open post.

[recreatable]

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[recreatable]

Get good enough at the piano, and maybe I'll let you join my band.

[ Just teasing, of course. Obviously, Jasnah has a greater future than that. ]

[elsecall]

And that would leave you to play what, exactly?

[ Even in this hypothetical, she's disinclined to deprive him of the piano. ]

[recreatable]

Hey, I told you I always wanted to duet.

[elsecall]

[ A duet, then. ]

Alright. A duet, then. Something to look forward to.

[ When wars are won and crowns are set aside and — perhaps most challenging of all — she can at adequately keep up with him at the keys. ]

[recreatable]

J'ai hâte.

[elsecall]

[ A fine little daydream. Safe enough, maybe, to indulge in even as the fate of the planet remains uncertain. ]

Hmm. Shall I guess?

[ One moment while she reviews her notes. J'ai is I have. So he has what...? Hope? Agreement? Doubts? ]

[recreatable]

"I can't wait."

[elsecall]

[ ...Doesn't follow the grammar rules she's learned thus far. Annoying. Must be idiomatic. Still, she makes a note. ]

It's your responsibility to let me know when my skills are up to snuff.

[recreatable]

As the queen commands.

You're doing very well. Improving every lesson.

[elsecall]

Finally figuring out the sheet music has helped tremendously.

[ She'll never be a play-it-by-ear pianist. But she's got the makings of an excellent sight-reader. ]

[recreatable]

Have you come up with an alternative to 'Every Good Boy Does Fine' yet?

[elsecall]

It's currently a tie between 'Every Good Book Deserves Footnotes' and 'Enthusiasm Grows Best During Failure.'

[ She's long since refused Even Geniuses Break During Fatigue. ]

[recreatable]

Someone's been doing their homework.

[elsecall]

As much as someone can without a piano at hand.

[recreatable]

Maybe if you're lucky you'll be able to commission someone to recreate one. Then you could have one of your own.

[elsecall]

Such a someone would need access to yours, first.

[recreatable]

Right, and I'm notoriously stingy and unhelpful.

[elsecall]

I simply assumed you wouldn't want an artifabrian getting their fingers into your possessions.

[recreatable]

[ Okay, context clues suggest an artifabrian is some sort of artificer— ]

I'm not the biggest fan of other people touching my piano.

[ Notably, he takes no issue with Jasnah's fingers all over the keys. ]

But it's a small price to pay to make more of them, no? I'm not so selfish that I'd keep it all for myself.

[elsecall]

[ Should she point out? Jasnah teeters on the edge, but — well! She'd hate to tip him back into further ungentlemantly hand discussions.

Carefully, though, she acknowledges what goes unsaid: ] I don't have requisite expertise to take a complex mechanism and rebuild it — and while I could soulcast stone or wood into the individual pieces...?

[ She lets her writing trail off. She'd need to understand those pieces so as to put them together. ]

Unfortunately, my brilliance has its limits.

[recreatable]

[ he's not a hand perv he just happens to not mind jasnah's pretty hands fondling the keys oKAY ]

I could be your consultant, of a sort. I know how a piano works.

[ Kind of. Mostly. Good enough! ]

If we aren't able to do it, then we can ask an [ What was it? ] artifabrial.

[elsecall]

[ By the weird, odd mechanics of spanreeds she somehow manages to circle the word artifabrial and, beneath it, rewrite ARTIFABRIAN. She underlines the last three letters. Pity it's not in red pen. ]

Engineers. Do you have that word?

[recreatable]

Ingénieurs.

[elsecall]

[ Another word for her burgeoning dictionary, thank you! ]

Considering I'm no ingénieur [ — see how she figured out the singular version of the original plural? So clever, these clogs — ] I worry what unintentional damage I might cause. However, if your risk tolerance is high enough, I wouldn't be against taking the first run ourselves.

[ Otherwise, she'll have to tap a resource from her mother's labs. ]

[recreatable]

I haven't been eaten seven times because I'm afraid of risk.