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 Posted: Mon Oct 06, 2014 11:56 pm
Margaery frowned at Falsetto's seemingly calm response to her, wondering if there was some other, less friendly emotion seething beneath the surface. If there was one thing that she had learned in her time of imprisonment, it was that uneasy silence was often worse than outright anger.
Stepping forward and into the tent, Margaery took in the interior with a bit of wonderment, unsure whether or not she had seen such opulence before. Running her muzzle over the cover of a pillow to feel its silky softness, she said, "It is beautiful here." It was, of course, beautiful outside, as well, but this place... It was an oasis of its own, an apparent hallmark of independence for this mare. Folding her legs delicately beneath her, Margaery looked decidedly at the floor, and then at the mare, praying that her next question would not offend. "Is... is there anyone else that I should worry about meeting tonight?" It was a purely innocent question; unannounced screeching visitors were not good for one's mental health, after all, and Margaery's mental health affected her flicker.
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Posted: Sat Oct 11, 2014 4:53 pm
Falsetto stretched her legs out and closed her eye for the briefest of moments. "Do you mean will more paramours be coming to check in?" She laughed, a lilting sound. "No, we'll be alone. Just you and I, Margaery. Won't that be just...lovely?"
The girl was a bit nervous acting, not like she'd imagine a supposed "noble" to be. Pure, sweet, and innocent. Innocent, now that was a strange words.
"If you want visitors though, I can provide some," she smiled again. "But tell me, why are you so far away from the Khalasar? Alone with your faith? Or are they too imposing on your conscience?"
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Nyx Queen of Darkness Crew
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Posted: Sat Oct 11, 2014 5:16 pm
Paramours. The word rang strange in Margaery's mind, one that she had not heard before. She did her best to ignore whatever other meaning False seemed to be throwing into her words; everything with her seemed to be innuendo or double entendre, her tone dangerous and sensual. "What is a paramour?" Another thought struck her then, one that made her a bit more nervous than she already was; False knew she was of the khalasar, but Margaery was certain she had never uttered the word in the mare's presence, not even during her prayers. Had she been spying on them? Or had she met the herd before? Careful, careful, her thoughts warned her. If she took a misstep, there was no telling what False might do, if she was as false as her name indicated. "I came to pray alone, yes. There is a part of me that yearns for solitude on occasion, but there is also a part of me that yearns to hide the very emotions you must have witnessed," said Margaery, wondering how to phrase the next part of her question so she didn't sound suspicious. If False was a suspicious person, then letting her know that Margaery thought she might be was the last thing she should do. "How is it that you know of the khalasar? We only rarely pass through here, and I do not recall meeting you before."
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Posted: Sat Oct 11, 2014 7:20 pm
Falsetto plopped a piece of fig in her mouth. "Paramour, a lover. It's a sensual word that leaves gender unrevealed, as it's not important in the end. Love the soquili, not the gender--the soul, the fire. Passion is passion, and love is love which are also not mutually exclusive. But we of the desert are more open about that, at least in my experience."
She eyed Margaery all tenseness and seriousness. She was all manners and all matter of propriety. If there was one thing False had no tolerance for--propriety. Was there ever anything more useless?
"You think that I don't see how you are unsure of me? I cut a strange figure to be sure. But you like me, I can tell." She smiled wickedly again.
Considering her words carefully, she spoke slowly. "I am by descendant and temper a trader in the desert. What kind of trader would I be if I didn't know who I was selling to? Or who was around? I hope to do business with them. Don't worry Margaery, I won't bite you without asking first."
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Nyx Queen of Darkness Crew
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Posted: Sat Oct 11, 2014 9:23 pm
Though Margaery took in the words False used to explain the concept of a paramour, the arrogance of the mare erased the subject from her mind, and near-anger replaced it. "Ought I not be unsure of one who calls herself 'False'? And wary, too, for I have met too many who were just so." And what evidence have I given to make you think that I like you? the rest of her screamed, but her mouth would not allow the words to pass. The courtesy was ingrained too deeply. She was far from liking this mare, far from even passing judgment one way or another, though every word added a new grain of sand to the side of ill-at-ease. "What was it that identified me as a member of the khalasar?" she asked. She had not met this mare before, and if she could find out this detail, she could prevent a less savory person from using her to get back to the khalasar someday, if it came to that. If, that was, Margaery could find out before she got up and walked out on a whim. Something about the way this mare spoke to her made Margaery think that False regularly walked the line between vulgarity and some kind of mysterious passion, but she was also a challenge - a puzzle that Margaery was unsure she would give up on unraveling before she got even close to the end.
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Posted: Sat Oct 11, 2014 10:11 pm
The wind was picking up and the sun was edging downwards below the horizon. The residual heat of the day was fading with the light. False got up and lit the lanterns in her tent as the smoke wafted.
"You must think me a heathen Margaery," her voice was quieter and less abrasive. "There are a lot of parrots in the desert, or maybe it's the world that's full of them. All they want to do is talk and talk. The Khalasaar is large enough it cannot move with secrecy. And I know because eventually, I may want to do business with them."
She blew out the straw she'd used to light the lanterns. Margaery had a temper, or at least some kind of fire that lit her up. Right now it was like looking at a bright light, flaring up before it dimmed again. "I cannot help the name my parents gave me, most can't. Falsetto Amachi. So many expectations, so much potential in a name. So I go by False."
False laid back down on her pillows before focusing back on the other girl. "I had not realized I'd offended you so deeply, Margaery. The desert...well, tempers flare her and words come off more harsh than they mean sometimes. I can see that same fire in you."
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Nyx Queen of Darkness Crew
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Posted: Sat Dec 27, 2014 1:13 am
Margaery's brows raised in some sort of surprise. A heathen? Hardly. All were entitled to their own faiths, as those who kept the Old Gods, like Jon Snow, knew all too well, though her own faith was not always known for its lenience toward those who did not practice with the Seven in mind. And this mare did not seem to be the kind who would care what Margaery thought, so her sudden quietness intrigued the mare. "The business with the khalasar would do you good then, Falsetto," she replied, proudly looking her in the eye. "The queen is good, and she likes traders well. As for the name your parents gave you, there is as much beauty in it as there might be expectation, and it seems to me that you like beautiful things." The blue silk that fluttered in every one of the tent's openings was evidence enough of that. Still, the mare had not said what it was that had identified Margaery as a member of the khalasar; after all, she could be simply a lone mare wandering the desert. But it made no matter - there was more interesting conversation to be had.
"Why call yourself False?" she asked softly. "Does it not demean you, cause others to treat you poorly from the first, as even I have?"
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Posted: Thu Jan 29, 2015 12:35 am
Margaery spoke of the queen's goodness and she wondered idly what it was that really judged Kings or Queens as good or bad? Had not some good Kings also done bad things? Robert had been one of them--good and bad in him, as in them all. "I will seek trade with her. I've never met a Queen or a Khalessi for that matter."
She listened to Margaery mention her name and beauty. She smiled up at the other mare from beneath her lashes. She did love beauty. Silk whispered things on the wind, but her eyes were only on Margaery.
"If others do not take the effort to know me, then I don't care for their opinions." She looked past Margaery into the fading light beyond the dancing silks. "It's an oath in part, a promise. It is a reminder to myself and those who know me." She turned her pale eyes toward Maergary. "I will not play someone false, I will remain loyal and true as long as I have loyalty in turn. I hope to find that in you," her voice was soft too as the candle flickered in the tent.
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Nyx Queen of Darkness Crew
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Posted: Thu Jan 29, 2015 7:11 pm
"Queen and khaleesi are not always one and the same, but Daenerys is more than either would suggest," Margaery said fiercely. A tiny, licking flame had settled into her gut, growing with every assumption that False made. I hope to find loyalty in you. Still, defense of her leader made her feel better, despite her discomfiture. "She is a leader, not just another's mate, as both titles could imply." But it did not matter; False probably wouldn't care. She was a trader, and business was always business, as far as Margaery had seen. Ethics rarely came into play when dealing in goods - trade was trade, and it did not often matter what crimes a merchant might have committed; they were gone again in a moment.
"It is an ironic oath, then," Margaery said, lifting a brow. "And loyalty is not something I give so easily as to bestow it on a stranger after mere moments of keeping her company." After a moment's hesitation, Margaery nodded to herself, and heaved herself to her feet. Her tail shook itself out instinctively, but she managed to repress the nerve to shake her entire frame and hopefully shake off all the impurity that felt as though it was skating off her skin. She did not play well with intrigue, though she could when she had to. Right now, she did not have to do anything. Her fur was dry enough now to make it in the desert, she was sure - even if it was growing darker outside, even if it was growing colder. Anything to cut this strange visit short. "And I think I will refrain from imposing on your hospitality any further, Falsetto Amachi," she said, taking a step toward the exit. "Thank you for allowing me to share your shelter. I will be certain to speak well of you to my queen."
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Posted: Thu Jan 29, 2015 11:20 pm
Falsetto listened to Margaery speak before she moved. She felt heat rise in her, her body hot and cold with it. She set her jaw and rose smoothly. "Don't leave." She pushed forward and past Margaery. "I am sorry to have offended you, my guest."
She looked at the girl as the moon rose above the horizon. "I would like for you to speak to your Queen of me. Please take the tent. I'm going for a walk while it's cool. I won't bother you." She glanced down then away and turned slowly for the sands of the desert.
She moved before Margaery could speak and out into the night. She walked past the small camp and listened to the sand shifting in the wind. Clenching her jaw, she let her mind wander in the cool night and think of the things she had said. Her words always seemed to be too sharp or too mocking--not that it had ever mattered to her, until now. For some odd reason, it did.
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Nyx Queen of Darkness Crew
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Posted: Mon Feb 23, 2015 9:12 pm
Primal fear shot through Margaery when Falsetto jumped in front of her, and for a moment, she was back in the closeness of the cave with the monster that had held her. Warmth brushed against her as the mare pushed past, and that brought Margaery back to herself; in the cave, it had been only cold, and the momentary flashes of heat there had been had been scalding against her shivering skin. Her panic and the threat of a flicker began to ebb away as Falsetto continued to speak. She was not threatening, she was placating, and that was a far cry from what Margaery had grown accustomed to. In the khalasar, Margaery was safe, an equal, but outside of it, she had hardly come across an individual who seemed so desperate to remain in her company, even at a distance. "If you insist, I will stay and guard your tent," Margaery said hesitantly, wondering why a merchant would leave her alone with her goods when Margaery could simply walk out anytime. Not that she would, of course; her honor might have been sullied by some of her actions, but stealing was well below her standard. Aside from that, Falsetto could very well come to the khalasar and the khaleesi and claim Margaery as a thief, and that would lead only to trouble.
"I will wait for your return," she called after the mare, poking her head out of the tent to see Falsetto turn a corner and vanish from view. Margaery frowned. When she turned back to the interior of the tent, she was again astonished by the beauty of it, all silks and pillows and fruit. The Seven speak against gluttony and avarice, she reminded herself, imagining the Father's just hoof coming down on her in one of the heavens. Still, Margaery stood there on the spot, unwilling to move lest she accidentally break something or be tempted into eating something that did not belong to her.
The warmth lulled her into a half-sleep, and she could not have said how much time went by, but either moments or minutes later, Margaery awoke and found herself still alone. This is not right, she thought, Falsetto's words about not bothering her echoing in her mind. Has she given up her home so I can finish drying in peace? It seemed a stretch, but for some reason, Falsetto seemed to want Margaery to stick around. And after that show with the male earlier, Margaery had a feeling that that was something not afforded to many for long.
Sighing, she poked her head out of the tent once more, and headed for the corner where she had last seen Falsetto. "You have been outside for time beyond that required of a walk," she called into the starry night, wondering if False was hiding somewhere on the other side of her tent. "I'll leave you to the warmth of your home."
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Posted: Mon Feb 23, 2015 11:08 pm
Falsetto stood beneath the bright stars, her body still in the shifting night. The sands seemed to whisper, to blow about her in perpetual motion. The wind was cold, but it woke her up to herself. She was tired to the bone. She was alone. Often she found it a solitude, a great gift that she enjoyed and treasured but now it was a misery. No one had ever compelled her to feel that way before--not Knochen, not any other mare or stallion. She had never wanted so badly to stay and just talk to someone as though they were kindred souls.
But Margaery was different. Something in her drew Falsetto to her like a tiny moth to flames. Being consummed by Margaery, by the flames of her did not feel half bad. Long she stayed out in the night in her reverie, lost to herself and the world.
Much later when Margaery's voice drifted to her she spoke without meaning to. "My home has no warmth," there was a slight bitter note to her voice.
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Nyx Queen of Darkness Crew
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Posted: Tue Feb 24, 2015 12:47 am
Margaery's sensitive ears flicked to find Falsetto's voice in the wind, and she went round the tent a little further and found the mare standing out in the open and the cold, the white in her locks swaying like a ghost in the wind. How many such ghosts have I met in my dreams? she wondered. "Your home has light, and the warmth of a good heart who has put care into its building. That is what makes it a home. But what is it that makes it feel cold?" Though False might have a different answer, Margaery's own guess was that it had been shared with too many, that it was no longer Falsetto's sanctuary. The encounter with that male had been enough to prove that. Perhaps it was not her home at all and merely a shelter; Margaery knew what it meant to be lost, to be without a home. Oh, she had roots, but they were far beyond her reach for now. And every breath she drew without her family around made her miss them more; some days she could barely breathe for the missing them.
But she would return to her ancestral home someday, and then it would be her true home. For now, she had to find her home in herself, and that began with remembering her charge: to help those in need, wherever she came across them. And Falsetto seemed in need of something, though what it was, Margaery could not say.
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Posted: Tue Feb 24, 2015 12:55 am
Her words drifted to her on the wind. Her eyes stung and she swore it was the sand that burned her eyes and throat. "Absence. Emptiness. It is silks and walls and pillows with no comfort in them. It is a tent of a wanderer never content ever roaming."
She had spoken the words and now she could not stop the feeling they caused. "It is cold because in the night it whispers loneliness. And no one whispers for me."
Falsetto sighed, "I am sorry. You should not hear this. But, perhaps I feel you have been lonely and yet never alone too?"
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Nyx Queen of Darkness Crew
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Posted: Fri Mar 13, 2015 9:22 pm
Buzzing her wings together against the desert breeze, Margaery gazed at the mare in front of her. Falsetto seemed desperate and despairing, but with her last question, Margaery's instincts turned to high alert. Was this all an act? It was a far cry from the way she had acted earlier, with what Margaery was beginning to feel had been some sultry attempt at beguiling. Everything they spoke of, somehow, Falsetto managed to turn it back to Margaery, asking something of her. Loyalty, fire, familiarity, and every moment, Margaery was finding herself more and more unwilling to give whatever it was Falsetto seemed to be asking. She was like a tree unyielding to the wind, and she was ready to snap.
But whether it was a game or not, Margaery could not simply leave her if she was truly lonely, as she claimed to be. Lonely, desperate people took desolate, desperate action, risks they might not normally take to feel like they mattered. "Where is your family, Falsetto?" she asked, sidestepping the question that was asked of her. "You seemed to speak of them before, the ones who named you. What has become of them? Surely you have roots somewhere. Perhaps it is there you must return to find your home again."
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