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TEST DRIVE MEME 005
⚰︎ ⍢ ⌲ ⍚ TEST DRIVE MEME:
Welcome to RUBILYKSKOYE — a dark, horror-smut game where player choices will drive a mod-run storyline about the world and its NPCs. This test drive meme provides a medley of prompts evoking the game's general tone.
THESE THREADS CAN BE GAME CANON if both players are accepted into the game and agree to it. However, if players who'd prefer to start fresh are welcome to reuse these prompts in their own personal logs upon acceptance into the communities. Note: the universal test drive arrival prompt will not be repeated on the any event log, but players are welcome to reuse the prompt.
CONTENT WARNINGS for this game include: monsters, body horror, dub-con, non-con, religion, blood/violence, and marking/branding, loss of autonomy/self, and mental influences. This log additionally has warnings for: spiders, aphrodisiac and truth serum effects, public nudity, exhibitionism/voyeurism, bdsm, kink negotiation, social pressure, and animal sacrifice.
If you have QUESTIONS about the test drive prompts, please ask HERE. Questions about the game itself or the general setting should be directed to the FAQ.
FAQ ✧ SETTING ✧ CALENDAR ✧ RESERVES ✧ APPLICATIONS
THESE THREADS CAN BE GAME CANON if both players are accepted into the game and agree to it. However, if players who'd prefer to start fresh are welcome to reuse these prompts in their own personal logs upon acceptance into the communities. Note: the universal test drive arrival prompt will not be repeated on the any event log, but players are welcome to reuse the prompt.
CONTENT WARNINGS for this game include: monsters, body horror, dub-con, non-con, religion, blood/violence, and marking/branding, loss of autonomy/self, and mental influences. This log additionally has warnings for: spiders, aphrodisiac and truth serum effects, public nudity, exhibitionism/voyeurism, bdsm, kink negotiation, social pressure, and animal sacrifice.
If you have QUESTIONS about the test drive prompts, please ask HERE. Questions about the game itself or the general setting should be directed to the FAQ.
IN THE WOODS SOMEWHERE
The chirping of partridges in the treetops rouses you. Light barely filters through the canopy, just enough to suggest daylight. By the time it reaches the forest floor, the light has taken on a sickly green. You lie amongst the frost-covered mosses and ferns, the frozen soil cold and just a little damp on your bare skin. Wherever you were before this moment, whatever you were doing or wearing, when you awaken in this forest, you find yourself naked and helpless as the day you were born. As you sit up and get your bearings, aside from a brief wave of disoriented nausea, you seem to be no worse for wear than you last remember.
You seem to be alone. The gnarled oaks and moss suggest no sign of civilization or sentient life. Just flickers of movement from curious squirrels or brave lizards reemerging after a long winter. With your feet under you, and you'll find the wood is filled with berry bushes and nut trees, though much of the fruit has been picked clean. The freshwater stream that runs north-south, populated by both poisonous toads and delicious crawdads, will lead people towards the first signs of civilisation, the cabins of those who choose to live beyond Rubilyskoye's formidable walls.
In the forest, you may run into others with stories just like yours. Some may have already formed clumsy nudist groups, others may still be processing their confusion, with no memory of how they got here. Now is a good time to overcome any hang-ups you have about modesty; it's going to be a long hike.
Turn your back to the darker, shadowy parts of the forest and eventually the glow of manmade lights and the curve of a dirt road may come into view. At the edge of the wood, you'll find a town surrounded by a fifty-foot wall of beige stone. The only entrance is an iron gate positioned on the southern edge. When you arrive, the gate is already open, welcoming people inside.
This quaint, historic town of five-thousand has cobbled street and signs lit by gas lamp. Wooden shutters protect otherwise open-air windows on the buildings, which are all under three stories with gabled roofs. A number of businesses hug the main street — a clockmaker, a cobbler, a grocer — while residential homes sprawl outwards towards the wall. At the far end of the main street, visible about a mile to the north now that the trees and the enormous wall is out of the way, sits a castle with three towers.
When you enter, the streets are full of people, but despite any efforts on your part to hide or make excuses, they don't seem offended by your nakedness. Even families with children don't gawk or look twice. Those determined to find proper clothing regardless will find that modern clothing stores aren't available — the closest this town has is a tailor's shop and a stand in the central marketplace selling scarves and blankets.
breaking and entering
If you intend to have your character break into someone's house or yard to steal some of their clean laundry, please review the info about game laws on the FAQ and give the mods a heads up HERE.
Fortunately, the people of the town are very generous! Anyone who ask the locals will be directed to the boarding house for both clothes and a place to stay. Accessible through an embellished iron garden gate and obscured by hanging plants, trees, and vines, beyond an overgrown yard in the residential sprawl of the town is a bright-red door, which opens to a spacious cottage of several stories. It's already full of people who appeared in the village just as you did today.
finding roommates
Don't spend too much time asking questions in the common areas. You'll want to claim a bedroom quickly because each one only has two full-size beds, and there aren't enough spaces for everyone. Maybe you'll get lucky and run into someone who has decided to move out? (Roommates will not be mod-assigned; players should coordinate directly with one another to determine their living arrangements; at this point, many characters have used activity rewards to move to accomodation outside the boarding house.)
Get a good night's rest. By the light of day, locals will help get the new arrivals set up on the coal stove with a breakfast of thick grain porridge and caramelised bananas from the new peaks; these NPCs can also answer any questions about the situation. You may notice they're dressed in a way you would almost call normal — at least, in a manner befitting 19th century Eastern Europe. Gossip about new arrivals spreads quickly, and Rubeans who run businesses or train trades are eager to help you find a place to apply your skills so you can contribute to your new home.
writer's block?
If you're struggling to pick a way to engage the prompts, try: naked hiking, acquiring clothing, being offered work, asking questions over breakfast, or staking your claim on a bedroom!
HEARTS FESTIVAL
New arrivals to Rubilykskoye will find themselves strongly encouraged to participate in the current zadza purging festival, and will be assigned either a collar in leather or iron based on their Niez or Wilk mark, or a wrist-strap or manacle that suits the attachment of a leash for those with a Diabel or Skala mark.
Characters are encouraged to embrace this temporary designation as a sign that they will be good citizens; those who object or ignore their designation may find the NPCs try to helpfully guide them, express displeasure at "Void-Touched" who won't assimilate, or in rare cases exert social pressure, coercion, violence or shunning to ensure compliance.
Throughout town various NPCs have set up tents and booths to host myriad performances, workshops, demonstrations, and food stands for their celebration. The foods were made using some of the new flora that have brought back from the peaks. Characters can get their hands on the following heart-themed foods from the second day of the festival onwards:
The nature of the booths set up for performances, workshops, and other goods focuses around the festival's dominance and submission themes. These persist throughout the day regardless of the hour or the audience, so very few people can be found consistently at their places of work during the day this week. In addition:
However, characters may also come across some carnival games operated by NPCs who are eager to help the Duchess find her heart! Some involve slaughtering livestock by removing their hearts—rest assured, these livestock were already on the menu, but their ritual sacrifice will now involve the cutting out of their hearts. Cut out an animal's heart yourself, or just attend the show! Many of the townspeople will get into it, painting their faces with animal blood or drinking from it.
Characters are encouraged to embrace this temporary designation as a sign that they will be good citizens; those who object or ignore their designation may find the NPCs try to helpfully guide them, express displeasure at "Void-Touched" who won't assimilate, or in rare cases exert social pressure, coercion, violence or shunning to ensure compliance.
Throughout town various NPCs have set up tents and booths to host myriad performances, workshops, demonstrations, and food stands for their celebration. The foods were made using some of the new flora that have brought back from the peaks. Characters can get their hands on the following heart-themed foods from the second day of the festival onwards:
- HEART-SHAPED COOKIES: eating these intensifies body heat, making characters a great cuddle buddy for the cold weather and likely to strip down, feeling overheated even in a snowdrift
- BEEF HEART STEW WITH DUXELLES: eating these fills those who consume it with confidence, making them more solicitous and dominant
- LIME-GLAZED GOAT HEART SATAY: eating these intensifies sensation, making characters more sensitive to both pain and pleasure
- CINNAMON GLUWEIN: drinking a cup of this hot beverage will make characters especially honest
The nature of the booths set up for performances, workshops, and other goods focuses around the festival's dominance and submission themes. These persist throughout the day regardless of the hour or the audience, so very few people can be found consistently at their places of work during the day this week. In addition:
- Skala and diabel NPCs may offer to share their partner(s) with the Void-touched, or ask to share theirs.
- PIOTR, a farmer, brings tools over from the farm including bridles and saddles, which can be found at a booth near some hunters who've made anal plugs that end with real animal tails, as well as muzzles.
- The cages from the Moot Hall have been moved into the streets, and people are allowed to move freely in and out of them. One of them has been covered in curtains to function as a glory hole booth.
- Some niez and wilk NPCs line up near the main event stage and kneel to offer themselves as human furniture.
However, characters may also come across some carnival games operated by NPCs who are eager to help the Duchess find her heart! Some involve slaughtering livestock by removing their hearts—rest assured, these livestock were already on the menu, but their ritual sacrifice will now involve the cutting out of their hearts. Cut out an animal's heart yourself, or just attend the show! Many of the townspeople will get into it, painting their faces with animal blood or drinking from it.
writer's block?
If you're struggling to pick a way to engage the prompts, try reacting to being assigned a dominant or submissive role, scenes where your character is starting to feel the effects of the food, watching (or participating in) a performance, or joining in on a gory animal sacrifice. NPCs that are usually welcoming may strongly pressure even new arrivals to participate in their cultural festivities.
the fathomless dark
At the outer edges of the forest, shadows grow long and the air grows thick. Though the sun never grows warm red-gold with sunset, the wood darkens. Birdsong is replaced by the click of mandibles and the skitter of many legs. Anyone who ventures out this way will soon find it difficult to see before them, even in the middle of the day — eventually, even the brightest magical light source or darkvision cannot stretch further than a few inches. In the void, the air feels heavy, as if it were not air at all but some more solid mass. Almost like liquid-smoke, it presses down upon you. Slowing your movements. Characters who push too far into the void may stop being able to move at all, and find themselves given over to insanity if they collapse, unable to draw themselves out. This is just one of many dangers.
Monsters thrive this far out. Huge, blood-red spiders the size of hunting dogs drop from the treetops. In addition to their venomous bite, which contains a fast-acting paralytic, these creatures are clever: they attempt to use their webbing to entangle any trespassers, binding limbs together or to trees. If you're unfortunate to become fully cocooned, you don't have long before this forest will be the last thing you see.
Those who seem lucky enough not to run afoul of the monsters here are in for a worse fate. The void can play tricks on your senses. As madness sets in and you lose all sense of direction, you may also lose control of your body — what is that steers your hands to turn against your friends? Why does it sound like your own voice whispering?
In the fog, you may also hear the voices of those familiar to you — people you know from the town, or people whom you know with almost perfect certainty aren't here. these figments may recreate unhappy memories or force trespassers to hallucinate their worst nightmares. Nothing is as it seems in the void, and when you swing at these figments, desperate to silence them, it might not be a figment at all, but a friend in the flesh trying to help you. By the time you see their true face, it could be too late to stop yourself.
writer's block?
If you're struggling to pick a way to engage the prompts, try fighting a monster, hallucinating your worst nightmares, and/or attacking a friend or stranger!
HIDING INSIDE EACH OF US
Uh oh spaghetti-os.
The marks worn by all residents of Rubilykskoye aren't just cool body art, as it turns out. The town is full of rumors, whispered in shadows and over candles of a starving creature hiding in the dark corners of your chest. Feed your inner beast, they say, before it finds a way to feed itself.
Alas, its emergence is inevitable — sooner or later, the horrible things that happen here pile up and make someone repulsed by the idea of human contact. Someone holds themselves back, bites their tongue, or simply does not believe the stories. Today, for one reason or another, that creature is coming out. Someone hasn't been keeping it sated.
Symptoms escalate over weeks, from monstrous irritability to full-blown body horror transformation, where people physically shed their human forms and evolve into the monsters this place made them. Once a person becomes something more (or less) than human there's only one way to go back — sate the beast.
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Poor Merta Chesnokov, the usually stalwart older woman who mans the Apothecary, has been beset by unusual requests in addition to her regular demands, not to mention sweating blood. The festival, a rash of skala blood flu, and a little extra town chaos in January, has brought a high demand to her little shop. Now there's also a local fashion springing up for teas and herbal remedies sourced from the recently revealed tropical mountains.
After another failed tisane test drive, and the third customer asking for a new kind of aphrodisiac to add to their festival food, she was seen tossing down her work knife with uncharacteristic frustration, and taking an "early lunch" that she didn't return from that night. Though her children, friends and employees reach out to her, there's no sign of her until you stumble upon her in the woods.
Merta overboils with her suppressed fury as her body distorts and her flesh blackens and crusts. Her attempts to hold off her transformation have failed, and Merta turns into a Smoldering Skink, a large repillian creature whose thick scales hold back her magmatic insides. The noise she makes is an unhearthly hissing scream like a boiling kettle, and she attempts to vent her pent-up stress by wildly attacking everything in sight. Immediately, the surroundings catch aflame! There will be a small fire eating at the dead wood of a long winter if it's not put out, but your first priority might have to be fielding a stampeding lizard with massive teeth and burning hot scales...
(There are other monsters lurking in every townsperson — feel free to invent your own npc monsters and scenarios!)
The marks worn by all residents of Rubilykskoye aren't just cool body art, as it turns out. The town is full of rumors, whispered in shadows and over candles of a starving creature hiding in the dark corners of your chest. Feed your inner beast, they say, before it finds a way to feed itself.
Alas, its emergence is inevitable — sooner or later, the horrible things that happen here pile up and make someone repulsed by the idea of human contact. Someone holds themselves back, bites their tongue, or simply does not believe the stories. Today, for one reason or another, that creature is coming out. Someone hasn't been keeping it sated.
Symptoms escalate over weeks, from monstrous irritability to full-blown body horror transformation, where people physically shed their human forms and evolve into the monsters this place made them. Once a person becomes something more (or less) than human there's only one way to go back — sate the beast.
someone else transforms
After another failed tisane test drive, and the third customer asking for a new kind of aphrodisiac to add to their festival food, she was seen tossing down her work knife with uncharacteristic frustration, and taking an "early lunch" that she didn't return from that night. Though her children, friends and employees reach out to her, there's no sign of her until you stumble upon her in the woods.
Merta overboils with her suppressed fury as her body distorts and her flesh blackens and crusts. Her attempts to hold off her transformation have failed, and Merta turns into a Smoldering Skink, a large repillian creature whose thick scales hold back her magmatic insides. The noise she makes is an unhearthly hissing scream like a boiling kettle, and she attempts to vent her pent-up stress by wildly attacking everything in sight. Immediately, the surroundings catch aflame! There will be a small fire eating at the dead wood of a long winter if it's not put out, but your first priority might have to be fielding a stampeding lizard with massive teeth and burning hot scales...
(There are other monsters lurking in every townsperson — feel free to invent your own npc monsters and scenarios!)
you waited too long
At first, as you hide yourself from your darker impulses, a subtle itch develops under your skin. An irritability that makes you snap at the person who bumps into you on the stairs because all those fleeting emotions that you've been repressing bubble to the surface. Every dark thought you've had about being here, all the fears of never getting home, of being surrounded by ticking time bombs, the anxiety of wondering who you might hurt or what relationships you might betray by doing what you have to do. The anger. Oh, the anger.
Maybe you shut yourself in your room or run into the woods to hide away, but there's only so much you can do to deny the itch that grows into hunger like a spark catching and growing to wildfire. Someone comes to check on you. That knock on the door or crunch of leaves in the wood that fills you with dread at what you might do and hope that you will be sated.
As claws and fangs and scales and spines and fur grow and your body transforms with a sickening crunch of bones and peeling of skin, so do your appetites. If you won't sate them, you'll lose yourself to your beastly impulses sooner or later, mauling friends and taking your fill. Is it better or worse if only your claws get inside of them?
Maybe you shut yourself in your room or run into the woods to hide away, but there's only so much you can do to deny the itch that grows into hunger like a spark catching and growing to wildfire. Someone comes to check on you. That knock on the door or crunch of leaves in the wood that fills you with dread at what you might do and hope that you will be sated.
As claws and fangs and scales and spines and fur grow and your body transforms with a sickening crunch of bones and peeling of skin, so do your appetites. If you won't sate them, you'll lose yourself to your beastly impulses sooner or later, mauling friends and taking your fill. Is it better or worse if only your claws get inside of them?
margaery tyrell | game of thrones | diabel
II. HEARTS FESTIVAL // CW: SACRIFICE GORE
III. WILDCARD / CUSTOM
II (cw: bones, heart cookies)
Her completely normal left arm reached up to steady the shorter woman. "Running away so soon? The evening's just begun."
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When did she become so warm?
"My apologies, madam, I'm not sure I'm suited for such..." she paused for the next round of cheers, "...festivities."
The touch on her own arm felt like a burning ember, as if the sleeve of her own shirt did nothing to protect her skin from the heat, and she couldn't be certain if she desired to feel even more (alarming).
"I'm not sure I belong anywhere."
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"Call me Ianthe," she said, bringing her hand up from the other woman's arm to brush the back of her fingers lightly against her cheek. "And I'm sure we can find something comfortable for you. You're a new arrival. We Void-touched need to stick together."
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And to her horror, there was a moment of weakness, when Margaery chased the brush of those fingers and almost opened her mouth to ask for more, but the mention of Void-touched was enough to distract her from her own distraction.
"Ianthe," she repeated, tongue clumsier than it normally would be, face heated from how husky her voice was. What were manners again? "Thank you for your kindness. Would it be too much to ask-" for you to touch me again? "-to rely on you for explanation?"
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Ianthe's psychometry only gave her a cursory analysis of the effect she was having on this beautiful woman. Had she payed more attention to it, she'd have noticed the food was responsible, but why bother when she liked the version of the script that had her as some kind of heartthrob. The flush on this woman's face, the way her voice alone made Ianthe want to ignore festival custom and kiss then and there despite it going against her submissive role... Fuck, yeah, that was the better version than being in the right place at the right time with some hopped up on aphrodisiacs. She'd enjoy the lie; the false always had a piquancy that the real could almost never match.
Arm dropping down to the other woman's waist, Ianthe swept her over to a nearby place to sit. Of course, she made to pull her new friend down with her. Close or on her lap - whatever she could get away with.
"What can I do for you, sweetheart?"
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ii. hello *squints at family tree* distant cousin
The prince's head turns to find, not a pickpocket (as though pickpockets weren't allowed to be pretty), but a flustered young woman. The hand at her elbow lightens its grip, but only slightly. One lone pale violet eye lords over her a beat longer.
"Can I help you with something?" Aemond feigns under the slightest inkling of irritation. Either she's drunk, hysterical, or mischievous; none of which he is ready to take responsibility for.
wait rly?? also LMAO the last line
She moves to pull her arm away, only to lose her balance again as the crowd swells and cheers at what sounds like another poor animal brought out to be slaughtered.
"I beg your pardon, ser." she says through her teeth, smile undoubtedly strained; she can't be entirely sure that she's not accidentally issuing some sort of wordless challenge by the way she almost glares back in her attempt to remain calm. She will not lose any more control of her situation than she already has. "I only meant to escape. Kindly let me go and I will bother you no more."
they're both half hightower!
A displeased grunt warms his throat, undoubtedly drowned out by the general buzz of the crowd. His eye rolls, simply pressed to be doing the chivalric thing, and releases her. He turns, arcing his arm out to create half a barrier between the bystanders and her to give a path out.
"Seems to me like you need an escort." Not an insult, merely a fact. Considering her propensity for getting rocked around like a boat in a storm. He's not offering, he's doing while simultaneously blaming her for the inconvenience.
omg..... right!! it's been a long week. 😭
"Very well." she says stiffly, following the path that he's given her, grateful that whatever caused the momentary lapse in her judgment has quieted for now. She's careful to remain untouched until they're in the outskirts of the crowd all the same.
Immediately, she feels better, more in control, and her demeanor shifts. "I'm in your debt, ser. As kind as everyone has been, I'd wager their priorities aren't so morally aligned when passions run as high as they are now."
Her eyes catch the sight of - are those people in cages? - commotion in the distance.
"And yet, you seem to be unaffected."
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"It's not to my tastes," the prince admits openly. "The festivities, I mean." Watching her and her curiosity get the better of her by observing whatever perversion is unraveling in the periphery. How does she react to this place? Is it more horror than wonder? His hands clasp neatly behind his back as he stands beside her. Performing his self-assigned duty, in the lightest manner possible.
Had he an ulterior motive? Certainly. It's just probably not the one she might expect of him.
"Nor does it seem to be of yours. Though, I wouldn't let the smallfolk see that. They prefer to see you adapt to their customs."
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I
If there were one thing that a life of adventuring hadn't prepared Peony for, it would be how often she was expected to share her personal space with others and the lack of good quality boarding. The young woman in the doorway was dressed in a simple peasant shirt and wrapped skirt, a threadbare stay over the top to protect her modesty and piles of blonde hair braided into a crown over her head. She would appear almost entirely normal were it not for the gossamer wings that sprung from her back, long enough to carry her slight frame.
Peony pressed her lips together in a sympathetic smile and closed the door behind her. "I am afraid that there are no single rooms in this Inn, miss. We're expected to share. I have been sleeping here for the past few nights now, the previous resident seems to have moved on." Or at least their things had gone missing for now. Borrowed clothing, borrowed housing, borrowed food. Would the horrors never cease? "You're welcome to stay. Or bunk with others. But some of the men here are brutes and I cannot say much better for some of the ladies. Permit me to introduce myself before you decide to throw me from a window; I am Peony." And she swept a delicate curtsey.
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"I apologize for my rude manners," she says at last, finding it within herself to smile ever so slightly in return. "It has been... quite the journey here," understatement of the century, "My name is Margaery."
Her curtsy is still perfect, even as the drab cloth tugs in different ways and she has to keep a hand on her neck to make sure the neckline doesn't bare too much.
"If you don't mind my asking, did you also find yourself alone in the forest?"
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While she might have been expelled from her family line due to refusing to bend to their wants, Peony had been raised within noble society and she could spot a woman of good kin a mile away. The delicate hand to her neck and soft tone were markers enough that she was dealing with real nobility here rather than social climbers like her family.
"Please, don't stand on my account, make yourself as comfortable as you can." Peony gestured to one of the small beds and sat on the opposite one, facing her, resting her hands in her lap.
"I did. Bare, cold and afraid. Not my most elegant of arrivals, I must confess. My former lady mother would have murdered me were she to hear of it." Peony confirmed, throwing in a few comments so that Margaery might know there was at least a note of familiarity between them. People liked to feel they weren't alone when they were afraid. "I hope you weren't given too much trouble getting into the village? And you were given adequate hospitality?"
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Still, she manages a small smile at the added comments, still reluctant to let a kind stranger's attempts to comfort go to waste. There's rapport being built here, and despite her better judgment, she can't find any hint of manipulative intent on Peony's part. Ah, she remembers a beat later, but we are not at court. There is no throne here from what she understands, no visible higher point that only one might occupy. They're all in the pits together.
"I..." Her mind flashes to waking up, the inherent confusion of being devoured by wildfire before startling awake on cool forest floor.
"The hospitality was, perhaps, the most confusing outcome thus far," she admits instead, skipping ahead to avoid the pain of remembering the worst details. "I expected hostility and shame and worse, but I was met with kindness I did not expect. Is that- a trick of some kind? A method meant to get our guards down before we're tested for our worth?"
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"To what I have experienced so far? No. The villagers show genuine kindness with little expectation of reciprocation beyond the creation of what they call zadza. They are quite explicit that zadza is the singular thing they are interested." She sighed, it hadn't sat right with her either. "I keep waiting for the other shoe to drop and the net to be lifted from beneath my feet. Sacrificed to some peculiar god, perhaps." It would not even make the first time she had been kidnapped in the aim of making her a sacrifice.
"It's gravely unsettling. I've taken to carrying a knife with me to protect myself."
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ii
Accepting enough that she had given in to her mounting stress and discomfort, and had followed the promise of - some sort of release, it seems, from the way her clothes are soaked through in spots from the blood of a chicken.
The bump of another grounds her, and by instinct Gala reaches to steady the woman. So her hand rests on Margaery's forearm the same moment Margaery grips her arm in return, and - gods, she bites back that feeling, how hypersensitive she feels, how it nearly stings her with the pleasant way this woman makes her feel with only the touch of her hand.
"My apologies. Are you alright?"
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It would be much less embarrassing, she thinks faintly as she freezes up on the full-body impact, if she had fallen on the floor. Better to be trampled by overenthusiastic townspeople than somehow accidentally assaulting someone seemingly twice her height, with nothing but a thinly lined dress on. Face burning with embarrassment (a Tyrell never trips!), Margaery takes a deep breath to compose herself as she pulls away, maintaining eye contact by sheer determination.
It only falters once, when she swallows and also tampers down all the unwelcome thoughts conspiring with the lingering pleasure gathering underneath her skin, jolting down her spine. Is she ready to bolt? Or climb this woman like a tree? Despite her best intentions, she wants to do both.
"The fault is mine, on both counts. I'll be more careful next time. Please accept m-my sincerest apologies."
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It doesn't help that she's hazy with warmth, sensitivity, a desire for intimacy from the things she's been exposed to here, either. Or maybe it does help, depending on how one looks at it, really. But Gala has punished herself for her desires for years - she has practice tempering herself.
"You needn't apologize." Said softly, more softly than might be expected, "You're overwhelmed. Do you need to be somewhere quieter?"
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The thought of accepting something borne out of pity is - frustrating. Infuriating.
And unfortunately necessary.
"Yes." she says, shakily drawing her breath, hugging herself as if it'll keep her safe from any other surprises. If she can't control her responses, she can at least control her actions for now. "If you wouldn't mind--?" The least she can do is know the name of her kind rescuer.
hearts festival.
She's new, Nikolai knows. He hasn't seen her face before.
And this has to be overwhelming. The hearts, the death—
There are no easy introductions to this place, but this festival must count among the more brutal. The displays on stage are easier to take in stride when it's only something lewd, even if that lewdness is of an unfamiliar quality. But all the blood, the people who die shrieking with laughter, maybe that is less easy to avert one's gaze from.
🥹
She doesn't though, just maintaining enough presence of mind to pull herself away gently, instead of going with the panic that wanted distance immediately.
"I'm fine." Ah, too brusque. She tries again. "Thank you." Her elbows still feel warm where he's touched her. "Is this-?"
How could she ask without being terribly rude, or giving away her opinion? Is this a common occurrence? Will this behavior be expected of her eventually? Not just the slaughter and the bloodthirsty cheer, but everything else that makes her feel as though she's stepped into a Dothraki brothel?
She crosses her arms across her chest, swallowing down her questions. "I apologize. I wasn't looking where I was going. I think I may have been affected by something I ate."
xoxo
"I tend to steer clear of what's offered at these celebrations," Nikolai confides, all but confirming her suspicions. "Will you walk with me? I know quiet tends to help when I'm in need of catching my breath."
Or when he feels likely to scratch out of his skin, composure cracking under the pressure of performance. The festivals tended to require it, and there are aspects of this one that are—
Taxing.
He doesn't tell her: We can speak more freely away from the crowd.
If it wouldn't alarm her, he might have telegraphed the words into her mind. But he can sense some level of unease, and finds himself reluctant to exacerbate it, even if he means to help.
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"If you tend to steer clear, what brings you here? The sight of a maiden in distress?"
There's immediate dismay at how unintentionally sarcastic she sounds - every day she remains here, she feels as though she loses more of herself - and she shoots him a look of genuine apology as they begin to walk.
"I'm. Sorry, that was uncalled for. Normally, I'm able to carry myself well enough in uncertain situations - perhaps even thrive in them, but this place seems to demand the control I've nurtured all my life."
A cost that is too high to bear. She glances at him again, studying him under lowered lashes; even a princely man is just a man, with as many weaknesses and temptations as the next.
"Why do you not partake?"
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ii.
which she's fiddling with when Margaery grasps her arm, startling her out of her own internal reverie, taking in the stranger. Well, and is there any point to calling her so, when everyone is a stranger?
“Very direct,” she says, a glint of humour in her eyes that undermines any real perception that she's mistaken this for a bold come on. “Steady.”