The following day, Ceridwen stares into the mirror in his room. He hadn’t gotten enough sleep to compensate for however long he had been up before-it had to have been at least two days, maybe three-but it was at least enough to mostly dispel the image of a chronic insomniac. Much to his dismay, however, he had been forced to wear some makeup under his eyes to help cover the dark circles.
Alright, come on. It surely can’t be as bad as lessons. …Right? Ceridwen attempts to psych himself up, hopping from hoof to hoof to get the blood flowing. It had been years since he’d seen his cousin last; to be entirely honest, he wasn’t sure he actually remembered anything about her beyond basic appearance. Hopefully, she was still partial enough to him, the whole situation would become unbearably uncomfortable otherwise.
A knock on his door informs him that his time is up. Taking a deep breath, he steps back and opens the door, all but completely zoning out as he is led to the dining room. Only after he steps into the chamber across from the pony in question, does he properly regain his faculties.
“Sir Ceridwen, it’s been far too long.” A gryph mare whom Ceridwen can only barely recognize curtsies from across the room. Flicking his gaze to the mare’s shoulders and then to her forehead, Ceridwen hesitates for a brief moment before bowing; No horn nor wings. And considering the lack of the other more extravagant features that marked Kirin, Elementals, or some of the other more rare forms of Ascended ponies, that could only mean…
Earth Ponies were decidedly uncommon; It was fairly rare for an aristocrat to have the temperament for such an Ascension. At first glance, they resemble Blanks more so than anything; But looking closer would reveal the stone hooves and hefty builds that mark them apart. Nopony had mentioned Highrock’s ascension, though Ceridwen supposes he might have guessed had he thought about the name more in depth; When he knew Highrock as foals, neither of them had ascended, so this was a surprise to him. Silently, he notes Aoife Highrock’s gaze flicking to his own wings, noting them briefly before she resettles upon his face.
That is neither here nor there; for now, there is protocol to follow. Ceridwen is all too aware of his father’s gaze, as well as the matriarchal form of another Gryph that somewhat resembles Evander from across the room. He would have to be extra careful to be on his best behavior today, no matter how disdainful he might be. Standing up from his bow, Ceridwen places one hoof across his chest in a gesture that appears far more sincere than it really is. “The feeling is mutual, Aoife. Or should I call you Highrock now?” Ceridwen asks, offering one hoof forwards.
“Aoife is fine.” The mare responds, taking Ceridwen’s hoof and allowing him to lead her to the banquet table-just as taught. Every action feels so stifling, knowing it is little more than a preset routine, almost like a ritual. Only this ‘ritual’ doesn't actually accomplish anything, unlike magic. Nothing besides keeping Evander off my back, at any rate. Ceridwen can feel the eyes of the stallion and mare, once brother and sister, boring into him and his potential match; he wonders if Aoife feels it, too, or if she was as oblivious as Seren had been until recently.
As was typical for these types of things, food had been laid out prior to the arrival of the two mares, though it is really only appetizers in preparation for a heftier dinner later that night. Ceridwen places himself at around the midsection of the table, pulling out a chair for Aoife Highrock to join him as he folds his wings back against his sides. The silence hangs in the air for a long moment, before Ceridwen eventually determines the other pony is waiting for him to speak first, and he hastily has to construct some manner of conversation to fill the space.
“It’s been what, ten years since we last met?” Ceridwen asks, pouring a cup of tea for himself and his guest. “I can only hope they’ve been as good to you as they have to me.” Ceridwen starts. When there is no immediate response, he continues, “I’m currently working on a prototype for a different kind of engine that doesn’t use pistons, I’ve been evaluating boron based fuels and...” Ceridwen pauses, trying to figure out how to swing this conversation in another direction; The mare’s eyes were totally vacant, he somehow doubted she heard a word he had just said. He knows talking about himself so much is probably bad form but, he had just been desperate to think of something. “...Well, it’s been taking up a lot of my time. I have to wonder just what you’ve been up to? Pick up any hobbies?”
Much to Ceridwens relief, the mare in question does in fact perk up at that. “Oh, most certainly! In fact, I brought a sample of my produce with me.” Raising one hoof, Aoife snaps two of her talons together-Ceridwen can only look on enviously, he’d never been able to figure out how to do that-and two of her family’s servants, invisibly standing on the sidelines, rush to her side to deliver a fine wooden cask as well as two crystal glass wineglasses, as Aoife grins proudly. “A gift for your family, straight from our vineyards. Escratero grows the best grapes, you know.”
Ceridwen looks on with a distinctive sinking feeling, doing his best to keep that from entering his expression. With Evander and Aoife both watching, he certainly wasn’t going to get out of it now. Taking a deep breath, and trying to pretend that he hadn’t, he picks up the wineglass and tries not to think about all the brain cells he would inevitably be losing today.
Turning the spigot with one talon, he fills up the glass with a dark reddish-magenta fluid, almost black where it is deepest, before lifting it to his beak with trepidation. He’d had plenty of practice controlling facial expressions lately; even so, keeping the disgust off his face when he downs the bitter, astringent beverage as quickly as possible is still difficult. He still can’t quite fathom how other ponies liked this stuff. Summoning all of his wits about him, he forces a positive expression to his face and nods slowly.
“Bone-dry, hrm? Hints of… Cranberry, I believe, yes? Somepony has refined tastes.” He remarks, almost utterly at odds with his internal feelings. He might not enjoy the flavor but, his mind is as analytical as always-at least, for the next few minutes before the drink starts affecting him-and he can still detect the undertones of flavor in the stuff. He’d spent enough time in aristocratic circles to know roughly what he is supposed to be complimenting, at least.
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“Very astute!” Aoife responds, beaming. “Most of our product is sweeter, but I really find the dryest wine to have such a richer flavor profile without the sugar masking it.” She explains, filling up her own glass. “I brewed this batch myself specially for my visit. Apologies that I couldn’t bring aged wine, our vineyard is rather young you see.” She apologizes, as she takes a sip of her own concoction.
I suppose I can’t get away with just the one drink, hrm? Ceridwen ponders with a sinking feeling. Well, at least the conversation was going… And so are your neurons. He can’t help but sardonically remark internally. He was almost tempted to go off on a tangent about the various negative health effects of the brew-he knew them all by heart, naturally-but manages to hold his tongue and force himself to take another sip.
Regretfully, Ceridwen stares towards the window, pondering and wishing internally that he could have been the one to leave the palace, and Seren could be the one stuck here in his place.
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“Sho normally, electrical transmission in combustion engines are considered to be less effishen… Efficient than direct drive, because there’s additional energy losses from converting the shaft horsepower into electricity, then from there back to electricity in the motor… hic… But! That’s only ‘cuz the whole thing is based on generators which are essentially just kinetic drives being used to drive a generator! If you’re converting thermal energy to electric directly, or even making chemical to electricity like in a fuel cell, you kin get higher first-stage efficiency that offsets thermodynamic inneffishen… In-e-fish-shen-seas… heh, fish in seas… later in the system!” Ceridwen rambles on, drawing his hooves across the table like there is a diagram there despite there being no such thing. Aoife stares listlessly out the window, not hearing a word of the monologue.
“So! I’ve been working on a pyrolectak… Pyrelektrik… Pyroelectric! …Ugh, what was I just talking about again?” Ceridwen holds a talon up to his head, wincing as he struggles to sift through the hazy fog that is his thoughts. “Right! The… Um, wait, no…” he goes on like that for some time, constantly seeming to remember before spacing out once more, before finally settling on an answer. “..A generator, which would use heat generated in the combustion chamber to heat and cool a system of crystals to generate power! Now schemes like that have been tried before, but what’s special about mine is it uses a molten salt fuel stored around the combustion chamber… Hic… An’ pumps it into the combustion chamber along with enriched oxygen filtered through a syshtem of… of…”
Ceridwen’s gaze becomes distant before he coughs and continues without finishing that thought. “So the magnetism of the fluid is activated by the electricity flowing through the crystals, an’ makes the fluid around the chamber magnetic! So then the hot side of the crystals, itself generating a potent magnetic field, rotates towards the cold outer fuel side, making sure the hot side continuously aligns itself with the coolant to allow a consis… Conshistent temperature gradient!” Ceridwen looks proud of having gotten that thought out, while nopony else in the room responds in any way to what he had said. Thankfully, Evander and his once-sister had retired to some other room to discuss business, so Ceridwen and Aoife are largely left to their own devices to ‘catch up’.
Oblivious to the other ponies' disinterest, Ceridwen furrows his brow and squints as he struggles to remember the rest of the reactor's design features; he’d written pages and pages upon the topic, so surely there is more to it than just that, right? But the haze of inebriation thwarts his every attempt, and he is left to just slouch against the table in disgust. “Blegh…” That was that topic all done, but he had to keep thinking… Of things to talk about. No, distractions! Distractions to make sure he didn’t say anything monumentally stupid. As long as he never got a chance to think about… What was he supposed to not think about again? He can’t quite remember, but he supposes that is for the best.
Even so, that isn’t enough to dispel the frustration that came with this, as he hops up to his hooves and begins pacing about, head hanging low to the ground and huffing in irritation. He loathed how his brain became like this; So slow and sluggish, like his thoughts were molasses trying to pour out of a… Something. He’d felt this way a few times when he wasn’t drunk, enough to have fairly firmly set his opinion as ‘not enjoyable in the slightest’.
“So… Sir Ceridwen.” The mare finally interrupts his pacing. Ceridwen looks over at her in a daze; the mare obviously could hold her alcohol much better than him. That wasn’t particularly surprising, since just about anypony save maybe Seren could hold their alcohol better than him, he swore he must have had something wrong with his neurons, or maybe kidneys, to make him extra susceptible. Wait, no, it's the liver, isn’t it? He can’t remember. “How have you fared in less… Intellectual pursuits?” She asks; at any other point in time, Ceridwen would have easily noticed she was just trying to change the topic.
At this moment, however, the young gryph stallion just perks up recognizing another opportunity for conversation. A hopefully easier conversation, even, since most of his interests are very difficult to comprehend while inebriated. “Oh, yes!” he exclaims. “Well, I can’t claim to be quite as good as Seren, but I was taking fencing lessons with Silverthorn. Well, I was, until the promenade, then Evander had me take etiquette lessons.” Ceridwen babbles, noticeably wilting at the last statement, and not noticing the verbal slip of referring to his father by name-typically he only did that in his head.
“Akshully, it really came in handy then, ‘cause a stallion tried to rape Seren, but I managed to get there in time.” The pegasids mood noticeably dampens as he thinks about that, clenching his talons and becoming utterly unreceptive to the clear discomfort of the other pony at the subject, clearly not fit for polite conversation. “I didn’t kill him, though. For some reason. I could have. I really should have. Why didn’t I kill him? He tried to rape my sister!” His tone of voice raises dramatically as he speaks, flapping his wings unthinkingly and ascending slightly into the air before collapsing back down onto his chair with a spontaneous Thud.
“Well, sho, I must be doin’ alright cuz I beat the daylights out of him, and he was pretty strong, so I think I’m pretty good!” He continues cheerily, seemingly perking up again. “How about you? Anything else going on other than your… vineyards?” Just in time, Ceridwen barely recalls he wasn’t supposed to insult the other ponies' interests, and manages to leave it at that.
“Oh, um, yes, of course.” Aoife Highrock mentions, stoically. “Well, now that we’re all caught up, perhaps you could show me around the estate? It’s really been much too long since I’ve been.” She states in an apologetic tone.
Ceridwen nods his head and pulls himself up to his hooves. “Of course, milady. Shall we be off?” His tone is just a bit too exaggerated, a bit too flamboyant, but his acquiescence at least feels earnest enough as he offers a hoof to Aoife. Relieved just to be able to escape from the endless rambling, Aoife accepts the gesture with grace, and allows herself to be led off for a tour of the palace.