Logs:Romantic Notions
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| RL Date: 28 January, 2016 |
| Who: Kh'tyr, Catling, Olivya |
| Involves: Fort Weyr |
| Type: Log |
| What: Kh'tyr and Catling are interrupted by Olivya at the Fountain. |
| Where: The Glass Fountain, Fort Weyr |
| When: Day 12, Month 12, Turn 39 (Interval 10) |
| Weather: It's been raining steadily all day with occasional spates of honest downpour, sheets of water just pouring out of the sky. |
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Despite its subterranean locale, the creamy wall paint, pale woods, and
frosted glass give the cavern a light, airy feel. Oil lamps reflect softly
in the polished wood of high-backed booths, glimmering through the opaque
glass dividers that help lend intimacy to the seating arrangements;
round-backed booths carved from stone, lined with deep, terra-cotta
colored padding and the addition of strategic, lyric shapes painted in a
subtle red shade. The sweeping, half-circle shaped bar with its top of
smooth stone, backed by cut-glass-fronted cabinetry flows gracefully into
the soft lines and mellow colors that dominate the Glass Fountain.
All the atmosphere aside, the main attractions of the room are clearly the
massive, multi-pronged chandelier that hangs from multiple chains from the
ceiling and the re-worked leak - which no longer resembles a leak at all,
having been channeled through glass to become a beautiful piece of art. A
curving wave and a series of glass bubbles guide the water past a bank of
glows, allowing the light to shine through the water and turn it into a
sparkling fountain. From its dark, dim, shabby history, the Glass Fountain
has become an elegant place with lattice-stands to hold the menus with
their selection ranging from typical 'bar food' to high-end dishes and
fancy desserts. With the ugly day of rain, rain and more rain outside, the swanky bar and restaurant that is The Glass Fountain is a popular refuge. Kh'tyr's early dinner is finished, the plate set off to one side with only a few sprigs of garnish left to mark it as 'used,' but he's onto his second drink and not looking like he's about to get up from his lonely table anytime soon. His brown gaze wanders across the faces of riders and weyrfolk alike occupying other tables, booths and the bar-stools with the bored interest of one who's too familiar with this scene. Most days now, Catling works with the tanners. And today she finishes the day by delivering a soft fleece to one of the proprietors. She is recently-bathed, yet the scent of leather hangs vaguely about her. Once the fleece is delivered she finally looks about her, and her eyes go wide at the sight. "Ooooh," she breathes. Kh'tyr's table happens to be close enough that the young woman's presence doesn't go unnoticed. It's moments, while she's making her delivery, the assistant is sipping on his ale. It's only when her eyes go wide and she's breathing that impressed note that he swears, "Oh, sweet Faranth, isn't there anything that doesn't impress you?" Nevermind that the namesake of the glass fountain is very impressive. "Sit down if you're going to gawk," he must move the seat across from him with a boot under the table because it slides out seemingly without help. The girl blinks, and then she frowns slightly before sinking into the chair. "Well.... if you saw where I grew up, it might make more sense. Everything here is so much.... much more...." She shrugs. "More everything. This is...." She looks around. "Beyond imagining. It's like...." She sighs. "We never had anything much like art. The harper had to explain it to me. I think I was a source of constant frustration to him. And I guess to you. Sorry for that." She rubs the back of her neck. "Tell me about it, your home." Kh'tyr instructs more than asks, his dark gaze settled on the girl. "Then tell me why you assume that I come from any different?" There's something accusatory and challenging in the last words, his look equally so. "Wasn't home." Catling shakes her head. "Took me coming here to figure it out." She shakes her head. "Harper said that the hold used to be a herders' shelter. So there was a hearth and a tiny kitchen. There was a main room. There was a cold spring. There were two sleeping-chambers. There was a short tunnel that led to the ovines. And there was a divided hayloft. Part for hay, part for storage. And that was my sleeping-room." She shakes back her hair. "It was.... lacking in domestic charms." "It usually does take some kind of change," Kh'tyr replies, more than a little dismissive. His eyes are a little narrowed, thoughtfully, as he looks at her across the table bear the bar that they occupy. He sips on his drink as Catling describes the place she grew up, his empty early dinner plate set off to one side along with one other empty cup. If he was out in the rain before, he's been here long enough that any damp evidence has dried. "So you slept with the ovines and now you're here in the Fountain and can't help yourself by making yourself look so naive with all your gawking because you've never seen art before," he sums up, tone judgmental somehow, even if it's hard to say if his judgment is positive or negative. You know who has seen art before? Olivya. Likely Kh'tyr knows that given the art that hangs in the personal depths of her weyr that the assistant has seen before. She looks slightly like a work of art herself, wrapped up in the soft, sheer purple layers of a dress that are gathered and knotted elegantly at her hip to fall in a sweep of skirts. The knot is mimicked in the low chignon that she wears her honey-blonde hair in, stray curls escaping from her evening that's preceded right now. (As Kh'tyr knows, she took a select group of weyrlings to a gather, which explains also why she returns sober.) That she spots Kh'tyr and sweeps towards his table? Well, that is to be expected. "Hello, darling. Buy me a drink?" is her greeting, before her cool blue gaze slides over Catling. She places her just as easily despite only meeting her the once when she arrived, greeting, "Catling, wasn't it?" "Is gawking problematic?" asks Catling, tilting her head. "I am naive, and this place does take my breath away. I don't mean to offend you by it, sir. It's like flowers, you know. They grow a long time in the dark, but oh, how fast they bloom in the sun." Then she turns her head, looking at Olivya. "Catling, yes ma'am," she answers. "Oh, shell," the swear is half under his breath and accompanied by an exaggerated roll of his eyes. "What are you wearing?" is demanded without real interest from the arriving blonde. Kh'tyr's tone suggests whatever it is, it's ridiculous. "Gawking isn't a problem if you don't mind everyone and their uncle's cousin's brother or boss," his eyes flick to Olivya, "knowing just how naive you are. And flowers die in the dark. It's mushrooms that grow because they're fed shit and kept in the dark. Not a mushroom, are you, Catling?" Kh'tyr lifts his drink to his lips again, adding for Olivya, "I'm not paid enough to buy you drinks." Whatever Kh'tyr's tone implies, it is fabulous. Swishy and feminine in a way that certainly draws other eyes as Olivya answers in dry counter, "A dress, I believe it is called." She doesn't press for a drink, not where the conversation veers. Her brow curves upwards, an amused gesture as she adds, "I do not think we should be considering feeding children shit and keeping them in the dark. But you don't want to be a flower, either, Cat. Too delicate, too easily bruised and wilted." "Weeds have flowers, but most of them aren't delicate," replies Catling. "They grow everywhere, even when you try to get rid of them." She swings her legs, then quirks a brow at Kh'tyr, and her lips twitch into a shy, half-teasing smile. "I don't mind being a weed. Most times, weeds are just what people call things they don't want around because don't know what to do with them." She looks at the dress. "That's.... really pretty." "Weed seems appropriate," Kh'tyr tells Catling, deadpan. Then he's lifting his glass, eyeing it and moving to stand, pressing it into Olivya's hand. "There, I can owe you half a drink. Or we can call it even and say it's the half I didn't accidentally spill on that thing," the dress. "Ladies," he gives by way of farewell, a mocking half-bow crisply executed before he swaggers off toward the stairs to the exit. "And now you want to be one of many?" counters Olivya to that statement with her own dry, bemused tone with a silent challenge to that curved brow even as she glances to Kh'tyr for his deadpan addition. Her fingers drop to swish her skirts, though, with a smile, though she doesn't seem surprised at the compliment. She knows it's pretty! "Thank you, darling." With Kh'tyr gone and half of a drink acquired, her attention is all for Catling. "I just want to be Catling," answers the girl. "Whatever Catling turns out to be. It's.... well. Just that all this... everything.... it's like the sun to flowers. Like the sun." She leans back, sighing. Olivya's steady gaze makes a study of Catling, giving little away given the Weyrlingmaster's reserve. But it's all the tone of a Lady Holder in which she tells the young woman, "I wouldn't go whispering those romantic fantasies around without a care, Cat. Dragonriders are notorious for thinking little of them, especially given how many we've heard over the years from soft-headed children who want to Impress a dragon without really knowing what dragonriding is about.' Blink. Blink. "I.... what? Romantic.... me? Him? Ma'am?" The girl's face flushes scarlet, and her mouth drops open. "I... ermm... no. I mean, that's not... this isn't.... I mean, he's handsome in his own way, but he's... ah... he's twice my age and...." She ducks her head, squeaking. "He's a friend! But I was... gawking about.... all this room here. Because it's.... amazing. I...." "Romantic notions aren't confined between two people," corrects Olivya with a curve of her brow upwards, her glass lifted to her lips without a care for the germs Kh'tyr must have left. She repeats, in clarification, "Like the sun to flowers-- That is a romantic notion. Some silly thing a child who has only heard the stories about a Weyr and dragonriders would say." "It isn't romance, ma'am. It's just a fair sight better than where I grew up. It's a lot better. And that's what we were talking about. And now, well. Compared to where I was, it is like pushing up out of the soil and the sun being on flowers. You can't grow right only being in the dark." Catling shrugs. "Dragonriders. They're people. Dragons. Seems to me they're people too. And there are good people and bad people. Mostly just people wanting to be happy. And I don't mean any disrespect, ma'am, but the way I feel about my new life isn't silly. It isn't all rainbows and pretty pretty prancing runnerbeasts. I still work hard. I still have people that don't like me. Have people who like me though, too. Have choices. Have... lots of things I didn't used to have. The only words I have to describe it, to describe how it feels, is sun on flowers. And I'm not going to try to change how I feel at having a chance at a better life than I had before, even if you do think I'm a silly child, ma'am." It likely shows more patience than most people assume Olivya has on meeting her that she allows the young girl to lecture at her, only those light eyes marking her attention as she listens. The glass is drained while Catling speaks and continues speaking, then set down lightly, empty. "Then describe it that way, Cat. You seem to have words enough," she instructs at the end, simply. She even adds an easy, "Have a good evening," before she twists away from the table and continues to find her own drink. |
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