un: man's greatest treasure (video)

[reparo]

[The talisman starts transmitting almost out of spite, catching a few seconds of Hermione chopping herbs meticulously, in what looks like her room in the teahouse. The few days before departure are very clearly spent preparing supplies for the road, with her cauldrons bubbling happily away.

She brings her herbs over to one cauldron and drops them inside, picking up a spoon to stir, muttering under her breath:] Ten counter clock this time, maybe it will be stronger - no replacement for - [She flinches, her jaw twitching where she grits it.

Somewhere in her head, she is treated to a cacophony of Ke-Waihu's dead, the most recent ones outraged that they were not rescued sooner by all these strangers. You stir your potions and tell us to mind that face paints aren't poisoned, but do you do anything for us? Where were you when the beasts attacked?

A from Hermione in stirring, the sudden flash of anger in her face at having lost track of her counterclock-wise strokes, and to anyone unwise to what's happening, she snaps at thin air:] Will you shut up for ONE MINUTE - all of you --

[She freezes in place, and looks at the talisman, propped onto the worktable next to her.] Shit. [The feed stops.]

[ooc: SOMEONE signed up to absorb some volcano spirits and now SOMEONE can hear the dead and the dead have A LOT to say right now so now SOMEONE might be extremely angry. (Set before sea-travel, after Subaru's post announcing it.)]

Comments

[downswing]

Appeared when?

let her stay private, bitch

[reparo]

Five today.

HIS NOT-WIFE WHO KNOWS THIS STUFF CAN'T SEE THEN

[downswing]

In rotation?

YES BUT

[reparo]

The number changes depending on where I am. Ke-Waihu has a lot of dead, so...

[downswing]

What do they ask of you?

[reparo]

They're not asking anything, mostly they're just angry they're dead.

[downswing]

When did the hauntings first visit you?

[reparo]

Well.
I went on the plank.
After that.

[downswing]

You yearned for death.

[reparo]

I did not YEARN for death.

[downswing]

You bear its stain.

[reparo]

Yes, well, the volcano held too many spirits inside it and was going to blow, I prioritised.

[downswing]

We held alternative.

[reparo]

You were busy fighting. I wanted it to not erupt, I thought fixing the mirror would help - and clearly I was not the only one.

[downswing]

( You were busy fighting.

Then, the fault is his own? )


Joint madness is yet folly.

[reparo]

I'm sorry - I know you must be disappointed, but I swear I was not trying to court a haunting. I thought that they'd be syphoned out of the volcano, released into the ether or something of that sort. I didn't think I would get out of there with this kind of...side-effect.

[downswing]

The dead are chaos. Lack direction. Want for steering.

[reparo]

I don't want to steer them - I don't want to be steered, either.

[downswing]

They require it. As children do.

[reparo]

If I start actually telling the dead what to do, isn't that necromancy?

[downswing]

The stirring of spirits from slumber is necromancy.

[reparo]

What is the guiding of stirred spirits, then?

[downswing]

Release their attention. Coax them asleep.

[reparo]

Is that cultivation?

[downswing]

No.