What the Heck is Ocher, Anyways?

Zulime did not feel terribly inclined to return the bow. But it would be terribly tacky to not give Saif anything, so Zulime found a happy medium with a head nod. It seemed wrong to her, to acknowledge the beliefs of a follower of another religion when she had been steeped in the lore of the voodoo loa since the day she was born, but even in the anlage of this holy war Zulime found it a disservice to those very same loa to not respect courtesies.

Part of those courtesies a clear, prompt reply to a challenge. "Of course, suga, wouldn't I be delighted to take another go at you. And honor is such a good word, ain't it?" Zulime posed the question with a tilted head. In the ring, she called upon all the spirits that she knew to stoop down from the vaunted heights and boost her as she attempted to pin or fuck another woman. The woman in front of her would be calling on this Gilgamesh fellow for aid. She wondered which heavenly helpers would be of more use.

She crossed her legs, and rested her hand on her chin. The first match had gone in her favor. Zulime knew how fickle the winds of fortune could be, and she wondered what would happen when she pushed all her chips forward. But no one knew how that would turn out. Least of all Zulime. "Good luck, darlin'," she said.

Zulime shifted a bit in her chair. Weird was such an ambiguous concept. To someone who grew up on a farm far up the Mississippi River, the ongoing party on Bourbon Street would have been very weird. But someone who grew up where Zulime did would have found anything else unusual. And the riverboat that she had been hardened on had its on little culture that made it its own floating world, where the border between the twilight realm invoked by the century old wood and the gaslamps was held at bay by the walls of the riverboat. But here, there was no limit for the oddness that was created in this room. Zulime found Saif's words quite strange, but she found her actions even more unusual. Saif bent done and kissed her, just as she said that she would. The Cajun girl did not protest it, only withdrawing after a second.

"Oh," she said. Zulime desperately wanted to quip, to find something clever to say at the moment. But words were failing her. She opened her mouth as if to speak and then closed it again. The hand touch was a good addition, something that she would be tempted to do if she were trying to wheedle something out of someone. It hadn't taken her much to get a match with Zulime, she thought.

But it was a match. And Zulime was a wrestler. So it was a natural fit. "Good fortune to you, too, darlin'," Zulime finally said. It seemed weightier than Zulime wishing Saif mere luck moments ago.