Semi-Open

[youwonscience]

WHO: Cosima Niehaus, Ruby Lucas, Avery, Lexa, Herian Amsel, Raymond Gibbs, you?
WHAT: Various odds and ends for Harvestmere
WHEN: Covering the last twoish weeks or so of the month
WHERE: Various
NOTES: Not going to set up open hooks this time. HOWEVER if I a) forgot a thing we said we were going to do or b) You'd like to do something with Cosima this month and aren't elsewhere, hit me by DM or Plurk. ETA: note the warning for discussion of torture in one of the threads.

Comments

[dashing]

Herian stops, then, and briefly catches Cosima's wrist in her grip - loose, and only lasting long enough to make her stop in her steps for a moment. "Do not make light of what happened to you." It sounds harsh, but she exhales and shuts her eyes for a second. Calmer. "Well do I understand that we each of us process such events in different ways. What happened to you, though, should not be dismissed so lightly. Such cruelty is horrifying. Your suffering is no matter to be rendered a joke."

For a moment - just a moment, she rubs her forehead before catching herself and schooling her hands back to her sides.

"Antiva is... home to people who are possessing a better humour than I, I've heard." Apologetic, sort of. "Colourful. Spirited, from what I've heard. Home of assassins and intrigues."

[youwonscience]

"Man, I suck at intrigues," she says, with a little smile, meant to put Herian back at ease. (And maybe to put herself back at ease a little.) "But I'd like to see it sometime."

They walk for a bit, then she says, "I didn't mean to... I just don't know what to do with it. You know? I mean, while I was healing from the physical effects, that's all I had to think about, and then my friend was blaming herself for everything that happened, and it's all just... I didn't mean to offend you."

[dashing]

A slow exhale, then.

"You committed no offence against me." Though there is a tension still pulling between her shoulders, turning them rigid. "What happened was horrific. I— cannot make light of mine own circumstances, but that is no reason to speak harshly against your own— coping." Her jaw clenches and loosens, visibly. "I spoke out of turn and unkindly. I am sorry. That you were hurt and that any would make light of it troubles me, but I... understand. We each of us come to terms in different ways."

Some people become overly rigid knights that have no chill, for example. Cosima's doing much better on that front. Gently, she catches Cosima's ribs with her elbow, conciliatory or teasing or both, maybe. "I've heard that Antivan dances are a grand affair. A lack of proficiency in intrigues might render you better able to enjoy those, and less time worrying about scandals."

[youwonscience]

The tease settles Cosima a bit, or at least convinces her she didn't completely sour things between them. "I'm hard to scandalize. Probably more likely I'd be the scandal, under the circumstances. I bet their dances aren't the ones I know, for one thing."

[dashing]

"Maker forbid." Truly, the most scandalised Herian has ever sounded. "I dread to think what the Duchess would say about that. "

Although, she does look to Cosima with a smile tugging at the corner of her mouth. "Naturally I'll be forced to write letters to all mine acquaintances, to advise them of this outrage."

[youwonscience]

"Man, hold off until I show you my dance moves so you can be properly appalled," she says, as they approach her room. "We're very informal, where I'm from, it's a lot of gyrating." It feels like something safer to joke about.

[dashing]

At that, Herian actually laughs. A proper laugh, too, not just one of her amused exhales. "You've not seen any of the dances from Starkhaven. Meetings of elves and such were not kindly looked upon, so when they came to pass... everything became very wild very quickly. Young as I was, I am well aware how... suggestive and free dancing can be."

And her eyebrow quirks. "Should I advise the minstrel at the tavern that we will require something spirited to dance to?"

[youwonscience]

Cosima takes the laugh as a total win. She grins back, shameless, as she unlocks the door. "You could, but it's the slow stuff that really gets the rumors flying."

She's probably made enough noise, but says, "Coming in," out of habit anyway. She doubts either Ruby or Avery is home this time of day, but it still seems the thing to do.

[dashing]

"Not that so delicate and proper a lady as yourself would be acquainted with such things," she counters, too richly amused and teasing for her to play off as dry.

Respectful, despite her teasing, Herian stands just outside the doorway.

"That would not be sufficient warning."

[youwonscience]

Cosima shrugs, sheepish. "Avery's almost certainly working and Ruby's almost never home in the middle of the day." The fact she knows this is, unfortunately, because she still has bad health days, but she certainly isn't going to spoil the move by observing as much.

"Besides, if privacy was really necessary, we'd talk about it first or put a ribbon on the door or something. Not," she adds, "that a proper lady is acquainted with the reasons for that."

"Come in if you like, I won't be a sec."

[dashing]

"We weren't proper ladies in the tower," Herian admits, stepping into the room. "Dalliances were strictly forbidden, but it served to encourage quiet and haste, rather than instill propriety." A little shake of her head, distantly amused by a memory. "Bed and ribbons on doors are unimaginable luxuries."

Not flippant, not near, but she is certainly speaking more freely than she might have some weeks ago, and she almost looks surprised at herself.

"Apologies. That was... not the most appropriate element of Circle life to share."

[youwonscience]

"Jesus, Herian, I promise I'm not that easily scandalized. Though you have my sympathies for the lack of privacy. The dorms at school were mainly a matter of staying on good enough terms with your roommate to work something out and not pissing off the RA - the person in charge of enforcing rules." She considers, and tucks the book in with her notes and the bag of elfroot next to a small jar of tonic on the shelf that was informally 'Cosima's things.'

"I lucked out my second year, because my roommate was literally always at her boyfriend's place, it was like I had a single."

[dashing]

"I did not imagine you so delicate," she assures, gaze idly sweeping over the shelf. "Though neither did I assume you eager to dwell upon thoughts of feverish trysts in libraries."

That was perhaps said a shade dramatically, with a side of playfulness. "I do not recommend engaging someone donning armour in a rush. There is an excess of buckles to consider."

And she laughs, quietly. "I would not have done well in such a political climate. Councilor LeBlanc endured a less than flattering excess of poor behaviour from me."

[youwonscience]

"I think I wrote a few racy stories as a teenager focused on feverish trysts in libraries," Cosima says, speculative. "Though I'm pretty sure none of them involved armor."

So... now they both know things about each other, don't they.

"People are people, though, I think. You'll always get a few assholes, but most people are too wrapped up in their own shit to give you much thought one way or another unless they have a particular reason."

[dashing]

"And here stood I, aware I was graced with the presence of a literary mind." A little bow - knightly poise turned to teasing. Though, she pauses as she looks up.

"Is that what you make of me?" She is not, to her own surprise, offended. More thoughtful, turning things over. "Wrapped up within mine own mind enough to isolate myself?"

It did not seem ill-fitting. "I've been noted as having a more than unusually cold manner, in times past."

[youwonscience]

"I definitely didn't mean you specifically," Cosima says, immediately. "I just meant... people. Generally. I think we have to work at not making everything about us because the consistent thread of our own experience is that we're always present in it, you know?"

I'm so sad I don't have a equivalent icon to mis-match with

[dashing]

Herian is silent a few moments as she mulls that over. "True enough." And then, the faintest hint of a smile. "Fortunately, I have the assurance that I am always in the right to vindicate my actions."

It's a very quiet, very wry self-mockery. "One could suppose there are those that allow themselves to become so conscious of their bias that they are incapacitated. I don't imagine that is so common a problem as the opposite extreme."

[youwonscience]

Cosima cracks a smile at the dry joke. "I think it's evolution, really. Survival. No one's going to be as interested in you thriving as you are. But it's also maladaptive to be totally selfish." She grabs the small coin pouch she's taken to using - her clothes are increasingly a mishmash of things she brought with her and things she's been given or bartered for in Thedas - and attaches it to her belt. Then she adds, "You know, altruism is supposed to be adaptive too. It's only a theory, so far, but people who take care of others build social bonds and make their community more likely to survive. So. All's not lost."

[dashing]

"Impossible. I can't imagine anything would matter so much to others as my well-being." She says it with that same, strange seriousness that she says everything with, though she is allowing herself the indulgence of silliness in this conversation and sees no need to break form now.

Still, joking or not, the theory of adaptive altruism draws out a smile that is less wry and joking and more sincere. "'Twould hardly do if we believed all to be cast upon the rocks and beyond all hope of salvation." Noting the acquiring of the money pouch, Herian briefly considers saying it is unnecessary to bring such, before deciding doing so would be presumptuous. "Ready to depart, good lady?"

It is said with the very slightest bow and flourish - a faint sending up of her own manners, perhaps.

[youwonscience]

"Vamanos," she agrees with a grin. "Do you have a particular place in mind? I'm not picky."

[dashing]

Vamanos. She sounds it out silently, shaking her head with quiet amusement. "The Herald's Rest? I must confess myself ill-experienced with the purveyors of liquid courage here present." She laughs very briefly at a thought. "I've an uncle whose very blood would be chilled at the notion of any of his kin paying for liquor. The man could render chaulk into wine, had he the inclination."

[youwonscience]

"Works for me. And that's impressive. I don't know anyone who makes their own at home, though that's becoming more common after years of everyone leaving it to the professionals." Cosima decides against trying to explain Prohibition. Or hipsters.

"Was he any good at it, or just prolific?"