It's much later in the evening when we get back from our faerie seeking quest than originally planned (there was... an incident with Gil's pony) and I have to rush to get to the library before it closes. Gil and Alica opt out, deciding to go eat supper while there still is some and we part ways in the front hall. There is nary a person in the hallways as I make my way to the second floor. The library door is still unlocked and I barge through into the virtually empty room. The only other person in the room jumps up at the loud sound and steadies himself on the front counter.
"Oh, hi Percy," I say, surprised. He's clutching the front of his shirt and glaring me in a murderous fashion. "I didn't know you worked in the library."
"Only the evenings, a few times a week," the prefect says quietly. "Gives me extra credit and something to distract me from my impending finals...."
"Right, you're graduating after this term, aren't you? Man, I'm glad I'm only a sixth termer."
"Yeah, lucky you," he mumbles and then clears his throat. "I'm gonna tell you the same thing I told the other guy who apparently can't figure out how a clock works; the library is closing for the night, you need to leave."
"No, no wait, I just need one book!" I say, throwing up my hands as he moves towards me. "I know exactly where to find it, won't take a second!"
Percy frowns and huffs. "Fine then," he says, walking behind the counter to fish out the huge books that the library uses to record who loans what and when. "But be quick, I need to lock up and I'd want to get some supper too."
I don't mention that it's more than likely that most if not all of the food will have been consumed by the time he can make it into the dining hall, but decide against it and dash to the shelf with the books on magical creatures. My fingers dance along the spines of books until I find the one I'm looking for and pull it out of the shelf with a triumphant smile.
The book next to it catches my eye and I have to take a second to make sure I'm not seeing things.
Slowly, with a trembling hand, I pull out The History of Sorcery and The Great Battle from the shelf and stare at in in disbelief. I don't understand... What is it doing here? In this shelf? In this school. I didn't know there were any left, I thought they'd all been burnt.... I run my fingers along the author's name in the bottom of the page, and a small smile tugs at the corner of my lip without my permission. Sharon Rey...
"Are you coming?" I hear Percy's voice from the front of the library and I snap out of my thoughts. I glance back, making sure he can't see me, but there's rows and rows of bookshelves stuffed to the brim between us and I quickly cram The History of Sorcery and The Great Battle into my bag. My heart is racing when I jog back to the counter and give Percy my most charming and innocent smile. He doesn't buy it, or if he does he doesn't show it at all.
"Sorry, it took longer than I thought to find the right one," I say sweetly as he raises his eyebrows and marks down the name of the book I'm borrowing.
"Sure... Sign here," he says, pointing at the last column on the page and I take the long quill he offers me and sign. "Now get out so I can close."
"Sir, yessir," I say and bow, skipping out before he has a chance for a comeback.
The History of Sorcery and The Great Battle is burning a hole in my bag as I carefully refrain from running back to my room.
~x~
I'm sitting at the desk, leafing through the faerie book and penning down a new letter when Gil walks up behind me.
"Do you still need that cup?" he asks, gesturing at the mug on the desk that had previously been filled with ginger ale. Gil - being the mother hen he is - had brought me said mug from supper, along with some bread and ham. It's empty now, resting next to the plate cleaned neatly of all crumbs.
I pick it up and hand it over. "All yours, buddy," I say, dropping it onto Gil's hands. He mumbles a quick thanks and then disappears into the lavatory connected to our room. I lean back on my chair, watching after him curiously. I can hear the water run for a moment and then he returns, cup presumably full, small droplets of water sliding down the outside and along his fingers. He sets it on the desk by the wall.
"Water?" I ask. He smiles.
"Yeah, well," he starts, going over to his bag and rummaging through it. "I picked these flowers from the forest, and I figure I should put them in water before they dry. We have no vase, but the cup doesn't look to bad, right?" He returns to the desk and places four blue-violet flowers in the cup. I don't recognize the species. They sag a little over the edge, but they look pretty and smell nice, so I guess it doesn't really matter.
"Yeah, they look good," I say and Gil looks away bashfully. He rests his hand on my shoulder for a moment but then lets it slide off and he moves back to his bed and his open history notes. I glance back at him after a minute but he's completely preoccupied by his studies and I decide not to say anything. The sweet aroma of the flowers fills the room as I write another letter to send the boy in case he doesn't respond tomorrow. I hope he does. Eventually we decide that's enough school work for one night and get ready to go to bed.
The flowers are already perked up a bit when I walk past the desk to turn off the lights.
___________________________________________________________
Heyyyyyy, I'm not late, you're late. Yeah yeah, sorry. The problem with knowing what you're gonna write is that you know what you're gonna write, so you don't really get the "I'll just start somewhere and see where it goes" feeling it's just "I'm not entirely sure where to start but I know where it needs to go and so the starting feels forced or sth". Or is that just me? Did you even understand that? Like... if I know where it's going it feels more like a chore and less like an adventure. Or something.
ANYWAY.
Bed time now I think. Bye.
Pie out.
ps ur topic is "steel"
Friday, May 29, 2015
Wednesday, May 27, 2015
The Sorcerer, Part 7 - Books
"Did you know that you can make a potion from the scales of a kokolhan lizard that presumably cures any injury?"
We're studying with Tauria at the huge academia library, looking for the interesting facts about the kokolhan lizards for the animalogy class tomorrow. We've been here for hours, because none of the facts seem to be quite interesting enough, to beat everyone else's probable interesting facts.
"That's a good one," I say, slamming the book in front of me shut, "I'm giving up. I'll never find anything as interesting as that. Especially if that's true."
Tauria eyed me for a moment over the table.
"There's no way that's true. A potion that cures any injury? Come on. Any injury."
"Well, it didn't say how fast it cures it. It might be that it cures anything, but just not fast enough that you wouldn't bleed to death meanwhile."
"You do realise with that logic all injuries are always cured just on their own. Some just aren't cured fast enough."
I stared at her and cocked my head to the side. Yeah. I can clearly notice my mind is being preoccupied with not lizards, but with the fact that someone knows my secret and my name, and that at any moment a bunch of government men can thrust in through the doors and arrest me, and have me killed.
I've been going through the whole thing in my mind so many times. Maybe it isn't about my magic after all. Maybe it's someone who's messing with me, maybe they heard some embarrassing rumour about me, and that's what they're talking about when they say I'm special, and they think they're playing a practical joke on me. Or it goes even further than that, and the writer really doesn't know anything about me, but just decided to humor themselves by making me think that they know my darkest secrets.
Then again, the letter did sound friendly. But in my situation I can't afford to trust anyone. Not even friendly. Which really has meaning next to nothing.
"What's going on with you?" Tauria stares at me from across the table.
"Uh.... Nothing?" I answer, very unconvincingly.
"You haven't been acting like yourself lately. For the whole of the beginning of this term. What's going on?"
"I haven't slept too well," I say, truthfully.
"Yes. I can see that," Tauria rises an eyebrow at me, "The question is why."
I shrug. We sit there, for a moment longer. Then she closes her book and begins to stand up.
"You know, all this time we've both been here, you've been my best friend. We used to be able to talk. About anything. And now. Now I don't know what's happening. I can see you clearly don't want to talk about it, so I won't push you. But I'm a little disappointed you feel like you can't trust me with something clearly huge. And I'm worried about you."
She picks up her stuff and walks away. I hit my forehead on the table. I sit there, with my head on the table, for a few minutes, thinking. Or rather trying to think. My brain is so stuffed for the thinking to actually go anywhere from "what am I doing? I have to tell her. But I can't. But I have to. What am I doing? She's my best friend. I have to tell her. But I can't."
I finally sigh, give up, gather my stuff and head towards where I think I took the book I had been reading to return it to the shelf. I find the right place and push it into the space between the two neighboring books. I'm already leaving when I notice the title on the book next to it: The History of Sorcery and The Great Battle.
I glance around the shelf. Everything else on the shelf is about animals. Either general books on animals, or books on specific animals, or animals living in foreign countries. But they're all animalogy books, in one way or the other. The system they use to categorise books in the library is insane, and even though the guys working there clearly know exactly how it works, it's taken me this long to figure out the general way the books are organised, though some books are still in places I wouldn't even think to look if I wasn't lead there by someone who knows the system. Even so, I'm pretty sure this book is simply in the wrong place.
There is something weird going on in this school.
I wave the echo of the words from the letter out of my head. Someone misplaced a book, that's all. It happens all the time. I think.
I take the book out of the shelf and start heading towards the desk where the library workers sit, so they can return it to where ever it's really supposed to be.
I leaf it through a little as I walk. Everyone knows the story about the Great Battle to rid the kingdom of sorcery, the one written by the King's father. But this one, it starts differently. The words are unfamiliar, not the ones I'm used to when reading about the Battle. It's been written by a sorcerer. A sorcerer who seems to have been there.
Someone touches me on the shoulder.
"Huh?" I say, looking up.
"We're closing the library for the night."
I look around. I'm sitting at a table, with The History of Sorcery and The Great Battle in front of me. There's no one else in the library, as far as I can see. Just me and the guy who just came to talk to me.
"Oh, uh," I say. "Sorry. I guess I just get carried away. How late is it?"
"We're closing the library for the night. They're serving supper in the dining hall."
"Oh. Right," my stomach grumbles loudly. I hand the guy the book, "Here. Someone had put it in a wrong shelf, with the animalogy books. I was bringing it to you. I guess I started reading it on the way."
The librarian takes the book and looks at it. Then he looks at me.
"Well, off you go now," he makes a shooing motion with his free hand.
I grab my things and hurry out of the library, to get something to eat. I didn't even know there were books like that in the library, books written by sorcerers. Well, obviously there would be books written by sorcerers, but old books, about animals or plants, or calculus. Not history books. I didn't know books like that even exist, that tell that part of history from the other side's point of view.
I head for the dining hall, starving, since I had apparently skipped a meal sitting in the library.
The next day I go back to the library, looking for the book, to read the rest of it. I can't find it anywhere.
_____________________________________________________________
I thought I'd do this first thing in the morning. Partly because, yes, only writing every second day is driving me crazy, since the next part always comes in so slow, and partly because I figured I can concentrate on other things when I don't have to keep planning this for the rest of the day.
And partly because I'm kind of avoiding eating breakfast, since I just had two of my teeth pulled out two days ago, and I'm not sure what I can eat yet without it hurting, and we don't have any oatmeal that I could make that I know I could eat. So I'm just postponing the eating.
Anyway.
Your topic for Friday is Water.
I'll see you tomorrow. Mom said you'll have to pick me up from the train, since she's off to something to do with work.
~matu
We're studying with Tauria at the huge academia library, looking for the interesting facts about the kokolhan lizards for the animalogy class tomorrow. We've been here for hours, because none of the facts seem to be quite interesting enough, to beat everyone else's probable interesting facts.
"That's a good one," I say, slamming the book in front of me shut, "I'm giving up. I'll never find anything as interesting as that. Especially if that's true."
Tauria eyed me for a moment over the table.
"There's no way that's true. A potion that cures any injury? Come on. Any injury."
"Well, it didn't say how fast it cures it. It might be that it cures anything, but just not fast enough that you wouldn't bleed to death meanwhile."
"You do realise with that logic all injuries are always cured just on their own. Some just aren't cured fast enough."
I stared at her and cocked my head to the side. Yeah. I can clearly notice my mind is being preoccupied with not lizards, but with the fact that someone knows my secret and my name, and that at any moment a bunch of government men can thrust in through the doors and arrest me, and have me killed.
I've been going through the whole thing in my mind so many times. Maybe it isn't about my magic after all. Maybe it's someone who's messing with me, maybe they heard some embarrassing rumour about me, and that's what they're talking about when they say I'm special, and they think they're playing a practical joke on me. Or it goes even further than that, and the writer really doesn't know anything about me, but just decided to humor themselves by making me think that they know my darkest secrets.
Then again, the letter did sound friendly. But in my situation I can't afford to trust anyone. Not even friendly. Which really has meaning next to nothing.
"What's going on with you?" Tauria stares at me from across the table.
"Uh.... Nothing?" I answer, very unconvincingly.
"You haven't been acting like yourself lately. For the whole of the beginning of this term. What's going on?"
"I haven't slept too well," I say, truthfully.
"Yes. I can see that," Tauria rises an eyebrow at me, "The question is why."
I shrug. We sit there, for a moment longer. Then she closes her book and begins to stand up.
"You know, all this time we've both been here, you've been my best friend. We used to be able to talk. About anything. And now. Now I don't know what's happening. I can see you clearly don't want to talk about it, so I won't push you. But I'm a little disappointed you feel like you can't trust me with something clearly huge. And I'm worried about you."
She picks up her stuff and walks away. I hit my forehead on the table. I sit there, with my head on the table, for a few minutes, thinking. Or rather trying to think. My brain is so stuffed for the thinking to actually go anywhere from "what am I doing? I have to tell her. But I can't. But I have to. What am I doing? She's my best friend. I have to tell her. But I can't."
I finally sigh, give up, gather my stuff and head towards where I think I took the book I had been reading to return it to the shelf. I find the right place and push it into the space between the two neighboring books. I'm already leaving when I notice the title on the book next to it: The History of Sorcery and The Great Battle.
I glance around the shelf. Everything else on the shelf is about animals. Either general books on animals, or books on specific animals, or animals living in foreign countries. But they're all animalogy books, in one way or the other. The system they use to categorise books in the library is insane, and even though the guys working there clearly know exactly how it works, it's taken me this long to figure out the general way the books are organised, though some books are still in places I wouldn't even think to look if I wasn't lead there by someone who knows the system. Even so, I'm pretty sure this book is simply in the wrong place.
There is something weird going on in this school.
I wave the echo of the words from the letter out of my head. Someone misplaced a book, that's all. It happens all the time. I think.
I take the book out of the shelf and start heading towards the desk where the library workers sit, so they can return it to where ever it's really supposed to be.
I leaf it through a little as I walk. Everyone knows the story about the Great Battle to rid the kingdom of sorcery, the one written by the King's father. But this one, it starts differently. The words are unfamiliar, not the ones I'm used to when reading about the Battle. It's been written by a sorcerer. A sorcerer who seems to have been there.
Someone touches me on the shoulder.
"Huh?" I say, looking up.
"We're closing the library for the night."
I look around. I'm sitting at a table, with The History of Sorcery and The Great Battle in front of me. There's no one else in the library, as far as I can see. Just me and the guy who just came to talk to me.
"Oh, uh," I say. "Sorry. I guess I just get carried away. How late is it?"
"We're closing the library for the night. They're serving supper in the dining hall."
"Oh. Right," my stomach grumbles loudly. I hand the guy the book, "Here. Someone had put it in a wrong shelf, with the animalogy books. I was bringing it to you. I guess I started reading it on the way."
The librarian takes the book and looks at it. Then he looks at me.
"Well, off you go now," he makes a shooing motion with his free hand.
I grab my things and hurry out of the library, to get something to eat. I didn't even know there were books like that in the library, books written by sorcerers. Well, obviously there would be books written by sorcerers, but old books, about animals or plants, or calculus. Not history books. I didn't know books like that even exist, that tell that part of history from the other side's point of view.
I head for the dining hall, starving, since I had apparently skipped a meal sitting in the library.
The next day I go back to the library, looking for the book, to read the rest of it. I can't find it anywhere.
_____________________________________________________________
I thought I'd do this first thing in the morning. Partly because, yes, only writing every second day is driving me crazy, since the next part always comes in so slow, and partly because I figured I can concentrate on other things when I don't have to keep planning this for the rest of the day.
And partly because I'm kind of avoiding eating breakfast, since I just had two of my teeth pulled out two days ago, and I'm not sure what I can eat yet without it hurting, and we don't have any oatmeal that I could make that I know I could eat. So I'm just postponing the eating.
Anyway.
Your topic for Friday is Water.
I'll see you tomorrow. Mom said you'll have to pick me up from the train, since she's off to something to do with work.
~matu
Monday, May 25, 2015
The Sorcerer, Part 6 - Hair
We have no classes on Wednesday afternoon, so we decide to ride out to investigate the supposed faerie nest that day. The journey is slow, because Gilbert is unaccustomed to riding (not to mention slightly scared of the pony) and refuses to ride very fast. Alica is leading the way, being the only one of us who knows exactly where we're going - I have heard stories of the sometimes wild things students get up to in the woods, but I've never personally attended any of them. Alica has, apparently, but refuses to tell us exactly what kind of 'party' it was.
"Are we there soon," Gilbert asks, not for the first time. "I'm not sure how much longer I can ride this thing."
"Relax, love, just a few more minutes," Alica says, carefree as always. "We should be able to see the edge of the clearing soon."
Gil grumbles a little under his breath and I push down a laugh. His pony snorts and shakes its head and Gil freezes for a moment, but the pony does nothing more, so he relaxes slightly. Very slightly.
"Oh, there it is, just up ahead," Alica says, pointing at the distinct lack of trees some ten meters in front of us.
We get to the clearing and dismount, tying the reins of the ponies to some trees. Gil side eyes his pony warily as I tie it to the tree, but the pony is utterly uninterested. I clap him on the shoulder as I walk past and he snaps out of it.
The clearing is surprisingly big, a good twenty meters in diameter, a few flowers sprouting in the midst of the light green grass and patches of hay. There is a tree, slightly off the side, which indeed sticks out like a sore thumb. We walk towards it.
"It's not exactly in the middle..." I say. Alica shrugs. "But I have to say, those leaves are way too green for the middle of May."
I pluck out one the leaves and inspect it. It seems like a perfectly normal leaf and I wouldn't give it a second thought if it weren't for the peculiar circumstances. It is, of course, perfectly possible that the reason the tree has grown so much faster is perfectly natural, perhaps because of the spot, maybe the soil is good or it gets more sunlight because it's more in the middle and doesn't have to compete with the other trees, but still... I just can't shake the feeling that there is something more to this tree. There has to be...
"Okay, that's kinda weird," Gil says from next to me, breaking my concentration. I look at him, but he's looking at the ground. "Do mushrooms normally grow so... evenly?"
"Mushrooms?" I say and look down. My eyes widen. There is a perfectly round line of small mushrooms circling the tree 30 centimeters from it. This is....
"Is that a faerie ring?" Alica asks and I can't speak. I'm too excited. The probability of there really being actual faeries here just skyrocketed. I'm probably grinning like a madman as I kneel down in front of the mushrooms. There is something small and glittery on one of them and I pick it up. Both Alica and Gil peer closer at the sparkling on the palm of my hand.
"What the hell is that?" Gil whispers. Alica's mouth is hanging open.
"That, my dearest friends, is tiny hair," I say, my eyes wide. "From actual tiny faeries."
"Γαμώτο..."
"Language, Lis," I say and Alica slaps my arm.
"This is unbelievable," Gil says. "I mean, you're telling me there actually is a faerie nest in this tree?"
"Seems like the most likely explanation," I say. "Unless you know of something else that leaves behind hair this small and shiny."
"What do we do now? Do we try to find them? Or just let them be? I mean, that kinda proves they are here, right?" Alica asks, and I consider it for a moment.
"We got proof already, do we really want to press our luck?" Gil says, hand grabbing onto the sleeve of my school uniform. He's incredibly tense again. "They might get pissed if they think we're trying to invade their home."
"You're probably right," I say after a while, putting the hair onto a small piece of parchment and folding it up, and can feel Gil deflate next to me. "We should head back."
"Whaaat, I wanted to see faeries!" Alica complains but comes willingly when we move to leave. Gil squints at the pony before he gets on but he's clearly more afraid of a faerie curse than the pony, so he doesn't say anything.
As we're leaving I get a sudden sense of being watched and I glance one more time at the tree. There seems to be some kind of small figures in the leaves but they're gone as quickly as they appeared and on the way back I could swear to gods the trees were waving at us.
____________________________________________________________________
Hey ho, here you go! Oh look, I rhymed.
I didn't really know what to do with this topic but I think this turned out ok. You know, it's really annoying how I have to wait for two days to get a followup and then two more days until I can write more.... But I guess it's better this way, writing every other day takes a lot of energy.
I have a vague sense of where this is going... Do you?
Your topic isssss........ Books.
Don't think I had anything else, so bye.
Pie out.
P.S. If you plan for the next bit to be after Friday let me know.
"Are we there soon," Gilbert asks, not for the first time. "I'm not sure how much longer I can ride this thing."
"Relax, love, just a few more minutes," Alica says, carefree as always. "We should be able to see the edge of the clearing soon."
Gil grumbles a little under his breath and I push down a laugh. His pony snorts and shakes its head and Gil freezes for a moment, but the pony does nothing more, so he relaxes slightly. Very slightly.
"Oh, there it is, just up ahead," Alica says, pointing at the distinct lack of trees some ten meters in front of us.
We get to the clearing and dismount, tying the reins of the ponies to some trees. Gil side eyes his pony warily as I tie it to the tree, but the pony is utterly uninterested. I clap him on the shoulder as I walk past and he snaps out of it.
The clearing is surprisingly big, a good twenty meters in diameter, a few flowers sprouting in the midst of the light green grass and patches of hay. There is a tree, slightly off the side, which indeed sticks out like a sore thumb. We walk towards it.
"It's not exactly in the middle..." I say. Alica shrugs. "But I have to say, those leaves are way too green for the middle of May."
I pluck out one the leaves and inspect it. It seems like a perfectly normal leaf and I wouldn't give it a second thought if it weren't for the peculiar circumstances. It is, of course, perfectly possible that the reason the tree has grown so much faster is perfectly natural, perhaps because of the spot, maybe the soil is good or it gets more sunlight because it's more in the middle and doesn't have to compete with the other trees, but still... I just can't shake the feeling that there is something more to this tree. There has to be...
"Okay, that's kinda weird," Gil says from next to me, breaking my concentration. I look at him, but he's looking at the ground. "Do mushrooms normally grow so... evenly?"
"Mushrooms?" I say and look down. My eyes widen. There is a perfectly round line of small mushrooms circling the tree 30 centimeters from it. This is....
"Is that a faerie ring?" Alica asks and I can't speak. I'm too excited. The probability of there really being actual faeries here just skyrocketed. I'm probably grinning like a madman as I kneel down in front of the mushrooms. There is something small and glittery on one of them and I pick it up. Both Alica and Gil peer closer at the sparkling on the palm of my hand.
"What the hell is that?" Gil whispers. Alica's mouth is hanging open.
"That, my dearest friends, is tiny hair," I say, my eyes wide. "From actual tiny faeries."
"Γαμώτο..."
"Language, Lis," I say and Alica slaps my arm.
"This is unbelievable," Gil says. "I mean, you're telling me there actually is a faerie nest in this tree?"
"Seems like the most likely explanation," I say. "Unless you know of something else that leaves behind hair this small and shiny."
"What do we do now? Do we try to find them? Or just let them be? I mean, that kinda proves they are here, right?" Alica asks, and I consider it for a moment.
"We got proof already, do we really want to press our luck?" Gil says, hand grabbing onto the sleeve of my school uniform. He's incredibly tense again. "They might get pissed if they think we're trying to invade their home."
"You're probably right," I say after a while, putting the hair onto a small piece of parchment and folding it up, and can feel Gil deflate next to me. "We should head back."
"Whaaat, I wanted to see faeries!" Alica complains but comes willingly when we move to leave. Gil squints at the pony before he gets on but he's clearly more afraid of a faerie curse than the pony, so he doesn't say anything.
As we're leaving I get a sudden sense of being watched and I glance one more time at the tree. There seems to be some kind of small figures in the leaves but they're gone as quickly as they appeared and on the way back I could swear to gods the trees were waving at us.
____________________________________________________________________
Hey ho, here you go! Oh look, I rhymed.
I didn't really know what to do with this topic but I think this turned out ok. You know, it's really annoying how I have to wait for two days to get a followup and then two more days until I can write more.... But I guess it's better this way, writing every other day takes a lot of energy.
I have a vague sense of where this is going... Do you?
Your topic isssss........ Books.
Don't think I had anything else, so bye.
Pie out.
P.S. If you plan for the next bit to be after Friday let me know.
Friday, May 22, 2015
The Sorcerer, Part 5 - Lizard
A few of days later I'm sitting in animalogy class, listening to our teacher go on about this lizard that lives up on the northern mountains.
..." and they can grow huge. Almost three times your height in length. It's about half the width of this room."
I'm usually enjoying these lessons. The world is a pretty fascinating place, after all. And huge. I'd want to see it all, but since I can't, I'll have to do with just hearing about all the things and animals out there, all around the world. But lately I've found trouble concentrating. I'm still every now and then overwhelmed by the feeling of using magic, two days later. Yesterday Tauria caught me staring into nothingness, smiling like an idiot.
And when my head isn't filled with the wondrous feeling of having magic, it's filled with the fear of having magic. The fear of being caught. The panic I assume you only feel when you know one single, tiniest unconscious slip can get you killed. If anyone found out, I'd be dead.
"...standing there in the middle of the clearing with mid-summer green leaves, now the newly hatched, lighter green leaves the other trees have."
My ear catches just the end of the sentence the girl behind me is whispering to her friend, but that's enough.
"Really?"
"Yes, yeah, they're saying it's the faeries. They made the tree grow in the middle there alone, and then made the leaves grow faster onto it than any of the other ones. All really fast. Nina said the tree wasn't there at all the last time they were there a week ago."
I freeze. My breathing gets shallow and fast. I resist the temptation of turning around and asking the girls if they're really talking what I think they're talking.
"No way. Can faeries do that?"
"Well obviously. Why couldn't they?"
"There aren't even any of them around here."
"Well, I guess everyone was wrong about that."
"Or you've been lied to."
"A-ah, no way. Nina also told the trees were waving to them."
"Ok, you were definitely lied to. They're making it up. Can't you see."
I notice I've stopped breathing. I let out a long, slow breath through my nose.
"...up in the mountains? Mister Ferrel."
I snap out of my thoughts, out of the conversation the girls are having behind me, and remember again where I am. I stare at the teacher for a moment.
"Uh," I say. I've never felt as stupid as this in class, "Uh, I'm sorry. Could you say that again?"
"I asked why they only live up in the mountains."
"The kokohlan lizards? Because," I pause for a moment to think. My brain feels sluggish. I feel like hitting myself in the head to make it work better. "They're huge. Which means their bodies produce a lot of heat, just by maintaining the basic functions. And they're reptiles. Their body temperature follows the temperature of their surroundings. It's cooler in the mountains. They live there so they don't overheat." I pause again, waiting for a reaction from the teacher. "That can happen to reptiles too, right?"
The teacher looks at me thoughtfully for a moment longer, and then nods.
"That's right," she nods. The big bell in the clock tower sounds and everyone around me starts packing. "Don't forget your assignment for next time!" she shouts after us before everyone gets the chance to leave.
"What assignment?" I ask Tauria as we get out of the class.
"Ok, what happened to you in there? You're usually scarily attentive in those classes," she asks, ignoring my question.
"I just slept really bad last night," I answer, "What assignment? I'd like to be better prepared for the next class."
"She wants us to go to the library and so some reading about the kokohlans, and find something interesting about them. The one with the most interesting fact about them the next time wins."
"Wins what?"
Tauria shrugs. Laelia appears to her side from out of the crowd.
"I guys," she says, "Wanna come have lunch with me?"
"Yeah, sure," Tauria says and turns to look at me, "You coming?"
"I think I need to go out for a bit, for some fresh air," I say, "I'll catch you guys in the dining hall a little later?"
Tauria nods and the girls disappear into the mass of students milling around us. I head the other way down the corridor, to a courtyard I found in the end of last term that no one seems to know even exist. I guess in a building complex this size there are so many places people can't know about all of them.
Once I get to the yard I just sit against the wall for a while, thinking. I did something in those woods. I made the tree. I don't know how, all I thought I did was grow some leaves in a branch. And even that was kind of an accident. Sure, I was trying to do that, but I still don't know how I actually did do it.
No one knows I did it, I tell myself. They think it was faeries. There is no reason why anyone would suspect me. But as I sit against the cool rock with the warm sunshine on my face, I can't sink the heavy feeling in my gut.
Finally I get up and head for the dining hall to find Tauria and Laelia. I get my food, and spot them quite easily, sit down with them. They're talking brightly, making jokes. Tauria's laughing at something Laelia just said. I don't know what it was. I don't taste the food.
When the bell sounds again we get up, Laelia waves bye to us, and me and Tauria head for the history class. In class I sit down, dig out the book from within the desk in front if me. Professor Cole comes into the class and begins to talk about something I'm not hearing. The class goes by as fast as an old snail. At some point I start leafing through the book, just trying to focus on something, anything.
I find an envelope in between the book, near the back. I turn it around.
Knute
I blink and look at the envelope again, this time more alert.
Knute
It says my name on the envelope.
I don't know anything any more, about anything.
What am I supposed to do? Take the envelope? Is it meant for me? There aren't any other Knutes in the whole school, at least that I know of.
It's probably a practical joke. I should still take it, just so no one else sees it and finds it. Besides, if I keep staring at it for much longer, professor Cole will notice. So I stuff the envelope into my bag.
The rest of the class goes by even slower than the beginning had. But finally it's over. I have no other classes today, so I head back to my room, where I hope I can find some privacy. When I get there I drop into my bed. I'm exhausted. From the worry, from the thrill. From the insane lessons today. From everything. From all of it. I don't know how I'm going to make it for the whole term, if I'm already a wreck.
I lay there, staring at the ceiling for a moment. Then I get up and dig out the envelope from my bag. There's a letter inside.
I forget to breath again.
I'm dead.
____________________________________________________________________
Ok, so that happened. I just started writing and then stuff kept coming out. But I guess that's good.
I hope there aren't too many typos. I'm super-tired, because I haven't slept too well for the last two nights. I actually thought this was going to end up a short thing because I felt too tired to write when I first started, but then it just kept going. And that's the kind for writing that I really love.
Anyway.
I made it through another university admission exam yesterday. I think it well really well. Probably. Meaning I'm guessing I might actually finally get to study what I really want to study.
Hopefully.
But I do want to go to sleep now.
Your topic for... Monday? Monday.
Is Hair.
~matu
..." and they can grow huge. Almost three times your height in length. It's about half the width of this room."
I'm usually enjoying these lessons. The world is a pretty fascinating place, after all. And huge. I'd want to see it all, but since I can't, I'll have to do with just hearing about all the things and animals out there, all around the world. But lately I've found trouble concentrating. I'm still every now and then overwhelmed by the feeling of using magic, two days later. Yesterday Tauria caught me staring into nothingness, smiling like an idiot.
And when my head isn't filled with the wondrous feeling of having magic, it's filled with the fear of having magic. The fear of being caught. The panic I assume you only feel when you know one single, tiniest unconscious slip can get you killed. If anyone found out, I'd be dead.
"...standing there in the middle of the clearing with mid-summer green leaves, now the newly hatched, lighter green leaves the other trees have."
My ear catches just the end of the sentence the girl behind me is whispering to her friend, but that's enough.
"Really?"
"Yes, yeah, they're saying it's the faeries. They made the tree grow in the middle there alone, and then made the leaves grow faster onto it than any of the other ones. All really fast. Nina said the tree wasn't there at all the last time they were there a week ago."
I freeze. My breathing gets shallow and fast. I resist the temptation of turning around and asking the girls if they're really talking what I think they're talking.
"No way. Can faeries do that?"
"Well obviously. Why couldn't they?"
"There aren't even any of them around here."
"Well, I guess everyone was wrong about that."
"Or you've been lied to."
"A-ah, no way. Nina also told the trees were waving to them."
"Ok, you were definitely lied to. They're making it up. Can't you see."
I notice I've stopped breathing. I let out a long, slow breath through my nose.
"...up in the mountains? Mister Ferrel."
I snap out of my thoughts, out of the conversation the girls are having behind me, and remember again where I am. I stare at the teacher for a moment.
"Uh," I say. I've never felt as stupid as this in class, "Uh, I'm sorry. Could you say that again?"
"I asked why they only live up in the mountains."
"The kokohlan lizards? Because," I pause for a moment to think. My brain feels sluggish. I feel like hitting myself in the head to make it work better. "They're huge. Which means their bodies produce a lot of heat, just by maintaining the basic functions. And they're reptiles. Their body temperature follows the temperature of their surroundings. It's cooler in the mountains. They live there so they don't overheat." I pause again, waiting for a reaction from the teacher. "That can happen to reptiles too, right?"
The teacher looks at me thoughtfully for a moment longer, and then nods.
"That's right," she nods. The big bell in the clock tower sounds and everyone around me starts packing. "Don't forget your assignment for next time!" she shouts after us before everyone gets the chance to leave.
"What assignment?" I ask Tauria as we get out of the class.
"Ok, what happened to you in there? You're usually scarily attentive in those classes," she asks, ignoring my question.
"I just slept really bad last night," I answer, "What assignment? I'd like to be better prepared for the next class."
"She wants us to go to the library and so some reading about the kokohlans, and find something interesting about them. The one with the most interesting fact about them the next time wins."
"Wins what?"
Tauria shrugs. Laelia appears to her side from out of the crowd.
"I guys," she says, "Wanna come have lunch with me?"
"Yeah, sure," Tauria says and turns to look at me, "You coming?"
"I think I need to go out for a bit, for some fresh air," I say, "I'll catch you guys in the dining hall a little later?"
Tauria nods and the girls disappear into the mass of students milling around us. I head the other way down the corridor, to a courtyard I found in the end of last term that no one seems to know even exist. I guess in a building complex this size there are so many places people can't know about all of them.
Once I get to the yard I just sit against the wall for a while, thinking. I did something in those woods. I made the tree. I don't know how, all I thought I did was grow some leaves in a branch. And even that was kind of an accident. Sure, I was trying to do that, but I still don't know how I actually did do it.
No one knows I did it, I tell myself. They think it was faeries. There is no reason why anyone would suspect me. But as I sit against the cool rock with the warm sunshine on my face, I can't sink the heavy feeling in my gut.
Finally I get up and head for the dining hall to find Tauria and Laelia. I get my food, and spot them quite easily, sit down with them. They're talking brightly, making jokes. Tauria's laughing at something Laelia just said. I don't know what it was. I don't taste the food.
When the bell sounds again we get up, Laelia waves bye to us, and me and Tauria head for the history class. In class I sit down, dig out the book from within the desk in front if me. Professor Cole comes into the class and begins to talk about something I'm not hearing. The class goes by as fast as an old snail. At some point I start leafing through the book, just trying to focus on something, anything.
I find an envelope in between the book, near the back. I turn it around.
Knute
I blink and look at the envelope again, this time more alert.
Knute
It says my name on the envelope.
I don't know anything any more, about anything.
What am I supposed to do? Take the envelope? Is it meant for me? There aren't any other Knutes in the whole school, at least that I know of.
It's probably a practical joke. I should still take it, just so no one else sees it and finds it. Besides, if I keep staring at it for much longer, professor Cole will notice. So I stuff the envelope into my bag.
The rest of the class goes by even slower than the beginning had. But finally it's over. I have no other classes today, so I head back to my room, where I hope I can find some privacy. When I get there I drop into my bed. I'm exhausted. From the worry, from the thrill. From the insane lessons today. From everything. From all of it. I don't know how I'm going to make it for the whole term, if I'm already a wreck.
I lay there, staring at the ceiling for a moment. Then I get up and dig out the envelope from my bag. There's a letter inside.
I forget to breath again.
I'm dead.
____________________________________________________________________
Ok, so that happened. I just started writing and then stuff kept coming out. But I guess that's good.
I hope there aren't too many typos. I'm super-tired, because I haven't slept too well for the last two nights. I actually thought this was going to end up a short thing because I felt too tired to write when I first started, but then it just kept going. And that's the kind for writing that I really love.
Anyway.
I made it through another university admission exam yesterday. I think it well really well. Probably. Meaning I'm guessing I might actually finally get to study what I really want to study.
Hopefully.
But I do want to go to sleep now.
Your topic for... Monday? Monday.
Is Hair.
~matu
Wednesday, May 20, 2015
The Sorcerer, Part 4 - Story
Three days after the first history class on Friday Gilbert, Alica, and I are spending the evening in the dorm room Gil and I share. I'm sitting with my back against my bed while Alica is laying on top of it, playing with my hair and humming, and Gil is on his own bed, a heavy looking arithmetics book on his lap. He's biting the nail of his thumb, brow furrowed in concentration or perhaps confusion. My own focus is on the piece of parchment in front of me, the one I'm trying to compose the perfect letter on. So far it's going terribly.
There's a hard tug on my hair and my head jerks back.
"Ow, what are you doing, Alica?" I say and try to rub the sore spot. She slaps my hand away.
"Shh, I'm going to make you beautiful," she says and I would shake my head in fond exasperation if moving was an option, but Alica's death grip on my hair is firm enough to know that wouldn't be wise. Instead I smile lightly and then cross out a few more lines from the letter and write some more.
Gil makes a loud noise of frustration and rubs his face. I glance at him sideways.
"You got a problem, pet?" Alicia asks, unimpressed and not stopping what I assume is braiding.
"I'm just so tired of memorising all these formulas," Gil complains, tipping forward and smacking his face on the bed. "Do you ever feel like that's all we do in school? Just memorise stuff?"
"That's all we do in life, Gil," I say, rewriting the first sentence. "We memorise things and events and then make decisions based on those memories. For example, you remember you don't like beans so you decide to pick something else for lunch, or I remember our first lesson is at 8 tomorrow morning and so decide that I won't stay up too late tonight. Memorsing things forms the basis of human behaviour."
"Yeah, and I remember that you're an insufferable know-it-all so I decide this is the last time I talk to you about anything," he grumbles into his bed. I laugh and then wince when there's another sharp tug at my hair.
"And Alica remembers what happened last time she nearly pulled all my hair out," I say, my voice overly sweet, "and she decides that this time she will be more careful."
"Oh, don't be so dramatic, love," Alica says and gives my head a pat. "It's not my fault you have a super sensitive scalp underneath all that beautiful, perfect, blond hair. You keep it at such a perfect length too, not super short like Gil's, but still short enough to present a challenge. Hairdressing wise, y'know."
"If you say so," I say and we all fall silent again, the only sounds in the room my scribbling and Gil's occasional annoyed grunts. They get drowned under the humming Alica starts up again.
"I am so done with this for one evening," Gil announces suddenly after a few minutes and slams his book shut with a loud finality. "Let's do something else."
"You need to wait a moment, I have to finish this braid," Alica says.
"And I have to finish this letter," I say and Gil groans.
"What are you even writing?" he asks and tries to lean forward to look over my shoulder.
"No way, Gil, it's a secret," I say with a laugh and pull the letter to my chest. Gil makes a thoughtful noise and then flops on his stomach.
"Fine then," he says. "But could we at least talk about something until you're all done?"
"Hey, did you hear the story about the faeries?" Alica asks. Gil perks up on the bed, and I have to admit, my own interested is piqued as well.
"Faeries? Where?" Gil asks, scooting dangerously close to the edge of the bed. He will fall down by the time Alica ends the story.
"I heard some of the girls talking about it today in class. You know that one opening in the forest out back? It's a bit out of the way, but people use it when they don't want teachers to catch them, y'know." Gil snorts. I can only assume Alica winked at that last part. "So anyway, apparently some of the girls had gone down there this weekend to, umm, relax, and they found this tree in the middle of the clearing that was green."
"Green?" I say.
"What's so special about that?" Gil asks, disappointed. "I mean I'd get it if it were purple or something, but trees are supposed to be green."
"I know that, dummy," Alica says, annoyance colouring her beautiful voice, and naturally my hair suffers the consequences. "But it's only spring. All the other trees were bare or had the smallest of leaves, but this tree was proper green. Like midsummer leaves green. Plus, when they were coming back they saw other trees, like, waving at them even though there was no wind. At all."
"And they think it's faeries?" I ask. Alica hums in agreement. I stare unseeingly at the parchment full of scribbles. Faeries, huh...Don't remember ever hearing about faerie nests in these parts, but I guess it's possible...
"They said it has to be something magical," she says. "Why else would that one tree have leaves so much bigger than the other trees."
"But faeries?" Gil says, worry underlining his voice. "I mean, it seems really cool, but I've heard faeries can be very dangerous if you mess with them."
"We should go investigate," I say. There's a loud thump.
"Are you crazy?" Gil hisses from the floor. I look at him unimpressed, my eyebrow raised. "Did you not hear what I just said about them being potentially dangerous?"
"Yes, I heard you. That's why we should go investigate! If there's something that could be dangerous near the school grounds wouldn't you rather know about it?"
"No..." he mutters, rubbing at the elbow he hit on the floor. It's going to bruise.
"Well, you don't have to come. We'll just go together with Alica, right?" I look up at her with a bright smile.
"Oh, honey, like I could ever resist that smile," she says, her own lips curling into a grin. "Or the prospect of a great adventure."
"That's my girl," I say and Gilbert makes several sounds of protest. We both turn to look at him.
"B-but...." he tries. I raise my eyebrows and he sighs. "Yeah, right. Sure, let's go investigate. And get a fucking faerie curse on our families...."
"Oh, don't be like that," I say and tickle his face with my quill. "You treat the faeries nice and maybe they'll bless your family instead of cursing it."
Gil finally laughs at that. I smile. Everything is much better when he's laughing.
"Okay, done!" announces Alica, and claps my shoulder. Gil looks up at my hair and makes a face that is considerably more impressed than amused, so I count that as a win.
"That suits you surprisingly well," he says and I just know Alica is grinning madly. I get up from the floor, the parchment and the book I used as a support forgotten, as I wander to the mirror by the door.
Alica has really outdone herself this time, I think as I turn my head to get a better look at the elaborate braiding patterns all around my head.
"I must say, Alica, this is really impressive," I say as she walks up behind me and places her hands on my shoulders.
"Thank you, I try," she says and slides forward, until she's leaning on my back quite heavily, her hands crossed in front of me.
I can see Gil from the mirror, still sitting on the floor and scratching the back of his neck. He looks rather miserable, probably thinking I can't see him. I roll my eyes.
"Why are you still sitting on the floor, Gil?" I ask and he looks up in surprise of being addressed. His eyes widen when he notices I can see him. "It's not that comfortable down there and I know that for a fact. My ass is still sore after sitting there the eternity it took Alica to make this hairdo." I can see a smile tugging at the corner of Gil's lips and I grin.
"I'll show you a sore ass!" Alica says and proceeds to pinch me. I yelp and try to get away but she follows me, making pinching motions in the air. Gil tries to separate us but only ends up getting pinched as well and for a moment we're a wrestling mass of pinching and counter pinching but then someone trips and we all go down with a loud crash.
"Oooowwww," Gil complains from underneath me and I push at his chest to get into a sitting position. "Move, Oz, I can't breathe properly."
"Oh, sorry," I say, scooting back a bit, so that I'm sitting on his hips and not his stomach. Alica jumps on my back from behind me before I have time to get up and I quickly lean on Gil's chest again to not fall face first onto him.
"That was fun," she says with a distinct glee in her voice. "Let's do it again!"
"No!" Gil and I say as one as he pushes up to lean on his elbows. He's clearly favoring his left one, I notice. Better check the severity of the bruise before we go to bed. Toppling down twice in the span of ten minutes - this must be a new record, even for Gilbert.
There's a loud knock on the door. We turn to look just as the door opens.
"Curfew in half an hour," the prefect says, his head peeking from behind the door. "So get ready... to..." he trails off as he sees us on the floor. There is a long pause as he stares at us, several emotions flashing over his face. Surprise, confusion, intrigue... Finally he opens his mouth again. "I'm not even gonna ask. Everyone get to your own rooms before curfew." Then he turn around and disappears from the opening.
"Will do, Percy!" I shout after him, but the door is already closed. The three of us look at each other and then burst out laughing. A few minutes later Alica finally gets off me and dusts her skirt. I rise to my feet as well, pulling Gil up after me.
"Well, I guess I better go," she says with a smile. Her eyes fall on my hair, which has undoubtedly fallen slightly out of place after our little wrestling match. "That really looks good on you."
"You do know I'm gonna mess it up the minute you're out the door, right?" Gil says with a grin.
"Oh, I bet you will," she says and he chokes. I laugh.
"Now, now," I say. Alica grins, and then leans over and places a kiss on my cheek before going over to Gil and does the same.
"Well, boys, see you tomorrow in class. Don't stay up too late!" She winks and leaves the room. I huff in amusement. Gil runs a hand through his hair and after a moment's pause runs it through mine as well, messing up all the braids and making is stick up at odd angles. He grins at me and I can't help but chuckle.
"Okay, now show me that elbow," I say. When Gil looks surprised I roll my eyes. "You fell down twice and I saw you being careful with it on the floor. Come on now, I wanna make sure it's not too bad."
He nods and rolls up the sleeve. There is distinct swelling and it's red, but after examining it for a moment I conclude it's not too bad.
"It's gonna be fine in a few days," I say, not yet letting go of the arm. "But I'd be extra careful not to hit it into anything anymore."
"It's not like I am clumsy on purpose, you know," he says. I 'hmm', running my fingers over the bruised skin. It's soft and warm and has little, light hairs growing on it. "Uhh, you can let go now?"
"Hmm? Oh, right, sorry," I say and let go of his hand. He rolls his sleeve back down. My eyes fall on the discarded parchment. Right, that. "Oh yeah, I need to finish the letter," I say and Gil looks down at the parchment. Disappointed.
"Right. I think, uh, I'm going to sleep, now," he says and walks over to his own bed. My heart tugs a little at the tone of his voice.
"You sure?" I ask and he nods.
"Yeah. Early morning tomorrow, remember," he says and tries for a laugh but it comes out a bit hollow. I frown. "Don't stay up too late with that, okay?"
"Yeah..."
I pick up the parchment and book and light the candle on my nightstand, while Gil changes into his nightshirt. I put out the big light and when I get to my bed, Gil is already in his and blows out the candle on his nightstand.
"Good night, Oz," he says, pulling the covers up.
"G'night..." I say, the warm, yellow light from my candle barely illuminating the back of his head. I sigh softly and turn back to the unfinished letter.
It's ages later that I finish writing and I grin as I seal it in an envelope and write the boy's name on it.
The only thing left is to leave it in the history class tomorrow.
___________________________________________________________
Sup. I wrote this for the whole day. Not even kidding. Like holy shittt. I started it last night instead of going to bed like a reasonable person and now it's finished. I have no idea what happened. I didn't know what I wanted to happen and I don't know exactly what ended up happening because I'm too lazy to proofread this and it's been so long since I wrote the beginning. But yeah. It kinda went on and on and on after I started.
Oh, I'm having some issues with the time line? Like.... I was thinking that the second part was on the day following the first part, but it's probably not because then the term would've started on a Friday and that's kinda dumb. Ok, so assume their history classes are on Tuesday and Friday (should there be a third one per week?), yeah, so if the first part was on Tuesday evening, the term started on Wednesday, the second part (first history class) was on Friday, the third part was like... Friday afternoon after classes and this one is the following Monday evening. That makes sense, yeah? Yeah.
Anywho. I forgot what I wanted to say uhh.
Oh right. I have the letter for you if you want to include it in your post on Friday. I guess that's all. Your topic is "Lizard".
Pie out.
P.S. Noticed that I'd written Alica's name Alicia at least five times so I fixed that. Also edited some really bad wording, but nothing big so if you don't see this that's cool. Bye.
There's a hard tug on my hair and my head jerks back.
"Ow, what are you doing, Alica?" I say and try to rub the sore spot. She slaps my hand away.
"Shh, I'm going to make you beautiful," she says and I would shake my head in fond exasperation if moving was an option, but Alica's death grip on my hair is firm enough to know that wouldn't be wise. Instead I smile lightly and then cross out a few more lines from the letter and write some more.
Gil makes a loud noise of frustration and rubs his face. I glance at him sideways.
"You got a problem, pet?" Alicia asks, unimpressed and not stopping what I assume is braiding.
"I'm just so tired of memorising all these formulas," Gil complains, tipping forward and smacking his face on the bed. "Do you ever feel like that's all we do in school? Just memorise stuff?"
"That's all we do in life, Gil," I say, rewriting the first sentence. "We memorise things and events and then make decisions based on those memories. For example, you remember you don't like beans so you decide to pick something else for lunch, or I remember our first lesson is at 8 tomorrow morning and so decide that I won't stay up too late tonight. Memorsing things forms the basis of human behaviour."
"Yeah, and I remember that you're an insufferable know-it-all so I decide this is the last time I talk to you about anything," he grumbles into his bed. I laugh and then wince when there's another sharp tug at my hair.
"And Alica remembers what happened last time she nearly pulled all my hair out," I say, my voice overly sweet, "and she decides that this time she will be more careful."
"Oh, don't be so dramatic, love," Alica says and gives my head a pat. "It's not my fault you have a super sensitive scalp underneath all that beautiful, perfect, blond hair. You keep it at such a perfect length too, not super short like Gil's, but still short enough to present a challenge. Hairdressing wise, y'know."
"If you say so," I say and we all fall silent again, the only sounds in the room my scribbling and Gil's occasional annoyed grunts. They get drowned under the humming Alica starts up again.
"I am so done with this for one evening," Gil announces suddenly after a few minutes and slams his book shut with a loud finality. "Let's do something else."
"You need to wait a moment, I have to finish this braid," Alica says.
"And I have to finish this letter," I say and Gil groans.
"What are you even writing?" he asks and tries to lean forward to look over my shoulder.
"No way, Gil, it's a secret," I say with a laugh and pull the letter to my chest. Gil makes a thoughtful noise and then flops on his stomach.
"Fine then," he says. "But could we at least talk about something until you're all done?"
"Hey, did you hear the story about the faeries?" Alica asks. Gil perks up on the bed, and I have to admit, my own interested is piqued as well.
"Faeries? Where?" Gil asks, scooting dangerously close to the edge of the bed. He will fall down by the time Alica ends the story.
"I heard some of the girls talking about it today in class. You know that one opening in the forest out back? It's a bit out of the way, but people use it when they don't want teachers to catch them, y'know." Gil snorts. I can only assume Alica winked at that last part. "So anyway, apparently some of the girls had gone down there this weekend to, umm, relax, and they found this tree in the middle of the clearing that was green."
"Green?" I say.
"What's so special about that?" Gil asks, disappointed. "I mean I'd get it if it were purple or something, but trees are supposed to be green."
"I know that, dummy," Alica says, annoyance colouring her beautiful voice, and naturally my hair suffers the consequences. "But it's only spring. All the other trees were bare or had the smallest of leaves, but this tree was proper green. Like midsummer leaves green. Plus, when they were coming back they saw other trees, like, waving at them even though there was no wind. At all."
"And they think it's faeries?" I ask. Alica hums in agreement. I stare unseeingly at the parchment full of scribbles. Faeries, huh...Don't remember ever hearing about faerie nests in these parts, but I guess it's possible...
"They said it has to be something magical," she says. "Why else would that one tree have leaves so much bigger than the other trees."
"But faeries?" Gil says, worry underlining his voice. "I mean, it seems really cool, but I've heard faeries can be very dangerous if you mess with them."
"We should go investigate," I say. There's a loud thump.
"Are you crazy?" Gil hisses from the floor. I look at him unimpressed, my eyebrow raised. "Did you not hear what I just said about them being potentially dangerous?"
"Yes, I heard you. That's why we should go investigate! If there's something that could be dangerous near the school grounds wouldn't you rather know about it?"
"No..." he mutters, rubbing at the elbow he hit on the floor. It's going to bruise.
"Well, you don't have to come. We'll just go together with Alica, right?" I look up at her with a bright smile.
"Oh, honey, like I could ever resist that smile," she says, her own lips curling into a grin. "Or the prospect of a great adventure."
"That's my girl," I say and Gilbert makes several sounds of protest. We both turn to look at him.
"B-but...." he tries. I raise my eyebrows and he sighs. "Yeah, right. Sure, let's go investigate. And get a fucking faerie curse on our families...."
"Oh, don't be like that," I say and tickle his face with my quill. "You treat the faeries nice and maybe they'll bless your family instead of cursing it."
Gil finally laughs at that. I smile. Everything is much better when he's laughing.
"Okay, done!" announces Alica, and claps my shoulder. Gil looks up at my hair and makes a face that is considerably more impressed than amused, so I count that as a win.
"That suits you surprisingly well," he says and I just know Alica is grinning madly. I get up from the floor, the parchment and the book I used as a support forgotten, as I wander to the mirror by the door.
Alica has really outdone herself this time, I think as I turn my head to get a better look at the elaborate braiding patterns all around my head.
"I must say, Alica, this is really impressive," I say as she walks up behind me and places her hands on my shoulders.
"Thank you, I try," she says and slides forward, until she's leaning on my back quite heavily, her hands crossed in front of me.
I can see Gil from the mirror, still sitting on the floor and scratching the back of his neck. He looks rather miserable, probably thinking I can't see him. I roll my eyes.
"Why are you still sitting on the floor, Gil?" I ask and he looks up in surprise of being addressed. His eyes widen when he notices I can see him. "It's not that comfortable down there and I know that for a fact. My ass is still sore after sitting there the eternity it took Alica to make this hairdo." I can see a smile tugging at the corner of Gil's lips and I grin.
"I'll show you a sore ass!" Alica says and proceeds to pinch me. I yelp and try to get away but she follows me, making pinching motions in the air. Gil tries to separate us but only ends up getting pinched as well and for a moment we're a wrestling mass of pinching and counter pinching but then someone trips and we all go down with a loud crash.
"Oooowwww," Gil complains from underneath me and I push at his chest to get into a sitting position. "Move, Oz, I can't breathe properly."
"Oh, sorry," I say, scooting back a bit, so that I'm sitting on his hips and not his stomach. Alica jumps on my back from behind me before I have time to get up and I quickly lean on Gil's chest again to not fall face first onto him.
"That was fun," she says with a distinct glee in her voice. "Let's do it again!"
"No!" Gil and I say as one as he pushes up to lean on his elbows. He's clearly favoring his left one, I notice. Better check the severity of the bruise before we go to bed. Toppling down twice in the span of ten minutes - this must be a new record, even for Gilbert.
There's a loud knock on the door. We turn to look just as the door opens.
"Curfew in half an hour," the prefect says, his head peeking from behind the door. "So get ready... to..." he trails off as he sees us on the floor. There is a long pause as he stares at us, several emotions flashing over his face. Surprise, confusion, intrigue... Finally he opens his mouth again. "I'm not even gonna ask. Everyone get to your own rooms before curfew." Then he turn around and disappears from the opening.
"Will do, Percy!" I shout after him, but the door is already closed. The three of us look at each other and then burst out laughing. A few minutes later Alica finally gets off me and dusts her skirt. I rise to my feet as well, pulling Gil up after me.
"Well, I guess I better go," she says with a smile. Her eyes fall on my hair, which has undoubtedly fallen slightly out of place after our little wrestling match. "That really looks good on you."
"You do know I'm gonna mess it up the minute you're out the door, right?" Gil says with a grin.
"Oh, I bet you will," she says and he chokes. I laugh.
"Now, now," I say. Alica grins, and then leans over and places a kiss on my cheek before going over to Gil and does the same.
"Well, boys, see you tomorrow in class. Don't stay up too late!" She winks and leaves the room. I huff in amusement. Gil runs a hand through his hair and after a moment's pause runs it through mine as well, messing up all the braids and making is stick up at odd angles. He grins at me and I can't help but chuckle.
"Okay, now show me that elbow," I say. When Gil looks surprised I roll my eyes. "You fell down twice and I saw you being careful with it on the floor. Come on now, I wanna make sure it's not too bad."
He nods and rolls up the sleeve. There is distinct swelling and it's red, but after examining it for a moment I conclude it's not too bad.
"It's gonna be fine in a few days," I say, not yet letting go of the arm. "But I'd be extra careful not to hit it into anything anymore."
"It's not like I am clumsy on purpose, you know," he says. I 'hmm', running my fingers over the bruised skin. It's soft and warm and has little, light hairs growing on it. "Uhh, you can let go now?"
"Hmm? Oh, right, sorry," I say and let go of his hand. He rolls his sleeve back down. My eyes fall on the discarded parchment. Right, that. "Oh yeah, I need to finish the letter," I say and Gil looks down at the parchment. Disappointed.
"Right. I think, uh, I'm going to sleep, now," he says and walks over to his own bed. My heart tugs a little at the tone of his voice.
"You sure?" I ask and he nods.
"Yeah. Early morning tomorrow, remember," he says and tries for a laugh but it comes out a bit hollow. I frown. "Don't stay up too late with that, okay?"
"Yeah..."
I pick up the parchment and book and light the candle on my nightstand, while Gil changes into his nightshirt. I put out the big light and when I get to my bed, Gil is already in his and blows out the candle on his nightstand.
"Good night, Oz," he says, pulling the covers up.
"G'night..." I say, the warm, yellow light from my candle barely illuminating the back of his head. I sigh softly and turn back to the unfinished letter.
It's ages later that I finish writing and I grin as I seal it in an envelope and write the boy's name on it.
The only thing left is to leave it in the history class tomorrow.
___________________________________________________________
Sup. I wrote this for the whole day. Not even kidding. Like holy shittt. I started it last night instead of going to bed like a reasonable person and now it's finished. I have no idea what happened. I didn't know what I wanted to happen and I don't know exactly what ended up happening because I'm too lazy to proofread this and it's been so long since I wrote the beginning. But yeah. It kinda went on and on and on after I started.
Oh, I'm having some issues with the time line? Like.... I was thinking that the second part was on the day following the first part, but it's probably not because then the term would've started on a Friday and that's kinda dumb. Ok, so assume their history classes are on Tuesday and Friday (should there be a third one per week?), yeah, so if the first part was on Tuesday evening, the term started on Wednesday, the second part (first history class) was on Friday, the third part was like... Friday afternoon after classes and this one is the following Monday evening. That makes sense, yeah? Yeah.
Anywho. I forgot what I wanted to say uhh.
Oh right. I have the letter for you if you want to include it in your post on Friday. I guess that's all. Your topic is "Lizard".
Pie out.
P.S. Noticed that I'd written Alica's name Alicia at least five times so I fixed that. Also edited some really bad wording, but nothing big so if you don't see this that's cool. Bye.
Monday, May 18, 2015
The Sorcerer, Part 3 - Riding
A few days goes past before I get some alone time. The beginnings of terms are always pretty intense. So the first free afternoon I have I go and borrow a pony from the academy stalls. I told Tauria I'm going to the town some way from the academy campus to get some paper and ink I forgot to buy before, and she almost came with me. I finally somehow convinced her not to.
I take the pony and head to the exact opposite direction from the town, to the woods and the trails that zigzag further than anyone I know has ever actually gone. I don't want to risk being seen by anyone. So I ride. For an hour, deep into the woods. I spot a clearing in the woods in front of me, so I head there, get off the pony and tie it to a tree. The pony just stares at me for a moment and then bends down to eat the newly green, fresh grass on the ground.
I walk away from the pony and to what I approximate to be the middle of the clearing. I sit down, my legs crossed.
I have magic. I know I do. I didn't know I did, but I know now. How didn't I remember it before. I was three back in my memory, but still. You'd think I'd remember something like that. You'd think I'd know something like that, even if I didn't remember the first time the magic came out. My parents must have done something to make me forget all about it. Maybe they did something to suppress the magic.
Maybe they did something to make it go away. Maybe I don't have magic any more.
I sit there, my eyes closed. The only things I hear is the pony munching on something and a small stream that must be running somewhere nearby.
There's only one way to find out. I open my eyes and stare at a branch nearby, with light green leaves, not turned the green of summer yet. It all started with a branch, maybe it will come out again with a branch. Though this one has leaves already.
I stare at the branch, trying to figure out what to do. How to do the magic, if I even can. I've never done it, how am I supposed to know how to make it work. Maybe I'm not supposed to know.
What am I doing?
Why in the world am I trying to bring out magic in me? That will only get me in trouble. Or killed. It's been nice and quiet all these years. Why lure it out now to cause all the trouble I don't want?
I sigh, close my eyes again, and breath deep. The pony is still munching on something.
But right now I feel like I don't know who I am any more. It's not like anything has changed. It's not like I have changed. But I don't feel like I know who I am. And I need to know. Otherwise it will drive me crazy. I need to know if I have magic, even if that brings trouble. I'll be able to hide it, somehow, from everyone. I've been successfully hiding it from even myself for all these years, it shouldn't be a problem to hide it from everyone else also in the future.
I open my eyes. I stare at the branch for a moment longer, and then reach to grab it. The branch is cool in my hand. The sun has set low enough behind the trees to cloak half of the clearing in shadow. I didn't even notice. The branch warms up fast from the heat of my hand.
I stare at the branch in my hand, not knowing what to do. My three-year-old self was right, though. The leaves are pretty. Though I like them more when they're a little darker. People keep telling me the green of leaves at midsummer is the green of my eyes. I smile quietly to the countless memories of midsummer feasts. I think every single year someone has told me I have the eyes the color of the forest of that time of year.
I feel my hand warm up a little. The leaves on the branch grow a little, then a little more, gently shifting they're color into a few shades darker, the color of midsummer leaves. I drop the branch, terrified. I stare at it, terrified. Then I stare at my hand, even more terrified. The pony is munching something behind me.
I almost stop breathing for a moment. Then I break our laughing. I do have magic. It's not gone. For a moment I don't understand why I'm laughing, this is terrible. This is the worst thing in the world that could possibly happen. But then I understand.
It felt good. It felt so good. Using magic felt right. It felt like something I was born to do. It didn't feel evil, even though that's what I've been told my whole life. It felt like me, more like me than anything I've ever done before. This is who I am, this is who I'm supposed to be. Even if the whole world is against me. Which it isn't, a small voice says at the back of my head. Just this kingdom. And this kingdom is wrong. That much is clear to me now.
I stand up. It's getting chilly. Well, chilly enough I need some sleeves to stay warm. So I walk up to the pony, which is still munching on something, and dig out my cloak from my pack. I throw it over myself, untie the pony and head back to the academy before it gets too dark. Even so, I ride slow, enjoying myself, enjoying my new sense of me. I try to do some magic on the way, just to see what I can do. But it turns out the only thing I can figure out how to do is make some branches wave from a distance. It might also be the wind, but it's not that windy. And the other branches don't seem to move.
An hour and a half later I return the pony, confused by everything that's been going on in the last few days. It's already dark, so I head back to my dormitory room in the light of lanterns all over the campus.
___________________________________________________________
Ok, yeah, the initial setting kind of ended up a Merlin meets The Kingkiller Chronicles kind of thing, which you wouldn't notice, since you haven't read the Kingkiller-seires. Which you should do.
The good news is the rest of the story doesn't have to be anything like either. It can be something completely different. I hope it will be something completely different.
You know, the story has only just started and I already hate the fact that I'm going to miss six posts in July and someone else is going to write it, and that for that six weeks I'm completely powerless and something can go horribly not at all in-character with how I see the situation and the characters. I realise this is what happens all the time when we've been writing together, but this time we have kind of separate characters, so it's different. Aaaaaaaa why can't I write in Italy.
Aaanyway.
Your topic for Wednesday is Stories. Or Story, if you prefer.
~matu
I take the pony and head to the exact opposite direction from the town, to the woods and the trails that zigzag further than anyone I know has ever actually gone. I don't want to risk being seen by anyone. So I ride. For an hour, deep into the woods. I spot a clearing in the woods in front of me, so I head there, get off the pony and tie it to a tree. The pony just stares at me for a moment and then bends down to eat the newly green, fresh grass on the ground.
I walk away from the pony and to what I approximate to be the middle of the clearing. I sit down, my legs crossed.
I have magic. I know I do. I didn't know I did, but I know now. How didn't I remember it before. I was three back in my memory, but still. You'd think I'd remember something like that. You'd think I'd know something like that, even if I didn't remember the first time the magic came out. My parents must have done something to make me forget all about it. Maybe they did something to suppress the magic.
Maybe they did something to make it go away. Maybe I don't have magic any more.
I sit there, my eyes closed. The only things I hear is the pony munching on something and a small stream that must be running somewhere nearby.
There's only one way to find out. I open my eyes and stare at a branch nearby, with light green leaves, not turned the green of summer yet. It all started with a branch, maybe it will come out again with a branch. Though this one has leaves already.
I stare at the branch, trying to figure out what to do. How to do the magic, if I even can. I've never done it, how am I supposed to know how to make it work. Maybe I'm not supposed to know.
What am I doing?
Why in the world am I trying to bring out magic in me? That will only get me in trouble. Or killed. It's been nice and quiet all these years. Why lure it out now to cause all the trouble I don't want?
I sigh, close my eyes again, and breath deep. The pony is still munching on something.
But right now I feel like I don't know who I am any more. It's not like anything has changed. It's not like I have changed. But I don't feel like I know who I am. And I need to know. Otherwise it will drive me crazy. I need to know if I have magic, even if that brings trouble. I'll be able to hide it, somehow, from everyone. I've been successfully hiding it from even myself for all these years, it shouldn't be a problem to hide it from everyone else also in the future.
I open my eyes. I stare at the branch for a moment longer, and then reach to grab it. The branch is cool in my hand. The sun has set low enough behind the trees to cloak half of the clearing in shadow. I didn't even notice. The branch warms up fast from the heat of my hand.
I stare at the branch in my hand, not knowing what to do. My three-year-old self was right, though. The leaves are pretty. Though I like them more when they're a little darker. People keep telling me the green of leaves at midsummer is the green of my eyes. I smile quietly to the countless memories of midsummer feasts. I think every single year someone has told me I have the eyes the color of the forest of that time of year.
I feel my hand warm up a little. The leaves on the branch grow a little, then a little more, gently shifting they're color into a few shades darker, the color of midsummer leaves. I drop the branch, terrified. I stare at it, terrified. Then I stare at my hand, even more terrified. The pony is munching something behind me.
I almost stop breathing for a moment. Then I break our laughing. I do have magic. It's not gone. For a moment I don't understand why I'm laughing, this is terrible. This is the worst thing in the world that could possibly happen. But then I understand.
It felt good. It felt so good. Using magic felt right. It felt like something I was born to do. It didn't feel evil, even though that's what I've been told my whole life. It felt like me, more like me than anything I've ever done before. This is who I am, this is who I'm supposed to be. Even if the whole world is against me. Which it isn't, a small voice says at the back of my head. Just this kingdom. And this kingdom is wrong. That much is clear to me now.
I stand up. It's getting chilly. Well, chilly enough I need some sleeves to stay warm. So I walk up to the pony, which is still munching on something, and dig out my cloak from my pack. I throw it over myself, untie the pony and head back to the academy before it gets too dark. Even so, I ride slow, enjoying myself, enjoying my new sense of me. I try to do some magic on the way, just to see what I can do. But it turns out the only thing I can figure out how to do is make some branches wave from a distance. It might also be the wind, but it's not that windy. And the other branches don't seem to move.
An hour and a half later I return the pony, confused by everything that's been going on in the last few days. It's already dark, so I head back to my dormitory room in the light of lanterns all over the campus.
___________________________________________________________
Ok, yeah, the initial setting kind of ended up a Merlin meets The Kingkiller Chronicles kind of thing, which you wouldn't notice, since you haven't read the Kingkiller-seires. Which you should do.
The good news is the rest of the story doesn't have to be anything like either. It can be something completely different. I hope it will be something completely different.
You know, the story has only just started and I already hate the fact that I'm going to miss six posts in July and someone else is going to write it, and that for that six weeks I'm completely powerless and something can go horribly not at all in-character with how I see the situation and the characters. I realise this is what happens all the time when we've been writing together, but this time we have kind of separate characters, so it's different. Aaaaaaaa why can't I write in Italy.
Aaanyway.
Your topic for Wednesday is Stories. Or Story, if you prefer.
~matu
Friday, May 15, 2015
The Sorcerer, Part 2 - History
"If you open up your books on page 394, you will find a picture, which was painted of the Great Battle of Kalehar. Now, in the picture you can clearly see..."
I block out the professor as he lunges into a long speech about the "greatest battle our kingdom has fought", as if it were some kind of amazing deed our knights did 30 years ago, when they killed or banished any living sorcerers in the land. It's only our first history lesson and naturally the teacher would start out with this particular piece of our past. I've heard the story countless times at home, one of the perks of having government officials as parents, and it does not get better the more you hear it. Of course, I've also heard the other side of the story, the one not found in history books...
"Am I boring you, Mr. Woodsham?" professor Cole asks and I turn to look up at him with a blank face. Apparently I was even more absent than I had thought. He looks unimpressed, his arms crossed, tapping this left bicep with his right hand fingers. He does that when he tries to not be aggressive.
"Yes, sir," I say and can hear sniggers around the class room. Professor Cole blinks in surprise and flushes pink.
"Excuse me?" he says, voice squeaking a little. I sigh in a bored and somewhat overly dramatic manner. I can see Gilbert grinning madly next to me. He knows what's coming.
"I do find this boring, sir," I say, my voice not unlike the voice used when trying to explain something to a very small child. "I know how this story goes, I've heard it several times, and I am sure all of my classmates have heard it too, considering that the last history course ended on us having to make presentations on the 'Great Battle' you so fondly speak of. So, not only is the story you're telling us a glorified version of an untrue piece of propaganda of what basically was a massacre of innocent people, it is also completely unnecessary because we already know everything about it that these books could possibly tell us."
With every word I spoke I could see Cole's face turning redder and redder, his hands clutching at his upper arms in an unsubtle effort to not punch me in the face. It's a reaction I'm very used to and, while sometimes very inconvenient, in this very occasion it fills me with a juvenile sort of glee, knowing that he can't do shit. When I finally stop talking he grits his teeth before opening his mouth.
"Excuse me, Mr. Woodsham, on what grounds do you call the Greatest Battle of our Kingdom a... a massacre of innocent people. Were you - were you perhaps there when it happened?" His voice is straining to stay level and he has a manic glint in his eyes. This could turn real ugly real quick, but I hold my ground.
"No, sir," I say and I can see his lips starting to turn upwards into a mockery of a smile. "But my aunt was."
He stops. Completely stops. His face is frozen in an expression of confusion and something akin to shock. He stutters.
"Your... aunt?" he says and I lift my chin up and stare right at him. "I don't... don't remember... there being a record of an... an aunt..." he trails off, scratching behind his ear. His eyes widen and he looks at me for a brief second before clearing his throat and stammering, "Never mind that, there is still a lot of things to discuss, so if Mr. Woodsham is finished with disturbing the class, we'll move right on." He gives me one last look, an impressive mixture of annoyance, worry and horror, and then goes back to his desk and continues with the teaching, skipping the rest of the speech on the battle of Kalehar.
I sink down on my seat and close my eyes.
~x~
"Damn, Oz, that was so brilliant," Gilbert says as we finally exit the room. He's walking backwards in front of me and I'm somewhat amazed by his ability to not trip or bump into anyone. "The way you stood up to professor Cole, I mean wow. Everyone else was thinking it too, you know, about how we already knew all that but no one had the guts to say anythin'." He glances around a bit and then leans a bit closer. "Cole has a reputation of not taking any bullshit in class, y'know."
"Yeah, Gil, I do know," I say. "I was really pressing my luck back there, huh."
"Nah, he wouldn't do anythin' to you!" Gil says with a wave of his hand and spins around to walk the right direction again. He slaps his hand on my shoulder. "I mean your parents are as influential as one can get in this country, save the royalty of course."
"Yeah, doesn't mean I like to abuse that power..." He gives me a pointed look and I roll my eyes. "Much. And they certainly don't like it when I do. They'll bust me out of trouble all right, but there will be hell to pay for me afterwards." Gil's hand on my shoulder squeezes a bit harder and then falls off.
The hall is mostly empty by now, all of our classmates already gone through the hallways into the dining hall. We've opted to wait some time before going ourselves, to avoid the biggest rush and so we're standing in the hall, in front of professor Cole's classroom. Two other students rush past us. Fourth termers, evidently, since their destination seems to be Cole's class.
"Come on, Knute, we're gonna be late!" the dark skinned girl says, pulling along a boy who looks rather out of it. No, not out of it... Preoccupied. He is concerned about something, his brow furrowed in absentminded worry.
He looks up at me suddenly and I blink. He doesn't say anything, just stares right through me with his brilliant green eyes. There is something about this boy that intrigues me, but I don't know what and things I don't know are few and far between. I swallow and he gives me a confused albeit amused look and then he looks away and ducks into the classroom behind the girl.
"Oz?" Gil is asking from somewhere next to me, but I don't pay him any mind, moving slightly to see into the class through the door that is left ajar. Cole looks at them with a stink eye, but says nothing and the two of them go to sit down. The only desks left are the ones Gil and I use, and the boy sits at mine, pulling out the book from inside it and I grin.
This ought to be interesting.
_______________________________________________________________________
Hey-ho! It's done! We're eating dinner right now and are about to leave to Sallisenmäki in like.... 15mins or something. As soon as we're done eating.
I was just about to say it's a wonder no one's complained about me writing this as we eat when mum said "since when are we allowing computers at the table?" So that's fun.
Anywayyyy.... In case you didn't realize, this is a different character than your character. Thought it would be fun to see what happens. I have nnooooo idea what's supposed to happen, but I'm guessing it's gonna be something about bringing magic back toCamelot I mean this as of yet nameless kingdom. Kalehar is like a city or sth. Also, they don't take the books with them, so that's why Knute took the book out of the desk (it's the same one Oz uses nudge nudge wink wink). But yeah.
As Oz said, this ought to be interesting.
Pie out.
P.S. Forgot to say, your topic is "Riding".
I block out the professor as he lunges into a long speech about the "greatest battle our kingdom has fought", as if it were some kind of amazing deed our knights did 30 years ago, when they killed or banished any living sorcerers in the land. It's only our first history lesson and naturally the teacher would start out with this particular piece of our past. I've heard the story countless times at home, one of the perks of having government officials as parents, and it does not get better the more you hear it. Of course, I've also heard the other side of the story, the one not found in history books...
"Am I boring you, Mr. Woodsham?" professor Cole asks and I turn to look up at him with a blank face. Apparently I was even more absent than I had thought. He looks unimpressed, his arms crossed, tapping this left bicep with his right hand fingers. He does that when he tries to not be aggressive.
"Yes, sir," I say and can hear sniggers around the class room. Professor Cole blinks in surprise and flushes pink.
"Excuse me?" he says, voice squeaking a little. I sigh in a bored and somewhat overly dramatic manner. I can see Gilbert grinning madly next to me. He knows what's coming.
"I do find this boring, sir," I say, my voice not unlike the voice used when trying to explain something to a very small child. "I know how this story goes, I've heard it several times, and I am sure all of my classmates have heard it too, considering that the last history course ended on us having to make presentations on the 'Great Battle' you so fondly speak of. So, not only is the story you're telling us a glorified version of an untrue piece of propaganda of what basically was a massacre of innocent people, it is also completely unnecessary because we already know everything about it that these books could possibly tell us."
With every word I spoke I could see Cole's face turning redder and redder, his hands clutching at his upper arms in an unsubtle effort to not punch me in the face. It's a reaction I'm very used to and, while sometimes very inconvenient, in this very occasion it fills me with a juvenile sort of glee, knowing that he can't do shit. When I finally stop talking he grits his teeth before opening his mouth.
"Excuse me, Mr. Woodsham, on what grounds do you call the Greatest Battle of our Kingdom a... a massacre of innocent people. Were you - were you perhaps there when it happened?" His voice is straining to stay level and he has a manic glint in his eyes. This could turn real ugly real quick, but I hold my ground.
"No, sir," I say and I can see his lips starting to turn upwards into a mockery of a smile. "But my aunt was."
He stops. Completely stops. His face is frozen in an expression of confusion and something akin to shock. He stutters.
"Your... aunt?" he says and I lift my chin up and stare right at him. "I don't... don't remember... there being a record of an... an aunt..." he trails off, scratching behind his ear. His eyes widen and he looks at me for a brief second before clearing his throat and stammering, "Never mind that, there is still a lot of things to discuss, so if Mr. Woodsham is finished with disturbing the class, we'll move right on." He gives me one last look, an impressive mixture of annoyance, worry and horror, and then goes back to his desk and continues with the teaching, skipping the rest of the speech on the battle of Kalehar.
I sink down on my seat and close my eyes.
~x~
"Damn, Oz, that was so brilliant," Gilbert says as we finally exit the room. He's walking backwards in front of me and I'm somewhat amazed by his ability to not trip or bump into anyone. "The way you stood up to professor Cole, I mean wow. Everyone else was thinking it too, you know, about how we already knew all that but no one had the guts to say anythin'." He glances around a bit and then leans a bit closer. "Cole has a reputation of not taking any bullshit in class, y'know."
"Yeah, Gil, I do know," I say. "I was really pressing my luck back there, huh."
"Nah, he wouldn't do anythin' to you!" Gil says with a wave of his hand and spins around to walk the right direction again. He slaps his hand on my shoulder. "I mean your parents are as influential as one can get in this country, save the royalty of course."
"Yeah, doesn't mean I like to abuse that power..." He gives me a pointed look and I roll my eyes. "Much. And they certainly don't like it when I do. They'll bust me out of trouble all right, but there will be hell to pay for me afterwards." Gil's hand on my shoulder squeezes a bit harder and then falls off.
The hall is mostly empty by now, all of our classmates already gone through the hallways into the dining hall. We've opted to wait some time before going ourselves, to avoid the biggest rush and so we're standing in the hall, in front of professor Cole's classroom. Two other students rush past us. Fourth termers, evidently, since their destination seems to be Cole's class.
"Come on, Knute, we're gonna be late!" the dark skinned girl says, pulling along a boy who looks rather out of it. No, not out of it... Preoccupied. He is concerned about something, his brow furrowed in absentminded worry.
He looks up at me suddenly and I blink. He doesn't say anything, just stares right through me with his brilliant green eyes. There is something about this boy that intrigues me, but I don't know what and things I don't know are few and far between. I swallow and he gives me a confused albeit amused look and then he looks away and ducks into the classroom behind the girl.
"Oz?" Gil is asking from somewhere next to me, but I don't pay him any mind, moving slightly to see into the class through the door that is left ajar. Cole looks at them with a stink eye, but says nothing and the two of them go to sit down. The only desks left are the ones Gil and I use, and the boy sits at mine, pulling out the book from inside it and I grin.
This ought to be interesting.
_______________________________________________________________________
Hey-ho! It's done! We're eating dinner right now and are about to leave to Sallisenmäki in like.... 15mins or something. As soon as we're done eating.
I was just about to say it's a wonder no one's complained about me writing this as we eat when mum said "since when are we allowing computers at the table?" So that's fun.
Anywayyyy.... In case you didn't realize, this is a different character than your character. Thought it would be fun to see what happens. I have nnooooo idea what's supposed to happen, but I'm guessing it's gonna be something about bringing magic back to
As Oz said, this ought to be interesting.
Pie out.
P.S. Forgot to say, your topic is "Riding".
Wednesday, May 13, 2015
The Sorcerer, Part 1 - First leaves
Ooooh
I literally just finished my last bit of school work I had to do this spring, so now I am free to (study some biology and work) begin our summer vacation story. I'm a little nervous. But here we go...
________________________________________________________________________
"Your favourite drink?"
We do this sometimes, me and Tauria. We met about exactly a year back, when we both came to the academy. We became friends really fast, both being a little younger than the average first-term academy student. Not unusually young, but still younger than most. And when I say friends, I mean friends. All our other friends keep teasing us about it, saying we would make such a beautiful couple. But that's not it at all, and we both know it. So we let them tease, and smile quietly to each other. I've been actually wondering if there is something going on between her and this girl Laelia, who came in a term later than us, and who is even younger than we were when we got here. But she's a girl, so... where we live, Tauria wouldn't tell even me, even if I asked.
"Juice. Orange juice," I say. We like doing this, just asking each other questions we don't know the answers to. Our fourth term, our second summer term, starts tomorrow, and we can still find things to ask.
"Orange juice?" she looks at me with a raised eyebrow, "Knute, you know I haven't ever even seen an orange. They don't exactly grow around here."
I smile, "Yeah, I know. But I've tasted it once, and it really was the best thing I've ever tasted."
For a moment she looks like she doesn't believe me, but then I can see from her face she waves it off in her mind and rolls onto her back, so she sees me upside down over the foot of her bunk. She waves her head a little and her hair almost sweeps the floor. I look at her for a moment in the dim light.
"Why are your eyes purple?"
"Why are my eyes purple?" she repeats. I nod. "Why are your eyes so stunningly green? How would I know why my eyes are purple?"
I shrug.
"Maybe there's a story to it."
"Well, there isn't," she rolls back onto her stomach. "What's the first thing you remember from when you were a child?"
"Hmm..." I say. I need to think about this one. She can see it from my face. I turn to look at the flame dancing on the candle next to me.
Suddenly I remember something. Something from deep in my childhood. I can see it in my eyes, clear as it had happened yesterday. I'm maybe three years old, and playing with a branch on a forest clearing. My parents are some distance away, eating and drinking. They're laughing, I can hear their voices. It's early spring, the leaves of the trees just about to break out and color the whole world green. The grass I'm sitting on is already green, and soft. I look at the branch and think how beautiful it would be if the leaves were out already, and I wouldn't have to wait for the pretty green any more. I can feel my hand get warm. The leaves in the branch slowly push out of they're little hiding buds. The whole branch becomes green with leaves. I laugh out loud and wave the branch. It tickles. I laugh louder, stand up unsteadily and run to my parents.
"Mommy, mommy look, the first leaves came out! I got the first leaves come out! Now it's all green and pretty and smells good," I say, and I show my branch to my mother proud.
But mom looks shocked. She's not even looking at my beautiful branch, she's just staring at me like I had done something very, very bad. I pull my hand back and look to the ground.
"You, you got the leaves to come out?" mom asks, and I nod. She sounds really mad, and like she's trying not to. I can feel tears flooding my eyes. She grabs the branch from my hand, roughly. Dad picks me up. Mom swings the branch in his face, and they talk fast. So fast I can't keep up with what they're saying. But they don't sound happy. They don't sound happy at all. I must've done something really bad. I...
"Knute!"
I snap out of the memory. Tauria is looking at me, a little worried.
"Uh," I say, and add after a moment, "What?"
"What just happened to you?"
"I... remembered something. I need to go."
"You remembered what? From the look on your face it was something really bad."
It was. But I can't tell her. I can't tell anyone. In some of the neighbour countries, maybe. But not here.
"Uh... I remembered I forgot to sign up for this one class that starts tomorrow," I can see she doesn't believe me, but she doesn't say anything, "I have to go. I'll see you tomorrow, ok?"
She nods. I get up, almost stumble on my way to the door. I pull it open, and shut it behind me a little too fast. I walk fast. I break into a run when I get out of the building. I run, it doesn't even matter where. I'm not going to get away from this. I stop and lean against a wall, out of breath. I'm behind one of the academy buildings, no one can see me, so I slide to the ground, my back against the stone wall, cold in the late spring evening.
I can feel panic trying to take over.
I have magic.
_______________________________________________________________________
I realise all our stories have been first-person narrators, and for a moment I was going to do something else with this, but it just comes out naturally. I can't help it. I fell in love with first-person narration years ago. I mean, seriously, I'm currently trying to write a book with multiple first-person narrators.
It' just gives a level of intimacy to the text than your typical more-or-less omniscient narrator.
Protagonist-narrator is just my way of telling a story, even though I've heard some author give advice saying (writing, probably), that you should never use a first-person narrator unless there is a voice in the story who's call is simply irresistible. Or maybe I just write characters with such voices. I have no idea.
Anyway.
You want a topic for tomorrow, right? History.
Also, are we going to not use the same topics we've used so far? Cause I think we should. But I'm noticing I keep coming back to the same ones. Even though there are so many things in the world.
Also, I hope you don't hate the names. Cause I really like them.
I'll hear from you on Friday.
~matu
I literally just finished my last bit of school work I had to do this spring, so now I am free to (study some biology and work) begin our summer vacation story. I'm a little nervous. But here we go...
________________________________________________________________________
"Your favourite drink?"
We do this sometimes, me and Tauria. We met about exactly a year back, when we both came to the academy. We became friends really fast, both being a little younger than the average first-term academy student. Not unusually young, but still younger than most. And when I say friends, I mean friends. All our other friends keep teasing us about it, saying we would make such a beautiful couple. But that's not it at all, and we both know it. So we let them tease, and smile quietly to each other. I've been actually wondering if there is something going on between her and this girl Laelia, who came in a term later than us, and who is even younger than we were when we got here. But she's a girl, so... where we live, Tauria wouldn't tell even me, even if I asked.
"Juice. Orange juice," I say. We like doing this, just asking each other questions we don't know the answers to. Our fourth term, our second summer term, starts tomorrow, and we can still find things to ask.
"Orange juice?" she looks at me with a raised eyebrow, "Knute, you know I haven't ever even seen an orange. They don't exactly grow around here."
I smile, "Yeah, I know. But I've tasted it once, and it really was the best thing I've ever tasted."
For a moment she looks like she doesn't believe me, but then I can see from her face she waves it off in her mind and rolls onto her back, so she sees me upside down over the foot of her bunk. She waves her head a little and her hair almost sweeps the floor. I look at her for a moment in the dim light.
"Why are your eyes purple?"
"Why are my eyes purple?" she repeats. I nod. "Why are your eyes so stunningly green? How would I know why my eyes are purple?"
I shrug.
"Maybe there's a story to it."
"Well, there isn't," she rolls back onto her stomach. "What's the first thing you remember from when you were a child?"
"Hmm..." I say. I need to think about this one. She can see it from my face. I turn to look at the flame dancing on the candle next to me.
Suddenly I remember something. Something from deep in my childhood. I can see it in my eyes, clear as it had happened yesterday. I'm maybe three years old, and playing with a branch on a forest clearing. My parents are some distance away, eating and drinking. They're laughing, I can hear their voices. It's early spring, the leaves of the trees just about to break out and color the whole world green. The grass I'm sitting on is already green, and soft. I look at the branch and think how beautiful it would be if the leaves were out already, and I wouldn't have to wait for the pretty green any more. I can feel my hand get warm. The leaves in the branch slowly push out of they're little hiding buds. The whole branch becomes green with leaves. I laugh out loud and wave the branch. It tickles. I laugh louder, stand up unsteadily and run to my parents.
"Mommy, mommy look, the first leaves came out! I got the first leaves come out! Now it's all green and pretty and smells good," I say, and I show my branch to my mother proud.
But mom looks shocked. She's not even looking at my beautiful branch, she's just staring at me like I had done something very, very bad. I pull my hand back and look to the ground.
"You, you got the leaves to come out?" mom asks, and I nod. She sounds really mad, and like she's trying not to. I can feel tears flooding my eyes. She grabs the branch from my hand, roughly. Dad picks me up. Mom swings the branch in his face, and they talk fast. So fast I can't keep up with what they're saying. But they don't sound happy. They don't sound happy at all. I must've done something really bad. I...
"Knute!"
I snap out of the memory. Tauria is looking at me, a little worried.
"Uh," I say, and add after a moment, "What?"
"What just happened to you?"
"I... remembered something. I need to go."
"You remembered what? From the look on your face it was something really bad."
It was. But I can't tell her. I can't tell anyone. In some of the neighbour countries, maybe. But not here.
"Uh... I remembered I forgot to sign up for this one class that starts tomorrow," I can see she doesn't believe me, but she doesn't say anything, "I have to go. I'll see you tomorrow, ok?"
She nods. I get up, almost stumble on my way to the door. I pull it open, and shut it behind me a little too fast. I walk fast. I break into a run when I get out of the building. I run, it doesn't even matter where. I'm not going to get away from this. I stop and lean against a wall, out of breath. I'm behind one of the academy buildings, no one can see me, so I slide to the ground, my back against the stone wall, cold in the late spring evening.
I can feel panic trying to take over.
I have magic.
_______________________________________________________________________
I realise all our stories have been first-person narrators, and for a moment I was going to do something else with this, but it just comes out naturally. I can't help it. I fell in love with first-person narration years ago. I mean, seriously, I'm currently trying to write a book with multiple first-person narrators.
It' just gives a level of intimacy to the text than your typical more-or-less omniscient narrator.
Protagonist-narrator is just my way of telling a story, even though I've heard some author give advice saying (writing, probably), that you should never use a first-person narrator unless there is a voice in the story who's call is simply irresistible. Or maybe I just write characters with such voices. I have no idea.
Anyway.
You want a topic for tomorrow, right? History.
Also, are we going to not use the same topics we've used so far? Cause I think we should. But I'm noticing I keep coming back to the same ones. Even though there are so many things in the world.
Also, I hope you don't hate the names. Cause I really like them.
I'll hear from you on Friday.
~matu
Tuesday, May 12, 2015
Summer story
Tomorrow we will begin our summer story. Which you know, but all the other people who (don't exist) read our blog don't know. So I'm gonna tell them.
We're doing the same kind of story as we've done for two Decembers now, but instead of Christmas we're doing summer, and instead of 24 days we're doing three and a half months.
We're starting tomorrow, because it's my last day of what you shouldn't call school, cause it's university of the year, so it's officially summer vacation for both of us. I will write the first bit, and then we go on from there as we've done for two Decembers now.
We're doing a total of either 48 bits, meaning to the end of August, or round it up to 50, and do a little bit in the beginning of September too. This means we're going to write three posts a week: Monday, Wednesday and Friday, every second one each.
We won't be doing normal posts on top of this, because the story is not only what we actually want to do, also enough work as it is.
Because I'm going to be in Italy for a month, someone else will be writing the six bits I should write when I'm there, because there is no way I can do that myself. I can write an extra post about Italy, though, to make up for that. The someone who will write in my place will probably be dad. Or someone else. We'll see. That's still a month and a half away.
Because I'll be writing the beginning of the story tomorrow, I won't go on today about anything else.
I think I have an interesting beginning coming up.
Oh! you know what's one of the best thing in the world to do? Googling baby names! I was trying to come up with some nice names I could use in the story, and decided to ask all the so many baby name sites in the Internet for help. It's actually a lot of fun. I do it every now and then, when I happen to need a name, or just feel like coming up with possible names for future characters.
Names are a really weird thing. I really like names.
Though now Youtube shows me Pampers-ads in the beginning of all videos I try to watch. But that's a small price to pay for names.
Anyway.
You'll hear from me tomorrow.
~matu
PS. I'm just gonna assume you're not going to ever finish that thing you were writing, because you said you'd get it done before now and you haven't. And we're starting a new story tomorrow, so...
We're doing the same kind of story as we've done for two Decembers now, but instead of Christmas we're doing summer, and instead of 24 days we're doing three and a half months.
We're starting tomorrow, because it's my last day of what you shouldn't call school, cause it's university of the year, so it's officially summer vacation for both of us. I will write the first bit, and then we go on from there as we've done for two Decembers now.
We're doing a total of either 48 bits, meaning to the end of August, or round it up to 50, and do a little bit in the beginning of September too. This means we're going to write three posts a week: Monday, Wednesday and Friday, every second one each.
We won't be doing normal posts on top of this, because the story is not only what we actually want to do, also enough work as it is.
Because I'm going to be in Italy for a month, someone else will be writing the six bits I should write when I'm there, because there is no way I can do that myself. I can write an extra post about Italy, though, to make up for that. The someone who will write in my place will probably be dad. Or someone else. We'll see. That's still a month and a half away.
Because I'll be writing the beginning of the story tomorrow, I won't go on today about anything else.
I think I have an interesting beginning coming up.
Oh! you know what's one of the best thing in the world to do? Googling baby names! I was trying to come up with some nice names I could use in the story, and decided to ask all the so many baby name sites in the Internet for help. It's actually a lot of fun. I do it every now and then, when I happen to need a name, or just feel like coming up with possible names for future characters.
Names are a really weird thing. I really like names.
Though now Youtube shows me Pampers-ads in the beginning of all videos I try to watch. But that's a small price to pay for names.
Anyway.
You'll hear from me tomorrow.
~matu
PS. I'm just gonna assume you're not going to ever finish that thing you were writing, because you said you'd get it done before now and you haven't. And we're starting a new story tomorrow, so...
Friday, May 8, 2015
The flow of thought run wild in the night
Sup.
What, it's still Friday. For like... 40 minutes.
I uh, I'm in Kuopio now. I was forced to go on an I-don't-know-what-they're-called-and-am-too-lazy-to-google tomorrow because the scout skill competition or whetever is here. I don't have to do much, apparently, but I am forced to get up at nine which is bullshit.
I've had some trouble with sleeping lately... Or rather, waking up. I've actually not had much trouble falling asleep which is nice, but I've been sleeping in super late for some reason. It's really annoying, like before I woke up at 10ish regardless of how long I'd been sleeping but for a few weeks or so it's been closer to half past 11 the first time I wake up. And that's a problem if I don't have an alarm clock cause I'm used to the first time I wake up to be like... 9:45 so I can easily continue sleeping.
It's kinda messing up my schedule......
Speaking of schedules, I will write the things! I know what will happen (more or less) I just have trouble getting the words out.... Without the pressure of the deadline I produce material at a much slower pace, although I do think it will be better without me having to force it out like what happened with the Juice post. That was just horrible that was.
I should also write more of Robin... I have finished the whole of the first chapter with is nice, and most of the second chapter (although it is like half of what the first one was) and a part of the third chapter. That's around... 35 pages or something and it's crazy because I've never written this much of anything and I am literally just beginning. Like Robin hasn't even left home. I just. All this text. I've written it. Wow.
Do you want to read the first chapter? I wouldn't mind posting it up here, for feedback and stuff. You do have to give me feedback tho, otherwise it's not fair. Although if we're starting the Summer Story of 2015 there's not really an opportunity to post that.......
Oh yeah, you start the thing whenever, but your topic is "First Leaves". Must keep with the pattern, yeah?
I uh, I don't really have anything else to say, so.... Bye. (whopping 25mins left woowoo)
Pie out
What, it's still Friday. For like... 40 minutes.
I uh, I'm in Kuopio now. I was forced to go on an I-don't-know-what-they're-called-and-am-too-lazy-to-google tomorrow because the scout skill competition or whetever is here. I don't have to do much, apparently, but I am forced to get up at nine which is bullshit.
I've had some trouble with sleeping lately... Or rather, waking up. I've actually not had much trouble falling asleep which is nice, but I've been sleeping in super late for some reason. It's really annoying, like before I woke up at 10ish regardless of how long I'd been sleeping but for a few weeks or so it's been closer to half past 11 the first time I wake up. And that's a problem if I don't have an alarm clock cause I'm used to the first time I wake up to be like... 9:45 so I can easily continue sleeping.
It's kinda messing up my schedule......
Speaking of schedules, I will write the things! I know what will happen (more or less) I just have trouble getting the words out.... Without the pressure of the deadline I produce material at a much slower pace, although I do think it will be better without me having to force it out like what happened with the Juice post. That was just horrible that was.
I should also write more of Robin... I have finished the whole of the first chapter with is nice, and most of the second chapter (although it is like half of what the first one was) and a part of the third chapter. That's around... 35 pages or something and it's crazy because I've never written this much of anything and I am literally just beginning. Like Robin hasn't even left home. I just. All this text. I've written it. Wow.
Do you want to read the first chapter? I wouldn't mind posting it up here, for feedback and stuff. You do have to give me feedback tho, otherwise it's not fair. Although if we're starting the Summer Story of 2015 there's not really an opportunity to post that.......
Oh yeah, you start the thing whenever, but your topic is "First Leaves". Must keep with the pattern, yeah?
I uh, I don't really have anything else to say, so.... Bye. (whopping 25mins left woowoo)
Pie out
Tuesday, May 5, 2015
Happy things
Good morning.
Tomorrow I'm doing a half an hour live radio broadcast on the university radio. I'm doing it about happy things.
For that broadcast I asked people to list me some happy things, so I can play them on the show.
And, because happy things are happy, I wanted to give you a that list of happy things already today.
So here:
- waking up in the morning and realising you can keep sleeping
- when it's warm outside your blanket but nice and cool underneath
- good music after a bad day
- morning cappuccino
- your boss telling a co-worker not to take their lap top home so they can have a proper vacation
- when George RR Martin doesn't kill a Stark
- weekends
- terrible music in good enough company that the music starts to actually sound good
- waking up to your kitten purring in your ear
- watching Eurovision in good company
- a cold shower after a long bike ride
- a cool drink in a sauna
- well-written books
- getting an actual card or a letter from a friend
- tickling your friends
- that the ice cream stalls are open
- mud cake ice cream
- nice hobbies in good company
- books you sink so deep into you don't hear someone repeating your name
- walking barefoot after a winter
- sauna
- laundry someone else has done for you
- swimming naked
- summer and winter
- when the train is on time
- when the bus driver greets you cheerfully
- riding a bike on clean, dry asphalt after a winter
- so terrible plot twists in TV series that they're starting to actually be good
- skirts and summer dresses
- the smell of grass that hasn't been just cut
- and the smell of grass that has been just cut
- being able to hang out with your friends and having a home an enough food, and generally not having to really worry about anything
- minecraft
- snow on tree branches
- weekly anime-nights with friends
- not needing alcohol to have fun
- but being able to legally buy alcohol anyway
- youtube-evenings where everyone wants to show the next video
- internet memes
- feminism
- human rights
- modern medicine
- little fluffy creatures
- Tim Minchin (who someone then said is a little fluffy creature)
- feeling smart every once in a while
- Protu
- watching a series through in one sitting
- capoeira
- having people you can go live with whole having the pipes in your apartment repaired
- being able to avoid being tickled
- love
- friendship
- aphorisms
- having enough money to live
- jokes
- philosophy just for fun
- being able to study, change the thing that you're studying and that your studying is supported by the government
- paradoxes
- long walks on summer nights
- kid's tattoos you glue to your skin with water
- when your vacation begins
- small kids who fall and then their parents lift them back on their feet from their hoods
Ok, this isn't actually all of them, because the complete list would've been even longer. But happy things are still happy.
I'll hear from you... I don't even know when, because you're still planning on writing the two last bits that you had to write on Sunday(?) but didn't. But I'll hear from you latest on Friday.
~matu
Tomorrow I'm doing a half an hour live radio broadcast on the university radio. I'm doing it about happy things.
For that broadcast I asked people to list me some happy things, so I can play them on the show.
And, because happy things are happy, I wanted to give you a that list of happy things already today.
So here:
- waking up in the morning and realising you can keep sleeping
- when it's warm outside your blanket but nice and cool underneath
- good music after a bad day
- morning cappuccino
- your boss telling a co-worker not to take their lap top home so they can have a proper vacation
- when George RR Martin doesn't kill a Stark
- weekends
- terrible music in good enough company that the music starts to actually sound good
- waking up to your kitten purring in your ear
- watching Eurovision in good company
- a cold shower after a long bike ride
- a cool drink in a sauna
- well-written books
- getting an actual card or a letter from a friend
- tickling your friends
- that the ice cream stalls are open
- mud cake ice cream
- nice hobbies in good company
- books you sink so deep into you don't hear someone repeating your name
- walking barefoot after a winter
- sauna
- laundry someone else has done for you
- swimming naked
- summer and winter
- when the train is on time
- when the bus driver greets you cheerfully
- riding a bike on clean, dry asphalt after a winter
- so terrible plot twists in TV series that they're starting to actually be good
- skirts and summer dresses
- the smell of grass that hasn't been just cut
- and the smell of grass that has been just cut
- being able to hang out with your friends and having a home an enough food, and generally not having to really worry about anything
- minecraft
- snow on tree branches
- weekly anime-nights with friends
- not needing alcohol to have fun
- but being able to legally buy alcohol anyway
- youtube-evenings where everyone wants to show the next video
- internet memes
- feminism
- human rights
- modern medicine
- little fluffy creatures
- Tim Minchin (who someone then said is a little fluffy creature)
- feeling smart every once in a while
- Protu
- watching a series through in one sitting
- capoeira
- having people you can go live with whole having the pipes in your apartment repaired
- being able to avoid being tickled
- love
- friendship
- aphorisms
- having enough money to live
- jokes
- philosophy just for fun
- being able to study, change the thing that you're studying and that your studying is supported by the government
- paradoxes
- long walks on summer nights
- kid's tattoos you glue to your skin with water
- when your vacation begins
- small kids who fall and then their parents lift them back on their feet from their hoods
Ok, this isn't actually all of them, because the complete list would've been even longer. But happy things are still happy.
I'll hear from you... I don't even know when, because you're still planning on writing the two last bits that you had to write on Sunday(?) but didn't. But I'll hear from you latest on Friday.
~matu
Friday, May 1, 2015
Day 8 - Juice
It is half past nine and I am standing with mum and Flame at the local transportation centre waiting for Cecil. I stifle a yawn, because it is way to early for this while Flame is blissfully asleep in my arms. Mum is going on about how great it is I'm taking an interest in culture and mythology and traveling is such a great way to get new experiences and meet new people and so on. I zoned her out a while back.
Finally Cecil arrives and I hoist my bag on my back and take my garment bag from mum. She chats for a bit with Cecil, who manages to look not only comfortable but also interested despite mum's ramblings. I try to pay attention, because it is probably important, but I can't focus. Finally mum gives me a hug and a kiss and she leaves.
"Shall we?" Cecil says and gestures towards the check in desk. I smile and he guides us through.
~x~
The check in process was long and tedious and the transportation quick and insignificant. We arrive in Dublin at ten and drop off our stuff in a hotel by half past. I don't have time to take in the room before Cecil is pushing my back out again, explaining excitedly about showing me around. Flame has also waken up and is curled around Cecil's shoulders.
We have an early lunch before going over to the NALMC HQ, where we spend the rest of the day with Cecil showing me around, mostly the ancient creatures department that he used to work for. He introduces me to a lot of his colleagues and they all seem like nice people, although they should probably go out a bit more.
Around five we go back to the hotel and I take a small nap because I slept like shit and we've been walking around the whole day and if Cecil expects me to stay awake for any longer than until 10 I need to get some energy. The bed is big and soft and I fall asleep almost instantly.
~x~
I wake up and stare at the unfamiliar ceiling for a bit. I check the time from my phone: half past six. I stretch as I sit up.
"Oh, great, you're awake," Cecil says as he emerges from the bathroom. He's wearing a beautifully fitting three piece suit and I just stare at him for a moment. "You should get dressed too, we need to leave in a bit." He smiles at me and I stutter something and lock myself in the bathroom to change.
I come back out ten minutes later after I've changed. Flame jumps to my lap and I catch her with a laugh. Cecil is oddly quiet and he's wearing a weird expression. I frown.
"What?" I say and he seems startled. Then he coughs and turns away. I could swear that his ears are red.
"No, nothing. You look great, let's go." And he's out the door. I look at Flame with a grin and she grins back before climbing onto my shoulders and we're off for Howth.
~x~
The hall is huge. And I mean huge. The ceiling is at least ten meters high and made of glass, which creates the illusion of being even higher. The back wall is also made of glass and it's giving us a lovely view of the village next to the building. There is also a stage on the left side of the room.
There are dozens of round tables around the room, seating around ten each, and the whole hall is bustling with smartly dressed people. I have to stop and stare when we enter the room.
"Impressive, isn't it?" Cecil asks from beside me and I have lost my ability to make words so I just nod. Flame sings softly on my shoulder.
"You remember to be nice, Flame," I say a bit breathlessly. "Stay close to me or Cecil, ok?"
"Come on, let's go find Rachel," Cecil says and takes my hand. I am surprised both by the sudden touch and the fact that I hadn't realised Rachel would be here too. I probably should have, she is a NALMC employee as well.
We do find her at a table and I am even more surprised to find Leea sitting next to her. Flame immediately jumps into her lap.
"What are you doing here?" I ask. Not squeak, ask. Leea gives me a bright smile.
"Rachel invited me as her plus one," she says and Rachel clicks her tongue and grins.
"Oh," I say, because I don't know what else to say. We take our seats at the table next to the two of them.
Several waiters walk around the room and they serve us drinks. I am old enough to drink, but I still chose the nonalcoholic option, which is a juice of some kind. It is very good, fruity and refreshing. Cecil tells me it's paopu juice. I have never heard of that before.
There is food and chatting and an orchestra on the stage, and Cecil introduces us to a bunch of other people. We laugh and talk and eat and have a great time.
It's nearing midnight when the lights are turned off.
_____________________________________________________________
This is so late I know, I had zero time yesterday. I'll write today's and tomorrow's thing tomorrow. Gotta go bye.
Pie out.
EDIT ON 18.03.2018 lol
After almost three years I finally finished this! Amazing, I know, I'm so good with schedules!
Finally Cecil arrives and I hoist my bag on my back and take my garment bag from mum. She chats for a bit with Cecil, who manages to look not only comfortable but also interested despite mum's ramblings. I try to pay attention, because it is probably important, but I can't focus. Finally mum gives me a hug and a kiss and she leaves.
"Shall we?" Cecil says and gestures towards the check in desk. I smile and he guides us through.
~x~
The check in process was long and tedious and the transportation quick and insignificant. We arrive in Dublin at ten and drop off our stuff in a hotel by half past. I don't have time to take in the room before Cecil is pushing my back out again, explaining excitedly about showing me around. Flame has also waken up and is curled around Cecil's shoulders.
We have an early lunch before going over to the NALMC HQ, where we spend the rest of the day with Cecil showing me around, mostly the ancient creatures department that he used to work for. He introduces me to a lot of his colleagues and they all seem like nice people, although they should probably go out a bit more.
Around five we go back to the hotel and I take a small nap because I slept like shit and we've been walking around the whole day and if Cecil expects me to stay awake for any longer than until 10 I need to get some energy. The bed is big and soft and I fall asleep almost instantly.
~x~
I wake up and stare at the unfamiliar ceiling for a bit. I check the time from my phone: half past six. I stretch as I sit up.
"Oh, great, you're awake," Cecil says as he emerges from the bathroom. He's wearing a beautifully fitting three piece suit and I just stare at him for a moment. "You should get dressed too, we need to leave in a bit." He smiles at me and I stutter something and lock myself in the bathroom to change.
I come back out ten minutes later after I've changed. Flame jumps to my lap and I catch her with a laugh. Cecil is oddly quiet and he's wearing a weird expression. I frown.
"What?" I say and he seems startled. Then he coughs and turns away. I could swear that his ears are red.
"No, nothing. You look great, let's go." And he's out the door. I look at Flame with a grin and she grins back before climbing onto my shoulders and we're off for Howth.
~x~
The hall is huge. And I mean huge. The ceiling is at least ten meters high and made of glass, which creates the illusion of being even higher. The back wall is also made of glass and it's giving us a lovely view of the village next to the building. There is also a stage on the left side of the room.
There are dozens of round tables around the room, seating around ten each, and the whole hall is bustling with smartly dressed people. I have to stop and stare when we enter the room.
"Impressive, isn't it?" Cecil asks from beside me and I have lost my ability to make words so I just nod. Flame sings softly on my shoulder.
"You remember to be nice, Flame," I say a bit breathlessly. "Stay close to me or Cecil, ok?"
"Come on, let's go find Rachel," Cecil says and takes my hand. I am surprised both by the sudden touch and the fact that I hadn't realised Rachel would be here too. I probably should have, she is a NALMC employee as well.
We do find her at a table and I am even more surprised to find Leea sitting next to her. Flame immediately jumps into her lap.
"What are you doing here?" I ask. Not squeak, ask. Leea gives me a bright smile.
"Rachel invited me as her plus one," she says and Rachel clicks her tongue and grins.
"Oh," I say, because I don't know what else to say. We take our seats at the table next to the two of them.
Several waiters walk around the room and they serve us drinks. I am old enough to drink, but I still chose the nonalcoholic option, which is a juice of some kind. It is very good, fruity and refreshing. Cecil tells me it's paopu juice. I have never heard of that before.
There is food and chatting and an orchestra on the stage, and Cecil introduces us to a bunch of other people. We laugh and talk and eat and have a great time.
It's nearing midnight when the lights are turned off.
_____________________________________________________________
This is so late I know, I had zero time yesterday. I'll write today's and tomorrow's thing tomorrow. Gotta go bye.
Pie out.
EDIT ON 18.03.2018 lol
After almost three years I finally finished this! Amazing, I know, I'm so good with schedules!
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