Glitter & Gold [Finn & Hilana]

[Finn]

Finn turned a bit pink at the teasing, but it was true: his fair skin was sensitive to the sun and often made it clear how he was feeling, at least in some regards. He supposed Arvælyn's lovely complexion was better suited for treading the boards, though he seemed to have no great desire for a stage when this whole situation in Solunarium was a sort of neverending improvisation.

"Well, I try to cover up unless I'm down in the Umbrium," he admitted, though often down there he was swathed in black and veiled as well.

"But I would like to join you on the sands as much as possible. It sounds like we will soon be sent out of the city on missions and I don't want to embarrass myself—or Arvælyn—by swooning at the Sun's glory." He patted Arvælyn's knee; his golden lover was the only sun he really wanted in this land dominated by the burning eye of heaven.

"And, if you like, on the way, you can show me your northron plants and I will try to identify any and tell you what little I may know about them. My grandmother was the village witch." He laughed with honest affection for the woman, may she rest in peace. "She said I didn't have the mind to follow in her footsteps, but she did teach me a thing or two."

None of her children or grandchildren had, which made him sad sometimes, but at least she had reconnected him with his previously unknown grandfather and sometimes he would tell him things he hadn't known about her in her lifetime. His own family had its secrets, though none so volatile as Arvælyn's. He watched his lover eat the dolma, enjoying the way his lips moved, the light of enjoyment in his eyes.

Ignoring his own wine for a moment, he sipped on chilled water. He had found that his body did better if he remained "water-fat" in the dry heat.

"The chickpea... dish... is good, as well," he said. "Fancier than I remember, but the cooks here are artists."

[Hilana Chenzira]

“I have a salve that I make for sunscreen,” Hilana offered. “We have it at Sweet Remedies. That will help keep him from burning up too much and it hydrates the skin, too. I wish I could say that your skin would get used to the sun, but that is never the way, I’m afraid. And even if it did, you wouldn’t like the results in a few years. You don’t want skin like old leather, do you?” her eyes were enormously wide and her face solemn, if only for a moment before she was grinning broadly. “Have no fear. We’ll keep you safe, but you may have some freckles... which is fine; we consider them a sign of good luck.”

She nodded when he spoke of the fact that the plants needed extra tending. That was true; she knew that well. It took a special kind of flora to survive the temperatures and emissions of an active volcano, and so to have such exotic plants out here... “That makes a lot of sense. They would use Elementalism for that? Or perhaps Summoning?” Hilana asked the Sunborn, curious. She had neither, but...perhaps they were worth a thought. She cared for plants the mundane way, but she had to admit there was something to be said for being able to work with aether to help them...

“A good title, then! I would like that. You can tell me about the northron plants, and I will provide sunscreen for your trouble. But I understand; it is sometimes that is the way it goes. My great-aunt had ten children, and not one of them was interested in herbalism or poisons,” she shrugged. “Nor are her grandchildren; I am the only one,” she held her hands palm to the sky as if to suggest that only the Founders knew. “But it is good to keep that knowledge alive. That is part of what I loved the most about traveling with the tribes... so much of our knowledge is lived through and shared that way, and much of it is also verbal, passed on through stories we tell on the camels, or around the fires at night, or in the shade of the tents during the day. And as generations continue, we add our own knowledge to the stories. Our own pattern to the weave... the tapestry of my people.”

She surveyed the food, clapping her hands together lightly, thrilled with the spread. “Yes, those are the dolmades, dolma. Stuffed grape leaves. We have some different dips here - this one is labneh, which is a strained yogurt with oil... and once you strain that yogurt, it becomes a kind of cheese,” Hilana explained. “You can make it from any type of yogurt, sheep, cow, goat, camel... any, whatever you have on hand. I think this one is cow’s milk, it’s got that texture to it...” she spooned a bit onto one of the pita chips to sample. “Cow’s milk,” she affirmed, once she had swallowed it. “This one is hummus, so mashed chickpeas, with oil, spices, garlic,” she pointed out the more golden dip that was swirled elegantly into a bowl. Finn was right: these cooks were artists, and it was something to aspire to. They say you ate with your eyes first, and it was what drew you in. “This third one here is baba ghanoush. It is similar to hummus, but it actually uses roasted eggplant instead of chickpeas. The nice thing about all of these dips is that they will keep when you travel, and they don’t take up as much space. You can eat them while you ride.”

“These are pita, fried pita, but I think you both knew that one?” she glanced from one to the other. “But these ones...” she indicated the crispy fried rectangles, covered in a light batter. “These are what we call sabaar,” Hilana offered her hosts the Vastian term for the food, “fried cactus paddles. No spines, I promise,” her eyes danced. Sometimes, making bread wasn’t always opportune, but if you could forage... “They also go very well with the dips when they are fried this way. You can actually eat many varieties of cacti, but these ones are the most popular. They grow very quickly and they are plentiful. You don’t have to cut down the whole cactus, just trim off a few paddles... very sustainable. We have them in salads, soups, stews, and you can grill them over the fire and eat them as they are.”

She indicated a plate with some sort of meat lollipops still on the bone, artfully arranged as it was. “These are the paidakia... grilled lamb chops. We cook them over charcoal to get the most flavour into the meat after they’ve been marinated for a day or so.” She only hoped she wasn’t overwhelming Arvaelyn and Finn with the flood of information, but the Vastii was rather proud of her culture, and many of these foods were those she had grown up with. “These ones here, we call saganaki. It’s actually named for the type of pan that it is cooked in, sagani, which is very heavy on the bottom, and has those lines on it. It is fried sheep’s milk cheese. Sometimes it is made with a cheese that is a mixture of sheep and goat’s milk, but that is less common and you will see that much further away from the cities.”

[Arvælyn]

"Elementalism, I believe..." Finn was more attentive to the goings on of the household. It wasn't that Arry thought he was above it, per se, but he was so overwhelmed by his personal concerns, that he didn't take the time to investigate things that ran smoothly without his oversight. Having regular dedicated servants had been a new experience at the beginning of this whole endeavour for Arry, but it was one to which he acclimated with great alacrity.

Arvælyn was passively attentive to the exchange about the desert. He knew Finn had met out on the sands, but his own experience in the desert to date had been a recent ride on the back of a wyvern. He'd only been a passenger of course, not a driver, but via that medium of travel he didn't really get a feel for the desert, except insofar as it was a lovely landscape. So, he was listening, but not really participating, and placing his primary focus on the food and drink before them. He collected an eclectic assortment of the Vastian offerings onto his plate.

By and by, the conversation rolled around to his current area of focus and he lifted his eyes to Hilana, as she pointed out and described the various comestibles before them. He scanned the collection on his plate, following her guidance so he could identify the morsels before he tried them out.

The golden elf was not naturally a delicate eater, but along with his native dialect, his name and a great many other qualities that were aspects of Arvælyn, he'd striven to change it. So he took small bites, rather than devouring the morsels whole, as he might have done as a starving teen back in Antiris. Now that he was familiar with surfeit, it was easier to take his time.

Idly, his golden eyes scanned the skies for dragonsign. Plenty of wyverns could be seen in the distance, and soon the chiroptera magna were like to emerge as the sun descended, but as usual- No proper dragons. Polishing off his first glass of wine, he held it aloft to his side and a servus rushed over to refill it.

"So, what sort of activities pass the time for you, Hilana? Do you attend the fights at the arena? The theatre? Museums?"

[Finn]

"No leathery skin, please," he interjected quietly with a smile and then listened to all the knowledge she had to share.

Unguents for the skin seemed to be something more suited to the courtesans Arvælyn used to work with than him, but he supposed he would have to take better care of his face if that was going to be his calling card as a musician and a way to keep Arvælyn's eyes on him. The elf had already had an influence on his toilette, after all.

Even after he stopped helping his mother in the forge, Finn had been a big boy, and he still had an appetite. All the same, he tried to only sample the things as Hilana explained them. Occasionally, he wished he could have things that tasted like home, but most of the time, he was happy with the feast for the senses that Solunarium presented. He wanted to ask about whether wine was made here or imported from climates more appropriate for grapes. She had already taught him that mastic could be fermented, and he had already tried the fermented cactus that burned so pleasantly with a bit of lime and orange. But he would ask her perhaps the next time they were on the sand, as Arvælyn had questions of his own.

"Say music," he urged, "and then help me persuade Arvælyn to sing with me in an Umbrian cabaret." With an innocent smile, he took a sip of wine and looked away. Arvælyn still sang with him sometimes, but not in public or for an audience. He knew his thespian was engrossed in playing his role, but Finn himself couldn't set his first love aside entirely to play at being a subvigil.

[Hilana Chenzira]

She sipped her wine and enjoyed the way it tasted. Considering the vintages she would usually get at the tabernas or Vasilei’s experiments with mead, this one was very good indeed. It reminded her a bit of Tertium, of the refinement and luxury that she refused to allow herself to get used to. Not when her long-term plan had involved leaving the cities behind, though that plan had been thrown to the wind after less than a season and a half. Still, this was a proper treat, and Hilana could savour it as such.

She followed Arvaelyn’s gaze to look on at the Wyverns, and they made her smile to see them as she was content to settle with her own plate of the appetizers. The cooks really had done well, and she hoped that her hosts were enjoying the menu. It did take time getting used to, but hopefully they were enjoying it. Hilana knew she was, and she had been able to smell the entrées when they had been in the house, and even more was coming.

At Arvaelyn’s question, Hilana had been about to answer when Finn beat her to it. She let out a giggle around the sabaar that she had dipped into the baba gahnoush, her eyes dancing as she swallowed as she looked from one to the other. “I love music, though I’m not very good at it. It was a running joke among my friends that if I start singing, the jackals and the golden wolves will answer,” she deadpanned. “There is probably credence to their theory because I am certain there was an awful lot of howling if I did sing…”

The smile hadn’t left her eyes, though. “I know Arvaelyn told me that his family forbade such activities, and I know that well… but perhaps the two of you might perform tonight?” She had seen the lute on her circular prowl of the gardens, and had made the connection between the two. “Know the rules so that you can break them. If you cannot perform in the cabarets… perhaps you might here. I would very much love to hear your song that the two of you wrote, and others that you might like to perform. I may only be an audience of one, but the plants are listening, too, you know.”

Something struck her, then. “You know, I will have to return to Tertium in Glade for a little while… so perhaps the two of you might come with me and you could perform together there.” She offered brightly. “Might that be beyond your family’s eyes?” She didn’t know quite how long their reach was, but maybe that was an alternative. Common was much more frequent in Tertium, considering how it was essentially the portal to the reclusive Kingdom.

[Arvælyn]

Arry chuckled, running his index finger down Finn's face from the cheekbone to the chin.

"You're still smooth for now, but I suspect if you don't douse yourself in one of her tinctures, you'll be a bipedal basilisk by end of week." He tiled his head and let it hang heavily at Finn's urging. He was reluctant, though it was sweet.

"It isn't..." He shook his blonde head, "...that they forbade the activity altogether. It's just that it used to be a profession, and occupations are not smiled upon by all." He looked to Finn to check in, smiling wanly. It would be bittersweet to reprise their first love theme. It had been quite a while since they'd performed it together, and they'd written it before they were even lovers. If Finn would perform it, Arry would.

He looked to Hilana and shrugged,

"I don't know whether there is such a thing as 'Beyond my family's eyes', when my father is as entrenched as he is in the Silver Sentinels, but I don't think he'd have much cause to object when we're alone in the garden with a friend." He smiled, but bit the bottom lip of it, a tad nervous for some reason. He'd performed for far larger crowds than a single Vastian girl, but somehow the intimacy made it more, not less, intimidating. In the grand auditorium of the Golden Peacock it was a sea of shadowy shapes. He couldn't see the faces. Also, he always found it more difficult to perform something as personally significant as the song they'd written together. This was the perfect storm, really. Hilana was someone who didn't know him well, but knew him enough to recognise the personal elements of the song and he'd have to actually look her in the eye during the performance. Part of him hoped Finn would decline and spare him the trouble.

[Finn]

"I suppose I will have to learn a beauty regimen," he admitted. "Arvælyn was always my prince, but now he's a bona fide prince." Finn had been today years old when he realized that was a term borrowed from Vastian. "If I'm to be a concubine, I'll have to dress better and draw around my eyes with kohl..."

He remembered Arvælyn practicing stage makeup with Finn as his canvas back in their home in Kalzasi, and he had to admit the dark pencil made his blue eyes stand out.

"The Silver Sentinels see all and know all," he agreed, with a lilt of humor, but no real disrespect. "I just hope they don't try to stop me from performing because I don't know what I will do. And I suppose we can see how we feel about performing later. Arvælyn hasn't had a chance to warm up." He smiled, a reassuring touch upon his lover. It didn't require Mesmer to read him most of the time, at least for Finn. But he did wonder what the future held for them, and how music would fit. They had been here for a full season now, and Arvælyn showed no signs of missing the cooler climes of the North. Perhaps soon the time would be right for Finn, at least, to return. Traversion ought to make the travel faster so he wouldn't be out of sight for very long.

Hilana was speaking of Glade and that seemed like so far away...

Finn smiled into his wine, wondering what he was missing in Kalzasi.

The upcoming holy day promised to be educational.

"Will you be attending the Radiant Mass, Hilana?"

[Hilana Chenzira]

Her gaze went from one to the other, and tenacious though she could be on some things, she knew to let it go. She could encourage them, and maybe later on, they would sing something, or perform something, and she would be able to delight in their skills and cheer them on. And she was certain that it would be a night to remember. “That is fair. The eyes of the Sentinels go much further than most,” she admitted. “I know my father has someone keeping eyes on me here that reports back to him, but that’s a very different animal than one’s father being a Sentinel and from a Noble house to boot,” she seemed apologetic enough. She hadn’t meant to overstep, and perhaps she had done so. Hopefully, after dinner it might be a different story. Worst case scenario, she could probably bring the sounds of jackals and wolves to the great Capitol with her singing.

She dipped a piece of pita into the labneh, her gaze going back to Finn at the question. “The one at the Templum Solis Radians?” she asked for confirmation. “I probably will, yes. The last time I attended one there was a few years ago when my family made the trip from Tertium to here to attend the Mass. It is popular... especially if that is the Path that you follow,” she knew she had to be careful what was said and how she said it; both Arvaelyn and Finn had not been raised here. She didn’t want to offend either of them, nor did she want to overly influence their experience of such a thing before they had a chance to witness it and decide for themselves how they felt about it. She knew from her own history with multiple Peregrini that the way of life here was very different to most, and it...took some getting used to. She just hoped that it didn’t discomfort them to the point where they may decide to abandon this place altogether. Both of them seemed to be kind spirits, and Solunarium was filled with difficult lessons that would rip them both from their comfort zones.

“I will probably hit the sands after work the day before and see what I can find out there for Deus Avaerys and Domina Varvara,” Hilana was thoughtful. “I have a couple of ideas, and I’ve been following tracks and signs when I go out at night... but sometimes the nature of the hunt is that you’re going to come back empty handed,” she shrugged her bare shoulders. “But I was always taught that you didn’t come to another’s fire empty-handed, so I will find something for Them. Even if it’s sandcocks again... but it’s the thought and effort that counts. Will you two be going?”

[Arvælyn]

"Not a prince." Arvælyn laughed it off, but gave Finn a bit of a pointed look. "Just a noble." He tilted his head, "Well, to Solunarium at least. For you I'll play my princely part, of course..." He flourished his hand and dipped forward toward the table in a seated bow, grinning as he rose from it.

"Kohl would be so stark against your complexion and make your eyes even more striking..." Arry noted, gazing into said eyes and biting his lip. The notion that Finn could be any more attractive to him was a wild thought, but as thoroughly as he'd explored Finn's form and as intricately as he knew it, a little bit of novelty went a long way. The attraction was always there, but it was fun to switch things up every now and again.

"Well, they've been helping you out with performance opportunities in the Umbrium, haven't they?" Arry tilted his head, "That seems like a good sign, and the audiences here find you impossibly exotic. You're eye-catching wherever you go, but there's something to be said for mystique..." That was something else Arvælyn felt like he'd lost, alongside his theatrical career. They may not have been the majority, but Golden Elves were rather ubiquitous in Solunarium. "If it's important to you, we'll make sure you can keep it up." Arry vouchsafed. Still anxious about Finn's reception of his motherland, he would do all he could to make it appeal to him as much as possible.

Arry sipped his wine, glancing to Finn, a bit surprised that he inquired about the Radiant Mass. He hadn't heard much about it himself, but he was vaguely aware that it was coming up at some point in the near future. His eyes turned to Hilana as she spoke of sacrifice. He nearly spat out his wine, laughing.

"What on earth is a sandcock?"

[Finn]

To be fair, Finn hadn't quite mastered the intricacies of the Solunarian peerage. But he had certainly conquered Arvælyn Imperator before he was fully awake that morning so he clearly made liberal use of honorifics and titles.

"Yes, they did give me a few leads and a few introductions," he admitted. "I asked for that sort of thing. Didn't want them to force people into letting me play..." Nobility could get pushy and he didn't want them getting pushy on his account and souring relations with people who could give him venues to play, though he was rather interested in the opportunity Cithæra had presented, collaborating with other artists to create some musical offering on behalf of her gens. Finn had yet to push for that, not wanting to upset the delicate balance they were playing with Arvælyn's family.

Perhaps he would have to invest in some kohl, let Arvælyn get his creative kicks helping him build up a persona like Finn the Fantastic until he became Finn Farstrider. He wondered if he would ever be so powerful with Traversion that he might be court bard for Kalzasi and Solunarium at the same time, but that was a daydream for another day. He almost spit up a mouthful of wine much as his lover did, and carefully brought a fine cloth napkin to his chin, not wanting the servi to do aught more than they must on his behalf.

"Are you making that up?" he asked, voice rough from choking. He grinned.

And so the night passed with good wine, good food, and good company.

fin.