Current location:	Ista Weyr Living Cavern
Current mood:	contemplative

Taini and Corana in the Ista LC
Logfile from Taini


Outside, the weather is predictably rainy, and so it is not a surprise to see many indoors this evening. Corana being no exception today sits by herself at one of the long tables, no food before her, but rather a length of white fabric, which she appears to be working into some sort of poorly-worked garment. The frown she displays isn't just from annoyance at her obvious lack of skill, it being too deep for just a shallow thought. She dips the needle through the fabric again, the thread pulled tight and puckering slightly in a display of pitiful seamtressing.
Taini steps into the caverns, away from the rain, and sighs.  "I'm getting really tired of this rain. One of the few things I dislike about Ista."  The young girl comes in all the way, and looks for a hot cup of klah. She spots the candidate sewing, or attempting to.  "Making a robe?"  It's pretty obvious.
The girl nods, and after a moment, she looks up, affecting what seems to be an honest attempt at a friendly smile. "Oh, hey Taini!" Corana greets the other girl with no gestures, her hands still busy holding the garbled mess of robes. "Yeah, trying to. I'm not great at sewing. I asked if they had some they could loan us, because, you know, most of us will probably never wear them again, if we do or don't Impress. Those they have are in even sorrier shape than this one here, if that's believable." She gazes back down to the rumpled white in her hands with obvious disgust. "It'll fall apart. I'm sure."
With a startled look Corana glances up at Taini, affecting a guilty grin that's perhaps meant to be beguiling. "I /am/ Tejano's friend," she replies quickly, then offers the offending garment, "If you can, I'd appreciate it greatly. This stitches are all crooked." Her blunt attempt at changing the subject is covered by an almost-convincing nonchalance, a stab at trying to pass over dangerous territory.
Taini takes the robe, and looks at it with a critical eye. "Well, for starters, your stitches are a little too big. And uneven."  She points to several stitches.  "See, this one's tiny. And then, the next one's huge.  That makes for a lot more mistakes."  The trader looks up at Corona, not accepting the dodge. "Then it's one of the others. Let me guess:  Thadd." 
"Ah, I just don't have the patience for sewing. Right there a stitch was too big, so I had to go back and cover it again." Corana indicates a particularly messy area featuring a tangle of thread in no discernible pattern, "It got a knot in it, though." For a moment she is silent, and then, "You'd not be incorrect. And I'm sure you can imagine." Perhaps hoping the topic will conclude there, she offers again, "Should I just cut them and start again, do you think? It's not attractive, not sure if it's even passing."
Taini does understand, and leaves it at that. "Yeah, it would probably be better." She says, looking at the knotted area. "The best thing to do is to go straight through, then if you need to fix it, you can go back and take the bad stitches out, and put in the new ones."  She pulls out her knife. "Want me to help you take them out?"
Another little nod as Corana offers the fabric, spreading it out flat on the table before them to do their work on it. "Might be better if you took them out, I don't have steady hands," the girl confesses this casually, accompanied by a small shrug, "I think if I knew what I was doing I could pass at it, but what's the point of making this thing into a masterpiece, anyway? All it needs to do is cover exposed skin and not fall to bits." The sound of her voice is light but controlled, and even though the topic had perhaps been dodged, she can't help but whet her curiosity. "What do you think of that whole business?" She asks, speaking of Th'deus, but naturally Taini can take it any way she wishes. Best source there may be, in fact, on that subject.
"Which business?" Taini asks, somewhat blandly, starting to remove stitches. "The pirate thing? If that's what you're asking about..." She says, stopping to look at Corona. "I spent several months with those sharding people, most of it flat on my back sick."  She goes back to pulling stitches. "It may have saved my life, though." She says, more softly. "They didn't get much chance to do more than beat me...Nothing I hadn't experienced before..." She shudders. "I saw what they could've done, though."  She doesn't elaborate on that. "Thadd's focused on that, sometimes to the detriment of everything else." She says frankly. "Well, except Xanth of course. But Xanth sounds like he doesn't mind."
The topic catches Corana off guard, not quite what she had meant, but does not interrupt. Her eyes are set before her on the thread Taini is unworking from the fabric, her hands in motion even while the girl is speaking. Her eyes do flick away for a second, to study Taini's face as she alludes to something that Corana can't fathom, but Corana doesn't inquire further just yet. Looks like she wants to, though, curiosity her natural vice. "I've heard very little firsthand about the pirates," Corana confesses, biting her lip, "How did you escape them?"
Taini works on the stitches almost mechanically. "There was a dead guy in the bed next to me when I got really bad, and I stole his clothes, dressed up like one of the crew, and got off when they attacked Boll."  She says, almost nonchalantly. "I had to do something. I'd heard Teej was hurt, but he wasn't with me, so I had to find him." Her voice carries more emotion as she talks about her brother. "I was really lucky."
"I heard the attack was chaotic," Corana replies, eyes drifting into some far off place of rest. "My mother is at Boll, and fortunately she wasn't a part of the fight, but she was kind enough to spare me no details." The implication here that that probably wasn't kind, at all. Still, there is a certain fondness in her voice when Corana speaks of her, and this is carried through to her next statements. "You and your brothers must be very close. I never had any siblings, but I can imagine. And Tejano is a good man, from what I've seen." Her smattering of comments on this subject are unrehearsed entirely, and perhaps she wasn't even thinking of them as they spilled out. After she finishes she grins sheepishly, as though realizing this problem.
Taini's comments aren't too rehearsed either, and she smiles, listening to Corona. "Yeah, we are close.  We kinda had to be with all the stuff our family's been through." She holds up the hand not holding her knife. "We probably set ourselves up for a lot of it, though." She says, by way of explaining. "We're a really rough lot. But it sounds like you might know that already."  She sets to ripping again.  "Your mom's at Boll? Would I know her?" She asks. "Toncho is working there now."
"I doubt you would," Corana responds with a faint smile, "She makes herself known if you're around her, but she doesn't have loads of acquaintances." Corana sly grins sends the all-too-clear message that her mother is probably too forward for many people. "Any idea when the wedding will be held for Toncho?" Corana inquires politely, grinning, "Those are always such nice occasions, if it's sometime after the hatching I'd try to attend. Nothing better."
"I haven't heard yet." Taini says, willing to go on to more comfortable topics. "It will probably be pretty soon, though, if I know my brother."  She watches Corona pull out the last few stitches.  "Now, the trick to even stitching is to find a comfortable position, and stay in that position for the whole time. The other trick is to get a rhythm going. Kinda like...cleaning the floor, maybe?  If you get a rhythm going, you can do it pretty quickly." 
"Cleaning a floor?" Corana echoes, perplexed, "I had no idea the two things were related!" She's half-serious, even as she's plucking the stitches she stares down at them with careful consideration. "I wonder if I wouldn't do better just bothering a rider for theirs? I'll bet you anything they keep them after they Impress. Maybe someone would let me borrow." She laughs at herself mildly, shaking her head, "Even though I'm certain that's not supposed to be what we're doing. Some of these tasks I think are just there so test our patience." After the last of them have been plucked away, Corana picks up the needle again, armed and ready to begin her haphazard task anew. Quietly, she purses her lips, and without any forewarning she turns to Taini and asks suddenly, "Did Th'deus ever talk to you, about the murder?" Her voice is insistent, strained, but in control. For now.
Taini shakes her head, watching the girl finish up on her side. "No, he hasn't.  He really didn't get a chance. Between being in jail and weyrlinghood, and on the hunt for missing siblings.." Tai counts things off on her fingers. "Oh, yeah, and the wet-lung thing..." She looks up as if trying to remember something else. "We haven't talked that much about anything more than getting Teej and Hira back."
A long moment of thought proceeds this statement from Taini, Corana quietly thoughtful. It passes quickly enough, the girl shaking it off like rainwater. "Alright," she responds, and is apparently satisfied. Nothing more needs to be added there, so she turns her attention back to sewing. Although being more careful and methodical this time, it's not much of an improvement from the last. "I think the hatching should be what I'm worried about, anyway," Corana mutters, though not excluding Taini from the thought, "Dunno when those eggs might break. Is this any better?" The garment is held up, a few fingerlengths of switches now present. 
Taini eyes the new stitches carefully. "Those look much better. Keep on like this, and you'll be a weaver." She grins, knowing that's exaggeration, but not retracting it. "That would be the hard part for me, I think. I hate waiting."
Corana is perhaps aware that that statement is not altogether accurate, but looks pleased nonetheless. "Looks like it might hold together now, which is the important thing, anyway." She smoothes the robe over the tabletop again and bends over it, continuing where she left off. "The wait is bad. Even worse waiting for it when you're not so very sure of how it will end." Corana's frown is just barely visible from beyond her curtain of blonde hair, which has fallen over her face while she's leaning over, "This is something that may change our lives. It's hard to think about. I don't even dare speculate."