middaeg | When it gets cold outside and you got nobody to love

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When it gets cold outside and you got nobody to love

Who: Lady Maria of the Astral Clocktower and OPEN
When: December
Where: All over
What: Catch-all for December! Snow, snowglobes, fighting some oogie boogies, and feasts. Not much mistletoe, though. She's not prone to it.
Warnings: A bit of blood and violence

[1: Does it kill? Does it burn? - Haunted Mansion]

[Well. This isn't so much different than what she's used to. The cold rain giving way to a blizzard of this proportion is certainly A Thing, though. It's been since Cainhurst that she's seen something this bad. Yharnam got a lot of rain, but tended toward that rather than any large amount of snow. Not that she thinks most people would've noticed, even if it did snow a lot there.

Well, it matters not. The Haunted Mansion is normally kind of shadowy and cold, but Maria's garden has been well-enchanted, so the grounds immediately around it are... mostly clear of the snow. In places, the wards fail for a brief period, and she can be often heard sighing as she watches the snow pile up on the plots for her plants. Inside, however, it's not so much magically enchanted as it is just sort of full of well-burning fires - naturally made, in hearths, and plenty of candles around when the power inevitably flickers and dies.

Anyone who wants or needs a stop over - or already lives there - is invited into the kitchen for some mulled cider (and a bit of rum, if they wish to splash some in there from the bottle next to the pot - Maria's cup is pretty much spiked the whole time.), or tea, or just a moment to shake off the cold and snow.

If they dare. After all, the place looks like something out of a horror story at the best of times; tall and imposing, with narrow windows set back into the facade, and spiky towers. The ivy that normally grows up the sides is mostly dormant for the winter, and all the winterized trees make it look especially haunted. But maybe the otherwise relative lack of snow is enticing... or the fact one knows who lives there and wants to brave it anyway.]

[2: Is it painful to learn that it's me who has all the Control? - Around town]

[Or maybe it's the opposite. Maria isn't afraid of a few... feet... of snow, anyway. So she bundles up in her hunter gear, and tromps out into the snow. The streets are mostly abandoned - honestly, just the way she likes it - as she sets out. Perhaps one runs into her in the few stores that remain open, hoping to eke out a bit of business from those brave (or foolish) enough to brave the winter weather.

Or maybe she's making a house call, if she knows the person well enough. She knocks the snow off her hat and boots before ducking through doorways.] It's not slowing down out there... [If only she didn't hate Cainhurst. She'd make a joke about it being just like home! Or maybe not, it is Maria, after all.]

[3: Does it thrill? Does it sting? - Snow Global]

No, no, it's... taller than that. The Astral Clocktower is built into the front of the front wing of the Grand Cathedral, but the tower stretches up far above the face of the clock itself. [She's explaining it to the crafter, who frowns a bit in concentration, and comes up with a new prototype. It's starting to shape up - the Astral Clocktower is an impressive thing, in the end.] And the front of the Cathedral is a large staircase down into the Central Cathedral Ward's plaza.

[Once they're out, though, it seems to become a bit of a commodity. Maria looks a bit bemused as, several days later, she sees yet another couple shaking theirs and setting the flurries about.] ... For as much as magic seems to rely on astronomy... I'm impressed they've never seen a star-reading clock.

[4: When you feel what I bring, and you wish that you had me to hold? - Modrainicht]

[And, again, Aefenglom loves itself a good, huge party, regardless of what else is going on. Mounting tensions among the populace? Doesn't matter, have a party. She has nothing to add to the giant potluck... and probably with good reason, because she's pretty sure nothing but the Vampires here would have taste for food that's been... imbued with Blood, and that's the only thing she can think of that's unique to her world. She doesn't even have the right type of Blood for it, anyway.

But, she'll partake, and enjoy the way the mood seems to have lightened up. She feels a few compulsions of friendly cheer as she mills about the place, but the mistletoe doesn't seem to stick when she's under it - that's on someone else to bring it up, because she's pretty resistant. Instead, she drinks the drinks, eats the food, and... sits down by a face - familiar or not - beneath the warmed tents. She picked up something from a serving dish that didn't look like it belonged, so it must've been brought in potluck style. She picks up a morsel of it, and puts it in her mouth... and immediately grimaces. Eugh. It's fish. The briny taste is immediately offputting. She's had enough of seawater and blood, thank you.

And with that, she slides the plate back out.] ... If anyone has a taste for fish, help yourself.

[5: Like a little girl cries in the face of a monster that lives in her dreams - The Woman]

[If she hadn't been pre-warned by the Wilders about this she might have - okay, no. She never would have fallen for this. Not only is this one of the oldest folklore tales in the books, the baby is a dead giveaway. No one just carries a baby around in the woods like that.

Though the haunting, ethereal cries of the infant make her skin crawl, for reasons entirely related to her time at home. How unpleasant.

Maria's swords spark into fire, into life, burning down the edges, illuminating the area. It's trying to lure her out. Again, nothing new. She can only think it's that the people here live such comfortable lives that this thing has claimed so many lives. It wants to be hunted like a Beast, well, Maria hears the hunt calling... and she will answer it. The itch for violence has been working its way into her arms for some time, her fingers aching to take someone apart - this will be the perfect outlet for it.

And then, she holds her sword out, stopping whoever is coming up from behind her.] Shh. She's waiting in ambush. She thinks she's clever.

[6: Is there anyone out there? Cause it's getting harder, and harder to breathe.]

[Wildcard! If anyone needs her for anything, might wanna bounce ideas off of her for the infiltration thing she isn't going to be actively participating in, but is more than down for being tangentially related to. Or anyone being harangued by the Hunting of the Wren? She's more than happy to scare off the crowds if she knows you. Hit me up on plurk at

Reslari on Discord at Reslari#9561 or at Maria's monthly plotting post here!]

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I'll trade you, ( gwen offers, immediately drawn by the prospect of delicious fish and offering a bowl to maria in turn; half-spheres of something covered in chocolate with thin biscotti alongside. ) I made it, it'll definitely take the taste away.

If you like desserts, anyway.

( striking to look at, it's fairly easy to see at a glance why she swivels towards fish; a blue-cast to her pale, wet-look and luminous skin that catches colours in the light. needle-fine and sharp teeth, and translucent webbing between her fingers. eyes huge and dark with pale slit pupils. no one has ever more visibly looked like they must be really into sushi. )

[The voice grabs her attention, of course - she did offer, and now someone has come forward to return the favor, but Maria is not quite prepared for what she looks up and sees. Monsters are nothing new to her; mostly transformed ones, similarly, are a perfectly common sight. Yet this one immediately tenses her shoulders, her head reeling back a couple of inches as though in surprise. The aftertaste of fish suddenly becomes worse, sharp and acute and sickening and she has to take a deep breath through her nose and let it out slowly from her mouth lest the immediate reaction turn her stomach.

Once the moment is over, she slides her gaze smoothly down to where the desserts are proffered, glad to have something else to take her attention, and to get the aftertaste out of her mouth, and she reaches forward.] A... recipe from your home, then?

[She focuses on the sweets, intently, as she reaches for them.] I would happily try these, instead.

( most of this transformation predates aefenglom; where the faerie in her had slowly overtaken her human heritage, now it blends with merrow for something equally unique. at home, though, no one ever saw her like this—she had concealed the alterations that bled into her with the magic she'd embraced beneath a glamour that these new transformations have taken from her, a smooth gloss of what she had once looked like keeping her secret and safe. it had been traumatic in a way she hadn't, prior to this precise moment, realised quite how much she'd come to terms with to lose that safety net.

it's only when she mirrors the recoil that she realises she hadn't been expecting it, this time. there's more of a hesitation before she says, more warily, the way her pupils dilate full of stars giving away tension she's otherwise determined to steady, )

—yeah. Yeah, it's, um. It's—

( this is fine, they're both being fine and normal and she can compose herself. she nods, like she's decided something firmly, looking down at the bowl and handing it to maria like she only had to steel herself a little bit to meet her halfway. they're meeting each other halfway. )

It's an Italian dessert, it's called tartufo—there's tart fruits in the middle, and layers of ice cream. I know that's kind of...I mean, the weather, but I like it all the time. And I can make it in my sleep just about. It's nice with the biscotti.

Edited 2019-12-09 00:50 (UTC)

[Were only it so simple as an aversion to Monsters, but it is not. Just when she thought it was improving, something like this happens. Maybe it's just Alex which smooths out the ripples, as it were, in Maria's aversion to fish. Unfamiliarity breeds stronger reactions, after all.

It helps not to look at the scales, and the webbing, and the teeth. She takes a bit of the dessert, and is relieved at the overbearing sweetness as it washes out the leftover briny taste of fish. When she swallows the bite, it chases down the bile that had risen in the back of her throat. After a moment, the whole thing is just an unpleasant memory, and a twinge of discomfort in her stomach that she can easily ignore.

It's more awkward to avoid eye contact and pointedly not look at the person across from her, so Maria lifts her head, and shoves the discomfort back down. It remains, wound around her spine and jabbing at her stomach, but her face doesn't show it, at least.] The winter is a perfectly fine time to eat ice cream. And it's delicious. Thank you for sharing it.

[And Maria will pass on the fish.]

( at least, on a closer inspection less immediately shocked, there aren't any scales. she's as smooth and pale as pearl, opalescent and catching the light, a gleaming thing made more mundane by her hair in braids and the shawl she's fidgeting with. hands and huge eyes betray nervous restlessness that's more obvious than maria's own tucked away unease—gwen is as easily read as a road-sign, despite her best efforts.

she's also awkward at the best of times, albeit not shy, and she lowers those enormous eyes beneath her lashes and picks her fish apart in her fingers before she eats it, avoiding scrutiny that feels weighted with what she's intellectually aware is probably two completely different experiences happening side by side, unrelated. but knowing is only half the battle, and anyway, what if it's not. )

I've started cooking more often since I got here, ( and she's very proud of herself for how conversational it sounds, between bites. ) Normally I don't, I honestly don't think I even know where everything is in the kitchen at my godfather's place, his housekeeper slaps my hands away from everything, but we—

( there's a dog roughly the size of a small bear beneath the table, at her feet. )

—we moved in with a couple of people, I mean, one of them is gone so it's one person now, but I thought I'd make myself useful, you know? Daddy has this friend who's a professional chef. I know my way around a kitchen.

[At the very least, Maria knows what causes her unease, and that no one else here does. Not even the one that is now living in her own mind, sharing some sort of nebulous space up there.

She pauses, takes a deep breath, and takes another bite. Somehow, the bipedal fish Monsters are worse than the outright merrow. Likely because... what pops into her mind, screaming and cursing and bleeding are-]

I see. It is a useful skill, to have in a place like this. You are taken away from what you know and left to fend for yourself, and food is a basic need.

[If she concentrates on the food, she can ignore the piscine features. It's not as though the voice is that weird, gravelly, bubbly noise that the villagers exhibited.]

And if you had little skill before, then I must say, you must have improved. This is quite good.

[Completely not making eye contact with the person you're talking to is normal right? Right.]

( it's totally normal, just two ladies not making eye contact ~~in a hot tub because they're not gay~~ across a table because they're both uniquely tapdancing on each other's psychological traumas. no need to closely examine what's going on over here, or for anyone involved to get extensive and serious therapy.

the voice is pleasant; low, as feminine voices go, lilting musical. plummy, privileged british diction, but taught and learned, lacking the regional markers of someone who learned it naturally by youthful immersion. a little more italian around the edges for her nerves, though that isn't her first language, either. it's probably better that she doesn't laugh, though, because while most young women's laughter described as babbling brooks is a metaphor, gwen is the exception that proves that metaphor is kind of weird and inaccurate. )

It was more of an 'I can but I don't' situation, ( is a little more wry, because sometimes the reactions to by the way, I grew up in a castle are not dissimilar to reactions to, say, her teeth and for arguably not dissimilar reasons. ) Someone else always has, but it was...you know, it was a fun thing to do with Uncle Euan, he used to sit me on the kitchen island and tell me what he was doing and give me little jobs to do and teach me how to hold the knives and all.

[Absolutely not, why would you even suggest that. There's nothing wrong, everything is peachy keen. Mental illness doesn't exist... everyone from Yharnam is a little mad, Maria just fits in with that, she's fine. It's Average.

Alas, it's what isn't said that might end up being the most interesting, but who needs to talk about those things? Even the mundane ones - Maria grew up in a castle, as well. A frigid, snowy castle nestled in the mountains, full of what were basically vampires.

Either way, outside of the lack of eye contact, she is very good at keeping things very conversationally neutral. Her accent remains as always, bending and stretching the vowels, curling her tongue around her r's; the soft, cold tone precisely the same, even after the initial shock wears off. She won't change. She's lived with this for a long time. She won't show the weakness, even if some of her hand has been tipped.]

Even that little bit is better than nothing, and it gave you the basis for something to expand. And here it has payed off. [She makes a motion to her food.] Most of what I knew how to cook was... camp food. The sorts of things you would put together when out on the road, or entrenched deep beneath the ground in dripping catacombs. It was never very... excessive.

( gwenaëlle judges it impolitic under the (vague, nonspecific, and totally fine actually) circumstances to note that on the rare occasions she's found herself in a comparable situation, she's opted for what she likes to think of as risky sushi. it's, like, free range. )

I'm kind of the opposite, ( she admits, instead. ) If I had a big enough kitchen and everything I needed and enough time, I could probably make you a seven course holiday meal, but I don't really—I mean, I'm sure I could figure out something a bit more practical, but I don't have as much...

( she makes a so-so hand gesture. )

I even make nice sandwiches. I don't have a broad middle ground between 'everyone get the fuck out of my kitchen I'm doing things' and 'I just remembered to eat an apple or something'. But I've been cooking more, here, I live with—well, just one person, now, Lambert went back through his mirror or whatever, but it's kind of nice making food for people. I don't hate it.

You would want to keep adding ingredients to improve the taste? Ah, if only you could carry more than just the bare essentials in the circumstances we found ourselves in. Truly, so long as it was browned on both sides, it didn't need to be better than that. [Then again, time was also strange in the Tomb of the Gods. It never seemed to flow properly; sluggish and slow, and repeating; not like flat circles, but an odd spiral drawn by someone with a case of shaking hands.

They tried not to let the expeditions last too long, or they could return to very different circumstances than they left.]

Have you passed your knowledge on? Here, I mean. Or simply made the food?

It's more I know recipes and not food, ( she says, her fingers lifting lightly over the table between them like it's a piano, delicate: ) I play music, and don't write it. I mean, if I wasn't going to make the food nice, why cook it? Eat some—

( raw fish you just caught in your mouth from somewhere, )

—fruit, or bread, ( only the smallest skip between the words, not quite a hesitation, her gaze studiously upon her own meal, ) or whatever, and get on with whatever you're getting on with. But I play music very well and I haven't poisoned anyone with food yet.

( a beat. )

I haven't taught anyone to cook, either. I don't know, I guess it hasn't occurred to me anyone who'd want to learn how to cook would be tolerable to spend an hour in a kitchen with.

Hm... but knowing cooking, and knowing music both give you a fundamental idea of how each thing is built. If you can play a piano, you can read notes, know how they sound, and put them on a page to make your own songs. It just must be approached from a different angle. I think cooking may yet be even easier; there's less technicals to worry about, and more simply adjusting for taste. Unless you're baking, then you have to take chemistry into account.

[When did she become a pep-talker? Oh, it doesn't matter. Once her little meal is done, she pushes the empty plate forward. The taste of fish is sufficiently out of her mouth, and she's - slowly - adjusting to her companion, and able to linger her gaze for a few moments longer before it becomes uncomfortable to face.]

Well, someone taught you. Did you think you were tolerable?

( she considers the question for a moment, sitting back slightly, and finally offering an elegant shrug— )

I think I was a child that he loved. It wasn't...

( how to put this. it's veering uncomfortably into feelings territory, which seems to be an ever-present danger in aefenglom, but not so close to the bone that it feels exposing. certainly not moreso than this interaction has already been; differently, and less. )

I didn't ask him to teach me how to cook, he didn't do it because he thought it was a skill I needed, particularly. He couldn't have exactly predicted this.

( and she's not wrong that the likelihood it would become important for her to be able to fend for herself in a kitchen was relatively low. she could probably have spent the rest of her life comfortably unable to do more than make tea without being more than mildly inconvenienced by it at any given time. )

Cooking is his thing, he's passionate about it. People sharing the things they care about with the people they care about isn't about the thing itself, it's the— ( a vague, encompassing gesture of her (translucently webbed) fingers ) the sharing part. That matters. The giving a shit about somebody else and wanting to express it somehow. And I don't give a shit about any of these people, so it's not the same.

( her delivery is not hostile, or even particularly hostile to the idea; instead, cavalierly matter of fact. she hasn't bonded with anyone. she's not close to anyone here, and while she could have put it more delicately, it's factual for the moment rather than a declaration of intent for how things should continue. she presses her mouth closed on a bubbling laugh, rueful: )

I don't know that me trying to teach somebody something is going to be as successful in building rapport. Although he's a cunt, too, and I still like him, so you never know.

Edited 2019-12-28 04:50 (UTC)

[She's there, she's following along, and about the point where Gwen gets to the "And I don't give a shit about any of these people" Maria makes a strange noise that might just be a laugh. Maybe. No promises.

After all, she looks far too serious to have that kind of a sense of humor, right?

She leans back afterward, though, a bit more at ease with something - maybe it's just the honesty that's refreshing enough to make her relax a little. Only a little, though. Her eyes still slide smoothly away from the more piscine features, and she looks at the crowd, the table, the food, anywhere but directly at Gwen still, frequently.]

You needn't like anyone to teach them something. You can make it a lucrative business if you so choose. [She makes a little motion with her hand, long fingers sweeping across the table as though brushing something away, and then gathering it back up.] But I think I get the sentiment.

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When it gets cold outside and you got nobody to love

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