Shortcut (Hilana)

[Raithen]

A huge yawn cracked the Avialae's jaw as his mind turned off in lieu of diverting energy to his stomach. Raithen didn't fall asleep, but he drifted a bit as hands that were both deft and trusted made their way through his ruffled feathers. He knew that Hilana set aside the ones that fell out during grooming but no thought did he have that she actually kept them. If he had known, he wouldn't have minded, as he would have been equally ignorant of their alchemical uses.

Even if he didn't entirely lose consciousness he entered a sort of meditative doze for a time, letting the sounds, scents and feel of the air in the Vastian kept home wash over him. Wondering idly if he would feel something similar were he in a home run by another of Hilana' culture, just due to familiarity, he leaned his head to one side. After a time that he couldn't have put a number to he said,

"I wonder what they would have done with me, in your culture." It was an idle thought born of half dreams and musings, he had no idea of what they might do. Some cultures revered his kind, others hated them or made slaves of them but Raithen himself had no particular connection to any cultural beliefs about himself or his wings. They were just a part of his body, a third set of limbs.

Looking back to make sure he wasn't about to get in the way he stretched, arms and wings, as wide to either side as they would go. It felt good to feel his feathers back in order, even if they weren't all done yet, the itchy dryness was gone. When he settled back he flopped over onto his belly, which was surprisingly not uncomfortable. Tucking his arms under his head and leaving his wings spread in a flop of their own he realized that most people probably considered alternate places they could have been born, ways they could have been raised, but he just... hadn't. His mother had been his world. Now there was Avaerys balancing the maternal with, if not paternal, at least masculine authority.

Hilana was in there too, though his sleepy brain was not inclined to sussing out how exactly. Raithen had what he needed, what he wanted, he was content.

[Hilana Chenzira]

His relaxation was rather contagious, as his Umbra was in a state of utter contentment with him and grooming his wings. She coaxed what oils she could from that gland that was hidden away on him, collecting it into a vial. That was a good first start; she would try again before she was done with him. She wouldn’t be using that oil, not today; it would be used later with her alchemy to produce several more batches of the feather oil that she could apply as she smoothed and sorted and cleaned each feather. When she knew she was by one of the nerve endings in his wings, she paid particular attention to them, gently, but deliberately drawing slow spirals with her fingertips to help encourage him.

Layer by layer, she straightened feathers, getting out each and every bit of feather dust and sand from them. Barbs were smoothed back together, loose bits removed, and she was able to use her nails on the casings of new feathers to carefully, carefully remove the casing and start the process of opening the feathers up in order to bring them out. The natural act of flapping with the wind resistance would continue to help loosen the casings: Hilana was not about to expose them fully before they were ready, but this way, they could get started. The Vastiana took this task quite seriously, after all, and so much of it was muscle memory.

When he stretched out, she was finishing off his first wing, and she waited for him to get settled once again before deftly climbing over him to settle on his other side and begin the process once again. Nimble fingers moved over the limb while she considered his question. She sometimes wondered what that would have been like, and had he been born to a Vastian mother rather than the Princess, but she admired and respected Cithaera as it was. She helped make Raithen who he was, and for that, she was glad. “I think it might have taken a bit for them to come around to your being Avialae,” she admitted. Her people could be very close-minded, as well she knew, but utility was important in the Sands, and he was so talented with what he did. “But your wings, and what you can do with them, would have served you well in the sands. I think your tribe would have had a number of offers to court you with the daughters of chiefs to sweeten the pot if you might be convinced to come to another tribe,” she smiled at that.

“Amongst the Equestrians, I think that your wings and your exoticness would have been a focal point. They try so hard to push on a ladder and outdo each other and anyone else that they can, so with them, you would have been a trophy. But the bloodline focus of the Patricians isn’t there,” she mused. She preferred the tribes, had always preferred the tribes, and she wondered if Raithen might have, too, had his mother been a Vastiana rather than a Re’hyaean Princess. It was fun to play pretend, sometimes, and it made her wonder what sort of reception a child she had with Raithen might have received, if she ever had one. But that was likely quite some time off, if it should ever happen. In any event... it wouldn’t matter. Nomad or Equestrian... she would have adored them no matter what.

“Do you wonder sometimes what it would have been like?” she asked him, working on one of his primary feathers, getting it untwisted and reconnecting the barbs. “To not be of the royal lines?”

[Raithen]

His mind was drifting enough that he hardly noticed when she extracted his own oils from him, neither when she used them on his wings nor when they were collected. If Hilana had intended him harm he would be dead, unless Avaerys noticed and interceded, but it never crossed Raithen's mind.

"Have you tried any of the pleasure houses in the city?" The question, mumbled from where his face was cradled on his arms, might seem disconnected but he'd been thinking about her skills both physical, herbal and alchemical, and the combination had led him to wondering if she had ever tried to sell her wares there. They would certainly be well received in a number of ways, but he realized, slowly, that perhaps he needed say more to be understood.

"For your oils and such, I mean." It was no matter to him if she went for other, more personal reasons, unless they wanted to go together.
"Sometimes what they have isn't the best and they don't always seem to know what will cause irritation." Either that or the workers were required to use what they had access too so often that they developed irritations to them. The finer houses had finer products, of course, but they were always looking for ways to improve.

"I could take you around, when I get back," Avaerys only knew when that would be but, "they know me and would trust you."

The Vastiana could earn her own trust, he had no doubt, but a known quantity might ensure a smooth acceptance.

He grinned, even if it couldn't be seen, at the idea of the people's of the sands making offers of courting to some theoretical family he might have had because it might mean their bloodline gained wings. It wasn't so different than how his social rank obtained mates, though negotiation for advantage. A simpler kind of advantage, perhaps, but it was the way of the world, high or low.

He took a slow breath before answering the question,

"As a child, not really. I was just now. I think it takes knowing someone who lives a certain way for me to consider what being like them would be."

He had considered what sort of courtesan he would make as soon as he was old enough to start frequenting such establishments as they were employed at. The answers had led him to learn their crafts as best he could, which, according to his teachers, was significant. Similarly, he had considered what it might be like to be a soldier when he had started spending time with them, which had led to his brief time in his mercenary company. Lifting his head enough to glance back at her he turned the inquiry back on his lover,

"Have you ever wondered what your life would be like if you had the gods' blood in your veins?" As he did, as all the true nobility of Solunarium did.

[Hilana Chenzira]

“I haven’t been, no,” Hilana admitted at Raithen’s question. Not for a lack of interest, but she had her own playmates, so to speak, that she hadn’t considered seeking them out. That was one thing her father would have absolutely killed her stone dead for in Tertium, despite how generally blasé the population was about such activities and endeavors... Her father’s peculiarities and protectiveness of his daughters was well-noted. One might think that it would make more sense that she had learned ‘how to please a man’ before a betrothal, but that was something she was expected to learn later. And of course, when her engagement fell apart, that had fallen through, but what her father didn’t know wouldn’t hurt him. The girl had had her own relationships and fun with her friends, male and female alike.

“But that’s a good idea, actually. I hadn’t thought of that,” she admitted, having finally finished applying the oil to the feathers of one wing and moving around their nest to settle on his other side to begin the process of grooming once again. “It couldn’t hurt to see what their needs are, and then that helps widen the base of clients,” she was thoughtful. Perhaps she was more like her father than she would ever claim to be. Besides that, having more people to make remedies, ointments, and salves for gave her more practice, and the more practice she had, the better for her skills and her people. It let her come up with creative solutions and recipes that could solve an issue and improve the lives of her people, and inasmuch as she needed to work on her poisoncraft as the Founders had said, that was something else that she was steadily working on. It was good to be busy, especially with Raithen away as much as he was on his mission for His Divine Radiance. “I’d like that if you would,” she smiled down at him, and bent to lay a kiss on his shoulder, her fingers going back to his feathers.

She was content to get back into grooming him, adding more loose feathers to her bowl of them as they came loose at her touch. The salt water of the island he was ministering to had not been kind to his wings, that was for sure, but she would come up with something for that when she went to see Domina Clelia for her next lesson. Water and sand repellent. She blew gently on one of the feathers, getting the excess feather casing off of the spine of the feather, and continuing along his wing, lightly brushing her fingers against the sensitive nerve endings contained within.

“That makes sense,” she agreed. Hilana had certainly never considered what the life of royalty or even nobility might be like before she had met Raithen and his family. Power, to her, was supposed to be accompanied by responsibility and duty, and the more power one wielded, the more duty they had to their people. That was true, at least, for House Phaedryn. The others? Well... maybe some of them. Far be it for her to criticize her betters. "Once we became friends... I did start to wonder, here and there, what it might have been like."

“It seems to me to be a lot of work and scrutiny. That despite the power you have by your status... It’s also limiting because of what is expected of you.” Hilana admitted. “That there’s constantly eyes and judgment and expectations and ever-increasing standards... My father’s plans for my future were suffocating and he refused to listen to me about anything... But all the same, I imagine his expectations were nothing compared to what you and your brothers and sister dealt with. Not just from Princess Cithaera, but from everyone else, too. What was it like? Growing up a Prince?” She knew his formal title was Dux, but he was the son of a Princess, and as far as she was concerned, he was a Prince of the Realm.

[Raithen]

Rai nodded when Hilana accepted his suggestion for new clients and his invitation for a tour of the potential locations to find them.

Humming to show he was listening he absorbed the Vastiana's answer to his question of heritage. His own experience, he believed, had been shielded from a lot of the disadvantages of expectation and duty that was the truth, for most, in what she said. He had been forced to study and to train but he was not expected to accept the burdens of leadership, and while he could access the privileges of his rank at any time, he found most of them to be not to his tastes. Except, of course, those that he accessed and didn't even notice, didn't think about, didn't even realize were different from how any other citizen might experience their lives.

Now that he was bound as a direct servant to a living god, these duties now took up the majority of his time. Of course, that had little to do with his blood. Avaerys might be less likely to choose servants outside of His bloodline but not so much so that He had not chosen some already. Raithen liked Finn, enjoyed his company, and was bound to him in the ineffable way that one was bound to those who etched magic into one's soul. The first rune had been granted him almost in passing, without intimacy or ceremony and while his rune felt very personal to him, the gifting of it had been a transaction. His second had been something else altogether and he had not yet spoken of it to anyone, even to Finn. Not that he had been granted the time to do so, but, even if he had, it felt in some way too intimate an experience to place into the solidifying realm of words. It was an honor to serve his God alongside the human; a sentiment that might not be shared by the majority of his people, but the same could be said of them towards himself.

Speaking still quietly, keeping the intimacy of their connection close between them he said,

"It is odd to me, that your father's plans for you were a collar around your neck to suffocate you, while my mother's for me have been a crown to my heart. I was expected to study and train as a child, in many different disciplines, but no less than you were, I imagine. My youth was a happy one." If at times it had been lonely, he had not really known how to explain it then and he was just beginning to glimpse it now without realizing he did so.

"I don't think I realized I was a prince until I was almost grown," One of the realizations of his adolescence. Somehow, knowing he was different from his older siblings had translated, in his young mind, to mean that he was not the same rank as they were. Only when he had began to be introduced into wider society had he realized that this was not the case.

"I was quite sheltered from both high society and low until my schooling took me out of my mother's home." Many more things had been learned in his years of public study than had been intentionally taught in classrooms and battle practice.

"I suppose I still don't really think of myself that way." He scrunched up his face, though there was no one to see. Thinking how he might accurately answer her he said,

"There was no want, no fear, no worries and very few discomforts. I suppose that means I was spoiled. Maybe that's why I chose to be a mercenary, even if those greater than me had other plans."

[Hilana Chenzira]

“When I was outside of Tertium, I was happy,” she admitted. “One of my grandmothers told me once that my father wasn’t... always as he was. Protective, yes, pushy, yes... but he wasn’t such a control freak all the time until we lost my mother and my brothers. Had they all lived, I imagine things would have been very different. Maybe I would have been able to stay in the Sands, though I know he would have sent my brothers in to attend the private schools if they were suitable. But if that had been the case, perhaps we wouldn’t have met,” her nimble fingers worked carefully on his feathers, using her Elementalism to coax a particularly stubborn bit of sand out of a feather casing that wasn’t entirely ready to be removed just yet. Exposing the feather too soon would make it vulnerable, and as it had a vein in the shaft, she’d rather her lover not be bled like that by one of his feathers. All the same, the sand had to come out, lest it damage the feather or try to cause an infection.

She considered what he said. Where he said he hadn’t really realized he was a Prince until he was nearly grown, Hilana had been told frequently and often that she was Equestrian, and was expected to act as something more than a frolicking dirt child. Every time she was brought into the city and told she needed to act this way or that way, to do this or to do that... Cithaera’s method with her winged child had been far better, by the sounds of it. Perhaps it was because she had plots upon plots, and enough leeway to fall back on any of the dozens more that she kept in reserve if something didn’t work out. They’d both been kept out of the public eye, though perhaps for different reasons. Raithen to protect him and continue his training, and then Hilana... for her own sanity and so that she didn’t embarrass her family anymore.

Raithen’s words gave her plenty to think about. She knew that she still had a privileged life that many would have done desperate things for. Her father’s home had every luxury and refinement anyone could have wanted, even if Hilana was perfectly happy with a blanket and her camel. Good food, and plenty of it, and private chefs who would let her sit there in the kitchen and occasionally participate when she wanted to learn what they were making. She’d had good tutors in the subjects that she wanted to learn when she was back in the city, and access to them had been through family.

“What did your mother think when you decided you wanted to be a mercenary?” she asked him, curious, enjoying his warmth and his touch against her while she was preening the next batch of feathers. Nimble fingertips and rounded nails scratched and caressed away at the feather casings that could come off, freeing and smoothing over their contents as they were exposed. She imagined the Princess had given her blessing, given how devoted to his mother Raithen was, but she did wonder what she had thought of that. Perhaps she saw the strategy in it - having eyes outside of the city through him. Perhaps it was indulgence in her favourite child's desires.

[Raithen]

Fatherhood was not a concept Raithen thought about very often. No figure had filled the role for him as a child and he had never felt the lack of it. It was as much outside his view in a positive way as a negative, leaving it neutral and simply not thought about in his own life. That Hilana seemed to have a frictious relationship with her one living parent was something to feel sorry for, but, unless it caused his lover to have difficulties or discomfort in the present it didn't seem like something he should concern himself with. People, in general, preferred to handle their interpersonal relationships without outside influence, in his experience.

The first answer to Hilana's question was a minute shrug, both because the Avialae was beginning to drift a bit under her expert care and because he didn't want to move his wings too much and disrupt the same.

"Didn't react much," He mumbled, waking up a little more as he considered, "I wanted to grow the skills I'd learned in school and then an Imperial Guardsman. It seemed a logical step, as I'd been sent out into the sands often as a Guard. Maybe not as often as those who don't share blood with the Empress, but often enough to realize I had a knack for it."

Yawning expansively he glanced back to see that the Vastiana was mostly finished with her work. The discomfort that had caused his irritation was gone and he turned slowly, reaching out at her small protest to pull her into his arms and wrap them up close. Covering her objections in kisses took care enough of them, and what came after, of hands and mouths and more, took care of all else.

[Hilana Chenzira]

Hilana kept on going, grooming feather after feather, working the casings and the barbs to get his feathers just so before coating them with oil. She had another go at his oil gland to see if it was ready for a second round, and to coax out what emissions she could from it. Even if it wasn’t much, as she circled and massaged that little sweet spot, it was something. The more she could get out of him, the more she had to work with, after all, but duplicating and replicating with alchemy was proving to be something that she was enjoying.

“That makes sense,” she agreed. "The Sands suited you.... but you're adaptable. You can flow wherever you need to, Lux." If he did spend time in the Sands, and he’d liked it... well, if there was someone of the Phaedryn Royal House who would do well in the wilds of the Atraxian Expanse, it was Raithen. That wasn’t to say that she doubted the capabilities of Phocion and Valaera... but Raithen was far more situated than his Moonborn siblings to get out into the endless sands and do what he had to do. He was also far easier to get along with, but perhaps that was just her own peculiarities, and the fact that they’d had a mutual attraction from the day that they had met a few seasons ago.

She finished with the gland and capped the vial, brushing and smoothing the oil over his feathers. She was just finishing up when his hands found her and drew her up under him, and while she had initially protested - she wanted to check her handiwork again to make sure she had gotten every last feather - his lips and tongue made an oh-so-convincing argument. Her protests were swallowed by his lips, and her body melted against and under his, while long, strong legs wrapped around the Avialae’s. Her cool skin brushed against his, soft and supple and sweet-smelling as it always was of that flower and fruit, lilac and gooseberries, and there was honey and spice from the food that she had made. She was a reminder of home.

Shadow embraced Light, for without one, the other could not be... the strongest light drew the strongest shadow, after all.

[Talisman]

Review

Name: Raithen

XP: 10 Points, can be used for Traversion
Injuries/Ailments: None
Loot: Freshly groomed wings, giant wicker basket of foodstuffs.

Name: Hilana

XP: 10 Points, no magic
Injuries/Ailments: None
Loot: Bowlful of Raithen's old feathers, two vials of feather oil.

Notes: Be it ever so humble, there's no place like home. And home is where the heart is.