BYRON & CALLI: MUSICAL INTERLUDE
(This scene takes place during Adventure Log X: Lavender Mobs. The player for Byron provided his responses/reactions for the story.)
"Let me just swing by my house again to drop the rest of this gear off to be sold for us, if you don't mind? It shouldn't take long." Calli knew it would take time to move the pile of goods she'd left with her mother, and didn't want to delay any longer than needed to add their latest acquisitions from the raid on Lavender’s. She wasn't sure Byron would want to see her mother after the faux pas at the Cracked Weasel, and was a mixture of relieved and pleased when he agreed.
Passing through the gate to her family home the guard on duty let Calliandra, looking like her natural self, know that her mother had just left and would be away some time. Renly was accompanying. This meant only Penelope and Agnes would be inside, both confined to their quarters due to their illness.
The house was basically empty. Seizing the opportunity, she turned to the taller man, "Do you want to meet my birds?"
Byron a little distracted absently replied, "I didn't know you had any birds, and we do need to be getting on."
She shrugged a shoulder more casually than she felt, "Oh, sure, no pressure. I'll just drop these and be right back..."
And though she tried to hide her disappointment Byron could tell Calli was a little saddened at his reply. "What kind of birds are they?"
"I have two exotic songbirds." She counted heartbeats.
"I could see some birds." And Calli's answering smile was all he needed to know that he'd given the right answer.
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Byron on a previous visit to Endicott hall hadn't really taken the space in, and space is what it was. A large square room, with sparse but carefully chosen decoration, letting the taste and quality instead be demonstrated by the features themselves. The floor was even stone tiles in two shades, creating a diamond checkerboard. A wide staircase curved upwards at far left corner with ornately carved banisters, and overhead the ceiling had a large opening so that inhabitants on the next floor could watch over new arrivals without leaving the party. A a large chandelier hung above the opening. To their left was one sliding door, to the right another, and straight ahead was a sliding double-door that opened from the centre. A cushioned bench rested against the wall to the right between the single and the double ahead, with a single art piece above: a mosaic made of brightly coloured glazed ceramics, it depicted the Eudicot family crest, the diamond lozengy field mirroring the flooring in the hall. It was large, it was uncluttered, it was clean, and after the last couple of days it's sparse elegance only served to remind Byron that he smelt of fire, blood and a Korvosa that was an intruder here. Indeed he quickly checked the floor to see if he'd left any foot prints that would mar the floor with mud and grime.
Calli realized she'd never had a chance to show anyone but Taylan around previously, so pointed at doors as she led him up the stairs. "To the left is the cloakroom, that one is the lavatories, and those lead through to the staff quarters and utilities.
They crested the first floor and Calli stopped. "This is the social floor, where Mother works and we entertain- mostly just for said work. Political gatherings not important enough to warrant a more prestigious venue but that still require a sense of office. Oh, and Gale's room is on this level. It used to be a general guard room for whomever was on shift before he took over being my shadow full-time."
The flooring on this level was a wooden parquet de Versailles, continuing the diamond motif. Looking past the opening to the ground floor there was a wide, tall glass pane that looked out over the front garden to the guard gate and road beyond. A seem in the glass and a small handle indicated a door built in, and carved railing that matched the banisters inside caged a small balcony. When they turned their backs to the glass, they could see into a spacious reception room, currently cleared of most furniture aside from some chairs around the outskirts, with another set of sliding double doors on the far side. The reception room had more ornamentation than the entrance, but all still reserved and inoffensive.
More sliding doors were visible in almost every direction from the stairs, with hallways disappearing down both sides of the reception room, but one heavy door to the right of the large glass wall had hinges and a keyhole. It was safe to assume that was Lady Eudicot's office. Calli resumed her way up the stairs to the top floor, "We'll skip the details of this floor for today, I'm sure now that Mother knows what I'm really up to she'll invite everyone in for dinner once we can stop this awful plague."
The top of the stairs brought them into the midst of an open space the size of the entrance hall, and had Byron not climbed the stairs himself, he wouldn't have known it was the same dwelling. As understated and carefully selected as the rest of the home had been, this floor was layered and eclectic. Deep, rich colours flooded the senses. Rugs with twisting borders, paintings depicting scenes from myth and legend, plush chairs, polished wooden side tables with wrought iron lanterns and statuary of graceful figures upon them, and heavy velvet curtains bordering more large glass windows across two walls of the room.
"This is the family floor, where we spend most of our time outside of work. Mother gets to be more herself, and less the diplomat. This way!" Calli lead him down a long hall, past two more sliding doors on the right, with more artwork along the wall to his left, some were clearly family portraits, and finally opened the door in front of them as the hall ended.
Only the odd word filtered through as Calli had given Byron the tour.
She obviously took great pride in the building and indeed in her mother and the work her mother did.
The house was impressive, delicate, refined, and Byron was scared that anything he might touch would break. The living area with its rugs and rich velvet drapes and plush furniture was definitely a place where he could see the young bard resting, singing, reading and relaxing.
Momentarily Byron stood and whilst Calli continued her chat about the room and her mother he was struck momentarily by the loss of his home. Ruby's Rest was gone, with its mismatched kitchen chairs, its uneven brick flooring and worn and used rugs, its chatter, the arguments, and the space filled with many rooms.
His home.
"This door to our right is my bedroom, but this one in front is my own little make-shift aviary! Try not to make any big, sudden movements in here. Birds are flighty... get it?" she grinned over her shoulder at him and stepped inside.
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The big man came out of his reverie, Calli had turned her back and luckily hadn't picked up on his introspection. Banishing all thoughts of home Byron followed the young woman into a room that was an ornate aviary. The space they stood in was barely big enough for both of them especially as Calli pulled the door they walked through closed.
The first few feet of the room had a small shelving unit that held bags of seed and room for someone to stand and refill the feeders. Between this and the rest of the room was an ornate set of finely worked metal bars neatly dividing the space, turning the room on the other side into one giant cage. It was an avian paradise filled with ropes, swings, perches, small landings, hammocks, mirrors, and various toys.
Byron was now acutely aware that he was standing very close to the young woman who seemed oblivious to their close proximity. He had never been this close to the young half elf. He dare not move lest he inadvertently touch the young woman only to have her black suited shadow come stab him with a lightning rapier! He became more conscious of the smell of fire, blood, rust and old Korvosa and wished perhaps for the first time it wasn't so strong. Luckily the young half elf opened the gate to the ornate cage and stepped in with obvious joy as around her flew two very colourful birds. She quickly ushered the barbarian inside as she was it appeared she was singing to the birds. And they sang back.
Calli whistled a complicated series of notes as she hurried Byron inside. The two small brightly-coloured blurs circled them both before landing on her shoulders. The birds made excited chirps in reply to her whistling, alternating between bobbing and nuzzling her cheek.
"These are my little darlings! This one's Treble," she gently scritched the head of the bird with the blue face first, and then the one with the red, "and this one is Clef." She lifted the rounder bird with the blue face on to her finger and held it out towards Byron. Both birds were a patchwork of vibrant colour, but differences in build and placement marked them as two different species.
"I see what you've done there," he chuckled. Calli indicated he should hold out his hand and she filled it with seed as Treble hopped on. Pecking at the seed on his hand, he could feel the creature move but it weighed nothing. It chirped whilst looking at the large man either tweeted it's appreciation or it was complaining that he was moving to much. Either way Byron caught a look at Calli who seemed to be smiling in joy at the scene of the barbarian too scared to move in case he upset the bird.
"It was father who gave me the idea. When he took my brother Archie away, he returned with these as an apology, I think. Something to replace the sudden void in my life. But this one," she stroked the red chest feathers of the bird on his hand, "screeched any time he tried to get some sleep in the carriage ride back from the Mierani Forest, so he took to calling it Trouble. I instantly loved them both. Not that I forgave him. But they are beautiful and they sing so sweetly! I'd never seen their like in Korvosa. I refused to keep his name, and Treble was close enough to suit. The name Clef naturally followed after. They're quite affectionate. Over the years we've learned we just can't fall asleep around my noisy boy. He wants to be sure he has your attention, or at least the potential for your attention, at all times. And that's why they have their own room. I need my beauty sleep, after all, and I don't always keep to bird hours!"
When he didn't say anything she finally noticed that he seemed to be frozen in place. She reached out and gently took the outside of his hand holding Treble to smoothly move it side-to-side. "He won't bite, well, it doesn't hurt much if he pecks at you anyway, it's okay to breathe." The bird fluttered a bit to keep balance, but was otherwise unfazed at the disturbance. "Do you know how to whistle?"
"What," Byron said, "Whistle, I can Whistle. Do you have a dog?" And still the tiny bird looked up at the big man chirping noisily every time his hand moved.
"Unfortunately not, he went with Archie. But you can whistle for the birds, and sometimes they'll copy. Clef-" Calli then demonstrated a simple three note whistle, and Clef repeated it on her shoulder. "That's my boy!" and she took a bit of the seed in Byron's hand to offer it as a reward.
Byron eyed the beast that looked up at him from the palm of his hand before returning to pecking at the seed. He tried repeating the same three note phrase Calli had used but the small creature was in no way impressed. Rather than repeat the phase the bird stopped eating the seed, turned and hopped onto the barbarians thumb and chirped his indignation at being interrupted. Having firmly put the warrior in his place the songbird jumped back onto the open palm and continued eating the remainder of the seed.
The scene brought a big smile to Byron's face, such a small thing with such an animated nature.
Calli had started to wonder if she had been too annoying, maybe bringing him upstairs had been a bad idea, when his sudden smile at the tiny show of sass eased the stress building in her chest. "Okay, okay Treble. Don't abuse my friend. Come on you two, we need to go. Maybe he'll come and see you again soon, if we're lucky. Shift." She pointed to a shallow dish at the side and gestured that he could brush the seed into it. Both birds abandoned their visitors to focus entirely on their meal, and Calli tried to imprint the scene upon her memory.
“Byron... Thank you for taking this moment with me. Really. I know it's silly, but I'll be honest. I'm out of my depth. Before meeting everyone at Zellara's I'd only ever personally witnessed murders on one terrible night. In the past month there's been more violence, death, and gore than I know what to do with. I haven't slept well since the plague pits. I close my eyes and see piles of bodies... how do you arrest a disease? You can't cure anyone by hitting them. We have no leads, yet, but we have to figure it out soon. And I'm scared." She fidgeted absently with the strap of the haversack.
"I need little things like this to remind me the world is still here under the chaos. That after we fix whatever is going on in this cursed city, we can rebuild. Maybe even better than before." The use of the word 'rebuild' reminded her of all he's lost, and it just deepened her feeling of inadequacy.
"I've been trying to bring everyone moments of joy, sweet little reminders of what we're fighting for, so that we don't get too miserable and lose sight of that, but I think Trevor misunderstands it as me not caring. Of course I care!" Her frustration was evident. "I know there are important things to do. But without small breaks in the horrors I'm afraid it'll all be too much, and I need to be at my best when I'm out with all of you. If one of you got hurt because of me-" Her brown eyes met his and the words died on her lips. Without the birds as a prop it was just the two of them stood together, alone, in her home. She bit her tongue and chided herself for ruining a nice moment with an emotional outburst. "I'm talking too much, aren't I? I thought it was only fair, I'm always prying into your life. Now you know bits about mine. Here, I can get that catch for you. It has to be tricky or the tiny menaces figure it out." She leaned past his towering form, and though she didn't really need to, held his arm with her free hand as if to balance herself. He radiated warmth, and combined with the smell of burning it gave the impression that he carried the fires of Old Korvosa within him. With a practiced twist of her fingers she pushed the cage door open and righted herself.
Normally for one so collected, so in control, this outpouring of words and emotions engulfed him. Suddenly he wasn't seeing the clever woman in control of a situation using her guile and her wit to help the Flowers to win through, but rather a young woman besieged by events. As she stood there in silence in front of him, he realised doubt was eating away at her. Doubt was eating away at her confidence, was she up to the task? Did she deserve to be here? What if she let someone down?
Carefully aware of his own strength Byron tentatively placed his hands on Calli's shoulders and pulled the young woman close.
"I don't doubt you Calli, we're all scared, we all feel inadequate. You saved Greta, not me. Your song inspires us all helping us to overcome incredible horrors. We wouldn't be here without you."
Suddenly conscious of their closeness, that he was hugging this young woman whether she liked it or not, and that he was wearing a breastplate and that he truly smelled of smoke and fire he let the young woman go. Looking a little embarrassed Byron continued, "Sorry Calli, didn't mean to be so... presumptuous. Hope I didn't hurt you? Maybe it's time to go and find the others?"
Without her hairclip active her face flushed full scarlet to the tips of her pointed ears. Head swimming from the embrace, she didn't move away immediately. "You haven't hurt me, on the contrary, I think that's exactly what I needed, and you have my leave to do it again any time the mood takes you." If the Bear himself admitted to having doubts at times, then maybe she was doing alright after all. Calliandra enjoyed having him all to herself a moment more, and then having been so bold, she flashed him her brightest smile and slid past to lead the way.
She left a note for her mother with the new acquisitions to sell in the living room, and together they finally departed Eudicot Manor.