Work Text:
You sigh, tapping your pen against the paper in distaste. A more devout person than you would make an offering to the Great Muse Calliope that you regain your writing spark, or that at least this horrid writer’s block would end.
You favor a more practical approach.
Putting down the unused pen and paper, you pick up your parasol from its stand and head out into the garden. There's a person out there between the rose bushes, so you head in that direction.
As you get closer, squinting in the bright sunlight, you think you recognize them--it's Jade,the gardener's daughter. You dredge up vague memories from when you were nine or ten and Mother tried to find you "friends your own age, dear". Jade had been one of three girls from the manor grounds that you'd half-heartedly played with, you think, but you barely remember her.
Now she is grown, and she even looks a fair bit taller than you. Her hair is long and braided under a large, floppy-brimmed hat and her skin is deeply tanned and comparable in color to the dirt she's got her hands buried in, though you suppose it would have been dark no matter what.
You're sure she's noticed you by now, but she keeps working, pulling weeds out from between flowers and putting them in a pile. "What's your name?" you ask, even though you already know the answer.
She finally looks up, but she seems unsurprised to see you. "Jade, my lady," she says, clapping her hands together to knock the dirt off. There's a smudge of dirt by her nose like she scratched it.
"And you're a gardener, then?"
"Second Gardener, my lady."
"That is no small feat," you say. "And at, what, eighteen as well?"
"Seventeen," she corrects, and you let the slight breach of decorum slide. "My mother is First Gardener, like her mother before her, and I intend to take the title myself eventually as well."
You, admittedly, hadn't known this beforehand. "Ambitious. But if your skills back it up, I'd be glad to see it." Your curiosity has been pricked; you want to learn more about this gardener. "Walk with me. Surely the flowers can spare a moment?"
"Indeed they can, my lady," she says, standing and leaving her tools in a neat pile. Damn, but she is taller than you, and by a fair bit too. You readjust your parasol so that it doesn't get between you and set off through the manor grounds.
"So you're a gardener. What else do you do?" you ask.
"Well, after the incident with the roast, I'm not allowed to help in the kitchens anymore, so mostly I do odd jobs with the mechanics if I'm not in the gardens."
"That was you?" you laugh. Gods, that must have been four or five years ago now. Mother had been more amused than furious, since the wine had already been served.
Jade has the decency to look sheepish. "Not one of my brighter moments. Er, my lady."
"You don't need to stand on ceremony for my sake. Now, for my mother's..."
That manages to coax a small smile out of her. "I'll keep an eye out for her, then."
"Excellent." You leave a few steps to see if she'll say anything else; when she doesn't, you continue, "If I may pry, what do you do outside of work for my mother?"
"Grandma taught me how to read, so I like to read whatever books I can get my hands on. Recently, that's been a physics textbook and this lovely novel by Rosin Mizar-Alcor--it’s fantasy, about these wizard kids and there's one who can see the future--"
You can't hold back a laugh.
"What, have you read it before?" Jade looks like she isn't sure if she's being made fun of or not.
"Well, I wrote it, so I would say I've read it."
"What? But the Lady Lalonde wouldn't--" She cuts herself off but you can complete the sentence anyway: But the Lady Lalonde wouldn't allow that.
"Which is why I publish under a penname," you finish.
"Sensible," Jade comments with a bit of a grin.
"Rose, dear, your mother is asking for you," someone calls from behind you.
You look around, a little surprised to see that you and Jade made it all the way to the other side of the manor.
You identify the source of the voice as your violin tutor and wave at her. "I'll be right there," you call back to her. “I’ll talk to you later, alright?” you tell Jade before heading for the main building at a slightly-faster-than-ladylike run.