Open Post: This Is Where The Magic Happens

[rememberettersberg]

A new notice has appeared on the welcome table and at several well-traversed locations around the mansion and its grounds. It invites residents to stop by a certain summer house (which has recently sprung into existence on the shore of the lake) if they are interested in the discussion and/or instruction of magic.

Should anyone's curiosity take them in that direction, they'll find Nightingale there with a pot of tea always on the go and a rotating selection of snacks and nibbles. He's started to cultivate (heh) a small library of his own - important texts in the history of his magical tradition, textbooks for the study of a number of dead/archaic languages, and a growing pile of his own notes.

He'll be delighted to catalogue the differences (and similarities) in the way various worlds practice magic, conduct experiments to see if they can use each other's traditions, and (in the case of Laertes and anyone else that seems like they might be a fit candidate) begin some basic magical instruction.

Closed.

Comments

[lightbearinglord]

Lan Wangji, curious on several levels, hovers quietly for a moment in the doorway of the summer house in question. He has not encountered Nightingale in some time; several things have changed since then. He recognized, he believes, some kind of kindred spirit in the man.

Once he has decided to make his presence known, he steps inside and makes a polite bow to announce himself.

[rememberettersberg]

Nightingale sits at a wide desk, tapping slowly but steadily at the keys of a typewriter. His jacket hangs over the back of his chair, his shirtsleeves are rolled up, and there is a pencil tucked behind one ear. Upon sighting Lan Wangji, he rises hastily and returns the bow, gesturing him further inside.

"Hello there! Come in, come in. Long time no see." He dusts off another chair and pulls it closer to one side of his desk, where a tea set sits with teapot steaming. He points at the pot and raises an eyebrow, the offer implicit.

[lightbearinglord]

The typewriter, in its immediate foreignness, is the first thing to draw Lan Wangji's attention, a quick and sharp glance. He is too polite to mention it, however, and takes the offered seat. He will also never refuse tea, and flicks his sleeves back neatly to pour one cup for each of them.

"I've intended to ask how you would prefer that I address you," he says as he watches the steam rising.

[rememberettersberg]

"Thank you." He settles back into his own seat and adds milk and sugar to his cup. "Oh, honestly, just Nightingale is absolutely fine. My work title is Detective Inspector, or just DI, but that has no import here, and my apprentices are traditionally supposed to call me Master, but that's not the done thing any more where I'm from." Especially when one is a well-to-do older white gentleman and one's apprentice is a Black twentysomething, he doesn't add. "What would you prefer I call you?"

[lightbearinglord]

Observant, Lan Wangji watches as Nightingale adds things to his tea. He frowns passingly but copies what he does. The tea does not smell the way he expected it to, but perhaps it would have been more surprising if it had.

In answer to both the explanation and the question, Lan Wangji hesitates. "Nightingale," he repeats, reluctant to use no title but equally reluctant to disregard Nightingale's preference. "Most address me as Hanguang-jun, if they are not close enough to use my name. Before I earned that title, I was typically introduced as the second young master Lan."

[rememberettersberg]

"Hanguang-jun," Nightingale repeats, raising his cup in a little salute. "If you don't mind me asking, what does it mean?"

Recalling the green tea Lan Wangji had served him when he first arrived, he pushes forward another empty cup. "If you find a good old British cuppa is not quite to your taste, it's perfectly acceptable to drink unadulterated."

[lightbearinglord]

Before answering, Lan Wangji takes one careful sip of his tea. His face betrays nothing, but he sets it down and, with some unexpressed gratitude, does indeed pour himself a fresh cup with no milk or sugar.

The matter of his title is more difficult. The meaning is, to him, evident. He repeats it but with a careful pause between each character, hoping whatever force the mansion employs will understand his intent: "Light-bearing lord."

[timebethine]

Laertes comes to the summer house with a smile on his lips and a dictionary of Latin under one arm. The prospect of learning magic fills him with a pleasant buzz of anticipation; he shifts from foot to foot after he's knocked, already eager to begin.

[rememberettersberg]

"Laertes, welcome! I see you've come prepared." Nightingale hauls a half-filled bucket of water over to some seating gathered around a low central coffee table. "Come and take a seat over here. Did Sagramore approve of the ring?"

[timebethine]

"Most heartily, and returned it in kind," says Laertes, holding out his hand to show a ring of gold with angled bands crossing and recrossing. It's still new, the weight of it on his finger; it still makes his eyes go soft to acknowledge it. "My thanks for the gift of your skill, then and hereafter. I hope I'll repay your teaching well."

[rememberettersberg]

"It's a beauty," he says approvingly. "No need for thanks or repayment, my having found purpose here is quite enough." He smiles. "This initial lesson might feel quite tedious and unrewarding, but it is the first step towards understanding the way magic is shaped and utilised in my world. Are you ready to begin?"

[timebethine]

"Of course." Laertes schools his expression to gravity, standing straight and attentive.

[rememberettersberg]

"I'm going to conjure what we call a werelight - a simple glowing orb without heat. I want you to focus very hard while I do it and attempt to feel the forma in the air around me as it happens. Forma is the invisible shape a spell makes and vestigia are the lingering traces left behind when magic has been done."

Nightingale holds out his hand, palm up, and curls his fingers into a fist. "Watch carefully," he says, and then, slowly and clearly, "lux". His fingers unfurl to reveal a golf ball sized globe of pearlescent light.

If Laertes has an aptitude for magic, he will already feel the shape of the forma as something like a catch in the air, a soft noise in the silence, the muted clunk of a key opening a lock. The vestigium Nightingale leaves in his wake is sharp and precise - the steady ticking of a metronome, the near-silent whirring of well-oiled machinery.

[onthewillowsthere]

Galahad isn't looking for Nightingale on purpose -- he's just wandering by the lakeside, with a book about Welsh flora, looking to see whether he recognizes any of the plants growing by the water's edge. There are tall phragmites turning to fluff, which he trails his hands through, and celandine down in the mud, and pickerelweed, which he's never seen before.

When he sees the summer house, and recognizes that it's new, he comes to the door and looks in curiously. Although he's nowhere near as miserable as he has been, he still gives a faint sense that he's haunting a place, dressed in white and pale as a ghost at the window

[rememberettersberg]

Nightingale is used to a housekeeper who announces herself exclusively with eerie silent lurking. He looks up from his book almost immediately and smiles in an encouraging sort of way.

"Ah, hello," he says, then hesitates, unsure what name to use. He recalls that Claudius had mentioned Laurel as well as the two he was already familiar with. "What should I call you?" he asks at last, gentle.

[onthewillowsthere]

"Galahad," he says, after a slight pause. "Galahad again."

[rememberettersberg]

"You're welcome to come in, Galahad. There's tea in the pot and some nibbles strewn about the place." A slightly awkward pause. "Are you well?" Nightingale feels very guilty for not following up on the memory situation properly.

[onthewillowsthere]

"I think so," as he steps inside, glancing around, his serious eyes taking in everything interesting, the books and the notes and the snacks all scattered about.

[rememberettersberg]

"What brings you here today?" Nightingale closes the book he's been reading and sets it to one side. "Does magic take your fancy?"

[sagramore]

Sagramore is still sober, and he's still not enjoying it very much, but he has an errand. He stops by the summer house, rapping lightly at the door before he enters.

"Nightingale?"

[rememberettersberg]

He's staring at the typewriter on his desk, a piece of paper wound into it and headed Third Event: Pernicious Truths but otherwise empty.

"Sagramore, do come in. Tea?"

[sagramore]

"No, no, thank you. I apologize -- I've come to ask you a favor, actually."

[rememberettersberg]

"By all means, ask away."

[sagramore]

"There's a man here who is a magician, like you. He has a great deal of power, I want to be upfront about that so you know. I don't know whether he's dangerous, though I know I was in no danger from him."

Sagramore is trying not to pace, but the urge is there -- he's restless, anxious, in spite of how certain he is of his purpose. He wishes, for approximately the thousandth time today, that he had a drink.

"He was my lover. I still love him, Christ, I love him tremendously, but he told me something about himself that I can't overlook, as much as I want to. I left him. But the thing is -- he's so guarded. He shields himself against other people. I don't think he'd let anyone know him before me, not for centuries, and certainly not love him. I don't know whether he even has friends here, but I don't think so. And I'm worried about him. I-- Christ, I hurt him but I'm afraid for him to be hurt--" He rakes his hands back through the mess of curls that's become shaggy and started to fall into his eyes at times. "I want to ask you to look in on him. I just want to know he's-- I love him. I want someone to care whether he's all right. And because you're a magician, I think he's less of a danger to you, if he's a danger to anyone any more. I trust you."

[rememberettersberg]

Nightingale's brow has furrowed at the description, but his eyes are soft and understanding. He's touched by the easy admission of trust; it makes his voice warm.

"Of course.. Who should I be looking for?" His first thought was Aleksander? but that doesn't seem quite right. How many powerful magicians with dark secrets can one mansion hold?