Vermilion Rewrite ~ Five: Winemaker
Oct. 3rd, 2013 06:42 pm![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
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yrae
The vintner grimaced and dug her fingers into the base of her spine, massaging at the pain that had been there for the last week. The harvest got worse every year, but she couldn’t afford to hire extra grape pickers to fill in for her. It may be a prolific business, but one frost, one heatwave, one week of rain too heavy, and the entire vineyard would be wasted. It wasn’t only the vintner’s money that came from the wine she sold, but her workers, too, not to mention the marginal profit that went back to the town itself. And so, the winemaker had to continue to participate in the harvest.She grimaced again, arching her back and looking up at the sky with a scrunched face. All the work the healer had done that morning had somehow all melted away just from her walk through the town. She hadn’t even lifted anything on the way, only stopped in briefly at the fortune teller’s.
The vintner sighed and rested her aching back against the wall of the closest house. The cool grey stone felt pleasant against the hot pain in her spine, and she almost considered sitting down, right there on the road.
‘Ah, my dear vintner!’
The winemaker started at the almost booming voice of Master Vermilion. She instantly straightened away from the wall, wincing at the pang it caused her, then dipped her head politely to the young master.
‘My apologies for not bowing, Master. My back—’
Vermilion waved one white-gloved hand dismissively as he strode down the cobbled street towards her. ‘Oh, pish. Such things happen, not to worry! I was just on my way to the winery to find you, actually.’ He grinned broadly, folded his arms and rested one shoulder against the wall the vintner had just sprung away from. ‘The ’33 or the ’25?’
‘The shiraz, sir?’ the vintner clarified.
Vermilion nodded. ‘To go with the filet mignon. I have a cabernet and a merlot already decided upon, but father and I have been arguing over the shiraz.’
The vintner frowned in genuine thought. The young master often came to ask her for wine suggestions, and he always knew what he was talking about. It wasn’t merely idle chatter, mingling with the commoners to keep his popularity in check, or so the vintner hoped. He at least seemed to take on the winemaker’s suggestions.
‘Ideally,’ he said carefully, ‘I’d allow the ’33 to sit for another two or three years. I opened a bottle early last year and it was still too soon.’ He wafted his hand in the air, trying to remember just what he’d thought of it at the time. ‘A little too sharp. Although… with the bacon it might soften the tannins a bit. The ’25 should be perfect right now, though. You’d have no risks opening a few of them.’
Vermilion cocked his eyebrows, almost mischievously. ‘Too perfect to pour for too many guests, would you think?’
The vintner almost grinned back. ‘That all depends on who you’re out to impress, sir, the lords or the ladies.’
‘The ’25 it is, then,’ Vermilion agreed with a candid wink. ‘Good luck with the harvest this year,’ he said, pushing away from the wall. ‘Beautiful weather for it.’
The vintner grimaced again, knives stabbing anew at his spine. ‘I wouldn’t mind a little cloud cover, actually, but not to worry.’
‘Incidentally,’ Vermilion continued, in a tone so offhanded the vintner suspected something and shuffled on her feet. ‘On the topic of gentlemen, you really should ask him to dinner.’
‘Sir?’ The vintner frowned, trying to pick something from the young master’s mild expression.
There was just a twinkle of humour in his eye that he quickly hid as he hooked blond hair behind his ear. ‘The fortune teller, of course.’ He frowned curiously at the vintner’s baffled expression then, making the winemaker look down at her scuffed leather boots. ‘He’s been on your tail for years, you know. Ask him to dinner some evening.’
The vintner glanced back up the street the way she had come. ‘Really?’
Vermilion laughed, an open sound that should have relaxed the vintner, but which only made her more nervous. ‘Haven’t you seen the way he watches you from the corner of his eye, flushed cheeks whenever you’re near, the pang in his eyes when you walk past with little more than a hello.’
The vintner looked at her boots again, dumbly polishing the toe of one against the back of her knee. ‘Oh,’ she said finally.
‘Oh?’
‘I always thought he was simply shy.’
There was another bark of laughter. ‘A shy fortune teller? Come, now. He’s only shy around you, my good lady.’ He smiled then, a strangely wistful look compared to his playful mocking. ‘When the harvest is over, ask him to dinner. He hasn’t the fortitude to do so himself.’
The vintner could feel her face growing warm, and not only from the sun overhead. ‘I will, Master. Thank you.’
Vermilion smiled again and clapped him on the shoulder. ‘Good man,’ he said, then flicked his red coat back and hooked his hands loosely in his pockets. ‘And I’ll ask you how it goes, so don’t think you can escape from this one.’
From any other noble, the vintner thought, that would have been a genuine threat, but the broad grin on Vermilion’s face and the twinkle in his eye made the winemaker grin back, if less exuberantly. ‘I shan’t let you down, sir,’ she promised.
‘Good woman.’ The young master nodded in satisfaction, then turned back up the street.
The vintner rested her back against the wall again for a moment, her back only a dull ache as memories of the fortune telling ran around her mind. Red and violet? His stall was always hung with dark shades of those colours, trying to look mystical and genuine. Long dark hair and a plain face? That was certainly the fortune teller. What had his exact words been?
The sort of face you wouldn’t notice, that would just slip past you unless you were looking for it.
She sighed and thudded her head against the cool stone wall. It was true. She never had noticed him, no more than anyone else in the town. He was just another to whom she had a brief chat every day she came down from his home on the hilltop vineyard.
He did always have his eyes on her, though, now she thought about it.
The winemaker groaned quietly as she pushed herself away from the wall and continued on down the hill. Her steps echoed woodenly as she crossed the bridge, then stooped to climb back up the other side of the valley towards her house.
The workers had been making good progress that day. Their large, floppy straw hats floated over the vineyard like leaves on the river, bobbing with the rhythm of grape picking. Hands stained purple from the rich fruit stuck up from the sea of vines to wave to the vintner as she trudged back up the pathway, and she gave a lazy wave back.
‘How’s your back?’ one called across the dark green leaves. His face was shaded by his hat, but the vintner could still see his glorious smile.
‘Better,’ she called back. ‘I’ll be with you in an hour.’
A spattering of light applause and cheers rose from the workers, glad to see their boss at least halfway back on her feet. The vintner doubted she’d be particularly useful today, though.
She groaned as he closed the front door behind her, then lay with her back flat on the floor as the healer had instructed. Her spine ached too much for her to feel undignified, and the cold, hard stone against it made her muscles noticeably relax. She sighed and closed her eyes, feeling as though he almost sank into the floor.
Why, oh, why couldn’t it have been her harvest helper? He was smart, funny, and his nose crinkled so adorably when he laughed. He was always positive, however bleak the situation seemed, and quite often, he had some idea of how to solve it. He was perfect.
She sighed again and stared at the wooden rafters overhead.
There was a bustling from the bedroom that quickly emerged into kitchen in the tiny, wiry form of the vintner’s mother. ‘And why are you so melancholy?’ she asked briskly before poking her once with her toe. ‘I’ve a good two and a half decades on you, young lady, and I don’t complain of my back nearly so much.’
The vintner closed her eyes and bit back a retort. Her parents had stopped working the winery more than ten years ago complaining of aching joints. ‘That isn’t the reason, Mother,’ she answered finally. ‘I saw the fortune teller on the way home from the healer.’
‘Oh?’ her mother asked, suddenly interested. ‘And what did he have to say? Are you finally going to talk to you-know-who?’
The vintner barely raised an eyebrow, though she’d never told her mother about her feelings for last harvest’s new recruit. If Vermilion had so easily seen the fortune teller’s feelings for her, it would hardly surprise her if most everyone who worked on the vineyard could see how she felt about the new grape picker.
‘No,’ she replied, being careful not to shake her head for fear of disrupting her spine. ‘It wasn’t him.’
‘What did she say?’ her mother pressed.
The vintner tried not to sigh again. ‘The colours red and purple, long, dark hair and a plain, ordinary face. The kind you’d only notice if you were looking for it.’
Her mother’s bustling around the kitchen stopped for a moment. ‘That sounds like him to me,’ she said offhandedly. ‘His hair would be long if it wasn’t such a bird’s nest, dark with a bit of a reddish sheen, purple hands from the grapes, and if you see anything extraordinary in that squashed face of his, girl, then he’s definitely the one for you.’
The vintner blinked her eyes open and frowned at the rafters. The thought occurred to him that, if the fortune teller had indeed seen the grape picker’s face in his vision, he could well have twisted the words just a little so she might be led to him instead of the grape picker. She turned her head towards her mother, flinching at the twinge in her back. ‘Are you sure?’
The tiny little woman set her hands on her hips as she peered down at her. ‘Darling, you’ve been doe-eyed for him since the day your father took him on last harvest.’
‘But he hardly looks at me.’
‘Of course he doesn’t!’ his mother tisked. ‘He’s a respectable boy, and I’m sure he’s been waiting an age for you to make the first move.’ She poked her again with her toe. ‘You’re the lord and master of these vineyards, after all.’
‘Ow, Mother.’
She shrugged unsympathetically. ‘I’m keeping you on your toes. Now, get up and get back to the vineyard. You look ridiculous. And ask the boy to dinner, for the love of all the gods!’
The vintner flinched as she poked her a third time. ‘Yes, yes, Mother, I’m moving, please stop kicking me!’ She drew herself into a painful sitting position, fending off her foot with her hands before finally pulling herself to her feet.
‘It’s about time,’ his mother muttered as she bustled back to the chopping board to prepare dinner. ‘Half the day’s gone already and you haven’t picked one grape!’
The vintner bit her tongue, but couldn’t resist glaring at the back of her mother’s head. She left without a word, afraid of what might come out of her mouth.
The straw hats still bobbed in groups in the vineyard as she closed the creaking door behind her. The grape picker straightened his back at the sound and held up one purple-stained hand to steady his hat in a gust of wind, and the other to wave to her. The sun shone little twinkles of light on his reddened face through the straw weave, and the vintner smiled.
That's all the old stuff rejigged. From here on everything will be new and shiny :D
no subject
Date: 2013-11-07 02:46 pm (UTC)Aww again. I feel really sorry for the poor fortune teller. Love is a cruel beastie.
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Date: 2013-11-08 01:23 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2013-11-12 09:44 am (UTC)A couple more gender fluctuations for you:
It wasn’t only the vintner’s money that came from the wine he sold, but her workers, too
If Vermilion had so easily seen the fortune teller’s feelings for her, it would hardly surprise her if most everyone who worked on the vineyard could see how he felt about the new grape picker.
no subject
Date: 2013-11-12 10:51 am (UTC)(got 'em, thank you muchly :D Hopefully that's the lot now =3)
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Date: 2015-01-16 01:26 pm (UTC)Ramble.
THERE IS NO SUCH THING AS TOO PERFECT VERMILLION DAMN IT.
And you, putting your nose into people's love lives. Honestly. A little nudge may be a good thing but tsk. You leave well enough alone!
(And get her gender right, Vermillion. KIND OF A LOT OF THAT IN THE END OF THIS CHAPTER TOO)
I want to give her a tight hug and crack her spine for her D:
Not a great comment here but I LIKED the past two chapters and the little interwoven non-romance between learning bits and pieces about Vermillion.
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Date: 2015-01-16 01:33 pm (UTC)It's about Vermilion in the end but I really enjoy having all these other characters being characters in their own right =3 It was fun to write them all!
(I just reread it... kinda sucked on the gender flipping there, 'narti-of-2-years-ago.)