(no subject)
Who: R'vain, Tavaly
When: Backdate! Day 22, Month 10, Turn 2 (Approx. 4-5 days before Tav and T'zen took off.)
Where: Weyrling Master's Office
What: Tav has been asked to direct Weyrling Activities for the first half of a day. Things go smoothly with the Weyrlings. However, when the master returns, things stop going smoothly.
Other: As mentioned, before Tav and T'zen's take-off. In other words, Tav is very high strung and not sane.
Warning: Language.
With the last few Weyrlings refilling barrels and oil pots, raking the sand and entertaining one another with raucus jokes, the big green has time to curl up beside the entrance to the Weyrlingmaster's office and snooze. Not all lids are sealed, however. There are still young dragons about, and her tail has already been pounced more times than she cares to count. Chin over the backs of both crossed paws, she looks positively bored.
Within the office, however, there is much to concentrate on and to take up ones attentions. Tavaly, hair finally let down after being bound up for half the day, is leaned over a book of records, taking down the day's events, the progress and fallbacks, the praise and the discipline. Her handwriting is slow, even. For once, it may even be legible to someone aside from herself. It is with great care that she writes, yes, but she's not so absorbed that she cannot feed the grumbling beast that is her stomach. A meatroll now sticks out the side of her mouth while the quill jiggles across the page.
Ruvoth does not trouble himself just yet to narrow down and fold back his wings so he can sleek through the entrance to the training cavern. His enormity is visible, however, through that entrance; it serves as a backdrop to the shape of his rider that leaps to the ground and then goes in. He's chipper. He tosses off lazy little salutes to the weyrlings that take note of his passage and salute in kind-- and one that forgets gets no worse than a one-eyed squint and a snapped, "Elbows broken?" before R'vain goes on to the door to his office.
There he pauses, tossing up a hand onto the stone. He's dressed like he's got somewhere to go-- the better of his good leathers and a dark green shirt that makes his complexion and hair seem only more like they're on fire, but does wonders for the depth of his eyes. He's been trimmed not long ago; the scruff is always scruffy, but at the moment it's confined to intentional space over chin and jaw and lip. He leans there, hip jaunted, and cants a wide, toothy grin at Immath. "Keep'er out've trouble a'right?" He's loud enough that he must intend for the woman inside to hear.
"The only trouble she gets into is when I'm sorting the laundry, R'vain." Comes a dry response, not lacking in the department of grumpy or disinterested. Tav's head does not raise, but she can tell from Immath's shared images the state of the man's attire. Definitely not Weyrling Master appropriate at the moment. "I do hope these absences of yours aren't going to be frequent." She adds to her previous statements, the same tone applied. Dotting an I and crossing a T, she finally straightens her back with a pop and dismisses the quill into its well. Now she looks up, arms crossing and features darkening only a touch. Neutral, will be the face R'vain sees. "Did you enjoy yourself?"
He unleans himself from the doorway and saunters on in. "Shouldn't be. Ain't ever been before." R'vain throws a paw over the back of one of the four chairs that face the desk, where weyrlings and visitors are obliged to sit, generally. Tavaly's got the business end of the room for now, so he draws back the chair, swings a leg over and drops into it. "I 'ad a lovely time. I'm eternally in your debt. Want me t'start makin' it up t'you now, or y'goin' t'come up with something I can do f'you later?"
"You can begin now. And you can repay me by being exceptionally good to her. Not like the others you are fabled to have entertained in your weyr." Comes the reply. Swiftly, business-like, and dead serious. Glacial blue seeks vibrant emerald as the greenrider prepares a decent stare-down of the man. "We both care for her, and this is the first time I've had the opportunity to speak on the matter with you. I don't want her hurt. It's not that I think her incapable of handling it, of course. She's a strong girl." Livid is not the word for this. Concerned, yes. To the enth degree. "What are your intentions with her, R'vain?" This question comes quietly. This is the voice of a friend. Of both parties.
It's like the grin is pasted on; nothing she says, no level of tense and irritable displeasure can wipe it off. R'vain leans back in the chair, knees wide, paws slung over his thighs, elbows out. "I don't entertain much've anyone in my weyr, Tavaly. If I'm fabled t'entertain it might be somewhere else I've done it, but-- " A loose shrug of broad shoulders, unapologetic. "I could bring y'up sometime, and serve y'soup and klah and then y'can tell fables about that, if y'like." The grin might get wider, worse, and his eyes glitter with keen, delighted interest, and damn him, but he doesn't even make an effort to answer her question.
Long fingers snake out and slip around the smooth pottery of the ink well. Quill and all, the object is hurled past the Weyrling Master's head and collides with the wall. Wrathful shards of the container cascade down the wall, mingling with the black substance until streaks above are all that's left. The quill, bent at its middle, flutters pathetically a few times before it, too, joins the pool on the floor. "You know damn
well what I am talking about, you ignorant ass!" Tav shrieks, jumping to her feet. "I am /NOT/. Joking. R'vain. You promise me. Promise me that you are going to do everything in your power to keep her happy." The furrowed brows interrupting the bolt of ivory between them lasts for a ver brief second. They smooth, quickly, and arc upward at the very insides. "Please." The fingers that had, moments before, tore the ink well from the desk's surface clench and release.
To her credit (and perhaps to the credit of his sobriety) R'vain flinches and ducks on swift reflex, though her aim doesn't require it. He straightens as soon as the crash betrays breaking glass, and doesn't bother to turn around and regard the mess she's made. "Temper," grins the Weyrlingmaster, in a voice almost soft by its low roughness, the gruff but affectionate tone he uses with his favorites. "I know what'cher on about. Siddown and get a deep breath in before you pop somethin', Tav. And eat. You don't do so well when y'don't eat, nobody does." His chin inclines and from her face his gaze strays to the meatroll, then back, weighty. The grin, finally, subsides a little-- the answer's coming. "I am already. There's a couple things we won't ever ask each other. Aside from our own swears between us, Tav, there ain't much I wouldn't do t'make her happy." A beat. "Can I ask why's it such a burr in your fur?"
"Because I love the both of you." Is her response, and the meatroll is plucked up and stuck in the corner of her mouth again, chewed on only barely. Both booted feet are raised and propped on the business side of the desk, clean undersides visible to the man. "It is difficult, to say the least. Having dear friends." She glances to the side, watching the doorway with brows sinking into their unhappy 'V' once more. "I have seen her happy, before. It has lasted long enough for her to grow too attached, and then it is snatched away like the mouse dangled before the starving cat. I trust you, R'vain. And I know she does. I just want to make sure that she does not offer her trust foolishly. Nor I." She swings her gaze back to the man, steady blues raining straight upon him.
It would have to be R'vain, to get that confession out of her at last and just lean back a little more lazily into his chair and reply with the smug silence of his unstoppable grin. At least he's listening to what she says, so when she's ready to rain her waitful attention on him again rather than words, he's ready to reply. "I ain't th'sort t'turn on a woman like that. Besides, what can I do t'hurt 'er? Run around in th'lower caverns? Fly out a night with th'boys couple times a season? Get an eye for th'same girl she does? Been there, done 'em, ain't seen her snifflin' yet." A beat, and the grin goes sly and uncommonly untoothy, and his eyes narrow. His tongue appears in the corner of his mouth, tip to tip with one of his long eye teeth, then disappears with a tiny *tschk.* "You'd hate me f'every one of those, wouldn't you, Tav. But it ain't you I'm entertainin' in m'weyr."
There is a long pause. The words that come from the man's mouth are listened to, categorized. Tucked. Reactions remain the same, as far as Tav is concerned. "Even Dara has boundaries." Tav says weakly. His final comment, the way it's delivered.. Earns him a look that hurts; the muscles are not at all accustomed to this expression. IT does not happen often. Tav's lips part, pale eyes widening only slightly under upturned brows. Stung, would be the proper name for this. Straight past the guarding defenses and brushed up against a chord that does not sing in tune with
the rest. Rational conversation has ended. "I never had the chance, R'vain. I do not know what I would hate you for were it me in your bed. Perhaps, had you not been so hung up on Sian's passing, I may have had that chance. Now, R'vain, I hate you for /this/." And from his chair she rises again and the doorway is sought as feet propelling a body unused to being exposed reach for a get-away.
He turns in the chair; not for the shattered inkwell, but for her, he'll do so. "Y'tryin' t'tell me I shouldn't give a shit my own weyrmate got killed and I didn't even have her speakin' t'me at th'time? Baloney, Tavaly. If I hadn't given a shit I'd be th'kind of man you wouldn't be havin' this conversation with at all." His eyes can get narrower than they have been, and now they do, becoming little but emerald slits, knife-keen. "Y'ain't missed anything 'cept what's right before y'eyes, and if you don't like it, then you were fooling yourself all along." R'vain shoves up out of his chair and heads around the desk, a paw trailing the surface, moving toward the notes she's made. "Get some air. I got th'weyrlings 'til you come back."
The sound of skin upon stone rings sharply in the office as Tav's hand presses right into the space on the wall where the inkwell had managed to hit. Black liquid still puckered there manages to squeeze between each finger, some actually trickling down the back of her hand. Her head whips around and those startled blue eyes stare at him in disbelief. "I'm saying you should have stayed in your own head long enough to realize
that the whole time there was someone here, in the living, that wanted to be with you. That wanted to be where Dara is now. I wanted to help you. I wanted to /love/ you, R'vain. Do you know how awful it is to want these things when something in the back of your mind tells you it wouldn't be you that was thought of, but the ghost of a dead woman? I'm not saying you shouldn't have given a shit about her death. I'm saying I wished you'd given a shit about me." Deep breath. Perhaps the exhale of it is a little too shaky for her liking. Once more, she turns to leave. This time, slowly.
R'vain flattens a palm on the desk and looks up. He listens, and listens-- by the solemn look he wears-- well. "I did," he remarks, ragged and soft. "Just not like you wanted, I guess." A beat. "Kinda thought you had someone." Another beat. "Sorry." On that, he'll let her go, returning his gaze to the notes she wrote.
When: Backdate! Day 22, Month 10, Turn 2 (Approx. 4-5 days before Tav and T'zen took off.)
Where: Weyrling Master's Office
What: Tav has been asked to direct Weyrling Activities for the first half of a day. Things go smoothly with the Weyrlings. However, when the master returns, things stop going smoothly.
Other: As mentioned, before Tav and T'zen's take-off. In other words, Tav is very high strung and not sane.
Warning: Language.
With the last few Weyrlings refilling barrels and oil pots, raking the sand and entertaining one another with raucus jokes, the big green has time to curl up beside the entrance to the Weyrlingmaster's office and snooze. Not all lids are sealed, however. There are still young dragons about, and her tail has already been pounced more times than she cares to count. Chin over the backs of both crossed paws, she looks positively bored.
Within the office, however, there is much to concentrate on and to take up ones attentions. Tavaly, hair finally let down after being bound up for half the day, is leaned over a book of records, taking down the day's events, the progress and fallbacks, the praise and the discipline. Her handwriting is slow, even. For once, it may even be legible to someone aside from herself. It is with great care that she writes, yes, but she's not so absorbed that she cannot feed the grumbling beast that is her stomach. A meatroll now sticks out the side of her mouth while the quill jiggles across the page.
Ruvoth does not trouble himself just yet to narrow down and fold back his wings so he can sleek through the entrance to the training cavern. His enormity is visible, however, through that entrance; it serves as a backdrop to the shape of his rider that leaps to the ground and then goes in. He's chipper. He tosses off lazy little salutes to the weyrlings that take note of his passage and salute in kind-- and one that forgets gets no worse than a one-eyed squint and a snapped, "Elbows broken?" before R'vain goes on to the door to his office.
There he pauses, tossing up a hand onto the stone. He's dressed like he's got somewhere to go-- the better of his good leathers and a dark green shirt that makes his complexion and hair seem only more like they're on fire, but does wonders for the depth of his eyes. He's been trimmed not long ago; the scruff is always scruffy, but at the moment it's confined to intentional space over chin and jaw and lip. He leans there, hip jaunted, and cants a wide, toothy grin at Immath. "Keep'er out've trouble a'right?" He's loud enough that he must intend for the woman inside to hear.
"The only trouble she gets into is when I'm sorting the laundry, R'vain." Comes a dry response, not lacking in the department of grumpy or disinterested. Tav's head does not raise, but she can tell from Immath's shared images the state of the man's attire. Definitely not Weyrling Master appropriate at the moment. "I do hope these absences of yours aren't going to be frequent." She adds to her previous statements, the same tone applied. Dotting an I and crossing a T, she finally straightens her back with a pop and dismisses the quill into its well. Now she looks up, arms crossing and features darkening only a touch. Neutral, will be the face R'vain sees. "Did you enjoy yourself?"
He unleans himself from the doorway and saunters on in. "Shouldn't be. Ain't ever been before." R'vain throws a paw over the back of one of the four chairs that face the desk, where weyrlings and visitors are obliged to sit, generally. Tavaly's got the business end of the room for now, so he draws back the chair, swings a leg over and drops into it. "I 'ad a lovely time. I'm eternally in your debt. Want me t'start makin' it up t'you now, or y'goin' t'come up with something I can do f'you later?"
"You can begin now. And you can repay me by being exceptionally good to her. Not like the others you are fabled to have entertained in your weyr." Comes the reply. Swiftly, business-like, and dead serious. Glacial blue seeks vibrant emerald as the greenrider prepares a decent stare-down of the man. "We both care for her, and this is the first time I've had the opportunity to speak on the matter with you. I don't want her hurt. It's not that I think her incapable of handling it, of course. She's a strong girl." Livid is not the word for this. Concerned, yes. To the enth degree. "What are your intentions with her, R'vain?" This question comes quietly. This is the voice of a friend. Of both parties.
It's like the grin is pasted on; nothing she says, no level of tense and irritable displeasure can wipe it off. R'vain leans back in the chair, knees wide, paws slung over his thighs, elbows out. "I don't entertain much've anyone in my weyr, Tavaly. If I'm fabled t'entertain it might be somewhere else I've done it, but-- " A loose shrug of broad shoulders, unapologetic. "I could bring y'up sometime, and serve y'soup and klah and then y'can tell fables about that, if y'like." The grin might get wider, worse, and his eyes glitter with keen, delighted interest, and damn him, but he doesn't even make an effort to answer her question.
Long fingers snake out and slip around the smooth pottery of the ink well. Quill and all, the object is hurled past the Weyrling Master's head and collides with the wall. Wrathful shards of the container cascade down the wall, mingling with the black substance until streaks above are all that's left. The quill, bent at its middle, flutters pathetically a few times before it, too, joins the pool on the floor. "You know damn
well what I am talking about, you ignorant ass!" Tav shrieks, jumping to her feet. "I am /NOT/. Joking. R'vain. You promise me. Promise me that you are going to do everything in your power to keep her happy." The furrowed brows interrupting the bolt of ivory between them lasts for a ver brief second. They smooth, quickly, and arc upward at the very insides. "Please." The fingers that had, moments before, tore the ink well from the desk's surface clench and release.
To her credit (and perhaps to the credit of his sobriety) R'vain flinches and ducks on swift reflex, though her aim doesn't require it. He straightens as soon as the crash betrays breaking glass, and doesn't bother to turn around and regard the mess she's made. "Temper," grins the Weyrlingmaster, in a voice almost soft by its low roughness, the gruff but affectionate tone he uses with his favorites. "I know what'cher on about. Siddown and get a deep breath in before you pop somethin', Tav. And eat. You don't do so well when y'don't eat, nobody does." His chin inclines and from her face his gaze strays to the meatroll, then back, weighty. The grin, finally, subsides a little-- the answer's coming. "I am already. There's a couple things we won't ever ask each other. Aside from our own swears between us, Tav, there ain't much I wouldn't do t'make her happy." A beat. "Can I ask why's it such a burr in your fur?"
"Because I love the both of you." Is her response, and the meatroll is plucked up and stuck in the corner of her mouth again, chewed on only barely. Both booted feet are raised and propped on the business side of the desk, clean undersides visible to the man. "It is difficult, to say the least. Having dear friends." She glances to the side, watching the doorway with brows sinking into their unhappy 'V' once more. "I have seen her happy, before. It has lasted long enough for her to grow too attached, and then it is snatched away like the mouse dangled before the starving cat. I trust you, R'vain. And I know she does. I just want to make sure that she does not offer her trust foolishly. Nor I." She swings her gaze back to the man, steady blues raining straight upon him.
It would have to be R'vain, to get that confession out of her at last and just lean back a little more lazily into his chair and reply with the smug silence of his unstoppable grin. At least he's listening to what she says, so when she's ready to rain her waitful attention on him again rather than words, he's ready to reply. "I ain't th'sort t'turn on a woman like that. Besides, what can I do t'hurt 'er? Run around in th'lower caverns? Fly out a night with th'boys couple times a season? Get an eye for th'same girl she does? Been there, done 'em, ain't seen her snifflin' yet." A beat, and the grin goes sly and uncommonly untoothy, and his eyes narrow. His tongue appears in the corner of his mouth, tip to tip with one of his long eye teeth, then disappears with a tiny *tschk.* "You'd hate me f'every one of those, wouldn't you, Tav. But it ain't you I'm entertainin' in m'weyr."
There is a long pause. The words that come from the man's mouth are listened to, categorized. Tucked. Reactions remain the same, as far as Tav is concerned. "Even Dara has boundaries." Tav says weakly. His final comment, the way it's delivered.. Earns him a look that hurts; the muscles are not at all accustomed to this expression. IT does not happen often. Tav's lips part, pale eyes widening only slightly under upturned brows. Stung, would be the proper name for this. Straight past the guarding defenses and brushed up against a chord that does not sing in tune with
the rest. Rational conversation has ended. "I never had the chance, R'vain. I do not know what I would hate you for were it me in your bed. Perhaps, had you not been so hung up on Sian's passing, I may have had that chance. Now, R'vain, I hate you for /this/." And from his chair she rises again and the doorway is sought as feet propelling a body unused to being exposed reach for a get-away.
He turns in the chair; not for the shattered inkwell, but for her, he'll do so. "Y'tryin' t'tell me I shouldn't give a shit my own weyrmate got killed and I didn't even have her speakin' t'me at th'time? Baloney, Tavaly. If I hadn't given a shit I'd be th'kind of man you wouldn't be havin' this conversation with at all." His eyes can get narrower than they have been, and now they do, becoming little but emerald slits, knife-keen. "Y'ain't missed anything 'cept what's right before y'eyes, and if you don't like it, then you were fooling yourself all along." R'vain shoves up out of his chair and heads around the desk, a paw trailing the surface, moving toward the notes she's made. "Get some air. I got th'weyrlings 'til you come back."
The sound of skin upon stone rings sharply in the office as Tav's hand presses right into the space on the wall where the inkwell had managed to hit. Black liquid still puckered there manages to squeeze between each finger, some actually trickling down the back of her hand. Her head whips around and those startled blue eyes stare at him in disbelief. "I'm saying you should have stayed in your own head long enough to realize
that the whole time there was someone here, in the living, that wanted to be with you. That wanted to be where Dara is now. I wanted to help you. I wanted to /love/ you, R'vain. Do you know how awful it is to want these things when something in the back of your mind tells you it wouldn't be you that was thought of, but the ghost of a dead woman? I'm not saying you shouldn't have given a shit about her death. I'm saying I wished you'd given a shit about me." Deep breath. Perhaps the exhale of it is a little too shaky for her liking. Once more, she turns to leave. This time, slowly.
R'vain flattens a palm on the desk and looks up. He listens, and listens-- by the solemn look he wears-- well. "I did," he remarks, ragged and soft. "Just not like you wanted, I guess." A beat. "Kinda thought you had someone." Another beat. "Sorry." On that, he'll let her go, returning his gaze to the notes she wrote.