Logs:Playing Pretend
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| RL Date: 24 May, 2015 |
| Who: Irianke, R'oan |
| Involves: Southern Hold |
| Type: Log |
| What: Irianke finally finds time to make good on a promise made R'oan just before she became acting. |
| Where: Southern Hold |
| When: Day 21, Month 11, Turn 37 (Interval 10) |
| Mentions: Hattie/Mentions, Lilah/Mentions |
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>---< Gather, Southern Hold (Irianke)(#1031RIJ) >----------------------------<
It's a gather in the balmy tropics of Southern Hold, taking place partly
on the beaches near by and in the hold courtyard.
Commands: +list, +select <#>, +desc <room name>/<area>=<desc>
-----------------------------< Active Players >-----------------------------
Irianke F 37 5'7" slender, dark curly hair, stone blue eyes 0s
R'oan M 40 6'1 muscular, blonde hair, grey-green eyes 30s
----------------------------------< Exits >---------------------------------
Out
>----------------------------------------< 21D 11M 37T I10, winter night >---< Being the sole graduated goldrider at a Weyr is tiring business. It's busy business too, and Irianke's free time has whittled to practically nothing in the months since the hatching, though cattier observations might say something about the Weyrwoman's habits of spending a few hours away from the Weyr each night. A few hours, however, does not equate to a full night, and this promise is one the goldrider fulfills when she, dressed to her version of the nines beneath a warm fur cloak, shows up unannounced on R'oan's ledge. « Indulge me, » requests Niahvth of the Fortian brown, an overly nonchalant image of just what her rider wears beneath those furs shared and then a flash of Southern's tropical vista. When the brownrider appears, the still mounted Irianke calls down a warm tease, "Follow us if you dare," before the gold rises, banks to one side, and up up up and into between. R'oan is barefoot and shirtless when he steps out from his weyr to the sound of a dragon beyond. His hair is mussed, despite the early hour of the evening, and his gaze only meets Irianke's impassively for a moment as she calls down that tease, before Niahvth rises from his ledge and Etrevth can be seen snaking his head out from the weyr to watch her go. But, the brownrider only turns on a heel to disappear inside. They still haven't left by the time she disappears between. It is another hour that passes, then another half again-- Before finally R'oan seems to have given into the call of the goldrider, the smaller brown appearing above Southern even as he announces to Niahvth, « We are here. » No apologies or excuses for their lateness given. There's a gather somewhere at Southern Hold, but the image the gold shared with Etrevth is just shy of such revelry, those flapping banners visible and some music heard if effort is made to listen. Irianke hasn't spent the time waiting with her thumbs twiddling, there's things to do after all, and in the end, when he does arrive, there doesn't seem to be much in the way of surprise at being kept waiting. In the mean time, she's unhooked a carry case for three bottles of wine of good vintage, a sack of snacks, and shed her cloak and excess clothing in favor of the swimming suit that somehow does more to pique interest than outright nudity. In the waning light of Southern's summer sun, the goldrider is lying back, dark curls spilled over the white sands, seeming to be asleep. Niahvth, unused to being kept waiting unlike her rider, says nothing but turns in such a way to catch the brown's attention towards that particular spot of beach. Etrevth ostensibly lands where water laps at the shore, because of course he does, his claws sinking into the wet sand below them with a hum of approval for it. It means that R'oan has to slide off his dragon's back with the light splash of boots hitting the ocean, wading through the knee high water without the same benefit of a bathing suit as the goldrider. He sheds his own riding jacket quickly, though, and tosses it next to Irianke even as he approaches the woman asleep. His approach staggers into a kneel beside her, fingers lifting to brush at her temple even as he leans over her to press a light kiss to lips as if to waken her. (For all that this isn't a fairytale and he definitely isn't a prince.) The smile that emerges, a lazy, indulgent affair, is meant to be felt more than seen, Irianke's arm slipping up about his shoulders to keep R'oan's face close, elongating that light kiss to something more before releasing. "I promised you a night. It's taken a while, but my entire nigh and much of my morning is at your disposal, R'oan of Fort Weyr. If," there's the caveat, "If we manage to make it over there for some dancing at some point." "Isn't that the point of this?" questions R'oan in a murmur, all too willing to have extended that kiss despite his late arrival. His hand curves over her hip, playing at the ties of her bathing suit there despite his words. "Otherwise, we wouldn't need a night. A few hours stolen anywhere would do." "You don't want just a few hours stolen away," surmises Irianke, her brows cocking over studious gray-blue eyes, as if to suss out all of R'oan's deepest darkest secrets and desires. "We could," she allows with the smallest grin whose depth of amusement is heard in her voice more than on her face, "Make it a true test of your stamina. Or mine, I suppose. Whoever gives in first buys the other something pretty." She's remarkably still under him, that arm that kept him close still around him in a comfortably lax manner. "I brought wine." In case he's missed the bottles tucked behind her under a broad leaf. "I have plenty of those," counters R'oan, meeting studious looks with only a crooked, easy half smile. "With much easier women, more often." But he brushes another kiss against her lips, a simple thing, before he moves to draw away from the curve of her arm, to lever himself back up from the beach to retrieve that indicated wine. "Do you doubt my stamina? Or self-control?" says the alcoholic holding the bottle of wine. "Confidence," starts Irianke, the laugh unlaughed but still present in the way she speaks, "In my own skills in this particular arena." Without R'oan over her, she stretches languidly, her head tipping back, burying deeper into the sand and exhaling an audibly wearied sigh. "You've two clutches on your sands? Or is it just one still?" Small talk, day to day events. "That arena is easier for you to last in than me," R'oan challenges, a hint of light, playful defense there as he goes about the process of opening that bottle of wine with intent. It doesn't take him long; he is very skilled in this arena, certainly, and he answers, "Just the one. Who knows if we'll have two at all," even as he makes his way back to the goldrider. The slender woman draws herself up onto her elbows. "There are still doubts as to Eliyaveith's viability as a clutching queen?" Rhetorical, Irianke's question hangs in the air nonetheless for a long spell, watching R'oan handle the bottle of wine beautifully. Her hand reaches out, waiting for the bottle to be shared as there are no glasses. The lifestyles of the moderately wealthy Pernese, drink good wine straight from the tap. "How long would it be until there would be a clutch?" Would, under normal circumstances. R'oan takes his drink first, a good, long one to wet his throat before he does share with the goldrider. "She's never had one," he replies to that question, rhetorical or not, as he takes a seat next to Irianke on the beach. He leans forward to start removing his boots, even as he adds, "Another two months, if there is one. Not that it matters, does it?" "Matters enough to fill in the silence between you with my wine, my wine with me," and here Irianke clasps her hands about the bottle's neck and brings it up to quench her thirst, "And whatever happens next." It's all innocent light in her stone-blue eyes that look at R'oan before drifting to take in the lapping waves. "Fort's not Searching outside the Weyr. Boll, Ruatha, Fort Hold." The three holds are ticked off on the free hand after Irianke's pulled herself up closer to her bent knees. Another swig of wine. "Are there enough candidates for one, potentially two, clutches?" The first boot is pried off and tossed casually onto the beach beside him, though grey-green eyes slide over to Irianke at that innocent light statement with the hint of a smile on R'oan's lips. "No," he answers easily enough. "We have a few Candidates up from Southern, I've heard, but I haven't been riding Search. Between the Weyrbred and the Southerners, we should have enough for Elaruth's." A pause, before he adds, "I doubt they'll even consider Searching for Eliyaveith's before the eggs are laid, if they are, after what happened last time." "Makes sense." It's hard for Irianke to turn off the calculations in her head, even off the clock. She is, for a moment, visibly distracted in her glazed look to the ocean. A jumping fish breaks her train of thought, an instant look of apology in her eyes. "Here," she passes over the wine and slides herself right next to R'oan, head tipping to rest on his shoulder. "It's been a long time since I've had so much time just for me. I seem to have forgotten how to be a good companion. Teach me?" It's no coincidence her arm's slipped about his hips, her fingers hooked beneath the waist band of his pants. R'oan gets through the process of unlacing that last boot, but never quite peels it off before there is a woman right there to distract him, and a bottle of wine too! "First, we get drunk," is his answer to that request, hooking his free hand against the ties of her swimsuit in turn, as if to use it to pull her into his lap as his lips seek her throat. But his suggestive murmur is, "And then we go dancing. As two people that are not us, so you'll have to stop thinking like a weyrwoman." "Whatever will be left of me if there's no weyrwoman persona to hold onto?" Mocking herself in the most self-critical and self-aware way that the past months have consumed her life, Irianke slides into his lap, partly due to his pull, partly from her own impetus, and pivots so she's straddling him face-to-face, or more rightly, face to chest. "Only get drunk?" Clearly, oh so clearly, there will be more than just drinking going on until the dancing. R'oan's next words are soft, for all the weight they hold as he lifts his fingers to slide off the first strap of her top, countering her self-mockery with, "That is what I want to find out." But that seriousness doesn't linger long, not with the goldrider in his lap, before he is agreeing by adding, "As a start." Amused, Irianke wears that expression clearly, looking down at the head so near her chest. "There might not be anything left anymore," she warns, the voice filled with levity. "You may not like what you find. Or," she works her fingers over the buttons of his shirt, "You may just be so intoxicated by what a delightful person I am when not being a goldrider, you will pine. Pine!" She leans to punctuate that tease with a deep, hungry kiss. Drunk may not happen first if she has her way. That kiss leaves R'oan little room to answer her warning, so whether he is the type to pine or not will never make it to the record. Not as he returns that kiss easily, his own response practiced and willing, even as he reaches to set aside the bottle of wine, making the prospect of getting drunk first a lot less likely as he focuses on the woman in his lap. Maybe drunk will come second, with eventual dancing after. Irianke is made of tease and a driven lightness tonight, as if needing this escape far more than she might have let on. The kiss doesn't get much further than her fingers half-unbuttoning his shirt, a gentle push wriggling herself away from his lap with her knees in the sand. Now that she's all hot and bothered and has done her best to get him hot and bothered, she's pulling back. "Let's go dancing now." Her smile is brilliant, her eyes coy, and one hand holds him by the collar of his shirt, a gentle tug that aims to bring him atop her or with her, or something that is entirely based on how he reacts. "We'll be lovers who've run away for the night before you're to be wed tomorrow to your betrothed." They'll be anyone not them. "What is wrong with my betrothed, then? I would hope that she's at least pretty," teases R'oan, his fingers capturing the wrist of that hand that tugs, tugging back on the woman to draw her back to him, if he can. "Though, I think we're both a little old to pull that off. More like you are a wife running away from her husband with a guard." It is only once he's drawn her back for a kiss that he will release her, allow her to guide him then. "You don't think I could pass for fifteen? How dare you?" But she's laughing, her hand tugging to bring him up after that last kiss, and she twirls, an action that would be much more suited if she had a flirty dress on, which well, is just over there, slung across one of Niahvth's saddlebags. "You, a minor lord in a loveless marriage, in love with his wife's sister?" R'oan reaches for his boot still in the sand as he rises, a smile tugging at his lips as she twirls. But his counter is made easily as he returns, "You didn't like the idea of me as a guard? Seemed more fitting, that I be below your station. And less love involved between a lady and a guard." "Would you like being the guard to my runaway wife?" Irianke returns the question with another, drifting from where his boots were to where her dress is. It must have been selected expressly for the evening ahead, the simple warp style of it making it easy to pull on. The cut of it making it show these tantalizing glimpses of her legs, her cleavage, her back, whenever she moves. The fabric of it, a sheer, fluttery layer atop a more substantial dress. The color if it, an eye-catching bright summer yellow. "You pick." "It works better," R'oan answers, leaning to finish lacing his boot before he draws closer to the weyrwoman. His fingers catch on the bright yellow fabric, thumb drawing over it appreciatively as he moves to kiss her lightly. "After all, you are running away, aren't you? And, given High Reaches' history, you could use a guard." "Aye," agrees Irianke, of High Reaches' history and perhaps that necessity for a guard, her return of affection absentminded, the bulk of her attention on swatting his hand away and smoothing out her dress. "But Igen born and bred surely must count for something by way of curses. Perhaps it is young Farideh that requires a guard more than I. Well?" She swirls within arm's reach, turning in a way so her dress flares and she's suddenly facing him with a coquettish smile on her mouth. There's a distinct southern drawl in her words. "Protector of my person, my heart, and my purse, shall we walk the gather together?" An amused smile curves at R'oan's lips, but he holds an arm out towards Irianke in a gentlemanly gesture, not quite suited to the brownrider but done all the same. He ruins it when he teases, "Faranth save any man who has to protect a woman's purse, especially from herself. I'd have better luck protecting your weyrling." "Ro," adopts Irianke, testing out the name and considering R'oan as she says it once, and then two more times, concluding with a satisfied nod. Then, she walks, her slippered steps aiming for light atop the beach, but having to settle for an unladylike trudge towards the gather with its torches, dance floor, music, and good food and drink. At least her skirts aren't long enough to drag. Her silence is companionable, a finger always somehow in contact with the guard's body, be it his hand, his finger, or the cuff of his wrists and her shoulders begin to take on a mildly diminuative set. Every so often, her gray-blue eyes flicker over, as if seeking reassurance, but it's the smile, secreted deep just beyond the superficial veneer of her face that gives away her delight to him. "Anya," is the name that R'oan murmurs for her, a crooked smirk there before he explains softly, "I don't want you to forget that you're someone else." As they enter the gather, he is protective in an obvious way, hovering close to the lady at his side and a sharp look cast to those whose eyes would linger too long. Here, the sunbleached blonde of his hair and the layer of olive tan could mark him easily as Southern, and with his riding jacket still abandoned on that secluded beach, there is nothing to speak to his status as a dragonrider. The knife tucked into his belt, however, is just at home with guard or dragonrider, made more obvious for the gather rather than hidden away. If he's distracted more than he should be in his duties by Irianke's smile and movements, well--. Irianke's natural observation of the role R'oan plays is shrouded behind the naive eyes of a sheltered woman out on her own for the first time in, well, ever. A sheltered woman ever aware of the divide in rank between herself and the man who hovers near. It is hard to tell what parts of the goldrider are still present in the delighted sounds that escape when Anya finds a stall with particularly beautiful items, and each one, from a blown glass nest of firelizard eggs to wooden wind chimes with intricate birds carved atop, are shown to her companion for his consideration. For now, she steers clear of the drinks tents. "This or this?" chirps the woman of her guard, holding out two different samples of some luxe fabric for his opinion. R'oan gives both samples equal consideration, a flick of his gaze over them and the brush of fingers thoughtfully across the fabric, before he decides, "That one," for the one on the right, with its dark sapphire hints. "Or, you can buy them both." A smile catches at one corner of his lips, briefly there and then gone before he takes back on that role of protective guard. Her smile warms, deepening at the suggestion she buy both and contrarily, because she can, Anya selects the one he didn't, not buying enough of the bolt to make much of anything, which, when this is pointed out by the journeyman weaver, is answered with a beatific smile and a significant look slanted towards her guard. Crafters aren't meant to judge, though this one press his lips while he fulfills her order. When they walk away, the bolt made ready to pick up later, Anya remarks, "He doesn't approve." "Your husband or the crafter?" R'oan questions with dry humor, his fingers brushing against the small of her back briefly as they move away, to draw her back closer and keep her there as if some invisibly perimeter has been crossed. "Not that you care about approval, do you? I think you might enjoy disapproval." They're not out of visibility range of the tent yet and a glance back finds the journeyman crafter busy with another customer, but he catches her eye, lifting his brow quizzically. Irianke, in her role as Anya, turns so her body is too close to her guard's and wraps an arm about his shoulders to bring him in for a kiss; her answer to the weaver. Murmured, "You're right. I enjoy disapproval. I'm parched, let's go find a drink and a quiet corner." It is almost pitched perfectly to his role, R'oan's response. He gives in to the pull of her arm, meets her kiss, but there is a tension in the set of his shoulder as they do so in the middle of the gather, a certain reluctance. And he draws back only to cast a quick look over those near them, as if that moment of weakness might have brought a new danger, even as his fingers settle at her hip to guide her to where he last saw a drink tent with a laugh for her agreement and his own murmur, "I'm sure we can earn plenty of disapproval tonight." Her own brazeness with the middle of the gather kiss has Irianke standing closer to R'oan, along with the tension he radiates and the protective hand at her hip. "Oh, I'm sure," she allows, her mezzo amused. At the drink tents, where many a familar face are, she slips out of role for one quick wink that seems to say everything she won't put in words, and seats herself at a quiet table, allowing her guard to both order and wait for her. R'oan is just as reluctant to abandon Irianke to get drinks, but he follows orders now, here, in this role. He disappears with the faint hint of a smile, moving to join the line. When he returns, it is with two wine glasses. He is not so dedicated to being a guard that he'll go without. But by then a man has approached the waiting woman to ask her to dance, a Southern bronzerider by his knot, and it leaves her escort to stand back for a moment to watch. Does he recognize her? Whether he does or not doesn't matter as Irianke feigns an utter lack. That her eyes appreciate the man is not masked, but she shakes her head, the gesture oddly demure, and her hands fall into her lap. "I'm here with someone," is her kindly uttered, though quite resolute, rejection. "But thank you nonetheless." "Surely they wouldn't mind one dance," charms the bronzerider, but it is R'oan that answers for her this time. This time, his voice cuts through as he tells the dragonrider without the respect one should be owed, "Yes, they would. Now go the fuck away." The two men's eyes lock, briefly, but it is the bronzerider who is much more polite. Polite enough to offer an apology to Irianke before he sees himself away and the brownrider moves to settle at the table with her, passing over her glass. Irianke looks from one man to the other during the duel of eyes, marked relief not entirely solely a part of her role flooding her eyes. "Thank you." For the glass. What more can she say? Plenty. "Be kind. I'm here with you. I've chosen you. Be kind, R'oan," says the woman to the man, a staying hand resting on his knee beneath the table. Quiet, if unexpectedly chiding words said, Anya returns and brings with her a lighter conversation over the first glass of wine, and then a second and third, then dancing where she has only eyes for the man in front of her and hands that always keep him close. What happens later? Those are tales good holdbred women don't share, but it might involve a beach, the ocean, some swimming, a lot less clothing and inventive ideas of play and fun, and eventually, a place not her weyr to sleep in with her dragon maintaining a respectful distance away. A woman of her word. |
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