⇨ 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

[atouts]

"Well, I had considered it just more of a mental aid," Childermass muses aloud, though he does consider it. Coming up with a motion to go with the spell but what? He looks down at his own shadow while turning it over in his head. He doesn't even know what the rest of them are meant to look like, though he won't let that stop him.

"Perhaps a grasping motion? Fingers hooked under your palm? A bit like a bird grabbing something."

He looks up again on saying that, demonstrating. Palm face down, fingers and thumb hooking under.

[whattaprick]

“Well, you know me. I can use all the mental aid I can get,” Lambert quips. He imitates the shape of Childermass’s fingers easily enough, then relaxes his hand and tries it again, over and over. It’s a little awkward at first, but it comes more smoothly with repetition, and he nods, looking up.

“Can you take me through the shadows a couple more times?”

[atouts]

"Of course," Childermass says, holding his hand out for Lambert's again. Once he has it, he'll move, shifting to using Lambert's shadow and not his own. They'll go to the shadow of one tree, then another, then back to the first. He'll take his time with it, adding longer time spent between shadows to give Lambert a chance to feel the magic out.

[whattaprick]

Feel the magic out Lambert does, though despite Childermass’s patience, it avails the witcher naught, no closer to being able to grasp at shadows and bend them to his will than when they began. Yet while it doesn’t yield them much in terms of Lambert’s progress in magic, Lambert doesn’t consider it a wasted afternoon — because it is, after all, the longest they’ve been able to spend together since the Hunt arrived in Shabon. And whenever frustration wears his patience thin, makes him more liable to snap, Childermass is a steady presence calling him back to himself.

They finally call an end to the day when it rolls around close enough to whatever the Summerlands has that passes for dinner. With the fae more inclined to eat out of pleasure than necessity, dinner ends up being whatever Baker manages to drag back from the forest, cooked assistance of one or two Manor folk mildly star struck from Alyss’s stories of Childermass. It’s a nice enough meal — companionable even, with Lambert managing to secure sufficient alcohol to loosen his tongue and tell people rowdy stories of other (heavily edited) feats of valor Childermass has performed — but at the end, when it’s time for bed, Lambert lingers by the portal back to the mountain cities, looking uncharacteristically bashful.

“So, ah ... can we try again tomorrow?” Under other circumstances, he’d be certain of what he could ask for, but ... even with the ring still on Childermass’s fingers, he isn’t. It had been easy enough to hold his hands all afternoon with the excuse of practicing magic to go with it, but right now it feels like an insurmountable distance.

[atouts]

And Childermass spends the evening looking as though he absolutely disapproves of those "feats of valor" Lambert gets on a roll about and yet he doesn't tell him off for it. He lets him have his fun, especially since with him telling tales, more attention is being paid to him than it is the magician, despite being the topic of those tales in the first place. Just letting the meal go how it will, it's relaxing, something he's had with finding on his own even after a few days in the Summerlands.

It's nice, to be left lounging against his big, stupid dog, eating a meal while people talk and laugh around them. It's a pity it can't last and he's walking Lambert back to the portal all too soon. He looks at the portal when Lambert asks that, absently fidgeting with that same ring...

"Yes, we will," he agrees after a moment, sounding a bit distant. Though he won't look back at the witcher, there's another pause -- a thoughtful one -- before he adds, "You could stay down here. I know it isn't as lavish but they have plenty of room."

[whattaprick]

Despite the obvious unspoken invitation, Lambert hesitates. He knows what he'd like to do, of course -- but the way Childermass can't look at him, the way his voice is a bit distant...

"You know I don't care about fancy," Lambert shrugs, rubbing a hand at the back of his neck. Drink softens his tone, slurs his words slightly as he tries to think his response through. "Short notice to ask them to get me a place, though, isn’t it? Don’t wanna bother anyone.”

[atouts]

Childermass's fidgeting with the ring slows to a stop and he does turn his head this time, towards Lambert, just enough to watch him from the corner of an eye. It's still difficult to see him like this, changed so by Polaris, tainted by Winter's magics along with so many others from the carnival. Just like him. It isn't a trait he ever had any particular desire to see shared.

But when it was just them, up on the cliff, trying to help him figure out the spell—

It felt normal again, with something else to focus on. He supposes it isn't, though. Not really. So when Lambert brings that point up, his expression does fall some, assuming someone can even go from tired to even more tired.

"It is," he agrees with a quiet sigh and goes back to gazing at the portal. "It would be presumptuous to ask for another bed to be made up this late, wouldn't it? Well. Maybe next time."

[whattaprick]

“... Yeah. I’d like that,” Lambert says, with real warmth in his voice this time, quiet as it is. Though there’s something in his expression that’s fleetingly disappointed, it passes quickly. After all, Childermass can’t even look at him, much less share a bed. After a moment of hesitation, he reaches out, drunkenness making him bold enough to brush his fingertips fleetingly through the feathers at the sides of the magician’s head.

“Hey ... if you’ve been having trouble sleeping—” he can’t imagine anyone in the Carnival who hasn’t. “I can ask Papyrus to make something up for you. No bad dreams. Just let me know if you want it.” His touch and gaze lingers a moment longer before he drops his hand and starts to turn to the portal.

[atouts]

Honestly, at that point, the biggest question on his mind is 'Papyrus is an alchemist?' Were both the skeletons that? Was that just a normal job for skeletons to have? He doesn't ask, of course, because he senses they only have a short time before Lambert leaves for the night, and just reaches out to catch his hand before it's too far out of reach instead.

"If you could," he says, turning back to look at Lambert again, really look at him. He's spent all day looking at him and his new horns and new tail, gaudily swathed though they are. This shouldn't be so hard. "I'd appreciate it."

He won't let go after saying as much, though. If anything, he tightens his grip on the witcher's hand. There's something more important to address here. Not magic lessons, not trouble sleeping.

"I still love you," he says. It's still a tired, stoic declaration, but saying anything joyfully isn't in the cards right now. "You have to know that. That hasn't changed."

[whattaprick]

It’s a declaration that seems to surprise Lambert, less for the actual sentiment than the fact that Childermass has said it at all. Like the magician, a joyful reaction to what would usually make him flustered isn’t something he has in him right now, but he can at least muster up a smile in return.

“I know that,” he tells him. Even if everything else has changed, well ... if they hadn’t had that little talk in Shabon, he’d be handling this a lot more poorly. As it is, even if Childermass can hardly stand to look at him, at least Lambert can feel assured it’s not something he’s done ... just something he can’t do anything about.

Impulsively, he tugs the magician’s hand up and turns it so he can press his lips over his knuckles, then the ring slipped over his thumb.

“I still want to spend the rest of my life with you. That hasn’t changed, either.” Even if that ‘rest of his life’ seems to grow shorter by the minute ... but he hasn’t given up on dreaming of finding a place they can call home.

[atouts]

Childermass lets him pull his hand up, kiss it, without complaint. For all he's having trouble with what's changed about Lambert, it would be a lie to claim he doesn't miss the close, casual contact that had normally been there between them, before.

And as much as a relief as knowing that he does know, that this doesn't change some things, there's something else that comes to mind when Lambert mentions the rest of their lives. Good news or bad news, he isn't sure what the witcher will make of it, but now's as good a time as any other—

"Which will be longer than you may have anticipated," he adds, quietly.

[whattaprick]

For all that he’s tipsy as hell right now, Lambert’s not that slow on the uptake. Besides, they’ve had this conversation before... even if it was just with half of Childermass, meaning Lambert might remember it more clearly than he does.

“Because you’re a faeblood, right?” He doesn’t ask where Childermass has gotten the information or if he’s sure; he must at least think so, for him to be telling Lambert so. The witcher gives him a smirk that doesn’t entirely reach his eyes. “Hah. Told you so. I knew I should have bet on that after all...” He presses his lips to Childermass’s hand again, because he can and because at least the magician seems willing to put up with it, before he lowers it reluctantly.

“Doesn’t change anything for me. Unless this is your way of warning me you’re already planning to throw me over for some hot young piece once I go grey... but to be honest? If we can make sure we both live that long, I’d say you’ve earned it.” A last gentle squeeze of his fingers, and he does start to pull away again. The longer he stays, the less he’s going to want to leave.

[atouts]

"Unless you have your own shortcut to immortality, all I've earned is to be the one who watches you grow old and die instead," Childermass can't help but focus on the most possible dreary outcome of this development. He lets his hand drop away, back to his side, once Lambert lets it go. He won't reach out and stop him again.

He'll just try to muster up a smile regardless, even if there isn't much heart put into it.

"But I suppose that's also something to talk about another time... Good night, Lambert."

[whattaprick]

Whether either of them will live that long remains to be seen. Lambert just chuckles and shakes his head, the bells sewn on his clothes jangling as he gives him a jaunty wave.

"Good night, John."

The next afternoon goes much the same as the first, without much to show for it except Lambert's bad jokes, more handholding, and Pig and Baker making a wreck of another section of forest entirely. In between bouts of practice, Lambert offers inane withering commentary on the attention he’s gotten from the fae, how the other Carnival members are adapting and what terrible fashion choices they’ve made with fae encouragement. Apparently, Lambert's mornings are taken up by sparring with Syrlya to help the Sylvari and witcher alike regain their fighting ability, it seems, and recently injured or not, the man's still managed to give Lambert a few good bruises or two.

After a point, it's probably embarrassingly clear Lambert's figured the most he's getting out of this exercise is the chance to hold Childermass's hands as long as possible. Which is what he's doing now while looking down at their feet, absently flexing his free hand into the sign Childermass came up with, the motion already second nature.

"So," he says, "What did they say about me sleeping down here? The dust Papyrus makes doesn't work that well if it's left out too long, so I'll have to go up and get it to you just before you turn in."

[atouts]

All of which is beginning to feel foolish to Childermass. He has no other idea how to teach a spell like this to someone else, not when he taught himself through pretty much the same method. Perhaps he should have started by teaching Lambert the English spell for turning into a stationary shadow, at least to another's eye, but would it have really helped?

He doesn't know but he is about to suggest it when Lambert speaks first, bringing the magician's head and attention both back up from the shadow under both their feet. He furrows his brow for a second or two before recalling, right, he had asked about that.

"That it's fine, of course," he says, like it was never a worry. The changelings from the manor are friendly to them all, thank god for that. "They've spare cots to set up. They can put one in the same room I'm staying in."

[whattaprick]

"Oh," Lambert says. He doesn't have much to add to that, not at first, like he's trying to decide how to respond, or tamp down his immediate reaction. His lips can't help curling, though, not realizing Childermass has looked up at him, still focused on the ground beneath them instead.

"Hm, so just like camping again, huh?" Only it's not like camping at all, of course. Yet for all Lambert had spent most of that time dozing away his injuries and exhaustion, not to mention the explosive shouting matches with Strange and everyone else, he remembers it pretty fondly. It was nice, having Childermass stay beside him, afternoons to spend sitting together in warm, dappled sunlight instead of just stealing moments in the shadows...

It happens with little warning. One moment, Lambert's standing in front of Childermass with a slightly foolish grin on his face. The next, there's a flash of gold light and the witcher's suddenly ten paces back, in a patch of light shining through the tree canopy. It's startling enough that Lambert takes a step back, only to hook a heel on a root and crash back with a yelp of alarm.

[atouts]

"A little like that, ye—" Only then Lambert is gone and Childermass is left staring wide-eyed at where he reappears, as surprised as the witcher is. There aren't any shadows where he reappeared, at least none he could have used on a whim. It's Lambert tumbling over and sounding off in alarm that gets him to move instead of stare, though, rather than the sudden burst of magic.

"Lambert!" It's only ten paces, space the magician closes easily, and then he's reaching down to offer him a hand up. It's an unconscious gesture, not really one he puts too much consideration into... like if he can even help someone with metal bones up again.

"Are you alright?"

[whattaprick]

"I'm fine," Lambert pants, pushing himself up on one arm and clasping the offered hand with the other. He's still breathless from having the air knocked out of him, still slightly wide-eyed. Childermass ... Childermass definitely can't really successfully lift him up, but he'll be able to feel the weight Lambert's been trying to avoid putting on him before now, the witcher too distracted by what's just happened to be as careful as he's been trying to be.

"What was that?" It's only half a rhetorical question.

[atouts]

The weight is off-putting, a sudden and real reminder of Lambert's alterations. He immediately stops trying, letting go of Lambert's hand and stepping back. He wasn't doing much to help, anyhow, so it's hardly a loss. Still, he purses his lips and tries to smooth over any upset he might show on his face.

"I'm not sure," he admits. "There's no shadow over here for you to jump to, yet you most certainly did jump."

[whattaprick]

Lambert's hand lingers in the air for half a heartbeat before he snatches it back to himself. If he wasn't on the ground, there's a mild impression he might have backed away too, but as it is, he can only look away.

"Well, it was something," he mutters. The scuffle, thankfully, hasn't been enough to take the padding off his horns, though one of the ribbons has loosened enough to dangle by the side of his face. "What did it look like?"

[atouts]

He similarly looks away, unsure what else to do apart from think back on just before Lambert teleported. There was no shadow over here, nothing big enough, deep enough, but there is a lot of— ah.

"Lambert..." Childermass looks towards him again, this time with a curious look on his face. "What were you thinking just before it happened? What were you feeling?"

[whattaprick]

The witcher looks back at Childermass at that, bewildered, light spilling over his head and shoulders. What was he thinking about? It takes him a moment to think back to before the sudden scramble, but he finally answers, slowly:

“I was thinking about you. Uh, us. After the Athenaeum, when we were all out living in the woods.” His ears twitch back, and he looks around. “This... reminded me of being there.”

[atouts]

"Which parts of being there, though?" Childermass pushes the question. He has an answer for Lambert but he'd like it to be a thorough one. "You must remember the details."

[whattaprick]

“The good parts, obviously,” Lambert retorts, stung that he even has to say it. Whatever passing good mood he’d been in before, it’s slightly fraying now. “Getting to be with you without worrying about hiding in the dark.”

[atouts]

Lambert's good mood may be fraying but Childermass's is rising. He gives a quiet laugh and steps forward again, offering his hand a second time, this time with more certainty. He still can't get Lambert up on his own, sure, but the offer to help is there again, weight and reminder be damned.

"There, that's it," he announces, a crooked smile crossing his face, "You were thinking about how happy you were, not hiding in shadows. Don't you see it, Lambert? What's over here instead of darkness?"