Completed [The Amphitheater] To Act a Song (Stefan)

[Alia Beaudouin]

39th of Winter, 513 AV
16th Bell

Perfection.
That was what it seemed Alia had to achieve. She had come after regular rehearsal to get a couple more bells of practice. The script for the next play had been quite difficult to memorize, with long, uninterrupted lines. Memorization was key, and if Alia didn't get her lines down, the stage master might decide that he had better actors to employ.
Projection of the voice. Speak loudly, do not shout. Speak clearly. Do not mumble. So many rules to follow bounced around in Alia's head she didn't notice that she had started pacing. Back and forth, across the stage. Somehow, the simple action helped.
"It wasn't supposed to happen, the arrow flew, my finger slipped, it wasn't my fault. I tried to save him. I did try!"
Alia paused, as if waiting for the response of her partner. There would be an interrogator in this scene. Murder is punishable by death was basically the message told by the second figure.
"I don't know what went wrong! It was just supposed to scare him! Messed with the wrong man, he did!"
Another pause for another response of the other imaginary actor.
"No, you don't understand, you don’t-"
The actress’s act dissolved, her concentration shattered as Alia fell into a coughing fit. She had been coughing a lot lately- had she caught something? She couldn’t go on stage sick, it simply wouldn't work.
Alia sighed, worrying wouldn't help anything. She set the packet of scripts on the empty stage, heading back over to where she had thrown her pack. First she drew the half-empty waterskin she had brought.
The water helped her throat, but not too terribly much. Maybe there was a healer that could help, if the coughing got worse.
Screwing the cap tightly back onto the waterskin, Alia slipped out a leather-bound book, the inspiration notebook, as she had started calling it.
It seemed she was looking to the book for help every rehearsal, now.
Flipping through the pages, Alia came across the page she had been adding to. The first two stanzas were written in bulky, but readable, font. The handwriting of her father.
Alia bit her lip. She missed him a bit sometimes.. A lot, other times.
The rest of the page was written in Alia's swirly, lighter writing. The page contained a song, one she had been working on for a while.

I’d really like to believe
These wonderful, crazy dreams
The ones where I hate to be awake
Chasing the darkness away
Where the shadows stay
I always stare but no one believes me

Alia hummed softly along with the tune. It was simplistic, easy to sing. It had been one of the first songs her father had taught her. She now knew how to sing and play it on her mandolin- And after a lot of practice - At the same time. Oh, how she wished that she had the instrument, but unfortunately, her old one was still in Wind Reach, probably sitting atop the hearth, waiting for Alia to return home.
If she could call that place home any more.
"I always stare but no one believes me.."
The lyrics didn't always make sense, and sometimes the songs didn't even rhyme, but Alia liked them anyway. She sung softly as she paged through the rest of the book. Many pages lay unfilled, waiting for stories to be told on their parchment, or songs to be sung silently on their white pages.
Life was really just a blank canvas, waiting to be filled with wondrous pieces of work that could only be made by hand.
Taking a small quill out from in between pages in the book, Alia jotted down another few lines to the song, adding some of the notes for Mandolin as well.

The further you climb the harder you fall
It doesn't take long before theres nothing left at all
Secrets hidden behind the waterfall

She hummed the tune as she worked, but eventually ran out of ideas for stanzas. The song was far from finished, but it was good enough for now.
Leaving the book on the bench, Alia returned to the stage. A quick breeze blew by and the Inarta shivered. Winter was definitely coming, or was it already here?
Her Katinu coat helped keep most of her warm, but Alia was definitely going to need some gloves or something to keep frostbite away.
Picking up a page of the script that had escaped with the wind, Alia began to read again, keeping the goal of perfection in mind, no matter how far away it was.

[Stefan]

Wearing his cloak, and with his old mandolin strapped on his back as always, the young Stefan walked through the streets of Riverfall, without looking at anyone, lost in his thoughts. He liked to walk on the streets at that hour, it was relaxing. He was without a designated way; he just wanted to see the city. As he was new, he wanted to know it well. It would be really inconvenient if he got lost.

The young musician murmured a song for himself, watching the sky instead of the street. It was a song he heard really a long time ago, he didn't remember when or where, but it was one of his favorites, and one of the first ones he learned.

Lost in the city of loneniless
Walked the hero that nobody heard
He was not afraid, he was fearless
Without fear, without regret
But with no friends to mourn his dead

He stopped where he was. He noticed that, right now, he really hated that song. It was horribly appropriate. Even since he arrived to Riverfall some days ago, he didn’t make any friends, and actually didn't know anybody (except for a few prostitutes in his work). His days were awfully lonely...

Stefan shrugged that off. Stefan was alone now, yes, but not for too long. He always knack for knowing people... but not always in a good way. Continuing his walking, he saw the Riverfall Amphitheater. He smiled as he looked at the arena, covered in snowy trees. He always liked theater, but he didn't want to spend money right now. He just had 60 gold mizas with him, and just because every time he purchased something, he replaced the lost gold as best as he could. Also, he only used his money on important things, like wine. And food, but for him, that was second.

Getting closer to the arena, he sat on one of the steps. It was covered in snow, so he shivered when he sat down. Taking his mandolin from his back, he started playing a few random chords. He didn't like the sound as much as he wanted to. That mandolin was old, and even though he tuned it as best as he could, the strings were also really old and he didn't have the time to find new ones.

Standing up, he walked to the stage. He didn't know why. Maybe he wanted to see what the actors saw? Probably. Probably he did that just because. He has done bigger things in the past for the same reason. He didn't know the reason of why he grabbed a leatherbound book that sat on a bench on the stage, though. A reason, of course, would be that he has an old habit of taking things if the owner wasn’t paying attention, like when he stole to live years ago. Old habits die hard, after all.

He was entranced by the book, and the eagle on the cover. Opening it, he saw three names on it, but only paid attention to the name on under the others: Alia. Cute name, he thought to himself. Without even paying attention to the girl sitting in front of him, almost enchanted by the fine book, he looked through the pages. Finally, he spoke to the girl, startling her.

"Oh! I really like this song. This is one of the first ones I learned! He smiled at her, only recognizing the title, and part of the notes, as he didn't knew much about musical theory.

[Alia Beaudouin]

39th of Winter, 513 AV
16th Bell

"Oh! I really like this song.."

Alia spun around from where she had been pacing the stage. Another person was in the Amphitheater, how had they snuck up behind her? Her grip loosened on the script for a tick as she scrutinized the man. What was he doing here?

A icy wind popped up from the trees, catching the flimsy parchment of the script in its grasp. Without a firm grip on the papers, the breeze easily stole Alia's script from her hands. She nearly swore before remembering that there were others around. Her thoughts turned internal.

Petching son of a Shyke! What is anyone doing her at this time? And what song is he talking about, he couldn't have been here when I was singing, could he?

Alia chased after the escaped script until is floated off the semi-circle stage, several pages of it getting caught in a tree nearby while others disappeared into the wind. She was never going to get that back! Now how was she supposed to practice her lines?

Sighing heavily as the remaining pages either got caught up above her reach or flying out of view, Alia spun on her heel to face the man who had caused such distraction. He had said something else about the song, but Alia had been far to busy chasing after disaster to bother with what he had said.
She tried to make her voice as level as possible, but her words still came out littered with annoyance.
"What do you want? I was working here...

Alia's voice trailed off as she realized what the mystery man was holding. Her inspiration notebook was clutched in his hands, and he was paging through it. How dare he! First he causes the destruction of the only copy of her lines for the upcoming play, and then he steals her possessions!

"Hey! That's not yours!"

She practically ran to the edge of the stage and jumped off the platform onto one of the benches, swiftly making her way towards the man.
Unfortunately, her last bound towards the stranger lacked a bit of planning, and it ended, to put it nicely, with Alia's head level with the stranger's shoes.

Today was just not her day.
Brushing dirt off of her Bryda and elbows, Alia tried to regain her composure, and dignity. This was hard, with some nice scrapes and bruises she could practically feel forming on her arms and legs.
With any luck, the man would keep his mouth shut about her fall. Alia prayed to the gods that she would never see the man again after this... Incident.
Holding her hands out towards her precious journal, Alia practically growled at the man.
"Please. Give. That. Back."

[Stefan]

The book as simply magnificent. There was no other word to describe it. The quality of the leather, the carving on the leather, and the songs that he could already hear in his head… again, magnificent.

The further you climb the harder you fall
It doesn't take long before theres nothing left at all
Secrets hidden behind the waterfall

He sung under his breath, with a rhythm he made up on the spot. He continued paging through the book, oblivious to the human that was chasing some pages that the wind stole away. “Oh, this chord here could work wonders and… Oh, by Rhaus, this is simply amazing!” But his thoughs were interrupted by an angry shout.

“Hey! That’s not yours!”

He lifted his head from the book, and when he saw the redheaded human running towards him, Stefan knew that he screwed up his first impression, again. He was used to it, though… he couldn’t help if his fingers itched when he saw something nice without anybody paying attention to it.

He was startled when the human jumped at him, but when he saw her tripping over her own feet, he couldn’t help but laugh. He tried to hold it the best he could, but at the end, it was useless.

The man covering his mouth in laughter contrasted greatly from the angry woman in front of him, covered in snow, frowning and growling at him.

“Please. Give. That. Back.”

“Of course, my lady…” after another quick glimpse at the journal, much to the woman’s annoyance, he gave it back. “Not an acrobat, aren’t you?” he laughed again, covering his mouth.

Now, it wouldn’t require an Auristic to tell that she wanted to punch him right in the face, and hard. So, of course, he tried to distract her.

“Ejem… let me tell you, I really liked that book you have there…” he smiled to her. “The notes where sublime, and I couldn’t help but notice that the song was meant to be played in a mandolin…” he continued, again oblivious about the fact that he made the woman loss her script.

After whipping the bench of snow, and in front of the angry look of the woman’s face, Stefan played the song he looked at previously.

For some reason, the tune of the mandolin fitted pretty well with the song, and made it clear that such song was also old, and warm. With slow chords, and notes as deep as he could, he played it, and also improvising some chords of his own.

“So… what do you think?” he asked to her, as if nothing happened “Some new strings are required… but you can hear that this mandolin sure has some years behind.”

[Alia Beaudouin]

Why did the world suddenly have something against her?
Alia sighed. Not only had the man laughed at her, but he had started cracking jokes about her athletic ability.

When the opportunity presented itself, Alia practically ripped the notebook from the strangers hands.It seemed he had been looking at a particular song, the one she had been working on earlier. It made sense, the page was bookmarked by her quill. Alia still wondered why he had looked so fascinated with it, though. It wasn't as if the songs were all that special, Alia had written half of them herself.

She snapped the book closed again as the man began stammering out compliments for the book, and then brushing off the bench Alia had nearly smashed her face into. Much to her annoyance, the snow floated down and stuck to her already freezing pants and shoes.

Alia had already begun to raise her hand to slap the man when he slid a mandolin off of his back and begun to play. She immediately stopped moving, hoping the man hadn't seen her actions. The sight of the instrument brought back many, many memories. Not all good ones, either.
Her train of thought got more rational as she pushed the idea of striking the man - no matter how much he deserved it - to the back of her mind.
She hadn't intentionally hurt someone for a while, but now it seemed she was angry at someone or something all the time.

She sat down next to the man after brushing off a space beside him, and after a few measures of the tune he was playing, Alia realized the melody was that of the song she had been writing. The man wasn't half bad at playing, either, though Alia was sure he played a lot of the notes wrong, or at least changed them.

Opening the inspiration notebook again so she could be reminded of the words she had written in, Alia began to sing the lyrics for the song, changing the rhythm of that of the man playing.

"I’d really like to believe
These wonderful, crazy dreams
The ones where I hate to be awake

Chasing the dark away
Where the shadows stay
I always stare but no one listens to me

The further you climb the harder you fall
It doesn't take long before theres nothing left at all
Secrets hidden behind the waterfall

It’s funny that you still can’t see
I would laugh if it wasn’t so hard to breathe
Nothing ever changes on its own

Things may just look the same
But life may rearrange
If you give it just a little push"

Sure, she wasn't the best singer, but when it came to her own songs, Alia was pretty good at matching the chords of the mandolin to her voice. As the man stopped strumming, he nonchalantly asked what Alia had thought of the tune. Once again, she was reminded of her anger towards the man, but restrained herself from showing it.

Smiling slightly as if nothing was wrong, Alia pointed to the mandolin. "Do you mind.. If I play?

[Stefan]

Luck smiled at him his time. At least that’s what he tough.

She was angry, of that there was no doubt, but Stefan managed to calm her –or at least postpone his beating – when he played his mandolin. For some reason, the mandolin sounded right this time… maybe Rhaus didn’t want him to be punched? He didn’t question it, though.

The lady instead sat next to him, and his surprise began when she started to sing. With her beautiful song, she managed to sing the tune, following his mandolin, even with the notes he changed, which actually where mistakes that he masked.

“…Things may just look the same
But life may rearrange
If you give it just a little push”

He smiled when she finished singing. He really liked her voice; it was just perfect with that song. He knew she practiced them constantly. He smiled at the woman and asked “So… what do you think, lass?”

She just smiled at him, without answering, and pointed at his mandolin. “Do you mind… if I play?” she finally said.

“Of course, my lady.” he replied politely, taking off his mandolin and giving it to her. He would not be surprised if she smashed it in his head, but Stefan knew that she would instead play his own version of the song, hopefully with fewer mistakes.

[Alia Beaudouin]

To her surprise, the man actually gave her the mandolin. He had seemed to be quite fond of it, and with the way Alia had acted, she was surprised he trusted her with the instrument.

Brushing off the bench in front of them and laying down the book so she could easily see the pages while holding the mandolin, Alia carefully adjusted her fingers on the instrument. It had been a while since she had played, and this was a much bigger instrument than the one she had used back in Wind Reach.

Flipping the pages in the book until she found one of her favorites, written by her father. Alia used the quill to keep the page open, strummed the mandolin once, then launched into the song.

"The world has it’s own tune
Why don’t you dance along
The stars and the sky
Sing the world’s song

The world is full of knowledge
But no one’s truly wise
I hope you get my message
See Mizahar through my eyes

You're living in a war zone
Battered and bruised
Wish you didn’t have to stay
Feeling so confused

The world has it’s own tune
Why don’t you dance along
The stars and the sky
Sing the world’s song

Come and join me
Mizahar will dance along
The stars and the sky
Will let you sing their song."

She let the last line ring, smiling broadly. She then turned to the man and did quite possibly the cheesiest thing she had ever done, strummed another chord of the tune and jokingly, sung another line.
"My name is Alia, care to sing me your song?"

[Stefan]

As the woman played his mandolin, Stefan couldn’t help but be impressed about her performance. She was, without a doubt, better than him in the art of playing mandolin, and he wasn’t afraid of admitting it. He just smiled at her, listening to the song and, and her beautiful singing.

Finally, when she finished her song, the woman said spoke to him, "My name is Alia, care to sing me your song?"

Stefan just nodded, and when he singed, Alia followed with a simple mandolin tune.

Love, adventures, never enough
Passion and tunes of far away
Makes it worth what you get through
Oh, the tunes of far away...

Oh, travelling land and sea
In my best and my worst
Tell me, can you see?
The things that matter the most

Far songs, of new and old
Wine that makes you think
Life’s precious, better than gold
Oh, let me sing you a song

Love, adventures, never enough
Passion and tunes of far away
Makes it worth what you get through
Oh, the tunes of far away...


Freedom to walk, freedom to see
This really dangerous
Yet beautiful world
My name is Stefan, and this is my song

He smiled at Alia when he stopped playing, and took her hand, kissing it softly. "My name is Stefan, at your service."

[Alia Beaudouin]

The man's reaction surprised Alia a bit. She hadn't meant for him to actually sing, just introduce himself, but she guessed that was what you got if you asked a musician to sing. He seemed to be very good at improvising lyrics, a skill Alia hadn't quite mastered yet. She frequently wrote down a rough 'sketch' of her songs and then in the end not using a word of the drafts.

Sometimes, looking back at old songs Alia had written, she wondered how she could have ever thought they were good. Other times she looked back and wondered wherever she could have gotten such a good idea from.

Smiling broadly at the man as he took her hand, Alia curtsied and muttered a quiet 'Nice to meet you' as he formally introduced himself. Stefan seemed nice enough, though Alia was still a bit miffed about losing her papers to the trees.

She was probably going to have to retrieve that later, unfortunately Alia was pretty bad at climbing, so that was going to be a problem. That packet of lines was the only copy she had, and the stage master would not be impressed if she told him about the wind stealing it.

Strumming the mandolin one more time, Alia ran her fingers over the grooves and what seemed like cracks on the mandolin. It looked old and well-used, but it still produced a fairly nice sound.
"Where did you get this? It seems really.. Worn.. If you don't mind me calling it that. Alia hesitated, would he be offended? It still sounds really good, I mean, I just wanted to know where it came from."

Was she rambling? It sounded like it. At least she wasn't stammering when she spoke anymore. Her meeting with Jorin hadn't been idle, slamming into someone and making them lose their papers wasn't ever going to be an idle meeting. Though, wasn't that what Stefan had done to her?
Karma was a wonderful thing.

[Stefan]

Alia seemed to have forgotten the issue with the script and the book. Good, he thought, now he got out of that. Still, he could see the pieces of the script on a tree... he wasn’t a good climber, but he needed to try before she noticed.

“Oh, don’t worry about that.” He said calmly at her question “As far as I know, this beauty could be older than me. I found it on a ship some years ago; it was from some poor sod that I never meet. The crew told me that he was so bad at playing, that they threw him overboard as a sacrifice...” he shrugged calmly, as if it was nothing, and actually laughed a little bit. “Anyway... even though the salt and the time haven’t been kind to it, It got some sentimental value to me, though I feel it could break down at any moment... besides, some new strings are in order, but I don’t have the faintest idea of where to find some...” he sighed, as he looked at Alia.
Stefan looked at the tree, as if wanting to change the subject. He smiled and gave his mandolin to Alia “Hold on a second...” he took off his cloak, shivering from the cold. He wasn’t at all dressed for cold climate, but that didn’t stop him for trying to climb the snowy tree.

Breathing deeply the cold air, he managed to get a good balance with his feet, as if the tree was made for people to sit down and watch the theatre. Still, his movements where slow, and the fact that the wind was freezing didn’t help at all. With some difficult, he managed to grab two pages of the script that where together on a branch.

“So far so good...” he muttered under his breath as he climbed higher in the tree, grabbing as much pages as he could; but as more pages he managed to get, the hardest was to climb, as one of his hands was busy holding them.
Finally, after his fingers had gone numb from the cold and the effort, he managed to reach the top of the tree, where one of the pages was fluttering. “Steady, steady...” he said stretching his arm, going towards the last page. With effort, he managed to get it, and decided to go down, slowly but surely. However, it wasn’t that easy, and having only one free hand, his foot slipped on one of the branches of the tree.

He fell towards the ground, with some branches fortunately dimming the impact, and finally landing on the hard, snowy ground.

“Petching void!” he yelled in pain, and tried to stand up, didn’t wanting to see if Alia was laughing or not. “Bloody... aghh... well, I think I deserve it, don’t you think?” he laughed softly, but stopped as his back hurt when he did. That was going to leave a mark, but at least he got most of the script.