[OOM] Eiattu - Palace

[fighting_mad]

Princess Isplourrdacartha Estillo is in a Mood.

She has been pressed into wearing a dress. This is bad enough in and of itself, but the green gown has a train that she keeps nearly tripping on, and also involved are: makeup, earrings, high-heeled shoes, and some sort of weird styling substance in her short hair. She looks beautiful; she feels a fool.

Train gathered up in one hand, she stalks through the palace, two members of her Guard following at a safe distance. She hardly notices the startled palace staff and assorted courtiers that she passes as she makes her way down several levels, toward the Great Hall. She was already annoyed enough to have to take time out of a very busy schedule for a formal supper with assorted nobles and high muckety-mucks, and this evening seems to be intent on raising her blood pressure by the second.

She veers from her path; throws open a set of old-fashioned wooden doors and steps out onto the small balcony, into the heavy Eiattu night air. She whirls back and barks, "Come out here and I'll vape you!" at her bodyguards.

She doesn't have a blaster--can't fit even a holdout anywhere under this kriffing clingy thing-- but they don't know that. The man and woman glance at each other, then hurriedly close the balcony doors to wait in the corridor inside.

Plourr leans on the railing, looking at the bright lights of Eiattu's bustling capital city through the low-hanging leaves of a courant tree, and she grits her teeth.

Comments

[fighting_mad]

She snorts. "Y-- Hey." She holds out an indignant hand. "My knife, Pernon. As pretty as it is, you can't keep it."

[eiattu_pride]

"I might."

He finds the knife and dangles it teasingly out of reach.

[fighting_mad]

She reachces up for it-- yeah, even with the boost of the heels, her fingers fall millimeters short. His arms are too kriffing long.

She halts and crosses her arms over her chest. "If you think I'm jumping for it, you're sorely mistaken."

[eiattu_pride]

"Oh, fine."

He hands it over, still grinning.

[fighting_mad]

"Thank you," she says haughtily, taking it back and sliding it up her arm. Fuck not matching. That matches. That so matches.

(It doesn't.)

[eiattu_pride]

Of course it does.

Rial watches her quietly for a moment, and then, "I need to talk to you."

[fighting_mad]

She looks up from her arm-- and her smile fades as she sees his expression. "About?"

[eiattu_pride]

"The engagement."

He sighs.

"I don't want to ruin your life. I'm in love with you, Plourr, and I'm not going to deny it, but you've got a long time still ahead of you. I just mean - look, go date other people. Stay out late. Have a contest to see who can do the most shots of Whyren's. I'm not going to become a husband to an unwilling wife."

[fighting_mad]

Oh.

She can't deny she hasn't worried a little over that, mostly over the no sex, but--

"I don't want to hurt you, Rial."

[eiattu_pride]

"You're not going to."

He's lying, but he makes himself smile.

"Have a life. It's a good thing, trust me."

[fighting_mad]

She knows he's lying. Plourr isn't a stupid woman.

But at the same time, she can't live some cloistered, gray life; she just can't do it.

She nods once. She reaches up and touches his cheek in a gesture that is part thank you, part apology, and all much gentler than her usual manner. "You won't hear a word of anything," she says softly. "I promise."

[eiattu_pride]

He shrugs.

"Maybe I'd like to. You could regale me with some wild tales. Come home falling-down drunk."

[fighting_mad]

Plourr had said 'anything,' but she'd meant 'anyone.'

She doesn't correct him.

She shakes her head seriously, in response to the suggestion, then snorts. "I don't do falling-down drunk."

[eiattu_pride]

"Well, we'll have to remedy that, yes?"

Grins, but his eyes don't smile.

[fighting_mad]

"I'm not paying for the amount of alcohol that would take," she says, and tipsy or not, she feels the underlying tension here. Her own eyes flick away from him-- and come to rest on a section of the wall. It looks different now that she's a good three feet higher off the floor than she was when she was nine, but she still spots the trigger immediately. She takes a sudden step to the side and nudges the depression in the baseboard with her foot, and the panel in the wall slides open.

She smiles quickly, with a brief flash of fierce joy that nobody has closed off the secret passages that she and her sisters used to run through, leaning forward to stare into the passage before she glances back to Rial. "I think I'm going to head upstairs."

[eiattu_pride]

"Of course."

He bows.

"Have a good night, my lady."

[fighting_mad]

She holds his eyes a moment, but says nothing significant, only, "Good night, Rial." Plourr turns away before she can add anything else. She gathers up the train of the dress and ducks into the passage, and the panel silently slides closed behind her.

[eiattu_pride]

And when she's gone, he turns away to his private rooms. Washes the paint off his face and sits in the window.

It's a start.