ravkanwitch | [[closed post: jormanen end denam danne näskelle*]]

[[closed post: jormanen end denam danne näskelle*]]

There's something about Dark that reminds Nina of Fjerda – maybe it's the cold and the scarcity. She remembers working long shifts at the cannery in Elling when she was trying to maintain her cover. Everything in that town was worn down and washed out. Even the crystal whiteness of the Ice Court is a bit bland in her memory. While she loves the country of Fjerda itself, somehow (maybe it's Djerholm syndrome; that's a linguistics joke), it all makes her slightly glum. And that's when the brightly colored magazines in the library grabbed her attention. What better time to hold a "slumber party" than now, when the end to Dark is around the corner, but the prospect of winter is still lingering?

Her room has been set up for the party ever since the early afternoon. She pushed her furniture against the walls and moved all of her "stuff" out of the way. With the help of Dionysus and the aftermath of their pinball bet, she set up a spread of juice boxes, grapes, and some really strange but quite tasty Japanese grape gummies. He also provided the jelly for some almond butter and jelly squares that Luo Binghe helped to make – after she promised him that she would spend some quality time with him after the slumber party, of course.

She wasn't exactly sure how to decorate... Festive? Girly? Spooky? A little bit of everything? She hung up a few brightly colored streamers as well as some black streamers and then found all of the spare cushions and blankets in the empty rooms on her level of the mansion. The cushions are laid out on the ground for everyone to sit or lay on along with plenty of blankets on top. She did read that spooky stories are typical at a slumber party, so she's scattered a few decorative bones around the room for a spooky vibe... And then the final touch: she found three strings of fairy lights hidden away in a dusty closet and strung them around the ceiling of the room where they're sparkling away right now. Thankfully, there's been no restriction on that whole "electricity" thing. And then... the wait for the guests to arrive.

[[Let's try this slumber party post this way... For each stage of the evening, I'll post a top level Nina comment. Feel free to respond to whatever strikes your fancy and then interact with everyone else as needed! Hopefully we'll end up with multiple short threads!]]

*Be welcome and wait out the storm, in Fjerdan

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

"Oh, if you love stealing from him so much, you can do it next!"

Gu Xiang unlatches the window, where she springs from the sill to catch the edge of the roof and swing herself lightly onto the shingles. The eerie wind has swept the shingles mostly clean of snow, and now the roof has a satisfying grip beneath her delicate slippers. Gu Xiang taps light-footed across the roof's narrow peak, glancing down through the darkness at the windows below her for one with a telltale glow. When she finds the window she's seeking, she peers over the eaves, assessing, her hair a tumble of braids. Yep, there are the the plants on the windowsill; there's Sagramore's sword hanging on the wall. This is the place! Hanging onto the edge of the roof with only her toes, she removes the screen, then eases up the window and dives through, landing on the empty bed and rolling to muffle the sound of the collision.

The man emerging from the bathroom was not part of her plans.

Sagramore blinks a few times as he stands in the doorway, still toweling water out of his hair.

"Good evening," he says mildly. "Did you need something?"

Gu Xiang straightens, brushing off her clothes, settling her hair, trying to buy time while she scopes out the room. She puts on her most innocent smile. "Laertes is your husband, right?"

"Laertes is my husband. Are you looking for him? --Did you come in through the window?"

Sagramore sees her as a child. He wants to protect her. He will do stupid, unpleasant, annoying things for her.

Her gaze lights on Szarka, sweetly gnawing at her rope chew in one of her many beds. She makes a snap decision.

"Can Nina and I borrow your dog?"

Sagramore is not a naturally suspicious person, but he does narrow his eyes just the slightest amount.

On the other hand, the name Nina carries a lot of cachet, even putting aside his fondness for Gu Xiang.

"For how long?"

"Just for a little while?" She makes her eyes extra big. "We want to introduce her to the other girls! Like Georgia and Gideon and Tally!" (She assumes that Tress has already met the dog.)

His heart softens. Szarka is the most perfect, sweetest daughter -- it's only natural that she would delight everyone. And she's been friendly and well-behaved with strangers every time she's encountered them.

"Don't feed her anything but these," he says, going to the table and filling an empty mug with the scraps of jerky that are left, this far into the month. "If she whines at the door, she wants to urinate. Do not play with her mouth or she'll think it's all right to bite as a game." He hands Gu Xiang the mug and lifts Szarka out of her bed. "If she jumps up on anyone, ignore her. You can give her a treat if she sits nicely or does her tricks. She can high five now." He pauses in front of Gu Xiang, Szarka nestled in her arms. "Am I forgetting anything?"

Oh no. Oh no. Szarka licks Gu Xiang's chin, and her heart goes soft like a steamed bun. This is the best, sweetest dog who has ever lived. Gu Xiang will protect her with her life. "What's her name?" she asks.

"Her name is Szarka. It means magpie, because she's black and white and clever."

"Szarka," Gu Xiang repeats--then to Szarka, in tender tones that no one has heard from her since she was eight, "Szarka. Little magpie, everyone's going to love you so much! Thank you, uncle."

"Don't keep her out all night," with the resignation of a man who does not expect to get his dog back any time soon. "And have a good time with the girls, all right?"

"Sure thing! Bye, uncle!" And with that, she disappears--through the door, this time.

Some minutes later, Gu Xiang returns to the party with a puppy, a mug full of jerky, and an expression of fierce satisfaction.

"You stole Szarka?!"

"Nina said it had to be something important! And nothing is more important than a dog!"

"I said the more important, the more impressive," Nina gently corrects, absolutely delighted. She ruffles the soft fur on Szarka's head. "And I'm impressed. Great job, Gu Xiang. Now you can choose the next victim!"

Edited 2024-04-22 16:33 (UTC)

Gu Xiang surveys the gathered teenagers. She discards Nina immediately--Nina is fearless; nothing would faze her. She feels too soft-hearted to pounce on Tress so early in the night. Georgia knows the game best, so she has an unfair advantage. Her eyes linger on Gideon, who is fearless like Nina but also knows about getting hot bitches; she probably has all kinds of good secrets! ... but she's also likely to pick dare over truth, so Gu Xiang probably won't learn any secrets about picking up girls that way.

Then her gaze lands on Tally. Her smirk is somehow menacing even though she's gently, delicately stroking a little Border Collie puppy. "Tally," she says. "Truth or dare?"

Tally's played truth or dare before, and with the Crims it could definitely get pretty bubbly and dangerous. She considers truth, wanting to get closer to her new clique, but maybe they don't need to know the shaming parts of her past yet.

"Dare," she decides, giving Gu Xiang a "give me your best" smirk. If it is shoving ice down her pants, that'll be very bubbly-making.

"Dare you to climb onto the roof," says Gu Xiang immediately.

Tally grins. "Done." She gets up and heads for the door to slip on her shoes, then goes to the window. Once she has it open, she considers telling Gu Xiang that she's already tried this before, but it would be bogus to reject the dare. Besides, she didn't actually make it all the way to the top.

She turns around to lever herself out, smiling when she sees that people look impressed. "I guess you'll have to go outside if you want to watch," she calls.

The climbing is actually much easier than last time, since she's been working her arms out every day lately. The night is crystal clear around her, and she feels every detail of the textures under her fingertips. She's at the next set of windows in no time.

Gu Xiang leaps out through the open window soon after, coming down to land on the snow-crusted grounds of the mansion. She watches Tally's progress with mounting delight. "She's amazing!" she shouts. Szarka, still safely snuggled in her arms, barks exuberantly, because the Larger Puppy is barking. "She's just hanging onto the bricks by her fingertips!!"

Edited 2024-04-23 00:38 (UTC)

Tally smiles to herself and keeps climbing until she gets to the top. She's shaking, but the idea of falling is too terrifying to allow for any weakness. She hauls herself up over the eaves and relaxes a little, enjoying the world in all its ultra-clarity.

"Now what?" she calls down. "Can I climb back in a top window or do I have to climb back down?"

"However you want!" Gu Xiang hollers back. "Wow, I didn't think you'd do it at all!" After she's leapt back up to the window and rolled inside (with Szarka carefully protected against her chest), she finds Gideon. "Your girlfriend is stupid brave," she informs her, and thrusts Szarka into her arms. Szarka, excited by all this leaping and flying and rolling, immediately covers Gideon's entire face with kisses.

Gideon's intellect is not the highest at the best of times, and the combination of a) Tally being described as her girlfriend and b) sudden armful of squirming puppy does not do it any favors. "She's not my girlfriend," she says, through the dog spit. "We're just. Uh. It's--anyway. Ask her about the time she kicked a cop off a roof."

Nina isn't going to say anything, but her ears are pricked for gossip as she quickly scoops Szarka's bottom back into Gideon's arms on her way to the window, as the puppy almost squirms its way out. She takes a quick peek out the window, closing her eyes against the cold wind. It is extremely high.

"Tally, you're doing great!" She yells up at the roof. "It's your turn when you get back in!"

Tally makes her way back through the hallways, in high and bubbly spirits. Everyone knows that she's totally crim now. She comes in through the door and points at Georgia. Gideon's holding the dog now, too, which is cute.

"Georgia-la! Your turn. Truth or dare?"

"Blimey." Georgia usually picks dare, but if that is how the dares are going, it might be time for a change. "Tally-pally, that was double cool with knobs. Truth."

Tally was kind of expecting dare, so she has to think for a minute.

"What's the biggest thing you ever got in trouble for as an ugly? I mean, when you were younger?" Tally asks, both giving Georgia the chance to stealth-brag and wondering about the kinds of tricks she might have pulled.

Gideon casts Tally a grin little over Szarka's head. "Trying to assess everyone's crim level?" she teases, pretending no one had said anything about her at all while she was outside.

"I just want some good stories," Tally protests. "Who knows, maybe Georgia's the most crim one here."

"Oh, bloody hell, let me think. Right, we have this barmy old school caretaker, Elvis, the grumpiest man alive, and this one day it was absolutely nippy noodles, and he was wearing these vair hilarious little earmuffs. So I ran into his hut and started sort of acting out shouting that my friend Jas was on fire, but silently, just mouthing it so he would think he couldn't hear anything through the earmuffs? Which was a classic stroke of brilliantosity on my part—my mates were all laughing, and I was waving my arms about like a loon—and then when he took the earmuffs off and realized it was a joke, he barged after me and slipped and fell and dislocated his hip. I was suspended from Stalag 14 for a week and I had to pretend I had tummy lurgy so my vati wouldn't find out and throw a total nervy b."

Tally can't help but laugh. It's exactly the kind of thing she'd find funny as an ugly, the kind of thing middle pretties would gently scold you for and tell you you'd stop doing after the operation.

"You lied to your crumblies about it too? That's impressive."

"Well, Mutti knew, but she kept it quiet because she wanted to use the fake lurgy as an excuse to take me to the doctor who looks a bit like George Clooney."

"Who's George Clooney?"

Oh, ickle Tress. There are sooooo many things she is clueless about. Georgia grabs several of the old magazines Nina has lying around and flips through them rapidly until she locates a picture of George Clooney. "Here. All the middle aged woman just go mad for him."

Tress pulls the magazine closer to take a look, studying the picture thoughtfully. George Clooney is a fairly good-looking man, in her admittedly inexpert opinion. "Oh, okay. That makes sense."

Gideon peers over her shoulder. "This is what middle-aged women like, huh? I'd better take some notes."

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