Who

Realilina, Kanriel

What

Backscened 5 IC Days : Kanriel and his mother paint the walls of his father's old studio and have some bittersweet bonding moments while celebrating his nineteenth turnday.

Mild Swearing

When

-- On Pern --
It is 10:18 AM where you are.
It is mid-morning of the fifth day of the first month of the fourteenth turn of the 12th pass.
In Igen:
It is the sixty-fifth day of Winter and 26 degrees. It is a bright, sunny day.


Where

Igen Weyr, Crafter's Quarters, Erikkhan's Family Studio

OOC Date 21 May 2018 06:00

 

realilina_default.jpg Kan4.jpg

"You knew? Oh, and here I was thinking it was a surprise!"


spacer.png

Art Studio

The first thing to hit you when you step into this corner of the quarters is the smell. Despite the shuttered windows that are thrown open, temperature and Threadfall permitting, Turns of loving use have ingrained the unmistakable odors of a traditional artist's studio into every nook and cranny imaginable; noxious turpentine, raw linseed oil, acrid paint fumes, canvas newly-sized with rabbit-skin glue over fresh pine splints, ashy charcoal dust, greasy lanolin, and chalky gesso create a sensory cacophony to the uninitiated.

White-washed stone walls and ceiling, replete with copious sources of glow light, create the feeling of spaciousness. Deep shelves and cubbies carved into the left wall, typically locked behind a series of hinged doors, are stocked with a vast array of art supplies and a veritable horde of vibrant pigments and inks, porcine-bristle brushes, fibrous paper with rough edges, prepared canvases, and pungent containers of Faranth-only-knows-what are tightly but neatly packed into the compartments. Several bare wooden frames, some crafted with effortless mastery and others telling of a less seasoned but equally able hand, rest against the only blank part of the wall.

Along the right wall are a few easels (two of which are occupied by covered works in progress), a small shelf with a basin of clean water and rack housing drying brushes, and a drafting table styled as a desk. The table is currently populated with a variety of charcoals—powdered, compressed, willow, and vine—and littered with requisite paraphernalia: tortillons, black-dusted bread, and a dirtied piece of gauze seem to be the tools du jour.

The back wall has two doors and, between them, a drying stand for artwork completed by the particularly trusted and talented artists who have access to the studio.



In keeping with her recent theme of throwing their abode into complete and utter chaos, canvases, easels, and anything else that shouldn't get splatter-painted has been moved by Realilina to towards the front of the room and covered with stained tarps to prevent any accidents. The floor has also been covered for the occasion. The doors on the far wall, already whitewashed, have been left conspicuously bare. Over a pair of stained work boots and pants, Realilina has donned and rolled up the sleeves of a humorously oversized and ancient (in the literal, Oldworlder sense) tunic that, as evidenced by the ruckus of colors, has previously been worn for wall-painting forays. You can tell the woman means business, though, from the deftly done plait of her hair tied up into a bun. She's currently plopped on the floor tarp finishing mixing up paints, waiting for her son to come back and set his 19th Turnday celebrations into full swing.

Kanriel did have lessons this morning, but he's returning now, having completed his first stretch of classes for the day. He's been working like mad to make up for his absence with the mind healers. He's had to abandon his previous Journeyman Project because he was working on it heavily with his father before he died, and then, Kan had spent some time mentally unstable. The project is unfinishable now that Erikk isn't around for guidance. And so, He's been trying to figure that out too. He's determined to get his knot. And with this determination and drive, he hasn't planned anything for his turnday, in fact, it's the last thing on his mind as he makes his way home and steps in through the door that leads to what used to be Erikkhan's studio. Sesa had stripped it pretty bare when she cleaned things out. Mama's been slowly bringing things back, so, as is customary these days, Kan takes a breath before entering in preparation for any new relics his mother might have brought home. The scene that greets him confuses him. "Are we hosting a painting party?" He asks jokingly, his eyebrow raising in question as he runs a hand through his hair and moves to shut the door.
.
Realilina's son is fixed with a brilliant smile. When he turns to shut the door, she lines Kanriel up in the reticle of her mind's eye, and mimes flinging ochre paint with the mixing stick she's wielding as he turns back to face her. With an infectious giggle, she spryly pops from her seat and gestures broadly with the paint-covered utensil, "A Turnday painting party, you single-minded wherry! I suppose I shouldn't complain too much, what with you focusing on your studies and all, but…" she drops her voice to a conspiratorial stage-whisper, "You're nineteen today, Kanriel."

Kanriel would be lying later if he said he didn't flinch a little when his mother mimes flinging paint at him. However, his features brighten quite a bit when the words 'painting' and 'party' are used in the same sentence. He chuckles and fixes his mother with a lopsided, broad smile. "I know Mama." He walks up to give his mother a hug, having to stoop down to do so. Excitement drums through him as he looks around the room, eyes lingering on that one suspiciously blank white wall. "So….what are we painting?" He can guess, but it's faster if Mom just tells him.

"You knew? Oh, and here I was thinking it was a surprise!" Lina dramatically declares, feigning a pout that resolves when he grabs her for a hug. She returns it with one arm, holding the other covered in paint droplets to the side to avoid getting it on one of his few sets of clothes that aren't already paint-smattered. "I dunno, I was thinking maybe the wall," she responds to his query with a good-spirited wink, halfway dancing away from him to plop the mixing stick back in the tin of paint and throw an old, threadbare pair of Erikk's work clothes in his direction. Really, he's of a height to just be lifting from his father's wardrobe now, which Lina has also slowly been stocking his room with over the past few sevendays. "Put these on before you mess up your nice clothes. Shoo." She punctuates the word with a shooing motion and then goes to finish opening the windows of the room to prevent the buckets of paint from fumigating them.

Kanriel likes that idea! Very much. Though he rolls his eyes when his dad's old work clothes are thrown at him. What? He thinks paint would be an improvement to his current clothing. "Alright, alright, I'll be right back." He heads for the blank wall with two doors and disappears into the one that leads to their living quarters. He wanders through the living space and into his bedroom. Seeing his father's clothing appear in his wardrobe has been bittersweet. But, he likes the fact that he can fill them out and wear them, and it makes him feel a little closer to the man. He fingers the work clothes for a moment before changing into them and heading back to the studio. When he gets there, he's all smiles for the project ahead, rubbing his hands together while the slightly loose sleeves of Erikk's tunic hang off his arms. So what are we painting on there?" He jerks a thumb toward the wall.

Lina is poised and ready when he returns, dipping a wide brush with firm bristles into the container of rich carmine red. In the spirit of showing and not telling, she motions for him to get his ass out of the way before flicking the brush firmly at the wall, flinging a generous splatter at their blank canvas. "Ta-dah! C'mon, you didn't expect me to actually paint shapes, did you? You know I couldn't paint a circle if my very life depended on it." She's so very proud of herself for concocting this whole plan. "And I mixed together all these different colors. " Another skill acquired under her late husband's tutelage. She taps a foot against a container of Harper blue with a grin, "You know me, though, always one for the classics. But first!" She spins away again and hoists a bottle of Erikk's stashed Benden from the covered desk, hand sweeping up and offering an empty glass to her son. Her hazel eyes grow misty for a moment, a sappy, sentimental mother moment coming on. "Happy Turnday, Kanriel, love. I'm so, so happy to be sharing this day with you." She wiggles the bottle in his direction, throwing away apprentice drinking rules to the Thread for the sake of occasion, "Would you like to do the honors?"

Kanriel watches his mother fling paint at the wall, eyes growing rounder with his excitement. She'd NEVER have let him do this before, in fact, Kanriel is pretty sure there were SEVERAL instances of his mother losing her shit because he'd drawn or painted on the walls….or his sister. Eyes flick over the array of colors at their disposal and Kan is reaching for the first brush he can get his long fingered hands on. Eyebrows hike up at the sight of Benden wine in his mother's grasp. And when she asks him to do the honors, well, Kan doesn't have to be told twice! He takes the bottle from Lina and with a practiced motion taught to him by his late father, he pops the cork. The sweet, heady smell of a deep benden red fills the air. "Thanks mom."

Hey, she only really lost her shit that one time when she had to spend CANDLEMARKS trying to get paint out of a screaming, 5-Turn old Sesa's hair. "You're welcome, honey," Realilina replies, eyes twinkling. A look of motherly pride at her grown son is given as he pops open the bottle smoothly and she holds her glass out to be filled (she'll be damned if she didn't teach the boy to pour a lady a drink) and keeps it in place to tap it with his in a toast, then bringing it to her lips and taking a generous sip after a long whiff. Happy sigh coupled with a pang of loss. Not today, Lina, not today. She puts her glass down on the desk again and takes a breath to collect herself, trying her best to not the let the blip in her mood show. Now, they paint! A brush with Kanriel's favorite blue is offered to the young man as she considers her own next color.

Kanriel will indeed pour his mother a glass before getting his own! He's no cad! His mama taught him right! Kanriel may not notice his mother's blip in mood, because his is much the same. It's bittersweet. All of it. The clothes, the paint, the wine. But, it feels right somehow. He sips from the wine, and then takes the offered paintbrush and flings it's contents at the wall, a satisfying splat following as sprays of blue land on the wall. He dips it in the red next, careful to scrape off the blue first and lets it fly. There are still spots of purple where the colors mix.

She clears her throat, loosening the threatening tightness. Bittersweet, but right, indeed. "So, how's nineteen feel? Feel older yet? Wiser? Girls swooning any more?" Realilina teases good-naturedly, settling on a green just shy of lime. This she tosses at one of the doors, laughing as the paint splatters in a brilliant shower. She dips the brush again and repeats the process on the door to her workroom, squinting at Kanriel as he double-dips his brush. "There's one for each color," she points out, sticking out her tongue and wrinkling her nose before tossing the remaining paint on her brush in his direction. Let's be honest, it's only a matter of time before the colors are splattered into each other, anyway.

Kanriel gives a lazy shrug of his shoulders when Lina points out there's a brush for each color. "Does it really matter if we're just throwing it around?" He manages to get spattered with pain and seems completely ok with the idea as he doesn't flinch a smidgen. Still, he grabs the brush for a sunny yellow and flings its paint at the wall. Jackson Pollock would be proud, if he'd existed on Pern that is. He drops the brush back in the yellow and takes his red and blue bedecked brush closer to the wall, using his fingers he fans the bristles of the brush toward the wall, spraying it in a fine mist of blue, red and purple. His mother gets a raised eyebrow for the shade of green on the doors. But hey. Whatevs. This is art deco Harper Style. His brush goes back in the blue and paint sprays closer to the ceiling.

The 'does it matter' response gets another wave of paint flicked in Kanriel's direction. "Huh," is her response to the multicolor mist, which after a moment of consideration has her disregarding her own rules and dipping the brush for purple into its intended color on the right side and blue on the left, then flinging it over the bright green repeatedly until no more paint will come off to tone it down. She takes a finger and brings it back and forth across the door to her studio, blending dots of color together. She directs a more serious look in his direction, "Nineteen. We're going to get you your journeyman's knot if it kills up. What's the plan?" She knows the conundrum her son finds himself in with his project, of course, but he's got the learning and the talent to create something amazing. There's a gentle push of a oft-repeated desire for connection between her children when she suggests, "You could always go the 'rider route, too. I'm sure Sesa's class would be brilliant subjects."

Kanriel shrugs nonchalantly as he stares at the current effect they've had on the wall. "I'm trying to sort it out." He blanches a bit when Lina takes the 'Dad's J-man Project' route and goes a bit silent at mention of his sister. "That could be one way, but Sesa and I haven't spoken in over half a turn Mom." Kan shrugs. "And she'll be too busy to talk now anyhow." He drops his brush in a bucket and takes a sip from his glass before attacking the wall with a series of oranges, reds and yellows. This one will be bright.

Realilina wisely drops the subject of Sesa, whistling energetically as she fetches more paint to decorate the door. Pink, she decides, after a moment of hesitation. Splat splat splat! "I didn't mean to upset you. I just—I'm happy to help you, Kan. I know how much it means to you to make rank and I want you to succeed. We're finally… things are looking up, right?" She shifts her gaze to her son and smiles slightly, adding, "Plus, I know you're ready for it. It's just a matter of getting the stuffy Nowtime Harpers to approve a sharding project that isn't mind-numbingly dull."

Kanriel shrugs his shoulders before flinging a mauve and a periwinkle blue at the wall. "I'm not really…upset, Mom. Just…." Kanriel gives another rolling shrug of his shoulders before puffing out some air. "Sesa and I never got the chance to talk about anything, first because I was mad at her, honestly, I'm still mad at her. And Secondly, she was pretty unreachable during candidacy and the first parts of her weyrlinghood. And it's a while yet before she graduates. It's just awkward to think I could walk up and ask her a favor now Ma." As for the hall and his project. "I'm not worried about doing something the hall will approve, I just haven't decided what I'm doing to replace my old one yet. Give me another seven to explore my options ok?"

"We are going to have to give her Keiza eventually, you know," Realilina says, referencing one of the pups her son brought home not too long after he was freed from the mindhealers' lair, but she leaves it at that. "Oh, I like that periwinkle with the red!" She goes for the periwinkle herself, squatting down and painting with the brush along the edges of the door. "I trust you, Kan, and I'm not going to harass you about. Let me know if you need help with anything, as always." Her attempt at drawing an even border has failed and she rolls with it, letting waves appear in the line where they're wont. Subject change time. "Speaking of the Hall, has that one stick-up-his ass stopped giving you a hard time?" While not as irritating as some slime-ball Harpers she's had the misfortune to know, there are stuffy Masters in every era.

Kanriel gives a long winded sigh. "I know mom. I was thinking of waiting until she graduates, I don't know if weyrlings are allowed to have pets." He's filled with relief when his mother goes back to talking about his project. "I will, I just need time to brainstorm." As for Masters and their varying degrees of like or dislike for Kan, he shrugs. "MOst are fine, and Master Peaston is Master Peaston. He really does hate our family." To the point that it's damn near comical.
"I don't know who in their fardling right mind ever gave that man back his knot," Lina gripes, grabbing some red and emphatically flinging it at wall. Not-quite-jokingly, she suggests, "Give it a few Turns and then punch him in the greasy face again. Faranth knows he deserves it." No love lost between those two. "I'm glad to hear it. I was a bit concerned about it, honestly, but if nothing else, you've proved how dedicated you are and given them no other reason to complain." Not even a girl! Which also concerns his mother a bit…

Kanriel never said he was following all the rules, just that he had no complaints. And honestly, he's been too busy to get in trouble, but that doesn't mean there isn't a tryst or two lodged in there somewhere. He just hasn't been caught…yet. "We'll see." He says of punching someone of higher rank than he. Oh yes, he's heard the stories of the epic fist fights his father got into with Peaston.

"Knot first, greaseball knockdown later," his mother recommends cheerily. She wipes her hands on her tunic and grabs her wine glass, sipping while regarding the wall in appraisal. "It needs something. What do you think, Kan?"

Kanriel eyes the wall carefully. Then, without saying a word, he stands up and grabs the brush to a matte black and flings it in a few places. The stark coloring of the black is a good counterpoint to the bright and vivid colors they've painted the wall with. "There. That should do it."

"You're brilliant." Realilina places her glass down for a moment to take a moment and sign the bottom of the wall in a neat hand with a slender brush and aforementioned black paint, handing the brush off to Kanriel and reclaiming her wine a moment later. "And don't forget to date it!"

Kanriel grins and takes the brush from his mother and signs the wall somewhere around the door to their living quarters. And yes, he dates it. Turning to stick the brush into a solution that's meant for getting the paint off, he wipes the wet paint off his hands and stares at the creation of the evening as he sips down the last of his wine, it's fuzz picking at his brain already. And as is typical of a teenager's stomach, it makes its presence known with a loud, loud, grumble. "Up for some food mom? I'm Starving.

Realilina finishes off her wine, as well, and follows her son's example by gathering the brushes and dunking them in the cleaning solution. A chuckle is given to the rumble of his stomach. "Food sounds lovely. Bazaar or raiding the living caverns?" While he decides, she takes the time cover the remainder of paint to be put to some use soon. "Also, we should probably change."

Kanriel chuckles. "I was thinking some Zingari curry actually, I haven't been down to the grounds in forever." And it's a sure sign he's healing, because curry with the Zingari had been a thing of his and his dad's after a work session. He looks down at his clothes and nods, for once, agreeing with his mother. "Aye, I doubt Miss Willa would appreciate us dragging paint all over everything."

Don't think Mama didn't miss that, either. The ritual meal is awarded a bright smile—her boys coming home smelling of paint and curry is a fond memory. "Willa would skin us," Realilina agrees cheerily, taking a rag to wipe off the handle of the door into the rest of the quarters, "though maybe she'd be a bit more forgiving if we brought the rest of that Benden along. I'd rather it be appreciated while it's fresh." It's what Erikk would've wanted, right?

Kanriel is trying not to make a big deal, a big deal Mom, ok? "I'm sure she'd love that Mom. Lets get changed, I can taste the curry already." If Kanriel were less dignified, his mouth would be watering and he'd look dreamy. However, his excitement over the meal is still palpable. And so onward and forwards towards the Zingari camp went mother and son, after a change of course, to the Zingari camp, where curry and merriment were had. Happy Turnday Kanriel.

P.S. Willa was indeed very mollified to have some of such a prestigious wine.

Add a New Comment