Salmon Gildays

Log Info

• Title: Salmon Gildays

• Emitter: Ravenstongue

• Characters: Ravenstongue, Simony, Slixvah

• Place: Lower Market District, Alexandria

Light rain doesn't dissuade anyone from going to the Lower Markets in search of a good deal. After all, it's the second-to-last day of Callem, and the merchants are more generously discounting all of the things that sell best in the summer. The breezy dresses and tunics best suited for the warmest days of Daeus's rays are flying from the stalls, and there are some merchants who are busy hanging up their wares in anticipation of the autumn season.

Cor'lana Lupecyll-Atlon is no stranger to finding a good deal, although the woman is shrouded partially under a long violet cloak that hides most of her body. Her dark waves of hair tumble over the cloak, however. She's engaged in a conversation with a merchantwoman that she knows quite well, a gnomish lady who sells some of the snacks that Pothy loves to consume, and she's rather bashful as the woman comments that Cor'lana's practically glowing from her pregnancy.

Not so far from Cor'lana, however, three younger girls--humans, who look so alike they could almost be sisters, what with their blonde hair pulled up into high ponytails and their color-coordinated salmon-colored dresses--talk. They're not exactly being shy.

"Oh my gods. That's the Temptress of Alexandria over there. Has to be. Look at her eyes!" says one with green eyes.

That draws a leer from another with brown eyes. She sneers. "Oh, it's her, all right. Look at those little eyes. Bet she's ensnared half the city's boys with those."

"I can't believe what she did to my poor Telamon!" the last girl says with a dramatic sigh. She lifts a hand and fans herself. "Having that wolf's baby instead of his! I bet it'll come out with a tail and then Telamon will kick her to the streets where she belongs!"

Cor'lana goes still in her discussions then. Very, very quiet. She doesn't turn to look at the young women, but it's obvious that she's heard them.

Another figure is here, despite the rain. Their gyroparasol twirling gently in the mild wind. Beneath it is a striking half-sil woman in a teal sundress. Brown hair bouncing in curls with matching teal eyeshadow and lipstick. Sky blue eyes stand out as she's busy hmm'ing and poking at various implements from a passing alchemist shop.

Their attention is drawn over to the gossips, and like a lodestone, she slides over, pretending to peruse another stall, but totally eavesdropping.

Her eyebrows shoot up, glancing from the salmon school to Cor'lana. She had heard the rumors and read the paper, but was it true? The chatty bird in her wanted to indulge, but logic wasn't connecting the dots on this one. Time to observe...

The Goblin is fond of a good deal, trying to be frugal with her coin. Dressed in her robes of copper with blue trim, she's protected from the rain by a good cloak. Her hood is down, however, to accommodate a bun made from a significant (for a Goblin) amount of hair. A pair of new easels are carried, one under each arm.

The violet cloak is spotted out of the corner of her eye, and Simony smiles, her pace increasing as she moves to catch up with the Half-Sil. The gossip isn't really heard until the Gobbo gets closer, and she slows, her eyes narrowing. At the mention of Telamon, she frowns. Pausing a moment, she notes Cor'lana's posture, and a decision is made. Straightening, Simony strides ahead through the gaggle of gossipy girls, the legs of her new purchases whacking shins, and catching the last girl behind the knee. Without stopping, the Goblin growls, "Don't stand in the middle of the thoroughfare, idiot children."

"Oh owwwww!" the Telamon fangirl whines, far too loudly. It definitely did not actually hurt that badly. Not unless this young lady has bones so brittle that they might as well resemble a slender and thin little glass sculpture.

The other two girls sneer at Simony. "It's a free city," one of them responds. "We can stand wherever we want."

"My father is high up in the Temple of Rada," the brown-eyed girl responds smugly. "That means, like, we own this Market."

"That's not how that works," Cor'lana mutters quietly to herself.

The Telamon fangirl, unfortunately, overhears the comment that Cor'lana makes, or at least the fact that she said something. "Oh, what's that, homewrecker? You saying something? Puh-leeeeese. Telamon deserves way better than you!"

That gets the other two girls staring at her. Like they can't believe she said that to the Temptress of Alexandria's face. But then they grin widely. "Get her, Jess!" they cheer.

Basic Slix stifles a giggle as she spies Simony hit shins, but she quirks her head to the side at the exchange as is escalates to bratty nonsense.

Oh. She smirks. Bratty nonsense is her specialty.

The teal clad half-sil struts up, parasol quietly clicking as her platforms do the same against the cobble. "It is a free city. It's also free to make choices. Salmon? Really? That's so last Aestry," she tuts, flipping a curl over her shoulder as teal lips purse. "If your father is so high up, surely he'd supply you with the actual latest and greatest in fashion?"

The Gobbo maintains a stern countenance despite the telltale 'I really want to smile' twitch in the corners of her lips. She comes to a stop and turns around. "Aye, it's a free city, an' you're free t'get your shins smacked for blockin' the way.", Simony growls. She glances at the brown-eyed girl. "You're an idiot. Rada doesn't have a temple here, or most anywhere. He has shrines, and his priests and priestesses travel the lands, tending to shrines. Nice try, girlie. How about ya learn a thing or two about how the temples actually work? I am sure your father would chastise ya for blocking the path."

The Gobbo turns to the Telamon fangirl. "And ye? You think Telamon would want someone like you? A vicious young idiot who will shrivel up into a crone inside his lifetime? PUH-leeeease."

There's something dark in Cor'lana's eyes, but she looks like she's stopped from doing something she might regret when Slixvah and Simony both intervene. There's gratitude in her eyes, a gratitude she's been conditioned to not express in recent times.

The young women are aghast with Slixvah's comment. "We wear salmon on Gildays!" the green-eyed one exclaims. "It's our thing!"

"It's a throwback! Fashion's cyclical!" the brown-eyed one adds on. "Like a... really big wheel! And my father doesn't live here!" Right. He lives somewhere else that they happen to have a temple to Rada and not a shrine. Very likely.

The Telamon fangirl, however, looks incandescent with rage for a moment as she looks at Simony. "I'm one of his biggest fans! I even have the tattoo!" she shouts. "Besides, I bet he'd want someone who isn't running off on him with a flea-bitten dog any day of the week!"

Cor'lana stares at the Telamon fangirl for a long and hard moment. "You should leave before you say something you might regret," she says darkly.

"What, and miss you bewitching someone with your magic? I bet the only thing stopping you from seeing that wolf again is that he's dead." The fangirl sneers.

Something visibly snaps in Cor'lana. She raises a hand...

Basic Slix's lips pinch together in an upturned pettiness as she watches Simony rip into the girls. Gods, this was juicy. Doubly so since she was secretly backing up Cor'lana on the sly. She glances over at Cor'lana, this strange, teal clad fashionista just stepped out of nowhere to-

Sky blue eyes crinkle in a very, very familiar smile. Oh. There's without a shadow of a doubt that this is Slixvah.

She turns back to women with a raised bow. "It's your thing on Gildays? Salmon?" She looks up to the sky. Down to the ground. Off to the street. Then back to the salmon school as she pretends to read her empty palm. "Gilead just sent a missive: he wants his fish back," she 'reads' cooly.

She looks back and forth between the two, a lance of alarm flitting across her eyes as Cor'lana raises a hand. Stupidly, she takes a step forward, getting between the potentially deadly magic and the fangirl. "Wow. Bewitching. Big words coming out of your mouth. Father ignore you so much he gives you gold to go on these petty sprees? Need a strong figure in your life so you tattooed someone completely out of your league on you so you can feel like you got a crumb of accomplishment? And pretend to have a touch of a man?" she tuts, raising her chin as she looks down at them. "Pathetic."

The Goblin's grinning now, a feral looking thing filled with fangs and sharp teeth. "Pfff, a throwback? More like the only fashion you can afford is last decade's castoffs. Do you even know your father?"

Simony reaches up and tugs the shoulder of her robes aside, baring her neck and showing off the five-pointed star tattooed onto her shoulder. "I am not only his number 1 fan, I'm the one who did the tattoos. So if you have one, yours is a fake, because I didn't tattoo you." She snorts then. "You're badmouthing a woman who disintegrated a demon that had the temerity to attack Telamon. A woman who has slain countless undead, monsters and demons, who's been holding back the darkness since before you were born and will be doing so long after you've shriveled up and blown away in the wind. Not only are you not in her league when it comes to the content of her character, you can't even hold a candle to her fashion sense. Pfff, you're so bereft of fashion sense that you need to dress according to what day it is? PUH-LEEEEESE."

The two young women--the ones with green and brown eyes--don't look like they're having fun anymore, especially the brown-eyed one. She huffs. "I saw my father last month!"

"Wasn't it because he was telling you he's cutting your allowance?" the green-eyed girl mutters. This earns her a dirty look from the brown-eyed girl.

Meanwhile, the Telamon fangirl in particular's cheeks are burning red with how viciously she's been verbally eviscerated by Simony and Slixvah both. She sputters for a moment before she manages to get anything out of her throat. "My tattoo's not a fake," she protests weakly.

There's a ghost of a smile on Cor'lana's lips then. She leans her outraised hand down so that the fangirl can see the curuchuil of stars and feathers that decorates the back of her hand. "Your love for him's fake and fleeting," she says darkly. "You will never know what it's like to stand by him through all of the things we've endured together. You will never know what it's like to hold him as he sheds tears over the sorrows you share. You will never know the genuine side of him, that part of him that shines so much brighter than his looks. You want a pretty face. He's far, far more than that. And only I know him best. Only I can ever know him like that."

And then she coils her hand into a spellcasting pose. "Now run along, all three of you, before I pick and choose which one of you will experience that magic you all seem so convinced I use entirely to bewitch men. I promise you--I am capable of far more than that."

GAME: Slixvah rolls spellcraft: (15)+16: 31
GAME: Simony rolls spellcraft: (19)+6: 25

Basic Slix snorts at Simony's assault, a lopsided grin cracking through the haughty front. "Yes. And besides, who are you to judge with such terrible tastes? You know nothing of her arrangement. Just like you don't know how to arrange that jewelry, gods its clashing with your caked on makeup."

She turns to to Cor'lana her amused joy at this situation flipping to a mild worry. That was spoken from the heart, not just some flimsy petty words. And now a casting stance is taken. Her heart shoots up to her throat. Then briskly falls back down. But her face doesn't belie the panic. She grabs Simony by the robe and attempts to pull her out of the way. "That's the Spell of Ultimate Bewitchment!" she gasps, getting out of the road. "It strips your entire sense of being and she feeds on it! Not that she'll get much from the three of them but get out of the way!"

The Goblin snorts in return at Slix's verbal stab, bending down to pick up a brown'd leaf, a subtle hint of the onset of Autumn. "I think this came off your forehead just now.", she says with a broad grin, offering it up to the Telamon fangirl.

Simony looks fearful for a few moments, carefully stepping out of the street. A small crate is settled upon, and a candy is pulled out of a pouch on her belt. It's popped into her mouth and slurped at.

"Mmmmmh. Thi' is gon be goo'" she mumbles.

"The Spell of Ultimate Bewitchment?!" all three young women yell at once.

"Fuck this, I'm out!" yells one.

"Me too!" agrees another.

"H-H-Have a nice life!" the Telamon fangirl tries to offer as a parting shot, before all three girls book it through the marketplace. They very nearly run into someone on the way--an older woman who shakes her cane at them and tells them off, before she goes about her business.

"Sorry!" Cor'lana calls over to the old woman, who just smiles and waves back to her. She sighs and looks at Slixvah and Simony. "I am so very happy the two of you were here," she says. "That could have gone... Way worse."

Basic Slix ducks behind the crate with Simony, her holding out a hand for a candy. "Oh, it really is gonna be, hon," she coos in a familiar tone- ah, it's Slix!

She grins as the three girls shout and start to scurry off, enjoying the hubris of their actions. A thought crosses her. Luck needs to be vented. Seen only to Cor'lana and Simony, the striking half-sil pulls an ethereal thread out of the air. Another. And another. Before she pinches them tight to snap them and pulls them back together again to shoddily tie them before letting go. They vanish. "There. Have a shitty day."

She rises smoothly, setting her parasol back on her other shoulder. "Ye. No problem, sugar. Like, don't gimmie wrong, I am very happy fo' ya! Congrats!" she smiles broadly. Then scowls. "But c'mon. So frickin' rude of folks ta do that."

A candy is handed over to the Teal lady, and then Simony JUMPS when they coo like Slixvah. She snorts and swats at the 'Half-Sil's' shoulder. "Such a tease.", she huffs. The Gobbo laughs uproariously as the three girls beat feet. "BUH-bye now! Don't come back, PUH-leeeese!"

And then she runs to Cor'lana's side, hugging at the woman's waist. "I am sorry you had to go through that. Well done on keeping your composure."

There's a little look of embarrassment on Cor'lana's face when Slixvah congratulates her, but she smiles anyway, going to offer Simony a little headpat. "Well, people can believe what they'd like," she says. "I'm just glad I didn't have to actually cast anything and that they all got the message."

She sighs deeply. "I knew I should have just sent Telamon to fetch things for me, but I thought with the partial rain I could go out. It's... not healthy to be cooped up in a house all the time." Her voice is dark on that little note, a little pain that she knows far too well.

But then she shakes her head. "No matter. I have things to be about today. I just hope that you both have far more peaceful days now that's done."

Basic Slix winks at being swat, her playfully rubbing her shoulder before popping the candy in her mouth. "When am I ever not?" she retorts.

She idly twirls the parasol, raising a brow and giving a lopsided smile. Dots aren't connecting when they should. Instead, she just flashes her teeth. "'course. I'm jus' glad ya didn't have ta explode th' place ta make a point." She sticks her tongue out.

She shakes her head. "It ain't healthy. Gods, I couldn't imagine being stuck inside all day, unable to stretch my wings. But-! I will have a good one!"

The Goblin is content with the headpat, smiling up at Cor'lana. "You did fantastic! And you, as well, Slixvah, you picked up on her meaning right away, and did some fantastic acting! And you had some top notch insults." Simony giggles brightly. "They learned not to mess with us, eh? Did you see their faces? They knew they'd bitten off far more than they could chew!"

She looks up at Cor'lana again, "I would come with you, Cor'lana."

"It's something I'd like to never experience again if I can help it," Cor'lana adds gently. "No bird should ever be stuck in a cage. Including... me."

But then Simony offers to walk her home, and the sorceress can't help but smile. "I think that's a good idea," she says to Simony. "We can have a bit of tea. My treat."

She smiles at Slixvah and offers the parasol-wielding woman (although the parasol is, as has been demonstrated, only one of her weapons) a little wave and kind parting words. It's not long before she moves to make her way out of the market.

It's also not long before the bad luck comes due. Just two streets down, the Telamon fangirl, while trying on sandals from a store not far from the markets that sells shoes, stumbles on her own balance, and she steps on a child's block toy with sharp edges that happens to be nearby, left there by an inattentive child trying on his own shoes.

Cor'lana hears the howls of pain as she and Simony passes by. She smiles grimly. "Isn't that unfortunate," she comments dryly.

She needs to send Slixvah some flowers later.