let's grease the wheel over tea
[02:51] * Martel is not, it must be said, a particular fan of Rendor. It's hot, it's sandy, and it's full of religious zealotry that isn't particularly fond of tall, cranky Elenes. It is, however, where they are now, in a small and likely temporary house.
[02:53] * Maryani likes Rendor okay. She's sitting on the dining room table peeling some kind of fruit, in approximately one fourth of the clothing she's supposed to wear outside of here. The people who work for Martel are probably not sure what her deal is, but she's fun to look at, isn't she?
[02:54] * Martel apparently disagrees, or at least he's not devoting a lot of time looking at her. This may be partially sheer stubbornness. "/On/ the table, really." Sir, you have known this woman for years.
[02:56] Maryani: "You can do /lots/ of things on tables beyond what you might imagine," she tells him, tossing her hair, "Although I'm sure a chaste fellow like yourself would have no idea." DRY. Maryani you're the biggest ho in hotown, although vastly, VASTLY less disgustingly so than Arissa.
[02:58] Martel: "I bow to superior experience." Dude, she stabbed you once.
[03:00] Maryani: "You could," she agrees, "It'd angle things ideally, but Elene men aren't terribly talented at that. Unless you'd like to prove me wrong?"
[03:01] Martel: "I wouldn't dream of taking away something so dear to you as my own inferiority." Martel needs a drink and possibly a nap.
[03:03] * Maryani laughs at him, and...crawls...toward him on the table, propping herself up on her elbows, legs behind her bent at the knees. And she is, naturally, barefoot. It is so tragic to her that this is wasted on him, which doesn't stop her from licking fruit juice off her fingertips. "You're always so obliging. Is there anything I can do for you in return?"
[03:03] Martel: "Have you considered leaving?" ...he asks this at least three times a week.
[03:06] Maryani: "You'd miss me too much. Would you like me to get you something to drink instead? You look like the heat is getting to you." She smiles at him.
[03:07] Martel: "How will we ever know if you don't give me the opportunity to try? ...yes." He's been /busy/, though, theoretically this is why he has the time to laze around like a persnickety cat in the sunlight and snipe at her.
[03:09] Maryani: "I know you better than you do," she tells him, smugly, and rolls off the table, indicating one of the chairs for his leisure. She's such a good little pseudo-wife! If you like the ones that are stab-happy and antagonistic and incapable of keeping their clothes on.
[03:11] * Martel is ambivalent on these subjects. Except for how he dislikes getting stabbed and would prefer she kept her clothes on. ...Oddly the antagonism is not a problem for him. "Hardly."
[03:12] * Maryani makes a noise of amused dissent and brings him his drink, draping herself over him from behind to do so.
[03:15] Martel: "/Must you/." A key phrase Maryani no doubt hears often. He takes the drink, all the same.
[03:16] * Maryani kisses his cheek and goes to perch on the edge of the table again.
[03:18] * Martel does not require a lot of focus in order to...drink in silence, which is good because he's a million miles away. ...As happens.
[03:22] Maryani: "What went on today?" Her feet don't quite touch the floor, tiny as she is, so she swings her legs idly.
[03:23] Martel: "Tying off loose ends."
[03:25] Maryani: "Mmm? I'm still not versed in the starts of those ends." And no, she's never stopped asking.
[03:26] Martel: "I'm selling the estate." Family estate, only inherited a few years prior. Also, a total failure to respond to the implied question.
[03:27] Maryani: "Why?" She's used to that. Doesn't mean she's accepted it, just that she knows it'll happen. It'd shock her if he actually gave her an answer.
[03:28] Martel: "I've no other use for it." He'll have to, sooner or later.
[03:32] Maryani: "Ah. You can't go back, because the Pandions are waiting ever so patiently with their torture instruments at the ready." Wryly!
[03:33] Martel: "I can't go back because there's nothing to go back to." And also because Sparhawk will probably kill him given half the chance, yes.
[03:34] Maryani: "Not even Lady Sephrenia?"
[03:35] Martel: "I don't think she'd be pleased to see me. Somehow."
[03:38] Maryani: "She is generally a forgiving type, in my experience."
[03:38] * Martel makes a noncommittal sound and puts his drink down, unfinished.
[03:39] Maryani: "Elaborating would put a lot of my annoying questions to rest," she tells him, surprisingly mild about it.
[03:40] Martel: "I was stripped of my knighthood and certain magical ability for crimes including breaking rules set down by the Thousand of Styricum, murder, and defiance of my Preceptor." ...now he's going upstairs. Apparently.
[03:42] * Maryani just sits there, quietly, not moving. She doesn't look stonefaced or angry or anything, just like she's trying to understand. After a few minutes, she goes upstairs, too.
[03:45] * Martel isn't ... doing anything in particular up there, sitting quietly.
[03:54] * Maryani leans in the doorway, watching for a while. "I don't have any more questions right now." ...okay!
[03:55] Martel: "I'm sure some variation of 'why are you /still here/' applies." Some people would sound more sorry for themselves saying that; Martel manages to make it sound like he has a really heinous sense of humor. (Because he does.)
[04:00] Maryani: "Really. Would you actually answer that one?"
[04:00] Martel: "Of course not. It's my question."
[04:05] Maryani: "I am here because I want to be." She draws closer, still barefoot, still not wearing nearly enough, but he never looks anyway and that's not what's on the conversational menu today.
[04:06] Martel: "You make no more sense today than you did yesterday, you realize." She probably does, yes.
[04:10] Maryani: "I make perfect sense to myself." She bumps his knee with hers.
[04:10] Martel: "Madmen say much the same thing."
[04:13] Maryani: "Yes, but I'm a /woman/, Martel, and while you may not understand the fairer sex, the rules do not apply." She does that draping-over thing again, but only for a second, because she totally thinks he'd kick her out of his lap onto the floor. It's more a rolly-hello of being annoying.
[04:14] * Martel absolutely would, and probably has before. "I understand enough to know I don't want to know any more." Look, he's getting better at lying. That's not a skill that should be encouraged, but there you go.
[04:19] * Maryani gives him a Look with just one eyebrow arched that basically says 'I Disbelieve'.
[04:20] Martel: "Chaste Elene fellow," he reminds her, dryly.
[04:25] Maryani: "Oh, yes, I'm sure--what was her name...? Or was that the other one? Would agree."
[04:26] Martel: "If their names aren't important, I doubt their opinions are, either." Martel, you are gonna get stabbed again.
[04:27] Maryani: "You value their company that highly!"
[04:27] Martel: "I suppose it would help if I knew precisely who you were talking about," he muses.
[04:29] * Maryani just has this look on her face women get when men are being what is conventionally known as 'pigs'. "I'm going to pretend you're joking. You /are/ joking?" No, she doesn't think he is. SIGH.
[04:30] Martel: "'What was her name' and 'the other one' are not particularly descriptive or defining references." He's very mild about it.
[04:33] Maryani: "The most recent ones."
[04:34] Martel: "So far as I know you haven't met."
[04:35] Maryani: "I don't understand you at all."
[04:35] Martel: "God's small mercies."
[04:38] Maryani: "Correction: I don't understand /men/ at all. Why do some women warrant being treated like glass while others are essentially parchment? You fill her up with ink and send her on her way." Her tone of voice is actually remarkably unguarded; she doesn't get it at all. Even if she is being fairly filthy about it, Jesus Christ.
[04:39] * Martel gives her a brief, incredulous look -- did she REALLY just say...of course she did -- and raises his eyebrow. "How do I treat you?" Sir, they are inventing minefields just for you right now.
[04:41] Maryani: "Like something you're still pretending you don't want," she says, matter-of-fact, "I don't really understand why, but that's been well-established."
[04:43] Martel: "I put up with you in order to avoid being stabbed. Again." He's not going to forget that in a hurry, and also apparently has no intention of clearing up the mystery of men.
[04:44] Maryani: "I don't think I even left a /scar/, you child."
[04:44] Martel: "And under no circumstances will you be finding out."
[04:45] * Maryani laughs at him again.
[04:46] Maryani: "Now. Aren't you going to answer my question?"
[04:47] Martel: "I wasn't planning on it, no."
[04:49] Maryani: "Why not?"
[04:50] Martel: "Oddly--and yet--I don't feel a burning desire to contemplate it in depth."
[04:52] Maryani: "Yet more answers you don't like, I expect. I'll let you to it, then." She gives his arm a squeeze and heads for the door. (While she has no idea if he watches her walk, if he does, hey, she might as well give him something to look at.)
[04:53] * Martel doesn't /watch/, which doesn't preclude imagining.
[04:55] * Maryani gives him a glance over her shoulder, and it's not all that challenging so much as kind of wondering and maybe kind, and then goes!