[Twelve Kingdoms] A Dream of Finery
May. 30th, 2009 05:39 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
runicloreA Dream of Finery
By: Amber Michelle
Prompt: regalia
Character(s): Shoukei
Words: 645
For:![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
canis_m (original request post is here)
......................................................
Light rain pattered on the leaves outside Shoukei's window and jeweled the hydrangea blossoms until they sparkled like hairpins in the silver light. She'd already dressed and her hair was combed and pinned in a swirled knot, the bottom half flowing free over her back. Three of Youko's hairpins sat in a flat drawer two hand-spans wide, lined with red silk, and she couldn't decide which would best compliment her robes. The gold fork with opal settings? The emerald butterfly and faceted gold dangles?
A long time ago she'd worried about this every day. Was it ten years? No-- less, but so much had happened since her parents were killed it felt like forever. She'd lived an eternity already, without jewels, without fine silks and embroidered slippers, and when she picked up the butterfly pin and slid the tines between two overlapping loops of hair - like the deep blue of the cloud sea during the winter, one maid said, when you look down through the many facets of water and see more water down below, and ice, and snow - it felt heavy and she thought it would slide out. She tried again, worked it behind some scalp hair, and it felt more secure.
The gleam of green in Shoukei's hair reflected the green embroidery of her sleeves. The silk was a warm, burnished red, like sandstone. The Royal Han would appreciate the complimentary nature of the colors, and that was her concern - not the weight of the jewelry, or the airy flutter of the sleeves when she was accustomed to heavier fabric. He would like it. If he told her to change one more time she would-- she'd yank his hair out with his comb. How is he even alive? she'd said the night before, while she re-poured Youko's tea and cleaned up the spill from her last attempt. How is it that Han stays afloat when its king is a capricious, lazy, perfectionist-- and did she have any idea how many clothes he cycled through in a single day?
Yes. Yes, Youko did know, and she laughed.
Nothing was funny anymore. Youko's smiles were strained lately, and Shoukei only laughed to deride someone. Kei was run by idiots, she sometimes said, idiots they just couldn't get rid of yet. Not until they had two full harvests and a few more reliable students taking the exam, and-- she wasn't sure. What had her father done? Should his example be followed at all, even in small parts, considering the result?
Jewels weren't meant for Shoukei - not anymore. They weighed her hair down when she stood up to leave, go meet the servants in the palace given over to the Royal Han, until it pulled at her scalp near the temple. He told her to dress up, that her elegance was wasted in plain robes, that it wasn't the sort of simplicity that would highlight the best in her, but there was something about Youko's blunt honesty that had come to reflect itself in her own appearance. Shoukei's earliest memories were of finery: candied rose petals, gossamer silk scraped so thin it was transparent. Myrrh in the brazier. Glazed walnuts and dragonfruit on a china plate she saw the shadow of her fingers through in good light, and a go board with legs carved into dragons.
She wore a robe and sash from Han on the day of her father's coronation, and for years they were the most beautiful things she owned. She remembered the shade of indigo, and the opalescent glow of pearls, and he remembered too, because he was there - but that princess was dead. The jewel of Hou died with her family.
Really, she was never alive at all.
.
By: Amber Michelle
Prompt: regalia
Character(s): Shoukei
Words: 645
For:
canis_m (original request post is here)......................................................
Light rain pattered on the leaves outside Shoukei's window and jeweled the hydrangea blossoms until they sparkled like hairpins in the silver light. She'd already dressed and her hair was combed and pinned in a swirled knot, the bottom half flowing free over her back. Three of Youko's hairpins sat in a flat drawer two hand-spans wide, lined with red silk, and she couldn't decide which would best compliment her robes. The gold fork with opal settings? The emerald butterfly and faceted gold dangles?
A long time ago she'd worried about this every day. Was it ten years? No-- less, but so much had happened since her parents were killed it felt like forever. She'd lived an eternity already, without jewels, without fine silks and embroidered slippers, and when she picked up the butterfly pin and slid the tines between two overlapping loops of hair - like the deep blue of the cloud sea during the winter, one maid said, when you look down through the many facets of water and see more water down below, and ice, and snow - it felt heavy and she thought it would slide out. She tried again, worked it behind some scalp hair, and it felt more secure.
The gleam of green in Shoukei's hair reflected the green embroidery of her sleeves. The silk was a warm, burnished red, like sandstone. The Royal Han would appreciate the complimentary nature of the colors, and that was her concern - not the weight of the jewelry, or the airy flutter of the sleeves when she was accustomed to heavier fabric. He would like it. If he told her to change one more time she would-- she'd yank his hair out with his comb. How is he even alive? she'd said the night before, while she re-poured Youko's tea and cleaned up the spill from her last attempt. How is it that Han stays afloat when its king is a capricious, lazy, perfectionist-- and did she have any idea how many clothes he cycled through in a single day?
Yes. Yes, Youko did know, and she laughed.
Nothing was funny anymore. Youko's smiles were strained lately, and Shoukei only laughed to deride someone. Kei was run by idiots, she sometimes said, idiots they just couldn't get rid of yet. Not until they had two full harvests and a few more reliable students taking the exam, and-- she wasn't sure. What had her father done? Should his example be followed at all, even in small parts, considering the result?
Jewels weren't meant for Shoukei - not anymore. They weighed her hair down when she stood up to leave, go meet the servants in the palace given over to the Royal Han, until it pulled at her scalp near the temple. He told her to dress up, that her elegance was wasted in plain robes, that it wasn't the sort of simplicity that would highlight the best in her, but there was something about Youko's blunt honesty that had come to reflect itself in her own appearance. Shoukei's earliest memories were of finery: candied rose petals, gossamer silk scraped so thin it was transparent. Myrrh in the brazier. Glazed walnuts and dragonfruit on a china plate she saw the shadow of her fingers through in good light, and a go board with legs carved into dragons.
She wore a robe and sash from Han on the day of her father's coronation, and for years they were the most beautiful things she owned. She remembered the shade of indigo, and the opalescent glow of pearls, and he remembered too, because he was there - but that princess was dead. The jewel of Hou died with her family.
Really, she was never alive at all.
.