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Etty catalogues and indexes the library of magic.
Since she has not had luck finding Astgabels or anyone who can direct her to it by flying in slightly different directions each day and asking random people, she stops trying, and instead tries to come up with ways to rejigger the available divination spells into producing a compass direction for her to follow. Or maybe she can come up with some variant on the food-generation spell that would be practical for a long trip, and bring Nona with her, and then they could be gone for days looking farther afield than she can get in half a day's flight.
Eventually she finds a spell that is not exactly right, but might be close enough, and she shows it to Nona.
mute_pen
growcrooked
"Sure, I'll cast it," shrugs Nona.
Magic has been getting easier and easier the more she has been doing it. That didn't happen before she started casting spells for Etty; maybe what she used to do was not big enough to count.
Magic has been getting easier and easier the more she has been doing it. That didn't happen before she started casting spells for Etty; maybe what she used to do was not big enough to count.
mute_pen
Etty kisses her and helps set up. The materials for this one aren't gross in and of themselves, it's just the procedure.
growcrooked
Nona is, as usual, completely serene about what she has to do to cast these things.
And after she has done it, and then had a good wash, there can be snuggles! The broken-off head of a boar-spear that is going to serve as their compass will continue to point in the right direction until and unless they bury it for a month.
And after she has done it, and then had a good wash, there can be snuggles! The broken-off head of a boar-spear that is going to serve as their compass will continue to point in the right direction until and unless they bury it for a month.
mute_pen
Snuggles! Snuggles are good.
The next morning, Etty sets out, carefully, in the direction the spell indicated. She doesn't stop at mid-day; there's a river in this direction, so she will at minimum have water, and she thinks that if she flies straight she will be at Astgabels before sundown - even accounting for the Baron's greater flight speed - where she will meet people she knows who will feed her. Hopefully, her father.
She is back the evening of the next day, and when she transforms, she doesn't look happy.
The next morning, Etty sets out, carefully, in the direction the spell indicated. She doesn't stop at mid-day; there's a river in this direction, so she will at minimum have water, and she thinks that if she flies straight she will be at Astgabels before sundown - even accounting for the Baron's greater flight speed - where she will meet people she knows who will feed her. Hopefully, her father.
She is back the evening of the next day, and when she transforms, she doesn't look happy.
mute_pen
Hugs. "Everyone else I knew is fine - they kept calling me Isabel, of course, which felt weird, but I wasn't about to explain - but Carl's gone."
mute_pen
"I'm going to - look through the library again - maybe if I understand it well enough - he had stuff on immortality, maybe I could figure out how to bring someone back."
mute_pen
Etty nods. And hugs her again, once, and then starts in the library's direction, and then changes her mind and spins around, she is not done, she kisses Nona fiercely before resuming course.
mute_pen
"Thanks."
Etty reads a lot, the next few days. She breaks to eat with less regularity, her sleep cycle keeps skewing later and later, but often - when she can't go through any more notes, decipher any more handwriting - she finds her way into Nona's arms. And there, there are kisses.
Increasingly squirmy kisses with increasingly whimpery little noises behind them.
Etty reads a lot, the next few days. She breaks to eat with less regularity, her sleep cycle keeps skewing later and later, but often - when she can't go through any more notes, decipher any more handwriting - she finds her way into Nona's arms. And there, there are kisses.
Increasingly squirmy kisses with increasingly whimpery little noises behind them.
growcrooked
Kisses. Kisses and snuggles and love and kisses and snuggles and happy sighing and kisses.
mute_pen
The squirms get squirmier. The whimpers get whimperier.
Etty doesn't appear to have the vocabulary to say whatever she means under that "I love you", but she has the motor skills to squirm squirmily out of her dress.
Etty doesn't appear to have the vocabulary to say whatever she means under that "I love you", but she has the motor skills to squirm squirmily out of her dress.
growcrooked
That... is definitely a thing that just happened.
Somewhat tentatively, Nona kisses her again.
Somewhat tentatively, Nona kisses her again.
mute_pen
Kisses. Also, Etty appears to have nonlinguistic opinions about Nona's state of dress too.
mute_pen
Good. Pleasedness is the general idea here.
A certain specialized sort of pleasedness.
A certain specialized sort of pleasedness.