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 Posted: Fri Apr 24, 2009 11:27 pm
"Shards!"
Leaping back, Rinfala ducked as the runnerbeast's hoof narrowly missed her shoulder. With another muttered oath, she gave the lead rope a sharp jerk, causing the difficult creature to settle down...somewhat. "The hell you'd do that for?" she snapped at the gelding, precisely as though he could not only understand her, but answer in order to explain himself. "I just mucked out your stall, I just put you back in it, I know you're not happy about getting dragged out of it in the first place but that's life so deal with it!" Shaking her head, she stepped forward to deftly slip the halter off of the runner's head before making her exit from the stall, walking down the aisleway at a brisk pace to put the halter and lead away.
"Damn idiots not teaching their beasts manners," she growled under her breath.
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Posted: Sat Apr 25, 2009 2:26 pm
Long ago, Quinnel had discovered that runnerbeasts were not as appreciative of her singing or music as, say, Flitts or cooks. It was for this reason that when Quinnel got assigned to mucking runnerbeast stalls instead of her typical kitchen duty that she was rather unhappy; that and the fact that mucking was dirty and smelly. The first runnerbeast she had worked with had a nearly clean stall already, and a fairly calm disposition, so despite the unpleasant job the day seemed to be looking up. Or it had been, before a certain small, unhappy creature decided to make itself known.
A chorus of angry chirps and squawks heralded the arrival of the brown Flitt, who dived at Quinnel and began to circle about her head. Quinnel flailed her thin arms, trying to ward off the Flitt, and the runnerbeast began to shift in agitation. Grabbing its reigns, Quinnel began to sign softly to the beast, hoping to soothe it, all the while glaring at the Flitt that had perched itself on a nearby ledge.
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Posted: Sat Apr 25, 2009 3:10 pm
As she came alongside a stall, Rinfala paused at the sound of singing. Singing wasn't all too strange a thing to hear in a stable--while a runnerbeast couldn't understand the words and likely didn't care what you were singing about, it was often a soothing and pleasant sound that could be quite effective around a skittish beast. What was odd, however, was hearing the agitated squawking of a firelizard. Hoping to aid in getting the flit out of the stall before the runner inside decided to make a fuss, Rinfala poked her head inside the stall door.
"Need a hand in there?"
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Posted: Sat Apr 25, 2009 6:04 pm
Realizing that someone was talking to her, Quinnel turned and fixed her large eyes upon the girl who was peering into the stall she occupied. Blinking owlishly, she pat the runnerbeast one last time before straightening up. The runnerbeast had more or less calmed down, despite the mistrustful glances it continued to send to the Flitt. Straightening, Quinnel fully faced the other girl before responding with an articulate,“ Hmm?”
Tilting her head slightly, her eyes flicked towards the Flitt, then to the girl, then back to the Flitt. “ Come here you.” The comment could have been slightly offensive, were it not for the fact that she had directed it towards the Flitt. Said Flitt rustled its wings irritably, but otherwise didn’t move.
“ You’re a pest.” Making obvious eye contact with the girl, Quinnel waved a hand vaguely in the direction of the now angry, puffed-up Flitt. “ Hm, I think that thing wants food.”
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Posted: Tue Apr 28, 2009 9:17 pm
Rinfala blinked, taken slightly aback. She'd assumed that the flit belonged to the girl and had decided to follow her, but the way the other girl spoke seemed to imply that it didn't. "Huh," she said by way of comment, digging into a pocket. "Haven't seen 'em shaking down strangers for food before--well, outside of the dining cavern, but they all seem to do that." Coming up with a meatroll she'd tucked away for a snack (and emergency flit-food in case her own egg started to crack shell), she held it out to Quinnel. "That should do the trick, I think. At least, maybe it'll decide to find someone else to pester?"
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Posted: Fri May 01, 2009 5:44 pm
Quinnel took the meatroll with a grateful nod. Gripping it between her fingers, she held it out at arm’s length and wiggled it in the Flitt’s direction. The action seemed to border on irritation and impatience, but when she spoke to a faint undercurrent of affection could be detected in her voice.
“ Here, eat.”
The Flitt needed no further encouragement. He stretched his neck down and caught the roll in his mouth, yanking up to his perch where he could tear into it. With a hum of approval, she watched the Flitt for a second as she processed what the other girl said.
“ Oh, he could pester lots of other people, yes, but he’ll come back. He came from my pocket, see? Ate my snack and now he stalks me.” Pausing, she seemed to reconsider something, “ Well, no, he came from a riddle. Yes, he came from a riddle, from a man, from a mother Flitt.”
The Flitt took Quinnel’s pause to swoop down and perch awkwardly on her shoulder, earning him a weak glare. Realizing something, she tilted her head quesetioningly, “ Do you often keep food on you?”
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Posted: Fri May 01, 2009 5:57 pm
Ah, so he did belong to the other girl. She just didn't seem to realize it. "Well, it looks like you've got a stalker for life, then," Rinfala explained with a crooked grin, a glint of humor in her eyes. "Firelizards attach to the first person to feed 'em, you see."
At the question, Rinfala shrugged, flipping her dark braid back over her shoulder. "Sometimes, if I don't think I'm gonna get a chance to snag lunch. I got an egg recently too so...it'd be a shame to let it go wild, or Impress on someone else. Costly buggers, especially when it's an obvious queen." It'd taken every last scrap of her savings to obtain the golden-shelled flit egg, but it would be worth it. Queens were smarter than the others, and they were least likely to lose their clutches. With luck, Rinfala would make back what she'd spent for the little egg and then some.
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Posted: Sat May 02, 2009 3:32 pm
“ Hm, yes, Flitts do do that, don’t they? Hm…” She gave the Flitt a calculating look. “ Good, very good, yes, that means I’m not crazy- hm, well, crazier. I thought some of my emotions were strange, I did. Makes sense now: they weren’t mine, no.”
Tugging at a curly, lose strand of hair, her eyes lit up in interest when the other girl mentioned owning a Gold Flitt egg. “ Really? May I see it? Oh, how rude; rude, yes, you don’t know my name. I am Quinnel. Better, yes? Now I may see it, hm?”
The brown Flitt chirruped in agreement, also interested in seeing the egg.
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Posted: Sun May 10, 2009 9:02 pm
Rinfala's first reaction was to hesitate. It'd taken many months of saving her Candidate's stipend to afford the small golden egg warming, and she was possessive of such an intrinsically valuable object. However, she forced herself to relax. Even if Quinnel were to have bad intentions, where would she go? Ista was an island, and a firelizard wasn't worth going Holdless for. All in all, even a queen flit would be too much trouble to steal. With that in mind, Rinfala nodded. "...Sure. Since we're introducing ourselves, I'm Rinfala."
Turning, she headed for the kitchens at a brisk pace. The hearthstones were a good warm place to keep the egg, and the kitchen staff could be trusted to send someone for her if the egg started to crack. "How'd you find yours, if you don't mind me asking? I mean, before he ended up in your pocket?"
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Posted: Wed May 20, 2009 9:58 pm
Quinnel kept pace with Rinfala as she followed her, the brown flitt trailing behind.
“ Find him? I didn’t find him, no. I found a man, see, one that was drinking. Yes, a man that had too much to drink, that was too lose with his tongue. Offended me he did, quite rude; persistent too. I challenged him to a riddle contest, yes, to sober his mouth and ego. I won, he lost, he gave me the egg.” Pausing, she tapped her lip with her finger thoughtfully. “ S’pose I put the egg in my pocket; forgot about it. It Hatched that night, yes.”
“ You say Gold egg is expensive. You bought it, hm?”
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Posted: Sat Jun 27, 2009 12:41 pm
Rinfala burst out laughing. "That's great! I wish I had ideas like that for the stupid ones...maybe they'd learn something, then! They seem immune to glaring. Or hints." Note to self, riddles are a prime weapon against drunks. Come to think of it she should have seen this as obvious, what with the way wine addled brains.
So many were addled to start with, though...
"Yes, a Trader girl sold it to me. Lucky wherry, she must have found it on one of the few bits of beach that isn't camped out." Rinfala was plainly envious, for flit beaches were prime real estate. If it had even a sniff of firelizard activity, it was watched. It was a small miracle they hadn't all been spooked South by now.
Shaking her head, she continued onward to her room, to proudly display the gleaming egg and discuss how they were obtained.
((Sorry for dropping this for so long! Since I went braindead for ages, I went ahead and finished it. ;-; ))
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Posted: Sun Jul 05, 2009 8:03 pm
{{Whoopsies! I'll edit this later.}}
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