lostcarnival | ⇨ The Tourist Trap: PROLOGUE

Lambert stares at the bird, jaw tightening, but it's not (only) in irritation as it is with the air of someone with something to say, but trying to figure out how much to say. The good news is with the bird being so persnickety at him, it feels more like a person and less like his memory of sometime-dinner.

"I've been where you are," he says, finally. If his first assumption that this bird is a cursed human like he was is true, or in more general terms, trapped in a form he doesn't want to be in. "Stuck." He picks up a piece of kibble between two fingers, turning it over absently.

"This can't be any worse than cat food." Its tempting to go into more detail than that, remind it that he's already saved it, he doesn't need to be its damn personal chef either, but negotiations are something this iteration Lambert is pretty used to, dealing with younger siblings.

"Come on, when's the last time you ate?" he coaxes, tentatively extending the piece of kibble to it. "Trying it isn't going to hurt, and if you don't like it, you can just eat around it. I'll get you something better later." After he does the groceries, anyway, and possibly gets more of a handle on what the hell he's gotten himself into.

Edited 2017-06-03 10:39 (UTC)

The crow squints, head bobbing as he looks from Lambert to the offered piece of kibble, then back again. He makes another, quieter croaking sound, though what that means, who the fuck even knows. On his own end, he's considering it. It's been hours, so it's not like he should be starving, but the amount of energy a bird extends on flight alone is massive.

The amount for a high-speed aerial chase, probably ten times that.

As such, a few hours for regular him wouldn't be enough to count as starving, but stuck in this form? It's different. He still doesn't like it and he'll make that known by nipping at Lambert's fingers first, though not hard enough to cause harm. The next bob of his beak is him snapping up the kibble, then throwing his head back to swallow it. Ultimately, it's not like he's really going to taste it much in the first place, so...

What the hell he'd meant about 'cat food' and 'being here before' is something he wishes he could ask about. Maybe someday, just not now. Probably not for days. Instead, he'll note it for later.

Nipping or not, Lambert looks pretty pleased the crow has decided to play along, at least for the moment. He'll return the favor by reaching out to run a finger up along the ruffled feathers at the crow's neck as soon as he's done gulping the food, then smoothing the feathers down.

"There you go," he murmurs. In some way, it's lucky the bird isn't more frightened or distressed, or showing more visible signs of being out of his element than he has. If he was (and Lambert doesn't even know if it's a boy or a girl at this point -- would it be a reasonable assumption to make on size? The internet tells him no, not really, so he's going to just have to put it aside) he'd be treating it differently, but its quiet nature is a change of pace from the hectic whirlwind of this househould, and it's not ... bad. It'd be great if this dingy bird turned out to be a hot babe, possibly even worth the trouble he went through just bringing it here, but with his luck the odds of that are vanishingly small.

For the most part, over the next few days, he'll let it recover in peace, keeping him in his room and checking on how his injuries and his makeshift splint are holding up in the mornings and evenings. Better food eventually comes in the form of spaghetti (with only a little sauce, because apparently salt is bad for birds) and pizza (when Lambert brings up his own dinner so he can work quietly at his desk, fingers flying on the keyboard) though the fruit remains. As long as the crow isn't making noise, it seems it's surprisingly easy for Lambert to forget it's even there, though he'll shuffle the box absently between the bed and the table and the floor depending on what space he needs.

Lambert's routine is a simple one. He gets up early, gets showered, and depending on the day he's either off to the library, off to the cafe, or off to meet his thesis adviser. The last seems to be a particular source of stress for him, days when he comes back muttering under his breath and giving up on modesty as he slams around his room to pull on clean clothes before collapsing into bed to sleep like hte dead. At least for the first week, he'll keep the door closed and won't let him out into the apartment proper; the bird will hear voices beyond it, both female, and the excited yapping of dogs. As the crow regains strength, eventually it's going to get set on the desk next to the laptop, the keyboard poised under its beak and a blank document on the screen.

"I'm Lambert. Sorry, I never properly introduced myself." Though the bird has likely figured out as much from just being around here, so he doesn't sound that sorry at all. "Who are you?" God, he hopes its literate.

Edited 2017-06-04 05:21 (UTC)

Which earns Lambert a second nip, when that errant finger strays to pet him, of all things. But aside from that? The rest of the first week, the crow proves to be a decent enough house guest. He doesn't cause trouble, since most of the time he only sleeps. He wakes up to eat, watches Lambert work from time to time — among other things — and then, unsurprisingly, even more sleep. He may not have thrown a huge fuss when letting Lambert handle the injured wing, but it had caused quite a bit of pain. Fussing would have made it worse, hence, no fuss. Hence all the sleep, too, since the less time spent moving and awake meant easier pain management.

It may have been alarming the first day or so, how lethargic the crow became after the initial rescue, but week two shows much more unnecessary movement, more time spent awake, and a lot more chatter, nonsensical cawing that it is. As curious as he is to see what else is out in the apartment, hearing a dog keeps him in Lambert's room, even when he does start hopping out of the box to poke around...

There may have been at least one time Lambert will have found the bird standing over his papers, staring down at them, but for what purpose, who knows. Perhaps that's what brought about the idea he might be literate and, truly, he is, but having the keyboard set down before him just gets a long stare.

The crow bobs his head up, turning it to one side to eye Lambert. Otherwise, nothing.

The notes are mostly a lot of Latin translations -- a frustrating one, judging by the number of scratched-out lines of text -- and he's in the habit of quietly talking to himself while he works. It's a tedious process, apparently some book of stories he's re-translating, apparently, and it's slow going. Some nights he'll simply let the bird perch on his shoulder while feeding it scraps and petting it absently while he retreats to less mentally taxing territory: skimming books of poems and myths, which he'll read out loud line by line in the original then translate into English for practice.

Not tonight, though. Tonight is for answers, with the bird not returned to its previous self, and Lambert's determined to get some.

"You were perfectly capable of answering a yes or no question when you were half-dead," he reminds it, raising a brow and leaning back in his chair. "Your name shouldn't be that hard. Otherwise, I'm happy to call you 'Fatass' as long as you're here."

Edited 2017-06-05 00:50 (UTC)

All in all, he wouldn't care if that's what he called him. It's not like a name really matters and names are tricky things with the fae and fae-changed, at that. On the other hand, along with that same train of thought, what if it sticks? Would it become a true name for this form? He sure as fuck doesn't know and he'd prefer not to tempt fate like that.

Regardless, the bird lets out a high-pitched huff, feathers ruffling, to let Lambert know just how he feels about this. He doesn't like it! But fine, he'll do it, a part which is made just as apparent when he hunts down the first letter and taps it with his beak.

A 'j'.

When Lambert had been turned into a cat, however briefly, he'd been frantic, desperate to communicate any way he could -- when he actually could remember to think like a human at all. The bird's reticence is suspect, making him wonder if he might have invited someone who deserved to be stuck this way into his home.

He looks at the bird with head cocked and arms crossed, squinting at it over his glasses. He's tempted to ask 'J for what' and rattle off names, but he'll give the crow a minute or two to finish before he starts up with the snide side-commentary.

The difference is he's a crow by choice. That he's been stuck in this form longer than usual is an annoyance, but it's not the worst thing that's ever happened to him. He pauses, giving Lambert another look, as if expecting him to get on with guessing names anyway, but that never comes. Alright, then, he'll continue.

Chances are he would have guessed 'John' pretty fast, anyway, seeing how common it is. By the way, that is the name he's spelling out. 'J-o-h-n'.

Lambert can't help it: he reads the name and snorts out loud. "Couldn't possibly get more generic, could you?" The bird doesn't look like a John, not that he'd really realized he'd been expecting anything until now. At least it isn't some impossibly hippie or Tolkien sounding name like Willow or Grima or some shit like that.

"But fine. John, then." He reaches out, tickles at those ruffled feathers again. He knows it annoys him, which is why he'll keep at it.

And that just gets him another bout of scolding noises from this so-called John the crow, first for calling his name generic — it is, but it's not as if he chose it — and then for ruffling his feathers. If Lambert's looking for an actually painful chomp from that beak, he's going to get one if he doesn't pull his hand back fast enough.

Luckily, Lambert's reflexes aren't awful, so he snatches the hand back before that beak can close on it, snickering under his breath. Unsurprisingly, what follows is a series of questions as he attempts to quiz John for more information: what is he? Where is he from? How did he get stuck here? Equally unsurprising is that the bird remains wholly uncooperative, so Lambert gives up on the effort. He doesn't know anymore about it then when it first got here and he wouldn't be entirely surprised to come home one day to see the bird gone and remaining just as ignorant about it as he had before.

Instead, what he gets when he comes home one day is the unsettling feeling of something watching him in the middle of unlocking the front door of the apartment. He looks up sharply, but there aren't any crows in sight. As it turns out, he should have been looking at the ground, because all of a sudden? Some dark shape nearly knocks him down as it bounds past and into the apartment. Yet it doesn't feel entirely solid, and though all the blood in Lambert's veins nearly freezes for a moment, a shaky hand run down his chest confirms he isn't injured.

More pertinently, though, whatever the fuck that was? It's just gone inside the house, and that galvanizes him to rush inside, just in time to see a shadow stretching across the floor disappearing under the edge of his door. Lambert doesn't have much in the way of self defense, but he does have a bat he keeps in the hallway closet, so he'll grab that and let his bag hit the floor before running to throw his bedroom door open.

It's uncertain what Lambert may have been expecting when he threw open that door. Chances are the short list doesn't include 'ghost dog', but that's what it'll turn out to be. It had been small when it dashed in, but with him throwing the door open, it snaps its attention around back towards him. Before, the creature had been looming over the crow on the bed, but now it's Lambert that it's burning red eyes are locked onto.

It growls, the room feeling as if it's vibrating with the sound, a sound too big for such a small package, but much to what will be Lambert's misfortune, it won't be remaining small for long. It starts growing, bed creaking under the increasing size, shadows being ripped up from under furniture and out of corners to feed into it as it creeps up and up, into a massive black dog, the kind he may have read about in one of his books, the ones of old stories, old ghosts.

A church grim, if he has the time and sense to make a guess, but what the hell one is doing away from a cemetery is anyone's guess.

To Lambert's credit, he doesn't scream or faint or piss himself -- a black ghost creature with red eyes isn't the worst thing he's seen, wandering around this city, but it is the first time one has followed him home.

With the way it was leaning over the crow, throwing the bat at it was something Lambert seriously considered. Instead, as it backs away (and he really doesn't have the immediate ability to identify what it is besides 'supernatural' right now, heart pounding crazily in his chest) and grows bigger, he's forced to admit a bat probably won't do much good. It's only a small blessing that his sisters aren't in the house right now, because he isn't at all proud of the way his voice cracks as he snarls back, like an idiot with a death wish:

"Back. Off. The bird's mine."

All that gets is another growl in reply, the creature turning around on the bed and getting ready to leap at Lambert. It crouches for a second, gathering its strength in its haunches when a voice cuts it off short, a voice coming from behind the massive dog. With the more shadows it pulled in, the less translucent it had become — not that a grim is all that see-through in the first place — and with how quickly Childermass can go from crow to human, the change is barely noticeable until he makes it so.

"Baker, sit," the voice commands, calm as can be, but firm nonetheless. It's an order and the grim knows it. Its ears perk and it looks back. In the next few seconds, it's wagging its tail and shrinking down again, shadows fleeing as it instead becomes small again and throws itself at the man that's now sitting where the crow had been. 'Scarecrow' would be apter than just crow, though, with how thin and long he looks. He'll undoubtedly be far taller than Lambert whenever he chooses to stand.

He's dressed sensibly enough, even if all of it seems a little well-worn. A black overcoat, an off-white shirt not quite buttoned all the way up at the top, dark jeans. Though he seems to lack actual feathers — untrue, though that depends on whether or not Lambert can call him out on hiding his true appearance — the coat and shirt have their sleeves folded back enough to allow the intricate black-lined tattoos of feathers show, replacing where there normally would be feathers on his arms, though not his face. They're technically that way for the feathers all along his back and shoulders, too, when disguised, but all of that isn't at all visible. Black hair, too, long and tied back into a bun, stray strands left wherever they feel like hanging around his face.

He's clutching the arm that would have been the splinted wing, making sure not to move it unless he has to, even as the ghost dog starts jumping all over him and trying to lick his face.

"...okay, okay, stop, cut that out," he mutters, looking down at the dog briefly. Nope, dog's going to keep going nuts, so he just sighs and scoots back, sitting up taller to put his face out of chruch grim tongue range (that shit's cold, like, super cold). From there, he'll pin Lambert with an amused look, an eyebrow quirked. "I'm yours, huh? And here I thought I was only a guest."

Under other circumstances, Lambert would probably have taken a jibe like that better -- and in the future, once he gets over the surprise of all this, he probably will. In fact, it's almost guaranteed he will never stop giving Childermass shit about it.

Right now, though? Right now, Lambert's emotions are shifting from panic, to confusion, and finally -- and more easily dealt with -- anger. He isn't going to throw his bat at the man on his bed, but he is going to hold it out, pointing it at the man and his dog accusingly.

"You have one minute to explain what the fuck you are and what the fuck is going on here before I hit you with this," Lambert bites out, tone hard and posture alert and ready for an attack. Sure, he can tell a happy reunion when he sees one, but that doesn't fucking change that a ghost dog broke into his house.

A ghost dog is his best guess, because it's form when he's not focusing on it ripples in that way that usually means other people can't normally see it -- much like the tattoos on the mans arms that turns from feathers to ink and back again. He blinks furiously behind his glasses, mouth drawn into a tight, pissed-off line.

Normally, he would raise his hands up as a show of not meaning any harm, but he isn't sure about moving his arm just yet. The threatening tone from Lambert does threaten to set the ghostly dog off again, the creature freezing in its celebration to turn and snarl back at him when he snaps and points with the bat.

As such, looks like he's going to have to talk fast, especially if Lambert really means that one minute mark.

"I can change into a crow on will," he explains, leaving out the entire 'also I'm a changeling' part. Shapeshifters exist, they don't necessarily have to be part fae. "But changing back becomes a problem when broken bones are involved. If Baker here hadn't tracked me down, I would have waited until I was sure the wing was healed, but..."

He looks down at the little church grim.

"I thought it might be best to keep him from attacking you."

The concept of shapeshifters isn't a foreign one to Lambert: after all, unless the crow's an idiot, he'll have realized that there are two living right under this roof. It's a thought that makes Lambert tense up instinctively, scowling again, though that much may be at the idea of needing someone to protect him as anything else.

"Friend of yours?" he asks, looking at the dog and lowering the bat, but only slightly. "I didn't know crow-men and ghost dogs got along." More accurately, he didn't have proof either of them existed until ... today, apparently. He nudges his glasses up with one hand, squinting harder, and -- yeah, those aren't just tattoos, they're actual feathers. Fuck.

"...If you're staying like this, let me see that arm," he says after a moment, swallowing.

He's aware enough of that fact, with Lambert's weird little family, which is why he's confident about slipping by with such a vague explanation. The more he assumes this is just another shapeshifter thing, the better.

"He's a church grim," Childermass shares with the class (of one). His gaze flits back up from Baker, who settles once the bat is lowered but still refuses to move off his lap, instead flopping across it with an illusion of weight that doesn't quite exist. "You're the man who reads fairy tales. Why wouldn't a crow and a grim get along?"

Both can be related to death, one way or another.

Anyway, since he is staying like this, he'll carefully pull his other hand away from his arm and offer it to Lambert to check. Yeah, there really are feathers, under the other disguise. Though where the feathers don't cover, which is still a fairly good portion of his arm, there are still fading bruises following the shape of something having grabbed and wrenched hard on it, just like how the smaller crow before had latched onto his wing right before he crashed.

"Why would I expect a church grim in Portland in the first place?" Lambert volleys back automatically, academic pedantry taking over caution. He drops to a seat next to the man's injured arm, setting the bat to the side. As he keeps talking, he reaches out to palpate the limb with his hands, trying and failing to avoid the feathers as he goes. If he's staring a bit more than he should, sorry John, it's definitely not because he thinks your tattoos are cool.

"A church grim's the spirit of the first thing buried in a new church yard. The Swedish variant, the kirkogrim, is said to take a form of a goat. Not to be confused with a barghest, gytrash, or gwyllgi, other black dogs of Britain." After that dry recitation, Lambert frowns at the feathery arm like it's personally offended him for existing, then looks up.

"They're were also supposed to guard against evil." So if nothing else, whatever this guy is, at least he can rule out that he's a demon, ha ha. Assuming the stories aren't a load of horse shit, which is debatable since ... a church grim is here, and very obviously nowhere near a churchyard, so someone obviously got something wrong.

"I don't think this is broken, but it should be kept stable." While he's no doctor, the prognosis is easy enough. "You need a sling."

Edited (rereading this in the morning i'm like what ... did i even write lmao) 2017-06-06 19:05 (UTC)

"He mostly guards against raccoons," Childermass says in a mild attempt at humor to cover up the grimace he makes as Lambert checks his arm over. A sling, though. That isn't the worst. However, he can't help but add, "Hm. A sling means still no flying yet..."

Admittedly, he can travel other ways. Like, take a bus or use his shadow tricks. Crow is just easier. Flying is easier.

"And I don't see why there couldn't be a church grim in Portland. They have churches here, ones with graveyards. Just because their story starts in England doesn't mean they're stuck there and only there." His gaze flits down to the little grim. "Isn't that right, Baker?"

The grim just lets out a doggy huff. Ethereal sounding, yes, but still quite dog-like.

"That's your problem, not mine." It's back to being in bad humor, apparently. Lambert releases the man's arm and slides off the bed, getting up to pace. He won't be baited into further debate on arguing the feasibility of church grims on the West Coast, because that really is the least of the impossible things in his bedroom.

"You can't stay here," Lambert says finally, coming to a stop in front of his desk. He crosses his arms to fend off the urge to press his hands against the headache he can feel building.

"Not like that," he waves a hand up and down, indicating the former crow's everything. He doesn't know how he'd ever explain some random dude to his sisters, it was weird enough having a crow -- that train of thought briefly derails as he flushes, and one can more or less guess at the slideshow flipping through his mind as he recalls exactly how goddamn close and personal he's allowed the crow to be over the last few days. Like an idiot, he'd let himself get complacent enough to forget.

"Who the fuck are you?" When in doubt, fall back on anger. "Where was that," he points at Baker, "When those birds were after you?" Because holy shit, he could have saved himself all that time if a church grim had just popped up and chewed on those birds, who seemed pretty evil to him!

Edited (dies on the hill of keeping namaes character-appropriate i guess) 2017-06-07 01:52 (UTC)

"You already know my name," he answers. That much hasn't changed. Though to the red spreading across Lambert's face, he can't help but let the faintest edge of a smirk cross his face. "And if you're so opposed to a man in your bed, I can just as easily turn back into a crow."

It's undoubtedly the worst time to tease Lambert, but Childermass is already expecting to be thrown out. It's a shame, really. Getting injured had sucked, though it was nice to take a break from worrying about his sisters or his father or the Rose Queen or that moron Strange. In any case, the smirk is pretty short-lived, since his attention shifts back down and away from Lambert and to the church grim.

"He can't be with me all the time. He is still bound to a location, which is why I'll be sending him away again once he's had a moment to rest."

Some rules still do apply, apparently.

Edited 2017-06-07 02:16 (UTC)

Lambert shoots him a dirty look for the smirk, but he won't deign that with a response any more than he did the grim. This time, he does give in the urge to run a hand through his hair, exhaling.

"I notice you didn't say anything about you going away."

There are, by all rights, a thousand questions he should be demanding answers to right now, but he keeps getting distracted by the sight of the feathers that keep blurring in and out of his vision. The effect is a little dizzying on top of everything else right now.

"Can you -- turn that off? The thing with your feathers."

This time, it's finally Lambert's turn to startle crow man over here. He blinks, then frowns, gaze flitting away from Lambert and to his arms. Yes, he can tell the glamour is in place. He's cast it a thousand times, it's as easy as breathing, but no one would ask him to turn off his tattoos, so--

"You can see them?" He asks, uncertain. On top of being startled, he shifts where he lounges, suddenly looking uncomfortable as well. "Ah... If it's a problem, I can."

And he will, because he assumes it is one. He lets the glamour go in a puff of magic and the sudden smell akin to winter's first snow and pine trees. It's only there for a moment, then gone, along with his disguise.

It's like getting noise cleared out of his vision, something that makes Lambert's shoulders sag a little in relief. At least his eyes aren't fighting to discern what's real on top of everything else.

That's better, though that isn't saying much. He exhales, rubbing at his arms uncomfortably at a chill in the air -- is that his imagination, something just brought on by the sudden smell in his room -- but he nods.

"Yeah, thanks." A beat. "That was ... a spell just now, wasn't it?"

⇨ The Tourist Trap: PROLOGUE

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

(no subject)

(no subject)

(no subject)

(no subject)

(no subject)

(no subject)

(no subject)

(no subject)

(no subject)

(no subject)

(no subject)

(no subject)

(no subject)