⇨ THE SUMMERLANDS

[ringleaders]

Who: Everyone!
When: Day 119 - Day 126
Where: The Summerlands
What: Ignatius and Gild portal everyone to the Summerlands, with hopes of appealing to the Summer Maiden for help. Meanwhile, the carnival gets the chance to relax in luxury as only tentatively welcome guests. Here is the location write up from the last time the carnival visited. Since then, of course, some things have changed.
Warnings: Nothing in particular.

THE SUN RISES↴ After taking the time to rest, Ignatius and Gild will be able to pool together their energy to portal the carnival (and the airship) to the Summerlands. Those still in Polaris will be left to their own devices for the moment as Gild intends to ask for the Summerlands aid in relocating them, hopefully as soon as possible. With the effort the carnival put into sorting things out in there, however, they should be fine on their own for a little while, at least. They will arrive in the flowery fields at the base of the mountains, and soon the Summer Fae will notice their presence. Since the last time they visited, however, the atmosphere has changed. ► YOUR ARRIVAL: As the Summer Fae discover the group's arrival, it will quickly become apparent that there is a tension present that wasn't there any of the other times the carnival has visited. The Summer Maiden comes to greet the group personally, with an entourage of armed Summer Fae. They are not at all aggressive unless provoked, but there is clearly a wariness that is new. They seem uncertain about Ignatius being here, and while Gild will be able to do a lot of the talking and smooth things over, the Summer Maiden will deflect having a serious conversation about affairs until the carnival has taken time to 'rest.' It's more likely that the Maiden needs a moment to think over this new information before dealing with it. ► SUMMER CITY: After the Summer Fae become aware of everyone's presence, and the initial uncertainties are accommodated, they will invite 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 it feels like more of a formality, and no one is obligated to take them up on it. ► SUMMER PEOPLE: The fae here will do their best to entertain these new visitors - but 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. ► FAMILIAR FACES: One very different thing about the Summerlands this go around is that there appears to be a small settlement built at the base of the mountains, filled entirely with the former residents of the Manor. Alyss and Reyna will explain that they set up a place to live down there with the Summer Fae's help, and that the fae seems to be trying to remain hands off except when they are needed. The Manor folk overall seem to be doing well, though there is some tension regarding their place in the Summerlands - they are clearly seen as refugees, and while the Summer Fae do their best to help them, the arrival of the carnival and the request for even more help with refugee aid seems to be making things awkward. ► OF THINGS TO COME: The Summer Maiden will remain distant for the first few days, but according to Gild and based on personal observation, it will seem that the news that the Ringmaster has been taken and the idea that even more desperate mortals are requesting to come here are putting her at significant ill ease. She's not rude or dismissive, but she seems reluctant to address the situation head on, though she has said that she will hold a meeting with the carnival later in the week to discuss everything in more detail. None of them seem particularly angry or resentful, but they seem to regard the carnival as an ill portent of things to come.

Comments

[lmpatientdefense]

"Obviously, we're not looking at this with however-fuckin-many years of knowing her," Beau butts in. "We haven't seen what you've seen, we're just looking at a couple of pieces of what we've heard."

"So far, I'm hearing she rallied people under your ideals, got some allies and power together, and killed the queen to take her place. And I bet she said, the whole time, she wanted to do it to make things more like how you want them to be, right? But then some shit happened, and by the time it all blew over, she was queen... and she didn't put in any of the improvements she told you she wanted, and she'd killed or chased off all the people who followed her into it. You ask me, that sounds like somebody who used you to get power."

She lets that sit a second, and pointedly shrugs, minimalizing the impact of what she's saying. It's a big implication to bring to somebody offering them refuge, that everything this Summer Maiden had known about the once-Winter Maiden might have been a lie... But somebody has to say it.

"Maybe we're wrong. Maybe we'd love to be wrong, because if you're wrong, you could try just... talking to her, your old friend and ally and whatever, and ask her what's going on. Maybe there's some other faction pulling the strings, maybe she wanted this all along... Or maybe it's because of how she took power. I don't know. But you should be asking these questions, and trying to get at the base of them, because you're a ruler. You owe it to your people to know everything you can about the people who might bring danger here."

And maybe that includes knowing too much about the carnival folks, but honestly, everything they bring with them is small potatoes compared to somebody whose weaker ally could take out the Ringmaster that quickly.

[betheman]

For Gon, this sort of feels a lot like where Yuuya's friends in Academia fell. Sure, Sora turned out fine. But Dennis? Not as far as he recalls.

"Regardless of what we do, or do not know- the fact remains that her actions at this time do not speak of someone who we can expect peace from. It is not necessarily a matter of how she acted the last you met with her now. It is a matter of addressing the reality of how she has acted in recent times."

He continues, tone as calm as he can manage. "The ultimate decision is certainly yours, as such- but if simply pursuing the Ringmaster is out of the question, why is it then, that the alternative is to simply remain here without ever touching the matter again? The Huntsman is allied with the Winter Queen- if you feel she can be reasoned with, why then can you not reason with her over this?"

A moment of pause- and then, "I, the man Gongenzaka, must apologize for what I say...but if you have doubt for what can be done regarding the Winter Queen- for what you remember of her, compared to what we know now...If you have doubt regarding the Winter Queen herself, should that not be a sign that something must be done, beyond waiting to see what occurs next?"

[npcarnival]

"I have not said that I believe she can be reasoned with. Not now," she says, looking away. She understands what all of them are saying, and she even agrees, but...

"But no other Maiden has ascended to power this way, not that I have learned of. Power is meant to be turned over at the right time, and often in unison with the other Court. I had thought, all these years, that she was merely being cruel as necessitated by her politics... but the things I have learned now have no purpose. No end in sight."

She looks at Ignatius, and then away again. She falls quiet for a few moments, staring at the table ahead of her.

"...I would need the cooperation of the Summerlands to move forward," she says. "I led them here, and I continue to shelter them, but I am not their commander. I will not order them to fight."

[whattaprick]

Lambert quashes the overwhelming urge to dig his own claws into his eyeballs, tempting as it is. It’d be less frustrating than trying to find words around all this.

“I get that we’re not popular. We keep bringing refugees to your doorstep, getting them to fight is the last thing they probably want to do. But this isn’t ... living. It’s playing house while the rest of the city is ... is freezing itself to death.” He’d been about to reach for a fire metaphor, but not exactly appropriate here. “Believe me, there’s nothing I’d love more than an army of immortals to watch my back ... but what’s pretty obvious is that there are things here even the Courts might not understand going on here. If we’re deciding what to do next, I say we go after the Ringmaster.”

He holds out his hand, palm up. “Maybe there’s something going on with the Winter Queen that needs to be fixed — a curse to break, a ghost to exorcise, an ass to kick — but I don’t know how long that’s going to take to figure out. I know you’re not used to thinking of time as a luxury, but it is. Every minute we spend twiddling our thumbs is just more time for the Huntsman to do whatever the fuck he’s planning to the Ringmaster, closer to helping Winter do whatever it wants — and then everyone loses.” He pauses. “I ran with the Hunt, before he turned us over to the Mother of Invention. Just a few hours, but long enough to know it’s a shit deal. If he’s trying to make her one of his...”

He pauses, grimacing, then goes for a more direct question again: “Are you telling us we need to go out there ourselves if we want to convince people to go along with this?”

[lmpatientdefense]

Beau chews her lip as the Summer Maiden finally concedes that she might want to, but doesn't feel she has the authority to make it happen. That's a problem.

"If this keeps up, war's coming to you all either way. It might be comforting to think if you just don't make trouble nobody'll do anything, nobody wants to believe they're in danger, but that's not guaranteed. We can tell people that, they'll be less powerless if they start preparing now, and try taking it on your terms, instead of waiting for it. But, uh."

She faces Lambert, tilts her head inquisitively. "You think the Ringmaster can get turned like that, quick enough to be a problem...?" Beau jerks her thumb back towards Ignatius. "How long did it take her to bring that guy around?"

[atouts]

"It's a different situation," Childermass shakes himself out of glowering at the court in general for a moment, glancing over in Beau's direction. "The Ringmaster is alive but in a very dangerous spot right now, with someone who is an enemy and has a way of influencing minds. With Ignatius, she never truly considered him an enemy. Aside from keeping him from burning us all to death, his decisions were all his own."

For better or worse and, uh, save for the weird Creation thing. That's a trickier discussion and not one he's going to bring up.

[npcarnival]

"It's also possible that it may already be done," the Summer Maiden says, grimly. "The Huntsman had little trouble enslaving so many other Wyld Fae to his cause... some of you have even felt his pull first hand. If that's the case, then the Ringmaster herself may be part of the opposition."

She shakes her head, slowly.

"There is no way that the Ringmaster would choose to serve him on her own, but it's possible that she could be tricked, or corrupted when she was in the process of being reborn. I don't know much of the Huntsman's power, but it was enough to make him the Wyldland's ruler until the Ringmaster's arrival."

[starseedling]

Steven has been sitting quietly for most of the discussion, trying to make sense of it all. Peridot, sitting beside him, has been comparatively disruptive, and he just listens along, waiting for the right time to speak. Apparently, he's decided that time is right now.

"I think we should ask the Summer Court for help," he says, as assertively as he can manage in front of everyone else and a council of Summer Fae. "If... If we just make their problems go away for them, then they'll just be able to pretend none of this ever happened! But if we can convince the Queen that the Maiden and the Summerlands are needed, and that the Summer Court is under immediate threat..."

He averts his eyes. He's obviously a little nervous about the concept, but he means it wholeheartedly.

"It took this long to even think about making it happen. What if something this bad is the only chance we have to make the Queen realize?"

[anti_nonsense]

Rita, who's been sitting with her arms crossed and a slight frown on her face for most of this time, suddenly looks to Steven with her eyes wide. "Wait, Steven... you're serious?"

This isn't the first time the idea of involving the Summer Court's been brought up, but she sure didn't expect to hear it from this kid of all people.

She shifts in her seat, cupping her chin in her hand. "I'm not saying it's a bad idea, exactly... The Summer Court might want to know about the Huntsman's change in loyalties, and how a Winter fae so brazenly captured and tortured one of their own. The enemy of our enemy could be... maybe not a friend, but something to help even the odds here." Because right now, everything is firmly stacked against them. And maybe a common enemy is just the thing to get the Summer Court and the Summerlands talking...

"The last thing we'd want is to deal with the Rose Queen again, though..." Rita goes on to add, then looks to Ignatius. "Do you know of a way we can contact the Queen directly? Or at least in a way that won't be easily intercepted?"

[kingsroads]

Now it's Strange's turn to pipe up, as he looks over at Rita. "I could always attempt to magically summon her."

And because he knows that he's about to be 'well actually-ed' into oblivion, Strange continues talking, explaining himself before other people can point out the various problems in his theory.

"Which presents problems of it's own: summoning is simply offering an invitation to talk. Whether she chooses to show up or not is her choice—and there's no way of telling if her not showing up is a refusal of the invitation or the magic simply not working. Likewise, I doubt the Summer Queen could just leave her post to show up at a moment's notice. We might have to wait around a while, to see if she gets a moment. But if nobody else has any methods of direct contact, it might work."

[npcarnival]

"There are ways for fae to contact each other," Ignatius says, "which are not entirely dissimilar from a summoning invitation. Strange is right that the Summer Queen wouldn't be able to simply leave Arcadia, even if she wanted to."

He looks at the Summer Maiden.

"But the Maiden of all people could absolutely send a message directly to the Queen. They share the same lifeblood. It'd simply be a matter of offering a meeting and seeing if the Queen will take her up on it." He folds his arms. "I can guarantee you that the Summer Queen will refuse to meet anywhere besides her own Court. She isn't a fool."

[starseedling]

Steven looks at Rita, smiling a little. It's complicated, but he doesn't want to let his fears hold him back.

"The Rose Queen is powerful, but she isn't the one in charge. If the Summer Queen says she wants to meet with us... then the Rose Queen will have to listen... right?" He looks to the Summer Maiden for confirmation. "If the Summer Queen was willing to count us as allies... then maybe the Rose Queen would have to leave us alone."

It's the only outcome he can think of that results in him being at all free from the Rose Queen. Besides killing her, of course, which would only lead to a whole new set of problems.

[hippocarnival]

Yuya's equally worried about Rose Queen approaching Steven, but he sees the reason in his thought process. If there was anyone she would listen to if they told her to leave Steven alone, it would have to be the Summer Queen. But they would need the Queen on their side, first.

"I'm willing to meet with the Summer Queen in her court," he offers, turning his gaze to Steven and smiling with confirmation. "If the Rose Queen does show up, she can't disrupt the meeting just for her own wants, right? And we'll all be there."

If Steven will be brave enough for this, despite the chance, they all should be.

[atouts]

Meeting with the Summer Queen is well and all but all these mentions of the Rose Queen this, the Rose Queen that, Childermass speaks up again, very clearly irritated this time around. Why are they even considering the possibility of going anywhere near the Summer Court?

"If there is a meeting with the Summer Queen, it would be wiser to leave those of us who would cause useless bickering out of it. Steven, Mr. Strange, and myself, we should be nowhere near that if there's a chance the Rose Queen and her nasty little sprite are involved. Syrlya now, too, I imagine, considering the issue stemming from the Blue Rose."

[kingsroads]

"Mister Strange can speak for himself," Strange briefly sasses, giving Childermass a slight frown. Though he too has a few objections to this 'let's go straight to the Summer Court' plan.

"It's far too optimistic to think that the Summer Queen, the head of the Summer Court, would listen to a group of changelings like ourselves, especially ones who barely know anything about the ins and outs of fae politics. The True Fae should be the ones to actually have the meeting. If any of us come along, we should just be quiet and silent examples of Winter's horrible mutilation, how those poor changelings were tortured, and so on and so forth."

That's not getting into the fact that Strange honestly doubts anyone in the carnival would be good at keeping their composure in front of literal royalty.

[whattaprick]

"It's a big 'if' to ride on," Lambert pipes up, ever-cynical.

"Ignatius knows the most about how the Summer Queen thinks these days. It sounds like a lot of shit has happened since you left the Summer Court. A lot of loss. That changes people."

He glances at the Summer Maiden, raises a brow. "We don't need to convince the Queen she needs the Summer Maiden and the Summerlands. She knows she does. What we need to do is convince her to work with us on our own terms, not just hers. She might still think all her problems would be fixed if her daughter would just give up her little tantrum and come home. Royal types tend to hear what's convenient to them. I don't known if she's interested in hearing anything except 'sorry, I was wrong' from the Summer Maiden herself. You said she's no fool ... so we'd better have something solid enough to offer a deal with, or tempting enough to be foolish for."

He crosses his arms. "We found evidence of the Mother of Invention's iron experiments on Polaris. We found actual iron on Polaris, but obviously, we couldn't bring it here, and it's not like it's conveniently labeled 'sanctioned by the Winter Court.' But it sounds like Summer already suspected the Winter Queen wouldn't be above that anyway." That's for Ignatius to confirm, again.

[atouts]

"If there is one thing in life that the entirety of the carnival is incapable of doing, Mr. Strange, it is being silent," Childermass sasses him right the fuck back. Don't stay with him, man, he could go all day and, yeh, he is looking directly at Strange when he says that.

[chronosynthesis]

Syrlya's been mostly quiet with those like Lambert making the points he would have brought up anyway, and it's not turning into a diplomatic disaster. He starts to nod in agreement with Childermass. "It would be best if there is a meeting, to send a proper delega--"

And then he does a double take. Wait, was that his name? "I--don't believe the Rose Queen will have any ability to manipulate me like Steven, if that is your concern."

He folds his arms. "As I was saying, if we do consider appealing to the Summer Court, it should be compromised of a few who will help smooth negotiations alongside the Summer Maiden and Ignatius. Our other option is to pursue the Ringmaster directly first, which may force the Summer Court's hand regardless."

And they may be less sympathetic after they incite even more tension on their own.

[kingsroads]

Strange gives Syrlya a look like he's a goddamn moron.

"Syrlya, you're a plant person who has bits of the Rose growing from your arm. If the Rose Queen was able to manipulate Steven to control the Rose from afar, then course she'd be able to manipulate you. You're staying in the carnival."

That's all he's saying about this, as he blatantly looks away from Syrlya and turns his attention back to Childermass, Lambert, and anyone else who's talking.

[whattaprick]

"To be honest, I don't think she'd be interested in manipulating Syrlya as much as she's interested in ripping out the bits that are her Rose and turning the rest of you into Rose fertilizer," Lambert chimes in. "She's a little clingy.

"And those aren't necessarily our only options." Just ... probably the most feasible ones. The witcher offers an elaborate shrug. "We could try looking for the third Miracle. It's still out there. And if it can think, maybe it can be reasoned with."

Instead of just unilaterally fucking people over.

[chronosynthesis]

Syrlya doesn't even look at Strange when he speaks up.

"Perhaps, but we have no leads on where the Red Beast even is. I spoke to a fae that was around at the time the Summer Court still held the Blue Rose, and it was little more than myth even then."

[starseedling]

Steven says his pieces, and people immediately start talking about how he can't afford the risk, how he can't be trusted with going on such a mission when the Rose Queen is a factor. The distress on his face is obvious. It's exactly what he was hoping to subvert.

"I want to go, too!" he says, more loudly, now that people are talking. He obviously wants to be heard. "I know it's dangerous, but... if I could face her there, then..." He trails off, feeling a little silly. It's an emotional need more than anything.

"I just want to be able to speak for myself," he says.

[whattaprick]

"And what would you say if you could?" Lambert asks.

That's really less directed at just Steven specifically, though. He's looking between Ignatius and the Summer Queen, frowning.

"Assuming we could stop her from just using your bond to shut you up from the start."

[anti_nonsense]

Rita sighs, leaning back in her seat as she regards Steven’s objection. “As much as I’d us all to get a few words in, we have to consider what happened last time we saw an Elysium. If the Count could abruptly drop all protections at the Rose Queen’s request, who’s to say the Summer Queen won’t do the same?”

[npcarnival]

"There are ways to get around that," Ignatius says, looking at Rita. "The Count's Elysium was fast and unorderly. Normally, a formal contract would be made between parties to establish the time and circumstances of the meeting's ending. It's also possible for more than one fae to hold Elysium... so it's possible the Summer Maiden and Queen could both lead it, simultaneously."

He shrugs a shoulder. "The Count's was a bad example, really. All he did was throw it together and wait for us to wander in. We participated because we didn't fear him as a singular enemy. If he dropped his protections, we would simply leave."