faithlikeaseed | AEFENGLOM INBOX [IC]

[In that frozen, hesitant standoff, L isn't sure whether Myr is talking to him, or the worm. Perhaps it's meant to be ambiguous, given that in spite of their surface differences, they share something poignant in common. Of the two of them, the worm might have the greater capacity for absolute trust, and stands down first, and thank goodness; L might not have been able to.

The bulk of the thing rests nearby; L endeavors to channel Myr's easiness with its presence so close. L was always more naural in the role of an observer, rather than a companion.]

For all the interpretations and higher meanings projected onto dreams... so much of it is simply a mind processing the day's events, as well as the memories and concerns of the dreamer. The magic of the Fae is different... more of a networked cojoining of minds aimed at a shared dimension... but for the typical dreamer and the typical dream, the world is smaller, more specific, and often incoherent or disorganized. The challenge of the dreamwalker isn't dissimilar to a book-binder tasked with assembling many scattered pages into something that makes sense, and fortunately... that's exactly the kind of work I happen to enjoy.

[Finding the patterns, the common strain, and drawing out a clear and bright answer from what confuses and frustrates others. The genius and the madman both know the feeling so well.

Though his shoulders are curled and his body is angled slightly away from Myr's gaze, self-conscious as he is of someone usually blind able to see him, he glances his Bonded's way at the invitation.]

We would need to take precautions-- waking while dreamwalking could be a disaster-- but... if you think it's something you wouldn't mind trying...

[He's tempted. The intimacy of dreamwalking, with permission, is at least on par with sex. Possibly greater, especially for a pair of individuals who so mutually admire one another's minds.]

I'm never going to get over that, you know.

[Dreams as just a mind processing the day's events. It isn't right or natural. (He kind of hates it.)

But the magic of the Fae-- Myr sits up straighter at that, his ears angled entirely toward L now with the force of his interest. Ever the mage at heart...]

That's what all of this is? They don't really have a Fade of their own, then? [...Which also feels neither right nor natural, but there it was; those were the rules that Talam operates on. Whyever the Sisters--or whoever else created it--had done such a thing was well beyond Myr's theological speculations--and worse, his capability to research, with the Coven's vast textual resources forever out of his reach.

(Though there surely must be workarounds, and then it simply becomes a matter of time. And that's so often thin on the ground, too.)

He takes in the rest of L's explanation as eagerly, though, and notes the way his Bonded looks at him. This...would be a solution to a great many things, wouldn't it? A solution and a welcome meeting of minds, something deeper even than the Bond gives them. It would be a less lonely way to dream; it would give L an opportunity to practice a magic he clearly takes joy in. (And it would be another way to keep the detective close and out of trouble.)]

More than wouldn't mind, [he decides aloud.] I want to try it. With you. [So there's no mistaking: As much as it's about relieving a loneliness he hadn't thought could be remedied, it's only L he wants this with.]

No, I respect him in that. [It's an automatic, snapped reaction, something that slips from his gut into his mouth without ever having been a thought. It was an unconscious admission, but now that it hung in the air he couldn't deny the truth in it. He lets out a short frustrated growl.]

I understand that in a way I really don't think you do. He chose to be there, he set the stage, and he was determined to see it through. He refuses to see himself as a victim, and that's the lie he needed to survive that night. I didn't intend to break it unless it was absolutely necessary.

Edited 2020-04-13 05:48 (UTC)

[Silence.

There is a whole world, here, beneath Niles' words--a whole world that is well beyond Myr's experience, sheltered child of the Circle that he is. He does not doubt its grim reality; only, his grasp on it is fleeting, his understanding of it so poor he is liable to do more harm than good if he were to speak on it. That uneasy knowledge makes him want to turn away--

But he remembers L's analogy to Mello's suffering, sacrificed god and that pleading feeling through their Bond: Don't take this from me because I cannot live otherwise.

His tone is bleak:] It is a lie that will lead him back there, or worse.

So, show him the truth before he does.

[Niles' voice has a strained, mixed tone. Myr has some kind of power, doesn't he? Managing to reach in and yank on the few thin strands of guilt clinging to his core. He has to forget about Linden if he wants to appeal to that urge and focus on his much easier to accept rage at Mello himself.]

The absolute bastard treated him tenderly after. [He lets the disgust in his voice carry his final, almost shameful, admission.] He would have had Linden limping back to him before the end of the week if I hadn't gotten rid of the rotten, greedy, manipulative invitation he left behind.

[He didn't bring this up as an excuse, or a bid for gratitude. He brought it up to show Myr the urgency here. To turn him towards seeing Mello as the more immediate threat.]

Edited 2020-04-13 06:44 (UTC)

[There is a risk, Myr knows, in speaking the truth so boldly about another person. Even when it's a kind truth, kindly meant, it can still hurt...

But it's that, or knowing each day Everett is torturing himself by comparison to a loveless monster. Myr's seldom had a choice in starker relief, and it strips the razor edge of guilt from knowing he's landed a blow. (Has made Everett cry, though he cannot see that, doesn't yet know it.) Oh, there is pain in him for his beloved's pain, and sorrow to have worsened it, but it's a healer's sorrow and not a soldier's, knowing mending could come of the wound.]

Flatterer, [he breathes through a smile that's nigh on tears itself, and:] Thank you, dearheart. For that, and for all you are and all you've shared with me.

[He believes in you, Everett, you see, and he is so very good at fervent, heartfelt belief.]

And, [because he is also very, very good at curiosity,] all you will yet.

[Hector is still learning how to be social. What had seemed like a fine idea when he'd been falling down drunk is harder to see through in sobriety.

Hector's stalled for a few days, but Myr was kind enough to send him a jar of honey and a repeat of the invitation, and that was harder to put off.

So here he is, at the door of the cottage Myr lives in, with a tin full of little diamond-cut baklava in hand as a handy excuse for why he's come if Myr is busy, or has company, or just doesn't want to see him.

He raises a hand and knocks.]

Coming!

[Truth be told, Myr hadn't been entirely sure how to approach Hector himself.

He wasn't--precisely--embarrassed about that night; that would imply he'd been somehow untrue to himself in his attentions to the other Faun, and he wasn't that. He'd meant everything he'd said, just...been a lot touchier about it than he'd ever have been sober.

He doesn't like feeling out of control that way, nor being reminded of it, but he'd promised and Hector had been so sweet and hopeful...

The honey had been a kind of stopgap while Myr worked out the rest of what he'd do, but now his hand's been forced--not that he'll know it until he's opened the door and Hector's said something to make himself known.

And open the door Myr does.]

Can I help you, serah? Caster and Archer are out at the moment, if you're looking for them.

[L had not spoken of any of this--it stood to reason; he hadn't been conscious for any of it--but a part of Myr is yet unsurprised that it happened. Mello has some ideas of courtship and propriety, but they are distorted, wrong, in much the same way so many of L's ideas of the world are. For many of the same reasons.

He wishes he did not know that, wishes he could be purely and simply furious at anyone involved in this, Mello especially.

Truth restrains him.]

Thank you for that. [Niles likely did not tell him to win his thanks, he knows; he has the dim sense he is being prodded about in all of this, pushed toward a conclusion the Chimera wants. Yet he will not let that change him, nor his earnestness.]

Though if you mean show him the real sort of demon he's bedded-- [He can't find the words to finish the sentence; a frustrated snort will do.] He knows.

[Oh, right. He shouldn't expect Myr to be able to recognize him by his step or anything like that. Welp.]

I, uh, don't need them. Here for you.

[Had poor Myr actually thought Hector would show up for singing and cuddling? Probably not. Never has Hector been happier for the rare time he's thought of a plan ahead of time. He clutches the tin like a lifeline.]

I thought...you might like to try a treat from my world...if you're not sick of honey by now....

[SO THIS IS GOING GREAT, HUH?]

No I mean, [He also gives a little frustrated exhale.] ugh. Show him he is a victim, not a martyr.

[Show him he doesn't deserve this kind of treatment, just in time to get more of it in another form.]

[That was the other option, the one Myr deliberately avoided, and to hear it plainly stated makes him laugh without a trace of humor at all.]

So he'll be in a proper state of mind for what you plan to do to him?

[Niles huffs again, playing up a little indignation.]

So Mello doesn't accidentally kill him first.

[So Mello's not the one guarding him.]

I'm not planning a lethal assault, and I'm not going to be in a reckless, drunken, jealous stupor bent on owning him. You'll get your boy back from me, you won't from Mello.

[Provided they don't bollux this up completely and Hector does keep visiting, Myr would learn to recognize him by tread eventually. But they hadn't done very much walking at the party, had they...

The other man's voice, though, that's instantly recognizable; there's a visible moment where Myr's eyes would widen if he had any, with surprise--caught!--and then he softens instantly into a grin. If it is a little strained--because he has no idea if Hector sober would tolerate a half of what had happened to Hector drunk--then so be it. The moment Myr'd been fretting over is here and what would come, would come.

Or so he reassures himself.]

Hector! [Not lambkin, ... yet. That might be too familiar.] I would like, and as I remember I owe you a song.

[He pauses a moment, ears working, manner abruptly a little shy.] Would you come in? We can go sit in the garden, if you like-- [A moment's inspiration:] And you can meet my bees.

[The logic's irrefutable, if Niles can be trusted at his word. (If.) Mello might kill L; Niles would not; better to spend effort warding the fatal threat. Myr is one easily persuaded by logic and reason, and yet--]

Fuck you,

[He spits--because, under everything, Myr's also still the boy who would fight anyone who hurt his loved ones, be they larger or smaller, mage or not. It had taken the trifold expectations of duty, of chivalry, of the Maker's word to tame that boy's ire at the world, and now he finds those expectations sharpened and turned against him as he's backed inevitably into a corner.

Niles wants L alive and in steady health for whatever it is he plans. Mello wants L alive and conformed to the shape he'd carved out for his idol. (And if not that--broken, eradicated, in no one else's hands.) Every step of progress he made with his Bonded--getting L to eat, to care for himself, to spin the slenderest bridges across the emotional gaps between him and the rest of mankind--played to one or the other. Every reversal likewise--every night of drugged oblivion, every well-considered impulse to self-immolate in Mello's flames.

It hurts. But there is no world where he can stop, no option to not throw himself on the thorns again and again to fulfill the bounds of his promises to L.

Trapped.]

Kill him yourself as a favor to both of us if you're so concerned that you get to Linden first.

[You know I've already put myself in his path. Why remind me how that helps you.]

Edited 2020-04-14 20:52 (UTC)

[Hector nods, then realizes that nodding won't get his point across.]

Yes. Sure, the garden will be nice.

[He comes inside. He doesn't know what to say about the song, or any other drunken promises. Well, actually, he does know one thing...]

So, did you ever ask your bees for their names?

This way, then.

[Within a space he's memorized, Myr's as confident as if he were sighted and leads unerringly for the door out into the garden. He even holds it open for Hector, gesturing in the rough direction of a bench set beneath a bower of wintering vines.

A tidy beehive isn't far off from it, the inhabitants flying in and out on their busy errands.

Myr brightens at the question.]

You know, I did! And, [a moment's dramatic pause,] they don't have them. Not the way we'd think of them, anyway, or the way Everett's rats have named themselves.

[Hector follows Myr through the house, and steps out ahead when the deer holds the door open for him. He takes a look at the hive before circling around to the bench.]

Oh? I suppose that makes sense. They may not have need of them.

[Hector was kind of hoping at least the queen would have some secret name to learn, but maybe she is simply 'The Queen'.]

At least it's less to have to keep track of.

[He takes a seat on the bench, setting the tin on his lap so it won't be in Myr's way if he sits down beside Hector.]

[One intrepid bee scout floats over to rest on Myr's hair as he crosses to the bench. He's a moment considering the sound as Hector seats himself before taking the space beside the sheep--carefully, reaching out a hand to feel for it before he does so.]

Mmhm! At least, not for the same reasons we do--as a, a marker, a signifier that we carry with us throughout our lives, to make us stand out from everyone else. They do have ways of referring to each other, but it's more like how I've heard the Qun to be--each bee is known for what she does, and it changes, day to day.

The hive has a name, though. [His excitement, his joy in all of this is brilliantly clear in his smile.]

It's efficient, since their role determines how they interact with others.

[And bees are known for their efficiency, aren't they? Always at work, and with geometry that fits together perfectly.

Myr sits beside him, and Hector pries open the tin. The honeyed, nutty smell of the baklava wafts up from the container.]

Well? You can't say that and not tell me. What do they call it?

[L's laugh is soft, unpracticed, a touch jittery. He nods; he knows that Myr's experiences with dreams are more in line with what the Fae present that is so very unique to the Mirrorbound experience. More fantastic, more connected... related, perhaps, to the Fade he knows.]

It seems similar, from what I've heard, but... I couldn't conclude that definitively.

[He's limited this way. As he mentioned, before, he doesn't typically dream on his own. It's either black and heavy, or fitful and broken to the point where it never dips into a replenishing REM phase to begin with.]

I'd like that, if you are sure...

[And he sounds like he's tempering his hopes, in case Myr does change his mind]

...we'll go to sleep in the same bed after drinking a bitter herbal tea. Close proximity helps... an experienced dreamwalker can do it at a distance, but I'm not that, yet. As you know.

[He fidgets, clearing his throat.]

A dreamwalker has the capacity to either hurt or heal the mind he's exploring... and dreams can be dangerous.

[Like human dwellings, to mice.]

But, I trust you, and so... it could be exciting...

[He's silent for a long moment. This is getting dangerous, he's inching towards giving away more information than he's receiving. But Myr's gotten off kilter here, but Niles is calming down. He needs Myr off his case, he needs Mello at least partially neutralized, and he needs L at arm's distance from both of them. Connor could be dealt with in other ways. He's had a plan for a long time, but now he's starting to get a date in mind.

He needs to tell Myr what he wants to hear.]

...You know I couldn't do it alone.

[The tone is heavy, weighed down with the suggestion of cooperation. But on the other end of the line, Niles is smiling.]

[...It is a tempting suggestion. It's nothing Myr hasn't been thinking himself. So many things would be easier if Mello could be quietly disposed of--

But there are reasons Myr cannot hold the knife, not least among them what it may do to L, if Myr should kill his tormented successor.

(The sound of L's skull cracking as he hit the ground still rings in the Faun's ears.)

Breath in, breath out.]

Then you'll need to make some friends, won't you.

[That Mello might also stand in Niles' way... that hasn't escaped Myr, either.]

[Niles makes a noncommittal grunt. He does have Henry. But as far as he knows, no one else has any idea of his potential involvement and he wants to keep it that way. Bringing him in to deal with Mello not only puts his ace in the hole right next to an open flame, it exposes his one unknown advantage far too early.]

Are you not the enemy of my enemy? Isn't that close enough?

Consider Mello's also the enemy of my enemy. [Though there's something in Myr's tone that says he wishes, dearly, it weren't so.

Niles hadn't threatened, repeatedly, to kill him out of jealous pique. Niles--for all his other vices and shortcomings--wasn't entirely consumed by the Original Sin. Niles was decent, in his own way; cared, in his own way, for those who needed it most, where Mello was eaten up entirely by short-sighted selfishness.

But Niles wouldn't be swayed from what he intended for L and so, here they are.]

AEFENGLOM INBOX [IC]

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Sometime after the Faun Party

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