abraxaslogs | EVENT #3: AN EXECUTION OF SORTS

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EVENT #3: AN EXECUTION OF SORTS

THE EXECUTION

As if performing a vicious mockery for what should be a somber day, the sun shines brightly in the sky. The rays of sun catch the iron brackets that hold up the gallows that have been erected overnight for the occasion, the gentle breeze causing the noose to swing ominously. Public executions do not happen frequently in Thorne, so a crowd gathers in strained anticipation of the grim sentence.

The welcome guests, who have up until this point been free to come and go within the confines of the castle, have been mandated to view the execution. It is meant to serve both as an example of Thorne’s power as well as a lesson to those who might think to try the same. The courtyard, which was buzzing with quiet murmurs, turns silent as Ambrose strides up the wooden steps of the gallows, flanked by two guards and a haggard-looking Jonathan Sims, arms bound behind him. As the guards march their charge to the trapdoor that will serve as executioner and position the noose around his neck, Ambrose turns to address the crowd that has gathered- willfully or not.

“Citizens of Thorne, our esteemed welcomed guests, it is with disappointment and a heavy heart that we’ve gathered to see to the execution of one of the very guests we sought aid from in our time of need. In a selfish and distrustful act, I was attacked, an action I cannot abide.”

He turns halfway toward his charge. “Jonathan Sims, you are charged with assault and intention of lethal harm. The punishment is to be hanged by the neck until you are dead. May the gods have mercy on your soul.”

Ambrose raises his arm to signal the executioner to pull the lever to release the trapdoor beneath Jon’s feet, steely expression locked on the prisoner’s face one last time.

MEANWHILE

Several miles away, atop a hill in the forest, two figures meet between portals. Oliver, tall and lithe, steps out to stand next to a petite waif of a woman who looks at him with a familiar smile. Her voice is lilting like a songbird’s when she speaks up, turning her gaze back over the city.

“Find out anything good?”

He hums softly, his hands clasped behind his back. “Two dozen prisoners, give or take. The one I met was very grateful for our assistance.”

“That’s good. Perhaps her gratitude will endear our cause to them.”

With a nod, he takes a deep breath and then sighs. “It’s time, Elizabeth,” he says, lifting one hand to open a new portal.

She nods and raises her arms above her head, eyes closing in concentration. Her arms begin to glow green while the grass around her begins to ripple in rings. The very ground seems to surge with power that radiates outward from her, and it isn’t long before the castle and the town are engulfed in a heavy air of intense magic. It courses from her in shockwaves.

Satisfied, Oliver steps through the portal.

In the wake of the magic flood, the walls of the dungeons seem to shudder for a long moment, and the doors suddenly clink open. No guards come rushing in to shut them, and in fact, all ambient noise in the dungeons seems to stop as the whole of the people of Thorne freeze in place. The hall becomes lit by daylight as a portal opens at the end of it, showing them the crowd of welcomed guests and Jon alone on the platform.

In the portal, alone stands Oliver, hand offered to the prisoners in welcome. His smile doesn’t reach his eyes, though this seems to be by nature rather than intention.

“Please come with me.”

CHOICES

Everything is happening quickly.

Once through the portal to the execution yard there's a moment of chaos and confusion at the sudden arrivals and then it stops. Everything and everyone has stopped, save for the guests, the prisoners, and the two mages who have come to their aid. Guards freeze in place. The attended mages are still as statues. Banners lifted by the wind remain where they are and even the noose hanging from the gallows stills.

"Time for them is halted." Oliver addresses the assembled, his voice projected to be heard but his tone calm. "It will remain so for one hour, no more. An hour is all you have to make your choices. Remain here in Thorne, or take a portal to either Solvunn or the Free Cities. The portals cannot be traced by the Thorean authorities, so no need to fear them giving chase.”

Elizabeth emerges from a portal behind him, which closes as she enters the yard. They both raise an arm and two white circles spread through the air, showing new towns in the distance on the other side. There is an ethereal glow around them.

“The Free Cities are martially powerful and seek to destroy the Singularity,” Oliver narrates, gesturing at one of the portals. “Solvunn is reclusive and claims neutrality, both in politics and in regard to the Singularity. I advise that you think hard about your choice. Travel between cities is not exactly easy."

He turns back to the crowd with an almost apologetic smile. “I'm sorry you don't have more time to make this decision. We’ll meet again.”

Opening a third portal with the wave of her arm, Elizabeth, who has not spoken a word, gives the group a wink and leaves with Oliver. Their portal closes behind them, leaving everyone to begin making moves.

Now is the time to make serious choices. Two portals stand in the courtyard, one courtesy of Oliver and one of Elizabeth. The Free Cities and Thorne are enemies, Solvunn watching both to see where the cards end up falling. None trust one another, none work with one another beyond trade through middle-men in Solvunn. The clock is ticking.

Someone should probably get Jon out of that noose.

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Ronan pauses in his work to look at Kylo again. Yes, he knows, none of this makes any sense. Though he takes the sword, he immediately sets it aside. VEXED TO NIGHTMARE is a hungry blade, always eager for a fight, and he's not going to draw it on Hennessy until she gives him no choice.

"She has to stay with me," he tells Kylo, turning back to Hennessy with the towel. "She won't survive on her own."

Edited 2021-09-17 08:46 (UTC)

That might have been a difficult sell before the still ongoing attack on Thorne's sovereignty, and there's very little way to tell how their hosts will react once the spell holding them frozen in place wears off. If it wears off. But Ronan already knows that, or he wouldn't be impressing the necessity on Kylo here and now.

It's looking a lot like Kylo's gained another ward— or at least like Ronan is hoping he can convince Kylo to take her on. His lips press together, jaw working on a response.

"This is what you meant about the dungeons," he mutters eventually, indicating the oilspill sickness Ronan's mopping from Hennessey's face. "If they had her held down there you will need to give them a reason to release her, Ronan."

"She's a dreamer," Ronan says. What damned them back home is the same thing that makes them indispensable to Thorne. "If they like what I can do by myself, they'll shit themselves over what Hennessy and I can do together. I'll make it work."

The trouble is, he's not sure Hennessy will. There's absolutely no reason for her to avoid doing everything in her power to take him down with her. She's already done it once. That's what Kylo's getting at.

Ronan leans closer to Hennessy, addressing her even though she's shown no sign of recovering from her paralysis yet, "The people here can help us. They can help you. It's not like it was with Bryde, so just... Give it a fucking minute and don't do anything psycho."

Hennessy feels rather like doing something psycho the longer the entire embarrassing scene goes on. She'd flinch away from Ronan and his damn towel if she could, his ongoing tenderness feeling like hot coals of shame heaped upon her head. She doesn't understand why he won't just let her go, though it becomes clearer once she hears him plead his case to Kylo.

Of course. Of course it wasn't about what she could do, or even his patronizing concern that she's somehow incapable of surviving when she'd done just fine without him for years. It's about what she could add to Ronan's already impressive power. He can't have been here much longer than her, and already he's impressed the people in charge enough to be allowed to roam free and found himself a magic bodyguard-slash-boyfriend besides.

Her limbs still don't work -- pathetic, honestly, for such a mundane item -- but she manages a scowl and, coughing weakly to clear the remnants of nightwash, rasps out a single word.

"No."

Edited 2021-09-17 17:22 (UTC)

Ronan probably doesn't need to see the look on Kylo's face to feel it shift in layers of concern. It isn't simply the rasping venom of Hennessey's voice, but the vicious, outward-turned hurt he can feel twisting behind it.

Dangerous.

"You can't want it for her," he reminds him, likely unnecessarily. "If she isn't willing to help herself, trying to save her will only doom us both."

Yes, both. Ronan's safety is no longer his own, as far as Kylo is concerned— and not just because of the effort they've made to have Thorne consider them each vital to the other's success.

It's a risk Ronan is willing to take for himself, but it's that us he gets snagged on. He's not alone anymore. Until now, he's been nothing but grateful for that. Kylo's always there, whenever Ronan needs him, ready to guide him and protect him and make him better. Ronan owes him the same, at the very least.

He can't make this Kylo's burden.

"She does want it," Ronan insists, ignoring Hennessy's protest but tossing the filthy towel aside. She can clean whatever's left on her own. "She wouldn't have brought something back if she didn't want to save herself."

If Hennessy could hear Ronan's thoughts she'd be in full agreement. She has negative desire to become anyone else's burden, which is exactly why the thing she brought back is designed to take her as far away from Thorne as it's possible to go.

She shoves the suitcase over and struggles to sit up with entirely more difficulty than seems reasonable given the amount of magic that's supposedly in this place. It's a tacky carry-on of the most mundane sort, something she'd buy purely for ironic value from a TJ-fucking-Maxx, something her mind came up with while pretending her life didn't depend upon it. She can't wait to change into whatever's inside, but she needs these two to stop talking as though she's not in the room.

"As much as I appreciate boys fighting over me, you can stop anytime. I was just leaving."

If Hennessy thinks a roller suitcase is the ideal luggage for a world that hasn't yet discovered asphalt, she's in for a rude awakening. But she's not going to get a chance to figure that out anytime soon. Ronan hurls himself off the bed with an irritable grunt and snatches VEXED TO NIGHTMARE before Hennessy can even think about grabbing it on her way out.

"Where the fuck do you think you're going?" he spits. "In case you haven't noticed, we're not in Kansas anymore. Your phone's gonna run out of juice in twelve hours and then your shit alarm won't wake you up and the Lace will either finish you off or feed off a power source about a billion times stronger than the ley line you killed me over and then this world will fucking end. What an awesome plan. You're the real brains of this operation."

She wouldn't actually know, not having seen the outside of the dungeon enough to know whether this place is a ren faire fantasy all the way down, but that doesn't stop her from scoffing at his entire premise. Especially the part he keeps wielding as a sharper weapon than any sword either of them can produce.

"Stop saying I killed you. Clearly it didn't take."

She swipes up the towel and cleans the remnants of inky goo off her hands as best she can while continuing to seethe about the rest of it.

"I don't know why you're so keen on protecting this shithole with the magic-eating dungeon that's going to kill us both the minute the wizards figure out what you're capable of and your bodyguard gets bored of guarding."

She shoots a challenging look at Kylo, whose role in this whole thing is unclear enough to make her curious despite her general distaste for the whole situation.

Kylo returns Hennessey's glare with a flat, steady gaze, heavy with the weight of his considerable attention.

"I don't get bored," he informs her.

And it feels true. Kylo seems perfectly capable of standing here until the eventual heat death of the universe, if he chooses. There's a colossal amount of control crackling behind the dark of his eyes.

The arrow almost hits its mark. For a split second, Ronan wonders if Kylo isn't tired of this already, and the possibility that he'll find himself without Kylo or Hennessy by the time this is over sparks a brief but violent flash of panic through Ronan. But then Kylo, with one simple statement, soothes that fear and brushes it aside, and Ronan laughs.

"Those wizards brought me here because of what I can do," he tells Hennessy with renewed confidence. "They saved me from your bullshit because they didn't want me rotting on a dead ley line. They wanted me here, with the Singularity, so that I can use it to keep doing exactly what I'm good at."

Hennessy doesn't buy it. Everyone gets bored eventually, but if this guy wants to play it that way it's not skin off her nose. She's a little disappointed Ronan's been so easily convinced, but then his words cut into her over and over again and do exactly fuck-all to convince her that this is where she should be staying.

"They wanted you. Once again I'm the inferior version. They don't need me and they damn well know it."

She says they, but her eyes say you, in the moment before she realizes she's giving him what he wants in admitting how much he can still hurt her, and that her continued engagement in this stupid argument means it's working.

She's quiet a long moment, holding his gaze, her shoulders finally slumping as she accepts at least this momentary defeat.

"If they put me back in there, I'm letting the Lace have me."

She refuses to die a prisoner in someone else's cage.

"If they put you back in there, I'm going to get you right back out."

Now that it looks a little less like Hennessy might bite his face off, Ronan circles around to her and leans against the edge of the bed, with VEXED TO NIGHTMARE set beside him.

"They obviously want both of us. You're not the inferior version, you're just the one that got played by the Moderators. The High Mage is looking for people who want to help him and siding with dream-killers is a bad fucking look. But I can talk to him. We can work this out. And then we'll deal with the Lace once and for all."

For a moment she looks as though she's about to reconsider the no-biting thing.

"Sure, I'm the one who got played. At least I know better than to let my dream self run the show."

That isn't strictly true; Jordan's the only person allowed to give her advice without a fight. But at least she'd know if she were following her own dream around like a stray puppy asking it for wisdom. Wouldn't she?

She doesn't get a chance to actually contemplate it for long, because she's decided it's at least time to change out of her nightwash-stained clothes and into whatever she's dreamt herself. She unzips the suitcase, staring at what doing so reveals for a long moment before cursing floridly under her breath and digging her hands into what appear to be nothing more than pink foam packing peanuts, enough to overflow the suitcase and spill out onto the floor. She's just about to upend the entire thing in a juvenile snit when her hands touch upon something cool and solid and familiar.

"Holy. Shit."

She can't quite trust her own senses, not even when she pulls out the item in question to stare at it with a growing sense of accomplishment -- the moonlight-bladed sword with FROM CHAOS etched into its hilt.

Any joy Ronan might have felt at the appearance of FROM CHAOS is dulled by the words preceding it. Fresh hot shame sweeps over Ronan at the mention of Bryde, his jaw working as he grinds down his teeth on words he doesn't have.

He could point out that yes, actually, she did let her dream self run the show. She's done it for at least a decade. But Ronan disagrees with the premise, too. Whatever Bryde is, he's not Ronan. He's not an alternate Ronan or an improved Ronan or even a distilled facet of Ronan. He's simply from Ronan.

Of course, that doesn't counter Hennessy's real point: Ronan was a fool. He'd looked around for someone to trust and found not a single person in his life capable of feeling anything true for him. Something in him had understood that even the people he loved would never love him and so it had given him someone who would remain after everyone else had gone.

What Hennessy doesn't understand is that Bryde wasn't the one who'd played him. It was everyone else. Bryde had been the one to catch him while he was bleeding from all the other knives in his back.

Ronan glances at Kylo, his new lodestar, and he's instantly steadied. Kylo's not his dream. Kylo chose him, and he's still choosing him, unwavering. Hennessy doesn't know shit.

"I told you," Ronan says, returning his attention to her and her dreamt sword. "Things are gonna be different here. You can do anything."

"We'll see."

She doesn't sound convinced. She'd felt like she could do anything before, when she and Ronan had first started dreaming together, before she learned he was doing so much of the work of keeping the Lace away. Before she knew that Bryde's coaching came with an agenda. Before she realized that anything could be a terrifyingly destructive prospect in the wrong hands, even if those hands were hers.

She turns the sword over in her hands, unable to hide the sense of pride and relief that floods her at having it in her possession again. She doesn't show any signs of intending to stab either of the room's occupants with it, though she hasn't ruled out running a wizard through if Ronan's wrong about his ability to keep her out of jail.

She does, however, feel really weird about the other guy just standing there quietly watching all of this without deigning to speak. It's starting to creep her out, so she falls back on the comfort of flippancy when she addresses him again.

"Do you have a magic sword, too, or do you skip all that and go straight for crushing skulls with your bare hands?"

He looks like he probably could, but it seems a bit messier than ideal.

"Mind," Kylo corrects her smoothly. He's doesn't look at all like he's joking.

He is however still wearing his own magic sword at his hip— the hilt from which a magical blade bursts forth much like his weapon from back home. He doesn't pull it into his hand. "Though I prefer a blade."

"Huh."

Hennessy looks... okay, a little impressed as she mentally reappraises him. The whole strong and silent thing is clearly working for him. At least he's not another dandy. She's not at all convinced that he's not a dream, but awareness of that possibility is all she needs not to care. It's not her business if Ronan wants to make the same mistake twice.

"Cool."

So long as they're not all about to murder one another, they're good here. For now.

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EVENT #3: AN EXECUTION OF SORTS

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