This is where dreams — dreams, do you understand — come to life, come real. Not daydreams: dreams.

[glass-beddau.livejournal.com]

[Wednesday            17th       479Thursday, September 18th (day 480)]
[The Abbey]
[In a late strange time]

The air is cool, and still, and waiting to burn.

The graveyard here is different to what it was a day ago; it's the one I've dreamt of, I think, where and a year and more ago I saw Nanshe come walking from the north; graveyard north, not town north. But the ground seethes like bothered ants, and the grass does not whisper. If I left off on looking, I think it would pull itself free and crawl away.

And I leave off looking, as that is not where we are going.

You feel no especial call to goodness, do you, Glass? No. It's not in me, not rooted; but I have come to hate the other, and what it works, and may be that is a beginning.

The Abbey's stone is weeping, and there are shapes even I cannot see in the shadows. This is not the Shuck's night; this is safety twisted to fear. And we have come.

[Open]

Comments

[hermia-sophia.livejournal.com]

Chester speaks up, saying "It may not be obvious, but the kid does know her stuff. She's had some pretty decent trainin'."

My lips twitch in a little smile, both in thanks for Chester's words and in guilty amused satisfaction for the looks on people's faces when they hear him speak. "Thank you," I murmur to him. And Syl does know what that means, for she looks at the gold bracelet and collar, and recognition shows in her eyes as she says, "All right, hope so. But ye're gonna follow my lead, y'hear? I been pract'cin' fer near thirty years. I gotta lotta 'sperience 't you don't."

As much as it rankles to be ordered about by her, I know that Syl is right. If she has been practicing magic for longer than I have been alive, then she should be the one to take charge. And, in truth, I am glad that I do not have to do this alone. "All right," I agree quietly, meeting her eyes directly.

Nanshe and Jack are speaking of the other side of the plan - of the fact that the only way to stop Icelus this time is to kill him. I feel a sad and wonderful warmth for both of them, Nanshe and Jack, that they are so reluctant to kill, even someone - or something - as terrible as Icelus. But if that is what they have to do, then that is what we will help them do.

I swallow hard, and glance over at Valmont once more before I draw myself up taller and say, "So. Where do we start? Would it be more effective to protect the path, or to put the protections on the people?"

[goddessnanshe.livejournal.com]

"Well," I say mildly, to Syl's criticism, "last time I had to kill myself to break his spell, so my opportunity to kill him was a little limited," and I smile.

"So, where do we start?" asks Hermia, and I nod at the question she asks about protection.

"On people, I think, at least until we reach the abbey. We can't assume any path we find will stay the same. Once in the abbey, perhaps you can defend a perimeter around the broken gate until I have found a way to mend it."

This discussed, and protection charms employed, we move toward the abbey (http://estdeus-innobis.livejournal.com/470488.html).