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Harper's Tale - Thursday, July 04, 2002, 6:39 PM
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Archive Vault
A cool dry chamber kept sealed when not being used for research, the shelves are full of volumes of every description and subject. Birth and death records, songs, even kitchen recipies from the last Pass can be found catalogued and stored here. A few sturdy worktables allow for students and masters to spread out their projects in comfort.
The scent of old books and a little bit of must pervades the room, tickling your nose with antiquity.
To the southwest, you see two people.
Watching from a high ledge are four firelizards.
Snip is here.
Obvious exits:
Main Hall and Ballroom

Ke'chara blinks in from ::between::!

Liesana is hidden in the back of the Archives, holed up in a properly-spinner-webbed corner with a thick legal textbook and a glowbasket. Hiding? You betcha.

Snip is the expert at hiding. You can't escape him. He prowls silently through the shelves and behind tables, creeping up near Liesana but staying silent, just watching through two books at what she's reading.

Ah, but Liesana's been getting more and more paranoid over the past sevenday. Having the Crafthead shadow you everywhere but the privy is... disconcerting, to say the least. Every now and again, her eyes glance up from the book, flicking around with a twitchy suspicion before returning to read. "Who's there?" she calls at last, listening to the silence and then giving a nervous little laugh.

Snip knows not to duck down too fast, and instead picks up a seed, throwing it at a firelizard lurking in the rafters to startle it into moving.

Liesana startles, jumping halfway out of her seat before attempting to relax with a forced effort. "Get a hold of yourself, Liesana," she murmurs. "Going to find yourself under Jathen's tender care." She pauses, and then eyes the air philosophically. "Talking to yourself is a very bad sign, you know."

Snip pops up on Liesana's other side in that time and chirps "Are you all right, Liesana?" he asks, glancing up with a competetly innocent look.

"Snip." Sighs Liesana at last, weakly, too young and healthy to suffer coronary failure. "I hate you. How long were you there, and why are you /spying/ on me? Huh? /Huh/?" Another nervous laugh. "It's Master Jueann, isn't it? She put you up to it? Yes?"

Sadahl saunters in from the Main Hall and Ballroom.

"Oooh, look who's paranoid now..." singsongs Liesana, before giving another little laugh. "Spying is a perfectly innocent word, you know." A grandiose sweep of her hand towards the bookshelves. "Look it up!" she cackles, before coughing, and regaining her poise. "Er, sorry. Bit of stress. Ah, so how are you, apprentice Snip?"

Sadahl swings open the door with a firm push of his hand, sending a small whirl of dust bunnies in all directions. Lips curl in smile as he spies Liesana -- singing? " Liesana?" he asks, voice trailing, before glancing in Snip's direction. " Is she okay? I don't think it's good to spy on people." Sadahl is into mischief, but not particularly that kind.

Snip lifts a brow. "Have you been into the wine or something, Liesana?" at her mention of 'spying' the little 'apprentice' nearly jumps out of his skin. "Quiet! Have you gone insane? What is your problem anyway?"

"Oh, how I wish I had been..." sighs Liesana to Snip in all seriousness, before twitching as someone else speaks up. "Oh..." she sighs again. "It's only you, Sadahl. No, I'm fine. Just fine. Never better! After all, it's not /every/ fortnight that you're stalked by the Istan Crafthead herself..." She trails off, mutering to her law book things along the lines of "Every waking minute... Only place she /hasn't/ followed is the necessary..."

" Who's stalking you?" Sadahl asks, surprised, before noticing the other apprentice. " Oh. Hey. I'm Sadahl." Is his great introduction, before attentions once again turn towards Liesana. " Why would anyone be stalking you?" He folds his arms across his chest; " That's just ... that makes me angry."

Sadahl saunters to the Main Hall and Ballroom.

Snip disappears as fast as he appeared while Liesana is distracted, ducking out so nobody sees him, going back to behind a bookshelf, listening in.

Liesana sighs and huddles in her chair, hugging her Law text for reassurance and leaning her head against the wall. "No, Sadahl..." she corrects in a worn-out voice. "It's Master Jueann that's stalking me, and as she ranks me, she can do whatever she sharding well pleases, so long as it doesn't touch my Charter rights. But I just wish she'd tell me /why/..."

Leyte> Kurt stalks in through an arch from the great hall.

Leyte> Jueann walks out of the harper office.

Leyte> Kurt drops down from hanging upside down again, arriving inches from Jueann's face. "Allo Master Jueann!"

Leyte> Jueann blinks and jumps back. "Kurt! You'll be the death of me yet." Looking at the vault, "So is Liesana hiding from me?"

Leyte> Kurt shrugs, still upside down. "Dunno. Been avoiding her, actually. No refuge here."

Leyte> Jueann chuckles, "Well, what do you think? Should I cook her a bit more well done?"

Leyte> Kurt shakes his head. "Are you forgetting that she was a little cracked from the whole Bitran incident? Making her afraid she's going to lose her rank might send her over the edge and what kind of master would she make then?"

Leyte> Jueann chuckles, "Shhh..... All masters need to deal with stress. You very well know. Any idea where she could be?"

Leyte> Kurt shrugs "But there's good stress and bad stress. This is bad stress." this coming from the guy who's upside down. "Probably in the archives. Dunno what you're expecting to get out of her. Making a person nervous is one thing, but she's slid off her bread. I think you ought to stop it before you start to do damage."

Leyte> Jueann hmms, "Maybe you're right. Then again.... I seem to recall what you went through for your mastery."

Liesana shakes her head at the silence, and then returns to her reading, her foot tapping a twitchy and irritating beat against the floor, nearly in tempo with her pulse. Her face is schooled to serenity, however, as she continues to turn the pages of her book at a methodical rate. Whether she's actually reading is another matter entirely.

Snip frowns, sitting on the floor where he hides. An unknowing apprentice comes along, and trips over his legs, falling face down on the floor, sending books flying everywhere loudly.

"Bloody Great Faranth!!" suddenly startles Liesana, her book flying to the floor with a thud almost equal to that of the hapless app as she springs to her feet, the noise likely to echo out the Vault doors. She then sighs and leans against a bookshelf, catching her breath in a bit of panting, before inhaling, exhaling, and turning a longsuffering air on the apprentice. "Please," she pleads. "Kindly remember that there are some of us in here trying to /work/?"

Leyte> A heavy and resounding pair of *THUMPS* can be heard emanating from the Archives. Probably just apprentices.

Leyte> Kurt shrugs "I'm a workaholic. Liesana is not. She doesn't handle things the same way."

Leyte> Jueann smiles, "Ohh I don't know, she tends to have her hand in alot of things. Have you seen the reports on her work?"

Leyte> Kurt shakes his head. "No."

Leyte> Jueann smiles and shrugs, "You should when you get a chance." Changing the subject, "So how's Kurrin? And Aerrin?"

Snip covers his face with his hands. "Sharding clutz! What are you trying to do, bring the place down?" he hisses, scurrying away before Liesana finds him.

Liesana eyes the young apprentice, looking quite crestfallen at having spooked a ranking Harper, and just... sighs again. "Oh, go on then Chienen. I'm not going to assign you work. Just pick up what you dropped." She then returns to her chair.

Leyte> Kurt frowns. "I don't agree with what you're doing, Master Jueann. Fun is fun, but there's a line." is this the first time Kurt's actually opposed his Mentor's decisions? "Kurrin is getting big. He'll probably be bigger than Kris when he grows up. Aerrin is as lovely as ever." still upside down, he folds his arms over his chest.

Leyte> Jueann shrugs, "There are reasons for it, Kurt. If you'll excuse me, I'll return to the office and the paperwork waiting for me."

Leyte> Kurt frowns and drops to the floor, watching Jueann with a frown as he stalks into the rehearsal hall.

Leyte> Jueann walks into the harper office.
Leyte> Kurt stalks to the Archive Vault.

Kurt stalks in from the Main Hall and Ballroom.

Liesana is in the very back of the Archives, still. She's actually calmed down somewhat, with the uninterrupted silence and the salve of turns-old writing for her nerves.

Kurt drifts into the vault, scowling. He's searching for something that isn't Liesana though, and sees it way way up on one of the shelves. With a spring, he vaults himself up, scaling the shelves until he can reach it, like a black clad crawlie.

Liesana hears the scuffling of a climbing Kurt, but the noise is slight enough that it only intrudes gradually on her senses. Absently, distantly, she intones "You'd probably better get a ladder. Janlis will be /ever/ so upset if you muss up his books. And since I'll likely be broken back to organizing duties in a day or two..."

Kurt lifts a brow, twisting akwardly to face her. "What are you talking about?"

Liesana sighs, and glances up from her book, looking pale and confused and nervous, and not at all her usual self. "What do you /think/ I'm talking about?" she intones. "Either I'm crazy, Master Jueann is crazy, or I'm about to be royally reamed, and I don't know what /for/." That last bit is apparently the worst, to the legist who's accustomed to being able to puzzle out anything she sets her mind to.

Kurt snorts. "You're crazy." is all he says, getting his book and fumbling as his hand twitches, sending the book pitching to slam on a table far below. Kurt scrabbles to get a handhold again, his foot slipping, but he gets it under control quickly enough, crawling down. "I can think of at least a hundred things." he says, perching on a bench at his table. "But I doubt Jueann could."

Snip has disconnected.

Liesana snorts. "You are /so/ reassuring, Kurt, you know that?" she intones dryly. But at least it's a flash of humour. "But honestly, she won't even tell me what she's nosing about /for/... Now correct me if I'm wrong, but aren't we supposed to point out what folks need to work on, so that they can actually /improve/? I don't get it. And she's /stalking/ me. I have a feeling she's going to turn up in my quarters next."

Kurt shrugs. "Lock the door. Ask her flat out. I don't like what she's doing but I suppose I'm in no position to contest her actions. Besides, with Master Ulisia around, I have to mind my manners."

Liesana's eyes narrow slightly, some little bit of court law training tingling even in the middle of a funk. "You don't like what she's doing..." she echoes. "Which means... that you have to know enough to know what she's doing. Give!."

Kurt scampers off the bench and away from Liesana, shaking his head. "Can't..."

Liesana is suddenly neatly on her feet and dancing around Kurt, blocking his route to the door and making full use of her four inches of height on him to attempt to look menacing. And, strung out as she is, it might even be plausible. "Can't is not a word in my dictionary." she notes. "Spill."

Kurt backs up against the wall, looking up at Liesana with just his eyes, slightly nervous. He shakes his head quickly. "Sorry. Can't." and he quickly makes a move to try and run past her.

Liesana steps forwards until she's a bare six inches from Kurt's face. Leaning down, with just a hint of madness glinting in her eyes, she whispers menacingly that "For the past two sevendays, my life has been gone over with a finetoothed comb. I have been questioned on everything from my duties to my ability to look after myself. I have had reports about me from my bloody /apprentice/ /days/ brought up and raked across the coals. I get the feeling that I'm being watched every second of the day. So if you know /why/, my old friend, I suggest you /tell/ me, before I lose what little sanity I have left."

Kurt backs up as far as he can go, hands reaching behind him to feel his way along as his dark eyes look up, locked on hers. Mind racing, he tries a new tactic. Looking away from her he looks over her shoulder and widens his eyes, drawing in a breath softly as if seeing something there.

Liesana catches the look and suddenly... twitches. "She's not there." she intones, her tempo rapidly speeding up. "There's nothing there at all. You're just trying to trick me so you can get away... You're probably reporting to her. /All/ of you Masters are in on this... I bet that stunt in the ballroom was a setup, wasn't it? Eh? Eh? C'mon, tell me the /truth/, dammit! Why is she out to get me? What did I /do/?" And this whole time, she hasn't backed away from Kurt.

Kurt smiles, tilting his head to the side cutely. "No setup. No conspiracy..." he reaches up to poke her on the nose, then silently summons Nightshade, who blinks in from between and quietly flutters down to a table behind them. Looking around and seeing no food the crazy old bronze gets onto his back legs and lets out a sudden irritated screeeeeeeeech.

"Eeep!!" suddenly yelps Liesana, whirling away at the screech of the bronze and then glaring. "Ooooh, that is so not fair. All I want is an explanation." And then, suddenly, shockingly, Liesana is... crying? Yep. Two little tears escape as she slowly sinks into a miserable little hiddle on the floor.
hiddle/huddle

Kurt blinks, then shakes his head. "I'm sorry, Liesana. I don't know what to say." he sinks to his knees on the floor beside her, sitting back on his heels. "It's not you. You're not crazy and you're not going to be demoted."

Jueann walks in from the Main Hall and Ballroom.

Liesana's more frustrated then upset, and more embarassed than anything at having lost control of herself, and in front of /Kurt/, of all people. So it's with her face hidden in her hands that she speaks up, muffled-sounding. "Then what's going on? And why won't anyone just /tell/ me? I don't think I'm a bad Harper... I've always tried my best for the Craft, even if I don't really do things traditionally. Why is she doing this to me?" Mastery Exams haven't occured to her. Liesana, after all, is still young, and Mastery Exams, in any case, only last 4 hours or so.

Kurt frowns, reaching out a slim hand to touch her shoulder, but hovers there for a moment, then retracts. "It's all right." he says quietly, folding his hands in his lap. "You're not a bad Harper. I can't tell you because until a short while ago I didn't know that all this was going on. You're not being demoted." he reinterates. "In fact..." he reaches out to carefully lift her chin so that she'll look at him as he reaches up and unfastens his knot.

Liesana doesn't say anything yet, but does drop her hands to her own lap and let Kurt lift her chin. Amber eyes regard him steadily, despite a little bit of standing water in them that makes them glisten in the glowlight of the Vault. Her expression is a guarded one, hope warring with distrust and confusion, but at last she tilts her head enough to give a faintly inquiring "Oh?"

Kurt looks down, pulling his knot off, and adjusting it slightly. "I want you to have this. You've earned it." Sure, he could have given her the new one in his pocket, but this one has a history. He gives her a weak smile as he reaches over to flick off her old knot, holding the double corded, double looped knot with one tassle between his slim fingers.

Jueann walks in as Kurt passes his knot, "Jumping the start a bit Kurt? I thought it was agreed we wait until all the reports are in before we promote her." she seems to be smiling.

And now it's time to see Liesana faint! Or... not quite. But the stressed-out young woman is looking decidedly wobbly all of a sudden. Good thing she's on the floor, no? "You... you... you..." she stammers weakly, before taking a breath and tring it again, more slowly. "You mean... a /Mastery/? But... I haven't had an Exam, or studied, or submitted a thesis, or, or... anything."

Kurt shrugs. "I think what Jueann put you through is good enough." he looks over his shoulder, lowering his brows as said master enters. "I think she's been through enough torture, don't you?" he asks, still offering the knot. "If you don't want it..." he says, starting to move it away slowly, smirking.

Jueann chuckles, "Liesana, dear heart, I'm sorry for the *torture* but I was giving you your mastry exam. Kurt here, just didn't agree with it. I don't blame him, I found it a tad distasteful but it was needful. Now what to do with it? we can't cheat the other masters their fun or the apprentices...."

Liesana's hand snaps out to lock around Kurt's wrist, and the slowly withdrawing knot with a firm grasp. "Ohhh no you don't." she intones to him, looking amused despite the tired slump of her shoulders. "Not if I'd have to undergo another repeat of such an 'Exam' as I've just had. Bah, and the /Smiths/ think they've got it hard." she shakes her head, before leaning back against the wall and letting him withdraw. Jueann is given a considering look. "Well... we're Harpers, right...? No need for me to let on to anyone that I know what I'm not supposed to know..." she offers.

Kurt scoots a little closer, offering her the knot anyway. "Congratulations, Liesana...you're a Master now. You earned it. Now cheer up...you've got some celebrating to do."

Jueann chuckles, "But not until tomorrow. The masters are still fighting over who gets to Walk you. Oh well, they're going to kill Kurt but what else is new?"

Liesana gives a tired, but ecstatic little grin, and slowly gets to her feet. "Celebrating? /Sleep/ is more like it, at least for tonight," she winks, muffling a yawn that's apparently cropped up just at the suggestion. "I am totally beat. But /thank/ you. I... wasn't expecting this at all." she admits.

Kurt looks up, still on his knees. "You're welcome...goodnight."

Jueann smiles, "Night Liesana. Congratulation on your promotion."

With another flash of that tired but jubilant grin, Liesana stands the rest of the way, and makes for the doorway. Just before stepping out, however, the newly-minted Master takes a moment to center herself, and then slopes out in a fairly good replica of the vaguely harried slink she'd adopted for the past week or two.