Never a Dull Moment [Yva/Nessa]

[Zen]

Turn 2762, Late 2nd Month
About a sevenday after the Clutching

Yvinka

Helping in the kitchen was a chore that Yva was all too familiar with. She and her mother and sister were generally the ones making large meals for her father’s crew when they were away from Tillek on trading ventures. Sometimes some of the younger men and boys in the crew were sent to help, sometimes it was just the three of them. Washing dishes when they were done making the meals was always part of the job. She didn’t really mind the work, she’d found ways to make it amusing and not so boring turns ago. Her sister had always appreciated her antics, and her mother was often amused by them as well, so it stood to reason that others might be too.

Like Lounessa. Her chore partner today. They’d both been sent to help out in the kitchens, along with a couple other candidates, but the two of them had specifically been assigned to dish washing once they’d arrived. The others were helping with food preparation or cleaning the dining cavern or something, there was plenty for the kitchen staff to do, and so plenty to delegate to candidates. Yva’s mind was hardly on the work, however, as Sularenth had laid her clutch some days ago and it was all that anyone seemed to be able to talk about, not that that was surprising. There were nineteen eggs, which was apparently a pretty big clutch. Rumors that the queen hadn’t picked out any as duds were promising, though didn’t always mean that there weren’t any, so said the clutch gossip. Supposedly there was no queen, but Yva didn’t mind that. Queens were huge, and beautiful to be sure, and powerful, but Yva had no desire to be saddled with all the responsibility that came with them. Staring around at all the dishes they had to wash, she sighed lightly. No responsibility at all would be preferable.

Bubbles was draped across her shoulders, the blue spitter’s eyes whirling warily at any strangers that happened to pass by, but no one was paying them much attention so the blue hadn’t spooked and popped off to hide yet. He seemed tolerant of Lounessa’s presence, probably because he saw her often enough in the barracks and at lessons to be used to her. She reached up absently to rub a finger under his jaw before she reached out to scoop up a handful of soap suds and settle them on her face like a fuzzy white beard, giggling as she turned to Lounessa, “What do you think? Is it me? I think you’d look great with a beard. Or maybe a hat would be more to your liking?” She giggled again and scooped up more suds, reaching over and trying to plop them on top of Lounessa’s head, like she always did with her sister. Neyia would always squeal and try to duck away and they’d end up flinging suds at each other for a while until her mother wrangled them back to work while trying not to laugh.

Taxx

[Taxx]

Candidate Lounessa

Dishwashing today. Not so demanding as other chores they could have landed, but tedious all the same. They’d get close to finishing one batch when a bunch more got set down for them, and Nessa’s fingers were water-wrinkled and a bit sore from the scrubbing she’d already done thus far. She didn’t bother complaining- out loud- because she knew it’d do nothing to change the kitchenworkers’ minds, and she at least preferred this to- say, shoveling herdbeast dung.

She’d mostly been… well, not quite ignoring Yva, but not really making a lot of effort to keep a conversation going. She’d asked about the seaspitter, and briefly shown off her own brown before Buttons grew jealous and had to be sent away again, and Stoic was more than happy to entertain himself without needing to be with her constantly.

Snapped out of her current daze, mind drifting as her hands stayed busy, Lounessa glanced over at Yva, and she blinked, caught somewhere between amusement and confusion at the bubble-beard decorating the other girl’s chin. Before she could do much more than open her mouth to comment on it, Yva had scooped up another handful and wiped them off on her head. She couldn’t exactly feel the suds, but she could feel them pop against the skin on her head, and she snorted a half-laugh.

“No thanks,” she replied, shaking her hands dry before reaching up and sweeping the handful away, the other hand squashing down any remaining to get rid of them. “If I say yes, though, would that make you happy?" Brown eyes stayed on Yva while her hands dipped back into the water to continue the chore.
Zen