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Post by ealasaid on Dec 20, 2009 1:41:49 GMT -5
Vingo jumped in surprise at Caden's sudden appearance. He struck out a sharply discordant chord on the lute, wincing slightly as he looked up at his nephew. The older marten, despite his current depressive mood, could not help but smile at the bouncing albino in front of him.
"Well, that's certainly...good, to hear." His smile faded somewhat at what the news meant for him. He had not expected this to come so soon.
"Er, when is he, um...headed out to sea, then?"
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Post by Ladorak on Dec 20, 2009 15:05:37 GMT -5
Caden finally stopped, realizing he hadn't caught that bit. "Oh! Um.....well I'm not sure Uncle Vin. Only that he's been slotted for a 64 gunner, with the prospects of a 74 gunner later on. They said they would finalize it with him next month I think? So uh....I dunno! Sometime next year I guess!" he said, hopping up in the air a bit again one last time.
"Just think though!" he spun around, then hopped over Vingo's head and grabbed hold of a branch on the beech and pulled himself up, his developing muscles straining a bit as he groaned, exerting himself in doing a pull up onto the branch. Getting himself so that he was standing, he put his paw over his eyes to shield them, and pretending to be looking out over a vast expanse of sea, which he sort of was as the ocean was in sight from here, but a good several thousand yards off.
"We'll finally be at sea! Sailing the vast depths! Seeing new lands! And who can forget the swashbuckling and combat!" He waved his paw as if he had sword in it, and was obviously visualizing himself in a fight one the planks of a ship. it was a romanticized view of course, but it had captured his imagination and had gotten him in an anticipatory mindset over the past year for when it finally would happen.
Looking down with a grin, Caden couldn't hope but notice the somewhat bereft look on his uncle's face. "Hey Uncle Vin....you OK?" he asked now, sitting down on the branch and letting his legs dangle over the side above the adult's head. They were too short to actually touch Vingo's ears, and Caden was looking at him from above, wondering just what it was that had his uncle so down. Was it that thing from before about his mom? Or something else?
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Post by ealasaid on Dec 21, 2009 0:34:23 GMT -5
Vingo ducked as his nephew hauled himself onto the branch. The older marten put a protective arm around the Lady Sonora in case the kit slipped. He looked up once Caden had clambered into the tree, watching as his nephew gazed outwards. Vin felt his eyes welling up with tears. Caden sounded exactly like Nuori had at that age. Part of Vingo had always wished he had gone with his sister instead of striking out on his own. Maybe this was a chance to do so.
"Hey Uncle Vin....you OK?"
Vingo blinked his tears away, taking a deep breath of the damp sea air. He tried to push away the feeling of darkness within himself, but it lingered there, and probably would for some time as he wrestled with what he had learned about his sister.
"Yeah, I will be...someday, maybe not at this moment..." he said, trailing off and sighing.
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Post by Ladorak on Dec 21, 2009 14:10:30 GMT -5
Caden's brow once again furrowed in that cute manner. As he rarely ever looked in a mirror, he probably wasn't even aware he was doing it. He could tell his uncle still wasn't feeling good, and looked out of sorts. Had this been the Caden of a year ago, he might have mocked such feelings in others, but as it was he truly did feel sorry for the adult, and the fact that he was his uncle helped him out as well.
Pushing himself off the branch, the albino landed deftly on his hind paws, brushing himself off a bit from the scattered blades of grass and leaves that were kicked up from his impact with the ground.
"Aw, well what's wrong Uncle Vin?" he asked, walking over so that he was once again in front of Vingo. "Feeling better someday well that...makes it sound like a long time. Aren't you excited to come with us when we sail?" he asked considering what to do in this situation. He settled on sitting down cross legged across from his uncle, and studying him with concern evident in his pink eyes.
"Or are you still upset from before in the kitchen? I didn't fully understand what it was that Ladorak had meant. Something about my mom having been changed by my dad's death and some other things. I....I only wish I could remember more about mom to tell you." he said, shaking his head. Only snippets were there, and nothing concrete. He could remember sitting on the floor of her office drawing things sometimes, or walking to Ladorak's castle with her but generally these were very dim, wreathed in fog and not coherent. If what Ladorak had said about Helandria was true than....Helandria had lied to him to an extent about his mother.
But who was more trustworthy here? Helandria, who he'd grown up with, or Ladorak? Ladorak so far hadn't done anything to hurt him, and he genuinely seemed to be wanting to make things easy on Caden, and then too Caden had gotten over his feelings of having been stolen by Ladorak for the most part. The ermine bought him things, took care of him, fed him, and educated him as well. A lot of the initial bitterness had faded, but what was true? What was his mother really like? He had always avoided talking about her for the most part around Ladorak, and he only knew what he'd overheard.
Helandria on the other paw....well she sort of scared him now that he was viewing life outside of that small house she'd kept him in. She taught him a lot of negatives about life, and he could acknowledge that. He was still bitter and fiercely resistant about some things, but why would the rat lie? To deceive him into thinking his mother was better than she had been?
Mom wasn't....a bad person was she? Had she done bad things? Hurt other beasts? Caden still found himself in a defensive mentality about all that though. Maybe it was to protect him, or maybe she had reasons he couldn't and wouldn't be able to understand. He finally realized he had been looking down the whole time then and quickly raised his eyes back up to Vingo's, remembering that was the polite thing to do when talking with another beast.
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Post by jaydjasmyn on Dec 21, 2009 15:53:27 GMT -5
Jayd quickly fell fast asleep. She was drained. It was all a bit much for her body and mind to take. Little did she move though. The femme was so exhausted that she had very little energy to do so. Eventually though, toward the end of her nap, she began to stir. The energy was beginning to return to her.
Bryony noted her movement and ended up at her side with a concerned look in her eyes. Jayd simply looked up at her and grinned. "Hey. Don't worry. I feel fine." The nurse-maid of course grinned and began to fluff the mother's pillows up so that she could sit up. Immediately after Bry handed her a glass of freshly squeezed orange juice and instructed her to drink up. She needed the vitamins and minerals to keep her strong.
In the meantime Jayd drank and Bryony finished her work in the room. Next she wanted to have Jayd eat something and so she headed toward the door. Upon getting there she noticed Ladorak there. She smiled largely and put a paw on his shoulder. "She's doing fine. She's awake and I have her drinking orange juice. I'm going down now to make her something to eat. She needs the nutrients from the food. I'll be back in a bit. It will give you and your wife some alone time." With that said Bryony was off.
Jayd was alone, or at least she thought that she was. Heavily she sighed as she smiled and looked over at her new kits. Indeed she was feeling much better to say the least. She was hoping that by tomorrow Bryony will let her get a bath and get dressed in her normal everyday clothing. But that would be hard to say with the nurse-maid. Jayd would have to pass her physical exam before she would allow it. Bryony had already mentioned that to Jayd.
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Post by ealasaid on Dec 21, 2009 16:05:32 GMT -5
"It's...complicated," Vingo said, strumming a chord on his lute. Playing music always seemed to help him think better. He had never been good at talking to kits, never really knowing how much they understood.
"See," he began, looking at his nephew, a slight tilt in his head as he thought. "I've been on my own for a long time, but I always knew there'd be somebeast back at home that I cared about an' loved, an' they felt the same way for me. That beast was your mother. I thought I knew who she was, had an idea of her in my head that I carried through all my travels. But now...well, things are different. She became a different beast, but I don't know the full truth about her an' don't know who to trust, which stories are true an' which are rumors. Either way, who she became is somethin' that doesn't sit right with me. I regret not bein' there for her when she needed somebeast by her side."
He sighed again, looking down at the body of the Lady Sonora, slowly drawing a claw across the strings. "An' as for goin' t'sea...Well, there's a reason I chose not t'go with your mother an' instead went my own way. I'm not overly fond o'bein' in water over my head. It was a hard enough journey for me t'come across the sea t'Welkin from the Imperium. But," here he offered a smile, looking back up at Caden, "I've made my choice an' I'm goin' with you an' Ladorak whether I'm afraid to or not. Gotta face your fears sometime, eh?"
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Post by Ladorak on Dec 22, 2009 1:41:09 GMT -5
"Hello Jayd." Ladorak said, poking his head in again and grinning. Stepping forward, he placed his paws behind his back, smiling the whole time. "After the clouds comes sunshine! Just guess what news I received!" he said, moving over to her bedside. "In addition to this wonderful day of receiving two new kits into the Fugate family....I....landed...a...JOB!" he exclaimed, though not too loudly, for fear of waking up Thersander and Nuori.
"An officer from the Admiralty dropped by today, and told me I was slated to command a 64 gun ship of the line, with prospects for a 74 gunner at a later date! This is wonderful Jayd! No more living in poverty! I'll actually be making a living for you and our kits! Couldn't have come at a more opportune time! They said they would get back to me at a later time, but chances are it will be next month when they finalize everything." He leaned down, kissing her on the cheek before pulling back.
All he did was look down at her now with elation and that old spark she saw from time to time, normally when they were out at sea over the water. He appeared to have lost his melancholy and regained his former bounce. Everything was going right in his life now. things were at long last turning around.
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Caden felt the exact same way. Who to trust? Why would Ladorak lie? Based on what he now knew of right and wrong, it made far more sense for Helandria to be the liar in this instance, but then why would his mom have been that way? It made his head hurt to think about all of this. Was it better perhaps that he had only the vaguest of memories about his mother in that case?
But Vingo's mention of the sea and conquering his fears brought Caden back to the present. "Uh huh!" he said, nodding and giving a smile. "And you'll have me there! Well...then again I don't know much about it, only what I've been reading in the books Ladorak has. There's so much going on though! It's like a small city! Job for everyone and everyone being transported all at once. I didn't know you were scared of the ocean Uncle Vin." Caden smirked, but not in an overtly mean way.
"But Ladorak's gonna be there and in command. I trust him. He's had experience with this stuff before. I know you don't really know him and all Uncle Vin, but.....he uh..." Caden began playing with some dead blades of grass now, twirling them about with his claws and plucking them up to discard them shortly after. Could he really admit this? He wasn't about to go around saying things like this right? But that was mostly the stuff Helandria had told him. Nasty old habit....hard for a twelve year old to break in all honesty.
"He's...not a....bad dad..." he said finally, very low, looking down at the ground the whole time and still playing with the grass. Wow...had he really just called Ladorak "dad"? Ladorak had yet to hear that word out of Caden's mouth, and Caden wasn't sure he'd say it again until he got a bit more used to the idea, but he felt it was different with Vingo and that he could at least drop that word in his presence. With Ladorak himself it might be a different story, but for now he'd said it, it had slipped out, and he barely could see Vingo right now as he looked up with his pink eyes, pretending to mostly pay attention to the grass.
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Post by ealasaid on Dec 24, 2009 1:26:08 GMT -5
Vingo's eyes twinkled knowingly at Caden, and he nodded. "He seems t'be a pretty caring sort, I think. I wouldn't have let you stay with him had he seemed any less than a good father."
He slowly stood up, wincing at the stiffness in his limbs due to the cold. In weather like this Vingo always felt older. It was a reminder that he was not a young marten any more and was on his way downhill.
"As for bein' afraid o'the ocean," he said as he tucked the Lady Sonora under his arm. "I'm not ashamed t'admit that I am." The older marten shivered slightly, though whether it was from the thought of being aboard a ship in no sight of land or from the cold, he was not sure.
"But we'd best be headin' inside. My paws are losin' their feelin' I've been out here so long."
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Post by Ladorak on Dec 24, 2009 12:12:07 GMT -5
"Yeah, you've been outside for a long time." Caden said, getting up too and brushing the dead grass off. It was in the times of winter that Caden felt most at at home here. Ladorak's fur turned white, just like his own, and he felt far less of an outsider when Ladorak's pelt was in ermine. He had seen the way the other kits looked at him in town, viewing him as "different" because of his white fur and strange pink eyes. They had never seen an albino before, and Caden was like no other marten they had ever met. The fact that he was being cared for by the roguish Ladorak (viewed by many in town as the "black sheep" of the community) didn't help much either, but Caden wasn't aware of the inner politics of Burnham Thorpe.
For roughly half a year, a little less, Ladorak's pelt was the same as Caden's, and in those months Caden felt far more at ease with himself and his surroundings subconsciously than in the summer months, when Ladorak had a "normal" coat. Stoats were unusual creatures in this way, but Caden actually liked it. He thought it made his guardian stand out from the rest of the creatures in town, who had fairly regular coats all year.
Caden charged ahead of Vingo now, kicking up the grass as he ran. He moved far more carefully through the garden, though most of the plants were dead this time of year, and the kit hopped and jumped his way over the stone path, leaping over parts he knew he wasn't supposed to step on. The youthful energy he possessed was rather abundant, and the marten couldn't wait to begin physical training under Ladorak in order get into the kind of shape that the ermine himself was in.
Throwing open the back door, Caden suddenly stopped and turned to face his uncle before they both went inside. "Hey Uncle Vin....could you do me a favor? Don't tell Ladorak I called him that." he said, giving the adult a serious stare. "I'm not...ready to tell him that yet and 'm still.....workin' on stuff. It just sort of slipped out before." he explained, even if he had meant to say it at the time.
Sure...he could see Ladorak as a father....he'd never had one before after all, at least not one he could remember. But Caden....had a lot going on in his life as well. Finding out who his mother was, meeting a real life family member, being taken in by Ladorak for the better part of a year now, having to unlearn many things he'd been taught growing up. It was mostly his own pride getting in the way. Caden was by no means a humble marten and still had a replete sense of dignity when it came to certain dispositions. Helandria had reinforced that with her whole "it's you against the world" doctrine, and Caden had yet to fully maneuver around his "look out for yourself and no one else" mindset, but he was learning. Gradually....bit by bit he was getting there. That "slip" as he'd called it had been a step in the right direction, even if he wasn't willing to admit it just yet.
So in conclusion to this rather complicated logic, Caden had meant what he said, and indeed was fully honest on that end. He just....wasn't fully ready to accept his own realizations yet.
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Post by ealasaid on Dec 26, 2009 18:58:06 GMT -5
Vingo inclined his head in a nod, though he was not sure whether he would tell Ladorak or not. It would be good for the stoat to know how Caden felt, Vingo thought, but there was also the matter of maintaining his nephew's trust. Then again, the older marten was mostly confident in Ladorak's ability to keep from telling Caden anything Vingo may say to the stoat.
The marten ushered his nephew inside. "Go on in. Let's see how the kits are doin'."
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