Weird-weird.
Who: Xhonya, D'kai
What: Late at night, Xhonya is looking for a mark, and D'kai is watching Mikhuth swim. Things get silly.
Where: Lakeshore, Fort Weyr
When: It is an autumn night, 20:04 of day 28, month 9, turn 20 of Interval 10.
Sweeps. Always gotta be sweeps when it rains like that, and when it's raining this hard over Fort it's not likely the riders will escape the wetness, either. But here's D'kai anyway, sans umbrella, perched on a rock with nothing but the collar of his jacket popped up around his chin to ward off the downpour. Somewhere, out in the water, there's a bronze dragon paddling and diving, but since suspicious-looking young women scouring the beach for some mysterious item are so much more exciting, D'kai calls out to the huddling figure, "Need a hand? Another umbrella? A glow?"
Xhonya probably didn't notice one lonely rider sitting sopping wet on a boulder out there, or even the splashing bronze. Elaruth left some time ago without her noticing, maybe she assumed the bulk out there was her. Either way, the voice calling now is definitely not Hattie and so she has to turn automatically to see who's talking. "No, no, really. I should just give up, it's just pointless by now." A heavy sigh regretfully given and she peers through the darkness and laughs. "A generous offer, though, from a man without an umbrella himself. What exactly are you doing up there, besides trying to drown?"
D'kai's only got one of those three things to offer -- the hand -- which he now lifts and waves, and then promptly runs through his hair to shake out the worst of the rain. Mikhuth/Elaruth (though honestly, it's really just Mikhuth) pays equally little attention to the girl on the shoreline as he wriggles and snaps for fish, but his rider asks, or shouts, "What is it you're looking for, uh...?" Thump, thump, he drums his heels against the rock he's sitting on, and leans forward to squint through the fading light and dripping rain, and where he might insert a name he just offers a bright-toothed smile.
Xhonya comes within easy speaking distance, though it does take her a minute to laborously cross the wet sand to come near him, the edge of her umbrella dipping courteously to cover him as best she can without stepping straight into his personal space. "Xhonya," she supplies readily, "the soap maker." By now, perhaps he's even heard of her, as talked about as she's becoming. "I lost a mark on the beach, but I am sure by now someone has found and taken it. I was hopeful, however."
Deke watches her trying trek over with sparkling blue eyes, and that eventual dip of her umbrella is answered with an invisible curtsy of an invisible shirt. Once she has neared, he tips his chin up to her and answers just as easily, "D'kai, well met." The soap maker? He makes a show of considering her introduction for a moment, then says slowly, "I may have heard tale of your adventures, soap maker." Then, with a chuckle and an airy wave of his hand belying the concern in his voice, "A mark? Oh, that's a shame. Not a terribly large denomination, I hope?"
Xhonya giggles at Deke's invisible curtsy, clearly charmed. She settles into an easy smile after that, though warily she does have to ask, "Dare I ask what adventures you have heard? I fear some of them may not have been flattering." And a hand waves back towards the beach, almost dismissively. "Alas, but it was a whole mark. I can only hope someone with need for it found it, hm?"
He offers his rock, patting the empty space next to him though if Xhonya doesn't appear too eager to sit neither is he overly offended. The bronzerider replies, cheekily, "Oh, you know. Just this-and-that. Nothing truly criminal," and his voice, along with his wagging finger, speak the unspoken, laughing, 'yet!', quick quickly melts into genuine consternation. "A whole mark? Well!" Clapping his hands to his knees, D'kai pushes himself straight. "We better get looking, then, eh?"
Xhonya will happily sit on his rock beside him, even if it's soaking wet. Her rump was wet to begin with. "Oh no, no, sit. It's gone. I've been out here all afternoon, and it's pretty much dark now anyway."
Okay, /half-/push himself straight. And then sit again when Xhonya takes a seat of her own. "You sure?" His voice is wistfully hopeful, as though traisping around on the wet beach was just what he felt like doing at the time.
Xhonya shrugs her shoulders in response and sighs. "No use for both of us to get covered in sand and ruin our eyes, sir. I think a hot bath will be more welcome than that mark at this point. Not that both wouldn't be lovely, but I have my priorities."
Deke squints experimentally out over the beach, scouring the sand nearest them as far as he can see until rain obscures his sight. "I suppose. You might come back tomorrow? Unless it's been missing all day, in which case. I think you might be out of luck?" Sigh. "Yes, a hot bath would be lovely, wouldn't it?" Raising his voice towards that splashing dragon: "Wouldn't it, Mickey?!"
Xhonya chuckles and reaches up to tuck a lock of her long dark hair behind her ear. "I'm fairly certain it's gone," she repeats as she has been doing since he greeted her. "It would appear he? doesn't care whether his bath is hot or cold," she observes of the dragon out there.
Seems like he's finally taking her word for it, because D'kai gives up and, rain or no, leans back on the rock and props himself up with his elbows. "Shame, that." Not about the dragon, the mark. The dragon's just ... "Pain in the butt. Yeah." Then, lapsing into silence, the bronzerider watches the bronze for a while. Then he tips his head towards Xhonya and asks, "So, Xhonya. What's it like, being a soapmaker?"
Xhonya seems a little caught off guard by the question, her attention focused with his out on the dragon, watching him play. It seems to fascinate her, the way he splashes. But all dragons fascinate her, just out of curiosity for the unknown. "I'm sorry? Oh. I don't really know. I think it's exciting. What's it like, being a dragonrider?" It's not actually asked as if she wants an answer so much as to show him what a hard question that can be to answer.
Laughter, either for the interruption of her thoughts or her unexpected reply. "You don't know? -- at least it's exciting?" Hesitant, like D'kai can't imagine the plentiful and many ways in which soap could be /interesting/, but he's enthusiastic anyway, equally enthused in his reply whether she expected it or not, "It's, oh. It's great! It's, uh. Awesome. Really great?"
Xhonya tilts a smile at him, as if he's learned some lesson well for his inarticulation of what dragonriding is like. "Hmm," she replies in approval and then tips her head back to laugh too. "It's like trying to explain the color red to a blind person. Unless you've experienced it, how could you truly convey all there is about it, everything that makes it something you enjoy?"
Lesson? There was a lesson? D'kai is blithely forging onward through the conversation, or at least pausing to think about it and forging on with a low chuckle, "Maybe. But a blind person couldn't see red no matter how hard they tried. But if I really tried, I bet I could learn to be a soapmaker." Thoughtfully dubious. Did he just mangle that analogy?
Xhonya nods her head. "That's true, I suppose." Grinning cheekily she offers, leaning in just a little, "I could teach you. You could be my apprentice." Oh, she'll have a fit of giggles for that in a moment, but she manages to look suitably serious and severe for a pause before she gives in to the urge.
Blond brows lift high in surprise, but at her offer D'kai beams brightly and extols, "Ah! Wise master in the soapmaking ways, teach me your craft." He flourishes a hand through the air, bends at the waist, then adds, "But it's okay if I'm a dragonrider in, you know, my offtime, right? While my soap is, uh, baking?" Or whatever soap does.
Xhonya watches him in amusement, eyes crinkled into slits. A finger wags at him, "Saponifies. We don't /bake/ the soap. And fortunately, soap making is a lot of down time. I think you could still be a rider." She has a big grin for him then. "You're very silly, did you know that?"
Deke breezily swats at that finger-wagging, though maybe he's just brushing dripping hair out of his face, and he says happily from behind his hand, "Cure it? Fire it? Wait, that's pottery. --I'd make a miserable soapmaker, I think." Silly? Who's silly? D'kai's silly? He makes an exaggerated expression of dismay and lifts his chin, his humour given away by his own widening smile. "Madam, I've never been spoken in such a tone in my entire life."
Xhonya smiles just a little, a very twisted smile. "You could learn, if it was something you were actually interested in. I've been doing it all my life, it's sort of second nature to me." But that draws wariness out of her. "I meant no disrespect."
"Could do, could do," D'kai echoes, ducking his head in agreement, looking sidelong at Xhonya from under wet and flattened hair. "Second nature. Could you say, maybe ... soap's in your blood?" Jokes, jokes, bright laughter, and he adds, "No disrespect taken. I might take you up on that, though. Casual observer sort of thing, depending on how much spare time I have kicking around."
"I should warn you, soap making's sort of dangerous. And it can be smelly. But you're welcome to come watch, it's sort of cool if you have the patience." And Xhonya laughs because she likes to laugh. "I think soap in my blood would be uncomfortable."
Ha! With a toss of his hair and a dip of his head, he glances over at the girl with narrowed eyes and a deepened voice, "Then... soap making and I have much in common." There. He manages to hold it in for ... a moment, a second, and then the laughter breaks out again just because /she's/ laughing and he too likes to laugh.
Xhonya can't help it, she starts laughing harder. "Oh no! Dangerous and smelly?" Giggling away happily she bumps his shoulder in a familiar way.
"/Dangerously/ smelly!" Gasp! His secret has been revealed! His grin in the dark is a flash of white teeth and he jostles back at Xhonya with an elbow and more laughter. "But, so!" In between laughter, "Better than having soapy blood!"
Xhonya dips her nose close to his wet shoulder and gives him a loud, experimental sniff -- and then mimes falling off the boulder in a dead faint, the back of her hand pressed theatrically to her forehead. "Sir, you could kill Thread with that stink!" she proclaims, and then sits upright again to tell him seriously. "My blood is suitably thick and lathers nicely in water. /And/ I smell quite delicious. I think you could use a bit of soap, my friend."
D'kai sits up, crossing his arms over his chest and quite primly lifts his nose to the air and leeeans toward a fainting Xhonya. Sniff, /sniiiiiiff/. "Hmph," he says hautily, "it's a good thing Thread never had to face me, then, isn't it?" And more conspiratorial, with a lifted finger to his lips, "don't tell anyone, but it's my super power." Soap, alas, his kryptonite! And then he has a faintly bemused, chuckling shake of his head. "Somewhere, this conversation got ... weird."
"Your secret is safe with me," declares Xhonya valiantly. Her head tilts though and she smiles whimsically at him. "Weird how? Weird strange, weird funny, weird bad?"
Wryly, "Weird /weird/. But not weird bad." The rider falls silent for a moment and stares out over the lake, where the rain has slowed to a drizzle and Mikhuth is finally floating peacefully, wings held high. "Weird, like, sitting-on-a-rock, on-the-beach, with-a-stranger, late-at-night weird." But definitely not /bad/ weird.
"You forgot in-the-rain," Xhonya murmurs softly and then turns her head to smile at him, and it's actually a sort of timid smile compared to her normal one. "Perhaps you wouldn't mind if we were weird again some time? I've...enjoyed it. Some lightheartedness is exactly what's called for in such times as these."
A-ha, two fingers tip towards Xhonya in agreement. In-the-rain. D'kai returns the smile, a kinder one of his own, and begins the long process of unfolding himself and shaking his out dripping clothes. "Certainly. I would also enjoy being weird together some time. But maybe at this point some dry clothes and hot tea are in order, mmm?" And, all gallant-like, he offers a hand down to the soapmaker.
Xhonya is very much the Lady Holder then, accepting the hand of the dashing bronzerider come to escort her out of the rain. "I like the way you think!" she proclaims and then grabs the edge of her sodden pants as if holding the train of her gown, and prances as regally as one can in clunky rain boots in the wet sand off into the rainy night for dryness and hot beverages and hopefully at some point a hot bath.
Mikhuth follows, eventually, dripping from the lake, and waits for his rider outside in the bowl while D'kai too heads in for hot beverages and a hot bath. Mmmm, dry clothes.
What: Late at night, Xhonya is looking for a mark, and D'kai is watching Mikhuth swim. Things get silly.
Where: Lakeshore, Fort Weyr
When: It is an autumn night, 20:04 of day 28, month 9, turn 20 of Interval 10.
Sweeps. Always gotta be sweeps when it rains like that, and when it's raining this hard over Fort it's not likely the riders will escape the wetness, either. But here's D'kai anyway, sans umbrella, perched on a rock with nothing but the collar of his jacket popped up around his chin to ward off the downpour. Somewhere, out in the water, there's a bronze dragon paddling and diving, but since suspicious-looking young women scouring the beach for some mysterious item are so much more exciting, D'kai calls out to the huddling figure, "Need a hand? Another umbrella? A glow?"
Xhonya probably didn't notice one lonely rider sitting sopping wet on a boulder out there, or even the splashing bronze. Elaruth left some time ago without her noticing, maybe she assumed the bulk out there was her. Either way, the voice calling now is definitely not Hattie and so she has to turn automatically to see who's talking. "No, no, really. I should just give up, it's just pointless by now." A heavy sigh regretfully given and she peers through the darkness and laughs. "A generous offer, though, from a man without an umbrella himself. What exactly are you doing up there, besides trying to drown?"
D'kai's only got one of those three things to offer -- the hand -- which he now lifts and waves, and then promptly runs through his hair to shake out the worst of the rain. Mikhuth/Elaruth (though honestly, it's really just Mikhuth) pays equally little attention to the girl on the shoreline as he wriggles and snaps for fish, but his rider asks, or shouts, "What is it you're looking for, uh...?" Thump, thump, he drums his heels against the rock he's sitting on, and leans forward to squint through the fading light and dripping rain, and where he might insert a name he just offers a bright-toothed smile.
Xhonya comes within easy speaking distance, though it does take her a minute to laborously cross the wet sand to come near him, the edge of her umbrella dipping courteously to cover him as best she can without stepping straight into his personal space. "Xhonya," she supplies readily, "the soap maker." By now, perhaps he's even heard of her, as talked about as she's becoming. "I lost a mark on the beach, but I am sure by now someone has found and taken it. I was hopeful, however."
Deke watches her trying trek over with sparkling blue eyes, and that eventual dip of her umbrella is answered with an invisible curtsy of an invisible shirt. Once she has neared, he tips his chin up to her and answers just as easily, "D'kai, well met." The soap maker? He makes a show of considering her introduction for a moment, then says slowly, "I may have heard tale of your adventures, soap maker." Then, with a chuckle and an airy wave of his hand belying the concern in his voice, "A mark? Oh, that's a shame. Not a terribly large denomination, I hope?"
Xhonya giggles at Deke's invisible curtsy, clearly charmed. She settles into an easy smile after that, though warily she does have to ask, "Dare I ask what adventures you have heard? I fear some of them may not have been flattering." And a hand waves back towards the beach, almost dismissively. "Alas, but it was a whole mark. I can only hope someone with need for it found it, hm?"
He offers his rock, patting the empty space next to him though if Xhonya doesn't appear too eager to sit neither is he overly offended. The bronzerider replies, cheekily, "Oh, you know. Just this-and-that. Nothing truly criminal," and his voice, along with his wagging finger, speak the unspoken, laughing, 'yet!', quick quickly melts into genuine consternation. "A whole mark? Well!" Clapping his hands to his knees, D'kai pushes himself straight. "We better get looking, then, eh?"
Xhonya will happily sit on his rock beside him, even if it's soaking wet. Her rump was wet to begin with. "Oh no, no, sit. It's gone. I've been out here all afternoon, and it's pretty much dark now anyway."
Okay, /half-/push himself straight. And then sit again when Xhonya takes a seat of her own. "You sure?" His voice is wistfully hopeful, as though traisping around on the wet beach was just what he felt like doing at the time.
Xhonya shrugs her shoulders in response and sighs. "No use for both of us to get covered in sand and ruin our eyes, sir. I think a hot bath will be more welcome than that mark at this point. Not that both wouldn't be lovely, but I have my priorities."
Deke squints experimentally out over the beach, scouring the sand nearest them as far as he can see until rain obscures his sight. "I suppose. You might come back tomorrow? Unless it's been missing all day, in which case. I think you might be out of luck?" Sigh. "Yes, a hot bath would be lovely, wouldn't it?" Raising his voice towards that splashing dragon: "Wouldn't it, Mickey?!"
Xhonya chuckles and reaches up to tuck a lock of her long dark hair behind her ear. "I'm fairly certain it's gone," she repeats as she has been doing since he greeted her. "It would appear he? doesn't care whether his bath is hot or cold," she observes of the dragon out there.
Seems like he's finally taking her word for it, because D'kai gives up and, rain or no, leans back on the rock and props himself up with his elbows. "Shame, that." Not about the dragon, the mark. The dragon's just ... "Pain in the butt. Yeah." Then, lapsing into silence, the bronzerider watches the bronze for a while. Then he tips his head towards Xhonya and asks, "So, Xhonya. What's it like, being a soapmaker?"
Xhonya seems a little caught off guard by the question, her attention focused with his out on the dragon, watching him play. It seems to fascinate her, the way he splashes. But all dragons fascinate her, just out of curiosity for the unknown. "I'm sorry? Oh. I don't really know. I think it's exciting. What's it like, being a dragonrider?" It's not actually asked as if she wants an answer so much as to show him what a hard question that can be to answer.
Laughter, either for the interruption of her thoughts or her unexpected reply. "You don't know? -- at least it's exciting?" Hesitant, like D'kai can't imagine the plentiful and many ways in which soap could be /interesting/, but he's enthusiastic anyway, equally enthused in his reply whether she expected it or not, "It's, oh. It's great! It's, uh. Awesome. Really great?"
Xhonya tilts a smile at him, as if he's learned some lesson well for his inarticulation of what dragonriding is like. "Hmm," she replies in approval and then tips her head back to laugh too. "It's like trying to explain the color red to a blind person. Unless you've experienced it, how could you truly convey all there is about it, everything that makes it something you enjoy?"
Lesson? There was a lesson? D'kai is blithely forging onward through the conversation, or at least pausing to think about it and forging on with a low chuckle, "Maybe. But a blind person couldn't see red no matter how hard they tried. But if I really tried, I bet I could learn to be a soapmaker." Thoughtfully dubious. Did he just mangle that analogy?
Xhonya nods her head. "That's true, I suppose." Grinning cheekily she offers, leaning in just a little, "I could teach you. You could be my apprentice." Oh, she'll have a fit of giggles for that in a moment, but she manages to look suitably serious and severe for a pause before she gives in to the urge.
Blond brows lift high in surprise, but at her offer D'kai beams brightly and extols, "Ah! Wise master in the soapmaking ways, teach me your craft." He flourishes a hand through the air, bends at the waist, then adds, "But it's okay if I'm a dragonrider in, you know, my offtime, right? While my soap is, uh, baking?" Or whatever soap does.
Xhonya watches him in amusement, eyes crinkled into slits. A finger wags at him, "Saponifies. We don't /bake/ the soap. And fortunately, soap making is a lot of down time. I think you could still be a rider." She has a big grin for him then. "You're very silly, did you know that?"
Deke breezily swats at that finger-wagging, though maybe he's just brushing dripping hair out of his face, and he says happily from behind his hand, "Cure it? Fire it? Wait, that's pottery. --I'd make a miserable soapmaker, I think." Silly? Who's silly? D'kai's silly? He makes an exaggerated expression of dismay and lifts his chin, his humour given away by his own widening smile. "Madam, I've never been spoken in such a tone in my entire life."
Xhonya smiles just a little, a very twisted smile. "You could learn, if it was something you were actually interested in. I've been doing it all my life, it's sort of second nature to me." But that draws wariness out of her. "I meant no disrespect."
"Could do, could do," D'kai echoes, ducking his head in agreement, looking sidelong at Xhonya from under wet and flattened hair. "Second nature. Could you say, maybe ... soap's in your blood?" Jokes, jokes, bright laughter, and he adds, "No disrespect taken. I might take you up on that, though. Casual observer sort of thing, depending on how much spare time I have kicking around."
"I should warn you, soap making's sort of dangerous. And it can be smelly. But you're welcome to come watch, it's sort of cool if you have the patience." And Xhonya laughs because she likes to laugh. "I think soap in my blood would be uncomfortable."
Ha! With a toss of his hair and a dip of his head, he glances over at the girl with narrowed eyes and a deepened voice, "Then... soap making and I have much in common." There. He manages to hold it in for ... a moment, a second, and then the laughter breaks out again just because /she's/ laughing and he too likes to laugh.
Xhonya can't help it, she starts laughing harder. "Oh no! Dangerous and smelly?" Giggling away happily she bumps his shoulder in a familiar way.
"/Dangerously/ smelly!" Gasp! His secret has been revealed! His grin in the dark is a flash of white teeth and he jostles back at Xhonya with an elbow and more laughter. "But, so!" In between laughter, "Better than having soapy blood!"
Xhonya dips her nose close to his wet shoulder and gives him a loud, experimental sniff -- and then mimes falling off the boulder in a dead faint, the back of her hand pressed theatrically to her forehead. "Sir, you could kill Thread with that stink!" she proclaims, and then sits upright again to tell him seriously. "My blood is suitably thick and lathers nicely in water. /And/ I smell quite delicious. I think you could use a bit of soap, my friend."
D'kai sits up, crossing his arms over his chest and quite primly lifts his nose to the air and leeeans toward a fainting Xhonya. Sniff, /sniiiiiiff/. "Hmph," he says hautily, "it's a good thing Thread never had to face me, then, isn't it?" And more conspiratorial, with a lifted finger to his lips, "don't tell anyone, but it's my super power." Soap, alas, his kryptonite! And then he has a faintly bemused, chuckling shake of his head. "Somewhere, this conversation got ... weird."
"Your secret is safe with me," declares Xhonya valiantly. Her head tilts though and she smiles whimsically at him. "Weird how? Weird strange, weird funny, weird bad?"
Wryly, "Weird /weird/. But not weird bad." The rider falls silent for a moment and stares out over the lake, where the rain has slowed to a drizzle and Mikhuth is finally floating peacefully, wings held high. "Weird, like, sitting-on-a-rock, on-the-beach, with-a-stranger, late-at-night weird." But definitely not /bad/ weird.
"You forgot in-the-rain," Xhonya murmurs softly and then turns her head to smile at him, and it's actually a sort of timid smile compared to her normal one. "Perhaps you wouldn't mind if we were weird again some time? I've...enjoyed it. Some lightheartedness is exactly what's called for in such times as these."
A-ha, two fingers tip towards Xhonya in agreement. In-the-rain. D'kai returns the smile, a kinder one of his own, and begins the long process of unfolding himself and shaking his out dripping clothes. "Certainly. I would also enjoy being weird together some time. But maybe at this point some dry clothes and hot tea are in order, mmm?" And, all gallant-like, he offers a hand down to the soapmaker.
Xhonya is very much the Lady Holder then, accepting the hand of the dashing bronzerider come to escort her out of the rain. "I like the way you think!" she proclaims and then grabs the edge of her sodden pants as if holding the train of her gown, and prances as regally as one can in clunky rain boots in the wet sand off into the rainy night for dryness and hot beverages and hopefully at some point a hot bath.
Mikhuth follows, eventually, dripping from the lake, and waits for his rider outside in the bowl while D'kai too heads in for hot beverages and a hot bath. Mmmm, dry clothes.