Another Year, Another Dance.

Re: Another Year, Another Dance.

Postby Vanidor » Sat Jan 12, 2019 4:06 pm

No reading. Just millennia of experience and knowledge. He had read many things over the long years of his life. Had experienced much more as well. Things someone could now if they had the time and inclination, like that certain fae were susceptible to the metal. One of the unused cabins far to the rear hard rowan and ivy, said to also be a ward of sorts.

Vanidor didn't really know. He'd never had a chance to test such a thing.

But such a concern was currently neither here nor there. Not with another... thing. Creature. He snorted out a laugh and yet maintained his general stance. There was a readiness there, but no outright violence. It was rare for anyone to enter the Sanctuary without his knowledge.

So a breath, then eyes narrowing slightly. Oddly enough, the discontent he had been feeling and exhibiting at her turn was suppressed.
"I am not sure, yet. But step no further."
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Re: Another Year, Another Dance.

Postby Niabh » Mon Jan 14, 2019 12:09 pm

Boundaries did not mean much to a raven. Ravens went where they were bid. Granted, he had not, speaking strictly, been bidden to go to his lady, but it paid to keep an eye on your monarch. Particularly when said monarch had gone off armed and when she'd been so...well, "unpredictable" seemed the most polite word for it, so let's stick with that one. As far as the morals of commissions of duty were concerned, trespassing was a grey area.

At Vanidor's word, all the bird's nervous twitching and settling smoothed away into complete obedience. He might have been carved in jetwood, two grey-blue topaz set for his eyes. Its ebony beak moved in an endless muttering, while its voice did not seem to issue from its mouth at all, but came from somewhere deeper than its chest. "I am stepping no further. This is me, stayin' put."

Its head cocked ever so slightly to the left, to peer around the tall man. He called deliberately into the darkened doorway, "I am only here to make sure that everyone here is here of their own free will. And also to make sure that anyone who maybe's been asked to leave in the past little while has left, what?"

Behind Vanidor, the woman cupped a palm to her sweat-sticky brow. The layers of shirt and tunic were suddenly smothering, too heavy, as if all summer burned beyond the door. The sickening buzz receded to a mere flush and pleasant tingling to her cheeks--the usual response to a drink a touch stronger than she was used to. What remained was confusion. Was she here against her will? She'd been welcomed. She was a guest. Lugh'us Danaan, had she made an arse of herself? Had she been rude?

Shakily, she called out, "I'm alright, Benedict."

To Vanidor, she explained, a little sheepish, "He's my messenger. He knows how to find me."
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Re: Another Year, Another Dance.

Postby Vanidor » Mon Jan 14, 2019 1:55 pm

He continue to eye the... Well. He was not all to sure what exactly to consider the raven. The creature. Perhaps he had been out of Myrken for far too long, such a thing as this was strange to him once again. Vanidor did, however, at least release a breath he had not been aware he'd been holding. His sword was still against the wall, and had had no weapons beyond a wine bottle rolling betwixt their feet.

Gratitude then, that there was no... Well, no. He'd maintain a small sense of attention to the surroundings. It still bothered him that this creature. No, her messenger. Did she call it Benedict? Another question for, perhaps, another time. So then, a breath to maintain the outer aura of calm that he wanted to project. Vanidor would glance back again at the woman in his cabin, then straighten a bit.


"If he is your boon companion, then I can hardly keep you from his presence if that is your desire. Huah. I thought you were going to try and ram me out of my own house." A short pause, and he'd pull a smile back upon his face as he peered at the woman. Then back out to the raven. "I have a feeling such a thing would have ended poorly for me, so I thank you for not doing so... Perhaps I should be more wary in offering drink to people in the dark of night."

He did, however, say that last with a wink. His humour always was fast to return.
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Re: Another Year, Another Dance.

Postby Niabh » Mon Jan 14, 2019 6:36 pm

The raven's presence was, in its strange way, a calming. It gave her some perspective that she was not entirely forsaken--that if anything untoward did happen, it would not go unwitnessed. Whatever might happen was less terrible than the prospect of no one ever finding out what became of her. The comfort put some perspective between herself and the strange burst of fear, enough to recognize that it really was strange. Out of place. Abnormal. And the very fact that it had come out of nowhere--

But that a subject to be plumbed in private, where she could think, or to be written down so that it all looked reasonable. Meanwhile she would do what Tuatha did: conceal.

The woman managed a long, shaky exhalation that turned, in the end, to a small laugh and a nod. "Well, I would scarce call him a boon companion." She summoned some her previous cheerful haughtiness. "He's certainly not my chaperone, whatever he may think himself."

"Yeah," the raven muttered, fluffing himself against the chill, "not like you need one of those, right?" Again he eyed Vanidor, less mistrustful than simply curious. She wondered less what he was thinking than what he might say, and to whom.

To Vanidor, she offered an apologetic smile and a small dip of her head. "No fear there. I am sworn. You have been wondrous mannerly and deserve better. I. I should like to know you better, really." Now the shyness was unfeigned. "I've been looking for someone who knows the past of this place better than I do. Mayhap one of our gods has watched out for one of us this night."

The very idea that she might have been rude was quite unforgivable. Intruding upon other people's rituals, nicking their very clothes out from under them--none of that was rude; it was the risk you took being abroad in the woods at night, and she would not have truly held the same against Vanidor had he done the same to her, were their circumstances reversed. But to bring rudeness to someone's very door, under their very roof, when they had done nothing to deserve it...that was not done.

To recover herself, she glanced over her shoulder, eyes scanning the floor by the fire, and added in feigned annoyance, "And if I've broken the only decent bottle of wine I've seen in years, I'll hang myself from the nearest tree."
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Re: Another Year, Another Dance.

Postby Vanidor » Thu Jan 17, 2019 7:27 pm

Vanidor considered her for a short moment. Her and her bird. Well, maybe not her bird, but there was a connection. As much as she wanted to learn about the past, he wanted to know about the now. So then, a decision was made, and his eyes adjusted to look into her face.

"Wine was made to be used, Darai, no sense weeping over it if it is spilled. But, I think we are in luck." The bottle rested there upon the floor, a slight chip in the bottom, but elsewise in better than fair condition. The yellowed scrap of paper than had been bound to the neck of it had come free, and sat there upon the floorboards.

Vanidor knelt some and plucked the bottle from the floor. Long fingers dragged against the glass, brushing away a few specks of dirt from it's body. He considered it again, then once more presented the bottle to the woman. Yes. She had certainly been less then mannerly when it came to their initial encounter. He wouldn't have called it outright rude, however, and that made him smile.

"I think that getting to know one another might be beneficial. It gets... quiet here, now that the majority of my people are gone. If you have questions, I most certainly have answers. I will also have more ale. And perhaps more wine, if I look in the cellar far enough."

He smiled again, looking past her to the barrel. Not that it was empty, but there was so little to do here during the long winter nights. And that beer was quite sweet.


"You have permission to come and go as you wish, let me know if you want me to open a cabin for you. Your... companion can roost here as well, if that is your desire." As before, there was a strange air of formality to the way he said that, though it rolled off the tongue like any other set of words he'd used tonight. "Just let me know if you wish to speak on those other matters, hm. I will do all I can to make certain I have a pair of breeks on. Or if not, I will at least have an extra pair if you make off with the first."
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Re: Another Year, Another Dance.

Postby Niabh » Fri Jan 18, 2019 2:28 pm

The ghost-memory of that strange prickling in her palms made her hesitate a half-heartbeat. But so eager was she to put the incident behind her that she overcame it, taking the bottle from him perhaps a touch too quickly, too greedy to prove that everything was better now. The heavy glass felt only cool and slightly gritty from rolling across the floor, a relief.

"Permission?" A brow went up, all too casually, while a faint spark of mischief lit her eye. The raven knew that look and that tone and began backing up, muttering under its breath, but the memory of earlier embarrassment was all too raw and recent for her to make an issue of being permitted.

Besides, this place was thick with him; it was as much full of his presence and that of his missing people as her own place was covered up by her petty wards and cantrips. An unspoken truce lay between them, to give each other the sanctity of their own ground. For so long her game had been keeping out things that didn't belong in the Woods that it threw her off-balance to find that, for once, she was the outsider, forced to abide by the rules of another's hospitality. But so agreeable and comfortable was the company that it hardly felt like force.

In the end, she nodded. "Aye, good neighbor, I'd like that. I keep my own places outside the Woods, near the lake. There's a bit of a trick to getting in and out but if you call for me, I can come fetch you. You bring the wine, I'll lay on a meal, how's that?" Cocking her head to the side, she added loftily, "You needn't even bother with breeks if you don't care to."

"I can leave?" the raven offered hopefully. "Please let me leave first."
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Re: Another Year, Another Dance.

Postby Vanidor » Mon Jan 21, 2019 6:04 am

If she knew the reasons for the particular phrasing, perhaps she'd be less inclined to cause mischief. Not that Vanidor minded mischief for what it was worth. It would be a refreshing change of pace, that was for certain. In any case, he would glance towards the creature. Two fingers would press to Vanidor's heart, then to his lips, then finally to his forehead. He had a feeling that the Raven could leave at any time.

Then he eyed the bottle in her hands and laughed lightly. It was a musical sound, now that some tension had been lifted. The man was back to being completely at his ease. With a sideways glance at the Raven, to whom he'd wink.
"I will keep that in mind, and you are free to do the same, eh. There is freedom to it, especially in the late spring."

Another pause, then a laugh to himself. "Ah, but yes. Wine and a meal. I look forward to it, I have a feeling there is much to discuss when it comes to the lay of the land. Both past and present."
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Re: Another Year, Another Dance.

Postby Niabh » Wed Jan 23, 2019 2:15 pm

The gesture confused her, though she grasped enough to respond by laying her hand on her breast and bowing her head above it, as much to buy time as for politeness's sake. "Then I will expect you, good neighbor, and perhaps we will go on better than we've begun. And I am of course joking about the breeks."

The hand fell, but her eyes stayed fixed upon him all the while, still a touch cautious, though the wild, unreasoning panic had subsided. Now she was simply intrigued, a small smile playing on her face. His phrasing was significant enough to make her wonder what she was agreeing to, and what authority he thought he had to believe she would agree.

She shifted on her heel, turning back to duck under the doorway once more. The raven let out a warning croak to her back, and she shot him a hard look over her shoulder. "Lugh'us Danaan, I'm getting my cloak. What's gotten into you of late?"

"I should ask the same thing," the raven snapped back. "Who even is this?"

Just to irk the raven more, she heaved an exaggerated sigh and gave Vanidor an apologetic look. "He's usually more mannerly."
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