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+---- Thread: [RA] treading water (/showthread.php?tid=12098)
treading water - Flora - 10-19-2025
Flora sits in her home office at Wildering House with LongNight pressed like velvet against the windows, the world outside swallowed to ink. Inside, the candles she has scattered across shelves and sills turn the room into a flickering coral reef of light; soft, amber tides rolling over stacks of parchment, the brass edge of a letter opener, the glinting coastline of her gold rings. Wax pools in quiet lagoons along the candlesticks while steam ghosts from her mug of tea, curling under her nose with a whisper of bergamot and warmth. She nudges a stray curl back into the messy knot at her crown, bracelets chiming faintly as she draws another page closer.
The desk is a papery representation of Torchline: lists of permits and tariffs, dock ledgers and festival costs, scribbled notes in her looping hand about beach patrols and reef restoration and how many torches were going to be burned this LongNight. She taps a ring against the desk—once, thoughtful—then leans back, chair creaking like an old dock under tide. The thought threads itself with tidy inevitability: a small tax, targeted and fair, on the biggest fish who have been feasting happily in Torchline’s waters. Not punishment, but...partnership with a little backbone. It covers next year’s regional quest without gutting anything joyful, and if the sea teaches anything it is that everyone pays the current one way or another.
Spice is nearby, a bright, familiar weight in the room. Flora glances her way and shrugs, mouth tugging toward a wry smile. [say]"They can deal with it,"[/say] she murmurs into the candlelight, voice soft enough to be mistaken for another curl of steam. Decision made, she gathers the relevant notes into a neat stack, clips them with a gold binder like a seal pressed into warm wax, and writes a concise line across the top.
Flora rises, smoothing her slouchy knit over her hips, rings winking. She gathers the empty mug of tea in both hands like a small planet of porcelain and heads for the kitchen, needing more tea if she's going to continue on with paperwork while Kaisel patrols and Niki works on Spice's backpack.
~FIN