FADE RIFT [INBOX]

[shri]

ＬＡＤＹ ＬＡＫＳＨＭＩ
( Lady Lakshmi, Bai Saheba, Rani Lakshmibai )

ＶＯＩＣＥ | ＡＣＴＩＯＮ | ＮＯＴＥＳ

Unavaliable To All:

• 30mins around dawn
  
  Only to Voice:
  
• Hour training morning and evening
  
• Any time she's gone riding.
  
• When she's in the field.
  
  Only to Book:
  
• When she's otherwise in a meeting, leave a message.
  
• Very late at night or early in the morning.
  
  Other:
  
• She usually takes her morning meals in the mess hall with everyone else.
  
• Her days are usually spent in Kirkwall seeing to either her personal business or Inquisition tasks.
  
• She has a bath twice a day, every day.
  

Comments

[rathercommon]

[ Uncertainly - ]

So I...move the reins?

[shri]

Mmmh. Tug with the hand you want to turn on the side of.

[ And she trusts her, at least, to be able to follow along with the rest. Even if they do wander around in a circle too long. But even so, she leans around, making sure that her chin stayed above Kitty's shoulder to find her hand and show her the pressure she needed to pull with to get the horse to listen. ]

[rathercommon]

It feels - weird.

[ She sounds a little uneasy with it, even as she does tug. ]

Controlling it.

I am so glad that this is the first thread in my inbox and we're going to break the whole damn entry

[shri]

[ She laughs, not meanly. ] How times have changed, then. I could not imagine wanting anything more when I was your age.

[ Because you look so much older, Lakshmi, anyway - ]

It becomes second nature, and you will need to adjust, I'm afraid. But the Inquisition treats their horses well, you can have that much peace of mind.

Same, same...

[rathercommon]

Can any treatment be good when captivity is involved?

[ She gives a sigh immediately after saying that, though, shaking her head. ]

I guess it's just a stupid horse.

[shri]

An animal, any animal, is your family. I do not suppose all of them are happy, as not all families are happy ones. But if you mistake calling love, care and affection from a horse as stupidity, you betray yourself as even more the idiot.

[ she will tug you by the ear Kitty if you ever hear you say that again. As it is, she reaches forward, tugging at the horse's reigns to still the horse before they go any further. Stopping them, right then and there. ]

So you should apologise to her, for she is giving you the benefit of her trust and sweet temper.

[rathercommon]

What?

[ Kitty half turns around to shoot Lakshmi a look of are-you-crazy. ]

I don't think it loves me when I'm climbing up on it and making it take me places.

[shri]

She trusts you. Or else she would have bucked you off and trampled you. They are want to do that, from time to time.

[ It's firm, not even slightly back down. ]

Apologise.

[rathercommon]

To the horse?

[shri]

[ One long, unrelenting blink. ]

Yes.

[rathercommon]

Does the horse speak English, then?

[shri]

[ Probably, there is a servant somewhere, laughing. But for the moment - ]

It could speak the language of the Gods, for all it matters. [ It's gritted, leaning back that little to look at her directly. ] Respect to those that work hard for you, whether you think it is ridiculous or not, must always be given. What would you think, if I, when a servant who went out of their way to fulfil my request, threw it back in their face to say they were stupid just because they were doing what they were asked?

[rathercommon]

Frankly, they are stupid.

[ Kitty shakes her head, her expression turning fierce. ]

Anyone who lets themselves be forced to serve, anyone who lets themselves get ground under someone's heel and thanks them for it, loves them for it, is a complete blithering idiot.

[shri]

For the love of - [ Right, they weren't getting out of here fast enough for the rest of that conversation. ] A canter, you say? Well, if you insist.

[ It's pitched, a little higher and louder than what they had just said. Probably too paranoid by far, but it had never been wrong to be too careful. She snags her arm around her waist. Locking it hard, to keep the reigns balled in her fist. The goal was at least a straight line. Out of the main keep, down and around the many winding paths. Until there were marginally fewer people around before she slows the horse, down from the canter, to a walk. Then onwards a little further until she's quite sure they're out of sight, and can be excused as having done nothing more than having had an impromptu lesson. Relenting a little. A little out of breath when it's over but even so - ]

Watch your tongue.

[rathercommon]

[ Kitty's temper is flaring - she goes tense at the grip, and doesn't fight it only because she's still scared of the horse and what it can do. Not scared of Lakshmi, though: soon as they stop, and Lakshmi scolds her, she cranes around to look the woman in the face. Her eyes flash, and her voice is a low snarl, as she says - ]

I'll watch what I want to watch, thank you. Just 'cause you're used to wearing silks and finery doesn't mean you can give me orders.

[ She flushes immediately afterwards, embarrassed and righteous by equal measure. She doesn't want to snap at Lakshmi, she likes Lakshmi, but that anger of hers is always there, and sometimes she can't rein it in. ]

[shri]

Shall I beg then? I will hit my knees if that's what you want in all my gold, with my son's baby blanket in my hands, if that will make you listen. For that's the price I paid for my rebellion. I lost a son, my kingdom and my father, and worse to come - it was my people who would be butchered without end for the day I dared raised my voice and armies against ones not so different.

[ It's snapped back. Her own foul temper that got the better of her just the same - but age enough to let her swallow down a little, it hurts, maybe, if she was in the mind to let herself be hurt by much of anything ( always ) how fiercely she used to rage, was not so different to Kitty now. Declaring to her father all that she might have, declaring to the priest that she would never be parted from her husband. Swallowing all her pain to think that she at least, could never be parted from her Jhansi.

How Devi, young and all of her heart, would snap about how her Queen-Mother could be so fussy, so worrisome, so determined to protect her. ]

Do not let them hear you say those things.

[rathercommon]

[ Rebellion registers, but Kitty is still to taken with her own fury and hurt and history to tend to another person's. For the moment, at least. ]

If they're the sorts of people who'll kill me just for saying that, then they ought to go ahead and do it, 'cause then they don't deserve my help.

[shri]

[ Better that she doesn't. She has no want for pity, only to have been listened too. ] It's not the Inquisition I am worried about. They have more to worry about their petty nobles, I am told this Corypheus is a matter above such concerns.

[ She sighs heavy, carrying on. ]

But it is why I brought you out to ride. So I need you to listen to me very carefully, do you understand?

[rathercommon]

[ Rebellion still bubbling: ]

Depends on what you've got to say.

[shri]

You are British, aren't you?

[ Not much of a question, she knows it from what the girl has said, her accent. ] And you know about the new world? The American colonies and their war for independence?

[rathercommon]

[ A small shrug. ]

I know there are worlds where the colonies won their independence. Never happened where I'm from.

[shri]

It will.

[ Firm. ]

And it spreads. From America, to France.

[rathercommon]

And how does it spread? How do they win that independence of theirs?

[shri]

How else do you think? Stories, from soldier to soldier. Then from tavern where they drank to the mouths of common people, and as far as that could carry them. But knowing what they have done to me, I don't doubt they tried to keep that knowledge to themselves. They hardly could.

[ It shouldn't be laughed at - but there is a humour, she'd found, after all that blood. That stings ugly perhaps in her mouth. Dark and mean. ]

As for the particulars. America had aid, for they turned into an all-out war. Armies of the Republic of the United States of America - or as they called themselves. I do not quite remember it now. But cavalry charges and artillery fire. France hated Britain after all and was all too glad to deprive the other Empire of her grandest colony. [ How the words sneer, how the anger bubbles, kept stiff as her hands on the reign. Her back is straight, her chin lifted, and she keeps herself composed to the point. But the creak might as well be heard for how it is a matter of must, she must keep herself contained. ] So America won. Once they had won, and not only won but did not even bother to put a King in place to replace them? It spread after that.

[rathercommon]

[ Kitty, though, shakes her head. ]

But - sorry - what about it? Why are you telling me this?