A joke Jigano could deal with. Discovering that the painfully shy but perfectly nice young man on the Atheneum's steps was a Launceleyn by adoption, though? The mirth fled the Loreseeker's face, but there was only a flicker of betrayal there before it was replaced by sympathy. "Are you one of those Zariah bullied into joining? Like Rexanna?" he asked gently. Peter, Peter... he knew he'd heard that name before. "Are you the one Zariah was going to force her to marry?" he asked, a flicker of stern steel underlying the gentleness. It seemed likely that Peter was a victim as well, but if he'd been party to that atrocity that had forced Rexanna into the Voice's embrace...
The bard knew that he was going to have to stencil a new sign for the guild, petty as it was. Safrin had been right about the foolishness of the grandiose claims he had been making, though, and this was just one more to correct.
The brief history lesson ended with a question and a shrug as Jigano focused on the mud, his good mood fading as he realized he was working beside one of Zariah's pets. "Who knows? It was more than three hundred years ago. But ambitious and power hungry seem likely, given what she became in the end." Very Launceleyn traits, too, though he kept the bitter words behind his tongue. Zariah had broken his own little found family with her threats and self-important decrees, and those wounds were still fresh and bleeding.
"Indeed," came the neutral response to Peter's lack of focus, the provost's attention mostly on his control over his magic and keeping the mud contained within four separate earthen walls. He'd seen Remi make far more complicated shapes from dirt and rocks, but simple walls and pillars seemed the limit of what he could manage at the moment.
"The Crimson Cataract? Yes, I've seen her. I was there when Arduinna healed her of the blight the Ascended brought down on her. She was dying from it," he spoke bitterly, for not long after he had also been brought low by the same sickness.
He brought the walls of the earthen corral grinding together into a smaller and smaller shape until the memory mud in the very center could be reached, then leapt down the steps to help shovel it into the last barrels. "Well done!" he called, the tension momentarily broken by the successful teamwork of the last capture. He helped load the barrels onto the waiting wagon, then nodded to the driver to set the mules pulling it into motion. "Perhaps it's for the best," he said conversationally as he collected the borrowed tools and shook hands with the volunteers. "Zariah doesn't seem the type to keep around anyone who isn't useful to her. She may yet let you go free if you can lay low and slip her interest."
The bard knew that he was going to have to stencil a new sign for the guild, petty as it was. Safrin had been right about the foolishness of the grandiose claims he had been making, though, and this was just one more to correct.
The brief history lesson ended with a question and a shrug as Jigano focused on the mud, his good mood fading as he realized he was working beside one of Zariah's pets. "Who knows? It was more than three hundred years ago. But ambitious and power hungry seem likely, given what she became in the end." Very Launceleyn traits, too, though he kept the bitter words behind his tongue. Zariah had broken his own little found family with her threats and self-important decrees, and those wounds were still fresh and bleeding.
"Indeed," came the neutral response to Peter's lack of focus, the provost's attention mostly on his control over his magic and keeping the mud contained within four separate earthen walls. He'd seen Remi make far more complicated shapes from dirt and rocks, but simple walls and pillars seemed the limit of what he could manage at the moment.
"The Crimson Cataract? Yes, I've seen her. I was there when Arduinna healed her of the blight the Ascended brought down on her. She was dying from it," he spoke bitterly, for not long after he had also been brought low by the same sickness.
He brought the walls of the earthen corral grinding together into a smaller and smaller shape until the memory mud in the very center could be reached, then leapt down the steps to help shovel it into the last barrels. "Well done!" he called, the tension momentarily broken by the successful teamwork of the last capture. He helped load the barrels onto the waiting wagon, then nodded to the driver to set the mules pulling it into motion. "Perhaps it's for the best," he said conversationally as he collected the borrowed tools and shook hands with the volunteers. "Zariah doesn't seem the type to keep around anyone who isn't useful to her. She may yet let you go free if you can lay low and slip her interest."
