[pfsb] investigations and explorations

[blue_ajah]

Two days after Moiraine brought Wei Wuxian's talismans back to Twin Peaks, after she has taken the time necessary to review all of her notes as well as the histories she has been collecting, she calls Dale Cooper, who is still in Olympia, now, rather than Seattle.

All things considered, the conversation could have gone much, much worse.

She is well aware that they are going to have a much longer discussion after he returns in a few weeks, but he had agreed not to ask her to wait. She, in turn, had agreed, as before, not to go to Glastonbury Grove alone, or at night. She also agrees not to approach the pool closer than necessary to place the talismans, or to test it with her own weaving - not at present, anyway.

Hawk had been her next call.

A few days later, after he has had time to consider and to consult with the Bookhouse Boys, Hawk knocks on her apartment door and agrees to her request.

* * * * * * *
When Moiraine returns to Milliways, she leaves a sealed note with Bar, addressed to Wei Wuxian.

Master Wei--

I made the trial of your talismans according to your instructions. When I activated the one at the northernmost point, glowing red energy swept inward from the circle in a wave focused on the pool at its center.

The pool absorbed it all. It vanished into the depths without a ripple, and without a trace.

Nothing else has happened. Yet.

--Moiraine Sedai

That task completed, she settles at her preferred table with tea and begins sketching something in a notebook.

Comments

[we_bring_hell]

Harrow rises early by habit, but by her own clock; she is used to a scheduled governed by the clock and not by a sun. It is hard to discuss the relative nature of time between three distinct chrono-asynchronous locations, but from Harrow's perspective it is still early enough for the lines of her makeup to still be knife-sharp.

She is exploring some of the options the Bar has made available to her--still within her ebon color pallet and her requirements of modesty, but for instance black denim and a black turtleneck meet her needs without being the standard Drearburh habit. She is not wearing gloves, which is outlandish license. The leather of her journal feels strange on her hands, accustomed as she is to wearing them.

"Greetings, Moiraine Sedai," she says calmly, accepting a cup of tea that she makes an effort to remember to drink.

[blue_ajah]

"Lady Ninth," she says. "Light illumine. How are matters with you?"

She makes no move to hide the sketches and writing in the notebook in front of her. In addition to circles and notation that may be familiar, there is an additional circular drawing not unlike a clock face. It is marked with twelve equally-distanced dots, and has a black coin-sized ring at its center.

[we_bring_hell]

"Matters are... in hand," she says. "I have continued to review my notes on the Lyctoral process. I have also put in train a device to communicate with this location from beyond my door. Neither have come to anything worth speaking of yet, but I am not dissatisfied with my progress."

Her black eyes flick over Moiraine's notebook. "What has occupied you, if I may ask?"

[blue_ajah]

She inclines her head in acknowledgement and assent, both.

"I am pleased for your sake, then," she says. "I myself have been somewhat occupied with continued attempts to translate common weaves to the new notation, after the model we have developed, and with initial investigations into ... certain phenomena, in the world where I reside."

[we_bring_hell]

She raises a white eyebrow. "Phenomena?"

Not just phenomena. Dot dot dot certain phenomena. Color her intrigued.

[blue_ajah]

"Yes," she murmurs. "It seems the best term for it, at present."

Her fingers rest lightly on the edge of the clock-like drawing.

"Tell me, Lady Ninth, are there places in your world that are known to be altered, somehow, from the normal state of things?"

[we_bring_hell]

"Indeed," she says slowly. "It might fairly be said that I grew up in one, and have departed it for another."

"But it depends on what you mean by altered, I suppose. Haunted?"

[acrookedpath]

Because he forgot to take the potion Ingress gave him, Wei Wuxian awoke with a vicious hangover, still in the too-snug clothes Madam Bar gave him, and would have reintroduced the entirety of last night to the floor if he hadn't fumbled the vial's contents into his mouth in time.

Once his head was clear and his stomach settled, he realized Lan Zhan still wasn't there.

Taking a shower and changing back into his robes did banish the last of the fog from his mind, but it did nothing to make Lan Zhan appear -- and by then, it was late enough in the day that he doubted he would see him at all until the evening. So much for his attempt at courage. So much for... a lot of things.

(How much worse has he made it already? Did Lan Zhan think he abandoned him? Did he decide he would be better off in Cold Pond Cave when he arrived at the inn and Wei Wuxian wasn't there?)

All of which is to say that he is already in a foul mood when he comes downstairs, hair still damp from the shower, and finds Moiraine's note waiting for him. Wei Wuxian takes a long, long breath, rests his forehead against his palm, and closes his eyes until he is sure he won't do anything rash.

Then he gets up, walks to her table, and unceremoniously drops the note on top of her sketch.

"Is every word written in here true?" he asks.

(She is oath-bound to speak the truth. Not, necessarily, write it.)

[blue_ajah]

She glances at the paper, confirming that it is the note she had left him and that none of the wording has been changed, then looks up at him.

"Yes," the Aes Sedai replies. "It is."

She appears neither surprised nor troubled at the fact that he had sought to double-check this, as it happens.

[acrookedpath]

Secretly, as with her initial descriptions of the disturbance, he'd hoped she would say no. That this would just be a further ruse he could walk away from. Besides, he promised Lan Zhan he would bring him along next he talked to Moiraine --

-- but Lan Zhan isn't here, and hasn't been here the whole night. May never have been there at all.

(May never be here again, whisper his worst thoughts before he boxes them up tight.)

His shoulders sag. Abruptly exhausted, as if the Serpentine potion had done nothing at all, he drags a hand down his face and drops into the seat across from her.

"All right," he says. "Then you were right: there has been no suppression on it. At the very least. And I do not like the sound of absorbing energy, either."

[blue_ajah]

“Nor do I,” she says, mildly.

“I suppose I should be grateful it is not Shayol Ghul, but I do not like it any more for that.”

[acrookedpath]

"Shayol Ghul?" he repeats, frowning.

[blue_ajah]

"It is a mountain in the world where I was born," the Aes Sedai tells him.

"There is a place within it where the Pattern thins enough that what is outside the world and time itself can affect that within the world. It was of great importance at Tarmon Gaidon, the Last Battle."

[mm_lorna]

Nearby, Gideon is stuffing herself full of fried paradoxes.

It's clearly not her first course of the meal, either: there are several plates clustered on the table she's commandeered, mostly scraped clean. Unsure of what else to do, she'd spent the morning doing press-ups and sit-ups out in the sun, then jogged around the perimeter of the woods surrounding the Bar and its surrounding buildings, so when she came back in, she was ravenous.

But now that's she's nearly finished eating, she's not sure what to do with herself, and is idly considering asking the Bar for some comics or dirty magazines to pass the time with when she glances at the next table over.

The jewel on her forehead alone is probably worth every dusty treasure in the Ninth's ancient coffers. And she's sketching on real paper, not just flimsy. Gideon, who has spent her whole life talking smartly back to Crux and Aiglamene, finds herself feeling unaccountably shy.

[blue_ajah]

After so many years, both here and elsewhere, the Aes Sedai has developed a fine sense for noticing when she is being observed.

“Light illumine,” she says, and only then does she look up at the other woman. Moiraine blinks, once, and dark eyes narrow slightly in sudden interest.

“I do not believe that we have been introduced here before. Would you care to join me for tea?”

[mm_lorna]

Gideon is suddenly grateful for her dark glasses. That look reminds her a little bit too much of the way the Warden stares at a rock or handle that isn't the age it should have been.

But Harrow had said the people here could be...allies, and Gideon isn't stupid enough to pass up the chance to meet someone who isn't tied up in Canaan House's bizarre test, so she nods and gets up.

(She brings the paradoxes with her.)

She'd wheedled permission from Harrow to forgo her vow of silence, but, sitting down, she realizes she's not sure what to say anyway.

[blue_ajah]

With court-perfect grace, she pours a cup of tea from the service at her table and places it in front of the younger woman.

“I am Moiraine Sedai,” she says, “but you may call me Moiraine.”

Even this close, it is difficult to tell her age, precisely. Her manner is calm, even serene.

“Are you new to this place?”

[mm_lorna]

"Oh!" says Gideon, and relaxes. "Okay, yeah. Harrow told me about you."

There's something of the Fifth in the way Moiraine Sedai pours the tea and in her perfect courtesy, but that just makes Gideon think of Marcus and Abigail and that just makes her sad.

"Yeah," she says, pushing the thought away and taking the proffered tea. "Pretty new."

She's never had to introduce herself before. Everyone on the Ninth already knew her, and Teacher did it for her at Canaan House. It's probably the polite thing to do, though, right? "Gideon Nav."

[blue_ajah]

"I am pleased to meet you," the Aes Sedai says. "Be welcome here."

"I have grown to regard the Lady Ninth - Harrow - as something in the nature of a colleague, as it happens, although I am not a necromancer."

[herald_ingress]

Ingress breezes through the bar on the way to some convenient thread in her continuity! She's in Herald Whites, her sword at her side, and her usual pleasant expression on her face.

"Oh, hello, Moiraine," she says when she sees the familiar woman. Ingress was probably a teenager in her greys, rushing back from the House to Valdemar, the last time they met here.

[blue_ajah]

"Ingress," she replies, with a smile. "Light illumine. It has been some time, has it not?"

She indicates a seat at her table with a graceful gesture, clearly inviting the younger woman to join her.

[herald_ingress]

Ingress takes the seat, because actually, Moiraine might just be the perfect person to ask about this new found compulsion of hers to visit Milliways more often.

“It has. I trust you’re well?”

[blue_ajah]

"As well as might be expected," she replies, and pours Ingress a cup of tea.

"And yourself?"

[herald_ingress]

“I’m well,” she says, grinning as she takes the cup of tea.

“I’m a full Herald now. Megwyn and I have been riding circuits for the kingdom for over a year.”

[blue_ajah]

"I am pleased to hear it," the Aes Sedai says, with a hint of surprise in her dark eyes.

"Time has passed indeed, but I suppose you are hearing that from several people here, are you not?"