Trance of Ternion

Trance of Ternion

Postby Tolleson » Sat Aug 23, 2014 7:04 am

The beach was not far, the sound of the surf was faint and the sand underfoot was all but gone. Where bark may have wrapped the tallest, widest trees known to any forest, here were lines of books. As if set upon a living shelf, hollowed out of the mammoths that continued to grow symbiotically, there were hundreds, thousands, if not millions of volumes that comprised this shady forest. The filtered sun flickering through leaves that shimmered and swayed on the slightest breeze. It was summer by the leaves, but a pleasant day, no, a perfect one.

Some distance in, surrounded by the majesty of the ancient forest was a figure dressed in white. Perched on a ladder, pressed against what looked to be an Oak with the enormous base of a Giant Sequoia, was a tall, thin woman. Her hair was flame, and it moved like thin silk on a breeze; it didn’t burn her or the tree, though it flickered and licked the air, snapping and emitting the glow of a camp fire.

“I’m nearly done now,” Genny blindly called down to the fae.
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Re: Trance of Ternion

Postby Pantha » Mon Aug 25, 2014 8:21 am

Is this world born from Genny's mind or the fae's? Are they inside Genny's dreams or his? The line has been blurred, the landscape sea of Genny's nightmares and the safety of the fae's forest made one long ago. She has turned this shared realm into a library when the one on the coast had been washed away so many, many times on lonely nights. Here, nature has bowed to them and Genny can store away her hopes, dreams, fears, and the fae will simply wait there for her at the bottom of the ladder, holding the books already chosen by his beloved Genny. He is patient, submissive even, but not in any sort of controlled way; she is no puppet master to him, not here. It is the patience of love, one he gives willingly and eagerly to show her his devotion. Other men might have been curious what the book hold, might have peeked down at the cover or idly flipped through pages while waiting for her, but not the fae. His beautiful face if turned up to watch her, his being wholly unchanged from that of the physical world where, short hair and all. Genny might see herself here as an idea with flaming hair and poise on what might have been treacherous in waking hours, but the fae, even here, holds some thread of narcissism when it comes to his projected self. He waits there in the shade at the base of a great tree, one of many great trees, ready to help her down and take the newest tomes and add them to the stack he carries. Overhead, hidden by the canopy and fluffy, white clouds rolling in from the coast, is a large, violet eye instead of a sun, watching innocuously.

In the physical realm, they had finally fallen asleep sprawled out on her bed, the fae having dozed off next to her as she read on into the late hours of the evening. Even here he had waited for her and waits still as her obsession carries over into sleep. Somewhere in his back there was likely the pointy spine of a book slipped free from her hand but he couldn't care less.
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Re: Trance of Ternion

Postby Glenn » Tue Aug 26, 2014 6:14 am

You are adrift, a sailor on a sea of imagination and deep-seated terror.

You do not get hungry. You do not get tired. You do not age. You cannot die.

You feel sensation. You grow in memory. You grow on memory. You see and hear and remember.

This is your existence and it has been for either months or moments or an eternity.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Elliot Brown was lost. He had been lost for quite a time now. At first he had been contained within Galacia Tarin's jewel, within the dreams of its wearer, the transformed Lady Marshall. Then Niall broke that, and though he had latched on to a familiar face's dreams once or twice, he was mostly lost amongst the souls of Myrken Wood. Like a moth attracted to a flame, he was drawn towards bright souls, to dreams full of thunder and bluster, like lighthouses, the only things one might see in the distance. He could not always navigate towards them, though, but he was getting better.

Each and every day he was getting better.

These were dangerous dreams, though, not a pastoral walk in a purple grove or the half-recalled memory of a trip to Derry. These were dreams containing all of Myrken's very worst, all of the world's very worst threats, and some of the very best things as well. He'd come to expect anything, to meet it and the dreamer head on, to make the best of it all, another adventure, another chance to grasp at least a little of what he once had.

And so it was now, here in this dual dream, this compound fantasy, this thing that should not be, that a cloud shaped peculiarly like a young rogue would stare down at the forest, would edge ever closer to the trees.
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Re: Trance of Ternion

Postby Tolleson » Tue Aug 26, 2014 11:33 am

It is ever the pleasant, pastoral scene, as if masterfully painted or expertly sculpted. Though the environment was not entirely realistic, it was crafted with care and detail. The leaves were different, the ground was soft in some places, hard in others, small sticks lay about, and the breeze whispered through the branches. But then this was the work of two minds, this was done with effort and purpose. Though Elliot had surely seen some of the darkest inner sights, felt terror, there was some unease than crept here. A silent trouble, a much different sort of danger, perhaps even more perilous given it’s innocuous appearance.

Genny, so acclimated to the presence of others in her dreams and in her mind wouldn’t notice the lost soul creeping in the trees. Rather, her attention was entirely on the fae and the books she had been filing and pulling from the strange library.

She descended the ladder with the grace of a dancer and brought only one, small, title-less, and weightless volume to add to the small collection that grew in the fae’s arms. The last few rungs were skipped and she simply hopped off, the ground swelled up and, almost like a pillow, caught her. With her skirts puffed up, for a mere second she might seem a child, but then the ground relaxed and fell back into place and so did she. She was lovely here, more Catch’s idea of her than the true version of her younger self. A graceful girl, not the too skinny, bony, pale, bumbling, and tumbling mess she truly was.

“six-thousand one-hundred and eighty-seven, but I haven’t counted to see how many are still lost,” the figure was more an offhanded notation, as if talking to herself more than directly communicating with the fae. Continuing a previous conversation she had been having, perhaps with herself.
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Re: Trance of Ternion

Postby Pantha » Thu Aug 28, 2014 5:48 am

The room where they sleep, while still cluttered and messy beyond what a normal person might find acceptable, has improved drastically under the obsessive eye of the fae. He seems accustomed to living among so many collected articles and with his own compulsions, he knows what to leave alone and what he may clean. In the weeks that he has lingered at her bedside, she would find her clothing cleaned without asking, her forgotten cups of tea collected, and all of the other chores that she had neglected are sorted. Here, all he can do is try to protect her.

In the sky, the clouds part and rays of brilliant rays of not-sunlight filter down through the boy-shaped cloud as the Seeing-Eye watches and assesses him casually. Below, the fae and his white-clad woman seem oblivious to the intrusion, carrying on as if he is merely another manifestation of their shared fantasy. This place is not perfection, however, and the strange words about lost books only underscores the danger lurking unseen but felt. Whatever her words mean, the fae seems to understand, taking it with a somber nod.
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Re: Trance of Ternion

Postby Glenn » Thu Aug 28, 2014 6:00 am

There were such rules in dreams. Had he meant malice, he would have been all the more constrained. Galacia herself was, but then she was a thing of malice, a fairy creature who was bound in the way such things were. Elliot Brown was something else entirely, and by his own nature, he never thought that he meant harm. No, he was a being of necessity, who had to bring truth to power or power to truth or just bang on a lot of things until he was heard. Lately, though, he had drifted from one dream to the next and he learned quickly what harm he could do. The truth hurt and sometimes it wasn't worth the hurt. It depended on the person and it depended on the truth. Solena might have told him more about the value of such things, of acting when it made sense to act and showing restraint at other times, and it took this imprisonment to even begin to learn that lesson.

Sometimes it blunted him. Others it made him more precise, deadlier.

That was with strangers, though. This was entirely different. No, today he needed to be heard, and be heard he would. He knew a thing or two about this tree, about Zilliah, his friend Zilliah, which was a title he chose and that nothing the fae could say could divest him of. He knew more than most, though far less than Genny. Genny, who he knew less, not that such a thing would stop him, errant teenager that he was. He was tempered by these last few months, but he was still himself, and he thought he knew more than what he needed to.

He needed to be heard so he would knock. It was convenient that this dream had provided him a door. It was made less convenient by the fact he decided to hammer onto the side of the tree instead. Cloud gave way to rogue-ling, clothes Galacia black, visage carrying a usual gleam and grin.

The knock was stylized, four beats, a pause and two more, but that was hardly the worst of it. No, the worst was that it reverberated. It stayed with all who heard it. Until one went and look, it would be there, nagging the back of the brain, demanding to be answered.
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Re: Trance of Ternion

Postby Tolleson » Thu Aug 28, 2014 8:13 am

As if another thing nagging at her brain was really necessary. But she is safe. Both here in the forest library and the organized mess of the apartment where her meager physical form slept. She knew she was safe, so it is not to the source of the knock that her attention darts. Immediately her eyes are upon Zilliah, a curious glance as if he had begun an unexpected game. And perhaps if this had been a shared, waking space she would have waited, would have listened.

But careless, resting dreams were harder to control than the landscape of the waking mind. And nightmares, even more so. In short, that was how Zilliah has saved her, he gave her a safe space to rest, to loosen the grip she had on the flow of her thoughts.

So, without restraint she neared the rogue, to say she stepped or walked closer was not quite right. The movement in dreams is rarely so deliberate, though in some graceful manner, she traversed the distance. Part floating, part dancing, part walking, and part simply vanishing from where she had been to a mere two feet away from the knocking rogue. If the door didn’t give way immediately upon her approach she would open it.

“Elliot?” Her question was not to the rogue himself, though she looked him straight in the eye, but to Zilliah; as if the fae were responsible for making him appear. She didn’t frown so much as the slight smile she had fell away, her own clouds began to grow darker and more populous above. A low rumbling of distant thunder rolled with a memory too similar to the forest where they stood; the bloodied, comatose Ser Elliot, laid out on the small wooden cart that she hauled through the forest. To Zilliah.
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Re: Trance of Ternion

Postby Pantha » Fri Aug 29, 2014 10:12 am

Where is Elliot? Zilliah had asked that very question not but a few days ago to Niall and Gloria. Had his waking questioning conjured up the night-time shade? Genny questions if it is the fae's doing, even face to face with the apparition as she is, and she would find the answer more in his actions than in his words. The books are hastily places in the leather pack slung across his shoulder and he is up after her, eager to collect her before the oncoming storm. Even the tree feel it coming, the bark beginning to grow over the edges of the shelves to protect it from the storm surge that had completely decimated the coast time and again.

The sun of his eye can only do so much against the clouds as they form but there is no longer a need to watch from afar; Elliot would be confronted by the flesh and blood thing wide open on the fae's brow, the pupil dilating in its blood-gold and kohl daubed socket as he tries to establish a link with whatever this is playing at Elliot Brown. What reaction would the sight of his body laid out, of Zilliah reforging that wrecked face and those brown eyes for him on the lawn of the Great Tree, the very Great Tree he means to collect them into shortly, would the intruder have? Friend, Elliot had called him friend. He had railed against such a title when the boy had first insisted on it, but now, he must surely think him a one to allow him to be here in such an intimate place.
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Re: Trance of Ternion

Postby Glenn » Fri Aug 29, 2014 1:55 pm

"Genny?" It wasn't his first word, usually. No, he had a method to this, trying to derive whose dream he was in first and foremost, each and every time. He wasn't the sort for routine, not even training which was generally erratic but effective, half to Solena's chagrin and half to her masked pride. Once he figured out whose dream he was in, it got a lot easier. Cobblers dreamed of one thing. Bakers another and so on. Victims, victims had their own sort of dream too, and in Myrken that felt like a job all its own. Those were the second most dangerous by far, worse only by those of the men and women who created such dreamers.

Then came the body and then came something else entirely. The Fae. "Zilliah?" Elliot had no formal training in dreams. Galacia hadn't told him much of anything. She was more the 'lounge about on black silk sheets' sort, but he wasn't entirely think and with months to pay attention to one strange fantasy after another, he started to pick up some patterns. The body was ignored, amazingly so, because frankly, they were even more amazing still.

"Whose dream is this?" It was violent, an accusation, for something was very wrong. He'd learn to tell the dreamer from the dream through instinct, through patterns, through trial and error and this? This wasn't right at all.

It was an interesting question. It was an important one. It was a shame then, that there was another distraction. The body from the memory, made tangible by the dream. Elliot looked down at the young knight in the cart, not recognizing the moment but perhaps understanding the connotation, the clothes. He understood enough, just enough for him, which was never enough in general, and then, with a cool glare, he began to stomp repeatedly on the prone body.
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Re: Trance of Ternion

Postby Tolleson » Sat Aug 30, 2014 9:28 pm

A baker, a victim, a villain, and a simple, easily overlooked girl; what sort of dreams did Genny have?

Zilliah knows the storm that nears, the reckless and uncontrollable cascade of emotion, often too overwhelming to wrangle even when awake. In minutes the woods might be little more than tree tops stretching to keep their upper branches above the flood. The fae’s name is spoken and he is soon beside her, but she needn’t look to know. Her eyes remain fixed upon the accusatory invader.

Pain had saved Ser Elliot. The fae’s blood and her own blinding agony. She had wanted to scream then, her lips had pinched until they’d gone white, biting back the sound. Even now it made her flinch, sending bright and burning flashes of lightning crackling across the sky.

Whose dream is this.

Did they dream? Logic failed to find anything more than the reality of the developing memory, and an answer failed to find her lips. This was a precise moment, Zilliah’s tree and the grassy glen. The bloodied boy laid out and suddenly she was filled with recall of all that had brought her to this point. It came rushing back as surely as the thin wash of salty water began rushing over the forest floor. Some of the details are lost, and others with exaggerated emphasis. Catch was close to her heart, and so it is no surprise that his was one of the most analyzed, detailed, and well-remembered moments. A mere second of reality to fill long minutes with more that just physical pain from when Catch had punched her. Then dread upon witnessing the blood in the grass, Noura vigilant at a bloodied Elliot's bedside, and Cherny tagging along through the trees. Her own perspective and assault of emotion follows, from the death if Niall on the lawn, the bloodied hands, reporting the murder, everything that had brought the three of them to this moment.

Almost like ink, bleeding down the white dress, her clothes turn black. Changing a dress to loose pants and rolled sleeves, the mercenary colors complete with the subtle smell that had disgusted Zilliah. As if recreating the entire memory to be relived in this new and twisted version, superficial blood crawls from the once damaged eye, down her cheek and drips onto Giuseppe’s clothes.

Except her eye was fine. She stared on, growing angry, perhaps without realizing the change.

“You’ll hurt yourself,” she scowled, as if it were the most natural thing in the world to say. After all, they had sacrificed a great deal to save him. Reaching out instinctively, she would seek to push him back, to keep him from landing another blow on the embodiment of memory.
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Re: Trance of Ternion

Postby Pantha » Tue Sep 02, 2014 2:15 pm

Genny can hardly take the pain and he reaches out to her, a hand pressed on her arm so that he might steady her in midair. Were they still among the trees? Or were they in his glen now? The sound of rushing water brings them back from the scene and he only then takes notice of the blood seeping over the white gown and from the socket of her eye. Had anyone else seen her like this before other than the fae? Had they ever seen Genny be upset with someone for not being thankful of her kindness? His own smile darkens and the laugh that comes out is dark instead of mirthful.

The warning that comes from her lips is echoed by the fae, “You will hurt yourself...” and he actually lets go of her so that she can fly at him, to stop him from injuring the memory of the sacrifice they had both made. The fae never expected thanks for anything that he does and he can only stay back and marvel at the fire in her spirit. It also gives him reprieve to take notice of the water swelling below them. The massive trees have already let bark grow over their shelves of collected books to protect them from the flood, a flood made worse when the growing clouds finally crack with thunder and let spill their angry downpour. And still Elliot might not know whose dream this is.
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Re: Trance of Ternion

Postby Glenn » Tue Sep 02, 2014 2:32 pm

"Genny," he played with the word. Of the two of them, he had been far closer to the fae, WAS far closer to the fae, because he had to think that way: IS not WAS. Always is. Always will be. Never was. Never had been. Never that. "Genny. Pretty good heart. Everyone's sister. I never liked my sister." She was scowling at him and he didn't seem to care in the least. "It's a good look for you. Black clothes. Blood dripping down. It's a good look for a sister. I'd teach you to pick a pocket if you asked nice."

He held out his hand. There was water coming down, but this was Elliot Brown and he could dance between the raindrops. Solena had taught him as much, but here in the dream, he could live up to the ideal. He could do more than that, though; he could steal them. The water flowed down between the leaves, but instead of washing everything away, it pooled tighter and tighter, more and more dense around his hand. "Zill. They washed me away; why can't I was him away, here and now?" No rain touched anything, but it was all there, in Elliot's fist, and with it, with the rage and angst he held, he could wash away the whole damn world.
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Re: Trance of Ternion

Postby Tolleson » Wed Sep 03, 2014 2:47 pm

Zilliah had steadied her, but unlike the waking world where a touch might soothe or restrain, they are already near. In many ways he is a part of her, so his action does little to sway her. They were among the trees, the glen, even the ocean crept in; it was all of these places in pieces, shifting. If Elliot only knew, it was both of them, fluctuating in delicate equilibrium, a careful balance, like walking a narrow ledge as winds from two directions danced or fought against one another.

So apt at riding the waves of her emotion, absorbing them, becoming them, the fae laughs. But though her anger grows, it isn’t directed at Elliot or even Zilliah. If only it was appreciation she craved, perhaps the wrath of the storm would be more merciful.

Brown’s continued presence slams into, cracking and shattering the memory, especially now as he rambles on about sisters. But with the unconscious Ser Elliot fading she falls to her knees grasping at shadows that she might save him, too caught up in reliving the moment, carrying on as if the path is too well worn to deviate.

Eventually he is gone and she is left searching the emptiness before her in the rising tide, she sits, but she rises too. Occupying nearly the same space, there are now two of the flame haired girls. One that scowls on at Brown and then down at the one who sits. Zilliah would recall many instances before, of her child-self, the awkward young pie-maker, but two of this Genny. Had he ever seen her this way before?

“Elliot, Elliot, Elliot. He’s washed away, he's washed away,” the sitting Genny laments aloud nearly weeping, as if the words suddenly erased him. Rather like Ser Elliot had done with Brown in another time and another place.
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Re: Trance of Ternion

Postby Pantha » Thu Sep 04, 2014 3:47 pm

Elliot throws around threats and Genny falls into pieces, actually splitting in half as she spirals into madness when they had otherwise been having a pleasant evening. Brown has ruined it and the fae's mirth at him is short lived when he sees his Genny suffering for it. He joins the side of the glaring Genny, leaving the mourning embodiment with his back turned to it.

He faces Elliot now, his face coming to mirror Genny's but his voice, his presence, becomes more alive, more tangible than his companion, “You are not the usual shade of Brown who haunts us.” And here he gestures behind him to Gahald. “She does not know you the way I know you, Elliot, so I am certain you are not a ghost of her making.” His expression is still the same but his head cocks to the side in curiosity. Above them, the clouds part and the angry violet eye that has been watching, ever watching, is glaring down at them all. The dream-scape becomes a field of clover, gone is the water, the trees, and the remembered bloodied scene on of his glen. “Why and how is the specter of Elliot Brown here?” He lifts a finger to stop the boy, “And do be polite and quick about it; I would hate to have to wake her up if you make this nightmare worse.” His wrath coalesces into a saccharine sweet smile.
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Re: Trance of Ternion

Postby Glenn » Fri Sep 05, 2014 6:04 am

"You know this is a dream?" Elliot still had the power welled in his hands, or the storm, the water, which in this place was power. He was before Zilliah and then he was behind him. "And she's the one sleeping." There were things he saw in these dreams, strange things, monsters and wonders, and the most mundane things in the world. That's what it was most of the time, someone standing in line to get food, gardening, endless gardening. Farmers were the worst. That would have been his life; even this was better than that. Rarely, though, did he find someone so aware.

Zilliah wasn't human though.

"What're you playing at, Zill?" He squeezed his hand tightly and the water seemed to absorb into his skin. A moment later he was hovering. "You think this is a trick, huh? Maybe. People get tricked here. Everyone's a rube. Everyone's a patsy. The whole world is stacking the deck against us. Look at me. So it's always a trick. Thing is, you're the one doing some tricking too, and you're more afraid of what you're doing than what I'm doing, so whatever you're doing has to be pretty bad. I see you, all squirmy like you're in a barncat in heat."

Perception shifted and he was suddenly between the two Genny's, floating ever so slightly, his hand slipping down to snatch theirs if they'd allow it and frankly, even if they didn't. That's why it was called snatching. It should have been impossible, as they were in two different places, but somehow, through the lens of the dream, it worked. There was only one of him but he was in two places at once, or the two places had become one, or there was just a fold between them to bring them closer. "Don't look at me like that," this to the scowling one. He would start to rise now, floating giving way to flying. "Do you know what your brother feels? Do you know what I do? How can you live without knowing?"
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