RE: QUIETUS [S!5] [Round 3: Deluge]
04-05-2018, 07:22 AM
The water was surprisingly warm. Amaranth hadn’t expected much from the bathing room, but there had been a copper boiler full of enough water to fill the large sunken bath, heated and ready. Then again, water didn’t seem to be in short supply. We’re in a rectory, maybe they use this place for rituals. Maybe I--we’re--profaning it.
She glanced over at Florica, who was soaking in the experience. While Amaranth filled the bath Florica had exclaimed multiple times over it, and mentioned how it seemed fit for a fine lady and that a simple river stream would do just as well for her. But she seemed to have settled down.
If anyone deserves a break, it’s her.
Robin had passed on the mention of a bath. She had ‘too many plans to make.’ Even with the bloodstains on her torn coat.
Not that...Amaranth had exactly wanted her to come.
”Sure, I’ll answer your questions. Cn’you...hmm, do that ‘thing’ you did back on the station? I could really use some chill right now.” She had lifted up her left hand. It shook from the muscle memory of its recently-exorcised occupant. “I’d like to be able to type.”
“It’s not a...substitute for decompression. We’re not in crisis right now...it would be better for you to sleep.”
Robin gave her a look. “I know what I’m doing. Hey, I’ve pulled longer all-nighters…” Amaranth’s expression didn’t change. “I know more about the limits of my body than anyone else ever will. Just let me iron some things out...and then I promise you I’ll try and get some rest.
“Don’t you want answers to your questions?
“I know I would.”
Not really, thought Amaranth in the present. At least not more than she had wanted Robin to say yes, I’ll sleep, to pull herself together, to stop habits formed decades before they had even met. To wash the blood off her skin and sew up her coat.
But Robin was confident she was right. So Amaranth took the bargain she was given, and sat down to ask the questions Robin had determined would be ‘fair trade’ for Amaranth’s mood stabilizing.
Where to begin? Where was the beginning? Robin’s world, Robin’s rules, as natural to her as gravity. As difficult to truly explain as gravity.
“I know what ghosts are.” Amaranth had begun, unspooling her confusion into words, “Or that...if you asked me what a ghost was, I could tell you. And not think I had left anything of importance out.
“But the way you talk about ghosts, your approach, the things you say...all I can wonder is what you truly mean. It’s like..” like I don’t know anything, like I’m lost, like there’s nothing you could ever say that would make this all make sense “A man who says the sun and means a ball of heavenly light put there by divine power talking to a man who says the sun and means a thing formed in a nebula.”
She had spent some time on that metaphor, weighing it over until she found the right phrasing. She hadn’t wanted this conversation but she had known its inevitability.
Robin considered her and her words. “An apt metaphor, given that the sun is used for energy…” She paused awkwardly. “Or at least it is in my world.
“But unlike the sun, it’s not beaming down whether we use it or not...and unlike the sun, we have no idea how long it’ll last...it may be much shorter than 5 billion years. Much, much shorter.”
Robin’s telling was disjointed, full of her tangents and talking points and viewpoints. The layers peeled back with out of order, and here Amaranth was gathering up the pieces. Robin had been...more emotional than Amaranth expected, still at a remove but at times intense, urgent, even…
Florica sighed contentedly, finger-combing her hair rather unsuccessfully. Florica hardly needed ghosts explained to her, and had hardly cared to understand what the patterns that Robin had drawn all across the floor and Florica’s body meant. All those little circles. All the glyphs. She just accepted it.
Amaranth had gone to walk around the building, get out of that room, had found this room with its copper boiler that gleamed out of the tiled shadows when she raised the oil-lamp. Thank goodness for small things. When she returned…
”No, not really.” Robin had said, later. “Florica and her talking to ghosts...what you’ve seen with her...it’s all special. Not how it usually works. If someone were to try that kind of thing in my world--and they used to, but--it’s not really them, just...a thing trying to be them, what you think the person was like, just to please you. Arcane energy’s obliging like that. Just wants to help. Won’t say no to anything, unless it hurts someone.
“Fits in nicely to people’s idea of the good in all things, animism, Holy Ghost, cosmic principle, whatever...very convenient. But they’re all wrong.
“Arcane energy. Ghosts. They’re the same thing.”
Just like that.
Of course, the bluntness hadn’t meant anything yet, not really. Robin had gotten carried away, disjointed, distracted, ruined the grand punchline. Amaranth hadn’t known what arcanic energy was yet, hadn’t yet been told that it was used ”--like gasoline--” in Robin’s world. The big twist ending fell flat.
But now, in the hot bath, rearranging, Amaranth shivered.
Not for the revelations. There’s only so many things you can process at once. But the intent--she wanted to slap me in the face with it.
At times, Robin had been intense, urgent, even--scornful.
What does she think of me? And then, the young woman, pale and worn and covered in hidden sigils, that were washed away but still remained and trying to wash the caked blood out of her hair--
What does she think of Florica?
“Here, let me try and do that.”
She glanced over at Florica, who was soaking in the experience. While Amaranth filled the bath Florica had exclaimed multiple times over it, and mentioned how it seemed fit for a fine lady and that a simple river stream would do just as well for her. But she seemed to have settled down.
If anyone deserves a break, it’s her.
Robin had passed on the mention of a bath. She had ‘too many plans to make.’ Even with the bloodstains on her torn coat.
Not that...Amaranth had exactly wanted her to come.
”Sure, I’ll answer your questions. Cn’you...hmm, do that ‘thing’ you did back on the station? I could really use some chill right now.” She had lifted up her left hand. It shook from the muscle memory of its recently-exorcised occupant. “I’d like to be able to type.”
“It’s not a...substitute for decompression. We’re not in crisis right now...it would be better for you to sleep.”
Robin gave her a look. “I know what I’m doing. Hey, I’ve pulled longer all-nighters…” Amaranth’s expression didn’t change. “I know more about the limits of my body than anyone else ever will. Just let me iron some things out...and then I promise you I’ll try and get some rest.
“Don’t you want answers to your questions?
“I know I would.”
Not really, thought Amaranth in the present. At least not more than she had wanted Robin to say yes, I’ll sleep, to pull herself together, to stop habits formed decades before they had even met. To wash the blood off her skin and sew up her coat.
But Robin was confident she was right. So Amaranth took the bargain she was given, and sat down to ask the questions Robin had determined would be ‘fair trade’ for Amaranth’s mood stabilizing.
Where to begin? Where was the beginning? Robin’s world, Robin’s rules, as natural to her as gravity. As difficult to truly explain as gravity.
“I know what ghosts are.” Amaranth had begun, unspooling her confusion into words, “Or that...if you asked me what a ghost was, I could tell you. And not think I had left anything of importance out.
“But the way you talk about ghosts, your approach, the things you say...all I can wonder is what you truly mean. It’s like..” like I don’t know anything, like I’m lost, like there’s nothing you could ever say that would make this all make sense “A man who says the sun and means a ball of heavenly light put there by divine power talking to a man who says the sun and means a thing formed in a nebula.”
She had spent some time on that metaphor, weighing it over until she found the right phrasing. She hadn’t wanted this conversation but she had known its inevitability.
Robin considered her and her words. “An apt metaphor, given that the sun is used for energy…” She paused awkwardly. “Or at least it is in my world.
“But unlike the sun, it’s not beaming down whether we use it or not...and unlike the sun, we have no idea how long it’ll last...it may be much shorter than 5 billion years. Much, much shorter.”
Robin’s telling was disjointed, full of her tangents and talking points and viewpoints. The layers peeled back with out of order, and here Amaranth was gathering up the pieces. Robin had been...more emotional than Amaranth expected, still at a remove but at times intense, urgent, even…
Florica sighed contentedly, finger-combing her hair rather unsuccessfully. Florica hardly needed ghosts explained to her, and had hardly cared to understand what the patterns that Robin had drawn all across the floor and Florica’s body meant. All those little circles. All the glyphs. She just accepted it.
Amaranth had gone to walk around the building, get out of that room, had found this room with its copper boiler that gleamed out of the tiled shadows when she raised the oil-lamp. Thank goodness for small things. When she returned…
”No, not really.” Robin had said, later. “Florica and her talking to ghosts...what you’ve seen with her...it’s all special. Not how it usually works. If someone were to try that kind of thing in my world--and they used to, but--it’s not really them, just...a thing trying to be them, what you think the person was like, just to please you. Arcane energy’s obliging like that. Just wants to help. Won’t say no to anything, unless it hurts someone.
“Fits in nicely to people’s idea of the good in all things, animism, Holy Ghost, cosmic principle, whatever...very convenient. But they’re all wrong.
“Arcane energy. Ghosts. They’re the same thing.”
Just like that.
Of course, the bluntness hadn’t meant anything yet, not really. Robin had gotten carried away, disjointed, distracted, ruined the grand punchline. Amaranth hadn’t known what arcanic energy was yet, hadn’t yet been told that it was used ”--like gasoline--” in Robin’s world. The big twist ending fell flat.
But now, in the hot bath, rearranging, Amaranth shivered.
Not for the revelations. There’s only so many things you can process at once. But the intent--she wanted to slap me in the face with it.
At times, Robin had been intense, urgent, even--scornful.
What does she think of me? And then, the young woman, pale and worn and covered in hidden sigils, that were washed away but still remained and trying to wash the caked blood out of her hair--
What does she think of Florica?
“Here, let me try and do that.”