#event .004

[theninthcard]

we're living in the currents you create when & where: july 4th, 9:14pm, pool open

Only one thing had made sense to her all day, and that was Balfour’s snarled denouncement of the Feiyan they had all seen at the meeting. Lailani had spent the rest of the afternoon restlessly drifting from place to place, her fingers twisting her sleeves to bits as it played out again and again in her mind. Even at their worst, Feiyan had never outright told any of the Councilors they were failures... It just wasn’t her style.

Though it had been months since her disappearance, and they had accomplished... nothing. Couldn’t even decide on a new leader, if any, an issue which grew more worrying by the moment now that it was apparent someone - something? - was out there trying too tempt them all to... The Ancients only knew what.

She wound up beside the pool, thinking the gentle sloshing of the water would calm her nerves. Just the opposite; every errant sound or reflection off the ripples made her teeth chatter. She stayed anyway. Footsteps nearby nearly sent her crashing into the water. She yanked her sweater tighter around herself, turning to greet the newcomer, desperately hoping the only reflection she would see in this room was the jumbled one in the water. 

[askbalfour]

suvaris

Though it felt nice to have someone aside from Eve or Daniel take her seriously for once, thinking too hard about the monster in the garden and Feiyan’s unsettling, brief visit left her too shaken to close her eyes for more than five minutes at a time. This meant, obviously, it was time to walk around the house a little more, this time with a blanket over her arm and a glass of water in her hand. She happened upon Balfour not long after she left her room, and after hesitating for a moment, she sat on the floor next to him and crushed the urge to scratch behind his ears. Everyone kind of hated him, but Azra couldn’t help but be a little smitten. “What did you mean by it’s not her?” she asked as she placed the glass of water on the floor at her hip and folded her hands in her lap. “Was she a projection like… like Daniel when he’s in the astral plane? Or it’s not her like… like the thing in the garden wasn’t me?”

“I meant it was not her.” If a cat could Bark, Balfour just did. His tail thumped erratically against her leg. Ever since he’d seen that wraith dressed up to look like Feiyan, it hadn’t stopped sweeping back and forth. The fur on his spine was still itchy, the way it got when it was supposed to be standing straight up, protecting against a threat. It was one of the stupider things about being a cat, in his opinion. 

Azra had asked him genuine questions, though. He could at least try to be helpful instead of a rude puffball. “I don’t know what that was. It looked like a projection. That’s a reasonable conclusion.” The compliment, paltry as it was, struggled off his barbed tongue. “But it had a smell. It smelled like her. Projections don’t do that.” Which didn’t help his argument in the slightest, but he just knew. 

He looked to Azra, his pupils narrowed to slits. “Do you think Feiyan would ever tell any of you that you were failing? Even if you were. Even if you were fucking up worse than any of your past selves ever had. Would she say that?”

[thcndcr-blog]

luke’s hand intertwined with kaliah’s as they walked through the lot. he was glad that he was here with her and not alone. because well, if luke had been let alone, he would’ve pulled one-too-many shenanigans on everyone who isn’t a savage. he stopped them in their tracks, hands grasping hers. “what’d’ya want to do next?”

@ofbctrayals (luke x kaliah)

[theninthcard]

and it's worth it, it's divine / i have this some of the time when & where: june 23rd, between bedrooms and a kitchen, early afternoon closed to @soundsempressive

Lailani was on her sixth cup of tea of the day already. The atmosphere surrounding The Lair was... off, to her senses, but she couldn’t put her finger on how exactly or why. Besides, of course, the vaguely threatening nines she kept finding everywhere. That seemed to be limited to her though, and if she was perfectly honest with herself, she couldn’t be sure she wasn’t just imagining things.

Or having visions, but that was the scarier possibility.

She was on her way back from the kitchen with sugar when a figure jumped out in front of her with the energy of eight suns in one body. She winced, but quickly recognized a favorite face and offered her a little smile. “Hi, Eve. Do you want some tea? I was just making more.”

[askbalfour]

@mitch-nom (continued from here)

he hummed, then stretched out on the floor, closing his eyes to bask in the light. “that’s precisely why there is so much spare time, especially when you don’t join in with the infighting and decision making.”

he curled in on his side and tried to fit as much of himself within the sunshine as he could. “prowling. sounds fun. what about naps? cats sleep alot, right? i could fall asleep right now, actually. “

Now Balfour looked at him, his face as bored as a cat’s face could possibly be. If this was another attempt to pet him, it was doomed before he’d ever laid down. “I’d argue with you over your actions if I thought it’d make a difference.”

His tail swept back and forth, but this time it thumped into Mitch where he curled on the floor, marking him far too close. “I have more important things to do.” But did he really? The sunbeam looked so enticing... Mitch certainly seemed to agree. How much would it hurt to roll over and doze off?

No. Not with Mitch there, certainly. “Do whatever you want. I don’t care,” he said, jaws opening in a yawn halfway through. “It’s none of my business how you waste your day.”

[theninthcard]

there’s no plan, there’s no kingdom to come when & where: july 5th, the library, mid-morning closed to @lapcpesse

You’re failing.

She couldn’t shake the words still ricocheting around in her skull. Could that really have been a message from Feiyan? Is that what she thought of them? She had never been so harsh before her disappearance, but perhaps... Well, even the kindest of people changed in pain.

Lailani had spent the past several hours trying and, as usual, failing to spark some kind of vision that might help the others. Instead she had just given herself a thrumming headache. Sighing, she rose from her desk, her eyes lingering on the marks marring the corner of her mirror’s surface, before picking a wooden basket up off the floor and drifting out the door to the one place she trusted would feel calm and safe in spite of the world’s general air of foreboding.

The smell of old paper settled her shoulders as soon as she stepped beyond the library’s doors. Peering around bookshelves, she went looking for the expansive room’s patron saint, presenting her basket once she’d found Annaliese.

“Tea? I brought a kettle. I... I hope I’m not bothering you, but- I thought we could both use a little break from, well, everything.”

[askbalfour]

"I'm bored." He states, plopping down next to the cat. He's useful, yes, but there are long stretches where no-one needs him and he knows he will only get underfoot. "What do you do in your spare time?" Surely the cat has to do something other than brood and plan evil plans, and it must be lonely without his creator here as well. "Or do you need me to entertain you?!"

Sitting in a shaft of sunlight that came in through the foyer window, Balfour had been resisting the temptation to simply lie down and bask for an hour or so. The light was warm… And the wood floor enticingly cool… And if he was lucky, no one would bother him-

But why would he ever think that a possibility in this house overrun by nosy nuisances?

At first he paid little attention to Mitch taking up the space beside him, his irritation marked by the twitch in his tail. The kid was hard to ignore when he wanted to be, though. “Please do not entertain me. I don’t care for what humans seem to think I’ll enjoy.”

“My spare time consists of prowling, mostly.” It wasn’t what he had been made for, though he’d gotten good at it in the years he had been gone. His true purpose was companionship for the one person who never got on his nerves. Perhaps if he had come back sooner, he’d still be fulfilling it now. “There is no spare time here, with all of you blinded by infighting and incapable of making decisions.”