take the path less traveled

[RHIANNON]

―――― While Rhiannon could not see the scrunch of the woman's nose, the words that followed said enough about what her expression might have shown. Surely, Rhiannon had shown a great deal of respect to the few that surrounded her during her time as a slave, and perhaps it was true that Rhiannon, inadvertantly or not, put more effort into her encounters with Nina, however infrequently they met. The woman was undoubtedly strong, in both mind and body, and there was something about her demeanor that Rhiannon found easy to respect. It wasn't like Stryker, whom for a slave earned respect only because he had the most power and ability to harm you, but it was a choice. A minor choice, to be more genuine to the woman, to not shower compliments and praise because she felt obligated, because she felt something there was to be earned from it, rather because Nina had shown Rhia no reason to not grace her with the minor respects of meeting her eyes or addressing her properly.

"Would you rather I not?" the answer came smoothly, in a silky tone as a light smile touched her lips as she continued on. She did not need to be told the merits of allowing people to think she was meek and innocent, but her words were not to be dismissed, or unheeded, even if the fact had already been considered herself. "Yes, ma'am, but I see no reason to create any... false pretenses with you. You have always been more kindly than many towards me," she answered simply, exhaling slowly for a moment. Rhiannon spent much of her life under some sort of pretense; whether it was kissing up to a leader, pretending she was more incapable than she was, or trying to manipulate herself into an image for others to grasp onto, it was nice to have the rare- very, very rare- moments where her real self could show through.

The shift of something against the ground made the woman's ears flicker softly as she turned her head downwards and gently drew a paw forward to investigate what had been pushed in front of her, nodding slowly at the words that accompanied it as her paw found the open mouth of the bag and pulled out one of the books, gently flipping over the cover as she ran her paw over the braille letters. It was a sweet gesture, though Rhiannon had to only assume that Nina had only gone through the trouble of finding braille-lettered books only so that she did not have to read aloud and teach her relentlessly. While Rhia was admittedly a little rusty with her Braille reading, given she hadn't done so in many, many months, she had faith she'd catch back up in no time. "Thank you, Ninazu. They are very appreciated. You may be assured that I will study them diligently and figure out what I might from them. Though, when it comes to descriptions, I may need your assistance with more physical- tangible- examples," she continued on in a soft, sweet murmur as she carefully closed the cover of the book and neatly tucked it back into the bag for now with all the others. There were many, that much Rhia could tell from the slight brush of her paw against the spines of them, all the knowledge that she would now have to retain within her head.

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