Live a Little

Log Info

• Title: Live a Little
• Emitter: Verna
• Characters: Verna, Aryia
• Place: Lower Market's, Aryia's Private Abode
• Time: December 8th, 2021
• Summary: On a sleeting, frozen night, Verna seeks refuge within her friend's private residence, staggered from recent events of life, limb, heart, and soul. Aryia offers refuge within the Magnificent Mansion that was placed there prior. The one and a half mul's kick back in a pool, and Verna shares the news. Some wonderful, others of personal worries. Aryia does her best to be there for the Mourner, and shows her that it's okay to live a little.

It was not so long ago that Aryia had company, and the temporary 'expansion' to warm the new home. The same day, in fact, as it is late, yet not absurdly so, when there is a knock upon her door.

Upon the simple abode, there were no lights present to indicate that anyone was home. Aside from a faint, pale luminosity coming from the window sill. The black petaled flower was in full bloom, iridescent streaks on it's petals soaking in the night light.

The flower shifts faintly from movement behind the curtain. Not a moment later, the door creaks open after bolts unlock. The lights are out inside, so a moonlit hand manifests in the inky black to motion quickly, "Come in come in, it's too fucking cold outside." <Handspeech>

"Thank you," Verna notes tiredly as she enters. Cold, indeed. Moreso given her state of dress.. or lack thereof. With only a light cloak over her shoulders, she stands in a familiar violet dress, sodden and adhered, making it appear more custom-fit than usual. A haversack dangles in hand from the strap.

Given the hour and apparel, one might wonder just what manner of evening she had...

The door shuts behind the Mourner and locks, as there's near silent padding of bare feet around the living room. The hearth was not lit, as it was not needed. There were other sources of heat nearby.

The glowing hand brightens some to a faint torch, illuminting some of a scarred mul'neissa's visage. One that was looking over Verna. A sigh leaves her, "I'm glad you're wearing my dress, but..."

A few dots are quickly connected in her head. "Come. Your house warming gift is still up and about." Glowing eyes and hand lead the way to the shimmering section of the wall, only to vanish into it.

The manor interior was... mostly the same. Save for a decent bit of the food stuffs was moved to be closer to the pool, and much of any drinks that were present were near the hearth. There was a small pile of books there, as well as one of the walls sporting a healthy, fist sized hole. <Handspeech>

Verna may require some light, still, with her diluted blood, but she does not require much. "It seemed appropriate for a dress shop..." she states somewhat absently as she follows Aryia to and through the entryway.

The shift in lighting with the transit leaves her blinking a moment and she re-orients. It has not been so long, and yet, something is different? Her haversack is release to drop to the floor near yet out of the way of the door as she glances about. "You have redecorated..."

Then there is the pool, with food conveniently relocated around it. She makes her way briskly there, promptly acquiring herself a filled pastry... and almost as promptly making it half disappear.

Aryia is fine with playing the guiding light until Verna gets her bearings, the mute herself taking a moment to deal with the change in brightness. She cocks a brow at the answer. Then the comment makes her glance to the hole in the wall. "Oh. Um... sorry about that, I sort of..." It's incomplete as she watches Verna zip off.

The pugilist's gut was telling her something was up.

She follows after the Mourner, getting in her line of sight while its half obscured by a pastry. "Do you need anything?" she asks, worried, and already slipping into the role of host far easier than last time. <Handspeech>

Verna holds up her non-face-stuffing hand to indicate a hold and moment needed. It is perhaps only a half-moment more before the pastry is completely face-stuffed. That leaves only chewing, which requires more time. Fortunately, there are methods of communicating with one's mouth full that do not shower others in pastry particles.

Her hands lift to respond, pause, resume. "I ... do not know. It is over. He is destroyed. She is angry. I ... do not know what to do." Perhaps a grat deal of contextual or vague information stuffed into a few gestures.

Aryia blankly stares at Verna for a few long seconds. Her gaze slides to the side. To the haversack. To the drenched dress. The hole in the wall. Then, finally, back to the Mourner.

Torch-bright eyes widen and brighten.

Hissed and signed words fail, Aryia instead quickly fields the distance between them and pulls Verna into a firm embrace.

Verna is weary and wet and might not have expected the incoming Aryia even were she rested and warm. As well, the mul missile may be more mobile than the Mourner could manuever to miss. There is a moment of startle and tension at the embrace, but that rapidly melts as Verna relaxes into it. Perhaps too much, as Aryia may find herself supporting the other for a moment. So many concerns, plans, investigations, fears... so many things, for so long... Now, they are ... gone? Unnecessary?

Aryia had no qualms holding the half-blood up. She expected to do as much, considering how troubled and weary even those that were far beyond her fared after dealing with such an enemy. She could only imagine the vacant feeling, the slowly decompressing catharsis of years of worry that expounded in just naught long ago.

Then recompressed some from relational woes.

Such thoughts are tossed aside as the mute supports the other, a hand on the back of the other's head to rest against a shoulder. Aryia said she'd help in any other way she can. And she was glad she could in one of the few ways she knew how.

One can eat pastries and handsign, or one could embrace and converse.

Obviously, someone needs to design a new form of communication that frees one to do both simultaneously.

This may or may not be a sudden, nearly-random epiphany for Verna that may or may not prompt her to regain her muscle control and straighten. She looks up to Aryia, moving back to arm's reach at least, if just so the conversation is not nose-to-nose.

"Thank you. I hope that I do not impose and did not interrupt. I was uncertain where to go."

Aryia releases the Mourner as she feels her pulling away. Though one calloused hand remains on a shoulder, her expression a rare one: hopeful. So, positively, radiantly hopeful.

She sharply shakes her head, it hard to cease a creeping grin on lips. "No, you aren't. I'm happy that you can find some reprieve here," she motions between them. She glances around, gesturing to various things. "Is there anything you want? The pool? Food? Alcohol? All three?" <Handspeech>

Verna nods at the response, both thankful that she is not imposing and also apparent that she does, indeed, find respite here. Her head then turns to follow the gesturing to the amenities indicated. "Yes," is her succinct, immediate answer.

After a moment of more rational thought, she adds, "While inebriated, obese, and drowned might seem a somewhat anti-climactic and ignominious end following recent events, I shall accept the risk."

That sparks a sharp laugh from Aryia, a wet, throaty sound that is followed by a coughing fit. Though she shakes her head and clears her throat. She holds up a finger, stills, and her image slowly fades.

She's near the drinks, shoving a bunch of bottles into an arm.

Now she's vanished into the dining hall.

Then she reappears, her dragging an end table behind her while she balances a platter of random foodstuffs and alochol in one arm. She nods towards the pool, making her way over there with new, vibrant life injected into her.

Verna blinks as she follows Aryia's movements (or ...relocations), or attempts to. In the end, she simply nods to the dragging of the table, with food and alcohol. Yet, when she moves, she steps away from the pool and back towards her dropped haversack. That she proceeds to unlatch and remove her boots to set them with may offer some explanation.

Additionally, she retrieves a small item or two from the pack before she pads her way back to the pool. Into it, in fact, as she wades her way across towards the table, food, drinks, and Aryias. She wears an amused smile that has formed all of its own accord. "It is good to see you so energized." In a positive manner not related to boring holes through walls, though she does not state as much.

The table is drop unceremoniously into place with a >thud< as drink and sundries are placed upon it. She couldn't help but that small part of her past twitch faintly at seeing the dress she made soddened further. But really, did it matter? It was just a thing. A thing that could be made again. People are a bit harder mend than cloth.

Hence why the spools of thread she had for that was placed onto the table.

The mute nods sharply, pulling off the cork of a random bottle with her teeth and spitting it out into a corner of the room. "This is probably the first good news I've heard in some time."

She offers the bottle to the Mourner. "And that means my sister is one step closer to being freed," she mentions. "Which I will *gladly* drink to that." <Handspeech>

Verna nods, accepting the bottle though not yet examining it. "Speaking of such, I wished to return this to you." She extends her other hand and opens it, palm up, to offer the partly-burned, slightly-bent wax candle. A priority over the alcohol, at least. The pastry and pool crept in just ahead?

Aryia blinks at the returned candle. "... she wasn't there..."

Her eyes dim a touch. Then brighten right back up as she accepts the object and stashes it away someplace safe. "... good. It probably would have complicated things. Thank you for giving that back." <Handspeech>

Verna shakes her head, albeit in agreement. "She was not, but I believe you correct. Matters were ...complicated enough." The thread on the table, if just by color, reminds her of the dress that she is now doubly-soaking.

"My apologies..." She wades to the edge of the pool, sets down the bottle, and pulls over a chair. What follows next would best be described as a combination of wiggle, struggle, and peel as she removes the dress. It is then to lain respectfully over the chair.

The bottle is reclaimed, now perhaps Verna's only acoutrement and a swig taken from it. Without even pre-scrutiny of the label! Whether as explanation or simple statement, she notes, "I have had demon squirming along my soul. A bath seems only appropriate."

The small part of Zilstrae that had been creeping up relaxes some as the dress is given respite as well, and Aryia sighs, shaking her head. "It's fine. It'll dry."

The mute blinks at that explanation. That was something she never had to imagine, or could imagine, yet it still makes her shudder at the thought. In solidarity, she too pops a bottle, peels her outer wear, and joins Verna in the waters with a lengthy sigh. "Ew, yes. Clean that filth off. Might take multiple times. I can talk with the TarRaCe owner to get you priority for the bathhouse if you need further cleansing," she signs, thumbing a simple necklace with a singular shark's tooth on it. <Handspeech>

Alternatively, perhaps the disinfecting properties of alcohol will burn things clean on the inside. It seems to do feel that way to Verna's throat following a second gulp, judging from the way her face contorts into a scowl. Moreso and different than the norm, that is.

"I should not become too indulgent," she notes mildly hypocratically given the moment. "A Mourner's needs are simple, and only slightly broadened as a sage..." She pauses, then, in thought, tapping the mouth of the bottle at her chin absently. "Ah, yes, per a comment from a past apprentice, I require only 'a lab and a slab.'" A firm nod follows.

Aryia's response was one of the few things she could actually verbalize with any volume. "Pfffft, f-ck th-t," she waves off, shaking her head with a grin. A hand speaks for her further as her lips were busy imbibing more. "You just had fucker number one die for good, him apparently touching your soul, and now you get to live to tell about it. You deserve a break, and much indulgence as you want."

Bottle freed and set away off to the side, both hands speak more. "A lab and a slab doesn't heal the soul," she notes, smirking.<Handspeech>

She makes a valid argument. It is an accomplishment. "Indeed. I suppose that does warrant... living a little," Verna admits, in the vernacular. The bottle is raised up to her lips in example of indulgence... yet stops short of a drink and is lowered. She looks to it a moment before setting it aside on the pool edge.

Her lips purse in thought, the expression rather celebration-averse. "I wish that she were here... though I fear she would not wish to be in my presence."

Aryia nods in agreement. Living a little is something she's learned to do these past couple of months. So she raises her bottle to that, and starts to drink from it.

Yet, Verna does not.

The water sloshes some as the pugilist turns to face Verna, her brows knitted together. She tilts her head to the side, asking the silent question: what happened?

Verna may be aware of the silent inquiry, though her eyes are mostly upon the surface of the water near herself and the absent trails her fingers draw through it. If she is aware, her response to the question is one of her own.

"If you were to face a foe that you knew you, and those with you, might well not survive, even if victorious... if that foe were one from Violet's past, who altered her entire life negatively... whom she might have worked every day since to study, to overcome, to thwart..." A blasphemous grammatical nightmare of a run-on.

Verna then looks up from the water to Aryia. "Would you risk her to be present, to possibly see her life's work fulfilled and vindicated? Or would you wish her elsewhere and safe?"

Aryia's exuberance is mollified at the hypothetical. She leans back, staring down at her scarred self. Contemplating without her witty remarks to liven the mood.

Then the conundrum involves Ven-Violet. Verna had the mute's full attention, it folding over into introspection at the seriousness of the endeavor.

She doesn't answer right away. Her lips purse in thought as she watches the faint eddies in the pool.

"... the severity of this circumstance has so many variables that it's difficult to answer that question."

The bottle is set down with a soft clink.

Hands slowly move to elaborate, as her gaze on Verna holds firm. "The foes of Violet's past are mortal," she mentions, uncaring she was causing a crack in a carefully constructed persona. "This foe transcends the typical. He would want as much death and pain to go with him in his final moments. What is the point of vindication and vengeance if you cannot revel in the afterglow of their demise? Aren't you just setting yourself up for the foe to be a martyr? The fiend's mere presence slays lesser men. Corrupts lesser men."

She looks to the doors to the pool, watching as if her other would walk right in on the conversation. Expression firm, yet steadfast. "Violet might be upset for a short term. But I think once realization sets in that they don't have to spend every waking moment worried, fearful, cornered, hunted, corralled, planning, schemeing, the catharsis will far outweigh that."

She picks up her drink, skulls the whole thing in one go, and rolls the bottle away on the floor with a soft >clink, clink cl-clink<. "And she'll learn to live a little." <Handspeech>

Verna watches, first in wait and then to listen (as it were) to the response. She could not agree more with the first statement, and that only grows. If the manner of explanation is intended any type of parody, it is lost upon her as she focuses on the content. At the end, she nods, once, followed by an exhale of the breath likely held the entire time.

"I chose her safety over her happiness, first. I later reneged and offered her the choice. In the end, she chose as I preferred... yet it did not feel like a victory."

An inhale, followed immediately after with another swallow from the retrieved bottle (hers, not the empty). "She was greatly upset, still. I..." A pause and a frown. "It may also be that I revealed too much of how I ..felt, and I offended her." Sometimes thinking is good. Other times may be best for drinking. Verna is now doing both in concert.

Aryia lightly smiles, feeling well as she could impart some sort of answer in the twisted mess of a complicated situation. She reaches up and behind her, nabbing a cookie off the platter of food and nibbling on it.

A sigh leaves through her nose, the mute reaching out to put a hand on Verna's shoulder. Cookie dangling from her lips, she motions with her other hand to speak. "Some things in life are not meant to feel like a victory. They are a choice."

She gives the shoulder a squeeze, then pulls away. "... if you offended her with your feelings, then what was the point of the dinner date, and you two spending time together? I think you find fault in this feelings bit where there is none. Though, perhaps she too made the difficult choice of staying behind for her own feelings, as well as yours."

She rubs at her face. "Regardless, this is all speculation. What she'll need is time. Both of you, actually, will need time. To process, to decompress, only then can you two come together to make what you will of the situation." <Handspeech>

Verna's attention is rapt upon this imparting of wisdom... though a small sliver is occassionally diverted by the cookie. All that Aryia states is perfectly sound, and so sensible and obvious in retrospect that Verna is somewhat abashed by her ignorance. "I understand. You make all simple and concise, in retrospect. You are quite the wise and talented mentor."

She reaches out of the pool, past the bottle in favor of a sweet from the table: cookie, pastry, gnome-sized bar of chocolate... whatever in reach that she can retrieve. "As well, more proof that I should spend less time in books." She chews still in thought. "Not too much time to process, I trust?" Having already wasted some years, she may not wish to burn the rest away too frivolously.

Aryia rubs her neck, giving a lopsided smile. "I've a few decades under my belt to figure out what people want," she signs, shrugging a shoulder. Her face colors some. "... my sister said something similar. Thank you"

The mute shoves the rest of the cookie into her face, chewing with puffed cheeks for a moment before gulping it away. She gives a light snicker. "Perhaps. Wouldn't hurt. Some things you can't learn in a book." Though, she shakes her head at that. "No. You needn't wait overlong. Just a few days. Maybe a week. Let her come to terms with it, and yourself. Who knows, maybe she'll seek you out when she's ready." <Handspeech>

Verna finishes her cookie without adding too many crumbs to the pool. "No, thank you. You earned the statement. I hope that she might say the same to you again, and soon." She leaves the comment at that: hopeful. There is more cause and room for such, now, it seems, which is a welcome state.

Even the suggestion that she might be sought out, herself, is taken with optimism rather than evaluation of probability or analysis of contributing factors. A nod. "A few days." She can manage that.

There is is again, that injection of exuberance that manifests in a shimmer of the eyes. She grins, and gives a sharp thumbs up. "She will. I look forward to the day she can."

After, of course, she fulfills her silent promise of decking her sister in the face. The pugilist cracks her knuckles for some reason or another.

The mul'neissa snags another bottle, cracks it open, and takes a fresh sip as she lets her lower half lazily float to the surface. "A few days," she echoes with her hand. "Now let's live a little, yes?" <Handspeech>

Verna responds with a casual-yet-utterly-appropriate affirmative in the form of a returned thumbs up. This while her other hand retrieves her prior bottle that is not yet half empty; an issue that shall be corrected in due time. Perhaps in short order as she resumes that effort.

She lounges in half float with her back to the edge, looking from Aryia, to the water, to her own toes breaking the surface of the pool before her. "Intriguing... I believe I begin to understand the attraction of unnecessary opulence..." she notes the stray thought, and adds another a moment later, "... and/or the contents of this bottle begin to affect my judgement..."

Aryia grins, her reclining back in a similar fashion. She lightly knocks her bottle against Verna's, takes a long drink, and lulls her head back while closing her eyes. "... then enjoy the opulence for a small while. Besides, I think a drunk Verna sounds downright entertaining. I wonder if your lectures would be entertaining if you gave them half sloshed. And this is one of the rare times I'd be willing to listen," she snickers with a hand splashing back into the pool only for it to resurface. "Regardless."

"You did good."

"I'm proud of you." <Handspeech>

"They might be more entertaining," Verna admits with somewhat lazy and imprecise movements."Perhaps I shall do so for a guest lecture at the Artificer's Hall, for the freshmen gobbers. There are enough detonations already that any misunderstandings would be inconspicuous."

She falls still and quiet after for some moments before she comments, "I am proud that we all did well, and pleased that all returned to speak of it after."

Her bottle is lifted in salutation, now, to that, before she ruly upends in in effort to consume the remainder. Some winds up in the pool as it runs down her cheeks, but the effort is made.

-End Scene-