EVENT: TRUTH BOMB

[faderifting]

WHO: Anyone
WHAT: TRUTH BOMB
WHEN: Bloomingtide 15-17
WHERE: The Gallows
NOTES: OOC information. Use appropriate content warnings in your subject lines, please.

It’s an ordinary day—so not a very pleasant one. The weather is dreary and muggy, and the day’s lunch is a soup that’s a little too watery and bland. The griffons are being their usual level of noisy and swoopy. The work is its usual level of urgent and difficult.

But in the storage rooms, something wiggles. Then it hums. Then it pops.

Outside of the storage room, there’s no actual sound, no shift in the wind, and no visible sign of a change. But the pop might be felt—like the moment something finally clicks, or two ideas suddenly fit together, except the opposite. In the heads of everyone in the fortress, something is suddenly not connected quite right.

The first sign of what’s gone wrong is that someone immediately stands up and tells the cook how bad the soup is.

A lot of people’s days are about to get exponentially worse.

Comments

[coquettish_trees]

"I did."

She takes a breath and exhales through her nose in a long thin stream, turning to look out the nearby window.

"This will sound quite arrogant, I am sure," a small wry smile plays at the corner of her mouth, "and perhaps you will not feel better by it, but I was trained very rigorously for over a decade in such subterfuge, and spent the vast majority of my life after my debut at court honing those skills as I learned them. I am very good at what I do, by necessity, and the shame is mine for using you, not yours for being used."

A moment after she finishes, her eyes widen slightly. The shift of that responsibility, spoken out loud and believed for truth, has sent a twinge through something so old and tight and hard in her that she hadn't known it was there.

Now she sits, looking a bit stunned.

[altusimperius]

He listens, at least, watching Alexandrie shrewdly, his expression closed.
"It does sound arrogant," he agrees after a pause, "...but it makes sense." Turning his head to look out the window instead of at her, Benedict narrows his eyes, fighting with himself over what to say next: what comes out isn't ideal, but it feels right, somehow.

"I was never trained like that. I think I was meant to pick it up." Hesitating, he tucks a strand of hair behind his ear. "...but I've never been good at it."

[coquettish_trees]

"I should not have been either, under different circumstances," she replies, her shoulders lifting slightly. C'est la vie.

"I understand in part what hurt comes of that, when subterfuge is not a natural talent, and you have inherited position in a world of wolves. But I am also envious of you, a little, for what you consider a failing."

[altusimperius]

"How is it not a failing?" comes his response, candid but still not entirely trusting, "I'm not a painter, because a Magister-in-training has no time for fripperies. Or for being a step behind anyone."

At least he seems angrier with his circumstances, perhaps even himself, than he is with her. "...especially not when we're at war."

[coquettish_trees]

There grows on her face something rarely seen there, and never by anyone outside her closest circle: Shame. Humility in it.

"You are right, of course. You are the heir of your House, and no matter how I have come to cherish and admire it, the luxury of being genuine is..." She sighs and looks down at her hands where they are folded in her lap. "I have abandoned my duty to my people, being so swept up in finally having it for myself. Become sloppy. Reckless. A step behind."

[altusimperius]

He doesn't answer right away, just watching her. Benedict has never seen Alexandrie this forthcoming or this wilted, and as strange as it is, it's also... welcome?
And not in a way he enjoys for its own sake, he finds-- but because it was all a sheen, she's truly no better than anyone.

A small smile twitches onto Bene's face, and if one squints, it could be called sympathetic.

[coquettish_trees]

Ladies, on the whole, don't squint, but Alexandrie picks through the possibilities of the look nonetheless and finds herself both heartened and galled by it.

An opening, yes, and one she had been hoping for, but it comes with the weary expectation that to keep it she may have to endure the teeth of a puppy sunk into her ear once in a while. Benedict has changed some, as she has, but despite the enforced humbling of circumstance—or perhaps because of it—she thinks the hunger to play and win at being courtier still gnaws in him.

She smiles back, small and made furtive and grateful for the chance at some mending, and keeps the wariness to herself.