Logs:Choosing Sides
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| RL Date: 7 December, 2008 |
| Who: Satiet, N'thei |
| Involves: High Reaches Weyr |
| Type: Log |
| Where: Living Cavern, High Reaches Weyr |
| When: Day 28, Month 5, Turn 18 (Interval 10) |
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| It is a spring afternoon, 13:57 of day 28, month 5, turn 18 of Interval 10. It's a wet spring day and the comings and goings of people have left muddy prints on the floor and a pool of water near the exit to the bowl. The hearths are lit and grilled cheese sandwiches and tomato soup of some kind have been deemed -the- food of the day. It's late enough that the living cavern is only half occupied so the table that Satiet sits at is empty. With her bare feet stretched out onto a nearby chair, and galoshes wet and floppy beneath the table, the Weyrwoman indulges in a leisurely, if damp, late lunch. Speaking of wet and muddy, it would hardly do the man's reputation if he walked into the living cavern on such a day looking clean and tidy; N'thei would hate to disappoint his public. Mud-splattered, soaked, red-cheeked, he enters from the bowl with every smell of the stables on him, from molding hay to wet fur to whatever he stops to scrape off his boots into the increasing puddle. Fortunately, the prevailing scent of delicious things overwhelms the aromas that accompany the esteemed Weyrleader while he crosses, pulls off his rain-heavy coat, makes for the food-- with an eye toward certain bare feet caught in a sidelong glance. He could be deaf and blind and he'd still know when Satiet was in a room, yes yes. A trio of children run from the inner caverns across the floor, shrieking as they dodge this chair or that table and the formidable figure of the Weyrleader arriving. One particularly heavyset boy stomps in the puddle at the base of the entrance and then continues on his merry way out into the ugly outdoors. The shrieking is what invariably draws Satiet's attention up, disgust not quite concealed in her pale eyes, and from the children to where they came from, that gaze lifts to wait; wait for the nanny that never appears. There will be words later, for sure, and with a toss of her hair, those narrowed eyes graze past N'thei then back to her meal. For good measure, however, those telltale toes wiggle in the heat of the firelight. Taunting? Beckoning? Just coincidence. It goes without saying the goldrider's procured herself the best, warmest, farthest from the door seat in the house. "Slow down!" is N'thei's hard rebuke, said while he collars the one boy foolish enough to put himself in arm's reach. "You break your neck, we're not paying for a funeral, boy, will just dump your body in a ditch somewhere," with a quick shake for the back of the kid's shirt before he's released with a half-gentle shove toward the bowl. Kids-these-days, so says the snort issued while he turns back to ladeling out food, ignoring the fact that he's probably just caused a lifetime of neuroses for a child guilty of nothing more than cabin-fever on a rainy day. Shortly thereafter-- moth, meet flame. "Do something about your nursery staff, madam, seriously." Sounds stern enough to fool ninety-percent of the population into thinking he cares two shakes about the work ethics of nannies. Toes and feet are what wriggle back in response, the equivalent of a disdainful little head toss somehow imbued in the way her feet flex. Unconcealed is the too deliberate feigned ignorance of just who N'thei might be speaking to, or that it's N'thei that's speaking until a breath later, the slightest curve claims one corner of Satiet's lips to shape her porcelain features amused. Seconds pass, long enough for the end of one of her sandwich triangles to be dunked into her soup and lifted to drip, before she pipes up with a dry, "Is it really my duty anymore?" A glance over her shoulder pairs with an overly bright smile to cast at the Weyrleader. "Unsettling rumors that some bronzerider too big for his pants wants to start wearing my dresses and manage the lower caverns? Sounds like a vacation for me." The smart solution would have been to get a tray. N'thei holds a bowl in one mitt, two sandwiches and a mug in the other, the sandwiches squished and greasing up his fingers nicely until he's able to dump the whole mess on Satiet's table, requisite splash of soup included. "Would it help you feel more settled if I admitted that I occasionally fantasize about wearing your dresses?" Ignoring the bigger issue, his meddling where he shouldn't, he reaches a muddy, greasy, unsightly hand toward a fold of her dress, far too delicate a thing for the likes of him to be touching let alone wearing. Begs the question: When has N'thei ever been smart? And with a climbing browline, Satiet watches N'thei with his handheld wares approach her table, drop his plates, eye the arc of that tomato splash, and for a brief moment, is safe from her dress being dirtied, after somehow keeping it clean all day in this kind of weather. Too delicate, thin, and white; but that hasn't stopped Satiet from wearing it, much like the over-delicacy isn't stopping N'thei from smearing the outdoors and grease on it. A beat decides which way the wavering of pale eyes goes: trivial matters such as a white dress being ruined, or the actual subject at hand. "With me in it?" Or something else entirely. Very grave; "You don't wear clothes in my fantasies." Let's everyone be thankful that the sounds of the living cavern prevent anyone else from hearing this conversation, cross-dressing N'thei and butt-naked Satiet have no business being discussed by the general public. Between his thumb and his first two fingers, he spends a good fifteen seconds only testing the tactile qualities of the fabric, his eyes very far away for a spell until he lifts a here-and-now smile to meet his cold-blue-eyed kryptonite. "Let's clear up these rumors, neh? Who whispers such lies to you." He also eats very unprettily, a task he starts presently. Fifteen seconds is enough time to transfer grease, for grime to be rubbed in, and for Satiet to be self-satisfied with his response - from his expression to the sudden here-and-now. To greet that smile is a head-tilted, chin-lifted, cheek-flushed, blue-eyed thinned smile of her own, smug. "Does it matter? Was I not supposed to know you've reappropriated one of my weyrwomen and shooed my Headwoman out of the business of the Snowasis?" The uneaten sandwich falls into the bowl to soak. "Is this something else I should just trust you about? Give you the lower caverns and fulfill all your fantasies unquestioning?" "Angry?" Hopeful, yes. A bite in his cheek, N'thei goes a long while without providing any further remark, no elucidation, just chewing and watching Satiet and sloshing some soup into his face to wash down greasy cheese and bread. Finally, rubbing his face with the heel of his hand, "/Your/ headwoman. Truer words seldom spoken, my love. Don't trust her, don't want her in my business. But /your/ weyrwoman." The first utterance was full of agreement; this one begs to differ. There's possession in the contrary quality of his tone, in the narrowing eyes and vague smile. "Does what I tell her to. So I fail to see an issue here." Silent, head poised as if waiting for something more that fails to come. Then she smiles; a thin, slow spread, and beatific smile. She moves, one leg reclaimed first, so its foot rests on her own chair and the dress rides up along her leg. The other moves momentarily underneath the table, to drift bare toes against N'thei's knees, daring to climb just a little further along before returning too, to her own chair. Because tugging on rainboots would so not help the elegant tripping off, those'll stay here for now. Feet drop to punctuate her smiling-through-teeth, "My weyrwoman does what I tell her to. This Weyr does what I tell it to. So if you fail to see the issue, enjoy your limb on your own, love." And she dares, as she stands, to lean forward to murmur, "Pity. In my fantasies, we don't see the sun for days." Whether it's warning or request, all N'thei says in light of everything-- bare toes stirring him up, Satiet's fantasies, who calls more shots-- is brief and pointed and carefully contained: "Don't make an issue out of this." It could as easily be followed by "please" as "I'm warning you." He thinks about delaying her too, that grimy hand on her shoulder while she's near enough, the vagueness of pressure there before his palm slides off to his spoon again. Right back to cold-hard-method again, to slate gray eyes and not-your-business. Things had been going so well too. "I like that you think you can scare me, Satiet. After all this time." Run-along-now. Touche. "I like that you think you ever scare me." With bare feet now, going outdoors isn't really an actual option, but there she goes, clingy white dress, bare feet and all towards the puddle-strewn exit and the rain-drenched outdoors. "Give me a reason not to. I'll consider it." "I'll give you a reason to..." Do some very debasing things. Not said loud enough for anyone, especially Satiet, to hear. Thankfully. A bright, uncharacteristically merry laughter lifts to the ceiling and with a final toss of her dark hair, Satiet steps towards the outdoors. She can fill in those blanks herself. N'thei's not a difficult man to do that for. |
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