"Just be sure she's fittin' company for the likes of us, mind."
Nell's saucy grin widened, not intimidated in the slightest by the imposing Mags. "Sure as shinplasters, Mags - an' I'll be wantin' a snifterpot o' yer banger while I'm scuttling the new frosty's dodges."
With a slight twitch of Mags' jaw that might have been begrudging assent, Nell slipped from the stool and began making her way across the crowded taproom floor, expertly dodging the stumbling revellers.
She led Elara through an arched doorway at the rear, shutting out the cacophony and leading them into a surprisingly cosy sitting room.
Well-worn armchairs were arranged around a low-burning fire, and an elderly man with a deeply lined face looked up as they entered with a soft grunt of effort.
"Ah, if it ain't our Nell with another lost bird needful of a berth."
Despite his aged appearance, the man's eyes twinkled with good humour as he took in Elara's fine if somewhat tattered clothing and noble features. "And don't she look a rara avis at that."
"Juke, love, be a dear an' see to fixin' up one o' the open bunks for our new frosty 'ere," Nell said warmly, using the baffling slang terms again. "I'll get 'er sorted whilst you put the kettle on, yeah?"
The old man gave Elara another appraising look but didn't pry further.
With a slight nod, he shuffled off through a door opposite the one they'd entered, disappearing into what Elara presumed was the pub's living quarters.
As soon as they were alone, Nell made herself comfortable in one of the armchairs, kicking off her scuffed boots to wiggle her stockinged toes towards the fire's warmth.
Despite her ruddy cheeks and youthful exuberance, Elara couldn't help but notice the faint outlines of older bruises peeking out from beneath the girl's shabby clothing.
"Right then, lovey - time for a proper yarn whilst the ol' ketlebar sets to brewin'," Nell said, her bright hazel eyes studying Elara openly.
Elara hesitated, her lingering distrust at war with the undeniable flicker of intrigue she felt towards this bizarre yet strangely welcoming place Nell had brought her.
Slowly, as if wary of potential trickery, she settled into the armchair opposite the street urchin.
"You said this was...a sanctuary?" she began cautiously. "From the 'dockside demons' as you put it?"
Nell's expression turned more serious, though her eyes still danced with youthful mischief.
"Aye, that I did at that. Ol' Nell's had herself a fair spell down 'ere amidst the banjax an' the brickbats. Learned a thing or two about the skruck an' the slums that few topside brizhers ever twig."
She leaned forward earnestly, seeming to relish her role as a world-weary informant despite her young age.
"These peckish warrens may seem nothin' but cold-cold an' grannybush misery to peepers uninitched in the dockside hanleys. But there's still fitten pockets where the promised corporate shines, if'n ye keep your dolly pals about ye."
Elara felt her brow furrowing once more as she attempted to decode Nell's torrent of bizarre slang terms.
Banjax...meaning chaos or violence perhaps? And cold-cold suggested bitter hardship, while granny bush sounded like the basest poverty.
She felt like a foreigner struggling with a completely alien tongue.
Nell's expression grew distant, her hazel eyes taking on a thousand-yard stare that seemed ill-fitting on one so young.
"Ben' there myself more'n once - chokin' on the shuddick an' dreamin' solely o' the Blackest Nedge, if'n you'll bark me. Dark nights where even Nell's constant callipers couldn't keep the nighood from creepin'."
A pang of unexpected compassion lanced through Elara's heart at the fleeting glimpse of hardship shadowing Nell's face.
Some of those obscure slang terms took on a more chilling connotation at that moment.
Then Nell's sunny demeanour reasserted itself, a sly smile playing across her lips.
"But I ben't alone for long 'fore I got squared away an' fitted fer more savvy escorts like Maggie an' the lads. They showed me the true dockside fettes of where the badblades keep their mags an' how to stag the prickrugs when needed."
She leaned back, seeming to savour Elara's evident confusion at her indecipherable patois.
"More importantly though, they turned me ог о slick a few dowries on how to play my holes with the pricklers an' treaders - how to skid by unslitched yet still keep clammed when their jannocks start pikin' folks."
Elara could only blink slowly, her head spinning from the onslaught of alien vocabulary.
She recognized some words that seemed rooted in the Cockney rhyming slang of London's working classes. But Nell's dialect incorporated so many bizarre twists and additions that it may as well have been a distinct language all its own.
Sensing her new acquaintance's mounting bewilderment, Nell gave a tinkling laugh.
"Easy there, doxy - let's just hog a spell whilst I fill ye in proper-like on the duties an' ins-an'-outs down here." Her expression turned slyly conspiratorial once more.
"An' mebbe by then, you'll be more willing for sheddin' that fancy banger an' hearin' me and the lads at The Anchor sing-song our full upwrights on you..."
Before Elara could formulate a reply to that curious statement, the elderly man named Juke returned through the doorway.
He carried a tray laden with a steaming ceramic pot and mismatched cups, the fragrant aroma of freshly brewed tea wafting through the room.
"Ah good, now we can chin-wag over a nice builders' scaldkin whilst it's still brikkin'," Juke said, placing the tray on a low table between their chairs.
Nell immediately launched into pouring out the tea, all while keeping up a nonstop litany of even more indecipherable lingo and slang that Elara could only partially grasp.
The younger woman settled back, sipping slowly from her cup while trying to acclimatize her ears and mind to this new, incomprehensible yet strangely alluring patois.
Her first long night at The Blackened Anchor was proving just as mysterious, disorienting, and yet undeniably intriguing as her initial hapless plunge into the unforgiving underbelly of the London docks.
But deep within, Elara felt an unanticipated flicker of optimism amid the risks - a sense that this strange new world represented a chance to be remade anew, reforged into something far stronger and more resilient than the pampered daughter of privilege she once was.
Even if it meant leaving behind the tattered remnants of her former life for good.
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