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Isabella is generally referred to as: promising.
Angels in general are a breed apart. Of course they've all got lovely voices, they've all got classical music training and know the masses and prayers, they're all blessed winged creatures -
But that doesn't mean they're all smart, or all good, even (Isabella was taken to see Windy Point, once, or what's left of it, and of course she sees the scars on Galo Mountain every year at the Gloria; there stood angels who were not good). And Isabella is smart and good.
Isabella is always the first to volunteer for an intercession. She likes them. She'll call down weather, plead for seeds, pray a shower of medicine to fall from the sky, and she will get what she asks for, and she loves nothing more than to dive from hours aloft in prayer and clasp the hands of the people she helped and go home to the Eyrie to take on her next assignment. When there are none - when there is the right amount of rain and sun in the province, when there is no plague and no famine - she studies. She studies a bit of everything, but she fancies herself particularly a historian, investigating the accounts of Archangels' reigns past. From books, mostly, although once she wrangled herself a year in Cedar Hills to assist the Archangel Linus, and when she is in the Eyrie she closely follows the leader of the host there, the former term-lapsed Archangel Delilah.
She tried to get in with the other living former Archangel, too, Alleluia the oracle who served as Delilah's interim while the latter's wing recovered from an injury, but after a few hours' conversation Alleluia said that she could not accept Isabella as even a temporary acolyte and sent her to Peninnah instead. Isabella learned a lot from Peninnah, but she's confused about why Alleluia turned her down personally only to send her to another oracle, after such a prolonged interview. Particularly since Sinai is in her own province; what was the point in sending her all the way to Gaza?
But the instruction came from an oracle, and oracles' words more often than not come from Jovah. She went to Gaza, learned from Peninnah, and went home.
Now she is back at the Eyrie, and the first thing she wants to do is let Delilah know that she's back. Her wings aren't so tired that she can't immediately fly to the Corinnis or the outskirts of Semorrah or anywhere and accomplish something. Failing that, she'd love to sign up for harmonies again now that she's home and wants to know what she ought to schedule around.
Delilah is with her husband Noah, and a visitor. He doesn't seem like a petitioner, and he doesn't look like an Edori, although the fact that he and Noah are talking in Edori suggests that he might be an adopted one. (There are hardly any Edori of either sort left; most of them live in Ysral, now.) Isabella waits patiently outside the door for the host leader's attention.
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jovahs_heiress
"She was talking more earlier," he explains.
jovahs_heiress
"Makes sense. Um - you said you were planning to stay at the Eyrie but only as of recently. Did someone offer you a guest room, or...?"
"No," he shrugs.
jovahs_heiress
"Okay. There may be one, but there may not, especially if I'm guessing right about why Delilah and Noah went off to entertain Manadavvi - there could be a lot of them."
"I'll find somewhere to stick my head under a rock," he says serenely.
jovahs_heiress
"...I was going to say that under the circumstances I can put you in my quarters," she says. "The angels' rooms have a lot of space."
"Oh!" He grins. "That's sweet of you. Sure!"
jovahs_heiress
"There's only one bed. I can get another, if you want, but the one there is huge - most angels sleep on their fronts with their wings out all the way, and so there's room for that, but I'm just as comfortable on my side with one wing stacked on the other," she says.
"I don't mind sharing," he says with a smile.
jovahs_heiress
"That's easier, then, I have honestly no idea how anyone gets a bedframe through the halls there. It may be that they have to be nailed together in the rooms themselves," laughs Isabella.
"Maybe they do," he giggles.
jovahs_heiress
"Okay. It'll be late when we land, but I think the laundry should still be open and I can get you a blanket - I know mortals are often cold in the Eyrie, everyone going around in sleeves all the time and shivering, I don't actually know what it's like but it sounds unpleasant - and what else do you need?"
"Blanket. Dinner? That about covers it," he shrugs.
jovahs_heiress
"The kitchens are open until midnight," she assures him. "And they're open again at six the next morning."
"I like your Eyrie," he declares.
"I'd say 'I like your city' if I was talking to somebody who lived in a city I liked," he says. "It's the same thing, isn't it?"
jovahs_heiress
"Mmm, maybe. I think that makes more sense if the thing you're saying you like is a class of things - 'I like your city', 'I like your friend', 'I like your recipe for mint sauce'. There's only one Eyrie, but it's an angel hold."
"I like your angel hold, then," he says agreeably.
Micaiah falls silent, smiling back.
jovahs_heiress
They travel the rest of the way to the Eyrie in companionable non-conversation, although not silence, as Isbella notes that they pass over an area that looks too brown for the season and spends the middle half-hour of the journey praying for a brief shower of rain. (Major weather interventions wait for petitions, but minor ones are permissible in passing.) They depart an area of drizzle, fly just over another hour, and touch down at the hold. A quartet of men - two mortals, two angels - are singing something somber and soft, not enough to wake sleepers; Isabella waves at them after she puts Micaiah down.
"My quarters are near Elisha's," she says softly, leading him through the corridors. "Not right next to them, but the same general area - you might find it easy to get lost in here at first." They find the kitchens again and Isabella gets two plates of potatoes, greens, and venison from the cook; apparently the meeting with the Manadavvi went on for long enough that they're still eating now.
"My quarters are near Elisha's," she says softly, leading him through the corridors. "Not right next to them, but the same general area - you might find it easy to get lost in here at first." They find the kitchens again and Isabella gets two plates of potatoes, greens, and venison from the cook; apparently the meeting with the Manadavvi went on for long enough that they're still eating now.
"I get unlost pretty easy," he says.
Mmmm, food. Food is good. He likes food.
Mmmm, food. Food is good. He likes food.
jovahs_heiress
Isabella likes food too!
The walk to her room is through most of the same hallways as the walk to Elisha's, but with a veer off to the right at the end. She pulls a key from where she keeps it on her boot fastenings and lets them in. "I don't have a copy of this, but I can get one," she says. "But - please don't steal my stuff, even if you mean to give it back after; if you need anything you can just ask me. Please don't look at my notebooks either. They're private."
The notebooks are an obvious stack in the corner. Isabella turns out to have one tucked in the back of her vest, which she adds to the pile. The room is a bit dusty with disuse, but not a year's worth of it - she's been visiting for the odd week here and there even during her two years of the Eyrie not being her primary residence. And the bed is indeed twelve feet wide to comfortably accommodate even the most sprawling, impressive wingspan.
The walk to her room is through most of the same hallways as the walk to Elisha's, but with a veer off to the right at the end. She pulls a key from where she keeps it on her boot fastenings and lets them in. "I don't have a copy of this, but I can get one," she says. "But - please don't steal my stuff, even if you mean to give it back after; if you need anything you can just ask me. Please don't look at my notebooks either. They're private."
The notebooks are an obvious stack in the corner. Isabella turns out to have one tucked in the back of her vest, which she adds to the pile. The room is a bit dusty with disuse, but not a year's worth of it - she's been visiting for the odd week here and there even during her two years of the Eyrie not being her primary residence. And the bed is indeed twelve feet wide to comfortably accommodate even the most sprawling, impressive wingspan.
Micaiah looks curiously at the notebooks.