2021-11-07: Sometimes Wishes Come True
- Log: Sometimes Wishes Come True
- Cast: Josephine Lovelace, Seraph Yvain
- Where: Harmonde - Port
- Date: November 7, 2021
- Summary: Yvain appears as a real-life booze fairy to Josie in Harmonde, and the two of them end up having a surprisingly honest heart-to-heart over a bottle on a windy dock.
<Pose Tracker> Josephine Lovelace has posed.
She exhales smoke, watching it uncoil up into the air around her. It's a cold one today -- the only ones out and about in town are those who have to be: sailors, dockworkers, the couriers traveling between the docks and the offices in town. Probably, she sticks out like a sore thumb, standing in what passes as a small park-type plaza. Must be a treat in the summer: cool air in off the sea, brilliant sun overhead.
Today, the water's probably freezing, the wind's not much better, the clouds obscure the sun and threaten a bit of rain...
Living near the sea has its drawbacks, she's given to reflect, her gaze watching the grey-white sky above.
So that was that. A little bought time, maybe. But it just might be enough.
Taking a long drag on her cigarette, Josie smiles lopsidedly.
"Sure wish I had a cigar or somethin'," she muses aloud. "Or maybe a damn drink."
It'd be a better treat than whatever these nasties she'd picked up turned out to be.
<Pose Tracker> Seraph Yvain has posed.
Yvain, the Seraph, would stick out here like a sore thumb... if hardly anyone here could see him. But they can't, and that's just how it is. The plaza is bitterly cold all right, and it's going to rain, but it's good for brooding. ...Not that he has a lot of brooding to do right now. Right?
But Yvain steps up from behind, his soft-soled boots making only a little noise on the docks, and he looks out into the sea as he stands near where Josie sits.
He also happens to lower his arm to extend a bottle of cider her way.
"Sometimes wishes come true." His grin is lopsided.
<Pose Tracker> Josephine Lovelace has posed.
The only tell that she might have attempted something else entirely as she turns about is the way she slips her cigarette between her lips and dips her hand towards her hip. But one dark eye sights the Seraph before she can get much further along this particular chain of reaction and, aborting it altogether, she reaches up retrieve her cigarette once more.
Dipping her head towards him as if in a mixed greeting and acknowledgement of his presence, Josie grins bright.
"Well, I'll be a Gob's auntie -- you come all the way 'round here just to bring along the good stuff, Yvvie?"
She flicks her still burning cigarette into the sea, and takes the bottle from him without hesitation.
"Ain't been drinking on a dock or none in a good, hm... well, it's been a year or thereabouts?" she says, shrugging loosely. "Don't s'pose you've have yourself the satisfaction?"
She pauses a moment, though. "Hopefully on a sight better day than this, though!" Her grin is a bright one.
<Pose Tracker> Seraph Yvain has posed.
Yvain knows full well what happens when you sneak up on shady people. But he's old enough to have fun doing it regardless. He keeps grinning back at her in greeting, and laughs a little at her reaction.
If he were a Water Seraph, he might complain more at the littering. As it stands, "I know when there is need," he says solemnly, as if that were indeed the reason he came. It is of course alcoholic cider, and pretty good at that. Sylvaland stock.
"Been a few hundred years," he muses as Josie considers the matter of drinking on a dock. "But definitely on better days."
A beat, "So I take it you aren't here for the tourism. Though I could be wrong. It's a lovely town."
<Pose Tracker> Josephine Lovelace has posed.
"When someone needs a drink, eh? Good enough by my reckoning," she quips, taking a look at the bottle. If someone asked her, the only sort of cider is the alcoholic kind; the other is just cloudy apple juice. "Well, you sure don't skimp," she says, raising a pale eyebrow. "And what's your angle here? I don't think you came all this way to give little ol' me a bottle of this for nothing. Less'n being an alcohol fairy or summat's part of the Seraph job description?"
In other words, just what is he doing here?
"Oh yeah? Well, sit yourself a spell, make up for lost time. Fair way to spend a good day... and ain't too shabby on the bad, neither."
But he asks Josie, in a manner of speaking, just what she is doing here. Her initial response is to shrug, as if she were similarly uncertain of the precise reason behind it.
"Waylaid. Catching a ship from here to elsewhere, but seems it's behind schedule. Ain't much to do in a town like this except drink, right?" She smiles, in a rather brittle way.
<Pose Tracker> Seraph Yvain has posed.
For Yvain, the other kind is mostly for kids and ascetics. He knows both. It's not a strange thing; it's not like he needs to drink anyway. Indeed, his 'angle' prompts a shrug. "True. But I don't need repayment for sharing. It's not like money means much to a Seraph." A beat, "I'm just familiarizing myself with Filgaia, a bit at a time. Haven't been here yet, so here I am."
Yvain indeed will take a seat. He gets fairly comfortable, looking out into the sea, and then back to Josie. "So it isn't."
But she's waylaid, is it? "Drink, people-watch. Steal a kitchen or two. It can be fun when people can't see you." A beat, "But what I haven't been doing lately is finding any more interesting ruins. Getting more practice with the ARM, but that's not quite the same."
<Pose Tracker> Josephine Lovelace has posed.
"And here you come, bearing drinks," Josie finishes, only to shrug. "Well, fair enough. I ain't about to go look gift horses in their mouths any," she says, and then she takes a seat, leaning up against some crates (they're empty, she checked) left here by some of the workers. "A right migratory bird you are, Yvvie! But maybe you'd find Ignas more your taste than Aquvy. A sight more desert in Ignas, and a lot less sea."
She passes the bottle back to him, perhaps indicating he should be the one to pop it open.
"Heh. Ain't much of a cook, and I've not much interest in the people here. ...Oh yeah? Guess there's a limit of them that's 'old enough' 'round here. Still, if you don't mind wandering a place that's a sight younger... I hear tell there's some interesting things to find. 'Specially up north," she opines.
"How's that ARM suitin' you, anyhow?"
<Pose Tracker> Seraph Yvain has posed.
"And here I am." Yvain considers the matter of Ignas, and takes the bottle back, popping it open and taking a swing before he offers it back to Josie in turn. He does not seem to care about 'germs' or 'cups' very much. Does he have any? It's a mystery. "Ignas sounds interesting," he says, "But I don't mind the sea. I've spent a lot of time aboard ships, believe it or not. Even a couple pirate vessels here and there."
"Up north, eh..." A little younger. "That piques my interest a bit," he answers. "I know there's a magic school somewhere up there, but that's the main thing I've heard of in the north. Any details to share?"
Then, "It's treating me pretty well. A friend of mine taught me a trick with the bullets, so I don't need to care if I run out too much, so it's just a matter of practice. I like the weight of it. I never realized humans could get 'fire' so right in a weapon."
<Pose Tracker> Josephine Lovelace has posed.
Josie has never cared about germs once in her goddamn life. She doesn't even hesitate.
"Well! Seems like the stories about Sylvaland's finest weren't exaggeratin' none. ...Oh yeah? You pirated lately, then?" She seems genuinely interested to hear it. "Way I see it, my business and a pirate's ain't all that different."
"More like 500 years or so, some of 'em. Thousand, tops. But there's some stranger stuff on about. ...You mean, Sielje? Ain't been, but I figure, there's gotta be a way. Otherwise, they wouldn't have new students, right?" she says, capping that remark off with a lopsided grin. "As for me 'n my end... there was a real strange ruin out in Damzena Desert. Said to be a fallen floating city, if you can believe that. Bad business inside, sure enough, but interesting. Other'n that... hmm, I think Kattelox has some stuff you'd be interested lookin' at. Whole place is set up on top of some old ruins. In fact, it's a bit of local business, exploring 'em."
Yvain then offers a status update with the ARM.
"Yeah? You Seraphs get all the fun. First time I got stuck up on Lunar, I had to cast my own shot! I keep hopin' I'll find something that's able to do its own ammo -- some of 'em do, if they're old enough -- but no luck yet." The closest she's had was Nostos, and...
She grimaces, and takes another swig.
"Hey. Yvvie. Got a weird question for you, but I wanna pick your brain. ...What d'ya think's worse? Death by drowning, or fire?"
Her gaze is out to the sea, at the waves that keep rolling in towards the shore.
<Pose Tracker> Seraph Yvain has posed.
"It's good--better than most I've tasted on Filgaia." He doesn't compare it to Lunarian ciders, though it merits a comparison at least. It is what it is, not what it's like. But the question of pirating... "Haven't done much lately," he says. "I was out of touch for a couple centuries. But back then, the seas of Glenwood--I've got some stories about the Emerald Serpent." Which is in fact a pirate ship of some note... in Glenwood history. "Hyland and Rolance both cursed us. Sometimes a navy needs a little humbling."
Her business, and piracy... "That's true," he says, from what he gathers of her business. He's been on the wrong side of the law before, though he was kinder than most pirates. Even so.
"Interesting. Not that old as ruins go, but certainly new to me." Then, "Yep, Sielje. I might visit sometime... but I might not. Mages are a headache."
"A fallen floating city... That does sound interesting. Looks like my map's going to be updated for Damzen and Kattlelox."
"Heh. We do. I still prefer to use real shot--bullets of purest flame are poetic, but do a number on the ARM." Something with its own ammo... "That does sound interesting. Doing that with technology has to be brilliant."
Yvain notes the grimace, and he shares it with the question--it comes after a moment, a frown of his own, as he suddenly looks on with great distance past Josie's shoulder.
"...For a mortal," Yvain says, "It's fire, for certain."
He does not immediately explain how he knows.
<Pose Tracker> Josephine Lovelace has posed.
"There's a place out east on Ignas, Gounon. Famous for its apple wines and such-like," she comments, perhaps sensing the unspoken comparison to Lunar's wines. "Another reason to head on out there sometime."
She arches an eyebrow. "Emerald Serpent? Haven't heard tell," Josie says. "'Course, I haven't been around there in more than a dog's year. So you sailed with 'em? Or are you just telling stories?"
On the subject of 'her business', her lips quirk in a tight, tired smile. "Sure enough."
The smile that joins his comment on Sielje is more genuine. "Yeah? They tend to spot you? Must do a number on your usual," she remarks, elbowing him lightly. Damzena's ruins and Kattelox may be more his speed.
She, on the other hand, has still been mulling over what she had plucked out of that machine. Perhaps she ought to go back, go and look again at it...
"That so? Well, fair enough," she says, shrugging. "Replacing fire damage on an ARM is a pain and a half, right." She nods as if to say she knows this one first hand. But Josie continues. "It's rare, is what it is," she says, on the matter of such ARMs. "But I've heard tell of such things. Who knows? Maybe I've even crossed paths with them that use 'em and didn't even realize..." After all, unless you know how many bullets an ARM takes and you're counting bullets -- you'd never even know.
Death by fire, or death by water.
It's been a question that's been on her mind since her encounter with the Trial Knight.
"...Heh. Right. If you're talking real-like, it's fire. No question about it."
She already knows that one, first-hand.
"But if we're talking metaphorically..."
She takes another drink.
<Pose Tracker> Seraph Yvain has posed.
"I'll have to add this Gounon to the list. Deserts are fairly uncommon on Lunar in any case; Ignas seems worth checking out." Even if it's more wasteland than healthy desert, that itself is a stark something to see. Another reason indeed.
"I sailed with them," he answers. "Of course, it was hundreds of years ago--unless you've studied Lunar history, or talked with a lot of pirates, you wouln't have heard of it. Fastest thing on the seas, though, for a good while."
He laughs a little at the matter of being spotted. "More often than others, for sure. And wizards, well." He shakes his head. He does not know, of course, that Josie knows wizards.
But the machine... Hmmm.
"It's possible. I guess you wouldn't know unless they fire something strange. And even then, we don't tend to look much at bullets when they're out of the chamber."
But death by fire, death by water. Yvain does not look to Josie's burn; he is more composed than that. But he's thinking it. She knows, all right. Metaphorically, though...
Yvain takes another drink, too, and hands it back, thoughtful. "I've seen both," he says thoughtfully. "Men lost at sea, youths cut down by fire. The sea swallows everything, drowns and overtakes... but fire consumes. We see what is lost in the depths, now and then, either by exploring or when it washes to shore. It's there; the ocean... is life, in a very real way, though it hides it underneath."
"...But fire is death. Fire, in moderation, can temper and change, but when it consumes... That's all there is. You rebuild anew, or you don't."
"He thinks back, hundreds of years, to that place. "...Metaphorically, I still say fire. To drown is to become part of the life of the sea, but to burn is to be nothing more than ash."
<Pose Tracker> Josephine Lovelace has posed.
"Sure seems like. Only desert I met on Lunar was off Spira-wards," Josie remarks, shifting her stance atop the dock.
"...Oh really? Well ain't you a right proper bundle of surprises, Yvvie? Wouldn't've pegged you for the piracy trade none. Was it fun?" An odd statement to make, about that particular(ly violent) trade. But Josie is as Josie does.
"Yup. And in some cases, you've gotta win the lottery, too. ...There's them that has the," she gestures vaguely with her free hand as she explains, perhaps remembering he's from Lunar, "the knack," she settles on, "for usin' ARMs. There's ARMs that just won't work if you ain't got it in you. And it ain't like all strange ARMs'll work for you 'cause you got the knack. Maybe there's just the one out there that'll sing right if you've got it in your blood, but the rest? Forget it." Her shoulders rise and fall in a shrug. "Ain't met an ARM like that, myself. But that's fine by me. I've got some beauties that'll do just what I want, anyhow."
She's silent a long moment, her gaze out at the horizon, well-wreathed in fog. It's punctuated only by a swig from the bottle.
"...Heh. Would've thought you'd give me some song 'bout the horrors of slowly going or somesuch," she says, without looking over at the Seraph. "That's what I've been wondering. Whether it's better to go quick or go slow. But you lot... you really do take the long view of it all, huh? Whether you're gone for good, or whether you'll just feed what's beneath... now you're really sellin' me on drownin' after all, Yvvie," she says, and the look in her eyes when she glances over at him then is...
She sets down the bottle with a soft thud on the docks. Her hand moves, along her gauntleted glove, undoing straps, easing it off. The hand underneath is bandaged.
Slowly, she unwinds the bandages.
"It don't really hurt so much, now," she tells him, without looking at him. "Been near long enough, maybe. Or maybe I'm just used to it hurtin'. ...I forget. I ever tell you about my fire?"
There's a reason she favors her left hand, as he will soon see.
<Pose Tracker> Seraph Yvain has posed.
"There's some on our side of Lunar, but not the areas Filgaians have tended to go so far. South of Meribus, a couple places in Glenwood."
"Heh. I'm usually not. But you try different things over the years... and sometimes I've had more grudge against the powers in charge than others." A beat, "It was fun. Exciting, for sure."
The... knack. Josie explains it, and this is something Yvain hasn't heard of so much. He looks at her as she explains it, and hmms over it thoughtfully. "Interesting. Magic can be like that, too--ancient relics of less technological bent, for instance. Maybe I'll come across something like that sometime, find someone who can use it. That would be interesting to see."
Yvain looks to the horizon, too, and then back to Josie. Quick, or slow. "Heh. Ask an immortal..." It's an intersting look. Yvain watches Josie undo the bandages, and looks towards the wunds there. He knows burns very well--extremely well, in fact. He can recognize them all right.
"Old wounds, mm?" A nod. "I couldn't say. But no, you haven't." Is she about to?
<Pose Tracker> Josephine Lovelace has posed.
"Guess I might too, if I had your chunk of time to use," Josie remarks, her gaze up at the sky for a long moment.
"Got it in one," she tells him, when he pivots towards the topic of magic. "Ain't exactly the same thing, and 'round these parts, it usually ain't inherited or none. But I get what you're putting down, right? On Lunar, it runs in families or something. Dunno how ARMs play with Seraphim, save the kind you found... but weirder things've happened, by my reckoning. Give a whirl, see what happens?" She shrugs, tilting her head as if to underscore the degree of 'doesn't hurt to try' she's currently implying.
But the talk turns to more serious things than any of that.
"I'm just an old sinner," she tells Yvain, now that her hand is freed. "And if you feel like harkening to what them Granas say, maybe your all-consuming fire's as I deserve. But here's the twist in the tale: I already burned some. It was a while back..."
Her hand rests in her lap.
"Still don't feel like talking up the details. All you gotta know is, my sister was comin' round to visit. Told her to go on ahead to where I called home, right -- I was in the middle of a job, and it took me way on out. But by the time I got back..."
Josie sighs.
"It was a bonfire. I ran in, thinkin' she was inside, and well... I was right. It was already too late."
She holds up her hand again, as if admiring the fire's handiwork.
"I know what you're probably thinkin'. I must blame myself. ...Well, you're right. And don't you patronize me." There's real venom in her voice, now. "Don't you tell me there was nothing I could've done. Got it, Yvain?"
She uses his real name.
"That ain't what this all is about. ...I'm tellin' you this 'cause you know what a fire can do. Right?"
<Pose Tracker> Seraph Yvain has posed.
Indeed, there's little need to say more of that; he's aware of the advantages he has as a Seraph on that front. There is not any particular need to rub it in. Besides--they're talking about something else more interesting, after all.
"Yes, it generally does. I don't know how it works, either. But it will be fun to find out." He picks up the matter of doesn't hurt to try, pretty well. It's fine. And he can handle the matter of how it works for the future.
Fire... Yes. She already burned some. Yvain listens stoically, not making much difference in his expression at the moment; it is a serious subject, and he treats it accordingly. Josie explains, and...
"Yes, I was thinking that," he says of her blaming herself. But the venom in her voice gets a lifted eyebrow from Yvain, down to the fact that she uses his real name. So, after a moment, he nods.
"I won't tell you that." He agrees to it easily, but there's something in his expression that suggests that he isn't just doing it because she asked.
"I do. Fire... can destroy lives. Can ruin. Can wipe away everything."
"...I've seen it, as well. There is a reason that I do not stay in one place anymore, as Seraphim often do."
He doesn't go into what it is, though. Instead he says, "The fire took away your sister... and though it did not consume you, it changed you. I see it."
"...What fire does not consume, it changes forever. That is what fire can do. So I won't tell you there's nothing you could have done."
<Pose Tracker> Josephine Lovelace has posed.
Anyone else might have. She might have gotten some line about how she couldn't have known. How she couldn't have done anything, how it was just some tragedy--
Yvain says he won't tell her that at all.
She just begins to laugh, a low and bitter chuckle.
"Ain't you a trip, Yvvie..." she murmurs, low in her throat. "A little more've your long-term perspective?"
Perhaps not... entirely.
<Pose Tracker> Seraph Yvain has posed.
No, not entirely that--Yvain shows that much in his eyes, in the way he meets Josie's for a few moments when she asks and does not immediately answer. He could get into that... But won't, yet. There is a time and a place, and while discussing Josie's life is not it for him right now.
But neither does he tell her not to be so bitter.
"I've seen it many a time," Yvain answers as to her having the right of him. Good, and noble--but not about to tell her kind lies, and an old hat at piracy. Yvain may have a few layers to him.
"...Right. Only the Goddess seems to have that power, and she does not dole it out." Undeath aside. She could probably bring back a horrifying facsimile of her sister, if she tried. She'd only have to be a bit more like her father...
Careful, silent work. He doesn't immediately respond to the matter of accepting it; he leaves her the bottle this time, having had enough for the moment--she has more need of the drink. And then what, she asks. And finally... it may be the right time to at least touch that old wound.
"When it was me," Yvain says to Josie of moving on, "...My choice was vengeance. But the circumstances you mention may not allow for that much. It was... a very long time, before I settled with mortals again."
"I have still not really accepted it. There is more I could have done, if I'd had the knowledge and the wisdom and the power."
He nods to Josie. "...I have no platitudes of encouragement for you. Clearly you have found a path of some sort. I hope that it gives you what you crave."
<Pose Tracker> Josephine Lovelace has posed.
"Heh... So I've heard." Her expression twists, tightening into a mask of grief. "Only the gods ever can. That... ain't our place. The dead are dead." She leans back then against the crates, her eyes closed. Her breathing is steady, clear; if someone weren't looking right at her, they might mistakenly think her simply resting.
She wipes at her face after a moment more.
"Must be fixin' to rain," she says, without looking at Yvain.
And Josie has another go for the bottle.
But the Seraph has something to tell her. When it was him...
She's listening.
"Vengeance, huh. So," she says, setting down the bottle again. "You get 'em? The ones that done it?"
Whatever the outcome had been for him, it doesn't seem to have brought him any peace. Even now.
Even after what may have been a long, long time.
"Some scars don't heal," is her statement, in the end. "Maybe that's how it'll be. I'll be carrying this 'till the day my bones find their rest. ...But you're right, Yvain."
His name, again.
"I got something I'm doin' before that last day comes for me. 'Till then... I'll see where this takes me. I can't turn back now."
And she lifts the bottle again.
"So. How 'bout it? Us two birds of a feather after all, nursin' our wounds 'till the end of days. Let's drink to that, and drink to whatever it is that keeps us goin'."
With that she takes a drag from the bottle before passing it over.
"Ain't a proper toast. But it'll do, I reckon."
<Pose Tracker> Seraph Yvain has posed.
"Mm." The dead are dead. It is what it is; immortal Yvain may be, but he cannot reignite the spark of life when it has passed. At best, he can save it when it's guttering. That's all. ...He does not particularly look at her in the moment where she wipes at her face, having more than enough practice at maintaining a quiet distance at such matters.
"Likely." The rain.
As Josie asks, Yvain nods. "I did," he says. "We brought him to justice. ...I hear he came back again later, as some kind of monster, but was destroyed again. For whatever that means."
Some scars don't heal. He inclines his head to that. Maybe she will be carrying it all along. But there is his name... and there--this is the insight into who she is. This something she has to do. Ths something she will do.
"...Heh," he answers. A toast, then. Yvain looks over Josie for a moment, and then takes the bottle, taking a swig of his own.
"To wounds, and whatever pushes us with them." A swig again, and the bottle goes back. "It'll do."
<Pose Tracker> Josephine Lovelace has posed.
"Back again twice over... here's hopin' I don't," she remarks, her lips pulling into a rather mirthless smile. "Well, good on ya."
It might be something that won't fade, but it's possible to get satisfaction, and that... is worth reaching for.
"To wounds, and to tomorrow," Josie echoes, quick to reclaim the bottle from him again. "There. Now it's a proper toast. Let's see if we can finish this one off before the storm arrives."
Maybe there will be rain to come, given the darkness on the horizon. Maybe the storm will make an honest woman of her yet.