Logs:Cool Temper in Short Supply
| |
|---|
| |
| RL Date: 29 April, 2015 |
| Who: Lilah, Tess |
| Involves: Fort Weyr |
| Type: Log |
| What: Tess (like so many in the pre-storm gloom) is short on temper. Lilah listens. |
| Where: Herb Garden, Fort Weyr |
| When: Day 2, Month 9, Turn 37 (Interval 10) |
| Mentions: Aira/Mentions, Paislie/Mentions, Qetred/Mentions |
| OOC Notes: Slightly back-dated. |
   |
>---< Herb Garden, Fort Weyr(#792RJs$) >-------------------------------------<
The Herb Garden is a veritable feast for the eyes and nose. All manner of
herbs from medicinal to edible are grown here and tended on a regular
basis. The area is fenced in, separating it from the rest of the grounds
around it, with a trellis arch over the gate leading into it. The pathways
are lined with irregularly shaped stones that lead between the various
plots and patches of exquisitely aromatic plants, each section labeled
clearly. Pots and boxes provide alternative growing spaces for plants that
do not thrive in Fort's native soil.
Stone carved benches scattered throughout the sprawling garden provide
places for quiet conversation or for gardeners to take a rest. In the
southeastern corner of the garden is the shed where gardening tools and
supplies are kept. As the air grows bleaker and the winds continue to change and grow, there is certainly a lot to prepare for in the Weyr in case of an emergency. One of these things consists of a rushed harvest of any and all of the herbs and vegetables that are even half-way decent in the sprawling garden of the Weyr. Work is currently being directed and overseen by Lilah herself, all from where she is planted on her knees in one of the medicinal beds, carefully examining the plants there despite the interruptions for one resident's question and another gardener's request; a steady trickle of people stopping her from making real progress here. And not far off, a distressed looking Eliyaveith has hunkered down, wings wrapped around herself and refusing, for once, to let her rider out of sight. Tess would probably prefer it if she were immune to the way the continued poor weather baits tempers into flaring, and she likely has a longer fuse than most, but her set jaw and tight expression is a sign that her temper is not as well in hand as it most often is. She holds a handful of something, bits of green protruding from her closed hand. She stops near the medicinal beds, a small tilt of her chin acknowledging Lilah as she searches out the plant in question (and by grace of that, the probable target of her aggressive approach). Lilah flashes what might be a smile in greeting for the Healer, her hands too occupied and even the tilt of her head done in just a way, though that is abandoned by the approach of a young resident with the too eager question about whether they are pulling up the more decorative flowers or not. Her attention is drawn away from Tess, though not without watching the woman out of the corner of her eye, as she is forced to stand up to point out where the resident can go to help. And she remains standing as the resident moves away, as if making sure he gets to the right place, while she wipes dirty hands together. Tess finds her target while Lilah speaks to the young resident and advances on the poor guy. He's probably not more than a handful of turns younger than the healer herself. It's with stern expression that she addresses him, "You're ruining the harvest of these." She opens her palm to show him the plant, her tone no-nonsense and just about as hard as it's ever been heard. "If you crush the seed pods, like you've been doing, they're useless." She stares at him in a way that communicates her displeasure at having had to come at all. Tess' approach does not go unwatched, nor does that displeasure go unnoticed. It is as someone else tries to approach the weyrwoman that she excuses herself to start towards the pair there, in case she needs to intervene. The young man has the time to talk back, at least, as he straightens away from his own job with an annoyance for the interruption. As she shows him the plant, he only shrugs up a careless shoulder, arguing, "How the fuck should I know that? Maybe you should be out here harvesting them yourself if you're going to be so picky about it." "Picky?" Tess answers the younger man, stepping into the front foot of her stance, which is an aggressive movement though it isn't followed (yet) by any violence. "How hard is it? Thirteen turn olds back at the hall can manage, but you can't?" Itty bitty thirteen turn old girls, even, with pigtails, is what the tone implies. Maybe he's just too manly for such delicate work. The healer is briefly distracted by Lilah's arrival, huffing out a breath and closing her fingers around the useless ones. "At least I am doing something," mumbles the young man, kicking at one of those plants in a moment of his own storm-born tension boiling over. "Qetred, you are dismissed; go see Aira in the stores to see how you can help her," are the first words that slip from Lilah's lips as she approaches, the line of the goldrider's lips tightening as she stares darkly at the man. But as he turns away, she adds, "And in the future, you will learn to address our crafters with respect. If you cannot manage that, I do not see how you will ever find yourself on the Sands." As he leaves, though, she watches him with a thoughtful silence, waiting until he disappears before her attention turns back to Tess. "Oh, yes?" Tess had started before Lilah's direction cuts through and the healer slams her lips together, the tension evident in her face, though she doesn't interrupt the goldrider as she deals with the resident. A dark look follows the young man as he goes before looking to Lilah. She has to take a breath or two before she manages an even voice to say, "Thank you," which is tense, but meant. "He's had a bad attitude for turns," Lilah admits to Tess in response to that thank you, shaking her head in a hint of dismissal before she continues. "And yet, if we can't Search, we're going to end up with weyrbrats like that on dragons." There might be a hint of hypocrisy there, but she doesn't recognize it in herself. "Everything's a bit of a mess, but I will make sure to harvest the rest of that myself." Tess actually has a frown for the matter of Search and she looks after the young man. "That would be a shame for you and the whole of the Weyr," she passes judgment even. Bad weather is the worst. "Thank you." She reiterates, slightly calmer before looking back toward the lake. "Have time for a walk?" Presumably where they can talk without so many ears. Lilah spares a glance for the workers around her, meeting the Head Gardener's gaze for a moment before she tips her chin back to Tess. "A brief one, maybe," she offers with the hint of a smile. As they do step away to angle towards the shore, it only provokes Eliyaveith's hunched form to shift and stir to her feet, a low noise of distress slipping out but otherwise she will follow them sedately. Her rider doesn't seem to pay her much mind, for that insistence of joining them. "I think," Tess starts slowly as they get farther from the listening ears, "That if one more person comes into the infirmary to complain they're feeling 'unwell' and not able to articulate their symptoms beyond that, I might begin to pull out my hair in tufts," she confesses with a sigh, as if it helps to get that off her chest. "Then you're only going to need a Healer yourself," counters Lilah with a hint of light humor, though she tips her chin in what could be agreement. It is even more clearly agreement as she continues, "Though, I would trade you places in a heartbeat. Better than dealing with the fact that no one seems to know what they're doing or why, and everyone would rather wait until the storm does hit, if it's going to." "Ugh, I can be an ugly healer. Who's to care, anyway? Just my future husband, whoever he is." Tess glowers a moment down at the ground as she walks. "I don't envy you," she tells the goldrider after an exhaled breath. "This waiting, this not knowing, it drives people batty. Almost like cabin fever, but worse because the anticipation is just there, and one never knows how bad things could become." Lilah nods, a tipped thing as she glances back to their oversized dragon shadow before returning her gaze to Tess. It preludes her suggestion of, "We should just all go to Southern until it's over. Spend a sevenday enjoying the sun and beaches." But despite that, she seems rather calm, her mood not seemingly different than normal. She adds, realistically, "If only we didn't have so much to get done and prepared. We couldn't leave the Weyr in this state." "Bother all that responsibility nonsense," Tess agrees heartily, though not in earnest. There's tug at her lips that preludes a smile. "Thanks," is a moment later. "Sometimes I can forget in doing all the listening that I need to talk sometimes too." Not that she's said anything terribly revealing. "Have you made many friends here, yet? Settling in ok?" Lilah questions of the Healer as if drawn in response to Tess' statement, those dark eyes flicking over the younger woman in a study. "Some." Tess admits though it sounds like not everything is as she might like. "I keep holding my breath to hear news of home. Sometimes I think about writing them so at least they'd write me, but then I'm caught in the middle, and I don't want to be in the middle when they won't understand I'm not an agent of theirs to do their bidding. It'll just be a mess," the blonde confides a little gloomily. "Have you thought about having a dragonrider take you to visit? They need not know that it isn't Healer Hall's watchdragon," suggests Lilah to that, a slip of a smile there briefly and then gone. "I would offer to take you myself, but--." Tess doesn't seem to consider it long before saying, "No, sometimes it's better not to know even if your heart aches to know. Knowing and not being able to help, I think, would be worse. It's one thing to know yourself that you are separate. Another thing to enforce it." The young woman sounds resolved on that point. That, Lilah can understand, a flash of something darker along with sympathy in the way she watches the Healer. She tips her chin in a nod again, accepting that answer, before she offers what might be an attempt at comfort, "I will have some of the sweepriders keep an ear out for news for you. I will not tell them it is for you." "Thank you," Tess offers sincerely to the redhead. "Speaking of family," Lilah might've seen this coming, now that the healer has gotten enough mental space free after venting her own frustration to make the inquiry, "I heard a member of your family might be visiting? How are you?" "My sister," Lilah confirms briefly. "Paislie. She has come here to stay, not visit. She--." Whatever she might want to explain, she cuts herself off with only the dismissal of a head shake. "It might do her good to see you, but I'm not sure if she'd agree. It is quite an adjustment to the Weyr." Tess nods her head slowly. "I can try to speak with her, unofficially if you like, or offi-" Only then there's a call of her name by an infirmary aide. "Bother." Again. "That responsibility nonsense is catching up to me. They must need a Journeyman." She looks apologetically to the goldrider. "We'll talk later?" before she's stepping away to attend to that nonsense in the infirmary. "Of course," Lilah agrees as Tess is pulled away, stopping her own walk around the shore as she goes. And soon, surely, she will be pulled back to her own responsibilities. |
Leave A Comment