#chapter 2 event

Desmond sighed with relief when Ravenstar seemed to be galloping well today. It had been a trial to bond with this particular horse over these past couple of days but he simply had no other choice. If not for his own horse having colic, he would never have to deal with borrowing a Crownland horse in the first place. But alas, fate it seemed wasn't looking kindly to Desmond first jousting event and gifted him a horse that was rather temperamental. Half the time Ravenstar was pleasantly obedient and showed keen intelligence. The other half, it seemed like it just wanted to throw Desmond off. The Seven only knew what its mood would be like during the tourney tomorrow.

Desmond made the horse canter over to the stands upon spotting someone he knew extremely well. Lifting up the visor on his helmet, he then proffered a slightly shy smile at the other. "Well, how do I look?" he asked, fully decked out in full armor, including with his lance and Manderly shield.

@gildedheirs

It felt that it had been years since they had a moment to themselves. Just them. The twins were busy, Qoren being shooed away from them; his siblings elsewhere, even his step-father. So now it was only mother and son. Perhaps it was Qoren looking too much into it, finding the silence unbearable while things were being packed and pushed around. Questions of why regarding her children’s betrothal still clouded his mind, but it was no longer on the forefront. They had somehow gone through so much scrutiny, and they were only destined to go through more. And yet his mother remained strong. That didn’t mean she could entirely be that, all the way through, down to her core. What son would he be without checking in on her? “How are you feeling, Mother?” A beat passes before he clarifies. “You can be honest with me, please.”

Deria had been speaking to her attendants, giving orders on departure arrangements when her beloved firstborn suddenly entered. Dismissing the staff, she then turned around to face him with her usual serene smile. At his question however, her facial expression then dropped to a contemplative and troubled sigh. "A little shaken at witnessing such a terrible decimation of an entire house of course. All those poor innocent children and members who had no inkling of what Borris Morrigen had done. I fear their screams will haunt my dreams tonight," she shuddered. "I understand why Aegon did what he did but---it is still a tragedy. I shall pray for all their souls tonight," she vowed. She then looked back up at Qoren. "And what of you, my son? How do you fare? What are your thoughts on this matter?"

@promisednight

He was still newly healing from his many injuries sustained during his remarkably disappointing and heartbreaking first joust. Thankfully he had healed his heart somewhat over the past few days and now it mostly remained for his physical injuries to heal. Though he drew a lot of sympathy from his friends and family, honestly he just looked worse than he actually was since most of his injuries were soft tissue injuries. Thankfully with his clothes, he was able to cover most of his purple-lish back and shoulders but the most annoying injuries were his strained neck and bruised coccyx. He had to use his whole body to turn now instead of just his neck as well as carry a small cushion everywhere cos he could barely sit on hard surfaces. And even soft ones. At least his cut lip had already closed up.

He had been politely conversing with another Northener when out of the corner of his eye, he caught Lynara crying softly as she walked past. Excusing himself from the other man, he then turned a little too fast in his haste and winced hard at the twinge at his neck.

It was like stepping into whole new world when Desmond stepped foot into Nyessara's Garden. The North had no beautifully colorful gardens to boast of as most of the gardens there -- be it in greenhouses or around Godswood areas, were mostly for functional flowers, plants, fruits and vegetables. And Dragonstone, with the exception of Aegon's garden which had more greenery than florals, there was hardly any other garden to be found on that volcanic island. Thus, Desmond was assailed with a cacophony of sweet aromas as well as myriad of rainbow colors, when he walked into the Royal Gardens. It looked and smelled utterly romantic and Desmond was in love.

Especially when he was told that there were Pentoshi flora growing in certain parts of the Gardens as well! Turning to the person beside him, his bright baby blues sparkling excitedly, he then asked," Do you suppose we're allowed to pick one flower and plant from each species in here?"

Desmond loved the North. He really did, it was his birthplace after all and where his entire family was currently, but to say that he was truly happy living there every single day of his life? Now that would be a lie. As creative and imaginative as he was, there was only so much one could do with the Northern geography, animals and climate. If he wasn't born a Manderly with access to a finely-stocked and vast castle library, as well as ports and people coming in from different regions and walks of life bringing in all sorts of foreign wares and stories, he would surely had died of pure boredom if his physical health had not killed him first.

Thus whenever he got the chance to travel out of the North, needless to say the secondborn Manderly was perpetually vibrating with excitement at all the different and new things he was now chanced to explore and experienced. As such, even attending the very First Court held at the brand new Throne room in the Red Keep, was an affair that provided much excitement to Desmond. "Do you think that there really are a thousand blades welded onto the Throne?" he spoke in a hushed tone towards Aemma. When she did not respond, Desmond turned his entire body to glance fully at her, finally noticing how she didn't truly seemed to be herself today. "Aemma, " he spoke softly as he placed a gentle hand on her shoulder. "Is this boring you tremendously?"

It had been a few days since the untimely reveal of Caren's haunting secret, and Timaeus still wasn't quite sure what to think. Something felt a little strange about her story and he couldn't quite pin down what it was… on the other hand, the physical evidence was right there, and what would she have left to lie about after admitting to murder of one and manslaughter of two? It wasn't really his place to question further.

This was all in the past, anyway. What mattered to him right now was getting out of this place alive, and until he knew more about what was going on, that meant playing along with Monokuma and his... fashion show? He wasn’t sure what the hell that had to do with anything, but it was better than being slowly suffocated so he wasn’t going to complain. And it would give Caren something to focus on that wasn’t murder, past or present.

He just wished that their fitting times weren’t so early! Well, he was used to getting up early, but that didn’t seem to be the case for Caren, who was still curled up next to him and snoring a little... so now he had to wake her up and feel needlessly guilty about it, great. He prodded her shoulder gently.

A... fashion show? Timaeus was a bit baffled by this turn of events, but it was better than an oxygen-deprived horror movie marathon, at least. Who would try to win this contest, though, when it was almost guaranteed someone else would kill them for the money? Maybe someone who thought they could get out unscathed... maybe the mastermind?

He snapped back to reality as the door opened to the barracks and Sahirah left the room, standing silently as the little pink animatronic bunny reengaged the handcuffs. That meant it was his turn, right? He gave Caren’s hand a small squeeze before holding out his wrist to Monomi, eyeing the doorway nervously.

Inside he found Tomo and Nao, just as Monokuma had said. He hadn’t really talked to either of them much. Both had rubbed him the wrong way at the trial, but tensions were running very high that day to say the least-- it was only fair to give them a second chance, he decided.

"Kaoru-san...."

How had it ended up like this? Clive wondered as he stared down at the section of road that had swallowed up Kaoru Hayashi mere moments ago. Today had been one disaster after another it seemed.

Earlier that day, everyone had received two secrets as MonoMANU's latest motive, one of their own and one of their classmates. And while Clive's was not something he'd kill for, it was very upsetting to see put in text, and he'd felt miserable since the motive announcement. The other secret he'd recieved had hardly been on his mind at all, except when Purin had texted him to ask about their secret. He'd agreed to meet up with them, but had time to kill and had spent most of it moping. Until he'd run into Kaoru.

He didn't know the gamemaster very well, but she seemed like a kind person, and when she'd offered to try and cheer him up, he really couldn't refuse. Tossing a very bouncy looking ball of elastics seemed like it could be fun...But it'd all gone wrong.

The ball had slipped from Kaoru's hand, and Clive had failed to catch it and the ball had crashed into a display case, breaking the contents.

And that's how it'd all gone to hell. MonoMANU had shown up, and called all the students to the shop and Kaoru had been killed with a trap door. Somehow he'd escaped with his own life but...He shouldn't have. It was his fault Kaoru was dead. He'd Jinxed her, somehow. Usually his luck wouldn't allow him to escape from that unharmed, so he must have stolen hers. He'd jinxed her and now she was dead.