brittlest: (Default)
Michael Ralston ([personal profile] brittlest) wrote2021-12-12 06:59 pm
rathercommon: (not comfortable)

prison break au? prison break au.

[personal profile] rathercommon 2022-02-23 09:26 pm (UTC)(link)
Aterlacus does not so often see new arrivals. It particularly does not see arrivals quite like this - a girl, and one of rather extraordinarily tender years, straight-backed and stony-faced. (In the years to come, no doubt there will be more like her, as even children catch a revolutionary fervor and begin to organize to resist the inhumane conditions of their factories and workhouses - but for now, at least, the union men and suffragettes coming in tend to have at least reached their majority.)

The cell in which she is deposited is across from Ralston's. Irregular again, the mixing of sexes, but what is one to do in such an irregular situation? She does not resist or fight when they lock her in, but the moment the guards are gone, she's pacing and exploring - dragging fingertips over iron bars, feeling at the mortars between the stones, measuring the length of the cell pace by pace.
potential: (Default)

let me here.

[personal profile] potential 2022-02-24 12:08 am (UTC)(link)
There is no one to whom Caleb can plead his case. (I cannot be here, I can't, I am needed elsewhere, you don't understand—) Those who wield authority here do not care to listen, and in his more spiteful moments, Caleb suspects they cannot undo whatever it is that brought him to this place to begin with.

There is a castle. It is cavernous and cold and filled with possibility. If he could think of something other than the absence of Nott, or the peril with which he'd left her (and Beauregard, and then the others, Fjord and Jester and Yasha) to navigate, or the fresh-made grave in which they had buried Mollymauk—

Well. It is a place where Caleb could coax out information. He could learn here. No one is stopping him.

No one but the splinter of guilt that reminds him: He had not left them when he was able, and he is surely not excused for leaving on a technicality, so surely he must devote himself to slipping the cage he's found himself in, no matter the gilding of the bars.

Magic hums in every corner of Thorne. It makes Caleb's molars ache for biting down, tearing into it. That same fervor that had driven him through book after book once Beauregard had finally, finally brought him to the library is unchecked but for his own tenuous grip on rickety morality.

His notes diverge. What he should pursue, what will take him home, and the rest. Revenge. Rectification. A scaffolding of scribbling notes in a journal set alongside his spell book, both working in tandem.

It is harder to do on the road.

There are skirmishes at the border and their hosts have been neglectful and disinterested, but they dislodge their guests from the castle to tend to their affairs in what might be a battle, or might resolve itself before reinforcements arrive. Caleb cannot think of it.

He is hunched by the fire now, writing still, mapping what could be a spell, could blow up in someone's face. The ink shimmers faintly, even in the poor light, made worse by—

"Please, you are blocking the fire," is carefully posed, one hand hovering over the page as he looks up. This man, with his cane, who Caleb has seen in passing but said little to before now. What he is capable of is a mystery, one Caleb is not sure he needs answered. Eventually he will need help, yes, but he hardly knows what he needs yet.

And so: he is polite, quiet, easy to ignore. That has served him well so far in his life.
skeine: maria mena. (Default)

WE'RE WINGING IT HERE WE GO

[personal profile] skeine 2023-01-16 07:26 pm (UTC)(link)
They say a lot of things about ward-witches.

"Don't anger a ward-witch, they'll draw a line in the dirt," some scoff derisively. "Don't anger a ward-witch," others mutter furtively. "They'll draw a line 'round your neck."

In some ways, they're even more regulated to being seen as mere tools than other disciplines of magic: shield this, ward that, connect X to Y to Z. In some circles they're even considered outright mundane, the magical equivalent of a blue-collar tradesperson. Nothing exotic and glamourous, just necessary even as the number of them waned over the years, over the decades.

Pela's happy to let those preconceptions work for her, smiling dutifully when expected. Born in a sunny southern colony, this is only the second time she's ever been to Somerset, but any excitement and indulgence she might have for the opportunity to see it again is blunted by the reason that she's here. Recalled by the State as part of an "asset review program", things were changing. Pela knows that she was likely to be reassigned somewhere far from her homeland, perhaps even here in Somerset.

She's not alone, arriving with a contingent of other magic users also from Eajorynn, although she's the only ward-witch among them. Their group is guided in for processing while the necessary administration is handled, and Pela takes the opportunity to look around while waiting her turn.