come_sailaway | wake me up when September ends [OTA + closed prompts]

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wake me up when September ends [OTA + closed prompts]

Who: Cassandra de Rolo, OTA + closed prompts
When: September
Where: Around the Serena Eterna
What: Flowers and their curious effects
Warnings: Game-typical angst; further content warnings in headers as they come up. The prompts below are occurring in no particular order over the course of the month.

1. summer has come and passed; the innocent can never last

Vivid purple-blue and yellow pansies nod at her from where they've twined up the banister along the stairwell, almost brushing her shoulder as she hurries by.

Later -- well, Cassandra isn't in large crowds very often these days, is she? But someone at the buffet on this particular morning may overhear the murmur you don't need more than one slice; someone in just the right part of the Promenade a little later may overhear there's a clear path to the stairwell if he comes this way; someone passing by Sundries in the next five minutes may overhear still need to talk to Valdis about the gun.

2. ring out the bells again, like we did when spring began

In a corner of the library there's a spreading cluster of the tiny white flowers of baby's breath, looking sweet and harmless.

On a comfortable chair not very far from that point is a pile of cloth that might, on closer study, resolve itself into a dark grey skirt, a white blouse, a blue and grey patterned waistcoat, and a leather belt with a bag attached on one side and a sheathed rapier on the other. The pile is oddly arranged, as though the person wearing the clothes had vanished from inside them while still sitting there; as though to support this image, a pair of sturdy brown boots is on the floor in front of the chair.

On top of the pile is a two-inch-tall Cassandra, bundled in in the stiff and voluminous folds of a dainty silk handkerchief, struggling to press buttons on a phone that is now bigger than she is.

(The screen currently reads ERIN ITS CA)

[Note: this prompt is not closed to Erin! Anyone is welcome to happen upon tiny Cass while she's trying to text.]

3. drenched in my pain again, becoming who we are [closed to Phil]

A patch of poppies has sprung up on the rooftop that's one of the Serena's highest points, where few can climb. With the number of passengers that can fly, that's less a guarantee than it might be, but Cassandra still seeks solitude up there every so often -- and today, that means she falls asleep there, with vivid red petals pooled around her dark head.

In the dream she's twelve again, lined up with her brothers and sisters in their finery, excited about the visiting strangers and the welcome feast that's about to begin.

4. seven years have gone so fast

Wildcard! If you want to talk to Cassandra at a point where she is not affected by flower nonsense, feel free. Message me here or on discord if you'd like an individual prompt.

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Anders's eyebrows draw down in a thoughtful frown, and he studies Phil for a moment or two. And decides, evidently, that it would be odd indeed if he were to dismiss the man's concerns out of hand.

"Very well," he says at last in a different tone of voice. "Back to the hall, then. I'll accompany you." He gestures an invitation to take the lead.

And as Phil turns away, there's no more warning than the faintest whisper of cloth at his right, on his blind side, before the hand closes over his mouth and the knife goes into his lung.

The hand is unnecessary, as it turns out. People think you’d scream. They always do in stories, in movies, but Phil had heard it from a Korean War vet once—that when you’re struck in the back like that, even if it hadn’t immediately pierced his lung—that you don’t make a sound. It knocks all the wind from you. You just drop like a sack of bricks and disappear.

Phil quietly hits the stone, still scrabbling at the floor while his chest fills with blood.

Edited 2023-09-15 14:06 (UTC)

"Idiot," says Anders's voice behind and above him, cold and dismissive and harried, already turning away.

The last pieces are tumbling into place for their final configuration. In the dining hall, the sweets and the wine are passed around, and one particular serving man exchanges a quick glance with one particular guardsman as he pours. In the deserted minstrel gallery overhead, little Cassandra settles in her spot just above the high table, contentedly watching. At a side gate, one man in de Rolo livery quietly pulls another into the shadows, as Anders releases the bolt and swings the door wide, and darkness pours in.

The first distant reverberations of many, many boots on stone are sounding when the last of Phil's consciousness drains away into --

-- into a castle he once knew, on a winter evening, the main dining hall bright with banners and evergreen boughs and countless lit candles.

Phil lurches with a gasp, coughing violently and desperate for breath as his throat and mouth are freed of blood and his muscles allowed to do more than twitch. Bad form for a feast. At least he's adjusted enough to coming back from violent death to have enough wherewithal to cover his mouth partway through.

Lord Frederick and Lady Johanna are seated at the high table, with all seven children in their best clothes, and a few of the higher-ranked members of their court. Chancellor Archibald Desnay and Professor Byron Anders are further down the way. (Something's wrong. Looking at Professor Anders, he seems to burn a hole in the veil of Whitestone's warmth, but--why? He never seemed like that before.)

All the candles on the table flicker as though in a chill wind, and he feels cold.

--

He has the wine again.

--

When Anders excuses himself, pleading a need to wake early tomorrow with a clear head, Phil follows him. He intends to speak, right until he notices that the way he's moving isn't the manner of one who is done for the day and wants to lie down. He's busy. And something is so very off, so Phil hangs back and stops following, and starts tracking.

Anders doesn't seem to hear him following; he strides down the corridors, more visibly hurried once he's well away from the dining hall, purposeful and anticipatory.

Phil has lived in Castle Whitestone long enough to know its many ins and outs and turnings -- though perhaps not all of them, as very few who live there now know all of them. Of the publicly known entrances to the castle, there is the front gate that faces the main road down to the city, the back gate that leads onto the enclosed courtyard, and several side gates that are less often used, though always guarded both inside and out. It's one of the latter that Anders approaches, and as the two indoor guards turn towards him, he lifts a hand and gestures at one of them. "Ah, Warrick. Deal with your partner for me, would you?"

The guard's eyes visibly blur for a moment as the Dominate spell hits, and without a pause he turns and drives a crushing blow into his partner's throat, catching him as he falls.

"Well done," says Anders, "now get him out of the way," and he steps closer and draws a key from his belt, busying himself at the lock.

Phil flinches and stifles a choke as Weisner falls. And then Warrick--

Fuck. Hide. Hide where? He's only stealthy in motion--a side hall, that'll have to do, he's over six feet with wings to boot, he's not small. He darts off into a narrow side corridor, begging nobody looks, begging to God, to Pelor, to anybody that it's enough.

The gate swings wide, and the darkness pours in: row on row of men in leather and chain mail armor that bears no insignia at all.

"You have your orders," Anders is saying. "Kill the Lord de Rolo and any of their men who stand against you; anyone else at the high table, take as many alive as you can. You, take your five upstairs -- the two youngest are already in bed, you know where their rooms are? Warrick, why don't you guide these men where they're going?" And in an undertone: "We won't need him once that's done."

The reverberations of many, many boots on stone are already moving up the corridor, past the side hall where Phil's hiding.

Oh, that is a lot of soldiers. He doesn't even have time to process the utter rage and heartbreak of what Anders has done.

Phil presses up against the wall as hard as he can but it's not enough, couldn't be enough if he couldn't slip into the very grout of the bricks. He barely breathes. Try not to move too much. If he can just slip away. If he can just find other guards, warn someone, get back to the main hall--

One of the soldiers sees him when he moves to run. A handful of them catch up with him almost too easily and close around him, blades out and swinging --

One of the soldiers sees him coming when he moves to fight, and calls out a warning. A handful of them close around him, blades out --

None of the soldiers spot him when he holds absolutely still; they're all intent on their orders, and quick-march past the side corridor where he's pressed against the wall. Eventually there's only one set of bootheels ringing on the stones, much more slowly: Anders, following behind at his leisure, like a man with all the time in the world.

He doesn't look down the side corridor either.

Phil watches Anders, the blood running hot and loud in his chest and his ears. He can hear his heartbeat. Love and rage and fury—like the shadow of a wolf, teeth bared, stalking from behind with its haunches raised as he draws his sword to

(would you forgive me)
(i trust you to be dangerous)
(better a warrior in a garden than—)

The dream jumps like a record skips. Anders is dead at his feet. Breathing hard, Phil limps his way upstairs, after the other soldiers and towards the kids.

Edited 2023-09-18 15:31 (UTC)

It's quite some distance to the corridor with the children's bedrooms; it's no distance at all, the stone walls and floors blurring and skipping. When he turns the corner, four soldiers are pushing their way out of Ludwig's room, one with the boy slung over his shoulder, bare feet limply dangling.

As he watches, another two burst out of Cassandra's room, and the first pushes back his helmet to reveal a look of flat frustration. "She's not here."

(Elsewhere in the dream -- and in the way of dreams, Phil may be somehow aware of it -- little Cassandra is flattened against the slatted wall of her perfect hiding place in the minstrel gallery, staring down at the dining hall and the bloodbath spreading through it, both hands pressed hard against her mouth to keep from screaming.)

Phil takes only a moment before he surges upwards with his bloodied sword pointed at the one holding Ludwig.

That, he only tries once. Sneaking past is something he tries more. He'll get it right.

Going directly up to Cassandra is surely not the best path to resolving this entire mess, but knowing what's going on in every place will help him in the long run, and anyway it's only a thought he has at the end. He always forgets exactly where she is, at the start. Always forgets Anders' betrayal until he does it. Something about this loop isn't very sticky. That bothers him; but like the faint impressions of an overworked sketch you couldn't quite erase, things begin to pile on, impressing a shape. He'll make it work. Eventually.

Killing Anders stops being a priority after the 5th time. It's already starting to get easier to focus.

Phil (finally) slips into the minstrel gallery, silent as he can will it, his lone owlish eye gleaming red in the dark with reflected light. He's miserably aware in the darkness; all of her petrified form is visible to him.

He crouches low, keeping distance. Whispers: "Your Ladyship."

Edited 2023-09-19 07:26 (UTC)

The tiniest sound emerges as she recoils from his unexpected voice, something between a yelp and a whimper, forcibly silenced almost before it comes out. She stares wildly into the dark, unable to see more than that faint red glow of an eye.

But she's seen it before, in rare instances, and after a long moment of horrified shock she's able to identify the combination of eye and voice.

"M-master Connors?" Her whisper is even lower than his, and shaking with strain.

It wouldn't matter. She could speak no louder than the thud of her own racing heart and he would hear her.

"Yes." His third eyelid flicks; he approaches carefully, the faint brush of feathers making no sound as it passes over the floor. "My Lady, how--how did you--how did you get here? I thought..."

Frozen in place, trembling, she watches him approach -- and then like a taut string snapping, she hurtles into him and clings like she's drowning.

"I s-sneaked out of bed," in a tiny tormented whisper against his shirt, "I, I wanted to s-see the rest of -- we have to help, we have to -- they hurt Papa --"

(She hasn't used Papa rather than Father for most of the past two years.)

Kill the Lord de Rolo. God, oh, God.

He holds her close, as much a comfort for him to see her safe as it is for her to fold into him. It might almost make it ignorable, the sound of every blade and every heavy wet thunk and every scream and every broken bone and every catastrophe happening below.

"I don't--" Where do they go? What is he supposed to do? Not questions he should ask of a little scared girl. He takes a deep breath. They need to move. He'll put himself between her and every blade if he has to. Death doesn't scare him, but he won't see her killed, not on his account.

God--how do you handle a castle invasion? He probably wouldn't know even if he lived here his whole life. "Can we try and--and find more guards? The garrison? Someone?"

A booming voice below -- not Lord Briarwood's voice, but one that sounds not quite human -- is shouting Stand down all of you, or she dies. A much smaller voice is sobbing and pleading no, Mama, no; an older voice cries out in pain and a young man shouts hoarsely, for Pelor's sake, he's an old man, you don't have to -- and cuts off with the sound of a blow.

Cassandra's still shaking like a leaf. "Captain H-Holbrook's down there," she whispers, "but m-maybe Captain Addisleigh, we could -- we could try the barracks --"

It's taking so, so much for him to not choke, or throw up, or something. It's hard enough to even stand. Focus. Focus. This won't be his only shot, but he just needs to make sure that she isn't the one caught in the middle.

"Then let's go get him," he says, trying so very hard not to think about too lates. He straightens. He'd still clutch little Cassandra to his chest if he could, but her hand--he won't let go of her hand.

He pauses at the door. Listens close for footsteps, bless this gift of Cordis today that he can tell exactly how far away they are, and hurries through the way. Please grant them safe passage, please let Addisleigh be okay, the barracks somehow intact, please...

Cassandra hurries along with him, her small cold hand clutching his.

There are footsteps spreading all through the upper corridors of the castle by now: marching, limping, charging, frantically fleeing. They pass two corpses, both house servants, before they run smack into the group of soldiers still searching for the missing de Rolo child.

There are three ways that encounter ends: the one where Phil is cut down, the one where they're both taken alive, and the one where he manages to dodge around them long enough to crash through a window with Cassandra in his arms.

It takes him several tries to find the angle that gets them out into the air without injuring his wings too badly to carry them.

If Cassandra ever died in those falls, he wouldn’t know. It was always his spine that broke first.

The wind blasts them in frost as they crash through the window and enter freefall, cutting through his clothing. He twists, his muscle responds, and the wind catches. He pulls them up. With great strain, he pulls them up, just as he did when he caught Darcy from the sky, when he caught Henry in the end of the world. Guards holler after them, unable to pursue. No one below with a bow has spotted them against the darkening sky.

He can tell something is wrong in the barracks even before they close in.

Those aren't shadows, spreading out around the low building snugged up against the outer wall of the castle; the snow on the ground has been churned up by more than just footfalls, stained by more than just mud. A body, half obscured by kicked drifts, lies face down half in and half out of the building's front door. Wind stirs up a ragged scarf of snow, whirls it about in the barracks yard, the only thing moving there.

(For a moment you might almost think you were seeing a ghost: sundered from the living too quickly to have realized, casting about in desperate circles, searching frantically for survivors, for a way to help, for what to do next.)

He lands. Only briefly, without putting Cassandra down, so that he can listen for something, anything still in the barracks without the wind of both the weather and his flight wicking every scrap of heat left in him. And not very close, so that Cassandra cannot see the worst of it through the gloom, so she doesn't have to whiff more of the slaughter than she has to. But the Briarwoods were here. They got here first.

... Not for long, if he has his way.

(It's a little strange. He's seen what it looks like before, blood in the snow, the way it stains it, melts just a bit, the steam of heat wicking off in the cold. Somehow he hadn't thought that other people's would look just the same.)

"There's still," her voice says from under his arm, tiny and shaky, "the guardhouse. Down in the city. There's the people there, they, they could help us ..."

Something indefinable shifts, in the timbre of her voice, in the feel of the air around them. Something stirs, like an uneasy sleeper.

"I never made it this far. I hid."

"... What?"

He looks down at her in his arms, then back at the barracks. It takes a few moments before some part of his mind registers the white streaks (streaks, not the ribbons) in her hair as odd. And it is odd, because she's still so little, she shouldn't--

There are shouts; men with spears, with bows, pointed at them. He doesn't dwell on it any further before he takes off again. To the city if they can, but if they can't...

They can't; there are archers, mages, shadowy undead giants, something. There's nowhere to flee but the snowy Parchwood.

Cassandra's wearing two layers, but neither is suitable for the cold, and her feet are bare. She's already shivering by the time they land.

(Percy should be here, she thinks distantly, and Crichton --)

(Who?)

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ongoing cw for lots of murder

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cw reference to suicide and self-harm

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