Logs:...But Never Was
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| RL Date: 26 September, 2015 |
| Who: Leova, R'hin |
| Involves: High Reaches Weyr |
| Type: Log |
| What: Immediately after a bad day, R'hin has something to entrust to Leova. |
| Where: Dragon Infirmary, High Reaches Weyr |
| When: Day 1, Month 12, Turn 38 (Interval 10) |
| Mentions: Suireh/Mentions, Riahla/Mentions, Madilla/Mentions, Anvori/Mentions |
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The vast cavern has much the same odor of redwort and numbweed as the
human infirmary, though here it's seasoned with coppery ichor rather than
the iron of blood. It's also laid out similarly though on a much more
massive scale, its walls lined with a number of places for patients, in
this case large dragon couches recessed into the floor for ease of access;
nearby cots provide space for riders. Tucked into the western curve is a
huge circulating pool of warm water, by which are kept vats of oil.
The healers' duty station is a counter on the north side of the room, a
checkpoint before the storage rooms behind it that are now shared with the
human infirmary, hosting supplies that are as neatly labeled and carefully
scrubbed as the rest of the infirmary. The senior dragonhealer has an
office there as well, and human-sized double doors have recently been
built as a direct route to the human infirmary, while opposite a wide
winding tunnel leads to the east bowl. Late afternoon, and there's not much light left. High Reaches eats it up early, would even if there weren't the storm brewing, too distant to see in the cold clarity of the first day of winter. Leova lets her last patients out early. The bluerider's worked harder with her dragon on his rehabilitation exercises since last winter, the endurance and the stretches and the special oil for his joints, the two of them spry but brittle-boned. The greenrider accompanies them out of the tunnel and lingers there after they have gone, the air cold but clear to her lifted face. From above, a bronze dragon appears. Not high in the sky, but familiar -- barely registering more than a passing, scant greeting from the watchdragon. Leiventh's descending fast -- wings snapping outwards as a seeming afterthought to slow him, the snappy aerobatics of his younger Turns not standing him in such good stead, today, landing awkwardly. But landing, all the same. R'hin, strapped in place on his back, doesn't move immediately, and when he does, it's only to straighten, to unstrap, but to sit, still, unmoving. He looks tired, whitewashed, old, for a moment. Familiar, that familiar, attracts Vrianth's attention. Fast, likewise. And awkward... the rangy green mantles dark-sparred wings, unsettled, from that ledge above the caverns that she frequents. The intensity of her gaze stays on the bronze, the glint of low-level electricity that she extends to him, but it must encompsss her rider in different ways. Leova, still autumnal tawny and amber and rust to his winter. Leova, who watches them now without a word: watches as a dragonhealer does to see whether they shake that off without her interruption. Electricity is repelled by cold winds, not so much seeking to evade as brute force rejection. That the winds whip and encircle are, no doubt, a reflection of Leiventh's mood, but he shares little else. R'hin, for his part, doesn't seem aware of the observation, at least not immediately. He laughs, abruptly, murmuring something under his breath, gloved hand brushing Leiventh's hide, before he's climbing down to the ground. Leiventh's weight shifts, after he does, subtly, and R'hin now notes the presence of the silent dragonhealer. Gone is the demeanor glimpsed of earlier: instead familiarly amused smile quirks the bronzerider's lips. Electricity sparks, static in her hiss. Talons move against stone. Leova doesn't move, hands curled deep in fleece-lined pockets. "Afternoon," she lofts the bronzerider's way. "Coming?" The wind recedes, pulled tight against himself, though still wary and watchful is the hook-nosed bronze. R'hin's head turns back towards Leiventh, for just a moment, and then he's stepping towards Leova, his shoulder brushing familiarly past hers. "I am hoping," he murmurs in a low, amused voice, "You have a secret stash of alcohol somewhere in there," he gestures towards the infirmary. "Or we'll have to raid Quinlys' stash -- and I'm not sure I'm game to do that, so close to a clutch. You know how she gets." She watches. Static lingers at the peripheries, stalking after the wind even as it draws in, distant and elusive as the first snowflakes of a long fall. Waiting. Leova doesn't wait. Leova un-narrows amber eyes. Nods him inside. Says, briefly, "Can't promise it's good. Have standards, today?" Inside, past tunnel and hangings, the cavern is as warm as it ever is in winter. The thermal pool circulates, empty. It's quiet. Large enough to hold a bronze, bronzes. It doesn't. His, "No," is emphatic. "Fair." Wry. "Back shortly." Unless he follows her in: an office with a hearth, made small by the shelves of its contents. U'sot's, but the man's not here. He follows to the doorway. Leans in it, effectively blocking it, whether deliberately or not. "I've changed my mind," R'hin says, like he's picking up a conversation somewhere in the middle. Or possibly near the end. Leiventh settles, and stills, as does his winds, by measures. He is aware of the watcher, but does not engage her, nor bait her. Neither, does he seek the warmth of the dragon infirmary. She drops back to the flat of her feet, bottles clinking: two of them, one herbal and astringent and potent, the other sweet and fruity. And potent. The flat of her hand pushes tomes back into place. Turning, she sets them on the desk, leans a hip there. Looks at him. "Which?" Vrianth hasn't moved. Pale eyes track her, neither approving nor disapproving, regarding the two bottles. "You wrote a letter, for the boor." R'hin reaches into his jacket, crossing over the space, taking up presence on the other side of the desk. Next to the two bottles, he sets down a letter. It says, the twins. "You should hold onto it." Not Madilla, not like with hers. She hasn't moved? Neither has Leiventh. Surely he has more patience than her. Vrianth yawns, hugely. He can count that as impatience if he likes. Leova looks to the letter, and doesn't touch it. Leova looks to the writer, and doesn't touch him, not across the desk or anywhere at all. Leova's hands have pressed into the edge of the desk. She releases them now, and reaches under for two shot glasses that she wipes out with a cloth, no carefulness there except by habit. They probably haven't had any healer potions in them too recently. When she puts them down, then she can touch the letter with one finger, slide it towards her with atypical irresolution. "R'hin." A roiling, dark cloud, neither borne by his winds nor her electricity, appears on the periphery of their thoughts. Leiventh shudders, ceding the win to her. While she cleans the glasses, he reaches, after a moment's consideration, for the non-herbal bottle, the fruity scent of the liquid detectable after he's pulled the lid. He splashes generous amounts into both, and, when she says his name, pauses to look at her, his hand still on the bottle. She's that much more uneasy for his reaction, her turn to draw even her static inward, though flickers of it linger further out as might some early warning system. Or mines. It's her rider who shivers momentarily. Not a shudder, yet. She gives R'hin a one-shouldered shrug in lieu of more of an answer, then takes the letter after all. Takes it up. Turns it over. And the bronze, he is shuddering silence. R'hin's gaze is mostly even. There's only a slight unevenness to the hand that releases that bottle, and picks up the glass, drinking. He gestures, wordlessly. The letter is unsealed, almost like he expected her to read it. Letter purposely omitted. She unfolds it, then. Leova reads it then, that message, tilting it toward the glows that light her profile. Not aloud, and her lips don't move, except when she pulls them in so they won't. Then, "I'll keep telling them," she tells R'hin. "Know that I will." She doesn't close the page, not yet. Then, wry of voice if not the amber gaze, "Reckon you did more to help the younger's, too, than you're saying." While she reads, R'hin leans on the edge of the desk, refilling his now-empty glass, drinking again, while pale eyes remain on the greenrider, taking in her reaction. "Know you will," he says, with the set of someone who is confident in the other. He doesn't address the latter, instead picking up her glass, holding it out for her. Leova doesn't so much trade him for the letter as give him another wry look, take and set down the glass, and fold the letter. It goes in her riding jacket, slung there over the chair, in an inner pocket. Then she can drink. Over that glass, the sweetness still burning, "Your father." "No." It is only marginally less emphatic than his earlier no. She lifts a brow, and for once in her life, it's only one. R'hin, immune to the wiles of that lonely brow, drinks. And broods, just a little. So Leova leans over, to refill his glass if it needs it after her own. "Hard landing," she says. He does need it, a silent tip of head in thanks as she refills his glass. "Those winter winds," is all the Savannah Wingleader says in turn. "The storm," the dragonhealer gives back to him, slow. There's a slight tightening of fingers against the glass, evidenced by the whitening of fingertips. He drinks, in lieu of an answer. She drinks, after him. "Leiventh." Ashes, in that smoky voice. "R'hin..." His, "Don't," is more request than command. She sighs. "R'hin." She touches the glass's rim with her finger. R'hin's chuckling, now, in that familiar, low-throated way of his. "If you keep saying my name, like that, you'll start to give people the wrong impression." Leova doesn't even give him that familiar, reproving look. ... Or, not for very long. Carefully, "If there were a man, who experienced certain things... if he were to have documented them, even the possibilities of them, that would go a long way with his dragonhealer." "I won't object, if you want to have someone come in and document our sexual exploits," R'hin says, with a twitch of lips. He holds up a hand, though: "All I ask is that you not share the records with the twins, because... traumatizing, I am sure." Clearly, he is not intending to take this seriously, or take whatever her request is implying seriously. There's that look again. "Our varied and complex exploits, yes." Leova sips this time. Starts to speak. Stalls it out. He's irrepressible, undaunted even by her look. It's the silence that, by measures, dims his demeanor, turns his attention elsewhere, or possibly inward. She gives him more of that, for now: sees whether that will change, or be more. He stands, eventually, after emptying and setting down his glass. "Thank you," R'hin says, stretching out a hand, not-quite-touching where she's tucked the letter away. Leova glances down to that chair. That jacket. That letter. When she straightens, her own glass is still dark with what liquid's left. She leaves it, and moves up to him, looking up. Her hands lift to either side of his neck, where he'd instructed her once. He goes still as she steps close, face expressionless -- not even his normal facade of amused regard -- just watching her. Her hands are warm about his throat, there where they gave each other leave to touch. She doesn't press in. Amber eyes on pale, "Safe travels, R'hin." Except, no... "Better than safe." Something surfaces in pale eyes, but he turns before it's fully formed, pulling free of her touch. "Goodbye, Leova," is instead, his parting words. Outside, Leiventh barely stirs at the appearance of his rider and, it's only after his rider is settled that the hook-nosed bronze finally takes to flight, a lazy, wide spiral finally taking him to his ledge. |
Comments
Alida (00:27, 2 October 2015 (PDT)) said...
- siiiig* :(
Squishy (09:15, 2 October 2015 (PDT)) said...
Heartbreaking.
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