Difference between revisions of "Logs:Positively Hair-Raising"

Resident Quarters, High Reaches Weyr

A small foyer, spartan in decor with only a rug on the floor and a chore board tacked to the wall, serves as a node for the network of dormitory caverns. Segregated by age and gender, the dorms provide sleeping accomodations for a wide range of the Weyr's populace. The largest dormitory has a brightly painted blue and yellow door and is hung with a hook board with clay name tags for the children who live there. Inside, bunk beds and single cots provide sleeping space for kids aged seven to fourteen, with clothing stored in a hodgepodge mix of trunks and foot lockers. A larger cot is pushed up against the wall near the door for the nanny on night duty.

Several archways lead to a loopy maze of smaller caverns that provide sleeping accomodations for two to eight people at a time, each with a basic cot-and-press setup; glows here are sparse and often dim, since the dorms are primarily meant for sleeping. A larger archway leads to the common room and, like the others, is protected by a tapestry that muffles sight and sound.

The High Reaches contingient has left - that many people heading out at once is hard to miss. What might also end up being hard to miss is Hana being assigned a smaller dorm, a pair of fellows helping her with her luggage.. thingy, and some odds and ends presented in baskets. Thankfully, she only needs one or two sturdy fellows.

Hard to miss and, therefore, the smaller contingent than Hana's likely used to has picked up a stalker, though it's an easy hop-skip for Mave from one dorm to the next, bringing her to stand in the doorway. She's visible by her peeking face and hair, and by the formally folded grey-blue dress held reverently along her crossed arms. Keeping presently out of the way, she yet gives a heads-up nod of familiarity to one of the helpers.

Hana points the fellows to the end of one cot, and then offers a bright smile, "Thank you so much! I could have gotten it, but well - I would have had to empty it to do so, and there would have been a great deal of dragging," she admits cheerfully as she puts her baskets on the cot, before turning. "Mave! Have you come to welcome me to my new abode?"

"I guess!" Pipes up Mave, glancing over her shoulder as if to follow a string showing the path Hana took from the weyr to here. Turning upon the young woman again, she enters the room a couple more steps, shrugging to indicate the dress folded over her arms. "And return this. Sorry for the delay-- I washed it." Though her cheeks puff with friendliness, the bright-eyed girl stands a little more subdued, teeth often worrying her lip when she stops talking, testament to distraction. "I..." a glance around the dorm, mostly bored; they look similar, "didn't realize you were staying."

Hana looks over her shoulder, then moves the baskets to the press, and takes a seat at the head of the cot, then patting next to her, "Come and take a seat - and you took lovely care of the dress. Thank you so much," she adds, before lifting a shoulder, "It.. wasn't part of the original plan."

Scooting agreeably over to where Hana sits, Mave flops down ungracefully next to her, tossing the dress-- with caution-- onto a free space before rocking her arms behind her to relax on. "No, I mean, thank you. Though I think we learned that this should be the last experiment of that kind." A snicker, easygoing and self-deprecating but not pitying. Tilting her head against her shoulder, she flashes Hana a grin, "This-- " then looks forward idly, biting her lip. "No, never mind."

"No, it just means you should come visit me the night before a gather so we can tie your hair up in braids to sleep on." There is no escape. No esca.. "This... what? You can ask, you know. I don't bite, and if I don't want to answer, I'll just say so. Deal?" That said, there is a bit of amused resignation to the statement; she can tell she'll have similiar conversations with a few folks, when all's said and done.

Mave's legs stretch out and she rubs her hands down her thighs, watching her booted toes play against the dorm floor. "Deal," she agrees, seemingly just because it's polite to answer; there's no conviction to it relating it back to what she interrupted herself saying. "It's just..." Words spoken before she's quite decided to say them. Stopping, she straightens, puffs out a breath and then coils her hand into her hair to pull it over her far shoulder, spying across the opposite one at Hana. "I was thinking, it's not the greatest time to feel welcome here. What with what's been going on. I want you to feel like you can-- " what starts out sentimental turns quickly-- well, Mave-sentimental, "ask me to knock somebody's teeth for you. I'm gonna be learning. In fact, maybe you could learn, too."

Hana tucks her feet up under her, hiding the shoes behind layers of skirt, then nods. "Things seemed.. very tense after the announcement." Not being one of the weyrbred, she probably lacks a great deal of background info on the matter. "I am hoping by being here, I won't add to the tension." There is a pause, then she adds, "I needed time away, and Lady Azaylia was kind enough to offer me a place. I.. don't quite think she knows what she's in for. Or I, myself, for that matter."

"It's," the ugh that Mave emits next is barely an answer, further worsened by her raising her hands to push the backs of them into her eyes fiercely. "confusing. Cause sometimes I feel like... I should be really up in this. And then other times..." and hands flop, "Like it's none of my business, cause what do I know." Sighing, she absently cracks her neck then plants her hands and scoots further back on the cot, letting her feet dangle rather than continue wearing anxious holes in Hana's new floor. Probably frowned on. "I can't imagine you will," she adds, more comfortingly and amiable, to Hana after, her smile shy but genuine in a practical manner, "Azaylia won't let you." A reassurance that sounds vaguely like a warning; her intention doesn't seem to be the latter. Another thought parts her lips, only for her eyes to flash panic and she snaps her jaw shut, warning now just for herself.

"Well then - you and Lady Azaylia will just have to be my current projects. Speaking of which, would you care to have your hair braided?" Hana asks, tone turning to wheeling as she adds, "I love playing with people's hair - the clothes are fun, and I like to be useful keeping things going smoothly, but hair is the best." Hence part of the reason the dress is left where it's left for the moment, instead of being put away.

"Uhh..." Mave's stare seems to interpret Hana's request as something twice as lethal but then, shoulders squirming a little self-consciously, she says, "Yeah, sure. I mean, you'll take it out before I leave?" That seems fair. So she gets a heel under another and shucks off each boot in order to put her feet on the cot, crossing her legs while scooting backwards again to angle her back towards Hana. A glance flashed over her shoulder seeks to confirm that this is the preferred, then she eyes forward, fingers picking at the cot's sheets till a crisp make turns into a wrinkled lump. "Too bad," she mutters thoughtlessly, "The Weyr can't just braid each other's hair."

"... I somehow cannot see that going well. At the very least, Alida would punch anyone who would try, and that assumes her hair hasn't already been lost." Woe, woe - great is the sorrow at that idea, as Hana fishes out a comb from one of the baskets, as well as a brush and starts from the bottom, keeping her touch light and the tugs lighter. "So. Did you at least enjoy the *rest* of the party?"

Tugging bothers Mave none, and as light as Hana goes, she barely appears to notice it's started -- too often trying to turn her head or sway. "That's not... quite what I meant," she admonishes, wry, then forgoing that to give into a soft snort-laugh; yeah, it's an image, alright. Fingers play, play, play into the sheet; she stares at them. "I did! Actually." Surprise, surprise? No, she's just popping her lips in amusement, "I danced, and K'zin tossed me and I didn't even die. It was... nice that we could still enjoy ourselves, despite everything. Y'know?" Naughty, she jerks her head to try and get a real good look at Hana.

"Good! And toss dances are the best," Hana agrees, lifting the comb away so that the hair just slides through her fingers. "Did Ni.. N'ky dance with you too?" she asks, teasing the young girl lightly, before adding, "Not 'quite'?" she then parrots, before turning the girl slightly so she can go back to the detangling portion.

Mave grunts in discomfort automatically at being maneuvered, belying how easily she slumps into the position made of her. Like she's just as quickly forgotten why she cared as that she was moved at all. "Yeah," her agreement flies through the clouds overtop any teasing, plain and simple. "Twiiii--- thrice? There was one time where we just didn't let go at all between songs, so I don't know what that counts as." Mouth curling up, then forgetting that, too. Tug, pick, wrinkle. Her head tosses thoughtlessly. "Not what? Oh. Yeah, what I was saying... I guess I meant more like... that we could have something that would be like doing hair is for you-- but for the Weyr." She lifts her arms to make a wide circular gesture, "Something that would help everything feel---- smooth. Or, at least... together..." faltering, she frowns around her words, disliking them, and forces herself quiet, head ducking.

Hana finishes up with a hank of hair, and slides it forward to hang in front of a shoulder, then grabs up another, "The question would be what - and how. And again, how - as as the gather for the hatching showed - there is a great deal of tension. I admit; I haven't really even spoken with most of those involved."

"It feels weird that no one's really... announced anything." Just for Mave, maybe, who flounders without the direction, writhing her butt and showing no signs of settling down even as more hair goes by. "But I'd barely know what to ask, or-- yeah, what to do. What helps." A scowl flashes, turning her mouth down, a tense scolding to herself for bringing it up without solution. She picks her last on the sheet then slaps her hands away and onto her knees, bouncing them. Trying to sound lighter, she mumbles absently, "When we were still in the fishing village, there were these plains nearby, and when I felt bad I'd just run into them and pretend to be-- well. Anything I wanted. Going on adventures, and slaying giant rabid whers, and defending my wild plains tribe from invading Holders all felt easier than... who knows." Whatever five-turn-olds cry about.

"... we invade tribes? Why was I never involved in any invasions? I feel cheated somehow..." Hana muses, before nodding slightly, unseen. "I suppose all we can do, for now at least, is not get into any arguments about it, and perhaps try to defuse any situations where arguments - or fights - might start over it? With the Hatching over, and many people going home, that will hopefully help some too." There is a pause, then she asks, "Do you like any particular types of braids?"

"Clearly, this is why you should be learning how to punch throats with me." Rubbing at her thighs, Mave emits a soft bleh, tongue rolling out, "Yeah! Why did it have to be so public? K'del's drink shattered all over my foot! Oh, wait, right. You were there." Sighing, her frown reappears, no any less troubled by the question put to her as she self-consciously lifts a hand to tug at the hair she's left in Hana's domain. Wincing silently, holding onto a squinted anxiety, she offers, "... the-- br-- aided type?"

Hana's movements pause for a moment, "I had actually not realized.. but if you were toss dancing later, there was no injury, I'm certain?" Another pause, then a chuckle, "Well, there are plain braids, three stranded and fat, either single or double; woven ones that go down your head," and here her finger is felt from crown down to neck, "Or even ones that are very very skinny and multi-stranded - and of course, all sorts of combinations there-of."

It's clear to the wall that Mave feels overwhelmed by the sheer amount of braidiness being discussed; it all goes over her head, despite supposedly being applied to it. "I," she gapes, pauses, clears her throat, and continues calmly, "I trust you." Sounding mostly not like the plea for Hana to pick that it really is. Then she shakes her head strongly, "No, I guess... not on my foot. That might've been a little strong. He was looking away, obviously." Obviously. Reminder of the event revives her darkened brow and she bites down harder than before on that poor abused lip.

Hana peers at the girl, then shakes her head and grins. "Well, we'll have to see then." Though, of course, she's already got an idea. Comb is traided for brush, and soon the heavier pull is felt, a slow and steady movement made for relaxing folks. "He used to be the Weyrleader before... well... before, right? He seemed to be very..." enthusastic? "involved, before everything. Was he good at it?"

Mave succumbs briefly to the magic of brushing, eyes closing and breath deepening to a low hum at the growing massage of brush hairs. "Yeah, definitely," she chimes in easily, then pauses to reflect, sniffing. "I mean... as far as I know about Weyrleader stuff. There were some bumpy times then, too... but that's never on just K'del. The Weyr isn't run by one person alone, y'know? That's why it's just wretched to see them... disagree, and climb on each other."

Once the hair is smooth and free of tangles, Hana starts to gather it up and brush upward, bringing it all up to the top, pausing here and there to rearrange escaping bits, then carefully twisting the entire mass. Except, of course, where she pulls pieces out to hang in the eyes and over the ears. "Well, it is good to know that he will not be trying to make problems.. though, from what I heard, he was involved in the original.. problems. But beyond that." There is a pause, "And if we keep mashed tubers away from him and... was it H'kon?" Another name she's still not officially sure of. And all the while, twist, twist, tuck and turn.

"H'kon's Arekoth caught Iesaryth." A factual answer, free of judgment of, really, further knowledge. Mave's mouth tugging remains generally neutral as she thinks, tilting her head against the tug of her hair but better than before. "Involved doesn't always mean... responsible. I don't know." Again, she tries to banish any authority, and, certainly, there's none in her tone. "The lower caverns'll keep chugging along, really. It's not like we require supervision for day to day stuff," she shrugs, though the thought is reassuring: keep your head down. "And that's where I'll be-- it just. Y'know. Sometimes you want to do more, even when you're the worst person for it."

Hana will, perhaps unfortunately, not be just in the lower caverns. This will probably cause heartburn. "Well, that's good in and of itself. Not having to worry about the herds, or laundry, or if dinner will be good can be a huge relief in and of itself," she finally says, before pinning the bun into place, using a bit of dark twine and some hairsticks. "And honestly, I don't think I would be any good at punching someone in the throat. That sounds too painful."

"I'd generally agree," Mave offers, throwing one leg out from under her and over the side of the cot so she can spin right around to face Hana-- hopefully, hairsticks means done, not that the girl is paying attention. More important to look Hana in the eye as she says, "But if it's that kind of painful versus... something dangerous happening to you," general you, though her look on Hana is not without caring, "painful... I know my preference."

Hana hms, and nods. "I have my hopes that actual dangerous isn't to be. If Thread," here she trails off, then just shakes her head, vaugely trouble-looking before reaching for one of those clumps danging in the face, "/Almost done. Haven't actually put in the braids yet, you realize," though with that small amount of hair, the braids have to be pretty small.

"Huh?" Mave wrestles her eyes to try and look at her hair, ineffectually. "Then what have you been doing this whole time?" Rather than impatience, her tone threads with the curiosity of merely not knowing. "And where did you learn how to do all this? And why?" Again, without condescension. "Did you always want to be a hairdresser when you were young? That seems awfully specific when I think about it, but would explain the lack of raids thing."

"I was putting in the bun. The braids are going to dip out from under it, little swoops, which is why there are loose bits - so I can braid and tuck them under - with the sticks to ground everything. And.. not exactly. I just liked to play with hair, the Lady and her family needed help, and my parents wanted me to bed the son, or a cousin, or maybe a visiting Blooded fellow." There is a pause, then dryly, "They aren't that picky." And yes, that tense /is/ correctly used. As she speaks, one of the small loose sections are smoothed, then swiftly braided right where Mave can watch, the fingers quick and swift, and long practice making the resulting braid symetrical. "What does one do with a raid, anyway?"

Watching is just what Mave does, eyes fixated on Hana's deft hand motions, "It's not that I never knew about hair stuff," she manages to comment, "It's just that you do it so well." Questioned, she lifts her head from the braid to ponder, lower lip pouting upward to reveal her concentration. "Well... I suppose, whatever you want. Depends on if you're raiding to cause chaos," lifting both hands, she peels a finger of one back with the other, counting long, "To steal supplies. To take over..." Brows furrow deeply as she swallows, chin darting shyly for a second. "Come to think of it... suddenly now it doesn't sound so great anymore." The conquering hero, tempered by harsh reality.

"Could I raid to make everyone braid their hair?" Hana asks absently, as she comes to the end, and then lifts it up. There is a tug here and there - like it's wrapping once around something, then something hangs a touch long, then a tug and tuck and she's moving to the next section.

"Deal," Mave murmurs over the top of the thumbnail she's adamantly chewing on. "Fuckanutter," a sighed curse, "but I can't get out of my head about wanting to do something. I just have-- " energy, clearly, because she's abruptly bouncing on her remaining tucked heel, hands shaking restlessly in the air next to her.

"Marvelous. So. Think we could lock everyone up who's disagreeing in their sleeping garments, in a celler until they agree to agree?" Hana asks absently as she concentrates on doing it for the other three sections of hair and finishing it up before the girl totally /explodes/.

Giggle-snort would be the noise Mave makes, though she sobers briefly before her next laugh; this one more breathless, sighing wistfully. "You know, I've thought of that? How people should sometimes be locked in a room till they figure it out. None of this hiding and mucking about behind backs." Feeling various tugs, she's managed to, at least, stop bobbing up and down. All of the nerves travel straight down her shoulders and escape out the fingertips she winds into her shirt. "I didn't think of the sleeping garments, part, though," Hana's due credit, said softer, pensive, "That's good..."

"No shoes for kicking, no beltknives for accidents to occur, no scarves for any other accidents," Hana points out practically, though that wouldn't stop fistcuffs. There is a tug here, a tug there, and then she sets back to consider it, before nodding. "There we go. I have a piece of shiny, if you want to take a look."

"Accidents," scoffs Mave, rolling her eyes, till they end up back on Hana with a slow blink. "Look?" Pause; think about i-- "Oh! Hair." Nevermind shinies, for her hands drive straight up her neck and towards the array, blindly patting about to figure out where her hair's gone. She also shakes her head strongly, feeling the whip of hanging braids. "I feel like someone's pulling gently back on my head," she comments ambiguously, not seeming to have decide whether this is acceptable or not.

"Sometimes, it helps my headaches, if I change how the hair lays. Well, go ahead," Hana urges pulling out that bit of shiny for the girl to look at. It /must/ come from being a Blooded Lady's lady in waiting, all the little toys she has - hairsticks, brush, comb, /mirror/.

Though she accepts the offered mirror, Mave spends time more comfortably examining it than her own rearranged reflection. "I think... I still own a pencil..." Dry, as she gingerly touches the edge of one of the hairsticks with her dirty, untrained hands. "No... no, wait, that's the Weyr's, too." A shuffle of her butt as she turns, "Which reminds me," she lowers the mirror, sliding it back towards Hana and then standing to jut a thumb at the folded dress, "Your payout is in there, too. Little purse tucked inside."

"Keep the sticks, Mave. It's a gift, yours clear and free," Hana offers before tucking away the mirror and unfolding to get to her feet. "Pay.. oh, right. All four of them made it!" There is a quick grin, then a shake of the head. "Can you believe I clean forgot about that? Anyway.. I suppose I should start putting things away, then... figure things out. Have a good night, my dear." And unless the girl remembers the whole taking things out... well, she has no problem with letting the girl escape /with/ the hairdo.

"What? No, I-- " Mave's a hesitant hand-grasp of the first hairstick away from yanking the entire ensemble down and therefore remembering that was her initial intention, when Hana's declaration utterly side-tracks her. Bobbing her head in politeness, she pushes off the cot, "Oh, yeah. Don't let me keep you from it." In the end, there's very little Mave remembers at all, except to grin and offer the other woman a goodnight before she scampers, because she does remember that people don't like to do their sorting and their getting settled with a wide-eyed unhelpful audience.