[b]Solarel and Angela[/b] They attack. There’s a melee of chaos, and in it is a dance of love. The two empresses are, for a moment, united. They each share a target, each move forward in their style: Voctine with her sharp, flashy advance and Nialkai with her graceful, flowing movements. But they share a direction and so they advance side by side. If it were just the two of them and Solarel, theirs would be an impossible temporary alliance to crush a shared threat. But it is not just the two of them and Solarel. Their own retainers rush in a scrambled frenzy and so they must split like a mountain river striking the rapid rocks. Voctine slams an elbow into one of her own people, then quickly spins her before she can release the energy, causing a chain reaction of Zaldarians piled in a rush of sudden exhaustion. In the flickering lights, her body glows a sparkling energetic blue as her short dress and cape snap after her. Nialkai ducks beneath the release of energy, the rustle of her dress like a breath of air, but then Angela is there spinning a stave and Nialkai is forced to raise her own energy blades to meet the challenge, stopping her momentum. She spins and her dress spins out and widely, brushing against Angela’s body with waves of sparkling gold and black. The force of her against Angela is like a rushing wave and it’s everything just to keep it from pulling her off her feet. But then it’s beautiful too, the stave sparks against the energy blades and Angela’s muscles glow in the golden reflected light of her dress and her body. Solarel, what comes at you then is not a sharp attack of two united empresses, but a rolling chaos. Retainers first, pushing and shoving, some already charged up and radiating molten heat, others fresh and eager. And then Voctine will reach you first, the empress you so loyally served, who abandoned you, and yet just tantalizing out of reach are Angela and Nialkai and a whole other set of retainers dancing their way towards you. This is the love of the steppe just for you, Varangian. The love of the whole self, of ten or twenty whole selves being poured out, shaping and rushing, stepping and twirling, all for you, all at your word, a Terenian shining as brightly as any Zaldarian amidst them. How do you manage to find yourself in the heart of this fight? *** [b]Dolly[/b] “This isn’t fair” Valynia whispers into the ear that she’s biting, and you can’t tell whether she’s talking to you or to Jade. “I’m the kidnapper, I take what I want.” Her claw is digging into your shoulder blade in just the right spot, hand slipped beneath the cloak to touch you above the low-cut corset. The way you purr against her chest is filling her with a heat that you can feel through your cheek. “You’re not supposed to want it, you’re not supposed to invite it. To…to make this a fair game for both of us.” She tastes like sweat, and like wine, and like spice all together. She shudders and it runs through you. Through all of you all the way down to the tip of Ksharta’s toes. “I haven’t felt like this since I was a girl on Terysil, since the first time I let someone…” she breathes through her nose, long and deep, and the tension floods out of her shoulders even as the claw digs deeper, deep enough to hurt in just the right way. “I wasn’t supposed to love you…” and then she’s pressing and she’s pressing, and her hands are at the edges of the corset and her tongue runs along the exposed neck below the headdress woven into your hair, her face working its way through the soft fur. And as she takes, you hear her whisper, so quietly “are you sure this is what you want?” *** [b]Isabelle and Mirror[/b] “Do you see what my dress-maker has offered me?” Angela asks, speaking to Isabelle as she twirls, audible to Mirror, audible to Marcina Villajero, hovering nearby, hooked into the role of chaperone for the evening, too responsible to fully entrust her charge to someone else once Adriana started leaning on her. “At the greatest international political event of the cycle, no Hybrasilian would dare approach me for I am a gift to the gods. Nor can I make a daunting approach myself, their nectar makes me far too unsteady. The Zaldarians are…” she gestures, and from the swirls above you, you can see the flashing of lights and the glow of energy releasing over your head. The world moving above and around you in a dazzling display, unapproachable without violence. Do you remember the heat you felt from Solarel in that moment? An unconventional fire. “And every Terenian who supports me finds themselves a little muddled before long. I appreciate your little drones. That’s the sort of preparation that makes you something special. But I don’t want the challenge removed. I don’t want it bypassed, I don’t want to be cheated out of it. I want to face it head on, to make everything I can from it. That’s my heart, you see. That’s the truth I’m living tonight. You need to have a heart because if you close it off for the sake of power, you’ll get lost and never find what you’re looking for.” She looks at Mirror as the dance comes to an end. “Thank you for answering me Mira of the Fisher Clan, whose star name is Whispered Promise. I look forward to your match with Marcina when you have it. I’ll be sure to have a rose sent to your hangar as a token of good luck. I hope you enjoyed my attempts at education. I want this…kitten you’d call her, to stop running from herself.” She grins and extracts herself from your arms Isabelle, Marcina quickly coming to help her balance. Marcina will lead Adriana gently into the next dance, offering a grin for Mirror herself before they separate. Leaving Mirror and Isabelle for their dance.