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 Posted: Mon Feb 16, 2015 12:40 am
"Do It For Me" - Solo RP She's sitting back against her bedroom wall in their quiet little hut just a few miles outside of Astral City, staring at the floor, wondering if she focuses hard enough that it might burn up and let her drop through it.
"Jessa, are you listening?"
She doesn't even flinch at the words. She knows her father is stooped in front of her on one knee, can see the roughness of his pants, the rough brown scales over the back of his hand where it rests on his thigh, but she watches the hardwood floor all the harder instead.
"I don't understand why you're not listening."
Oh, she's listening to a great deal. She's listening to the crackling fire in the main room just beyond her door. She's listening to the thudding of her heart in her ears. And she's definitely listening to the exhaustion in his voice.
"Jessa, please...we need this."
She wonders if the blood pumping so thick through her veins has anything to do with the fact that the ground looks a little hazy or if it has to do with her empty stomach instead.
"Your mother...she wouldn't want you to throw it away, and I just..."
She snaps her eyes shut on the second word of that sentence, catches her breath and holds it just to keep that little semblance of control. Her fingernails dig into her pantsleg.
"...listen. I can't take care of you anymore. All right? I don't have...I...this is your best opportunity to grow up, learn a trade, be happy."
There are dull images flitting past her mind's eye - a slowly growing shop's life cut short when her mother took ill, everything shut down and all funds focused on her, nothing changing, the last money spent on a funeral - and each one punctuates the black spots growing behind her eyelids, the steady pounding of her heart getting louder and louder-
"Jessa."
She gasps in a breath when her father grabs her hand and opens her tear-filled eyes, staring up at his face. He's wrecked. Absolutely destroyed. And she wants to say something to comfort him, but she can't, she just can't...
"I would do anything for you. Do you understand that?"
The exhaustion is fading away from his tone, replaced with impatience, with fear, with desperation.
"Why can't you do this for me? You won't even talk to me anymore? You won't even..."
Tears start pouring down her cheeks when his voice cracks and he tilts his head down, reaching to rest his hands on her shoulders, both a comforting warmth and an oppressive tether. He finally sucks in a thick, wet breath and leans forward to press a kiss to her forehead before he stands and quietly walks out of her room.
Jessamine stares at the doorframe for a long few minutes. She listens. He's putting together the last bit of their food that they could afford, she thinks.
She doesn't doubt that he loves her. She doesn't doubt that he's accepted her mother's death, and she's completely sure that he never wishes that he could exchange Jessa in her place. But the fact that he wants her to leave, to go so far away, to...the thought alone is unimaginable enough for her to create it.
He's not wrong. She can't speak. She wants to, and sometimes she even tries, but her tongue doesn't cooperate, and it hasn't since her mother passed three months ago. How does he expect her to go start an entire new life when she can't even communicate with her instructors?
He'll starve if she stays. They both will. He's too proud to ask for help. He'll put her first and foremost every day while he himself wastes away.
She stands up, steadying herself with a shaky hand on the edge of her bed. She picks up the curled parchment resting on her pillow and smooths it out, reading it one more time. She takes a long and steady breath and hopes that her legs will carry her no matter how much she wants to run out into the plains and hide.
Her father doesn't even look at her until she tugs at his pants, but his eyes widen when she holds up the letter to him and silently nods.
He picks her up and crushes her to his chest, quietly weeping into her hair, and she reads the letter over his shoulder one last time as she clings to him.
"...we have reviewed your application and would like to congratulate you on acceptance into our academy on full scholarship! Here you will learn many fantastic skills before your apprenticeship opportunities arise..."
Please, Abronaxus...Jessamine shuts her eyes as tightly as she can and buries her face in her father's neck. ...help me find my words...[Word Count: 802.]
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Posted: Mon Feb 16, 2015 11:27 am
"Nothing Like Her Mother" - Solo RP "Quiet little thing, isn't she?"
For a moment Jessa's knife pauses, and she stares into the boiling water in front of her, heart pounding in her ears. Are they talking about...?
"Well, she can't help it, last I heard. Headmaster says."
Of course they are. Why did she even think differently? Her cheeks flush and she ducks her head a little more, focusing on the potatoes, on making sure she gets every single piece of skin and every little eye off of it until it's a silky white.
"Shame, though, isn't it? About her mother."
She squeezes her hand and the slick potato almost flies out of her fingers. She catches her breath with an almost inaudible gasp, just barely keeps her grip on it, but the two gossiping cooks don't seem to have noticed.
"I knew her once, y'know."
"Yeah?"
"Of course. She came here a good, what, four years ago, gave a nice little lecture to all the upperclassmen, y'know, the ones 'bout to head out into the world and all that. Dunno if any of them was listening, but they was looking, at least."
"And you got to go?"
"Well, Headmaster let the staff stand and listen in the back if we was done with our work, so..."
"Wow. Was she-"
"Force to be reckoned with. And lemme tell you, her voice, it carried through the whole room crystal clear. Yeah. They might not've heard the words, but they heard the voice. Beautiful like a bell."
It was. She can hear it now if she focuses hard enough. She drops the potato into the pot and reaches for the next one. Her heart, it's still pounding, but her ribs almost feel too tight for it and her lungs, like they can only accommodate one of them...it's distracting is what it is...
"Think she's gonna be anything like her? Besides the, uh...well, I mean..."
"Dunno. She barely looks like her. Got her skin color, but that hair? Not a thing like it. She had black hair, blacker than anything, really set off her eyes. She was Fireni, you know, was-"
She can't breathe fully anymore, she thinks, pauses to touch her breastbone as if she can feel any swelling under it. The knife's blade is cold against her skin where the flat of it is pressed, and she swears she can feel her heart beating through it.
"-and maybe she'll get her spirit, but right now I think she's just a quiet little thing that needs-"
Something's clawing up her throat, blocking her air, and she reaches for it, gasps quietly, tries to figure out how it's even in there when nothing got in her mouth in the first place.
"-so right now, I dunno, think she's sort of the opposite of her mother, just-"
Jessa gives a gutteral yelp when she nicks her skin with the blade, drops it and the potato to the floor and stumbles back against the table holding all the rest, heaving, finding every breath almost impossible-
"Whoa, hold on there, dearie, let's breathe, all right?"
She tries as hard as she can to focus on the plump women approaching her, the two who'd just been discussing her like she wasn't even there, but the warm hands of the blonde are comforting somehow and she sinks against her, fighting the panic, the terror, the fear-
She wants to say she's sorry for being this little mess of a child that doesn't deserve to be here, but when she opens her mouth the only thing that escapes are sobbing breaths that barely carry any sound, and though both women are speaking, trying to soothe her, she pushes away the second she feels her feet and runs as fast as she can from the kitchen, ripping off her school-provided apron and throwing it on the floor.
The cut isn't bad. It won't even scar. That's what she tells herself an hour later when she's staring in the mirror, watching that blemish of her skin tone, her beautiful skin, the only thing that matches her mother, yet another thing she might've ruined all over again...[Word Count: 691.]
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Posted: Mon Feb 16, 2015 1:38 pm
"Voices Unheard" - PRP with Erahn[x]
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Posted: Mon Feb 16, 2015 1:40 pm
"Voices Unheard" - Journal Response "He doesn't think it's real.
He's not the first person who doesn't think it's real but he's somehow one that matters the most...
Oh Diary, I feel like I've made a mess of things somehow. Is it my fault? I don't know. I just know that I met a little boy today who plays some of the most beautiful music I've ever heard. He's far younger than me but somehow so talented. I was almost overwhelmed by it. I can barely do anything, yet he's somehow out there catching attention in public for being so incredible.
But he can't speak. He seems incapable of it, maybe has been ever since he was born, I'm not sure. The difference is that I can occasionally speak and he absolutely cannot.
I thought I'd found a kindred spirit in him, really, but when I tried to fight against him being misunderstood and even harassed by someone, that's when my silence broke. Just for a second. Just for two words. But it was enough for him to decide I'm nothing like him, to call me a liar.
Maybe I am lying. I don't know anymore. Maybe I'm just too weak to talk. Maybe if I stood up and grew a backbone I'd be able to. Maybe I'm just making excuses.
I just don't know anymore.
I feel pathetic. I'm going to go stare at the ceiling and hope I can figure out why I'm so weak."
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Posted: Wed Mar 04, 2015 2:40 pm
"Something New" - Solo Profession Practice It takes a bit of time before Jessamine can make it back to the kitchen. She should go earlier, she KNOWS that - every scholarship student must help earn their keep, after all - but she spends most of her time waiting, wishing, hoping that she can perhaps go somewhere else like the library or the laboratories, but...but no. There always something holding her back, whether it's because she's too nervous to climb on top of the inconceivably high ladders to reshelve books or too anxious to keep up with the high-paced nature of the labs. The kitchen is calmer, and everyone there already knows her.
They also already talk about her behind her back like she can't even hear them, but...
Jessa cautiously makes her way back to the kitchen one rainy day after classes are out of session, cheeks flaming, eyes on the ground.
"Jessa, love!" She recognizes the voice of the eldest cook, the woman who everyone simply knows as Mrs. Hearthlyn and who took her under her wing in the first place. "We've been worried about you, dear. You been all right?"
Jessamine nods, then chances a glance up to meet her eyes.
Mrs. Hearthlyn's smiling. She looks all too happy to have Jessa back under her roof, and that makes something inside of her reach out tentatively, hopefully. "You back to work a little more?"
Another nod.
"Well, I know just the ticket, c'mon now."
Jessa makes her way toward the table where she's used to peeling potatoes, but she blinks when she realizes that Mrs. Hearthlyn is wandering elsewhere in the kitchen, notably toward the oven. She cocks her head to the side and follows behind, feeling incredibly young and pathetic right around then.
"Have you ever baked anything, Jessa?"
She shakes her head, eyes wide. It's a little thing, watching the older woman pour some milk into a small bowl, sift out some flour, but the fact that she seems to know exactly how much to add without a single bit of help every single time is fascinating.
"Well, today's your lucky day! I need a little bit of help. Mind stirring all this up for me?"
Of course not. Jessa immediately picks up the wooden spoon Mrs. Hearthlyn gestures to and sets to stirring. She looks up at her, desperate for encouragement, and when the older woman smooths her floppy hair she feels a burst of warmth in her chest as she gets back to it.
She's not sure how long she stirs - Mrs. Hearthlyn wanders around checking the temperature of the blazing oven, scattering a bit of flour across a series of metal molds - but soon it comes time to remove the spoon, and she pours the batter into each of the molds under the woman's supervision.
"Now we simply have to wait for them to bake, don't we?" Mrs. Hearthlyn asks, as if Jessa would even know in the firstplace.
Still. The muffins, when they emerge, are fluffy and warm and moist, and Jessa listens closely that night in the dining hall to the other students who compliment them and take seconds, even thirds.
And honestly for once? She feels like she belongs somewhere.[Word Count: 540.]
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Posted: Wed Mar 04, 2015 7:06 pm
"My Own Life" - Solo Profession Practice Crack the egg.
Add the milk.
Sift the flour.
Scatter the blueberries.
Fold it in.
It all comes easy to Jessamine now. It's been just a few months since she started baking, but goodness, it only took a month before Mrs. Hearthlyn put her in charge of all of the baking for breakfast. It was a little silly at first, probably, Jessa coming down to the kitchen before the sun even came up, but that's how she likes it. Bright light hurts her eyes and skin, has her wincing more often than not, so she's more apt to be more active when it's dark, even if it means getting most of her sleep through random power naps throughout the day. Breakfast is the least populated of all of the meals anyway, so there's less bread and muffins and biscuits to bake, enough for a young girl like her to take care of.
She's starting to add her own flair, too, thanks to Mrs. Hearthlyn's encouragement that she experiment with the easy recipes at her fingertips, that she add or substitute things to see what works better. What's more, it comes naturally, and that's incredible to her somehow. Yes, she's made some mistakes, and wow but did those mistakes taste terrible, but she's also learned from them, and she finds herself able to apply those lessons even to things she hasn't had too much exposure to yet.
Honestly? It's sort of scary, but...it's almost like she has a talent for this. She'd rather be down here all day than in classes and doing homework, and she'd be down here doing homework while waiting for things to finish baking if she could, if Mrs. Hearthlyn didn't tell her to go up to the library and get a little sun every once and a while.
One of the younger cooks, Pyrrha, leans over her shoulder and smiles. "Looks lovely, Jessa. You do something different with the batter?"
She nods up at her with a shy smile of her own. She left her notebook in her room, so she can't reply, but she gestures to the two different kinds of flour that she used - the white unbleached and the thicker grain sort - and pantomimes mixing them together.
Pyrrha simply smooths her hair, her palm spreading a tickly sensation over the shaved sides of it. "Can't wait to taste it, dear."
She swells with the praise, positively glows with it. See? If she could hear things like that for the rest of her life, she's pretty confident that she'd be happy!
...then again, why shouldn't she be able to hear that for the rest of her life?
She gets by in her classes, average marks and retention, but here? This? She thrives. And for the first time, she really finds herself seriously considering what exactly she could do with her life if she had both the confidence and willpower.
Her own shop...her own bakery, especially. Her calling the shots. Her making her own life. Her father owns his own smithy, so it's not out of the realm of impossible, is it? He'd be there to answer any questions she had about owning her own place.
There's still so much to learn, though, so very much. And as she starts pouring her batter into the muffin molds, she's already making a mental checklist of things she needs to look into in the library.[Word Count: 574.]
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Posted: Mon Mar 09, 2015 2:52 pm
"A Fresh Challenge" - Solo RP "Can I ask you something, Jessa?"
She looks up from where she's frosting a cake, blinking curiously at Mrs. Hearthlyn. She rarely bothers Jessa in the middle of her work in the kitchens unless it's something important, so she's quick to pause and set down her knife, wondering if perhaps she should sit down as well.
The kindly older woman comes over and leans against the table where Jessa is working, looking down at her work with a smile. "Your frosting's very smooth, do you know that? Smoother than my old hands can manage these days."
Jessamine doesn't think she's very old, honestly, but maybe she has a poor measurement of time and age given her own mother dying so young. She shrugs and looks down at her lap with a smile of her own, though, pleased by the praise, cheeks flushing slightly.
There's a long moment of silence, and Jessa peeks back up at Mrs. Hearthlyn through it, violet eyes wide and curious as she watches her. She looks hesitant, and that's a rare look for her given how easily she gives advice to Jessa, how often she tries to help her on to grow. But she hasn't done that recently, has she? Not in terms of her baking in the kitchen, at least. In all honesty Jessa's sort of missed the critiques and the gentle encouragement that she used to hear every day. All she hears now is that she's doing lovely work, but it's making her feel like she might perhaps start to...stagnate. And that's nothing she really wants.
Mrs. Hearthlyn finally sighs softly and smiles at her again, reaching out to smooth her knotted hand over Jessa's droopy hair. "I daresay you've learned everything I can teach you here, love. And that honestly seems like quite a crime, keeping you here if you're going to learn nothing else. No, I'd rather see you bloom and flourish."
Jessa wrinkles her brow. She immediately reaches for a towel and starts to rub the bits of frosting and such off of them, eyes jolting toward the small chalkboard sitting on the edge of the table, the one she uses to communicate.
Her mentor continues on, however, even seeing Jessa's fidgeting and haste to get her clean hands on the board. "I never imagined you'd learn everything I do about baking so quickly, but you've taken quite a shine to it. It comes to you naturally, I think. And so I've spoken to Headmaster Klefstad about your continued improvement, and we believe that your time working in the kitchens would better be spent elsewhere."
Jessamine's fingers fly for a piece of chalk, and she starts scrawling quickly, messily, a rare moment of her dropping her poise as her heart starts to pound.
"There's a fine bakery just a few shops down the avenue. It's small, and the owner's a little cantankerous when he chooses to speak, but he's got a fine talent and runs his business well. His name is Kyndal Ransock, and there's a great deal more you could learn from him..."
When Jessa presses her chalkboard into Mrs. Hearthlyn's hands her words trail off as she reads the words, sees how Jessamine's hands are shaking as well.
"Did I do something wrong? Are you sending me away because I upset you?"
Mrs. Hearthlyn clicks her tongue and pulls Jessa close, wrapping her arms around her. "No, child, never. You've made my days here some of the brightest I've ever spent, and believe me, I've no desire to see you go, but..." She sighs and presses a kiss to the top of her head. "You have such a talent, my dear, and such a beautiful life that it could bring you. And it'd be selfish of me if I held you back from it."
Jessa buries her face in her chest and sighs.
"...you can still come see us, of course. Can even come work with us if you like."
She peeks up at her, eyes sparkling.
"What, did you think I was banishing you?" Mrs. Hearthlyn grins at her. "I'd never. But promise me you'll keep your marks up and don't waste any valuable time down here just because you feel sorry for a couple of old women stuck in a dungeon."
Jessa shakes her head with a shaky smile of her own.
A new place to learn? A new person to learn under? It's all a little terrifying to consider, and she's honestly not too sure how she'll get by with it all. But it's another chance to learn, and when it comes to baking she's already discovered that she's insatiable. No, this is an opportunity that she can't possibly deny.[Word Count: 797.]
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Posted: Mon Mar 09, 2015 3:16 pm
"You Have To Get Burned" - Solo RP "You'll call me Master Ransock, and you'll start with those biscuits."
The first words that her new master spoke to her are still ringing in Jessamine's ears nearly three months after she began. It's mostly because she's barely gotten anything out of him but grunts and huffs since then, but also because they're possibly the kindest things he's ever said.
It's maddening, working here when she's so used to Mrs. Hearthlyn's kindness, to the other kitchen women who eventually got used to her and stopped their gossiping. She was surrounded by love back there at the Academy's kitchen, and now? Well. Now she feels like she believed she was worth feeling the first day she arrived at the Academy.
The shop itself is pleasant enough. It's well-lit, with yellow walls and clean display fixtures. She knows they're clean because Master Ransock tasks her with cleaning them every night before she heads back to the Academy, and if even a single speck is left he sends word that she'll be arriving late. It's aggravating, though she can't see fit to complain, not when every extra minute she spends there awards her another coin in compensation at the end of the week. It's the first coins she's had to her name since arriving here, and though he isn't responsible for compensating her for her apprenticeship time that she originally spent in the kitchens he's never once complained about the funds he gives her nor tried to cut corners on them.
He's simply...an interesting old man. He has long white hair that he keeps pulled back in a sleek ponytail, glasses that always have flour smudged on them, and a bright orange apron, of all things, that he wears when he rarely steps into the kitchen to undo her mistakes, which seem to be frequent. But he's quiet. And, if anything, that's rather calming. It's almost as if he's somewhat like her.
The change in tide is slow-coming. One day she's kneading at some dough for a loaf of bread and he's harrumphing at her and telling her in no uncertain terms that she'll "learn to keep the bubbles out of that dough or lose all credibility for the business," and the next day he's letting her take one of her muffins home before it gets stale overnight, since it was apparently "an adequate representation, and it's far too late for the dining room to be open back at Klefstad."
It's a little over a week later when she's working on a particularly tricky mixture for some cheese buns that he comes over and snipes at her, and she's frustrated and angry enough at the dough that she simply can't get to thicken that she throws her spoon on the floor and whirls around, glaring at him, arms crossing over her chest in defiance.
He stares. He scowls. "You're angry, is that it? Thinking I'm being a bit too harsh with you?"
Jessamine nods curtly, then thrusts her chin into the air.
Master Ransock grinds his teeth together before he picks up the spoon and tosses it into the sink of washing for her to do later that night. He snags a clean spoon for himself and plunges it into the dough mixture, carefully folding it over itself over and over again. "They were soft to you back at Klefstad, girl. They babied you for your voice - or your lack thereof, I should say. They thought you couldn't handle a little bit of fire." He snorts. "Fire's our business. They forget that." Master Ransock grabs a handful of flour, then sifts it between his clean fingertips until he has an unspecified yet apparently perfect amount, which he tosses into the dough and proceeds to stir. "Doesn't matter how long you're a baker, you'll burn yourself every day. If you don't, you're not getting close enough to the flames to make sure they're doing you right."
The dough's starting to take shape, she realizes. She moves closer, peering into the bowl.
"Nobody in this business is gonna baby you, girl. They'll terrorize you. Antagonize you. Try to force you to speak. There's no kindness in the world beyond the Plane, and hell, there's barely any kindness here either. And somebody's gotta toughen you up." He abandons the spoon, then, begins working the dough with his fingers. She instinctively reaches for the pan and begins to grease it silently, still listening closely. "You've a hell of a talent. But you can't coast on that. You've gotta get your hands dirty and your skin burned. That's our way." He begins forming the buns with his hands and placing them on the tray, and Jessa begins spreading cheese across the top of each. "So the sooner you stop being all uppity and pretending the world's gonna hand you anything on a silver platter just because your mother's dead and your voice is gone, the better. Nobody's gonna hand you nothing. You're gonna have to take it. Got it?"
She does. She reaches out and takes the bowl right out of his hands, starts shaping the buns for herself.
He nods curtly. Then he turns and leaves the room.
Her heart stings a little, but her soul feels all the lighter. She wishes she had a way to thank him for that.[Word Count: 896.]
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Posted: Mon Mar 09, 2015 6:35 pm
"But Why?" - Solo RP Regarding Civilian Path "Can I ask you something?"
She's eating a quick dinner with Master Ransock during a slow period of the day, when the baking's already done but she's not yet done with her duties for the day. She looks up at him and blinks, then nods, brushing her hands off on her napkin and reaching for the chalkboard on the table.
The old man leans back in his seat and rests his folded hands on his lean belly. "I wanna know...why you wanna do this with your life. Y'know, instead of going out there and laying waste to all the baddies of the world like the rest of your generation."
Just the question is enough to make her stiffen in her chair. She frowns at him, hesitates, then scribbles with some chalk. "Long or short answer?"
He snorts when he sees it. "Short's fine. You know I don't have a lot of time for rambling."
Especially not when it takes her a few moments to respond. She writes quietly, head down, the only sounds being Master Ransock's knife cutting through his steak and then his quiet chewing. She offers the chalkboard again. "I've seen enough death already."
He quirks an eyebrow. "What, your mother? That's it?"
She nods. That's more than enough.
He snorts, slicing at his steak again. "Some people would just consider that reason to go out and kill something. Figure out why that death happened in the first place, you know? Understand it more."
More writing. "She died because she was sick."
"How old was she?"
Scribble scribble. "31."
"Thirty-one-year-old Dovaa don't just die from being sick. They ever figure out exactly what got her?"
She stares at him.
"So I thought."
Jessa's cup is jostled to the ground when she reaches out and grabs her mentor's wrist, squeezing it tightly, eyes riveted to his face, no time to write, just urgency in her gaze.
He blinks at her. "I know the story of your mother. Met her myself a few times. Girl was healthy. Girl like that doesn't just keel over." He gently removes Jessa's hand from his wrist. "Say something happened to her out there. Say there was some kind of foul play. That gonna make you change your mind? Make you go off and be a battler instead?"
She's shaking, she realizes. It's not that she hasn't considered the idea before, that her mother wasn't completely safe out there on her last journey, but to have someone present it to you in cold and unfeeling terms is just...Jessa swallows. She grounds herself, like she has every day since she watched her mother die. She shakes her head.
"No? Why?"
She writes her answer, fingers still a little shaky. It's an impulse now, unfortunately. She can keep herself almost completely emotionally stabilized, but the fact remains that some small part of her continues to be shaken even after all these months. "Because life is sacred, human and animal and khehora alike. I'll never be part in taking those lives. I'm neutral, just like all dovaa should be. If they're passionate about ending lives, I'm going to be just as passionate about making them better. With cookies."
Master Ransock reads silently. But when he gets to the last sentence he laughs, and he laughs, and he keeps laughing, throwing his head back with mirth. And when he's finished he palms her hair like dog and stands up, shaking his head as he walks both of their empty plates back to the sink. "You do that, girl. You do that."[Word Count: 611.]
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Posted: Thu Mar 19, 2015 2:44 pm
"You're Going Places" - Solo RP With Profession Master This is it. This is her one chance. Or maybe it's not, maybe it's not so crucial, maybe she has a million chances, but...this is Master Ransock they're talking about, and there's absolutely no way she can just assume that he's going to be charitable after today.
See, her mentor's been in a good mood today. He had a wealthy patron come in and commission an incredible cake for her joining ceremony and it'd been completed in more than enough time, and her payment had included a hefty tip. It meant a decent amount of exposure and more than enough money to buy supplies for the next few months, and that coincided with a cheerful Master Ransock who was actually whistling as he did the monthly accounts. Whistling! It's a soft symphony to Jessa as she works quietly in the kitchen.
She's fortunate enough that Master Ransock never minds her doing her own baking work when she's finished with the quota she needs to fill for the day, and she's recently finished up her classes for this term at the Academy, and that means an endless amount of supplies available to her. So she mixes. She stirs. She bakes. And she frosts.
It's an almost endless amount of work, but given the timeframe that she's working with she thinks she's doing quite well. She's showing she can multitask with multiple ovens and equipment. She's showing she can prepare a pleasing amount of flavor profiles. She's showing-
She's interrupted by the sound of Master Ransock putting away the accounts for the day, and she hurries to finish the piping detail on her last batch of cookies.
When Master Ransock steps into the kitchen, his whistling cuts off abruptly. He stands at the doorway and simply takes in the scene.
Two cakes, one conservative and one far more elaborate with multiple tiers and a study on weight distribution and support. Three sets of cupcakes to display her icing and piping skills, as well as her work with edible pearls and flowers. Just two sets of cookies, but each one decorated as pristinely as the last, showing her ability to do consistent decorating work over dozens and dozens of cookies. Even a pie, though those rarely are purchased here, and a number of rolls and loaves of bread to boot.
He stares. And then he softly murmurs "How the hell did you manage all of this?"
She slides the timetable she wrote on her chalkboard toward him, every intricate calculation that led to proper timing displayed.
Master Ransock considers it all. Then he reaches to palm over her hair, blowing out a low whistle. "...upon my word, girl. The hell are you still doing here learning under an old man like me?"
She beams up at him, almost preening on the spot.
"Come here," he says as he plucks up one of her cookies and samples it, murmuring his appreciation at the taste. He fills a plate with a sample of everything she's created, then speaks as he waves her to his office. "We've got a lot of talking to do about where you're wanting to go from here, 'cuz I'm about through with you. Not gonna hold you back, that's for sure."[Word Count: 547.]
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Posted: Thu Mar 19, 2015 3:22 pm
"Make Your Choice" - Solo RP for Clan and Profession Choosing "So you've completed your work here, have you?"
Jessa sits in Headmaster Klefstad's office as he looks over her file. The classes here are small enough that he can do this with every student in the graduating class, she remembers Mrs. Hearthlyn telling her when she stopped by the kitchen yesterday for old time's sake, a basket of her work from Master Ransock brought for each of the ladies in the kitchen. She'd baked far too much, after all, and couldn't bear to see it go to waste.
She nods to the headmaster's question, feeling he'll see whatever he needs to answer her question right there in her files.
He hums in response, then glances back down, shuffling through a few pieces of parchment. "...your marks have made a drastic improvement since you began here. I'll not lie to you, Miss Jessamine, initially the committee who awarded you your scholarship thought they might've made a grave mistake."
She dips her head, cheeks flaming.
"But you came highly recommended." He pauses, adjusting his spectacles. "I knew your mother quite well, rest her soul. She was a fine woman. Brilliant mind, lovely face, and an inner strength the likes of which I've never known. And she assured me that you'd leave a mark on his academy and beyond." Headmaster Klefstad brings out another piece of paper. "I see you haven't disappointed her. Especially in regards to your apprenticeship with Master Ransock. The man has more glowing things to say about you than I've heard him say in a decade."
Jessamine smiles as she looks back up at him. She'd grown to love the old man, cantankerous as he was. There was a certain lift in her chest now, a sort of warmth within, more confidence than she'd felt ever since she could remember.
After a few more moments of silence, the headmaster pulls out a form and looks up at her, folding his hands over it. "There is the matter of your clan and recording the profession you hope to pursue, of course. The first is incredibly important, you understand, and the second simply for our records. You needn't feel like you're putting yourself into a box."
She nods, holding her piece of chalk and preparing for his questioning.
"So, if you would allow me to hear what clan you'd like to choose, and why?" He pauses, flinching for a moment at his wording, then clears his throat. "Erm. See, that is, not hear. My apologies."
Honestly? She barely catches phrasing like that anymore. But the attempt to smooth things over and to include her is appreciated, and she gives him the brightest smile she can manage before she begins to write.
She writes slowly and thoughtfully, thinking over her parents and their own clan choices. She remembers a long conversation tucked in her mother's lap where they both told her their own stories of how they selected their clans. Her father, for example, was Gaili - "There was something about the materials that I worked with when I first started forging. I swore that I could almost hear the stones calling out to me as I cut them from the caves, that they...they WANTED me to pick them and shape them into their ultimate form. Maybe it's a bit silly, but I hoped that by choosing that clan I could communicate with them better." "Did it work, Daddy?" "Not at all. But I'd never felt a deeper sense of satisfaction when I saw how my eyes sparkled after that day, not ever." - and her mother was Firani - "It was your grandpa's fault, honestly. I'd argue with him until I was blue in the face, and he always told me that I had a fire in me just like the Firani khehora. Told me that maybe I'd be a little more intimidating if I had red eyes too. So I took that clan just to spite him." "Momma, you didn't!" "Oh yes I did! Never regretted it, though. Made your grandpa eat his own words that day!"
By the time a minute has gone by, she has a paragraph almost covering the chalkboard, and she presents it to Headmaster Klefstad: "I've never felt more at home than I have around an oven or a hearth. From the day I first stepped into my father's smithy I can remember sitting as close to his flames as I could not just to watch him work, but to see the way the flames licked the metal and danced around the coal from which they burned. I'd be a fool if I chose any other clan than Firani."
He glances up after he's read it in silence. "Don't suppose it has anything to do with your mother either, does it?"
Jessa blinks, then erases a small section of the board, writing where he can watch. "I love my mother. Always will. But this choice is mine, not hers. Firani is what I am. Just like I'm more than my mother's legacy."
Headmaster Klefstad hums in acknowledgement and nods. "All right, Miss Jessamine, I understand. Firani it is. A fine choice, if I say so myself. Now then. Your profession?"
She can't help but chuckle as she wipes her chalkboard clean, then writes a bit more. It's faster this time, and the headmaster doesn't look at all surprised when she presents the board. "I'm a baker, Headmaster. It's who I am and what I do. You ate my bread for a whole year before I trained under Master Ransock."
"And trust me," he murmurs dryly, "I miss it dearly. A whole year where I wasn't chipping my tooth on biscuits." He sighs and shakes his head. "Fair enough. Firani and a baker will you be. I'll record it for your diploma for the ceremony. Suppose you show off a bit and bake us a cake for the festivities afterward? We'll put your name to it and everything. Good way to get people talking about you, don't you think?"
"It'd be an honor," she writes, beaming up at him. Just her first step toward making her own way and choosing her own name in this world.[Word Count: 1,060.]
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