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Having organised for Phaedra to do a reading for her, Eyrgjafa has made sure her house out in Lansdale is nice and tidy, and is now reading a book while she waits. From the outside, lights can be seen around the curtains in the front room, and a dark purple Prius is parked in the driveway.
Phaedra arrives on bicycle, dressed in yoga pants and a tank top with a floral design on it, and leaves the bike on the porch before ringing the doorbell. There's a small crossbody purse over one shoulder and sitting on the opposite hip, and her hair's worn back in a braid with a scrap of yarn tying off the end--though it seems to be fighting to escape from all sides. She hasn't bothered to Blush herself for this meeting.
Putting her book down - with a bookmark in; she might be a literal heathen but she still has standards - Eyrgjafa rises, going to open the door. "Good evening, Phaedra. I hope you weren't too unsettled by the incident earlier?" She's dressed fairly nicely, in a light yellow dress, and Blushed. Maybe she had a video call or something earlier?
"Mmm. Intrigued, more than unsettled." Her head tilts to one side. "I think Rihat of Nineveh is the Kindred the Nereids want. Which is interesting when you consider Nineveh's ties to a great big whale who swallowed a man? But that might be a connection for a Lance to chase down. I don't want to touch a Bible again anymore."
"Fair enough," Eyrgjafa nods. "I don't think I even have one in the house, so." She leads Phaedra through to what is technically the dining room, even if only of the house's occupants use it as such. There're the usual signs that Eyrgjafa doesn't live alone on the way - raincoat too small for her on a hook by the front door, soccer trophies on the mantlepiece - but now they've been joined by a few carefully-painted miniatures and some oddly-shaped dice.
"I don't own one, either. But the thought is still interesting--but we're not here to talk about that business tonight. We're here because you wanted a reading." She smiles as she follows Eyrgjafa to the dining room, pulling a deck out of her bag--there's at least two others in the bag still, and she's been seen with several different decks. A guilty pleasure, a professional collection. "Any topic of interest?"
Eyrgjafa nods, gesturing for Phaedra to choose a seat before she takes one opposite the younger vampire. "Mostly about my personal life. I've been thinking about trying to get back into the whole dating thing, but not sure if it's a good idea right now, what with Mina to take care of."
"It's a question that I wouldn't be able to aid you with, without the cards, I don't think." But the tone of that is amused and self-mocking, as she begins to shuffle her deck. The deck she's chosen seems to have warm bold colors, and more abstract depictions of card themes; there are no faces, but the hands shown on many of the cards are impossible to place, racially, due to a style that involves bold, saturated contrasty colors, instead of flesh tones.
(warning for non-realistic illustrated gore/injury, scars.)
Eyrgjafa shrugs. "With or without the cards, your aid is still of value." She falls silent after that, waiting for Phaedra to be finished with her shuffling.
She sets the deck on the table. "Cut the cards, please. I'm going to be doing a six-card reading here."
A nod, as Eyrgjafa picks up the cards, cutting them quickly and smoothly. Almost like she's been read for several times in the past by Phaedra alone.
She sets the first three cards off the top of the deck in a line on the table before her, pausing--if she were blushed, this might be where a slow deep breath would come. But in the meantime, she's falling into the relaxed state she prefers for her readings. "These three cards represent elements of the situation at hand, and are a broad-scope view of what's going on when read together.
She flips up the first--it shows two hands cupped around a spark, fingers and thumbs facing toward Eyr. "The Sun, reversed. This is a bit of a downer to start on, and shows there's been some past failures that are part of why you're hesitating about the matter. Once burned, twice shy. You're not sure if you can stand for the idea of being bitten again."
Eyrgjafa nods once more, waiting for the other two cards before she says anything in response to them.
The second card shows a jumble of things, the collection of a small murder of crows (or perhaps a parliament of ravens)--a feather, a crown, a lantern, a leaf. "The seven of cups. This card is about having fantasies. You have an image built up in your mind about what the ideal relationship would look like, and you hold every potential date up to it, comparing and contrasting."
She flips the third as well; it shows a pair of flame-colored roses, and is right-side up from Eyrgjafa's perspective. "Two of coins, reversed. There's a lot weighing on you at this time. You don't feel like you have the right footing necessarily, or are balanced for this. You worry about overcommitting yourself on too many fronts. Mm?" A glance up, seeing the reaction to the spread so far.
Eyrgjafa hesitates before speaking, clearly considering her words carefully. "Yes. With this Nereid problem we're been having, and the Inwictoos drama that's sprung up alongside it... I don't know if I have the time to properly balance those and my own studies with taking care of Mina, let alone adding a romantic relationship on top."
"Would it be another burden, or the escape your mind and heart both crave?" She pulls the next two cards, putting them in a line closer to Eyrgjafa than the first. "These two cards are about 'what's on hand'. What will help you or hinder you, the resources and baggage that you're bringing to the matter."
The first depicts a pair of ravens on a branch, deep in a fog. The colors are extremely muted greys that contrast with the rest of the cards so far. "Five of cups, reversed. Upright, this is regret and exile, but reversed that's less harsh. Sure, there's setbacks here, but it's also about moving on. You have gained experience and brought it forward with you."
The second shows a hand, palm-up. It seems to bear scars that represent the four tarot suits or the four tools of a magician, as well as a lemniscate, an infinity sign, near the wrist. "The four of swords. How fitting. This is a card that's all about 'taking a break'. You're not going straight from a bad breakup into whatever comes next. You've had some time for contemplation, and are bringing stillness with you, instead of frenetic energy and desperation."
"It has been a while, yes." Eyrgjafa says slowly. "I have... the term at the time was "courted", I think, in English." She shrugs. "Nobody I knew before my Embrace spoke it."
"This final card is what I like to think of as the 'pivot point', or what the situation revolves around," she says, flipping the final card and staring at it for a moment. Almost the whole of the card is taken up with the image of a single rose--it might be intended to be a white rose, but it's shaded with every color of the rainbow, making it vivid and rich rather than boring. "Ah. The nine of coins. In many readings, this is a good sign, because it speaks to abundance, self-sufficiency. But in a romance reading, the undertones it has of independence aren't exactly encouraging. You're a force to be reckoned with, Eyrgjafa, and no partner who won't meet you on your level and respect your selfhood will ever be right for you. Everything you've built up for yourself is yours, and that's clearly a thing in this reading."
Eyrgjafa nods again. "Thank you, Phaedra. You've given me a lot to think about." She doesn't seem particularly happy or unhappy. Just... meditative.
"I'm sorry this isn't a more optimistic outlook." She picks the cards up quietly. "Of course, my own experiences may color things a little, where love is involved; I've never had any, myself. Not...romantically."
A shrug. "Unless you stacked the deck while I wasn't looking somehow, it's not your fault. You drew the cards, not chose them." Eyrgjafa reassures Phaedra, pausing for a moment. "Have you ever wanted romantic love?"
The question seems to merit a long moment of thought, her gaze going distant and brow wrinkling. "Maybe when I was a very little girl, maybe."
Eyrgjafa nods sympathetically. "The desires we have as children often pass, in light of the things that shape us into the adults we become. Only more so, for beings like us, who can survive centuries, or even millennia."
"Any desire I had to be loved, to be wanted, to be touched was...taken from me." She shakes her head like she's clearing an etch-a-sketch. "That's all in the past now. Putting it in the past and giving me a life where I could make my own choices was why my sire Embraced me. To empower me."
"...I'm sorry that it was taken from you, Phaedra." Eyrgjafa says quietly. "Though I am glad that you have been empowered to make your own choices nonetheless."
"Let's just hope the ones I make are okay, now." She chuckles quietly. "So, besides uncertain about love and busy with fishy things--how have you been?"
"Good." She smiles at the younger vampire. "I've been talking to Tahmina about branching out in my personal studies, which went well. Meeting new people, some of them amongst our Seasonal friends. You?"
"Trying to get out of my shell a little? Sledge took me for a motorcycle ride the other night, and now I'm curious about the idea of riding as ecstatic ritual. I still don't know what to make of a lot of everyone sometimes, though."
"...I've never thought about that possibility." Eyrgjafa admits. "It could be interesting to study." She hesitates for a moment. "You know you can always come to me for assistance figuring people out, right?"
"I'd hardly want to annoy you every time I want to ask." She looks sheepish.
"Phaedra, sweetie. If I'm offering something, I'm not going to get annoyed with you taking me up on it, okay?"
"Alright." She nods slightly. "What do you think about Atalo? Sometimes, he seems like he's caught between this idea of who he's been and who he's actively being, like he's trying to use one as an apology for the other."
"He's... interesting. I hadn't thought to put it in those terms, but that makes a lot of sense." Eyrgjafa hmmms for a moment. "He needs to work on accepting that those two aspects of him can coexist. Both the temple guardian and the charitable merchant are parts of him. Neither is complete without the other."
She nods quietly. "He's said he wants to be our guardian. My trouble is, the fights I get into aren't often in the physical space at all. I don't want him to feel bad, if he can't support me."
Eyrgjafa turns that over in her head for a moment before she speaks. "Are there things in the physical space he can support you with? Even just having someone to make sure you're not interrupted could be useful."
"Mm. Maybe. Maybe." She nods quietly. "I just...mh, wish he saw how hard he's overthinking it?"
"Ah. That...hmmm." She pauses for a moment. "Sorry, I should have asked. Do you actually want suggestions right now, or just need to vent?"
"Suggestions might be nice. Can't promise to follow them, but the perspective's useful. Sometimes I don't see past the end of my nose and sometimes I'm peering into space, and both make it easy to miss what's in front of me."
"Take him out hunting sometime, maybe? Not one of his special ones, just to feed, but getting him out of his head and focusing on what's immediately in front of him might help." Eyrgjafa shrugs slightly. "I might be a Serpent, not a Mekhet, but even we know that sometimes it's getting away from what you've been stuck on that helps."
"I think he'd be very twitchy about watching me hunt, when I'm not feeding on my Herd. I put myself directly in the line of danger, and play up my wide-eyed innocence, and see what gets drawn in by a lost little Lamb."
"Ah, the creeper bait method." Eyrgjafa nods. "I'm familiar with it myself. Maybe only if there's someone to sit on him, make sure he just watches you taking care of yourself, then?" She considers for a moment. "If hunting together isn't an option, though...I might need to think about it for a while and come back to you, sorry."
She looks thoughtful. "Someone like Finley, I'd bring along to hunt with me, though. Or even Sledge."
Eyrgjafa nods. "Finley's pretty cool. And I'm not just saying that because zhe's Family, either. Sledge is... she's not the sharpest knife in the drawer, but she's a lot of fun."
"She knows a lot about things I don't, though. Have you seen her motorcycle? It's...really, really amazing. A masterwork, like the Holy Grail of motorcycles. She may not know anything about blood sorcery or a lot of book learning, but she knows what she does know."
"Only in passing, I'm afraid." A shrug. "I don't really know much about vehicles beyond how to drive one. I knew she was good with her hands, but not that good."
"She let me use Auspex to read the motorcycle. It's...a beloved partner. And bloodstained in more ways than one. I'm half in love with it."
Eyrgjafa pauses for a moment, squinting at Phaedra. "In love with it, or with her?" There's no judgement in her tone, just curiousity.
Blink. Blink. "Huh? I mean. I admire her a lot..."
"Oh, nothing. Just an idle thought." Eyrgjafa shrugs again. "Where did she take you on that ride you mentioned?"
"All over. From Atalo's shop past Bala Cwnwyd down to he Wissahickon Memorial Bridge and then to a tea shop. Most of it was so fast all I could do was hold on and watch and I hope she didn't hear me laughing in mania the whole time." Given the comparison to an ecstatic ritual, she may be using the original definition of mania, there.
Eyrgjafa blinks at that. "I didn't realise she was into tea. Or was going there your idea?"
"I think she chose it for me. I don't drink tea anymore; vomiting it up makes me feel gross. But I like how mint tea smells, still. And she drank a mango green tea, and I think she enjoyed it." She looks thoughtful, remembering the date outing.
"Just the smell can be pleasant enough," Eyrgjafa agrees, clearly sympathising with the desire to avoid throwing it back up. "Do you think that's something you'd like to do again with her?"
"Well, yeah. It was a lot of fun. I also want to see her making music sometime, because people who can do that sort of thing are just...magic to me. I can't carry a tune in a bucket, and knowing she's built a career on it? That's awesome."
"She's pretty good at it, isn't she? It's not a genre I particularly like, but she makes it work."
"I haven't heard any of her work. I ought to search it on Youtube..."
"It's...an experience. Better in person, of course, but what isn't?"
She nods thoughtfully, then gives Eyrgjafa a quiet look. "Who do you consider yourself close with?"
"My Family, of course." Eyrgjafa ponders for a moment. "Outside them... Floretta, I'm not sure if you've met her?" She pauses for a moment, looking at Phaedra. Not in the eyes, of course, she only does that when making a point. "You. I don't let many people into my Haven, after all."
"I know Floretta. She seems very, very sweet. I don't know if I'm only getting the top layer, or if that's who she is, but a lot of what I've seen is completely inoffensive in all ways." She tilts her head to one side. "I'd invite you to my Haven in turn, but it's...hardly anywhere near so fancy."
"Floretta is very sweet," Eyrgjafa nods. She doesn't seem offended by Phaedra's unwillingness to reciprocate the invitation. "Fanciness is something that can come in time, if you want it. I didn't have anything like this in my first decades in Philadelphia, after all."
"I don't know if I'll ever want something so fancy. I like...seclusion, more than space and amenities. And I don't need to worry about sharing my space with someone who eats food and needs a kitchen." There's a glance at one of the nearby signs of Mina's life here--the hanging coat, a piece of homework on a table somewhere.
Another nod. "I like seclusion well enough, but I do need enough space for my library. And taking care of someone who needs a kitchen adds to the need, both for space and for amenities."
"So it does. But you love her, and so you do it." Phaedra nods. "I should probably head out. But it was really, really nice getting to talk to you outside a crowd."
"Pleasure talking to you as always, Phaedra, and thank you for the reading." Eyrgjafa stands, walking Phaedra out.
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