now what?

[small_magics]

Isibel gates the demon and all of the useful books except the parts about summoning Darkness (which she burns) into the cave where they've been sleeping.

She stays there. Their physical presence is a comfort; their mental presence works over arbitrary distances and at least they're not awake to read her.

She reads the books. Just for something to do.

Comments

[small_magics]

Isibel shrugs negligently.

She tells him about the expedition and the statues of Tialle and how she first found the demon, how he didn't hurt her, and showed her the dragon, from whom she ran; how he told her about the local poisons, how Magania corroborated his story. How she met Liselen later, and worked to learn hyperfocus, and came back to the island, and joined her Bonded, and how she studied magic, and how they found the summoner and how he has now been stricken from the lists of the living.

[pythbox]

Andoreniel listens gravely to this recitation.

At the end of it, he says, "And yet it seems to me that one task remains before the land will be free from Darkness once more."

[small_magics]

Isibel takes a moment to parse that.

"Liselen says that my beloved isn't Tainted," she volunteers softly.

[pythbox]

"Liselen is the son of Kareta, and grandson of Shalkan, and I am sure that when he is grown he will be very wise," says Andoreniel. "But I have not heard that he has met your - beloved."

[small_magics]

"That would not be a comfortable experience for Liselen. But he received a message from the Wild Magic about my beloved and relayed it to me, nonetheless," Isibel says.

She's still sitting on the floor of the cave. If she had the will to live still, perhaps she'd try to wake the demon and dragon, and gate away. Instead she's sitting here defending the right of a peacefully napping being to exist.

[pythbox]

Andoreniel nods regally.



There is a crashing in the underbrush, and Liselen bounds into view. He shoulders his way - twitching already - past the king and into the cave.

"Hi!" he says loudly. "So I heard somebody was trying to argue with a unicorn about who's Tainted, but that's not what's actually going on here, right, because the king of the Elves is really wise and stuff and not a total clod."

[small_magics]

Isibel laughs, just a little.

[pythbox]

"I do not say that you lie," Andoreniel says mildly. "I merely say that you may be... mistaken. And that if you are, it is far too high a price to pay."

"Nope," says Liselen.

And he makes his way shakily to the back of the cave, and flumps down next to the sleeping demon, and bends his head to lay his horn across the demon's scarlet neck.

It feels like dipping it in a clear well.

Nothing else happens.

[small_magics]

"...But Tialle burned him," murmurs Isibel. "He bears the scar."

[pythbox]

"Something probably happened in the intervening ten thousand years," says Liselen, rising awkwardly. "And now I'm outta here."

He gets all four hooves under him and hurries out of the cave.

"...Well," says Andoreniel. "I stand corrected."

[small_magics]

Isibel nods. "I take it we may all three remain as we are."

[pythbox]

He surveys them for a moment.

"It is," he says, "not my royal command, but my royal suggestion, that you bring your beloved to the house of a suitable clothier. In all other respects, yes."

[small_magics]

"He doesn't want clothes," Isibel says absently.

[pythbox]

The king sighs.

"Then I suppose he does not need them."

[small_magics]

She nods.

[pythbox]

The king nods back.

He leaves.

[small_magics]

Isibel curls up with her beloveds and closes her eyes.

[endragoned]

Eventually, the demon wakes.

[small_magics]

Isibel relates the conversation with king and unicorn.

[endragoned]

He sighs, and hugs her.

"I wish you had let him, my love," he murmurs.

[small_magics]

"I didn't - try very hard. The Wild Magic went to some trouble to see that you were allowed to live," she murmurs. "Perhaps it is necessary." She lifts her hand, lays it on his face. "And I love you."

[endragoned]

"I love you," he echoes, cuddling her. "I don't want you to hurt."

[small_magics]

She snuggles up. He's so warm.

"There are times when you sleep and times when I'm focusing and times when you're focusing, and then I don't hurt, and maybe I'll - get used to it, somehow - and even if I don't, in a thousand years I'll be gone and you can go on without me and I won't hurt at all."

[endragoned]

Blinking back tears, he settles a wing around her and kisses her forehead.

[small_magics]

Snuggles.

She barely thinks of anything, now. Maybe that's how it will stop hurting. She'll flinch away from thinking until her brain stops trying to do it.

[endragoned]

No. That is no good at all. He loves her mind, every piece of it, he just - wishes he could love it from farther away.

[small_magics]

She's not sure she knows how to put it back together again now anyway.

[endragoned]

Her beloveds could help... but of course that's the problem, isn't it?

He sighs, and cuddles her, and stops thinking. It's easy enough by now to do nothing but snuggle.

[small_magics]

Snuggle. Thoughtless comfortable snuggle.