vatheon | 3rd - I may be a fool, but I intend to be a live fool.

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3rd - I may be a fool, but I intend to be a live fool.

Who: Matrim Cauthon and you!
Where: Inside the Nostalgia Nook
When: Morning to Afternoon
Style: [Action!]
Status: Open~!

[Today, Mat's decided to look through all the selections of longbows, and if what he's muttering is any clue, he isn't finding what he's looking for. Only really seeing all the bows on his right doesn't help any.]

Blood and ashes...Too short. And that one feels about to crack... [He reaches for a couple more, lifting them individually before putting them back with a grumble, leaning on his ashandarei a bit.]

Too light. And that one was too heavy. [He turns left to better see the selection, lifting another possible choice before putting it back with a sigh.]

This one's too tall. And all of these probably wouldn't have enough flaming range. [Bother him?]

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[Whoa, man, that glare is a little scary and unwarranted. Especially when the man is connected to a polearm, but Kurow overlooks it all enough to not appeared fazed.]

Can't you fix that? Or is it not possible to change the way they are now?

[He doesn't know much about how bows work. You shoot and an arrow comes whizzing out, and if you hold it wrong it tears your cheek off. That's about it, physics aside.]

[I like that description-- Mat would've run a hand through his hair at that, but he's wearing a hat and only has one free hand. So he settles for facepalming.]

You can't really fix it. At least, I've never heard of someone increasing an already made bow's range. Most of the time you just buy or make one with a better range if the one you have isn't good enough.

[Rude. In a way, however, Kurow is no better, as he either ignores the gesture or doesn't seem to get it.]

Then why don't you just make it? Or you can be the first one to attempt that change. [He extends his arms outward.] Whichever sounds better to you.

[Mat is rude. He examines another bow before putting it back with a small sigh.]

Once I find the materials, I probably will. I wasn't sure if this place had [good] longbows, but I figured I'd look first. You never know. [He actually expected to find one because of his luck. But oh well, he wasn't roped into the Fisholympics, that's enough luck right there.]

Well, they do. If you don't like 'em, you can always come back later. They might have a better stock then.

[Seconded on the Fisholympics sentiment. Kurow retracts his arms to his side, now eyeing the polearm with renewed interest. The man speaks of bows, but that arm boasts a different battle style entirely.]

[Mat can't see you eying the ashandarei, Kurow. It's on the wrong (left) side of him. It just looks like you're looking behind him to him.]

I might do that. Thanks for the suggestion kid. [But he kinda doubts that he'd be able to find a suitable bow for him here anyway. He'd just figured he ought to look first.

And he was an archer long before he was an....ashandarei wielder. Though not long before he was a quarterstaff wielder.]

Hey, no problem! Whatever works, yeah?

[It was a basic suggestion, but he takes pride in being thanked for it anyway. Helping people feels great.

. . . yeah, he shouldn't think about that kind of thing, it's dampening his mood -- ]

But, uh, is archery your combat style of choice, or is it more like a hobby?

Yeah. [His combat style of choice?

Mat lets out a chuckle.]

I prefer not to fight if I can. [A pause.] Archery used to be how I always fought, but after [What had happened to his bow? Had he broken it or left it...] I couldn't use my bow, I used quarterstaffs and daggers. If they got in my face, I used both of those even when I had my bow. [He lifts the spear.]

Now, I use this whenever the flaming Band and I fight, and when I fight when the Band is elsewhere. [What hobby. His hobby is training horses if anything. And gambling]

[With your terrible luck as seen here, wonder if gambling is such a great avocation for you, Matrim . . .

Kurow inclines his head, the mention of another company sparking his curiosity again.]

What's the Band?

[It's normally better than this! He's only lost at gambling when he's chosen to after he figured out he could win any dice game he chose to. That story involves falling off a bridge, he should tell it sometime. His luck's also made a wall fall on him, this is better.

Mat tugs his hat down.]

My army. It's full name is the Band of the Red Hand. [Light, he'd left them when he went to rescue Moiraine. They better not have started trouble without him there.]

[So how did kissing the wall work out or you, young man.

Kurow's eyes widen a small margin, impressed by the mention of an army. And with an almost eerie sounding name with "Red Hand," his imagination's working full time.]

Whoa, an army? Are you supposed to be some kinda general?

[He met his wife afterward, it worked. He broke a couple bones, but it's no big deal.

He nods. No point in denying it since he'd already said the Band was his army.]

Yeah. The Marshall-General of the Band of the Red Hand, Shen an Calhar. [The second is the same as the first, though Mat can actually tell they don't sound the same- since he'd meant to say it in the Old Tongue the second time. Even though he didn't actually...intend to fight the day that it was formed.]

[Whoa.

That stuff sounds legit.]

That's awesome, dude! What did you guys do? Protect the queen of some country?

[He's met remarkable characters, for sure, but not quite someone this prestigious in position -- a commander, a leader.]

[The Band isn't really tied to any country...though they did get hired on by Murandy for a short while, and he did send some of them to help Elayne in Cairhien... Elayne had also made him agree to having the Band on a renewable contract with Andor in return for the Dragons...

And what does dude mean?]

You could say that. Mostly we just traveled and fought when we needed to, but we're helping Elayne since she's making the Dragons for us. [When they weren't contracted to anyone. The Band actually isn't a band of mercenaries.]

[Nothing negative like flaming, that's for sure.

The mercenary nature of the band doesn't pass over Kurow, but confusion over the bizarre logic in a general not serving a lord or country doesn't stay for long. Rather, he turns to the new topic at hand, and he tips his head to show his newfound curiosity.]

Seriously? She must be one heckuva person to do something like make dragons.

[Flaming isn't all that negative. Try blistered bumps on the Dark One's backside for negative.

Oh, that's the same sort of confusion that Rand had. He chuckles.]

They aren't the scaly dragons out of legends. They're devices for launching large chunks of metal over a mile or so. They have something like the exploding powder from Nightflowers in them to make the "dragon's egg" fly.

[They're cannons. Yep. And he grins.]

She had all of Andor's bellfounders working on them when I left. She's certainly not what you'd think of when you're told she's the Queen. Swears too much, for one thing. [That's what heckuva means right?]

[That just sounds nasty.

At first, Kurow thinks of some sort of catapult, but the second Matrim brings up "exploding powder," he's reminded of the Goryeo. There had been that loud device . . . ]

Oh. So they're, like, cannons.

[One mystery down. The next piece of statement puzzles Kurow a little, though he doesn't react too much otherwise. He's just subdued in general, if he had to say so, himself.]

No kidding? Isn't a queen taught to speak all proper and good since she's born?

[Not as nasty as some of the other things he's said.

He shrugs. Dragons are new technology for his world, so he isn't all that surprised that they have another name in a different world.]

If that sounds like a cannon, then I guess so. I've never heard of a cannon before.

[He laughs. Instead of looking at bows that don't fit him, he ended up talking about Elayne?]

She doesn't talk like she grew up on the streets, but she swears like a sailor or a stable-hand. That's probably where she heard them, on the docks or in the stables.

Geez . . . Never thought a queen would actually talk like that.

[Much less pick up the habit from commoners, considering how Otohime talked around sailors. Kurow scratches the back of his head.]

Maybe they do, but just in private . . . ?

[He thinks for a moment, then shakes his head.]

I don't think her mother - the old Queen - did, even in private. [Before everyone thought she was killed. He's not even sure that she does swear now; Perrin didn't say. And why would he? It's not like that's important.

He laughs a bit more.]

Elayne's one of the few nobles I like. She's got her head screwed on straight, for an Aes Sedai Queen. [He hopes becoming Cairhien's Queen worked out for her. It'd be bad if it didn't, this close to Tarmon Gai'don...]

[That throws that theory under the bus. Kurow tips his head, thinking again, when the mention of Elayne and queens brings him back.]

You say that like most queens don't have their head on right. Or is that just for Aes-Se-Dai queens?

[His pronunciation is a little rigid; not fluent, certainly.]

[He thinks for a moment, tugging his scarf.]

I think most queens and most Aes Sedai don't. That's how they seem to me anyway.

[Tylin had seemed strange, even if he realized now that he did like her. Saying Aes Sedai rigidly doesn't even make him blink his eye. He wonders what would happen if someone said other Old Tongue words rigidly to him...Maybe he'd actually be able to tell. That wouldn't really help him explain what he said though...]

. . . well, all queens are related, right? I guess that'd explain the trend.

[Of course, he's taking Matrim's word for the women without contesting it. To Kurow, everyone is a stranger in this particular conversation.]

[He blinks.]

I don't think they're all related. I'm not sure the Borderlander royalty are related to the Altaran or the Andoran royalty.

[Tylin being related to Elayne...he gives a small shudder at the thought. Moiraine was nobility too, related to a king of Cairhien if he remembered right. He really hoped she wasn't related to Elayne or Tylin. Or Faile, since wasn't she the cousin of the Queen of Saldaea?

Not thinking about Queens being related sounds like a good idea...]

What about your world? You know any royalty or mages?

[Uh-buh? So many royalties?

Wherever Matrim is from, it sounds like a fairly sizable place to boast multiple rulers. Nippon, all things considered, is tiny; easily managed under one Queen, save the waters, which is reserved for another.

. . . and they're probably not related, either.]

Donno about mages, but I know a miko. Met a queen, once, too, but we parted ways fast. She didn't talk anything like yours.

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