TheAmishPirate

Breathless Dead

So. It wasn’t a prank of Zeus’. Wonderful.

“I can’t just step down, and, vanish away. No, no, it’s simply out of the question.”

And yet. When she turned her mind to the problem at hand, where was the road that carried her to victory over her foe, when she no longer had divine aid on her side? Hadn’t she said this quest was important? Hadn’t he said so?

“But if it’s for the sake of the voyage, then. Perhaps.” Give her a moment. This was a set of words in a novel order. “Perhaps I can find a way to step. Back. Temporarily.”

It was, all things considered, remarkable progress under dire circumstances, and if she felt a little less like death then she might’ve demanded a medal for her efforts. But step back to what? She couldn’t leave the voyage. The auguries predicted smoother sailing for some time, yes, but not nearly enough to set down anywhere for, what, a vacation?

...when was the last time she’d had a vacation? Question for later.

“Hestia, I wish we could have met earlier, but perhaps I can make up for that some by asking more of your wisdom: What do you suggest I do? Pasts, futures, these are tricky things to take hold of. I may have forgotten how, along the way.”

*****************************

The ship bore him on. Hera held him up, and in her presence no care could intrude. The physical awareness of form, the mental balance of attentions, the emotional weight of anticipation, all that usually composed a Dolce scattered to the void. What was left was free to drift and rest and simply be.

Now, much of him shied away, naturally repelled from the thought of marital debts owed. He much more preferred the reverse, to give, than to risk greed, and overstepping of bounds. But, amidst himself sat a shining core of a thought, a vision of two resting their full weight on the other, and neither falling or slipping. And if that couldn't be marriage, than what could?

And yet...

"I don't know what I ought to say." He heard himself wonder. "I could sit in front of her for hours, and I wouldn't know. I can't, Hera. I'm not ready. I need...I need..." And the strain of searching for the unknown threatened to pull him back together, until a gentle brush of Hera's hand scattered him back into restful quiet, and tipped the words right out of him. "I don't know what I need. And I don't know how to know what I need."

TSL: The Excess of Flowers

Han

The Beast

Archetype: Heir of Dragons

At the height of their power, the daughters of the Dominion stand unveiled. Their birthright manifests amid torrents of tightly-woven Essence, revealing scales, claws, fangs that had always been there, had you the eyes to see them. In their hands, their mother’s gifts are an elegant saber, dancing free in the wind, effortlessly graceful, all the more beautiful for their peril. All the Kingdoms love them, and rejoice in their presence.

Vermilion Beast of Lanterns carries a hard reminder: Dragons ought to be feared.

Tall as a litter. Powerful as an earthquake. A cataclysm imprisoned in ruby scales. Limbs ending in claws, where they do not hold blades. Inferno heart, ever-burning, consuming wood, air, Essence. The face of a girl, now sharpened by crest and pointed ears, and a pair of glowing, slitted pupils. Hearts and flagstones break at her roar. Blink, and she is gone. Falter, and you are finished.

Face her wrath, and despair.

Aesthetic: Defiant Demeanor - Delinquent clothes - A crude sword

Han is. Compact. But rather than frailty, her stature speaks to a tightly-knit form, not easily moved or broken. Her hair is a deep auburn, and you may ask if it is dyed at your own peril. She wears it in a plentiful, messy ponytail, to keep it out of her face. Good thing too; any hair that strayed in front of her piercing eyes might well be incinerated on the spot.

As to attire, those of the Dominion speak the virtues of skirts and shun the shameful, unnecessary display of bare skin. Many have taken up the refrain, putting away the traditional pants and loose garments of their lands in favor of the high-class foreign styles. Last Han checked, this was still the Flower Kingdoms. And if any of those Dominion types took issue with her clothes, then they were welcome to try and dress her themselves.

She wears loose, baggy pants, regularly hiked up to the knee. (Let’s see you walk around with soaked pant legs, see how you like it.) Her shirts are simple, plain, and unadorned, with nothing to distract from her bare shoulders and toned arms. A tattooed dragon’s claw snakes over her left shoulder, curling around her bicep to grasp at a jagged sun. The rest of the design hides on her back, and you will not see it. She carries no umbrella, opting instead for a drab brown poncho and a wide-brimmed straw hat. Simple. Unassuming. Ideal to hide under and glare from.

Her sword is a patta, technically. Practically, it’s a lost blade attached to a lost gauntlet, and it gets the job done. While messy, and ill-equipped for more traditional forms, it favors a blend of wickedly powerful slashes and intermittent martial arts. What weaknesses it has, she more than makes up for in physical ability and sheer stubbornness. Given the impossibility of sheathing it, she opts to wear it on her back in a conspicuous bundle of cloth. Which, in a pinch, also makes a perfectly serviceable club.

Stats
Daring +2
Grace +1
Heart -1
Wit +0
Spirit +2

Conditions
Angry (-2 on Figure Out a Person)

Feral: 3

Your Feral score starts at 1. If it hits 4, you can’t hold back the beast any longer and you Transform. If your Feral drops to 0, you lose access to all your Beast playbook moves until it increases again. On the plus side, you’re fitting in. You blend. You’ve assimilated.

Increase Feral when:

• You express yourself in a shocking way through your appearance
• You display intense emotion that society wants you to conceal

Decrease Feral when:

• You feel that your bestial nature has hurt someone you care about
• You go along with an uncomfortable interaction to fit in

Moves

Transform: You have a bestial form, which you can assume at will and must assume whenever your Feral hits 4. When you do, tell everyone what the beast in you looks like, increase your Feral to 4 if it’s not there already, and roll +Daring:
10+: Choose 2
7–9:Choose 1

• You are in harmony with your beast and may clear a Condition
• You are magnificent and little escapes your notice; you gain leverage or an opportunity with a monster
• Pain is nothing to you; ignore the next time you would Stagger while transformed
• You can move in ways no ordinary person could

You revert to your usual form when your Feral drops below 4. While transformed, you may mark a Condition to avoid reducing your Feral, as often as you like.

Ferocious: When you Fight, you may mark a Condition to choose an additional option, even on a 6-.

Tenacious Purpose: When you commit yourself to a specific goal, you may ask the GM once per scene how you could advance that goal in a way that violates “civilized” norms. Take +1 forward to act on the answer. If you refrain, it counts as an uncomfortable situation that reduces your Feral by 1 and you must mark a Condition.

Shameless: When you say aloud what you want from an NPC, you may give them a String on you to ask a question about them from the Figure Out a Person move.

BDE: When you make it clear to your foes that you’re the biggest threat, then for the rest of the scene, whenever you roll a 10+, you may choose someone present to be impressed or intrigued with you. Once during the scene, when you gain a String on someone, gain an additional String on someone else who considers you an enemy.

Oppositional Defiance: You defy authority as a reflex. If someone tells you to do something, even if it's something you wanted to do, your instinct is to not do it. If you directly defy authority, gain a String on that person. If you comply, they gain a String on you.

Truths of Heart and Blade

Smitten Kitten: When you become Smitten with someone, say why, give them a String, and answer this question:

• What have you done that you are sure they view as inappropriate?

The Bloody Truth: When you Figure Out a Person in physical conflict, you may additionally ask one of these questions, even on a 6-:

• What awakens the beast inside you?
• How could I get you to kiss me?

Strings
Giri: 2 strings
Kalaya: 2 strings
Piri: 2 strings
Red Wolf: 1 string
Lotus: 1 string

Smitten With
Lotus
Machi

XP: 1

Advancements:
-Move from Beast playbook: Shameless
-Move from Beast playbook: BDE
-Move from another playbook: Oppositional Defiance
-+1 Spirit

Fellowship: The Heart

Let us return, for a moment, to a sad soaked bundle, held twice tight. The first grip looses, and deposits two passengers on solid ground. Collect all your things. Mind the gap. Ride again, soon! The second grip relents only that eyes may see what hands cannot. Are there tears? Does she breathe? Does she fear? Maybe. Possibly. Probably. The cloak intrudes. Were both of her arms not unquestionably occupied, Wolf would have already torn it to shreds. An anxious growl builds in her throat as she waits, and waits, waits for trembling arms to peel away the layers.

The cowl falls back, and Wolf falls into a dream of enchantment and cunning. A vision of fiery orange and creamy whites, of fur invitingly soft and glowing with color. A curiosity of pointed, fluffy ears and a precious dollop of black dotting a perfect nose. A promise of poise, power, and so much more, wrapped in limbs curving with lithe muscles. An eternity of shining emerald; stare, please, stare, lose yourself deeper and deeper and deeper in her, without hideous lenses to get in the way.

Wolf stares. Wolf waits.

Blink. And the dream is put aside. Back to waking. Back to gangly limbs and patchwork, speckled coat. Back to ill-kept and tangled fur. Back to spectacles perched on a snout all the wrong shapes. Back to a low rumble in Wolf’s chest, felt through paws, through cloak, filling her with unconditional approval. Back to lying weightless in a strength that could hold her forever. Back to a closing distance, and foreheads meeting, and one last, precious word spilling from Wolf’s lips.

And the name was

”Jackdaw.”

Breathless Dead

This would be the part where an objection ought to go. Were it Zeus before her, she might’ve still found one. But it was unfair Hestia, and she put into words aches her heart had never thought to speak of, and Vasilia had no one here to hide behind or lean on. Just her, a lifetime of exhaustion, and a jagged little truth.

“So, what now?” She still didn’t want the cocoa. But the warmth of the mug was...pleasant. And it gave her hands something to do. “I regale anyone who’ll listen to my infinite record of regret until I can say what color I’ll paint the garden fence?”

She winced. Only thing she was good at. “Ugh, no, it’s not like…” Like she planned on not sticking around for the rest of her life. Just. Not something she thought of in much detail. And. Well. The question stood vis a vis painful autobiographies.

*************************************

Forgive the little sheep, if he cannot manage any more divine revelation today. He carefully unpacks every word, arranges them just so, as ordained, they never transform into anything more than words in an odd order. Impossible? Cannot fail? Hadn’t he gotten into this mess by trying to do too many impossible things? But enveloped in the presence of dear Hera, even the lost were acceptable. Especially the lost.

“Who can I even go to with...any of this?” He’s only whispering now, and this too, feels acceptable. “This is, well, it might be, she’s the Captain. My Captain. And, a personal matter, such as this…” He couldn’t. How could he? If word got out-! No no no no no, no, a thousand times no. So who...?

(He did not dare close the last inch between them, to rest his head against hers. Such a thing would be far, far above his station. But. He did close one of the two last half-inches. And if she deigned to close the other, she would not hear any complaint from him.)

Fellowship: The Heart

The world is quiet. All is still.

Her mind was a whirling mechanism of epiphany, each thought setting the next into motion, free of jam or ill-fitting conclusion. Nothing could grow stagnant when all was in proper order. Nothing could rot, poisoning her heart, dulling her eyes until all she could see was herself.

You see? You see! Wasn’t that lovely? She could tell you the pages of the novels she’d cobbled that together from. She’d held onto those words for years now, thinking that it would be the perfect way to explain such things should the moment ever come for her to express the thoughts. But that was all backwards, wasn’t it? She’d held onto them not because they were perfect. But because they were perfect to her. Picking out the one right answer in a sea of infinite words had crushed her into a useless stone time and time again. Picking out the words she adored, to be whatever they needed to be for the people she held close to her heart? So much easier. So much more fun!

Love. Always kept turning up in the best stories, didn’t it? She really ought to have noticed the throughline sooner-

And that shadow of a memory kept her at the boundary of Crowhame. Because she wasn’t a machine. Not really. Not in the ways that mattered. All that ran well in this one, beautiful moment would, in time, wear down, skip, clog, fall apart, drown, descend into a useless pile of anxieties all over again. Even the act of trying to hold onto this perfect clarity would squeeze her to the point of breaking. Wouldn’t it be nice, to never have to fall from this height? To never endure the cycle again? Hadn’t she climbed enough?

Can she rest, now?

Perhaps.

But then again, she did have a rather good memory. If she found her way here once, she could do it again. And this time, with better company.

She took a step. And gently closed the book behind her.

***********************************************

“Ack!”

A black-cowled figure stumbled into the clown-rich chaos, the victim of a sudden lesson in comparative body mass. But before she could fall to her knees, where a death of pies surely awaited her, a second pair of shoulders came under her burdens, and a second pair of paws marked her path forward. Wolf wasted no time on words; they had precious little to reach safety, and less still to complete the miracle.

Soon the four of them were huddled behind the now-flaming donut cart, mere seconds of safety left. Just enough time for the figure to hurriedly transcribe one, last edit to their reality...

Lucien!

You can’t be dead.

You smell fried pickles.

No, more than that, you hear fried pickles, Crackling, sizzling, fresh from the fryer and ready to eat.

Worst of all, you want fried pickles. Don’t lie. We all know you do. And when was the last time you heard of a dead man wanting anything?

Now then, are you going to wake up and taste them? (Mind your tongue, they’re still hot.)

Professor!

So. You’ve finally wound up dead, have you? After all this time, the boogeyman finally caught up to you, like you knew it would. All those years of worry, and now that it’s here, does it seem so bad? Was the ending really worth all that fuss? I bet it seems rather silly, in hindsight. You’d think that simple logic would’ve steered you right. By what merit does the last day get weighted more heavily than all the others that came before? The rest of your life outnumbers the end of it, after all. So by that logic, the end shouldn’t be all that important.

You think so too?

Ah-ha!

And how exactly is a dead man agreeing with me? Unless, of course, you’re not really dead! You never were! Members of the court, I rest my case, we may all recess for fried pickles now. (Yes, yes, there’s some for you too, Professor. Get up already, before Lucien scarfs them all down!)

Breathless Dead

Zeus. You bastard.

You knew.

You knew this would happen. You threw Hestia at her, and you knew this would happen. All roads led to cocoa. Moments of absolute stillness, when all their attentions were enraptured with the first shy wisps of steam emerging from the kettle. The intense battle between too-large fingers and a rascally little packet. A spoon riding the eternal circuit of a mug, scraping out a steady little tune as it went.

This is how he learned to make it so well; learning at the feet of the master.

The gift of a goddess lay before her. She took the mug in her hands. Felt the heat bloom against her skin.

She didn’t want a drop of it.

“I don’t know why I’m this way.” She continued. Quietly staring into her mug. “I don’t want to be this way. Not a day goes by that I don’t ask myself why, and in all this time I haven’t found an answer.” The first sip filled her belly with a sweet, comforting warmth. Reminding her, keenly, of the warmth she so sorely missed.

“And I hurt him. He put his precious, fragile little heart in my hands, and I shattered it. For no reason at all.” The mug froze, halfway to her lips, clouding her face with steam. “...no. I think there was a reason.” A terrible, awful, reason, but a reason all the same. “I was alone. Bella was in my way. And it was the easiest way I could think to get one over her. Of course, nobody forced me to, but once I had that...all I could see was forward.” Good, that the cocoa was hot enough to scald her tongue, if she wasn’t careful. Kept her from downing the whole thing in one go. Forced her to take it slowly. Linger. “What happened after that...I don’t know. I don’t know. Always, it’s forward, forward, and I don’t know why. Why did I have to be the one to beat her? Why couldn’t I love him enough to stop?” Her head fell, catching on the rim of her cup. “And why can’t I think of anything else I could’ve done?”

“I hurt people, Hestia. That’s what I’m best at. That’s all I’ve ever really done. Oratory, the stage, the arena, this ship, what good is any of it? But put an opponent in front of me, and I will make them bleed. That, I can do.” No matter who else got hurt along the way.

Herself - and him - included.

“Leaving Lakkos...was just the first time I had to do it on purpose.”

Was that it, then? Had she told enough stories for one day? Was she going to have to say her name? please no Would this be the last she’d ever see of Hestia? The thought cut through the stone-heavy haze, and before she realized what she was doing she was asking, “Is all this why you’ve never visited me before?” She couldn’t stop herself. She didn’t want to. She didn’t want cocoa. “Is this why you stay away from him, whenever I’m near?” She stared the Lady Hestia dead in the eye, crumbling beneath the whole of her presence, and still she could not be silent. “Are we that unsuited for each other?”

************************************************

Terrible. Horrible. As if there were words enough for such a tragedy. That someone so kind, so beautiful, so unbelievably deserving of so much should think herself not even worth loving. In spite of the unimaginable breach of propriety, were Zeus in the room at that moment, Dolce would have bent time and space to show her the full extent of the harm she’d caused. Had Hera not already recovered - and what a relief, she knew she was wrong! - he might’ve raced to the altars to get started on-

Wait.

She was wrong. About herself.

If Hera (a goddess) could be wrong in this matter, and Dolce (a silly, lost chef) was no better than her, then. Then.

Oh. Oh heavens.

A door burst in his heart, before he could finish giving himself permission to open it. Questions upon questions, without form, before words, filled him up to bursting. Nowhere to go, but they had to go, but nowhere to go. No way out. Too many words. No words. He felt...he felt something, several somethings, all blended together into a horrible lump, deep in his chest, at once hardened into a thousand needle points and melting into white-hot slag, and, and, and,

“I don’t feel well, Hera.” His legs were splayed out in front of him. He didn’t remember when he’d stopped kneeling. Or when he’d begun to sob. “It hurts. It hurts bad. You told me I could not carry the darkness alone, but. How can I ask someone else to shoulder something so awful? Something I can’t even manage myself?”

Breathless Dead

"But Hera, I don't want to stand alone. I want to stand with her. I swore I would, always." What value was an oath if he only kept it when things were easy? If his word could be broken by a cross-universe voyage, then what good was it? "Besides, there's nothing wrong between us. Whatever’s the matter with me, it doesn’t feel fair to blame the both of us for my shortcomings." And that was just good, common sense.

*************************************************

"I believe I mentioned the tragic past?" She waved her flask in a vaguely past-ward direction. "Take your pick: Perhaps it was discovering all my good intentions could not overcome my pride, vanity, and the cruelty of wicked souls. Only took me years of earnest collaboration with them to realize I’d been played. And to think, I once believed I would be the one changing them! Me! Armed with the right words, speaking them in the right way, what heart couldn’t I change? Obviously, Lakkos would have discovered a better way of life years ago if I’d had the decency to be born sooner.” She directed a derisive snort to her younger self. “A naive lie. Or perhaps, a truth meant for a better person. Maybe that was what did me in.”

Her ears perked up, and a slow smile curled across her face. “Oh, here’s a good one: Of all the shuttles in the family hangar, when it came time to leave my life behind, what did I take but the biggest one? Surely I would need room for all the friends, family, and associates who would want to leave with me, no? Imagine my surprise when we only used two seats. Including my own!” What a grand joke! The two of them, alone, in a shuttle that could’ve held her entire household with room to spare. She couldn’t help but laugh; what a fool she was! “Myself and dear Alethea only, who would’ve run off without me had I refused the idea. When just days prior, there’d have been a stampede to share a ride with the Queen of the Arena. Ha! Some good a silvered tongue is when you’ve not the silver to back it up.” Wasn’t she a card? Wasn’t she in rare good form today?

“I’d thought,” (Had she?) “We’d at least have convinced a few to follow us.” But no one had listened. “I thought about ordering the staff aboard too, but, hrm, not the wisest thing, to have a disloyal crew when you’re about to stab someone else in the back.” It’d been a mistake to tell them anyway. Should’ve left alone, or left no one to tell the tale. “It’s hard enough to fight off all your terrible co-workers without” Half measures. They catch up to you, don’t they? “Without, having to” They told her. “Go through...” She found you.

“A-anyone. Else.”

Ah. Oh no. Bad. Bad. Laughed too much. “Excuse me, I just.” She wiped her eyes with the back of her hand. Her fur came back damp with tears. “I just need a moment.” Come on, Vasilia, pull yourself together. So you don’t get to have nice people; what else is new? Clarissa wasn’t nice people anyway. Bad luck, getting tangled up in her. You’re better off without her, now. Or. You were.

Her hands flew to her pockets, checking them again and again and coming up empty but having nothing better to do with them then check yet again. Of course she didn’t bring a handkerchief to guard duty, who would? He would. Like a child she dried her eyes at the expense of her sleeves, and before long they were mottled with unsightly wet splotches. “Forgive me, I. I’m not usually in such a state.” No, she was usually much better about the awful things she’d done to the people she’d made the mistake of loving. A thousand pardons, Lady Hestia. She will take care not to love you too, just as soon as she collects herself.

Captain. Captain Vasilia heaved a great sigh, sinking against the command table along with the tattered remnants of her composure. “Well. There you have it. What a mystery, that we haven’t met before.” Miracle of miracles, was she still here, listening to her?! Her gaze drifted to the now-empty mug of cocoa, set above her. “...I don’t suppose you have another mug of that you could spare?”

Fellowship: The Heart

All happens, as it always has happened, and as it always will happen, and as it all happens. Thus is Crowhame. Thus nothing changes, once happened, and always happening. And nothing is the Jackdaw.

*******************************

“You are transformation in the eternal present.” The click-clacking hagstones cackle. “You are the tree pruned by storm. You are slag which was iron. You are courage persisting. The tide strips away, and you surge forth, lest nothing else remain. The Flayed! The Flayed! So you are! So you are!”

What is this, that comes rattling down the hagstones? An offering? An insult? Here are broken bones, and shattered senses, and all that would stifle existence. Here they come to the many feet of the Flayed. “It is yours! It is your name! It is not his. It is not anyone else’s. You must have dropped it, didn’t you?” And that which spoke in no tongue, how could it argue against its own name?

*******************************

“Hopeless! Hopeless! Hopeless are you, Ring-master! How could you have forgot? Was eternity too long to remember?” The figures upon the Grail, they do not caper for you. Gone is their laughter, so poor a show you put on. They busy themselves with far greater entertainments of station queues, morning newspapers, and taxes. “Do not frown, do not cry, I will teach the lesson to you again, and again, for as long as the lesson shall flow."

“And the lesson is this: That all things are the joke, and all places are the show, that all is sacred nonesuch.” Catch the twinkle upon the shining Grail! A light of revelation in this new venue. “Who forbid you to be the punchline? Why does no-one laugh at my Ring-master? All things are the joke.” And the engraved audience peers from their drudgery, and the Grail peers close at what used to be a man.

“Go show them what it means to take a fall.”

*******************************

The meat who was a man is gone, the standing-stone who was a man is gone, the book that is the whole of Crowhame is gone too, and the backwards footprints will tell you the Jackdaw was never here. All that happens had always happened and nothing changed. Nothing, to hold everything, to be anything, of anything she loved. The Jackdaw was never here.

Fellowship: The Heart

Everything is wrong here. The three of them should not be here, and should not be, as they are. Crowhame and the Dark Carnival declare the other to be wrong, and perhaps both of them are correct, but how terrible the argument, here for all to witness. Lucien, the Professor, they belong somewhere other than between the two. And whether or not they make it there? It ought not to depend on a gangly fox with no name. But here is Coleman, riding in Sasha - so big now! So grown-up! - the rain hissing off her hide, iron whining, low and curious. Here is Wolf, a bundle of unbreakable twigs, and here Wolf will be, even if she is gone a year and a day. All of them, huddled around an upturned cart; this is right, and maybe that will be enough.

You’ve never seen her smile like this, Coleman. She’s only ever had the two; smiles atop smiles, when she is too lost in her books to think, and smiles atop fear, when she thinks it’s the safest way for her face to be. But when you look at her now, she has found something new to build a smile upon. “Words, Coleman. All that I’ve ever had.” She pets Sasha, on the tippy top of her head, right in the space where a fox might like to scurry and cling to. “We’ll have some more passengers soon. I think, you should get ready to leave, Conductor.” Out she goes, from safety into the downpour. Stops. And looks back, square at your cabin, Coleman.

“Wormwood wasn’t your fault.”

And there’s a second chain. That’s not enough words to explain how she could say them with such certainty. So she’ll have to say more. She’ll have to come back.

She steps into the wavering boundary of Crowhame, and of all the books in all the pockets in all her cloak, she reaches for the one she’d never read before. Tempted to, on many an occasion. Peek ahead, at what she might find in the depths of the Heart. But if she did, would she ever make the journey herself? Would it be another fox who discovered a perfect, precious name? Or would she read some terrible prophecy, and live the rest of her days crushed by it? So it went.

She flips to the one spot that was safe to read. Or, rather, the one spot it was safe to flip to. The present. Her present. Still being written. Not quite ready to read. And what would she write? What could she write? Just about anything. The second reason she’d never opened it.

The right words still elude her. Which, wasn’t to say she had no words. Always too many to choose from. But as it was with Wolf, and as it was with Coleman, she opens the book of a book, and the words pour out of her...

Peace! Peace! The Jackdaw walks the woods!

Unlatch your doors! Uncover your treasure-vaults! Let all that is precious to you walk free in the black rain!

Sit, sit, and do not watch for her. Do not wait for her. You waste your time. You waste your worry. Peace, peace. She who has no name, how will you recognize her? What cry will pass your lips, to give her form? Frustrate the robber, but the word is not thief. Resist the enemy, but the word is not foe. Welcome the friend, raise the daughter, abide the neighbor, obey the king, suffer the Flayed, forevermore be the present, but the word is nothing, and the word is Jackdaw.

Nothing to bind. Nothing to catch. You will not see her. You cannot stop her. Everywhere, nowhere, anyone, no-one.

Peace! Peace! The Jackdaw walks the woods!

Breathless Dead

“What?”

So first you ignore her, now you’re picking over her past with a fine-toothed comb? Which is it, Hestia?!

“Well. It’s, it was, a rather complicated decision. There wasn’t just one reason behind it.” Vasilia muddles on, grasping at a rhythm that kept slipping between her fingers. Thrillingly tragic tales were not meant for this sort of sudden transition to scrutiny. Hestia, to her credit, did not rush her. Soon enough, she had her thoughts, and she began a new tale:

“When we first took Redana on board, the celebration lasted two full weeks. Not because she was the life of the party; far from it, all she knew was formal balls and state dinners. No, she wanted to see everything. Do everything. There was nothing so insignificant aboard our ship that she wasn’t interested in. We had to keep pausing to make expeditions to the other decks whenever we offhandedly mentioned the waterfall we used to cool the cannons, or the second, upside-down bridge on the lowest deck, or what have you. The things we all took for granted, she saw their worth. Their wonder. All this time, and I don’t believe she’s stopped seeing it, not really.”

She fixes her gaze on her audience, and draws her voice, ringing with iron certainty. “That girl is going to die, Lady Hestia. Either in space, or Tellus will catch her, and they will kill her, and it will be centuries before she is permitted her rest. The only way she survives this is if she reaches Gaia, and receives her wish. There is no other path for her victory. Her future. None that I can see. It is simply what has to be done.”

“...so I’m an old softie. Guilty as charged. Perhaps I could’ve withstood just her, but two-”

She stops. Stares a hole through the deck, eyes filling with a simpler past. She does not even look at the numbing flask as she draws it to her lips again.

“Ah. Two. Two bright, dear hearts. I didn’t stand a chance.”

**********************************************

The Lord of the Dead possessed many wondrous things. A comforting presence was not among them.

So, please, do not take it the wrong way if Dolce is silent and still through the whole argument. Nor should you think he chooses a side, subtly inching towards Hera. How can he; he works for you, after all! But she is an honored guest, and you should not think much of it that he sits, kneeling, at her feet, filling his vision with her warm radiance.

“I don’t understand, Lady Hera.” It could only be Lady, this close to her. “Where is the threat? She said she did not fancy Bella that way. She clearly regrets her actions. I told her that we will be fine.” Do you hear it, Lady Hera? His voice, he doesn’t intend for it to shake so. Clear enunciation, he strives for it, but hear what hollow, brittle words pass his lips. Broken, just as he said. “So, then, where is the threat?”