"Yes, thank you so much," Ulrika said shortly as she flipped the arrogant knight the bird. She glared as he walked off with his self importance holding his head high, and half her purse in his pocket. It was a moment before she realized that a small child and his slightly older sister were standing right next to her, holding on her cloak curiously.
"Miss? Miss!" the boy said, his brown eyes open so wide Ulrika was afraid they'd fall out of his head. "What does this mean?" he asked, and he stuck up his middle finger at her.
Ulrika paused, then rubbed the back of her head, feeling a sour weight land in her stomach. Damn what was she supposed to tell the kid? That was probably the reason why the knight just left without threatening her some more with jail time for not paying a traveling tax. Or whatever it was that he claimed, Ulrika had stopped listening. The only reason she paid was because she didn't want to keep using Gisil as a "get-out-of-fights-she-picked-free" card.
"Well, uhm," she said, then grinned. "It means 'Have a nice day!' You can use it both as a greeting and a good bye!"
The children's mouth gaped open, and Ulrika saw the boy was missing his incisor and the girl had her adult front teeth crowding the baby ones. She glanced around, but the handful of adults that were still paying attention after the argument looked just as curious and interested. So the middle finger didn't exist here? Sweet.
"I'm going to use that all the time!" said the girl happily. "Mamaaa! Mama! Look at what I learned from the nice traveling lady." She grabbed the boy's wrist and ran off with him, both holding their middle fingers aloft.
Ulrika was trying hard to not tear up from laughter.
"Clever," said the raven Bates as he fluttered down and alighted on her shoulder. "What will happen if another of your people ends up here?"
"Too bad," Ulrika said, "I got here first."
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