for_tradition | { pfsb } by the fireside

A fireside – the proper kind, with the scent and crackle of flames as they transmogrify the passive energy of wood into heat and light – is something one just really can't have without wood to burn.

The swimming fish are an added bonus, but really don't lend much to the ambience beyond novelty.

It's very pleasant to sit by this fireside, real or magicked up as it might be, while ferociously taking notes. The warm, flickering light of the flames reflects off Abigail Pent's smooth brown hair and the silk of her skirts – the rich brown of excellent milk chocolate, struck through with gold – and illuminates her neat, slightly cramped handwriting. So engrossed is she that when the waitrat arrives with her ordered tea, she doesn't notice until the creature gives a polite half-cough, half-squeak.

Glancing up, she peers myopically at the proffered tea set. (She is wearing two sets of spectacles, but forgotten to put either over her eyes. One sits lightly on her hair, the other hangs around her neck off a cord of brown silk.)

"That doesn't look right," she tells the waitrat. It certainly is tea, but the stunted white pot and small, handle-less cups don't look at all like the bone china she'd expected.

She looks about, searching – ah. Getting to her feet in a rustle of fabric, she accepts the tray from the waitrat and makes her way over to the table she'd spotted, where a tall, slim young man has received a bone china tea service and plate of iced biscuits. "Pardon me," Abigail says, smiling as she approaches him. "I believe our orders were switched."

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From:

lightamidchaos

His first suspicion on receiving the unusual tea service had been that somewhere the all-too-persistent Aes Sedai was trying her tricks again, seeing as how she had sent refreshments to Wei Ying before. Apologizing to the stranger in the silence of his mind, Lan Wangji rises to his feet and offers her a formal bow.

"It was kind of you to discern the matter," he replies. He can practically hear his brother and feel his patient look, and thus continues, "Would you wish company?"

From:

for_tradition

"Passionately," Abigail tells him, beaming. "I haven't stuck my nose into nearly enough goings-on in this place."

She sets his tray down and takes a seat, every movement efficient and graceful. Abigail smooths her skirts, then looks back at him. "Lady Abigail Pent, formerly of the Koniortos Court, at your service."

From:

lightamidchaos

He matches her formality with his own. "Lan Zhan, courtesy name Wangji, the Second Jade of Gusu Lan, called Hanguang-Jun." He does not smile, but there is something not unfriendly in the subtleties of his expression for those who can read it.

"May I pour for you, Lady Pent?"

From:

for_tradition

"Goodness me, you have nearly as many titles as us House scions," Abigail says, sounding delighted. "Thank you, Hanguang-jun, that is most kind of you."

She indicates the delicate china dish of iced biscuits. "Would you like a biscuit?"

From:

lightamidchaos

"My brother leads our sect," he explains, and flips back his sleeves before reaching for the tea. He selects her teapot, concluding that she might prefer her own blend, and pours carefully.

"From what I have heard, it is not unlike being of a House." The House of Arch in particular, he thinks, although certainly Harrow's formality is comfortably familiar to him as well.

"Thank you. I would be pleased to try one. If you like, I might offer something of the sort that we would usually serve for you to try, as well."

From:

for_tradition

"How could I resist?"

She offers him a small plate, which he may fill with as many of the biscuits he likes, and nudges the platter of biscuits towards him. "I suppose that makes you the younger brother, does it?"

From:

lightamidchaos

He accepts one single biscuit with a nod of thanks, sets it on the plate, and signals to a waitrat to approach before he pours his own tea.

"Yes. Xiongzhang, Lan Xichen, Zewu-Jun, is the First Jade of Lan. He is older than I by some few years."

From:

for_tradition

"I have a younger brother, myself," she tells him, and selects two of the iced biscuits for herself before adding cream to her tea. "He'll be taking charge of Fifth now, I expect... although his children were next in line, anyway."

She says this with perfect equanimity, and sips at her tea, which is delicious.

From:

lightamidchaos

He murmurs a request to the rat, which squeaks cheerfully and runs off again to bring a selection of tea snacks according to the standing instructions, including a bowl of nuts, another of fruit, and a plate of osmanthus cakes.

Lan Wangji pays sharp attention to Lady Pent as he absorbs what she has just said. "Your pardon, but are you then no longer among the living?"

From:

for_tradition

"Can hardly tell, can you?" she sparkles. The smile she gives him scrunches up the corners of her eyes. "What an interesting place this is. I wonder who makes the rules? Not that I'm unhappy about them, mind you. It's nice to breathe and have a pulse again, even if they aren't strictly necessary."

From:

lightamidchaos

"I do not know," he murmurs. "I know of the limitations on leaving, for those who have died, but not as to how it is possible to manifest here as other than a spirit."

Although he will be grateful for it to the end of his days.

From:

for_tradition

"Do you," she says, with great interest. "I suppose you mean 'leaving by some other method than the River.'"

From a pocket in her graceful skirts, she whips out a tiny notebook and a small pencil and poses the tip of the latter over a page of the former, then gives him an expectant look. "Can you clarify? To what sort of limitations do you refer?"

From:

lightamidchaos

“The river?” He lifts a tray from the returning rat with a murmur of thanks and sets it before her with a single graceful movement.

Lan Wangji blinks once, slowly, at her preparations, then says, “It is possible for those who have died to go from the inn to other worlds than their own, to visit. They exist there as they do here, but the effect fades after three days.”

From:

for_tradition

She makes a pleased sound and selects several delicacies from the new tray, then returns to her notes, scribbling furiously before she blinks back at him.

"Three days," she muses, tapping the pencil against her lip. "I suppose there must be a reason why it is no more or less. Thank you, Hanguang-jun, that is extremely interesting."

Edited Date: 2022-09-14 01:13 pm (UTC)

From:

lightamidchaos

“I presume there must be, but I do not know it.” He takes a sip of his tea, then tries a small bite of the iced cake she had shared, and tries not to startle at the sweetness of it.

“It is possible to restore the effect by returning to the inn, then to the world being visited,” he offers. “And thus to extend the duration of the visit.”

From:

for_tradition

"Yes, that makes sense," she says, thoughtful, before she bites into one of the cakes she'd accepted from him. It goes nicely with her Darjeeling.

"Whatever magic holds revenants together here and gives us a simulacrum of real life must require constant refreshment or begin decay."

She looks pleased at the thought, as though she's glad to finally find some sense in the situation.

From:

lightamidchaos

Lan Wangji eyes her carefully. “You speak as one who knows.”

From:

for_tradition

"I wouldn't say knows," she says, cheerfully. "But I can take a pretty good whack at a guess. This sort of thing is my specialty, you see."

From:

lightamidchaos

"Your specialty?" He lets his teacup rest in his hands and gives her his full attention.

From:

for_tradition

"Spirit magic," she explains. "Although my strengths really lie in spirit summoning. You'd really want the Sixth for a thorny question like how does this place work? I daresay the Master Warden would be fascinated."

From:

lightamidchaos

The Fifth, she had said, when mentioning her brother, and now the Sixth, in the context of spirits and the deceased.

Very, very slowly, Lan Wangji says, "... Five for tradition and debts to the dead?"

From:

for_tradition

"Goodness," she chuckles, warmly. "You are one for formality, aren't you? Don't take that the wrong way; I adore formality. And of course you are correct. I am -- was -- the Scion of the Fifth House, and those are our words."

From:

lightamidchaos

It has been some time since he has seen Harrow, and he is not certain who among her associates is aware of her visits to the inn, besides Gideon, if indeed anyone is.

He settles for a fractional nod. "Spirit summoning?" he asks.

From:

for_tradition

"I am a Speaker to the Dead," she says, as though this might explain anything. "Not to brag, but I could summon a five hundred year old revenant from a pencil he once chewed on."

She studies him, curious. "Are you familiar with the Houses?"