Thread: The Ward (NobodysAngel80 x EvelynWillows)

Even in a city as bleak and dangerous as Vistamare, there were little pleasures to be found. It was necessary in a place like Vistamare, with the spectre of madness ruling over the people, with so many empty homes and businesses from the great exodus of those who had the means to escape King Lothian's rage. There were theaters and taverns of course, musicians and dancers and ladies of the night who plied their trades in perfumed brothels and the alleys of the docks. But while there were many diversions for those left in the city, The Sweetest Things was perhaps the most well loved. It was a shop as old as the city itself, opened by a man and his wife, passed down to that man's son and his wife, passed down to their daughter and her husband...and now passed on to that daughter and husband's own daughter. Rihayne had been the proprietress of the shop for two years, ever since her parents had left on a much encouraged holiday that they weren't intended to come back from. Her father had enough of a look of something other than human to him that staying in the city when the first murmurs of the king's newest madness began rumbling had been decided to be a very bad idea. Rihayne didn't show any sign of her father's half breed heritage and so was far safer than either her mother or father, and so the shop would stay in the family, as it always had been. At the moment, she was busy pulling a pan of sweet buns from the oven, drenched in melted sugar and cinnamon, full to bursting with molten berry compote, her sable brown hair slightly grayed from a dusting of flour from helping her stock boy put away large bags of flour, her face round and pink cheeked from the heat, her cheeks dimpled and streaked with a line of white from a flour and confectioner's sugar mix she'd swiped across her cheek when pushing back stray hair that had escaped from the messy knot that held most of her hair back from her face. She was as much a part of the happy, bustling atmosphere of the shop as anything else, cheerful and busy, partridge plump and slightly bossy and nosy in an almost motherly fashion to the patrons that came in, asking about their families, their days, their work. She was of course careful to avoid topics of the king that was a dangerous thing to discuss with anyone these days, and she knew that better than most. The softly chiming bells brought her attention to the door as she smiled brightly, rubbing the back of her hand against her forehead after placing the pan of rolls on the counter to cool. Hello there! Welcome to The Sweetest Things! What can I get for you today? The shop, like it's proprietress, was bright and cozy, with gleaming glass windows holding displays of the day's breads and pastries, polished wooden floors and rustic looking tables covered with woven blue tablecloths and with backed benches and chairs in the open, well lit sitting area. Wood and glass cases filled with pies and cakes and tarts of all varieties lined the store, and the back, barely visible, showed a row of ovens filled with baking bread and other treats. The whole building smelled of vanilla and fruit, sugar and cinnamon and warm, fresh bread. It was a comforting place and always had been, due in no small part to the smiling, eternally cheerful face behind the counter greeting her newest customer.