An Apple a Day (Open)
Posted: August 31st, 2019, 7:06 pm
They said that the more things were different, the more they stayed the same. Liolet Belwhyn wasn't a philosopher, though, so she tended to point out that kind of statement as both moronic and oxymoronic. If things changed and stayed the same, then did they change at all? Laying here, staring up at the ceiling over her bed, though, she almost understood what the pundits meant, and she didn't like it a bit. Life hadn't been normal since...ever...and she was tired of change being her constant. It was hard to steer a course clear of the rocks when you had a prow full of granite, perhaps.
Laying there, she was struck with a wave of longing for her too-short year in Tarabon, pretending to nobility and buying small stakes in racehorses to support herself. Of course, she'd tampered with the horses, but no one there would ever accuse anyone of that, because no one there had any idea that Aes Sedai could fit in so easily. She'd played younger than her years, let a few of the prettier men pay court to her, and invested the outcomes - really ugly jewelry, for the most part, and half of a racehorse, likely now delivered and training for the Circuit of Heaven without her input - and it had been such a simple life. She'd been...happy?
Now, she was just...here. It was disturbing to leave a life as structured as the Farm, just as it had been disorienting to leave a self-willed life like the one she'd pretended to in Tarabon. She didn't know what to do with the free time. Not, she mused, that there was much of it. She'd been to the library, and she'd pulled out texts and scrips about random things just to irritate the girls who'd been novices when she'd left and would aspire Brown for far less time than she'd been pretending at being Blue, but that was only good for an afternoon's entertainment. She had scribing, of course: everyone did. You collected your personal library that way, or if you were savvy and had the coin, you paid the novices to sneak your scribing done. Liolet didn’t have the coin. She’d had a fair amount when she’d been discovered in Ebou Dar, but she’d seen not a hint of a copper since, and she doubted she’d see any of it again. Irritating, but well, she’d earned her little fortune once: she could always do it again.
And the morning wouldn’t wait, of course: no one let anyone lie abed anywhere in the Tower, save perhaps in the Infirmary or the cots for the children. Not for the first time, Liolet considered the trajectory of stupidity that was inherent in marrying one’s Warder. It probably wasn’t too bad if you got a great many children: some would channel and possibly, survive. She wasn’t going that route, of course. Neither was she going to go preen at a Dedicated, though: for one thing, the majority of them were half her age - or less, considering that half her age was a good round thirty, and the Dedicated were a well-scrubbed, fresh-faced lot of louts, most with a few youthful spots still on their noses. There were a few exceptions, but Liolet wasn’t having them, either: they were their own individual (and sometimes spectacularly) bad options. It was better, she decided, to aim for the life of the ascetic.
But always, she mused, easier said than done, particularly when your path crossed ever so many pretty young men with their shirts off in the late summer sun. The rains that had heralded her arrival in Hama Valon had cleared for a last gasp of summer heat, and it seemed like pretty boys were everywhere. She realized she was twisting before the glass, trying to work out the best angle to pin back her springy golden curls, and frowned. You couldn’t be an ascetic and still be trying to find the prettiest place to pin back your hair. Still, she moved the knot twice before she approved of it, then clambered into the ridiculous white dress with its wide banded hem. She still had little idea what to do with the day or the hours in it, but someone would find a way to fill it for her, and if no one did, she had an appointment to view the stables in the afternoon. The master of horse from her youth had passed on - he had been elderly when she had been an actual maid - and the new one did things differently.
But a stable was a place that didn’t tend to change over time. Liolet headed toward the relative certainty of horses with an apple in each pocket and a pasty in one hand, snatched as she darted through the kitchen (quickly, because the Mistress of the Kitchens had no problem at all seizing the scruff of an Accepted and thrusting her back into a pot or five to wash.) Nobody would make her muck a stall or the pot-washing equivalent out here: the horses had staff, unlike the Tower’s learning ranks. She considered the implications of that as she settled herself to one side of an open pen to finish her stolen breakfast. Well, horses were valuable.
Also noble, brilliant, beautiful, and dead useful. Your average novice was perhaps one out of five on that scale. Liolet wasn’t even sure she rated that highly, herself. Still, a few of the stable boys gave her the knuckle-to-the-ground sweep of the cap due someone of high rank. Liolet ignored them: it was about all the kindness they deserved. More than one stable lad had warmed more than one bed and ended up in the stupidity-of-marrying-one’s-Warder paradox. Of course, if you ignored all the lads, you ended up with the very bold Gaidar, now and again…
Liolet finished her pasty and sighed. Why was it so hard to be good, even inside her own head? She’d paused outside a familiar stall, although the horse in it was a stranger to her. (Once upon a time, this had not been a possible thing: very young Liolet had known every horse in the Stables, even a few whose owners had declared she’d lose a finger or three for her impertinence.) Digging in her pocket, she turned up one of her apples, and let Air separate it into tantalizing chunks. By winter, the fruit would all be mealy and wizened, but this was summer: it was still juicy and crisp. The horse rubbed its velvet muzzle against her palm, licking up even the remaining hint of sweetness, and the girl who wasn’t really a girl any longer - looks were so deceiving - leaned into its warm bulk.
Thankfully, even when everything else changed, a horse was still a horse.
Laying there, she was struck with a wave of longing for her too-short year in Tarabon, pretending to nobility and buying small stakes in racehorses to support herself. Of course, she'd tampered with the horses, but no one there would ever accuse anyone of that, because no one there had any idea that Aes Sedai could fit in so easily. She'd played younger than her years, let a few of the prettier men pay court to her, and invested the outcomes - really ugly jewelry, for the most part, and half of a racehorse, likely now delivered and training for the Circuit of Heaven without her input - and it had been such a simple life. She'd been...happy?
Now, she was just...here. It was disturbing to leave a life as structured as the Farm, just as it had been disorienting to leave a self-willed life like the one she'd pretended to in Tarabon. She didn't know what to do with the free time. Not, she mused, that there was much of it. She'd been to the library, and she'd pulled out texts and scrips about random things just to irritate the girls who'd been novices when she'd left and would aspire Brown for far less time than she'd been pretending at being Blue, but that was only good for an afternoon's entertainment. She had scribing, of course: everyone did. You collected your personal library that way, or if you were savvy and had the coin, you paid the novices to sneak your scribing done. Liolet didn’t have the coin. She’d had a fair amount when she’d been discovered in Ebou Dar, but she’d seen not a hint of a copper since, and she doubted she’d see any of it again. Irritating, but well, she’d earned her little fortune once: she could always do it again.
And the morning wouldn’t wait, of course: no one let anyone lie abed anywhere in the Tower, save perhaps in the Infirmary or the cots for the children. Not for the first time, Liolet considered the trajectory of stupidity that was inherent in marrying one’s Warder. It probably wasn’t too bad if you got a great many children: some would channel and possibly, survive. She wasn’t going that route, of course. Neither was she going to go preen at a Dedicated, though: for one thing, the majority of them were half her age - or less, considering that half her age was a good round thirty, and the Dedicated were a well-scrubbed, fresh-faced lot of louts, most with a few youthful spots still on their noses. There were a few exceptions, but Liolet wasn’t having them, either: they were their own individual (and sometimes spectacularly) bad options. It was better, she decided, to aim for the life of the ascetic.
But always, she mused, easier said than done, particularly when your path crossed ever so many pretty young men with their shirts off in the late summer sun. The rains that had heralded her arrival in Hama Valon had cleared for a last gasp of summer heat, and it seemed like pretty boys were everywhere. She realized she was twisting before the glass, trying to work out the best angle to pin back her springy golden curls, and frowned. You couldn’t be an ascetic and still be trying to find the prettiest place to pin back your hair. Still, she moved the knot twice before she approved of it, then clambered into the ridiculous white dress with its wide banded hem. She still had little idea what to do with the day or the hours in it, but someone would find a way to fill it for her, and if no one did, she had an appointment to view the stables in the afternoon. The master of horse from her youth had passed on - he had been elderly when she had been an actual maid - and the new one did things differently.
But a stable was a place that didn’t tend to change over time. Liolet headed toward the relative certainty of horses with an apple in each pocket and a pasty in one hand, snatched as she darted through the kitchen (quickly, because the Mistress of the Kitchens had no problem at all seizing the scruff of an Accepted and thrusting her back into a pot or five to wash.) Nobody would make her muck a stall or the pot-washing equivalent out here: the horses had staff, unlike the Tower’s learning ranks. She considered the implications of that as she settled herself to one side of an open pen to finish her stolen breakfast. Well, horses were valuable.
Also noble, brilliant, beautiful, and dead useful. Your average novice was perhaps one out of five on that scale. Liolet wasn’t even sure she rated that highly, herself. Still, a few of the stable boys gave her the knuckle-to-the-ground sweep of the cap due someone of high rank. Liolet ignored them: it was about all the kindness they deserved. More than one stable lad had warmed more than one bed and ended up in the stupidity-of-marrying-one’s-Warder paradox. Of course, if you ignored all the lads, you ended up with the very bold Gaidar, now and again…
Liolet finished her pasty and sighed. Why was it so hard to be good, even inside her own head? She’d paused outside a familiar stall, although the horse in it was a stranger to her. (Once upon a time, this had not been a possible thing: very young Liolet had known every horse in the Stables, even a few whose owners had declared she’d lose a finger or three for her impertinence.) Digging in her pocket, she turned up one of her apples, and let Air separate it into tantalizing chunks. By winter, the fruit would all be mealy and wizened, but this was summer: it was still juicy and crisp. The horse rubbed its velvet muzzle against her palm, licking up even the remaining hint of sweetness, and the girl who wasn’t really a girl any longer - looks were so deceiving - leaned into its warm bulk.
Thankfully, even when everything else changed, a horse was still a horse.