wagon ahead of..." his voice trailed off when he realised how that sounded. Even though it was, to him, a perfectly reasonable suggestion to make in light of things. "I mean, it doesn't take two..."

Shit.

He deserved that, of course. But somehow he had not been prepared for it. "I--Right. Yeah," he stammered, "I'll--uh, I'll see you there. Or... around."

"Won't be long," Jérémie promised, privately relieved that Paol hadn't taken offence - or shown more concern. It was bad enough he felt sufficiently worried to basically brush his mate off. It didn't, of course, occur to him that there was an equal chance of trouble finding him again once he was alone.

He headed off toward where he'd left his pack, glad that he'd at least thought to keep his musket with him.

By the time he reached the wagon, he'd at least managed to cobble his composure back together. Or maybe not. Mathildes' first question when she saw him was, "What's wrong?"

"Nothing, little one," he replied, lightly enough. "But I can't stay. More food for you and Rosy, yeah?" he added with a lopsided grin. But Mathilde was having none of it.

"Why?" she demanded, eyeing him gravely. "What happened?"

He took a deep breath. "Nothing happened. I just can't stay. I'll see you in the morning, alright?" He kissed the top of her head, and hitching his musket up higher on his shoulder turned to go, followed into the darkness by Mathilde's worried, little frown. If he hadn't felt like a bastard before, he certainly did now.

It didn't take him long to retrieve his pack from where he'd left it. In truth, he wasn't wholly sure why he hadn't simply kept the thing with him in the first place. At least the brief detour gave him a chance to get a handle on his thoughts, which were considerably scattered.

His unease returned with startling speed when he reached the wagon and saw only Mathilde, at first. "Where's Paol?" he asked, unable to keep a note of concern from his voice.

Mathilde looked up from the pot she was stirring. "You don't know?"

What? He'd assumed Paol would have come here to wait. Where else would he have... oh hell. Jérémie checked himself, managing to stop before he'd turned completely around. He had no idea which direction to go in - and he couldn't leave the wagon and its occupants unguarded.

"No," he said. Which was not entirely true. "Did he..." No, not a good question. Though there really wasn't a good way to broach the topic at all, was there? Damn. Jérémie hesitated, thoroughly disliking the heavy weight that had settled in his gut. He wished he hadn't come round this evening at all.

Then, with a sigh, he sank down to sit, mostly upright, where he'd previously stood. He'd made a proper, terrible mess of things, hadn't he? "I'm sorry," he muttered.

Mathilde didn't understand. They'd only been gone a matter of minutes, how could something else have gone wrong? "Did you," she began hesitantly, then plowed ahead before her nerve failed, "Argue?" She found that hard to believe, but then why had they separated in the first place?

"I don't know," Jérémie confessed. The words they'd exchanged hardly counted as conversation, never mind an argument. But he regarded his sense of judgment as considerably lacking this evening, so who knew? "No," he added, though this probably wouldn't go very far in lessening Mathilde's inevitable confusion.

He shrugged, avoiding another sigh. "I'm just..." There was any number of things that could fit there, he thought. None of them were good. "Stupid."

Mathilde's frown deepened. "No," she said with grave simplicity. She gave the small pot a final stir, then ladeled the contents into two mugs and, producing a pair of mismatched spoons, offered one of the mugs to Jérémie. "Eat," she told him, an almost comical seriousness in her tone as she dropped to the ground beside him.

The corner of his mouth gave a faint upward twitch when she settled down to join him. He accepted the mug with a nod, some of his frustration fading. His pack was set aside without a second thought, but he kept his musket within easy reach.

"Thank you." He dipped his spoon into the mug, realising abruptly that he was hungry after all.

"We should get Marcel to kill us another horse," she remarked around a mouthful of the thin stew.

This time, his fleeting smile was more obvious.

"If he receives a fair share of the result, he may just." Jérémie ignored the heat of the broth as it scalded its way down his throat. It felt good to get something down, hot or otherwise. Which reminded him. "Here," he added, shifting to the side a little so he could shove a hand into his trouser pocket. His last coins appeared a moment later and he offered them to Mathilde. "For the washing. And this."

Even as he said it, he was not sure if 'this' was the stew or the company. Maybe it was both.

Her initial sound of protest was muffled by a full mouth. "Put that away."

He hesitated, torn between the instinct to obey and the somewhat-stronger desire to pay what he saw as an honest debt.

"But..." He glanced down at the coins in his palm. "It's only fair."

Christ, didn't that make him sound more than a little wheedling. His cheeks grew warm and he tried to ignore it.

Clearly they had different definitions of the word.

"You helped with the laundry," she reminded him. "And the stew is not for selling."

His face burned and he knew he had to be about as red as possible. Old instinct made him duck his head to conceal his blush, though anyone who knew him would recognise the gesture. Really... he supposed he should have expected that response, even though it was rare to receive a meal without payment being required. But the stew not being for selling was a new one to him.

Without a word, Jérémie shoved the coins back into his pocket. He didn't trust himself not to babble something idiotic in an attempt to express his gratitude. A faltering smile would have to suffice.

There. That was better. Scraping one final mouthful out of the tin mug, she smiled back. Things were not alright yet, she knew, but at least for the moment she had the feeling that they would be. She curled her legs up against her chest, hugging her arms round them and resting her chin on her knees, feeling suddenly rather sleepy.

Emptying the mug of its contents helped pass a few moments, during which the heat and, he hoped, the colour in his cheeks lessened. It had been good stew. He hadn't known till he'd eaten that it was precisely what he'd needed. Another thing to be grateful to Mathilde for.

"It's warmer by the fire. If you're going to sleep, I mean," Jérémie ventured, feeling unaccountably shy.

" 'M not tired," she murmured, her eyes already half closed.

No, of course she wasn't. A brief grin brightened Jérémie's face, causing a twinge in his bruised cheek that he ignored, and he set the empty mug down.

"So I see," he said. He reached for his pack and fumbled with the straps keeping his blanket in place. The blanket came free after a bit of wrestling. Jérémie gave it a careful shake before draping it round Mathilde's shoulders. Not quite as good as being near the fire but it'd do.