[He looks puzzled by River's suggestion, but he's not going to argue with her whimsical logic. There's no harm in trying it.]
I'll grab the doll. They can get mad at me.
[He squeezes her hand as a sort of good luck charm before detaching from her and, without preamble, plucking the saw-dust stuffed doll from the center of the circle. He makes sure to curl his fingers over the glass-bead eyes. Immediately, the children's distant, dreamy expressions crumple in agitation.
Give her back! demands one of the girls, stamping her foot. What will you do to her? asks a boy, his tone sharp with accusation. Wilhelm holds his empty hand up in a placating gesture.]
Nothing, I promise. She's just...going home. You guys can come with her.
[ the children practically start hissing and clawing to get the doll back the moment wilhelm touches it. river flinches as their panic lashes out, a genuine if misplaced concern for the doll's safety that seems all-consuming. they hardly even seem to notice her, their energy focused on getting the doll back from wilhelm, so she watches and contemplates it for a moment before interjecting. ]
Adair. Oisin. Jessalyn. Trystan.
[ she may not have been paying attention to their conversation but she heard their names, or maybe she can hear them in wilhelm's thoughts. but she says them in a careful deadpan and their eyes all lock onto her at once, seemingly on the same level of weird as she stares at them like she sees it too and understands.
she doesn't, not really, but that's not the point as she tries to think of what she can say to get through to them. ]
It's not time yet. The leaves are still changing colors. Gotta be good and go home, so you can stay together when you Roam.
[The children might as well be wielding pitchforks and torches the way they surround Wilhelm. He's half sure that he didn't tower over them, they'd try to wrestle the doll from his grip.
When River ensnares their attention, pronouncing each one's name as carefully as an incantation, he's about three seconds away from bolting for his bike and shoving the doll into one of his bag's many pockets. Fortunately, her words have a calming effect on the children. After they share a series of glances with each other, one of the girls — Jessalyn? — nods solemnly. All right, she concedes with a pout.]
Follow me.
[Now Wilhelm does return to his bike, which he's left standing by the gate into the schoolyard. As he walks, he tries to keep the doll tucked out of the children's sight, so as to avoid setting them off again. He slips it deep into his bag, where only he'll be able to retrieve it.]
[ river blinks in surprise at their easy compliance ( she didn't really expect that to work ) and stays behind to watch as the kids follow wilhelm over to the bike. her heart seems to beat a little harder when notices the way their shadows move - the way they move when wilhelm's doesn't, shifting and twisting on the ground even when the children stop to ogle the bicycle curiously.
perhaps their hypnotic fixation on the doll has been broken, enough so that they don't notice when wilhelm shoves it into his bag, but there must be some kind of magic that still clings to them. river shoots wilhelm a furtive glance and decides to follow along behind them as they escort the children home. still looking for clues, in a sense, both in their strange company and the rest of nott in the late afternoon around them.
it's surprisingly uneventful. when they stop at the first child's house, as they say their oddly whispered farewells to each other, river stands beside wilhelm to watch them with wide eyes. ]
I was kidding earlier. About the ghosts.
[ but something in the way their shadows seem to dance in a separate of their own makes her wonder if she wasn't far off in some way. ]
[As Wilhelm leads their strange parade through the streets of Nott, he keeps an eye on the children. They chatter among themselves, crashing into one another to slip whispers into ears. They skip and jump and do normal kid things, but every once in a while someone's gaze snags on Wilhelm's bag on the back of the bicycle. Then they fall into silence into a spell, as if scheming how to get the doll back.
The boy, Adair, seems reluctant to part ways with his friends. Or with the doll. But he scurries into his house, slamming the door behind him.]
Are you sure about that?
[Wilhelm is half joking, but with so many strange things to account for it's hard to say. Where do the boundaries of magic lie? How far and wide do they stretch? Then they're onto the next one. Oisin and Jessalyn, brother and sister.]
[ the remaining children start walking again without waiting for their say so, although river briefly makes eye contact with jessalyn to nonverbally confirm that they are in fact taking the path toward their own house. all three of them seem to stare at wilhelm as they walk past, silent and intense for a long moment before they return to their whispered conversations.
river can't quite detect any malice in them but it's vaguely disconcerting nonetheless. it's almost like looking into a mirror; maybe this is a time to self-reflect...
no, that's nonsense. there are ghosts to catch! river continues to watch the kids closely as they both follow behind the group this time. ]
There's no scientific basis to the concept of spectral entities like ghosts or poltergeists, but reports of unexplained phenomena are pretty much universal across various cultures throughout recorded history. And in a world where everything is magic and anything is possible...
[ she trails off, giving a hapless shrug, and smiles at wilhelm. ]
I thought it would be fun to find out together. Not sure this is proof of anything, but look. Can you see them?
[ river isn't sure if he can, if it's only there by virtue of her third eye or because she looked into the doll. ( she doesn't discredit the notion it could be a figment of her own overactive mind either; it's not like she's a stranger to hallucinations. ) but she'll try to point it out to him anyway, where the shadows on the ground seem to move on their own behind the children that seem otherwise oblivious. ]
[And in a world where everything is magic and anything is possible... His thoughts stray, as they often do, back to Erik. When he imagined he was talking to his brother down in the hopeless darkness of the pit, and he'd clung to the possibility that whatever was left of Erik in death had somehow found him across the universe, it must have been a hallucination. He was on the brink of starvation, and spores were warping his mind.
But what about at the end of the summer, when the Heralds swept across the land? Was he really only imagining that Erik was there, or...? It hurts to wonder, the hope of it a double-edged sword.
River points to the children's shadows, stretched out behind them as the sun sinks toward the horizon, and Wilhelm looks but doesn't see what she wants him to see. He shakes his head.]
The shadows?
[All he sees is the children sneaking looks at his bag, as if making sure that he hasn't run off with their precious doll.]
[ she can tell when his thoughts drift away from the children and their quest, and suddenly it doesn't seem quite so fun anymore. try as he may to hide it, wilhelm wears his emotions on his sleeve, and there are always dark clouds that linger just above him even when he otherwise seems to be in good spirits.
river understands. well - she doesn't, not really. the world has torn her apart from simon more than once, leaving her with the despair of thinking she might never see him again, but she at least has the comfort of knowing that he's ( theoretically ) still alive out there somewhere in the 'verse.
rather, what she understands is the way that grief wrings wilhelm's heart until it feels like it may never beat again. it dulls his vision, shadows cast over an empty world without erik in it.
they've never talked about it. perhaps they ought to, someday. as it is, river's hand lowers slowly, her tone and expression falling to something more neutral even as her eyes remain on the children, distantly curious. ]
Yes. They whisper nonsense and disobey the light. The doll has one too. They're doing mischief - they're mischievous.
[ slowly, her gaze slides back to wilhelm and she weakly offers: ]
Maybe it's just "kids will be kids" instead of ghosts. Seems like they're having fun.
[He's not so sure. And from the sound of it, neither is River.]
Yeah, maybe. [He finds a chuckle.] It's the cool new thing. We're just too old to understand.
[The knotted problem of what's behind all of this twists in his thoughts as they finish shepherding the children home. Is it just mischief, or is the mischief a mask for something more sinister? By the time they drop the last girl off, and she skips to the door with the precious doll clutched to her chest, the sun is slanting low in the sky. Afternoon is beginning to sink into evening. Wilhelm looks at River.]
Do you want to keep looking for answers? Or should we head back?
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abraxaslogs2024-09-01 09:06 pm
no subject
I'll grab the doll. They can get mad at me.
[He squeezes her hand as a sort of good luck charm before detaching from her and, without preamble, plucking the saw-dust stuffed doll from the center of the circle. He makes sure to curl his fingers over the glass-bead eyes. Immediately, the children's distant, dreamy expressions crumple in agitation.
Give her back! demands one of the girls, stamping her foot. What will you do to her? asks a boy, his tone sharp with accusation. Wilhelm holds his empty hand up in a placating gesture.]
Nothing, I promise. She's just...going home. You guys can come with her.
no subject
Adair. Oisin. Jessalyn. Trystan.
[ she may not have been paying attention to their conversation but she heard their names, or maybe she can hear them in wilhelm's thoughts. but she says them in a careful deadpan and their eyes all lock onto her at once, seemingly on the same level of weird as she stares at them like she sees it too and understands.
she doesn't, not really, but that's not the point as she tries to think of what she can say to get through to them. ]
It's not time yet. The leaves are still changing colors. Gotta be good and go home, so you can stay together when you Roam.
no subject
When River ensnares their attention, pronouncing each one's name as carefully as an incantation, he's about three seconds away from bolting for his bike and shoving the doll into one of his bag's many pockets. Fortunately, her words have a calming effect on the children. After they share a series of glances with each other, one of the girls — Jessalyn? — nods solemnly. All right, she concedes with a pout.]
Follow me.
[Now Wilhelm does return to his bike, which he's left standing by the gate into the schoolyard. As he walks, he tries to keep the doll tucked out of the children's sight, so as to avoid setting them off again. He slips it deep into his bag, where only he'll be able to retrieve it.]
no subject
perhaps their hypnotic fixation on the doll has been broken, enough so that they don't notice when wilhelm shoves it into his bag, but there must be some kind of magic that still clings to them. river shoots wilhelm a furtive glance and decides to follow along behind them as they escort the children home. still looking for clues, in a sense, both in their strange company and the rest of nott in the late afternoon around them.
it's surprisingly uneventful. when they stop at the first child's house, as they say their oddly whispered farewells to each other, river stands beside wilhelm to watch them with wide eyes. ]
I was kidding earlier. About the ghosts.
[ but something in the way their shadows seem to dance in a separate of their own makes her wonder if she wasn't far off in some way. ]
no subject
The boy, Adair, seems reluctant to part ways with his friends. Or with the doll. But he scurries into his house, slamming the door behind him.]
Are you sure about that?
[Wilhelm is half joking, but with so many strange things to account for it's hard to say. Where do the boundaries of magic lie? How far and wide do they stretch? Then they're onto the next one. Oisin and Jessalyn, brother and sister.]
no subject
river can't quite detect any malice in them but it's vaguely disconcerting nonetheless. it's almost like looking into a mirror; maybe this is a time to self-reflect...
no, that's nonsense. there are ghosts to catch! river continues to watch the kids closely as they both follow behind the group this time. ]
There's no scientific basis to the concept of spectral entities like ghosts or poltergeists, but reports of unexplained phenomena are pretty much universal across various cultures throughout recorded history. And in a world where everything is magic and anything is possible...
[ she trails off, giving a hapless shrug, and smiles at wilhelm. ]
I thought it would be fun to find out together. Not sure this is proof of anything, but look. Can you see them?
[ river isn't sure if he can, if it's only there by virtue of her third eye or because she looked into the doll. ( she doesn't discredit the notion it could be a figment of her own overactive mind either; it's not like she's a stranger to hallucinations. ) but she'll try to point it out to him anyway, where the shadows on the ground seem to move on their own behind the children that seem otherwise oblivious. ]
no subject
But what about at the end of the summer, when the Heralds swept across the land? Was he really only imagining that Erik was there, or...? It hurts to wonder, the hope of it a double-edged sword.
River points to the children's shadows, stretched out behind them as the sun sinks toward the horizon, and Wilhelm looks but doesn't see what she wants him to see. He shakes his head.]
The shadows?
[All he sees is the children sneaking looks at his bag, as if making sure that he hasn't run off with their precious doll.]
no subject
river understands. well - she doesn't, not really. the world has torn her apart from simon more than once, leaving her with the despair of thinking she might never see him again, but she at least has the comfort of knowing that he's ( theoretically ) still alive out there somewhere in the 'verse.
rather, what she understands is the way that grief wrings wilhelm's heart until it feels like it may never beat again. it dulls his vision, shadows cast over an empty world without erik in it.
they've never talked about it. perhaps they ought to, someday. as it is, river's hand lowers slowly, her tone and expression falling to something more neutral even as her eyes remain on the children, distantly curious. ]
Yes. They whisper nonsense and disobey the light. The doll has one too. They're doing mischief - they're mischievous.
[ slowly, her gaze slides back to wilhelm and she weakly offers: ]
Maybe it's just "kids will be kids" instead of ghosts. Seems like they're having fun.
no subject
Yeah, maybe. [He finds a chuckle.] It's the cool new thing. We're just too old to understand.
[The knotted problem of what's behind all of this twists in his thoughts as they finish shepherding the children home. Is it just mischief, or is the mischief a mask for something more sinister? By the time they drop the last girl off, and she skips to the door with the precious doll clutched to her chest, the sun is slanting low in the sky. Afternoon is beginning to sink into evening. Wilhelm looks at River.]
Do you want to keep looking for answers? Or should we head back?