Where my feet lead me [Jourdan]

[Kasia nó Gentian]

The day had dawned uneventfully- though what could be eventful for a dawn I wasn't sure- and I'd woken not long after that as usual. So far there was nothing about the day that was standing out extraordinarily so I'd dressed in a tiered skirt and blouse with a tunic over it and went to get breakfast. I'd gone with Felicja a couple of days ago to choose a gown for my debut and it was currently hanging in the small armoire in my room but I wasn't inclined to try it on again; it fit and I didn't want to muss the fabric yet.

With nothing else in mind to do I let my feet lead me where I would, looking around with mild interest as I wandered the halls. The assignation chambers were off limits unless we had reason to be there but everywhere else was free to be seen and I soon found myself in something of a gallery filled with various tools of fortune-telling and seeing. Cards, stones, pendulums, even some of the more exotic tools were all on their shelves or hanging from hooks and I simply looked at them closely, waiting to see if I would feel any kind of inclination toward them.

[Jourdan nó Heliotrope]

It had been a few days after my debut and life felt wonderful. I'm certain the spring air contributed to that: the flowers, the sunshine, the emerald hue of the grass. I felt like just getting out and visiting someone. I was certain who, for I knew few people outside of the night court. Of course I could always greet one of them. My thoughts turned to Kasia, a Gentian that I had met once or twice and we seemed to get along well. So I walked over to Gentian and asked if she was in. I told to wait and someone would let her know she had a visitor.

[Kasia nó Gentian]

It wasn't a usual thing for me to have visitors, at least not ones who called on me formally- generally Camille would just come up to my room, and of course my sister lived in the adept's quarters, so they had no need to. When one of the other trainees found me though, muttering about how I was only ever where I was supposed to be half of the time, I was told that a Heliotrope adept wanted to see me. Did I know any Heliotropes? Jourdan, of course, but he'd been a trainee about my own age- but that didn't mean he hadn't debuted and I didn't keep track of him the same way I did my closer friend Camille so that was entirely possible.

Without any argument or even hesitation I let my classmate tell me where I was supposed to go and meet him, then went to the room and stepped inside, my slippered feet making scarcely any sound against the floor. "Oh, it is you, Jourdan," I said with a happy, distracted smile, cocking my head slightly and looking at him for a moment. I hadn't seen him terribly recently but he was nice enough and I considered him something of a friend even if I didn't know him terribly well yet. "Rupert said you're an adept now. I didn't know or I would have sent a note to say congratulations."

[Jourdan nó Heliotrope]

I smiled when Kasia came in and I stood up. I nodded at what she said. "I am, and it's quite alright. It was a rather quiet affair anyway. And I hear that you are not far away from your debut. I wish you the best and hope that it's a night you will always remember." My expression was kind and I sat down again.

[Kasia nó Gentian]

"Well, it may be alright but I still should have checked," I replied in a matter-of-fact tone as I sat down as well and turned slightly to face him. "It's very nice of you to worry about my debut though. I'm not sure what exactly it will be, or when, but that's probably because I don't want to look at my cards and ruin the surprise, or get the wrong meaning from them. It seems as though it would be unfair." Smiling a bit more brightly I clasped my hands in my lap and considered my companion for a moment, wondering if anything about his assignation would come to me. Generally things didn't unless I had my tools in my hands though. "Being handsome and matching your House so well I expected everything would go as you hoped. Did it?" My tone was mildly curious, which matched my thoughts well because I did want to know how he'd fared. "I should offer you a drink. Do you want something?"

[Jourdan nó Heliotrope]

When she questioned me about my debut I smiled again. "Oh yes! It was beautiful, perfect really, all I hoped. I don't really know why I was so worried. I don't know if you remember that I postponed this by a year." I briefly considered what sort of drink I wanted. "A light wine would be nice, thank you."

[Kasia nó Gentian]

"I remembered that you'd postponed it, but not why," I replied calmly, standing up again and walking over to where a few bottles of wine were stored in a cabinet, then pulling one down and pouring a glass for him before putting the bottle away again and bringing it over. "But then I suppose my own must have been postponed too, though really no one ever planned it at all before now. Perhaps they were waiting for something, or hoping that I'd get ruined and they wouldn't have to worry about marketing my oddness." Every House had competition among most of the adepts and for some reason there was a good bit of hope that I'd scar myself in some accident or flit away in the night and become a disgrace. I wasn't sure why. Sitting down again I held the glass toward him, waiting unblinking for him to take it.

[Jourdan nó Heliotrope]

I took the glass from her and sipped it. It was quite good. However the more she spoke the more my head cocked a little, finding what she had to say interesting, if not confusing. "That's a horrid thing to say, Kasia!" I told her. "I know you have your quirks but would they really want that?"

[Kasia nó Gentian]

Jourdan's reaction surprised me somewhat and I wondered if I'd said something I wasn't supposed to- but it was already said anyway. "I don't know if it's horrible or not but it's true," I said, focusing a bit more on him but not really perturbed except by the idea that he may have thought I was lying. "Though because I'm so strange I think fewer of them are worried about me taking their patrons. That's the only reason, because they're not sure if I'll be a better fortune-teller or adept than them and they don't want to lose their places. It's almost a compliment, but a confusing one." I blinked once, slowly, and then kept my eye on him as I waited for his thoughts. Perhaps Heliotrope didn't work the same way as Gentian.

[Jourdan nó Heliotrope]

Hmm well I had no reason to doubt her. I didn't seem right though, to think such about a fellow servant. "I see ... I suppose I'm not used to such a thing, not in Heliotrope. We're all too fond of one another. And love is not a skill such as fortunes," I explained. "Nevertheless I wish you success." I raised my glass and offered her a smile.

[Kasia nó Gentian]

"That's very nice, thank you," I replied, giving him a smile as he raised his glass since I hadn't made one for myself. It hadn't been that long since I'd had breakfast and I simply wasn't thirsty yet, at least not for wine. If I'd had to guess though I thought Jourdan still looked a little worried and I reached out to lay my hand on top of his free one lightly and giving him a slightly more sympathetic smile. "I guess I shouldn't have said that, should I? Don't worry though, I think I'm more clever than anyone expects me to be. I'm not worried at all really. Let's talk of better things, I don't want to make you leave too soon by saying the wrong thing again. Do you like the wine?"

[Jourdan nó Heliotrope]

I smiled at her blunt honesty. From most other people it would have been disturbing, but to me it simply added to her charm. "Oh I don't think you could do that." I sipped the wine again and smiled. "Oh yes it's quite good."

[Kasia nó Gentian]

"I'm glad you like it," I told him sincerely, giving Jourdan a wider smile before I slowly pulled my hand back from his and put it on my lap. "And thank you for understanding. I know it's hard at times, but you are a good person for trying." I meant that as well; most people either shut down their minds and simply responded to the most literal things I said, or got annoyed and didn't continue at all, but his boy was nicer. "Do you want to go walk around somewhere? It always seems a little confusing to sit in a room with someone without knowing what to say."

[Jourdan nó Heliotrope]

I nodded at the invite to go for a walk. "Yes, I think I would like that very much. I think any of the gardens in the morning are lovely, don't you?" I stretched, remembering just how early it was. "Lead the way."

[Kasia nó Gentian]

"The gardens are always supposed to be lovely, aren't they?" I asked in a mildly curious tone, cocking my head slightly and considering his observation. "But in the morning there's the dew and that makes it stand out a bit more and the weather is nice and cool which helps a lot." Smiling a bit more widely I offered Jourdan my hand to start leading him out. "Perhaps we'll see something unexpected."

[Jourdan nó Heliotrope]

I chuckled at the way she specified what I had said and I nodded. "Mayhap we will." I took her hand and started to walk out with her.

[Kasia nó Gentian]

The hallways were still quiet, probably because most of the adepts were still sleeping and the trainees all had their chores, but it would still be more calm in the garden. The trip wasn't a long one and as we walked at a steady pace I brought him to an ornate lattice-work door and pushed it open, then stepped out onto the steps. "I think almost everything is in bloom now, and there are some birds nesting over in the trees," I offered helpfully. "But perhaps we should go to the reflecting pool. They say that people can see things in the ripples sometimes."

[Jourdan nó Heliotrope]

The idea of the reflecting pool intrigued me and caused a smile to form. Of course, so did the fresh air, the morning twitter of the birds and the scent of the flowers. "What sorts of things?" I asked

[Kasia nó Gentian]

"Well," I said in a slightly wondering tone of my own, glancing at him out of the corner of my eye and smiling as I started toward the pond at a nice pace. It wasn't fast, but if you rushed past beauty most people didn't appreciate the blur the same way they would the details. "Sometimes it's used to tell fortunes in the ripples, or by the way the light dances across and makes pictures. If you drop leaves in they can drift over the surface in certain ways too. Then there's just that sometimes it has ducklings this time of year. What are you hoping to see?"

[Jourdan nó Heliotrope]

We took a leisurely pace through the gardens and it was nice, seeing the simply beauty around us. "I'm not sure, anything really. I like leaving the future to chance ... at the same time though maybe it can show us something else." I followed that with a smile as I thought about the way in which she described it. Even her words seemed to have magic in them. "Perhaps it can tell me ... tell me if I have anything to fear, from becoming an adept."

[Kasia nó Gentian]

His words drew me to look at him more intently for a moment, my head cocked slightly sideways and my fingers going to brush his cheek with a bare whisper of contact. It was easier to tell what people were thinking sometimes if you could feel their skin, which is perhaps how Gentians worked so much more easily that way. "Are you still worried then?" I asked sympathetically as we got nearer to the pond, my eyes on his as I squeezed his hand, the other at his cheek falling back to my side. "Because if you are I probably should be too, shouldn't I? You seem much more suited to being an adept than I am."

[Jourdan nó Heliotrope]

Her touch was a soothing comfort to me. "I am somewhat. But you should not be. I simply worry sometimes, that giving so much true love away will leave me frazzled, wore out in my heart before my time." I nodded. "You, Kaisa, you'll be wonderful. I don't need to see the future to know that much."

[Kasia nó Gentian]

The fact that he could be so nice while being worried was interesting to me and I smiled a bit more widely, patting his hand gently. "It's very nice of you to say so, even though you don't know for sure," I replied cheerfully, then spotted the reflecting pool and started to lead him toward the marble edge of it. "Do hearts really wear out? It sounds like it would be very sad indeed. Maybe it's only that they get so hard to listen to at times because they don't understand time."

[Jourdan nó Heliotrope]

She responded sweetly and then lead me to the edge of the pool. Her next statement made me cock my head. "I'm not entirely sure that I understand, Kasia."

[Kasia nó Gentian]

It wasn't unusual to me that people didn't understand me, so I simply knelt calmly by the edge of the water, dipping my fingertips in and then pulling them back out so the drops that fell made concentric ripples across the surface. "Well, if it's the heart that holds love, maybe the problem is that the heart can't let it go, so it keeps calling for it past when it should be. They don't know it's over even when us adepts have to let it be. I think it would be easier to just let the love go, then the heart wouldn't get so heavy."

Some of the ripples started to bump into each other, making new patterns, and I watched them for a moment before I looked back at Jourdan. "Maybe that's why adepts need friends. It's a sort of affection that doesn't weigh anything. It seems like once adepts take patrons their hearts get heavier unless they have someone to help them."

[Jourdan nó Heliotrope]

I nodded and smiled, looking at her tenderly. "Friends like you." I put my arm around her in a sort of half-embrace and watched the water as it moved about. "What do you see in there?"

[Kasia nó Gentian]

His hug, small though it was, did a good deal to remind me of his kindness and I was well aware of the warmth of his arm as I continued to watch the water. "Do you really want me to see?" I asked curiously, watching as the ripples, the light and a few leaves moved across the surface of the pool. It was a bit like reading tea leaves and scrying in a crystal mixed with mirror-seeing. "I don't want to scare you. I think you're the only friend I have right now and we all need friends."

[Jourdan nó Heliotrope]

"Well now you have to tell me, now that you've mentioned the word scared," I said, teasing a little. "There's nothing you can do to harm our friendship Kasia." Part of me was scared now, but I trusted her. Maybe because we were both in a similar situation.

[Kasia nó Gentian]

"Oh, I don't know that I'll see anything frightening but some people get nervous just because Gentians can see things and speak the truth even when it's not pretty," I replied, cocking my head slightly and giving him another smile, then turning back toward the water and watching it more intently. Perhaps I shouldn't have been so ready to see when I didn't know what would come to me but he was my friend and my mind was still my own, so my vision was too. I'd tell him the truth of what I saw and know that it would help him.

It took a moment to find the thing that drew me the most and I watched it for a moment, letting the symbols and pictures talk to me about Jourdan rather than all of the other things that wanted to speak. Him sitting next to me helped too. "Look, there's a rabbit, it means fair success, and it's near a tulip for health and constancy," I said after a moment, my eyes only slightly focused as they moved across the leaves floating on the water and the dancing light. "And that's Ehwaz right there, it's a rune that stands for a great tree. Be strong and patient and you will grow to reach great heights." A slight frown crossed my face as I looked at another ripple, then dipped a finger into it and watched the light shift slightly. "But you have to use your wits too and trust yourself. There's always the heart-eaters, the ones who want to see how much love can hurt, so keep watch for them. If you're careful though they can't hurt you."

[Jourdan nó Heliotrope]

Her words are what I might have expected, positive with a solid warning, or really more a piece of advice. In a sense it was confirmation of what I had always been told as a Heliotrope, as well as a positive outlook for the future. "Thank you, Kasia. See there was nothing to fear at all." I gave her a soft smile and a light kiss on the cheek. "I'll be just fine, so long as I'm careful of this," I said, placing my hand briefly over my heart.