the dreamers of the day are dangerous men, for they may act on their dreams with open eyes...

[goddessnanshe.livejournal.com]

Morning of 21st June

It's still raining, though not as heavily as earlier, but I couldn't wait any longer to come out here and see what has happened. I was wakened in the early hours of Sunday by a strange feeling of pressure and brilliant light, but my cell was completely dark. I walked through the abbey, and all was still and shadowed. Anyone else would say I had just had a dream - but I know there is no just to dreams.

In the afternoon, one of the novices came back from gathering in the woods to say that there was the strangest sight: a charred circle, as if lightning had struck and destroyed a neat section of the forest. Something about this oddity set my teeth on edge, and I was resolved to see it; but I had duties at the abbey in the evening, and I would not shirk them.

Today I woke to a downpour, but I have borrowed a raincoat from Sister Dove - she is slighter than me, and so it is a little tight, but it will do - and wrapped up my hair with a scarf to help shield it from the rain, since carrying an umbrella into the woods seems foolish - and I start walking the couple of miles to where Novice Diana said she saw the circle.

[OPEN][closed]

Comments

[jack-hollow.livejournal.com]

Huh. Samuel's on 'bout some things I ain't following the particulars of, though if it boils down to not that hot, several times over guess I c'n follow it. Copy down what he's sayin' for Mab, though, holdin' my hat over the page in my off hand ta keep it dry. Way he's describin' it...

God pounds his nails. Fer a second I imagine what that'd look like, an' I look around in the rain and shiver.

"Pretty clear't wuzza blast'a power. Likely fire. But't don't feel like anythin't wuz meant, if'n y'get m'meanin'. Feels like... Feels like'n amateur. But not total, annat's what's buggin' me," Thorn says.

"Well, look, see'ere, where th'grass ain't scorched'n th'middle? 'at feels t'me like a circle'a protection. Annat ain't 'n amateur's trick. A real bloody amateur woulda gotten'emselves broiled 'long wit' th'trees. So somebody here knows t'protect'erself, but can't control 'er own powers. I don't rightly get't, t'be honest."

"Maybe..." Think about it a sec an' shake my head. "Could she be used ta the protectin', and just started flailin' round for the rest? Like used ta usin' a shield, an' then tryna beat someone over the head with it?"

An' then Samuel finds blood, an' aw hell. Close my eyes a second. Miss Noma goes and kneels down.

"You sure it's from the same time?" I say. Mean, bin more'n a day. Can see one person comin' out ta look, another showin' up and bad luck says the two have some kinda grudge goin'...

"'scuse me. I gotta find someone who oughta be dead an' kick'm square'n th'balls."

Gotta say I was not expectin' that.

"Miss Thorn?" I say carefully. "Ah-- mean, could you--" And then it dawns on me, cold and clear and awful, who oughtta be dead and could maybe get that kinda reaction. Can feel the candle buckle and flare inside me, and put one hand up as if I were tryna shade my eyes. Just workin' on keepin' the rain outta them.

"C'n I help you with the finding?" is what I settle on. Because Christ damn well knows that if Donner is around I'd like to know soon as I can and get him caught quicker than that.

[samuel-durand.livejournal.com]

I cannot quite follow all that is being said by the others, and it isn't just Syl's clipped words that I mean. Unfamiliar terms are being bandied about-- well, not that the words themselves are unfamiliar, but their usage suggests loadings that escape me completely. Terms like 'power,' 'circle of protection,' and so forth. I commit them to memory, falling still and quiet as I listen.

The strangest bit is, even though some of them don't even know each other, all of them are on the same wavelength, speaking the same shorthand, operating from the same basic assumptions. Something in that garbled jargon explained it all for them, and I realize that they don't even have to hide things from me: like a child being talked over by adults, I simply lack the knowledge to understand. It is incredibly frustrating, their certainty doubly so. No one asks anything like 'Even if someone in the center could somehow survive such a blast, what were they breathing in an inferno-created vacuum?' For them, the capacities of the central active mechanism are clear, therefore the question irrelevant.

Noma joins me after I find the blood, a salve to a wounded pride I hadn't even known I possessed. I'm about to tell her that with the blood having dried and then been reconstituted by rain, I would need a microscope-- and then Syl comes over and tastes the thrice-damned bloodstained grass. I think for a moment that I know what she's up to, tasting for the differences in iron and copper content that can differentiate human from animal blood, and I am impressed. Though I don't think it'll work. Too many of the trace elements would have been leached out by rain.

But her face hardens in --recognition?-- and I realize I'm off. Way off.

"Ought to be dead?" I repeat neutrally, running on autopilot as my brain continues to scramble. "Can I assume you mean something a bit more than just that he was recently lying prone and bleeding out in the middle of a pyroclasm?"

[goddessnanshe.livejournal.com]

Should be dead. The deputy's face goes still, like a candle blown out, but I don't think he has the right idea. I ignore Brother Samuel, because he has no idea what's going on, no matter his effort to cover that with long words, and right now what Syl is saying is more important.

"Is it -" I say to her, and roll my eyes skyward. She knows who I mean.

[syl-thorn.livejournal.com]

'm tryin' t'breathe out hard through m'nose. S'bout th'only thin't's keepin' me from screamin' curses 'n puttin' m'fist through a fuckin' tree. Tez. Fuckin' Tez. 'e puts me'n Genny through alla'is an'e comes waltzin' right back like't ain't nothin'...

"Miss Thorn? Ah-- mean, could you--C'n I help you with the finding?" S'th'lawman, an'I dunno what bizness'e'd have wit' Tez. 'e sounds scared too, almost, an'I dunno what reason th'town law'd have t'be scared'a Tez. Well, no reason't wouldn't also lead t'bein' scared'a me. So I don't rightly know what'e's on 'bout.

Luck'ly Samuel jumps in. "Ought to be dead? Can I assume you mean something a bit more than just that he was recently lying prone and bleeding out in the middle of a pyroclasm?"

"Y'can." I says, bit sharp. Nanshe's lookin' worried, an' she turns'er eyes up t'th'sky. Yeah, she gets't, an'I nod when she looks back't me. Tez. What th'bloody hell'd 'e manage? Did'e come back jes' now? Izzis what happened when'e shoved'imself back inta meat? 'r did'e jes' fuck up like'e always duz?