(no subject)

[iniquiticity]

Ludvic for #19 "Omnium enim rerum principia parva sunt. The beginnings of all things are small." ?

Ludvic liked to sit on the bench outside the house and absorb all the morning sun that beat down on him - making up for a millennia spent primarily indoors, Rhodin had quipped. It was here he would put the desk Conju had gotten for him across his knees and carve trinkets. It had been long, so long, that he had carved anything. He hadn't needed the meditative stillness in the long guard hours; all that time gripping a spear, hoping not to use it, made him less interested in any other knife.

But these days -- these days the knife seemed more appealing. He was pleased to find out that his hands remembered shapes they had long, long, long ago done, in a long-lost home.

He thought often of the fated vacation, in which Fitzroy had asked him to carve some pegs for his harp. He had ..... Fitzroy had not known what sort of leap Ludvic's heart had made at such a request. He had known about Ludvic's grandfather.....

He often thought that Fitzroy was not the only person who had remembered something of who they had been. Fitzroy was not the only one Cliopher had begun to save.

And yet. The bench was an excellent vantage point for the street, the long line of houses stretching to the lagoon. It was from here that Ludvic was well-positioned to stay abreast of the comings and goings around their house.

No. Not and yet. The guard was no less him than the much-younger carver. Fitzroy was no less himself than Artorin Damara; Kip was no less himself than Cliopher Lord Mdang.

From here he saw Aya walking down the street to the house. He looked up at her when she arrived, and even offered her a slight smile.

"Hello, Aya," he said, putting down the half-carved tern he was working on. His mother had been precise about animals. He had been working on that, himself. A few of the guards had come out on vacation a year back; Zerafin had helped him with birds.

"Hello, Ludvic," Aya said, and sat down next to him. She looked at the half-carved tern in his hands and then looked up at him, "How are you?"

"I'm well," he said, "How about you?"

"I'm well," she said, "I wanted to ask you a favor."

"Certainly."

"One of the municipal buildings took a bad hit in that storm last week and the façade was smashed. No structural damage, thankfully, but it's going to need to be redone almost completely from the ground up."

Ludvic nodded. Conju had told him all about the various reportings about what had fallen over for whom during the storm, as well as who was the most upset about it, and who was in progress in fixing it. Ludvic had moved a couple of the larger trees out of the way, but by now most of the bigger legwork was already completed.

Had he missed this? He would have been happy to help clear away the old debris so something new could be completed.

"How can I help?"

"Well, we were trying to figure out what to do with the new façade when someone said you came from a family of carvers and I see that you're working on it. Would you like to be a part? Obviously we'd pay you for the time, and maybe you have carving advice no one else has?"

Ludvic blinked once, and twice, and a third time. He looked down at the tern and took a steadying breath. The carver and the muscle, he thought to himself, nearly shaking his head.

He said, "It's been a very, very long time since I've carved anything bigger than this, and nothing as big as a façade."

"That's fine," Aya said, and smiled at him, "Start small. I don't think it will be that hard for us to figure out how to go with you at the base."