Closed Post: Practice

[sorrowandsorrow]

Thank Christ that wedding dance is over. Janet had felt it looming, like exam season at Brakebills but way, way worse, and it had made her feel like she was being stalked. It's over, and Susan came to keep her company, and she still has a bottle of wine stashed in her closet about it. Spoils of war.

In a better mood all around, Janet's in a sitting room not too far off from the main drag of the mansion. She's cross-legged on a couch, in stocking feet but with her boots tucked up against the side of said couch, and she's essentially playing with dolls.

Okay, it's a little more grownup than that. She has a couple of those ubiquitous green toy soldiers, the ones every kid ends up with whether they want them or not, and she's practicing a Cavaleri Animation, making them march around and aim their tiny plastic guns at each other.

Comments

[sorrowandsorrow]

"Half the men! You're not as picky as I am, huh?" Janet laughs, relaxing a little. "My further demand is that you show me immediately next time you learn new magic."

[timebethine]

"My tastes are catholic in this respect," he says dryly, meaning all-embracing. "I certainly will. Nightingale hath promised to teach me another spell, but not yet told me which, or when. I'm afire to learn."

[sorrowandsorrow]

"Well, I'm afire to see it," Janet says, a little teasingly. "I'm guessing there are no Circumstances you have to adjust for?"

[timebethine]

He tilts his head. "I know not what thou meanest by 'Circumstances.' Perhaps?"

[sorrowandsorrow]

"So, when I do magic, it's -- I told you how complicated it is. Every time you do a spell, basically, you have to adjust the way you do it. For the phase of the moon, the altitude, the weather, all manner of bullshit."

[timebethine]

"Oh! Ay, I do remember that. So far, nothing Nightingale has taught me requires Circumstances--but he has only taught me one spell," says Laertes. "More complicated works may require a more precise alignment of the spheres."

[sorrowandsorrow]

"I want you to tell me when you find out. But," she adds, "if it's easier than my magic I'm going to be pissed off. Just to warn you."

[timebethine]

"He did say that practicing for more than an hour or two a day could scramble my brains," says Laertes. "Is that recompense enough?"

[sorrowandsorrow]

"Holy shit." She raises both eyebrows. "That would've put a damper on my insane study schedule at Brakebills. Yeah, don't explode your brain. I guess that'd be one way to cope with being a character in a play."

[timebethine]

"Has anyone here read thy story?" Laertes asks.

[sorrowandsorrow]

"Oh, no, I'm not--" Janet makes an apologetic face. "There are books about Fillory, but I'm not in them."

[timebethine]

This isn't entirely surprising to hear, Laertes thinks. Janet comes from an era hundreds of years removed from his own; there has been time for the play that contains him to be widely printed and widely read. If he met a stranger from hundreds of years after her time, perhaps he would hear a different answer. "Of course," is all he says. "Forgive me--I should not have assumed."

[sorrowandsorrow]

"Those stupid books would be so much better if I was in them." Janet's not offended, obviously. She's surrounded by fictional characters; it makes sense they'd assume she's one of them. "They're for kids, you know, the Fillory and Further books."

[timebethine]

Laertes raises his brows at her. "For children, as in soothing and mild as milk? Or for children--as in cautionary tales?"

[sorrowandsorrow]

"Uh, neither?" She raises her own eyebrows right back at Laertes. "They're just adventure stories for kids. Most of the fucked up stuff about Fillory got taken out, but there's still a villain."

[timebethine]

"I think that thy time has different thoughts than mine about what's best for children," Laertes laughs. "Tales of travel in distant lands have no fixed audience, in my time, and almost every story has a villain."

[sorrowandsorrow]

"The villain's not even that scary," Janet says conspiratorially. "I've met her. Honestly, I thought she'd be hotter."

[timebethine]

"My lady," says Laertes, "thou wouldst be a towering villain, shouldst thou choose to be. I would tremble. I'm trembling now."

[sorrowandsorrow]

"You are not." Janet gives him another nudge with her foot. "Everyone's pretty lucky I'm just a bitch, not evil."

[timebethine]

"The queen bitch."

[sorrowandsorrow]

"Ha! He can be taught."

[timebethine]

And as he laughs, something that's been tense in him since the last time they'd spoken finally releases.

Their friendship is not a stay of execution, benevolently handed down to an undeserving a criminal. It's something they're making together. Something, he thinks, that they both badly need.

He slides his foot along the floor to give her a fond, companionable nudge.

[sorrowandsorrow]

Janet kicks him in the shin. Not hard, not enough to hurt. She's not smiling, because she has the feeling that if she does smile, it'll be too revealing. For months, she's been missing Eliot like someone hacked off one of her limbs. Yeah, it pisses her off when men are right -- but she can't deny that Laertes is right. "Thanks for asking me to your feast," she says, on the begrudging side but meaning it.

[timebethine]

"It will be good to see thee there," he answers, all low and warm sincerity. Then mirth twitches up the corners of his lips, and he adds, "I'll greatly enjoy watching thee charm Susan to thy side."

[sorrowandsorrow]

Janet smirks and mimes tossing her hair over her shoulder. "I'll bring my cherry Chapstick." She pauses. "If you were from 2009, I promise that would've been a good joke."