Pen skritching carefully along the paper, the ink gradually resolved itself into a completed image. Aven stared down at it, carefully checking it with the picture in front of him, before deciding it finished. He stretched for a moment, reflecting as he gave his hands a break.

Aven knew he should have been concerned by the way Ash'aman Laridian had looked interested after he had mentioned he had been a painter's apprentice. After class the man had collared him and asked to see some of his work. Initially, Aven had been delighted, excited at the prospect that such an important person might like his work. A week later, Aven was not quite so happy.

This was his third day in the library, working at his new chore. Copying art from the books. He'd spent several days with ter'angreal too, drawing them for reports, and illustrating diagrams that several disheveled looking Ash'aman described to him. Dieb Chas seemed a breed apart most of the time. Apparently they used to hire a man to do all of this, but with the arrival of Aven, they had their own personal art clerk.

Sighing, he looked down at the pile of parchment in front of him. There were five copies so far, of Illustration 52-A out of "Age of Weaponry: A Treatise on Weapon Ter'angreal" Despite having stared at the page for the past hour and a half, he'd only caught a few of the words and had no idea what the thing was meant for. It looked vaguely like some kind of conical spear. Blotting sand on the parchment, he made sure the ink was dry before adding this one to the stack. Number six complete. Only fourteen more to go.

Setting the pen to the side of the inkwell, Aven wiped his hands on his pants, ink spots blending perfectly with the black of the uniform. It was the only benefit he had found so far, and he exploited it for all it was worth. His hands by this time were rather spotty, and there was a very large blot encompassing his left thumb. That came from when he'd tipped the damn ink-well and ruined a whole stack of drawings, Light curse him for a goat-bedding oaf. It had taken another three hours to replace them.

Sigh. Back to work.

He pulled another sheaf of paper before him, and dipped his pen in preparation. Someone clearing their throat behind him made him stop.

So this was the fabled library of Tar Valon. This was the place her mother had tried most of her life to get into to complete her research. As much as she had hated books as a child, she had her mother had taught her well enough to appreciate the wealth of knowledge that was currently spread out before here in endless aisles of bookcases. Her hands found the scarf around her head, making sure it was still firmly in place. The places seemed empty enough, but then most were probably in class at this time of day. Being new to the Tower, they had given her a week’s respite from classes, but not from the every day chores. The Aes Sedai were firm believers in the philosophy that manual labour formed character, but Rahien liked to think she already had plenty. The first couple of days had been tougher than she had expected, both physically and emotionally. If she had thought she could just keep to herself and get on with it, she had been badly mistaken.

From the onset she had been set upon with questions about her appearance and why she did not go for Healing. Her hands subconsciously checked the scarf again as she advanced amongst the books. What lay in here was part of the reason her mother had given up her life and all of the reason for her being there. She let her fingers slide over the spines of some of the books, reading titles as she went along. Some few she even recognised, as they had also been in her mother’s collection, but most were unfamiliar and cried out to her with a promise of what lay inside. Rahien smiled wryly. Apparently her mother had managed to pass on her passion for books after all. The realisation brought an unexpected pang of sorrow and Rahien blinked rapidly against the tears that suddenly blurred her vision. She resolutely pushed her thoughts away. Crying, she had learned, only brought on more questions she did not want to answer. Let them think as they may. She did not understand most of it herself; she was still trying to get her head around the fact that she was apparently capable of learning to channel.

Smirking to herself, she thought she would probably end up setting the whole place on fire with her luck, if she actually managed to channel at all. As she turned the corner she realised that she was not as alone with her thoughts as she had thought, for at a table not far away sat a young man, obviously engrossed in whatever it was he was doing. She quickly scanned the black uniform and the auburn hair above it and decided to silently back away. Rahien new even less about these male channelers than she did about the business of the White Tower, apart from the stern lecture she had received upon arriving that she was not to “associate” with men. Rahien had fought the urge at that point to make some flippant remark about odds of any man ever wanting anything to do with her ever again, but one look at the Aes Sedai’s face had made her decide that perhaps now was not the best time for sarcasm. The memory suddenly seemed comical and before she realised she nearly laughed out loud. She managed to catch the sound at the last minute, until it came out as if she was merely clearing her throat. Rahien froze in her spot, caught between common courtesy and the urge to flee. Her eyes studied a spot on the floor just between her feet; she still found it hard to deal with the looks some people gave her.

Aven turned around, looking to see who was standing behind him. She was just at the turn of the bookshelf- likely she'd just been wandering the shelves to see what was there and happened upon him. She was looking very studiously at the ground, trying to avoid his gaze. She was in novice white, but also wore a scarf around her head, almost completely encompassing it. He hadn't seen any other novices dressed like that. Odd. She looked up after a moment, and Aven couldn't manage to keep the shock out of his eyes.

Her face... well, it was a face, but just barely. His mind registered the short locks of auburn hair falling from the front of the scarf as he tried to accept the image before him. In an odd way, he was both repulsed and fascinated. On the one hand, she must have been through something horrible to render her as she was. On the other hand, the pitted and scarred face before him amazed him on an artistic level. It was a texture never meant for human skin. Light, what that must feel like...

Clearing his own throat now, he took control of himself. Swearing internally, he could see that he'd embarrassed her. Light, how could he not have, staring like a buffoon! He rubbed the back of his neck vigorously, pangs of guilt stabbing him.

"Ah...sorry. My name's Aven." He blinked, pulling back his hand, realizing he now surely had black smears on his neck. Frowning at it, he swore as he rubbed his hand on his pant leg again, hoping that this time it would be fully dry. Looking back up at her, certain she must think him some kind of simpleton, he spoke again.

"Light... this is going to sound odd, but.... do I have ink on my neck?" He turned and lifted his hair, showing clearly several inky finger smudges. Aven still hoped that maybe they weren't there... if this kept up like it was, he would have to spend hours in the bathhouse trying to get all of the ink off of him. He was so clumsy with it!

(ooc: Boards never showed there was a new post! Sorry for the delay!)

Rahien felt like she was trapped in one of those horrible nightmares where you know something bad is going to happen, but you’re unable to move. Her hands clenched on the skirts of her dress as she returned his shocked look, like a deer caught out in the open by the hunter. She could feel the heat rise in her cheeks, but strangely enough the experience was nowhere near as bad as she had dreaded. She had been convinced that she would die of shame the first time a man looked at her like that, but the realisation that he seemed to feel worse about it than she did, made it somehow easier to handle. His embarrassment was so endearing, that Rahien could not help but smile and felt like a tight band around her chest was suddenly released. She was pleasantly surprised to hear the familiar sound of her homeland roll off his tongue as he introduced himself and turned to expose his neck, which clearly bore the marks of his ink-smudged fingers.

Amusement shone in her eyes, but her tone was carefully neutral as she replied: “I think you somehow managed to get more ink on yourself than on the paper, which, in itself, is no small feat.” She coughed behind her hand to cover the fast rising mirth and with a surprising urge for mischief she added: “At this stage my mother would normally dab her tongue on a clean handkerchief and start scrubbing furiously, something I’d be happy to try if you would like me to.” Rahien had always detested her mother doing that and she could only imagine his horror at the thought of some weird novice rubbing her spittle on his neck. Rahien suddenly realised just how bizarre the whole situation was and her amusement subsided considerably. For a moment she had almost forgotten who and where she was and had reacted pretty much like the old Rahien would have.

Men had always had a strange fascination for her, mainly because there were so few around when she grew up. After her father left her mother, she had obviously made a resolve to stay far away from men and they seldom had any male visitors unless you counted the grey and grizzled professors that by to discuss theories with her mother. So when she was old enough to accompany her mother to social events, she had thrown herself in with enthusiasm. Saldea was a country where the women ruled much of the politics in the background and Rahien was a natural when it came to manipulating people. She had no scruples when it came to using her female charms to get what she wanted, despite the many lectures her mother had given her about the importance of education and personality. Aven was still trying to establish the extend of the damage he’d done to his neck and Rahien realised that she had seldom had a conversation with a man without any ulterior motives. Aven’s hazel eyes were set off by his light complexion in a very flattering way and he had a very disarming charm, so Rahien was sure he’d known his share of female attention.

Most channelers never married outside their own circles and a lot remained single for the rest of their lives, or so Rahien had been told. There were just too many complications with aging and the impact of the power on any children a marriage might produce. Her cheeks coloured again as she realised where her thoughts had led her and she firmly pushed them away. She was bound for a different life now. Realising that she had not returned his introduction yet, she softly said: “My name’s Rahien by the way.”

((ooc: *shakes fist at IRL* Sorry it's been so bloody long... I had some enforced free time when I realized I didn't have the stuff I needed to do a project and couldn't get it for a bit, so I made my way here. Soorreee!!! :( )

“I think you somehow managed to get more ink on yourself than on the paper, which, in itself, is no small feat.” Aven was surprised to hear a rather dulcet toned voice that spoke in the accents of Saldaea. The novice gave a little cough and continued. “At this stage my mother would normally dab her tongue on a clean handkerchief and start scrubbing furiously, something I’d be happy to try if you would like me to.”

Aven grimaced with his back still turned. Sei had done that to him when he was little. Light, how he hated that. Motherly or not, it was still someone else's spit being rubbed into your skin. And besides, at that age he had been convinced that girls, his sister included, had cooties. "Ah, thank you, but no thank you. I managed to outrun my sister by eight when she tried to do that, I'll just take a bath later." He turned back and smiled at her.

She smiled back for a minute, and then introduced herself. "My name's Rahien by the way." That voice still seemed rather odd coming from that face, but Aven refused to show being bothered by it. This was someone who, more or less, was from home. He hadn't met but a few Saldaeans since his time here. It was good to hear a voice more familiar to him.

"I'll have you know, though, that there is indeed more ink on these papers than on my neck," he said. "I've been here a few blo- er, a few hours working on these." He grimaced at the stacks of paper to his right. Light blasted copies. Light blasted Ash'aman Laridian. They couldn't even have made it charcoal or graphite, which would have been much quicker. Nooo, charcoal and graphite smudge, they say, they need ink. (Which admittedly was true, but Aven was still annoyed.)

He looked back at the novice, who largely seemed to look amused. Figured. Women were generally perverse enough to find humor in another's pain... er, annoyance. He felt guilty, realizing that she knew a great deal more about pain than himself. Ah well. At least this time he was only an idiot in his head.

"So where in Saldaea are you from? I'm from Mehar, myself. One of the smaller cities, in the south?" He looked hopeful; chances were she knew of it. It wasn't a major place of commerce, but it did get a good deal of traffic on its own, and there was the huge bank, the reason most merchants made their way there. D'avren and Sons was the premier banking company in Saldaea, something he assumed he could validate, his father being a clerk there. It had branches in several other cities, outside of Saldaea even, but its home base was in Mehar.

Rahien nodded as he mentioned he came from Mehar; she had passed through it on many occasion and even attended a few balls there in her time. The most impressive detail about the small town was probably the bank building that stood out amongst the otherwise fairly ordinary buildings. “Yes, I have been to Mehar a few times. My mother had a small estate just to the east side of Maradon, we stayed there if she wasn’t too busy dragging me across the world in search of books and artefacts.” As always the thought of her mother made her grimace and she quickly changed the subject. Tilting her head slightly, she tapped her pursed lips as she asked: “Aven…that’s not a name you hear very often. Did your parents know it means “tree” in the Old Tongue?” Rahien’s mother had often tried to teach her more than the basics of the Old Tongue, to little avail alas, and Rahien was surprised she remembered that much of it.

She probably wouldn’t even have made the connection if it were not for the fact that her mother had used the Old Tongue to call her daughter “Dawn”. Her hand nearly went up to her scarf, but she checked herself at the last moment. Her mother had thought it a fitting name for a baby that was born into the world with the first signs of her auburn hair already visible. There had been a time when she was proud of her long thick auburn locks, but she had chopped all of it off after the accident, not being able to stand the sight of it, a constant reminder of what she had lost. Of course now her hair looked like something a pack of rats had been chewing on, not something that was fit to show in public at all. She looked towards the table and the stack of papers Aven had indicated. If he had done all that, he had to be a capable copier. “If you need some help, I’m not too bad with a pen myself, although I guess they would notice the difference in the handwriting.”

She wondered if he had been instructed to copy that much for a penance, or just for a chore. So far she had not been given any chores that didn’t involve a fair amount of manual labour and a lot of cleaning and scrubbing. Thinking of scrubbing made her think of the ink on his neck again and the glint of mischief returned as she said levelly: “You might want to consider passing by the stables and borrowing a steel brush from one of the grooms, it’ll take more than soap and a cloth to get that off.” Rahien suddenly realised that she was enjoying the casual banter more than she could have imagined. It made her realise just how much she had been isolating herself, out of fear of rejection or other adverse reactions.

((Half futile attempt to restart this thread, half dipping my feet back into the waters of RP-ing.))

“Yes, I have been to Mehar a few times. My mother had a small estate just to the east side of Maradon, we stayed there if she wasn’t too busy dragging me across the world in search of books and artefacts.”

Dragged across the world and an estate outside of Mehar? So she came from money. Aven had a fleeting moment of discomfort before remembering where he was. Power and status in the Towers were based on ability, not wealth. Everyone of equal rank was just that; equal. It was refreshing to have that confirmed with someone from his homeland, who, were it not for their both being here, might not have given him the time of day otherwise.

She was thinking for a moment, a look of puzzlement crossing her face as she tapped a finger to her scarred lips. “Aven…that’s not a name you hear very often. Did your parents know it means “tree” in the Old Tongue?”

He smiled. "Yes, actually I did. My father was an amateur scholar himself and learnt as much of the Old Tongue as he could. Aven is actually short for Avendesei- "tree eyes", since they're greenish and brown." He pointed a finger to his iris. Aven was ready for a change fo topic, though. He wasn't especially fond of his father. The man had been there, but just barely.

There was silence for a moment. Rahien broke it first. “If you need some help, I’m not too bad with a pen myself, although I guess they would notice the difference in the handwriting.” Aven blinked a moment, before shaking his head. "No good. It's not so much handwriting as it is style." He lifted one of the dried drawings up and held it out to her so she could see. "I was a painter's apprentice back home.. something the Shen al'Dieb Cha has decided to take advantage of." He grimaced. "They've had me doing diagrams and copies the past three days. Something about ter'angreals especially seems to require diagrams and illustrations, I guess."