milliways_bar | (no subject)

(no subject)

Jack is carving today, outside under the trees with a view of the new grave. He is humming to himself.

Under his hands the block of wood is taking on a curving horn-shape, with a texture as if it were woven from reeds. There are almost no shavings on the ground.

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Jack beams back.

"I believe he's new. I think I spoke to him the first day he was here. I got to give the rules speech," he adds proudly. "My first."

Asar-Suti grins brightly.

"Oh yes, that is always fun. Once you give your first rules speech, you are no longer new yourself. Welcome among us regulars, Jack!"

Jack laughs aloud. "Thank you very much."

"I'm really happy about your being here, you know. You were a tremedous help with Gil, and now we're finally happy again, thanks to our friends helping. Seems I didn't have the right scent to let him overcome some inbuilt faunish inhibitions."

Discretion? What is that? Eeep, not to Green!Jack.

"Well, good. I'm glad I could be of assistance."

"I'm glad you were there," Asar-Suti says again.

"What is that thing you are making, though?"

"It's for the party tomorrow," Jack says, smiling at how it's turning out. "A bit of old magic to help me manage things."

"Oooh, fascinating - what does it do?"

Whee, new magic!

"This," he says, showing Asar-Suti the carving, "is a horn of plenty. It will help me focus the magic to see that everyone is fed tomorrow. I will ask the elements to assemble themselves as food and that way everyone will be able to eat and no one will be left with the washing up."

"A cornucopia? A real working one, not just a carved symbol somewhere?" Asar-Suti is impressed.

He would just conjure the food out of the atoms in the air, but the way Green!Jack plans to do it sounds infinitely more stylish, and with an additional potential for surprise. You never quite know what might come out of a cornucopia.

"I'll make it real," Jack says. "First I give it shape. Then I'll give it purpose.

"I would prefer to use Dagda's cup but I fear its magic would clash with Milliways's own."

"What is Dagda's cup?" Asar-Suti asks, curious. Magic that Milliways would not tolerate? Milliways, the palce where all magic works so much more easily?

"It belonged to one of the younger gods. He enchanted it so that it would feed an army and never be empty.

"The powers here . . . they aren't connected to anything, as far as I can tell. My magic is drawn from the Earth and all that dwells in it--which powers the magic here, I cannot tell.

"Thus, Dagda's cup stays home. Just to be safe."

"Oh, but Earth magic worked through me, even though this is just a small non-linear worldlet off the normal reality," Asar-Suti says. "But I can believe that some sorts of magic will not work away from their home."

"I'd rather not chance it. The repurcussions of poorly-used magic would be dreadful."

"I'm sure your cornucopia will be up to all that is asked of it," Asar-Suti agrees. "Magic overkill is never good. Why use the magical sword of the Kings of the West to carve a turkey? That cup of Dagda sounds like strong magic - you don't have an army to feed, just a crowd of well-fed Milliwaysers."

"Nearly an army," Jack says, amused. "I hope with the dancing and games they'll be hungry."

"Oooh - games?" Asar-Suti grins. He'd heard about the dancing, but games might be a new kind of fun.

"Yes. Those I have yet to figure out, as I think Highland games would be too much for most of this crowd. And there should be some for the various children."

"There's a lot of them here now," Asar-Suti says. "Seth or Joshua might still be too young for games, but Sunny definitely isn't."

He shrugs. "The only thing that might yet ruin the party is the air of general doom; I have no idea what happened to make so many people so subdued."

"There has been death," Jack says without looking up from his carving.

"Death? Who died?" Asar-Suti sounds alarmed.

He nods to the new grave. "Someone well-loved and deeply mourned."

He blows sawdust off the carving.

"But that has been here a few days," Asar-Suti says. "And the great feeling of doom only descended sometime between last night and this morning."

"There are battles being fought and friends endangered." He speaks mildly. "When one doesn't know the end of the story, it's easy to believe there will be an unhappy ending."