closed | couldn't drag me away.

[poleaxed]

WHO: Butch Porkfist poleaxed & Final Fantasy's Amelia Bedelia archademode & Snidely Whiplash altusimperius
WHAT: I don't want to ride my chocobo all day. Neither does Benedict.
WHEN: Now.
WHERE: The stables.
NOTES: I don't actually know how horses work.

UNO.

Every stable has an old nag, so old and docile no one really uses it anymore. Some of them had names once, but when a horse gets old enough, they just fade into the background until they die. It'd be sad, if Jone gave a shit, but she doesn't, so it isn't.

Nag is a grey mare, born some time in, presumably, the Blessed age. She walks slowly and calmly behind Jone, who is holding a carrot. Nag slowly uses her flat yellow teeth to saw into the carrot.

"This," Jone says to the tower of metal standing before her, "is a horse."

DOS.

Later, at some point after Jone has menaced Gabranth with the platonic concept of equestrianism, she spots young Benedict in the distance. What he's doing doesn't really matter to her, and the fact that she might be about to make a fool of herself barely crosses her mind.

Without warning, she just shouts, with (practiced, but) real (sounding) concern in her voice. "Oi! Ben! They're coming, they are! Hide here!"

She waves her hand, looking generally distressed.

Comments

[archademode]

"The world is made by declarations alone."

Conviction drove a man without home— without country— to crawl hand over foot into the Emperor's shadow as if he were destined for it. So far from those memories now, they exist as little more than the lining of his armor, or the weight of his cape where it clings to his shoulders. Still, he feels it no less. Is no less certain of it here, now, in a world that should be more foreign to him than it is.

"Was it not you who said commoners could lift themselves up?"

[poleaxed]

Jone snorts, dismissive. The mare next to her does the same, which Jone assumes is an entreaty for more snacks. A few sugar cubes are held out, open palmed, and Jone speaks of kings and princes while a horse licks her fingers.

“Weren’t me. Nobles at the landsmeet rose the Mac Tirs up after the Orlesian Occupation, for all the good they did to help. Why, you planning a coup?”

[archademode]

"Not as of yet."

He's never been the sort for that, truth be told. Insurrection, deviation for a worthy cause, the few against the many— that was always Basch's way, and though Gabranth wears his face now beneath the shadows of his helm, he cannot bring himself to become any more like his twin. His reach was always lacking, his strides ever too short to keep pace.

...perhaps that's why he'd been left behind in the first place.

"But I will teach you, if you've a willingness to become more than yourself."

[poleaxed]

Jone cocks her head. “Teach me what, exactly? When we fight, it comes out a draw every time.”

[archademode]

That is not true, is the argument he seems to want to make, given the way his plated shoulders rise by degrees— only to stop halfway. In essence, it’s all pride. One stubbornly insistent ego with no bite or bark, and instead it’s chased by a tepid exhale, and the spread of his fingers along the nape of the horse's neck.

"The rules by which you will live, fight and serve. The very same that mark the difference between a man in armor, and a noble's chosen hand."

Chosen, as someone out there in the broad span of this world surely would, were Jone to fit herself well enough to play the part.

"I see no reason why you cannot take them on as your own, and serve as I once did."

[poleaxed]

Jone sighs, pinching her nose in a sign of frustration. “You can’t make my blood better,” she says. “You missed the point. Changing for them—”

She shakes her head, cutting the anger off as Gabranth did. She recognized something there, or she thinks she did. That control, she has it too.

“Do you wanna ride the damned horse or not, Gab?”

[archademode]

"Not for them."

Clarified with one last shake of his head— mirrored thereafter by the mare stood between them, likely for having to endure the push and pull of their mulish conversation.

"Fine. Show me how it is done."

Easier to observe than to bother with it himself, clambering over tack in heavy armor. That Jone hasn't demanded he remove any of it is a strangely specific mercy, and one he suspects is entirely intentional on her part, perhaps born out of knowing he would only refuse.

[poleaxed]

Jone nods, taking a moment to fight the signs of frustration and disappointment out of her expression, before coming around to Gabranth’s side of the horse.

“Right,” she says, and her tone isn’t as easy-going as it was, but it’s no longer granite ground in her windpipe. “Properly, most put the armor on after they’re on the horse.”

No comment on Gabranth’s particular fancies. She’s stopped demanding he take it off because the other talk they have is far more interesting.

“Even without, I’d still need a leg up.” She looks at Gabranth expectantly. Come on, then.

[archademode]

He does as he's bid— hardly surprising to anyone present— crossing around the horse's substantial frame and kneeling low, his gloved hands extended: palms up, fingers knitted together in as much of a makeshift stirrup as he can manage.

Go on, then, Jone.

[poleaxed]

And up she goes.

“Moira, here,” Jone says, patting the horse, “is precious gentle. No good for the battlefront, but she’s good for breeding, I imagine. S’why you can ride her without saddle for a little while.”

This, Jone reflects, isn’t probably the best actual demonstration, but then, she’s really trying to show him there’s nothing to fear, isn’t she?

Wouldn’t that be a laugh.

“C’mon, your Majesty, let’s trot.” Jone makes some affectionate clicking noises, moves the bridle in her hands, and Moira walks them around in a slow circle.

[archademode]

Impractical as it is in terms of form and accommodation, it does at least serve the purpose of letting him compare what trots languidly before him versus what he's familiar with from his own world: the differences in seating, the fact that her balance is more upright rather than forward-leaning to accommodate a creature with two legs, rather than four.

"Simple enough." He concludes, despite not having a hand in it at all.

[poleaxed]

“Been riding since I were fourteen,” she adds, “and Moira here is uncommon polite. Ain’t you, Your Majesty?”

Jone pets the horse’s mane, scratches behind an ear, and Moira makes pleased noises.

“Lucky for us both, Riftwatch ain’t much for horsed combat, so you’ll only need to learn riding.”

[archademode]

"Unless I desired to enter that tournament you spoke of." He counters, letting his arms fold while he watches her pad around in slow, steady circles.

[poleaxed]

Jone’s eyes light up, all excitement. “Would you really?”

[archademode]

"I doubt I'll be proficient enough by then," Learning to ride is one thing, after all. Learning an entire sport while riding on an unfamiliar breed of beast altogether might very well be too much for him.

And...truth be told, he still has far too much work to manage to even begin to consider matters of leisure.

"But should fate deign to allow it, yes. I would."

[poleaxed]

Joan continues to beam. She turns to get off Moira, leading her back to the stables, where one can find a saddle and wooden stairs that lead up to nowhere. Not everyone has a partner to push them up on the big horses.

“We’ll have to get you trained up, then.” The pleasure in her voice is impossible to miss. “Can I ask why?”

She says, affixing saddle and stirrups to Moira.

[archademode]

"To settle our score, naturally."

Said as he moves to retain full view of her, even as she moves to begin the lengthy process of laying and adjusting tack and blanket. His voice, if ever he sounded close to it, could be read as almost teasing.

But that would be impossible, of course.

[poleaxed]

She finishes saddling the horse, and, step stool in hand, walks over to quickly peck his helm. She leaves no blood, this time. “A prince, you are. The real kind, not the sort that go whoring and whelp bastards.”

It doesn’t occur to her that those sorts of princes only exist in fairy tales for a reason.

She sets the step stool down, so Gabranth has a chance in hell of mounting the beast in front of them— who is nosing at Jone’s now empty hands, searching for more treats. Jone takes a step back, sturdying Moira. “Now, up you go, and be sure to treat Her Majesty with respect. I’d try’n give you a leg up, but I’m not partial to breaking me back so as to maintain your mystique.”

[archademode]

It doesn’t sit well with him, that compliment. The way she says it, with a simplicity that feels so desperately sincere to his ears. Kind words wasted on a man like him.

But she outweighs the discomfort of it. Even the kiss placed does nothing to unsettle.

“Princes don’t keep score.”

Said with an ease to it, a familiar push and pull; he rises fully along with it, pressing away from the wall and letting the step bear all his weight— though once he sits, once he feels the beast move beneath him, weight switching from one hoof to the next, he finds himself gripping the saddle with one hand, his balance too far forward on instinct alone.

[poleaxed]

“You- you’re leaning, mate. Relax.” She stands parallel to him on the ground, and tries to mimick the riding form he should have. Shoulders back, back.

“You’ll give Her Majesty a shoulder ache like that. Don’t want to upset the Queen, now.”

[archademode]

He doesn’t mean to. There is so much about it that feels strange to his senses— and he’d more often relied on Archadia’s airships than any high-blooded chocobo for transport, aside from the occasional need for a ceremonial procession or narrow pass.

His shoulders roll back, but his hips stay forward— his body stiff to maintain an odd angle, heels digging in.

“All right—“

All right, he says. Not knowing what to agree to or how best to act on her instruction.

[poleaxed]

Moira makes a frustrated noise, and horse-faced Jone can’t help but agree. She pets Moira’s mane to calm her, and puts a hand on Gabranth’s knee to calm him. Well. His armor. It’s probably not that calming.

(What a lonely thing, hiding from everyone, not being able to feel their touch. Armor makes every physical entreaty into an attack. The part of her mind that handles abstract thought seizes on that idea, a puzzle box to be peered at later at night when sleep won’t come.)

“What’d calm you down, mate?” She asks, earnest, “I can tell stories, or give you instruction, but what you need to do is relax, aye?”

[archademode]

Relax. As if that were so easy. As if he could manage anything more—or perhaps less— than the perpetual sense of immediacy clinging to his every movement. He was meant for the Hunt. Intended to act without leisure or comfort, a point of pride, and that alone is what promised him a life at the Emperor’s side.

He exhales, attempting to let the saddle hold him (more than he clings to either it or the reins), and though he doesn’t quite manage it, it is at least the small semblance of progress.

“I do not know.” Said teresely. Irritably.

More childish in his impatience than he’s ever been.

[poleaxed]

Jone guesses, based entirely upon her knowledge of herself (that she is, ultimately, an irritant) that reaching out to him again likely won’t help. He’s got to get comfortable with the animal, and he isn’t even comfortable touching people. Instead, she takes the reins, and lets Moira move slowly about.

“You know why she’s a queen?” Jone says, voice light, “Queen Moira of Ferelden. Rebel Queen Moira. When Orlais invaded, she lead the rebellion, taught her son how to wage it. I dunno if that’s what they call this mare, here, but I always wanted a horse named Moira, so that’s what I call her when I come down. Suits you, don’t it?”

She pats Moira’s mane as she leads her, slowly, steadily.

[archademode]

"Rebel queens. Common uprisings. Your world is a tumultuous one.” Said the pot to the kettle, and sounding a bit petulant for it at that.

Steady movement— predictable movement— helps: there at least he can feel out where step and stride meet, and where his own balance ought to adjust to meet it. True, there’s no grace to his movements, it isn’t even the shadow of his fluidity in a fight or the form he intends to maintain beneath her instruction, but so long as he stays seated with his spine more at ease, it turns to less trouble for everyone involved.