Date: Midsummer 798 ------- Location: Greyleigh Manor, St. Loomis
Midsummer's Night has come to St. Loomis, and the gates of Greyleigh Manor have been opened wide for celebration. All are welcome this night!
(Eoforwynn): Summer has arrived in the new Principality of Innithel, bringing with it a damp heat that settles over the land like a wet blanket steaming by the fireside. But all day a sense of excited energy has thrummed through the streets of St. Loomis, and despite the muggy warmth there seemed to be an extra bounce in everyone's step as they went about their daily affairs. Through the gates of Greyleigh Manor even more bustle and excitement were afoot, as the entire staff looked to be engaged in preparations for a sizeable celebration, stringing garlands and lanterns, fetching kindling from the woods, cooking in the kitchens and laying out tables -- with frequent recourse to a bit of refreshing ale to get them through the warmth of the afternoon.
But the coming of evening produces a shifting of the winds and a pleasantly cool breeze to relieve the swelter, and now the stars twinkle with a mellow light through a fine haze of clouds. With the last glow of the sun vanished and the turquoise dusk transmuted to the sapphire of night, the gates of the manor are opened wide to all.
Midsummer Night is here!
(Velusiyen): Never one to miss a celebration, and still less one to allow anyone else of her acquaintance to miss it, Lucy Mudlark is out and about in St. Loomis, calling out to all and sundry as she tromps energetically around. There are a great deal of all and sundry to call out to, given the activity that has reigned all across town since sundown. Lamps burn brightly upon doors and candles in windows, lighting the way for the many people who traipse merrily through the streets -- visiting the houses of the wealthier sort, where simple fare is set out upon tables, singing and laughing with family and friends, and all chattering excitedly among themselves. Having circled back around to her home neighborhood after making the circuit of Painter Street and the Wollock, Lucy's own shouts now echo along Beacon Row with extra familiarity.
"OI!" she belts out, as she stops beneath one second-story window. "Goody Angold! You told me not to let you fall asleep, but I bet you did, so here's your wake-up call!"
"OI!" she yells out, turning now to face a dingy doorway in the opposite direction. "Goodman Harl! Better finish gettin' the littles put together; pretty sure I saw Himmie runnin' off to the manor already. He'll prolly get lost in the woods if he ain't got someone to tie a string to him!"
"OI!" She's at the edge of Fountain Square now, where the town council has provided a tidy little extravaganza of candied nuts and slinkets. "Caddie! You're not gonna have any room left for fire cakes if you don't quit stuffin' your face with slinkets!"
(Yasin): In spite of all the excited energy in the air, at least one man seems -- for the moment -- to be completely oblivious to it. Yasin.
Instead, he is hunched over the anvil at the Silver Street Wagonyard, tapping a large, iron wagonwheel rim with a hammer while he rotates it in deliberate, minute adjustments. The heat of the forge cools gently behind him, mirroring the easing temperature of the evening. And yet he forges on.
Clang! Another precise strike of hammer against metal as he works to correct a warped section.
"Told him he should be more careful overloading the thing," Yasin mutters to himself in Sirdabi, sweat beading at his brow. He gives another few taps, nudging the rim further into its intended shape.
Then he lifts up the rim and holds it against the wooden wheel propped nearby. "Close..." He mutters in careful scrutiny.
(Velusiyen): Passing through the square, Lucy waves to various other people whom she must know, but graciously leaves off OI-ing at them since they're already headed in the right direction -- north, and presumably towards the manor. She herself pauses by the fountain basin, dabbling her fingers through the water as she glances irresolutely to south and west. Her head tilts thoughtfully for a moment, but then her eyes narrow as she casts a faintly suspicious glance off down Post Street.
With an uncertain frown, Lucy mutters to herself, "Nah... no one would really be workin' at this hour, today... not even him." But this assertion doesn't seem to actually carry much weight even to she who has muttered it, and there's a questioning sort of '.. Right?' in her eyes as she frowns westward. After just another instant of indecision she heaves a long sigh, and determinedly heads off towards the intersection with Silver Street.
(Tabithah): Over at the manor itself, people are already streaming more or less steadily in through the gates under the watchful eye of the young guard Texen, who looks faintly disgruntled by the fact of not being allowed to perform his bounden duty of denying entry to almost all who should wish to pass. But standing not far from him is a somewhat more welcoming presence in the form of Tabby the little brown-haired maidservant, who greets each visitor with a shy nod and the handing out of a single flower from the many bright blossoms she carries in a basket over her arm.
Every now and then, whenever the flow of guests lessens, she turns first to peer over her shoulder at the manor courtyard, then ahead to look off down the street for oncoming arrivals. Dressed just as usual in her particolored kirtle of mist grey and green, and with her ordinary quietly self-effacing manner, she seems quite muted compared to those already beginning to engage in revelry around the fires behind her. But her sea-green eyes sparkle with an excited light, and every now and then one foot begins to tap along as one of the minstrels setting up on a platform along the manor house drive gives a few merrily experimental saws on a rebec, or a cheery tootle from a fife.
(Yasin): But indeed he is working at this day, even at this hour. Perhaps he's simply grown oblivious to the passing time. He shifts his jaw in critical consideration of his work, and the look in his honey-brown eyes seems to say, 'Just one more adjustment...'
So, back to the forge and anvil with the wheel rim in hand. "Must've gone into that ditch after the river," Yasin mutters to himself, diagnosing the cause of the warping (who knows if his diagnosis is accurate). Some light heat is applied to the rim, before he shifts back to some careful tapping. In this last bout of tapping, he is fully and utterly focused. There may as well be nothing going on around him, no noticeably reduced chatter in the street outside as neighboring residents and other workers wander in the approximate direction of the manor, no gentle evening breeze signifying the close to the work day. Just a man, his hammer, and a stubborn wheel rim. With a loud 'Tink!' sound, his hammer strikes the shape once more.
Surely he'll be done soon and realize the time, yes?
(Ziyad): Tap, tap, tap. The sound isn't loud, but it's insistent. Ziyad raps his knuckles against the wheelwright's gate while he stands planted just outside the compound peering through to stare at Yasin's figure. Tap, tap, tap. The sound grows louder to compete with the metallic pings of the smith's hammer.
"Yasin! Did you forget what day this is?" Ziyad calls out, stopping his tapping to beckon at his friend. "If you stay here all night like you so often do, you're going to miss all the festivities. I already seem plenty of people streaming down the streets towards Greyleigh manor while I was walking here to get yet." The young scholar gestures to Yasin's sooty apron. "Get cleaned up, and we can both walk there together. Maybe all three of us, if Ighlaf also shows up to remind you. I bet Ighlaf also realize you'll lose track of time without someone to drag you free of this place."
(Yasin): Yasin blinks through his hammer striking, that repetitive tapping likely competing for awareness and attention. He looks upward, then notices Ziyad and smiles in a distracted way as he listens.
And listens.
And his expression falters on his face as the realization begins to set in.
"Oh no." He mouths at first. "What-- what time is it?" He asks, even as he looks past Ziyad to the look of the approaching evening outside. "Oh, no." And the smith looks nowhere near close to ready, the very picture of labor with his sooty apron, his soot-stained hands, his kaftan wrinkled underneath the apron, sweat both fresh and dried on his face.
He's still for several moments, before he suddenly whirls into motion, putting away tools, setting the in-progress (nearly there!) wheel rim to the side, snuffing out the forge, and several hurried sweeps of coal clinkers to the side. "I'll just need a moment!" he calls out to Ziyad while he rushes to and fro in the shack. He gives a vigorous rub of a cleaning rag to the anvil, and then seems poised to rush right outside the wagonyard. "I'll find you and Ighlaf later!" he promises in his mad movements towards the gate.
He does pause, however, in his rush to give a delighted grin Ziyad's way. "Hope you're ready to dance, my friend."
(GM): OOC: The scene fades to black.