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Aelyn slammed the door behind her. She'd put as much force as she could possibly muster behind it, and the thing flew shut with a resounding wham that echoed across the house. Good riddance. One of these days, she was sure, she would get angry enough to actually break one of these stupid doors.

She hated it here.

This house, this whole ridiculous family. If not for the individuals that she did love, Aelyn would have left the moment she was old enough to find work and never looked back. It had never mattered to her that she was the daughter of a wealthy family that had money and a fine reputation - neither of those things meant anything to her, especially when everyone knew that she wasn't a "real" Kavensei. In her world, anything attached to the privileges of the family were simply dangled in her face as political tools, reminding her day in and day out that most people thought she didn't belong here.

Today, she'd gotten into it with Merle again. The woman hated her, which was just fine with Aelyn, who had little tolerance for Merle. But the woman did know how to push her buttons, which was how a simple snide comment had escalated into a full-blown shouting match and led to the slammed door that had alerted the whole house to the fact that Aelyn had once again gotten into a fight with her father's wife.

She stormed up the steps, away from the dining room, seriously debating throwing all of her earthly belongings into a bag and leaving right then and there.

Aelyn was sulking in her room by the time Niiemh made it to the top of the steps. In her youth, she might have been found hunched at the top of the staircase, shooting daggers at anyone who wandered past below. Now that she was older, she understood that not all of the workers in the family were on her side, and the less she left out in the open for prying eyes to see, the safer she would be.

She recognized Niiemh's gentle voice and reluctantly cracked open her door, peeping out through the slit to make sure her sister hadn't been followed. You couldn't be too careful around here. With a sigh, Aelyn pulled the door open wider to invite Niiemh in.

"Hey Nii. I'm alright," she said sourly, sounding anything but alright. Luckily for her, any battering she'd taken today was entirely emotional. It wasn't as fortunate as no battering at all, but at least there were no bruises to show for it. "I got into a fight with that woman. I guess... you know that already." She managed a ginger smile. Niiemh had a ridiculously big heart for someone who had grown up under Merle's cruel parenting.

Aelyn pushed the door shut with a little thud and made her way to the bed, perching on the edge while she stared at a spot on the floor. The expression on her face worked up a storm as she thought back to the argument and she let out an exasperated sigh.

"It started off as the usual," Aelyn said finally, pressing her lips together into a thin line. "She said something about how I'd never get anywhere in life if I couldn't figure out how to act like a lady. So I said at least if I'm not a lady, I won't have to worry about marrying into the wrong household, being a disappointment to my husband and my family, and turning into a dry, bitter old crone."

The words were harsh. But Aelyn had heard far worse come out of Merle's mouth - especially directed at Kuloma - and her simmering resentment blinded her to how deep such insults might strike. If anything, she wanted them to hurt, wanted to be able to exact some small form of revenge on Merle for all the pain she had caused.

"She got mad at that," Aelyn continued. "Said if I didn't watch it, I'd end up on the street selling myself to cheap strangers, and if that happened, I'd better believe I'd have to take my mother with me."

Aelyn's sharp jabs had a way of bringing out the worst in Merle, who in turn knew exactly how to bring out the worst in the girl. She had never bowed down to Merle's politics and scheming, never felt particularly inclined to do as she was told. It meant trouble. Constantly. And it was exhausting. Aelyn continued to fume, hands balling into angry fists. "I threw a fork at her head. Missed." she shrugged plaintively. It would've been nice to see it bounce off of that woman's stupid, smug face.

Aelyn nodded. "I know," she said with a nod. "I'm not so worried about me. She knows she wouldn't be able to get rid of one of father's children so easily. But we all know she'd looking for any excuse to get my mother out of here."

That was the part that worried her. Kuloma was a gentle soul. There wasn't much fighting spirit in her, which was one of the things Aelyn loved so much about her mother. But it could also read as a sign of weakness, and Merle was apt to exploit anything.

"I guess not. There was no one nearby, though," she said with a small shrug accompanied by a sigh. "She's getting worse, though, Nii. I don't know how much longer I can put up with her crap." She looked over at her sister and caught her gaze.

Aelyn leaned into the hug with a sigh. "Well, how do you put up with her?" she asked, looking up at Niiemh. Merle didn't have a direct hand in Aelyn's upbringing thanks to Kuloma. She'd never had to look up to the woman as a mother figure and knew that she had the special privilege of having much more room to openly hate on their father's wife. Jenesa's children didn't have that. "It seems like she'd be much worse with you."

There was a frown on her face as she continued to think about it. "Once I'm 18 and I've found my profession, I'm out of here," she said after a while, sounding terribly convinced. Both she and Niiemh knew it wasn't as simple as that, and that she wouldn't actually walk out on the family without provocation. After all, where would she go? And how likely was she to convince Kuloma to go with her?

It didn't hurt to gripe though.

"You say that like I try to run into her," Aelyn groused, flopping defeatedly onto the bed. Life was stupid like that. The less Aelyn wanted to see that woman, the more she seemed to pop up, and always when she was least welcome. "I can't just run the opposite way every time I see her."

In truth... she absolutely could. But Aelyn's pride would not allow it. She'd rather have a hundred escalating confrontations with that woman than to once back down or acknowledge that she couldn't face her father's wife. That was asking too much of her dignity.

"I'm glad you guys like my mother," she said with a grin. "Course, it's not like the other one is any good, so she would have gotten away with being even just a halfway decent human being." Fortunately, though, Kuloma was a saint.

"And I guess I can... sort of try to plan my routes around her?" she said after a moment of consideration. "The woman's everywhere though. I'll do my best."

Aelyn let out a quiet grumble, but she didn't argue. Niiemh's suggestion was a good one, a temporary solution to an ongoing problem. She let a moment of silence lapse, before suddenly springing up from the bed, energized once again. "Okay, you're right," she conceded, perching herself on the bed next to her sister. "Game plan - just don't be where Merle is. That's doable."

Aelyn scratched her chin in thought. "Do you think growing up in this family creates lasting emotional trauma?" she said. It was a rhetorical question, of course. There was only one possible answer to that question. "Maybe we're all just addicted to the drama, can't live without it."

"Keep in touch with the good parts of the family, you mean," Aelyn intoned, widening her eyes meaningfully. Some of their siblings were brats too, just like their mother. "But don't worry, Nii, you don't have to tell me twice to get out of here when I'm older."

Father couldn't pay to get her to stay.

Aelyn heaved another sigh, this time just to be dramatic, and leaned comfortably against Niiemh, happy as always to have a sister like her. "We would stay in touch though, wouldn't we? We wouldn't drift apart or anything."