Completed Breaking the camel's back

[Naiya]

Winter, Day 90 514 AV

Sewing was an escape. Especially when she could do so away from home, in the gentle quiet of the shop where Maybell was often her only company outside of other Drykas hoping to view the wares of the shop. It was a peace she sought especially today, for she had spoken to her family about her intent to travel with Shahar, and his pavilion to Riverfall. The outcry from her family was large and immediate.

So it was to the shop she departed, far and away from her family's upset. The dealings of a seamstress far more simple. Not that their response was unexpected, but it seemed unreasonable to forbid her to travel with her betrothed only because they were not yet bound by the mark of Cheva.

"Ouch." The word was an involuntary exclamation, escaping her lips as she pricked her finger with the needle. A sure sign of her distraction.

"Are you alright?" The words came form the woman who's dress she was repairing, she had decided to stay the few chimes that the task would take, and Rue had nearly forgotten her.

"Ah, yes. I am fine, thank you." She replied, without pause to inspect her finger. Finding the tip of a needle with her finger was a common occurrence still, though she did not often bleed now, whether from the building of a callous, or just a steadier hand.

She turned back to her work, finding her place in the line of hook stitches that pulled the edges of the cloth together. She was nearly done. One stitch, a second, and a final one, looping in the far corner with a hook perpendicular to the others. Followed by a simple knot, needle through the thread loops twice to make it secure, and a cut to detach the needle and the remaining string.

The tail of the thread stuck out at the ends, a small problem that would not be noticed once the garment was turned right-side-out. That was why one should always do repairs from the inside of the clothing.

"It's done." Rue told the woman with a smile, offering the righted dress to her. "If it is acceptable, then we are done, it will just be five silvers for the work."

The woman examined the stitches, her eye perhaps a better judge than most. "It is fine," The other Drykas told Rue, folding the dress carefully. "But the work is worth twice what you say."

Rue shook her head, Too kind she signed to the woman, "I am still new, my stitches not as neat. It is only five."

[Naiya]

The woman argued some, protesting gently the underpaying of the work. Rue continued to press her, though it did not take more than just a extra words to convince the woman. Paying more was not something she really wanted to do, it just was the proper thing to offer.

Rue walked the woman out, offering further services in the future, and wishing her a safe return home. She smiled and waved, the picture of a happy worker. She was, too, a happy worker, but more because it kept her away from home rather than an intense enjoyment of patching holes in other people's clothing.

She returned then to the more simple of the activities at her fingertips, or rather, one less urgent than than a living being standing at the door asking for help.

Embroidery. The task that often was her escape from the things around her. Her family especially. She could embroider at home, and not be questioned about how she was spending her time, because embroidery was work, and working was all a Drykas had.

All this particular Drykas had.

She had a swatch of cream colored linen pressed between the shape of a hoop, too, holding her practice cloth in place. She was making flowers, trying to anyway. But the process was proving trickier than her expectation.

Yet the struggle to figure out the more complex stitches was still a more welcome task than returning home, though the prospect of finding the Dawnwhispers occurred to her, first she would spend some time with her stitches.

The idea was to bundle the thread over and through itself enough to create a raised flower. It started with a line, and a second, a third. A triangle now, she looped her needle beneath her first thread, and then swung it beneath the second, forming a straight line across towards the second edge of the triangle. A loop up made a cross over the second line that headed for the third, under and over again brought her back to her first stitch.

It was a star. Composed of two triangles overlapping one another. It looked nothing like a flower. Would repeating the process really fix such an obvious design flaw?

Trial was her only real guide here, though if nothing else, she had learned to make a star. She repeated the process, making another triangle between the lines of the second triangle, then another, and another. She really was failing to find the key to this flower thing. Someone had said this flower was easier than stitching out and then filling in the shape of a flower, creating it with the position and direction of the stitches was supposed to be easier.

She didn't buy it. Neither did her thread.

It resembled a flower. Maybe. If you sort of squinted at it.

[Naiya]

Perhaps the error was her stitching, perhaps the needle went beneath the thread, but not through the fabric. Looping around the thread instead. It would change the appearance drastically. The cloth was a barrier, rendering the underside of the embroidery invisible to the viewers. Hiding the flaws, the errors, and sometimes even a beauty unintended.

She was distracted, wandering in her thoughts rather than focusing on her work, her task.

She began again. One line, two, a third. Then the challenge. Making the needle scoop the smooth, stretched, thread up, without breaking through the barrier of the taut fabric. It was easier to move beneath the cloth, beneath the hard line of linen, a strange thing to note, such a soft material stretched until it was firm. It was more difficult this way, but the shape was wrong the other, not a flower, and only vaguely resembling a star after the numerous stitches that were meant to form the petals of the flower. She pressed the needle beneath the thread, hoping to bring herself closer to her goal.

The tip of her needle was uncooperative, passing beneath the thread, and through the cloth. She pulled back some, moving her entire hand to erase the mistake before it could become impossible to fix. The thread was lost, caught by the linen but missed by her needle. Her hand was too high. She adjusted and tried again. Better, the thread was hooked, and her needle still on the same side of the cloth. It turned then, beginning the shape of the second triangle. Careful not to pull to hard on the now looped threads she made her shapes once more. Finding the star, and then the many spiked shape of the not-quite-flower to be the same as before.

This was silly. It still did not resemble a flower. Not really, not the way she wanted it to.

Something was still wrong. Perhaps her care not to pull the threads?

She threaded her needle a third time, knotting the strings together and again attempting the same flower.

First a triangle. Then the beginning of a second, crossing the first carefully, looping the threads but not passing through the cloth, and then pulling in the thread that had been looped. At the end of her second triangle, she didn't have a star any more, though if it was a flower she made, it didn't appear one yet.

She followed the pattern, triangles mangled by the same thread that formed them, pulling down towards each new triangle as they grew smaller and smaller.

In the end she had, something. Whether or not it was a flower was still a matter of suspicion.

[Naiya]

Frustrated with the lack of progress, she turned away from the embroidery, standing to move about the shop and see if she could find something more useful to do than creating oddly shaped stars that were meant to be flowers.

She moved around, straightening displays, and hoping that someone would come inside and ask to try on some clothing, or perhaps even buy something. It didn't work like that, her thoughts and hopes could not summon people looking for clothing.

Instead she turned to separating materials. Digging through for the heaviest weight clothing in thoughts of putting away the items that would not appeal to people as the spring arrived. Zibri wool was quite nice, coming in a variety of colors without need of dyeing. It was thick, and warm. Great for late fall and winter, but spring was too warm, even early in the season for such warm material. So she began separating that material out, placing it all in a single place.

Perhaps keeping it separate would make things easier in the days to come. It would make finding it easier.

She moved again, finding the familiar texture of the zibri wool piled with other fabrics. From the coarser feel of other wools, to the light, cool feel of cotton, or the cool soft touch of linen.

Fabrics were distinct. Each of them serving a purpose, whether staying warm, or keeping cool, or some other purpose, like covering the heads of the Drykas in the shape of their pavilion.

Now, though, was no longer time for the wool, nor would felt be as popular, the soft tightly worked feel of felt would only serve now as decoration, becoming less popular among the Drykas as the weather warmed.

She began pulling that out too, setting it beside the wool. They would soon near Riverfall, perhaps the people there would need the warmer fabric further into the warm seasons? She wasn't so familiar with fashion there as she was among the Drykas.

Riverfall was not a moving city, they might not be so much slaves to the seasons in their dress as the Drykas were.

Chimes passed, and soon after a half bell.

She had nearly neat displays and a stock of warm clothing pulled out from the others. Leaving only the lighter weight clothing on display. The rest was tucked away where it could be found by request.

Well, the rest, really was a relative term, the rest of what she had found, the rest of the things that had been on display. What she had found, had been put away, that was the important part. The task, however had grown boring, and Rue turned back to her flower, star things.

She had not figured out the flower. She could however make leaves, stems, and grass, all things that might make a pretty craft if not a practical embroidery style.

[Naiya]

The change in tactics was much easier, mimicking the ebb and flow of the grasses was easier, perhaps because she had seen far more of the grass than sharp, jagged edge petals that were her original goal. Grass was small stitches, close and tight atop one another, allowing for the flowing and curving that was so reminiscent of grass in the wind. Single blades had to form the shape of the plains, layering one small bladed stalk over another created an intermingled mass of stitches that couldn't be traced in any one direction. No it would take a complex idea supported with simple strokes.

First, a blanketing of larger stalks, threaded amongst one another only in the spindling crests of the plant. A secondary row, separated by the creamy craft material that provided her with a canvas. These reached an apex sooner, entirely smaller than the previous row. The illusion was one of distance, but whether it was a successful illusion, or just her own mind providing her with the sight she desired was an entirely different story.

These leaves, the mingling of the grass, it was a nicer communicating of the grasslands than some, but without nearly the grace of the the finer works of embroidery she had seen.

This was... sufficient, but not beautiful. It didn't even hold the inherent beauty of flowers. It was grass. There was an abundance of grass around, no Drykas was unfamiliar with that sight. Grass whether lush, viridian, and plentiful in the early spring, or the rigid, yellow ocher of the ending summer and approaching fall. Grass was hardly a scarcity.

She wanted to figure out how to mirror the gentle beauty of a flower, the rarity, the fragility of an early bloom, the steadfast grace of a flower grown and at the peak of maturity. Even the quiet dignity of a bloom past it's peak, falling, gentle petals dwindling down to the hard core of the plant.

These were the images she wished to ensnare in her work and exhibit to the people around her. Grace, beauty, dignity. Her mind brought the images to bear as easily, thought all that was required to see the plan she had, yet her fingers could not produce the shapes.

Rather than the depictions of beauty that hemmed the clothing of the wealthy, she had a triangle.

A many layered, intertwining, triangle. Reminiscent of a star before the depths of the intended focal point, the unfurling bud of the flower, marred the clean lines that screamed of dazzling pinpricks of light in the sky after Syna's descent beyond the far off horizon.

This was more frustrating than it was a practice in a skill. Though why she was suddenly so bothered by her failed attempt wasn't certain, it was enough to press her away from the work. Perhaps it was boredom that had her mind so distracted. Or a desire to be preparing to travel with Shahar and Khida, rather than sitting here sewing pointed not flowers into scrap cloth.

Regardless, she was done now, her efforts had produced a wildly marked scrap cloth, and not really anything worth saving. Her day had dwindled away in the shop, and now she had a choice. Returning home to a family who was possibly still in an uproar about her desire to travel, or going to visit the family who occupied most of her mind, and more of her heart.

A simple decision, really.