At Fault
Location: Weyrleaders' Office
Time: Late Morning on Day 12, Month 12, Turn 3
Players: R'vain and Roa
Scene: The weyrwoman would like to throw herself a one-woman pity party, but R'vain crashes it with a backrub. R'en and Miniyal get discussed at length. Issa gets a mention, Ashwin gets several, and the Headmaster gets both attacked and defended.
The office in the morning smells as it should: ink, hides, woodsmoke from the fire, and klah. R'vain is seated at the sandtable for a change of pace, though his mug and writing things and a heap of hides from the wingleaders he's probably meant to initial and return or forward to records await him back at the conference table where he usually spreads out his mess to work. He's been distracted, maybe, by a particular hide tucked under his thumb against the sandtable's frame, and using his finger (the stylus is on the floor, having apparently fallen and rolled away from easy reach) the Weyrleader 'edits' a formation in the sand, narrowed eyes on the original. His paw pauses over a symbol and his nostrils flare, brows bent; mild frustration comes out in a soft rumble, then he wipes the symbol away with the heel of his hand.
The weyrwoman is a bit late. Or a bit early if one counts that she's been up for some time, if not in the office. She makes her slow, careful way up the steps now, her belly nearly preceding her into the room. Roa looks worn, eyes shadowed, as she heads over to her desk to pick up a cluster of hides and tuck them under one arm. The sandtable is a common spot for her to work, when the glass cover in in place. Of course, just at the moment, the sandtable is being used for its actual purpose. Swallowing down a yawn, the weyrwoman drifts over to peer down at the formation R'vain is busy constructing. "Morning," she murmurs, "What's that?"
"It's an abomination," rumbles the Weyrleader, though he's probably been up enjoying the abomination of morning for several hours now. He says it with a grin, and tips his head so a glint of green can shine at her from the corner of one eye before he looks back down at the sand and answers what she intended to ask. "Formation. S'something got shuffled into one of th'reports, maybe by mistake. Trying t'figure out which wing it goes with, if any of 'em, so I know whose it is."
"Ha ha ha," Roa says with a small roll of her eyes, each 'laugh' an actual spoken word. "May I see it? I'm a bit leery of mysterious documents appearing in random places, as of late. Just a routine sort of thing?" She leans a little forward, but the 'bump' doesn't allow for much of that before she bumps the table and must still. "Something else?"
"Nothing bizarre." R'vain unthumbs the hide from the edge of the sandtable and scrambles it into his fingers so he can hold it across himself and up for Roa to take; he grins, a little pointedly, down at her belly in the process. "Have a look, I'm goin' t'grab my cup," he says, and as soon as she's got her hand on the hide-- nothing bizarre, sure, but everything's relative and this formation isn't strictly traditional, either, with greens tucked around the forward flanks and one lone bronze anchoring the center rear-- the Weyrleader slips out of the chair so he can prowl over toward the klah.
The weyrwoman looks down at the hide and pointedly not as R'vain when her belly gets a once-over. She chews on her bottom lip and then shakes her head. "Looks like maybe a third-tier wing or something for the weyrlings?" she suggests, turning to lean her hip against the sandtable and look between hide and sand.
"Might be," shrugs R'vain, stalking down his cup and recovering it into the curl of his paws. He bends his head down and takes a sniff and, finding the result wanting, reaches out for the pot. "Issa wouldn't-- I think-- lose track of something s'bad as t'get filed in with th'reports. Has t'be a wingleader's, or a second's. Just curious. Probably ain't worth thinking about. Just-- " Obviously he is thinking about it. He pours fresh klah on top of what he had before and puts down the pot, then turns around and hitches his hip against the edge of the conference table. "Siddown, y'want."
"Standing's easier," Roa tells him, her weight shifting a little bit. "Just..." she lifts her brows, head canting to the side in silent question. The hide is set back down next to the image in the sand.
"Just, wondering if it's one of th'ones I've talked to about formations, or if it ain't." R'vain's shoulders lift, ripple, and fall; then one rises again as he lifts his cup, swirling it, for a taste. He winces a little at the bitterness, but turns to prowl back toward his Weyrwoman anyway, not to bother with more sweetener. "You want a better chair or something? Y'look like th'morning's been--" A beat, like he selects this carefully. "At least s'bad as th'were a few months ago."
"Mmm," is Roa's offer for who might be behind the mystery formation. "Maybe even a wingrider experimenting. I'm fine. When I sit down, my legs cramp, so..." she makes a small mark in the sand with her smallest finger. "Not sleeping all that well, I suppose. I've been better. Just...it's all right." The weyrwoman lifts her dark blue gaze from the sand to the weyrleader and his too-bitter klah. "I'm all right," she assures him gently.
R'vain blinks down at Roa, coming to a stop beside the sandtable, klah in his hand before his chest. His tongue slips up over an eye tooth, then retreats with a small, thoughtful *tschk.* "If y'say so," he rumbles, and unhooks a thumb from his pocket so his paw can try a touch at her shoulder. "Y'been quiet lately. I expected more complaints 'bout y'feet, or something. Hey, they sent up some kind of pear something juice, y'want it?"
"Most folks would say I'm usually quiet," the little weyrwoman notes with a faint smile. "Pear something juice sounds good. Thanks. I just..." she presses her lips into a thin line and shrugs. "I just feel like I'm making a mess of everything. I'm trying but I..." her shoulders lift against his palm in a small shrug. "Just a rough spot."
The paw on her shoulder slips down to the center of her upper back and rests there a moment, heavy and warm and very /present/, and to excuse this small intimacy by making it less personal R'vain looks over the Weyrwoman's shoulder at the sketch in the sand, mock-thoughtful. "A'right," he rumbles after a moment, and turns from her to get the pear something juice from the tray on which the klah was probably originally delivered. "What's a mess, b'th'way? I mean-- what's a mess that you've made. We got plenty of mess, I'll admit, I just ain't so sure I can saddle you with any of it." Grinning as he puts down his cup and turns over a glass to pour juice into, he makes it sound a bit like maybe he's tried.
When R'vain's hand moves, Roa's gaze drops down to her hand resting on the table. "Well, I seem very unassuming, these days. It's all part of my nefarious plan." She holds up the hand not curled around the table to receive the glass, once R'vain has finished pouring it. "I'm losing with Miniyal, again. We were doing all right for a moment, but that's done, now. R'en's..." she bites her bottom lip and shakes her head. "It's bad. I can't even go flying now, and I only have a month until...anyhow. Things."
"There ain't no losin' with Min'yal s'long as you remember there ain't no win that don't hurt," R'vain rumbles, tucking his klah into his elbow so he can come over with one hand ready to put the juice into Roa's reach and the other ready to touch her shoulder again. "Would goin' flyin' be a help? Got t'be something we can do t'get you fresh air, you need it. What'd Jen do t'you?" There's not even a beat between the fresh air comment and the one about the weyrling bronzer-- but the Weyrleader's tone manages to alter wholly in that space nonetheless, from casual concern to toothy threat.
"I don't think I understand that first bit." Roa brings the glass up to her lips to first take a small sniff, and then a tentative sip. "Mm. S'good." Sip, the second. "Flying just lets me straighten my head a little. It's not the air, it's just flying. Just being up there, just her and me. There's plenty of air, I'm just not allowed to ride anything. No dragons. No runners. Nothing." Si-...she sucks in a bit to much of her drink as R'vain's tone alters, and she swallows hastily. "He hasn't done anything. He's just upset with me. It's my fault, don't sound like you want to bite him."
"It could take me a while t'explain Min'yal," R'vain grins, and turns the weight of his paw on her shoulder to a caress, the kind meant to move muscles. "Here, turn a bit--" He applies pressure to imply /how/ she should turn and leans sideways to nestle his klah cup into the sand so he can apply both hands to massage. "He's upset 'bout Tavaly. 'Bout you and me sending her, and her being an adult, and him not being one. How's that your fault again?"
"I don't need..." but despite the protest, Roa is turning, head ducking down, a soft sigh escaping as achy muscles get rubbed. "If you understand Miniyal well enough that you can explain her, take the time. I desperately need the tutorial. I should have told him. When we sent her. I should have said." She keeps her eyes closed, chin tucked against her chest. "I know him better than anyone, and I blew it. I used to be able to fix these kinds of things. Now I'm -making- problems. I don't...he says...we just used to trust one another."
"Why should you have told him?" R'vain's question is almost a growl-- and the massage Roa's shoulders are getting is a little more meaningful while he protests. "She didn't want him told, and th'business is th'Weyr's. Ain't a weyrling's t'ask, and he's not anything else, f'now. Special treatment's only going t'make things worse."
"She's his sister, weyrling or no. I would have wanted to know, if Ashwin had been the guard he chose to send to Five Mines." She wanted to know about the guard, regardless, but..."I don't know. I just used to be better." Roa winces faintly as R'vain's hands squeeze a bit harder.
And then his hands stop, just heavy and warm on her shoulders. He's silent for a moment, and as his thumbs start to stroke up the back of her neck (this is almost absent-minded, this small part of the massage) he rumbles, softly, "Then th'first thing would have been t'tell her that she needs t'tell him, or that we'll tell him on her behalf. But." Here R'vain starts circling the heels of his enormous paws into the Weyrwoman's muscles again, gentler than before, working his way down her shoulders in slow movements. His voice takes on a grim certainty softened just by a hint of toothy grin. "Fact remains. He can be bitter as a man, a friend, whatever he is t'you or me. But he's insubordinate-- and dishonorable-- if he's using that shit t'pull rank on his own Weyrleaders."
"I don't think that's what he's doing," Roa notes quietly, her shoulders rolling against R'vain's broad palms. "Rumors say he hit you. Did he?"
There's a long quiet where the Weyrleader just focuses on massaging those small shoulders below his hands, or on something, anyway. "S'pretty much how it sounded when he came t'me," he rumbles after the long quiet, without answering the question. Directly, anyway.
Her head was lowered before, but now it droops. "Oh," Roa says very softly. "I'm sorry."
"Ain't your fault," growls R'vain, and one hand steadies on her shoulder while the other slips around to try a knuckle beneath her chin; he sidesteps, bending his shoulders and head down to try for a look at her face, or at least the blockade of her hair. "Roa. What's eatin' you?"
"Nothing. I'm all right." Roa tilts her chin away from the offered touch to better continue staring at the floor. "I just...I can't talk to R'en. I can't manage Miniyal. How'm I supposed to...adults can be reasoned with, at least. I don't know." And then, much much softer. "What'll I do when he goes?"
R'vain's snubbed hand retracts, but after a moment it comes to reside again upon her shoulder and the Weyrleader returns to the work of massaging her shoulders. "He's hard t'talk to. She's hard t'manage. You ain't failing just because it ain't easy," he rumbles to the back of her head. "And if he goes-- well, let's not worry more'n we have to until Sehkrath can fly. That'll bring him back, f'he gets th'bright idea t'go traveling alone."
"What?" Roa lifts her head, blinking, and briefly confused. "Oh. Right. I think he's already got that idea pretty firmly. Anyhow, -you- seem to manage her well enough. How come you're able to tell her when you disagree and she'll listen, and when I do it, she takes it as a personal attack?"
"Wait, was-- " But Roa moves on, and R'vain just stands quiet for a moment, his hands sliding lower to spread out the massage into her midback. He has to bend his knees a little to do this at the right angle, and does so with unthinking, athletic grace. "Ain't sure. I guess I don't make a big deal out of it when /she/ disagrees. Best f'us both-- f'now, anyway-- f'she don't figure I give a wherry's ass what she thinks. Means /my/ opinions ain't threatening." His thumbs start slow circles aligned with the Weyrwoman's spine, and though she won't see it the Weyrleader's brows draw low and tight over thoughtful eyes. "Ain't sure she /listens/ so much as don't block me out. Once in a while, by accident, somethin' gets through."
"Do I even want to know how you learned to be so good at this?" the weyrwoman groans softly as R'vain's hands move to the middle of her back. Roa's spine is a bit more curved than usual, due to the peculiar posture unique to the heavily knocked-up. "I think you're still better off than I am with her. I don't know how it's going to work when she graduates. I'm afraid she's going to make herself miserable. And us along with her. I asked her to talk to you about something. Has she?"
Behind Roa, her Weyrleader shrugs, though his grin's plain to hear in his voice. "Big hands, little practice," he asserts harmlessly, or as harmless as can be through the sharp edges of his grinning teeth. His hands flatten to her back, fingers arching out to the sides, heels of his paws against the muscles closest to the spine; gentle pressure, then he sidelines a low, "Lean on th'table," before adding, "Min'yal? Not yet. Th'Caucus thing, y'know... she's probably hiding."
"Oh. Yeh, maybe." Roa leans forward as requested, her hands settling on the edge of the able, fingers curling around it until her knuckles brush against the densely packed sand. She closes her eyes with a small sigh. "I don't know. She might come to the dance, if only to point out that one, she did so and two, the experience gave her yet more proof for why the entire institution is horrible and its headmaster more horrible still." She snorts. "You know I had to have a dress made for this thing? A dress I'm never going to wear again."
"Th'entire institution's not what it's s'posed t'be and--" R'vain stops short of saying the same for Sefton, shaking his head, grinning around a sigh. Warm flat paws run slow over the muscles lower in Roa's back, feeling out with extra care the tense spots, the aching spots, the spots that bear the most of her burden. "Never?" Beat. "Well-- y'can pass it on t'someone else, then, or have it remade, or let th'tailor take it when you're done. There any chance of him comin' along with you?"
"Mmf. Probably never. Faranth, right in the middle, if you could..." Roa groans again, her back pressing against the weyrleader's fingers. "The institution isn't, but the headmaster's exactly what he's supposed to be. Just because you don't like it doesn't change that. Maybe I'll pass it on to Issa." The last comment is, one must presume, about the gown.
Right in the middle, R'vain flattens his palms, splays his fingers, marks mentally the positions of her ribs and spine, then starts in with those circling strong thumbs. "What he's supposed t'be and a shitload more, which is what I worry about," the Weyrleader rumbles, though this is not quite the same as objection. A choked little splutter precedes, "Y'think /she's/ goin' t'do this again?"
"I think she's a few months behind me. Maybe she can use it for Turn's End or something, I dunno. Mhf. Oh shells, yes, thank you, right there." Roa's shoulders curl forward with the momentary relief that the rubbing provides. "Why do you worry about it?" she asks after a thoughtful beat and then, in belated answer, "He's on duty tonight."
"Because you're about sixty months pregnant and it wouldn't hurt f'him t'have one dance with you," rumbles the Weyrleader-- who only /then/ realizes that he probably wasn't asked about Ashwin. His hands pause, then start in again, and when he says, "Because he's buildin' his reputation here, and that's building /our/ reputation too," it is in a tone much more subdued than bitching about Caucus would usually merit.
She laughs softly, shaking her head a little. "We dance. Just not at these things, they set his teeth on edge." Her eyes open slowly and one finger stretches to begin an idle doodle in the sand. "He's not building a bad reputation, though. Not for himself or for us."
"Say that t'me in twenty turns." R'vain huffs, fingers stretching to join counterpoint rhythms to the massage primarily accomplished by his thumbs and the thick, heavy heels of his hands, warming the muscles now as much as stroking them. "What d'you think's goin' t'be said 'bout him and Caucus by then?"
Her small smile hitching upwards a little, Roa laughs. "Okay," she agrees, lids lowering once more, "Twenty turns. It's a date. I miss sleeping on my stomach really a lot." Her bottom lip is nibbled. "I think they'll say 'it's a waste that Caucus is a marriage mart' or they'll say 'I can't believe they let all those cotholders and lower caverns workers in there' or they'll say 'shame about that incident that closed the whole thing down isn't it'."
"Y'think they'll still be ranting about th'common folk in twenty turns?" R'vain huffs again, and having spent this long on the middle back that she asked for, he lets his hands slip a little lower into the arch of her back, or what will once again be the arch of her back when she's no longer so very gravid. "More to it than a marriage market. Sefton's going t'run Conclave, we'll be lucky f'he don't run th'Council too, dragon or not. S'a market f'th'whole world's affections. That's why I worry."
"I think it'd take a while to get them there in the first place, so possibly." Roa leans forward further, elbows making divots in the sand. "he doesn't need a market to win the world's affections. It's handy, but it's not...look. Yes, he wants power. Yes, he's selfish and self-centered. Of course he is. But that doesn't make him bad at running Caucus or the Conclave. It doesn't make his decisions any less beneficial for others."
R'vain's hands stroke a last long, stretchful path over the Weyrwoman's back, sliding smoothly to her waist and back up with fingers crooked, wakeful. Then he steps back and lets out a thin, nostril-flaring sigh. "This probably ain't th'decade f'you t'get me t'believe that tunnelsnakes don't bite, no matter how charmin', Weyrwoman. We got enough scars on us f'a while."
"He's not a tunnelsnake," Roa says with mild exasperation. "Look, what Sefton wants is to be powerful and influential." She straightens slowly, pushing up onto her toes for a stretch, before stepping away from the sandtable a pace. A hand reaches out to rub away the imprints fingers and elbows have made. "But to do that he has to do the job well and maintain good faith with those he charms. The man will do what's best for himself, but usually that means doing what's best for others, too. He's a sp-..." that analogy is cut off immediately. "He ties people to himself, but that ties him to others as well."
Not fast enough. "Exactly," says R'vain, voice rough around the edges, and prowls an unnecessarily long path around his Weyrwoman to the sandtable so he can bend and catch up his cup from where he left it lodged in the sand for safekeeping. "You feelin' any better?"
She tsks softly, wrinkling her nose. "Not exactly at all," Roa grouses quietly. "My back is much happier. Thank you."
"Good." And to the pits with Sefton. R'vain grins over the rim of his klah and tips up the cup for a drink. "It help it any t'soak in hot water? Y'goin' t'be on your feet a while this evening, I bet, specially f'sitting down's worse." His shoulders roll; he takes another small swig from his mug and starts a slow prowl toward the conference table. "What've you got t'do before then?"
"Oh, some of the usual. Go over inventory, write a few letters, make sure I know everybody's name who's supposed to be coming to this thing tonight. Ugh, I wish this had happened a couple months sooner. I'm going to be waddling about attempting to make polite conversation with the equivalent of a sack of firestone poking out the front of me." Roa sighs faintly. "Besides that, I'll nap. Maybe soak. Maybe nap while I'm soaking. Multitasking is very efficient."
"Let someone else do inventory," rumbles R'vain, turning once he's by the table to lean his hip into it, one paw crutched beside him, elbow a little bent so he can slouch partly. "Let th'letters wait, you'll have more t'write about tomorrow." A flicker of brows. "Who wore what, who looked th'most like a sack of firestone, s'forth."
"I thought if I at least started the letters today, I could sleep in a bit tomorrow. I'm finding if I leave blank spots in just the right places, I can fill them in once I have the actual details. " The weyrwoman smiles, leaning up against one of the chairs and using the added support so that she can lift one foot. "Thank you for the backrub. I'm sure you have better things to be doing than smoothing my ruffled feathers."
"Well, that's a talent f'writing letters I ain't quite yet achieved," laughs R'vain. He launches easily from the conference table and prowls back toward Roa, the hand not holding his cup going out to stroke the backs of his knuckles over her shoulder. "Nah. I mean, I got all kinds of things t'do, but smoothin' y'feathers s'sometimes part f'my job, ain't it?" He withdraws his paw, pocketing it, and a shrug ripples through his indifferent shoulders. "I'll see you tonight."
"I suppose so," the weyrwoman concedes, shifting to lift the other foot as R'vain's knuckles brush her shoulder. "Always feel a bit guilty when you actually end up doing it, though. I tend to prefer it the other way around. It's easier. Being the one that's helping." Her foot lowers and she straightens. "See you tonight." One hand lifts and falls in a vague wave and Roa turns to begin drifting towards her weyr, the pear-something juice left behind and forgotten.
Time: Late Morning on Day 12, Month 12, Turn 3
Players: R'vain and Roa
Scene: The weyrwoman would like to throw herself a one-woman pity party, but R'vain crashes it with a backrub. R'en and Miniyal get discussed at length. Issa gets a mention, Ashwin gets several, and the Headmaster gets both attacked and defended.
The office in the morning smells as it should: ink, hides, woodsmoke from the fire, and klah. R'vain is seated at the sandtable for a change of pace, though his mug and writing things and a heap of hides from the wingleaders he's probably meant to initial and return or forward to records await him back at the conference table where he usually spreads out his mess to work. He's been distracted, maybe, by a particular hide tucked under his thumb against the sandtable's frame, and using his finger (the stylus is on the floor, having apparently fallen and rolled away from easy reach) the Weyrleader 'edits' a formation in the sand, narrowed eyes on the original. His paw pauses over a symbol and his nostrils flare, brows bent; mild frustration comes out in a soft rumble, then he wipes the symbol away with the heel of his hand.
The weyrwoman is a bit late. Or a bit early if one counts that she's been up for some time, if not in the office. She makes her slow, careful way up the steps now, her belly nearly preceding her into the room. Roa looks worn, eyes shadowed, as she heads over to her desk to pick up a cluster of hides and tuck them under one arm. The sandtable is a common spot for her to work, when the glass cover in in place. Of course, just at the moment, the sandtable is being used for its actual purpose. Swallowing down a yawn, the weyrwoman drifts over to peer down at the formation R'vain is busy constructing. "Morning," she murmurs, "What's that?"
"It's an abomination," rumbles the Weyrleader, though he's probably been up enjoying the abomination of morning for several hours now. He says it with a grin, and tips his head so a glint of green can shine at her from the corner of one eye before he looks back down at the sand and answers what she intended to ask. "Formation. S'something got shuffled into one of th'reports, maybe by mistake. Trying t'figure out which wing it goes with, if any of 'em, so I know whose it is."
"Ha ha ha," Roa says with a small roll of her eyes, each 'laugh' an actual spoken word. "May I see it? I'm a bit leery of mysterious documents appearing in random places, as of late. Just a routine sort of thing?" She leans a little forward, but the 'bump' doesn't allow for much of that before she bumps the table and must still. "Something else?"
"Nothing bizarre." R'vain unthumbs the hide from the edge of the sandtable and scrambles it into his fingers so he can hold it across himself and up for Roa to take; he grins, a little pointedly, down at her belly in the process. "Have a look, I'm goin' t'grab my cup," he says, and as soon as she's got her hand on the hide-- nothing bizarre, sure, but everything's relative and this formation isn't strictly traditional, either, with greens tucked around the forward flanks and one lone bronze anchoring the center rear-- the Weyrleader slips out of the chair so he can prowl over toward the klah.
The weyrwoman looks down at the hide and pointedly not as R'vain when her belly gets a once-over. She chews on her bottom lip and then shakes her head. "Looks like maybe a third-tier wing or something for the weyrlings?" she suggests, turning to lean her hip against the sandtable and look between hide and sand.
"Might be," shrugs R'vain, stalking down his cup and recovering it into the curl of his paws. He bends his head down and takes a sniff and, finding the result wanting, reaches out for the pot. "Issa wouldn't-- I think-- lose track of something s'bad as t'get filed in with th'reports. Has t'be a wingleader's, or a second's. Just curious. Probably ain't worth thinking about. Just-- " Obviously he is thinking about it. He pours fresh klah on top of what he had before and puts down the pot, then turns around and hitches his hip against the edge of the conference table. "Siddown, y'want."
"Standing's easier," Roa tells him, her weight shifting a little bit. "Just..." she lifts her brows, head canting to the side in silent question. The hide is set back down next to the image in the sand.
"Just, wondering if it's one of th'ones I've talked to about formations, or if it ain't." R'vain's shoulders lift, ripple, and fall; then one rises again as he lifts his cup, swirling it, for a taste. He winces a little at the bitterness, but turns to prowl back toward his Weyrwoman anyway, not to bother with more sweetener. "You want a better chair or something? Y'look like th'morning's been--" A beat, like he selects this carefully. "At least s'bad as th'were a few months ago."
"Mmm," is Roa's offer for who might be behind the mystery formation. "Maybe even a wingrider experimenting. I'm fine. When I sit down, my legs cramp, so..." she makes a small mark in the sand with her smallest finger. "Not sleeping all that well, I suppose. I've been better. Just...it's all right." The weyrwoman lifts her dark blue gaze from the sand to the weyrleader and his too-bitter klah. "I'm all right," she assures him gently.
R'vain blinks down at Roa, coming to a stop beside the sandtable, klah in his hand before his chest. His tongue slips up over an eye tooth, then retreats with a small, thoughtful *tschk.* "If y'say so," he rumbles, and unhooks a thumb from his pocket so his paw can try a touch at her shoulder. "Y'been quiet lately. I expected more complaints 'bout y'feet, or something. Hey, they sent up some kind of pear something juice, y'want it?"
"Most folks would say I'm usually quiet," the little weyrwoman notes with a faint smile. "Pear something juice sounds good. Thanks. I just..." she presses her lips into a thin line and shrugs. "I just feel like I'm making a mess of everything. I'm trying but I..." her shoulders lift against his palm in a small shrug. "Just a rough spot."
The paw on her shoulder slips down to the center of her upper back and rests there a moment, heavy and warm and very /present/, and to excuse this small intimacy by making it less personal R'vain looks over the Weyrwoman's shoulder at the sketch in the sand, mock-thoughtful. "A'right," he rumbles after a moment, and turns from her to get the pear something juice from the tray on which the klah was probably originally delivered. "What's a mess, b'th'way? I mean-- what's a mess that you've made. We got plenty of mess, I'll admit, I just ain't so sure I can saddle you with any of it." Grinning as he puts down his cup and turns over a glass to pour juice into, he makes it sound a bit like maybe he's tried.
When R'vain's hand moves, Roa's gaze drops down to her hand resting on the table. "Well, I seem very unassuming, these days. It's all part of my nefarious plan." She holds up the hand not curled around the table to receive the glass, once R'vain has finished pouring it. "I'm losing with Miniyal, again. We were doing all right for a moment, but that's done, now. R'en's..." she bites her bottom lip and shakes her head. "It's bad. I can't even go flying now, and I only have a month until...anyhow. Things."
"There ain't no losin' with Min'yal s'long as you remember there ain't no win that don't hurt," R'vain rumbles, tucking his klah into his elbow so he can come over with one hand ready to put the juice into Roa's reach and the other ready to touch her shoulder again. "Would goin' flyin' be a help? Got t'be something we can do t'get you fresh air, you need it. What'd Jen do t'you?" There's not even a beat between the fresh air comment and the one about the weyrling bronzer-- but the Weyrleader's tone manages to alter wholly in that space nonetheless, from casual concern to toothy threat.
"I don't think I understand that first bit." Roa brings the glass up to her lips to first take a small sniff, and then a tentative sip. "Mm. S'good." Sip, the second. "Flying just lets me straighten my head a little. It's not the air, it's just flying. Just being up there, just her and me. There's plenty of air, I'm just not allowed to ride anything. No dragons. No runners. Nothing." Si-...she sucks in a bit to much of her drink as R'vain's tone alters, and she swallows hastily. "He hasn't done anything. He's just upset with me. It's my fault, don't sound like you want to bite him."
"It could take me a while t'explain Min'yal," R'vain grins, and turns the weight of his paw on her shoulder to a caress, the kind meant to move muscles. "Here, turn a bit--" He applies pressure to imply /how/ she should turn and leans sideways to nestle his klah cup into the sand so he can apply both hands to massage. "He's upset 'bout Tavaly. 'Bout you and me sending her, and her being an adult, and him not being one. How's that your fault again?"
"I don't need..." but despite the protest, Roa is turning, head ducking down, a soft sigh escaping as achy muscles get rubbed. "If you understand Miniyal well enough that you can explain her, take the time. I desperately need the tutorial. I should have told him. When we sent her. I should have said." She keeps her eyes closed, chin tucked against her chest. "I know him better than anyone, and I blew it. I used to be able to fix these kinds of things. Now I'm -making- problems. I don't...he says...we just used to trust one another."
"Why should you have told him?" R'vain's question is almost a growl-- and the massage Roa's shoulders are getting is a little more meaningful while he protests. "She didn't want him told, and th'business is th'Weyr's. Ain't a weyrling's t'ask, and he's not anything else, f'now. Special treatment's only going t'make things worse."
"She's his sister, weyrling or no. I would have wanted to know, if Ashwin had been the guard he chose to send to Five Mines." She wanted to know about the guard, regardless, but..."I don't know. I just used to be better." Roa winces faintly as R'vain's hands squeeze a bit harder.
And then his hands stop, just heavy and warm on her shoulders. He's silent for a moment, and as his thumbs start to stroke up the back of her neck (this is almost absent-minded, this small part of the massage) he rumbles, softly, "Then th'first thing would have been t'tell her that she needs t'tell him, or that we'll tell him on her behalf. But." Here R'vain starts circling the heels of his enormous paws into the Weyrwoman's muscles again, gentler than before, working his way down her shoulders in slow movements. His voice takes on a grim certainty softened just by a hint of toothy grin. "Fact remains. He can be bitter as a man, a friend, whatever he is t'you or me. But he's insubordinate-- and dishonorable-- if he's using that shit t'pull rank on his own Weyrleaders."
"I don't think that's what he's doing," Roa notes quietly, her shoulders rolling against R'vain's broad palms. "Rumors say he hit you. Did he?"
There's a long quiet where the Weyrleader just focuses on massaging those small shoulders below his hands, or on something, anyway. "S'pretty much how it sounded when he came t'me," he rumbles after the long quiet, without answering the question. Directly, anyway.
Her head was lowered before, but now it droops. "Oh," Roa says very softly. "I'm sorry."
"Ain't your fault," growls R'vain, and one hand steadies on her shoulder while the other slips around to try a knuckle beneath her chin; he sidesteps, bending his shoulders and head down to try for a look at her face, or at least the blockade of her hair. "Roa. What's eatin' you?"
"Nothing. I'm all right." Roa tilts her chin away from the offered touch to better continue staring at the floor. "I just...I can't talk to R'en. I can't manage Miniyal. How'm I supposed to...adults can be reasoned with, at least. I don't know." And then, much much softer. "What'll I do when he goes?"
R'vain's snubbed hand retracts, but after a moment it comes to reside again upon her shoulder and the Weyrleader returns to the work of massaging her shoulders. "He's hard t'talk to. She's hard t'manage. You ain't failing just because it ain't easy," he rumbles to the back of her head. "And if he goes-- well, let's not worry more'n we have to until Sehkrath can fly. That'll bring him back, f'he gets th'bright idea t'go traveling alone."
"What?" Roa lifts her head, blinking, and briefly confused. "Oh. Right. I think he's already got that idea pretty firmly. Anyhow, -you- seem to manage her well enough. How come you're able to tell her when you disagree and she'll listen, and when I do it, she takes it as a personal attack?"
"Wait, was-- " But Roa moves on, and R'vain just stands quiet for a moment, his hands sliding lower to spread out the massage into her midback. He has to bend his knees a little to do this at the right angle, and does so with unthinking, athletic grace. "Ain't sure. I guess I don't make a big deal out of it when /she/ disagrees. Best f'us both-- f'now, anyway-- f'she don't figure I give a wherry's ass what she thinks. Means /my/ opinions ain't threatening." His thumbs start slow circles aligned with the Weyrwoman's spine, and though she won't see it the Weyrleader's brows draw low and tight over thoughtful eyes. "Ain't sure she /listens/ so much as don't block me out. Once in a while, by accident, somethin' gets through."
"Do I even want to know how you learned to be so good at this?" the weyrwoman groans softly as R'vain's hands move to the middle of her back. Roa's spine is a bit more curved than usual, due to the peculiar posture unique to the heavily knocked-up. "I think you're still better off than I am with her. I don't know how it's going to work when she graduates. I'm afraid she's going to make herself miserable. And us along with her. I asked her to talk to you about something. Has she?"
Behind Roa, her Weyrleader shrugs, though his grin's plain to hear in his voice. "Big hands, little practice," he asserts harmlessly, or as harmless as can be through the sharp edges of his grinning teeth. His hands flatten to her back, fingers arching out to the sides, heels of his paws against the muscles closest to the spine; gentle pressure, then he sidelines a low, "Lean on th'table," before adding, "Min'yal? Not yet. Th'Caucus thing, y'know... she's probably hiding."
"Oh. Yeh, maybe." Roa leans forward as requested, her hands settling on the edge of the able, fingers curling around it until her knuckles brush against the densely packed sand. She closes her eyes with a small sigh. "I don't know. She might come to the dance, if only to point out that one, she did so and two, the experience gave her yet more proof for why the entire institution is horrible and its headmaster more horrible still." She snorts. "You know I had to have a dress made for this thing? A dress I'm never going to wear again."
"Th'entire institution's not what it's s'posed t'be and--" R'vain stops short of saying the same for Sefton, shaking his head, grinning around a sigh. Warm flat paws run slow over the muscles lower in Roa's back, feeling out with extra care the tense spots, the aching spots, the spots that bear the most of her burden. "Never?" Beat. "Well-- y'can pass it on t'someone else, then, or have it remade, or let th'tailor take it when you're done. There any chance of him comin' along with you?"
"Mmf. Probably never. Faranth, right in the middle, if you could..." Roa groans again, her back pressing against the weyrleader's fingers. "The institution isn't, but the headmaster's exactly what he's supposed to be. Just because you don't like it doesn't change that. Maybe I'll pass it on to Issa." The last comment is, one must presume, about the gown.
Right in the middle, R'vain flattens his palms, splays his fingers, marks mentally the positions of her ribs and spine, then starts in with those circling strong thumbs. "What he's supposed t'be and a shitload more, which is what I worry about," the Weyrleader rumbles, though this is not quite the same as objection. A choked little splutter precedes, "Y'think /she's/ goin' t'do this again?"
"I think she's a few months behind me. Maybe she can use it for Turn's End or something, I dunno. Mhf. Oh shells, yes, thank you, right there." Roa's shoulders curl forward with the momentary relief that the rubbing provides. "Why do you worry about it?" she asks after a thoughtful beat and then, in belated answer, "He's on duty tonight."
"Because you're about sixty months pregnant and it wouldn't hurt f'him t'have one dance with you," rumbles the Weyrleader-- who only /then/ realizes that he probably wasn't asked about Ashwin. His hands pause, then start in again, and when he says, "Because he's buildin' his reputation here, and that's building /our/ reputation too," it is in a tone much more subdued than bitching about Caucus would usually merit.
She laughs softly, shaking her head a little. "We dance. Just not at these things, they set his teeth on edge." Her eyes open slowly and one finger stretches to begin an idle doodle in the sand. "He's not building a bad reputation, though. Not for himself or for us."
"Say that t'me in twenty turns." R'vain huffs, fingers stretching to join counterpoint rhythms to the massage primarily accomplished by his thumbs and the thick, heavy heels of his hands, warming the muscles now as much as stroking them. "What d'you think's goin' t'be said 'bout him and Caucus by then?"
Her small smile hitching upwards a little, Roa laughs. "Okay," she agrees, lids lowering once more, "Twenty turns. It's a date. I miss sleeping on my stomach really a lot." Her bottom lip is nibbled. "I think they'll say 'it's a waste that Caucus is a marriage mart' or they'll say 'I can't believe they let all those cotholders and lower caverns workers in there' or they'll say 'shame about that incident that closed the whole thing down isn't it'."
"Y'think they'll still be ranting about th'common folk in twenty turns?" R'vain huffs again, and having spent this long on the middle back that she asked for, he lets his hands slip a little lower into the arch of her back, or what will once again be the arch of her back when she's no longer so very gravid. "More to it than a marriage market. Sefton's going t'run Conclave, we'll be lucky f'he don't run th'Council too, dragon or not. S'a market f'th'whole world's affections. That's why I worry."
"I think it'd take a while to get them there in the first place, so possibly." Roa leans forward further, elbows making divots in the sand. "he doesn't need a market to win the world's affections. It's handy, but it's not...look. Yes, he wants power. Yes, he's selfish and self-centered. Of course he is. But that doesn't make him bad at running Caucus or the Conclave. It doesn't make his decisions any less beneficial for others."
R'vain's hands stroke a last long, stretchful path over the Weyrwoman's back, sliding smoothly to her waist and back up with fingers crooked, wakeful. Then he steps back and lets out a thin, nostril-flaring sigh. "This probably ain't th'decade f'you t'get me t'believe that tunnelsnakes don't bite, no matter how charmin', Weyrwoman. We got enough scars on us f'a while."
"He's not a tunnelsnake," Roa says with mild exasperation. "Look, what Sefton wants is to be powerful and influential." She straightens slowly, pushing up onto her toes for a stretch, before stepping away from the sandtable a pace. A hand reaches out to rub away the imprints fingers and elbows have made. "But to do that he has to do the job well and maintain good faith with those he charms. The man will do what's best for himself, but usually that means doing what's best for others, too. He's a sp-..." that analogy is cut off immediately. "He ties people to himself, but that ties him to others as well."
Not fast enough. "Exactly," says R'vain, voice rough around the edges, and prowls an unnecessarily long path around his Weyrwoman to the sandtable so he can bend and catch up his cup from where he left it lodged in the sand for safekeeping. "You feelin' any better?"
She tsks softly, wrinkling her nose. "Not exactly at all," Roa grouses quietly. "My back is much happier. Thank you."
"Good." And to the pits with Sefton. R'vain grins over the rim of his klah and tips up the cup for a drink. "It help it any t'soak in hot water? Y'goin' t'be on your feet a while this evening, I bet, specially f'sitting down's worse." His shoulders roll; he takes another small swig from his mug and starts a slow prowl toward the conference table. "What've you got t'do before then?"
"Oh, some of the usual. Go over inventory, write a few letters, make sure I know everybody's name who's supposed to be coming to this thing tonight. Ugh, I wish this had happened a couple months sooner. I'm going to be waddling about attempting to make polite conversation with the equivalent of a sack of firestone poking out the front of me." Roa sighs faintly. "Besides that, I'll nap. Maybe soak. Maybe nap while I'm soaking. Multitasking is very efficient."
"Let someone else do inventory," rumbles R'vain, turning once he's by the table to lean his hip into it, one paw crutched beside him, elbow a little bent so he can slouch partly. "Let th'letters wait, you'll have more t'write about tomorrow." A flicker of brows. "Who wore what, who looked th'most like a sack of firestone, s'forth."
"I thought if I at least started the letters today, I could sleep in a bit tomorrow. I'm finding if I leave blank spots in just the right places, I can fill them in once I have the actual details. " The weyrwoman smiles, leaning up against one of the chairs and using the added support so that she can lift one foot. "Thank you for the backrub. I'm sure you have better things to be doing than smoothing my ruffled feathers."
"Well, that's a talent f'writing letters I ain't quite yet achieved," laughs R'vain. He launches easily from the conference table and prowls back toward Roa, the hand not holding his cup going out to stroke the backs of his knuckles over her shoulder. "Nah. I mean, I got all kinds of things t'do, but smoothin' y'feathers s'sometimes part f'my job, ain't it?" He withdraws his paw, pocketing it, and a shrug ripples through his indifferent shoulders. "I'll see you tonight."
"I suppose so," the weyrwoman concedes, shifting to lift the other foot as R'vain's knuckles brush her shoulder. "Always feel a bit guilty when you actually end up doing it, though. I tend to prefer it the other way around. It's easier. Being the one that's helping." Her foot lowers and she straightens. "See you tonight." One hand lifts and falls in a vague wave and Roa turns to begin drifting towards her weyr, the pear-something juice left behind and forgotten.