(no subject)

[tire_moi_mes_bottes]

Milliways is filled with wonders, a near-infinity of unknown persons and objects and ideas.

For instance, pencils with erasers at the end. And once you have pencils with erasers at the end, you're bound to discover pencil games. So Laigle is perched at the bar with a thick book, at which he's frowning mock-fiercely while he makes and erases marks.

He's eminently interruptible: he's got a bottle of wine and a glass at his elbow, as well as a potted plant, which he occasionally sprinkles with a few drops from his wineglass.

((OOM link: Bossuet and Joly explore.))

Comments

[wheatencrown]

"Why are you giving that poor plant wine, dear boy?" Demeter is smiling as she sits down beside him and pets the plant.

[tire_moi_mes_bottes]

"Why, he likes it; and we are making friends; and it would be rude not to share! Do be careful, Madame. It's a mandrake. I ought to make a cautionary sign."

He doesn't recognize her, with her face for a new season, but he unconsciously sits up a little straighter and tucks his elbows and knees in more tidily, a good boy inspired to his best company manners for an elegant old lady.

[wheatencrown]

She listens for a moment to the plant and smiles, "Yes, he does but don't give him too much. His constitution isn't as used to wine as yours is."

[tire_moi_mes_bottes]

"Not so thoroughly marinated as a Paris student? Well, well, I expect you're right, Madame. Do you hear, Mandrake, I am considering your morals and your good health: you are in good hands! --We haven't named him yet."

[wheatencrown]

"Very few people are. I think he might be a Henri or possibly a Rene?"

[tire_moi_mes_bottes]

"Henri? René?" He leans in, but the plant makes no signal--at least, none that Laigle can see. "I'm afraid I don't speak its language. We've been reading on mandrake culture, but not in the right sense of the word for that. Perhaps they even have names of their own to begin with."

[wheatencrown]

(OOC: Is there a name you want the plant to have or to not have one? Wit her gift of plants, she could find it out but she also can be told that it doesn't have one.)

"Everything has a name, that's how the world knows itself. May I ask it?"

[tire_moi_mes_bottes]

"...Can you? By all means, you may; but you can make conversation with it?"

((I haven't picked anything yet, so maybe the mandrake should just be shy about sharing?))

[wheatencrown]

"Of course I can, dear. I am a goddess of agriculture," She speaks to the plant once more, its something that could be Greek or French then looks up, "You my dear friend have a rather shy plant who doesn't wish to say their name yet, but they do like the wine."

[street_sparrow]

"Lesgle", Gavroche observes, wandering up. "...you've got a pet plant?"

[tire_moi_mes_bottes]

"Please, a vegetable companion," he corrects. "Joly found it, and now we have a mandrake. Careful, don't pull!"

[street_sparrow]

"Wouldn't dream of pulling it up", he assures him. "An actual mandrake?"

[tire_moi_mes_bottes]

"Unmistakably so. We pulled it up like a pair of idiots before we thought what it might be, but being already deceased it did us no harm. We didn't think it right to put it back for some other idiot to find."

[street_sparrow]

"So now you're taking care of it... and giving it wine."

[tire_moi_mes_bottes]

"It likes wine. I am winning its confidence, you see. I wouldn't want to live with a mandrake that resented me. Would you?"

[street_sparrow]

"That sounds dangerous", Gavroche agrees. "But how do you know it likes wine? Can you see its face?"

[tire_moi_mes_bottes]

"After we so rudely uprooted it, I gave it a little splash of brandy and it looked quite grateful. And here, watch." He sprinkles a few more drops of wine onto the soil, and the leaves rustle faintly. "We need to design a better pot, though. One with a window."

[herr_bookman]

Autor blinks, and blinks again as he approaches. "'Lo, Bossuet! Wine for a plant? Is it that picky?"

[OOC: That OOM was adorable!]

[tire_moi_mes_bottes]

"We're getting acquainted, and I find that most people like me better when we've both had a bit to drink. Good--afternoon?" He's not quite sure what time it might be.

[herr_bookman]

"Good afternoon," Autor says, inclining his head. He eyes the potted plant. "Getting acquainted with a plant, though? I can't imagine it has the most scintillating conversation."

[tire_moi_mes_bottes]

"It's a mandrake." He gives the pot a gentle pat. "Terribly lethal, so simply as a matter of policy I'd rather be on its good side. And I fancy it has thoughts."

[herr_bookman]

"An Alraune?" Autor says, blinking. And then he has a most unusual reaction: he blushes, and blushes terribly. He clears his suddenly parched throat. "Oh, I see. How on earth did you find one?"

[tire_moi_mes_bottes]

"It was in the ground." He shouldn't ask. He really shouldn't. And a mandrake is an embarrassing and improper sort of a thing, no explanation needed there.

But his eyebrows go all questioning anyway. "That is, Joly was engaged in cartography, and stuck a stake in the ground, and the ground groaned, and we dug down to see what we could see--we being very foolish people who would pull up a mandrake without stopping to ask what it was."

[herr_bookman]

Autor's trying awfully hard to rein in this blush. He rubs his reddened cheek, which of course only makes it redder. "Wait, it groaned? I suppose I'd groan, too, if someone stuck a stake in my head," he says, and clears his throat again. "Did it shriek at you when you pulled it up?"

[tire_moi_mes_bottes]

Lesgle takes pity on him and restrains his questioning eyebrows. He'd have blushed too if he'd found that mandrake in the company of nearly anyone but Joly. "It groaned first, and then it did indeed shriek."

The memory of that sound is enough to erase gossipy amusement from his expression entirely. "If I weren't already dead, I would be now."