675-05-29 - Followers of the Heart
Followers of the Heart | |||||||
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Summary: Baldwin and Rayne have a moment in the Public Gardens | |||||||
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In the middle of the afternoon, with the sun high and the weather nice, Rayne could be found in the public gardens, walking around and taking in the sights. In truth, she felt a little more at home in the gardens, being surrounded by all sorts of flora and random plant life. The hedge bush around this section keeping it just private enough to be peaceful but it was open to the public so of course there might be people enjoying the sights as she was. After walking half way through, at the center of the gardens she would find a stone bench to sit upon that over looked a fountain next to the large tree. It was all amazing, and she would take in the sights all around her while closing her eyes as a stray breeze caught some of the water in the fountain and the mists sprays against her but - truly? That was fine as well.
Closed as her eyes may be she may not notice a knight approaching. "Miss Rayne," a voice beside her will greet suddenly, the tone friendly and not at all intimidating. When she should open her eyes and look his way she'll recognize Sir Baldwin Ivounel smiling at her, although the smile may be a bit tempered by the weary look of his eyes. Too much trouble being already behind them. And some trouble there had been involving his own sister. "I was looking for you at the inn," the young man adds after a pause. "And seeing you were not there, I thought,..." And he was right, obviously.
Upon hearing a familiar voice, though sudden, Rayne would open her eyes and flickers her gaze in the direction of Sir Baldwin. Her lips curving up into a smile before she gives a nod of her head. "Sir Baldwin. I hope I did not cause you some alarm when I wasn't at the Inn. I just..I wanted to step out for a bit. Get some fresh air if you will.." She took note of the weariness behind his eyes, and would shift enough to motion next to her. "Would you like to join me sitting here? Or perhaps a walk through the gardens will refresh us both." Either option was fine with her, she would simply enjoy his company and perhaps hear a little on what was plaguing that mind of his.
Baldwin's gaze flickers a bit and he shakes his head. "No, I wasn't alarmed really. I feel we are safe now, on this Island." Stressed a bit oddly perhaps, the latter part. "A walk would be fine, Miss Rayne." he adds after a moment. "But if you'd like to remain here, it would be fine with me as well, of course." The grey-blue eyes of the knight drift off for a moment, as he casts a glance about the variety of flowers and trees. "It feels odd, in a way, to have stayed behind, when the others where leaving. But I am glad I made the decision to stay, after all that's happened I couldn't leave you behind, here on the Isles."
Rayne stands after a moment, offering a smile and she listens intently to all that Baldwin has to say. Glad that she didn't alarm the man, and she agreed that things did seem more peaceful now. Still, she would shift so that they could perhaps begin to walk together, and still she listens to him speak. "When I learned that there were people from Two Rivers already going home...I thought you and your sister would be on that ship. I did not wish to cause trouble between you both so I opted to stay behind and not see you off if such were the case." Though she would have wanted to. "I had already decided to stay behind, because I feel that if I do not, my name will never be completely clear...and I wish for such a thing to be so. I may be a...a simple healer, born a commoner...but I have my pride and my reputation still." Saying as much before she turns her gaze towards Baldwin. "I am glad to see you stayed behind, and...well that you stayed for my sake in a way...I am honored and grateful, Sir Baldwin." Her hands were clasped in front of her as they walked, pace slow and just sort of shuffling about at best perhaps.
Baldwin does enjoy the walk it seems, judging from that smile that is still present in his features, and the fact that he can let his gaze wander as they proceed at a leisurely pace. "I would have returned with the first ship," he admits after a while. "For the reasons you mentioned. But... then again, I feel it perhaps is for the best I am spared from speaking with my sister for a while." He frowns as he pauses and shoots Rayne a glance. "And I understand the reason for you preferring to stay. Your name has been tainted with an accusation, and it will need the true culprits to be caught and punished, and you will be free of any of this." His own hands are clasped behind his back, and he continues in that slow stroll.
"Did something happen between you and your sister? I remember the other morning it seemed as though you were worried for her. You had sent your guard to go check on her even.." Rayne wondered if something more happened after she left to go get herself some rest. Then she ran into Marcus, and then Maerwynn and Ottis, and now she just wanted the fresh air. As the indoors could get stuffy over time. "I just feel as though if I were to run back to Two Rivers now before clearing my name, it may mar myself more. I would much rather stay here, and be as open and accomodating to the continuing investigations as I can be." She would glance over to Baldwin then, offering a smile still.
A frown appears on Baldwin's face when asked about his sister. "She... disappeared. Then was recovered. I am glad she is on that ship actually, as it will keep her from getting into trouble, as well as causing it." At least he hopes so. The briefness indicating he'd rather not get further into that topic of Livessa. A nod is given to Rayne's remark about why she chose to stay. "You might still be called as a witness at a trial, should there be one," he remarks pensively.
Rayne knows a dropped subject when she hears one, so on the shortness of the topic of Livessa, she would simply nod her head. Agreeing to the fact that it was good the Lady was on that ship. Rayne, despite everything, still had respect for the young woman and yet... Still, at the comment about a trial she gets a thoughtful look and then smirks. "Better to be a witness, than stand falsely accused still? I would have gone crazy. Being kept away from you and the others like that." Saying so much as she finally stops at a patch of flowers and kneels to take in their sight. Bright purple petals with white tips. "A dahlia! I haven't seen one of these in years..." And oh if she could pluck but a few petals from one...the healer's gentle hands take in the flower while she gazes upon it in awe - clearly in her element in that moment.
Baldwin may still look a little thoughtful, when Rayne speaks of the trial. That expression fades however when he notices her fascination with the Dahlia. His lips curve into a smile, as he studies the plant for a moment, attempting to feel the same enthusiasm as Rayne, but it does not come. "A nice flower," he comments instead smiling at her. "But don't we have those at home in Two Rivers as well?"
Rayne studies the flower for a little longer before standing upright once more, a flush of color on her cheeks. "Well, yes...but I've never seen that particular coloration before. But see how the petals sort of look like they've been dipped in something? True sign of a dahlia..and a nice reminder of home, along with company kept." Flashing the knight a smile, and having enthusiasm enough over a simple flower for the both of them, she doesn't seem to mind Baldwin's lack thereof. "So...tell me a little more of you, if I may pry Sir Baldwin. What was your childhood like?"
The question seems to take Baldwin off guard. He shoots Rayne a glance and it seems he'll start to stammer again. "I... um... Well. There's not much to tell. I'm the eldest child of Sir Erek Ivounel. Livessa is the second, and then there is Verlak, my little brother. Still squiring." A warm smile flickers over his face when he speaks of his brother. "He looks up to me in a way. So I try to be a good role model for him. The essence of chivalry." And there his smile fades a touch and he lowers his gaze. "This essence of chivalry has taken up a great deal of my education. My father is an Ivounel. We need to make up for our lower birth by excelling anywhere else. I was a page at Castle Equitaine, then I would have hoped to squire for my uncle, Sir Berec. But my father decided otherwise. I was sent to Granville. And stayed there, until I was knighted. It seems,..." And there he clears his throat, his grey-blue eyes flickering. "Livessa missed me very much while I was gone. At least that's what she tells me. Fact is, we got along pretty well before I left, but when I came back, she was... different. I can't really say in what way exactly. I feel she has been jeopardizing our name by her behaviour. This is what stands between us." Plus another suspicion on Baldwin's part, that he still needs to speak to her about.
There was motion to begin walking onward as Baldwin answers the question posed by Rayne. She listens, and intently so, as if drinking in every word like a lone flower in a desert praying for water. Watching as his emotions sort of swing between happiness and pride, to a sort of sadness of sorts. "Forgive my ignorance, Sir Baldwin, but when you say you need to make up for your lower birth...what do you mean by that?" It's simply true curiosity in her question. Then he speaks on his sister again, and truly she can tell the love that the man has for his family. "Well, she is young yet...perhaps just trying to find her way in this life..." A glance given to Baldwin as she wrings her hands together some while keeping them before herself. "Still, you're family, and I believe that such a thing can overcome...most objections in life."
The question has Baldwin almost pause in his steps, and he shoots Rayne a glance, a faint, almost apologetic smile flickering across his features. "Lower birth would not be the way to describe it, really. I am noble, but my grandfather was Sir Maric. Born by a commoner woman, fathered by my greatgrandfather Duke Elias Lenouvi. Maric was raised at Castle Equitaine, an openly acknowledged bastard. He squired and became a knight, and because of his deeds and honourable conduct he was 'ennobled' so to speak, and got his own House. Ivounel. The Bastard Branch." And there he falls silent for a moment, his gaze drifting again to the beauty of the Public Garden.
A dry chuckle escapes the knight when Rayne speaks of Livessa. "She is indeed young, and... too complicated a soul for me to comprehend at the moment. I have tried to speak with her, and what she had for me where naught but riddles. Or maybe I lack just the wits, or the understanding for her ways. It will be good for her to be back home. Under father's control. I certainly feel I've failed the task given to me. To look after her." A sigh leaves Baldwin's lips and he shakes his head. "It was a mistake to send her to the Isles with the delegation. I've tried to convince father, but he had insisted."
"Oh I see..." Rayne would speak, and then she considers a few things. So were they just a step above the commoner? She wouldn't actually question it of course and instead continues to listen as Baldwin goes on. "I do not have much experience with siblings, sadly...my parents only had me and then...well..." Letting the point trail off a moment as she looks ahead a bit. "So I really do not know what to say more to that affect. I wish I could...offer some sort of advice or some such." There was a shake of her head then at the last bit that Baldwin would offer. "I do not think you failed, really, Sir Baldwin. You cannot keep an eye on your sister at all times, especially when she seems as fleeting as she is. Plus, you had your own other duties to attend to." A blush fills her cheeks with color before she sets her gaze to the ground. "And I suppose, in some ways, I did not help in those matters either... keeping your company at random times, or drawing you to the dungeons to visit me when you could have been watching and rebonding with her."
Had she voiced her question aloud she would have gotten a reply, but not a simple one. But as things are, Baldwin is left to answer her words regarding Livessa. "I have tried," he says with another sigh, as his grey-blue eyes are once again to meet Rayne's gaze. "And the guards failed in keeping her from running off. And yes. In a way I blame some of her conduct on the closeness that has developed between you and I, Miss Rayne. She disapproves, and she has made that clear on several occasions." His gaze will drop once again onto the path ahead of them, as he continues. "I do not regret any of those visits, Miss Rayne, however. Nor any words that were spoken." Or deeds that were done. And there it happens that his own pale cheeks take on a slightly rosy colour, even if Baldwin avoids her gaze at the moment.
Rayne nods a little and then seems to frown while continuing to listen to Baldwin speak. Though her moss green gaze shifts over to glance upon Baldwin once more and she smiles a little. "Nor do I regret any of those things...though I admit, I was perhaps a bit too hasty in some of my actions. While I would not take them back should my life depend on it...I do wish they had been done and certain words spoken in...a better context I suppose." While not being locked in a dungeon and facing an unknown future which turned out to earn her freedom anyway. Taking note that Baldwin avoids her gaze then, she pauses in her steps and takes a look around. "I know I can be brash at times. And irrational. These are only a few of my faults...but I...I hope I did not somehow disappoint you..." That much more said before she glances up to the skies which were beginning to darken with the coming of dusk.
Baldwin looks up again, when Rayne speaks about not wishing to take back hasty actions, and he shakes his head, with a bewildered flicker in his grey blue eyes. "Too hasty in your actions? If so then we both are to blame. And even if I have to admit, I had a bit of a restless night afterwards," he smiles at the memory, "I would not take that... whatever it was... back either." Glancing about him now, as if suspecting the bushes and trees to have ears, he still hesitates to call that 'hasty action' by its name. And after seeing noone about, he'll take a step closer to Rayne, especially after her latter remark, and he'll reach for her hand. "Miss Rayne. You have not disappointed me. I doubt you could. It's just that I... in a way I am trying to do things right." Now did that make sense? Probably not. As if aware of that, he adds, at a lower volume: "I mean,... what happened in the dungeons, it happened because of the situation. We might have never seen each other again..."
Rayne smiles a little at his words, which she listens to intently as she always does. That moss green gaze of hers meeting his own grey blue. "Then we are both to blame, but such is not a bad thing, I do not think..." Saying that much as she sees him glancing about, but perhaps such wasn't a bad thing since there had been rumors about them before. Though she does not notice any prying eyes or ears in the immediate area, it does not mean they are not around. Finding her hand taken, when he speaks again she would give a smile to his next words as well, and in the midst of it all, actually finds herself momentarily speechless. Leaning in just a bit more so she could hear his hushed tones and then she blushes with a smile. "If I may be so bold, Baldwin..I believe you are doing everything right. Yet I also believe..there is no true text written anywhere about how all of this should go. Especially when in the course of time you can be tugged left when you wish to go right." A pause and she considers, "As bold as this may seem...I am not asking you to come to my bed...as that would be inappropriate...and even I know this. All I would ever ask, is that you follow your heart...as I did in the dungeons, as we have done since we first met I believe. To find this path and walk it together. A chance, a moment, because I've come to figure out that life is simply such...moments strung together to make it a glorious tumble." She gives his hand a squeeze then, and the smile never leaves her lips. "Besides, even great men and women are aloud to take a slight stumble every once in a while, and I would be there for you always, to catch you and set you upright once more."
Dusk is falling, indeed, the green of the trees, the colourful flowers soon fading into shades of grey, when a knight and a woman speak in hushed tones in a more and more deserted Public Garden in the City of Deavel. Baldwin smiles when he hears Rayne speak. Returning that squeeze of the hand, he'll lean even closer, leaving only a few inches between their faces. "Follow my heart...? For once...?", he mutters, his grey-blue eyes flickering over her face her eyes, those lips. His hand sliding up her arm now, as his other arm slips around her waits to pull her in to him. And there he follows her advice, or was it her bidding, when his lips meet hers, the kiss this time not obstructed by any bars of a cell door.
In such a moment, as dusk pales everything to grey, the world would all seem to slip away and not exist. The only grey that Rayne knew of was the blue tone of such in the Knight's eyes as their gazes held for a lingering moment. When he smiled, she did as well, and as she felt that arm around her waist to pull her close she would willingly let herself be guided. At his words, there wasn't much time to respond to them, as soon she felt his lips meet her own in a kiss that she would let herself sink into. Arms lifting then to gently wrap around Baldwin's neck as her head gives a slight tilt if only to deepen that kiss slightly and hold it as well as him for a lingering moment. A thing she had longed to do since the kiss they shared behind cell doors in a moment of unknown outcomes.
While it was her who broke the kiss the first time, it will be Baldwin who after a long moment of almost losing himself in that kiss breaks it, his grey-blue eyes for once gleaming as he smiles at her, the smile of deeply felt joy at what he has just experienced. His arms still wrapped about her frame he will hold her for a moment longer, out of words it seems, as any words he could say to describe his feelings would not do them justice. And so the silent interaction between his eyes and hers will have to suffice, until he finally releases her, takes a step backwards, his attention now shifting back to their surroundings. "Tis getting late, Rayne. Let me accompany you back to the inn.", he says softly.
There is a soft protest of sorts as he breaks that kiss, her moss green eyes sparkling in the fading sunlight. The moment continues with words unspoken, a silent moment that spoke volumes in Rayne's mind. A bit of reluctance shown as he pulls back but her arms fall away to fold back together at her front. The world around them comes back to life yet her smile remains as he speaks and she gives a nod. "Of course, I would certainly enjoy you doing so." Turning then to at least face the direction of the exit to the gardens which would lead to the inn.