#support: l'arachel dimitri / noble hart

[aglaean]

It's a little awkward, he thinks, at first, due to the nature of their first meeting. She had thought him so astounding, but it was merely due to him fudging the truth to discuss her interests.

On top of which, he fell so easily during such an important battle. What a house leader, what a shining prince.

He smiles as he approaches, and he extends a carafe of juice to her. "Hello, Princess L'Arachel. I...I wanted to express my sympathies, that your bout did not end in victory for you. ...And admit that my own ended in failure..."

It is hard, to keep the smile on his face, but he manages. "I'd like to apologize - perhaps if I had been...a better leader, we might have been able to scrape a victory for our teams, but as it stands, I have much more to learn yet."

He wants to please her, wants to impress her, but it is hard, he realizes, and he is young. There is so much that he hasn't done, hasn't fought.

His grin becomes lighter, more genuine, after a moment. "Perhaps, er, our alteregos might have, ah, slain the villains! And brought us...glory?" He laughs, but it is sincere. "Thank you, Princess, for fighting for the Lions today."

A flask hovers in her vision, and attached to it is the arm of her monster-slayer-in-training! Delighted, L'Arachel takes the offered juice and a hearty swig in one smooth motion. Her lips are still a little cracked from the alternating swirl of fire and ice, but the cold tang of apples soothes their tiresome aching somewhat.

'Dimitri! Ah, that is to say,' Before her very eyes, Uncle hovers, spectral, his eyebrows knitted in a familiar warning - titles were such a hassle, but she supposed they had to be put to use sometimes. Even if she wished they were half as fun as they ones she created herself. 'House Leader!'

A sigh escapes her lips at the memory of her short-lived brilliance on the field. But, perhaps it was for the best. Had she been permitted to unveil her full magnificence... Well, it certainly wouldn't have been much of a 'mock' battle!

'To say admit makes it sound like a crime!' She gasps, with a little more involvement than she had perhaps intended. But really, a crime would be so very thrilling! And then she could once more don the mantle of truth-teller and-! But, his face does not echo a taste for mystery in the present moment, and so she stands.

'What you and I have done today was no failure, Dimitri. To suggest ones such as we can fail!' And here she wrinkles her nose, as if suddenly accosted with a bad smell. 'This battle was but a taste of our potential, and our foes should be wracked with thankfulness to have been fed so well!'

Smiling indulgently, she digs into a pocket in her jacket and produces a slightly crumpled piece of paper. 'We cannot know why the Gods will what they do, but adversity is essential to the formation of a true hero!' She toys with the wrinkles in the slip for a moment; a rare expression of hesitation on her features.

If she'd known she would be parting with such a treasure, she would've secured a better copy!

The mention of alter-egos barges into her musings and for a moment she nearly loses grip on the paper in her excitement. 'Ah!! Yes, The Beautiful Princess of Peerless Beauty and, um, pray tell, what is the name of your heroic mask?' Doing her best impression of someone trustworthy (an impression that she believed with all her heart to be simply the truth) she leans in close, her voice dropping to a stage whisper. 'I won't tell a soul the identity of who lies beneath it!'

Allowing him time to deliberate, the wind ruffles the sheet in her hand, elevating its already eye-catching details, flashes of bright pink and curling text, to her attention. 'We all have much to learn, Dimitri. I am sure it will shock you to know that even I have knowledge yet untapped!' She says, a prompt for compliments very much explicit. 'But this is a school no? I believe that learning is the most exciting part.'

And, grinning, she hands him the sheet of paper, as if written within it was the answers to the deepest and most pressing questions of life itself. 'Here, use it to inspire even greater deeds in the future!' Inside the folded sheet, a scrawled image of herself, framed with text providing an encouraging rallying cry for a particular day of the week, seemed to smile too.

[aglaean]

continued from here !

He is every bit the sort of person she imagined. Noble, with well-turned out speeches, and ever so chivalrous. The sort whose features would look best adjacent to a long, grand tale detailing their exploits.

This pleases L'Arachel. You'd think the burden of always being right would have grown tiresome, but she found that her assumptions being vindicated was always just as delightful. The Gods had chosen well: she was prophetic to the extreme!

She nods along to his diminishing list, her ever-expressive eyebrows knitting themselves increasingly tighter. 'And, you hunt for sustenance, yes?'

It hadn't occured to her that righteous violence wouldn't be the sole motivating factor in taking up arms. Hunting did not have the same Aeolian note of breezy romance. It was so, corporeal. She imagined it must be harder to feel like a hero: standing at the feet of a creature you had felled for your own purposes.

The conversation had lulled, and it was this, more than the cue embedded into the speech itself, that L'Arachel seized upon.

'You wish to hear of my exploits? Well, forgive me if I supply but only a small sampling - you see, I have accumulated so many over the years!' She sighs, with a fond nostalgia. 'Why, on one occassion, my darling retainer found himself menaced by a simply enormous gorgon!'

She leans forward in her seat, already whisked away by her own tale.

'It looked dire, all hope was lost... I feared I would never hear his sweet praises ever again!' L'Arachel says, conviently forgetting the hasty curses Rennac had been flinging in every avaliable direction at the time. 'But then, at the last moment, I sallied forth! Staff in hand! With one mighty blow, I struck the gorgon between its petrifying eyes and it fell with a howl!'

Far from stony, L'Arachel's eyes are sparkling.

'Truly, it was a sight for the ages! I whisked my retainer from the fangs of danger and was showered in applause!' Singular, though it may have been it certainly was loud - Dozla was always good at magnifying her praises.

'But please, I speak too much of myself,' She said, entirely unapologetically, 'is there a beast you wish one day to prevail over?' You believe yourself capable; I do too! Perchance we may seek out evil together, and vanquish it in harmony!'

@blaiddllodi

✧ tale as old as time (monsters and blight) dating hypotheseeees ✧

love hypothesis event: round one!

[aglaean]

Each sentence unspooled from her boundless yarn of daring exploits and fearless adventures, was a tie, however small, however uncertain, between herself and her audience.

Saaga had played upon this with a practiced hand - plucking the strings woven sentence by sentence and driving the young princess to distraction with to be continueds or but then!s. Of course, Saaga's had been but crafty falsehood; L'Arachel spoke of nothing less than the truth.

When there was a cliff 'pon which her story had to dangle, chance would have it that it she and her trusty compatriots were the ones clinging to the edge.

And yet, it seeemed she had no need to pull out the truly captivating tales. The young prince was already attentive to her less extravagant encounters! There is something in his expression; the way he leans towards each word as if he can bring the events closer if he hears them nearer, that is reminiscent of something.

She cannot put a name to it, though it feels like small knees folded on carpets, and hours spent dreaming oneself outside of cold castle walls.

'But of course, Rennac would dive headfirst into danger for my sake, and he knows that I too, would do the same!' She says, preening at the praise she had courted - even if she knew it was to be so, it didn't mean she couldn't enjoy it! Such were the gifts of providence!

And naturally, she is all too happy to elaborate on his speculations: mystery was dashing in its own way, but it did put rather a damper on extolling one's virtues. 'Countless, endless! Were I to tell you of every encounter with evil, every daring rescue, and careful plot, we would not leave this table for at least a week!' It almost sounds like a threat, though she naturally doesn't intend it that way.

She hardly registers his fumbling: to be striken with nerves before one as glorious as she was hardly a surprise, but, her eyes snap towards his when he mentions courts and advisors, and isolation. 'Twas but a recent development. In past years I too, saw little beyond the walls of Rausten Court.' She says, softly, before returning to her default volume: loud. 'Well! There is nothing for it, we simply must depart on a quest! That is the only true way to encounter the world!'

Suddenly, her face turns deathly serious, or, about as serious as it can be. 'Now, have you a secret identity? I spent several years in the craft of mine: without such a visor you cannot encounter the world, lest you reveal your nobility carelessly!'

It takes her a moment to construct what 'beel' refers to - her mind is momentarily plagued with visions of some enormous yellow-and-black buzzing thing. 'Why, yes!' She says, clasping her hands together. 'A bael is an excellent choice!' Although of course, there were no baels prowling Magvel anymore. Nor would there ever be. L'Arachel would always, unequivocally be glad of such a thing - though it made her bank of stories stagnate, ever so slightly.

✧ tale as old as time (monsters and blight) dating hypotheseeees ✧

love hypothesis event: round one!