Closed [Job Thread] Until Dawn (Sayana)

[Aislyn Leavold]

36th of Fall, 515 AV

”Miss? Hello? Miss?”
Gods, this was strange. Alvadas had been trapped in an endless night for a couple of days now, Leth permanently frozen high up in the sky. The stars had been merrily dancing alongside Him for a lot more than twelve bells. Not only that, but it appeared that night wasn’t the only state that Alvadas was trapped in. She’d heard people in the Bazaar talking about the half of the city that was constantly bathed in Syna’s light, yet Aislyn was yet to see it. Rather remarkable, that.

That brought her to the question at hand; were there people sleepwalking on Syna’s side of the city as well?

”Miss? Are you sleeping?”

Aislyn had been once again, enjoying the darkness, for what must have been the fifth day (night) in a row. Or maybe it was the tenth night. Now that there was no day to interrupt the night cycles, were the nights considered doubled, or extended? Did that make this one long night, or did the sun simply rise behind the curtain of darkness? Would it affect the season change? Ionu only knew. Either way, Lyn had run into several people so far that were in the same state this woman was; fast asleep, and quickly walking. This, however, was the first time she’d seen a sleepwalker carrying things.
A small basket of what appeared to be art supplies- paints, charcoals, and parchments, tucked under her arm and somehow just barely managing to stay upheld. It wasn’t going to stay there for long, however, and Aislyn, spying an opportunity, had noticed this. Of course, she tried to wake the woman up first. Even as Thief, the artist was a woman of fairness. But when Ionu kept the mystery stranger in a never ending sleep, and the basket, as she had predicted, slipped out from her hands, Aislyn decided to capitalize.

But mere seconds after picking up the newfound materials, everything got very, very bright.
And very, very loud.

Letting out a hiss of discomfort, the woman’s hands flew to her eyes, trying to shield herself from the damaging light. She’d never been very good with bright light to begin with, nevermind after being exposed to nothing but darkness for five days. And then there was the noise; Loud, merry music, and the chatter of people just around the corner. The mysterious woman had disappeared, replaced with a colourful crowd, all painted in tints of pink and yellow, the sunrise- or sunset, Aislyn couldn’t tell- decorating their silhouettes. There were easels set up, canvases on the ground, dancers teaching lessons, musicians filling the air with intermixing songs.

Drawing her eyes up to the sky, Aislyn found a stark contrast to the beautiful blues and blacks of the night. Clouds, not stars, danced along the edge of the setting sun as it appeared to continuously drift down the horizon. Or, the woman thought, squinting, perhaps it was not moving at all. Like the moon, the sun appeared to be frozen in a constant status of indecisiveness on whether it was going to rise at all. It was a beautiful sight, and, just as every other artist appeared to be, Aislyn felt drawn into the festivities. Maybe she could get some work done, while the sun hovered just below the sky. After all, she hadn’t been able to fulfill requests during the unfortunate events near the beginning of the season, so there was a few of them piled up. She was sure there would be at least one that could be bent into a picture of the sky.

And maybe, after that, she’d even interact with some of the other artists.
What a strange thought.

[Sayana]

The days had been, well, day. The first time it had happened, Sayana hadn’t clued in until Fabel sent her home and she realized just how much her body ached and how tired she was. And yet, when she reached the Cubacious Inn, Syna continued to stay in the sky. She enjoyed an extended evening that felt like midday but when she tried to sleep it was near impossible. She probably only caught few bells before she gave up and went back to find the Crooked Playhouse. The second “day” was the worst as she could hardly keep her eyes open yet at the same time she couldn’t sleep. Fortunately the playhouse had meandered near the strip of dawn and dusk and she had managed to get some sleep there. But, well, sleeping on the job isn’t the kind of thing you want to advertise to your boss or colleagues.

From then on her schedule was all messed up but luckily she wasn’t the only one. The schedule of plays became a mix of this and that, and more often the actors would do something out on the streets alongside other artists. To-‘day’ she was paired up with one of the actors to practice some partner dancing.

“Spin, spin, spin, spin!” Shouted a gathering of bystanders as Sayana’s dance partner led her in a turn. However, instead of just doing one twirl guided by his hand, he kept her going again and again. The chanting got louder and he spun her round even faster. All she could do was keep focused on the connection between their hands and hold her arm just firm enough to gain the momentum of his movement. The world became a blur and in attempt to keep from getting dizzy she focused on her wrist instead of the swirling colours behind it.

There was a round of applause as he finally brought down her arm and she ceased turning. With an exaggerated flourish of her hands she bowed low, but not without a couple of stumbling steps to regain her balance. There was some laughter and instead of letting it phase her, she did a few more rather comically stumbling steps. “I think, I think Ionu has blessed me to see stars,” she spoke pretending to still be in a daze. “See right there, I think I can reach out and grab it!” The Eypharian mimed grabbing out of the air in front of her and there was another round of laughter from the bystanders.

“But wait! I’m not done.” Sayana continued. “I must, I must have a glorious portrait painted of me. While I’m upside down!” The sheer ridiculousness of it all caused another ripple of giggles and the Eypharian launched herself into a handstand, landing on her mids and highs. She had forgotten that she was wearing a skirt, and as the red fabric started to slip down her dance partner reached out in attempt to preserve her dignity. Fortunately, her low hands were quick as a flash and got there in time. “Beat you to it!” She cried out as she wobbled momentarily in her handstand.

However, even though she thought she had rid herself of all her dizziness, being upside down brought a bunch of it back. Her legs started to sway in the air and she tried to compensate by shuffling around her arms supporting her. As she took ‘steps’ with her hands, the people watching instinctively parted out of the way should she fall. “I’m alright, really!” But with one more misstep, her whole body started to tip and she crashed into someone, scattering various art supplies onto the ground.

“So sorry about that, I was being too daring.” She apologized as she got up from the ground. “But you’re an artist, just what I need.” In hardly a tick she had gathered up the various paints and brushes in her six hands. She briefly patted a couple of daggers sheathed at her hip, really glad they hadn’t fallen too. She was still trying to go along with her gag of needing a portrait painted but it seemed that after her spectacular fall, her audience was losing interest and began dispersing.

[Aislyn Leavold]

Just as Aislyn had found a peaceful spot to set up and get to work, the woman's luck decided to abandon her. One moment she was cross-leggedly relaxing, charcoal stick in hand, the next, a parade of people was stomping over her. Other than the initial feeling of inconvenience, Aislyn didn’t mind the interruption all that much. Until it happened again.
Then again.

By the fourth time, the artist was practically prepared. As she set herself up, further from the streets this time, her eyes would dart back and forth between the streets and her work. A painting, had been requested, this time. A far bit out of her comfort zone, but in order to get better, she had to try more. Just a few more brushstrokes, over charcoal lines. In yellows and blues and pinks and reds, the sunset seemed to be just out of reach. Time and time again, Aislyn refreshed her canvas, traced the image of a rooftop and the sun overhead, and tried to paint it.
Then time and time again, she pushed it away. It just didn’t look right. It didn’t look beautiful enough. The colours were great, as was the inspiration, but Aislyn just couldn’t get it right. It didn’t look like the image in her head, or the image in front of her eyes.
It was, plain and simple, wrong. But the artist just couldn’t figure out how.

By her fifth attempt, Aislyn was growing frustrated, cursing the petching yellows for not creating the right orange when they bled into the red. The sunset surely wouldn’t approve of it’s portrait. Even the artist herself didn’t approve of the picture. How would anyone else?
Another piece of parchment set aside.

At least she had all the time in the world; if the sun would never set, it wasn’t exactly like she had to rush herself. She was halfway through her seventh draft when she let down her guard, and, once again, was trampled over. Except it wasn't just intruding feet, this time. It was an entire body

Immediately, Maya flickered, her blonde hair and blue eyes fading into dark hair and darker eyes in Aislyn’s surprise. Fortunately, the artist was lucky. Her reflexes were fast, and muscle memory served her well in regaining her guise.
The fallen stranger, who appeared to be a dancer of some sort, jumped back up from the ground so quickly Aislyn was hard pressed to believe she had fallen at all- if not for the paints (luckily contained) and parchments (not so contained) that had fluttered to the ground around her. The stranger’s words barely processed in the artist’s mind. A painting? Now? A tight feeling in her chest began to rise as the idea of being the center of attention started to become a possibility.
”I-”
There was a certain look in the face of the dancer’s face as she briefly glanced over at the dispersing crowd that caught Aislyn’s attention. She never liked crowds, but how would the dancer react?

In her experience, these situations often went in the direction of agree or be forced to agree. A memory of miscommunication that ended with Aislyn becoming a piece of human artwork came to mind. Maybe she could position her canvas so no one could see her. Her eyes locked on the crowd, Aislyn tried to avoid the dancer's eyes as eloquently as possible.
She didn't wish to seem rude, but this was not exactly her bed of roses.
"I am an artist yes. I can... I can draw you." Gods, how did people do this regularly? Speaking as if selling a product; except they were selling themselves. Often, on a stage.
This is precisely why Aislyn did all her commissions through letter.
"I came here to capture the great colours of the sun, but a dancer..."

Ionu save her, she had no idea what she was doing.

[Sayana]

“The sun, Syna, of course!” Sayana exclaimed as she reached out with her high hands in attempt to grasp at least one of Aislyn’s while keeping hold of any artistic implements that had fallen in her other hands. Her eyes glanced over the artist briefly and for a moment she could have sworn the woman’s hair was had been a darker colour than the brilliant light blonde that it clearly was now. Perhaps it had been the trick of the light or the fact that she had ‘met’ the artist while upside down.

“Come come!” She beckoned excitedly. “We have a painting to paint!” The Eypharian gestured grandly to streetscape bathed in the golden hues of Syna and sought to pull the artist along to find a particularly impressive backdrop for the painting. Sayana had picked up on Aislyn’s initially uncertain expression and the way she kept her paints and parchment close, so despite having earlier wanted to entertain the crowd, her plans changed swiftly to accommodate the woman. Should she wish to draw in more bystanders, she could easily do that another time, and probably with a painting.

There was the market itself, court yards, fountains, and even gardens and greenery to make up a beautiful backdrop. However, Sayana had another idea in mind. “See that small building over there? With the flat roof?” She pointed to one of the buildings along the crowded streets. But what was special about this one, was that there was a smaller shed-like structure right next to it and a ladder leaning innocently against the shed. “I bet you could paint something glorious from up there.”

Sayana released the artist and dashed off towards it. Running hard with carefree energy she reached the ladder and propped it up against the shed. Grinning back at Aislyn she climbed up carefully, most importantly getting the right footing as she got onto the sloped roof of the shed. Then with a quick run and jump, she mounted the roof of the neighboring building, placing her hands upon it and swinging her legs up. However, she entirely forgot that she was still holding some of the artist’s paints. All the more reason to persuade her new friend to join her.

“You could paint me with rays of light streaming through my hair like the goddess Syna herself,” Sayana called from above imagining what such a portrait might look like.

[Aislyn Leavold]

In a flash of movement, a hand wrapped itself around Aislyn’s wrist. Two hands, actually.
No, Three hands.

...Three?

Startled, Aislyn realized something she hadn’t noticed before.
The dancer had not two, not even four, but six hands. Six of them. What creature needed that many hands? Two of them wrapped around Aislyn's lonely, singular pair of hands, two carrying what appeared to be the artist's missing paints, and the last pair making excited gestures at the sunset.

What exactly had the woman gotten herself into?

Drifting with a sort of stunned movement, the artist was led through the street, the dancer so excitedly bounding past several places that could, in theory, be just fine for a background. The woman didn’t object, though. If the dancer knew what she was doing, which Aislyn prayed to Ionu she did, then there must be some sort of goal to this. Could the dancer have some sort of place already in mind? It was a possibility, though… Finding anything among these streets was no doubt going to be an issue. Could she have been led into a trap? What if this wasn’t a dancer at all? What if…

The dancer’s voice broke her out of her thoughts, indicating towards a building just up ahead. It didn’t seem particularly interesting to Aislyn, but in theory, it had caught the dancer woman’s eye, so there had to be some importance to it. Something she would see from on top of the building that wasn’t immediately visible from below. Yes, that must have been it.
The question was, how to get up there?

The dancer apparently knew the answer already, as she bounded off towards a smaller, squatted structure beside the building. That was when Aislyn noticed the ladder, just barely tall enough to reach the height of the shed, leaning precariously beside the structure. Floating after the dancer, Aislyn quickly hid the parchment and supplies she’d been holding in her backpack before following the strange, six-armed woman up the ladder. After scaling the shed, however, Aislyn didn’t have a plan. She was surely not as limber as the dancer-woman was, and there was a gap, if only small, in between the buildings. In theory, she could still back down, but…
Looking up to where the dancer-woman was, the artist realized that a fair amount of her art supplies were still held hostage in the woman’s many hands.
Gods, today was not turning out how she’d imagined it.

Double- and triple-checking to make sure all her possessions were securely strapped to her person, Aislyn took a both metaphorical and literal leap of fate. It was an intense moment in the artist’s mind, but in reality, the gap was only three or four feet across with a slight increase, so, although terribly ungraceful and in need to be helped up onto the building, Aislyn made it across in one piece. Her appearance flickered once she hit the ground, if only for a moment. How did the dancer-woman live her day-to-day life like this? Aislyn loved climbing buildings for her art, yes, but leaping across rooftops and hanging on to them only by her fingertips was not an activity she took part in often.

Once atop the building, Aislyn got herself set up as the dancer-woman chose the perfect place to stand.
As the artist chose her colours, the dancer chose her pose. This wasn’t something Aislyn did very often- drawing an actual model.
Actually, she couldn’t remember ever having drawn a living model before. She’d never sought them out, because, first of all, people moved, and second of all, it would require interacting with people when no interaction was required.
”So, ah… What did you want your- the painting to look like?” Aislyn prepared herself for an answer far outside her range of skill. She was most definitely outlining everything in charcoal- comfortable, wonderful charcoal- before even touching her paints. It would no doubt take longer, but if she tried painting outright, the dancer-woman would no doubt be unhappy with the end result.
”Would you like the same colours as the sunset, or something that would stand out more? A replication of the true scene, or an exaggeration? Things like that…” It was different dealing with a real person, rather than a letter in writing. More difficult. People actually talked back. It was rather inconvenient.

Charcoal pausing just above the parchment, Aislyn looked up to the dancer. The artist could only imagine what her reaction would be if she turned out something unsatisfying. In the chaos of making it to the rooftop, she had completely forgotten to think about payment. If the dancer didn’t like it, the artist doubted asking for anything at all would go down well. Besides, the dancer-woman seemed nice enough. If she liked it, maybe she’d seek Aislyn out again.
That was just about the most optimistic end to the situation Aislyn could think of. Alternatively, she could end up falling off a rooftop with only a six-armed stranger whom she hadn’t even learned the name of yet to be her witness.
What a positive thought.

[Sayana]

Sayana periodically checked to make sure the artist was keeping up. It wouldn’t do to climb all this way just to have to come right back down. As the beautiful blonde leapt the gap from the shed to the main building, Sayana momentarily applauded with her high hands and then reached down to grab the artist’s upper arms and help pull her up onto the roof. There was a moment that she could have sworn she saw something protruding from underneath the artist’s backpack but once she was safely on the roof, there seemed nothing out of the ordinary. Other than the fact they were on the roof, of course.

“What would I like it to look like? I’d like it to shimmer with Syna’s colours. And I’d like my likeness intertwined within it.” The dancer answered vaguely as she tried to picture what it might look like and what she even wanted. “It doesn’t have to look like I’m right here on the rooftop, so long as you can see Syna well and paint her beauty. Maybe… maybe with water or something in the background.” She gestured roughly towards the setting/rising sun and what lay beyond.

Sayana tried out a few poses, trying to come up with one that was vivid yet also comfortable enough to hold. By now she had returned the art supplies to where Aislyn had set herself up. At last the dancer settled on one where she turned almost completely profile and reaching outwards with three of her arms, her highs and the closer mid, with her other arms relaxed at her sides. Her expression was an intense gaze as if seeking out something. However, despite her attempt to position the sun between the angle created by her arms and face, it meant that her face was cast in shadow which might have a debatable final look.

To her credit, she managed to hold the pose for almost ten chimes but then her arms began to ache and she started to get restless. Abruptly she broke her pose and skipped over to where Aislyn was drawing. “How’s it doing?” She asked excitedly.

However, the next tick she was distracted by the various paints. “It’s going to be coloured right? Lots of brilliant reds and oranges, and yellow too.” The Eypharian started opening up various paint containers with her mid hands. Soon after, she found a bit of canvas amongst the supplies and held it up between her two highs. With a child-like curiosity she started dipping the fingers of her mid and low hands in the paints and smudging colours onto the canvas. She started with red of course, tracing out a rough circle and then when she couldn’t find orange started adding some yellow. To her delight, as the yellow mixed with the red, it began to turn orange.

“Look look!” She exclaimed excitedly as she showed her rudimentary artwork. “Don’t worry, I’ll pay for this one too.” Although, as she added more colour to it, there was increasing danger that she might accidentally mix the wrong colours into the original containers of paint.

OOCExcuse her lack of patience and low attention span.

[Aislyn Leavold]

Shimmer with Syna’s colours. Paint her beauty. Water in the background. Lots of brilliant reds and oranges and yellows too.
Ionu, what had she gotten herself into? The sketch… Well, it was actually doing pretty well. Having a reference was actually really helping. Usually, Aislyn’s “references” were maybe a flash of inspiration from a passing bystander, who happened to stand in a nice position for a single moment, before moving on. After that, she went off memory. But with an actual, stationary (or at least mostly stationary) reference, she could practically trace the image onto paper. She was good at tracing.

The dancer’s form, was, admittedly, a rather goddess-y figure. It wouldn’t be very hard to turn her into the likeness of Syna, or something similar. Syna’s likeness in general, wasn’t the hardest thing to project, after all. Aislyn had no idea what She looked like, so there was definitely the freedom of artistic liberty. As long as there was some essence of over-present and beautiful sunlight in the picture, she could call it Syna.
There was, however a catch. Sunlight wasn’t exactly something that could be conveyed in black and white, so though Aislyn liked how the sketch looked thus far, she began to dread finishing it. Painting wasn’t exactly her strong point, as her attempts earlier in the day had proven. If she couldn’t get the sun right when she was just painting the sun, how was she supposed to get it right with a person thrown into the mix as well?

With a few final strokes, the torso of the dancer was done. Her arms were slender and graceful, and, mimicking the real-life equivalent, outstretched. Three of them, that was. The other two were darkened up until the wrists, where they dissolved into sketchy shapes. The artist had focused on her face and torso first, of course, due to the fact that they would probably be the hardest to recreate from memory. Which turned out to be a good decision, because, just as Aislyn began her work on the legs, her model broke away, happily coming over to where Aislyn was sitting to check up on her progress. Compliantly, the artist moved over to show off how far she’d come. Unfortunately, her movement was for nothing, as just as soon as the dancer had taken interest in the drawing, she’d lost interest, and found Aislyn’s paints instead.

In just a few ticks, six arms had managed to open almost every container Aislyn had in her possession. Instinctively, the artist reached out to try and contain the disaster, but hesitated once the dancer began her work. Finger painting, with the brightest red she could find. Then a yellow, then pink. The colours melted together, of course, forming a bit less than a masterpiece, but still, something about it…
Well, Aislyn liked it. There was just something so delightfully fun about the way the dancer used the paints. A few moments ago, the woman was posing as a goddess, but now, she was sitting and finger painting alongside Aislyn.
People were strange.

Reaching over the mess of art supplies, Aislyn dipped her fingers into the yellow paint, neglecting the fact that there were perfectly good paint brushes underneath her nose. On her palm, she mixed them together, stealing some of the orange and white to make a fleshy sort of colour. She didn’t dare touch her actual drawing, though, so instead, she joined the dancer in experimenting on a spare piece of canvas. She’d never really tried mixing the colours on the paper itself before, instead trying to keep them within their containers before she went anywhere near the paper. But unsurprisingly, mixing them on the paper made it a lot easier to see how they’d turn out.
Strange how she learned things by messing around.

As eight hands with five fingers each dipped in and out of various colours, the shades began to become distorted, forming new, strange colours. The red didn’t look entirely pleasant, becoming more brownish in appearance, but the aggressive yellow became a beautiful honey gold that Aislyn put aside for use on the artwork itself. The orange became goldish as well, though closer to the colour of fire than the colour of the sun.
The bright blue that was more sky than water quickly darkened to become the ocean, while the green wasn’t as lucky, becoming a murky pond colour that Aislyn lost hope in. Barely ten chimes later, the two women had an array of colours very different to the ones they had begun with. They also ended up with two very, very colourful canvases, and many colourful fingers.

”See, this is why I love art so much. Everything is so colourful, and something beautiful always becomes of it, no matter the medium.” Looking up at the woman, Aislyn wiped at her face, completely forgetting about the fact that her fingers were covered in paint. The end result was a rather pronounced streak of red that Aislyn had to remember to let through her illusion of Maya’s otherwise perfect skin.

Sighing, she sat back, ”I’ve realized I don’t even know your name.” The artist extended a particularly red hand, ”I’m Maya. And I may call you Syna, I suppose?”

[Sayana]

Sayana grinned at the display of colours. Every so often she glanced over to see what the artist was creating with the paints before returning to her own canvas. When she started to add blue to her sky, she was startled that it mixed with the yellow to turn green. How odd. She never would have thought those colours would have mixed in that particular way. She peered over at the artist’s use of pink and when she mixed it into her sun, it gave off a warmer sort of glow.

Sayana grinned at the woman’s words. It was indeed beautiful despite the chaotic nature of the paints. But at the sight of the glaring red streak, Sayana couldn’t help but laugh at the unintentional mark. “Haha! Red for blood and power! And now you’ve got… yellow on your nose!” She made a quick jab with her hand to put a dot of bright yellow paint upon the artist’s nose. “Someone has been sniffing around the Pressorah’s garden!” She playfully accused.

Upon the mention of names, Sayana realized that they hadn’t yet exchanged names. “Maya, that’s a beautiful name,” she replied in earnest. “And you may call me Syna if you like, my mother named me after her, but my full name is Sayana.”

She glanced at the reddened hand for a moment and then took up the challenge. She offered up her mid right hand and shook it, feeling the paint squish between their palms. “Lovely to meet you Maya.”

However, another idea came to her and she set down the canvas to look for some red and black paints. Her eyes flitted to the red mark upon Maya’s face and then in the palm of her hand she mixed up a dark red. Closing her eyes, Sayana began dabbing the deep red onto her face to create a thick horizontal band at eye level. She systematically used the paint in slow strokes and was careful to cover her eyelids too.

Once completed she exclaimed brightly, “Look! I’m a Chaktawe!” She gave a few wavy gestures with her hands to mimic their mysterious and spiritual nature. However, she had to blink fiercely as a drop of paint threatened to enter her eye. “Ahh… I must work on that.” Yet it meant that she now had a rather striking appearance with the dark band and many of her facial features appeared quite different with that single bold mark.

[Aislyn Leavold]

Throughout the chaos, Aislyn managed to save several colours for Syna’s drawing, whenever they returned to it. The honey-yellow for the sun, the fire orange for the sky, the blue for the ocean, what was left of the red for her model’s clothing. Soon, she had small pallets of colour for almost every part of the drawing.
So maybe, even if Aislyn’s painting technique wasn’t perfect, she could make up for it in good colours. As she was switching around the order of the paints, however, Aislyn was attacked.

”-yellow on your nose!” Caught off guard, the artist flinched back, but eventually realized that though, yes, the woman was touching her, and yes, she was very very not a fan of it, she wasn’t actually under any immediate threat. Aislyn had never been very comfortable with being touched, for obvious, illusion-y reasons, but it wasn’t as if the woman knew that.

”Sayana?” So she had been surprisingly close with the talk of ‘Syna’, then. ”Lovely to meet you too.”

Moving focus back over to her drawing, Aislyn found that, though her right hand was rather hopelessly covered in paint, her left was, though not clean, dry. She would stain the charcoal, or worse, the paper, if she tried to use her very-red fingers to hold the very-black stick. The only issue was, though Aislyn herself was perfectly capable with her left hand, Maya was not. Which was rather unfortunate, and meant that she’d have to wait until the paint dried on her right hand before continuing work on the drawing. In the meantime, Sayana seemed to have found a new way to use the brownish red that Aislyn had abandoned. In a sort of tribal paint, she drew streaks along her face and over her eyes, in a sort of bold face paint.

Chaktawe. That was a word Aislyn hadn’t heard before. Was she referring to the paint, or the gestures? Or both? Either way, she laughed at the woman's imitation before satisfying her curiosity.
”Forgive my ignorance, but I have no idea what that is.”
The end result, however, whether Aislyn understood it or not, was stunning. The paint added something to the woman’s appearance. A boldness the artist couldn’t quite explain.

Shuffling back over to her drawing, Aislyn wiped what remained of the paint on her right hand off onto the scrap canvas from before. The end result was a blood-like handprint eerily sitting on an otherwise cheerful background of colours, but that wasn’t what the artist was focusing on. Once her hand was clean enough to not drip onto her drawing, she dipped her finger in red, and, studying Sayana’s face, changed the image. She added a ribbon of colour over the tiny goddess’s eyes, creating a dark band on an otherwise black and white image. Using her fingernail, she managed to make a clean enough ending to the ribbon, dragging it off into where the sunset would be.

That tiny detail made a lot of things a lot easier.
First of all, it meant Aislyn wouldn’t have to paint the eyes, which was no doubt going to be the hardest part of the painting with how small they would be. Second, it added a trait of surrealism to the art, even if it was essentially just a line. A very, very easy way to make things look good. Even if Aislyn wasn’t very good with a brush, anyone could paint a line and colour in a shape.

Picking up her charcoal again, Aislyn drew out the legs, officially finishing the tiny goddess’s figure. The background wasn’t much more than a line marking the horizon, but at least she had the main part done. As she looked back and forth between what she had drawn and the woman she had based it off, a thought occurred to her.

”You’re a dancer, correct?” She paused, for Sayana to answer. ”What kind of dance? Just as in art, there’s different types, is there not? Like drawing, with charcoal and eraser, then painting, or different mediums… Sculpting, carving, things like that.”

The woman paused for a moment to concentrate on keeping her hand steady as she drew the outline of the sun onto her canvas.

”Which dance is that of Syna?”

[Sayana]

There was a frown of disappointment when Sayana watched as Maya painted a band of deep red across the eyes of the portrait, but she bit her tongue against words of criticism. Everything else was turning out quite beautifully and perhaps it was not such a terrible thing to fully embody the desert with an array of races.

“Chaktawe… they are one with the land and survive in the harshest of sands,” Sayana explained briefly with a sense of mystery. “Plus they are rather good at tracking down thieves.” Her second comment was far lighter and stemmed from a memory of a Chaktawe she met in Syliras.

The Eypharian continued to peer over as Maya worked at the painting. She seemed to have a way with the paints and colours, not to mention her careful and smooth lines. Sayana produced little sketches of this and that on her own canvas but exclusively working with the paint and enjoying the colours it produced. She attempted smooth blue hues of the sky and added some white to it to soften the colour. Then she dabbed a chocolate brown in little dots to form the rough shadow of a humanoid figure. Yet the charcoal made Maya’s painting crisp where the Eypharian’s fingers had not the talent nor the precision.

At the artist’s question, Sayana leapt to her feet in a twirl. “Yes! I do the Semhu.” She mimed a couple of punches in the air with a round about kick. In truth it wasn’t her first dance, but it was one she liked people to believe she had talent in due to its prestige. “I also do the seductive dance of the Pressorah’s concubines.” She shimmied her chest as she stepped forwards and her hips twisted this way and that in demonstration. This one she was far more well versed in and her movements flowed naturally and seamlessly. “I act too, and I will be performing the aerial Akvatari ballet near the end of the season.” She leapt into the air with another spin and with a quick run she launched herself into a cartwheel followed by a dramatic pose.

Her heart thumped in her chest and she realized she had gotten paint spots in many places on her dress. Yet it hardly mattered as she raised her arms towards the rising sun. “But Syna herself does the most beautiful dance of them all. She does the celestial dance and brings light and hope to all that feel her touch.”