It was a quiet afternoon in the Teahouse, which was no doubt part of why the young red head was lingering in the common room on the ground floor. Normally if the others were out and about she lingered in her own places, liking the peace of her own thoughts outside of when clients or Master Ryan had a need of her. It did sadden her at times, she reflected as she twirled her feathered quill in her fingers, that she and the others who called the Teahouse home had not become closer, were not friends. But how to foster friendship when so often the others viewed this all as merely a competition, something to win at. The more elite clients, the most money, everything was a game it seemed and she found herself wondering how much of a fantasy she had woven around the trade she had chosen.<br/><br/>Fiona sighed, letting her shoulders slump from their normal perfect posture, relaxing backward into the oversized arm chair she had chosen for its position in the room, in full view of the grand floor where clients might appear and yet still basked in the sunlight of the sunny afternoon that was streaming through the windows. It was almost as good as being up in her own rooms, though she found in the public ones she was never able to focus truly. Her eyes trailed over the open journal on her lap, meant only to record scribblings and random musings of her mind and not her novel or scholar work. A poem lay there, inked out in her careful fluid handwriting. Another glance of her bluegreen eyes showed her there was no one around, not even a servant, she lingered positioned just so to be able to assist any clients that might appear. The Master was tending business matters, and both Zara and Anel had other clients currently. She was the only one with no plans for the afternoon, which at times worked out well for the Master of the Teahouse, she was readily adaptable and a easy pleaser.<br/><br/>Still she was alone and so she took the nerve then to murmur aloud the poem that lay written on the creamy parchment, something she hardly ever did, reading her own work aloud, though she had always agreed with her father that writing always sounded best spoken, caressed with ones soul.<br/><br/><em>"I am but a star to his sun<br/>Pale, silver light cast upon the dark<br/>I am but a sliver of what he is<br/>Something so deep within ones heart<br/>His golden rays seduce and tease, <br/>Reaching within my very soul to cup<br/>To cup and sip at the essence of self<br/>And I, I let him bathe in all that I am<br/>His radiance burns through the fountain<br/>A meld of dazzling lights that dance upon the air<br/>So full of joy, desire quickened there<br/>To breath is to need, to yearn and ache<br/>With all the desperation of lovers newly born<br/>And each morn, to his radiance do I wake<br/>Happy within the captivity a heart puts upon a soul<br/>Puts upon a body, to not stray from whence<br/>He has found me, has taken me<br/>I am a star upon the night, a jewel to wink<br/>And he, he is the sun to all my world<br/>That which pulls me, plucks within to call<br/>And to him my petals unfold, blossoming beneath his light<br/>What tales have I to share, but lips unfit<br/>To truly tell, for what words could speak of the worship<br/>Or the soul speak of our touches<br/>For my very soul do the flames of passion rent<br/>Each time he summons, each time he but does glance<br/>To him ever shall I bend, kneel, to worship as I should<br/>For in this godless clime he has become my heaven<br/>And his flames sear me, brand me ever his..."</em><br/><br/>By the end she found herself smiling, thinking to herself that the poem was perhaps her best effort at that form of writing to have come from her fingertips yet. She was a scholar and a novelist yes, though she had never had the courage to send her work to a publisher yet. The five manuscripts that haunted her writing desk in her room upstairs were unspoken of, locked away and unknown even to Ryan she hoped. Would that she had her famed father's courage. With a sigh she put down her quill on the side table she had dragged near her chair, capping her ink well and putting aside the journal carefully. Her fingers she flexed, wondering what time it was and how long the lull over the house would last. Her fingers moved then to caress the violet silk of her gown, today's dress all silk in fact, one fluid sheath like affair until it got to her knees, then flaring out in what was commonly called the mermaid style. It was a far more sleek look then most of her day gowns, she loved her tulle, petticoats and full skirts. She had almost worn a bustle skirt today but the violet was one of her newest creations.<br/><br/>At least, she thought to herself, her gowns and clothing were an art form many approved of and enjoyed on her. That garnered a slight wry smile from her, wondering if perhaps with custom made wardrobes offered the other two most active workers in the Teahouse might contemplate a friendship with her. She was lonely, as that poem had shown her. A desire, a yearning for a heart to match her own, to fill her up and make her burn with love. Perhaps that was what she gave her clients, those who came to her so often, that fever dream of what could be, in a perfect world, of how they would fit together; though it was never true. Reality interceded too much.<br/><br/>Love she had seen in her parents marriage, and in the way that her mother had loved her new husband. She believed it was out there, that it could be had; it gave her more faith in people she thought, made her better at soothing their weary hearts. But who soothed the whores weary heart? What a question indeed and not one she could pose really to anyone else. Few of the people she interacted with were as philosophical in bent as she was.<br/><br/>Fiona sighed, laughing inwardly at herself as she picked up her tea cup and sipped at the still hot tea, enjoying the clean mint flavor of the tea, focusing just on the sunshine and the dream her poem spoke of.