Council Chambers, High Reaches Weyr
At the heart of this oblong cavern is its meeting table: a long hardwood oval with a mirror's dark shine, High Reaches' sigil picked out in lapis and onyx at its center. Twenty chairs surround it, each softened by an embroidered cushion that's just a little too stiff for complete comfort -- meetings need to be kept short, after all -- with the chair at the table's head, facing the ledge, being somewhat larger than the rest.
Interspersed between glowsconces upon the smooth walls, ancient tapestries depict the territories High Reaches protects in a particularly pastoral fashion, all fluffy clouds and fluffier llamas, or else fishing crafts sailing merrily out to sea. Among them is also a natural alcove, its several wooden shelves primarily stocking fine wines and liquors as well as the glasses to serve them, though the lower shelves also hold whatever hidework requires particularly frequent attention.
A narrow wooden door leads to the Records room, while the tunnel that extends to the weyrleaders' ledge is wide enough for three men to walk abreast, with just enough kink in it to block the wind.
Thunderstorms: they're what keep the foreign bronzerider more or less indoors, now that Vhaeryth's parked himself quite familiarly upon Iesaryth's ledge (/with/ Iesaryth, it must be underscored) until her rider might be freed from duty, instead of wandering off to some more congenial locale. Nepotism: it's what lets the man occupy the council chamber without particular guard, though there have been some who have peeked in on him, now and again. If he's had the effrontery to try out the highest chair, and it /is/ slightly askew, he's not seated there now. Not that the other chairs are lined up in any more orderly fashion. No, N'rov's standing before one of the tapestries with wineglass in hand, a rich fur collar raised about his shoulders, studying a fishing boat's sail so close up that it must resolve into individual stitches instead of the big picture.
H'kon has all the look of a man come to the council chambers on official business; the serious set of his features, the orderly, if certainly not ornate, appearance of his clothes, the portfolio. Entering to find N'rov turns serious to displeased, furrows and creases deepening. Does that make the grey in his beard stand out more? The faint jut of his chin might, after a moment's regard has almost conclusively placed what he can see of that man, anyway. "Do you have some pending business here, bronzerider?"
The initial sound of footsteps initiates N'rov's turn to greet the arrival, his smile flashing towards a grin, a distinct warmth in his gray eyes: the sort of reception H'kon may never meet again. Certainly it's one that fades into visible disappointment even before the pull of his mouth to one side, the way he leans a hand against the wall. At least it isn't on the tapestry. "You might say that," he says, light as his gaze is probing. "I await the weyrwoman's pleasure." While he's at it, "Good wine."
"Indeed." H'kon's gaze strays to the finish of the table, the corner of his mouth pulling ambiguously sideways. It isn't long before he's looking to N'rov once more, features back to their more usual beginnings of a frown. (Just his face.) "I should wonder if you are planning that here. It's not so late that I can't have Arekoth see to changing my meeting place." The delivery, at least, is deadpan. The way he grips that portfolio and straightens his back isn't.
The table's finish is, as it happens, currently unsullied. N'rov's returning smile, by contrast, grows and angles towards something very like a smirk. At least he schools it before replying, with an eye to that straightened back, "Important, is it? Your... meeting. Something I could learn from?" Entertain him, please!
H'kon disapproves of that smirk by way of even heavier eyebrows. Stern look is held. "Perhaps you could." Learn from it. "I'm not thoroughly familiar with Fort's arrangements. At any rate, I should imagine that is little of my business." The slight tilt of his head will have to serve as the only means of reflecting the decision back, vice versa. Entertaining.
"No one would expect you to be," N'rov assures. He glances back over his shoulder towards the tapestry, a moment's regretful look... and then switches his wine glass to his other hand so he can advance on H'kon, palm out to cross. Or to deny, if H'kon's feeling impolite. "I'm N'rov, of course, bronze Vhaeryth's. Have we met?" His head's slightly tilted, his tone congenial, his gaze on the brownrider's in a way that would be level if only the other man were taller.
H'kon does not deny that hand when it's offered, though there's something of a weary look to him when he attempts a pleasant smile. It looks difficult. "I believe you were at the weyrlings' graduation. H'kon." The stolen liquor is not mentioned, though might be blamed for the twitch at his eye's corner. "Brown Arekoth's."
Realization hits, and with that, N'rov's palm against his own forehead just as soon as he gets it back. When his hand falls, his expression is boyish, regretful, even commiserating as though they'd withstood this generation's version of Thread together. "I've tried to block all that from my memory," he confides. "You look familiar, now, though I don't remember much else. Did I do anything awful? Tell me you'd tell me. And the name..."
"I have not," comes back, a flat smack of a comment to answer N'rov's confidence. It's not entirely a patient wait, the way the brownrider tilts his head up and squints just a little at the younger man before him. His mouth does that same fissuring of his face that isn't really a smile. "Rest assured, you acted much as you do now." The last words from the bronzerider, however, have brought some element of unfeigned interest. It's in the changing lines. Right there. At the corners of his eyes.
"I shall rely upon your word," N'rov avows, lifting his glass in the direction of the other man just before he savors High Reaches' vintage (or, at least, the vintage by way of High Reaches) all over again. "And be grateful that you did not meet some simulacrum, tattered and torn, scraping across the stone... no, you're the notorious one, aren't you? Or the man /he'd/ have made that way, falsely accused, cleared in a blaze of glory, restored to the weyrwomen's right hand. Hands, rather, since they are a collective."
H'kon's boots shift against the chamber's floor, first impatient, then into a readier stance. All those little lines throughout his face go comparatively smooth. "You would be the first," and he rocks that portfolio against his hip, "to suggest notoriety or glory. Well-" and his head twitches in the direction of the ledge beyond the chambers, "the second, perhaps. I wonder if this is so well known by all of Fort's riders."
That twitch twitches a smile into being, but one that lingers as N'rov looks ledge-ward, longer. Still, he does turn back towards the brownrider. "Loose lips sink ships, I'm told."
H'kon's twitch, at any rate, doesn't last long. The look that replaces it, the one that settles pensively on N'rov, does. "Indeed," is more drawn out than most of the brownrider's words tends to be.
N'rov, thoroughly capable of talking (and talking, and talking), for the moment refrains. Of course, there's the wine to drink, but moreover, the slight inclination of his brows that bespeaks a certain attentiveness towards the brownrider, who just might say a word or two more than the tapestry he'd studied before.
In time - spent studying N'rov - H'kon does speak. His words come with a faint lift of that portfolio. "My Weyr's business will be carried out here shortly. You will not be welcome for it."
There's a contemplative moment, after which N'rov says lightly enough, smiling, "'Will be.' 'Will not be.' You speak as though you do not speak for High Reaches, H'kon, as though you are not the one who would not welcome me. I appreciate your kind warning. How long would you say we have, before they come for you?"
H'kon shifts again, heels coming nearer together, chest rising and falling with a controlled breath. "It is not my place to speak for the Weyr-" doesn't quite end as a sentence should. There's a lag, and nothing to follow it directly. His demeanour (and feet) shift again, before, "I think the time is nearly run out."
"'The time.'" It's lifted in a tone the slightest bit more wondering than before, and quiet enough that it might well have been for N'rov himself. Barely. Then the bronzerider turns as though on a thirty-second, quick and businesslike if still genial, "Good man. I'll be sure to tell Brieli of your, hm, thoughtfulness." He flashes H'kon a grin, then turns his shoulder instead of his demeanor, setting off for the goldrider's quarters. Oh, but he'll refill his drink, first.
"No doubt." H'kon's look has gone sharp, eyes a little more intent, the beginnings of a real frown, instead of just his face, present. He manages to keep that portfolio still, to keep the fingers of his free hand from twitching. Only once N'rov has gone does H'kon lay whatever documents he's got on the table. He probably won't realise he's fallen to looking at that same ship on the tapestry until he's met by his wingleader.
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