Logs:Hard History Lesson
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| RL Date: 5 June, 2013 |
| Who: K'del, K'zin |
| Involves: High Reaches Weyr |
| Type: Log |
| What: K'zin asks K'del hard questions about history. It doesn't go well. Not even with whisky involved. |
| Where: Snowasis, High Reaches Weyr |
| When: Day 24, Month 2, Turn 31 (Interval 10) |
| Mentions: Seani/Mentions, Tiriana/Mentions, Devaki/Mentions, Raum/Mentions, N'hax/Mentions, C'wlin/Mentions |
| OOC Notes: Back-dated and played via gdocs. |
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| Snowasis, High Reaches Weyr The Snowasis is rarely quiet, and even then, the high-ceilinged former weyr is kept from echoing by the fantastical booths tucked into its convoluted perimeter. The secluded seating spaces have been shaped from the truncated stalagmites that escaped the smoothing of the main floor, and are both softened and separated by colorful hangings that are thick and opaque enough to make each corner its own private nook. Some of the smaller stalactites still roam the ceiling, their jagged teeth tracing a bumpy, inverted spine to the hearth. There, a thick rug with a low klah table and comfortable armchairs and couches sit, their upholstery and cushions changed sporadically to match the season: bright, light colors in the summer, fresh greens and yellows in the spring, warm autumnals in fall, and clear, rich hues for winter. Small tables litter the rest of the cavern, enough to fit up to four people each, while stools stand along the smooth wooden bar behind which is the passthrough window to the kitchen. Glass-paneled cabinetry behind the bar provides a clear view of the available liquors, the many colors reflecting the soft light of glows tucked into strategic niches around the cavern.
K- I need a history lesson. It's going to suck some, probably. And you might punch me for asking about it. Maybe. Hopefully not. Drinks will make all that easier. Snowasis at dusk? Signed: K
There's no answer to that note, though perhaps that has something to do with the fact that K'del has been out on sweeps for much of the day. He's home before dusk, though, and has apparently had time to clean himself up and clear his head, because when he arrives in the Snowasis, he's clean and composed. He's already at the bar and ordering himself a beer when he spots K'zin across the room, so it's with that beer in hand that he approaches, swinging long legs into the seat opposite the weyrling. "What's this I'm going to punch you about, then? Are you counting on a public place to spare you from my wrath?" "Nah," K'zin's answer comes with a smile, though it doesn't completely mask the unease, an attempt at humor as he says, "I just wanted to make sure I had plenty of witnesses that could attest that this time, my nose wasn't broken by a girl." Since the last two times... well. "This is probably a stronger-than-beer conversation," he notes as he nudges the second whiskey toward the man, the humor all but vanishing. "I was trying to learn some things about Devaki." Beat, and a measured look toward K'del. "If you could," He says as an aside then, "Warn me when I'm getting close to that punch," Meaning, if he starts to dig too deeply. "I was young when he was here and I'd just apprenticed and all, so I didn't really pay attention to any of what was happening." Children are oft guarded from such stories and happenings anyway, so it's little surprise there. "Someone..." Softly, gently, with a look that shows he's uncomfortable asking for fear of how the memory might affect his faux-Pa, "...said that there was a girl found murdered in your weyr..." There he stops, brown eyes settling on the older man's face. He doesn't ask a specific question, but the whole set-up just asks: 'what happened? With Devaki? With the girl? With all of it?' K'del's gaze narrows at that reference to Devaki, his feelings about the once-exile, now-Lord pretty obvious in his expression: there's no love lost there. By the time K'zin has finished, his hand is on the whisky glass, and he's downed it all in a single gulp. "Shells," he says. "You don't want much. You're not going to do something foolish like those classmates of yours, though, right? You're not that stupid." His gaze turns, staring off into the distance, but he doesn't wait for an answer to that (evidently he's pretty confident that K'zin is not actually that stupid), and instead says, quietly, "It was the day of a hatching. Cadejoth and Iovniath's last clutch together; the one Quinlys and Iolene and all of them Impressed at. During the hatching. She-- her name was Seani, and she was an exile and a nanny, and my kids liked her-- went to my weyr to fetch a toy for Nicky." His son. "She was found afterwards, during the party. Someone else went to go find that stupid toy, and found her, instead." K'zin looks as though he has an answer prepared, but K'del doesn't seem to want it, so he remains silent, expression thoughtful, open, honest, with a flicker of frustration when 'those classmates' of his are mentioned. When K'del speaks again, he listens, expression providing the appropriate gravity for the conversation starting. If K'del were close enough, he could hear the man's heartbeat begin to race, the conversation unnerving to be sure, but somehow, he feels, necessary. Rasavyth lets these sensations bleed to Cadejoth. It's not that he 'couldn't' hide it, surely he has at 'least' that much control, but in every conversation there are layers, so many that go unseen and this one, the young bronze wishes to reveal, though he provides no motive for having done so. "What happened next?" are the only words from the weyrling, simple but intense. If it were a different topic, something less intense, K'del would probably have paid attention to that frustration - and probably had a remark for it. As it stands, he's still not even looking at the weyrling, as if by staring at the wall he can defeat his demons, or, perhaps, succeed in distancing himself from those events, all those turns ago. Cadejoth answers those sensations with a rattle of bone and chain: he's listening, but for the moment, has nothing else to share. "She started screaming, and Cadejoth stucks his head in to find out what was going on, and so Tiriana and I went running. Her throat had been cut. The next morning, we discovered that two of the exiles were missing: Devaki and Raum." For a moment, it looks like he's going to add something else, but evidently he thinks better; his head shakes, just once. "So they were the obvious suspects." K'zin says softly. Instead of asking the same question again to progress the sequence, he has a different question. He twists his half-emptied glass in between his fingers. "How old were you?" He glances away from K'del only a moment to catch the eye of a server and gesture - two more whiskeys on their way. "Right," confirms K'del, who contents himself with his beer for the moment, while waiting for the second round of whisky. "And... for some other reasons, that aren't things I can get into. It was - turn 26? So five turns ago, a bit more. I was twenty-four. There was a whole investigation, of course, but it was turn before we knew where Raum and Devaki had gone, and by then... Devaki had been recognised as Blood by High Reaches. It basically made him untouchable. He denies killing her - of course he does - but it's all connected. It has to be."" He sounds bitter; miserably bitter. "And now he's Lord Holder. A murderer." "Other reasons you can't get into?" K'zin looks confused. There are too many things wrong with this statement for the truth-seeking weyrling to just let it go. "Obviously I can't ask what after you say that but, why can't you get into them? Are there, like, super secret things Weyrleaders are sworn to secrecy about?" Faranth help K'del (and K'zin) if the man says 'yes'. The whiskeys hit the table and K'zin downs the rest of what's left of his old and picks up the new. "So what did the investigation turn up?" "Things that..." K'del hesitates, attempting to put his thoughts into words. At least the arrival of the whisky gives him something else to focus on - though he sips this one instead of drinking it straight. "Aren't public knowledge, for a reason. There are plenty of things in this Weyr that don't get told to everyone. It's... just the way of it. It's not like being sworn to secrecy. It's more... it's complicated." He's not doing a very good job of explaining it, either. "Oh, this and that. When she died. What caused her death - as if that weren't obvious. But nothing to conclusively prove anything, which is why it all sort of... died down and went away." "Things that never get put on public record, you mean?" K'zin asks, lips setting to a harder, displeased sort of line. He swirls the whiskey in his hand, watching it as it moves. Then takes a sip. Then with a deep breath in and out, he forces his gaze back to K'del, expression both thoughtful and disappointed, the kind of disappointed one might hope to never see from a not-really-a-son. His tone is completely neutral, bland, as though he were asking about the weather, when he says, "Is it any wonder, then," With answers that can't be given when a question is asked, with murder investigations that just 'go by the wayside, "-that people go searching for their own answers and create area-wide incidents just to find some?" This probably wasn't why N'hax and C'wlin went 'venturing to High Reaches Hold, but there's just enough there to make it sound possible. In reply, K'del scoffs - a visibly dismissive sound. "Are you really that naive?" He doesn't pause for an answer. "Do you honestly believe that it's necessary for people to know everything that goes on in this Weyr? Do you honestly believe that it is in everyone's best interest to know the ins and outs of things that are not relevant to their daily lives?" He slams back the rest of his second whisky and shoves the glass away, almost violently. "If people know everything, every detail, then there would be more people rushing out to to solve things themselves, without understanding the intricacies involved. There's a reason we have leaders. And if you can't grasp that, then there's really no point in having this conversation." He begins to stand. "People. people, people." K'zin's temper rises as he follow's K'del's movement, his hands going to the tabletop, leaning forward. "I'm not fucking people, K'del. Not to you." Or not in his mind. "But if that's the way you think of me, think when I have questions I should just keep them to myself, then I won't ask you anymore." There's a hardening in K'zin's expression as he stares at the older man, and underneath, a deep hurt. That only seems to make K'del more angry. "Being you doesn't give you a free pass to every little bit of Weyrleaderly information. I'll answer any of your questions that I can, but do not expect me to simply break every confidence, and uncover every secret. Some things are not for public consumption, and that means I will not talk about them. That's all." And that's when he turns on his heel and leaves, a tower of smouldering anger. |
Comments
Alida (Alida (talk)) left a comment on Wed, 12 Jun 2013 08:26:31 GMT.
< Hoo man... I think this might be a bit of a turning point for Waki, at least, in his relationship to K'del.
Azaylia (Dragonshy (talk)) left a comment on Wed, 12 Jun 2013 23:08:19 GMT.
<
A hard lesson to learn. It's interesting (and fun) to see K'del actually angry. At least K'zin didn't get that punch he was worried about!
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