Challenge: Showing Love

This post is part of the Wednesday Weekly Blogging Challenge. You can find links to other writers' answers over at Long and Short Reviews.)

Prompt: ways to show someone you love them

...It's eleven o'clock on the night before this prompt is supposed to go up, and I have absolutely no idea what to do with it.

Okay, no, that's not right, I do know how to answer that. I know, because Beautiful Wife took the dog for a walk earlier -- much earlier -- and when she still wasn't back at a quarter to eleven I called and asked if she wanted me to come pick her up. (She was at her mom's house; it was the only thing that made sense under the circumstance.) So one way, obviously, is to realize that it's very late and your spouse is still out with the dog and then go rescue them so they don't have to walk all the way home.

But also, I spent an hour this weekend going over Secondborn's homework and helping him work it out. So that's another way to show someone you love them: help them with math.

And that brings me around to my absolute favorite, which works for both Beautiful Wife and Firstborn: tea. Especially tea with little notes attached to it. "You are amazing and you can do all the things. Here is tea." "I'm very proud of the way you're taking care of your responsibilities. Have some tea." "This tea was forged in the cauldron of the gods and may only be drunk by the most beautiful and wonderful of women."

But those are just some particular examples. Showing someone you love them is basically just a matter of understanding their needs and desires -- and then being mindful about helping them when they need and want it. Our dishwasher broke, and I did the dishes myself, by hand, so we would have forks, without complaining (much) or asking for help from Beautiful Wife. That shows love. I leave Firstborn in charge of his own bedtime and wakeups, because he's shown that he can handle that and still get his schoolwork and etc. done. That shows love. 

Pay attention, and do what you can to show appreciation and support. Everything else is just details.

Music: Coffin Nails

 The band is Lucero:

Undone by Snow Days

Let us speak of all the things I have not done. Come, children, gather 'round. We have electricity and running water, at least. Come.  

Let us speak of the Three Days of Vacation that I applied for some weeks ago. Let us speak of the plans I had for them: the meals I would eat, the scenes I would write, the sleep I would get. There would be cooking, and cleaning, and video games! It was to be a wonder, those Three Days of Vacation. 

Let us speak of the Time of Cold that came during those days. Let us speak of the snow and ice, and the closing of the schools. Let us speak of my children, with whom I spent the last four days indoors, and let us speak of how they grow very excited at Snow Days and do not sleep. Let us speak of how it falls that when they do not sleep, I do not sleep. 

Let us speak of the dishwasher as well. Let us speak of its honorable service as a household appliance, and the many dishes it has cleaned for us. Let us speak of its demise, and our mourning, and The Great Hand Washing of the Dishes. Let us speak of the horror movies that carried me through that task, and give thanks once again that we had electricity and clean water.

Let us speak of the stories I did not write, of the resume I did not clean up, of the cover letter I have yet to produce. Tomorrow, I tell myself, knowing full well that tomorrow I will face The Inbox of Bottomless Email, and another troubleshooting call, and fasting for the bloodwork for my annual physical exam. Let us speak of the Coming of the Plumber and the Repair of the Shower, much anticipated for all that it will occupy Tuesday afternoon. Let us speak of how the promise of Tomorrow is rash and unreliable. 

Let us speak of finally returning the children to a school schedule. Let us speak of the difficulties this will entail, and the relief we hope it will bring. Let us speak of the overdue Math Homework, now all filled out and paper-clipped together as it rests in a young man's school folder. Let us speak of our hopes for the return of a regular sleep schedule.  

Let us speak of the things that have passed, and the things that we hope are yet to come.

Setting: The Arcane Empire

The Arcane Empire is the setting for the Magic School For Monsters book that I'm (still) trying to write. It is a land populated by human beings as well as magical races, rich in sorcery and under constant threat from the monster-filled wastelands beyond its southern border. Those are the two fundamental elements that define and inform everything else about the empire. 

Regarding Sorcery:

• Almost anyone can use sorcery. The right words and gestures, made together, produce reliable results. No real mystical understanding is required; words and phrases can be learned by rote, and most people know at least a handful of useful sayings.
  
  
• Speakers are the ones who study the grammar and vocabulary of sorcery, in order to assemble their own phrases; the best of them are able, through long practice, to condense long, precise speeches into shorter phrases that can be filled in with keywords specific to a particular situation.
  
  
• Scribes are able to render words and phrases into the hieroglyphs of the Forgotten Tongue, and so add magical qualities to ordinary items. This can encompass anything from creating a doorway that cleans you off when you walk through it, to marking a chest with a glyph that will explode when someone touches it, to adding powerful magics to a sword or shield. Scribes are highly valued by the Imperial military, and learning how to inscribe is one of the best ways to complete your service without ever seeing battle.
  
  
• Images also have power in Imperial magic. An image can be connected to a real place, or to a specific person, allowing a means of magical communication and transportation. This can be done with any size of image, but tarot or playing cards are especially common, particularly among Speakers. 

Regarding Monsters:

• The monsters come out of the southern wastelands, and would lay waste to the empire were the southern border not constantly defended. This is the primary role and purpose of the Imperial military, and the reason why a four-year term of service is required of all Imperial citizens.
  
  
• The monsters come in many shapes and sizes, but even the ones that most closely resemble humans are incapable of infiltration. Their actions, outlook, and understanding are simply too alien for them to pretend to be human. The more humanoid strains are also a relatively new development; Imperial records show no accounts of them prior to about thirty years ago.
  
  
• The monstrous Great Houses within the Empire are almost all the result of sorcerous attempts to create beings better suited to fighting the wasteland beasts (as are their more heroic equivalents within the houses of Light).
  
  
• Sorcery -- Spoken or Inscribed -- remains the most effective defense that the Empire has against monstrous incursions. Regular troops are trained in basic sorcerous attacks and defenses, but officers and specialists are expected to be Speakers themselves, or at least have a good vocabulary. Most have other gifts as well, either dark or light Arcana.
  

Fanaxia: Escape from the Abyss

 We're still in the Abyss, and still naked. We've just killed our second slavemaster, and we're trying to come up with a plan. Our plan was for Azrael to create a distraction and then Plane Shift out while we escape through the portal.

We decide to sneak off and engage one of the Retrievers, the demonic constructs with the magical eye-rays, to get it to zap the staff and thus recharge it. Azrael absorbs its first attack and blasts it with a lightning bolt.

It moves up on us, and Tavros starts ripping into it with claws and fangs; Azrael moves back and fires off another lightning bolt. Marshall attempts to grapple the thing, taking a bit of damage on the way in, and the thing shrugs him off. Leira hides behind Azrael and taunts the Retriever. Martini starts slinking around, and Ruin goes after it with a pry-bar and damages it some more.

It fires an eye ray at Azrael, and then attempts to attack Tavros but misses and gets a claw stuck under a rock. The other three attacks do some damage, though. (-82 HP to Tavros.) We leap on him and try to pin the other claw down. Tavros takes more damage (-33) and grabs the claw and successfully grapples it. Azrael uses telekinesis to drive the arm into the ground and trap it there.

Leira taunts the thing again, keeping its attention and its eye lasers on Azrael. It attacks Tavros with its claws, doing another 33 damage to him.

Marshall offers himself as the sacrifice for the next attack of opportunity, taking a bit of damage. Tavros uses the distraction to grab the next leg and drive it into the ground. It fires its eye-beams at Azrael again, and attacks Marshall again.

Tavros drives the third leg into the ground, effectively pinning the thing. We move back out of reach of its claws, and let it keep firing at Azrael and thus recharging the staff.

Azrael: "I think we've taunted him enough. Kill it now!"

We run back in, and beat it down.

Azrael is fully confident in his power now. Azrael starts laying out his plans for how best to distract the demons, now that he's fully charged.

Azrael makes us invisible and we head for the stair up the pyramid. We look back, and see Azrael riding on the back of a giant scorpion, shouting shit at the demons and summoning Celestial Rocs and devils and whatnot. Demons start teleporting over to deal with him.

We run into the pyramid and come into Behemoth's throne room. All hell is breaking loose outside, and Behemoth and Hecate are gone. We take a minute to look around for our stuff.

There's a *lot* of treasure here. We locate a bag that looks like it has our stuff, and Ruin dashes over to it. Tavros moves over there as well. Martini and Marshall move into the room as well.

A Babau runs in. "What's going on in here?" It can't see us, but it definitely hears something.

Leira sneaks towards the portal. Martini just jumps through the portal, invisible and inaudible; we don't even know she's gone. Tavros grabs a carpet of flying and heads for the portal, making a bit of noise; Ruin grabs the bag and follows silently.

The Babau casts See Invisible and starts yelling: "Slaves! Slaves escaping!"

We jump through the portal and escape.

Marshall, Tavros, and Leira wake up in coffins. Martini, Ruin, and Geddy crawl out of the water of Mar Dentro, at the edge of the rainforest beside Titan's reach. Our equipment is magically restored to us.

Geddy uses one of his wishes to make sure that Eva is safe and happy. Eva will no longer be part of the party; she is much older, and has grown into an adult while we were away.

Turns out that when Geddy went through the portal, he landed in the swamp and wound up staying there for some fifteen years. He finds a magic pond that lets him look in on Eva, hundreds of years ago in Povos. They become friends, and she grows older, and then after about two years a human man wanders in and introduces himself as Bryce Lamont, the crown prince of Fanaxia. So Geddy starts trying to help him, mentor him. This goes on for another fourteen years, until finally one day the swamp starts to change and a path appears, leading to the place of an ancient tree.

Bryce returns to reclaim his throne; Geddy stays by the pond. As the demons are destroying the ghost tower, Eva dives into Mar Dentro and pulls Geddy out through the pond.

Geddy, unfortunately, has been aging at the same time-frame as Eva; he is *old* now. (OOC: "Venerable".)



Meanwhile, Azrael makes his escape and shows up in someone's summoning circle. He escapes and winds back up in the Abyss. Behemoth is waiting for him: "The Compact prevents you from leaving, Mortal."

Azrael: "Oh."

Behemoth: "I accept your challenge, mortal."

Azrael absorbs more of Behemoth's magic; he throws lightning back, but doesn't do much damage. He remembers what the staff can do, absorbs more magic.

"You bulbous, crypt-nosed whore!" yelled Azrael. He laughed. "Pathetic. Your mother should be ashamed of you. Your the bitch of the litter, useless... boyfriend!"

A barrage of magic drove him to his knees. The staff burned in his hands.

Behemoth drew his sword and whip, and came forward to finish him.

Azrael came to his feet as the Balor charged. He raised the staff above his head, and Behemoth stumbled to a stop. There was a brief moment as their eyes met.

Behemoth turned to flee, but it was too late. Azrael brought the staff down and cracked it over his knee.

The explosion shook the Abyss.

We went into Fanaxia in April of 557. It's... about two years later. Somewhere in about May, the Solari died and were buried. Viggo the Whisperer is a bit broken up by this.

Next time we'll pick up with Evil!Party and find out what's been happening in the meantime. Hatch has left Evil!Party and retired to live it up in Sander's Reach.

Blogging Challenge: 2022 Theme Song

This post is part of the Wednesday Weekly Blogging Challenge. You can find links to other writers' answers over at Long and Short Reviews.)

Prompt: your theme song for this year

I... kind of have two answers for this one. The first one is the one that suits the mood of 2022 so far, "Everybody Knows" by Leonard Cohen:

The other one is... more aspirational, perhaps. "Giants" by Matt Nathanson:

I suppose that together they're sort of the two sides of 2022 for me right now.

...You know what? I need one more, on the theme of giants. Lindsey Stirling, with Dia Frampton, "Giants".

Duendewood: The Librarian Who Wasn't

Aesa sighed and tried to find a comfortable position while she read. They'd been here for days, tucked away in the chapter house just outside of Woodhill, while the human scholar Domian Ulthres and the Elvish scholar Rondelvan sorted through the ancient treaties, took notes, and made copies. The gnomish librarian Ellywick was supervising them, and for the first few days that had been enough to make Aesa grateful that she'd been left in the larger library outside of the study room. 

The elvish paladin Werendril raised his eyes and shifted his weight at the next table over. He was not unattractive himself, she thought, though she wasn't sure how much of that was her reaction and how much might be Corellon Larethian wanting her to be allied with one of His own. Divine politics were both subtle and complex, and Aesa wasn't eager to involve herself in any more of them after the crash course that had resulted in her pregnancy. 

"Are you finding what you need, dear?" asked a soft voice, and Aesa realized that one of the librarians had stopped beside her. The woman was old, even for an elf, white-haired and stoop-shouldered; she might have been old enough to remember Saint Margery herself. 

"Amun provides," Aesa answered automatically, then added: "Corellon does as well."

"In his way," answered the librarian, with a small laugh. "You offer praise to them both, still?"

Aesa looked up, distracted enough to give up on trying to sort out the Elvish view of history. "I do. I am a priest of Amun, and I honor Corellon on behalf of my father."

"He is well," said the librarian, and Aesa blinked and asked: "What?"

"Jerivir Quindillan works the docks in Annon, for far too little pay. Still, he is whole and well, and he would pleased to know that his wife and daughter are safe, and that you seek news of him."

Aesa held up a hand and took a deep breath. "This is too much. Who are you?"

The librarian chuckled even as something tickled at the back of her mind, a hint that all was not as it seemed. "Were you married, I would be your mother by law." 

Aesa drew breath to speak a name, held it, then let it out without forming the words. "It is good to finally meet you." 

The elderly librarian smiled. "You are wise, and gifted. No wonder my son found his way to you. Would you speak well for your human companion?"

Aesa nodded without hesitation. "If I have the timing right, Anica caught him first. And she was interested, and apologetic for a mistake she had made. She is my friend, and she made her own choices for her own reasons... but there is nothing of dishonesty or betrayal there. Ask the paladin, if you're uncertain."

The supposed librarian smiled. "I did, and his assessment matches yours. I will see you both later. If anything comes up, Darvinin can contact me."

Aesa nodded again. "I am... honestly, kind of puzzled. But it was good to meet you at last."