>>5394757>>5394761>>5394763>>5394840>>5394883>>5394943>>5394964You idly run your talons through your accursed monkey hair, suddenly a little self-conscious of your appearance. Would that you could get rid of the shock of hair completely, you would… But no. Perhaps one day, with the Novice’s help, you can eliminate I t completely. Simply shaving it is a fruitless endeavor, though—you know that much from your embarrassing childhood attempts. It grew it too swiftly, too thickly, a bristly layer that simple served to accentuate the attempt to conceal your defect, and thus embarrassed you further by highlighting your emotional vulnerability. Even now, you cringe to recall the taunts of the Novice Fleshweaver—back when she was simply Chaplains’ Daughter—and her cadre of young Serpents.
Still… When among the Drow, perhaps it is best to do as the Drow do? Certainly, it can’t hurt to make the best imrpesison possible upon the Queen fo Elves.
“Very well,” you graciously allow, and Jazkarmel’s smirk extends.
“Don’t think you’ve distracted me, though,” you add. “I would hear the reason for this urgent call to action, Princess.”
That dashes her mirth upon the rocks of your persistence, breaking her smile. She sighs, and nods.
“We will speak of this after you are sized for armour,” she says, “and while your hair is washed and styled.”
“You would speak so freely of… Sensitive matters, in front of your servants?” you ask, as much out of genuine curiosity as to angle for a hint as to the hidden purpose behind her insistent summons.
“In True Speech,” she suggests, in the tongue of your own people. “Few Drow speak it, so far.”
The process of being measured for armour is awkward. Elves—elf-men, you think—encircle you with knotted silken threads, this way and that, touching you freely and moving your limbs about without a word. You instinctively ush against their gentle, guiding hands, tail lashing in discomfort at how freely they invade your personal space. Jazkarmel’s expression is reassuring and affirming, though; it holds the assurance that all this is normal, and amusement at how you fidget. You force yourself to stop, to simply endure the process until completion.
“The winter solstice is an important time,” Jazkarmel tells you, as the elven tailors attend to their business, pressing segments of leather and chitin to your body at various points and marking out contours and measurements in chalk upon their materials. “It is… End of a season.”
“Yes,” you acknowledge, a little uncertainly. “Well, the middle of a season, traditionally.”
Jazkarmel shakes her head, clarifying: “The end of… a SEASON.”
You stare, and she sighs.
“Your tongue lacks the words,” she laments. “It is the end of the season of female rule, and the beginning to the season of transition. It is when the Queen and Princesses relinquish leadership, in stages, to a King and Princes.”
