Catch All for November

[lightbranded]

Characters: Will Stanton and Anyone
Date: Throughout November
Location: Various
Situation: Various

A. Around Town

Will spends much of the first part of the month slowly exploring the parts of Aifaran around the Dreaming Bridge. At the beginning he has to rest often, and is grateful to find quite a few benches and small cafes to rest at. But as the month goes on, he slowly starts to get some of his endurance back, and does not tire quite so easily any more. He finds one of the neighborhood libraries, and spends a lot of time there in the folklore and mythology sections.


B. Seitura Park Arboretum

Towards the end of the month, Will finally finds his way to Seitura Park, where he regards the autumn colors with more than a little delight. He wanders through the arboretum, reading the descriptions of each tree and trying to remember the names to look up later.


C. Astronomy Hour

Will had always liked watching the stars at home. Having grown up in a small town in the country, the stars at night had often been easy to see without the glare from city lights. Upon receiving the invitation to visit an observatory, Will had accepted with great anticipation.

It was disappointing that the night was too cloudy to truly see anything, but Will still wanders around the observatory with great interest. He has many questions about how everything in the observatory works, and asks them of anyone who seems likely to know.


D. For Yuuko

Yuuko's first meeting with Will had left him with much to think about. And with no school or family here, he'd found himself with a great deal of time to think.  He often thinks about that certainty he felt that he had forgotten something terribly important. And those few words. On the Day of the Dead, when the year too dies. By Cadfan's Way where the kestrels call. What did it all mean?

And Yuuko...  She'd said she'd sensed a power around him. But what power could that be? He didn't think that there was any kind of power or anything remarkable about himself, apart from being the youngest child of a very large family. But she had sounded so convinced. And she didn't seem the type of person to joke about something like that.

He resists for a few weeks, but in the end his questions drive him out in search of Yuuko again.
 

Comments

[lightbranded]

Will stares down at his hands as they rested on the table.

"I don't remember ever having any kind of power." Even if some part of what she had just said echoed strangely within his mind.

"But... I think I've forgotten something. I know it was important. Maybe more important than anything else in my life. But I can't remember what it was."

[shaini]

Her head tilts as she stares at him, then she leans forward, one arm extending across the table, and taps his forearm lightly, over the pale quartered circle branded into his skin.

"I suspect it is related to this. Do you remember it?"

As her fingers touch his skin, she blinks, taken aback at the rush of power running up her fingers from the mark, and from Will himself. She pauses long enough to get a sense of it, then sits back, flexing her hand to clear it from the tingle still thrumming slightly through it.

"It is quite powerful, Will." She frowns slightly, not in irritation, but a certain sense of concern at somebody carrying that kind of potential wandering around nearly helpless. In her experience, this only leads to bad things for everybody involved.

[lightbranded]

Will frowns. "I think I burned myself on something?" But the memory was hazy. Had it been at the hearth at home? In the shop at school? He wasn't sure.

But as she touches his skin, he stiffens as a rush of power runs through him and he is lost within it for a long moment that seems to never end. Images run through his mind. Snow, deep and cold. A pair of cat-like golden eyes, fringed with feathers. A golden cup. And fire, fire blooming into a flower.

And above everything else, the words that come into his mind.

"The Youngest of the Old," he repeats aloud.

[shaini]

Yuuko sits back, her eyes narrowing as she watches him, his reaction to the power, and how he seems to lose focus of everything else for a moment.

"So, a memory." She shakes her head, as the phrase he utters does not currently mean anything to her. "Those words are a place to start."

"Drink your tamago-zake. It will help" She is familiar with the crash which can follow an unexpected flow of spiritual energy, not to mention hidden memories. Sugar and protein will do a lot for him now.

She moves her chair slightly away from the table to relight the pipe, and spends some time lost in thought herself. After a few moments of turning things over in her mind, she turns back to him.

"You are from an Earth, are you not?" She had assumed so based on his appearance, but appearances are not accurate. "Do you remember where are you from precisely? "

[lightbranded]

He nods and reaches for his cup. His hands shake slightly as he raises it and takes a sip.

"England," he says after swallowing. I live just outside the village of Hunterscoombe in Buckinghamshire. Although I was a traveling to Tywyn Station in Wales before I arrived here."

[shaini]

This is mentally noted. Since she has plans to visit the academy library stacks, she may just be checking the folklore of England and Wales, too.

"I see. Do you miss your home?" Her head cocks, still watching him closely. She is curious what 'home' will bring up to him, with his apparently fragmented memory.

[lightbranded]

He sets his cup back down and stares down into it.

"Mmm, quite a lot. It is too quiet here, I think. And it doesn't feel right. But I guess even if I hadn't been brought here it would have been a while before I could have gone home."

[shaini]

Her eyes flicker toward him. "Why do you think it would have been a time before you could go home?"

She tamps some more tobacco in the barrel of the kiseru pipe with her thumb, and lights it again. The scent of the smoke, when it reaches him from time to time, is unusual. It doesn't seem to be just tobacco, but something she has mixed into herself.

[lightbranded]

"I was sent there to convalesce." His gaze flicks up at her as he gestures at himself. "You saw how I was when I first arrived here. Mum has an old friend who has a farm in Wales. I was supposed to stay there until I was recovered."

[shaini]

Again, her eyes narrow. "To convalesce from what, Will? What happened to you?" She holds his gaze, her eyes steady, not shifting, then takes another, meditative pull on her pipe.

She follows her first question with... "Can you tell me at what point you lost your memories?"

She is quite sure the amnesia is linked to something to do with his abilities, and is looking for threads to weave together into something coherent.

[lightbranded]

"Hepatitis," he says, keeping his eyes on his mug. "I was very sick for a while. I don't remember much of it. Mum and the doctor told me that I had a terrible fever, and I was saying all kinds of strange things. And I think that was when it happened. Because the first thing I remember when I woke up was being sure that I had lost something important."

[shaini]

"How long after this illness did you find yourself here?" She is leaning back, still smoking thoughtfully, but angled toward the window so the smoke doesn't drift his way.

"Also, what kind of strange things were you supposed to have said? Did anyone record it?"

She frowns, the her expression smooths out and she pats his hand gently.

"If you are sure you lost something" she says "Then you probably have." She pauses, then adds. "The world is very small place, so just move onward. Your memories will return when it is time. To those who know, the world is also a very large place, and when seen by those who know, holds far more than just one world can hold."

[lightbranded]

Will frowns thoughtfully. "If you mean by when I was able to get out of bed, it was only about a week."

He tries to think back. "Mum didn't want to talk about it much. I think it worried her. But she said I kept insisting I had lost something important. And I said some things like lines from a poem. On the day of the dead when the year too dies. On Cadfan's Way where the kestrel calls. Something like that."

He frowns."I suppose so," he says doubtfully."Perhaps I'm just being impatient. But it is a terrible feeling to constantly feel like I've just forgotten something."

[shaini]

"I wonder"...she says musingly "..if your illness, memory loss, and arrival here are not all linked. High fevers can cause amnesia, but it is temporary. However, your amnesia could have left you more vulnerable to things like...this"

She gestures around them, to the city, the barrier, all of it.

"Normally, someone of power would be able to avoid a trap like this. Forced relocation, being bound to a locale.. It makes me wonder what the purpose is, and why."

She doesn't mention what circumstances might have left her vulnerable to the very situation she just described, because A- they are focusing on Will's issue, and B- she does have her pride.

[lightbranded]

Will smiles uncertainly. It did make some kind of sense. But it still felt odd to think of himself as someone of power. He believed Yuuko when she said that she had sensed something from him,but there was difference between believing what you were told, and knowing it to be true.

"So you think someone was doing all of this on purpose?"