RP Time? You betcha!

[shipwreck_light]

"Lucien? What did I tell you about running off on your own?"

Somewhat unsurprisingly, his son didn't answer him with more than a grin. And a splash, once Claude had drawn closer.

Leave it to any child of his to throw off his nice new boots just to stick his feet in the first likely looking stream that came along.

It wasn't even as if they'd gone that far out of town, but away from the roads, from the other sorcer-sorts and Aethies, even the breeze felt calmer, though it had hardly caught to much all the while they'd been walking. Claude being glad they had any at all, as hot as it had been the past few days.

The storm the night before had left lacy scatters of twigs and leaves and knocked down spider webs. Clean and still damp, the leaves overhead and tangled in the grass, they looked pieces of stained glass. And the trees, when they nodded, they sounded clear as harp strings with nothing else to cut the sound.

Out of farmland use and the whiles of any humans at all, the stream had been left so clear, so delicious looking. Just begging for some little blond imp of a boy to come along and kick his heels in it.

Well, one already had. Claude didn't bother with another sigh. He pulled his shoes off and laid them in the stones at his side, stretching lazy as he reached his own toes towards the glittering surface.

And promptly jerked back with a yelp. "Child of mine? That's /cold/."

"I know," said Lucien. "I think it feels nice."

"Maybe if you're part bear. I've always halfway figured, you know."

They had some teasing hums between them and Claude crossed his legs, feet now on the warm pebbles along the bank where they damnwell belonged.

"I think I got that from your side of the family," his son suggested after a while. "Anyway, why do you think it's like that? I don't hear anybody around."

"That wasn't tagging along?"

"Well..." The boy knitted his fingers in his hair, tugging himself a wingtip curl along his temple. "I think I'd only notice Nene if she was /gone/."

"And as for our new friends?"

"They couldn't have gone far. They know we have candy." To which, he nodded. Ever so sure of himself.

Ah, children. Children had gotten him this far with their self-assured beings. And children had found him what was really a rather strange clearing on closer inspection. The stream wore deeper through some places in the grass than others, showing shifts of rock, glints of moss and tree roots sneaking by. It divided the clearing just about cleanly in half.

Besides, on the edge of the forest easing back into being, a great, old ash stood.

Covered in tiny flowers. Pink and violet and hints of white. All of them, growing in streaks as if the bark had long ago turned to soil, though the tree seemed healthy and strong otherwise.

Besides.

"Papa," said Lucian, voice hushed. "There aren't any birds here, are there?"

"No," Claude answered after a moment. "It's just you and I and /a bunch of stinkers who ran off from us/."

"Oh, so that doesn't include me?"

"Child of mine."

They had a few more hums, there in the quiet of the clearing.

There, before something very strange and very faint began to creep along Claude's Aether lines.

It felt like being tickled almost. Anyway, it made him smile. Lucien too.

And next, there his son darted off again, racing over the grass and into the middle of the clearing, where he stood staring into the sky and whistling. Expecting a giant Gust to come sailing down in the form of a giant bird? It might just be that.



Welcome!

Note that anything your characters do in the clearing may result in posts back of things happening around them, even if these aren't exactly invited. Something's lurking around here, and it wants a snack!

Feel free to bring your own fairies, ghosts, mages and seriously confused regular people.

Comments

Re: Conall and Yuyan

[isana]

"How do you ever get used to this?" asked Conall. "I hate not knowing where I am, or if I'll come back, or--"

"Shh!" Yuyan held a finger up to her lips. Someone was crying from not too far off, and as she followed the sound, Conall in tow, she discovered a young girl, all by herself, tears streaming down her pale face and plastering tendrils of red hair to her cheeks.

Somehow, she looked oddly familiar, like that lady she'd met at the fountain.

"Excuse me," Yuyan said, crouching down beside the girl, "but is everything all right?" She produced a handkerchief from her sleeve, offering it shyly.

Re: Conall and Yuyan

[bookblather]

Summer looked up, accidentally met the woman's eyes, and dropped them immediately, shoving herself backwards. "I'm s-sorry," she said, stuttering and hating it. "I d-didn't mean to b-be a b-bother."

Re: Conall and Yuyan

[isana]

Oh, poor thing, Yuyan thought. "You're not a bother at all," she said, and meant every word. Except for the occasional cursory glance in their direction, nobody seemed to notice.

She decided to offer the handkerchief again. "Is this your first time here?" she asked.

"I told you it was scary," Conall muttered. He settled down just behind her, coiling his tail around her knees.

Re: Conall and Yuyan

[bookblather]

Summer took the handkerchief, shyly, and still without so much as looking at their faces. "Y-yes. Where's here?"

Re: Conall and Yuyan

[isana]

"Well, that's the problem, usually," Yuyan said. "We don't know either. But sometimes we'll open a door or turn a corner and find ourselves in a completely different place. It's happened to me at least four times already."

"This is my second," added Conall. "Anyway, what's your name? I'm Conall, and this is Yan." He looped an arm through Yuyan's, drawing her to his side.

Re: Conall and Yuyan

[bookblather]

She sniffled into the handkerchief, and raised her eyes to collarbone level. The boy-- Conall, he said his name was-- he was a naga, which was all right, she'd met a few and they were all really nice. The girl, Yan, she looked just plain human. It was probably all right to give her first name, then, as long as she didn't let them know the other two. And they probably wouldn't make fun of her for it.

"Summer," she said, shyly.

Re: Conall and Yuyan

[isana]

Something lit up in Yuyan's mind, like a candle flaring to life. "Summer," she repeated. She certainly looked like the Summer she'd met at the fountain, but younger, much younger. "That's a very pretty name."

"What's it like, where you're from?" Conall asked. Yuyan noticed that even with his tail out in the open, Summer didn't look at all fazed. Did they have Serpent Folk where she came from?

Re: Conall and Yuyan

[bookblather]

"Thank you," Summer said, and the last urge to cry went away. At least people she could talk to were here, even if she couldn't look them in their faces. "I don't... I'm not sure? It's loud all the time, and it smells, and people are mean. But I like the parks, and the rivers."

The parks were her favorite, especially Central Park when Gina took her, to the secret hidden pool that Gina said absolutely no one else knew about, not even Ivy.

Re: Conall and Yuyan

[isana]

"Oh, we have rivers where we're from, too," Conall said. "And there's a stream nearby where we go swimming, sometimes."

"You go swimming," Yan muttered, pouting. "That stream over there looks nice. Do you want to come with us?"

Re: Conall and Yuyan

[bookblather]

Summer blushed, and looked down at her feet again. "I don't swim very well," she mumbled. "It's stupid, I know, my grandmother was a Selkie but I'm not very good at it. I..." How could she explain? What was there to explain? "I keep meaning to practice."

Re: Conall and Yuyan

[isana]

"Oh, Conall swims better than everyone," Yuyan said. "I've been swimming before I could walk and he beat me soundly when we had a race."

"You're not that bad, Yan," Conall muttered. "But Summer, what's a selkie?"

Re: Conall and Yuyan

[bookblather]

She blinked at him. "Oh, um... it's a... it's a person who is half human and half seal. Not... not like half one and the other, like you, I mean like... half the time they're a human and the other half they're seals. My grandmother let my grandfather hold her skin for a while-- that's how they change from one to the other, they change their skins. Anyway, my grandmother let my grandfather have her sealskin for a while, but when my father was nineteen she went back to the sea. Selkies do that. I've never met her."

Re: Conall and Yuyan

[isana]

"Oh," Conall said. "Well, I can do that too. Change my snake half into legs, that is. But I don't have to spend half my life as a human and half my life as this. That would be difficult."

"Did your grandfather ever get to see her again?" Yuyan asked.

Re: Conall and Yuyan

[bookblather]

Summer blinked at the thought. "No, I don't think so..." she said, trailed off, and then said, "But I don't understand. I thought nagas were just always half-snake and half-person. That's part of why people had to be so... um. Shouty about rights?"

Re: Conall and Yuyan

[isana]

"I...what's a naga?" Conall asked. "Serpent Folk like me can switch between the two, but I just like my tail better." He waved it up and down for emphasis. "But the humans I'm staying with, some don't like the tail. Or me. Or anyone like me, for that matter."

Re: Conall and Yuyan

[bookblather]

Summer tilted her head to the side. "Aren't you... well, a naga is half human and half snake, just like you are now. I thought you were one. And..." She almost asked why anyone would not like him just because he had a tail, but she knew better-- that was a stupid question to ask. "I'm sorry people don't like it. I think it's pretty."

Re: Conall and Yuyan

[isana]

"Oh." Conall thought about that for a moment. "I guess I could be a naga, if they can change to human form too. But thank you. I'm glad you think it's pretty."

Re: Conall and Yuyan

[bookblather]

"They don't," Summer said. "That's why I was confused. I think you're something different, but... cousins, maybe?"

Re: Conall and Yuyan

[isana]

"Cousins?" Conall thought about that for a moment. "I've never met a naga, but that doesn't mean there aren't any, I suppose. Have you ever seen one, Yan?"

Yan shook her head. "Only you."

Re: Conall and Yuyan

[bookblather]

"I don't mean really cousins," Summer said. "Like not your aunt or uncle's children. I mean... I mean genetically cousins, like the species are cousins. If species can be cousins." Could they? She would have to ask Ivy when she saw her sister next. "Anyway, I've met some. They were very nice to me." She smiled, a little wistfully. "Miss Chatterjee let me touch her tail."

Re: Conall and Yuyan

[isana]

"What does 'genetically' mean?" Conall asked. "Like we're similar but not quite the same?"

As for his tail...well, humans didn't really seem to want to touch it. But Yan never minded when he coiled it around her, when they were sitting next to each other.

Re: Conall and Yuyan

[bookblather]

"Yes," Summer said. "It's like... there are these little tiny things called genes, and they make us grow into the people that we are. Everybody has them. Everything. Except maybe rocks."

Re: Conall and Yuyan

[isana]

"Genes?" Conall asked. "Like seeds, but for people and animals?"

Re: Conall and Yuyan

[bookblather]

"Um," Summer said. "Sort of? It's more like... like a plan, for a building. The builders have to know how to put it together. Genes tell our bodies how to put themselves together." Sort of, anyway. As far as she understood.

She was better with anatomy.

Re: Conall and Yuyan

[isana]

"Oh," Yuyan said. "So these...genes, right? They're like the drawings for building certain things, like designs for contraptions like a still or a ship."