Logs:Satiet's Fingers Taste Like Cheese
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| RL Date: 3 April, 2008 |
| Who: Satiet, N'thei |
| Type: [[Concept:{{{type}}}|{{{type}}}]] |
| When: Day {{{day}}}, Month {{{month}}}, Turn {{{turn}}} ({{{IP}}} {{{IP2}}}) |
| With dinner winding down, so too does the activity in the kitchens: cooks taking much needed rests and partaking their own meals at the breakfast nooks, while the bus boys take a breather before tackling the growing mounds of dishes. They rest, their easy chatter providing a low underscoring to the din of the living cavern without, and midst this lull, Satiet sits nursing a mug of something that's definitely, from the scent, not all-klah, no food, and certainly no work. Anti-social? Perhaps. Except the chatter around her keeps her pale eyes constantly roaming towards interesting exchanges. Not everyone hates N'thei, and vice versa. Witness: after entering around a banal whistle, the man exchanges a coy parlay with a woman old enough to be his grandmother, the kind-hearted soul easily prevailed upon to leave her respite and rummage up something as suits a man's hunger; she earns a smile and a softened pinch to her wrinkled cheek. Laden and cheery, he starts to cut all the way through the kitchen toward the lower caverns-- but puts on the brakes a step or two beyond Satiet's seat. "It occurs to me suddenly that I don't recall having ever seen you eat anything." He looks down at his tray, over at her glass, back-and-forth, then up to the goldrider with a brow lifted. Her casual glance overs of the kitchen make N'thei an all too easy figure to spot -- so tall, so broad, so striking midst the every day worker that Satiet is compelled to pause her roaming gaze to observe. She watches the exchange, lip movements, rather than indiscernible voices, and the physical affection between the grandmotherly woman and Weyrleader. But when he turns to exit, the pale eyes veer away, somewhere else. She wasn't looking. But the decided lack of surprise when he does stop is overcast by the blink that turns her bright gaze up at his question. A pause, then a low, self-mocking laughter. "I drink my meals, or haven't you heard?" "I might have guessed." N'thei hinges a look on her mug again, amusement writ all over his expression. His tray overfloweth when he sets it before Satiet, when he turns it so the shallow angle makes an invitation for her out of the gesture. Cheese and bread, a healthy portion of tonight's meat, room temperature potatoes that look appealing even cooled down, and three citron tarts. "Can I tempt you at all, my love? Or just eat in front of you." He means to have a seat beside her, a may-I look while his hand touches the back of the chair. The question is less may I, and more, if she said no, would he acquiesce? So, instead of responding, she doesn't say anything, accepting that he will eventually sit. "I'm perfectly fine with this," she declines, lifting the mug. "Word has it, the biggest scandal to hit the caverns is how Miele kicked that no good husband of hers to the curb." Light chatter, nothing substantial, with a flick of dark lashes towards the gossiping cooks in the next booth over that then returns to N'thei, paused. "Do you need a drink with that?" And the answer is obvious; N'thei claims that chair will-she or won't-she, a thorough five second hesitation before he does what he wanted to in the first place. Regret in the slow way he shakes his head; "Did she. For nothing but being drunk and unfaithful, poor man." Declined, he still leaves the tray largely in front of Satiet, tempting morsels that he pulls from with greedy fingers. "Are you offering one?" "For -some- women, that's enough." Disdain colors her subtle emphasis. The mug is set down and Satiet's hand drops to her waistline, the tunic lifted slightly so she can pull the flask kept snug there out; all sorts of hiding places for her liquor. Slightly warmed, the silver container is lifted with a one-word explanation. "Moonshine." Best to pretend N'thei's looking at the flask's reveal for a second's single-minded intensity. His smile dawns on its arrival, choked as it is while he takes to shoving food in his at his face. Least he has courtesy to hide his mouth behind his hand and force most of a swallow before he speaks again. "It would bother me if people loved me only for my liquor," the corners of his eyes creased around a smile. Best to pretend, except Satiet's having difficulty in pretending all too well. Her smirk gives her away, and after a moment of holding the flask in the air for just as long as N'thei's second-long look, it joins her mug on the table, set down firmly with a half-full thud. "Don't say things you don't mean, darling," she drawls, mimicking his penchant for endearments, but finds little other conversation topics to broach with her Weyrleader, other than, of course, the subject of Miele's marriage. Awkward; her fingers play about the mug, bringing it up to gulp to fill the silence. Suddenly realized; "We have very little to say to each other." A mere statement of fact, though a surprising one, then N'thei resumes eating with all the eagerness one would need to get through a mountain of such food. Somewhere along the way, he takes possession of the flask to risk a sniff, to draw it away and peer like the thing's apt to cause him physical harm if he takes his eyes off of it. As though it were a deeply probing question; "Do you have friends?" Now he's giving Satiet the same scrutiny he favored her flask. A long beat, where pale eyes lift, pinned to N'thei. "No," she disagrees, "We choose to say very little to each other." A smile slips, sardonic. "There's a difference." As for his question, Satiet takes this opportunity to steal a slice of cheese from the edge of his plate, considering it from all angles than face N'thei's scrutiny and rather than the hardened glint of distance, her sharp features seem to smooth briefly, thoughtful. "I do. I did. It's hard to tell these days. You?" "Do you believe that? That I bite my tongue?" N'thei argues mildly in tone but certainly with a look, dry and disbelieving. Finally, he pushes the tray away, flask upon it, and clasps his hands briefly across a filled belly. "Do I? Mm." Interpret that however, a yes, a no, a neither. "I try to imagine you with friends, happy, never works. So I asked." Shrugs, simple as that, and begins to pile utensils on the fragments of his meal. "Do you believe that I have such little to speak of at any time?" Satiet returns just as mildly, but lacking the dry disbelief. The cheese garners a far more favorable response, the long consideration granted it leading to an appreciative sniff and a nibble along the edge. "Not everyone portrays happiness in the same way." To punctuate her point, the wedge of cheese is shook at N'thei, taunting as she stretches her arm halfway along the table's length, body leaned forward. She mocks herself openly, "There's even been a weyrmate or two in my past supposedly. Perhaps some men enjoy frigid." N'thei, smirking, "I flatter myself that I render you speechless." It's a lie and no denying it, one he utters while staring her dead in the eye and twitching the smirk to meet her cheese-wielding taunt. "Perhaps some men do. But you're not frigid." The voice of experience. "The meat of the question is just whether or not you're happy underneath it all, but I suppose it doesn't matter much." Just now, he reaches to close a hand around her the wrist extended across the table, looks like he'll eat the cheese right out of her hand-- or else bite her fingers, equally likely. "Maybe you do." She doesn't deny it, but there's an indulgent smile for N'thei, curved slightly and accompanied by a sickly, head-tilted expression. "And the meat of my answer is, it's really none of your business on my happiness." And yet Satiet continues, oddly oblivious to the hand that closes around her wrist. "I thought becoming Weyrwoman would make me happy." The nose wrinkle is answer enough, startled a moment later as pale eyes drop to the hand, the fingers, and the cheese held loosely between them and fascinated, or continually surprised, she doesn't move; bite off her fingers, maybe that'll shock her in a much more animated way. None of his business. Makes him smile, a little darkly, and catch her eyes again once she resumes speaking even after her rebuke. "Hasn't it?" N'thei shakes his head the moment the question's out, sure enough of Satiet's reply. He plucks the cheese from her fingers with his empty hand, quick to cast it off onto the plate, to press her fingers briefly against his lips in what looks like a blissful repose. Purely glib; "I'm happy. Shouldn't that make you happy?" Then he does nip at the pads of her fingers lightly, amusing himself to an abbreviated laugh through his nose. "It would bother me if people were happy merely for the touch of my finger tips." Just as glib when given a chance to retort, Satiet presses those fingers in a touch more intimately before attempting to pull back, but not soon enough before he nips, another startled rabbit look crossing her sharp features. She blinks, pursed lips hesitating, then smoothing into the slightest, faintest, tiniest little smile. And then she's moving. To leave. Pushing back her chair, and it's then she answers, less amused, less happy, and more wearied. "Being Weyrwoman is a burden when you pause to think and care. It's easier not to. Good night, N'thei." But the slight woman doesn't move immediately out of her seat. Surprise draws N'thei from his reverie, raises his eyebrows right after the words think-and-care. "I'm not familiar with the terms, madam." Briefly, he pulls on the delicate wrist in his fingers, as though he would pursue more of Satiet than the taste of her fingers, but no. There falls a good night, thus released her hand. "Good night, Satiet. Don't forget." Like it's some delicate wild thing he might crush if mishandled, he holds up her flask from the table. "Forget?" She's already forgotten, fingers drawn away to the lips from which her confession fell, brow knitted. Remembrance of who she's speaking with drops her hand to her side slowly, and even slower, she stands, a glance cast to the flask. "You know where I live. Return it when you're done." With such flippancy in her intonation, Satiet withdraws from the table and the kitchen, leaving N'thei with that half-nibbled piece of cheese, her klah-spiked brandy, and her homebrewed liquor. |
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