- 58 Fall 519
One of the more obvious signs Taalviel’s cooked up some new imposition to impress on him is a certain way she has of pursing her lips while fixating him with an unblinking stare, a demonstration usually following her having burst into a room unannounced.
On this musical morning she’s caught him mid-practice, mid-yawn, with a look on her face that means she’s a mind for meddling.
“Slim pickings ‘neath the western wharves today?” he asks lightly, as if he’s inquiring on cordialities as quotidian as a trip to the milliner’s, rather than the fact that sometimes his sister turns into a bird and out of recreational and habitual instinct scavenges for shiny bits, sparkly bobs, and just as likely, dead frogs at the Docks.
Resolutely, he’s remained facing the window, and returned to the easy arpeggio he’d been playing when she swept in, a first-third-fifth on a major scale. Behind him are the familiar sounds of her rifling through the closet and pulling on her linens. Before flying out she’ll shuck her clothes and hang them here, and upon flying back there’s a moment where she’s no longer a bird but a very unapologetically unclothed young woman on his doorstep, in thankful repossession of the limbs and digits required to turn a handle.
Caspian can only imagine what the neighbors think, though she’s no fool and chooses her moments of transformation wisely.
In any case, no one’s said a thing.
“There’s a music school in the northern end,” she says by way of greeting.
First-third-fifth, fifth-third-
“A little sharp, wasn’t that-?” she says, and he’s not falling for it, not today, so third again-first, first-third-
“Flat,” she intones as befittingly.
At this, bow screeching tightly against the strings in abrupt halt, he whirls around to face her with - he certainly thinks - an admirably restrained glower.
“I assure you I am very aware as to the extent and consequences of my being out of practice. I’d rather like it if you didn’t rub it in.”
“Not what I meant,” she replies simply and remorselessly. “You couldn’t afford it anyway.”
“If you’re trying to insult me, could you at least pick something that sincerely hurts? It’s beneath me to be so relentlessly misunderstood.”
“It’s about a job, and if you don’t want it, I’ll handle it myself.”
Frowning, he crosses his arms, violin held akimbo and bow jutting haphazardly into the air, readying for emphatic conduction. “I don’t know why you didn’t just lead with that.”
“Because anything else I might say to you isn’t worth your time?”
As ammunition, somehow, that’s the one that lands.
The bow quivers midair as he opens his mouth in retort, comes short, and shuts it.
“Don’t say you’re sorry,” she says before he tries. “I know you don’t mean it, and you’re not a very good liar, so to hear it from you would be - what do you call it? Insulting[i] and [i]beneath me.”
They fall silent, and he imagines a whole host of reactions he might take, most of it derived from repertoire they’ve cultivated together and seem to constantly find themselves trapped within. Lately, though - the past year, he supposes, ever since she’d appeared last autumn - there’s a breath he takes, one that doesn’t always completely dispel the recurring veil of snappishness and grit, but lifts a layer all the same. It becomes critical, that he can suddenly see what had first presented itself as an impossibility - that perhaps his sister, though relentlessly frustrating and automatively critical, and usually over aspects and events he doesn’t seem as worthy of the same intensity of regard, may not be the worst person he’s ever met.
In fact, she may be one of the better.
“Thank you,” he says instead of simulating repentance, which is not entirely beyond him but would have in this moment originated, more than anything, from wanting to eliminate her ire.
“You’re welcome,” she replies, and she isn’t angry, only watching him with her curious dark eyes, hands already fiddling with the silver-tipped drawstrings at the neck of her poplin blouse. “Can I tell you more about it?”
He nods, loosening the camber of his bow, and joins his sister at the dining table.
WC: 708
On this musical morning she’s caught him mid-practice, mid-yawn, with a look on her face that means she’s a mind for meddling.
“Slim pickings ‘neath the western wharves today?” he asks lightly, as if he’s inquiring on cordialities as quotidian as a trip to the milliner’s, rather than the fact that sometimes his sister turns into a bird and out of recreational and habitual instinct scavenges for shiny bits, sparkly bobs, and just as likely, dead frogs at the Docks.
Resolutely, he’s remained facing the window, and returned to the easy arpeggio he’d been playing when she swept in, a first-third-fifth on a major scale. Behind him are the familiar sounds of her rifling through the closet and pulling on her linens. Before flying out she’ll shuck her clothes and hang them here, and upon flying back there’s a moment where she’s no longer a bird but a very unapologetically unclothed young woman on his doorstep, in thankful repossession of the limbs and digits required to turn a handle.
Caspian can only imagine what the neighbors think, though she’s no fool and chooses her moments of transformation wisely.
In any case, no one’s said a thing.
“There’s a music school in the northern end,” she says by way of greeting.
First-third-fifth, fifth-third-
“A little sharp, wasn’t that-?” she says, and he’s not falling for it, not today, so third again-first, first-third-
“Flat,” she intones as befittingly.
At this, bow screeching tightly against the strings in abrupt halt, he whirls around to face her with - he certainly thinks - an admirably restrained glower.
“I assure you I am very aware as to the extent and consequences of my being out of practice. I’d rather like it if you didn’t rub it in.”
“Not what I meant,” she replies simply and remorselessly. “You couldn’t afford it anyway.”
“If you’re trying to insult me, could you at least pick something that sincerely hurts? It’s beneath me to be so relentlessly misunderstood.”
“It’s about a job, and if you don’t want it, I’ll handle it myself.”
Frowning, he crosses his arms, violin held akimbo and bow jutting haphazardly into the air, readying for emphatic conduction. “I don’t know why you didn’t just lead with that.”
“Because anything else I might say to you isn’t worth your time?”
As ammunition, somehow, that’s the one that lands.
The bow quivers midair as he opens his mouth in retort, comes short, and shuts it.
“Don’t say you’re sorry,” she says before he tries. “I know you don’t mean it, and you’re not a very good liar, so to hear it from you would be - what do you call it? Insulting[i] and [i]beneath me.”
They fall silent, and he imagines a whole host of reactions he might take, most of it derived from repertoire they’ve cultivated together and seem to constantly find themselves trapped within. Lately, though - the past year, he supposes, ever since she’d appeared last autumn - there’s a breath he takes, one that doesn’t always completely dispel the recurring veil of snappishness and grit, but lifts a layer all the same. It becomes critical, that he can suddenly see what had first presented itself as an impossibility - that perhaps his sister, though relentlessly frustrating and automatively critical, and usually over aspects and events he doesn’t seem as worthy of the same intensity of regard, may not be the worst person he’s ever met.
In fact, she may be one of the better.
“Thank you,” he says instead of simulating repentance, which is not entirely beyond him but would have in this moment originated, more than anything, from wanting to eliminate her ire.
“You’re welcome,” she replies, and she isn’t angry, only watching him with her curious dark eyes, hands already fiddling with the silver-tipped drawstrings at the neck of her poplin blouse. “Can I tell you more about it?”
He nods, loosening the camber of his bow, and joins his sister at the dining table.
WC: 708
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Boxcode credit: Antipodes!