New Friends (Aria)(Open)

[Lucinda Noru]

+++++Lucinda laughed as Aria asked about putting on pants with one arm. "I could imagine that would be quite difficult though I've never worn pants myself,"she said, smiling. Though she lapsed into a more thoughtful expression at the next question about the Fated and shook her head. "If we have, I am unaware of it. It seems to be a localized to Teair, which is rather odd," she said.

The princess continued to watch the egg as the hatching began. It shook often and there was an audible scraping and cracking sound that echoed slightly in the big room. She grinned, barely able to contain herself and listened as Aria explained about the Noru family crest. She looked at her with interest as she talked about raising baby dragons and asked about the house dragons. Lucinda shook her lightly. "I'm afraid I couldn't tell you much. This is my first house dragon. Granted, I did visit the dragon hatchery often enough but we had special trainers to help raise them," she explained, giving Aria an apologetic look.

She turned her attention to Melda as the Duchess asked her opinion of Aria's look and nodded. "I do agree. She'll look like a royal when I'm done with her, Duchess," she commented, her eyes sparkling with anticipation. She shook her head though when asked about the servant.

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Aria shook her head with a frown when the duchess asked if anyone had recognized the man…which was true she certainly didn’t recognize the face…

”I try to avoid gentlemen whom look like they could supply me with a candle of questionable make or tempt small children with candies into a dark ally.”

Aria chuckled at the inappropriateness of pants to a brunch.

”Perhaps not these ones, I don’t think my argument that they are at least black will count this round. Though there are outfits that mix a form fitting dress with pants. The dress itself has long slits up the side of the skirt to allow freer movement. I find those most comfortable. Though skirts do offer a nice breeze I suppose.”

She nodded when the princess explained that the fated seemed to be just localized to Teair. At least for the moment. Though with things the way they were she wouldn’t be surprised if people started immigrating on over to other kingdoms.

”Perhaps the crossing into the forest or by sea is daunting. However I wouldn’t be surprised if other Kingdoms start to see fated immigrate on over. But anyways, tell me more about your home Princess. Any place that has a dragon hatchery has to be interesting.”

Aria blushed as her hair was complimented; she always did like the color; but then slightly alarmed when the Princess announced her intentions to make her look royal.

”Princess; again I’m honored but I really don’t wish to step over my station. Dressing like a royal would seem presumptuous. I’m not even a noble…technically I’m stepping over my bounds by wearing black regularly.”

[Lucinda Noru]

Lucinda laughed lightly as Aria's comment about the pants again and smiled when she expressed interest in Palico. "We're well known for our bond with dragons. Some of our best guardsmen even use drakes for mounts instead of horses. There's a careful selection process though and each man is paired with a dragon before it even hatches to ensure good bonding, then that man would help with the raising and training," she explained, continuing to watch as her own baby dragon made progress into the world.

At the mention of not wanting to be dressed over her station, Lucinda waved her hand in a dismissive gesture. "Don't worry, I was slightly over exaggerating. You will be beautiful though and more than presentable. Please, help yourself. There's plenty of dresses and we'll have your choice tailored to you. It is a gift, after all. There's a few more of these similar style robe dresses, if you'd like," she suggested, motioning to the closet. "Of course, matching shoes will be provided as well but we'll pamper your feet and nails first," she added, giving a pointed look to Aria's bare toes.

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”Interesting; Drakes I always found a bit more brutish then their dragon cousins; however Wyverns would probably be the easier type to train. Very much like a dog in intelligence standards. To fly on dragon back is an interesting experience…tell me do your guards have special saddles? Or something how does that work?”

It was becoming fairly obvious why Aria seemed so knowledgeable about random things. She always found something to ask questions about.

”What is Palico’s main export?”

Aria glanced at the closet and sighed; last time she had to go pick clothes it was with the persistence of Core and Rivers. Really she was fine with potato sacks…..nice, always the same, not to flashy, but a bit itchy she supposed…..Aria stepped towards the closet and leafed through the clothes. Avoiding all purple, reds, or anything dark really… she found something that was mostly cream with a bit of green. It was in a similar fashion to the princesses; if not a bit simpler. She ran a hand over the phoenix stitching along the hem.

”Do you mind if I chose this one?”

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Melda didn’t really pay attention to the talk of dragons. No need to learn about any other kind than the one that would be residing in the castle she supposed. She moved to a nearby chair and sat down, back straight.

Yes, Princess, tell us more of Palico. I’ve never been there myself, so I do not know what it is like. If the Fated have not yet entered your borders, it must be odd here, yes? It would be shocking I imagine. she shifted and tilted her head. How would your kingdom react I wonder?

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Jeon came to castle as soon as he heard the news: his cousin from Palico is living in the capital. He was enthused! He had visited the land of the dragons as a young child when Lucinda was just a babe, and he remembered running around the grounds with Silas. He had fond memories of his days with those cousins. It was in high contrast to his memories of his cousin Noku as a child. His father had visited Palico to visit his brother Thaddeus and to learn more about the magical abilities of the mystical creatures that flew in the skies. Oh, how excited he was to see Lucinda.

He had dressed for the season, as Royals always do. He wore a traditional garb with a sea-green inner garment held in place by a wrapped belt. Over the garb was a robe of white that was detailed with the same sea-green thread. This was always his favorite outfit for this time of year. The wind would catch up in the robe and helped to chill his sun soaked body. By the time he got to the castle gates he was running in glee. He just ran past the guards with no introduction. The surprise that sprang on their faces left him in a fit of laughter by the time he came to the main entrance.

The guards stood frozen in confusion at the site of a gleeful and rambunctious royal,"Sir, are you alright,"one brave guard asked.

Jeon was slightly out of breath from the run and laughter. His hand were down on his knees and he was panting heavily while trying to control his laughter,"Yes, quiet alright,"he looked him in the eye and smiled. The guards still looked confused,"I am here to greet my cousin Lucinda. Will you please guide me and present me to her so that I can see her?"

"Yes Sir Jeon,"the guard crept into the castle and soon came out. He opened the door and bowed. Jeon walked through the large door and was greeted by a servant dressed in fine clothes. He held a towel in his hand and a glass of purified water. He gave a quick bow and gave the items to Jeon,"Thank you,"he said as he accepted the gift. He gently padded the towel across his brow and drank the water slowly,"We were informed that you were visiting today and prepared a meal for you in the dining hall, sir,"Jeon looked at the servant in surprise. He didn't inform anyone that he was coming, but he decided not to question how he gained that knowledge,"I thank you for the meal, but I must graciously decline. I want to meet with my cousin as soon as I can,"the servant bowed again and walked off. Jeon had no idea where her room was so he stood patiently waiting for the servant to come back.

"Follow me, Sir Jeon,"Jeon obliged.

While Jeon followed the servant another man was sent to Lucinda's room to announce her cousin's arrival and whether or not she accepted him into her room. The servant looked around, confused by the many people that had found his way there.

[Lucinda Noru]

As Aria continued to ask questions, Lucinda laughed and held up her hands. “Slow down, Aria, goodness,” she said, still laughing. She thought a moment about how best to answer the questions, then explained. “Drakes are actually easier to train for use as mounts than wyverns or dragons. They’re also more reasonably sized than their cousins and have more reasonable tempers. As for saddles, those are custom made by the royal leatherworkers and decorated with both the Palico coat of arms and the House Noru crest. The guard I described earlier that uses the drakes is the personal, royal guard. Only them and certain other royals or nobles use drakes or have house dragons. They can be quite..expensive to maintain,” she finished, smiling.

The question about exports was a little more complicated. “Well, mostly we supply weapons, armor, soldiers, and raw materials that the other kingdoms either don’t have or need more of,” she answered, being vague but not really on purpose. Their exports really depended on what was in demand most at the time.

Lucinda’s attention was diverted as Aria finally made her way into the closet and came out with a lovely cream and green robe-like dress. She grinned, looking at the colors in contrast to Aria’s coloring and nodded. “That will suit you perfectly. There’s matching slippers too with the same design. This is going to be wonderful!” she exclaimed, obviously quite pleased with the choice and motioning for the chambermaids to assist Aria in dressing. The seamstress waited patiently to begin her work.

As the servants worked with Aria, the princess turned to answer Melda’s questions which were more difficult. “What would we do if the Fated showed up in Palico? Well, for starters they’d have to be added to the city’s official register like everyone else. Then, we’d probably attempt to get some background information on them to help determine what their social status should be,” she said, thinking about it. After a moment, her face brightened. “Actually, a really good idea would be to create a farm for those Fated that don’t turn out to be related to some royal or other, and let them live and work there to help take some of their burden off the economy,” she said, thinking it was a rather wonderful idea. Maybe she’d mention it to Uncle Noku later.

The princess’s musings were interrupted by a knock at the door as a servant poked his head. It wasn’t the strange man from before but rather one of the servants used to escort people around the castle. “Yes? Can I help you?” she inquired, one eyebrow raised. The servant announced Jeon’s arrival and inquired if he was welcomed to come and visit her. Lucinda grinned, immediately excited to see her cousin. “Yes, of course! Please, show him in,” she answered and then waited anxiously for him to make it to her room.

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Aria blushed, she always did ask a lot of questions.

”Sorry; lots of questions have always been a bad habit of mine…I think of them faster then I can ask them”

She chuckled slightly; somethings never changed. Aria listened with interest as she explained more about the drakes. It was interesting to hear them work so closely with drakes since they were usually feared creatures.

”I would imagine they would be expensive, out of curiosity how many drakes does your guard have? Don’t they get territorial?”

She listened with interest as she described Palico’s main exports.

”So you have a lot of natural metal ores then. Do you have a limited about of mages? Manna likes to eat away at most precious metals; So I would imagine magic might be limited there. It sounds like a fairly profitable export. Is Palico a land locked country or is it coastal like Teair?”

Aria looked at the dress closely, a soft smile spreading across her lips as she gazed at the phoenix. A creature of fire, it was fitting.

”I do like the phoenixes, such a rare creature. I hope to come across one someday.”

Aria listened to Lucindas answer with interest. Roland had already at least started to get some background information on the fated. That and she knew there was a list of fated who came through. She chuckled at the idea of a farm.

”Princess, I would reword that you make the fated sound like cattle. Some of the fated I don’t think know how to farm…or really any basic skills or social structure to survive in this world. Frankly if you want fated to be contributing members to society they have to learn how first. If all fated were pushed onto farms then the farmers which make up a large portion of the population would now be competing”

Aria raised an eyebrow as a group of assistants came over….was she getting dressed here? When one came to help her out of her clothes she held up one finger. She gripped her shirt with one hand and awkwardly pulled it off her head. She still had her breast band on and her left shoulder was still heavily bandaged. Aria was surprisingly quite toned, you could see her mussels were somewhat defined, indicating she was extremely active. Besides for the scar on her face and the injury on her shoulder there were no marks on her body. Aria moved on to take off her pants, as she was hopping out of them awkwardly, there was a knock on the door. Aria turned to look and ended up getting tangled up in her pants and proceeded to fall on her ass.

She blinked from her new spot on the floor….and then giggled in spite of herself.

”…whoops”

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Melda nodded with Lucinda’s answer, it did seem like quite a good idea, though Aria’s input also made sense. Treating them like cattle would not help the situation. That idea is a start Princess! Perhaps we can work on it later together. Melda didn’t like the way the Fated were being treated, and wanted to do something to help change the society to adapt to them.

Melda watched curiously as the assistance tried to change her here— she looked away, stunned that they wanted to do so publically— though they were all women. She glanced over in time to see her fall on her behind, and she had to hold in a small laugh. Her attention was diverted once more as there was a knock, announcing the arrival of Sir Jeon. Melda stood, ready to bow when he entered.

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When Jeon arrived to the door the other servant was holding open the door. The man he was following went in first and announced,"Sir Jeon of Dalarus,"he extended his hand and made room for Jeon to come in. Jeon gave him an odd look; his disgust of the formality was apparent. The first thing he saw was the young princess and he could not hold himself back. He ran to her and hugged her,"I can't believe I am finally meeting you! The last time I saw you, you were barely walking. You were such a beautiful babe and have grown to be such a beautiful woman,"while in his embrace he became aware of his surroundings. He first some the glorious Duchess Vanya and then he became aware of another presence in the room. He looked into the face of the red head. The scar on her face brought back a horrible memory of being drugged. He stood straight up.

"You!"his voice became hash,"Why are you in the palace!?"he started walking toward her. Jeon wasn't aware of the recent events that lead her to where she was at this moment. He had been secluded at the Arch of Ages. He only knew her as the woman that gave him lunar drops and caused him to go spastic. His eyes glared in complete anger at the girl whose hair was just as red as his own.

[Lucinda Noru]

When Aria asked if the drakes were territorial, Lucinda shook her head. “We have about 20 for use as the guard but our knowledge of drake and dragon training comes from the Kray, many of whom fled to Palico and we still have their descendants. Basically, the trainers become ‘alphas’ so there’s no issues with territory or commands. As for the other questions, we are landlocked, surrounded by the mountains that join to make Heaven’s Pass so our mages are few and seasonal. They don’t like the harsher winters,” she explained, laughing a little.

As Aria shot down her idea, the princess frowned and nodded. She supposed that would be a problem if they didn’t know how to farm. She’d think on it more later, perhaps with Melda, who also seemed interested in trying to positively deal with the Fated rather than just kill them all off like Severine.

Her musings were once again interrupted as Aria fell to the floor. Lucinda couldn’t quite help the giggle that escaped and she reached to help the other girl up just as Jeon arrived. She grinned and returned his hug. She blushed lightly at his compliment. “Thank you, Jeon. You’ve grown up quite well yourself,” she returned. His sudden interest in Aria caught her off guard as he questioned her about her being in the palace. “Jeon, you seem familiar with Aria. She is my guest at the moment. We are to attend a brunch with Uncle Noku later this morning so I’m helping her get ready,” she explained, though she had a feeling that wasn’t what he meant.

Meanwhile, the audible cracking and scratching noises were coming from the egg as it rocked this way and that. After a few moments, a large piece broke off and a little nose poked out, sniffing curiously.

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Aria kicked off her pants and stood up as Jeon approached her, one hand on her hip as she raised an eyebrow. Really he seemed angry about her mere presence here….was he hanging around Severine lately? A sweet smile spread across her features as she tilted her head to the side; really someone ought to fill him in on the events of late….

”Yes his majesty has been kind enough to invite me to his family brunch with Lucinda. Though I have suspicions it will be a bit of an interrogation on this”

She pated her heavily bandaged shoulder lightly.

”As for why I am in the palace in the first place perhaps you should find the arch duchess Severine. I’m sure she would be happy to elaborate. Perhaps you’ve been too busy with the arches clean up duty with cs shards; I know Adrain has been away from the arch for a bit. Things must be busy with him absent during such a hectic time.”

Well the fact she was half naked and standing in front of a male didn’t seem to bother her in the least. The assistants meanwhile were helping her get into the delicate gown. One started brushing out her hair; she could feel heat coming from one of the brushes as they worked on straightening her wavy locks. It would seem one of the assistants was a fire mage. While it felt odd to be assisted, she was thankful for the help. The dress was actually surprisingly comfortable, nice thing it was loose around the shoulders so it didn’t hurt to wear. It was nice; her attention turned to the egg that had just had a piece pop out. She smiled. Luci would be likely jumping out of her seat.

”It will take rests before it’s fully out; so we have still a little bit. Make sure you’re the first thing she sees when she’s out though. Since we’re all in the room at the time we’ll be the first things she imprints on.”

She turned to the other two with a wicked grin and waggled her eyebrows as she said.

”Congratulations you’re all potential dragon sitters.”

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When Jeon entered, Melda bowed her head, curtsying lightly, despite the fact that he ran into a hug with the princess. First the King, now Jeon? Both seemed extremely enthused to see the young lady, not that it mattered. She nodded her head once more when he looked at her, though she saw as his attention was diverted to the half naked Aria behind her. Once he headed in her direction, Melda moved out of the way, and sat elsewhere, away from the new formed drama occurring. Without realizing, she sat next to the egg. She arched an eyebrow as Jeon began yelling at Aria, curious as to what his problem was with this woman— and why she seemed to know everyone.

Melda watched, slightly amused, as the Princess told Jeon why Aria was in the room, as if it were a perfectly normal explanation— though it didn’t help that Jeon was unaware of the reason Aria was even in the castle. Though, that was fixed soon after, as Aria herself explained. Melda stayed silent, aside from a greeting there wasn’t much she could say, and the moment for her greeting had passed, once he saw Aria. So, instead she sat crossed legged in a chair, leaning back into it, her chin on her hand, and her elbow on the chair. She heard a cracking noise, causing her to look over at the egg.

Imprints on? Oh for the love of the Gods… Melda sat up, staring incredulously from Aria to the egg. A potential dragon sitter?

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Jeon glared at Aria, but then accepted the odd scenario and moved on,"Brunch with Noku? How...delightful...."there was a purposeful hesitation in his voice. He had an inkling that since he was here he was responsible to go, but he had gone so long ignoring his cousin; he had made a game of it. He had denied many an invite from the palace the past few months while he's been sheltered at the Arches. His last interactions with his cousins did not go so well.

"Duchess Vanya, it is an honor to meet you this day. I can see your magic is healthy and flowing. The winds speak fond of you,"he gave a slight bow, but his attention was taken a hold of by the dragon egg that had begun to hatch. He didn't have much knowledge of dragons so he listened intently to the conversation. Imprinting? What an odd thing.

[Lucinda Noru]

Lucinda listened quietly as Aria explained the situation to Jeon, who accepted it with grace. As Aria warned them of the little dragon imprinting though, a slightly worried look crossed her face and she inched over closer to the egg. She laughed at Jeon's choice of words and smiled. "I'm looking forward to it actually. It should be very interesting, at least," she said, "How're things at the Arch? I hear you work there now?" she asked.