Private Lacquer

[Thessaly Veruna]

The memory came in fragments.

Seven years old, she had waited in the antechamber while voices rose beyond the carved door. Her mother’s tone was bright, but brittle. Aurelian had just been born. A son. The Veruna heir. The wet nurse had walked past with him bundled in silks, and Thessaly had reached out her hands. She wanted to hold him, to feel the smallness and warmth. Instead, her mother’s fingers pressed against her shoulder. She was gentle, but firm enough to hold her young daughter in place.

“Not you,” Saphira had said, her eyes cool, her smile reserved for the infant alone. “Your place is elsewhere now.”

Elsewhere. The word lodged deep, a quiet banishment. She had smiled, because what else was there to do? But that smile hid a wound poorly, as her moistening eyes betrayed her. She had not forgotten. She would not forgive. Even now, the echo of that dismissal shaped her every movement.

---

Years later, the door to Ravion Corvalis’ gallery opened and Thessaly stepped through, every inch the opposite of that cast-aside child. The dress she wore was not necessary for calling on a proprietor of the arts. It was extravagant, provocative and no small degree revealing. She had indulged deep silks , and a slit high enough to hintat scandal. Pearls traced her collarbone, pulling attention downwards. She did not merely walk, instead letting her heels strike a commanding rhythm against the polished stone.

The gallery was alive with quiet wealth. Canvases hung under muted lighting. Sculptures were arranged in studied asymmetry. The perfume of old varnish and fresh paint drifted together. Ravion’s reputation preceded him. He was art broker, collector, and patron. The sort of man who could make or ruin a reputation with a single whispered remark. A useful man. A pawn, even if he would never recognize himself as such.

“Corvalis,” she said, her smile inviting intrigue. “You honour Naboo with your presence again. I hear Malastare was generous enough to grant you their hopes. And yet here you are, curating...”

Her gaze drifted across the displayed works, pausing just long enough to seem appreciative. Inside, her thoughts twisted sharper. Saphira Veruna had committed her life to collecting in order to crown herself queen of the Naboo's art world. But a queen could be made to stumble. The upcoming exhibition would be the stage. Saphira would arrive with her precious pieces, and her pride. Thessaly would ensure those same pieces became the instruments of her irreversible humiliation.

Ravion need not know. He would play his part simply by being himself, blind to the silken thread that guided his hand. Thessaly would see to the rest. For now, she was all charm, all cultivated poise, the daughter who had learned to survive rejection.

She leaned closer to him, conspiratorial without pressing. "I understand you are bringing several rarities to the exhibition. Naboo will talk of nothing else for weeks. It is… fortuitous." Her eyes narrowed just enough to suggest intimacy, though her smile remained untouchable. "I was wondering if you would be willing to receive a loaned piece...ancient Rakattan art...from my personal collection on Eliad."

Ravion Corvalis - fyi Aurelian Veruna​

 

[Ravion Corvalis]

​

The hush of the gallery shifted when her heels struck the polished stone. Ravion Corvalis did not immediately look up; he let the sound carry across to him breaking the silence, he measured its rhythm as it came closer to himself, and he allowed the presence behind it to arrive in its own flourish. When he did raise his eyes from the stone plaque that was sat on a polished marble table before him, it was as a man accustomed to staging first impressions.

“Lady Thessaly,” he greeted, voice warm but threaded with that faint indulgence he reserved for players in the same game. “Naboo always did have a flair for timing and here you are! How I thought you had faded into the shadow of your brother…” He paused, took a breath and spoke calmly. “I mean his Majesty. I am glad I have been mistaken. Malastare has been…intruiging to say the least, yes, but I have to admit, it lacks a certain refinement. Naboo dresses its ambitions far more elegantly and with jewels like yourself it will take the declaration of the Hapes Cluster itself to change my mind.”

His gaze lingered a breath too long, not crude, but deliberate; she knew the game, she wanted his admiration where she wanted it. She was no casual visitor. The dress was a statement; the pearls around her neck were her signature on a contract she was forcing everyone who saw her to sign. He inclined his head slightly, a collector acknowledging a rarity.

“My gallery thanks you for gracing it,” he continued, gesturing to the subdued glow that bathed canvases and sculptures alike. “I am indeed bringing in quite the collection, some ancient Naboo woodwork, some rumoured Jedi pieces from Monastery and one particular pre-plague art from a questionable time of Naboo galactic control. Should be enough variety to keep the most ostentatious Family happy.”

When she spoke the word Rakattan, he allowed silence to settle between them. His fingers tightened subtly on the magnifying lens he held in his hand before easing again, as though he had briefly handled something volatile. His smile did not falter, but a glint sparked in his eye filled with curiosity sharpened with suspicion.

“Ancient Rakattan,” he repeated softly, tasting the syllables like a rare spice. “That is a name that stirs more quickly than any purse of credits. Dangerous, infamous… irresistible. Such a piece would turn an exhibition into a battlefield of whispers. Provenance would be scrutinised, rivals would circle, and a single crack in the story would see reputations fall like plaster.”

He drifted toward a nearby sculpture, marble carved into the serene curves of Naboo myth. His hand never touched it, proximity alone was statement enough. “I rarely risk Rakattan art, you see, it is never simply the object. For some reason people just gravitate towards it, like it is a performance. The one who unveils it bears the risk if it dazzling too brightly.”

Turning back to her, his expression softened, conspiratorial now. “But you, Thessaly, understand that better than most. You survived this world not by inheritance, unlike some in the game. I could almost believe you simply want to watch Naboo gasp in unison.”

The faintest tilt of his glass, the faintest narrowing of his eyes. “So consider this my long winded way of saying, for you I will indeed loan such a piece. I would be in your debt of course, having such a rare item within my Gallery. We mustn’t forget that debts, my lady, can of course be… cultivated.”

Thessaly Veruna​

 

[Thessaly Veruna]

Her lips parted in the faintest smile, as though he had offered her not a debt, but a secret. The Rakattan name still hung between them like a dangerous carrot. She lowered her gaze just long enough to suggest modesty, though her mind had already sharpened the outline of her plan.

Not her name. Never her name. Let it drift as rumor, as gossip whispered in corridors where lanterns swung low. A mysterious donor, some faceless benefactor. The moment Naboo’s social stage heard of it, Saphira would not endure the shadow of anonymity. Her mother would seize it, hungry to crown herself with the rumoured relic. And when the provenance faltered, when it crumbled into forgery, Saphira would fall with it. Humiliated, diminished. Never knowing whose hand had tilted the crown.

Ravion was perfect. A collector, a voice the haut monde trusted, a man who could seed speculation without ever being seen as the gardener. He did not need to know he was the instrument. In fact, it was better that he did not. All she needed was his willingness to speak the right words at the right moment.

“You understand me,” Thessaly said at last, her tone soft, almost conspiratorial. “It is enough that such a piece be seen. That people wonder. But my name must remain…elsewhere. The politics of family, you see.” She tilted her head, pearls trembling at her throat. “Would you indulge me in this? Let them believe the Gallery is blessed by an unseen hand. What is unseen, after all, draws the eye most of all.”

She let the pause breathe, then added with a curve of her lips, “You alone can make that rumor shine, Ravion. And Naboo will never stop talking.”

The rest she left unsaid. He would never guess the true quarry was not the Republic, nor the nobility, nor even himself. It was her mother. Always her mother. And Thessaly would see her stumble, finally, under the weight of her own pride.

Ravion Corvalis

 

[Ravion Corvalis]

​

The silence that followed was pure orchestration. Ravion let it linger, filling the room with it’s presence, before setting down his magnifying lens with a deliberate click that echoed faintly through the gallery, a punctuation mark to her final words.

“Ah, yes…” he breathed, circling slowly, “The politics of family… only Naboo could turn such a phrase into a kind of religion.”

He came to stand beside her shoulder, close enough that the faint trace of her perfume; which was something rare, floral, touched with spice from…he couldn’t put his finger on where, drifted toward him. He didn’t look at her immediately. Instead, his gaze lingered on the reflection of her pearls in the glass frame before them. “You surprise me, Thessaly. Most who come to me want their names carved into the plaque beneath the masterpiece. But you…” he let his voice dip lower, threaded with quiet admiration, “...you understand the unseen hand. The invisible patron.”

His eyes slid to her then, the faintest curve forming at the corner of his mouth. “Do you know what I find most dangerous about that? Once a such a ghost enters a room, everyone starts whispering its name, even when no one remembers who invited it.”

A pause; then, he added softly. “I can make that happen for you.”

He crossed to the nearby sculpture, one carved from alabaster so thin the light seemed to breathe through it. His fingers hovered just above its surface. “Of course,” he continued, “every illusion has a cost. My art lies in knowing which truth to trade for it.”

He turned, the air between them shifting, more intimate now, less negotiation than confession. “Information,” he said, the word drawn out like an invitation. “Information and a lasting friendship.”

He stepped closer. “Indulge me in knowledge and friendship, and I’ll see to it that your little phantom becomes the talk of every parlour from Theed to Deeja Peak. No one will ever trace it back to you; but they’ll feel what you want them to all the same.”

A slow smile ghosted across his lips, equal parts charm and challenge. “And between us, Thessaly…” His eyes lingered on her just a beat too long, tone softening to something dangerously close to admiration. “I’ve always preferred the artist to the art.”

Thessaly Veruna​