“Avelreese, stop.”
Avelreese paused, a grease-stained rag halfway across her breastplate. “It’s maintenance, Zyneese. It has to be done.”
“Maintenance is a ritual,” Zyneese said, adjusting her gold-wire glasses with a click of perfectly manicured nails. “What you are doing is a chore. You look like a peasant scrubbing a hearth. You’re letting the drudgery dim your soul.”
Avelreese sighed, wiping a smudge from her forehead. “My soul is fine. My armor is filthy.”
“Your soul is exhausted,” Zyneese countered. “One should never let the mundane strip away the magic. If you polish that silver with resentment, it will never truly shine. It will just be… clean. How pedestrian.”
The void whispers: Pedestrian is the greatest sin.
“I’m just tired,” Avelreese muttered, though she slowed her movements, trying for a more graceful stroke.
Reyneese drifted into the light of the fire, carrying three cups of tea. The steam smelled of jasmine and ancient forests.
“Zyneese has a point, dear,” Reyneese said, her voice like a warm exhale. “The things we do every day—the cleaning, the mending, the tending—these are the threads that hold our lives together. If we treat them as burdens, we are only burdening ourselves.”
She set a cup down beside the shield.
“Never let the work extinguish the light that makes the work worth doing,” Reyneese added softly. “Drink. Then polish for the joy of the reflection, not the fear of the rust.”
Avelreese took the tea. “The Chanel Standard?”
“My standard,” Zyneese corrected, though she looked pleased. “But she would have approved.”