Shot Down in Flames |Tag: Dania|

[Eden Cobriana]

He really didn't understand why Lucien was warning him against spending so much time with Dania, but he didn't really care.  Lucien probably wanted her attention, and didn't understand why Eden had it.  It wasn't like he hadn't done it before.  She was the future monarch of the Avians, which was more fitting for his older brother, if you really thought about it, but he didn't think that their families were thinking that way.  Thus, it was much better for Eden to be hanging out with her.  He didn't carry the weight that his brother did, so it was safe.  For once, he was glad that he wasn't his father's Arami, having just started realizing the freedom it gave him.  He got off on so much more than Lucien ever would or had, and Lucien was the one that was trapped going to all the formal events.  They made Eden go often enough to get a handle, but not enough to put him in place to take over.  He'd resented them for a long time over it, but it left him with more time to make his schedule work out to see Dania.

He'd never understand it, since she was a bird, but she was a very, very beautiful bird.  He'd have thought he'd never be able to be friends with the stuffy Avians, but with Dania, it was different.  She was stuffy when she had to be, but she'd lightened up around him so much since they'd met.  She'd actually laugh and joke with him, and he could see her happiness for a change.  It wasn't just a void, like it was with other avians.  He hated that, how it felt like he was talking to a shell, so she was a refreshing change.  He liked spending time with her more than his own family, which shouldn't have been a HUGE surprise, but getting her away from her own was tricky.  At first, they'd all been friendly and supportive of an inter-species friendship, but they'd gotten more fussy over time.  It was to the point that they practically had to sneak her out or him in to spend some time together.

He thought that everyone was making way too much fuss over everything.  What was the issue? 

[Dania Shardae]

"I really don't see why you insist on spending so much time with him," Dane said in his uppity voice as he followed Dania down the stairs of their large estate. Eden was waiting in the foyer with two of her guards who had probably been drilling him about where they were going for the last ten minutes. It was good that the Serpiente had a sense of humour about it; his own family didn't seem as interested in making her feel bad about her presence there, but they certainly were forward when they did ask.

  "Because," she said to her brother as she picked her way down without tripping. "He's nice to me. He doesn't pressure me to be someone or to say things or to make hard decisions. And because he's not afraid to talk to me even though I have a title," she added.

  Dane caught her by the shoulder before she reached the bottom of the stairs, in plain view of the party waiting below. "Dania, he's supposed to be afraid of that title. He's supposed to respect it and fear it. Serpiente are too bold," he insisted.

  "Brother, I love you fully and adore you wholly," Dania said. She placed her hand on his own and then removed it from her, holding it out to him to 'take it back'. "But you really must let me spread my own wings and fly. There's no harm in having friends, especially when this makes us look diplomatic and open-minded."

  "Mother never should have named you after Danica," Dane said with a final jab. He made sure to narrow his eyes at Eden, and then returned back up the long, open staircase back to where he and his father had been reading in the solarium. Dania only sighed and descended the final steps, an element of grace and beauty unparalleled in her form.

  "I'm terribly sorry to have kept you waiting, my friend," she said apologetically. She knew that hugging Eden in front of the guard would be frowned upon, so she settled for a clasp of the wrists. "Shall we go? I had Antony prepare the horses, so this should be a lovely afternoon," she continued, blatantly ignoring the strange looks as she pushed open the massive white doors of her home. The plan - a horseback ride and a picnic - had started simple enough. It wasn't until her brother had opened his mouth that things had become problematic.

  And she'd been trying to not necessarily tell Brennan that she was spending the afternoon with Eden. He'd been weird, lately, too. Dania didn't understand any of it.

[Eden Cobriana]

Dane had absolutely NO clue how badly Eden wanted to either flip him off or make a face at him, but he refrained.  Partially because of inter-family politics with the Cobriana and Shardae lines, and partially because he did want to spend more time with Dania.  He might not be able to do that if he seriously insulted the other hawk. 

Thus, good behavior.  He still looked like he wanted to laugh, but he toned it down enough that he wouldn't irritate the hell out of people who could tell him to leave.  He didn't like toning it down THAT much, but hey, he could do it.  At least it didn't look like Dania's shadow was joining them, which was a switch.  She must not have told prissypants that she was hanging out with him that day, or Brennan would have been at her heels the entire time. 

He wanted to hug her, and they'd gotten to the point that he could have if everyone in the Avian kingdom didn't seem to be watching, but he clasped her wrist instead.  It was more appropriate for a compromise between their peoples than a hug would have been, and he still didn't know how to approach that idea with her family nearby.  It was so much easier to talk to her than any of them.

"It's not a problem, Dania.  I actually expected more interference," he admitted quietly, gesturing for her to lead the way.  It was her house AND she was a lady.  He knew how to conduct himself.  "Did you have anywhere specific in mind for the ride?  I hear there's a waterfall a few miles into the forest."

[Dania Shardae]

As they rounded the side of the house on the stone path that lead to the distance easily a quarter-mile or so to the stables, Dania reached out to clasp her friend's hand in her own. She felt so guilty about the way she had to speak in front of him, and she feared that he would begin to resent her for it. Still, she did not apologize aloud, merely hoped that he understood. If anyone was the type to understand something, it would be Eden, right?

  "I hadn't been that far out yet. Every time I try to ride with Brennan he wants to turn around and come back," she said with an irritated sigh. "It's either that he doesn't like me, the horses, riding, or the heat." She glanced at Eden with a frown. "I like the horses just fine. Those won't be going anywhere when I'm in charge, much to the chagrin of the guard. I'm sure they believe firmly Dane's warnings that I'll fall and break my neck like that little girl in Gone with the Wind. Honestly," she said, shaking her head.

  Dania's long blonde hair had been pulled into a tight French braid, as it always was when she rode. She had a fairly typical riding outfit on - breeches (one of the only times Eden would ever see her in them), a fitted rather vibrant cinnamon-coloured riding jacket, and black boots. Her cap was in the stable where she'd left it, and she hoped it didn't have any bugs in it. Still, even in such "plain" clothing, Dania looked every bit her role. There was something about the way she spoke, or walked, or just breathed, that screamed that she had class.

  "How is your brother?" she asked, changing the subject. "Are we still politely ignoring him?" It was laughable that she said 'we', because she referred to both she and Eden when she said it. If Eden was displeased with Lucien, Dania showed him only the most polite and brief attention she could during their visits; mostly, it was obvious that she was Eden's friend, while Lucien was a political ally, and since Dania wasn't Tuuli Thea yet, she didn't take him as seriously as her family wanted her to.

  She suspected that the older Cobriana thought she was childish, but she didn't really care. She was sixteen, and so that qualified her perfectly to behave as she was.

[Eden Cobriana]

He didn't outright admit how pleased he was when she took his hand in hers once they were out of sight of her uptight family, but it showed in his face.  He smiled at her and gave her hand a gentle squeeze, silently accepting her unspoken apology.  He understood, and as long as she was willing to be more open with him, he could accept that her family was uptight and needed kid gloves.  He sure as hell didn't get along with his own family most of the time.  They were much more forward and outspoken than the Avians, but they were still uptight about tradition and making a good impression, both of which Eden decided he hated at least four times a day.

"Well, you know my opinion of Brennan, so I'm not surprised that he didn't want to go.  We can, though," he assured her, squeezing her hand once more and grinning.  "I like you, the horses, riding and the heat, so everything is covered there.  Brothers are predisposed to complicating things, I think.  Lucien does it daily." 

He didn't say it, but he was glad to hear that there were things that weren't changing when she was in charge.  There were quite a few things he hoped never changed, and though the horses weren't at the top of the list, they'd be on his list as long as his number one item stayed just the way he wanted it to.  That was the problem, though.  He wasn't as confident as he'd like to be that it would stay just the way it was.  He was hoping, and he definitely wouldn't be happy about it if he was wrong, but he was worried.  Today was supposed to take his mind off of those worries with a nice picnic, just the two of them.  No brothers, no family, and no guards.

"We are still politely ignoring him," he agreed with a laugh, ducking his head ever so slightly.  It amazed him that she would 'politely ignore' his brother on his behalf, especially with the way her family was.  He'd seen it, and it made him want to laugh his ass off at his brother's expense when she would be ridiculously polite and incredibly brief in her interactions with him just because Eden was angry with the older Cobriana.  She treated him like he was just another boring political acquaintance and like Eden was the important one, and it did wonders for him.  For once, there was someone who was putting him first.  "I think he suspects, but doesn't believe you'd really brush him off, which makes it funnier to watch him puzzle over it."

[Dania Shardae]

"I don't know why you two can't seem to get along," she said, glancing at Eden. "He is a very nice boy, just a little.... Avian. But so am I, and we do fine." She shrugged a little, as if to drop the subject entirely. The answer that it was just the way things was never did agree with her. Dania had been taught not to question so many of her own traditions and values but she did anyways, because she was - well, sixteen.

  "I wouldn't brush him off so openly if he didn't act like... well, a royal-blood. I don't think he means to, I just think that all of that conditioning went to his head. Sometimes, Eden, I wish that I were not the first born girl; believe me when I say that Callisto has had all of the rigidity and iciness ingrained into her to be the perfect Tuuli-Thea. It isn't even that she doesn't care, it's just that she's more able to put aside her emotions than I am, and she's only just fifteen."

  She paused as she held the stable door open for him, something that one of the hands gave her a strange look for. As they approached their horses, she sighed. "Sometimes I think this job would be better for anyone besides me, between you and I." With that, she motioned for their horses to be brought out. Her own, a spirited Palamino named Citrus, had been a birthday present from her father - every little girl wanted a pony, after all. Eden got the pleasure of dealing with the Appaloosa - Stripe.

  "Ariadne named him," she explained to his quizzical look. "She also has a turtle named Fluffy. Shall we?"

[Eden Cobriana]

Eden definitely wasn't going to get into why he and his brother didn't get along.  It was along, involved story that would probably seem petty on both of their parts if he just told it.  You had to be there over the years and see the disappointments and various incidences.  Eden and Lucien had just grown apart.  They obviously valued different things now. 

"I think you give him too much slack.  He's a jerk."

Ever the blunt, honest one in their friendship.  It wasn't that Dania wasn't, just that she was Avian.  They naturally weren't as open, though she wasn't anywhere near what some of her people were like.  Eden liked her.  "I really don't think it's some big tragedy that you can't put aside your emotions like that.  It kind of freaks me out when other Avians get that whole emotional wall up, anyway, and how can you really connect with your people if you're not willing to show them how you feel?"

It was a rhetorical question, and not one he needed to have answered.  In fact, he pressed on as though he hadn't even seen it, glancing at the horse he was offered and finally grinning.  "Your sister has more sense of humor than she pretends."

[Dania Shardae]

"Cousin," she corrected him. "I wouldn't mind switching Dane with Ariadne, though, I promise you. I keep telling Dane that it wouldn't kill him to be nice, but he insists that he is. I don't think he fully understands what 'nice' means." It was either that or the Shardae family had a very skewed perception of the word. She sighed a little, and then shook her head. Just like that, her frown washed into a smile.

  "Let's get on with it. It's a gorgeous day outside, and I want to spend it with you instead of in this musty barn," she declared. After they were mounted up, they rode out from the back doors of the barn and onto the massive property her family had. The basket had already been set up for them, and Dania wanted to get to it before the ants did - best case scenario, she could always eat those, but she didn't fancy it when she knew she had fresh picked blackberries to deal with.

  They were perhaps two miles out, couldn't even see the house anymore, when Dania spotted the basket. "Wow, they put it pretty far out here," she mused. "I guess I got lucky and it was my father who rigged this. Mom would have put it directly behind the back patio," she said with a laugh. Her father was slightly more relaxed about most things - he didn't necessarily 'approve' of Eden, but he did know that Dania wasn't as braindead as everyone treated her. She was lucky to have at least one sane parent.

  "You know, if you pretend, it's like we're just out in a spectacular sort of country setting with nothing for miles," she observed. She shifted her weight in the saddle and leaned back on her horse, stretching her arms out as she switched hands with the reins. "This could almost be paradise if I didn't know that there's a possibility we're going to be scrutinized from a distance," she said with a short, dry laugh.

[Eden Cobriana]

"Cousin," he repeated, but he wasn't likely to remember.  It wasn't his family and he didn't like most of them, outside of Dania.  He didn't dislike them, but he didn't particularly like them.  Besides, it seemed like the Hawks had more family than he did.  Maybe it was just because he didn't know them all that well, but it seemed so.  Actually, her brother Dane was the closest Eden got to not liking one of her family members, and maybe that was because he just had a thing against brothers.  Dane just struck him as being too much like his own, except without the right to say anything about him.  If Lucien gave him a hard time, he didn't like it but could accept it.  Dane didn't get the same treatment. 

"I agree, on all counts.  Let's go," he offered with a grin.  His parents had been drilling it into his head not to be so outspoken with the Avians, but he just couldn't help himself.  So, he'd compromised.  He hadn't called Dane a dick, but he'd still agreed with her not thinking her brother understood 'nice'.  Everyone wins.  Besides, getting to the basket before the ants did was in his favor, since he wasn't eating ants. 

He was just about ready to ask who had set up the basket, just because of how long it took them to reach it, when they came upon the thing and she mentioned her father.  That actually made sense.  "I thought we were getting pretty far for your mother or brother to have done it.  You sure there isn't an ambush of your Royal Flight waiting for me here?  This feels pretty isolated for being as close to the house as it is," he joked, dismounting and looping the reins over the animal's head and then his arm through the loop so that he could hold the horse and still offer Dania a hand down.  Not that she needed it, but he'd offer.

Really, he knew that two miles was nothing, but it was still more to him than it was to any of the avians.  They could fly.  He had to walk or crawl, so he assumed there'd be an audience somewhere.  He'd forget after a few minutes of them playing and teasing, but right then, he remembered.  That was his problem, though.  He was prone to forgetting himself, and to thinking she was a girl, just like he was a boy. 

[Dania Shardae]

Dania took his hand as she had already made to slide off of the horse, because she was used to doing it. Besides, she'd never seen him so much as hold a door for anyone else, so why waste a good thing? She brushed off her jacket and shrugged, taking her cap off and resting it on the horn of her saddle as she lead her horse to the spot they'd designated for them. It was nice, with a small brook for the animals to drink from and graze by.

  "I don't think it's an ambush," she said. She unbuttoned her jacket and tossed it onto the blanket, and then flopped down, opening the basket to find out what was in it. "Oh, nice," she breathed. She pulled out a fruit tray that had been fresh-cut that morning, complete with pineapple slices and fresh blackberries. "Never say they didn't give me anything," she mused, snatching a blackberry out of the selection before she even had the lid completely off.

  There was more - bottles of water, vegetables, sandwiches, the whole lot. Small snack cakes for dessert, too, even though Dania wasn't big on sweets. She might have one if she still had room; she didn't eat terribly much most of the time. She set out two plates and made herself a little arrangement before getting into a comfortable position and digging in.

  "So, how long do you think we can hang out here before someone comes to get us?" she asked him. Her curfew was dusk, but it was usually a lot sooner before someone broke up their party. "I bet my mother is pacing right now. Really, they're so much more uptight than I am - I hope I don't ever get to be that way. Serpiente are a little too open by the cultural standards, but I like to think I'm at least on the 'relaxed' side of my Avian heritage."

[Eden Cobriana]

Honestly, he hated holding doors for people or doing anything that even looked considerate.  He was just a jerk, period, but the fact of the matter was that he was a jerk to people he either didn't like, or didn't give a shit about.  He liked Dania, and she deserved to be treated like a lady.  If she'd taken that and gone all 'Tuuli Thea' on him with the coldness and indifference, he'd have been pissed and probably never done it again, but he didn't prefer politeness.  He used it when it suited his purposes, or when he felt like it was deserved.  Dania was one of the few cases that wasn't for his own purposes.  She deserved to spend time with a gentleman, even if he wasn't her family's idea of a gentleman.  He wasn't so sure that she'd like that anymore than he would have, which made it win-win.  He figured that if he was like Brennan, she'd probably hate him, and that was okay because he'd hate himself for it.  That dude seriously needed a surgical procedure to get the stick out of his ass, and Eden figured that Dania's father had something to do with getting Brennan out of their hair for the day.  Eden had no delusions that any of the Shardae family had any desire to see him spend much time with Dania, but her father seemed to be the only person who thought that their friendship might be at all important.  He didn't really care if it was important to everyone else's purposes, as long as the two of them were happy, but whatever.  Again, if it helped, he was okay with it. 

"Only if you're sure," he offered about the idea of an ambush, and though he was kidding, he wasn't unaware that it was a distinct possibility that they weren't alone.  It made him wonder what would happen if they wandered further.  Would someone show up out of nowhere and try to force them to go back, or were they really alone out here?  While he hoped for the latter, he highly doubted it.  This was the Heir, and they wouldn't leave her alone with an untrustworthy snake.  As many years could pass as anyone wanted to consider, and that would still be an important factor.  Hell, snakes had been a problem in the Bible, too, and that didn't help their image.  It really didn't help that Eden didn't do anything to counter that.  Why would he?  He'd never been the type to cater to someone else's sensibilities, anyway. 

"You're not like the rest of the Avians, I assure you.  Imagine how many in the court would be caught out here, sitting on a blanket so close to dirt with a snake.  'Relaxed' almost doesn't even cut it," he informed her, and he meant it.  She didn't have to be as bold as a serpiente to not fit in amongst her people.  "You're a gem, I promise.  Don't ever change."

He meant it, and between the grin he gave her and the fact that he popped a piece of fruit in his mouth immediately after the words left his mouth, it somehow managed to be less serious and awkward than it could have.  It didn't lessen how much he really did mean it, but he wasn't into awkward.  Eden didn't do awkward if he could help it, and soon enough, he wouldn't do it at all.  It just wasn't who he was, and he'd worked hard for that.