eachdraidh | (third lemon cake) voice ✧ open to both courts

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(third lemon cake) voice ✧ open to both courts

( VOICE: OPEN TO BOTH COURTS )

Fellow [ ... ] shardholders. Seven blessings upon you all.

[ sansa is back in caer glaem, but there is no visual recording to accompany this address. (perhaps foolishly) she believes she may be somewhat protected from joffrey's attention. she would avoid an address altogether, but she feels there are those in the opposing court who ought to be quietly warned against the evil presence in their midst. trouble is, she doesn't know their names. and so here is a quiet attempt to draw out some of those people she'd spoken with at the very outset of using these lockets. ]

These lands are impressive. I have spent the larger part of two turns of this moon travelling them. Their roads are hard, perhaps, but I find myself oddly...pleased that I made any progress at all. [ there is a quiet (and honest) reverence in her voice. improvement and daring is not a thing she expects of herself, and so the mere understanding that she can now build a fire or ride a horse for days? it kindles something in her heart. a spark of pride. ] Seelie. Unseelie. Both territories boast beautiful landscapes -- I should like to see them painted, perhaps. Are there any artists in either court? Painters? Sculptors? [ ... ] Have we any musicians? These kingdoms must have their own songs. I would fain learn them.

From what played at the first feast, I imagine fairy music must always be a delight.

[ a protracted conversations, perhaps. but she hopes to catch the ear of wary allies and would-be friends. and as for her public behaviour? ah, well. she will be alayne stone a little longer. she is not ready to reclaim herself in one headlong rush. small steps and little leaps must be made. ]

(ooc: this post comes on the evening of june 27th. if your character is in caer glaem and is more apt to find here somewhere around the castle, go ahead and hit me with an action thread instead. i'm good with it. )

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[Silly, silly girl. At least she'd noticed. Some people he knew wouldn't have. But he didn't want to give her a throwaway answer since it seemed to genuinely be bugging her.]

Well, Gendry's a big boy. If he thought he needed a break, he would have said something, right? I mean, if he was so worn out that he couldn't take care of himself or you, he would have said something. Or fallen off his horse.

[He shrugged. It was in the past and Sansa couldn't go back and undo it, but if she'd noticed it and there were future travel times, she could do something about it next time. That was a start.]

Have you ever kept watch before? Was it something you would have thought about offering to do?

I have before been sleepless. [ but that is not the same as taking watches. worse yet, she knows how many nights she'd rested by their fire with her eyes shut and no sleep in her brain. she knows how many nights she could have been watching, because she wasn't sleeping regardless. but-- ]

But -- no [ she confesses. ] I would not have wanted to do it. [ she is a lady, whatever her supposed birth. and just as she had asked gendry to move a wooden chair for her at their final inn, she would have expected him to take the stag's share of any watching. ]

Lots of people are sleepless. Doesn't mean they should be watching for danger all night. Look, Alayne, you can't beat yourself up over things like this. We're all... adjusting. This is new territory and we have to figure out how to work it properly. You can't just become this super forest goddess in a matter of weeks because you want to.

[ her laughter is hollow. ] I would never be so ambitious. No, Stiles. I will settle happily enough for never giving someone cause to resent me.

[ as she fears ser gendry must, in some corner of his heart. he had been kind enough -- eventually. and he'd refused her offer of glittering rewards. and he'd promised her a silver trinket for all her trouble. but the old fear settles easily on her shoulders: i am a disappointment. ]

Hey, if anyone resents you for not being a jungle commando on your first trip out, they can kiss my ba-- bleep. Repeatedly. Kind of hard to resent you, Alayne. You're not exactly a top offender.

[ oh, she thinks it easy enough to resent her. but she isn't so stupid as to say it aloud. she likes it better this way; she likes how stiles seems to think so well of her. ]

You sound so certain! [ she dares a small and calculated smile. ] And yet you've only truly met me today.

I happen to have a good radar for picking up on evil or jerky people. And it's not even twitching around you. I'd say it's safe to say you're off the list of baddies to watch out for.

[Another smile and, oh, hey, a bench up near a little rock pool.]

Feel like sitting over there? Half sun, half shade, looks pretty perfect. Then I can have a minute to convince you that you seem like a pretty good person without worrying about tripping over anything.

[ valiantly, she resists the urge to make some light jape about water parks and gardens and pools. instead, she bobs her head and decides that -- barring stiles's strange manners -- this time with him is as comfortable as the rare moments she'd spent with loras tyrell. a kind of odd gentle conversation -- filled with a side of life she's never known, and an absence of threat. of course, she's not ready to go to his workshop. or even leave the bailey with him.

but the bench? the bench will do just fine. ] Gladly. [ another smile. ] If you would sit, I would sit as well.

[ and then she waits: either for him to walk first or else to offer his arm. who knows. ]

[Guess who grew up watching a lot of old movies? Yep, this guy. He does offer his arm, along with a smile, his other hand holding the staff and resting it against his shoulder.

He wouldn't try to lure her into dark alleys or anything, but he would be trying to get her more comfortable around him. Not for ulterior motives, but because nothing soured a friendship like one party thinking the other was doing to do something bad when given the chance.]

Well, let's go rest our butts, then. Maybe you can tell me what your trip back was like, so I know what to expect if I ever go out?

[ she hooks her arm stiffly 'round his. indeed, there is nothing wholly affectionate about the moment: it's done as ritualistically as a handshake or a bow. but it does put them on some sort of equal social footing -- like a lord and a lady, taking a turn about the garden.

except he had to go and mention butts. she will always be on the back-foot with him and his language. ]

I would caution you against it, I think.

Yeah? Is it that bad?

[He led her over to the bench and waited for her to sit before taking his own seat -- with enough space between them that she wouldn't think he was trying to cop a feel.]

I don't know, I've done a little camping. I might be able to take it.

If I had my trusty air mattress.

[ one fist gathers the brunt of her skirts and shifts them gently so she might sit with grace. and ease. and once sat, she settles her hands together on her lap. each movement has thought behind it, and each thought is bent towards economy of movement and a struggle to be statuesque. she works hard at it. ]

The nightly camp is not the hardest part. Not truly. At least you may rest, then. Tell me, Stiles -- do you ride?

[ horses. but she doesn't know to specify. ]

Oh, um... no. Kind of a, ah, it's not really needed where I come from. We drive instead and I have a jeep... it's ah... a sort of chariot that doesn't need horses or things to move it. It has an engine, a machine that moves it instead. Horses... nope. I don't really think horses and me are on the same wavelength.

They can kill me.

I thought myself a decent rider, except-- [ wait.

wait. ] Kill you?

[ she needs to stop taking him literally. ]

They would. They'd throw me off and stomp on me and bite my face off. Or just bite my face off. Have you seen those teeth?

I promise, all the decent horses are trained to do nothing of the sort. [ a beat. ] They're well-broken.

I don't want a broken horse. I just don't want them to turn me into paste.

[ her eyes narrow for a moment. ] A horse obeys when he's broken-in. He's no danger to you, then. But -- when he's still wild?

[ a shrug. ]

Oh. Broken in, not like, broken. Right. Horse lingo. Got it.

[No, he didn't, but he'd watched enough westerns that he got the gist of it.]

I think I need an, ah, alternate mode of transportation. Horses just sort of scare the crap out of me.

Some day -- [ when we know each other better ] -- we could ride. My own horse is very sweet and well-behaved. He may convince you otherwise. Even Ser Gendry had little trouble with im after his own mount was lost.

[ and the pair of them had been forced to ride together. awkward. but at least if she took stiles a-riding she might borrow one of her father's horses instead. ]

M--aybe. Or, hey, maybe I can like, magic up a flying carpet? Huh? That'd be cool. You ride along on a horse and I take a nap on my rug. That could happen.

[ no. no it couldn't happen. because rugs don't fly. except that all bets were off when fairies are involved.

and perhaps she's a little sad to have her (admittedly very buried and oblique) request for companionship mildly rebuffed, but sansa gainfully responds with curiosity instead of despair: ] Is your...magic already so skilled? To create a thing like that?

Oh god, no. I'm still the master of the bubbles.

[He pointed the head of his staff at an angle from the bench in front of them, mumbled something, and bubbles shot out into the air.]

I mean, I can do more than that now, but that's still my, uh... it's good to show off what I mean.

[ she leans forward, chin lifting and head tilting as she observes the staff. it is not (perhaps) the most shocking of magicks, and yet she treats it as seriously as she might treat a fire-breathing dragon or some sort of transmutation. her blue eyes widen and her fingers knot gently in the excess fabric of her skirts. sansa has long been good at playing to a person's ego, but this awe is raw and artless. it is not faked. ]

I thought your staff was only a staff! [ she says in a hushed tone, as if the staff might somehow hear her. ]

[There's a tiny bit of gloating there, the bubbles finishing off, the ones sprayed out floating around, translucent orbs bobbing in the breeze.]

Nope. It's, uh, I guess it's my wand type thing. I channel through it. Only thing I can do without it so car is potion stuff, but all my actual magic magic has to be done while holding it. I don't know if that's just how they designed it when they gave it to me or if I'm too low a level to learn otherwise. There's witches here that can do magic with wands and without them, but they do it better with the wands since it's like, channeling.

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