☼ RUTH OF HOUSE IESHAN ☼רות
"bronzed as earth, the second lies / hearing ticks blown gold / like pollen on bright air. Lulled / near a bed of poppies,"
"bronzed as earth, the second lies / hearing ticks blown gold / like pollen on bright air. Lulled / near a bed of poppies,"
I see the girl first for the yellow – the golden nose ring, or the gold in her hair, or the gold rings around her neck, or her golden hooves, or, most of all, the way that the white of her tail falls way to yellow, like the way rays fall away from the sun. She is a wandering speck of light, and, in the glow and the buzz of the party, she is an anomaly. (She does not belong here at all.)
She approaches me, one lonely stranger to another. I don’t move.
The girl is bright, certainly, but she is bright without being ostentatious. Compared to the dull sandstone of the capitol and the perpetually-bloodied sands of the Mors, I am certain that our manor seems dazzling and wonderful, a small oasis of brilliance among the grit. I know better, of course. It is an overused comparison, but poisonous things are often brightly-colored as a warning sign. Our household is decaying from the inside out, and my brother is throwing a party. Adonai is dying, and Pilate is throwing a party. Adonai is dying, and Hagar is playing games in the courtyard, and Corradh is trying to tempt every girl that he can find into his bed at night, and Pilate is serving drinks at the bar, and Miriam is creeping the halls like a shadow, stirred from her near-perpetual rest for the first time in days, and our two youngest sisters are nowhere to be found.. Our dedication to keeping up appearances is either impressive or sickening, and I don’t know which.
Of course – it would be worse by magnitudes to let the world know that the Ieshans are eating themselves alive. I put on a smile for the girl, because I have been to enough parties to know that it is what you are supposed to do when you meet people at parties, but I’m sure that it doesn’t reach my eyes. It is more reflexive than anything. More veil.
She looks rather young to be here all on her own, but I don’t care enough to comment on it. I note the drink that she is carrying, and I hope that she isn’t the kind of child who, fresh out of the house, will be apt to drink and party too vicariously; there are a few such youths at most every celebration I attend, and, as one of Solterra’s few doctors (and, most of the time, as the only one in attendance), I usually end up dealing with the aftermath, either in the venue or in the hospital the next day.
I don’t say a word. She doesn’t, either, until, Lovely party, isn’t it? She lifts the glass to her lips to drink.
It is small talk – the universal language of people who don’t know what to talk about at parties. I’m rather grateful for it.
“It is,” I agree, with a nod of my head, though privately I find it no more lovely than usual. “Pilate would claim to throw the best parties in Solterra, I imagine.“ More likely he’d claim to throw the best parties in Novus, but I don’t say that aloud. I can’t speak to his skills over the denizens of other courts – it is always difficult to outdo the celebrations they throw in Denocte, which has always had a reputation for revelry -, but he certainly has a better taste in music than most other Solterran nobles. (He knows it, too, and takes particular pride in it; I’ve seen the invitations he sent out for this one.)
Do they do this often? A perfectly innocent question.
“Very often,” I confirm. “Is this your first time attending one?” I can already guess that it is, but I don’t bother say it; it would hardly be polite.
@Maret || hello I love Maret || "Two Sisters of Persephone," Plath
She approaches me, one lonely stranger to another. I don’t move.
The girl is bright, certainly, but she is bright without being ostentatious. Compared to the dull sandstone of the capitol and the perpetually-bloodied sands of the Mors, I am certain that our manor seems dazzling and wonderful, a small oasis of brilliance among the grit. I know better, of course. It is an overused comparison, but poisonous things are often brightly-colored as a warning sign. Our household is decaying from the inside out, and my brother is throwing a party. Adonai is dying, and Pilate is throwing a party. Adonai is dying, and Hagar is playing games in the courtyard, and Corradh is trying to tempt every girl that he can find into his bed at night, and Pilate is serving drinks at the bar, and Miriam is creeping the halls like a shadow, stirred from her near-perpetual rest for the first time in days, and our two youngest sisters are nowhere to be found.. Our dedication to keeping up appearances is either impressive or sickening, and I don’t know which.
Of course – it would be worse by magnitudes to let the world know that the Ieshans are eating themselves alive. I put on a smile for the girl, because I have been to enough parties to know that it is what you are supposed to do when you meet people at parties, but I’m sure that it doesn’t reach my eyes. It is more reflexive than anything. More veil.
She looks rather young to be here all on her own, but I don’t care enough to comment on it. I note the drink that she is carrying, and I hope that she isn’t the kind of child who, fresh out of the house, will be apt to drink and party too vicariously; there are a few such youths at most every celebration I attend, and, as one of Solterra’s few doctors (and, most of the time, as the only one in attendance), I usually end up dealing with the aftermath, either in the venue or in the hospital the next day.
I don’t say a word. She doesn’t, either, until, Lovely party, isn’t it? She lifts the glass to her lips to drink.
It is small talk – the universal language of people who don’t know what to talk about at parties. I’m rather grateful for it.
“It is,” I agree, with a nod of my head, though privately I find it no more lovely than usual. “Pilate would claim to throw the best parties in Solterra, I imagine.“ More likely he’d claim to throw the best parties in Novus, but I don’t say that aloud. I can’t speak to his skills over the denizens of other courts – it is always difficult to outdo the celebrations they throw in Denocte, which has always had a reputation for revelry -, but he certainly has a better taste in music than most other Solterran nobles. (He knows it, too, and takes particular pride in it; I’ve seen the invitations he sent out for this one.)
Do they do this often? A perfectly innocent question.
“Very often,” I confirm. “Is this your first time attending one?” I can already guess that it is, but I don’t bother say it; it would hardly be polite.
@Maret || hello I love Maret || "Two Sisters of Persephone," Plath
HE FEEDS ME RED MEAT / HE WATCHES THE BLOOD POOL IN MY MOUTHlaughs at my red teeth❂please tag Ruth! contact is encouraged, short of violence
