{ pfsb } by the fireside

[for_tradition]

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."

Comments

[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.

[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?"

[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.”

[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."

[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.”

[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.

[lightamidchaos]

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

[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."

[lightamidchaos]

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

[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."

[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?"

[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."

[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.

[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?"

[lightamidchaos]

"Mn," he affirms.

"I also have some skill at summoning and speaking with spirits. Through music."

[for_tradition]

She looks very much as though she'd like to make another note, but reaches for her teacup instead.

"Through music," she says, thoughtful. "Now that is interesting. Is it the call or the structure or the tithe or all three at once?"

[lightamidchaos]

"It is the melody," he says. "Inquiry. When backed with spiritual energy of sufficient strength, a spirit will answer. Once they have, I can communicate with them through the ancient language of the qin, by careful selection of notes."

He considers, then adds, "I do not know what you mean by the tithe. Or the structure, beyond the melody itself."

[for_tradition]

She waves a hand, dismissing the details -- for the moment, only, as she passionately loves details. "When I summon a spirit," she tells him, "I require -- usually -- an item to use as a grounding force -- or a structured ward -- along with something to offer the spirit. Something to eat, usually, or something that reminds it of life. Blood is the classic tithe."

Now she does open her notebook again, scribbling in the margins of what she'd written before. "It sounds to me as though your music is the call, the offering, and the grounding force, all in one. Very efficient."

[lightamidchaos]

He listens attentively, then nods. "The music, and the spiritual energy, together," he corrects.

[for_tradition]

"Spiritual energy," she revises, and studies him with intent brown eyes that go just a bit too long without blinking.

"Not necromancy?"

[lightamidchaos]

Very simply, he explains, "I am not a necromancer. I am a cultivator, but not of that path."

[for_tradition]

"Ah," she says, understanding. Her cup makes a tiny clink as she sets it back on the saucer. "Another thalergetic adept."

She says this the way other people might say: Christmas.

[lightamidchaos]

Lan Wangji gives her a mildly surprised look. "Another?"

[for_tradition]

"Yes, I met one here, earlier," Abigail says, comfortably. "Fascinating stuff. But then everything has an opposing side, doesn't it?"

[lightamidchaos]

He nods, at that. "All things seek the harmony of balance."