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The Scrivener's cottage stands out for a few reasons. It's a dark teal color, with orange sunflowers and marigolds and some deep violet black roses. And there's a Scrivener sitting in front of it today, skin dark with glowing freckles over the top, each a tiny perfect pixel square.
He seems to be meditating, for certain values of the term, sitting with a lock in one hand and a pair of picks in the other, eyes closed, repeatedly locking and picking. Slow, rhythmic, how else do you empty your mind?
The Scrivener. Line still wanted Mearc to Scriven her, if only so she could find out what that meant. She hadn't figured it out, despite her research. Her approach to their cottage halted a fair distance off as she saw Mearc going through their rote actions, and she watched for a moment in silence. Unable to figure it out, she shrugged and marched on towards them.
About twenty feet away she called out. "HO, Scrivener! Saying your Hail Schlages?" She gave a wave as she did so, the wide , loose sleeve of her oversized t shirt sliding down her slender arm as she did so. When she stopped a meter away from Mearc, she was lightly bouncing from one foot to the other in time with a Rhythm supposedly coming from the multicolored headphones on her head.
Mearc's mantle has grown stronger and washes over her as he opens his eyes. It's a strange mix of sensations: a rustle like someone running through a cornfield in October. Soft panting sounds. A sensation like eyes on the back of one's neck, and the feeling of warm breath there too, like something's just about to pounce.
He's a little Autumn, you know.
"That's a Catholock thing, isn't it?" He grins as he delivers the pun. "Care to take a spin on the lock? I've loosened it up for you."
She cants her head at the offer, even as she giggles at the pun. "Uh...never done it so...sure!" Line exclaims holding her hand out for the lock. "Its just a matter of tripping the tumblers right?" Her own mantle wasn't subtle, but it was far less predatory. Hers was the hair raising feel just before the strike of lightning, the smell of a lightning struck tree, and the swirls of restless autumn breezes. "So, Scrivener. Mind if I metaphorically chew your ear a bit?"
“Exactly so. Used the wiper blade for torque. Not too much, this one will resist for you’re pushing it too hard.”
He leans back on his hands, watching Line after passing the lock and picks over. “I am at your service.”
Line took the lock and picks, and without paying much attention to them, continued talking to Mearc. "So...I...ah...this may seem odd, considering things, but, like, what does it mean to be an Autumn?" she asked. "I was training with Sensei - er, Reiko- the other day, and she was talking about what it was like being in her court. And I realised I did not know why I fit into our court as I did. I mean, surprisingly well, considering." The lock popped open, and Line looked down in surprise at that. "Oh! Fancy that."
“It is definitely surprising that you have that strong a Mantle without actually having a grasp on what Autumn means to you. How far back do you need me to start with this talk? Like...you do know what our court’s emotion is, right?”
Mearc’s gaze shifts to the lock, and he smiles crookedly. “You’ve got a good feel for mechanical things, mm. Did that pretty quickly.”
The Elemental handed back the lock and picks. "I would hope I have a good feel for that kind of thing. Its pretty much my schtick. Cars, Electronics, Rockets. Definitely rockets," Line says with a grin. "Just requires a deft touch. I can do deft. Usually. Often times my mouth just gets in the way."
She took a deep breath. "It's fear, isn't it?" Line answered. "The utilization of that..I think? I really don't understand what is meant by that."
He nods. “Fear is an amazing emotion. Its our body’s alert system. When something is scary, our body is flooded with adrenaline, right? Fight or flight, the responses of Summer or Winter, and that moment in between, that moment of choice is where we sit in a lot of ways. But more than that, we cultivate fear.”
"Cultivate? But I am not scary at all," Line insisted, then she put her hand son her hips, and leaned a bit towards Mearc. "And neither are you!"
Mearcstapa looks up at Line and smiles, showing off a maw full of predatory fangs, and she is filled for a brief moment with the dreadful knowledge that she just told a predator that it's not scary. And oh, oh he is in fact scary. Everything about him is sleek and honed for his hunt, the mantle flaring up like a beast about to leap onto its prey and break its neck.
Line stumbled back, red flashing across her black skin in patterns almost appearing like error or warning signs, and exclamation marks. She lost her footing and fell on her butt, and just sat there, staring into the middle distance- what would be her eyes open wide and unblinking, as bursts of red and yellow light flashed upon her like various caution lights.
Mearc quietly pulls out one of his throwing knives and tosses it so it bonks Line on the head with the blunt end. "Not scary my ass."
line blinked in flutters, and her skin slowly calmed its warning display. She shook her head and rubbed her forehead where the knife's hilt had hit. "Ow? Why the..." she started, and picked up the knife. She casually flipped her wrist, and the knife seemingly appeared embedded into Mearc's seat, between their legs. "Okay, maaaaybe I was wrong, but you're always so...mellow."
Mearc looks at the knife, then at Line. "Mellow surface. Anxious fucker below, but that wasn't what I meant by cultivate fear at the beginning of this tangent. Geez, a couple inches off and you'd owe Lux and Jack a big apology there."
"I was aiming for the ground," she counters rather flippantly. "Okay, Anxious. I can get that. I'm a bundle of anxieties...probably the power cell to why I am like this.." She gesticulates to herself somewhat wildly like Stan the boat salesman as she stood up and brushed herself off. "How did you do that?"
"I'm a Hunterheart. Did you not know that? Did I not advertise that I'm a fucking nightmare panther monster?"
'Fucking nightmare panther monster' comes out to the rhythm of 'teenage mutant ninja turtles', naturally. He takes the knife and tucks it away in his cargo pants safely again.
"But this is, again, only a surface level of what the court does and is for. Tell me something, Line. Do you remember any of the children's lore in the town you grew up in?"
Line actually sits down on the ground criss cross applesauce in front of Mearc when they start in on 'Children's Lore', and grins. "You don't actually advertise. No one does. I kinda have to guess most of the times, and I don't know half of them to start with!" she exclaims. Then she sniffs. "I...uh...no. Don't remember any of that. Kinda don't remember where I grew up. I think Toronto?"
"Are you familiar with the concept, though? 'Circle, circle, dot, dot. Now you've got your cooties shot.' Or 'don't go out into the woods on the night after Halloween because the wild Huntsman rides through looking for people who're lost.' Or we could go back to older legends, where iron is a bane of fairies, and moly keeps demons away and that's where we get 'holy moly' as an expression."
"Really? That's where Holy Moly comes from? Huh?" That's the take away for Line, but she nods. "Don't step on a crack? Floor is lava?"
"There's grains of truth in the stories. Perhaps Old Man Jepperson who lives in the house on the hill is just a grumpy veteran with PTSD. Perhaps he's actually a Loyalist who takes kids to Arcadia. Either way, the children know to stay away. It is whispered. The fear is cultivated. That's a role our court takes on, along with learning lore. Banes and frailties and secrets about our enemies. Contracts only whispered about, not known by the masses. Tokens hidden from prying eyes. I recommend talking to Alexis at some point, if you want to learn occult secrets. Technically, as a Twilight Page, you're under her command already."
"Okay...so...we spread the warnings? The ones that make people nervous or sleep uneasily?"
"It's one role we take. See, there's a lot of facets to fear. Different parts we play, different roles we take. Someone like the Ghuls, they have a different purpose than me with my Scrivening, than the Legate of Mists. So...the bottom line, heh. Is that you need to figure out what fear represents to you, and how you choose to represent it."
"Oh well...that's...not easy," she says after starting to sound SUPER CONFIDENT. "I mean...I fell like I could represent the industrious energy of someone needing to prepare for something terrible about to happen." Line nods. "Yeah..that foreboding that drives one to make plans, and set things up. The one that drives you to do things." She looks back to Mearc. "You...I mean, aside from being fucking scary...what do you do?"
"Protect the Freehold on the mundane front. Make sure people who need paperwork get it. Hold onto the Autumn Court's bail money. Cover people's asses in the real world, as opposed to in the hedge." He grins. "I'm not entirely the best in the Hedge, yet. Decent with the Markets, though. Not as good as Charlie, yet."
"I wanna be a ranger," Line suddenly declares. "I like the hedge. Is...is that weird that I do?"
"I don't think it's weird at all. Haaave you met or talked to Vorpal yet? Jackie? Strong mantle like mine, big Wyrd, makes doors feel weird?"
"Vorpal...I have, yes. We went diving into the weird Tree's dream to do the rescue," Line answered. "Very boring trip. Right up until the hands came out of the trunk. THEN it got SUPER interesting." She chuckled. "Jackie...I ....don't know? I surprisingly don't know a lot of people."
"Jackie's another name for Vorpal. She has others." He chuckles. "She's someone to talk to and train with if you want to work to become a Ranger. Also, if you do want to move up, talk to Alexis, not Buidhe directly. At least not in this season."
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