⇨ THE SUMMERLANDS

[ringleaders]

Who: Everyone!
When: Day 138 - Day 152
Where: The Summerlands
What: The Ringmaster brings the carnival to the Summerlands immediately after being freed from Portland so that everyone can take a fucking nap. Her included.
Warnings: Individually marked! Most likely discussion of torture and trauma in here.

DAYS OF SUMMER↴ You made it! And things are back to normal... more or less. Upon waking, you will be greeted with a clear blue sky and gentle breeze – the carnival has found itself situated between a pair of mountain peaks, with great fields of flowers extending in the distance. In the other direction, you’ll see mountain-top cities and tall waterfalls accenting vast swaths of forest. Some of you will already know this place. It’s the Summerlands. You game here once to rest in safety nearly a year ago, and now you’ve come to rest once again. ► WAKING UP: Shortly after the carnival arrives, the Ringmaster will send out a somewhat cryptic radio message - but her immediate location won't be clear. Whatever items you had on your person at the time the Severing was broken will still be on your person, including whatever clothing. All of the animals and pets of the carnival will have returned to the grounds as well, though they are currently free from their designated living spaces. Things in the carnival will appeared to have naturally aged a month, as if the carnival was been sitting here empty and waiting while everyone was in Portland. The lawn needs mowing. ► SUMMER CITY: After the Summer Fae become aware of everyone's presence, they will welcome you into their city. There are stairs that lead up the sides of the mountains, but thankfully there are also magical means of getting up there as well. The Summer Fae will be willing to help workers with the injured as needed, offering herbal remedies and healing magic to those that want it. You'll also be invited to join them for dinner, but they will not be particularly offended if they are turned down, for now. ► SUMMER PEOPLE: The fae here will mostly enjoy the company of any carnival members that offer it - it doesn't seem that much happens here besides day after day of peaceful meditation and relaxation. It is not uncommon to see Summer Fae spent days doing exactly the same thing, whether that be enjoying the weather, listening to music, or dancing - the day and night periods may be similar to earth, but when you don't need rest it can all blur together just the same. Some of the fae work on feats of agriculture or craftsmanship, and while there is no particularly need to work in this place, they take pride in the fact that they do. ► NEW ARRIVALS: Though the Ringmaster will not be offering much guidance for the first week or so, eventually the carnival will begin running for a few small performance sessions, off and on, as a thank you to their fae hosts. The carnival will also be open to receiving new arrivals during that period, and so there will likely be some newbies to train and get orientated as well.

Comments

[kingsroads]

"Some of those choices weren't her fault," Strange explains, with a dismissive wave of his hand, jumping in almost instantly to the Ringmaster's defense. "We went to hell out of necessity, not as a choice."

Though...Yuya's kind of right. The fae certainly have different morality and different beliefs on what's dangerous, something that Portland only further showed Strange. Still, he's got faith in the Ringmaster. She has their best interests in heart. And after all, it's no good having a carnival where all your performers are traumatized.

[hippocarnival]

"To deal with the vampires?" Maybe expecting the carnival to bring smiles to hell is a bit much. Well, he can't blame Strange for defending the Ringmaster. He probably knows her better. And after dealing with the fae in Portland, she's definitely a leg up.

Speaking of those fae--"Uh, how are you doing anyway? I know not everyone held back." He seems in good spirits, but that doesn't say anything for his physical state.

[kingsroads]

He nods at Yuya's question. He's about to go on and give Yuya a very rambling and slightly nonsensical anecdote of their time in hell, before he changes the subject.

Fun fact: Strange is not doing fine in the slightest, as shown by that whole drunk in the afternoon sort of thing. (Though regrettably, he's finding that he's shifting from 'fun drunk' to 'oh god alcohol was a bad idea drunk' the longer they talk.) Denial isn't just a river in Egypt and acknowledging the trauma that happened to you is for suckers.

"Yuya," he states, before saying the kid's name again because it's kind of fun to say and these are the things he's thinking about apparently. "Yuya, I'm fine. Perfectly wonderful. My chest hurts but that's only from Psionic's, erm, psionics. Besides, you are the one we should be worried about." It's said as he points at Yuya in a way that's a tad too dramatic, even for Strange's normal standards.

Unfortunately, said dramatic point means that Yuya can easily see the mirrored scratches marking up Strange's wrist.

[hippocarnival]

Those scars catch the light easily, and Yuya's eying them as Strange gestures. But then her turns the conversation back around, and Yuya's distracted from his worry to defend his own health.

"I'm fine!" He pumps his fist in the air, though the energy is weaker than he means it to be. "They said I'm gonna recover and it's not physical, I don't need to stay in bed all day."

And, well, nothing more needs to be said for his emotional wounds. He's done his crying for today.

[kingsroads]

Considering that Strange regularly pushes himself out of bed and forces himself to get going when he isn't fine, this means that he should be able to realize that Yuya's doing the same thing. However, insight is for suckers, so he's taking Yuya's words at face value, though with a little frown of his own.

Though not physical...that's interesting. And then it hits Strange that really, he has no idea what happened with Yuya in the first place. Oh, Yuya told him that he was the catalyst, but Strange never really knew what being the catalyst entailed.

"What actually happened with that whole ritual nonsense?"

[hippocarnival]

Yuya knows he should be in bed anyway, he just refuses to.

"Well.." Yuya brings a hand to his chin as he gauges how to explain it. "Since I was willing to do the ritual, the angels didn't have to drain all my blood." It's so much more effective when the person being sacrificed it willing, incidentally.

"So instead, my soul was used as a catalyst with the power of the Earth spirit. It was going to be with the pendant, but because the spirit was in Peridot she was able to join the ritual in its place. So Yugo took Pru's sword, did some sort of ritual dance, and then stabbed us."

[kingsroads]

Oh, so the Earth Spirit was in Peridot? That made sense. Something had to make her get large and scary, might as well be that. Though there is one more question that Strange wants to ask.

"Who's Pru? Was she the one I threw a fireball at?" She was an important looking lady with some sort of weird soul weapon and really, that's all Strange knows about Pru and her role with the angels.

[hippocarnival]

Yuya nods, his gaze wandering from Strange's arm back to his face. His shadow, however, seems to lean over slightly like it's still trying to get a look.

"Yeah, she was leading the angels in Portland, I think? And she was taking them to break the Severing... which, uh, was supposed to keep the Summer Court from taking it over for the fae."

He purses his lips, because that's a harsh thing to admit to the guy who was just aligned with them, but... he thinks Strange should know everything about those people. "The angels are there to protect the world from being invaded, though, so now that they can reach heaven again they'll be strong enough to protect it."

[kingsroads]

If Strange takes offense at Yuya calling out the Summer Court for trying to take over the planet, it doesn't show on his face.

"The problem now is that if the angels can reach heaven, then the fae should also be able to reach faerie or Arcadia or whatever the name of that realm is. I'm afraid the angels are going to be in for a bit of a fight."

Which is probably a bit of an understatement.

[hippocarnival]

"I know, but I believe they can do it." He has to have faith in the people he helped. "The Severing had to go anyway, so it's not like there was a lot of choice... for the Earth Spirit or for us. Most of us would rather be who we really are, and not who we were there."

[kingsroads]

"Trust me," Strange grumbles, with a roll of his eyes, "I'm happy the damn thing's gone and happier that I'm myself again."

Someone might still be a little bit bitter with regards to the Portland everything. That man was a terror and Strange is far too happy to put the Portland nonsense behind him and return to being...well, to being himself.

[hippocarnival]

"I think most of us feel that way." Even though Yuya's life in Portland wasn't traumatizing, he'd take all the pain he really did go through for the stuff that he has in his... real life? More real than Portland, anyway.

And he suspects no one more than Strange is glad to be rid of that life. "... She didn't hurt you too badly, did she?"

Because brainwashing is pretty screwed up, you know. So is losing control of yourself.

[kingsroads]

He desperately wants to lie, to tell Yuya that everything's fine and there's nothing to worry about. Yuya's been through too much already. He doesn't need to worry about an idiot who made terrible decisions.

And yet, there's a feeling deep in his gut that twinges horribly at the mere thought of lying, even if it's just something as blase as this. So, Strange pauses for a moment, before shrugging it off, with a shake of his head.

"It's nothing that I won't recover from." The technical truth. And one that will have to suffice because the expression on Strange's face plainly states that he does not want to talk about this.

[hippocarnival]

"... Yeah, I know." He doesn't doubt all of them will find this way through this, because they're not alone.

"But if you ever need to talk about it, I'm not holding any of that against you." Portland Strange may have made terrible decisions and been a general asshole, trapped a changeling to his bidding... aligned with the Summer Court... would have tried to kill him if he knew Yuya was the catalyst...

Look, he saw some good in him before the brainwashing debacle. And you can't blame someone for getting brainwashed.

Yuya looks back at the dancing circle, idly at first before he sits up a bit watching them. "How long have they been dancing?"

[kingsroads]

At Yuya's question, Strange shrugs. Heck if he knows, buddy. "At least an hour? That's when I started, at least."

Though it's probably been longer than that. Which really...Strange is slowly coming to the realization that while the idyllic paradise is nice, it can also be boring as hell for certain people. He doesn't mind wiling the day away with music, dance, and relaxation, but he can think of a few people at the carnival who would find this absolutely horrible.

[hippocarnival]

"That's a really long time to be dancing." At least, he thinks it is? He doesn't know, he plays cards games, not dance. Card games didn't last for hours. "Is that how long you had to dance at all those parties, too?"

[kingsroads]

"Oh, we usually danced longer than that," said as if dancing for over an hour is a perfectly normal occurrence. "Of course, you have to take a moment to sample the food, have a drink, go around and have a brief conversation with anyone of importance, and occasionally step out for a breath of fresh air, but Arabella and I tended to focus on the dancing."

There's a ritual to Georgian English parties. You don't just go for the fun, you go to be seen, to talk to the right people, and then for the fun.

[hippocarnival]

The way Strange phrases it sounds rigged, especially since the extent of Yuya's experience with parties is children's birthdays and a decent guess what adults do to party in Maiami. Given the choice, the dancing does sound the most appealing of the options. And then maybe the food second, if it's good.

He wrinkles his nose a bit. "Do those drinks smell as bad as these?" Because he'd been getting whiffs of Strange's breath as they talk and it isn't appealing. He doesn't want to say 'your breath smells', but alcohol smells.

[kingsroads]

Fun fact: in his useless gentleman bachelor phase, Strange was pretty much an alcoholic (though he'll swear to the moon and back that he wasn't that bad--only a bottle a day!) So he has no idea what Yuya means when he complains about the drink's smell and thereby his breath smelling as well. He's certainly drunk worse things--all of the drinks that he's been served here smell positively pleasant!

"I've no idea what you're talking about," he admits, with a frown. "Do you have a specific example in mind or...?"

[hippocarnival]

"Your breath smells terrible, Mr. Strange." Regardless how they smell on their own, everything turns sour once it comes in contact with someone's mouth, especially when Yuya has no tolerance to it. Probably, especially, the mouth of a man used to 1800's English hygiene. "What'd you drink?"

[kingsroads]

There's a pause while Strange discreetly checks his breath. Is it that bad? He thought it wasn't terrible at all. And Yuya's about to be downright disappointed by Strange's answer. "I've no clue," he explains. "It was light blue, served in a wine glass, and sparkled with it hit the light a certain way."

[hippocarnival]

"Oh." Not that Yuya'd be able to tell the difference one way or the other. Even if these fae are friendly, he definitely remembers the lesson not to eat their food willy-nilly. "You should probably ask--" He waves off the invitation to dance for a third time. "Uh, what it was so you know what you drank?"

[kingsroads]

"I wouldn't worry too much about that," he responds, with a wide grin, as he looks back towards the fae. And then, in a semi-conspiratory tone, he leans in to gossip.

"Apparently the Ringmaster and the Summer Maiden are very close friends. It wouldn't be good to enthrall someone else's employees in the first place, it especially wouldn't be good to enthrall your friend's. Besides, the carnival's been here before."

[hippocarnival]

Yuya leans over as well, as this is apparently gossip. "Who's the Summer Maiden? I mean, what's she like? Have you ever met her?" She's gotta be nicer than the Rose Queen if the Ringmaster likes her company.

[kingsroads]

This is certainly gossip in Strange's mind, though it's not precisely good gossip or secret gossip compared to what it could be.

"She's apparently the person who helps run this place, she's a big deal among the fae, and no I haven't met her." Strange looks a bit too proud of himself for learning this information that's common knowledge among the fae. "I'd like to meet her, though, if only to see what she's like."