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| Details |
| Author: | Athena |
| Summary: | Although officially there for business and political reasons, Avrenne is, by nature, an efficient multi-tasker, and so while she is in Pandaria, she takes the opportunity to spend some of that time visiting with her family, who also happen to be engaged in those political and military efforts (efficiency!). World Plot RP discussion. 6k~ words |
| Rating: | T for Teen |
The Pandaren house in Paw'don where the Duchess Esprit is staying in Pandaria, and her husband is staying with her whenever he can, is a lovely place, chosen for its privacy and beauty both, a proper place for a precious and prized jewel of a wife to be kept in comfort and style.
Avrenne Esprit Fallon is not inclined towards nerves in a general way, nor in a specific way for even those that many would find intimidating across several reasonable considerations to be nervous about from power to significance of the meeting. She has met with volatile kings over critical matters of state, and highlords over volatile battlefields in critical states with hardly a blink. So, perhaps it is a little telling about something in the state of her mind how often her hand seems to want to stray towards her waist as she prepares the glass teapot herself for her and Siamus, and sets out the two cool jugs of milk (one of fresh pandaren local yak milk, and the other of precious imported Elywnn farm milk), not a duchess but a mother's fussing to keep busy and occupied.
She doesn't wear either her armored or duchess clothing either; she's in her at home clothes, a simple, sweetheart neckline and soft mermaid silhouette, long sleeved with a little extra tulle puff with subtle dots, and a heavy velvet drape that does little to enhance her natural rectangular form. This is the time of year that she wears red, for the season and the holiday, and it brings out the golden glow of her ivory skin, and her hair, worn down because she is at home among her family, and tucked behind her ears, for no reason in particular of course. She wears her wedding ring, and a lovely white gold necklace of small pearls and tiny sapphires, cut into a design that suggests a gentle rolling wave across her collarbones, her ears with simpler sapphires like stars that sparkle with each move of her head.
Siamus moves to stand behind his wife, and rests a light hand on her shoulder. "She'll be glad to see ye," he says, and bends to kiss her shining hair, giving her shoulder a squeeze before he steps casually away. In case anyone should forget to knock and accidentally witnesses Affection.
He is dressed more casually than he has been for most of his Pandarian tenure, in a white shirt and tailored navy blue trousers. He is wearing neither waistcoat nor cravat; his shirt collar is open and his sleeves rolled.
Avrenne looks over her shoulder at him with a flicker of a smile, before she checks on the tea water (again), to see that it is still not precisely ready for the leaves (still), as it was not the last time she checked on it (a few seconds ago).
"It's only that it always seems different with the older ones, that's all," she tells the teapot. The teapot has no idea what she's talking about. And then Avrenne gathers up her composure, her chin rising, as her shoulders square off. "I'm sure it will be a productive afternoon of conference of her doings and intentions, and I am confident she will continue to be well in Pandaria with the knowledge of continual support of her House." That sounds very…businesslike and unsentimental. It also neatly sidesteps any discussion of whether or not Ralaea will like spending time with Avrenne or not, or if that is, in fact, anything of the point at all.
At that moment there is a knock on the door, perhaps a little heavier than necessary, as though the knocker is intent on being heard.
"Ah," says Siamus, and crosses the room to open the door.
Avrenne settles the teapot and the tea leaves, arranges her hands in a light clasp in front of her, and then arranges her expression in a light clasp of her composure.
Ralaea stands outside, wearing a new pair of engineering goggles over her eyes, and a blue scarf over the rest of her face. She almost looks like a celebrity trying to hide her identity, if that celebrity also wandered around in full armor with two swords at her hips. Peering up at Siamus, she greets him with a muffled “Hi,” before stepping inside.
There is a brief, bemused silence as Siamus surveys her, and then he nods affably and closes the door behind her. "Ralaea. Ye look — aye."
Avrenne is pleased. "You look well dressed for kite travel," she says diplomatically, stepping forward with her arms held out for something a little ambiguous, something between what could turn into a hand greeting of noble women, or a mother's hug. She seems to be gauging Ralaea's body language as she closes the distance to finish deciding which one it will become.
“Avrenne, you’re here,” Ralaea says, moving to join her. She doesn’t herself offer a hug, but also doesn’t seem to realize one might be coming. “Did you talk to Aze? She wrote me and gave me this scarf, and said the sha monsters might spore like mushrooms and so it’d be better to cover my mouth just in case, so I went further and made some goggles. I could make you and Siamus a pair too, but I don’t know what to do about the scarf part. Maybe you’d be fine if you tied a sock around your face instead. Or… you could borrow my scarf while you’re here and I could wear the sock.”
Between the goggles and the scarf, her expression is impossible to read.
Avrenne absorbs this information with a blink, and doesn't laugh because she is an extraordinarily skilled politician and diplomat who has spent decades learning how to control her reactions, and also she has decided that Ralaea is most definitely getting a hug, for no reason in particular, except that is especially convenient that a hug temporarily obscures Avrenne's expression for a period of time. No one can see if Avrenne's mouth is twitching or if there are faint lines around her eyes.
Don't look at her, Siamus. No eye contact for several seconds at least.
"Mm. I… see," Avrenne says, in a particular motherly tone that suggests that she is opening the dialogue to start to unpack all of that…somewhere.
Siamus is gazing directly at Avrenne. Full eye contact.
Siamus Aidan Parrish Westry Fallon.
Avrenne extends the hug. She's also battling for her life to control her face, as she now stares up at the ceiling, and tries to make her mouth stop trying to laugh and say what??? because Ralaea is definitely very serious.
Siamus has mercy on his wife. He clears his throat. "A gift from Aszera? Kind of her. Would ye like a drink, Ralaea? I believe there's milk." If he has thoughts on Aze's suggestion to Rae that sha monsters might spore, he does not voice those. He might voice them later. At Aze.
Ralaea perks up immediately. “What? Milk? Is it real milk?” she asks. “I haven’t seen a single cow in Pandaria. Yet, I guess. Maybe they hide their cows. But if not, maybe we could trade them some? You know, for… whatever we need from here?”
Avrenne arranges her face, tucking away the laughter under affection, patting Ralaea's hair once to settle it as if it was out of place as she releases the hug.
"Yes, it is milk from Elwynn, I brought some with me, for you. We can always arrange a greater trade agreement with the Pandaren for the long term, but those are precisely why we are working slowly towards such arrangements. I expect given everything we have already established of our opening trading efforts that they do not hide their cows, and it may be that cows are not appropriate for the location, for a variety of reasons. They will have their experts, and we will have ours, and they will speak with each other on the matter in depth to decide what level of trade is appropriate of either raw materials or processed goods," Avrenne says. "That is not my particular area, but such things always eventually have an effect on military matters for how it influences access to the way an army is fed abroad, and thus it is of some interest to me here to pay attention to the matter in a general way."
She crosses the room as she speaks, moving to pour the jug of the Elwynn cow milk into a pandaren mug with a practiced elegance. "You may also rest assured, Ralaea, that I came here fully prepared, with expert advice of the local pandaren who know the dangers of their country well. I would never endanger myself or the health of the children on my return. I have no need of any covering, and I have heard of no spores that I need guard against, but I thank you for your concern, and the scarf is still most useful against the cold, which I am glad to see you taking more seriously as a threat to your well being." Motherly fuss fuss.
Siamus does not hug Rae, but he drops an affectionate hand on her shoulder as he passes her to move back toward Avrenne and the tea. Good lad. Don't worry your mother.
“Well, I’m glad you’re here,” Ralaea says, finally, reluctantly, lowering the scarf. “And not just because of the milk. It’s nice to know I have family waiting for me back home, but it’s also nice to actually… you know… see that family sometimes. It’s pretty out here, and I don’t think me or Siamus could describe it well enough in words, so now you get to see for yourself, which is… like a shared experience.”
Nope, just kidding, the scarf returns. A slight deepening of color is visible at its edges.
Siamus nods gravely at Rae over Avrenne's head, then offers the curve of a conspiratorial smile. "Aye, neither of us a wordsmith."
Avrenne, who has known Finley all his life, is an expert at strategically missing signs of emotion when it's obvious the person in question wishes to have it somehow absent from one's face. She happens to be looking at the tea, and sees nothing of any color, surely. "And I am not so imaginative as someone like Isla, to read off a page and see it so clearly. I believe in the importance of seeing it for myself. Indeed, that shared experience is crucial to my philosophy of why I always take such trips personally, for my business, for I don't believe any written word ever captures or encompasses the experience as fully as is necessary as seeing for one's self when it comes to decisions that will impact life and death." She pours the tea into two mugs with those delicate pours that took years to perfect.
"But I will admit to you here that I am most glad that my business gives me ample reason to indulge in my personal wish to see you, as I have you missed at home, as we have we all, and to have opportunity to see a little of what you see while I am here," Avrenne says, lightly setting Siamus' cup into place with nearly no sound first. "As I understand it, you were working with White Squad of Cobalt Company, if I recall the name correctly?"
Ralaea nods. “White Squad, yeah, for a bit. My team had Gwen, Azizia, Estel, and Shun. We joined a monastery for a little while.”
Avrenne sips her tea. Oh, boy. "If I may ask, was it of an intellectual draw of sudden interest, or… religious conversion?" She's trying very hard not to ask if it was a phase. But. Was it a phase, Rae? Tell her it was a phase. "And you all joined together?"
Siamus picks up his teacup and then immediately forgets he's holding it as he gives Rae an arched-brow expression. Again: Don't worry your mother.
Ralaea claims her milk, pulling her scarf down to take a drink. When she’s finished, she says, “No, I’m pretty sure it was diplomacy. But we did all join together. There were a lot of chores involved, like killing tigers, hauling soup, and gathering plants, but then we got into combat training, and that was pretty fun. Anyway, I don’t think there was any religious converting going on, unless their religion is ‘how to punch fifty guys in a ring.’”
Avrenne's lips don't twitch, she is drinking tea, that's what she's doing. "Oh, well. I admit I am not familiar with that as a tenet of a religious cornerstone, but of course if you have adopted it as an interest, well. I am certain we can have a ring built on the grounds at the house," Avrenne says, and she's serious, but there's also a bit of a gleam of mischief in those dark brown eyes. What, no. Can't be. Ahem. Serious Duchess. "I am so pleased though to hear of Cobalt Company's diplomatic endeavors on the whole. You would say that this was beneficial to that goal, then, this…" She moves a hand in a circle in the air. "Brief monastic joining?"
Ralaea shrugs. “Oh, well, I think they like us okay, but they also said when we joined that the Horde would be welcome, too. We didn’t see any while we were there. Would’ve been awkward, since I don’t think diplomacy involves killing monastery guests. And Azizia didn’t like the chores part. Also, they have an unbelievable number of stairs in that place.”
Siamus looks a little dire at the suggestion that diplomacy would for some reason mean not killing Horde.
There's a cold, dark thing in Avrenne's eyes for a flashing brief moment at the mention of the Horde, and a blink of her eyes, and it's gone, if it was there at all. "Do they? I wonder how they compare to a mage's tower's endless propensity towards adding more unnecessary stairs than anyone could possibly find reasonable for tradition's sake. Perhaps an unexpected common upwards ground," she quips.
Ralaea wrinkles her nose. “Mages have no excuse,” she says. “At least here there are mountains.”
Siamus nods at Rae and raises his teacup to her briefly. He may just be agreeing that mages have no excuse.
For anything.
(Present company excepted.)
"Oh, with mages it's never about the locations, dearest. It's about the ego, and those you can take anywhere, especially if you can make an arcane pocket," Avrenne says.
For a moment, Ralaea seems to be seriously considering the idea of carrying an ego around in a magical pocket. “Well, if anyone can physically manifest ego, I guess it’d be a mage,” she concludes. “Unless there’s a sha-monster of ego and we can all do it. Have you seen very much of Pandaria yet, Avrenne? Maybe you’ll visit the Tian Monastery? Or… Well, there’s Krasarang, but it’s not exactly a safe place, so don’t go alone.”
"I have seen some of Jade Forest by horse. We passed through Nectarbreeze Orchard, up through the north along past the Serpent's Heart, and on to the Jade Serpent's Temple, and I intend to visit Dawn's Blossom as well. There are several places of particular interest of mine in the Valley of the Four Winds, and while it is not especially safe for a casual visit, Krasarang has necessary information that could be crucial to the war effort, and so it is on my itinerary, but you may rest well assured, Ralaea, that I am most aware that I am a civilian, and I will place myself neither in danger, nor shall I place any soldier in undue danger to ensure my protection for any unwarranted reason. If I travel to a location, it is only if I am certain that reason is worth the risk, and those risks are mitigated to the greatest possible degree," Avrenne says.
"You must remember dearest that I have been doing this for quite some time. I was there preparing the army at Nethergarde before the march into the Dark Portal after it reopened. I have been to Outland, both when they were preparing to assault the Black Temple, and again before the preparations for the Sunwell, and I was there in Northrend, twice." Only a little flicker of her lashes, a brief tightness around her mouth. "This is what I do. It is my House's promise to not shy away from the front, and to see truly for ourselves what it is that we are putting to paper elsewhere. I make decisions that affect the lives of people who I will be speaking to over the coming days. It is important that I do not see them as numbers on the page. It is important that I might observe something in reality that I might have missed in pure math." Avrenne's chin is held high in that pride of hers, the truth of a deeply held, personal sense of code of honor.
Siamus nods gravely and brushes a hand briefly against the small of Avrenne's back. To Rae, he says, "The first night Her Grace and I met, we compared notes on conditions in Northrend. She is ever at the fore." And then, more lightly, "We have some new star charts, Ralaea. Collected 'em from one of the scroll-keepers at the Temple of the Jade Serpent, to learn the constellations as the pandaren know them. Had to trade a copy of Bywin's Principles of Navigation."
Rae will surely miss Bywin's Principles of Navigation.
"Oh, and speaking of." Siamus turns to Avrenne. "I told ye that Ralaea took some soundings herself when we made our coastline surveys? She does a fine job taking a sight wi' the sextant now, as well. We'll have her calculating positions any day, no doubt."
(Maybe that latter is a little in doubt.)
Ralaea’s expression sours at the idea of calculations. “Can’t someone just invent a device to do that for us?” she asks. “It’d be quicker, right?”
"Well," says Siamus, "there are gnomish calculating machines. But outside of Kul Tiras I've not met a gnomish navigator, so I don't know how much useful calculation they could do in that regard. And to use a calculating machine, ye still need to know the formulae to give it to make the calculations." He smiles warmly at Rae. "There's no hurry, ye do a fine job with what ye've learned and ye're a credit to your Tirasian blood."
But also: trigonometry is coming for you, Rae.
"There is also the consideration that one must have with all machines and technologies — which is what one will do in the circumstance should they fail or break. That is precisely why an operator of a trebuchet learns how to use alternative handheld long range siege weaponry such as a crossbow, and why a sword trained warrior learns hand-to-hand combat. Even when one has a machine, one must always understand the principle beneath it for oneself.
"A machine may be quicker, but it can also derive no enjoyment or satisfaction in the completion of a job well done, nor can it ever experience well earned pride for having learned so well," Avrenne says. She also considers her audience. "And, of course, once you know it, consider how it sets an example for your younger brother Brendol Westwind, who could most assuredly benefit from such skills, and how he will surely be both most impressed and encouraged to follow in your footsteps to see how you accomplished it through hard work and application of time and effort, and how you might show him how you learned it."
“First of all,” Ralaea says, addressing Avrenne, “someone could just program the machine to say ‘yay’ or something after it successfully calculates. As proof of enjoyment. And second…” She leans forward, lowering her voice a little. “Are you saying if I learn… formulae like Siamus said, I’d be smarter than Bren?”
A tempting offer, perhaps.
Siamus conceals his smile by taking a sip of his tea. Nice shot, Your Grace.
"You will most certainly have more knowledge than him," Avrenne says, accurately. "Which will allow you to do things that he cannot, not until you helped show him how, of course." You would hold the power of the secret of knowledge in the palm of your hands. Or scarf, as it might be.
"And, of course, if you did take up an interest in wanting to learn how to be that person who programs a machine to say, yay after a calculation, well, I am certain we could find an instructor," the duchess adds. She'll add it into the ring for the 'guys' to line up to punch. She's a supporter, after all. It's also the first, and probably last time, anyone will ever hear her say 'yay,' spoken like some sort of foreign word that she is doing her best to pronounce.
Ralaea nods her approval at the pronunciation of the word yay. Good job, mom. “I bet Elle could program something to do it, but he’s… Actually, I don’t know where those guys have gotten off to. Would you say that these formulae are not common knowledge? Something that even well-educated, high society nobles might not know? Other nobles, obviously, because you both know them.”
She doesn’t say it directly, given present company, but the hopeful eagerness in her expression hints that it may be a certain well-educated (former) noble she intends to lord it over.
"Unless the noble in question had need of particular expertise in maths, I don't believe the sort we're discussing here — trigonometry, and specifically spherical trigonometry — is common curriculum for mainland nobility." Siamus looks to Avrenne for confirmation, but he seems pretty confident that mainlanders can't fucken navigate.
"They should be, and I am certain that if there was a great encouragement from the kingdom to pursue mathematics for general educational purposes of enlightenment of their many applications and exercise of the mind," Avrenne says with a small degree of fervor before she collects herself and continues, "there would be. However, at this time, it is not considered a standard, and I often find it necessary to explain what are basic trigonometry principles to many of the Eastern Kingdom noble class who are considered to be well educated, as it is simply not covered." Not for the first time, Varian, she is asking you to please fund STEM education in the Kingdom. Ahem.
"Even among gnomes, this sort of navigational mathematics are not exceptionally well known, although there is often an easier leap if they have a strong basis in other forms of trigonometry and calculus, of course. It is a rare math specialization. As I said before, until Siamus, this particular type of navigational trigonometry and how to apply it was not one I was versed in, and I adored trigonometry when I had my summers with it after geometry and before calculus. Those were special times." That tone in Avrenne's voice is most definitely not one people usually hear her use, and frankly isn't one people usually hear applied to math at all. But the woman really does love her maths.
“Rare, huh?” Ralaea’s expression twists into a sly smile, as though she thinks she might get away with something, not even considering how she might regret it later. “So then if I learn this, I could teach Har… other nobles, because I’d be smarter than them.”
She is all but sold on the idea. For now. Probably because no actual math has entered the conversation yet.
What can she say? Avrenne specializes in Persuasion.
"It was also interesting to note that when we visited the Jade Serpent's temple, one of the topics that came specifically was how the pandaren here have been so landlocked by the mists that they are unfamiliar with navigation on the open sea, and it might be of some genuine interest for some of the pandaren to learn the techniques, as something to trade of knowledge in return for their own sharing of theirs. It could very well be a form of exchange for diplomatic purposes of demonstrating our continuing efforts of open dialogue and cultural knowledges," Avrenne adds, because the woman never loses sight of the many goals she has her eye on. "You did not stay at the monastery, obviously, as part of the continued efforts. Have you been traveling along the coast, then, with the surveys, to the Krasarang Wilds?"
Ralaea takes a moment to smugly drink her milk, imagining future victories while ignoring the hard work that will have to go into them. Then, she nods. “Krasarang? Yeah. Horde’s there. And the fleet. And the mogu. It’s where I’m most useful. Staying active means I don’t have to think about sha-monsters reading my mind or however that works.”
"Staying active and keeping to the ships otherwise," Siamus agrees. "They say the sha are in the land."
Boat-boy has found a loophole. Land-suckers.
Ralaea nods seriously. Don't touch the lava land.
Avrenne raises both brows. "Oh, that is interesting, and I see the continuity in it, especially given how the mists have thus far worked as well. Do we yet know if water banishes the sha, or if it works to repel them in some way, if they have taken hold?" She might have continued another thought, but a glance at Ralaea has Avrenne deciding to perhaps hold her peace on it for now, and keep to only the questions.
"I don't know that it does anything to cure someone afflicted," Siamus concedes. "Shine's team fought the Sha of Despair in a village in Krasarang, where it had emerged from the earth during a miserable rain that eroded parts of the land around. It kept on raining the whole time they were there, and the Sha didn't seem to suffer for it." He pauses. "Rainwater isn't saltwater, of course." (Everyone knows that salt- is the superior water.) "But no sign of Sha trouble aboard the ships at anchor or asea. I do think the land is a requisite origin point."
“I did watch a pandaren punch it out of a guy,” Ralaea adds helpfully.
Avrenne nods to Siamus. "The land being a point of origin is most certainly worth strong consideration of strategy, and it does make one wonder about the potential for saltwater's interactions in prevention as well for what it might mean, for the superior position of the navy over merely lifted off the ground as a skyship might be." Her gaze flicks to Ralaea. "As for those afflicted, I admit, I have not yet heard of the strategy of…punching." She still has not referred to a guy. Avrenne is not really the type.
"I do wish I'd seen that myself. Ralaea and Shine and others have described the event to me, and I do think it was… a very specific sort of punching. A technique, possibly such as they train at their monasteries. Did ye see anything like it in your monastery training?" Siamus looks an inquiry at Rae.
“When I hit fifty guys in a ring, no sha monsters came out,” Ralaea reports. “Maybe it’s a Shado-Pan thing.” She shrugs.
"Did they have you facing sha afflicted people in the ring?" Avrenne asks with a small frown. That was not what she had been imagining in this training montage of diplomatic guy people punching martial something something.
“Some of them could have been,” Ralaea says. “But it’d be hard to tell. The night elf who got the sha punched out of him started to turn black and white and that’s how we knew, but some pandaren are already black and white, so how would you tell? Besides, fifty is a lot. Probably at least one of them was having a bad day.”
Siamus drinks his tea. Just because he wants some tea and not because he is masking his expression or anything.
Meanwhile, Avrenne is…frowning. Seriously. Because she is making a serious expression of a thoughtful frown, and that is the facial expression she is holding. When she raises her hand to rub seriously and thoughtfully at her lips — still frowning — she is considering these facts.
"Yes," Avrenne agrees. "Fifty is a lot." Number talk, always safe. "What an experience that must have been for everyone involved." A possible late entry into the Understatement of the Year, though not among her best. "You haven't spoken much about your White Squad companions. I recognized several of the names, including Miss Herald and her partner, and Miss Whittle, of course. Was it an enjoyable experience working with them?"
“My team? Oh, well, I was already friends with Estel and Gwen,” Ralaea says. “Estel helped set me up in an inn right after I first joined the Company, and Gwen was my first Mysterious Greatfather Winter.”
She scoots her milk to one side and hoists her misshapen bag onto the table. “She made this for me without magic because she knows I don’t like it. According to her, it didn’t turn out well. She cried. I like it, though. It’s unique. As for the rest, Azizia’s pretty good in a fight, although by the time our stay at the monastery was over, it seemed like she was ready to fight all the pandaren whether they wanted to or not. I don’t know much about Shun. He’s quiet. Assassiny I guess. Thinks of himself as a weapon. Anyway, I think we all worked together well enough.”
Siamus mouths 'Mysterious Greatfather Winter' dubiously under his breath.
Avrenne takes note of the bag, and the information. "There can be benefit in a diverse team for offering various perspectives," Avrenne says diplomatically. "Although, I do hope that Miss Azizia has found alternative outlets that put that desire for fighting activity to use since." And not, say, punching random pandaren 'guys' out there. "I must admit that I am not particularly familiar with the 'Mysterious Greatfather Winter' concept. Is this a game or something like it in Cobalt Company or among your friends?"
“It’s where you stop by headquarters and put your name in a hat, then you randomly draw someone else’s name and have to come up with a gift for them,” Ralaea says. “Does that count as a game? Oh, speaking of, I wanted to show Finley, they have some sort of wood-art here and I thought he might be interested. Art is more expensive than I thought, so I did my own.”
She stands up and digs around in her bag, producing a folded piece of paper. The drawing on it looks nothing like the art in question, and could easily be mistaken for squiggles inside a rectangle.
"Ah," says Siamus, contemplating the squiggles. "Is it… symbolic?"
To be fair, the man doesn't really Get art in the first place.
Neither does Avrenne. She does like symbols though. "Oh, is it?" she seconds. "I have only seen a little of Pandaren artwork."
“Symbolic?” Ralaea stares at her drawing blankly. “I don’t know, ask the pandaren. Anyway, it’s a drawing of a wood-art of a rocky cliff and the ocean.”
It does not look like any of these things.
"Ah," says Siamus again. "The ocean."
Sure. Sometimes the ocean is squiggles, if you squint at it.
"Oh, I see, yes," Avrenne says, examining the squiggles anew. "Finley will be most interested in the technique, I am sure. He has been learning something to do with painting on metal recently. I am not as up to date with it, now that he is no longer at the main house." Avrenne does not linger in that sentence very long, as she adjusts her teacup for no particular reason. "Of course, dearest, if you did wish to purchase some art, you need only let us know what the cost is, and we shall arrange for it to be included within your allowance. I don't expect it will be beyond a reasonable price, and I can always negotiate it to one if so, if you found something you liked. Where did you see this wood art of the rocky cliff and the ocean that you liked but found expensive?"
Siamus looks sternly at Rae for her answer. Unacceptable that something should be 'too expensive'. Something is welcome to try, but.
“There’s a place called the Arboretum, I think it’s close by the Jade Serpent Temple? I saw it there, along with some others,” Ralaea says, writing a number down under her drawing. Then she frowns. “Wait, Finley moved out? Why? Is he getting married? Or is it to hide his stuff better from Isla?”
There is a brief flicker of something around Avrenne's eyes at the mention of Finley getting married, a drop of her gaze lower, before she picks it back up, and arranges her features once more. "Neither. It's a matter of practicality. Much of his socializing with his artistic community and various interests are directly related to, or begin in Stormwind City, and with the townhouse now complete, having his primary residence there has vastly improved his commuting and ability to commit to multiple social engagements with greater flexibility. He is at the main house often, of course."
Avrenne sets her hand on the drawing lightly, and makes a little oh at the number with a small smile. "That's a most reasonable place to start, and not at all too expensive if they hold to it. The Arboretum by the Jade Serpent Temple. We'll go see them tomorrow before you head back out, and you can point out the one, assuming they still have it, and I'll begin negotiations to ensure all parties are satisfied. Perhaps we might even find something for Finley specifically while we're there. A brown cliff maybe." Or brown field. Or brown rock. Or brown sky. Or … brown…block of brown.
Ralaea smiles as well. Maybe it’s contagious. “Don’t worry, they’re all brown. Different shades, maybe, but brown. I don’t think they color the wood. That’s why I thought of Finley, besides the art thing.”
It startles a fond laugh out of Avrenne, her true laugh not held back by her public mask, and so it is the one rich and vibrant, warm with all the depth of a hearth fire in deep winter. She catches it back with her fingers to her lips. "Oh, yes, well." There is a sparkle of a bit of teasing in her voice for Finley, though he's not there to know it. "He will appreciate that, I'm sure."
Siamus smiles benevolently at his two ladies lady and lad. It is, of course, very humorous that a gentleman should live such a monochromatic existence.
Monochromatic in a color other than blue, that is. A monochromatic blue existence is perfectly reasonable.