Katie's most recent diary entries are here. Older entries are on the following pages by date:
-Birdie got a call to teach Song in Lewiston
-Ruby got invited to a Summer Party (and asked to help set up as well)
-Solomon wanted to ask about how to deal with his Fetch without telling us anything about his Fetch or story ... so we ended up at Big Nick's getting the "why you should trust your motley" speech. Solomon filled us in about the situation with his Fetch, and some of his Durance, once we got home.
-Picked up a bit of EMT work at the ER, before coming home for archery training.
-Witch Olmstead came to talk with us about the audience with Whispers. Seems she did decide to use Birdie and I as backup, and we decided it would be best to set the location for Fort Katie. Meant the rest of the motley could be there too as "servants", and we got other "servants" to fill out the representation, so that we had at least one person from each Court. We also decided to have Birdie tie the tie around the tree just before the meeting was to take place, so that He'd be forced to deal with both at once.
-Strangely thick mist clogging the city when we woke up. Looked weird, and when we talked to Saber (at Witch Olmstead's suggestion), he said the College had rung the Doom Bell. Something bad was going to happen. Went to confirm with Sam that he didn't have new information, and with Caleb that he'd look after Sam, and then we headed back to get ready for the meeting with Whispers.
-Negotiation with Whispers - He tried to get us to turn on Abtanis and break our Pledge, in exchange for at most some Loyalists, access to an "exclusive" Goblin Market, and the ability to get Him to forward research questions to the Cenobic Library. Sounded like a Demesne, from the way He talked about it. Offered us the Unfinished Doll to absorb the broken Pledge, but didn't have anything to say about the fact that the entire Freehold would be susceptible to Oath and Punishment. Didn't really seem like He wanted to make a deal, He was just going through motions. So when He turned around and asked us to teach Song, combat, or experience with Contracts (asking about our Special Friends). I asked Witch Olmstead to represent us again, and she said we could do it in exchange for the sort of non-aggression that Abtanis has with us. He said only if we could also provide instructors in the Court Contracts. We said no deal, and she postponed our response date for two weeks, after the holidays. He was clearly annoyed at having to wait. Departure pleasantries engaged, and I got a note, delivered by Ade, from Sophie, asking for help defending the Chat Room Hollow. Signaled to Witch Olmstead to rush things along, which she did, and all but Ysenia, Patches, and Ade went to help. 30-ish attackers, 18 left when we got there (through 2 Hollows). Downed everyone, then started stabilizing. Got to about half, despite Solomon prioritizing his own kills instead of triaging the group as a whole. When he insisted I help him, I just healed the most injured of the bunch, who woke immediately. I held a sword to his throat and told him to stay down, whereupon he looked at me with empty eyes and disintegrated. Then the rest of the enemies started to disintegrate as well, dead first but also the living. The only two that didn't were two that Birdie had enchanted earlier, making one a Napoleonic megalomaniac, and the other Oppositional Defiant Disorder. Those survived, though now with a Pledge Birdie didn't make connecting them to her. She has to teach them to be people ("teach them to sing"), while they have to listen to her instruction, give her Glamour, and learn a Contract on their own. On pain of death for them, and a Greater Curse for her. They have 28 days to do it. And bizarrely, the Pledge lines connected not amorphously from body to body, but to her platinum hand. Now I want one. Or I at least want to have been able to keep the one I spent the effort to Heal, on Solomon's request or not.
-Took everyone home. Napoleon signed on to the house Pledge as a Defender, Dynamite signed on as a Guest. Showed them around, introduced them to the beginnings of changeling life.
-Talked Birdie and Solomon out of going to the spa, in spite of the magical fog and the Doom Bell. I get the sense that they're going to make me pay for that later, but I don't know what else they wanted me to do. I didn't even tell them not to go, and I certainly didn't prevent them. I just told them it was a bad idea, and they should really wait for LITERALLY ANY OTHER DAY. And they act like I'm the bad guy. I think it's because they want someone to be a bad guy to work against, and no one else is paying enough attention or cares enough to try to keep them safe despite themselves. Birdie I've come to expect it from. Prymja sometimes too, but he usually helps me talk Birdie out of the really bad ideas (that he didn't start himself, anyway). But Solomon surprised me. I'd thought he was a little more sensible than Birdie and Prymja. Hopefully this will turn out to have just been a one time thing.
Called in to deal with a problem at Summer House. It was worse than I'd thought, and I wish I'd brought Patches. I hope he can forgive me if we make it back. Someone apparently not previously involved in the game is trying to build a Temple made of mist and sand over the top of Summer House. It's deep night out there now, and Summer's daylight is the only thing keeping the mist from getting in. No one knows what will happen if it succeeds. There's a door that it keeps getting through. They've asked us to go through and see if we can do something weird to stop it. I told Sam that he could use my Entitlement to Summon us back if it's needed, but I don't know what that will mean for us. I hope the junior motley can forgive us for bringing them along. I hope that Napoleon and Dynamite stay faithful to Birdie's cause, if they don't find a reason to truly sign on to ours. And I really hope that I can get everyone home safely. I'm sorry, Patches. If we make it back, I'll find someone else to guard the house. You can come with us from now on.
-Approaching the Temple of the Forgotten
-Acolytes met us, but weren't terribly useful. Offered to take us to a cleric. Birdie said she'd like to see a cleric and disappeared. [She found memories of her Keeper being loving, and also of His promise to her parents that her health issues would be over. Then she was sick again, her dad gave her soup, she ate it, she started feeling bad, and she died. He poisoned her, clearly, but was it because he'd always been poisoning her, or because he realized she wasn't the same person?] Ruby said she had things she wanted to know, and disappeared. [She found a lot of memories of her prior life, including verbal abuse by her parents, and physical abuse of her boyfriend for being out late with her. Something in shop class where she really liked one teacher's voice, and really didn't like another's?] An acolyte offered to bring a cleric to us, when I was reluctant to go anywhere without the missing friends. Solomon decided that he needed to find us a way out, and conjured a dream door in the pillar. Went to a multicolored sea, with a beach that was also a metal bowl. So he decided to go through the door, and none of my arguments or iron sword in the way could dissuade him. I should have just hit the door with the iron sword instead of arguing with him, but I also wanted him to be right about it being the way out. He skirted around the sword and jumped in. I gave Prymja the other end of my rope to go in after him. He also failed to talk Solomon into coming back. [Prymja traded his memories of the faces of everyone he's killed, gravely offended, or stolen from, in exchange for the story of how the Princely Suitor was banished - courted the Queen of Sands/Gemmed Queen, forgot and cheated with another Gentry, now the Seductress, Gemmed Queen found Him with the other Lady, demanded satisfaction of a Duty, other Lady demanded fealty for eating Salt in her House, He asked for time to decide, went for a walk, forgot to come back, lost Himself.] So I talked with the cleric, once he showed up. Asked about who'd asked for the Temple to show up in Port Bowen, and he said he couldn't tell me, but he could take me where I could find out. And the rope would reach as long as it needed to, as long as I held on tightly. I asked if Napoleon and Dynamite could come with me, and he said that could work, so we went to find out. And the cleric led me to a pillar, and invited me to step inside. Then I was looking at the multicolored sea, now with the rope wrapped around it several times, and talking to a skeletal Raven standing on the hand of a bloated dead Boy. Only the Bird spoke. I had my iron sword, so I left it hovering in midair. It stuck there, for a couple minutes, so I figured I knew where we were. There were a couple guards in the background, probably to match the two people I brought with me. None of the four of them seemed at all inclined to get involved, which was fine with me. I talked in circles trying to get the Bird and the Boy to give me any useful information, but all They wanted to know was what useless forgotten knowledge I wanted back for personal reasons, and They didn't want to tell me anything related to our actual objective unless I traded memories I can't afford to give up, or things I don't have authority over because I'm not a queen like Prymja is king. Somewhere along in there, the sword fell, which confused me, because it's iron, and I hadn't forgotten about it as far as I can tell, so why did it suddenly decide to participate in gravity? The Bird and Boy were confused that I was surprised, asking what I thought would happen. I said I'd expected it to keep sticking there, once it started. Then I picked it up and put it away. I asked who asked them to be there, and whether Their involvement would be hurting the changelings, because I still wasn't convinced that this bit of weirdness was even the reason they rang the Doom Bell, but other than saying that somewhere along the lines, the Temple's presence would probably hurt someone, They wanted memories for all of that. And the cleric's offhand remark about the Temple not being cruel or dangerous as long as no one did anything really stupid like being rude made me hesitant to ask the direct questions I really had. The Bird and Boy did say that They had no interest in the Game, and didn't intend to get involved, which was a relief. They were content to wait for things to be forgotten, which is fine by me.
-The Sanctum of The Most Sacred Child and His Raven, in the Temple of the Forgotten
I decided to forget about the question of who send the Temple to Port Bowen, and focus on what I actually needed. Doesn't really matter who sent Them, I just needed to get them to go away. Or at least stop distracting the Freehold. So I asked about the Doom, and whether They thought They were part of it. They said that something about "doom" had been forgotten for a long time, but didn't need to stay that way, and apparently "doom" doesn't mean "disaster", but something more like predetermination. Not hard to figure out where the negative connotation would come in, but it's really just "fate". Which I took to mean "don't worry too much about the Doom Bell, because it really just means that something extremely portentious is happening." They assured me that They meant no harm to anyone, that They already knew the contents of all the forgotten memories, that people recovering memories in the Temple kept them unless they organically forgot them again, etc. They did say that They gained some benefit from letting people recover their memories, but I couldn't figure out what that was, and didn't think it would be worth it to try. So I asked about removing the Temple, or at least the obvious access to it, so that the Freehold would be satisfied. Since according to the Bird and Boy, everything forgotten was Theirs, but They needed to exist in a lot of places in order to exercise Their natural dominion over some immobile forgotten things, it didn't seem likely that "getting rid of the Temple" was even a practical thing to attempt. The Bird and Boy didn't seem to be more interested in Port Bowen than in every other place people exist, so I figure as long as the doors were gone, people were fine. And frankly, this is the most accommodating Gentry I've ever heard of, and all Their people are either manifestations of Them as well, or seemed content. So I checked about the removal, and it was going to be very expensive, but removing the Temple Pillars from the human world really wasn't, just one memory. I couldn't give up pre-Durance memories without it affecting Jenny's ability to play her role, so I didn't do that. But They said that if we wanted, my companions could pay. The Bird and Boy looked to Napoleon and Dynamite, and they were wildly shaking their heads, but I'd never considered them paying it anyway. They don't have any memories to spare yet. But when I suggested that my other companions might have something they'd be willing to give up, everyone but Solomon was suddenly there with me. And Nidhogg mentioned we were in Arcadia, which Ruby hadn't realized, but Birdie took in stride. Despite being disturbed about the locale, Ruby was willing to give something up. Eager, in fact. I warned her what the consequences might be, and she was still sure. Birdie brought up that the Pillars would go away when the Mist did. The Bird and Boy said that mist usually retreated with the dawn, but that Someone prolonging it might keep the Pillars there too. Birdie offered to try Diviner's Madness to find out who sent the Mist, and so forth, but I figured that was better done in the human world (so we could talk about stuff not in front of the Bird and Boy). So Ruby gave up the memory.
Birdie had also asked for a way to return to the Temple for more research. Rope was wrapped several times around the pool, then some of it had unspooled for some reason. More of it unspooled when Birdie asked for a way to return sometime later, and the Bird and Boy gave her a string of 5 beads, one per person per visit. I kind of wanted some, but I thought about it, and I didn't want to return to the Temple, so I didn't bother to ask. Then when Ruby agreed to give a piece of her Durance memory in exchange for the Bird and Boy removing the Temple Pillars from the human world in Port Bowen, the Boy opened His mouth all the way around His body and everything, and when He'd closed it again, the rope was connecting straight from me to Prymja. Don't know what happened to the rest of the spool, or who'd joined whom's version of the pond. [check if anything's different about the rope, especially since I think the Bird and Boy were using is as string for the Beads] We'd cleared up the reason we'd come, though, so I asked about Solomon, and found out that he was with a Cleric looking for memories. So I decided to spend some time looking for some of my own. Father Halfred helped me. Found the faces of the people I faced in the Arena, and recovered a name that I can probably use for my Keeper, without Her getting mad, or me having to get hurt, although apparently to say the name properly, I was supposed to hurt myself [would it have hurt if I'd been properly Fire? Was I just too human still? Or was the pain part of the point?] [The Forge-Flame, Lady Fireblood]. Just in case I ever run into Her again. It's one thing to say I'm a completely different person, it's another entirely to not be able to give her a polite form of address. And I'll paint the other faces later. When I got done, Solomon had wrapped up as well, so we regrouped to find our way out. An Acolyte showed us around in what felt like circles for a while, until we came to one weirdly bent over pillar. The Acolyte explained that the Bird and Boy had gone to some effort to help get us back to where we'd come from, and that this door should lead us back. Which seemed unusually kind. I don't know what we did that They liked enough to be doing favors for us, but I appreciated it. I opened the door (like a Hedge Door), and there was a long-forgotten Hollow, complete with spoiled food, on the other side. Everyone but Prymja/Nidhogg walked through. He'd apparently decided not to come with us out of the Temple. He did seem to be leaving, just closed the door behind us. Since it was Nidhogg, and I assumed he was probably up to something, even if I couldn't see any sign of that, I warned him before we left not to do anything that he'd get caught and hurt over. We'll see what trouble he gets up to. Hopefully he's smart enough to keep the level of trouble to his preferred level, and hopefully his self-preservation instinct is as strong as I think it is. In any case, the door on the other side of the Hollow opened to Summerhaus, through the same door we'd left from. Abel Jack was waiting for us. I told him we'd found their Hollow. And the most important tactical info I could come up with, although really, since we were working on the distraction, that wasn't much. Birdie went blackout drinking. Solomon drank with her, less energetically. Napoleon and Dynamite drank to get drunk, but not as thoroughly as Birdie. With Ruby and Summer, if they're smart, but I wasn't paying that much attention. I was more interested in debriefing, so I went to talk to Sam instead.
-Warning to Nidhogg means I've given my responsibility for keeping him out of trouble back to him. And if that gives him the rope he needs to hang himself, well, that will be so sad, now won't it? *sad face* And I intend to do the same for the rest of them. Maybe they'll take care of themselves. Maybe they'll get themselves into enough trouble that I'm simply not able to get them out of it when they ask. I'll of course try to save them, once they ask. My Motley obligations demand it, and I'm actually still happy to do that much. I just might not be able to succeed at that point. And you know what? I'm okay with that. I'm just done being the only one bothering to try to avoid additional hardships. So we're going to see how tough love works. I hope they can survive it.
-Came back feeling outwardly calm, in the center of a maelstrom of emotions I was choosing simply to experience in the background rather than act on. They'll be there when I gets to them. And it actually feels really good! I am at peace in the center of my storm, and those emotions are just flavors I can taste again when I want them. In the meantime, they're floating patiently in the everywhere, waiting for me, like the comforting presence of a few favorite pets.
-talked to Lydia and Chaser, went home and talked to Solomon, actually resolved some things.
-Morning Calisthenics with Chaser and Solomon. Things are working better with him since we got back. Hope that continues. Suggested that he and Ruby should get another car, since they mean we've got 4 drivers for 2 winter-worthy cars. He went out to get one.
-July at Christmas party with Summer and everyone except Winter. Birdie and a male Fairest [name?] did phenomenally well. Birdie's was themed around leaving a beloved who wasn't good for you. I wanted to walk out, but couldn't bring myself to do it.
-Archery contest. Artemis was managing, so she couldn't compete, but I competed against Brad Hill (Summer all-around warrior) in the nonmagical archery contest, and against Lucius (Summer Wizened who specializes in archery) for the magical. Beat Brad fairly soundly, but Lucius beat me, with all the Contracts. Still made a good showing for myself.
-Talking with Ivan Ramdedović (Vernal Advocate or Archivist who specializes in Entitlements), who was playing babysitter/Spring happy-maker, at least from the point he noticed something was wrong. And he asked if it would help to set something on fire, despite the stereotypes. I wasn't sure whether it was better to indulge the destructive urges or not, but I was pretty sure it wouldn't make stuff worse, so I decided to go with it. Then Ivan arranged a firefighting competition somewhere away from the party, so that I could be the one setting the buildings on fire. I decided to go all in, and just become the fire. Ivan had me covered, because while they were setting up, they lit a bonfire for me to sit and contemplate. Once I'd set the first building on fire, I had the Catch satisfied for Control as well, and got to just play in the fire for a while.
-Came back to the party to go ahead and have a shoot-off with Artemis. Talked with Dr. Bowler in the meantime. Nobody else wanted to actually talk to me while I might be upset. I wish that the people who aren't afraid of me would take me seriously, and that the people who are afraid of me would get over it or talk to me about why, dang it. But other than making me want to shut him up for telling me the Spring Court line I'd told Solomon in the past, he did have good points. And by the end of it, I'd figured out what I needed to talk to Sophie about. We'll need to figure out the Entitlement stuff later.
-Talked to Sophie. She didn't really have new ideas about how to deal with loss and grief, other than I was already doing. Which was disappointing. But she did manage to help with the advice I didn't want. She said "if the worst happens, make a nice painting, and hope that you don't have to paint too much of yourself in it," and it really got to me. And I didn't want to cry in front of her, so I averted my eyes and just stood there for a minute, until I remembered that my Mantle shows off all my strong emotions anyway. Then I was laughing at myself, and all the emotions kind of went back where they belonged. It felt better, rather than worse like I'd expected. Which was a nice surprise. Still raw, though. And I'm still not certain I wouldn't rather just dissociate.
-Woke up to find a Christmas Tree and festivities in the living room, and a bunch of presents under the tree. I was pretty sure that it couldn't have been someone outside of the house, but when Sophie denied it, we did start to wonder who could have snuck it in. Turned out, Solomon has been planning a real Christmas for all of us for weeks, and managed to implement it without anyone but the dogs and Winter guards being the wiser! Holy cow! And I wasn't expecting how touched I would be. I didn't realize how much power the holiday for a religion I don't believe in could have.
-Chaser and Sophie had gotten presents for everyone too. Feel a little sheepish that I didn't think about presents or Christmas myself, but it was really nice that we had a real Christmas after all. Maybe the world isn't over, and it's going to be okay after all. And we kind of felt like a family for the first time with all 5 of us, and for the first time in a while regardless.
--Chaser gave me a set of waterproof playing cards that convert from tarot to modern suits by the cunning use of card sleeves (wrapped in fire wrapping paper)
--Ornate and complicated puzzle box from Sophie, with a simple Christmas greeting note on the inside. Really touched by the gift. If she's getting me a box this complex as a present, she trusts me enough to be able to get it right. And since it's a very Winter-ish thing, it's a nice complement. I left the note with the other Christmas cards to show her I'd found it.
--Garden crate of orchid and young roses from Solomon, along with a haiku about me:
Unquenchable Fire:
Sanguine friend who winks at death,
hunting for her joy
He certainly gets a lot out of what he sees of those around him. Including the "hunting" part.
-Went to Dr. Bowler's for dinner, to catch up, and discuss the situation with Napoleon and Dynamite.
-Came home from talking to Dr. Bowler (after something made Ruby uncomfortable), and talked about all the skeletons in the closet, all the other cool things the Senior Motley have done, and stuff. I actually got around to telling people how I've been feeling too, because I felt like they needed to know not to wait for me to stop them from doing stupid things. They took it really well. Thanked me for my efforts, and for telling them how I felt. Solomon led that movement, but they all seemed to be in agreement. And we're going to work on training to work better as a unit. Best Christmas ever? Certainly the best I can remember. Thanks, guys.
-heavy fog, from mundane winter storm coming in
-volunteered at a soup kitchen. Prymja cooked a super-food nutritious meal, then convinced a couple of teenagers to accept help, which consisted of some money and an apartment at the Nicks' place.
-invited Jenny, Georgia, and Chaser's motley over for a snowed in party.
-Group of Mist Hunters came over for sanctuary, along with the female Cuttlecat we met when we were recovering people from the Gemmed Queen. The Mist Hunters said there were groups of Riders killing everyone from the backs of 4-winged bird mounts. Chuckles had left a goblin hand, but hadn't come in yet.
-Built a serious snow fort, then had snowball battles with everyone, including the neighborhood kids.
-Shell Phone rang, and Abtanis gave us info on where to find the people the Mist Hunters had described. They apparently killed some of His people, and He wanted vengeance, but didn't want to try to order us to deal with it. Also gave us some really detailed metallurgical information for no obvious purpose. Got the go-ahead to experiment with the metallurgy, but Sam and Mason changed the "kill the loyalists" plan to a "find out what we can learn from the loyalists and kill them if needed" plan. Had to ask Sam to give me specific orders, though, because he was trying to leave it up to us, and there's no way I can make that call. Mason had no difficulty giving those orders, though.
--He is tailoring His "sweet nothings" to me almost exclusively now. Which was expected, since I'm the only one who answers the Shell. And I'm the one who answers the Shell because my Entitlement will keep me from responding to His murmuring. I also find it flattering, which makes me nervous, but I don't think there's anything I could do to act on it. We're clearly playing with fire here, though, both in terms of our relationship with the Freehold, and in terms of His expectations of Us and our interactions with Him.
-Worked on Tokens while folks casually prepared for our trip tomorrow
-Ruby started a sex-gossip conversation, which apparently made Solomon uncomfortable enough that he ran back outside and started trying to cut down a tree.
*missed notes between 12/26-27*
-went out early to capture the first group. They were more dangerous than we anticipated, and started off with a full-auto fire on 4 or 5 of us, using Hedgespun bullets that somehow ONLY ate through mundane bullet-proof armor. They were also riding winged creatures, which made capture trickier. I got mad and became the fire, which lasted approximately 4 seconds before one of them dropped his previously-unseen water armor on me and extinguished the flame. That was a significant mental shock, and I apparently need to avoid using that form except in places where it's a tactical necessity. Nevertheless, it drew everyone's attention long enough that we could take them down. Prymja scared one pair away, which helped, and Dylan (Dynamite) encased another in earth. Ruby incapacitated the one using the automatic rifle, which probably caused our victory.
-Birdie and Solomon went to their spa day. Doesn't seem to have screwed them up, although Solomon seems to have gotten more than he bargained for, and Birdie DEFINITELY enjoyed it more than he did.
-rescue driving in the snow. The Nicks got hit, for no clear reason, by a couple of people. Other than them providing shelter for vulnerable people, there's no reason to have a problem with the Nicks. So we can't figure out what the point was here, other than driving people to change behavior or leave their shelters. There has to have been some point, but so far it just looks like nuisance behavior. Did run into another unknown changeling on the way to the Nicks' place, which seemed suspicious, based on proximity, especially since Big Nick didn't recognize the description, but at least it seems unlikely that he was actually involved.
-Napoleon has officially adopted his name, and learned about the historical figure it references, as well as some connected memes. And Dynamite adopted a non-nickname, introducing himself officially as Dylan. And since naming oneself is such a big part of becoming part of the changeling community, I hope that this is a good sign for their Pledge success.
-Freehold decided that we shouldn't go out for the afternoon encounter, leaving everyone free to relax, in the strange crowd we made in our house.
-worked on Token
-Realized we needed to spend the night in the Detroit Hedge, so we did. I worked on my Token, and then decided that it might be nice to go visit Den's den for a while. She was wiry and harsh looking, with a sub-machine gun, but friendly enough, and happy to host. It was a bit dingy, with an old-fashioned arch to a dark room (apparently the kitchen, but also kind of a bedroom). Den explained that because the bedroom is the place most people see as their most private sanctum, and it's dark because it's associated with sleep. Also that I'd just see the kitchen, which might be jarring. She did say that some cultures would smell the kitchen, and when I said that that would be nice, I started smelling baking bread. There were some other stranger aspects, though, with the syringes in a corner, and police sirens in the distance. I suppose Den's right that a lot of people expect that from their safe havens, but personally, I'd prefer that keeping the unpleasantness of the world at arm's reach meant a little bit further away. I did love the gigantic, roaring fire, though. Some connections to Hearth there, perhaps? It's certainly a part of a comfortable home, either way.
Needed to sleep, so I broke my rule and slept in the City. Worked out, though, because Solomon came to talk to me. First he was warning me about Alice having built another Hollow door, which I appreciate, even though he was a little more concerned than I felt was warranted. I agreed to tell Mason that it was there, so that he (or the monarch) could warn guards if necessary. Not sure, though, if Solomon's use of male pronouns meant he was treating Mason as one with the monarch, if the male pronoun is just his default, or if he's actually making an assumption about who the monarch might be, but even though I was a little curious, I didn't bother to say anything (what would I say, "you're assuming the monarch's gender but I can't actually say you're wrong about it?"). In any case, after that, we actually got into some important interpersonal stuff, like his concerns about me liking Abtanis, and my willingness to kill people I like. I told him about my Durance, and the fact that I do make judgments about whether I'd kill people if it came to it. I told him I'd kill Abtanis if He turned on us, but also reassured him that even though I'm making snap judgments about life-or-death matters, I'm also constantly reevaluating them. And he said some really nice, and poetic things about me, and what I'm like, and asked me to try to take better care of myself, and avoid locking myself into one way of doing things. I tried to reassure him about my Entitlement and what it does for me, which did seem to help him. And told him that I was working on the self-care thing, and would continue to try to get better at that. Then he watched my dreams, which made me more comfortable about the fact I'd decided to sleep in Detroit after all. All in all, a really good interaction.
I also told him I loved him back. Took some thinking, given how much he scares me (which of course turns to irritation because I tend toward Summer), but after all, how could he scare me if I didn't care? And even with the strange ideas and the tendency to turn my hair grey despite the fact that it's made of fire and doesn't work that way, he's very caring, and perceptive, and he's willing to embrace the scary parts too. He's a different kind of person, and I haven't figured out how to work with him fully yet, so I hadn't said it before, but I'm sure by now that it's true.
-Talked to the City reps about having stand-ins visit in our place while we go to Florida. The City was okay with that happening again, at least this once, although it clearly indicated that we need to avoid making a habit out of it. Offered to let Solomon and Ruby become residents, with a slight veiled threat that if they should do what we've been doing without us present, they'd be in trouble. Then I went back, because I felt like I was neglecting my guests, while the others gathered Glamour Crystals for the trip.
-Sam had called overnight with an update on the Game. The skirmishes largely stopped late night, with Climber making large gains, mostly from Abtanis. Apparently, Abtanis lost quite a lot in the end. I hope the trip to Florida comes soon enough to stop this going the course it looks like. I don't like seeing the Players start moving in earnest.
Got the sense of something ringing, and went to check the Shell Phone. I didn't know it was capable of alerting me personally, but sure enough, it was going off. I let Solomon answer it, because me listening to sweet nothings remains not a good idea. This time it was musings about Hedge plants, though. Abtanis got right to business, and seemed disappointed and aloof. It might have just been because He'd had a rough day, but I actually think it was because He was upset with us for not doing what He'd wanted with the information He passed us. I felt bad about that anyway, and learning from Sam that Abtanis had suffered some significant losses made me feel worse. I told Him I was sorry (when He said He'd get straight to business), which He said He appreciated. He wanted us to help Alice and Guy heal, after they'd been significantly injured. I wanted to say "yes, of course," but I don't get to do things like that. So I said that if they showed up at my door seeking sanctuary, I could hardly turn them away. Which I'd intended as a hint, but He responded coldly, which either means He didn't catch it, or that it wasn't personal enough. Like, I'm sorry I can't just be buddies with you, Abtanis, but you know that you being a Gentry means the Freehold dislikes you on principle! You've been with us for 100 years, this is not new! And I'm sorry that you thought you had more of a hold on us than you can be allowed to have, and I'm ACTUALLY sorry that you misunderstanding us seems to have hurt you, but I don't have a choice here about how to behave! The Freehold will only accept so much from us, and we're treading on very thin ice as it is. Whether we were friendly agents of a foreign power, or your agents undercover, there's still only so much you can actually expect us to do for you!
As for Alice and Guy, things get really complicated. Because they're friends. Maybe they SHOULDN'T be friends, because there is a reason that fraternizing with enemy agents is discouraged, but at the same time, whether you're at war or in a truce, the people on the other side are people too. Choosing to dehumanize them because they're working for people we're fighting with isn't acceptable, and refusing to acknowledge their good points because they're not on our side is dishonest and cowardly. Sure, you don't want to ignore the bad side, especially when they're not on our side, but I'm not doing that. Charlyn was in charge of at least 4 changelings who we know were being kept captive until she released them. But she did release them, on her own initiative, and someone was going to be in charge of them. We know that she is capable of being very cruel. But she's not capricious, and she hasn't shown us that. What I've seen from her is a woman, fae, sure, but a woman, grieving for those she's lost, and finding herself with no clear path forward. She's frosty to avoid letting people hurt her, but she feels quite deeply. What we've seen from Alice suggests that she's certainly capable of viciousness, but she's also capable of deep feelings. And she's a child, who's trying to be enough of an adult that the world doesn't eat her alive. She's been hurt badly in her past, and still expects that from everyone she runs across, but she wants desperately to have people she feels safe with, to belong, to be loved. Guy I don't know well, but what I've seen of him, he's pretty straightforward, able to follow someone else's lead, and seemed decent. Alice likes him, enough to be willing to stick her neck out a little to protect him. Maybe he's a bit of a thug, but we've liked plenty of those in the past.
So when Abtanis asked me to take them in, my first instinct was to say "of course!" But I can't do that, because of politics. Why did He have to become a Gentry? Why did He have to get involved in this stupid Game, where we have to weigh what our actions will mean for the other Gentry breathing down His neck? He doesn't understand that my hands, and my responses, are bound by what the Freehold will allow. He may know it, but He doesn't understand it, or He wouldn't have sounded so irritated with me when I couldn't just agree. I did say that we would house them for a while, to which He said that 24 hours wouldn't cut it. I told Him I'd never kicked anyone out, but He wanted us to commit to keeping them longer if He was going to send them. I can't do that! Not only can I not get away with it without checking with the Freehold, but I also can't keep them here when we would otherwise be going to Florida! And I can't tell Him that we're going to Florida, because there's the chance that He might try to stop us. Frankly, this could be an attempt to stop us. Which would explain, perhaps, why He's sending them to us, but He also sounded really worried, and hurt. I know He's good at manipulating people. I also know that this was really uncharacteristic behavior, and I just don't think it was a lie. I don't know what He gets out of this, but I don't think it was just a ploy. Even if it is really convenient that He only asked us to help the people we know and like. I had to ask Him about Charlyn. He hadn't admitted at first that she was injured. Apparently, she had no intention of coming to seek healing, until Guy and Alice "needed an escort." They were badly enough hurt that that was probably true, but He also admitted that He was using it as an excuse to send her too. Apparently she proved her mettle. It worries me, though, given what I believed her position to be, that she was able to get injured. Either He was sending her on errands she wasn't usually doing before, or Climber got way closer to Abtanis's operations than I'm at all comfortable with. Makes me wonder if I should have asked about Him. Is He also injured, and just not admitting it? I wouldn't blame Him. Doesn't help to admit your weaknesses, unless it's to someone who would shore up those weaknesses. And He's right that we wouldn't. He probably couldn't have come to us even if He'd been so inclined, and we wouldn't come to Him. Even if He did show up at our door, it would be a very different thing to be healing a Gentry, battlefield medic rules or not. I hope He can hold out long enough for us to make it to Florida and back. Things get a lot worse for us if He's taken out before we can find out whether there's a no-victor option for this Game. Because if there isn't, I don't know that the Freehold can afford for one of the Others to win it.
This whole situation is really screwed up, and I don't know how it happened. Every option feels wrong. Alice, Guy, and Charlyn are Loyalists. Freehold Lost kill Loyalists on principle, because they're the bad guys. But these three haven't seemed like bad guys, they've seemed like people like us who are fighting for what they believe is right (and not against us!). Alice and Charlyn are friends, and I feel kindly toward Guy. You support and help your friends, it's just how things are done. But your friends aren't supposed to be working for Gentry, or for anyone else who's potentially antagonistic toward your cause. And you support your Freehold. The community comes first, after only your Motley, if that. I'm so devoted to that idea that I bound myself to an Entitlement based around it, and even when that impinges on my own individual interests, it's very much in line with what I believe in. But you are also supposed to support the weak, help the injured, and protect people who are being attacked by bad guys (which definitively includes Climbers's and Whispers's people). So I'm supposed to kill them, but I'm supposed to fight for them, but I can't and shouldn't work against the Freehold that kind of hates them on principle, and I'm obligated to protect them because they're weaker, injured, and being attacked by our other enemy-bullies. There's no path to take here that doesn't work against some of my really top-level objectives, and I'm actually not sure which objective SHOULD take precedence. So what I DID do was the path that seemed least likely to violate my obligations to the Freehold, while allowing me to help my friends. Even if I couldn't do it without hurting Abtanis's feelings, or without probably pissing off the Freehold as a general population. This fucking sucks. At least I found a path that I'm able to comfortably fight for. I am taking the path that seemed most right, and I can defend that. Just maybe not as loudly as I'd like. These are, in my opinion, people worth fighting for, even if that would ordinarily seem absurd. Six-Months-Ago-Me might well have decided to kill Present-Day-Me for this. Things seemed a lot simpler back then, and you could safely kill any Loyalist you ran across. Maybe she would have had a point. All I'm doing now, though, is trying to help keep people I care about alive, and it shouldn't involve hurting the Freehold, or anyone who isn't a known bad guy, at all.
Maybe the difference is not writing them off for being stupid, by backing a Gentry instead of working against them all. I would have done that six months ago. Even if this particular Gentry HAS saved us (the Freehold) more than once, and never to our knowledge done anything to harm us. It was more obvious back then that all Gentry were bad, and that anyone working with them had made an irredeemable mistake. Now that seems less clear to me, and the uncomfortable part is that I actually can't tell whether Now-Me is corrupted, or whether Past-Me was just naive and oversimplifying things. I just don't have the perspective to be able to be sure either way. Somehow, I came to love Him, not that that's meant anything much in the past. I've only ever chosen to save myself, when the time came to decide whether to make the ultimate sacrifice for someone. It's actually untested whether I would in fact do so now, and I wouldn't for Him, so it makes no difference in the moment. But Damn it Katie, you can't write that stuff down. [Stuff not written: how could I love Someone who's potentially (or actually) antagonistic to everything else I care about? And why does it hurt so much to think about a Gentry losing? Why does supporting Him, when I know that I'd lose everything else I care about to do it, feel right?] He doesn't know, because I couldn't tell Him. I can't afford to admit it in front of people, and I can't afford for Him to have that information either. But His reaction stung, and I couldn't say anything to improve things. I don't even know if it would have. I don't know if His thought processes work such that He would care about anything other than not getting the results He wanted. I couldn't let it matter anyway. That's the worst part of it. I can't speak freely, and I can't fix it, and He may never forgive us for what we've done, or for what we're going to do, and I can't do anything about that either, so I'll just have to do what I can for everyone, and hope that it all works out in the end. If everyone ends up hating me, at least I'll know that I tried. Even if no one around me still thinks I'm on their side, I'll know that I always have been, and always will be. I'll know that I did my best, and if they benefit while hating me, I've accomplished something. I'll have to be content with that.
-Everyone's in the House Pledge. Charlyn and Aiertes (the crocodile) signed on as guards, everyone else as guests. And the goblin's name is Simtin. He's a joker, seems like he could be fun. Used to work for the Nizam.
-I was right about Alice needing more time in Detroit. So I did her surgery there, and then stayed with her while she finished the few hours she had left. She's very worried, but says that Abtanis won't be disappearing if He loses this, and He may have sent them to us to keep them safe for His recovery period. So there's some sort of plan for the future, and perhaps for future collaboration in a situation where we're not in as bad a position if we misread things. So that's something at least.
Solomon remains worried about me. While we were working on Alice, he asked me for help keeping me from getting destroyed by the Game. He was telling me to focus on our new guests as individuals rather than agents of Abtanis. Either we weren't communicating well with each other, or he doesn't quite understand what my problems right now are. Things would have been much cleaner if I didn't see them as individuals. I don't know how to "do what feels right" at the moment BECAUSE I see them as individuals. Obviously, I'm going to be trying anyway, because what else would I be doing other than what I think is most right in the moment, but I don't know what's coming of it. And right now it feels like what IS right is less tactically important than what LOOKS right. It won't help much to do what feels right if it gets us killed in the end. I don't expect anything to be there waiting to judge my immortal soul when I die. I don't really have a vision of what I think does happen, but I'm more inclined to believe in the whole "return to the collective pool of energy" theories of philosophy, personally. So yeah, I'm willing to die for what I believe in, but it's because the thing I'm dying for is more important than I am, not because of some eternal reward. If my death isn't going to help anything, what would be the point of dying? And dying for being perceived to be a loyalist won't help anything. I don't know. Maybe I just wasn't getting what Solomon was trying to get me to do.
I think he's probably right about the Game caring what your intentions are. Birdie ended up a Player for a while because she wanted to be. Prymja and I have been manipulating things just as much, but because we do it from a perspective of being the chaos in the system instead of having a place at the table, we never have been. I just don't think that there's anything more that I can do to avoid my actions being relevant to the Game. I'm also pretty sure he's right about me being the glue holding us all together. As befits the Matriarch, ironically enough. Pretty sure She didn't mean to give me that Title for real. Pretty sure it stuck anyway. Maybe that's the Mantle someone would get for consuming my heart?
-Charlyn said that Soren wasn't dead, which shocked Prymja into a sudden and protracted meditation session, prompting Ruby to come get me. I'd just finished stitching up some of Alice's deeper wounds, so I had Ruby and Solomon stand guard while I checked on Prymja. He was fine, just shocked a bit. I told Charlyn that I had a hard time believing Soren wasn't dead, since I'd seen his heart ripped out and destroyed. Prymja said he was sure of it, because he'd taken something from Soren as well. Might have preferred that he not reveal that to her, but she did tell us that that was not an uncommon thing to be doing, and did suggest death. We mused on how Climber might have created something like Soren to replace him, or used what was left of the shell to make something new.
*missing section*
I realized that Solomon had a point about making sure that what I was doing for our visitors was done for them as individuals rather than because of who they work for. Which makes things even trickier, because I'm also unreasonably interested in the outcome of the Game. I just can't afford to participate in it. So since I needed to focus on why I wanted to help the individuals, as well as because it helped me with the loophole to get around Mason's forbiddence, I decided to talk to them as individuals, try to get to know them better, to make sure that if it's possible for it to happen, I'd want to heal them for my own reasons. I started with Alice because I know her best already, and I've always found her complexity, and the sad puppy dog undertones she has going on, really intriguing. I also thought she'd be the best chance of being able to satisfy the Catch. She was happy to talk, and more open than she had been before, mostly because it was too much energy to keep her guard up, I think. Started by talking about what she liked, "favorite things" style. She likes power, feeling effective, feeling appreciated. Feeling like she's got stuff she's good at, and it matters. Somehow we started talking about her human life, and I do think I was right after talking with Guy, about Abtanis's people all being rescued from suicide attempts. In her case, He let her have her death, though, He just made sure that it wasn't the end for her. I don't know how that works, probably she just wasn't actually dead, but I guess she got the closure she wanted. She has no interest in her human family, or anything about her past life. That life is as dead as she could make it. Personally, I want them to have mourned for her, but I don't know that I'll look into it to find out. It wouldn't be helping her, after all.
-didn't talk about what she was doing in harm's way, but did say that they were all surprised by how dangerous the mercenaries were, but they certainly took more damage than they intended. Their side has time manipulation, and can read the future, but can't read fate, and that's another issue altogether apparently.
-We did a little bit disappoint them, because they were really hoping that we'd behave like we had in the past, and kill the mercenaries. Alice, at least, wasn't mad that we didn't, though. She understood that we don't work for them, and that we couldn't have handled it. I did explain to her where the Freehold changelings were coming from, and how difficult it is for Song of Sixpence to act right now. She understood, and didn't blame us for it. I don't know that she can speak for Abtanis, but hopefully that holds true for Him as well.
Alice also told me that Climber has Whispers in His back pocket, and the mercenaries were Climber's people, even though Whispers is the one paying them. She was adamant that I not tell anyone, besides the one person on our side who's like our tactical genius. I'm assuming she didn't mean to hide it from my motley, and I'm going to have to probably tell at least two people, just because Sam and the Winter Monarch probably both actually need to know. They're also theoretically both really good at this stuff. Sam needs it because he's watching. Winter needs it because they're in charge and this sort of espionage crap is actually what the Court specializes in (minus the Gentry stuff). We did already know that Climber was manipulating Whispers, and I told her that. The degree of that control matters, though. If Climber is able to count Whispers' employees as His own, does that in fact mean that we're already down to two? What would happen if Abtanis lost? Is it over right then? Climber, Whispers mercenaries. Tactical genius, Motley?. Hopefully I'll know what I meant if I reread these later.
-Alice expects to be punished for telling me these things. I threatened to challenge Him to a dual, which admittedly was a bit reckless and boastful, but she insisted that it wasn't appropriate anyway. She knows what she's getting into when she goes against His wishes, and when she chooses to do so anyway, she does it because it's worth it. She enjoys being able to make that choice, even. And it makes a difference whether you're doing it because you're messing up, or because you have a good reason for it. He'll still punish you either way, but you get credit for having a reason, and for thinking independently. So when it's still a problem, the "punishment" is mostly showing you why it hurt Him. Sounded very intimate, and probably unpleasant just because He's sharing too much, regardless of content, but the objective seemed to be understanding and avoiding it in the future. At least from her description. That really doesn't sound that bad. "The light is worth the pain." And presumably, if you're actually right, He wouldn't need to punish you, even if it's not what He expected. She mentioned that in this case, since she thought it was really important for us to know this stuff, that it wouldn't be that bad for her, and whatever it was would be worth it. It occurred to me that that might actually be something He had in mind anyway. The Gentry may be restricted in what He can say to us, and the Goblin can't really give the information away for free. But Alice has neither of those problems. So she can share what Abtanis can't, and if that's useful to Him, He may not need to punish her at all. I told her that He'd given us things before for way less than they were probably worth, because He wanted us to know them. I don't know that I'm right this time, but I am sure that she's right that we needed the information. So hopefully He won't just get pissy at her, because I still might need to dual Him for that, whatever she says.
-Alice finally got around to returning my admission of love. She thought it might make things harder for me. Hah! I'm glad that my victory grin didn't bother her. She didn't realize that she'd satisfied the Catch yet, she just thought that I'd helped her find the loophole I told her I'd needed at the beginning. I healed her once, and she asked if I could do it again. When I told her about the Catch, she asked be to do it again, while holding my hand. Did something really funky with an unidentified magic, and pulled some of my molten glass into her hand. Then all the rest of the wounds closed up, and I know my Contract wasn't THAT impressive. Apparently, she learned how to draw on the actual Faerie Star that her Throne relates to, and use its fusion to close her own wounds. She's not sure exactly what it was that she did, although we're pretty sure it wasn't Spring, and I really don't think it was Lizard's Tail. It sounded too much like Spring for that. I'm wondering at this point how to classify what she even is. Pretty sure she can't be Gentry, but is this just something a Knight can do? Is it a Goblin Contract? Is there something in her Title that makes her special like that? I'd like to know, but it doesn't really matter. She's still Alice. And I have proof that she loves me. She's going to see if it's possible to use that ability on anyone else, starting with Charlyn because she'd be more likely to survive it. Since the fusion part's really, Alice isn't certain that the worst-case of a failure would actually be "no effect." And she may mention to the others what the Catch for my Contract is, if that wouldn't spoil anything. In the meantime, I can move on to step two, where I try to heal anyone else...
Omen+Board - pile of Tarot cards falls out of the cabinet, with a black curtain hiding the path the the Test. Curtain tears at Birdie's touch to reveal a straight road with too many roadsigns, none of which the road follows. On touching the cards:
Seven cards preserved (some duplicated)
Oath and Punishment + Board - Cabinet (in non-existent capital Cyrillic writing) contains book: The Rules (readable in all languages)
-Dream in Kel, with the Pauper. Watched the Fall of Kel, where Ranlight Fearchaser sent a plague to torment the people of Kel until eventually they caved. King of Dusk killed the King of Dawn, went out to speak to the Gentry, and the remaining living people disappeared and were never seen again.
(1/3-1/4 - Sears Port Trip - 4 changeling Freehold, Alanna the Summer Queen is goddess of coming back from unlikely odds, or some such.)
(late 1/4)
-Spoke to Oath and Punishment. Freaking speeding promise was a bigger deal than the Banishment Pledge. Told O&P I would help a couple keep their marriage vows. Changeling husband's name is Joseph Knight. Help him avoid temptations, help them both keep things working, till Death do them part. But I only have to kill one of them if they're going to screw up and I've chosen to.
Goblin Fruits brought to Florida
-Around DC, we noticed we were being followed by several cars with changelings in them (one per car). They looked really serious, but weren't doing anything. Prymja wrote his phone number on a sign and held it to the back window, and one of them pulled up to read it and called. Told us to pull over to a Christian school's parking lot, so that representatives of the Twin Freeholds could speak to us.
-Talked to representatives of the Red/Blue Freehold of DC, and the normal seasonal Freehold of Baltimore. The reigning monarchs both came, which was kind of cool. Blue King was [name], with a Red representative named [name] whom [Blue King] kept forcing to explain his Court and Freehold. Once they determined we weren't there to cause problems, they were friendly enough, but I still don't understand why everyone was so upset about us driving on the one big highway in the area.
-Phoenix-based Gentry calling Himself Ash-Born jumped out of the back windshield of a police car, after causing all the other traffic to disappear. Same one that made the Bloods sign and threw a burning feather at us. Wanted to know how I left the Fire-Wrought's service, and was interested in trading a "tidbit" that I would be interested in about Her. He said He could smell the connection from my brand, because He would recognize that particular burned flesh anywhere. We negotiated a Pledge where we agreed to a modified Good Neighbor Task along with trading my story for His tidbit, and He won't try to contact us without first notifying us that He wants to speak through Birdie's Mailbox. Turns out, She is upset that I'm gone, and wants me back. She's created a new Arena, and is training servants (and "throwing out the chaff"), for the purpose of sending them to retrieve me. She's also pissed at Jenny for not dealing with the problem for Her. I made some snide remarks about Her use of proxies revealing flaws in Her character, in the hopes that He might egg Her into coming to deal with me Herself, but we'll see.
-Jacksonville Florida was totally not touchy, unlike DC. They have two feuding Freeholds, but still welcomed out-of-towners (or at least the Autumn Courtier Tammy did). Shared some stories with Tammy and her motley, shared Memetic (and 20 minutes later, Antidote) with the patrons of the bar Eclipse, and all in all, it was a pleasant night.
*untimely recorded section*
-Got to Miami, set up garishly golden Hollow outside of the Magic City casino. Met a Winter Courtier named Lee inside. Met a homeless man in the parking lot the next morning, and then got accosted by a group of Summer Courtiers wanting us to convince them we weren't there to cause trouble. Since we were, that was a little difficult, but they went away without gunfire. Took photos of us... and who cares? What, take our pictures! It's not like we're not on CD covers and stuff! Asked us about the Silk's Maw, who was supposedly a Gentry in the area, although not one Rosa had warned us about.
-Used Diviner's Madness to find out how to go about meeting Order's Diviner. The chandelier started writing things to us, which added a LOT of extra detail to the answers. Found out we'd need to go to Autumn's university that evening, and found out how to find Him once we got there, sort of. Side trip to Vischi Spring's beach first. Got to drive a Lamborghini with Birdie, with the old man who owned it loving the whole thing. While we were there, a member of True Spring showed up "conveniently" on the side of the road. We picked him up, he covertly exchanged contact info, and we dropped him off. Also met an Autumn Courtier, who invited us to a meeting with the Autumn Court that evening (timed perfectly to allow us to follow it up by meeting with Order's Diviner). Also got to see Vichi Spring. They all tried pointedly to avoid us, which was weird for a Spring thing.
-Met with a sculpture speaking for Order's Diviner, while a bunch of Hedge crocodiles contemplated trying to eat us. He told us how to end the Game: with a sacrifice of a humanoid life, while beseeching the Pledge to end, done by anyone who had a connection to the Game. Didn't technically have to be a suicide, but the Game Pledge prefers it, as the way to play fair. In exchange, we agreed to publicly accuse Casey James, a Summer Courtier, of working for the Silk's Maw. He gave us a memory of Casey James talking to Her, which He said we could use as compelling evidence.
-Using Order's Diviner's memory item:
-shake in circle precisely 5 times
-Game info
-end it by convincing/tricking remaining players into agreeing to end it
-doesn't know why this clause is there: ANYONE who is related to the game can bring it to an abrupt end. Go into Hedge of location, scrawl message onto something permanent (chisel on rock is traditional). Must contain plea for cessation of play. Must list why it is to be ended. To make Pledge notice, must make sacrifice (traditionally life of the person making the plea, but doesn't have to be). Sacrifice must be death/life of person, or equivalent. Failed sacrifice causes entity behind the Pledge to look unfavorably. OD thinks there is a conscious entity behind the Pledge, and you are asking it to kill itself. Very bad manners.
-Ruby snuck out that night, and went to gamble in the changeling-only portion of the casino. Got into a wager she couldn't keep matching, wagered something she couldn't pay, then refused to make amends, threatened to kill everyone if they wouldn't let her leave, tried to kill them, and wouldn't stop fighting until she was dead. We woke up to a hole in the Motley Pledge. Barged into the casino, then I forced my way into the Hollow, and Lee and another Winter companion explained what happened. Sounds like there wasn't really anyone to blame except Ruby, although Lee was also mad that Deathless Ivan kept raising the stakes.
-Met with True Spring, in a hidden Hollow in the Everglades. They told us that they'd help with our violent plans if they could, but their ability to do so was mostly knowledge. Did tell us that Silk's Maw was an Autumn Court fabrication, making the arrangement with Order's Diviner really funky. Planned a way to get at Vishi Spring, and a way to meet with Summer. Ended up deciding to talk to Summer first, then high-tail it to Spring and flee the city before the fires broke out. True Spring hired Autumn to make sure that Summer's goons couldn't get to Spring to kill everyone in the bar before we got there for the precision shot.
-Met with Summer, under the guise of talking about Ruby, and reconciling with the Freehold after her misstep. Started by toasting her. Everyone joined in on that. Then Grandfather Thunder started grilling us, asking for promises not to cause problems for him and the Freehold. I was unfriendly from the start, but we weren't able to promise him that we wouldn't cause trouble, and he wasn't willing to accept anything less.
*end untimely recorded section*
Hedge Trip to find a location for Birdie's Hedge city (after attending 1 class)
-collected a bunch of blue/green grass glass, suitable for clothing, from the mountain-scape, along with a bunch of ridiculously green lichen that Prymja said tasted really good (earthy, nutty, coffee aftertaste, leaves a strong acid feel on the tongue like vanilla extract).
-higher up, reached a cliff overlooking the super active fighting-for-territory Hedge, with red arches that led somewhere interesting, and that Solomon said felt like the Hedge air where we'd run into the mercenaries.
--Ran into some cool insects we decided to call Pixie Wasps. Looked like a paper wasp nest, but they're like 3 inches long, 1 inch wide, and carry weapons made of the same red stone as the arches. Looked wickedly sharp, like Hedge obsidian. They were very social, as in operated in an extremely organized society, and we were able to persuade them into allowing us passage without either side hurting the other. They knew fae, and knew we could be trusted to keep our word, and since we did in fact keep it, agreed that we might be able to meet again to discuss trade in the future.
-Ran into some Weeping Eyes, but promptly scared them off. They know better than to mess with things that are both threatening, and also entirely unconcerned by the threat they might pose.
-Found a really dangerously hot desert-scape full of beautiful crystals. Birdie decided that was good enough for her, so we started work immediately. With wards, to give us a sun shield. Unfortunately, a group of Hedgebeasts quickly came running in, and were greatly concerned with our reshaping the crystals. Turns out, the crystals were the corpses of the Parthenoceps' (their name for themselves) dead, which grow into these fantastic structures once they pass. There was a big, lumbering, winged one ringed by a number of smaller, six-legged rugged mammals, all of which had bright blue crystals covering them. They pled with us to stop, though saying that we couldn't fix it once it was done. I took over Birdie's efforts to try to gently release our creative energies to allow the crystal to reshape itself the way it started. It worked partway, not perfectly. Then I heard a small whisper, saying "un cadeau pour mon amie," and a portion of the crystal dissolved and regrew into the whole. It looked to my eye EXACTLY like the original. I believe I now know how to use the first clause of Hours, and that a certain someone is a confusing sort of liar. I said "merci", though I'm not sure if there was anything there to hear me. The large creature said it was a good attempt, which was probably all I was getting in terms of approval under the circumstances. We wished each other well, she went into the desert to die and grow her own crystals, and the rest of us followed her suggestion to keep going looking for some "hungry" crystals she said was nearby.
--The Gemmed Queen showed up, apparently looking for the King of All Beauty. Making all of us SUPER comfortable. She was friendly, which was a lot more of what we wanted than it could have been. She said that neither She nor He had any claim to the area we were considering building in, and we wished each other well. And all gave a sigh of relief when She was gone. We decided to build there anyway. She said it wasn't anywhere near Her Demesne, and She had no reason to believe that the King was about.
-Back at 5 PMish, call from Nickle asking to discuss interesting magic issues with the police.
--Solomon introducing himself to Nickle as Germain O'Hare
--Jacob Tarmin - Birdie's new cultist - got discovered by Nickle
--kidnapping case fell through the cracks when the Dream Poison problem was going on. Deputy Superintendent Michelle Best stole it and buried it, when it shouldn't have been her unit. Also the Latin Eagles and Ashland Riot is about to have a gang war, but there's guys from both groups getting together and not doing crimes, in a really suspicious way. Wants us to look into those, if he can find leads on the kidnapping case. Had names, photos, etc. for the gang issue.
-Investigated Felicity Orosco's dreams since they purged dream poison but then the dream suddenly changed, and the dream tried to drag them in. Went back, and the same dream was going on again. Recurring dream, sure, but suspicious in the context. Warm ocean, small boat, family snorkeling. Girl found a train figure. Looked like an eyeball to Prymja. I took it from the girl using a dolphin disguise, the eyeball train tried to make me swallow it, but I gave it to Prymja and traded the girl for something else. Then he demanded that it give us some useful information or we would destroy it, and it boiled the ocean and air, forcing Prymja out of the dream. A female voice with an islander accent told us the girl was cursed for taking the train figure from a long-dead people who lived on an island off the coast of Florida. She's taking payment from the girl in her dreams, or She'd take the girl herself if we interfere further. Only other way for the girl to atone would be to return the trinket to the ocean where it came. Doesn't have to be the girl who returns it, but if we try to keep Her from taking payment one way or another, She'll just take it out on us too. Said we had no business being in the girl's dreams if we weren't bound by Horn and Bone, but She was willing to talk with us further the following day if we intended to get the trinket returned, either by manipulating the girl, or returning it ourselves, as long as we didn't try to interfere with Her uses for the girl. Solomon wants to return the train. Birdie and I were (embarrassingly) on the same page with thinking this is too big of a thing to want to take on as our problem, especially since the Gentry's focus is pretty narrow, and based, apparently, on an old oath. Prymja was mostly focused on how She'd blown him up, and how he'd like to punish Her for it, but since She's the type of person who can apparently blow us up, he's a little reluctant. She did welcome us back, though, if we left Her Dream Poison alone. Said She thought people like us would find it comfortable, if we could stomach the idea enough to try it. I tried not to argue with Her, while also not agreeing to anything in particular. I just wanted to understand Her terms, and we could discuss what we wanted to do later. She wouldn't give us a name unless we come back tomorrow, though. Not sure what She's planning, but I'm pretty sure it's not a good idea to get too involved here, if we can only convince Solomon.
-things!
-tracking device on car
-helped Prymja get $750 to buy random WWII paraphernalia, which included a hat from an Arcadian soldier.
-Solomon flirted with disaster again talking to the triangle creature in the Metamorphic Dream, and the rest of the motley staged an impromptu intervention involving tattling to Witch Olmstead and Ted.
-arranged shipping with Darryl for the train and the sickle to get to Miami. Arranged with Casey to receive it on his end.
-Investigated Prymja's hat.
-Called Jaia Greenhand, of Miami Winter Court, so I can get my contact info to Jeremiah Sleet, the Winter King. Explained what I wanted, sorta dared the king to call me or handicap himself, and hung up on good terms.
-funeral for Jason - Birdie's performance of her song went very well. Event went well, once the regular black-and-somber mourners figured out that the New Orleans bright-colored-wake folks were also being respectful and mourning in their own way.
-goblin market trip so Birdie could sell directions to Lucent, and Prymja sold a few more plots in Detroit. Saw Charlyn from a distance, but no one else from Abtanis's side of things.
-evening restaurant meeting with Andre (scheduled by an unknown man using a voice changer) established that we're not at odds with each other, set groundwork for contact with his past-reading contact, and then the meeting got interrupted by a gang fight. Voice changer person had set up the meeting at the same place as the big negotiation between Ashland Riot (with Cody leading) and the Latin Eagles (except apparently two separate factions thereof). Christian Ocampo and Ronaldo were leading the two factions, and THEY got into a heated argument. When it looked like that was about to come to blows, Prymja went to speak with them to tell them to tone it down in public, they DID, motioned to the guards to stand down ... and the guards started shooting, looking confused. Jayden was there with the Latin Eagles, and we initially thought he must be the one up to something, but then Prymja noticed that the server, who'd been afraid of folks having too high of an alcohol tolerance according to Solomon, and who registered as supernatural, was also looking on like the arsonist watching his work at the kitchen door. Which would have been really useful, except that then Prymja decided to cut his head off for being a kinslaying oathbreaker, instead of us taking him in for questioning. Meanwhile, I'd realized that I didn't actually NEED to do any fighting, when what I actually wanted to do was prevent the chaos someone was trying to cause. So I healed Cody when he went down, and sent him home with Andre. Solomon fetched Christian for me, and Jayden asked if I was collecting, and when I said I was, he threw Ronaldo at me to tend as well.
-They therefore made it to the ambulances stable, Christian was conscious, and only random unimportant guards died. Someone threw a lot of magic around, because all of the guards were radiating, but it seemed that probably that was the kitchen worker's doing, because Jayden actually seems not to have done anything wrong. He was there, by his report, just because something big was happening, Christian and Ronaldo wanted more backup, and he thought it would be interesting to be there. They were apparently expecting more than just Cody, despite Cody being the only one agreed upon. He didn't know why we were there, I told him that I didn't know why we were there, and neither of us knows why all this happened.
-Prymja changed his face so that Jason Vain wouldn't be arrested for murder, we gave statements to the police (along with a sketch of Prymja's new face), to keep the heat off of Prymja or the gang leaders that actually didn't do anything. Explained most of the real situation to Wines, though.
-Prymja went to talk to Oath and Punishment to find out more about the broken oath he'd killed the guy over. Found out that the broken oath seems like wasn't actually the dead man's oath, but a set of 5 Ashland Riot gangsters. Two confirmed dead, killed by the oathbreaker, one being Anton Cardoso who's apparently alive, and probably the oathbreaker, and two other possible suspect if he's not the one. Damone Grant and Anthony Garner confirmed dead, within the last week and a half, and Wines didn't know it. Wym Lucas and Noah Freeman are the other potential suspects. The dead guy was Karl Garicia, who wasn't actually involved, except that he may have been possessed by "Anton" in order to break the oath, and was likely possessed by "Anton" during this gunfight situation. Probably the reason he was registering as supernatural. Out of Ashland Riot leadership, the only ones missing are apparently Cody (who "Anton" tried to kill), and Babtiste, the actual head of the gang. Now I just need to know who it was (ostensibly from Ashland Riot) that arranged to have a healer there to prevent the killing and subsequent gang war, and why.
-Prymja used the Chariot to find Anton Cardozo. Turns out he's not dead. Led us to a suburban row house, where we met with Bartolo of the Italian Mafia (or Roger, if you prefer his wife's name for him). He didn't seem to know anything about Anton, although he told us to "give him his regards" if we saw him, mobster pun intended.He had a magic dog that wasn't actually a dog. I suspected it was a Fetch Beast. The cat was also a "secret" according to Birdie's Eyeball, as was a mirror, later three mirrors.
-used the evening to spy on Bartolo's dreams (he's not lucid, but he is a chessmaster, I suspect), and then go talk to Anton in his own dreams. "Anton" who's still around is almost certainly the Fetch, killed the Changeling (could technically be the other way around, but I doubt it), and is a real menace. Probably wants ALL of the local crime leaders dead, so he can take over as the shadowy Godfather behind the scenes. Or Kaiser Sose, rather. More like that. Tried to talk him into quieting things down. Then when we left his dreams, we went immediately to our higher-ups (Mason and Wines, so far), to tell them everything. They're going to kill him. Shocker there! But seriously, this guy needs to die. Quietly, and out of the blue. Like Winter does best.
-called Andre to try to get him to get us in touch with the Man Behind the Voice-Changer. He says he'll ask. We'll see where that goes.
-Called Jayden. Arranged a meeting to have a frank discussion in the afternoon. He seemed unexpectedly nervous to actually come over, but was still willing to do so. Meantime, Birdie tried to deal with her fear of birds to get in touch with Fang and Talon, and Solomon asked Sanjay over to talk about hedgespinning vs. Solomon's Metamorphic Dream stuff.
-negotiation with Jayden was largely unproductive. Interestingly, he seemed unexpectedly empathic when he realized that the changes that were coming made me sad.
-Letter to Keeper, written by Fae side, in hopes that speaking in Her language might actually get through to her.
Dearest Mother,
You’re high Order, while I am extremely high Chaos. It would not work for me to serve you. The brightness you see that so impresses you and others, would stifle to nothing in the environment you thrive in. Your Servant equates my service to the changeling Freehold to one claiming to dedicate themselves to tending an anthill. Perhaps you and your kind world consider that a waste. I would say that nothing is wasted, as all of the potential remains unscathed. However, service to you, in light of the extreme incompatibilities between yourself and myself, would destroy any potential greatness, leaving nothing but an unsatisfying mediocrity in its wake. My pride forbids me from allowing that, and my sense of artistry rages against the idea. Worse than that, however, the act of trying to make it happen anyway would speak extremely poorly of you, Lady Mother. To persist in trying to demand my direct service would be a contemptible act. I have no desire to serve where I am not needed, I cannot serve where I am not valued for what I actually am, and I will not serve one whom I cannot respect. I do not believe you to be one who deliberately blinds Herself to the true nature of what She has, and I truly hope that you will not disappoint me now. I would prefer that we find an option calling for neither death or demise on my part, and I do not seek to proclaim myself your enemy, but if we cannot find a solution you will accept that demands neither, then so be it. My lines are drawn, and I will not cross them. I hope this letter finds you well, and that our future interactions may produce a more mutually beneficial outcome.
- Signed, one whose proper Titles remain unclaimed
Arena-Game
(Mandag (Máni's Day), Tirsdag (Týr's Day), Onsdag (Odin's Day), Torsdag (Thor's Day), Fredag (Frigg's Day) and Søndag (Sól's Day).)
"I don't think they make a 12-step program for Contract addiction."
"Ookay, I'm gonna fold it up real quick and put it back, before I spontaneously become boring!"
"I don't know how to write peanut butter.
"Sometimes when you play a crazy person, you have to make bad decisions."
"Can I get a fuck yeah!" "Can I get a tourniquet?"
"Can I fall upon him like the wrath of an angry god?"
"And I bet he wet himself in his mind."
"I am an attention whore! I have derangements to prove it!"
"I have so many band-aids."
"Maybe it's because they respect cabinet doors so much that they think you're like, slut shaming them or something."
[OOC] "I would buy black market illegal [course] credits if I could."
"I'm not playing her as Lawful Stupid, but I am playing her as Lawful Overcompensating."