Of Parties and Potions

Of Parties and Potions - Part 2

"I take it you are having as much fun as I."

Blythe stopped trying to push her annoyingly floppy ears away from her eyes when she heard the familiar voice. Etri leaned against the wall next to her as though he wished he could pass through it- something not too far outside the realm of possibility considering that he was a Shadowweaver. Although Etri towered over everyone here, Adair had chosen the most suitable costume for someone with a penchant for hiding.

"Hang on, your whiskers are smudged." She reached up to wipe his cheek. His round ears were knocked slightly askew by his mess of curls, so she adjusted these. "There. Yeah. I'm hoping if I stay in this corner long enough, Addy will forget I'm here and I can sneak out the side door."

"That is unlikely after all the begging he did to get you to come in the first place."

"Said the pot to the kettle. He knows we hate parties. I don't do small talk and you don't do talk."

"It could be worse, yes?"

Blythe let out a huff of air and pushed her ears away from her face again. As obnoxious as the things were, they still weren't as obtrusive as the fake snout tied behind her head with string. She would have preferred the painted whiskers. "Since when are you the optimistic one?"

Etri gestured towards the center of the room. "Ever since I saw what the other sentinels wear. He could have garbed us in that."

Blythe snorted a laugh. The lounge was full of artists and their sentinels, most dressed far more ridiculously than Blythe and her pair. The artists seemed to have gone in for a few of the Muses this year-- lots of dragons, arborein tree-folk, and birdlike aerigals. These were presumably supposed to be Tessera, Mortise, and Andante, the Muses of glassblowing, woodworking, and music. And, of course, cats. There were always cats at a costume party. What wasn't normal was the fact that the bodyguards were almost entirely crustaceans.

"Okay, I get the whole fixation with artists and Muses and their whole art thing. But why lobsters? Shouldn't sentinels be dressed more ... impressively? Or at least a little less silly?"

Etri's lips twitched into a smile. "Well, ponder this. We are supposed to be defensive of our artists, yes? What better for this than an animal both possessing a natural kind of armor and capable of attacking a foe."

"Claws made from stuffing and fabric kind of defeat the purpose. How exactly is a sentinel supposed to defend an artist when their hands are inside large oven mitts and they're waddling around with a stupid tail?"

"What could possibly hurt us here?" In her ranting about how mind-numbingly stupid this all was, she hadn't noticed Adair walk over to them. He grinned behind his own set of painted whiskers and handed Etri a red beverage. "And I knew you'd say that. That's why I didn't make you or Etch wear gloves for your paws."

"Thank your Creators," Etri muttered under his breath as he took a drink.

"Ha! I knew you'd start talking like a Concordian eventually!" Adair reached up to adjust Etri's headband from where it had slid forward again. As he shifted to stand on his toes, his striped tail swung back and forth. Blythe thought he looked far better than the trees and lobsters, even if he had expressed disappointment that so many people also chose cats. A cat suited Adair. He was like a small, hyperactive, overly-affectionate kitten. Even his tattoo-like skin discoloration- the side effect of channeling weaving that was not his own- resembled the dark markings on a tabby.

When he took the glass back to hand it over to Blythe, she couldn't stop the sigh that escaped her lips. While Etri might be getting more and more Concordian as time went by, she just couldn't adjust to Adair's Artisan traditions. Why did the three of them always have to share food and drink? It wasn't as though she really minded sharing with Adair and Etri, but she wouldn't say no to her own drink every once in a while. She couldn't remember the last time she finished a meal without Adair nibbling from it. Etri once jokingly threatened to climb up on the roof of their wagon during meals, a place where he knew the acrophobic artist wouldn't go. The intense disappointment Adair projected through their link had quickly stopped that jibe.

Blythe rubbed at her forehead as she handed the drink back to Adair. It made her head a little fuzzy, which shouldn't be able to happen to her, especially after only a few sips. "What's in this, anyway? It's potent."

Adair shrugged as he drank from it. "I dunno. Fruit?"

A loud clanging sound distracted Blythe from her worries. "Oh no. What's he doing here?"

Clamoring across the dance floor and bumping into everyone he passed was Etri's brother. When Sol saw them, he waved his arms wildly to get their attention, spilling some of his drink on a pair of birds and knocking a tree off her feet.

Etri hid his face behind his hands. As the only other tall foreigner at the party, it was obvious that he knew Sol- or if this wasn't obvious, Sol untangling his feet from branches and coming over to give Etri a bear hug would have made this undeniable.

Adair broke into a titter as Etri tried to pry himself away from someone who seemed to be made entirely out of metal.

"So you're a... stove?" Blythe leaned over to unhook Etri's shirt from where it stuck to Sol's burner. "That's certainly different."

"No, I'm a knight! Like from the stories! Dray's my dragon!"

Blythe groaned. "Dray's here too? What part of 'private party' don't you understand?"

Never mind that she didn't want to be here and would have gladly allowed Sol to come in her place. He didn't have to know this.

"The part that left us sitting at home bored, of course." Dray had come up behind Sol. Dwarfed by the much taller man, Dray wouldn't have made a very threatening dragon if not for the fact that Dray really could breathe fire. "We decided to see what all this fuss was about. Frankly this party is rather boring."

Blythe couldn't disagree there, but before she could say as much, Dray let out a gasp. "Solei!"

At the sound of his name being shouted, Sol started with his glass halfway to his lips. The liquid ran down his arm and splashed the front of Dray's coat. Dray crinkled their nose and frantically began brushing at this with their hands.

"You klutz! It will be impossible to remove this stain. Do you know how hard it is to get punch out of-" Dray froze and stared at their hands in disgust. When Etri handed them a handkerchief, Dray waved it away. "There isn't much point now, is there? I'm afraid I made a horrible mistake."

Something was wrong with Dray's hands. They seemed stained a strange color different from the punch... green, perhaps, but when Blythe took a step forward to get a better look, she stumbled. She reached out to steady herself against Etri only to find he no longer stood at her side. Typical, she thought as her knees hit the floor. Ten minutes into a social situation and out he crept through the nearest door. Occasionally it was through a window. Once it was up a chimney.