Closed Belated Birthday (Khara, Bran)

[Drusilla]

16th of Spring 515AV Drusilla walked slowly down the tunnel way, a covered cage in one hand and her other keeping her bag closed. "Is it dark enough, Bitta?" She asked the bat, he had been with her a week now. His recovery going great. While she mainly kept the bat in her room today she brought him with her. "Today you're going to meet Khara or Chickadee. I was sick all winter and missed her birthday so today we're going to wish her a belated birthday!" Some Inarta stopped and stared at the Symenestra talking to a cage in a strange language. "I'll have to speak Nari to her though, not Symenos. So I'll sound much different to you." She continued walking most people avoiding her as she went. "Not much further now, just down this hall." Ah the Commons, Drusilla missed the hustle and bustle of them. She missed hearing people talking and the general noise of people being about. The Aeries always seemed so quiet, so empty. It brought a nostalgic smile to her face and she almost walked past her destination. "It looks like we're here, Bitta. Now behave when you meet her." Drusilla knocked on the door, "Chickadee, are you home?" She asked in a pleasant voice.

[Khara]

If there was one thing that Khara would never ever get used to, it would be someone asking for her here. It wasn't exactly a secret that she was living with Zhol and had practically abandoned her own room. The space wasn't hers, however, not really anyway. A Dek bringing her a message or one of the other game scouts meeting her outside the door was one thing, but a visitor? Someone who was actually going to come inside the room?? Zhol had mentioned he had seen Drusilla the day before and told her of their arrangement, Khara just hadn't expected this.

"Y-yes! J-just a, a, tick!" She called back, fighting against surprise and nerves to be heard.

Khara quickly sprang from where she had been sitting at the small table, moping over it being one of the impossibly cruel days that Zhol actually had to work and she didn't. Her journal and various colored inks were closed in a flurry of movements as she attempted to tidy up. Blankets were tugged into some semblance of neatness on the bed, next the bit of red fabric that Khara had secured from the ceiling and draped over the heading and footing of the bunk was smoothed out as best as possible. With the main item in the room squared away she hurried about returning items to and shutting the small chest that held her belongings, and finally shoved her bag that had most of it's contents spilling out onto the floor against the wall.

A cringe flashed across her features as she noticed the overall lack of a proper setup for entertaining guests, especially someone like Drusilla whose opinion actually mattered. Hopefully she would understand, though. At least Khara had the sense to bring the chair from her room so that there was more than one place to sit.

The door was approached as the Chiet attempted to straighten out her own clothing, even if it was only her typical plain garb. Her hair - well, there was nothing to be done by that point but quickly drag her fingers through it and hopefully caused it to lie a bit more presentable than it had been. A deep breath was taken, struggling against every nervous tick that wanted to present itself and she opened the door to the simple yet cluttered room.

"S-sorry it took a bit. I wasn't really expecting anyone." The sight of Dru standing in the hall did manage to bring a smile to her. It was nice to have someone whom she could consider a friend arrive, even if the scout was uncertain about having someone in Zhol's room without his permission. Khara figured he wouldn't mind if it was his sister, though, so that helped ease her worries a bit. "P-please, come in! Sorry if it's a little messy, I don't think one of these rooms is exactly supposed to have all this stuff in it."

A slightly shocked look came upon her as she noticed that Dru seemed to be carrying quite a few things. "Can I help you carry any of that? Though, I guess you already made it here by yourself. Here, you can set it down-"

The Chiet scrambled to pick up the simple bound journal and vials of ink and tucked them away in the bag on the floor. "-on the table."

"Nari" | "Common" | "Pavi"

[Brandon Blackwing]

Comfortable was not quite the word to describe how hanging in a cage was, when said cage was being carried to some place that was too far from the house of the spider to actually get it over with quickly. Fortunately, he had managed to hang from the top of the cage -with some help from Dru of course- which made the rocking a bit more bearable. If he'd been sitting or lying on the floor he'd been thrown from side to side. Was it dark enough? Yes, it was, the black cloth draped over the cage kept the light away, but that didn't mean he could actually sleep. Not with this damned rocking! Why did they have to go to this Chickadee again? Why by day? And why did he have to come too? If he had been asked, he'd have told the spider he'd rather stay in her home, but his opinion did not matter. As far as people were concerned, animals had no opinions about those things because animals were stupid and couldn't think. Well petch off people!

Of course the fact that Dru kept asking questions and kind of pampered him did not mean that he actually had any say in certain matters. Bathing? No thank you. However he'd be soaked anyway. Spread your wings for me so I can check for whatever the heck she was looking for. No, Brandon didn't want to. But still; his wings would be forcefully spread. Do you want to come with me to Khara? No, let me sleep and enjoy some quiet. Where was he now? Where the heck was he now?! In a cage traversing the tunnels and being brought to Khara. No rest, no sleep, no peace and quiet. Great, just great.

It didn't help that the tunnels were noisy and echoed a bit. He missed the boring, quiet house already. At least there he could just sleep when he wanted to, or enjoy the silence. Now he could not, and he was hungry. He had been hungry for days; Dru could simply not catch enough bugs in one night and even though she did her utmost best, Brandon still ended up hungry. Meditation hardly helped, and being still all the time made it so he'd need less food, but still. If the bugs you could get were not even twenty-five percent of an ordinary or even bad hunt... well...

Behave she said, behave. Well, he might, if you could just leave him alone and let him rest! Gods damn freaking Symenestra and stupid Wind Reach! the bat's thoughts grumbled as the Sym's voice spoke in a language that sounded too high pitched and was just plain annoying at the moment. Maybe in a good mood he'd have thought it to be quite nice, like birdsong in a cool forest, but right now? Nope. Too high a pitch, too fast paced, too freaking bird-like and he didn't understand a thing. If he hadn't known better he'd have believed Drusilla to have been transformed into a blackbird or so. More chirping erupted from behind the door, a response to whatever Dru had whistled. Well, this Chickadee is a bird after all. I can tell that this is going to be a great day for me.

Even more chirping, and this time the door was opened and Dru walked inside, chirping even more, and enticing still more birdsongs and whistles from the one called Chickadee. If his ears were accurate -and that they were,always- the person was female. Nervous too, but he could be wrong, this whole language was too fast and too hurried to actually discern emotions and different tones. Chickadee was probably just speaking normal and the Kelvic had been mistaken. Maybe she was just really happy, or ranting about one thing or another. He didn't know, and neither did he care. It was good that the cage had been placed down, that the rocking had subsided and that he might be able to catch some sleep; if those two would be quiet that is. In some pointless effort, Brandon wrapped his wings around his body tighter, tucking his ears underneath them as well. Maybe this would help? No, no it didn't. Gods damn all birds in the world!

OOCHooray for cranky Bran
c

Credit goes to Ollic

[Drusilla]

"It's okay, my visit was sort of unplanned." Drusilla admitted. "I mean I knew I wanted to come and see you, but it happening today was, well.... Planned last tick, you could say..." She smiled at the girl. "Don't worry you should of seen my room here in the commons. While I didn't have a lot it was strewn everywhere... But.. That did make it easier to hide a few Deks from the Endals and others who wished them harm. Oh, but don't tell anyone! Because I think they still hide out in my old room." Drusilla looked about the room, bringing a smile to her face, "I came here today because I was sick over the winter and missed a certain someone's birthday, and after all she did for my birthday... Well, doing nothing was out of the question. But after finding out yesterday that well, this." She motioned an arm around the room. "I felt that a congratulations was in order as well. Chickadee, I'm so happy for you! Not that you are with my Verda, but that you are happy." She grinned, "The way Zhol's eyes light up when he talks of you, well one might think he has candles in his ears to make them shine so bright! He truly without a doubt loves you Miss Khara." "Ah, that reminds me, I want you to meet someone!" She pulled the cloth off of the cage. "This is Bitta, he's an ear bat. I wasn't sure if you'd be interested in seeing him, but as a game scout I figured you might. Hmm... He looks kinda grumpy today... I found him after an owl attack after the market. Poor little guy, I patched his back up and so far I haven't noticed any abnormalities in him... Besides being grumpy today..." She pouted at the bat. "Any who, the reason I'm here... Birthday presents! You got me that pie so it's only fair. So at the market, there was an Avora who was selling amazing candles! There were some that smelled like Wind Eagles! How do you make a candle smell like that? Well I stopped and found one that smelled like 'grasslands' and bought it for Zhol. I gave it to him yesterday, and asked him to help me pick out which candle you'd like best... He was of very little help..." Drusilla pulled out a pinkish orange candle. "So I went with this wildflowers one. I-I hope it's to your liking." She gave a meek smile, "If you don't mind I'd like to learn what things you do like, I know rock climbing is one... Drusilla pulled something small from her bag, "And I know you liked mine so I found you one, an Opalgloam." Drusilla handed the gifts to Khara, "Happy Late-Birthday Chickadee!"

[Khara]

Khara couldn't help but smile at Drusilla's enthusiasm; it was infectious as it always was and immediately the Chiet felt her nervous fidgets shift in nature, less worrisome and more their typical uncontrolled constant ticks.

"It-it's okay, I just never really have had a visitor before," Khara quietly admitted as Dru entered the room.

The only reaction she had to Drusilla's sudden confession of hiding Deks in her room, was a quick wide eyed glance; that sort of thing was dangerous! Not entirely surprising given the Symenestra's unusually kind nature, but still could get someone in a lot of trouble. Khara had absolutely zero intentions of telling anyone. Before she could assure Dru of that fact, the seamstress was off again, talking about what brought her here today before mentioning how she had learned of where Khara was staying and how Zhol must have told her about how they were - whatever they were now. Like a great deal of things, it caused Khara to blush. Hearing Zhol say kind things to her was one thing, knowing he spoke of her to others to where his feelings for her was obvious was entirely different, not bad just... different.

Khara opened her mouth to try and say something again, though she wasn't entirely sure what would come out and was saved from any potentially embarrassing admissions by her attention being suddenly drawn to the cage that Drusilla had brought with her. An ear bat? Khara had never heard of such a thing before and couldn't help but be curious. She approached the cage cautiously, a twinge of sadness felt that apparently the animal had been attacked by another that she really liked. Bats weren't birds, but that didn't mean the little flying creatures didn't fascinate her all the same. Dru was right though, he did look quite grumpy.

And then Drusilla was giving her presents and Khara's eyes widened again as she looked back to the Symenestra. A candle that smelled like Wind Eagles? Was that even possible? The fact Dru had seemed to find the perfect candle for Zhol was something Khara figured must have meant a great deal to the boy. She was handed the pinkish candle whose color reminded her very much of some of the wildflowers around Wind Reach and Khara raised it slowly towards her nose and breathed in. It really did smell like wildflowers! Just like the ones that littered the meadows she always loved to come across in the Spring once the snows bloomed.

She was just about to thank Dru when another gift was given and Khara couldn't help but let out a surprised squeak. "An... an opalgloam?" She placed the candle on the table and cupped the small gemstone in both hands, blocking out some of the light around it to clearly see the glow that had so captivated her the first time Dru had shown her the one that Turrin had got for her.

"Th-thank you, Dru," Khara softly stammered as she looked back up to the other woman, a soft smile fighting for control over the urgings that she was undeserving of such a thing. "It's beautiful. It will always make me think of you and how nice you've been to me. I would love to tell you more about what I like, but I don't think I'm so interesting..."

Khara set the small stone aside and fidgeted, an urge to hug Dru coming forth before a new instinct settled her arms back at her sides. A fleeting memory of how she had reacted from the casual brush against her in a crowded market had made her feel threatened to seep in and ruin the moment. The girl banished it by picking up the opalgloam in her hands again and turned back to look at the bat - the perfect opportunity to take the focus off her and let her mind think of something else.

"You're right, though. He does look a bit grumpy. Maybe it was too loud in the halls for him?" Khara suggested, her own voice dropping a few levels in volume. She didn't know much about bats, but did know they were nocturnal creatures. Nighttime was dark and quiet, and the warrens of Wind Reach during the day were anything but. A thought occurred to her and she quickly set about blowing out the closest of the candles that were lighting the room. She became suddenly very aware of the light the small stone in her hands was giving off as well and cupped her fingers around it further.

"How do you know so much about bats? Did they have them in Kalinor?" Khara asked, once again trying to keep her voice down to hopefully help calm the bat. Owls didn't make a lot of sounds, but she was overly aware of how much Nari sounded like birdspeak to some others, she didn't want her chirping to remind the poor thing of how it was attacked.

"Nari" | "Common" | "Pavi"

[Brandon Blackwing]

Brandon would have sworn Dru couldn’t manage to stop talking, chatting fast with her chirping and sounding like some hyperactive sparrow. Her speech didn’t quite sound as the other person’s though, there was some strange accent that was eerily familiar, and yet it sounded completely different than anything else Dru’d spoken. It was Symenos, no doubt about it, but it sounded entirely not like how he’d heard the Symenestra speak it the last few days. Either way, he couldn’t quite put his finger on it why it sounded so… strange to him to hear her speak the Inarta language, but it probably was because she was a spider.

Not that it mattered, she seemed happy enough and rattled away, blabbing about things the bat could not understand. Did it annoy him? Yes, he couldn’t eavesdrop on the conversation now, and any good reason to actually try and stay awake was gone. Yet, with the noise there was no way he actually could pull it off. Unbeknownst to him, his wings had tightened even more around his body and his teeth showed a little, kind of resembling an angry snarl. Perhaps people might have sworn they could see a scowl on his face too, if they could actually see through dark cloth, that is.

And then it was gone, n good bye darkness, good bye cloth. Say hello to freakishly bright candle light and do so as shockingly fast as possible. No surprise, Brandon gave an angry, startled shriek and flapped his wings once before folding them back around his furry body, eyes clenched shut while he tried to find out the reason for this crime against bat kind. How was he supposed to get a wink of sleep if they kept disturbing him of it? And don’t call him Bitta for Dira’s sake! He had a strong dislike for that name. Maybe I should bite some fingers and teach them a bat needs his sleep! Or just teach them to leave me alone during the day. I have no need for visits to whoever’s place it is we are at right now.

But, what was this? The Chickadee person lowered her voice? She actually started to whisper? Some candles were blown out, the light dimmed a bit? Oh, this was good, he liked that! Yes, this was better, good move, he liked her already. Maybe he’d be able to do something about his lack of rest now, maybe he’d wake up with a better mood. Carefully, he opened his eyes, blinking ferociously at the light that was still a bit bright but a lot better already. It took a while, but he actually got used to it, adapting after a while and finally getting a good look –or at least as good as his bat-perspective allowed- on the Chickadee. Proportions were a bit ridiculous of course, everything close to him was too large and in general they didn’t make too much sense.

Either way, if the cage would be covered again, it would be great, but knowing Dru, that wouldn’t happen anytime soon; she’d probably try to hang him in her hair or something like that, perhaps even believing he cared about being in someone else’s room and trying to pet him. If there was anything he’d learned about the Sym in the past six days it was that she was slightly crazy and that she had her own special way of doing things, and that she was a scatterbrain who forgot doing a lot of stuff that actually mattered. Like stitching his wound for example. She hadn’t done that until it had been blatantly obvious it was necessary, like three days ago or so. It had hurt too, but biting on a small piece of wood worked miracles, as would the stitches. Now his back could close itself again, instead of being some loose flaps of skin and flesh.

c

Credit goes to Ollic

[Drusilla]

"It's nothing, Khara." Drusilla had decided to switch to common as she felt the chirping was irritating the bat and mentally cringed and the horrible accent that came out of her mouth. "After what you did for my birthday, it's the least I could do. It meant a lot to me." She smiled, "Well how will I ever know if what you like is boring if you never tell? Like, do you enjoy picking flowers, or archery! I finally made it to an Avora! Took me forever but!" She grinned from ear to ear."We can go to the Avora range to practice." It had taken the Symenestra forever to climb the ladder of Wind Reach, but she had did it. "I decided in my spare time, I'll be a dress maker and I even have an apprentice! His name is Lyerd, he was my dek errand boy before. He's also the one Azira punched. He has a bad eye and can't talk, those are the reasons they made him a dek. But, he's smart, we have a makeshift sign language type thing to interact." She turned to the cage, "Yes, we have bats aplenty in Kalinor. We keep some as pets. He's a paler version of the average Ear Bat, making him much rarer than a brown one." She half covered the cage with the cloth, "You see, this kind of bat has large ears. But he's covering them... While most bats hunt using their sonar, these guys use their ears and listen for prey. Bats see fairly well and have a great sense of smell. Plus, these ear bats have such cute faces! Bitta we've stopped chirping and lowered our voices along with dimming the lights... Won't you just sit on my hand for a few ticks so Khara can admire the lovely bat you are?" She was talking to the bat... in front of Khara... Great.. But Drusilla opened the cage and held a hand inside. "He's upset because he's hungry, I can't catch even half as many moths as he needs... Do you know a method to catching a large number of moths?" Her voice was sad. The poor bat was no doubt, starving and it was her fault. She just couldn't catch the thousands of bugs he needed every night.

[Khara]

Drusilla was an Avora. It shouldn't have been the single thing out of the many that the Symenestra had said that stuck out, but it had. While Khara knew it wouldn't change anything about how the seamstress acted towards her - not with the constant kindness she showed not only to the scout but also apparently to the spider's Dek helper - but that didn't mean that some part of the Chiet felt that maybe it should. It wasn't like Khara was over casual with Dru, but she wasn't with anyone , well maybe Zhol but even that had taken ages to happen and for her to actually be comfortable about it.She was happy for Drusilla though, that much Khara knew for sure. The Symenestra had succeeded where the Chiet was still fairly convinced she never would.

"Congratulations," Khara said, trying to sound as sincere as possible even with the strange sound of the word leaving her. The decision to switch to Common had been a suggestion, the reason in favor of not startling the large eared bat seemed sound, but she couldn't deny that in a way she felt compelled to. "It is good to see the city understanding how valuable you are."

It wasn't exactly what Khara wanted to say, she knew it the second she had finished speaking. She began to shift the opalgloam from one hand to the next, finding the way the weight of the small stone rolled from one palm to the other soothing in a way. All things considered the small motions were probably what made her able to finally think on what else Dru had said.

"Azira asked me the same thing in the Fall, about what I like to do, a-and I don't really have an answer still. I don't r-really have hobbies or a lot of free time for things." Khara let her eyes flit between the glowing gem in her hands to the soft grey colored bat in the cage, trying to settle for what wanted her attention more, or what would be best to keep her mind from wandering too much to other things as she continued to speak just a bit above a whisper. She hoped that the softened tones would conceal at least some of the dejection that would no doubt accompany what she said. "I liked going to the ranges though. N-not so much anymore."

Movement from the corner of her vision pried away where she had settled on staring at the soft light cupped in her hands once more and she watched as Dru opened the cage and put her hand inside for the bat to maybe climb upon. He - Bitta was what Dru called him? The term sounded familiar somehow - was certainly an interesting looking creature. It was hard to get a good look at any sorts of bats as they quickly flitted overhead during warmer evenings, to see one now up close still entirely captured her intrigue.

"I-I haven't really had a need to try to catch any moths. I know they're drawn to light. Maybe if you somehow took a candle and set it in a place and..." Khara paused to think as the idea formed in her mind, trying to envision and create all at the same time. "If you maybe made a bit of a circle around it with some fabric, so it was like a-a-"

The Chiet paused again and set the opalgloam aside so she could make a large circle with her fingers. "Wall? I think you would say. Then maybe if you put something sticky - not glue though because no one wants to eat that - honey maybe? On the fabric on the inside where the light is. They might fly to the light and get stuck as they bounce about like they do and you could trap them like that?"

Picking the stone back up, Khara returned to letting it gently fall from one hand to the other as she looked back towards where Dru was trying to coax the bat into being held. "I don't know how many it would catch though," Khara admitted, her voice lowering again as her shoulders slumped a touch. "If any."

"Nari" | "Common" | "Pavi"

[Brandon Blackwing]

There was a switch in language as the Inartan tongue was replaced by Common, something Brandon did speak and understood. Well, was it better? Yes, in a way. He could actually follow the conversation now, which meant that at least one thing that annoyed the bat had been removed, but that did not take away the fact that speaking was making noise and that noise was not appreciated when trying to sleep. Brandon would have sighed if he could and given up hope to actually try to fall into the realm of slumber, deciding to focus on the conversation instead.

Needless to say, Brandon had no real knowledge of Wind Reach social structure, customs and other odd things. As a result he had no idea what was meant with the words “avora” and “dek”, he had some suspicions, but no real proof he was actually right. To him they just sounded like some sort of odd naming of certain jobs. Apparently Dru had been made an Avora recently, and that was something special. To Brandon it seemed as if the whole thing was some way of saying “Well, congratulations, you are officially useful to the city”. That alone would have been enough to piss the bat off on a good day. It sounded too… arrogant and cocky, as if it actually mattered whether you did something useful or not. Everything was useful! Even stealing was useful, crime was useful! Crime created job options; now people could be guards, intent on keeping the people safe and stop crime. Give a person a broom and tell them to clean the floor? Useful. Were those made Avora? Probably not.

Hm… so if he thought about it this way, Avora did seem to be some sort of social status of sorts, which probably meant dek was too. Nevertheless, social status was bullshyke and if he had any say in the matter, he’d rather have no caste at all. Lhavit hadn’t been much different, though it had been a lot more subtle. People who made a lot of money and dressed well were considered important and those rarely mingled with the more common folk. Haughty pieces of shyke that had found their homes breached and vaults cracked one day or another. They’d seen fit to feel better than anyone else but they weren’t at all. In a way, Brandon had been telling them just that. Money couldn’t stop skilled thieves from entering your home and robbing you blind, sure you could buy fancy locks and traps and alarm systems, but none of those could really keep out someone who really wanted to enter. Heh, great times…

Yet, those happy memories were no reason why Brandon should release his grip on the top of the cage and fall into Dru’s hand. ‘Let Khara admire the lovely bat you are’, she said, yeah right. He’d be poked and he’d bite in response. Dru’d be angry and tell him to behave, or something along those lines. Not that he cared about Drusilla scolding him, but well… she actually managed to make him feel bad about it. It had something to do with the mixture of disappointment and sadness in her voice, it wasn’t anger. It hadn’t been before anyway. Biting was a bit of an instinctual reaction to fingers getting to close to his head or body. Perhaps because he believed they’d poke too hard, maybe because he wanted them to know that he wasn’t helpless for being so small. Or perhaps because he wanted them to know he might be tiny but he was vicious.

Either way, he was not coming and turned his head away from the outstretched, pale hand. Because of the wings wrapped around his body, the bat struck a pose resembling someone crossing their arms and looking away, perhaps accompanied with a ‘hmpf’ sound. If Dru really wanted to lure him onto her hand she’d better use a different strategy. Food for instance might be a step in the right direction, a leap even.

c

Credit goes to Ollic

[Drusilla]

Drusilla pulled her hand from the cage and closed it with a sigh. "It seems that he wishes to be stubborn. Had I known he would be this grumpy. I would not have bothered to bring him along." She looked at the bat, "You win, are you pleased with yourself?" With that she pulled the cloth over the cage. Fine, he could be a grumpy bat. She didn't care. She turned back to Khara, "I think everyone is of importance. The deks most definitely, they keep the city moving and thriving. If all the the deks vanished what would become of the city? Even though they tend to the lowest jobs there are, they may be the most important people in Wind Reach. People should be thankful for what they do, but instead most step on them." Drusilla chuckled, "Am I that important? I just mend clothes for a living, where as you help find food for the people of the city. You help keep everyone fed. Now, tell me. Who is of real importance here? I believe it's you. Speaking of which, I'd like to accompany you learn the wilderness better. I can't say I can bring down any real game but I'd like you to show me what a game scout does, if you don't mind of course. I'd never want to do anything you didn't want." An eyebrow was raised, "I take it that something bad happened last you visited them? You don't have to go into detail, I don't need to know. But whatever happened most certainly has left you shaken." The Symenestra gave a soft smile, "Know that I'm hear if you ever need anything. I take being a big sister to people very seriously. Once again if you'd like to view me as such, as a friend to talk to." She listened intently to Khara's sugestion nodding as she spoke, "I thought of something similar. Like a mesh wall or something... But, I don't know. They honey part of your idea sounded tasty though! Is there anywhere you've noticed a large number of moths while out scouting? Maybe I just need to find a place with more moths.... Or grow extra arms..."