Logs:New Girl Tess
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| RL Date: 28 February, 2015 |
| Who: N'muir, N'rov, Bijedth, Vhaeryth, Tess |
| Involves: Fort Weyr |
| Type: Log |
| What: N'muir finally stops spending every waking moment in search of Astivan (or supposedly out searching for Astivan). He begins to unwind with N'rov when a new face shows up and mentions C'stian of all people. |
| Where: The Glass Fountain, Fort Weyr |
| When: Day 18, Month 2, Turn 37 (Interval 10) |
| Mentions: C'stian/Mentions |
| No bread for the wicked. Other Hematite riders have come and gone, but at their table, N'rov's gotten a bet going on with the few remaining on how long it will take for the flat fried cheese 'crouton' (something that might ordinarily be a treat, but these days /isn't/) to stop floating and fall into his soup. It's taken too long, though. He's gotten distracted by talk of the olden days and one time when this one valley in the lowlands supposedly had their Thread not get frozen into crackdust. And then he sees... "/Y'ral/. No blowing on my soup," he tells the bluerider, hurriedly trying to block the other man's face with his palm. It's been nearly a month since N'muir was seen in these parts for anything other than cutting through them in order to kiss his children goodnight - and in the days since C'stian was ousted as his son, he has been nearly entirely absent from the Weyr. So on this day, stepping under the cover of the inner caverns comes with a cautious glance to the table that Hematite occupies before N'muir heads to the serving tables. Soup and wine collected, N'muir navigates his way to join his wingmates, planting himself across from N'rov. "Don't believe /everything/ you hear about the Pass," N'muir remarks quietly with the barest, smallest, littlest, almost-not-even-a smile that he aims across the table. "What've I missed? Clearly nothing new on the menu..." If there's a murmur of surprise and interest at the Weyrleader's presence, that starts well beyond Hematite's safety zone; both those moods show up in the quick lift of gray eyes, in N'rov's slow grin and in the relinquishing of Y'ral with his hand instead splaying above his bowl for its safety. Yes, that means Y'ral gets away with it. It's a special occasion, though, and the crouton hasn't sunk /yet/. "No?" is his easy drawl, for all that he's still looking at N'muir searchingly, as though the man might have changed in that near-month. "But I /want/ to believe Moreta showed up to rescue him," a nod marking the grizzled brownrider who gives their wingleader a grin. "It's got to be true." If N'muir notices any looks, he feigns ignorance the entire time and puts his spoon to soup. It isn't until he has downed the first few spoonfuls that he gives one very quick sidelong glance around to gauge the atmosphere of the cavern, having found himself within the familiar company of wingmates. There are subtle differences in the man he is, his nose and cheeks chapped from windburn, his eyes a little more worn and banked by darker circles, his air slightly edged as if wound up beneath the calm of his exterior. For those who care to take notice in his behaviour, it's the sort of calm disconnect that might suggest he isn't far from a fight. N'rov's remark is a tincture then, making N'muir's mood that small amount sunnier as a touch of a smirk lifts the corner of his lips. "Must be true. Do brownriders lie?" A rhetorical question. "Don't let N'ran overhear you talk about Moreta or we'll be here all day listening to a lecture about respect." He looks up at N'rov's mop of hair as he swallows down another spoonful of soup. Never let it be said that Hematite can't answer rhetorical questions anyway, but not only does N'muir keep talking (and deliver that dire warning), that's when the sinking crouton finally bubbles under; there's a brief exchange of bets that's probably more complicated than it needs to be, involving the usual favors like sweep-choices and oiling, and that's when the others head off and N'rov can eat his soup at last. Not that he does. "Now it's cold," the bronzerider mutters. "That took far too long." Then he looks back at N'muir, more contemplatively now. Speculatively, even. "Tell the truth, man. Were you," his baritone's practically meant for drawing out dramatic pauses like this one, "off eating /good stuff/? Someone's special stash?" N'muir looks around the table (/Hematite's/ table, as it might be unofficially known as) at the exchange of bets and division of labour, bending to eat his soup while the commotion gives him uninterrupted time to do so until the other wingmates up and wander off, leaving N'rov and N'muir the lone occupants of a very vast table amidst a sea of very crowded tables. N'rov's question earns him a raised brow. "Are you kidding? When was the last time you saw me eat bread or sweets or anything baked?" In truth, since his heart attack, minus a few treats that the former Fortian junior-now Southern's senior weyrwoman Ali might have made. "Are you having withdrawals? Do you want me to steal some for you?" he teases. "Hey, you're off and away from our healers, /anything could happen/," N'rov deadpans right back at him. Though, "Don't tempt me. Because I'm absolutely saying yes." His hand's even shaking. And then his arm. And then his other arm. Withdrawal, all the way. Tess looks out of place as she takes her tray with the soup and side of half a baked tuber with naught but a light shower of spices to dress it. It's not the tray with its scant bit of lunch that makes her look so, but the smoothness of her skin and the luster of her messily braided hair. Certainly there are others in the Weyr whose persons look so well-tended, but most of them look like they work for a living, and the honeyed blonde? Well, she doesn't appear so. There's no knot on her shoulder, but there's a badge pinned to the floppy collar of her cream colored blouse in the usual place that denotes she's one of Fort's own, if not anything else about her. She's probably /most/ marked by her newness for the oblivious way she places her tray down at a chair half way between N'muir and N'rov with a bright smile. "Do you mind?" It's asked, but no answer is awaited as she slides into the seat and picks up her spoon to address the still steaming soup. "Don't tempt /you/?" N'muir echoes, using his spoon to point lackadaisically at the bronzerider acros from him and then swivelling it to point at himself. "Don't tempt /me/. I don't even remember what pastries taste like. Fu-" Mid-curse, N'muir's head turns in the direction of the young woman, his spoon immediately finding itself put properly back into the soup rather than being brandished around impolitely and a small smile somewhat warming N'muir's windburnt face. "Um..." Brown eyes search Tess's shoulder instinctively and then flick sidelong to N'rov for something - help maybe. "Sure." There's surprise in his tone - pleasant surprise but surprise nonetheless. And then silence and another look over at N'rov. N'rov's broken out into laughter, better that than spots or whatever other symptoms might accompany his 'withdrawal,' and he's even gotten over the shakes thanks to N'mur's mighty powers of humor-healing. Or, perhaps thanks to Tess' arrival, his head turning along with N'muir's; he keeps looking at her as the other bronzerider looks at him. Whether it's help or not, "Depends; do you mind us not watching our language?" "I have a brother. I'm not bothered," presumably, although she doesn't say so, the brother has acclimatized her to the use of language. Tess' spoon dips into her soup, but as she raises up the spoonful to blow lightly across the steaming surface, she looks between the men. "Did I interrupt something interesting?" N'rov's question is legitimate, so says the look that N'muir turns to Tess following its utterance. Her answer - whether right or wrong - only leads to N'muir giving N'rov another meaningful look. But their companion remains and so N'muir takes his spoon and eats another mouthful, attention roaming to the woman that sits between them. "We were talking about wheat things - sweets, bread, pastries..." Things of the past, given the wheat shortage. "Are you visiting the Weyr?" "I have a sister." N'rov, dry. He has his own look for N'muir then, one upon which he doesn't elaborate; there's soup (cold soup) to eat, answers not to interrupt /yet/. Vhaeryth's moved to check in with Bijedth; « They keep looking at each other. » (To Bijedth from Vhaeryth) "Oh, I have a couple of those, too," Tess tells N'rov brightly, followed by a much more serious (falsely so), "They're not given to shows of language. I'm sure my mother would have a heart-attack if she heard them so much as swear by the First Egg," which really isn't even a bad one. She turns a bright smile to the Weyrleader, "No, sir. I'm here to stay. I've only just moved in and am still getting my bearings. I suppose with the wheat shortage and the shorted tithes, I should put to rest any hope of cookies anytime in the foreseeable future." It's a lamentation. "I supposed I can survive it. This is a very pleasant place. The Weyr I mean. I'd never been before." She chatters. Only some of it has meaning deeper than the surface, but she can't be unaware of that, can she? To Vhaeryth, Bijedth is catching up on his gossip, his reply brief and distracted, faintly blurred by the criss-cross of fifteen other conversations painted in the tastes and colours and tones of the sources from which they come. « Who? » A beat. « Oh. » Deadpan, because /boring/. « Maybe N'rov is N'muir's son too. He has curly black hair. And he's pretty. N'muir is pretty. She is pretty too. » « He is prettier than Liesanth's rider, » Vhaeryth staunchly agrees, and given that his rider's ears don't turn red, N'rov must not know about it. « /Is/ she? » Pretty. « He hasn't said; only that she talks a lot, » this highly tinged with the bronze's own amusement given their riders' own proclivities toward the same. (To Bijedth from Vhaeryth) N'muir has no siblings, or if he does he isn't divulging those details. Instead he just watches Tess as he spoons more soup into his mouth, something of a disgruntled edge sloping his brows and the corner of his lips and stealing some of his previous warmth. "Welcome," he murmurs and finishes the last spoonful of his soup and trades bowl for cup of wine, taking a gulp of it promptly. He exchanges a look between N'rov and Tess yet again from behind his cup. "You two have things in common," he states as he sets down his cup. "N'rov, you should give Tess a tour of the Weyr sometime. It's a big place with its fair share of well-known secrets. Wouldn't that be nice?" It's wen she gets to that heart attack that N'rov finds great interest in resuscitating the cheese 'crouton' from the depths of his soup, but only to admire it for a moment in the bowl of his spoon... and then crush it between his teeth before swallowing it down into the acidic contents of his gut. It's not his only focus; he has more to eat, glances to exchange. But then, at his wingleader's proposal, he looks over at the traitor. "You know, we do," he says with a note of surprise. "We also both have," he double-checks with a glance at Tess, "two eyes." "Ten fingers and ten toes?" Tess queries of N'rov with widely innocent eyes and just the peeking out of her dimples as she smiles, close-lipped. "Though a tour would be immensely helpful. I keep getting turned around." She confesses this before looking back to N'muir and studying his face in a way that might hint at the unseemly given the differences in their ages. "I had thought of asking Cast-- er, C'stian," she corrects herself with the smallest trace of a blush, "for one, only I haven't come across him yet. I suppose it's just that there are so many faces in the Weyr that finding a single familiar one is like the perfect cookie in a batch of fine ones." There's a little wistful sigh. Cookies. The traitor Weyrleader looks back at his wingmate with poorly veiled amusement for N'rov's suffering. "Two eyes, really?" N'muir squints at N'rov first, then Tess. "Oh, look at that. You do. And they are kind of similar in colour, too." Not really, clearly, but N'muir does squint a lot these days. "What do you say, Wingrider N'rov? Take our newest resident on a well-needed tour?" He lifts his wine for a smug swig when a particular bronzerider's name is dropped, lending N'muir to half-inhale his wine and begin coughing uncontrollably. He tries to set down his wine blindly while trying to smother his coughs, the edge of the cup catching on the stray end of his spoon sticking out of his bowl, resulting in said spoon flipping out of the bowl with a noisy ruckus. He eventually gets his wine set down without spilling and coughs enough of his wine out of his lungs to ask (almost desperately) with wide, horrified eyes, "Why? Are you related to him?" "Last I checked," N'rov assures Tess of his digits, though he doesn't check here and now; perhaps he's attempting to decide whether to knife N'muir and dump his body, versus letting himself be relieved that the newly-returned man can once again pull these sorts of things, when he is /rescued/... by further calamity. Gray eyes spark N'muir's way and coughing is one thing, but when the other man keeps at it and that spoon flips, he's quick to round the table and get set to thump N'muir on the back if he has to. Or to call the healers, or whatever; if only they had a healer here! He relaxes only when his wingleader actually manages to talk, and that's only to the point of /waiting/ as though it might start in again. Not that he doesn't glance over for the answer. If only! Tess leans back, her hands bracing on the edge of the table as if she might get up, but once N'rov has sprung to action and it's known that the Weyrleader isn't starting to turn purple with lack of air, her figure loses its ready tension, though remains leaning back in light of the spoon acrobatics. Her brows are still lifted in surprise as she answers, "No, sir. We only knew each other before he was Searched." She gives N'rov a questioning glance, though what her question is isn't made clear. N'muir tries to ward off N'rov's good intentions with a hand that waves uselessly in the air. "I'm /fine/, stop hovering," he dismisses with a defensive knit to his dark brows. As long as Tess isn't related to C'stian, N'muir recovers without relapse and pushes himself up to his feet, eyeing N'rov warily. "Oh, well, if we see him, we'll tell him to look for you," he murmurs to the young woman. "We should get going. But I'll have N'rov here come and find you so you can be properly shown around the Weyr. N'rov would love to do that, wouldn't you, N'rov?" N'muir casts an expectant look back at his wingmate. "They only knew each other after he was Searched," N'rov supplies of C'stian and N'muir, right after Tess; it's not as dry as it might have been if he hadn't been eyeing his wingleader just in case. But once said wingleader renews his task, "It would be my honor," comes complete with a half-bow that's distinctly that before he accompanies the other bronzerider out. There's an effusive smile from Tess for the older man. "Thank you, sir, I'd be most appreciative." It probably answers both the matter of C'stian and the Weyr tour he's so strongly recommended to his wingrider. She looks unbothered by their move to depart, her spoon finally making it to her mouth again. And again, once she's alone, as is the usual order of a meal taken alone. N'muir is facing Tess when N'rov's words cut him deep and drive the Weyrleader's eyes down to scrape the table with some uncomfortable emotion - regret, guilt maybe. Whatever it is, N'muir lifts them again to the young woman only to nod once in her direction and then quietly fall into step with his wingmate without hesitation, leaving that uncomfortable emotion behind in exchange for the world outside. |
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