I stared after him, my spirit struck like a temple bell, ringing, ringing. There, I thought, goes the priest.
It was a short dareleni we kept that night, and Shame left not long after secreting my painting away... and I... I found myself in a whimsical and contrary mood. He thought he knew me so well! Well and again, perhaps he did... but not entirely. That is how I found myself in the halls that evening—let him come back to find my bed as yet unused!—intent solely on pleasurable conversation, and perhaps a cup of tea.
Yes, indeed. After too many years, I found myself at a woman's door.
Seraeda opened it for me, saw my face and smiled all the way to her eyes and lifted brows. "Ah!" said she. "This is a welcome surprise, though you are late-wandering, osulkedi."
"Farren," I reminded her.
"Farren," she allowed. "What brings you here, then?"
"The want of company," I began.
"—which you surely have, rooming as you do with the inimitable priest of Shame?" she suggested mischievously.
"—more attractive company," I continued more firmly. "And conversation that does not involve duty."
She giggled. "What, you do not find Shame attractive?"
"Every Ai-Naidari finds Shame attractive," I said. "As that is right and proper. And you, Observer, are teasing me." We shared our grin before I continued, "Am I too late? I have no wish to disturb your rest—"
"Oh, not at all!" she said. "But I am in my nightgown. Give me a moment, Calligrapher—Farren—and I shall change. We'll find something in the kitchen and repair to a quiet place to enjoy it."
"That sounds perfect," I said, and tried not to wonder what her nightgown looked like. From what little I could see through the narrow opening of her door, it was embroidered at the collar... with flowers, of course. But also with something else... molecules, perhaps? I wanted to ask, but it would be quite, quite outré to reveal that I had been staring near enough to her décolletage to remark on her neckline. That she would probably find it deeply amusing rather than offensive only emphasized the need for caution. Amusing a woman too much is as good as courting her, and as much as I enjoyed her company I wasn't quite sure I was ready for more than that.
I was not kept waiting long. Seraeda slipped out of her room, dressed quite properly in a robe of silvery-gray with hints of peach and beige and gray-brown at the collar and sleeves.
"So," she said. "Tea?"
"And maybe something small to eat," I said.
"Excellent," she answered. "Let us raid the kitchen."
That is how I found myself hidden away with a lovely woman in one of the house's many semicircular alcoves, the candlelight flickering along the edges of the beveled windows that framed our table and seats. It was a perfect night for such a thing, for no sooner had we seated ourselves that it began to rain, just the lightest of patters.
"Ah, this is cozy," Seraeda said, pouring for me as I served us both slices of a delicate foam cake. She reached under my wrist to steal one of the berries we'd brought as garnish and nibbled on it while pouring her own cup. "I had no idea you were passing-nocturnal."
"I'm not, usually," I said. "But I have been keeping odd hours here in Qenain. At home in the studio, morning is the best time to work, so I am usually up before dawn preparing my materials so I need not waste any of the light."
"You can't work by lamp?" she asked, curious. "Even the ones that mimic the sun?"
"It's not the same," I said, and sipped from my cup. "There is some quality we have never been able to duplicate. To my eyes, anyway."
"I would think it would be more variable than the lamp, sunlight," she mused, putting her cheek in her palm and resting the berry against her lip as she paused between bites to speak. It glazed her lower lip an endearing light red. "Surely the quality of the light changes as the seasons progress."
Her observation brought me back to less rarified thoughts. "Well... yes," I said. "Winter light is very different from summer light, as much as morning from afternoon light. I often schedule my painting around those changes."
"Ah!" she exclaimed, brows lifting. "So you mean to tell me you paint different things to take advantage of the differences in the light?"
"I... yes," I said. I'd never really thought about it before, but, "Yes, I do."
"That seems far more complex than just using a lamp, which will always cast the same kind of light!" she said, laughing. "You are imprisoned by nature."
"Say more accurately I am inspired by it, and guided by it," I answered, trying the sponge cake. "It is well to move in tune to the world around you. To move against it is..."
"Unwise?" she suggested, mouth quirking.
"Far more effort," I offered, and we both laughed.
"I know nothing of your art," Seraeda said, smiling. "I see how accurate it is to call it art, however. You are a different creature from people such as Shame, and myself."
"Ah?" I said. "What is the commonality there?"
"We both work very hard to make the data gathered by our subconscious minds conscious," she replied. "To bring to light the unspoken assumptions and observations of our senses."
"And I do not," I said, amused.
"Of course not," she said, laughing. "Is that the aim of art?"
"To make conscious the subconscious thought?" I said, thinking. "Maybe not always."
"Not on purpose, I imagine," she said. "Your task is to bring forth feelings, not thoughts."
"Thoughts proceed from feelings," I argued, enjoying myself immensely.
"Feelings might also proceed from thoughts!" Seraeda said, pointing her spoon at me. "The relationship is not so simple. But feelings are less specific, and more open to interpretation, and are frankly more likely to result in the unusual and inspired thought."
