When In Doubt, Ask (Jewlery Stall, Open)

[Ember]

"Its a shame I couldn't bring Nuoth this time," the girl muttered to herself. The quiet tone wasn't really neccesary with the wind tearing the words away, but she really didn't want the rider she had convinced to giver her a ride having even a slight chance of overhearing her. The blue was currently circling the Hold as he waited for his chance to land. It was early in the day yet so many people were still arriving. She gave the dragon a cursory pat and leaned forward against his rider. "Lets hope it doesn't take too much longer," she said directly into the man's ear. Seriously. It wasn't like she enjoyed winding her arms around him.

The blue crooned suddenly and Nephele tightened her grip in anticipation. Finally! The dragon angled downward and slotted himself neatly into a flight path that took them conveniently close to the main body of the Gather. Small dragons really had the best in these kinds of situations. Nephele waited patiently as the blue landed and she even allowed the bluerider to assist her down. Easier to have help then try and get down in her clothes. She flirted briefly with the man - she may need his blue to get back - before disappearing into the Gather.

It was a good day for the Gather, and Blossom Hold was a nice place. She paused at some stalls and completely ignored others for the time being. She was actually looking for one in particular...and if she wasn't mistaken, there it was. The Jewlery Stall, mandatory to most any Gather. She wandered over and looked over the merchandise. She'd woken up in the morning thinking herself all prepared for the Gather. Ride gauranteed, dress ready, marks to spare...but she'd been missing one thing. The dress she had picked she hadn't managed to find a matching accesory.

The pleasant shade of royal blue of her dress simply didn't match with any of her usual jewlery. Most of it was meant to go with clothes of warm or neutral colours, not the cool blue she was wearing. Her dress was short and made of breathable materials. It had been a bit awkward adragonback but the flight had been short enough. More pressing than riding dilemmas, was the dilemma of which accesory she wanted. Bracelet, necklace...one of the two but not both. Simplicity really was her preferred style. There was a nice selection of both but she wasn't entirely what she wanted.

The stall owner seemed a bit busy or she's ask them what they thought. This is when girl friends would be of use. Or anyone who has at least a tiny bit of sense, she mentally commented. She glanced around at the other people but found herself unwilling to ask a random person. Times like these even Nephele wished she wasn't such a loner. She sighed and picked up a silver bracelet with small bright blue stones. Not quite right. The blue of the bracelet would clash with the dress, though she did like the style of the bracelet. Sigh.

[Lotty]

K'sel pretty much thought he was hot shit for once. Mainly because while the other weyrlings had to hitch rides, he, the last surviving member of his class, was able to escort himself to the hold aboard his own dragon. Pettahth looked spectacular if he could say so himself, probably due in part to the fact that he had spent the better part of his day bathing and oiling the brown to perfection. Although the leathery hide tended to have a 'dusty' look, even Pettahth could sparkle a bit from the liberal layer of shine his rider had adorned him with. It wasn't so much showboating to him since everyone should take care of their dragon, and it was a chore that even he didn't mumble about too loudly, but instead it was about proving a point: no matter what rumors floated around about him, he was still a good dragonrider. For all of his failures in life, maybe he could redeem himself here. Or maybe it was Nephele's little comment in the jungle that inspired it all...who knew?

Regardless, was he selling himself short? Sure. He had many skills he didn't talk about. He was about as twice as graceful as he looked...he could even do a bit of dancing believe it or not, but Faranth forbid he ever talk about these things. To be anything special was a shame to him almost. Which probably explained his entire attitude towards this gather. While he was dressed up, to a degree, with his loosely collared sateen maroon shirt under his unbuttoned grey vest (a flower was appropriately pinned here, pink, to give him some color) he still elected to be rather understated about it all, only fiddling with his blackish hair once after dismounting and finding his way down the main thoroughfare. That was when he made the mistake of seeing Nephele there...looking at jewelry of all things. Bah!

He froze and immediately looked to the sides, was there a place that he could hide? Please sir! Let me hide in your barrels! Let me...can we just stash me back here behind the merchandise? Something? He was at a loss for where to go, but the lithe little weyrling was able to recede into an alley between a couple of stalls where he could lie in wait for her to leave. He had very specific goals for this gather after all: no licking, no punching, no Nephele allowed. On the to do list included: Get drunk, pass out, wake up in own bed. Thus the obvious predicament K'sel was faced with. He kept an eye out for the greenrider girl, and hoped that she would pass out of sight, but by the way she was taking soooo sharding long shopping he felt like he could be stuck there forever. Women! Thank Faranth she wasn't looking at shoes.

What could she want with jewelry anyway? She looks perfectly fine the way she is.
Oh really?
Don't even start with me. You know what I meant.
You think she is pretty without the shinies. How sweet is that?
I never said anything about pretty. You are now putting words in my mouth...head..whatever.
I think you should help her pick something out. It would make her go away faster...
Nice try, but I'm not falling for your tricks...

He craned his head around the corner again, and to his dismay, she was still there.

[Ember]

Ah, finally the stallkeeper was done with the other people. The girl watched the couple walk off with a slight snort. How sickly sweet was that? Despite what she may project, even Nephele got jealous on occasion. In the end she was a human too. As the stallowner approached her she put on a smile and started the small chat. Easier to haggle when you were more comfortable with the person. While she had a fair amount of marks she had no intention to go crazy with them.

She indicated the one she'd been looking at before and asked, "I don't suppose you have any of these with a different colour stone?" She really did like the style of that one. The man frowned and picked up the bracelet. "I'm not sure. Hold on and I'll check." Nephele smiled pleasantly and returned to looking at the other jewlery. She felt rather strange, standing at such a girly stall for so long. She didn't normally make a habit of even visiting such a stall, nevermind lingering so long.

Was it so important to buy something? Not really. Its not like she was intending on impressing anyone. What do you think Nuoth? Skip the shiny stuff for today and go look for something else to do or stay and find something suitable? The green's feeling was warm as she responded, You want one though, don't you? You'll find something you like soon enough. How soon was soon though?

"Sorry miss, looks like this is the last one," the stallkeeper said, surprising the girl. She glanced at him and smiled flirtatiously. "Is that so? Then what do you think would suit me? I'm having a little trouble deciding, they're all so pretty." She touched his arm briefly, beseechingly. And like that he was caught. "For you miss? Surely most anything would match well with you. There's this - no, maybe this..? Hmm." She stopped a slight grimace as he began holding items up and examining her with them. She hadn't been counting on him being quite that enthusiastic. Not to mention everything he held up was gaudy and not at all what she'd been looking for.

[Rei]

Erilena held tightly to F’lyn as his blue circled to land. The rider had been preoccupied and rather quiet the whole ride. To bad really, he looked like he might be an interesting sort. He certainly had a lovely blue. So dark but immensely friendly, perhaps as friendly as Aonith. To bad he hadn‘t spoken to her as the green had, but she knew such favors where rare. As the blue back winged to land, the candidates eyes hungrily drank in her surroundings. Gather time. Excited as Erilena was, she didn’t even notice she was still holding onto the rider until he chuckled slightly. “You can let go now miss.” Erilena retuned F’lyn’s laugh with one of her own. “Oh dear I’m sorry.” She retuned lightly, her arms unwinding from his waist.

A short amused rumble from his dragon completed the merry atmosphere and soon the rider had dismounted and offered a hand up to her. It was bit hard to dismount dressed as she was, and so she was immensely grateful for the help. Accepting F’lyn’s hand Erilena allowed him to take her about the waist and swing her down. Her skirt billowed about her ankles and her belled anklets jiggled to add to the festive air. Shrugging off the riding jacket she handed it to the rider before adjusting her top. “Thank you F’lyn, and you to Pandorath.” Curtsying she turned and skipped off. F’lyn had already told her she would, more than likely, need to find another ride home and she was fine with that.

Erilena had picked out a rather interesting outfit for the gather. But is was one she was comfortable in. She would be able to dance well in it and that was what really mattered. A tight spaghetti strap black top showed off her cleavage spectacularly. Especially with the red beaded leaves trailing from her shoulder to her left hip. A scarlet scarf was wrapped about her neck and left to trail down one shoulder. The candidate’s outfit was completed by a long, skirt that hung at her ankles. Solid black with six strips of matching red fabric hanging separately down it, it billowed as she walked the strips of red moving of their own accord. Her belled anklets added to the image as Erilena strode forward, drawing wanted attention toward her. A dazzling smile was given to anyone who met her eyes.

Examining the stalls carefully Erilena stopped in her tracks as she turned the corner and entered an alley. She knew that back! Quickly she bent down and unclasped her ankle bracelets, stuffing them into her breast band for safekeeping. It would do to be caught now. Not when she had a goal in mind. Creeping as silently as she could she peered over K’sel’s shoulder. What had him so spooked? As Nephele came into her field of vision her eyes widened. Oh dear this was just to good. He was spying on her? She examined the picture in front of her quietly and a mischievous smile lit her features.

“You know. You could gallantly rush in and save her from that idiot right now. You’d probably earn her undying gratitude, or maybe her ire. Either way you get attention from her and that’s all you really want isn’t it?” Her words where whispered quietly into the weyrling’s ear as her hand suddenly flashed up to grasp his ear. Erilena didn’t plan on giving K’sel time to answer. Time to answer would be time he could use to make excuses. Tightening her grip on his ear she also placed a hand on the small of his back. “So go be her knight in shining armor okay?” With a smile the candidate released his ear and shoved him hard out of the ally way, directly into Nephele’s line of sight. There now he really didn’t have a choice. The green rider had surely seen him, K’sel couldn’t abandon her now. Smiling at her ingenuity Erilena leaned carefully out to watch her plan at work.

[Lotty]

He was just about to shrink back into the shadows again when he felt the prickle of warm breath against the back of his neck. The air culminated into little whispers in his ear, and only the fear of his outbursts being heard by Nephele is what kept his lower lip bitten closed. It was plain to him whose voice it was, it would belong to none other than the candidate girl he had met peeling tubers, since he didn't know or associate with too many other cheery souls. Nor did he tend to pal around with someone who would speak such heresy; the idea that he wanted attention from Nephele was enough to inspire the bile in his stomach to inch forward into his throat. That my friend was the taste of hate on the tongue.

He didn't even have time to stab her with one of his death-inducing glares when he felt a tug on his ear and like the mangy mutt he was practically growled out his disdain as he was shoved out of his hiding spot. Meddling woman! After (barely) trying to resist the woman's shoves and pushes, he sharply threw a glance at her before looking back ahead of him and at the girl in the navy blue dress. Sighing he gave into the fact that yes, he surely has been seen and no there was no way out of this. He began to stomp off in her direction, but not before giving a very heated dissertation to Pettahth about his newfound hatred of the fairer sex.

Make sure you tell our friend Erilena that I hate her, and before this is all said and done I WILL kill her.
You want me to tell her this verbatim?
Feel free to dress it up as you please.

The dragon didn't even do so much as lift his head, he was very comfortable sunning - Blossom was such a nice place - but he would carry out orders with the best of them and made sure to touch the candidate's mind and let her know exactly what his rider was thinking. It mattered not that he didn't know this so called Erilena, all that mattered was that he had to keep his rider in a state of relative contentment if not somewhat happy. In a voice that could only be called distinctly masculine, the dragon rumbled, My rider wants you to know that he will personally kill you for doing this to him. Most likely it will be very bloody, and he will have me help hide your body.....but don't worry, I won't let him do this to you. So reassuring, but as nice as Pettahth truly tried to be, one could never say that he was the warmest dragon on the planet.

The brownweyrling was still steaming by the time he made it to the other weyrling's side. It would turn out that K'sel would in fact save the day, but in his own brusque, devilish way. A knight in tarnished armor would be a better descriptor than what Eri originally had in mind. The young man looked over at the stall keeper like he was a big dimglow buffoon and treated him every bit like one. While Nephele had planned on flirting her way to a good deal, K'sel ust wanted some shardig efficiency, "Are you sharding blind? The young lady doesn't want to buy the jewelry you were so unfortunate as to inherit from your trashy, tasteless, grandmother. Now find her something with some semblance of class..." He shooed the idiot off with a quick gesture before leaning on the front table and looking over at the girl.

"Whats up?"

[Ember]

Nephele, distracted as she was, may actually have missed K'sel had he retreated into the crowd immediately. Since he didn't, her eyes eventually caught sight of him coming her way and she raised a brow slightly. Oh? It was either brave or foolish of him to randomly approach her. Just look at what happened at the last Gather! Suddenly a piece of flashy jewlery was waved in front of her face and she blinked. "I asked if this was to your tastes, miss?" She stared at him blankly for a moment before shaking her head sadly. "Not quite what I was looking for."

Had she really been that absorbed in thought? That was a bit unnerving. Being so oblivious in a crowd of hundreds generally wasn't a good idea. Way to ignore the real reason Nephele. She watched curiously as K'sel closed the distance and was thoroughly amused at his perfect delivery. He'd said what she'd been wanting to say but couldn't, minus a few insults of course. She wasn't the malicious type, after all. The affronted look on the stallkeepers face was priceless. How many colours could the man turn? "Humph! Tasteless reject," he muttered before turning away.

"There goes any chance of a discount," Nephele observed quietly. She turned her face away from K'sel slightly to hide the fact that she was fighting a grin. The young man's question forced her to hide her amusement quickly and she looked at him with thinly veiled suspicion. "Other than losing a deal? Not much." After a moment she relented slightly. He had saved her, even if she was reluctant to admit it. "And I suppose I just got out of a rather annoying situation thanks to you."

There. He should be pleased with himself now. Now she was curious about something. "So what is the great K'sel doing coming to my rescue?" Surprisingly her question only held an ounce of sarcasm. She really was more interested in the why then antagonizing him...for the moment. Sometimes she grew tired of arguing solely for the sake of it, especially on such a nice Gather day. She did intend to enjoy herself. Besides, he really had saved her a lot of annoyance.

[Lotty]

Smoothly, suavely even, the weyrling immediately had a response to Nephele's distress over lost bargains...no it wasn't unusual for him to immediately think of something clever, it was just odd that he had something nice to say. He was almost being a gentleman and Erilena wasn't exactly hovering over him to force the words out either. This was something natural, a very frightening prospect to say the least, "Pffft, I don't know why you are so worried about a discount, I'm sure that some dashing young lad is willing to fork out full price for whatever the lady wants..." A wink is what the girl got to denote that yes, he really was talking about himself and that no, this wasn't anything but the most innocent of gestures and as long as they both played their cards right, they could be out of each other's hair unharmed.

K'sel would never admit that he was trying to buy the girl's attentions. He didn't need to do that. He could get a rise out of her for free and none of this was courtesy of Erilena's encouragements. He would however say that he was buying peace, that this was a treaty and that maybe if he smiled and played nice then everything could go smoothly and they would part ways in something of a mutual agreement. Of course this was well wishing, Faranth knew that these two together were volatile elements and they had something of an odd chemistry to say the least. He just continued his easy going lean and treated her to curious glances that resembled something akin to flirting (though he didn't really realize this himself).

"Let's just say I was compelled to," it was the truth, a certain little candidate was to thank for all of this, but he knew this answer would be met with some sort of scorn so he was quick to change the subject. He gently beat the front counter of the stall with the fleshy part of his hand, obviously impatient with how long the stall keeper was taking. Was it too much to ask for some customer service? "Where did that dimglow go? I'd like to have a drink sometime today..." the next thing he said he never thought he would ever utter, but all of a sudden he found himself inviting the girl to come along with him to that too. They had officially stepped into the Twilight Zone, "How about you, want a drink after this?"

"That is if you don't suck me dry for all I'm worth demon-woman..." Ah well see, that was more like it. Even if he was teasing, it was at least somewhat reassuring to hear that he never really lost his edge, for a second he was getting very concerned about his mental state.

((I went ahead and posted since Rei is sick. I'm sure we will force her to jump right back in when she is better.))

[Ember]

The expression on Nephele's face was probably nothing short of comical. Utter surprise at the offer mixed with her usual bit of distrust. He was just joking with her, right? They did it often enough that she ought not to believe it and yet...she wanted to. She decided to assume it was not a joke. That being the case, what did he want out of it? The immediate answer was discarded just as quick as it came. It had been K'sel himself that said he didn't intend to do anything like that. That left two answers. Of those the only possible one was that he wanted peace too.

With her wilful blindness turned on to the max, Nephele ignored the odd glances he was giving her and focused on the upsides. She was not only getting free jewlery but a small break from the fighting and the tension they normally had. In a way getting along with him was even more confusing but in other ways it wasn't. So getting along for one moment at a Gather was okay by her books. She offered one of her patented grateful smiles. "Imagine my luck today. A nice day, pleasant people, and the best deal around?"

His comment was indeed met with scorn, though she hid it well enough while he latched onto a different topic. The first part she had to agree with. That stallkeeper was taking far too long. At his question the girl froze. What? She'd assumed they'd part ways afterwards. That made her wonder if her original assumption was wrong. She was fortunately saved from responding by his comment and the return of the stallkeeper. The man glowered at them before showing the pair a rather pretty bracelet.

Nephele took it from the man and looked it over. Not too bulky or heavy on the stones. The design was similar but not the same as the original one she'd liked. She tried it on and held up her wrist slightly. It matched well enough. "Its very nice," she said, with the accompanying thought of, musn't be from his grandmother. She also supposed she owed K'sel a reply. "Once this is paid for, a drink or two would be nice." Nevermind that Nephele really didn't have much of an alcohol tolerance.

[Rei]

Erilena could have squealed with joy at the scene that played out before her. Oh she was just too good at this! K’sel was being so well behaved. Had he been a canine he would have earned himself a treat. It was a relief, she had been worried that the brown weyrling would come across as rude and uncaring. Instead K'sel was still his sarcastic self but, there was a bit of charm involved as well. The candidate bounced in place. If only she had a flitter or something similar it would be all too easy to keep track of the pair. As it was she would have to try and blend in with the crowd and stay hidden to keep an eye on things.

K’sel couldn’t be trusted to stay so charming for long. Erilena would have to keep giving him snatches of advice when she could to help matters along. Biting her bottom lip the girl melded with the crowd, all the while keeping a practiced eye on the pair. Who said gathers where boring. This one was proving to be quite entertaining indeed.

((Short but there isn’t much she can say. Beware she will be lurking and if she needs to she will pop it ;D))

[Lotty]

On one hand, K'sel was completely irked that somehow he was going to fork out four marks. Four marks for the bracelet. He thought this was some kind of messed up extortion, but at the same time there was that warm feeling that came with gift giving that even he liked. So maybe even though he wasn't getting the bracelet for himself - and why he would even want it he didn't know, jewelry was a waste - he was still getting something out of this. There was the peace, which was nice, but it also won him brownie points with the greenweyrling which was even nicer.

He cringed. He couldn't believe that thought ran through his mind...but even then he stilled pulled out four marks from a pants pocket and handed them over to the stall keeper before turning to look at the bracelet. He didn't care what it looked like as long as it made he girl happy, so his eyes poured over the jewelry for the first time. He gave something of an indifferent nod before saying simply, "I like it," and then trying to fight back the shock of the girl agreeing to his drinking plans. Really? He had hardly expected her to say ok. Where was Erilena when he actually needed the advice of a girl? This was preposterous.

He had to shake it off. There was nothing in this world he couldn't do...after all who was the one who ran the relationship advice stall last gather? Thats right...he was! Though admittedly he figured he could pair up with Eri next time...maybe as a show of thanks. He offered Nephele his arm as he supposed a gentleman should...even though it felt incredibly odd, and used a jerk of his head to motion towards the wine stall, "Well com'on then...I better start now so I am not too drunk at the end of the day to fly myself back home..." Oh yeah, he had to rub it in a little that he had his own ride...though he would probably eventually offer Nephele a ride home too...because he was hopelessly falling for her despite all of his instincts that screamed no and stop.

[Ember]

Had Nephele known what compelled K'sel to actually act like a gentleman she might have just paid for the bracelet herself and ditched the guy. As it was, being bought a gift because she thought the brownweyrling was being nice all on his own made the girl oddly happy. She refused to acknowledge it but the truth was there nontheless. She waited as he paid for the bracelet, fighting back an amused snort at his comment. It didn't matter if he liked it since he wasn't the one who would be wearing it.

She took his arm somewhat hesitantly and let her eyes fall on the wine stall. She was seriously going to go have drinks with him? Nephele tugged him to get them both moving to the right place as he commented about starting early. She knew well enough that Pettahth was old enough to fly the brownweyrling wherever he wanted. Well if he decided to bring that up she would of course be forced to bring up her own means of travel. "A good idea. I'd hate to make my ride wait on me. He really was too kind to bring me here and offer a ride back if I need one," she said easily.

In a way it was a reminder that their peace depended on them both not pushing each others' buttons. She was a bit of a spiteful creature and would retaliate each time he tried something. Wasn't that normally why things escalated between them? Of course he had bought her something which meant she would have to go lighter on him for the time being. The first attempt on her part to get along came when she asked, "So you really drink for fun?"

[Lotty]

He calmly walked by her side with his arm laced around hers, and no matter how weird it felt, he would not, could not, make a comment about it. It just wasn't allowed. Head forward - and slightly tilted down - he continued with her over to the beverage stall and fell into the rather massive line that was there. He didn't understand himself why on Pern there would be a big long line, not when the choices were limited and the decision supposedly easy. Do you want good wine or bad wine or something else non alcoholic and simply not fun? This was not astrophysics!

He sighed a bit, resigning to the line, taking petite steps forward as people were served their share. He kept silent as she talked about her flight home, a twitch at the corner of his lips knew that he was about to say something stupid. K'sel was being very careful to censor himself on this one...musn't sound too eager to take a girl home after all...he was afraid his sudden change in demeanor was creepy. Caring is creepy.

"Well, if you find yourself stranded I'm sure you can find me. I'm sure I'll be here all night..." he was going to try and drain all of the fun out of the gather in one long day...two if he really had to, he did sign up for that storytelling contest after all, so maybe he'd have to show up all over again. Oh well... The offer would still have to stand. He did make the mistake of opening his mouth after all. Oh? I will remember you said this. You are lucky I like you...and Nuoth. Otherwise she couldn't come along for the ride.... Whatever. You know you are a sucker for the ladies.

And then the subject of his drinking. Was this a problem? He didn't think he was a drunk. It's not like he showed up to lessons smashed or anything...he wasn't anything like that greenrider who served as his master for a while. She was a drunkard...he just liked feeling silly every so often. Sometimes it was ok to lose control...it could be just as fun as it was frightening, but maybe that was just a weyrbred part of him speaking. He glanced over at the girl, slightly suspicious of her intentions...this better not all be a giant ploy...hopefully his few acquaintances wouldn't come out from behind the stalls and force him into an intervention..."Well I do drink...for exactly that reason. It's fun...especially with other people," the loner act was in trouble now, "Believe it or not missy, I do like to have fun you know. I've had friends before..." but way too many of them were dead.

[Ember]

Nephele's expression darkened slightly as she noticed the line. Seriously? How long does it take to get a drink? the girl thought, tsking out loud as she fell into line next to K'sel. Speaking of her companion, if the wait was going to be long she needed to find a way to remove the physical contact between them without seeming too rude - no need to set him off. Being offered someone's arm was a formality she didn't particularily enjoy. It felt weird being guided around as if she was someone's posession.

Her thoughts were interrupted by K'sel's offer and she blinked owlishly for a moment before what he'd said truly sunk in. Now he was even offering her a ride home? She didn't know what to make of that. She couldn't see a way to reject the offer either if she really did end up stranded. Its not like Nuoth would object to Pettahth flying her if she hadn't objected to a random blue. Sometimes having such an understanding dragon could be such a bother. Hmm, but was Pettahth as willing to carry her?

"I really am a lucky lady today! No need to worry about having to go back early if my other ride decides to," she said easily. Actually, she was kind of grateful if she didn't have to worry about time as much, despite the ride potentially coming from K'sel. Gathers were one of the few things involving a lot of people that she liked. Most everyone was able to be a bit more loose and outgoing at Gathers. She always figured it was because you never had to see most of the people again if you didn't want to. Back to what she'd beenShe forced her expression to fall a bit as if something had just occured to her. "Oh, but is Pettahth okay with it?"

Nephele met K'sel's eyes coolly, despite the surprise she was hiding. He was really forcing her to rethink some of her opinions about him. She looked away at the end of his explanation and stepped forward with the line. Her mind had snagged on the fact that he'd used the past tense when referring to friends. The desire to ask why he didn't claim to have any now was present but she tried to ignore it. Instead she said, "You know, there's more ways to have fun than just drinking. Swimming, dancing, whatever strikes your fancy." She grinned slightly as she realized both of the activities she'd just mentioned she was horrible at. It could be taken as amusement over her next words.

"Not to mention there's a lot of sex in the weyr," she added teasingly. Oh yes, she remembered what he'd said to Erilena during that tuber peeling chore. Nephele must have been in a good mood that day. She even turned to face him more clearly and removed her hand from his arm to make a face at him. So she hadn't necessarily intended to make a face but it had been the perfect opportunity to remove the physical contact factor. Not to mention that dropping that word on a guy normally had them thinking about it and it was fun to tease him even further by removing her hand.

[Lotty]

"Oh yes. Indeed you are, " K'sel replied casually as possible. He tried to not make any notice of it...but it....it felt like for a moment she was being nice to him, and he was much, much more suspicious of when the girl was doing so than any other time, but before he could turn an accusatory stare at the girl, he was caught by her question. For some reason he was much less surprised that she showed concern for Pettahth. Somehow - despite the creature being a complete butthead - he managed to endear himself to everyone and thing. K'sel needed to learn his dragon's secrets, "No he's fine with it. He likes Nuoth, so that helps your case..." Not that it mattered anyway. He was the one in charge, not the dragon...most of the time.

As the weyrling stepped up in line he was hardly bothered by Nephele's rejection of his arm. To tell the truth, he didn't really want to do anything that could be misconstrued as affection around the girl, and offered the arm in the first place out of politeness. Yes, he did act polite, he did know etiquette, he was very well trained in such things and occasionally the vestiges of this past found themselves cropping up in the oddest situations and almost always around girls. Hmmm. Funny.

With his arm free he was able to gesture to the server that he needed two glasses and with a nice directed poke he signaled the nice wine too...the unintentional spending spree was to continue. Now he had officially spent five marks on the girl, the price of peace was higher than he had initially imagined, but he would admit that it was worth it. He liked that they were getting along just this once and kept quiet as he pulled out the marks and handed them over. He could have easily argued the point about swimming and dancing...he did like both of those things just fine, just not as much as he liked...

Oh wait what? He had just lifted the two glasses of wine off the counter and turned on his heel to offer one to the girl when he found himself not frozen, but most definitely a little shocked by what Nephele had said. Now why would she go and talk about sex like that? He jutted his hand forward in the hopes that she would take her glass quickly and they could walk away before he could say something so classically K'sel. Too late, "Oh, so I take it you've been getting plenty then?" He shared with her the same teasing tone that she had offered him and cocked his head to the side. He was quite curious to hear her counter.

[Ember]

Nephele's brows rose slightly in surprise as she digested that bit of information. Pettahth liked Nuoth? She turned her face away and hid a smile behind her hand. What would the green think of that? If anything Nuoth would probably shy away more from Pettahth. Since both dragons were fond of each other the green wouldn't want to push Pettahth away with her occasional moodiness. Nuoth had a harder time getting close to others than even she did. "Nuoth is fond of Pettahth," she told the brownweyrling.

Nephele actually thought she knew the reason why, though Nuoth had long since forgotten exactly why. The girl was convinced it had something to do with the night when she'd been sick and Pettahth had indirectly helped through K'sel. No need to bring up that night though. She'd successfully evaded that subject - with a little help from whats-his-name - and she would not be the one to remind K'sel of it.

The girl watched as her companion (so strange to apply that word to K'sel) selected and paid for the wine. Tsk. Why the expensive stuff? If the guy went broke it wasn't her fault. Its not like she was markless. She'd actually be willing to bet she was one of the richest in her weyrling class. Her manipulative side was rather pleased about what was going on though. She'd just gotten a guy to spend marks on her after all.

As he turned to her and offered the class she smirked slightly at his expression. Had she surprised him? She took the glass and sipped from it a little bit before responding to his question. "With an immature dragon, how could I? Although now that Nuoth has hit the right age..." she pretended to be considering it when she was really just checking his reaction. Why what he'd think of it mattered to her she had no idea...