calm as still water, swift as a deer

[With all these people graduating lately and all her wardens gone off, Arya has been doing a lot of thinking. She's wormed her way into the CES - she always seems to find a way - and is sitting against Nymeria, using the direwolf as a pillow. She's wearing a modern looking zipper hoodie over her usual threadbare attire; the zipper is open, but the hood is up, and on its top are two fuzzy, gray wolf ears. There's dirt on her face when she clicks the feed on, in a swoop from her cheek to her jaw; on the other side she's managed to accumulate a couple scratches. She doesn't seem to notice either.]

There's no one left from Westeros, besides me. Tyrion's gone. Viserys used to be here; I don't think there are a lot who remember him. Jon Snow was here, too. But he left.

[They all left is what she doesn't say out loud. She scratches at her jaw, somehow missing the dirt.]

I've been here a long time, though. I checked - it's two years, now. [She doesn't pause; she's already let that sink in.] Your worlds are all different from mine. You treat people like babies till they're old; you call them kids until they're eighteen, twenty. In Westeros, and Essos, and all over in my world - a girl is grown when she's flowered. [She makes a face, because it's a dumb euphemism, but it's ingrained.] My brother was a king when he was fifteen. He wasn't a boy, he had a beard and led men and killed his enemies. [And he died.

She pauses for a moment, looking up as a shadow passes over her, presumably a cloud.]

When I was littler, I wanted to know if I could build castles, or be a High Septon, or be a councilor to a king. He said I could marry a king, and my sons could be Septons and builders and knights and lords. Well I'm not getting married, and I'm not having sons, not ever.

Is that what it's like in your worlds, too? I don't mean, do they say no and you do it anyway, that's not any different. Are girls allowed to be rulers and builders and fighters where you all are from?

[When the feed clicks on in the middle of the night, there's some scuffling, as if the device is being moved about. A blanket rustles, a wolf's claws clack across hard stone, and a little girl breathes in sharply.]

I dreamt--

[She cuts out mid sentence, and the device falls, its clatter muffled by a thing blanket. The clacking claws sound again, along with a bark, sharp and concerned, then angry and wild and uncertain. It's very loud, then fades, as if Nymeria's darting to and from the device. It goes on for a long few minutes, then abruptly, she falls silent. There are a few empty heartbeats, and then a howl starts on level seven, broadcasts across out from room eighteen, out further over the network, high and sad and mourning.]

[OOC: And Arya's off for a canon update! Leaving behind a very asdfkjh direwolf. :c]

[The cramped, sloppy handwriting is back, though it's much sloppier than usual, now. Arya's using her right hand. It's pretty hard to read.]I want a different warden. One who doesn't attack a bear who's just trying toleave.

[Writing is too hard, she's switching to audio. There's a tension in her voice, though, pained.] This whole place is stupid! No one changes just because you want them to! You won't make me a mouse again!

[She falls silent again, going so far as to hold her breath. It's a long moment before she talks again.] The whistling stopped. My door is frozen, and I can't see. [Mumbling:] Valar morghulis.

Who's there?

( Spam for Rachel )