closed.

[exequy]

WHO: Caspar, Kostos, Lakshmi, Lexie, Marisol, Nell, Nikos, Petrana
WHAT: Coming into a Merchant Prince's house, on the day his daughter is to be married, and asking him and all his friends to quit with their stupid neutrality. Plus Truth or Dare.
WHEN: Mid-Harvestmere
WHERE: Antiva City
NOTES: Will update with CWs if needed.

Comments

[exsecutus]

She's quick, all at once, abrupt and decisive. And not wrong. The predictability was what led him to choose his target in the first place. He wanted to lose, because losing meant drinking.

"If you wanted to dance, you might find a partner without building a fucking game around it." Never mind the little leap in his chest at the suggestion, a childish kind of anticipation. Ignoring it for the present moment, Nikos drains his glass easily, and sets it aside on a nearby plinth. The taste of wine makes thick his tongue. He holds his hand out to her anyways. "The world we were born to is horseshit, because the world is built upon the assumption that there are those lesser and greater, categories that are mere chance. Accidents of birth."

The song playing was just recently started, a good enough time to join in as any. Nikos tips his head, mock quizzical, letting that smoldering anger cool into sarcasm. "Do you know this one?"

Because, against all odds: he does. Often underestimated as a dancer, he'll take the lead to start with. As per the rules of the bet, he'll hold it.

[coquettish_trees]

"I might have found a partner without building a fucking game around it, true enough. And if you simply wanted to drink, you might have done the same. The neither of us did, because games are diverting.

"As to this dance it so happens that as an accident of birth," she replies wryly, "I do."

Even well past tipsy, Alexandrie is a excellent partner and follows Nikos with the ease and grace of a thousand evenings spent in just such a way. The body remembers even if the mind has a veil of drink over it. She won't try to take over their steps just yet but she's certainly coiled like a serpent, ready for him to be focused enough on words that she might, subtly, begin to backlead him.

"Tell me, are some not born cleverer than others? Some stronger? Some better at figures? Those too are an accident of birth, no? Do you say that because it is mere chance it should have no bearing on who is a smith, who a scholar?"

[exsecutus]

Nikos snorts. Like hasn't been drinking since before they walked in the doors, is what that snort means. He manages to hold the lead as they start. The music is a decent volume--enough that it can be heard over the ambient social din of the room, not loud enough to be distracting, or to prohibit conversation.

Which is good. Because Nikos has a lot to say.

"Innate skill is an accident of birth. It is also a product of upbringing. A man born a slave will be a slave, no matter if he carries buried in him the seed of skill. If that skill is never encouraged or recognized, what becomes of him? Nothing. He dies a slave. And," if she was thinking of rebutting, too bad; there's more-- "And at least in a trade, a son of a smith might work alongside someone who studied, to be a smith. Someone who learned. And yes, there might be an edge of innate skill, but even a mediocre smith might open a shop. How would you advise a poor man go about gaining access to your social circles? When he trips over his feet at a ball, will you think kindly of him? Will he be allowed to enter the ball at all? If he can buy his way in: perhaps. If he is rich enough, titled enough, if he gets a parcel of land in the right region of the country--"

He's gripping her hand quite hard now, as passion picks up. Gracefulness compromised by anger.

[coquettish_trees]

This is precisely what Alexandrie was waiting for: hands that clutch rather than prompt her, questions that fall one after the other in both crescendo and accelerando without waiting for answers. It is often easier when ones adversary is as fine a dancer as Nikos is. If she moves, she expects he is likely to compensate for it without thinking, and will perhaps continue to do so as long as he is kept distracted. So she steps herself into a turn before his arm asks it of her, and replies:

"I might advise a poor man with useful skill to find a patron or patroness to encourage its growth and take charge of his entrance into society. Perhaps you shall scoff at such, but how is such a suggestion different than telling any youth to seek out a master to apprentice to? Unless you mean to say that all, regardless of talent, deserve such education simply by virtue of their existence? How many apprentices do you mean a master to have? How many ways can the attention of one instructor be pulled before the quality of their instruction is throttled to nothing?"