You know about the knights of elsewhere, but do you know about the coven?
A group of witches from all different paths gather to create a large coven at the school. It’s invitation only so if you want in, leave jars of water outside of a full moon, draw sigils on your notebook, smell of incense, then they will find you.
She sends her familiar first, a snake as black as night, (His name is Monty and he’s pretty sweet when he’s not out on business). He will drop a letter off on your bed then return home. It only says a date and a location, written in runes. Do not share the location! She keeps track and outsiders will not be treated kindly, remember Straw? He tried, he slowly descended into madness with visions of the fae. About 6 months later he walked into a crossroads and was never seen again.
Beware the Coven of Elsewhere, and if you’re lucky you might get a visit from Monty.
The cornerwitch of the comic is not, but there are many cornerwitches. Every few years one passes through Elsewhere U on the way to becoming a cornerwitch, and while they’re there the place itself protects them. They can help you with the Gentry, although they have their own price and it’s not always the kinder option.
@steel-eu Hello, nice to meet you I have heard you provide sleeping aid? I have come about some sort of mild narcolepsy due to a recent deal. I am happy with the deal. But I was wondering if you have anything that could lessen the side effects? Or perhaps something to give me more warning, 15 seconds is good enough to not hurt my head but not if I found myself in an environment unfit to naps. What would be your price?
I swear it's like this school gets crazier and crazier every year. Who even puts silver in water? *sigh* Anyways, this week was strange. Too many exams, too many sleepless people. I did meet this one guy with pink hair though, new to the corner witch gig. He was pretty cool. I think his name was Cornbread, or Lemonbread, or something like that. Speaking of new people, @elsewherequill how's that reading going?
I was inspired by Elsewhere and The Cornerwitch. I hope it is good.
Everyone in their little town called them Cornerwitch. Not much was known about their background or their home life, only that if you needed something (protection, beauty, luck, sleep, anything) they had a spell or a potion or a rune to help-for a price. They never charged very much, and if you were desperate enough they gave freely. This Cornerwitch was generous.
Their origin stretched back to the beginning of middle school for them. They found a book of the Fae in the school library and they could hear it calling to them. They devoured every last word of it and then looked for more. The next time they went to the library there was a book of witchcraft waiting for them on a table and they devoured that one too. Book after book after book until their parents found out and punished them harshly, but at that point it was too late.
They got clever with their witchcraft after that. Carving runes into worrystones so they were nearly impossible to find, sewing them into underclothes, turning potion mixes into tea bags, turning bibles into portable hidden altars; they were unstoppable. They started selling their spells and tea and runes their sophomore year of high school when their parents found one of their altars.
They saved what they could from their parents’ rampage and in order to restock started to sell in return for offerings of dried herbs and crystals and anything else they could get their hands on.
They sold calming draughts as tea bags, protection runes in worry stones, luck spells in small bottle necklaces, healing potions in pastes to be spread over bruises and scrapes and cuts. Cornerwitch had what you needed.
Their senior year changed. Their parents found out about their business and something changed in them. People who went to Cornerwitch came back and warned people not to look too long and to bring salt or iron with them. There was something sharper about them, something new and other about the bruises and the grimace and the hollow smile as Cornerwitch bargained with those desperate enough to seek them out and warnings were given as though Cornerwitch were Fae. Be careful, was the whisper of the wind in the ears of those who looked for them, Be wary.
By the time they were to go to college the birth name they put on their application and student ID for Elsewhere University was as much them as any nickname as they had ever worn.
Cornerwitch walked around campus free of burning iron and protective salt as they offered deals to students naive or desperate enough to take them, their hollow smile full of sharp teeth and air moving in waves around them as the flutter of unseen wings sprouting through the cape they wore caressed the faces of those they passed.
Rumors had it they studied the forbidden major. Rumors had it they walked completely unprotected at all times of the day. Rumors had it they dealt deals with the Fae as often as they dealt deals with humans. Rumors had it Cornerwitch wasn’t human and if you had the sight you would see exactly who their parents had turned them into.
The truth was in two hearts that beat as one on the high court of the Fae where their parents could never harm them again.
I just reread the original comic and had to ask, the narrator, is he the founder? Did he build Elsewhere, see it grow, survive as it changed his friends, learn from their mistakes (she never spoke again, he learned to watch his words), and still love this place he built? Is the reason Elsewhere considered a prestigious university because of his efforts? And the reason the fair folk abide by the rules, the reason everyone has a chance to win, the reason one third of the students can leave (1/3)
untouched (almost) by Them, another third only brushing past and only the rudest get taken is partly because of the rules that bind them, but also because of this is His territory and he is the Dean. The students have rumours you see, why the wyrm stays at the western corner (not because of fear, oh no, but after a few hundred years, you learn how to strike a Bargain), why Elsewhere is considered a 'safe place' is because the Dean loves the this University he built. Has loved it (2/3)
it for centuries and when you love something so touched by Other, it starts to love you back. The students don't complain (although they avoid the door down that one hall with a nameplate from a time the Uni stood on flat land. No one can read the name), they are protected. The Gentry don't complain, if the University is busy loving the Dean, it is too busy to turn its attention to Them. The only way a human can surpass the madness of eternity, to love something that consumes, All. Other. Senses (3/3)
The original comic was intended more as advice from one student to the next (or as a kind of contraband student guidebook, possibly?) and the fairy hill didn’t crop up until thirtyish years after the University was founded in the late 1800s, but I do love the idea of whoever is in charge at the time of the Change changing with it (this whole ask is in a lot of ways really in sync with the bit I wrote about cornerwitches - if you love the place enough, and everything in it, it will protect you)
So is the Corner Witch the only witch allowed at Elsewhere? Is there some kind of witch quota? Do they have to be Corner Witches, specifically? I ask because I may or may not be totally down with Elsewhere U, but I may or may not also a witch with more herbs and rocks than any one person really needs, and I don't want to step on anyone(thing?)'s toes. Maybe there's a part time attendance option?
Given that the student make-up of Elsewhere U isn’t too far outside of what it is for the average university, there’s a handful of witches in every year (although at Elsewhere U they’re perhaps more powerful, either bc of the proximity of the Elsewhere or simply the knowledge on offer). No quota!
The Cornerwitch (more a title than in individual) is an entity bound by choice to a place with iron in its bones. Acts as equal parts oracle (speaking to the city on behalf of others, and speaking for the city) and local magical pawnbroker (the Gentry avoid places built on iron, usually, but the Cornerwitch will be there in their place if you need to make a deal). Unlike the Gentry, they tend to deal almost exclusively in items of invented value; stories are what gives a thing power. Also unlike the Gentry, they tend to be precisely, brutally fair. They’re in-between creatures themselves, and balance is of utmost importance. Above all else it’s a mantle you take up out of love for a place and the people in it, and the place loves the cornerwitch back - no harm will ever come to a cornerwitch in their city.
What this means in Elsewhere U is that at any given time there’s two or three fledgeling cornerwitches arguing out behind the gym over whose turn it is to man the designated Witch Corner this week in case anyone comes with questions.
Answered asks that were initially sent to my main before this blog was created - I’m answering them in this format to avoid having to crosspost it all. First of many. Everything below is from anons.
elsewhere university q: so you mentioned that silver is a way to see them; would (sterling, i suppose?) silver earrings/piercings factor in at all to seeing them or anything of that sort? they're, like, 92.5% silver, but they're also very small usually, so.
You’d feel constantly like you were seeing movement out of the corner of your eyes - a slippery kind of feeling. With enough you might be able to see things clearly in your peripheral vision, if not directly.
Elsewhere uni reminds me of my high school not to the same extreme. one of the unspoken rules was you always spoke to the lady in the creek even if you could not see her when you crossed it. There were ghosts in the ASL classroom that you acknowledged but didn't talk about. Nobody questioned who you were talking/nodding to. We all knew. There's more, but I can't recall it all off the top of my head.
This is the weird college shit I thrive on. This is the horrorwonder goodgood.
What if They found a poet they liked (but was just super careful and stuff, never slipped up with their salt protection or anything) so the fae just leave the poet secret messages on their poetry no one but the poet can see and the messages are just like "we are waiting for you, young poet" and weird stuff like that, and one day the poet goes to a party... and no one ever sees them again, but legend says that if you write enough poetry, you'll get a secret message.
Canon.
Where is elsewhere u
In the center of a highway, a set of train tracks, and a river. Beyond that, it... varies.
I always loved the corner witch comic, but I had an idea! Most of them are half Fae, or they're changelings that don't necessarily wish to be rid of that human bit. So they find the places in the corners, between the Elsewhere and the Here. Places where they fit, they can help, and they can be protected.
It’s not uncommon - it has a lot to do with love of a place, and a willingness to bear that mantle of in-betweenness.
The fair folk find themselves intrigued by those who have either been to Ireland or are from there. Those who have carry the scent of the old homeland, those born in Ireland are especially interesting. The students born there have a special kind of dread when setting foot upon he grounds of Elsewhere
Although international students have changed the landscape of belief on campus, the university was initially attended by people who grew up with western european folkloric traditions in their childhood and their bones (it’s this history that gives these such weight, still). I think it would be most accurate to say that students from places where these beliefs still have some context, such as smaller towns in Ireland, would be among the first to recognize what exactly all these funny school traditions actually mean.
Are there any banshees at elsewhere u? I've seen them described as either a fairy woman or a ghost
Yes - they’re rare; actual fatalities aren’t that common on campus, although they also serve as omens of impending doom (the washer at the ford?), and this is probably slightly more common. I believe they tend to follow certain families - some students might have inherited them, and one tight-knit sorority was adopted by one back in the fifties. If you hear it singing, one of the sorority girls is going to disappear, one way or the other. It tries to look out for them, as much as it can. A warning is better than nothing, and time to say goodbye is precious. (Also - something really interesting is that banshees have apparent dialects in folklore! In different parts of Ireland their voice are describes as beautiful, as hellish, and high-pitched enough to break glass... which is entirely fitting for a country with as many dialects as Ireland has.)
