His sister returned before the ale did.  She walked proudly across the Inn, nearly strutting, and Jasine arched a brow slowly.  His little sister had stood up to that and came away smiling?!  He was almost impressed for a moment, and then she spoiled it by darting her eyes to the side like she was trying to make sure the Aes Sedai wasn't stalking up on her and now he could see her swallowing repeatedly like she was scared.  He had to admit, he was still impressed by the bluff she was trying to pull.  He didn't think she had it in her. 

She sat down and finished her water almost as quickly as he had his ale, gulping it down with both hands wrapped around the glass.  Jase couldn't help it, he laughed before he could stop it, but it was a warm smile for a beloved sister.  Selene glared at him, and this time he did catch it, which only made him grin, and then wince.  The wince was for his chin, however, not the fury his sister was trying to convey in mere expression.  The smiling had brought a fresh stab of pain to his chin and he was pretty sure it had just finally stopped bleeding, too. 

Dinner and the card games afterwards were blissfully uneventful after the rest of their evening in Tar Valon, and the two of them stayed up too late talking and laughing and being friends.  It was as if they both knew the morrow would bring serious change and neither wanted to let it happen yet.  When they did finally both fall asleep, the candles burned down to their last inch and finally sputtered out in their own melted wax.  The siblings fell asleep fully dressed, and woke the next morning stiff, but refreshed.  Selene woke first, to the knocking at the door not long after dawn where a maid delivered the dress she'd asked to be cleaned and pressed by the morning.  Jasine was up before the door shut again once they had both washed he stepped out so she could get dressed.  He asked at the kitchens for breakfast to be brought up to their room, hot rolls and bowls of a warm oatmeal sweetened with sliced peaches.  They ate in a comfortable silence and then packed up their things to leave.  Selene sighed softly as she gathered up the cards that had spilled to the floor from the bed when they'd fallen asleep the night before and when she stood back up with them Jase hugged her quickly and smiled.

"Let's go see about making you an Aes Sedai."

Inside the Inn, the room was procured with little fuss at all and when one of the hands offered to take the bags Jasine relinquished then easily.  Now that they were here, in Tar Valon, all Jase really wanted was a quiet meal, a quiet drink, and bed.  They took seats near the stage and listened to the pretty dark-haired girl there play the dulcimer while they waited for their food.  Jasine's ale was dropped off, and Selene's water.  He drank half of it down in a single pull, and came up gasping for breath.  The serving girl, another pretty dark-haired girl who looked like she could have come from his own town, trilled a high giggle and smiled at Jase, winking once before turning away with her empty tray.  Jase smiled after her, the dopey unselfconcious smile of a boy who had not yet learned to school his face as a man might, and he completely missed the scowl that his sister wore around her water glass.

He was pulled out of his admiration of the retreating serving girl's hind parts by a stately woman with an unreadable expression approaching the pair of them.  She had her hair cut in an almost severely short bob, the black tresses smooth against her bronzed skin.  Her dress was some kind of light tan color and shiny, the slashes cut into the skirt with yellow of the same fabric.  She tipped her chin and looked down her nose at the pair of them, looking for all the world like a displeased school marm or aunt.  Definitely not someone to mince words.  Jase didn't look to his sister when she gasped softly, but his hand dropped from the ale on the table to the sword hilt beneath it that he didn't have enough room to draw anyway.  He didn't know why his sister gasped, but he wouldn't be caught of guard by this... woman.

"Child, if you try to pull that blade on me I shall have you turned upside-down and spanked with the flat of the blade before you can get it halfway out of the scabbard.  Drink your ale and let me speak with this... girl."  She didn't pause for his reaction, but bent and took Selene by the arm and had her standing up and marching away before he could protest.  He stood up sharply, knocking over the chair and as he was gripping the hilt she called back severely, "I do not make idle threats, boy.  Mind your manners."  He stood there, dumbfounded at being so soundly called down, and dropped into the seat.  At least, he tried to.  The seat was now approximately a foot and a half further back than he thought it was and as he came down awkwardly on a chairleg sticking up into the air he fell from it to the table, catching his chin on the solid wood.  He cried out, his teeth clicking together audibly at the impact, and wound up on the floor, rather rudely deposited for the second time in less than a half an hour.  The girl with the dulcimer giggled and Jase flushed as red as the blood that dropped from the new cut on his chin onto his shirt. 

He mumbled a curse and righted himself, and then the chair.  The serving girl that had smiled at him before came over, clearly trying to stifle giggles, and handed him a cloth to press to the chin.  She leaned in close and murmured "Best not be taking such a tone with the Aes Sedai, handsome.  Especially not in this town."  She nodded to the woman's back, who was across the room and had his sister cornered against the wall near the kitchen door.  Jase uttered another oath and sat carefully in the chair, wincing as he made contact with it.  That chair leg would leave a bruise he would not soon forget.  Jase pulled away the cloth to see how much blood was on it, grimaced at the sight, and then folded it and put a clean part of it against his chin again.  Face injuries always did bleed a lot, more than they really accounted for how injured someone was.  He worked his jaw a few times, eventually satisfied that he hadn't hurt anything important.  A quick swipe of his tongue confirmed that he had lost no teeth, there wasn't even a wiggle from them.  Holding the cloth in one hand he drained the ale and then nodded to the girl to get him another.  He spoke up just as she turned away, thanking her for the cloth.  The girl giggled again, dark eyes twinkling brightly, and he blushed again as she turned away.  The girl at the dulcimer had thankfully gone back to playing and while she wasn't staring at him, he could see the smile trying to show upon her lips.

Tar Valon was blessedly uneventful.  There were people from all walks of life within the city and both Jasine and his sister did a lot of staring as they made their way towards the Tower.  Selene caught Jase staring at a particularly clingy dress hugging the curves of a Domani woman who could have posed for a statue and with a jerk of her head and a loud sniff, he only had time to snap his eyes away from her and towards his sister before he caught a full face of blonde braid moving at high velocity.  Seasoned rider or not, Jase startled and barked a yell and fell to the cobblestones between their horses.  The Domani, who had apparently noticed the boy watching her, had set her basket of goods down and was doubled over them, laughing uproariously.  Jase heard similar sounds coming from all sides and glared at Selene.

Selene laughed too, steadying the unsettled filly with primarily knees alone as she had both hands pressed to her mouth, reins trailing from them, as she giggled.  Jasine's mount Brownie just stood there, steady and apparently unamused or upset by his rider's abrupt absence.  Jase untangled his scabbard from his legs, struggled to his feet, and took Brownie's reins up in a hand.  He shielded his eyes with a hand as he looked up at Selene, squinting against the last red light of sunset.  "It's late sis, and now I'm all dirty in addition to being travel sore and bone tired.  Have we got enough silver left to stay in an Inn tonight before going to the tower?  We could play cards, one last time, before you go."

Selene bit her lip, thinking briefly.  Without checking the purse, she nodded her assent. "This one here looks nice, and it'll just be a short ride to the Tower in the morning."  She dismounted and led her horse beside Jasine, the two of them seeing their horses to the stable and put away properly themselves.  It wasn't that they didn't trust the Inn's stablehand, a lad named Jerlyn who watched them with narrowed eyes as they curried, brushed, and stabled the horses.  It was simply that the horses were theirs, and they had been raised to always take care of their horses, before themselves, and to see to their responsibilities quickly and without needing reminder.  Likely, Jerlyn's distrust and anger came more from the silver pennies he would not get for tending to the animals in their stead.  After a brief argument, Jase took the bags for both of them and Selene patted the dust off her dress as best she could before leading them outside again.

Jasine warred with himself internally about taking the bags.  Burdened, he wouldn't be able to protect his sister as effectively, but it was an Inn.  In Tar Valon.  They should be perfectly safe here, but the worrying nag of his sense of duty wouldn't stay quiet.  Selene did end up giving the stable boy a single silver penny, asking that the horses be fed lightly, but twice.  They could colic given too much feed right away after the exertion of long-distance travel.  They'd had primarily nothing but night-time grazing for most of their trip north.  Jerlyn's scowl was replaced by an insincere-looking smile, but he would probably do as asked.

It was just before sunset when Selene and Jasine rode up the bridges to the island of Tar Valon.  Travel-worn and weary, the guard narrowed his eyes and looked at them closely before nodding to Selene's assertion that she was sent to the tower by an Aes Sedai.  They rode on into the city of Tar Valon itself, weariness forgotten in the majesty of the city up close.

For Jasine, the beauty of the city was of second importance to the safety of his sister.  Once the guard at the bridge had let them by he managed to relax enough to really behold the glory of the fabled Tar Valon.  The reddening sunlight made the white walls glow almost pink, transforming the delicately formed seashell and wave buildings into something almost ethereal, out of a storybook.  He supposed Tar Valon actually was a city of storybooks and he saw now why it was touted as the most beautiful in the land.  The shell buildings especially looked enchanting, almost as if they could be alive.  Jasine and Selene sat their horses, side by side, watching the colors shift and flicker as the sun set behind them, the shadow of Dragonmount slowly but surely moving to eclipse the riot of colors.

At the harsh call from a wide wagon jostling through to get into the city before dark.  Selene reached out to Jasine, took his hand for one quick squeeze, and then lead then forward on the general path towards the White Tower.  Originally Jasine had insisted on leading the way when they couldn't ride abreast, but that was how Selene had gotten tangled with that vendor, when she was behind him and he couldn't keep a constant eye on her.  The girl was too trusting by half, and even if she lead the way, he was able to watch her back, quite literally.  Jasine kept his hand on the hilt of his sword, riding tall and sure in the saddle and trying to bluff his way through any harm that might think of going for the diminutive blonde on the flighty black filly.

Bats, and here I was hoping Raeyn posting in this thread meant she was offering. ;)

I... don't think they measure inches in 18ths

I definitely have some brown in me. :)  The fact that it's a book covering the stripe should say much to that effect!

O.O  I would very much like to retain access to this usergroup.  I just got it!

Bio approved and CC'ed, this is me signing up for the division.

Hello, all. :D

Is this your first baby?  Knowing how big your first one was can help with guessing later weight, babies tend to get progressively larger, with some modification for gender. 

My three were 9lb 3oz, 9lb 4 oz, and my teeny baby girl was a svelte (lol) 9lb 1oz. Tall too, the shortest was my first, at 20.5 inches.

Thanks, I made that late last night.  She's got a book in her off hand that's covering most of the brown stripe, I'm thinking about redoing it.  I have waited to put up a sig until I actually am a Novice, but that will be coming soon. :)

• Novice Quiz - Complete! - Bio Here
  
• Arrival/Meet MoN - Complete! Arrival Story Part I and Part II (7571 word count), MoN Here 4/4 posts ~ 2260 word count
  
• Meet Mentor - Melianna (Accepted) - Complete! Here 7/4 posts ~ 3152 word count
  
• Meet Roommates - Carina Al'Tara - Complete! Here 6/4 posts ~ 3835 word count
  
• Freeday - Complete! Here 5/4 posts ~ 2182 word count
  
• One OP Related RP
  *Introduction to Saidar - Complete! Part 1 Part 2 Part 3 Part 4 5/4 posts ~ 3712 word count

• Choose 2
  *Homesickness - Complete! Here 4/4 posts ~ 2205 word count
  *Chore RP - Complete! Here 7/4 posts ~ 2811 word count

• Three Arches - Complete!! Here

Early afternoon, 20.5 in, 7lb 9oz.

(also, yay baby!)

Sent my bio in this morning and I was told to post in here so I can be added to see the other boards.

Hi there. :)