[open] what mystery pervades a well; the water lives so far

[isorropia]

CHARACTERS: Rhan, Lyr, & YOU
WHERE: The Red Coast
WHEN: DAY: 029-:034
SUMMARY: Puttering around for fun and profit. Wild cards are okay!
WARNINGS: N/A, will add if necessary

LYR. THE ORCHARD

[The twisting fruit trees lay in perfect, ordered lines. They stretch out in the shadow of Tyrisson House and crawl quietly up the hillside. It's quiet here; the yellowed fruit on the knobby branches must not yet be ripe and the weather must be kind enough to simply let the trees grow. Come noon, the skeleton crew of grounds keepers and field hands have largely quit the place, leaving the orchards empty. Or close enough to it.

It makes for a good place to take a walk anyway. A fact that Lyr is currently taking full advantage of. He cuts a path first up between two straight lines of lumpy trees and then down the next, crisscrossing the orchard in exacting lines.]

RHAN. ABSOLUTELY GODDAMN EVERYWHERE

[Considering the amount of time Rhan's kept largely to herself in the Graze, it should be hard to pin her down here on the Red Coast where there's so many nooks and crannies to get lost in. But it seems the opposite is true: that cloaked figure at the pub's corner table? Rhan. That Carbauschian wandering the coast and cliffs? Rhan. Trying to get in some alone time? She's almost guaranteed to show up at your elbow.]

Well, fancy seeing you here.

LYR & RHAN. CARBAUSCHIAN QUARTERS (DAY :033)

[It's late in the afternoon and you've made a mistake. Meaning: you've arrived just in time to catch Rhan and Lyr in the middle of a debate. Lyr has taken up post in one of the heavy built in bunks and Rhan is walking circles in the center of the space. Clearly most of the other Hosts have not yet returned from whatever misadventures they're having, or (more likely), the two elder hosts' dialogue has driven off any unwilling participants.

Not that you're so lucky. Before the newcomer can so much as shed an article of their heavy Carbauschian disguise, Rhan calls out:]

Oh! Just in time. Come help me tell Lyr he's being ridiculous.

Comments

RHAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAN

[aluminumandash]

[ Among the lessons of the Barithian hunt had been this: the nest didn't extend forever. There was a limit, a point at which the thoughts and feelings receded. Rust's working on his walls, sketching tentative lines between himself and the rest of them, but it's been too long since he last had his thoughts to himself and—well, fuck it. He'll take the easy way out.

It's early, the air still cool, sea more black than red. The fisherman who'd offered to take him out has expressed so many concerns about water-soaked robes that Rust suspects anything less than a tragic drowning will break his heart.

He's grabbing an extra pole when she turns up, and he can't muster much in the way of surprise or even disappointment. ] We're just heading out. [ Rust doesn't brush past her to step into the boat—wouldn't be so nakedly rude—but his thoughts list that way. ] Something you need?

[isorropia]

Oh, not at all. I just happened to notice you from the street there and thought a morning on the water sounded lovely. You don't mind, do you?

[This is, categorically, not directed at Rust, but rather the fisherman standing in the little boat, currently wrapping a line and stowing it there at the prow. The fisherman pauses, gives her a look (more robes...), and then evidently decides he's already lost one battle, no sense taking up arms to fight another one.

It's impossible to see Rhan's smile under the heavy outerwear, but the shape of it in her mind absolutely blooms between them.]

Fantastic. [She claps Rust on the shoulder and moves to step into the boat.]

[aluminumandash]

[ It's choppy, in his head, as first he tries to gloss over his emotions—suspicion perceptible in brief, brilliant flashes, like fish beneath waves—then thinks better of it. Her smile meets with cool irritation, her touch with resignation.

Once she's found her footing he joins her on the boat, obeying the fisherman's gesticulations about where to stand. He swaps out his fishing pole for a paddle. Without looking her way, he says: ] I don't know how much fishing you've done, but a certain amount of quiet is de rigueur.

[isorropia]

Is that so?

[Her mind is there at the edge of his, a cat on counter slowly sliding things off the edge and to the floor. It's all but guaranteed that sans cowl and hood and swaths of Carbasuchian outerwear, she must certainly be wearing a particularly broad grin.]

I think I'll manage, darling. I can be very mindful, you know. [Which:] ( That's a pun, by the way. )

[Not that thinking does anything to slow down her mouth. Rather, Rhan exchanges brief pleasantries with the fisherman, arms herself with a paddle of her own and does her very best to follow directions as they push away from the dock out into the ruddy sea.]

[aluminumandash]

[ Rust bristles, mentally. Annoyance is his natural inclination, and if he exaggerates it a little, paints in broad strokes to obscure the finer details—hopefully she's too busy getting a kick out of it to notice. ] ( Yes ma'am. ) [ As though he'd been informed it was an order.

While they row, he tries to get a sense of her—fall into a rhythm of thought as well as movement, a mental synchronization. ] Aren't you in a fine mood. [ He says eventually. Grazes the surface of her mind as if by accident. Lingers like water on a paddle before slipping away. ] Is it the change in scenery?

[isorropia]

[Annoyance she can recognize - and put aside just as easily. Please; she's in a brood with Lyr and Siva'co. That particular tang on the air is as familiar to her as the roof of her own mouth. Her own though--

There's a steadiness to this: the slash of the oars cutting down through the rust colored sea, the sound of the water splitting around the brow of the little boat and the rhythmic grind of the oars against the fibrous side of the boat. Rhan's mind is like that: moving and attentive, parting easily to the graze of his focus. Sure. Touch her with your brain, Rust; she doesn't much mind it.]

Nothing like that. I just don't see the point in not enjoying myself. Life's too damn short, isn't that right my friend? [This directed at their Hyrypian chaperone, who grunts out a gruff imitation of a laugh and leans harder on his oars. Ah well. Tough crowd.] But if you'd like the credit, you're welcome to it.