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[center][img]https://i.ibb.co/vXD6Q0t/Update-Text.png[/img][/center][center]━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━[/center][center][hider=Rose River Vineyard][img]https://i.ibb.co/yRk60Zg/Vinyard-Estate-Gridded-Day-Lv4.jpg[/img][/hider][/center][center]━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━[/center][center][hider=Coach House][img]https://i.ibb.co/5jfBrYW/Coach-House-Opener.jpg[/img][/hider][/center][center]━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━[/center]	

	[u]Weather[/u]: A steady coolness settles over the land, with the fully established morning sun cutting through the hardest of the season's edges. Wind gusts through the open areas around the estate do an amazing job reminding people that sharper weather was possibly headed their way. 

	[u]Time[/u]: Early to mid morning. An excellent time for a leisurely breakfast and the discussion of plans.     

	[u]Ambience[/u]: The breakfast table lay filled with various delights, simple in presentation but with a drawing feature that only well made foodstuffs can provide on a cold morning. The worst of the wind gusts is abated by the presence of the great Estate House, giving the protection of its bulky, exterior walls. Braziers filled with hot coals vented heat, the radius of which overlapped with the one next to it, giving an oasis of relative warmth around the al fresco breakfast table.

	The view overlooking the river is noteworthy, if one walks to the edge of the terrace. Sounds of water leisurely passing by are muted but ever-present, competing with the sharper yet distant sounds of people putting lines in the river and pulling the occasional fish back out. Truly, it is a nice day for fishing, is it not? It might even inspire a contented chuckle to that effect. 

	From this vantage, one may see the stretching fields containing rows upon rows of grape vines upon framework, most starting to show the signs of seasonal dormancy but still mostly green in the distance beyond the river's bend. The hill just beyond the river's cove to the west held the stone lookout where Kathryn stood atop just earlier, the top third only visible past the larger bushes and trees therebetween. 

	The house itself stood as a monument to the capability of industry and the money acquired by it. Not the dwelling of a ranked noble of some prosperous king's court, nor a palace set to receive siege against armies, but an excellent example of wealthy folk of common birth who had done well enough to pass their prosperity and reputation to the next generations. Good, solid wood and stone fitted together with quality, panes of locally produced glass mortared within stout frames with heavy, safe shutters, and controllable access points, one of which led into a kitchen that one could glimpse small portions of when it opened to admit one or another of the domestic or scullery workers.      

[center][color=darkgray][h2]*****[/h2][/color][/center]

	The barest mention of an omelette got the apron-clad gentleman cracking eggs into a bowl and assaulting them furiously with a small wire whisk. A brief pause to add a touch of cream and dash of salt marked the only reprieve the albuminous yellow liquid saw before it was re-introduced to a beating so vigorous and frothy as to teach all the other eggs present lessons of humility. [color=darkgray]"What would Madame prefer in her omelette, if you please?"[/color] came his voice, heavily influenced by a local accent. There were options of a decent variety, both animal and vegetable. Maybe even a bit of fungal. 

	The flatbreads were accepted by the L'Roses with differing amounts of enthusiasm. Cecily gave a pleasant, [color=darkgray][i]"Why, thank you,"[/i][/color] and folded it, setting it upon the side of the plate in front of her. Lizbeth, ever the grasper of life, immediately ripped a bit of it free and popped it into her mouth. Pleased with this, she applied a formidable helping of pepper jam upon if and began to devour in a manner that was probably not as ladylike as her aunt would have preferred. This was made evident by the sudden, sharp clearing of Cecily's throat, and a reduction in the vigor with which the younger L'Rose consumed her bread. When she came to an appropriate moment to do so, Lizbeth gave a hasty, [color=darkgray]"Thank you!"[/color] and continued. 

	At one point, Lizbeth addressed the mention of the name Annick Floquet, sharing, [color=darkgray]"She has a daughter who's older than I am. She's nicer than her mother. I think her father died in the war, but... I've never met him."[/color] This earned a sharp look from Cecily, prompting an apologetic look from Lizbeth. Apparently, there was a little difficulty with oversharing that she still had to address. 

	Cecily made an abrupt subject change to answer Victoria's question about local manners. [color=darkgray][i]"Oh, we are politely informal here,"[/i][/color] she began, gesturing at the lack of a dozen different kinds of forks and spoons. [color=darkgray][i]"Don't use the tablecloth as a napkin, use serving spoons to serve and supping spoons to sup, and don't put a butter utensil in the honey. That sort of thing. Common manners of the realms north of the mountains. And I don't mean this to insult,"[/i][/color] she paused to look around the table, [color=darkgray]"but if any of you are far traveling folk who are unaware, please just observe and act accordingly. I am quick to forgive small matters of table etiquette among friends, especially if they are trying. If you are versed in formalities, then the same rules as Khimn or Argentum gentry would apply, even if I shan't hold you to it."[/color] Since the first big war against the Alhazred, the collective groups of desert people to the south, there was a great exchange of ideas and culture, including a formalized agreement of trade language and an diffusion of etiquette, thanks in part to intermarrying families from the classes nobility of several different nations, not to mention the breaking down and restructuring of territories. It wasn't a full homogenization of manners, not by a far stretch, as pockets of older schools of thought and less extroverted sections of cultures kept to their old customs. For this reason, it was safe enough to ask, just in case. 

	Another mention of manners got Cecily's attention, this from Baronfjord, and to a point that might have gone to the host or service staff were it not for the small speech that she had just given. [color=darkgray][i]"Coffee. That is coffee. If you are unfamiliar, please have some for yourself. My father called it 'an acquired taste, like good whisky.' But not for me, thank you."[/i][/color] She offered up a cup for the martially inclined Dragonborn to fill, requesting, [color=darkgray][i]"Tea, please."[/i][/color] She made her movements deliberate and demonstrative, just in case anyone needed a refresher course on the northern standard of etiquette without having to ask. Cecily seemed a lot more in control of herself and her emotions now that she was back home, the present Lady of the Manor, so to speak. More assertive seeming. 

	Concerning her availability to suitors, as noted by Kathryn, Cecily smiled just a little. [color=darkgray][i]"Sweet of you to say. I know I'm not the youngest girl at the festival, but I still turn a few heads, if you'll forgive me. But no, I simply couldn't marry again, knowing I might have to leave this place, and it would be questionable if someone of means desired to stay here when Lizbeth comes of age. I believe I might be happiest as the Vineyard's caretaker, if the recently annointed Madame L'Rose of Rose River allows."[/i][/color] She nodded to Lizbeth, who was busy applying butter to a steaming mille feuille. 

	Lizbeth took a moment to allow her brain to catch up to the conversation, when she suddenly plopped her extremely delicate, thousand-layer pastry onto her bread plate. [color=darkgray]"Aunt Ceecee, of course you can be the caretaker. You kind of already are, aren't you? And even if you weren't, or wanted to retire, this is your home."[/color] It was said in the matter-of-factly tone that only absolutely certain teenagers were capable of achieving. 

        [color=darkgray][i]"So tell me,"[/i][/color] inquired Cecily to the whole of the table while moving to put a few choice morsels on her plate, [color=darkgray][i]"have you any plans for how you will spend your time here at Rose River Vineyard? I might be able to point you in a helpful direction."[/i][/color]