This post's authors have general content warnings that might apply to the current post.
View Flat HTML
View Metadata
Search Post
Veron is installed in a nice house in Seattle with the help of Isabella's staff.
The colony gets big enough that Isabella sculpts herself an ice crown and applies permanency to it so it won't melt. She makes Adarin one too out of cypress branches, wired into shape, magicked to stay alive and shaped like that, and then freed of the wire. She wears hers on Earth sometimes, as well as on the colony. Her queen elects not to comment.
Various people are resurrected. Isabella hires more people to sort more requests; she's not going to be able to handle this via descending on charities. (She extracts longer-term promises of help - and nonviolence - from the clans she shares this spell with, though.) She opens an office near San Francisco, puts a lot of poultry in the back yard and makes a deal with an egg producer to save the otherwise unwanted males till adulthood for the purpose in future months, arranges regular deliveries of all the necessary herbs and ashes, and has someone carve out an enormous stencil of all the runes to speed up the process: the diagram may now be drawn with a broom, as long as it's still a witch doing it. (She also has stencils of the immortalization spell made.) There is always some witch in residence, working off their favor to her a few hours at a time, and a security team to prevent unruly demands, interference by religious protestors, and a receptionist or two to make sure the people coming in actually have appointments (or standby arrangements, in case of no-shows) to collect loved ones.
She gets into a bit of an argument with the United States military about resurrecting fallen soldiers. While she originally had no intention of discriminating against soldiers, she insists that resurrected ones be considered honorably discharged and that their re-upping be optional, and absolutely refuses to approve any systematic preferential resurrection of people who are just going to pick up guns and walk into war zones again.
Normally, there would be some clan with access to the spell who'd cut a deal.
On this occasion, with this particular Olympic witch having come up with three (really two, but the portals are still officially credited to her, with everyone understanding now that she's proprietary about the process and capitalistic about the disposition to fund her anti-death projects) revolutionary spells in fewer years than that, they're a little concerned that they won't get a look in the next time she publishes, if they do things she doesn't approve of.
Isabella threatens to move her resurrection office to New Zealand. The military backpedals. Resurrections proceed.
(Isabella does open a second resurrection office in New Zealand. And one in Finland and one in India. There are witch clans all around the world and they are all beholden to her.)
Insurance companies freak out, then remake their actuarial tables and throw lawyers at their contractual language and calm down again. Isabella's insurance company of choice has a small head start. Isabella's insurance company of choice loves her.
Luzia gets her son back. She dithers for a bit about the husband. She gets the husband back. The husband is kind of taken aback by Luzia's activities since then but decides that Zeviana "doesn't count" as cheating. It's up to Zeviana whether she wants to call that close enough and continue carrying on.
Isabella and Adarin have no such problems. They continue to be deliriously happy.
Then, there's a relatively slow day. Isabella flops across her husband's lap on the couch and says, "Want to start looking for places to plague with utopias?"
+ Show First Post
dark_light
come_midnight
"Okay. I'm willing to talk to them as long as I go in having an idea what I can and cannot commit to over the course of the conversation."
royal_obligation
Edarial nods. "I can give ideas of both. That would be extremely helpful." Pause. "Thank you."
royal_obligation
And then it's back on to fixing things. Obsessively. There are a lot of problems with one country.
come_midnight
Iobel is deficient in experience and detailed background information. And occasionally tact.
But not in other requisite attributes.
After a while she sends Cricket to talk to the visitors, since he can and he promises to be cordial and no one else will be able to eavesdrop effectively if they speak his language, and ask about the fungibility through interworld trade thing.
Cricket comes back with a list of recognizable herbs that Isabella is willing to trade pretty much arbitrary things for in large quantity.
But not in other requisite attributes.
After a while she sends Cricket to talk to the visitors, since he can and he promises to be cordial and no one else will be able to eavesdrop effectively if they speak his language, and ask about the fungibility through interworld trade thing.
Cricket comes back with a list of recognizable herbs that Isabella is willing to trade pretty much arbitrary things for in large quantity.
royal_obligation
Edarial takes a bit to adjust to her competence, but once he does, he starts laying out problems with requisite detailed background information and his potential solutions and their effects, and works from there, rather than being patronizing. He is no slouch in other requisite attributes, either, but he tends towards thinking economically and politically rather than branching out a bit more. Iobel turns out to be helpful in several situations, though many he's got covered and just handles.
He is less awkward and distant when running a country. Actually, he warms up to Iobel a bit as they work, though not to 'flaunting' levels. It's progress, though. Some.
He is less awkward and distant when running a country. Actually, he warms up to Iobel a bit as they work, though not to 'flaunting' levels. It's progress, though. Some.
come_midnight
Iobel's focused almost absolutely on the tasks presented and not on Edarial at all. She relaxes a little, around the shoulders, in her voice, when the patronization goes away. It streamlines the conversation; she no longer has to fight down the feeling that she's being actively goaded. It would be premature to describe her as "warm".
come_midnight
She's not really speeding up his work at this time. There's too much time spent on filling her in. But she's taking notes and will probably be less time-consuming to have around on future occasions.
royal_obligation
Edarial does get time investment, logically. It's a thing he supports, even. So he manages to be reasonably patient with her and fill her in every time it's necessary, he just - has to force himself to slow down and explain for her. He's not used to actively going slow, he's used to multi-tasking large amounts of things and bouncing between then as they gestate. It quietly bothers him, but he does like having someone to actually talk to about work, so he deals with it and slows down. Though she will probably have to remind him a few times.
royal_obligation
That works. He answers them, gives reasons for why he does what he does, and then moves on to the next problem. Occasionally his actual top speed shows a bit, but he slows down when she needs him to. Obviously he is actively trying to help her with being a queen.
come_midnight
That is good of him.
It's not so much that she does any given thing very slowly, it's only that she needs to do more steps than he does. Including the notetaking. She refers to things she wrote down earlier in the conversation once in a while.
And, every once in a greater while, the questions she asks lead to clever sideways - cheats, sidestepping part of all of a problem or subtask.
It's not so much that she does any given thing very slowly, it's only that she needs to do more steps than he does. Including the notetaking. She refers to things she wrote down earlier in the conversation once in a while.
And, every once in a greater while, the questions she asks lead to clever sideways - cheats, sidestepping part of all of a problem or subtask.
royal_obligation
He waits for the notetaking, and eventually he starts helping with background information necessary to skip the steps completely unprompted by a problem to solve.
When she finds clever cheats, Edarial is extremely pleased. He compliments her every time, honestly, and genuinely.
When she finds clever cheats, Edarial is extremely pleased. He compliments her every time, honestly, and genuinely.
royal_obligation
That was not why he was giving the compliments, he tries not to be in the habit of ignoring good work. But he's not going to complain about the results.
come_midnight
Iobel sends Cricket to the kitchens to have food sent to where they're working, after it's been long enough. And then sends him to ask their alts if they have enough food or if someone needs to bring them some. Cricket obligingly runs these errands. It's the most she's had Cricket away from her person since Edarial has known her to have access to him.
royal_obligation
This is a good idea. Edarial forgets to feed himself, sometimes, at least someone remembers.
He's not going to ask why Cricket is away from her person so much recently. He's tempted to, but doesn't dare, because they are functioning and he does not want to screw that up. Work, work, work.
(Berathyme is bored by obsessive work, she finds a sunny spot by a window to curl up at.)
He's not going to ask why Cricket is away from her person so much recently. He's tempted to, but doesn't dare, because they are functioning and he does not want to screw that up. Work, work, work.
(Berathyme is bored by obsessive work, she finds a sunny spot by a window to curl up at.)
come_midnight
When Cricket returns with the news that the visitors have plenty of food for the duration of their stay if it would be inconvenient to discreetly feed them, Iobel translates this message for Edarial while flipping through pages of notes to find something in her records about the personality of some relevant member of gentry.
royal_obligation
"Probably a bit inconvenient, but we can manage it if they're going to be living off of bread or something for however long they're here," he replies. "It seems excessively mean to have helpful guests that are - us - and not make sure they're treated well. Even if they're extremely flaunty."
come_midnight
"They didn't tell Cricket what they'd be eating, and the word chosen was 'inconvenient' as opposed to something more like 'intractable', but I do imagine if we have the chance to bring them something hot they'd appreciate it."
royal_obligation
"Mhm. Maybe not an entire fancy meal, but probably some hot chocolate or something," he agrees. "I can just blame it on my brother and say he is feeling voracious."