lostcarnival | ⇨ GREYSOL

Entry tags:

⇨ GREYSOL

Who: Everyone!
When: Day 155 - Day 169
Where: Greysol
What: The carnival resumes its tour, this time heading to Greysol, a city tied deeply into the fabric of the multiverse. Here, everyone has an animal companion from birth that is the second half of their soul - and thanks to the Ringmaster, so do you. (Remember,

joysweeper is our guest event runner for this location, and location specific questions should go to them.)
Warnings: Individually marked!

THE CITY OF GREYSOL↴

The carnival arrives in a manicured park in the center of a big city that sprawls out along where the river reaches the ocean. It’s spring, early enough that nights are chilly, warm enough in the days that people and their souls savor the weather, and sometimes shelter together from the rain. Greysol was designed from the bottom up to accommodate the human-dæmon bond. Go out and see!

► THE SHAPE OF YOUR SOUL: The dæmon-forming spell kicks in at about four in the morning. Most characters will wake up with their souls in some small form, curled against them. Even if they were awake, they became dazed and unfocused while their souls were being drawn out of their bodies and have little memory of how it happened.

Until that evening every character's dæmon is able to change shapes, and children and some teens will continue to do so. Most will settle on their permanent forms by evening. Characters without dæmons will just look on, and the few who are thousand-pound bears have to handle being really big.

► IT’S GOOD TO SETTLE: Elaine Tavis Aracari, sixteen-year-old daughter of two actors and a moving pictures sensation herself, just ‘settled’ - her dæmon Tavis stopped changing shape - as a stunning blue peacock. Settling is a major coming of age milestone and celebrated as such in different ways all over the world. She and her family are throwing a massive party in the central park and inviting the public to join in! Enjoy easy access to free catering, live music and showings of moving pictures, and displays of mostly trivial magic. There are also form readers from across the country setting up booths, happy to accept a small fee to inspect your dæmon’s settled or most favored forms and tell you what they mean. Is there anything to these analyses? Eh, maybe, but they’re flattering and fun.

► WITCHING HOURS: Characters who are clearly witches for this event will often be assumed to be in town for a lover, and people, witches and not, may want to know who that is. Humans usually regard them with wary respect and interest. Real witches living with their human families or on business quickly suspect that something’s up, but without clear and present danger take a relaxed wait-and-see attitude. Wait for long enough and any possible decision will come around again, they believe.

There isn’t time to learn much witch magic, but witches, real and carnival-made, have an inherent power: the ability to fly using branches of “cloudpine”, an attractive soft-needled tree common in the park. Witches usually ride large branches as if they’re steeds but can use even short sprays, and you’ll probably see the few witches in the city coming to the park to do so. Why not try?

► BEAR PUN: Human-panserbjørn relations have historically been troubled, but have warmed in the past century. It’s the 65th anniversary of the breaking of the Siege of Bertin, a much-mythologized time when Spectres flooded Greysol and a company of panserbjørn arrived and directed efforts to get the survivors out of the city. A statue is being erected and many florid accounts of the story are being told. If you’re in a panserbjørn shape for the duration of the visit you will probably get thanked and celebrated by people trying to hide their nervousness of you. Expect someone to ask if your dæmon would be a human - it’s a common supposition.

► KERNER ISLAND: From the harbor you can see a wooded island. Although there are no rocks to speak of it sports a tall lighthouse, and nearly all boat traffic avoids it carefully. On a clear day someone with binoculars or a particularly sharp-eyed soul can see loads of trash, birds and various other animals that don’t seem local, and… children? Adults and settled teenagers will see tall vague shapes moving about too.

When asked about it the most important thing adults will tell other adults is don’t go there. They’ll hold their dæmons close and tell you that on that island are things that eat souls. They may also admit with mixed pride and shame that it’s been a source of wealth and innovation for the city. There’s a facility there that can open windows into other worlds, and the children who can reach it can cross through and bring things back. Many of the children are recruited by research and development teams on the lookout for items they can use, but there are also kids out to have adventures or who’ve run away. More on this later.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

A - Shape of Your Soul (155, early)

[Joker generally tends to wake up early even now that he's not a vampire who has to scuttle to the big tent before the sun makes him crispy. Stage manager, lot to do, all of that. But when he wakes up earlier than usual to a tiny little magpie nestled inbetween his wings (his sleeping pose is a bit awkward), well. That's new.]

[So is the fact that she can shapeshift. And talk.]

[Clearly this is either someone lost their pet (Feathers the Dartix is curious if nothing else) or, much like that time when they all got to breathe underwater, something is weird about this world. There's only one way to be sure, and that's why Joker plus two birds can be found gliding through the air and glancing around. Sometimes the bird that isn't Feathers is a peahen, or a hawk, or a swan. However, once Joker spots someone and he comes over to land, so does she, and thus becomes a brilliant coated fox.]

[Joker grins as he straightens up.]

Hey! So how about all these bleedin' animals, eh?

[The fox laughs quietly, her voice rough but feminine.]

Polite way of sayin' that sorta thin', huh?

B - Day 156

[Now that it's become apparent that everyone's fun animal companion have stuck to a single form- Joker's own being a magpie that often can be found on his antlers- he has an important thing to do.]

[So if you're a part of the Performance group, except Joker to be whistling for your attention, either from within the big top during practice or while you're out and about. (In which case, look up for two birds and some tit with wings.)]

[If you're not, Joker will come bouncing up.]

Hey! We're lookin' for some folks. Have ya seen...?

[And he'll give a list of names.]

C - Good to Settle

Good timin' for us, huh?

[Whether you're taking part of the free food, checking out a movie, or pondering the form readers, Joker and Aurora the magpie are there as well, and the stage manager has no shame in getting into other people's business.]

[Hey, it's a party, right?]

So what have ya done so far?

D - Kerner Island

[It's been hard not to pick up the strange little island off in the waters, or the odd occurrences around it. Certainly, Aurora is uneasy, and Joker always feels her shifting on his shoulder whenever he glances that way. He's doing right now, in fact, and anyone he can recognize from the carnival will get waved over.]

What do ya make of that place?

E - Songbird

[Anyone going near the trees of the carnival- any trees, whether by the trailers or where the menagerie is kept- might end up picking on the sound of a low conversation.]

-not fine. We kin say that, can't we?

Yeah, yeah- but then who do ya say it to? S'not that easy....

[Both voices go quiet upon the realization that there's someone around, and the branches up high rustle a bit as Joker pokes his head out.]

Hello?

[Having just woken up, Allen had been trudging toward the cookhouse when Joker soars overhead. The small, blue bird perched on Allen's shoulder responds to the whistle before Allen himself does. Its head flicks up toward the sky, and without her even saying a thing, Allen looks up, too.

His brow immediately draws together in consternation. He so isn't awake enough for this.

Still, he raises a hand in a weak wave, prepared to follow or wait for Joker to land. Hey, boss.

The kingfisher on Allen's shoulder, however, takes flight to meet Joker and his small flock. This may turn into a collection.]

Are we gathering? [The small bird speaks with a soft, feminine voice, much more ready to follow orders than her body.]

[Well, he already had a bird thing going on. May as well start a proper flock, huh?]

[Aurora takes a content perch on Joker's antlers, not seeming to mind that she's a bit big for it, and Feathers the Dartix goes for his shoulders. As the kingfisher flits around, Aurora speaks up to her.]

Not now, pet.

[Joker watches the new bird, careful not to move his head around too much with Aurora there.]

So that's what yers ended up lookin' like eh?

She still shifts every now and then, but this form seems to be her favorite.

[Allen is shooting her a glare, blaming her for taking a form so related to Portland. It's like she's trying to piss him off. The bird just rustles her feathers and begins preening, innocently. Allen huffs and turns his attention to Joker's dæmon.]

Somehow, the magpie suits you. Though I wouldn't have been surprised if it had been a deer either.

Joker - ota

B (some tit with wings jfc lmao)

can you say it's a false description

well I mean....no. no i cannot (and a million years late HELLO)

Shape of Your Soul

JFC..... peridot why are you the best

SHE'S EMBARRASSING IS WHAT SHE IS

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