(( Yays! My First Brunnholder! ))

Oaria set her sewing down in her lap for a moment to stretch out her back. She had been hunched over making tiny stitches in a student's torn waistcoat. She turned her ears to the other seamstresses who seemed to be sharing tidbits they'd heard about the school.

"Apparently there are some students sleeping about in the eighth form rooms. There've been stains on some of their sheets!"

"You recall that professor who kept letting classes slip? No one's seen him in the longest time."

"Apparently the potter for the West Gardens has run off with some other woman."

She bowed her head momentarily. She didn't have anything to offer to the conversation. Not really. Just to try, she raised her head and opened her mouth, but nothing came out and the other women didn't notice.

Sighing, she turned her eyes over the laundry. The large tubs of lye and soap were being loaded, churned, and unloaded. Shirts were starched and pressed. She was glad she didn't have to do that as much anymore. It was much more fast-paced than she liked, and she was often frightened that she might trip and make a fool of herself. In sewing, there was no risk of making a public fool of one's self. Just sitting quietly and fixing or patching holes and tears.

She made the last few stitches and nipped off the excess thread. She gave it a once-over for any other problems, then rose, dusting of bits of snipped thread and fibers from her skirts, and started heading over to the presses. They were mean-looking contraptions, and she hoped someone would be there for her to simply hand the garment off to.

Luckily, there was somebody to hand the garment to.

She sighed and took it, being polite she said "Thank yo--" She stopped mid sentence. "Wow! Did you really sew that?" Her fingers traced the new stitches; she could barely even see them! She trained her tired wide eyes on the woman; she herself had never sewn anything that nice before.

Moira had been told to help with laundry, so here she was. She didn’t envy the ones with their arms shoulder deep in the buckets, but after operating the press for so long she almost wanted to trade. Her arms were about to fall off, mopping wasn’t this much work, and dishes certainly weren’t either.

She listened to the seamstresses, only understanding some of what they said. She wished she were sewing right now, instead of turning a huge crank and crushing laundry dry. In fact, she wished she were anywhere but here. And while she was at it, anywhere but this school, even! She frowned as a woman handed her a garment she had just been mending. When would the work end? She had to do so much, too much, it was too much... But she had to do it, she didn’t want to be punished again.

Oaria handed the waistcoat off to the girl. She's so tiny... she can't've been here long, she mused.

When the little girl piped up with a question, Oaria was startled. People usually didn't address her with such enthusiasm. She was shocked into a fumbled, "What? I don't-- oh, ehrm... Y-yes, I mended it along here."

She pointed to where a seam had come open and a tear had been.

She looked a little more closely at the tiny girl. She looked so tired. Her hands hadn't even had time to callous to the work. Her eyes softened. "Do... do you want a little help?" She held her breath and motioned vaguely at the press. She didn't like using the machine if she didn't have to, but she supposed the little one liked it even less.

She gaped at Oaria for a moment, had she just said she would help her? If the hadn’t been holding the coat, and hadn’t thought it would be a bad idea, she would have hugged the woman. "Y-you... would help me?" she asked in an awed voice.

Nobody had offered her help since she had come here, besides Aura, and this was a welcome change. She eyed the press and wrinkled her nose, before turning back to the woman and nodding. "Yes I would like some help!" she said.

"I do not think I was working it the right way, anyway." She shrugged.

(( Sooo... I didn't do my research, and they didn't have clothes presses like I imagined during this time period, so I'm making one as it might have worked at the time ))

Oaria nodded and gulped a little, "I-it's a complicated, erm, process..."

She eyed the machine. It looked like a gaping maw, ready to eat her hands right off her arms. She wilted a little.

The press was made up of two main parts: the base, and the press. The base was a padded, fabric lined space to lay the garment. It was safe enough. The press was the dangerous part. Inside that large, flat expanse of iron was a bucket load of hot coals that kept the iron hot enough to steam the water they spritzed on the garment.

She reached up to the handle (How could she reach it?!) and lowered the press, using a spare rag to pop open the top. As she feared, the coals were mere ash at this point. they would have to replace it, first.

"Uhm... Could you get a fresh bucket of coals? We're out," She pointed to where they kept stoves going to heat the water. She would be able to get fresh coals from there, "I'll, uh, clean this out..."

Though the coals had gone to ash, the iron was still quite hot. She locked it down using a crank near the hinge and began scooping out the ash into a bucket using a small shovel. When Moira got back with the coals, they would have to spread them evenly in the little chambers so that no one place was too hot for the cloth.

Moira nodded, it most certainly was complicated, and it had been taking the poor girl forever! When she was asked to get coals she looked down into the machine and grimaced. How many things could she mess up in one job? She shook her head and backed off, looking in the direction Oaria had pointed.

"Okay, I will be right back, then." She smiled and walked over to the coals.

Her smile disappeared as soon as her had touched a bucket. She had a faint memory of living in her house, and being able to order a servant to bring her coals. Now, she was the servant. Her eyes started tearing up as she thought about it, how long could they make her serve them? Surely they had to let her go! Surely she could return to her parents one day... One day...

She sniffed and wiped tears off of her face. She wouldn’t allow herself to think of this right now, if she did then she wouldn’t be able to do her job. Her eyes and nose were red now, but that would go away soon. She sighed heavily and scooped some coal into her bucket, and then turned and walked back to Oaria.

"Here, I’m sorry it took me so long." She said as she held up the bucket with both hands. She gave the woman another smile, and did her best to make it look real, it would have been convincing if not for the sad eyes and the girls uncomfortable pose.

Oaria took the bucket carefully, making sure not to brush the hot metal against the little girl, "Th-thank you."

She glanced at the ten-year-old's sad smile. She took a look of concern, oh, the poor thing. It's all too much. She must be really fresh from mum and dad. She set the bucket down on the press before taking Moira's hands and bending down to her level, "A-are you okay, sweetie? How long have you been with us?"

She whimpered. The woman’s question reminded her that she hadn’t been here forever, and made her remember the days before this school. The days with candy and cakes, the days with silk and lace. The days where she could walk where she wanted, tossing her curls and showing off her dresses. The days with big dinners and sunshine… The days when Mommy and Daddy had tucked her in and read her stories, and never left her room without a kiss to her forehead.

It hadn’t been long ago, and she still had some of her habits and reactions from life as a spoiled golly child. She wanted to leave, she wanted to go back home. She wanted to sit around a fire, in a big fluffy chair. She wanted her old life back. She wanted her parents; couldn’t they feel that she needed them?! Her lip stuck out of its own accord, old habits die hard, and tears spilled out of her eyes, the kind that just fell out and splattered on the ground. She was too tired to wail or go into a fit; she couldn’t handle screaming like that right now.

"S-six... Six days." Her voice cracked and broke as she said this.

Six, six long days had been spent here away from her family. Her face turned to her boots, and tears splashed against the leather. She didn’t want to be here, she wanted to go home!

The trembling lip... Uh, oh.

The welling eyes... Oh, no.



"Oh, dear," Oaria was glad she had already set down the bucket of coals, because she surely would have dropped it now. She settled on her knees and wrapped her arms around the ten-year-old's shoulders, "Shh, shh, shh. There, there, dear..."

She realized she didn't know the little girl's name. It didn't really matter, just now. The poor thing had been separated less than a week. Of course it still stung like lemon in a cut. She patted her curls and let her cry.

She squirmed against the woman, uncomfortable and surprised at the sudden hug, and then wrapped her arms around her neck. It wasn’t her mother, but it was a hug none the less. She had missed hugs, just a simple little thing, but it meant so much.

She sobbed into Oaria's shoulder, "I want t-to go ho-ooome!" her voice was broken by her tears, and tears ran down her cheeks. "Can't I?" Her shaking calmed and she leaned back to look the woman in the eyes. "I promise i will be good!" she said with hope in her eyes.

It seemed Moira thought Oaria could just snap her fingers and have her delivered back to her parents, but things weren’t going to work like that anymore. All she knew was that she wanted to go home.

"Can’t I please go home?"

Oaria gave to Moira's squirm, realizing that she might not appreciate it. But when she hung around her neck, her heart ached. She just needed affection. It was a rough transition.

When her little sobbing voice rose, other workers in the laundry started looking their way. Fearful of reprimand, Oaria gently shushed her, "Shh, shh, there, now..."

Then she was begging to go home, promising to be good. And Alioe, Hulali, and Ophur: those eyes. She sighed, don't they explain anything to them these days?

Oaria shook her head sadly, and with a look to the others near them she withdrew from the girl, though she wanted to keep holding her, and started distributing the coals in the press, "No, dear. It's... i-it's not that simple."

She seemed to wilt a bit-- she remembered the fresh pain of searing disappointment, of inadequacy. She shook her head, that was some time ago...

When the woman let go Moira wanted to grab a hold of her again, but she stopped herself. She realized just how much she was crying, she had cried so much lately, when would it end? The girl bit her lip and wiped her tears with her arm, hand felling its way to her tattooed shoulder. Her fingers dug into her skin, but she didn’t even notice.

"Not that... simple?" She didn’t look like she understood. Things were always simple. She pointed at something, and soon after it was in her hands. She raised her arms and walked up to her mother, she was picked up and held. Of course, she hadn’t been picked up for a while now, she was heavy, but still. Things couldn’t not be simple.

"Why...?" She grabbed a handful of coal and arranged it in the box, she had to help, had to do something.

Why... That was the question that had plagued her for so long. It didn't haunt her every waking moment as it once had, but it still tugged at the back of her mind now and again. She had answers she could feed the hungry little question now and again, but they were mere snacks to the answers it wanted. But it was enough to sate the question for a time. She couldn't give the little girl the answers she deserved. But she could sate the nagging thing for her, at least for a time.

"You know... you know that feeling you get when you're around your parents? Especially if they're casting a spell? How you can feel something happening, even though you can't see it?" She didn't know how often the child had been around her parents when casting, but surely she would get the gist of their fields.

"I don't know if you've been around humans... but if you have... you know how that's not there?" Surely there had been servants in the girl's household.

The girl bit her lip and nodded, she could feel things happening when her parents casted, they had shown her how spells worked and taught her what they did... She could taste things when spells were cast, even when she hadn’t eaten anything.

"How, you can taste things?" She asked. She would never get tired of speaking of magic, and that was going to be a problem for her.

Sometimes she could see the results of the castings when they happened. She remembered all too well how badly she had wanted to cast... How badly she still did want to cast. She wanted something that she had been told she couldn’t have, and she would never get it. She had also felt the lack of field around humans, and she felt it every day around these passives. She suspected they felt the same lack of... anything around her, as well.

"And how... Humans can’t cast magic? And passives--" Her eyes went wide, she was a passive... she would never cast. She had already known that, but realizing something yourself and being told by someone else were two very different things. She dug her nails into a piece of coal. She was a passive, she would never cast, and she didn’t have a field. She was just like a human; she was weaker than even a wick!

"can't either." she finished.

Oaria nodded sadly, watching comprehension cross her face. "That's right. Not when we want to... no matter how much we want to..."

She shook her head, latching the cover closed over the lit coals, "I don't think it would be so terrible... they might not lock us up like this... i-if it weren't for the diablerie."

She lifted the cover on the press, wary of the metal plate, hands trembling a little as she laid that silly waistcoat across the padded base, "I don't suppose they've told you about that..." she spritzed the waistcoat with water from a small mister hooked beneath the metal monstrosity, "There's one spell that's attached to you somehow... I don't know how it works, but sometimes, if you're hurting enough... or angry enough..." she closed the press, sending out a shoot of steam, "it goes off.

"That's why they really lock us away... to protect us from that... Or maybe to protect them. I don't know." She shook her head and closed her eyes against the years of uncertainty and fright attached to it. Hers wasn't too bad, but she had heard stories... Like the explosion in Dorhaven. That's why you're safer in here...

"I have...” she sighed, "I have been told about that. I just..." She watched the press work, learning how Oaria was working it. She would need to know how to use it; she was a passive servant after all.

She brushed coal dust off of her fingers, and traced her tattoo again. That tattoo, that was her mark, that mark was what told people what she was. She would never get rid of that, she would never not have it again. She could cover it up, she could lie about it, but she would never use magic.

"They need protection from us?" this confused the girl. She was of course aware of the dangers of passive's diablerie, but she couldn’t imagine actually hurting a galdor. Or anyone else for that matter.

"If they are afraid of our diableries... then why do they make us work in the school, so close to their children?"

Oaria paused a moment. It all depends on who you ask, really...

She rearranged the waistcoat, considering all the answers she'd heard and told herself, to keep us all where they can watch us, to keep us under their boots, to make sure there isn't enough stress for our diableries to go off, free labor...

"Not all diableries are dangerous... not exactly. But for the ones that are, well," she picked at a piece of lint on the vest, "I suppose it's so that they can be sure that nothing bad enough to set it off happens to them. And this is the best place. Other cities are full of humans and wicks, who would do circle knows what to them... here they keep us away from all that."

She turned to Moira, "The galdori wouldn't hurt us like they would. They can keep us safe here."

Is it really so terrible outside the walls? She cringed a little. That's what scared her so-- she didn't know.

She processed all of that information, and then crossed her arms. "I still don’t like it." She glared at the floor. "It's like... Like we are just going to be here forever, I had things I wanted to do. How am I going to be a famous seamstress now?" The girl had an urge to kick the press, but she held her foot in place. Kicking such expensive machinery would surely result in punishment.

She sighed and looked back up at Oaria. "How... hasn’t it been hard? Don’t you ever, you know, get mad?" she asked the woman. A woman who had been imprisoned here since her tenth birthday ought to have gotten mad, or wanted revenge sometimes.

"And how do you know it's so bad out there?" she made a wide sweeping gesture with one hand, to show what she meant. "It seems perfectly fine in The Stacks." She pouted. She knew the argument was pointless; it would never get her out of the school. And after what Oaria had said, she wasn’t even sure she wanted out. But she had to say something... Life was hard here, and the little girl didn’t like it. She wanted to do nothing but complain, every day she would be stuck here.

"Mad? No," Oaria shook her head, "I did, now and again, when it was all new, but now..." now you're just too scared to do anything about it.

"The stacks are different because they're still within Brunnhold. It's not like just anyone can live there," Oaria reasoned, "And I've heard stories about those other cities. Wicks and humans doing all sorts of terrible things..."

She decided it was about time to take the little girl's mind off of such dark broodings as haunted her. She folded the freshly pressed waistcoat, "Now, I don't know about 'famous,' but I could teach you to be a good seamstress, if you like. Did you make your apron?" She pointed to the pretty yellow thing, "It looks to me like you have the basics down already."

She blushed and held up her apron to show it off. "Yes, yes I did!" She said. She seemed very happy that the apron had even been noticed, she was very proud of it. It did have its flaws, though; on one side the ruffles were shorter than on the other side, one of the pockets was badly sewn on, and there were wrinkles from where she had gathered fabric in stitches by accident. But it looked loved, it was her favorite thing to wear, ever.

"And, you would? Thank you!" She smiled at the woman. "I have got the basics down, my mother," she sighed as she said this, "taught me how to sew; we had to be ahead of everyone else in the fashion game."

Oaria smiled, glad to see the child happy and with her mind off her troubles... at least for a time. It was obvious that she truly loved to sew and create. She could do well with the other seamstresses once she got better... Oaria could almost see the girl laughing and smiling among the other women, copper curls bouncing as she shared her gossip and tidbits...

Internally she sighed, would that I could...

"I'll be glad to teach you after your duties and mine are done. If you ask around the rooms for Oaria, you'll find me," I'm the dark, quiet one, "What's your name, dear?"

Her face fell a little, after her duties? Why couldn’t they do it now and ignore her duties altogether, that way, she wouldn’t have to do the work? She didn’t like having to wait, but she smiled again anyway.

"Moira Catriona Montrose," she still had a habit of proudly saying her full name, showing off her last name like it would get her extra treats or something just because she was a Montrose. The habit probably wouldn’t go away for a while, so often had she repeated it. "but my parents call-- called me Kitty."

Oaria nodded at the nickname, but wondered if she wouldn't prefer something different since her parents were no longer about to call her Kitty, or if she needed to hold on to that little piece of familiarity...

"So you'd rather Kitty, then?" she asked gently, "It's sweet. But Moira is a lovely name as well."

It presented the option without pushing one way or another. She wanted the little one to feel comfortable in her new situation. Whatever made the transition easier was alright by her.

Moira brushed her hand over her tattoo again. Did she really want to be called "Kitty" anymore? It wasn’t like her parents were here now, but surely she shouldn’t get out of the habit of being called by their nickname for her... One day, when-- if, she saw them again, she didn’t want to not recognize her own name out of their mouths.

"I'd rather Kitty, yes." She nodded. "Thank you for showing me how to use this," She gestured toward the press, "Oaria." She wasn’t sure is she should just use her first name like that, it made her uncomfortable, which may or ay not have been visible on her face. She had been taught to respect adults, and that meant titles like Ma'am, and Ms., maybe even a Miss thrown in there somewhere. But she had called Aurelie, Aura, and not Ms. Aura, so why call Oaria, Ms. Oaria?

Still, it felt odd to not use a formal title. Maybe that’s just what passives do, she thought, they only use first names for each other?

"Alright, Kitty," she said softly, "You're welcome. I have to get back to my work now, as well," she sighed with a glance to the gossiping biddies in the corner.

She patted the girl's bright red curls, "Look for me when you've finished, and I'll show you what I know."

She gave the girl a wan smile, "Keep your chin up, dear. It gets easier with time."

She turned and left her to her chores before she got in trouble herself for neglecting her own.