#vvitchstart

[gisladottirs-blog]

     location: the Banisters      time: just after weekly meeting, Tuesday, 16 October          ( open )

The announcement, at least, had give her a reason that her mother had been on campus without telling her. There had been talk, lately, Yemi had mentioned over the summer, of some restrictions to compensate for a few issues with humans in the southwest; she could have guessed it was chaos magic, if she’d been pressed to. But it didn’t explain why Gisla, on campus, hadn’t stopped in to say hello.

She tamped down the disappointment annoyance threatening to bubble up in her, as she left the meeting, letting herself be taken along with the flow of traffic, out of the meeting hall and into the hallways, towards the main doors as people returned home for the evening. But when the annoyance wouldn’t pass, when she found her jaw tensed up with it, she decided to take it out on something else.

     “About time someone did something about it,” she exhaled, to no one in particular. Where was Nico when she needed him? He’d let her blow off some steam, knowing she didn’t really mean it. “Let the rest of us study real magic in peace.”

[gisladottirs-blog]

     location: the Mansion, second floor, east wing, outside of a lecture hall      time: mid-afternoon, 19 October           ( open )

She’d thought that the temporary ban on chaos magic would render the school a more peaceful place, more conducive to her work, and-- it had, as long as she stayed away from the kinds of places where witches were causing trouble around campus, which had been easy enough. But even without that particular distraction making a difference, she’d still found herself too distracted to properly focus on her work. 

She’d been using one of the classrooms to test out a pattern she’d been trying to devise for the better part of the past few weeks -- one she’d been close to perfecting, before the chaos ban -- but it felt like she was only getting farther away, every component she added taking her one step farther from the right order, the right alignment. Normally, she was the kind to channel her frustration into working harder -- late nights, obsessive notes, a specific kind of intellectual fervor that at least made her feel productive. But today, each failed attempt made her throat tight, her eyes sting, and eventually she’d come so close to tears that she’d stormed away from her work, up the stairs, and out the door into the hallway.

The door to the room slammed behind her, as she exited, louder than she would have liked, loud enough to draw attention, and so she wiped her face on the sleeve of her sweater, trying to hide it, hoping that no one in the hallway had seen.

[staimes-blog]

Location: A secluded path, nearest to the pattern cottage Time: Late afternoon, Oct. 20th

It didn’t take a witch to see it: a storm was coming. The past few days have brought turmoil to the Institute, a domino effect that had only just begun. Surprisingly, and entire discipline had been banned. Unsurprisingly, many of her fellow chaos students had begun to revolt. Surely, the powers that be knew it would come, and had their plans to get the students back in line. St. Aime didn’t have to be clairvoyant to know it, it was clear as cards, as tea leaves in a drained cup, as a face in a mirror. The writing was, as they say, on the wall. 

In her haze of confusion she found herself in a part of the grounds where the air was clear, much clearer than her own hex filled cottage. She stood barefoot before a pattern scratched in the dirt, opened a bottle of spiced rum, scattered sacred herbs before her. 

Footsteps made her pause. “Mon chou,” she said, assuming someone from camp chaos had found her. “You should leave. If I am caught, we’ll both be in trouble.”