Shiloh was trying to do the "responsible level head" thing, but Silk's comment made him balk, made his eyes widen, and he was overtaken with a sudden rush of energy and emotion, "Silk," He looked for a moment like he'd yell in his typically Beaumont(tm) way, but he managed to sigh it out. "No, I'm sorry." Being an adult or whatever was hard, "But I promise when I say I'll protect this with my life." His had smoothed over the cover of the folio, "I wouldn't do anything to bring it harm."
Hence why he was so ******** attached to it. Jeremiah was the only other one who'd touched the thing, and it was only in a moment of curiosity.
This feels like high school, he sounded momentarily miserable, I just want it to work out right, y'know? Besides...
None of this is even going to matter in the end anyway.
It wasn't a foreboding comment; Shiloh's ambitions were getting more and more set on the utter deconstruction of the cage though. "Anyway, it really doesn't matter." He was addressing the fetch thing again, "If fetches want to stay in the Court, or pursue a way outside of it, or whatever. So long as the Court exists, I can at least promise on my own behalf to give them whatever freedoms they want." Beel wanted a human face—his own—and a name; an identity.
"To elaborate on what Horace is saying," Shiloh was so tired of addressing everyone, but this explanation was mostly for Silk, "It's like I had told you before. After the creation of the second sigil—our sigil, whatever, the key-tree-knot conglomerate—the Madame's presence shifted. I'm still not entirely sure why, but she has a conscious on the other side. She goes to school. She does normal... human stuff, 'cause that's what she is." His hands twisted around, "She's expressed to me that she doesn't want to see anyone hurt either. She knows about her identity as the Spinel Lady. She's scared of her." Shiloh occasionally gave Horace looks as he piggy backed off of his words. "And I know the charter's sigil is starting to hurt her physically, too."
"The geas is very dangerous." Shiloh went on to say, "But maybe necessary too? It's scary to think about someone's free will being taken away, but Nobles arguably have more responsibility, power, clout..." He was listing off his fingers, "If it could be done away with, I'd want to see something else put up in place."
And finally, "Communication is a lot easier said than done." This time he was echoing Jeremiah, "I'll come across new visitors in Otherworld from time to time, and I always try to explain to them what's going on." Kaleb had been one, but he'd been there to meet Horace, done his best to educate people like Nathaniel; when it came to more recent things such as the charter business, he'd made an effort to inform Rabbit and Temperance about the going-ons. "I don't... think it's something that can be blamed on any single person, if anyone at all. How are we supposed to find every new visitor that wanders into the Otherworld? People in this world especially are extremely secretive about their magic. Every meeting with someone I've had up until now has been chance at first." He was frowning. "It's not very easy to put up a "Welcome to Otherworld" sign with an infographic." Shiloh huffed.
"Besides the fact that I have school and work and every other goddamn thing in the world, plus Court. I think everyone here has a life outside of magic, so..." He shook his head, "Helping new visitors is something I try to do, but it's not the easiest either. We got stuff like the listerv now that helps, but the problem with growing bigger is keeping the secret under wraps too." His hand drummed on the table, "I think we can all agree that everyone present isn't going to do anything stupid with their abilities, but it also only takes one too." He cleared his throat. "But um, I'll get off my soapbox. I think it's good to come up with ways for us to self govern from within, too."
He looked at the paper in front of him.
"I think it should be everyone's rule to protect, though. A Noble should still serve and be kind to their fetches, and I think they should guide to the best of their abilities too." He was doodling in the margins, Shiloh. "Ruling yeah, but I don't like the sound of control. It should be a give-take relationship. Whether or not the weres and wargs wanna take up their mantles as the secret-Otherworld-police and spies is up to them." He shrugged impassively.
After a while, he jotted down actual things onto the paper.
paper
why exactly did the purge happen? why was it decided to be necessary? tl;dr is fine too
He tore off the part he'd written on and went to slide it to the front, except Bean quickly intercepted it (he'd been so good all meeting! So quiet!). He took up the mantle of walking the paper to the end of the table, handing it off to whichever fetch was receptive to it. He might write more later, but right now that was his only pressing question. If there had been a purge once, what was saying there wouldn't be one again in the future, in the opportunity that the cage didn't break by the end of the year?
Sigh.
Shiloh took the opportunity to lean forward on the table, eyes watching his empty glass of wine as he thought. Would you want the spirit-bond... restored? He pinged at Jamie, It seems a lot more intrusive and hectic than what you have going on now, but they sounded very powerful; Shiloh yawned, looking very... tired.
saedusk
bb
azuredreams
jer
iloveyouDIE
kind of alg??? +geas
The Semblance of Unity
horace
shibrogane
silk hi
Posted: Tue May 02, 2017 7:24 pm
Nasir watched and listened, mostly quiet. He glanced over at Horace and Ollie, trying to smother a smile as Trouble was carting small bits from his plate over to the raccoon moonwalker. Food for friend, food for friend ~ was chirped in an almost sing-song voice to his ears.
"Pretty sure he's asleep, Trouble." The flying squirrel paused and then kept going anyway. Store for friend for later! Nasir couldn't really argue with that.
The young man went back to listening before he decided to speak up. "I, ah ... have helped some people learn about wargs and helped others become one." One of the pads of paper was brought over, Nasir making notes. "If one of the fetches could tell me what they know about the, um, seers," still trying out that word, okay, "that have come before I would be very grateful to have more knowledge. I've been working on putting together something to share, a kind of information guide for wargs and other visitors. Something that could be put up on the listserv," since that was mentioned, "and given out. I don't expect specific answers or anything really long but any bit that could be shared ..."
He was doing good, not letting his nervous habits come out even though he really, really wanted to fidget with a barrette in his hair.
On his piece of paper, he wrote:
- knowledge about the seers of the past - what were some of the things they did? - does anyone know a specific thing that they were capable of but has been lost due to the purge? - what happens if a familiar dies of natural causes and not a sudden death? will we still go mad? - also thank you for this meal. it's really amazing! someday i hope to be able to use magic to make food like this!
To be fair the last one was not really a question but it was always a good thing to tell someone thank you when you really enjoyed their food. Trouble was quick to grab the paper and darted off with it towards whomever would take it from his paws. Then he would be back to making sure Oliver had more than enough snacks to last the winter the rest of this conference.
"Yes," said Silk to Preacher. Her tone would have spontaneously frozen boiling water. "I would be much more comfortable in the nude, but as I respect the people to whom I am speaking and their comfort level, I am wearing clothes."
Ezra rolled his eyes. "And how am I to find these people to guide? When I was asked for help, I gave it. I can't be blamed for you all ******** up and deciding everything in ******** magic-land is your friend, and I won't be. I didn't ask to be made what I am any more than Melany did." He sounded, well, drunk, but also bitter.
Silk's attention went back to Horace. "I'm not sure it's possible without destroying the Charter entirely," she said. "And I'm still uncertain as to whether that's the desired outcome for the lot of you." She spared a moment to scowl at Lilt, apparently disapproving of the fetch's decision to speak mind-to-mind as opposed to speaking aloud or to the group at large. It was only a moment. She looked to Temperance next. "It may take time," she said. "I don't know who among us desires release to a human life. But I can send someone to ask." She looked to one of the robed and masked fetches along the wall, and jerked her head; they departed, the hem of their robes drifting along the ground behind them.
"It has happened," said Silk to Algernon. "But nobles who have done such a thing have, historically, been done away with by the spirit-bound."
Aleksy leaned on his elbows, chin pillowed in his hands. "Theoretically, we can make this whatever we want," he said. "If you want to change the pack touch I do not see why you could not make it that way." He shrugged. "I also think that we are ignoring the fact that we all can choose to ignore the guidance of nobles. They control the other creatures; they do not necessarily control us unless we choose to let them." But at the mention that no one knew the geas, he said, "Uh? It is not that difficult. Grant that I may never prove so fond to trust a man on oath or bond." With each word of the geas he spoke, each noble would find their attention drawn to him, until all that mattered in that moment was whatever the hell Aleksy Spektor wanted them to do.
"Alex," said Silk.
"Oh," said Aleksy. "Er. Remember to breathe." And then the spell was broken, and all the nobles had to do was focus on their breathing for a minute. "As for the matter of the Spinel Lady... We can create the Charter to say anything we want. Why not split off the monster and leave the girl free?"
This is not hte official GM post! The official post will be tomorrow :3
AMItotic
Lily
cibarium
Leila
lizbot
America
Melancholies
Shiloh and Ollie
saedusk
Jamie
Smerdle
Rabbit
The Semblance of Unity
Preacher&Horace&Temperance
happy bonsai
Hux
iloveyouDIE
Algernon
azuredreams
Nasir and Jeremiah
Posted: Wed May 03, 2017 5:45 am
It didn't take looking at Shiloh for Jamie to feel his exhaustion. They hadn't been here that long, but he was tired of it all, too. Still, he knew Shiloh's weariness was more than just a symptom of this single meeting. He sighed.
I don't know, he replied to Shiloh honestly. I'm not sure if having two strong classes would be better than one strong and two average. That's how it was now, right? I wonder if it wouldn't make us more... equal, though. That might be nice...
Jamie's thoughts were interrupted by Aleksy, whose casual use of the geas resounded in his mind through his shared mental bond with Shiloh. "H-Hey!" he balked, but Silk was there with her calm response before he could do much of anything. Now he breathed, relieved, as if he were the one commanded to do so. He settled back on his stool.
Are you okay? he asked Shiloh. Just to be sure.
"There wouldn't be any side effects for Melany, would there?" he asked Aleksy next. "And the Lady?" Not that he really cared much if the woman who tortured Shiloh was injured herself. "What exactly would splitting them do?"
The weight was familiar but the way the words drew his attention was not. Jeremiah focused Aleksy without anything else coming to mind. Then all he had to do was breathe. The breath came as the words did and he flexed his fingers in and out after the focus faded.
It brought him back to the topic at hand, his mind cleared of the other things he had been thinking about.
Jamie was asking the right questions.
"... and where would the Lady go if we split her from Melany?" He thought about what he had heard, of Melany's bloody back. The fact that it could come from how she was struggling to fight against the presence within her.
Other thoughts would come in a moment, once he did not feel- Once it passed. The feeling he had.
shibrogane
Posted: Wed May 03, 2017 7:51 am
Lily supposed she should have been listening to the goings-on of the meeting, the important words of the movers and shakers of the otherworld and how they wanted to fundamentally alter this critical document. These were big plans being discussed, and for once Lily was there at a point where she had a place to speak, a voice, and even a half-formed opinion about what was happening. She had the power to change worlds and realities, if only she pulled together the will to speak up and join the rabble. It shouldn't have been hard--Lily led people for a living, knew the things to do to make herself appear confident and self-assured.
Lily did none of these things. She stared absently at the walls as people talked and moved about the room, and when dinner arrived she did not eat but sipped idly at her wine glass, the blush to her cheeks feeling as hollow as the vapid beauty of the court. She nodded in farewell when Oliver took his leave, and might have glanced at Jamie when he spoke, but when she wasn't looking at nothing she was watching Temperance, her expression slowly sinking as the minutes passed.
Temperance wasn't pack, and she carried no familiar with her, which meant that she had, at some point, been chosen for nobility. As a moonwalker, Lily had been charged with protecting visitors from otherworld shenanigans, and after her talk with Eve regarding the court she had taken to assuming that it meant keeping people from the tithing process. Given that Temperance was here, it stood to reason that she had either been spirited away right under Lily's nose, or that she'd never been the person that Lily had grown so fond of in the prior months. The worst part was that Lily couldn't tell the difference, that there was no way of knowing whether Temperance's focus on the task at hand was simply her professionalism or if there had been no sidelong glances towards Lily because this Temperance had none to give.
Either way, Lily had failed, and the only thing to drown out the bitterness behind her eyes was the bottom of the wine glass in her hand.
At some point after Ezra mentioned Lady's involvement in Michael's death, Lily's expression went blank, her eyes glassed over by some unconscious calm. She did not drink from her glass anymore, and breathed only shallowly, focused on nothing in particular as the conversation continued around her. This time, however, she was listening, and when she saw an opportunity to spit she inclined her head towards the center table, lifting one hand for recognition.
"If there are no immediate drawbacks to separating Melany from the charter, then that is what we should do," she stated plainly, her words steady and flat. "But I would not agree with removing the geas entirely. If the nobles were created to police and break apart the spirit-bound, then they should also bear some sort of limitation. It is unfair if they get to run free while the rest of us are held back by the limits of our class."
Why had she even been so bothered before? Talking was easy, having an opinion was easy.
shibrogane
talking to silk kind of
azuredreams
talking to jer kind of
iloveyouDIE
so talking to alg kind of
The Semblance of Unity
temp reference
saedusk
jamie reference
melancholies
ollie reference
AMItotic Crew
Nebulous Trash
Offline
happy bonsai
Offline
Posted: Wed May 03, 2017 9:43 am
Lilt twitched beneath Silk's needle-gaze. She dropped her eyes, cowed by the other fetch's obvious distaste for her use of private mindspeak.
---
Hux's hand tightened on his glass when the geas was uttered, his attention tore itself away from whatever it was he'd been mulling over before and he focused on Aleksy.
On command, Hux inhaled and then exhaled. He was momentarily very aware of the air around him, the air that filled him. Then his grip on the glass loosened and he set it down. He looked particularly aggravated now. He hadn't been aware of the geas until they'd begun discussing it and he didn't like it. At all.
"How about," he said suddenly, voice like a low roll of thunder. "Instead of taking away someone's free <********> will, we have it so a noble can't harm anyone unless it's clear they need to defend their self or someone else? That way, no one gets abused- and we can't be used." He addressed his question to Silk and the nobles, but he did take a moment to glare at Lily upon his mention of will.
AMIotic
shibrogane
geas talk
Posted: Wed May 03, 2017 11:04 am
"I think you misunderstand, Lily," replied Jeremiah, "the Nobles were not created to police the split spirit-bond but the other way around. The moonwalkers and wargs are that which watch and police Nobles. To move should they go to far, to implement the geas - which you all just learned - against us.
"In fact, everyone present now knows of the phrase. You have, in a way, power over us." They had all just watched as the Nobles all froze, all ceased their breathing until they had started back up again at Aleksy's command. "This is a method of policing that has existed for thousands of years but it can be used by anyone, visitor or being."
His gaze, bright and eerie, turned to Hux then. "With what you're saying you are still removing will and our ability to act as we need to. There is still a potential for abuse as well. Nobles are gatekeepers, protectors as need be, and monitor this world. I fought the eye-ball thing, I fought something I can't quite explain other than a glitch. Were we bound to only act in defense of ourselves or another, we would likely found ourselves in a situation where we fail to do what needs to be done. Do I like the geas? No but I understand why it exists. We would need other methods of policing were it to be removed." Yet he absolutely did not like it. Jeremiah was still under a geas himself.
"... but I am getting away from things. If it is possible to remove the Spinel Lady from Melany, then I want to speak of this." His fingers drummed the table. "If this would protect her, would save Melany, then it's something to pursue."
On a piece of paper, he wrote: What was the cause of the purge? If no one knows, then what are the theories?
If Shiloh had anything else insightful to say, it ended the second Aleksy murmured the geas. There it was for god and everybody to ******** hear; his attention was trained on his work boss, the sounds and sights and smells of the room turning into mud, his focus hypersensitive. Jamie was there in the back of their mind link, but Shiloh's conscious was as dangerous and energetic as a live wire. It wasn't the same when Liam had showed him the geas, or the times when Jamie had used it on him jokingly; those had all been conducted with his consent. They weren't scary.
The burning in his lungs; that was a little scary.
And it lasted until he was told to breathe. He looked down at his hands for a long moment, and then to the charter, and then he was filled with the overwhelming urge to shred it. He didn't, not after the way he reacted to Silk's accusation of him manhandling it improperly. <******** this. Something in the shared headspace with Jamie was wavering uneasily, like it was threatening to fall apart. It didn't, but only because they were so intertwined with one another. <******** this, I'm going to die, someone's going to kill me.
His eyes were scanning the room with an immense sense of paranoia. Who was speaking? Hux? That didn't make any sense—who else; Lily? Keep the geas, right, of course, dangerous. Nobles were dangerous. He knew that.
"You could literally kill us all with a few words." He reiterated, his gaze on Aleksy as he spoke. After a moment, he looked back down at the charter.
- - -
Oliver, meanwhile, had his ears swiveling around. He was in fact awake, though only vaguely. At the mention of the geas he shifted around, his snout setting up on the table, but his eyes still closed. He made a snuffy animal sound.
shibrogane
qq
saedusk
QQ
The Semblance of Unity
lapcoon moves, but only vaguely
Posted: Wed May 03, 2017 8:52 pm
Bean handed off the papers to the fetches that came to collect them, and Silk tapped the base of the pages against the podium to straighten them before she looked down to read them.
"How can we free Melany? I do not know. Dissolving the charter is your best chance. As I have said, it would require that each of you who was originally involved revoke your permission. This would be the first stage; the second would be the destruction of the Charter's physical form, and the third would be to grind it free of the Lady's bones." She tapped a fingertip against her chin as she thought. Off to the side, the door that Silk's messenger-fetch had exited through cracked open. Beel emerged, followed by the fetch that had gone to retrieve him.
She had more written questions to respond to, so Silk did: "I don't know why the purge happened," she said. "It wasn't commanded by the Lady or by Lord Ezra. I'm not sure who commanded it, why it was done, only that it happened. For you, it would have been in the late eighteenth century, approximately 200 years before you were born."
This note she set aside as well. She looked at the next one. "I'm not very familiar with the wargs myself," she said. "I'm not sure any of the fetches are. And the only living seers are here in this room..." She looked to Aleksy, then to Leila. "And he is more of a Seer that you would expect.
"As for the loss of a familiar... It is still as traumatic, I believe. It would be as if one of your arms spontaneously died. It would become gangrenous and dangerous to you."
Aleksy took the answer to Jamie's question, since he was responding to Aleksy anyway: "If we wrote them out that there wouldn't be, then we would presumably be able to save her from negative consequence. We could write out all negatives of which we can think, and then negate them. Splitting them... it would give Melany a chance at free life. As for the Lady. Whatever we design for her, this is what will be."
As for Hux: Aleksy looked at him, eyebrows arched, unimpressed. "And is that not also restriction of free will? Should we restrain people from pre-emptively striking, to protect themselves? I am not here to ******** a thistle; I am here to ensure that my family is not poorly used in the future."
Silk nodded at Lily. "Then I believe it is time we put this to a vote," she said. "There are further questions. But we'll decide now. From there, we can make a plan.
"I don't know the cause of the purge. I have reason to believe that someone among the Court decided that the spirit-bound and the nobility beyond Lord Ezra, Lady Adoelle, and the Lady herself were dangerous. I do not know who. Only that someone made that choice."
Aleksy did seem regretful as he met Shiloh's gaze. "I would never do such things," he said. "I would act to protect myself and mine. But I do not believe most of you pose a danger to me."
Silk cleared her throat.
"It's time to decide, then. Shall we modify the existing Charter, or destroy it?"
The whiteboard changed again. Now it read:
PROS TO MODIFICATION Requires much less coordination and work Most of the effort has already been expended Requires consent from affected parties and no others
CONS TO MODIFICATION The Spinel Lady will continue to exist, possibly consuming what remains of her human host The baseline forms of the Court and the spirit-bound descendants would remain in place There will be minimal change to powers beyond the removal of certain weaknesses as spelled out
PROS TO DESTRUCTION Freedom for the Lady's human host Creation of classes which could be more beneficial Changes to the otherworld which would be more beneficial Possible reformation of the original spirit-bond
CONS TO DESTRUCTION Time-consuming; requires much more work Consent should be sought even by those unaffected Possible massive changes to fetches, freeing them if they desire it to be so
The next GM post will come on Friday around 10PM PDT Please post your character's vote for modification or destruction in big font so Shibe can see it Any votes not posted by Friday's GM post will not be counted
AMItotic
Lily
lizbot
America
Melancholies
Shiloh and Ollie
saedusk
Jamie
Smerdle
Rabbit
The Semblance of Unity
Preacher&Horace&Temperance
happy bonsai
Hux
iloveyouDIE
Algernon
azuredreams
Nasir and Jeremiah
shibrogane Vice Captain
Stellar Lightbringer
Offline
Smerdle
Scamp
Offline
Posted: Thu May 04, 2017 7:17 am
He hadn't expected it to be like that at all, and yet, the feeling was familiar. An unwavering compulsion to do something that he never would have thought of himself, but seemed like such a good idea once it had been suggested. Just stop. Stare at the boy he'd met at Maverick all those months ago. Wait. Nothing was more important.
When he got his breath back, Rabbit's reaction was the same as it had been the handful of other times he had been pushed in a way he didn't like. I'll be better from now on so that never has to happen again. But he hadn't done anything this time to deserve his sobering loss of control, so there was no way to improve. He scribbled more hasty notes in the absence of a plan, words devolving into the sorts of patterns he might draw while on hold with customer service.
"Destroy it." He spoke just after Silk did, as if they were in a room alone deciding the fate of the world. "Please."
shibrogane
DESTRUCTION
Posted: Thu May 04, 2017 6:00 pm
I'll protect the charter, he had said as Silk wrote up more information on the board. Funny how the things he wanted lined up more with the complete destruction of it. Had he been right before, then? He hated being so wishy-washy. He didn't say anything in response to Aleksy's claim; of course he didn't think Aleksy would hurt him, but what was stopping anyone else? He looked around the room to take note of who was present.
Abruptly, he stood up, his hands brushing invisible dirt off of the front of his person. "Sorry," He said as he bumped the chair up, "Sorry... I'll be back. Excuse—"
Charter still in tow with him, Shiloh excused himself without much fanfare. Beel walked in as he was exiting, a look of confusion shining on his face. Still, if he was bothered by it, he didn't show it. Instead the fetch cleared his throat and gave a wry sigh. He tried to be uninvolved, for once, and yet he ended up back here anyway.
"Someone wanted to hear a testimonial?" He would raise an eyebrow if he had any brow to raise, but the muscles still moved instinctively. "A fetch that wanted to return to a human life?" His gaze fell on Temperance. "I can do that. What did you want to know? It's rather straight forward."
The Semblance of Unity
hi
saedusk
ur bf absconded
shibrogane
shiloh out 4 a second
Quote:
but beel is here
Melancholies
Springtime Teenager
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saedusk
Dedicated Bunny
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Posted: Thu May 04, 2017 6:12 pm
The assurance should've been enough to sway Jamie immediately to the side of rip the charter in half, we can start over and do better. If they could save Melany and rework the status quo into something good for everyone, what reason did he have to hesitate? Still, there was a spot of doubt on his heart. A Jamie from another life had probably thought what he was doing then was the right thing, too. Would they actually be right this time?
Well, if nothing else, he had already rescinded his permission. He glowered at Ezra. That's when Shiloh got up.
Where are you going? he asked through the mind link, but got no response. It was possible Shiloh wanted some alone time, a chance to breathe, but Jamie couldn't let him go alone. There was worry picking at his gut. This was nothing to be taken lightly.
"I'll be back, too," he told Lily, brushing a hand carefully against her arm before retreating to follow Shiloh.
Melancholies
AMItotic
Posted: Thu May 04, 2017 9:48 pm
Jeremiah watched Shiloh, listened as he spoke and Aleksy responded, as then back to Shiloh as he left the room and then Jamie as well. His shoulders finally rolled, a hand smoothing through his hair with a sigh. He looked to Algie, then to the rest of the room. It was just a cursory glance but one he made all the same.
"Unravel it and let us make it anew. Separate the Spinel Lady from Melany, free her, as well as move forward to create something that is more beneficial to all. Something that is founded not on the blood and bone of the innocent." There was no need to state anything else.
The genuine truth was that Algie felt the trust already broken among friends and colleagues. He couldn't sugar coat the reality in his mind. But they'd all vowed to make a magical world not built on suffering and if they could take themselves as far from the old regime as possible, it would only be better.
He fully intended, he and Jeremiah both, to remake the court into something better. They would probably have to fight for the right, more than they had already. But to fight for anything resembling the court to be molded anew, fight through this magical life - through this process - was nothing new.
"We'll make it something that works," For everyone, "Away from the old ways. It will take a lot of work but if everyone wants the world we've asked for, that is inevitable."
His hand stayed curled tightly around his husband's under the table, their emotions echoing one another closely in determination.
