June 29, 2009

In Which Octavius Reads Another Sign

August 11, 1158
Octavius was not particularly surprised to find Medea alone in the sitting room as usual, but the fact that she was wearing only her nightgown did puzzle him slightly. Ordinarily, Medea was not one to leave her own bedroom in anything less than her typical brocaded, straight-laced perfection, far beyond modest and into the realms of frigidity. Had it not been for her severe hairstyle, he might have thought she had simply not bothered to dress for some reason or another, but seeing as not a single blond strand was out of place, it seemed more likely that she was entirely unaware of her attire.
"Uh... Medea?" he addressed her, unsure of whether or not to comment. "Are you... feeling all right?"

Her stony eyes fell upon him unblinkingly. "Of course. Why would you assume otherwise?"

"No reason," replied Octavius quickly, taking a seat beside her on the couch.

Medea rolled her eyes. "I see."
For a moment, they sat in a strained silence; Octavius half-expected her to ask him to leave, but she seemed oddly content to merely forget about his presence and stare into the space directly ahead of her. He might have thought it a nice change to her usual screaming and nagging had he not been questioning her very sanity.

"Sparron was asking for you," he ventured at last.

Medea shrugged. "So? He knows I have better things to do than to be at his every beck and call."

"He's two years old, Medea."

"And...?"

Perhaps he'd been better off just keeping his mouth shut. He didn't want her talking about their children like this; he had to change the subject.
"Oh, did you hear? Alina had her baby yesterday," Octavius informed her.

His wife only blinked. "Another one? Good Lord, that woman has babies like a hen lays eggs. What kind is this one?"

"A little girl. They named her Viridis, for Severin's stepmother. Funny thing is, they're both blond and brown-eyed; quite the coincidence, is it not?"
"I'll say. Three fair-haired babies in a row? Either Severin turns a blind eye or he's a complete idiot; obviously, Alina's sleeping around. Oh well, at least he can be certain that Rahileine is his--unfortunate girl."

So it seemed she was just as ready to insult his friends and their children as she was to insult him and his own. Was no one immune to her disdain and judgment? Surely there was someone of whom she could speak no ill...

Ah! Who better than the person of whom none could speak ill?
"I recieved a letter from your cousin this morning," he declared. "She was fairly ill for a while, but she seems to be recovering quite nicely."

Medea bit her lip. "Which cousin?"

"Princess Holladrin."

"The princess?" she parroted; had he not known better, he might have thought she sounded confused.
Octavius nodded. "Indeed. She sends us all her love and hopes that you are well."

"Don't be ridiculous, Octavius! Why on earth would the Princess of Dovia be writing to you?"

Well, that had certainly been unexpected.

"Because she's family, maybe?" He shouldn't have had to explain this to her.
"If you're trying to make me laugh, it isn't working," she scolded. "To call a princess one's family is near blasphemy. You shouldn't voice such falsehoods."

"Falsehoods?" Octavius repeated, silently praying that she was only playing some sort of joke. "She's your cousin. Her father the King is your uncle; you never miss an opportunity to remind me of that!"

Shaking her head, Medea stood. "Really, Octavius, if I had a King for an uncle, I would know. Now, if you'll excuse me, I have some important things to attend to."
And with that, she was gone; in some ways, he felt as though she'd never even been there to begin with.

NEXT CHAPTER:

16 comments:

Van said...

So with the one hundredth post coming up fairly soon, I'm thinking about doing a few little extras. One of the things I might do is take some pictures of what some of the characters might be like in a modern setting. However, obviously I can't do that for every single one of the characters. I'm thinking I'll only do maybe ten or so.

The question, of course, is which ten? With the exception of Florian, I often have difficulty telling which characters readers seem to like and which they don't. So, what I'm going to do is I'm going to ask everyone to list the ten characters that they would like to see in this photo shoot. They can be your ten favorites, or the ten characters that first come to mind when you think of the story, but they don't have to be--you can choose absolutely any ten characters you like. Also, this is a great de-lurking opportunity (if I dare presume to have lurkers at all, that is).

So if everyone lists the ten characters they'd like to see, then I'll take pictures of the ten characters with the most "votes". Obviously, if there's a tie for tenth place, I'll take pictures of both characters, but other than that, I won't do any more than ten. Sorry :(

Phoenix said...

Oh wow! She's really going off the deep end huh? Strange! Maybe she'll die of some brain disease and Octavius can finally be happy! I'm just saying!!

FLORIAN!!!(You knew that one right?)
Thetis
Farilon
Geneva(I know she's gone but I want to see her in slutty clothes!)
Alina
Severin
Dalston
Nora
Ummm....those are the only ones I could think of!

Van said...

"Maybe she'll die of some brain disease and Octavius can finally be happy!"

You seem both hopeful and excited, Phoenix :)

Phoenix said...

LOL!! I can't help it! I hate to see people miserable(apparently in other peoples stories cause I cause my Sims all sorts of misery!). I just want them to be HAPPY! I could have hosted Love Connection or something!:P

Van said...

Lol, I'm like that with other peoples' stories too. As much as I torture mine, I want everyone else's characters to live happily ever after.

Penelope said...

LULZ @ you two with your, "I torture my characters but PLZ DON'T HURT YOURZ!!"

Heh, oh gosh. I'm probably no different.

Ok, here are my favs:

Florian (naturally)
Severin
Celina
Adonis
Halford
Arydath
Holladrin
Nora
That little naked kid
Thetis

Gaaahhh, Medea. She feel from the crazy tree and hit all of the branches on her way down.

You're not thinking of killing her off and inserting Holladrin where she used to be are you? ;)

Penelope said...

Also, who's the hottie in the preview? Yes, please!!!

Van said...

She's definitely losing it, that's for sure... but if she dies, I'll probably kill her slowly. Also, poor Holladrin isn't in the best of health physically :(

But of course, that's not necessarily a "No"... :P

The guy in the preview is Lileina's older brother. He didn't turn out too bad at all :)

Verity said...

I assume I am waaay too late to join in with this but I thought it might be fun to write down my favourite characters anyway:

Florian (looove that guy)
Severin (who wouldn't love him?)
Arydath (she is kickass)
Celina (too sweet not to love)
Thetis (she and Florian are too cute)
Nora (kickass potential)
Halford (big and wonderfully goofy)
Lonriad (he rather a bit phwoar isn't he)
Cambrin (I know we only saw him a couple of times but he was so nice)
Dalston (he gets put on the end for being naughty but I still love him)

Van said...

No worries, Verity. It's nice hearing about people's favorite characters. That way I know who I need to work into the story more :)

Unknown said...

Yay! Time to list my top ten. Even if I am dreadfully late. ;)

- Florian
- Severin
- Thetis
- Alina
- Roderick
- Viridis
- Geneva
- Celina
- Arydath
- Raia

Van said...

Thanks Maruutsu. It's always good to hear everyone's favorites :)

Please Note: said...

I'm horribly late too, I just started reading this story about a week ago and I've gotten to this point...whew! It's drawing me in! I LOVE your writing style and I LOVE this story. Seems I'm lurking, but a little late since I have three years worth to lurk through.

Okay...favorites

Celina (she's been #1 from the beginning)
Dalston (I fell for this couple from the beginning because that's how I imagine most of my medevil sims.)
Thetis (I identify with her)
Alina (I have a soft spot for read haired sims)
Electra (I know she's dead, but she was sooo pretty and you made comments about her style. I think if she was alive she'd deserve a makeover.)
Nora (She's pretty cool)
Falidrin (I think, eh..Severin's Steward...just cuz he got screwed)

That's all I can think of for now and it's really late...and I have to get up early with my 3month old. lol

Keri said...

I'm new to Blogger...that was me above :-)

Van said...

Welcome Keri! Glad you're enjoying the story so far :)

It's always great to hear people's favorites--characters who need more screen time, etc. Fortunately, I have plans for some of the characters you mentioned--in some cases, maybe even happy plans :)

Thank you so much for the nice comment :) Have fun with your baby :)

Van said...

Do to absolutely ridiculous levels of spam (30 in my inbox today!), I will be closing comments on this particular post. I can't imagine that will impact anyone, since it's an old post, but in any case, sorry for the inconvenience.