Back Room at the Magic Box, Friday Night

[angelo_wings]

Rinoa didn't realize it was Friday, or that she hadn't taught her class today. Rinoa didn't remember the last time she'd had a full conversation with another human being, instead of just nodding at people and waiting for them to go away.

She was too deep in her book.

She'd been obsessed with books before, but never like this. It was a Sorceress's life, spilled out on the page. It was all of her questions answered.

Rinoa had started taking notes, lately, of important messages and sequences of events. Sometimes she'd go back and re-read an earlier chapter just to be sure she had it all down. She couldn't believe she still hadn't reached the end of the book yet. She'd been reading obsessively for ... it had to be a few days, now, but the days were all blurring together. And she was always just at the good part, just where things where getting interesting.

And she was learning quite a bit. Such as: early Sorceresses had used one another as their protection. They had formed an enclave and secured one another's hearts. Knights had only come later -- Knights had been an issuance by the town, an instruction. Allow these men to guard you, Or Else.

And then the Knights had started to betray. Did Edea know that that was the true nature of Knights? Only a Sorceress could guard a Sorceress's heart. It suddenly made so much sense.

She was hunched over her book, as she had been for hours. Her stomach growled, but she ignored it. She'd eat soon enough. Whenever. It didn't matter.

(Expecting one -- can be open if anyone else would pop in! This isn't the store proper, which is closed, just a back room.)

Comments

[whateverknight.livejournal.com]

Squall walked in with some Mooby's. It wasn't the best-tasting food, or the healthiest, but it was quick and easy and he had a suspicion that Rinoa hadn't been eating much lately. This, she could shove in her mouth and then go back to reading, and maybe he'd feel less worried. It didn't help that he still had no idea what had happened to Quezacotl, and Jono seemed sick or something. Rinoa was his priority, though.

She hadn't spent much time at home, and she hadn't talked much when she was around. Her behavior was abnormal, and he didn't like it. He didn't know how to phrase it in a way that wouldn't come out rude.

(...But I have to try.)

He walked up behind her. "Hey. Are you learning a lot?"

[angelo_wings]

Somewhere deep within a village, several centuries ago, Rinoa's nose found its way to the present.

"Food?" She lifted her head from her book. "Is that food? Did you bring me food?"

Could she have it? Please? Please? It suddenly smelled amazing. Mooby had never, ever smelled that good to anyone in history, ever.

She wasn't ignoring his question. She just hadn't heard it.

[whateverknight.livejournal.com]

Squall nodded. "It is. You didn't answer me last night when I asked if you'd eaten, so I thought I'd bring you something just to be sure." He shrugged. "You don't normally miss meals, no matter how good a book is. This one must be really special."

[angelo_wings]

He'd asked her last night? Oh. Right. Okay.

Rinoa stood up from her chair and gave Squall a perfunctory kiss. "I'm sorry," she said. "It's incredible. It's -- so many answers to questions I didn't even know I had. I've been taking notes? And then I go back and double-check my notes, and take new notes, and --"

She shook her head. "I'm not not-eating on purpose. I just keep meaning to, but later, and then later is so much later that I don't even realize it happened."

And without further ado, she was going to tear into that Mooby's and devour it.

[whateverknight.livejournal.com]

"I didn't think you were doing it on purpose," Squall pointed out. "But... I don't think you realize how much time you've been spending on the book. It's been a lot." He shrugged. "I'm curious what's in it. Would you like to come home, and sit down and tell me some of the things you've learned?" He was really proud of that last sentence. He'd been working on it all day.

[angelo_wings]

It was -- wow. That was Squall, politely asking for her to open up to him. That was a little like seeing a unicorn ice-skating.

So why did she feel a twinge of resistance? She didn't want to come home and tell him about it. She wanted to get back to her book. Why couldn't he understand that and just leave her alone!?

Because he was her Knight, and her boyfriend, blahblahblah. He'd brought her food. It was going to take her a few minutes to eat it. Did she really want to get stains on the book?

That line of reasoning worked.

"Compromise," she said, flipping the book shut. "You sit down here, and I'll tell you what I've learned, and then I can get back to reading when we're done."

[whateverknight.livejournal.com]

Squall thought for a moment, then nodded. "It's a start. Maybe I could even stay and we could read it together. It's interesting?"

[angelo_wings]

That suggestion made Rinoa's skin crawl, but she did her best not to show it. He was trying. She was going to be nice.

"It's more than interesting," she said, only not rolling her eyes with great effort. "Melia was a great Sorceress many centuries ago. She lived in a small village -- she calls it Thalassa, which we have no records of now. I haven't figured out yet where it was located, but there are hints. I have it narrowed down to just outside Timber, or somewhere on the southern end of Esthar's coast."

Certain geographical landmarks had ruled out places like Deling City, or Winhill, and the climate patterns suggested it wasn't Centra. She wasn't getting into that now.

"Anyway. Despite the town being so small, Melia was only one of many Sorceresses. Well, 'many' may not be the right word. She hasn't listed out names, and sometimes she writes about a particular Sorceress in one place using a nickname and another, her actual initials, which means I might be double-counting, but I think it's between eight and ten. They formed a -- a -- I don't know the right word. 'Coven' implies something spooky and purpose-driven."

Hopefully Squall had a comfortable seat. She might talk about this book for a few hours.

[whateverknight.livejournal.com]

It didn't matter whether his seat was comfortable. Squall had been trained to not care about comfort, and she was actually talking to him. He'd stay and listen until she was done.

"Not necessarily," he told her. "Really it's just a gathering of witches. The word is only spooky because people don't like witches. I don't think what word you use matters, though."

[angelo_wings]

"I don't like it," Rinoa said, wrinkling her nose. "It sounds like they were up to something. They were really just a group of Sorceresses who looked out for one another."

A friendship circle. Sure, they had their disagreements -- like that time one had apparently stolen the other's intended beau -- but they had a kinship nonetheless. It made her feel lonely, suddenly, to know that she was the only Sorceress, and would be all her life.

"Anyway. The town was worried about them, because they were the Descendants of Hyne, that old claptrap, but they also liked having them there to rely on. Has the summer been dry? Ask the Sorceresses to make it rain. Trouble with your crops being eaten by wild goats? Get the Sorceresses to put protective charms around. So there's this weird tension where they expect the Sorceresses to do whatever they'd like, at the drop of a hat, without payment or more than an offhand thanks, but they also don't trust them, because apparently some years before ..."

She gestured. He could imagine. Adel was hardly the only Sorceress to wage a war, after all. Plus, she really needed to shove more of that burger into her mouth, now.

How many burgers had he thought to bring, anyhow?

[whateverknight.livejournal.com]

For her, just the one, but he pulled his burger out of the bag and handed it to her. He could always get more later.

"A Sorceress did something awful," he filled in the gap. "People are people. With that many Sorceresses, it would be bound to happen sooner or later, just by simple probability. Especially if they didn't have Knights."

[angelo_wings]

She frowned at the word knight.

"They didn't need Knights," she said, stubbornly. "I told you. They had each other. A coven-thing. A friendship circle. They each kept one another balanced. They worked together to keep their powers in check. Knights didn't come until later."

She said it as if the word tasted bad. And it did.

[whateverknight.livejournal.com]

Squall nodded. "Right, you said that." Did she think he wasn't listening? Or wasn't interested? Because he was! "I just meant, a circle isn't personal. It would be easier for one of them to use too much power without the rest realizing, because they didn't have someone dedicated to watching over them."

[angelo_wings]

"The Knights weren't there to protect the Sorceresses," Rinoa said, darkly. "They were there to spy on them. Report back to the town what they were getting into. The Sorceresses all trusted one another, and they were fooled into trusting the Knights, and it was their downfall."

[whateverknight.livejournal.com]

Squall scowled. "People are horrible."

He considered the story for a moment. "So... If the Knights started off as a way to control the Sorceresses, then how did the relationship change? Or did that come after this was written?"

[angelo_wings]

"How do you know that it did?" Rinoa asked, lifting her shoulders idly. "Maybe you aren't my soul's protector. Maybe you're just supposed to be my leash."

And maybe Edea didn't know any better, because all of that information had been concealed.

[whateverknight.livejournal.com]

"..."

Squall crossed his arms.

"...If that's supposed to be a joke, you're doing it wrong."