Room 528, Thursday Morning

[icecoldfrost]

Emma had skipped class yesterday, preferring instead to cocoon herself in a pile of blankets and try to sleep-off her powers hangover. She didn't need to give herself a worse migraine by listening to Professor Dèmon prattle on, no matter how entertaining and well-intentioned he was.

She was feeling a bit better today, however, and was bored with sleeping. She'd ventured out of her room long enough for a shower and to steal a movie from the common room, and was now curled up on her bed again, happily humming along.

Hopefully her furred roommate wouldn't mind her choice of entertainment.

[Door and post are open! ETA: Now on SP as I go to the internet-less job.]

Comments

[icecoldfrost]

"The basics," Emma answered. "He can fuss, within limits, and I won't do anything besides my basic shields for a few days, but if I need some quiet time without any boys, he has to go away and find other ways to amuse himself for at least an hour. In return, I will have quiet, inside fun that does not include picking fights or using my powers."

Not telling Karla that she had promised not to move past basic powers without a Healer's permission. Because Karla had already said she was fine, so that part of the rules had already been met.

Rules made it easier to get away with things.

[glacial_queen]

Fine did not equate to permission, Emma!

"Those sound like decent rules," Karla said, making a mental note to have Morton fill Jack in on the proper rules of fussing. She hadn't yet realized why that introduction might not go all that well. "Usually you can get the rules to include that he has to bring chocolate and delicious things to eat while he's fussing, by the way."

That didn't count as telling Emma rules!

"What kind of quiet, inside, maleless fun did you have in mind?" Karla asked. Somewhere, 'Dite was facepalming at the lack of innuendo in that question.

[icecoldfrost]

Emma shook her head and sighed. "Someday, Karla, you will learn how to use innuendo," she promised, getting comfortable against her pillows and making room for Karla to stretch out too.

"Reading, mostly. Naps without him hovering, or doing homework or watching a movie. Perhaps plotting my revenge for when I'm up and mobile again. Nothing sordid."

[glacial_queen]

"Revenge?" Karla asked, amused, and taking up Emma's wordless offer to stretch out. "Revenge against who, exactly? Or were you going to take your vendetta out against the fog?"

[icecoldfrost]

"For every time someone brings me tea and no chocolate, revenge shall be had," Emma announced grandly, flipping her hair over her shoulder. "A woman can only drink so many teas."

[glacial_queen]

"Mine are special teas," Karla said loftily. "Brewed with the finest water--" from the fountains in the hall, "with only the most aromatic leaves, all skillfully tended by lovely virgin hands." Hers. "With Craft specifically woven to make grumpy telepaths have fewer headaches. I an clearly an exception to your rule."

[icecoldfrost]

"I'll float away with all these fluids," she whined. "You wouldn't want that, would you?"

[glacial_queen]

"Poor Emma, getting fussed over," Karla teased, quite unsympathetic to Emma's plight. "Well, I hope you've neither floated away nor died from boredom in about a week or so. I'd be sad if you missed out...."

[icecoldfrost]

"Tease," she accused, swatting at Karla. "It will not take a whole week, you'll see. I won't miss out on anything worth doing."

"What has your devious little brain been devising?"

[glacial_queen]

"I asked Uncle Saetan if I could bring people back to Kaeleer for a visit," Karla said, now sounding almost shy. "I'd really like it if you would come. I'd like you to meet Jaenelle and Lucivar and the unicorns and see my world."

And see something other than Briarwood, really.

[icecoldfrost]

"I'd love to, darling," Emma assured her, reaching to give Karla's hand a quick squeeze. "I've got the one dress you gave me, but you'll have to take me shopping so that I don't give your cousin or your Uncle Saetan a heart-attack."

[glacial_queen]

"Uncle Saetan already said that we could go to Amdarh the first night and he'll put my Queen's Gift towards the tithes instead!"

Then Karla realized that she had probably just made no sense at all.

"Okay, so Amdarh is the capitol city of Dhemlan. Every person who lives in Amdarh owes a tithe to the District Queen, who in turn owes a tithe to the Province Queen--though I think Zhara, Amdarh's Queen, is both Province and Disctrict but anyway--and they all, in turn, owe tithes to Saetan because he's the Warlord Prince of Dhemlan. So, if he wants, Saetan can go shopping in Dhemlan and anything he buys, the shopkeep will subtract from his tithe to Zhara and she'll subtract that amount from her tithes to Saetan. Uncle Saetan says that if I do have this trip, he'll put the amount of money he usually sends me as the Queen's Gift towards credit in Amdarh, so people can go shopping there and I don't go through all of his tithes!"

Because the SaDiablos were so concerned about funds, really.

"Did that make any more sense?" Karla asked a beat later.

[icecoldfrost]

Emma was used to Karla's verbal torrents when she got going on the subject of her homeland, but they were still funny.

"You get an allowance -- yearly, I'm assuming -- called the Queen's Gift. Because your Saetan's bookkeeper doesn't want a heart-attack when he gets the bill from the damage I can do to the shops in Amdarh, anything we buy, we reimburse him the cost of our adventures from your accounts."

"Does that sound about right?"

[glacial_queen]

"Umm..." Karla shifted uncomfortably. "It's more like a quarterly allowance. Uncle Saetan knows I can't access my personal funds and doesn't want me starving or anything."

Of course, his idea of an 'allowance' was a bit on the extravagant side.

"But that's the gist of it, yeah. He knows that no one will be coming with Kaeleeran gold or silver marks to spend, so we agreed that this would be easiest for everyone."

[icecoldfrost]

"Quarterly, so then the tithes are yearly?" she mused, her brain already poking at the Kaeleeran system. "Out of curiosity, do your marks have value based on weight or purity of the mineral, or some other system?"

Please, Karla. Emma came from money too, originally. The idea of playing with large amounts of money as an 'allowance' didn't bother her.

[glacial_queen]

It bothered Karla--at least, it did when her allowance was being given to her by someone she wasn't even properly related to.

"Tithes are also quarterly," she answered, trying to stop squirming. "Seasonal. And, I think the marks used to? A really, really long time ago, back before Uncle Saetan was born. But now Kaeleer's banks, the Dark Council, and the Keep all work together to keep the marks at a stable value. They're not even made from real gold or silver anymore. It's a special kind of foil, kind of like your paper money here."

[icecoldfrost]

"You need to get used to talking about money and the tithes if you're going to rule as a Queen," Emma pointed out gently. "And who better to start with than me?" After all, if Karla couldn't talk about the economics system with an outsider, it would be that much harder with someone else from Kaeleer.

[glacial_queen]

"I'd feel less awkward if the money we were talking about came from my own holdings, investments, or income," Karla admitted. "Rather than Uncle Saetan's generosity. The Queen's Gift isn't charity--even if it's rarely this extravagant--but I wouldn't have need of it if I could access my own funds."