#elsewhere

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It's early yet, at the new abode shared by a certain formerly emissarial troll and formerly liaison sidhe, now both settling into new roles and new homestead. Whoever rises first may well hear the sound of work being done - which may be odd, as there wasn't anything scheduled for today, not that Sylvi OR Nadeen would recall. And yet, a panel van is parked down a ways by the stable door, and some bustling is heard from within.

Nadeen makes sure her wards are up to her room, then ... gets dressed and goes out. She doesn' dress fancy, but rather- having been warned, suitably for muddy terrain if need be.

"Nadeen? Did you have workers scheduled?" Sylvi calls from her room.

As Nadeen glances out, she recognizes the van - at least, it's often seen parked at Silverwolf - not in front of the manor, of course, but around the stables, or in one of the garages.

A few seconds later, Sylvi, is also heading downstairs. Jeans, boots, oversized sweater.

"I donn't recall. I mean, we'vea lready moved the bulk of our furniture" And by 'we' she means troll friends

"Then who the heck is that?" She follows Nadeen out to investigate.

"But I've seen that van before.. could it be Dolph?" She moves on out

"Dolph?"

Voices from within. Indeed, she recognizes the friendly tone of the boggan grump. "I won't insult ya by asking you to keep up, Willy my good lass. But if you'd be so kind as to pry loose those rusted hinges first, I can get a fresh coat of paint on before you can say 'Bob's yer uncle', and by the time you've finished the other side of the stalls, it will be dry enough to screw back the fresh ones."

"Dolph he's a stable man exroidinaire" Nadeen picks up the pace and heads over

Sylvi is right behind her, and while she's not the biggest, bulkiest troll around, she certainly towers over Nadeen as they get to the stable entrance.

Inside, there is the smell of fresh sawdust, metal oils, and paint. The multi-stall stable that came with the house but in some state of wear is now about a third spruced up. A small pile of rusted and worn hinges lies to one side, and bright new brass shines in the ones that Willy is working on. The boggan himself is dabbed with paint here and there - an off-white primer, a coat of which is applied to several of the walls already.

She certainly does. Nadeen is used to being one of the shorter people in a hold, the transition to Silver wolf means that's no longer the case "Dolph, Willy, what are you doing?"

Sylvi blinks at the transformation in progress. "Wow!"

The boggan straightens up and doffs his cap. "M'Lady! That is, My ladies." He corrects, seeing that the wall of blue behind Nadeen is not, after all, the morning sky, but a troll looming. "Just sprucing up these stalls a bit, we'll be out of your hair in a jiff. We didn't wake you up, did we?"

"No, I was just curious. This is Sylvi, Bridge of Dark Gate. I think you met once before but it was sometime ago. This is Dolph, and over there is Willy. Skilled the both of them"

"Hi," Sylvi says with a smile (though she's still waking up) and a little wave. "I didn't realize...well, I mean, the work needed to get done, but..." She glances down at Nadeen and mutters, "Can we afford this right now?"

Nadeen just nods and says "I suspect it's covered" Which is much better than tellilng an honor focused troll I think this is a freebie

The nocker (not the largest of her Kith) is busy pulling nails.

"Oh. Cool." Then she says more clearly, "Um, have you folks had breakfast? Or want coffee?"

She may not a coffee addict to the degree common in Rivervale, but there's still a coffee maker present in the kitchen.

"Consider it a housewarming gift, or perhaps a horsewarming gift." Dolph chuckles. "We left right early, I wouldn't say not to a cuppa something warm. If we'd waited any later, Miz Marigold would have insisted, and I'd ruther she get her rest. Ain't that right, Miz Willy? Something for ya?" He asks the Nocker.

Dolph has proven to be good companionship to Willy. Insofar as he gets his work done, and if he chats, well, it's done AS he works and doesn't interfere with what needs doing - nor does he actually expect her to respond.

"Is the coffee any good?" she keeps working but squints at Sylvi.

"It's nothing special. But I make it strong enough."

"Then I'd be pleased as punch for a mug, Miss Sylvi. It is miss, is that right?" Dolph asks politely. "As th' lady says, I'm Dolph of Silverwolf employ, and that's not a mister or a sir nor anything fancy. Is that 'Bridge' as in acting as a bridge, or as in building bridges, or a bit o'both?"

A grunt. "Yeah, cup of coffee wouldn't suck."

"We can add a cube of sugar or two and a dash of milk if you like" Nadeen adds

"Miss Sylvi is fine, yeah. Or just Sylvi. And Bridge...it's kind of a new position at DarkGate, kind of an outreach person. Oh, I'll bring the stuff out so you can fix your coffee how you like. Gimme a few," And she gives Nadeen a glance to make sure she's fine out here with these two.

Nadeen seems quite at ease, "Thank you, Sylvi."

She admires the stables "It's got enough room if we get a horse big enoough for Sylvi yes? I mean head room?"

"Sure." But don't go thinking I'm the maid. She heads back to the house, yawning when the others can't see.

Dolph watches Sylvi go... and with boggan intuition, he smiles a bit. "That one is not a dull lass, she isn't. Miss Sylvi will keep you on your toes. For a moment there I thought perhaps you'd gone and hired a guard, but neh, only took a minute to see that she's not at all that temperament. Not a servant, that one, except maybe to the people, eh?"

"You have a good feel for it, Dolph. If I may be so blunt, Sylvi takes no shit from anyone, but is out to help just about everyone. In a lot of ways she's a better diplomat than I, but don't tell her I said that" that last in a lower tone

A soft chortle from the Boggan, and he winks. "Even a boggan can keep it to 'emself when he needs, Lady. Now, I did also get some of that information you was looking for. Ain't so much as you may have hoped, but it is what it is. And I wanted you to peep some of these paint choices for the stalls. In your own good time, that is, I know it's early yet."

"Oh you have the information on top of all this? Dolph, you are a LIFE saver"

And yet at the same time, she turns her eyes to the stable color paint selection.

In the kitchen, Sylvi gets the coffee going...and for good measure, she makes up a big mess of scrambled eggs and cheese to put in breakfast burritos.

"It's up to you and Miz Sylvi, it is, but here are a few thoughts..." Showing off a page of paint samples. Here is a combination of a cheery sky blue with silver accents. Black trim is classic, combined with gold is elegant but perhaps a bit too sober - but here is a deeper blue with sunny gold? And then pages more of options.

her eyes fall on the black trim with gold sober or not, her house colors inrigue, but the deeper blue with sunny gold might be something Sylvi would prefer. The important thing is to weed out the ones she hates fast

After about 15 minutes of paint ogling, they hear Sylvi at the door. "Is there a shelf or a stool or something I can put this on?" She's got a big tray with the coffee pot, mugs, milk, sugar, and a platter with several breakfast burritos.

Dolph quickly finds a few planks of wood to set across sawhorses, and a makeshift table is ready. "That smells mighty fine, Miss Sylvi."

"Oh Sylvi, when you get a chance, want to help me pick out colors? Ignore page 3 and 5, lost causes"

She sets it down and shrugs. "It's just kid stuff, really. But I figure, it's easy to eat while working." She pours coffee in all the mugs except one. "I figured you wanted tea, Nadeen," and there's one mug with water and a teabag steeping.

On one side, color swatches spread. On the other, breakfast! Dolph takes a mug with grateful thanks, and no sense of entitlement in the humble hostler.

As Nadeen investigates breakfast, Sylvi investigates the color samples.

She checks out pages 3 and 5 first, just to check...but she generally agrees.

"We can also do accents if you wish. No artist me, but I can paint a template fair enough, if you wanted a custom design."

Nadeen does indeed help and out breakfast as needed "Obviously I like the black and gold but it might be a touch too grim."