Thane is something of a migrant. He moves from place to place, but seems to have settled for the past year and some odd days into a centuries old farm in the deep woods which right now in January are spare and full of switches gilded gold by the setting sun. The snow blankets everything; this could be an alien scape, an other world. There are walls of granite, slabs of stone on the way down the windy path to Thane's place, and there are icicles frozen thick river vein blue-green on the stone, there are stone walls gingerbread frosted, and then there is the farm house itself. Large enough for multiple families, if the multiple families are small, with a dilapidated garage beside it and a barn that blazes an earthy red, and that is where the animals are because the cold snap is real. Beyond the barn is a stable, and the door to the stable is open, and Nick is arriving to hang out on his own because Pen is already there, inside the barn, sitting atop a pyramid of hay and watching Thane work. She did offer to help, but he refused it, and there is a goat munching on the side of the hay bale fort, and flirting rather mockingly around the ground. Thane is shirtless, because though it's cold in the barn Thane is Thane and he runs hot and has been hauling heavy buckets of feed hither and thither and they're chatting animatedly about something Lysander did.
Hyde
Nicholas is arriving at the barn, and he is arriving without Pen: he is arriving because he enjoys Thane's company, and he enjoys Thane's house. He enjoys how strange and foreign it feels to him, this place that could be an alien world, this centuries old farm that has been used by perhaps dozens of people before them. He is breathing in the crisp scent of winter as he approaches the house in a heavy coat and boots, his wild curls trapped by a red hat.
He waves as he approaches the two of them. There are a few snowflakes still lighting upon the top of the red hat: it has been snowing on and off for days, the way it does in January. Nick makes his way over toward the hay bale. He says nothing, just yet: he is content to let them carry on their conversation.
Winter-light
" - and then oh look it's Nick hey Nick why don't you sit down do you want some cider there's cider under the hay by Pen there's some milk too if you want it fresh, really fresh,"
Pen interrupts " - exceedingly fresh," and smiles at Nicholas, "And warm. I am not trying to make certain that all the cider belongs to me."
"Which there's always more of, watch out for M.F. over there!"
Goat: has spotted Nick.
Goat: has begun to gambol towards Nick. Adorably. Charmingly. Look how adorable and charming the goat is.
[Goat Charisma.]
Dice: 3 d10 TN6 (9, 10, 10) ( success x 3 )
Hyde
Goat: has spotted Nick. And Nicholas looks down at the goat, initially with a trace of amusement there along the line of his mouth. But the goat: it finds something deep within him, something that wants to hold and protect, and the smile widens almost instantly as the goat wanders toward him. "Hey there, M.F.," Nick says, and tugs his gloves free and shoves them in a pocket so he can hold his hands out toward the animal.
Any thoughts of cider have been forgotten.
Hyde
[Init, +5]
Dice: 1 d10 TN6 (8) ( success x 1 )
Winter-light
[Goat! +5]
Dice: 1 d10 TN6 (7) ( success x 1 )
Winter-light
Declare! M.F. is true sweetheart. Black and white, with a long face, delicate horns, floppy ears at just the right angle to be somewhat endearing; and M.F. - Nick can see this clearly - reaches out to nuzzle Nick's pocket/glove with its teeth juuuuust before it lowers its head to nibble on his jacket instead.
Hyde
Declare! Nick is lost. Nick is so charmed that he is not going to try to stop this goat.
Winter-light
[Strength + Brawl! MINE!]
Dice: 4 d10 TN6 (6, 6, 9, 9) ( success x 4 )
Hyde
[Strength + Brawl, wtf, goat]
Dice: 2 d10 TN6 (3, 4) ( fail )
Winter-light
M.F. takes Nick's jacket delicately between his teeth and then nibble nibble nibble PULL YANK CHOKE DROOL SLOBBER the slobber just flows and those teeth come perilously close to Nick's skin as it YANKS on the jacket and, look, M.F. is adorable, and also quite strong, and the yank to get a better swathe of jacket sends Nick spinning and spiraling to the ground.
[Damage.]
Dice: 5 d10 TN6 (2, 2, 8, 8, 8) ( success x 3 )
Hyde
[holy shit soak]
Dice: 2 d10 TN6 (7, 7) ( success x 2 )
Winter-light
"M.F., stop it bad goat goat this is your nature I know but you gotta stop hold on Nick don't get hurt I'm coming to save you," Thane says, shutting the gate on one of the cows.
The barn is redolent, shall we say. Off in the shadows, a grey hound is watching with alert interest, ears pricked and eyes bright. Off in other shadows, a cat is not watching, because it has better things to do with its day, although when Nick hits the ground the cat tenses and its ears prick up and it glowers in Nick's direction.
Pen is more affected by the goat swinging Nick to the ground than the cat is; she has more in common with the grey hound just now, in that she is tensed to help.
"Hey, goat! Away!"
[I can ... intimidate a goat. >.>]
Dice: 6 d10 TN6 (4, 5, 7, 7, 9, 10) ( success x 4 )
Winter-light
[Goat: >:[ ]
Dice: 3 d10 TN6 (8, 8, 10) ( success x 3 )
Hyde
It is startling, how quickly this situation escalates, or more accurately how quickly Nick ends up on the floor of the barn with the wind knocked out of him and a bruise developing on his ribs. M.F. is surprisingly strong, and the coat only does so much to cushion his fall as he topples and lies there for a moment, stunned.
Then he coughs, once, as the goat wanders away after Pen has scared it off, and reaches up to flick a piece of straw from his hair. "That thing should come with a warning sign," he says, and his voice is thin.
Winter-light
M.F. goes mincing over to the far side of the barn, gamboling out of Thane's reach though Thane does reach for M.F. There is a 'merry chase,' as they say, while Thane tries to get hold of M.F. so he can corral him with another goat (one with more white on its face), but to little avail, and meanwhile Penelope climbs down from the hay bale fortress to help Nick up if he's still sitting on the ground and if he's not to make certain he's all right. She is trying not to look amused in case he's really hurt; if he's really hurt, if he seems really hurt, her amusement will instantly transform to concern and sympathy, and it will be true, and it will be honest, and it is hovering on the edges anyway; but it was pretty funny, how quickly it happened. "Are you all right?"
"It's a goat that's its warning god damn it fucking that's its fuck come on that's, fuck it, warning sign," and Thane finally gets M.F. where he wants M.F. to go. Blows out, cheeks puffing, and then grins: it's a wicked sort of grin; one which starts when his eyes meet Pen's and lightning goes all shivery between.
Hyde
Nick is sitting on the ground by the time Pen reaches him, or at least for the sake of Nick's dignity we can say he is sitting: rather, he has lifted himself up on his elbows and is making a move toward semi-horizontal, though he is still trying to draw air back into his lungs. He gives his arm and shoulder a shake or two; it will be sore tomorrow. "I'm all right," he says.
He accepts Pen's hand when she offers it and allows her to help him to his feet. He rolls his shoulder once or twice and shoots a look from Thane to the goat. "Well, he will never again be trusted," Nick says.
Winter-light
Thane leans against the gate. The barn is a criss-cross network of temporary animal pens. His chest gleams in the animal warmth see of the barn in the candle light fire light glow which comes not from actual candles or fire but from a lantern or three and how they react against the wood. He grins. "Next time listen to us eh if you don't want to hang out in the barn we can go into the main house how about some of that fresh milk or cider or something man you look like a starveling."
Meanwhile: Pen curls the fingers of one hand around Nick's wrist a loose bracelet, slipping one finger and then the other beneath his coat sleeve to find his pulse (warmth). The other hand pinches the fabric of his January jacket sleeve and she pulls Nick Defeated By Goat closer to her.
Her eyes, see, are gleaming, and she has decided on (open; the sky is that open) amusement.
"You know, I feel left to the side, for you had a warm greeting for MF, but where is mine? It's not too late." And now her eyebrows arc, haughtily suggestive; hay is a crown and sweet and it is winter. "The taste of fresh milk is interesting. It's what went into the Song of Solomon, milk and honey under your tongue."
"There's honey in the main house but I don't have a stash out here Pen unless you're angling for my mead which eh I'm not sure how it turned out."
"The mead we made last year?" Pen: finds her attention pulled, or at least a thread of her attention pulled, away from Nick.
Hyde
"I'll try the fresh milk," Nick says, albeit cautiously, "but I mostly want cider." Pen's description of the taste as interesting only solidifies this decision in his mind. Her fingers against his wrist draw his eyes to her, and if she did feel left to the side, perhaps the smile that leaps to his face unbidden would put those feelings to rest.
Nick takes a few steps over to her, though Thane's mention of mead halts him mid-lean downward. "We could help you taste test it," he offers, because he is magnanimous that way, Nick.
Then his head turns back to Pen, and here he is smiling again. "I didn't realize you were going to be here already," he says, and he catches her chin in his gloved hand but only so that he can tilt it up to meet him as he leans down to kiss her. "Do you still have any work left to do, Thane?" He calls it over his shoulder after he has pulled a scant few inches back. "If you're done I'm okay with heading inside."
More than okay, if truth be told: he is still not accustomed to the winter, and he is only just beginning to realize that January is always the coldest month and not December.
Winter-light
Let's leave them in this moment, and find them in another.
In this moment, Pen exemplifies the idea of ardent, and Thane of hearty; she in greeting Nick, Thane in getting right to milking a cow so Nick can try some fresh milk. They are both rather gleeful when it's time for Nick to try it. Pen, with earnest eyes wide, mouth half-open, chin on her fingertips, leaning and leaning and leaning forward, and Thane with a sparkle in his black black eyes and the cat winding between his legs before it eschews Thane's legs for Nick's.
And fresh milk is fresh milk is fresh milk.
--
Inside, in a sun room, by a fire in a stone fire place, on a swing couch heaped with pillows, glasses out and a bottle of home-made mead, and Pen over the fire with a little saucer, "Do you want yours hot and spiced too, Nicholas?"
And Thane flopped out on the floor, spread eagle, a hand over his stomach. "I want mine hot and spiced remember," Thane says, "I remember," Pen replies, "but be sure you remember in a moment too," Thane says, and, "Don't worry; I shall," Pen replies, and Thane says, "Ooof. So Nick how are you weren't you what'd you say Pen something about what was he doing something, uh, something,"
"You were with your Chakravanti friends." Whose names Nick won't mention, if they're notable. Things happen in the past and they can change; can't they?
"Yeah!" Thane says, all enthusiastic, and then the enthusiasm flat lines, "Yeah that. How's that?"
Hyde
This next moment will find Nicholas, too, flopped out on the floor on his back, his arms folded behind his head. Thane has a way of making these things look comfortable, and Nick has a way of adopting other peoples' manner, however subtly, of taking his social cues from them and of internalizing the mood of the room. It is something he cannot entirely help, and it is not always to his advantage.
"Yes, please," he says to Pen when she mentions hot and spiced mead.
He is half-turning onto his stomach and leaning over over over to reach up onto the couch for a pillow when Pen and Thane mention his Chakravanti friends. He seizes the pillow and pulls it down into his chest, then stuffs it beneath his head before he makes his reply. "I was with them," he confirms. "There's a new guy who just Awakened recently who I got to meet today. I went up to the new chantry house. One guy bought it a little while ago and he and a few of the others have been using it on and off, and they decided to open it up recently."
They are all notable, and so he does not name them, though: this is for the sake of convenience and simplicity, here. A beat. "Do you ever see much of the other Verbena around here, Thane?"
Winter-light
"Sure. I see much of other everybodies around here as long as our paths cross." Thane blinks his thick sooty lashes together and smothers a yawn with one hand. The fire is making him sleepy. He is still shirtless, in the truest and most farm boyiest way there is to be shirtless. He only sits up when Pen gives him his mug of spiced-hot mead. Steam rises from it, calligraphic ballet of vapors, and he says, "I observe some of the High Holidays with them, or portions of the holidays anyway because you know it's more fun to celebrate with you guys sometimes or more fitting maybe not more fun I mean some Beltaine rites I'll stick with my Tradition mates though I bet you guys'd be welcome I can ask. There's a coven nearby I hang with a lot, I'm an honorary member of some of their rites, we've known each other for a long time though I mean I've drifted in circles up and down the coast for, oh, holy shit, just the longest fucking time, isn't that right Pen?"
Pen does not want to be on the ground because there is a cat in the room with them. She does not consciously eschew the ground because of the cat, but subconsciously the cat's presence is why once she is done heating up mead for herself and for Nick she takes her own mug to the swing and, look how it rocks, sinks back into it, pushing the swing with her foot so that it will rock her into a ballad, into a story, and the cat --
Well the cat is deciding what it wants to do right now. It was amenable to chin scritches and head strokes when they first entered, then batted hands and flopped on the ground near the fire and it watched with great judgment as the Hermetic lit the fire and the Verbena hauled out a great number of bottles of home brewed liquor and as the Chakravanti did whatever the Chakravanti did.
Pen makes a noise of assent.
Hyde
Nick also sits up to accept the mug of hot mead from Pen, and then carefully sets it down on the floor beside him so that he can adjust himself and sit up. He will have to in order to drink it. There is a lingering look at Pen there on the swing: so far away now.
He holds a hand out to the cat, who appears to be deciding where to go next. Nicholas has never said so in so many words, but he did not have pets growing up; they fascinate him now. The number of animals, of living things, at Thane's house fascinates him. He makes an interested noise as Thane tells him about the Verbena circles he runs in, and: there is a rueful smile as Thane invites them to Beltaine rites. "I don't know if a public celebration of Beltaine is my thing, but I appreciate the offer," he says.
He lifts the mug of mead so that the curls of steam can drift up toward his nose, breathes in deep. "Have you always practiced here in New England?"
Winter-light
"But is a private celebration?" Pen asks, clear eyes steady and curious.
The swing is pitched more for Thane's legs than her own, so she has to swing on her tippy toe, and Pen curls one leg beneath her like a swan or a stork and she has shed layers since coming inside and the ground is scattered with hay. Pen regards the way a particularly golden stalk looks against Nick's hair, and her phone buzzes in the pocket of her tunic-smock thing.
Thane was going to ask a variation of that question so he doesn't say anything now except a deep sigh after he takes a cautious sip of the hot liquid. "Spiced nice," he says. "You celebrate any other holidays Nicholas besides Yuletide of course and uh Happy New Year and shit."
Hyde
"I like having it as a private celebration," Nick says, and any delay he has in making this reply could be: he has celebrated it for the past few years, and he and Pen are still relatively new yet. He does not know how well such allusions are likely to go over.
Thane's question draws his eyes, and he folds both of his legs beneath him and edges a little closer to the firelight. He discarded his jacket and gloves and hat upon coming inside, and he is still wearing a thick grey sweater, knit in such a way that it lends him bulk but still oddly leaves him looking more like a starveling than before.
"I celebrate Thanksgiving," he says. "And both of the solstices. I don't...my mom was sort of a lapsed Catholic so I didn't really grow up celebrating anything specific. I've picked up holidays here and there based on what's significant to my practices, as I learned them."
Winter-light
Pen doesn't say anything, but looks rather wistful.
"You should come by, you and Pen," Thane repeats, before sipping more wine. A drop escapes his mouth runs down his chin heads and he wipes his mouth with the back of his hand after. Plops his back against the swing, which sends it veering back. "Did you pick it up cos it's significant to your practices--your Disparate practices or your little sleeper Nick practices?"
The cat paces toward Nick. The cat is an orange tabby, the orange almost red, a white splash rakish at the chin and on the breast. He (because the orange tabby is a young male) begins to flirt with the booze bottles, rubbing his side against them and flicking his tail.
Hyde
"Maybe we will. Can," Nick says, with this quick flick of a glance toward Pen, this half-lashed thing that takes scope of her wistful expression. He is gauging: what that means, how open she would be to such a thing.
"I picked it up because I moved in a few different circles as a Disparate, and that was the style of magick they all practiced," he says. He runs his fingertips along the top of the cat's head and around his ears, will scritch his chin if the cat is so inclined. "I was invited to celebrate a few holidays, so I did." Another little smile. "Sort of like what you're inviting me and Pen to do."
Only he went alone: such is the life of a Disparate. "I didn't really keep any holidays as a Sleeper. Just what was important to my family. Did you?"
Winter-light
The cat's eyes go slitted and he lifts his chin, purring on cycle purr purr purr purr purr getting louder. The booze bottles--well, a bottle--falls on its side when the cat lifts its back and knocks the thing over. It flops over onto its side and exposes its belly, writhing a few times before pausing to stare at Nick. Then: writhe writhe writhe.
"Yeah sure like Eid and shit for mom and Christmas for dad started celebrating the solstices when I was a little lad innocent and new as a goat that hasn't caused trouble yet gamboling all around and frolicksome," Thane says, and Pen's phone buzzes again. This time she digs the phone out and checks the texts. Her expression will change as she does; sluice away all joy, grow still.
Hyde
Unlike goats, Nicholas has enough experience with cats to be a bit leery of the one that is writhing and exposing its belly in front of him. He eyes him for a moment, and continues to rub his cheeks and jaw, and does not fall into the trap of petting the cat's (admittedly very tempting and fluffy and soft) belly fur.
"Did you find something that made you celebrate the solstices as a kid?" Nick asks, and there is a curious glance up toward Thane now. Perhaps he is recalling his own memories, his own echoes that he experienced in his youth, and: wondering.
That is, until he sees Pen's expression. At that point his attention is solely on her. "Is something wrong, Pen?"
Winter-light
The cat's head is tipped back in ecstasy and purrpurrpurrpurrpurr the cat mouth looks like it's smiling tip of pink tongue just sticking out and eyes closed.
"Rob's not coming," she says, shortly.
Hyde
Nick's hand stills momentarily on the cat's head as he absorbs this new information, Pen's clipped tone and how it followed her expression: her muscles had grown still, see, and Nick cannot help but feel some sort of dread there coiling in his guts.
He resumes petting the cat, though. "Did something happen to Rob?"
Pen
"His master won today." Her tone is still clipped. The sort of clipped that could take a pound of flesh: a nose, a pair of bright eyes, claim them in blood. The sort of clipped that is a dread to hear, and it is accompanied by a cool curl of her fingers back behind her ear, tucking away a lock of messy red hair. The firelight shakes free of it and the cat chooses this propitious time to abandon Nick and climb over Thane on its quest to leap up beside Pen. Bright its eyes as it gauges distance from ground to cushion.
Hyde
The cat leaps away, and Nick brushes some of its hair away from his hand and onto Thane's floor (which has doubtlessly been littered with animal hair many a time before). "Won?" Nick echoes, and he lifts himself on an elbow now so that he can regard Pen, the flame bright lock curl she tucks away behind her ear. "What did he win?"
Pen
Thane meanwhile gets very scowly and very solemn.
Pen says, "Coldness. Or. I don't know what they win; the contest. There's no prize in it, there's only the dumb shit idiot contest with no purpose except the vile satisfaction of being undefeated or unbowed. Unbowed rather than undefeated, I think, since the defeats are so multitudinous."
Hyde
Nick looks to Thane. Looks to Penelope. Absorbs the shift of mood in the room. His hand wanders across his stomach and flattens there against the soft thick knit of his sweater. He has heard about Rob's mentor before, see, albeit briefly: idle mentions, or barbs from Pen, or the time when all of them were gathered around the fire when Pen asked Rob why he had not chosen another mentor.
"I see," he says. "That...it sounds like it would be stressful for Rob. Just all that competitiveness," and this he says carefully, because nothing that Pen has said so far is quite in line with their reactions. So there must be more.
Pen
"You haven't run into very many Order mages of Rob's house have you?" Thane says. "They're like fuckin' nuts man, they're crazy intent on fucking one another over sorry Penny but you know it's true,"
"I wasn't going to interrupt," she says, finicking around the edge of her tunic-thing, laying it down over her legs, smoothing it along her calf, and Thane meanwhile,
"they're fucking ruthless fucks they're the worst of the Order, I mean most of 'em, they're just shit fucks, they're a lot of striving and mindfuckery, they're,"
"They're not all bad," Pen says, lifting her voice, coolly; it's a cool edge. "But Rob's master is," and see, her voice is made so molten, so bright, with hate that she loses a word; it unravels. "He is someone I would rather not know." Here: a fine shiver.
"He's a," and Thane says a word in another language. The meaning is clear. "Someone should tell you about him sooner or later anyway Nicky I mean if you're gonna be with us and friends and shit you might have to deal with him or have him deal around you it's fucking terrible he's," and Thane's eyes are lambent, too: this steady, earthen: lack of humor. Thane: he spits into the fire. "He doesn't have respect."
Hyde
You haven't run into very many
And here Nicholas just shakes his head once, the long curl that kinks over his forehead swaying as he does so. He reaches for his mug of mead and takes a sip from it now that it has cooled somewhat, leaning back on his other hand.
He is motionless save his eyes, which move from one person to the other as they exchange words. His eyelashes bat once or twice: strong words. He knows Thane means them.
"What makes him so terrible? Is he...I mean, what does he do that makes him disrespectful?"
Pen
Pen doesn't say anything. Pen studies her ankle, and then she studies the cat, who is crouched on the edge of the swing gazing at her with lambent eyes, with shining tiger eyes, with the hopeful eyes of a cat who wants food or a cat who wants a friend and thinks because you have ignored it you are the perfect friend.
Thane, though. Thane sits up runs his hand through his hair his own hair becomes wild wild around his face forest lord hunter. "He doesn't care about who you are a person guarantee that you bet. He what does he do Pen he hasn't I mean you he fuck he just when he's 'training' aka abusing Robin he will fuck with you. Put you in danger or whatever."
Hyde
Nick, too, glances at the cat, so hopeful there at Pen's feet. There is a little smile that pulls on the corner of his mouth, though it does not last; it cannot last. His brow furrows at Thane's explanation, which all told does not illuminate extensively. "Like what kind of danger? How does he fuck with people?"
Pen
"He'll set you up to be attacked," Pen says, and there's radiance in anger so simple, so total, "or, since you aren't part of the Order and you aren't his apprentice who has sworn away his life to your machinations and agreed to allow you to 'test' him at any opportunity, he'll attack you himself; he's clever in the way of compassionless egomaniacs who are fond of chess metaphors. He'll get inside your head; he'll make you fall asleep in front of a bus. He'll make you walk into a busy intersection. He does terrible things to Robin, all of the time, and Robin is happy for them because it gives him an opportunity to show that he is unaffected by them, because Robin is an idiot."
Hyde
Nick's eyebrows loft: firelight catches them, makes them gleam like polished ebony set in the ridge of his brow. "Has he...done any of those things? Make you fall asleep in front of a bus or walk into a busy intersection?"
Pen
"I am a member of the Order of Hermes," Pen says. "He cannot do anything directly to me without having House Quaesitor come down on him. Unless he did something nobody could trace. Why are you on the floor? Come sit by me."
"He got me sick once, yeah," Thane says. "When I was with Robby, and there was a fuck load of fire, and Robby had to choose himself or me or I think that was the idea; it was some fucked up bullshit."
Hyde
The deep furrows in Nick's forehead deepen still; his mouth is hidden by the rim of his mug, which he lifts up to sip from. The mead within is still quite hot and so eventually he must lower it, and the line there formed by his lips pressing together is a thin one.
Pen has invited him up beside her though, so: after a lingering look toward Thane he pushes himself up off the floor, at least enough to move (hunched, it is not far) toward the couch and tumble half into Pen's lap, half against her side. He keeps his mug clutched against his chest so as not to spill. "Doesn't anyone stop him from doing those things? How is he allowed to do that?"
Pen
"How are the powerful allowed to do anything?" Thane asks. "They do it 'coz they can do it, man."
Pen doesn't say anything. Her profile is still even when Nick collapses against and into her; see, her are lashes low, and her gaze is slanted off to the side.
Hyde
Nick makes some noise, something thoughtful that is kin to assent. He has one of his legs folded into Pen's lap, though a glance to the side tells him all he needs to know about the topic and her feelings on it. He is still learning her and her moods and how to read them, but generally they are clear to him.
"Still," Nick says. "I guess I would just think that...there would be some kind of consequence for things like that. That the Order wouldn't stand for it time and again."
Winter-light
(Pen: sigh, I am just going to TRY not to be TOO much of an open book. I'm going to TRY, with willpower, even.)
Dice: 3 d10 TN6 (5, 7, 9) ( success x 3 ) [WP]
Hyde
[Aww, Pen.]
Dice: 7 d10 TN6 (1, 2, 6, 8, 9, 10, 10) ( success x 7 ) [Doubling Tens]
Winter-light
Thane laughs, but quietly: it's the kind of laughter one does not quite expect from him, but seems very suiting; it's dark, you see, and full of night; the blowsy, winter-raked night; that kind. He's a generous man, a penny mystic, and though he believes in vengeance: hard stop. He believes in vengeance. He also believes in his friends, and Pen is his friend, and this is her Tradition.
"The Order is, sorry Pen, but Nick it's like anything good the Order does and all right I'll concede the Order does good but anything good the Order does it does for itself and if it, or anyway if its powerful members, can get away with doing what they want to do then they'll do it. I don't know about consequences. I guess maybe people are like fuck him he sucks and that's a consequence, but I dunno."
Pen is still. Her fingers working themselves through Nick's hair, deciding to tie some of his curls together in a love-knot, they are graceful enough; not preternaturally graceful, but humanly graceful. They could make a mistake as easy as they could draw a perfect line.
Nick is getting very good at reading her moods, not that she is difficult to read for the astute in general. He can tell the moment, sense it maybe, when she draws herself in, collects herself in order that what she says next be taken one way instead of another, see: she tries not to throw a shadow, to suggest with anything in her, that she has personal experience here, that it is an intimate subject and she knows it so well it's a live-coal in her gut. But.
"We have our laws, but he doesn't break any that you could pin him with. He's within his rights to treat Robin however he wishes; he's in his rights, or solid enough in the claim of his rights, to mess with those in Robin's vicinity in order to 'strengthen' Robin. He could even fuck around with another Hermetic as long as he could hide the traces that he'd done so or if he did it indirectly. That's how all rivalries and feuds in my tradition go: indirect attacks. He might do things that are illegal, say, according to the law of the land, but I don't think very many Willworkers care about the law of the land - I mean, the USA, or whatever country they are citizens of - once they've settled into being awake."
Hyde
Nick makes some low sound in his throat and it is exactly the kind of sound people do expect from him, a twilight sound that fades there at the end. He's a creature of thresholds, and he has swallowed their words and is trying to digest them though they have hardened into a lump in his stomach.
And he was a Disparate, see, and so he is not naive: he knew the sort of danger he lived in back then. He knew how poorly protected he was against Willworkers stronger than himself.
He cannot reach for one of Pen's hands since they are in his hair, so instead he bumps the side of his head against her shoulder. Curls sway toward her cheek, toward her ear. "That's...I guess knowing Rob I understand why he puts up with it. He's told us. Has he ever hurt either of you?"
Does he need to keep an eye out?
Winter-light
"Yeah. He trashed my truck he burnt my corn to fucking ashes he encouraged, fuck, I mean he's done so much shit. He didn't do it directly I guess what Pen says that's right he does it all indirectly. He's made me say shit to Rob before. I remember. Bad shit." Thane runs his fingers through his hair and sighs, then wiggles his finger to draw his orange cat's attention. The orange cat ignores him because he wants its attention: it is such a cat.
"He's very inappropriate," Pen says, smiling (but distantly; aloofly; there is a point, perhaps, where she becomes untouchable: so collected is she in her anger) down at Nick when he bumps his head against her. "Sexist misogynistic old in-his-head hard chess player. I wouldn't care, but he is cruel to Rob and cruel to anyone."
Her fingers tighten (it's a grateful impulse; it has something of the word cherish in it) on Nick's curls and she wants to kiss him so she does, and after she does, she pushes the swing back to give it one big push and then abandons it in order to tend the fire.
"I think sometimes the pursuit of any proficiency in Mind only gives people a test, and most fail it. The test is whether or not people are real people. I suppose I can imagine how you might come not to regard it if you can just change real people into being other than they want to be."
Hyde
Nicholas's eyebrows loft as Thane begins to illustrate Viktor, the things that Viktor has done to Thane alone, and his free hand slides open across his stomach, digs into the soft pile of his sweater. Pen when she gets up to tend the fire leaves him swaying in the swing, his leg sprawled across the space she just left, and just the slightest bit hazy from her kiss and from the mead.
They are young, and they are still relatively new: she does this to him. He is watching her there at the fire.
At least, until Thane draws his eyes, which fade into something somber. "I don't think I'd want that kind of power. To take away other peoples' autonomy," he says quietly. "That...Viktor doesn't sound like a person I'm eager to meet. Have either of you thought about doing something about him?"
Winter-light
"I hope you don't meet him," Pen says.
Pen's back is to Nick and the cat who has huffed off to the ground and become a crescent cat loaf of orange, paws tucked neatly underneath it. Pen's hair is limned by the fire; the edges of it are a halo; she licks her lips and inhales.
"Rob'd be bound to do something back," Thane says, shrugging. "So. Not yet."
Hyde
"Rob would...do something to the two of you, for doing something about Viktor?" And here Nick's forehead furrows, just a little. Pen cannot see it there with her back to him, limned in the light of the fire: Thane can.
Winter-light
"What sort of 'something' are you imagining?" Pen asks before Thane can answer, but she is still looking at the fire. Fire often has this mesmeric effect, doesn't it? As any moth might say, or any star. The stars fall to burn, not for any other reason.
Hyde
"I don't know," Nick says. "Just...something to protect yourselves. Some way to keep him from striking out against you again." And here he reaches up behind his head, tugs at a curl or two. "Especially if he hurts other people who are less able to defend themselves."
Winter-light
"Of course. Wits are sharp, and there are charms to make one's mind less penetrable. But he is a Master," Pen says. Pen: not defeated; only stating a simple fact: one which makes it difficult. "I don't think he'd allow me to work out a geas under which to bind him. Bet you and I could come up with a good one, huh, Thane?"
Thane is a bloodthirsty man. He smiles and it's a sweet smile a floppy haired smile a smile that has less of blood in it and more of thirst, and he scrubs his face, seems a touch relieved by Nick's answer, or not relieved but eased by it; had he come uneasy? He says, "We could come up with some poetic justice I'm sure. Pact. When we've got what would it involve the Entropy and Prime to do it let's do it."
"I can't work against another Order mage," Pen says, with this slender smile, this moon sliver of a smile over her shoulder; it makes the statement more inscrutable. Her eyes switch to Nick after she smiles at Thane; only looks at him.
Hyde
"Some day we'll have sufficient knowledge of both of those," Nick says, and he means himself too; he means whatever else he may come to have at his disposal, Time and Spirit and other knowledge. Tytali carried brands burnt on their souls after the Massassa Wars; it would not be anything so new to them.
Nick is not a bloodthirsty man, but one would be mistaken to think him meek, wouldn't they? He meets Pen's eyes unflinching, and there is a little smile there before he glances down and to the side.
"What do you think Rob would do, if something like that were to happen?"
Winter-light
"Depends on a few things. How much he still wants of his master and, hmm, hmm hmm hmm hmm, what the geasa was, whether it reflected poorly on him and, uh, whether he wanted us to do it or not," Thane says.
Meanwhile, Pen. How easily looking could become gazing. Light must eat the dark; dark must eat the light. Must. There could be something like that, some times, that sense of necessity, of natural order, to the way Elaine Siddal looks at Nicholas Hyde. Even after he looks away, or especially then. But it is a rather cautious look, all things told; it is two things.
"What would you do if someone laid a geas on one of us? Or one of your teachers? And it was done to stop them from practicing in their way?" Pen asks.
Hyde
"I suppose it would depend on the geas," Nick says, and this is thoughtful and it strives for fairness. "But I'm not sure if it means we should let Viktor practice in his way, if it involves taking rights away from other people. From us."
He has not missed the caution. People have often looked at Nicholas Hyde, at things he has said, with caution. He gazes back, and there is a pang in his heart. "But I don't know him, either. I just...he sounds dangerous and I guess I just think maybe we should be prepared, one day."
Winter-light
Pen: pivots on the balls of her feet, still crouched; it is a smooth, clean movement. A knife could twist so, elegance in simplicity. "He is terrible," Pen says.
And she still wants it to seem as if she has no personal stake; as if he has never done anything that touched her, specifically; she is not good at that. There is too much feeling in her declaration, however coolly spoken.
"And I think Rob might kill him one day. I think Viktor killed his own Master. Or 'bested' him. I often think I'd rather be turned into a mouse than have found myself in House Tytalus. I don't -- you should be prepared. As prepared as you can be, Nicholai."
"What was it tonight for Rob?" Thane wants to know. He's watching Pen and Nick and who knows what he's thinking.
"He doesn't say via text," Pen says. "But it sounds like Mind versus Mind. The way he's texting." Pen: she stands up and comes back to the swing and Nick, and who's turn is it to flop? Pen's turn! Pen flops: languishes, languors. Roll the r to make languor fancier.
Hyde
Nicholas has sometimes thought, privately, that he would rather be turned into a mouse than have found himself in the Order of Hermes, much less House Tytalus; he does not say this. Wisely. His gaze flicks from Pen to Thane and back again as the two of them discuss Rob.
Then Pen flops on him, and it draws his eyes down to her face, and we have already noted how looking can turn into gazing. He is private about it though, or as much as he can be: see how he glances down at her sidelong, through the dark bar of his eyelashes. "We should invite him here. Maybe that will help him feel better."
Winter-light
"You are welcome to try to lure him. You are very beguiling; you might just succeed," Penelope says, with a smile, lofting her chin. The smile is spare; she hands Nick her phone with the intention that he use it to text Rob.
The last text chunk of text from Rob is:
not coming. regrets. old man almost cracked it
The rest of what's on the screen:
and I don't know what it means to be moony but I'd rather do that than study Euclides one more time w/ Di. How does Eve do it? He is inhuman.
R: Inhumane. He takes after her.
P: He is humane he is just inhuman. It's such work. N's here gtg!
P: Are we meeting up?
Hyde
"I don't think my beguiling would work just the same way on Rob," Nick says, and note here the wry twist of his mouth, softened by the glint in his eyes.
He glances at the run of words that appears here on the screen of Pen's phone, and after this he shifts a hip so he can pull his own from his pocket. He's quick with his thumbs, or at least as quick as people of their generation are with touchscreens: they come more naturally to people a few years younger or more.
Pen said you're not coming, which is a shame. Spiced mead and whiskey. Going to let a headache keep you?
Winter-light
Robin does not respond with anything resembling immediacy and speaking of spiced mead Pen broods over her cup, re-settling and re-settling on the swing until she is leaning against Nick just so and heavily and yet at such an angle as to still be able to drink and her gaze is absorbed by night thoughts. Thane doesn't find the silence awkward any more than Pen does. He stretches out on the floor and, finally, the orange cat rolls on its back then to its other side, stretching out one delicate paw so that it is touching Thane's ribs with it. The claws come out. Disappear. Come out. Disappear. Thane strokes the cat's ears.
When Robin does reply it is thus:
immune to goading f off jekyll dogood
Hyde
"He made a Jekyll joke, he must be really off his game," Nick says sidelong to Pen: murmurs, really, against her hair, against her ear since she is leaned into him. He does not seem to mind the silence either, though he does shift somewhat to make himself more comfortable as she leans against him. Such is the curse of sitting so close to one another.
Then he sends another text to Rob (All right. We are missing you though :) )and sets his phone down on the bench beside him, taking up his half-empty cup of mead and leaning his head into Pen's. And night thoughts settle in, the way they do when basking in firelight at midwinter with one's dearest friends.
