[Jaeyi] Last time, being promoted was a lot more fun. (Vignette)
Originally in response to an Esraval vig that got de-bunked because the timeline of the plot got re-ordered, but oh well. A long and windy vig about becoming a Journeyman. This actually also pre-dates the scene with T'rev by a few days, so it would be going back to the 18th of month 12, say.
She thought about sabotaging the audition. It wouldn't be hard to burn something, do the old "salt instead of sugar" routine, leave the milk out overnight, any little faux pas. But more than five years as an apprentice rebelled at the thought of blowing this chance-- regardless of who she'd blown to get it. In the end, she'd done well, though Jaeyi already knew that it didn't really matter. The audition was a formality, a place for someone to sign on the dotted line, to tick a box on their clipboard: Audition, check.
Fortunately, there had been someone around to fuck afterward. That was a lucky break. Not to say that was the only reason. Paddy was sweet and attractive and she was... well, she was Jaeyi, to whom "hi" was synonymous with "take off your clothes." As circumspect as she'd been these last... gosh, nearly two Turns since Mecaith flew Peirith, since it became patently obvious that she wasn't going to be allowed to have everything she wanted if she didn't start at least pretending to adhere to certain craft standards, it still all came back to the fact that she wasn't going to be promoted on her merits as a Baker. She was going to be promoted because she was the Steward's mistress.
Though it was a foregone conclusion, Jaeyi still put on a show of surprised delight when they pinned her with the new knot, when they watched her take a stroll around the kitchen table. She wasn't the only apprentice in the kitchens of Fort Hold, and she had to maintain a serious blindspot the rest of the day to ignore the way the others looked at her: eighteen and a journeyman and everyone knew why, it was like a pink dragon was in the room and everyone was pretending it didn't exist while secretly sneaking peeks at it all day long. She was going to be so relieved to get back to her room and climb under the covers and cry it all out, clinging so hard to that thought that she ignored the fact that she would undoubtedly be expected to celebrate or express her gratitude or whatever they were going to call it.
When she finally got to her room, when she saw all her things were missing, when she found the note and the key, it was all she could do to keep from curling into a ball on the empty bed and suffocating herself with a pillow. Shells, at least then she could just go to sleep and not turn what had become an agonizingly long day into an agonizingly long night, too. With her palm against her forehead, trying to keep a headache from fully blooming, she sat on the end of the bed for a spell-- "Ohfuckfuck fuck fuck fuck." It would have felt more cathartic if anyone was around to hear, though she was briefly gratified that Sugar turned up to chirp questioningly at her. Where was all his stuff? What happened to his lotion and his ribbons and his quilt?
Carrying him the old way, with her hands just beneath his shoulders, with his back tucked against her belly so he could see where they were going while he hung all limp and fat over her forearm, Jaeyi followed the instructions to the new room. And, when she opened that door, the threatened tears were uncheckable. She let Sugar go examine things, though he didn't take as much delight in them as he would later, distressed in his little way by her mood, peering back at her with his big-worried-eyes while he knocked over the jewelry box, tangled himself up in pearls and amethysts. She closed the door, leaned against it, covered her face, and felt shame rise up like a boil from down in the pit of her stomach where it had been brewing since the audition.
It was the imagining that was her undoing. The faces of her friends, the people she loved when she saw them. The way congratulations would be tendered with a questioning lilt, as if they weren't quite sure how to say it. The thought of meeting Kaida with her gray eyes and the knot she'd earned legitimately made her sink even further in on herself, slide down the door till she sat with her back against it on the floor, cheeks burning. Her auntie would write a letter full of honest praise and congratulations, having no idea what was really behind this promotion, proud of her niece for her "accomplishments." If she ever saw her father again, he would take some small paternal pride in having helped pave the way for her success, the marks he'd sent throughout her childhood so she could study instead of work having paid off.
T'rev. Oh fuck, how was she supposed to respond to the look in his eyes. Would he try to pretend that he was happy for her? Proud of her? The thought that should have delighted her, knowing that being a journeyman meant they could legitimately be together, the pleasure that ought to have accompanied being able to tell him that all the waiting was over--
Then the thought of just not telling him, of not telling any of them occurred to her. She didn't really wear her knot, anyway, so it's not like they would immediately know. It was an idea chock full of cowardice, but it was also one that dimmed the sense of shame she couldn't shake. If Jaeyi didn't tell them... well, sure, they'd hear about it eventually. News like that had a way of getting around, but then it would be "something unremarkable," as she liked to call it. There'd be no need for them to stumble over whether or not to congratulate her or wonder if she knew what they were thinking or any of that. It would just be something that had happened and they could all ignore it and nothing would need to be different.
Heartened by this utterly childish and cowardly decision, feeling her cheeks cool and her tears dry, Jaeyi swallowed resolutely and, with the door-handle for support, pulled herself to her feet. Sugar was having a field day by now, having discovered a gorgeous polished wooden dish of scented powder and immersed himself in it, a little cream-speckled firelizard squawking away on a dressing table that probably cost more than most people would earn in a year. He croaked a greeting to her, sensing the turn in her mood, and invited her into his boudoir with a cheerful flap of his wings that sent a spray of soft-smelling dust all over the place. "What do you wanna bet," she mused in response to his glee, "that I'll even have someone who comes in and tidies up for me, hmn?" She tipped her finger under his chin, wiped some of the powder off his eyeridges for him, and set about examining the sumptuousness of the suite.
She opened the letter and gave it a cursory, careless reading. Hour of nine, congratulations, jewel among women, "Blah blah blah." Jaeyi had long-since grown weary of Esraval's veneer, seeing it for what it was by now: a shiny polish to hide something unpretty, perfect manners to disguise a spoiled little boy with a vindictive streak a mile wide. She tore it up into little pieces and delighted in watching the shreds fall like snow into a waste-basket made of polished brass. Wandering the room, she stopped to smell all the things gathered by the bathtub, to wonder briefly what had happened to all her own soap, to "accidentally" leave the lids off the jars with the heavier scents that Esraval preferred, Sugar would very much enjoy the smells of sandalwood and patchouli, she was sure.
If Jaeyi was going to be locked in a silk prison, she was going to take little digs at the warden where she could get them. Esraval, who expected her to do things to please him, might make a carefully worded comment about the way she smelled, might even offer to help her with a bath and go looking for those particular bottles, but he wouldn't recognize the lie behind the innocence of her blinking eyes, behind the oh-gosh-silly-Sugar dismissal of the problem. When he had the bottles renewed, she knew she wouldn't get away with the same ruse twice, but at least she'd know that it had cost him effort and money and irritation to replace them.
She would take a proper bath later tonight, once Esraval had gone back to his own rooms. For now, Jaeyi stripped and left her clothes in a pile next to the tub, wetting a cloth with warm water and wiping away the sweat and grime of the day. She sat on the stool in front of that dressing table wrapped in a light robe in rich purple silk, which she had to admit felt awfully good against her skin. For all she had grown weary of Esraval and would like to have put him away as a lover, she acknowledged that he certainly knew how to take care of a woman. What influence and money he had at his disposal were well-employed. If she could have had him as an occasional tryst-- someone to see once a month or so-- she probably would have enjoyed it very much. A skilled lover, well-endowed, generous. Oh well.
Dressing herself, rolling her eyes at the store of lingerie, she had just clasped a heavy amber-and-gold beaded necklace, just felt the weight of the pendant come to rest on the curve of her breast when she felt a momentary rush of panic. Her things! Not so much the clothes but... but she had a few personal things that she very much didn't want to get mislaid or even really touched. In a swirl of silk and lace, she went to the closet where she'd seen her own things and tore through them carelessly, tossing aside her clothes until she found a cache at the bottom in the back and sighed relief, kneeling on the floor of the open closet door to open the boxes carefully. The largest one was the box that the rolling pin Kaida gave her had come in originally. It was tied closed now with one of her own ribbons, and she undid the bow to slide off the lid and smile at the chaos of letters therein. All the letters over the past two years, all the way back to the first one, were in this box. At the bottom, buried under notes as short as "Please come" to letters with detailed descriptions of pleasure, was a bit of polished wood that made her grin. If the box had been opened, if anyone had gone through it, she sincerely hoped it was a maid that would be embarrassed and shocked and dismayed at the toy down in the bottom of the box.
Entertaining that thought still, she closed the lid, retied the ribbon, and put it aside. Her own small jewelry box was next, replete with trinkets collected over the years, the tokens a pretty girl could collect. Most of them weren't much, though Jiella's earrings flashed enticingly at her and she half-contemplated wearing them instead of the pair she'd decided on from her new treasures, just to fuck with Esraval. But she put that away, too, and found the wooden, rose-shaped box next. Another flash of rubies held her interest for a few moments, but she brushed aside the glittering strands with her index finger and found the mark at the bottom of them, still attached to a ribbon but unworn since coming to the Hold. She ran her finger around the edge of it, lifted it briefly out of the box to hold it dangling by that ribbon and watch it sway in front of her eyes, then carefully put it away again.
It was almost nine o'clock. She pushed her scattered clothes back into the closet to be unpacked properly later, went around the room shielding glows until it adopted an appropriately low light, took a moment to locate and don a pair of stockings, a pair of heels, found a velvet ribbon among her new duds to sweep her hair up off her neck, yawned, and settled alluringly on a settee in the sitting room.
Helluva day.
She thought about sabotaging the audition. It wouldn't be hard to burn something, do the old "salt instead of sugar" routine, leave the milk out overnight, any little faux pas. But more than five years as an apprentice rebelled at the thought of blowing this chance-- regardless of who she'd blown to get it. In the end, she'd done well, though Jaeyi already knew that it didn't really matter. The audition was a formality, a place for someone to sign on the dotted line, to tick a box on their clipboard: Audition, check.
Fortunately, there had been someone around to fuck afterward. That was a lucky break. Not to say that was the only reason. Paddy was sweet and attractive and she was... well, she was Jaeyi, to whom "hi" was synonymous with "take off your clothes." As circumspect as she'd been these last... gosh, nearly two Turns since Mecaith flew Peirith, since it became patently obvious that she wasn't going to be allowed to have everything she wanted if she didn't start at least pretending to adhere to certain craft standards, it still all came back to the fact that she wasn't going to be promoted on her merits as a Baker. She was going to be promoted because she was the Steward's mistress.
Though it was a foregone conclusion, Jaeyi still put on a show of surprised delight when they pinned her with the new knot, when they watched her take a stroll around the kitchen table. She wasn't the only apprentice in the kitchens of Fort Hold, and she had to maintain a serious blindspot the rest of the day to ignore the way the others looked at her: eighteen and a journeyman and everyone knew why, it was like a pink dragon was in the room and everyone was pretending it didn't exist while secretly sneaking peeks at it all day long. She was going to be so relieved to get back to her room and climb under the covers and cry it all out, clinging so hard to that thought that she ignored the fact that she would undoubtedly be expected to celebrate or express her gratitude or whatever they were going to call it.
When she finally got to her room, when she saw all her things were missing, when she found the note and the key, it was all she could do to keep from curling into a ball on the empty bed and suffocating herself with a pillow. Shells, at least then she could just go to sleep and not turn what had become an agonizingly long day into an agonizingly long night, too. With her palm against her forehead, trying to keep a headache from fully blooming, she sat on the end of the bed for a spell-- "Ohfuckfuck fuck fuck fuck." It would have felt more cathartic if anyone was around to hear, though she was briefly gratified that Sugar turned up to chirp questioningly at her. Where was all his stuff? What happened to his lotion and his ribbons and his quilt?
Carrying him the old way, with her hands just beneath his shoulders, with his back tucked against her belly so he could see where they were going while he hung all limp and fat over her forearm, Jaeyi followed the instructions to the new room. And, when she opened that door, the threatened tears were uncheckable. She let Sugar go examine things, though he didn't take as much delight in them as he would later, distressed in his little way by her mood, peering back at her with his big-worried-eyes while he knocked over the jewelry box, tangled himself up in pearls and amethysts. She closed the door, leaned against it, covered her face, and felt shame rise up like a boil from down in the pit of her stomach where it had been brewing since the audition.
It was the imagining that was her undoing. The faces of her friends, the people she loved when she saw them. The way congratulations would be tendered with a questioning lilt, as if they weren't quite sure how to say it. The thought of meeting Kaida with her gray eyes and the knot she'd earned legitimately made her sink even further in on herself, slide down the door till she sat with her back against it on the floor, cheeks burning. Her auntie would write a letter full of honest praise and congratulations, having no idea what was really behind this promotion, proud of her niece for her "accomplishments." If she ever saw her father again, he would take some small paternal pride in having helped pave the way for her success, the marks he'd sent throughout her childhood so she could study instead of work having paid off.
T'rev. Oh fuck, how was she supposed to respond to the look in his eyes. Would he try to pretend that he was happy for her? Proud of her? The thought that should have delighted her, knowing that being a journeyman meant they could legitimately be together, the pleasure that ought to have accompanied being able to tell him that all the waiting was over--
Then the thought of just not telling him, of not telling any of them occurred to her. She didn't really wear her knot, anyway, so it's not like they would immediately know. It was an idea chock full of cowardice, but it was also one that dimmed the sense of shame she couldn't shake. If Jaeyi didn't tell them... well, sure, they'd hear about it eventually. News like that had a way of getting around, but then it would be "something unremarkable," as she liked to call it. There'd be no need for them to stumble over whether or not to congratulate her or wonder if she knew what they were thinking or any of that. It would just be something that had happened and they could all ignore it and nothing would need to be different.
Heartened by this utterly childish and cowardly decision, feeling her cheeks cool and her tears dry, Jaeyi swallowed resolutely and, with the door-handle for support, pulled herself to her feet. Sugar was having a field day by now, having discovered a gorgeous polished wooden dish of scented powder and immersed himself in it, a little cream-speckled firelizard squawking away on a dressing table that probably cost more than most people would earn in a year. He croaked a greeting to her, sensing the turn in her mood, and invited her into his boudoir with a cheerful flap of his wings that sent a spray of soft-smelling dust all over the place. "What do you wanna bet," she mused in response to his glee, "that I'll even have someone who comes in and tidies up for me, hmn?" She tipped her finger under his chin, wiped some of the powder off his eyeridges for him, and set about examining the sumptuousness of the suite.
She opened the letter and gave it a cursory, careless reading. Hour of nine, congratulations, jewel among women, "Blah blah blah." Jaeyi had long-since grown weary of Esraval's veneer, seeing it for what it was by now: a shiny polish to hide something unpretty, perfect manners to disguise a spoiled little boy with a vindictive streak a mile wide. She tore it up into little pieces and delighted in watching the shreds fall like snow into a waste-basket made of polished brass. Wandering the room, she stopped to smell all the things gathered by the bathtub, to wonder briefly what had happened to all her own soap, to "accidentally" leave the lids off the jars with the heavier scents that Esraval preferred, Sugar would very much enjoy the smells of sandalwood and patchouli, she was sure.
If Jaeyi was going to be locked in a silk prison, she was going to take little digs at the warden where she could get them. Esraval, who expected her to do things to please him, might make a carefully worded comment about the way she smelled, might even offer to help her with a bath and go looking for those particular bottles, but he wouldn't recognize the lie behind the innocence of her blinking eyes, behind the oh-gosh-silly-Sugar dismissal of the problem. When he had the bottles renewed, she knew she wouldn't get away with the same ruse twice, but at least she'd know that it had cost him effort and money and irritation to replace them.
She would take a proper bath later tonight, once Esraval had gone back to his own rooms. For now, Jaeyi stripped and left her clothes in a pile next to the tub, wetting a cloth with warm water and wiping away the sweat and grime of the day. She sat on the stool in front of that dressing table wrapped in a light robe in rich purple silk, which she had to admit felt awfully good against her skin. For all she had grown weary of Esraval and would like to have put him away as a lover, she acknowledged that he certainly knew how to take care of a woman. What influence and money he had at his disposal were well-employed. If she could have had him as an occasional tryst-- someone to see once a month or so-- she probably would have enjoyed it very much. A skilled lover, well-endowed, generous. Oh well.
Dressing herself, rolling her eyes at the store of lingerie, she had just clasped a heavy amber-and-gold beaded necklace, just felt the weight of the pendant come to rest on the curve of her breast when she felt a momentary rush of panic. Her things! Not so much the clothes but... but she had a few personal things that she very much didn't want to get mislaid or even really touched. In a swirl of silk and lace, she went to the closet where she'd seen her own things and tore through them carelessly, tossing aside her clothes until she found a cache at the bottom in the back and sighed relief, kneeling on the floor of the open closet door to open the boxes carefully. The largest one was the box that the rolling pin Kaida gave her had come in originally. It was tied closed now with one of her own ribbons, and she undid the bow to slide off the lid and smile at the chaos of letters therein. All the letters over the past two years, all the way back to the first one, were in this box. At the bottom, buried under notes as short as "Please come" to letters with detailed descriptions of pleasure, was a bit of polished wood that made her grin. If the box had been opened, if anyone had gone through it, she sincerely hoped it was a maid that would be embarrassed and shocked and dismayed at the toy down in the bottom of the box.
Entertaining that thought still, she closed the lid, retied the ribbon, and put it aside. Her own small jewelry box was next, replete with trinkets collected over the years, the tokens a pretty girl could collect. Most of them weren't much, though Jiella's earrings flashed enticingly at her and she half-contemplated wearing them instead of the pair she'd decided on from her new treasures, just to fuck with Esraval. But she put that away, too, and found the wooden, rose-shaped box next. Another flash of rubies held her interest for a few moments, but she brushed aside the glittering strands with her index finger and found the mark at the bottom of them, still attached to a ribbon but unworn since coming to the Hold. She ran her finger around the edge of it, lifted it briefly out of the box to hold it dangling by that ribbon and watch it sway in front of her eyes, then carefully put it away again.
It was almost nine o'clock. She pushed her scattered clothes back into the closet to be unpacked properly later, went around the room shielding glows until it adopted an appropriately low light, took a moment to locate and don a pair of stockings, a pair of heels, found a velvet ribbon among her new duds to sweep her hair up off her neck, yawned, and settled alluringly on a settee in the sitting room.
Helluva day.