[ota] sleeping under strange skies

[thepupthatmatters]

He's ready for this. Of course he's ready for this.

He wouldn't be here if he weren't ready. Holló wouldn't have sent him through without being prepared. This isn't, after all, the sort of place a person gets sent without it being purposeful. Even the people who wander here 'by chance' are the people who need to be here, he's been told.

So it's the right time for Aleksei Volkov to be stepping out into the cold sunlight barely warming the walls of the Castle Spades, newly minted and processed and told he'll have to start working his way up from Two now.

The few things he'd brought with him have been settled into the cramped quarters he'll be sharing with a few other recent arrivals. What's stuck from his grandmother means he'll be starting off under the apparently quite severe Spade kitchen staff.

Hopefully it isn't the end of the world that he needs to pause when he's sent out to Town to pick up a few extra bottles of truffle oil and vanilla extract. Hopefully being 'ready for this' doesn't mean he can't take a moment--take a deep breath--as he lets settle into his bones the fact that he's here.


{ooc; He can be bumped into at the castle or being lost in Town. Also tag plz?}

Comments

[maidenthespade]

Poor zaichik. New ones always looked so lost in early days. Katya stops beside the new Card whose mind appears to be far, far away. Bad habit in Spade Castle, but he would learn that if he meant to last long.

"It is confusing at first, yes? Corridors all look same."

It is perhaps pity Deck royals do not wander about wearing crowns. For him. For Katya, it is good way to take true measure of newcomers.

[thepupthatmatters]

Maybe there's something in the water, that all the women he's been meeting have such captivating eyes. Maybe it's hormones hitting overdrive from finally being out of the all-boy's prep. Who knows.

It's that more than anything overly regal about the woman that has him briefly stumbling over his tongue, even as he shifts to stand taller.

"More-- candlesticks here than I would have thought. I thought finding it would help me find the stairs, but..."

A rather defeated gesture is made--toward all three visible stairwells flanked with candelabras.

[maidenthespade]

"Oh, we are having our fair share of torches and pitchforks," she assures him with perfect straight face. "Though former congregate in great hall and latter in stables. You are--" She pauses and places his accent. "Uhorska? Hungarian? Üdvözöljük a Ásó Vár.

"I should warn you my knowledge of your language is sparse. Consider me your native guide. Where are you trying to go?"

[Hungarian: Welcome to Spade Castle.]

[thepupthatmatters]

It's only been a few hours since he'd said good bye to his homeland in his native tongue. That doesn't mean the words, however simple, don't light him up just the same as if it had been years.

"\Nonsense./" Hungarian pops back to his tongue thoughtlessly, with a swiftness of fluency not at all helpful for those who didn't speak the language well. "\That was quite beautiful./" His mind only catches up with itself a moment later, tongue forcing back to accented English. He'd have to live in this language now--best to keep practicing. "I was-- trying to get back to kitchen?"

[maidenthespade]

No matter how long she has lived among English speakers, the rhythm of her native tongue still touches her. She remembers and so has made it point to try to learn phrases in several languages. "You are very kind. I have been told my accent is atrocious. Now, you would not think so, but we are having system to halls and staircases. Some you can tell by materials and furnishings. You will note one candelabra is not so grand as others, yes?"

[thepupthatmatters]

At the end of it all, whatever language she's speaking is lovely. She's just got one of those faces. And voices. And everythings.

He does manage to tear himself away from her to look down the hall again. The candelabras are studied with a quiet scrutiny before he points.

"The-- pewter?"