#also a curveball for you! feel free to take this wherever / however :bunglad:

[venalier]

work has ever been the balm for the disquieted spirit. . . . or something like that; she's pretty sure she read that line in a romance novel somewhere once. —which! is definitely not what this is.

but the sky knight can't deny the number of sighs that escape her while she works.

and maybe this is why, at some point, she gets a firm bump on the head from the nose of one of the horses she's cleaning, enough to startle her from her concentration. after spending more than fifteen minutes wrangling the stallion in forty-seven she'd been told about even with the sugar cubes, it's an unwelcome interruption. "hey! what's that for?" brow purses up at the spotted gelding ( slow dancer. she's always thought the name was a clever one, albeit a bit girly for him if anyone asked her — and his coat lovely every time she's seen him ), who pretends to be disinterested now, nosing at some hay sticking out of the feed.

. . . animals, really.

a while later, carrying tools and covered in a mild sheen of sweat, she makes her way back to the center of the row, feeling grateful that the rest at least hadn't given her much trouble. a smile lifts to see andrei already there — and caeldori hastens her step, buckets jangling. "usually i'm the one finished first when i do these chores with someone else. this is a nice change of pace. i hope i didn't keep you waiting."

plunk. something cool lands on her head— and when she looks up, it's to the sight of suddenly grey-blanketed skies. huh? it'd been only partly cloudy a couple hours ago. "is it— raining?" other hand instinctively stretches out palm-up, but she's already regretting the amount of work they won't be able to finish. at the very least, the kinshi were going to hole themselves up somewhere as dry as possible, and definitely wouldn't want to be looked at in this weather. and exercising the horses . . . if only there was some indoor track or ring to at least get them moving.

"let's get all this cleaned up before it starts coming down." purposeful motions re-gather brooms, picks, and the like with speed, urging them both toward the tool shed; she steals a glance at andrei along the way in case he had other ideas. "i guess the horses will just have to wait a little longer. but — ugh, hm . . . maybe we can manage it if it's only a drizzle?" hard to say if it'd stay that way, having come on so suddenly.

the sun and moon like a shuttle