event: a gentle web

[thestewards]

I've lived a lot of different lives
Been different people many times
I live my life in bitterness
And fill my heart with emptiness

► The OOC plotting post for this event can be found here.

► Direct all questions to the mods at this link.

► Characters can speak with Fayura or Verim in response to her request or her web. If you would like to speak with them, please add a prompt to your top-level or as a comment to your top-level. A thread with Fayura can be requested here. A thread with Verim can be requested here.

STRANGER SUMMONS
In the morning
You wake to a feeling of unease. It’s not the room, which is comfortable and well-appointed, if plain—much like the guest room of a hotel. A note rests on the nearby bedstand, inviting you to breakfast with Queen Fayura, her court, and the Strangers who make their home with her, and it lets you know you can ask the many footmen in the twisting halls of the Queen’s Residence for directions.

That isn’t what leaves you uneasy, no.

There’s a strange flavor in the air to those both new and already present. Some of the Strangers who have been in Draega for a month or more will recognize this unease as the psychic flavor of the Queen’s emotions. Fayura’s dark presence fills the residence, and while it is normally calm and steady (if a bit wrinkly around the edges, like an exuberant young woman rumpled from her activities), now it is outright unsettled. Because her presence is so strong, because it permeates the very rocks of the bizarre building, it changes the mood in air.

Breakfast is lean: little more than thin porridge, glasses of milk and water, and carefully rationed cups of fruit preserves. The Queen’s Court, those of her First Circle, look wan and hungry. There is as much unease between them as in the air.


In the afternoon
Around midday, a psychic call touches the minds of each Stranger in Draega. Fayura’s mental presence slips along your own, quietly seeking permission to speak to you mind-to-mind, and when she has it, she says: Come straight to the Residence if you are not there already, close your minds to every thought but the beacon I leave for you, and speak with no one, not even your friends.

The beacon is a mental loadstone calling you to the Queen’s Residence. When you arrive, you’re ushered not into the Great Hall, but into a little used room. Here, the Queen holds formal court, something she rarely does.

Though witchlight and candles fill the room with light, a psychic darkness creeps across the floor. Tendrils of ice fill the spaces between the old, hardwood floorboards. Frost spiderwebs across windows and over the walls. In spite of this, the room itself doesn’t feel cold.

At the end of the room, the Queen of Hayll sits on a simple stool. Gowned in black spidersilk, she looks like midnight come to life. To her right stands a frame two feet by two feet: a tangled web simply woven. At its heart sits a Jewel chip. Should you probe it, you find its color and rank difficult to determine. Red, but not. Something darker, something strange, something that isn’t quite right. Her Consort stands just behind her, his golden eyes glazed.

“A coven of Black Widows has come to my city,” the Queen of Hayll tells you once all the Strangers are assembled before her. “They broke a young girl who had the potential to be a Queen when they tried to kidnap her last night.” A wave of fury ripples through the residence, something dark and dangerous—a dull roar from the abyss in the mind from which the Jewels’ power springs. “I have never directly asked you to put your lives in danger, but I ask you now: find these Black Widows. Bring them to me or bring them to Grand Master Niall or Lord Grejor, whomever you trust more to mete out justice, but bring them.”

She gestures to the web beside her. “A Black Widow rarely shares the webs she weaves, but I will share this one with you.”

Fayura's web Trigger warnings: mental assault against a child
Webs of dreams and visions are not concrete things. To weave them, a witch steps to the side in her mind, looking through the veil of madness to read possibile futures. But Fayura’s web doesn’t tell of possible futures. It recounts a single past, a vision pulled from walls that echo with a child’s agonized cries of pain and fear.

Three spiders crawl through the night. They chitter and clamber. They weave their wicked webs in dark corners of the city, ensnaring minds. They search, they search, they look, they seek, seek, seek, probing dreaming minds, peeling back shields around vulnerable minds, tasting the air for the earthy flavor of a Queen. (this one this one take this one to rip and rend)

They find her— is that her? —a girl that is a Queen but a girl who is not a woman— too young to have her adult strength it makes her sweet so sweet —young enough to be woven into a new shape— CON­SUME HER DE­STROY HER

They sing to her from the Darkness, but she doesn’t want to go, she doesn’t want to leave her dreams or her family her home this place this city it’s not dark but it’s Dark and it feels right and good there’s more right and good in the Darkness than in the dark corners and she fights and she pulls and she won’t go, she won’t, and she—

White
Yellow
Tiger Eye
Rose
Summer-sky
Purple Dusk
safety that's safe
it's safe there it is
it's safe it's safe
it's safe it's safe
it's safe it's safe
it's safe it's safe
it's safe it's safe
it's safe it's safe
it's safe it's safe
it's safe it's sa

She flees into the sanctuary of her mind, where the Darkness is a caress around her. She plummets past the White and the Yellow, and the Black Widows give chase, thrilling to the scent of fear.

One peels off with a shriek of rage.

Deeper, darker darker, where the abyss is quieter (quieter still deep below in the frigid depths of the BLACK and she reaches reaches for a presence deep below her) and full of Summer-sky power—she can’t go much further, her web is made of Purple Dusk, but the other doesn’t slow. The little girl slams through the web of her mind, shattering it, collapsing the abyss with a scream of power, flooding her body with more power than it can contain.

The spiders withdraw. Their prey is no good to them like this, but maybe they’ll feed on the corpse of her mind later, filling it with nightmares until not even the Black Widows of the Lady’s court can piece the little girl back together.

beneath them far beneath them a quake of power a profound fury a silent song of rage and sorrow that spirals and shivers

TANGLED WEBS OF FEAR AND LOATHING
This Black Widow coven has left tangled webs throughout Draega. These webs snare the minds of light and dark Jeweled Blood and Strangers alike. In many of the webs, the mind of a captured victim assumes an active role within the vision contained inside the web, forcing them to live through the vision. Landen minds can’t be trapped by tangled webs, but their moods and actions are certainly affected. Until the webs are cleared, they will radically alter the behavior of landens throughout the city, twisting their behavior.

Fayura has tasked you with not only finding the members of the coven but with removing the tangled webs the Black Widows wove throughout the city. The events in the web can be changed—much like with lucid dreaming, you need only realize you’re trapped within a tangled web to change the course of its vision or to escape it, and then, when you understand it, you will be able to destroy it.

A Web of Violence Trigger warnings: female on male rape, sexual violence, impending death

run

run

run

RUN

breath burning run faster faster legs aching heart hammering pulse pounding throbbing throbbing throbbing

She’s behind you, you know she’s behind you, hungry for your body and your mind, but you can’t slow down. Your sister, you think about your sister, who just barely wears the White. You need to be there for your sister. She could be a Healer, she could be more that what the Blood have become, she co—

An acrid psychic scent hits you, sour and sharp and seductive. You want her and you hate her as her power slams into your back and throws you into a wall.

A second later, she’s on you, her nails ripping through your skin as she tears off your clothes. You try to shield with your Purple Dusk, but she’s stronger than you. Shields shred like butter beneath her hands. Skin parts and opens and burns. She jabs the snake tooth under the nail on her right ring finger beneath your skin (the rough edges of all her rings cut into your bleeding flesh, and you scream before she muzzles you with an aural shield) and pumps poison into you.

Your panic spreads it faster. You feel the poison in your limbs. You’re going to die. You know you’re going to die. She’s climbing onto you, and you’re going to die like this.

A Web of Desire Trigger warnings: dubcon, sexual assault, assault, sex work, abusive relationships

You were pretty, once. You paint your lips with red paint made from the venom you milk from your snake tooth during your moontime, and you smile. Your face is hazy in the mirror, but your lips are red red red (he wears the Red, and one day, he’ll see how much you love him and he’ll love you, too) and males love red lips. Red mouth, red body, red between your legs when they ride you too hard.

You were pretty, once, but that doesn’t stop them from pushing you down. You watch the ceiling as they pant and groan and heave above you. This will keep you safe. This will keep you alive and fed. There’s nothing left in the wilderness except dead, dry desolation. Same as the desolation inside you. You’re not a Queen, but you feel it, too.

You were pretty, once. You remember what it was like to smile and watch a male’s blood drop from one head to another. You remember the power you had before they used you up and left you dry, before they wrung the joy from loving someone else. You love him, and you wear him close to your heart.

You were pretty, once, and then you told him no, not tonight. You were pretty, once, until he held you down with Summer-sky power. You railed against the Darkness for letting him be just one rank darker than you as he took your beauty from you. A blade over your eye and down your cheek. Sharp edges in your arms, across your breasts, cutting new roadways of pain all along your abdomen.

You were pretty, once. With red, red lips and a smile that drove males to their knees before you, but now red repulses you and your love never came for you. But in this memory, things are different. You are not you. You are someone else, and you can escape the one who wants to cut you.

A Web of Innocence Trigger warnings: domestic violence, violence against women, blood, implied medical torture

You’re five years old, on a ship that rides the waning waters of the Heartsblood River. Your face to the wind, adventure on the horizon. Papa calls out to you, and you turn, running barefoot across the deck to him. He holds his hands behind him, and you jump around him to see what he hides. A shield hides your prize, but Papa is kind, and once you close your eyes, he puts something soft and warm in them. You cry out with delight, opening your eyes: a stuffed animal in the shape of a puppy. From Draega, he tells you, where the landens make amazing things.

You’re 12 years old when you meet him. He’s landen but he’s smart and he makes you giggle and blush, and you give him the stuffed puppy you’ve cared for all these years and he gives you a blue ribbon. You wear it until it falls off your wrist, and then you go back to Draega and buy another.

You’re 20, at the altar in Draega. You want to wear the Sapphire, because Sapphire reminds you of the landen boy, but no one gets Birthright Jewels that dark anymore. Still, you squeeze your eyes shut and hope and hope and hope and hope and pray and pray and pray until you bite your cheek and taste blood. A wish offered with blood is a prayer to the Darkness. That’s when you smell the smoke. You know you should run, but you have to finish your Birthright, you have to succeed, you have to complete it, so you struggle and struggle and struggle. The fire takes your eyes but you take the Sapphire.

You’re 21 and you’re with him now. Your family disowned you, but you don’t care. At last, you’re happy. “Can you tell me our future?” he asks, and you weave a web that shows you with two Sisters but no husband. You lie and tell him something pretty.

You’re 27 years old, reading fortunes not just for your husband but for the hypocrites among the Guild. The Guildmasters come to your husband in the dark and pay him for your visions. He trades the money for drink and comes home stinking of alcohol. Even their Grand Master comes to you, the young prodigy they all adore. “Tell me how to ensure the Blood don't destroy the landens,” he tells you, and you give him a vision of Ebon Askavi and a song that resonates deep within the mountains, growing louder with every passing year. He strikes you hard across the face, but you know he’ll go to the Black Mountain within the year.

When you’re 29 years old, your husband drags you to the Medico Guild and leaves you there. “Weave, little spider,” their Guildmaster says, and you weave because they hurt you when you don’t, turning on their muters and cutting into your skin to see what color you bleed. You weave and weave and weave, pressing deeper and deeper into the sanctuary of your mind until at last you break yourself when you drift down below your inner web.

You’ll kill them all one day. You’ll leave them broken on the floor, eternally sleeping in puddles of their own blood. But you need to find a Queen, and the Queen you want is here but she isn’t ready, not yet, so you’ll wait ten years or find another. You’ll make her understand, you’ll make her see what you no longer can.

AIR TIME
Whether you catch the news on a Far-caster in the city or you're spinning the dial on your own device, you'll hear…

etiquette with evandra and aren
[Today, Evandra speaks softly and slowly. Sorrow thickens her throat and stretches her words into brittle filaments.] How do landens deal with Black Widows, Lord Aren, when even the Blood can be destroyed by them?

[Aren, too, is quiet.] Trust is—

[Evandra, sharply:] The Blood always speak of trust! What good is trust so often broken?

[Aren stumbles over his words.] I… that is, as Blood, we… We rely on Queens… [He trails off.] You are right to be furious. Nothing can be said that repairs a shattered mind.

the weather
[A soft-spoken man’s voice rumbles out of the Far-caster. He’s pleasant to listen to, with a soothing cadence to his voice.] …flooding along the banks of the Heartsblood River to the southeast. The river walk will be unsafe for the next week, and pedestrians are advised to take great care if they want to walk it. Interested in sailing? The Transport Guild…

the news
[Garret speaks with his usual briskness, but his temper snaps behind his words in a way it never has.] The Ebon Council and Guilds have spoken out against Queen Fayura, demanding to know what use a Queen can be if she can’t keep “undesirables” out of the city.

[Wilt sounds hollow.] While the Ebon Council demands the Queen's Court do more to guard the city’s gates, the Guilds have announced their intention to build a large-scale muter that would suppress the power of the Blood within a two-mile radius of the city. A spokesman from the Tinker Guild says they’ve already begun work on this device.

[Garret:] Indeed. The Strangers’ support for the Guilds the past few months…

Comments

a web of desire (locked to close CR; CW for extreme canon assault)

[theladyofwinterfell]

( Sansa has devoted herself to helping Fayura and her Court in any way she can in the past two moons she's spent in Draega. She's spent days in the poorer parts of the city, helping to cast warming spells in landen houses. She's helped negotiate between Blood and landen over both food and politics and when the Queen asks her to help dispel the webs left behind by this coven of Black Widow witches, Sansa volunteers.

She only wishes she'd realized how dangerous it would be. Thinking there would be no physical harm to her person, she'd not hesitated to volunteer. It's only when she's trapped within the web that she sees that it's not a physical harm but a mental one; Sansa's mind is her treasure and as soon as she touched the threads of the web, she'd become paralyzed with fear.

It starts with someone else's face, someone else's body, but it twists until it's Ramsay wielding knives and Ramsay smiling his slick, evil smile. She hears the knives sharpening against leather, hears him laugh when he says he'll make her a good wife who does her duty for her husband. She doesn't want to be Reek, does she? Oh, oh no. There's only parts of her he needs and he takes glee in dragging the point of the knife between her breasts and curves it around to come dangerously close to a nipple. He thrusts his fingers into her, dry, as he debates whether or not she needs both breasts, if she needs all of her toes. Sansa hates giving him the dignity of a response and she doesn't when he's atop her, doesn't when he seeds her.

She screams and nearly bites her tongue in two when he draws the edge of the knife along the curve of her left foot and she swears that he likes this more than he likes anything else. His cock no longer makes her react but his knife does and he threatens to plunge it in her after she's given him the son he needs. Sansa wishes he'd just do it now and end this. )

No...Ramsay...no...no please...I've been good, I was good, I'll never run, I'll stay here with you, I'll never run.

( He reminds her that she did run, though, ran to her bastard brother at the Wall and fled from him before he could give her his son. He tells her that she'll never run again as her feet are slick with blood and tells her that after he fucks her he'll let the whole Bolton army have a turn - the lowborn and the highborn - and that every man and boy from the Wall to Moat Cailin will have their turn in Sansa Stark and for each bastard she bears him, he'll take away something else she loves.

It goes quiet, though, as she goes away. She goes away inside her mind where there's snow falling and her family lives, where she never went south and never thought to marry a king. The snow swirls, White and Yellow, Tigers-eye and Rose. Sansa falls as the snow goes Purple Dusk all around her and stays but there's claws of Opal beneath it, Opal too deep for her to touch. What if she went there? Would Ramsay be gone there, deep in the Opal? )

[sunborne]

i;; get your bearings.

[ well. the web was an experience. that's all daylight can find himself describing it when it's all said and done, his processors reeling and his core spinning almost too wildly from its own good.

daylight leaves the room, almost stumbling but not quite. if anything- he's clearly determined, clearly ready to try and tackle what's been placed ahead of them all. if he was left shaken from being drawn into the web, daylight can only imagine the terror the young girl must have felt when forced into that.

that bit is what upsets him the most, however. daylight is unsure of what to do, what to think when he mulls over the information. he knew that the city was, um, volatile in a lot of ways he isn't used to. but for a group of adults to harm a child so badly...

he wonders what his parents would do. what his friends would do. he would give up a servo and then some if he could get their advice or even some assurance that he's got this because, right now, he doesn't feel like he's got this. not when his processors are reeling at the ramifications that have occurred.

the first thing he decides is to slide up to the nearest stranger and gauge how they're doing. he's not exactly subtle with his height and colour but there's no mistake in the concern in his face, the worry that seeps through him- he wants to make sure the others who experienced the web are doing okay. ]

Hey... How are you holding up? Need anything?

ii;; not into the parlour just yet.

[ when called upon to look for the coven who did this to the young girl, daylight is all gung ho in tracking the black widows down and bringing them to justice. his conversation with fayura was an informative one, allowing him to mull over the angles he could tackle for the assignment.

the thing that stuck out to him the most was the fact webs could be found around almost all of draega. a lot of webs too. so someone must have seen someone making those things. dragea strikes him as the type of city that never sleeps, so somebody knows something. he just needs to find a way to get people to start talking.

he thinks he's found a possible lead to follow after some (careful!) snooping around the most web-choked areas and use of his avaform. but, like all good things, there's a catch to what he needs from the folks and that catch requires a bit of help.

hence him approaching the nearest stranger he can find, hoping they can give him a hand- ] Hey! Hi! Can we talk? This is, like, super important! I swear!

iii;; all hands on deck. (network option.)

[ some time into the investigation of the black coven, certain folks might be getting this message, wether they're meant to or not: ]

Hey! Sorry for the sudden message and all but hi. I’m Daylight, just in case we haven’t met and stuff. (And if we have and this is super redundant and stuff - Sorry! It’s been a hectic few days. @ w @)

Anyways - I heard from others that you were also looking into who could be part of the Black Widows coven. Do you wanna, like, compare notes and stuff? See what we have in common?

iv;;; wildcard!!

[ want to do something else? feel free to do it here! also, you’re welcome to hit me up/plot with me via my plurk prognostic if there’s something specific you want. ]

[garmr]

_-nsa..^Sansa-

[His voice is a distant echo. With it comes warmth in the snow. The comfort of furs and wool cloth against an icy wind. The pleasant heat of a sunny day breaking through the chill of winter. The flicker of campfires - numerous enough to look like stars in the sky. The dance of happy company, enjoying the fleeting joy of victory with each other. An attempt to beckon her away from the claws.

The Opal-tinged snow contrasts by growing hot, seething, like a cooking plate getting too close to the hand. It is a molten crucible. A bright inferno. Tongues of dark hellfire. Half a web shield and half a blunt instrument of will, trying to pull her away from the precipice. As much as fire can warm, it can also warn of impending danger. Guts can't say he's good at gentle applications of Craft, but his message is clear: Turn back. Stay the hell away.]

Sansa!

[theladyofwinterfell]

( Sansa recoils from the scalding hot of the Opal, wrapping herself in Purple Dusk but ascending no higher. She feels the warmth of the campfire and the beckoning of the flames and she wants to go to it but she's still so afraid. Here in her wintry world, her family is alive and she's safe from Ramsay. Ramsay cannot cross the snow, cannot chase her through the thick blanket of Purple Dusk all around her. Where she is, he cannot follow.

She hears the voice, though, and that isn't Ramsay. She strains to hear it again and finds it, touches the thread of it. )

Gu...Guts? Is that you?

[unwieldy]

I. CLOSED to jonathan.
cw for bullying, violence against a minor.
[ The first time Haein comes across a tangled web, he isn’t careful. He slips into it, his mind easily ensnared with how unprepared he’d been, and he finds himself somewhere else, in a memory that isn’t his.

Five years old. Papa calls out. Haein turns, but the man is a stranger to him. He doesn’t have a father, doesn’t know what’s like to have one, so where does this feeling of delight come from as the man places a stuffed animal in his hands? He’s five and the web twists. Someone is pushing him to the ground, and he feels his palms scrape against asphalt as he catches himself. He doesn’t bother looking up to see who had pushed him, keeps his eyes trained to the ground as the other kids laugh and walk past him, calling out taunts that make tears burn at the corners of Haein’s eyes. He doesn’t have a father. He holds the tears back. He’s five years old and he’s too old to cry.

Twelve years old. Haein stares down at the blue ribbon on his wrist as he thinks about the landen boy. His cheeks feel warm, and then it shifts to a stinging pain. He holds one side of his face, his gaze vacant as he stares at nothing while a man screams down at him, his hand raised for another go. You fucked it up! You fucked everything up! The man’s face is a horrible shade of red, his eyes bulging from his head, the veins on his neck straining to burst. Haein is twelve years old and he’d fucked it up indeed, mangling the man’s wish to harm the woman he’d been sleeping with to protect her and her unborn child. The world is full of monsters and they teach Haein how to hate with everything he has.

Twenty. He can’t breathe, the acrid smoke choking him as the fire licks away at him, burns his eyes. He’s in so much pain he thinks he’s going to die. Tears stream down his face, and he can’t remember the last time he’d cried this much. He gasps for breath, but it gets stuck in his throat. Haein had thought he could trust Hyunseok. He’d been happy for the first time in a long time. They were supposed to be friends. Maybe... maybe even something more. Something one-sided on Haein’s part. But Hyunseok had betrayed him, accepted that cursed talisman, and used Haein like everyone else had used him. He’s twenty and his heart, which he’d thought had been absent before, breaks. He leaves it that way.

Twenty-one. He’s happy. No, she’s happy. Haein is twenty-one years old now and he’s the furthest thing from happy. He pushes against the tangled web, tries to call out for help. This isn’t his. He can’t be here anymore. ]

II. TANGLED WEBS OF FEAR AND LOATHING.
[ He's more careful this time. His hands shake with the memories of his first run-in with these webs, his skin sickly pale with the shock of it all, but he can't let that stop him. Having seen what they can do, having experienced it, he knows he can't just hide away and hope they disappear on their own. They need to come down. All of them. It's a bitter, hostile resentment that has him working to pull down as many of the tangled webs as he can.

His anger drives him to seek them out and destroy them. They've shaken him up something awful, memories both unfamiliar and too familiar assaulting his senses. It had been an invasion of his privacy, an attempt to make him vulnerable, and they'd done it. Haein who keeps his personal matters locked up, who shuts out everyone and everything, had found himself exposed and helpless. Unacceptable. How dare they.

As upsetting as the news had been about the broken girl, it paled in comparison to Haein's own selfish feelings. So he works with an almost obsessive fervor to find the tangled webs, and doesn't shy away from pulling in other Strangers to help him remove them. ]

There are two here. Get that one. I'll get the other.

III. WILDCARD.
[ come at me with anything else you can think of and i'll get right back at you! ]

[strikingtwice]

Stranger Summons - Morning
The moment that Meallan wakes and realises that this isn't his chambers, he's up and out of the bed, checking that his things are still here, that the window is open and a possible exit if he needs it. Then he calms enough to look around more carefully, taking in the note and trying the door to ensure it isn't locked. He can't shake the feeling of unease, however, and creeps out of his room on silent feet, scanning the hallways and rooms before he enters. The fact that no attack comes does little to put him at ease and, when someone else appears unexpectedly, he starts and falls back in preparation for combat, palms outstretched and his left glowing faintly green.

"Who are you? What is this place and why was I bought here?"


Tangled Webs - Searching
All of this is a lot to take in, but it is far from the first time that Meallan has found himself thrown into the middle of a mess and having to adapt to it all as quickly as possible. He picks out the important parts first and decides to focus on them. There are people here that are have hurt and trapped others and placed traps around to do so again. It's important to find these webs and help destroy them and free anyone trapped.

It seems easy enough, although there's a faint sense of doubt and uneasiness that continues to tug at the back of his mind. He has to admit that he's not terribly familiar with what these webs look like or how to destroy them, half hoping that they're not too different from the webs of giant spiders and that a good bit of flame will help.

He's grateful that he's not alone in this, however; the Queen insisting that they travel in pairs at least and Meallan glances over at his assigned partner curiously. Maybe they know more about this than he does?

"Have you ever done anything like this before?"


Tangled Webs - Violence - cw: blood
Not knowing what exactly to look for, Meallan isn't entirely clear on the signs either. It strikes him as strange when he sees several Landen running from an area, one of them snarling and shoving at him when he tries to stop them to ask what the problem is. That makes it clear that there's a problem at least and Meallan darts and weaves past the running figures towards--

--away, running as fast as he can, legs aching and lungs burning with each gasping breath, his bare feet cut open by rough stones and sharp crystals of bright, bloody red catching and slicing through clothes and flesh, shining anew with his own bright blood. He knows this place, but the castle is twisted from what he remembers and red crystal grows from the walls, the ceiling, the floors, the flesh of the dead scattered around the halls. The doorways he expects are broken and caved in or overgrown, and Meallan can only run on and on, knowing that running cannot work forever. He can hear pursuit behind him as he bursts out into a courtyard, overgrown with thorns and twisted trees. The leathery sound of wings fills the air until the sound itself is a force buffeting him, throwing him against the sharp edges of this place and leaving him sprawled and panting on the ground. It's going to end like this, his racing heart seems to scream as a hand as big as his head, seizes him and lifts him bodily, he's going to die like this, alone and afraid and forgotten--

[championbittersweet]

He's more cautious, familiar with this place and how easily it seems that the webs can catch and twist around the unwary, trying to remember Lady Fayura's words of caution in the past to prevent himself from rushing in with a burning rage to find who has done all of this. So when the web wraps around him, Jonathan allows it, letting his anger simmer and reminding himself he needs to understand what he's facing and how to destroy it. He braces himself to recall that the visions are not his own when he finds himself watching the scene instead of living it.

He doesn't recognise the boy at first, his expression creasing into a frown at the laughs of others, cruel and terrible, and then the ringing slap against an older boy, barely in his teens and--

He knows that face. The realisation freezes him in place as they jolt further forward again, the boy turning to the man he knows before his eyes and he can feel the betrayal in the air like a palpable force, pain and broken trust, and Jonathan reaches out with a growl and grabs for the younger man's shoulder.

"Haein! Listen to me!"

[garmr]

Yeah.

[He's a little amazed that his attempt actually works. A more adept magic user may have a better way of coaxing a frightened mind out of its shell, but he wasn't that. The best he had was his voice and his own stubborn willingness to go through those dark pains with her. The scars of suffering raked across her mind in ways he found more familiar than he'd ever admit. Guts knew this kind of pain couldn't be forced through - she needed to work through the web with her own strength.

But now - where to go? How do they get out? He keeps his own mind focused on the tenets of that same memory - the beacon of flickering fires against the cool night. He assumes this snowy land was her home - Winterfell. He didn't know the people that inhabited it, but he remembers the way she spoke of it with fondness. The rare loyalty of a kind leader.]

You can't stay here. People need you out there, remember?

[theladyofwinterfell]

( Guts' voice is soothing to her, for all that it's a bit rough, and Sansa inclines her head to it. The Purple Dusk snow all around her is comforting and she wants to stay in it but his voice is telling her to come out, telling her that people need her out there. She wants to stay in here but people need her? Her? )

I'm afraid, Guts. It's safe here. It's safe in the snow. Nothing bad ever happened to me in the snow.

tangled webs - searching

[burn_with_us]

Katniss has been assigned in a pair with someone she doesn't know but that in and of itself isn't shocking. She keeps to herself, for the most part, and there's a lot of people in Draega she only has a passing familiarity with. The man she's with now seems steady enough, for all that he looks different from her, and she gives him a grim smile. The month or so she's been here has told her that nothing is what it seems and that this place is a powder keg that only needs one spark to blow.

"No, I haven't. We don't even have magic in Panem, so this whole place is foreign to me." She's wearing her Summer Sky Jewel and she hopes it's enough power to cleave through whatever web has been woven. She's angry that a little girl got hurt because of these Black Widows and it leaves a dark stab of hate in Katniss' scent; innocents should never be touched by war.

[unwieldy]

It's like being in a haze. Confusion clouds Haein's mind, and he tries to find some clarity by distinguishing between what's his and what isn't. The sudden grip on his shoulder as well as the call of his name seem distant. His eyes are unfocused at first, like he's not sure where he is, what's going on, or if the man in front of him is real. Another memory...? It couldn't be. He doesn't remember this.

His gaze drops down to the grip on his shoulder, and then his eyes go wide. Recognition strikes him and Haein's hand shoots out to grab at Jonathan's arm, the one holding onto him, and he tries to fight against the panic threatening to claw its way up. A lifeline. He can't let go. He can't go further into the tangled web.

"What—" His voice fails him for a moment, sounds hoarse, and then he tries again. "What are you doing here?"

[yesterweek]

A. AFTER FAYURA'S WEB

[ Calvin has been pretty quiet all morning long, and while his initial emotion was a sort of quiet confusion his entire demeanor has slowly changed over the course of the morning. He's far from the only person in this room who is angry right now, and compared to a lot of people his anger seems pretty mild. He's not the type to scream, yell, and carry on with violent gestures in a rage, but at the same time he's not the kind of person who really manages to instill terror in someone with a silent fury.

Don't misunderstand, whether he's all that intimidating or not he is quietly fuming, his jaw clenched as he takes in the scene, the vision, the information he's given. He wouldn't consider himself a particularly noble guy, but he did help raise his three younger siblings. He has a soft spot for kids, and this entire thing makes him sick to his stomach.

He doesn't have much to offer in way of power, but if he can just help track down whoever did this...

Calvin approaches whoever is closest and doesn't look completely lost at how to go about this. ]

Any chance you know how we track them down?

B. AFTER A WEB OF INNOCENCE

[ The experience of stepping into someone else's vision was jarring enough earlier when he was expecting what Fayura had to show him, but it's more jarring now, especially with how disjointed the web is. Piecemeal bits of a life very unlike his own come to him, and while he feels angry about the injustice of it in the moment he experiences it all, when the visions fade the foreign experiences aren't hard for him to step away from.

This isn't his life. This isn't anything like the life he's lived, and despite the fact that he needs a moment to lean against a wall and catch his breath after all of that, the anger he feels begins to quickly fade, leaving him feeling sick and anxious as he straightens up.

If that was the vision of the Black Widow who did this...

Calvin reaches up to touch the white gem hanging off one of his ears, the visions of blue still swimming in his head as he scans the crowd in front of him.

Even if he's got a clue of the person who did this, even if he can find her, he's completely outmatched. He needs help, and the very first person he recognizes from being at Fayura's court he's making a beeline for. ]

Hey!

[ And a little louder now. ]

Hey hey! Hold up!

[mollymocked]

[Molly wears such a dark Jewel that these webs have seemed such paltry things, but he's gotten caught in them too- just the once. Once was enough. He fought his way out of it and has only grown more irritated at the concept. This whole mess is a disaster and it was bad enough when it was him.

Now it's someone he cares for.

The world goes green, springtime trying to peak through the snow. He's becoming a fair hand at shields and that's what he offers first. This is too delicate to just rip down.]

Hello, darling. [There's a relief when he feels like the shield is working, keeping her safe in a bubble of hastily manufactured encroaching spring with all the warmth and promise it contains.] Can you hear me, Sansa?

[championbittersweet]

His eyes widen in faint surprise as Haein latches onto him, and while Jonathan knows that it's driven by fear and a desperate need for rescue, he's still grateful that it's one less thing to worry about. He imagines it will be fight enough to get out of here.

"Trying to deal with these webs, as you are," he answers, although he can feel it pulling at them both, seeking a way in to twist and undermine--

--and for a moment there's a voice echoing through the air, chanting that he'll never be able to forget now: "A prayer for the summoned by warring song, a child born from darkness must take scent of his path..." and a ghost of fangs in his neck and burning heat through him--

Jonathan snarls and shakes his head as the visions shimmer and shift, and his grip tightens on Haein's shoulder. "Don't let them in! Remember where we are, remember your hate for me if you must, but do not give it anything to use against you!"

[theladyofwinterfell]

( Spring is something that is a longed-for dream, something that Sansa doesn't see in the bleak white of winter. Winter is her home and her friend, yes, but spring is something that reminds her of new hope and new beginnings. She wants to touch it, to feel the warmth of sun and blades of grass beneath her feet. When she hears the voice calling to her she recognizes it and turns toward it. )

Molly? Is that you?

( Ramsay is still there, clawing at the green and trying to take it from her and she shrinks away. Ramsay doesn't have the spring. Ramsay is autumn, red red autumn, and he cannot have her during her winter or her spring. )

[strikingtwice]

"You don't have magic where you're from?" He's started to get his head around the fact that people here come from different worlds and places and that it may not be what he's used to, but there's knowing that and knowing it, it seems.

"At all?" He's curious how that would work really. It's the sort of world that some of the more extreme templars and their supporters would dream of, but Meallan can't picture it, and not only because of his own magical abilities. "I can't imagine not having healers available or ways for the aravels of my people to travel faster."

b

[championbittersweet]

[There's enough general unease and heightened tempers that Jonathan is certain that a web is nearby, but he's limited to the shadows himself and scanning the crowd for anything that stands out. The sun is past it's peak, but still bright enough to burn him even with Fayura's protection and the limit chafes at him.

He's relieved when someone calls out to him and he spots another stranger waving at him. They haven't spoken before, but he'll welcome any possible lead right now.]

Is something the matter?

[unwieldy]

Haein has already given it so much to use against him. This thing knows him now. It knows him better than anyone else and for someone as private as Haein, it's jarring to think about. He hadn't freely given up his memories, they had been taken from him and then used as some kind of painful reminder as it made him relive some of the cruelest moments of his life. Jonathan's own whisper of a memory is proof of that.

He concentrates on Jonathan's words along with the feeling of fingers pressing down on his shoulder, and he squeezes his eyes shut as he tries to remember. A dream. No. A snare.

"I'm trapped inside one of those webs," he admits. There's a tremble in his voice, but the admittance seems to immediately change the landscape of the vision into something less foreboding, the web curling in on itself as the realization is made. He tries to draw on something, anything. His hatred for Jonathan seems like a faraway memory compared to what the web had shown him.

bbb

[unwieldy]

[ The unfamiliarity of the webs as well as a general carelessness on Haein's part had really fucked him over. He'd fallen into one of the webs and quickly lost himself inside. It had taken some effort and outside help to free himself from the trap, but the damage his own memories had caused him still linger.

It's why he works tirelessly to pull down the rest of the tangled webs he comes across. He understands now how they work, and how to destroy them. He keeps a Purple Dusk shield close for protection, and tears them down one after the other.

He's so focused on the task that he barely registers the voice calling out to him, and when it becomes a little louder, Haein finally turns.

They have to stop running into each other like this. But unlike before, when Haein had been determined to be the biggest jackass in the history of ever to Calvin, he looks a bit distracted. ]

What is it?

[championbittersweet]

His fingers dig in sharper as Haein closes his eyes, Jonathan afraid he's slipping back into the trap, but instead of a new memory, the web seems to shudder around them and draw back. He still doesn't trust it in the slightest and Jonathan tugs Haein slightly closer and behind him, although he's certain that it doesn't matter to this particular trap what he does. This is all in their heads, after all.

"Try a positive memory," he offers, scanning the area for some sign of how to undo this trap now they see it for what it is. "There must be a way to escape and unravel this."

[unwieldy]

There's no way Haein would normally allow this kind of physical contact, but he's too distressed to protest.

A positive memory...? He tries to think of one, but draws a blank. The memories he had with Hyunseok are all tainted now, and he searches even further, digging deep into the recesses of his mind. He thinks of his mother, looks past all the difficulties they faced, the times he'd been left home alone because she had to work, the struggle to show him motherly affection due to never receiving any herself, and he finds something.

He can't be older than seven in the memory. The walk back home isn't long, and Haein is surprised to find his mother home from work when he arrives. She looks tired, dark circles under her eyes, but she still smiles when she looks up from the couch and sees Haein walk in through the front door.

She calls for him, pats the empty seat next to her, and Haein reluctantly goes. He sits down, and she brushes his bangs out of his eyes. An action he's not used to, and it's even more strange when she takes both his hands in her own. He wants to draw them away, but her hold is firm.

She tells him she has received a promotion, and she looks radiant as she breaks the news. They can move out of their small, cramped apartment. They can start a better life, she promises. Haein doesn't think he cares about any of that, but the way her voice sings in excitement makes a small smile tug at his own lips. He likes seeing her like this. Her happiness is infectious, and she goes into great detail dramatically describing the future ahead of them.

The web peels back even more as Haein basks in the warmth of his mother's optimism. He's starting to understand how things work as he uses it to his advantage, bending it to become his own. He had forgotten about that memory... All those years after he'd been so consumed in his hatred that he'd lost it. It serves him a kindness now as the web collapses, and an escape presents itself when Haein wills it.

[yesterweek]

[ A literal stranger this time, but there's some comfort in seeing a bearded older guy. Calvin is young enough that he's still experiencing a lot of "I need an adult-- shit I am an adult" moments, and someone who at least has a look of competence is a big relief right now. ]


No! Yeah, I mean...

[ Give him a second to gather his thoughts. He's still reeling a little from just having experienced someone else's lifespan in bits and pieces here. ]

I just... one of the webs. I just saw inside one of them, and I think I maybe have an idea of what to look for?

[yesterweek]

[ Destroying webs is probably beyond someone of Calvin's ability to do alone. He's been practicing magic here and there, but he's not good at it. Regardless of how weak his jewel is, he just doesn't seem to have a natural gift for it either, and it takes him several attempts to get even the most basic things right. It's frustrating for someone who is used to learning cerebral things without a ton of effort, and magic feels like it should be more intellect based than anything else.

That's a different issue for a different day, however. He might not be good at magic, but he thinks he can be decent at finding a suspect that fits the bill. He just needs help.

Only... he didn't really want Haein to be the help he found. Still, beggars can't be choosers, and Haein in theory has magic a lot stronger than what Calvin does. So when he takes a deep breath before continuing. ]

If you have a moment, I think I could use your help. I think-- I mean, I don't exactly know, but I think I might be able to figure out who one of the culprits are.

ii

[arrogator]

What is it?

[She's honestly not in the best mood right now. Or anything approaching anything close to any sort of tolerable mood. She's pretty furious about this whole mess and wanting to go out and drag the culprits back here in whatever sorry state they're in by the time she's done with them. But she'll listen for now.]

Important or not, make it quick.

[unwieldy]

[ It should annoy Haein, having his time taken up by someone he decided early on was worth little more than dirt on the bottom of his shoes, but his interest is piqued when information about the culprit is brought up. A suspect for whoever is doing this? Someone to blame for what had happened to him?

Sign him the fuck up.

Haein turns his full attention to Calvin now, a dangerous glint in his eyes at the potential for exacting some sort of revenge for the hell he had been put through. ]

How?