[b]Giriel![/b] Three Gleaming Petals has had several jobs over the course of her ageless life. Once she was the goddess of a simple village, its name now known only to her; from there she became a fertility deity for the northeastern kingdoms, and she successfully managed to leverage that into a cabinet position in the House of Lapis Lazuli. Even in her voluminous robes and her elaborate flower-wreathed bun, it’s impossible for her to completely hide her broad shoulders and hands, the physique of someone who still tends to gardens by hand. More worryingly, she seems uncharacteristically frazzled; her bun, usually perfect, is frizzing, and the hem of her shining blue robe is muddy. “Oh, [i]Bruinstead,[/i]” she says, when she materializes from smoke, delight clear on her tired face. (Feel free to explain what, exactly, you have helped her with before.) She drapes herself on the furniture and accepts the offering of rich southern rum, knocking it back like a shot. “Hmm? Yes? This?” When she takes the prayer slips from your hands, she frowns. “Well, the slip is from An-Teng. Presumably, brought here by the Dominion.” She gives you (and your collar) a sidelong glance, and purses her lips around saying more on that subject. “The ink was made in Chiaroscuro, in one of the old workshops, beneath the sign of the Yellow Moon. And I can’t tell you a single thing about the writer!” Which, of course, presuming that she is telling the truth (with little reason to lie), means that it was written by someone outside of Fate and the gods’ domains: the fairies, or the demons, or the dead. Of those, of course the demon maids are the most likely; one imagines a clandestine heist to steal writing supplies, forced to work together to get what they want separately. Three Gleaming Petals graciously accepts more rum. “Don’t tease me, Bruinstead,” she continues. “Is this about the imminent rebellion, which no god will claim credit for, or is this about those damned demons spilling out of Kingeater’s? You won’t believe it, but I’ve heard the whole thing was finally torn down— and good riddance to it! We don’t need the [i]old guard[/i] meddling in our affairs! And little help from Yu-Shan, either—“ And here she stops, suddenly, as if aware she treads on dangerous ground. “But tell me more about your change in circumstances, Bruinstead. This isn’t the hill country, and I could almost swear I was at the world’s axis, seeing this imperial finery on you.” The trick is that she wants to trust you. She wants to tell you about the untrustworthy emissary sent from Heaven who humiliated a priestess and vanished into a rakshasa’s den. She wants to tell you about her search for Lotus of Tranquil Waters, to beg you for your help in finding her, to overextend and offer you whatsoever you might please, if it brings the wayward girl back to the House of Lapis Lazuli, to her distraught mother’s arms. And she will. But she hesitates to divulge this to the Dominion, to the invader. You have many ways that you can come to the same place: by reassuring her of your neutrality and your old vows, despite the Dominion collar, whether you mean it or not, and sincerely offering aid with what troubles her; you can ply her with offerings and rum and trick her into revealing more than she means to give you, a method that many witches would swear by; you can even seduce her into loosening her sash and letting her worries melt away underneath your lips, and perhaps not for the first time, either… *** [b]Kalaya![/b] Ven throttles a pillow. The noises she is making suggest that she either is very displeased by the prophecy about her death, your presence onboard a Dominion barge, your request to not go and save you, or all of the above. [i]What do you want me to do?[/i] she finally hisses, like a knife dragged down the strings of a lute, the pillow leaking silver sand out of where her brass hand punctured it. [i]Leave you to be seduced by that lecherous dragon? Sit here and sigh like a princess in a tower, waiting for her Knight to save her? I need you here! Whirling-in-Rags is making a play, there’s open war in the Wrack-waste, there’s opportunities here while the Blues scramble to catch up with us! We can rebuild everything and more, we can hold power that the Flower Kingdoms can’t even dream of, and then— whatever you want! It’ll be yours when we rule the Kingdoms! Together![/i] She’s trying again, despite what you said to her in the Wrack-waste. She’s trying to make both you and her ambitions fit. And your most obvious rejoinder would be to tell her to just come and be with you, which you just told her [i]not[/i] to do. Face it, Kalaya. The longer she stays there, the more entrenched in Hell she’ll be. She’ll barter more, become deeper indebted, make different preparations— perhaps not arriving in Golden Chrysanth at the head of an army of dolls, but in the midst of a whirling, gyrating, lascivious carnival of Hell, overturning walls with a stomp of her feet and ousting the merchant families with an aria that consumes her voice in the singing. The music outside is getting faster, more manic. The curtains around the bed shift and have strange shadows play over them. It’s building to a climax, whatever it is. *** [b]Piripiri![/b] “I will die before I let that happen to my home,” Uusha says, simply. She means it. She says it fully believing she will die. It is unlikely that she will be permitted to do so, but perhaps it would be impolitic to point out what awaits her on Lamentation. “I hope that the day comes soon that you realize the beast you feed will never be sated, daughter of Hymair. And I hope I do not have to kill you.” She means that, too. She respects what you have shared with her, the care you have shown her weary body. She would feel bad if she had to kill you on her way out, and not just because it would be a failure of her knightly oaths. Just as you would feel bad if Agata ordered you to poison her. But you would still obey Agata, for the sake of your family… and Uusha would still do whatever was necessary to protect her homeland. *** [b]Lotus of Tranquil Waters![/b] A rabbit will do a very silly thing when caught by a little brown fox. You’ve seen it time and again in your mother’s gardens: a rabbit, peacefully trimming the weeds, will be pounced upon, and will go still and stiff rather than struggling and trying to get away. Sometimes this just means that they get eaten all the faster, but more often, the fox will stop to congratulate itself, and the rabbit will race away, leading to a delightful chase all through the bushes. Your heart is a rabbit in Han’s jaws. The veil she made for you isn’t fancy, though your standards are very skewed by the clothes you had available in your mother’s house. But it’s a familiar comfort, and it feels right resting on your face, and when you breathe in, the world is filtered through the smell of Han, as if you were right next to her. You half-lift your hands, then catch yourself and ball them in fists at your side, rather than pulling it taut over your face and [i]huffing.[/i] Your heart hammers and she’s staring at you and so is the Dominion’s girl and weren’t you supposed to be doing something? With her watching? With Han waiting? You can’t back out. That would be ungrateful. You’re not ungrateful, are you, Lotus? No, you’re very grateful. The way a grateful girl shows her appreciation is by offering her healing, by making the pain go away, by being magical. And Han will understand. “I’m sorry,” you say, “it has to be— I can’t just— because of how it—“ You shove your face into her neck and lift the veil, not daring to try and untie the knot that Han tied so carefully, and you give her a quick and shuddering peck, but, oh, stupid girl! That’s not going to work! You barely touched her! What kind of girl lets her rabbit heart stop her from soothing someone in pain? You take her shoulder in one hand, still lifting your veil with the other, and you kiss her neck hard enough that, when you finally pull away, lips throbbing with the essence of water and wood, the only thing left is your lipstick smeared on her skin and a growing bruise, even though her skin is smooth again, the pain gone, and you realize that you could kiss her again. So you do. You kiss her on the cheek, hungry and just as wet, and you feel her stiffen, and your heart plummets from the peak of Mount Meru. Look at you, hungry little slut! You didn’t even ask her if she wanted it, if she forgave you for the lies about your identity and, Hell, even your name! You straighten up just as stiff, lower the veil back over your face. “I hope it helps,” you blurt out, and you scamper off like the rabbit, out the door before Han can stop you, back towards your room. And once you’re there you’ll sit on the floor next to your bed and pull that veil taut over your face and close your eyes and imagine that you’re burying your face in the strongest, bravest, best smelling, most kissable girl you know, wishing she wanted to kiss you back, wishing that she wanted to do more than that, that she’d use her strength to make you feel pretty and helpless and just shut you up [i]so[/i] good, the way you don’t deserve at all, not from a real hero like her. *** [b]Han![/b] The room is absent one Lotus of Tranquil Waters, but her floral scent still lingers. You sit there, poleaxed, trying to process the three kisses you just got and what they might mean, and whether you just ruined everything forever. It was guilt, wasn’t it? Guilt over how much you wanted to return the kiss, repay her for the cool, soothing sensation that flooded you from chin to shoulder when she worked her magic with clumsy, hungry dragon lips. Did you do the right thing, or the worst thing in the history of forever? Emli sits down opposite you and firmly, without letting you argue, takes one of your hands in hers. “Han,” she says, full of determination. “Tell me about that girl. Tell me [i]everything.[/i]” She immediately pulls one of your Strings; mark XP if you blurt out a flood of feelings about Lotus (and Emli, for that matter). Sing your song of [i]dragon want kissies.[/i] Don’t worry, she’s [i]very[/i] good at affirming noises and “uhhuh?” and soothing thumb strokes.