eswareinmal | Orb post - morning on the 10th (intro)

[Her hair is frazzled – enough to suggest that she’s lost, stressed, vulnerable; not enough to make her ugly, unsympathetically bedraggled. She wants to look innocent, harmless, deserving of good will. She ducks her head, smiles shyly. The view behind her is lovely, a wide blue sky and a distant view from the river. She's outside on one of the castle towers, perched nimbly on the edge of the wall.]

I can barely believe all this is happening. I mean – last thing I knew my brother was off to college, and now I’m in some kind of magic kingdom?

[Her disbelief isn’t too strident, just a little shaken, good-naturedly self-deprecating about her own adjustment.]

It’s probably not as different as it seems right now. I mean, human nature is the same everywhere, right?

[A smile, as though that's a good thing. There. She’s established herself as sensible and open-minded. People from a world similar to hers will think she's normal enough, thanks to the lie about college. Even better, if there's anyone here who looks down on humans like mutants do, maybe some of them will be arrogant enough and offended enough at being lumped together with them to reveal themselves by correcting her assumption.]

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Your brother must be quite the scholar, to be leaving you for college.

He's going to do great things.

[Lying her FACE OFF. But lying well.]

Or else spend the rest of his life with his nose in a book, like mine. [ Short though it turned out to be. ]

I'm Alanna.

[She laughs]

Yeah, maybe.

I'm Anya! Nice to meet you.

Tell me, Anya, do you know how to fight?

[She ducks her head]

I know some. Not a lot.

I'd love to learn, though.

[That last is painfully, hungrily sincere.]

Perhaps you could train with me and the other knights when we return to the castle.

Do they let you do that? If you're not a knight, I mean.

I'm not, I'm just a sage.

Who's going to stop you? We have yet to start training together. Don't give them a reason to think you shouldn't be there and they'll have no reason to question you.

[She smiles - it's a tactic she's used a lot, but more often listening in the background when she shouldn't have been than participating.]

Even if I'm lousy to start with?

[She doesn't say it like it's a reason not to; she says it like a problem she just might have to solve first.]

Just don't be a nuisance, we'll be glad to have you.

[smartly]

Yes ma'am.

...sir? Sorry. We didn't really have knights where I came from.

Whichever you're more comfortable with, although I prefer 'Alanna'. We haven't had any lady knights in Tortall in over a hundred years. [ She's special like that. ]

[A quiet smile - suitably impressed, but not about to gush over it.]

What's Tortall like? I don't think it's a place in my world at all.

It's... hard to describe, really. The Great Southern Desert is about what you'd expect from a desert, but the weather in Corus to the north is nice. There are equal parts hills and flatlands. King Jonathan's castle is there, in Corus. I was born in Trebond, to the north. It's a nice enough place.

A bit like here, then? With...kings and castles and knights, and all.

Yes. Why, is your home not like that?

Not really. I mean, some countries still have kings, but they aren't...actually in charge of much? In some places people vote on leaders, and in some places the Party chooses them for everyone.

What is the Party? Do you mean they get everyone to vote? But how? [ THIS SOUNDS MAGICAL DO EXPLAIN. ]

The Party is...complicated. It's supposed to represent the people, but it doesn't really. I don't know as much about it; I was pretty little when we left Ukraine.

It's not that everyone does vote, but most people are allowed to, if they're old enough. The exact rules are different in different places.

How do they get them to do it?

Well, you just - I mean, you go to the little booths they set up everywhere and you mark the person you want in charge. Because you care, supposedly, who runs everything. And if you don't care then you don't go.

You mark it? On a paper? But what about the people who can't read?

In Europe and America, almost everyone can read. But I heard that in India, where lots of people don't, they have symbols for the different groups that want the government to do particular things. So you mark the hand, or the wheel, or the tiger, or whoever you believe in.

That's brilliant. And the whole system actually works? Absolutely mad.

(no subject)

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