agentlelog | walking in a field of fog

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walking in a field of fog

Who: You and Fayura
When: Today, a week after the Strangers' arrivals
Where: The Queen's Residence and the Old Town Bazaar
What: Q&A
Warnings: n/a

EARLY MORNING, THE QUEEN'S RESIDENCE
The morning is cold and dark. Inhaling the frigid air is so shocking that those who aren't expecting it cough and wheeze with their first breath. No one really wants to make their way to the training field. Even the Queen's court moves sluggishly, but move they do with muttered recriminations against Allairavar. Cold weather doesn't stop training.

A warming spell around the field keeps it warm enough to practice, and bobbling witchlights and steady e-line floodlights keep the darkness at bay. All along one side of the practice area are weapons with blades live and dulled. The court eases onto the field alongside the Strangers with sighs and grumbles aplenty. No one likes practice on chilly mornings, but they like Allairavar's retaliation against tardiness even less.

Everyone has paired off by the time Allairavar strides out of the manor home with his arm around a woman's shoulders. In the harsh e-line lights and softer witchlight, it's clear she hasn't been well and still isn't entirely healed. Sunken golden eyes scan the field, and her expression is vaguely nauseated. She trembles, either from weakness or discomfort, as Allairavar pulls away and calls in two bladed sticks—weapons caught somewhere between sword and ax.

"Let's go," he tells her, and she takes one stick from his hand as court and Strangers alike look on.

Another male follows them in, sleekly predatory in his slow prowl around the practice field. A dangerous look glazes his eyes, and he circles the whole field once before making a second, tighter pass around the marked off area where Allairavar and the woman square off.

Members of the court trade wary looks, sharing them with the Strangers. More than a few murmur things like, "Verim will go for his throat if he pushes her too hard," and, "Should she even be out of bed yet?"

It seems Allairavar's rule for training is absolute. Even the Queen takes part. Under his watchful eye and tutelage, they run through a warm up that clearly exhausts her, but when he asks if they should stop, she snarls at him and pushes on for another five minutes. Only then does she sit off to the side of the field and begin stretching.

As she lifts from a leg stretch, she catches your eye and offers a small, shy smile. "Would you like to stretch with me? Allairavar's workouts are always hardest the first day back," she says softly.

Allairavar's exercises may be hard, but she looks like she's seconds from collapsing from exhaustion. If she spent this last week resting and still looks so wan and thin and weak, her initial injuries must have been severe.

MID-AFTERNOON, THE BAZAAR PAVILION
Snow drifts lazily through frigid air. Though temperatures hover around freezing, the Old Town Bazaar bustles with activity. Slowly, people rebuild homes and shops burned by the Hunter Guild, and for perhaps the first time in the past fifty years, sentiment has turned against the Hunters.

Strangers out and about in the Bazaar hear:

A landen woman, to her friend: It's not right what the Hunters did, burning down our homes, too.

A well-to-do Blood male, at a food stall: …believe what that pompous Grand Master has to say about a Queen of the Blood.

There's some commotion toward the center of the Bazaar, where the Queen has settled at the pavilion with a group of landen and Blood children. Her only guard seems to be the elegant man seated across from her at the pavilion's wooden table, his eyes watchful as the people pass by.

The Queen herself looks unwell. Though she wears a bright smile and her golden eyes glitter with laughter, they are sunken and dark smudges circle them. Her arms are thin, little more than skin wrapped around bone. In spite of the freezing weather, she wears a tunic with wide sleeves that pool around her elbows as she holds up a small plank of wood and tugs at a ribbon embedded in it. Here, in the chilly winter morning, the woman who brought some twenty Strangers across the vast distances of many worlds looks very human, very mortal, and very fragile.

Her eyes meet yours as she looks up, and you feel a gentle brush against your mind. No matter how familiar or strange mental communication is, no matter how disconcerting or easy you find it, the touch strikes you as incredibly polite. *We can talk, if you'd like,* she tells you over a psychic thread.

Should you join her, you find respite from the cold. A warming spell makes the pavilion pleasantly toasty, explaining why no one wears a jacket and, maybe, the Queen's clothes. She's dressed plainly in a loose, knitted tunic and fitted breaches. She wears no coronet and no visible jewelry except for a golden chain that tucks beneath her tunic.

Fayura offers a quick smile in your direction as she guides the end of the ribbon in her hand through the thin strip of wood in a twisting loop. She offers a soft-spoken explanation to the children before inviting them to try—and inviting the Blood to explain the magic to the landens, too.

As the children turn to their task, Fayura turns to you. "I'm glad to see you made it through the Hunters' attack relatively unscathed." She sets her plank down and taps her mug. Steam beings to rise from it and she lifts it to her lips with a sigh. "And I apologize that I wasn't there to greet you." A wry smile tugs at her lips; her appearance is, in her mind, enough of an explanation for why. "How have you found Draega?"

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Fayura grimaces. Yes, the Hunters being willing to set fire to landen homes would not mollify the Blood at all; if anything, that only made the Blood trust the landen Guilds even less. And the landens... They'd always believed the loss of lives acceptable if it meant gaining even an inch of ground against the Blood.

"There's always push back," she agrees with a sigh. "It's impossible to build trust between two groups that rightly hate each other, especially when the world is dying. Why bother repairing something if everything's going to Hell anyway?"

She runs a hand through her hair and leans her head back, looking at the domed roof of the pavilion. "This was the first project I gave the city. The ground here..." She closes her eyes, pain drawing her brows tight. When she opens her eyes a moment later, they shine with tears. "Before the Cataclysm, the Queens of Draega must have executed their enemies here. The land was soaked with blood and the anguish of the dying. Instead of asking for money for the tithe that year, I asked for time. The entire rotunda was cleared, the ground cleansed, and the pavilion built. Landen and Blood worked side by side."

Sighing, she turns to her mug. "I'd thought this might help. Give people a place to celebrate their joys."

That mug has to have answers somewhere, or at least it must look like Mordred's thinking that as she's staring at it again, a look of irritation crossing her face. Not so much at Fayura or anything around them, she's just not good at discussions like this.

“I...”

Okay, there's a word, a letter. That's...something. But she doesn't keep going, frowning, and trying to think about her words. Usually she doesn't do that, but she's pretty sure there's a right way and a wrong way to respond and she's got a habit of picking the wrong thing. Not that she'd apologize for saying the wrong thing, but she's been trying to think more since that conversation with Rider and that homunculus (even if since then has only been a couple of days at most). So she'll down her drink to buy a few more seconds of time to think and try again.

“I mean, I get it. Kind of. The world's dying, but you're the Queen, so you have to keep trying, right?”

Her head's kind of somewhere else at the moment. Camelot's wasn't that great off, people were hungry, the economy was crap due to importing and the King was still trying even if people hated her for it. There would probably be some sort of life lesson or revelation following this reminiscence but Mordred's not entirely there yet.

“And I don't think this is the worst way to try? I mean it's better than some sort of cursed execution ground.”

She's just thinking of Camlann, it's the closest frame of reference she has for grounds soaked with death and blood. Not really a pleasant thing to think about it, she'd probably have done something stupid with it if she'd won. Like a monument to her victory, not trying to change and move forward with things.

"Yes, that's it," Fayura says, her voice soft and full of sorrow. "That's..." For a moment, she almost says something else, but an old hurt flashes in her eyes, and she shakes her head. "It's a Queen's duty to tend to the land and her people, and there aren't many Queens left."

She considers this for a moment, but sees no harm in sharing more. "Of the five Queens in Terreille, one is three years old and won't be ruling anything for many years yet. Another is 4500-ish." She wiggles her hand back and forth. "Give or take. She's too old to rule and has no desire. Between me and the other two who are old enough but not too old, one wears the Yellow, and she's not strong enough to hold a Territory as broken as Hayll. No one will follow her. The other is..."

Fayura grimaces.

"She's the kind of person who wouldn't understand why having a place to publicly, or privately, execute your enemies won't help Draega. And so that leaves me." She exhales heavily. "So I'm trying as best I can and wondering, constantly, if what I'm doing is enough."

“Yeah, that's a mess.”

She sighs, thinking that one over. The kid and the old one's not a problem, neither the Queen with a yellow jewel, or at least they don't seem like one. That other one though, that sounds like there's an issue there.

“Where I come from, kingdoms usually have one ruler, so I don't really know how that all works. The former king's usually dead and then you don't have other ones hanging around.”

She may not have the best frame of reference for these things, but doesn't go on too much about it. She's not cut out to give an ancient fictional British history lesson, nor does she actually want to. But there was kind of a nice neat line of succession, even if it was by war and death until Mordred came along and ruined everything with...well, more war and death.

“This other one though, do you think she had anything to do with what happened?”

Mordred really has no idea, but she doesn't think it's entirely out of the realm of possibility if their viewpoints are that opposed.

A king? Fay has no idea what a king is. Some kind of ruler, maybe, based on context. She'll clarify later. For now, she focuses where Mordred focuses: on the only Queen who could be a potential rival.

"Lisette? No. She wears Purple Dusk. In a... a healthier world, that wouldn't be dark enough to rule a Territory. Don't mistake me: a dark Jewel isn't the only thing that draws a court to a Queen, but it helps. Territory Queens need a certain degree of strength, and if they don't have it inherently, they need strong males who will be their hands." It doesn't occur to her that Mordred might not understand some of the casual jargon that she's using even though she'd just been flummoxed by Mordred's talk of kings. "Here, now, that Jewel is dark enough to rule a Territory, but Lisette..."

Fay smooths her hands down her thighs.

"Lisette lived here when I set up my court. She tried to take my males from me. She drugged one of them and used a Black Widow's tangled web to ensnare another's mind. Because Allairavar realized something was wrong and protected those males before anything could happen, I only exiled her." There's a hardness in Fayura's usually soft eyes. If something had happened, if Lisette had hurt those who belonged to Fay...

The Blood are not kind, and there's a reason Warlord Princes step onto killing fields in lieu of their Queens.

There is just the deepest frown on Mordred's face. Not because she doesn't get it, okay she doesn't get some of the jargon, but she more or less gets what kind of person Lisette is now.

“Yeah, I get it. I've met a few people like that and...well, like I said, I get it.”

Assassin of Red and her mother come to mind, but she's not going to elaborate on that one. Like with not going into detail about kingdoms and successions, elaborating on the Grail War and her mess of a family tree isn't in her plans anytime soon.

“Sometimes exile's not enough and you've gotta do what you have to do. But if you don't have to...”

She stops, she's not adverse to killing her enemies. She killed plenty in life and in the Grail War, she kind of has to keep at it. It comes with being a knight and then a Heroic Spirit.

“I don't know. Maybe if there'd be more things like this,” she looks at the pavilion, the kids trying the ribbon, it's all so peaceful despite what just happened. She doesn't know if it'll last or not, but she doesn't hate it. Even if peace and quiet does make her a little antsy sometimes, it's not the worst thing in the world.

“Less need for exile or execution, more stuff like this, might not fix everything, but it could help. Course if people try to screw with it or start crap like those guys did, I can knock some sense into them.”

And any attempt at making a real point is derailed by her needing to attempt at being a badass anytime it might seem like she's not all fight happy delinquent all the time.

Relief washes over her face. Relief that someone else understands and agrees with her, someone who has no biases toward the world or the people. Fayura lives every day knowing her decisions can destroy lives, and when she actively makes a decision that will hurt someone, even justified, it eats at her.

Sometimes it's nice to hear someone confirm her decisions.

"That's my hope," she says. "That we needn't execute or exile people, but that we can build something new and grand out of the rubble we've been given." She smiles. She saw Mordred's point under the bold, brash words, and she likes what she hears. "Someone to defend the good things in the world is exactly what we need. I'm glad you answered my call, Mordred."

“I don't know if I'd go that far. You want somebody who goes for all that, you should've brought one of the other knights here.”

She doesn't really do the whole defender of good and all that, looking a little uncomfortable with the whole thing. She's not going to screw up and she's not going to start a rebellion or anything, but it's still weird for her to hear praise like that. So she tries to downplay it and deflect.

But that only goes on for so long before she goes to the well of trying to act all cool again. Which she just did a moment ago, but it's her tried and true method of dealing with things she doesn't really know how to deal with. Tried in that she tries it a lot and true in that she thinks it's works. Whether other people think it works isn't something she puts much thought into.

“Course that doesn't mean you can't count on me. I've crossed swords with the King of Knights, I can handle anything they want to throw at me.”

Of course she also...died, so maybe she shouldn't brag about that, but she can't take it back now.

Edited 2019-02-08 05:20 (UTC)

Fay has been around enough prickly males to know when someone is deflecting, so she lets the issue rest.

"I look forward to seeing what you can do, Mordred," she says easily, with no judgement for good or ill in her voice. "Since you've answered my questions, is there anything I can do for you?" She tops off her coffee as she asks the question, using Craft to lift and pour the pot. When she picks up the cup, her hand trembles the slightest bit.

She's well enough to be up and about, but she's clearly not entirely healed.

Mordred stays quiet for a moment, thinking about that and thinking about the way Fayura's hand was shaking. It doesn't do anything to change her answer, but she's never really seen a Queen or ruler display weakness or vulnerability like that. Her father certainly didn't, at least not in public or even with the knights (or at least where Mordred could see), so it's a little jarring.

“Nah.”

Still, she's not going to make a big deal of it though, instead choosing to not draw attention to it.

“I haven't really done anything yet that I think merits asking something from the Queen. And any questions I've had, I can ask somebody else. I feel like I'd be wasting your time with those.”

"Nonsense," Fayura says softly, giving Mordred a kind, gentle look from behind the cup. She takes a long sip of her coffee, her eyes drifting shut to better savor the dark, bitter flavor. "A Queen looks after her people. Answering questions is the least I can do. But if you haven't any, I'll return to the lesson I was giving."

Behind her, the children have largely figured out how to get their ribbons through the planks of wood, and most of the landens have had this explained to them to their satisfaction. A few of the Blood children have taken to pressing their hands against the planks with fierce looks of concentration.

"Mother Night," Verim mutters before rolling to his feet to stop any courageous young idiots from putting flesh through wood before they know how to get the flesh back out of the wood.

Fay smiles. "Precocious creatures, Draega's children. They give us hope."

“If you say so. I really haven't spent much time around kids.”

She thinks about that watching Verim run over there. She didn't have much of a childhood and what little she had was prepping her for the role she'd take on one day. In that respect, she isn't too different from her father.

And thinking about that, she'll say a little more, it's a little guarded and unsteady because she's not quite sure how to say it, but she'll give it a shot. It's not a question and she's not trying to interrupt the lesson for the children, but she feels like she needs to say it or it's going to kick around in her head all day.

“You're different from other royalty I've met. Kings, queens, I can't really see any of them out here doing this.”

Her frame of experience is tiny, but it's just something she needs to say.

“It's not a bad idea thing, just not what I'm used to seeing."

Fayura remains acutely aware of Mordred's continued presence as she stays sitting, letting Verim sort through the potential mess of children with fingers stuck in wood. He finds one and brings the silently crying little boy to her, and she bends over his hand to inspect the damage. Easily fixed, but he'll still need a Healer.

As she works, carefully applying Craft to the wood to soften it as he fights the hold and risks damage, she cants her head to one side.

"I'm not sure what royalty is," she says. The word doesn't actually translate between them, so she uses the same word that Mordred does, putting a heavy accent on it. "Or kings. But, yes, I'm different even from other Queens among the Blood." The little boy makes a shrill sound, and Fay pauses, lifting her eyes to him. "Warlord," she says quietly, "your Queen is asking you to endure just a little longer so that she may help you."

It's not what someone might say to comfort a crying child, but the boy reacts immediately. He stops trying to pull his hand free and nods. "Yes, Lady."

Fayura goes back to work. "Draega needs someone that will care for it and help it, not someone who will rule it with an iron fist. Sometimes that care is cruel. You need to lance wounds or rebreak and old injury to make sure it sets properly. But, sometimes..." Fayura lifts the plank of wood away from a raw, red finger. "Most times, you just need a bit of compassion." She touches the little boy's cheek. "You did well, Warlord. Lady Jesiree is on her way to tend your injury."

He looks proud but also relieved and, after hesitating for a second, he sinks against Fay. She strokes his hair as he cries against her shoulder, smiling faintly at Mordred. "Hopefully, what makes me different and what makes you different will be what's needed to save Draega."

“So that's really not a thing here.”

She just sighs at that one. It's going to be weird getting used to the fact that her only frame of reference for things doesn't really work here. Makes her feel more out of place than normal, which is going to get pretty annoying. But yes, things are different, she gets that, and Fayura's words to the child only prove that further.

Also a source of irritation for her is that she doesn't entirely know how to react to a kid being comforted. The whole having Morgan le Fay for a mother thing means that even if her childhood weren't weirdly short, she still missed out on having someone who was there for her and not planning on turning their kid into a weapon to be used against Camelot.

And since she really doesn't want to think about things like that, she'll handle it the way she usually handles not wanting to dwell on crap like that.

“Well then, if you're hoping I can help, I'll head back then. It's a little late in the day, but I can probably find someone to spar with.”

Some part of her feels like she should say thanks for the conversation, but that seems weird to her, so she'll just get up and wait a moment in case Fayura wants to say anything else. If not, she'll head out on her own.

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