Open Post: Woven Strength

[sorrowandsorrow]

Fuck it. Janet's stuck in purgatory. She may as well use this time to brush up on the things that actually matter to her. Those things, in no particular order, are: Eliot, welters, magic, ruling Fillory, kicking ass, and judging first lest she be judged.

Right now, she's practicing magic. It makes her feel like a first year again, but who's going to know that? She hasn't seen a single other Brakebills graduate here. This is a spell that saved her sanity, if not her life, and she sure as shit better be positive she can cast it even outside of Fillory, outside of the desert.

Woven Strength at full power, she's in one of the lounges with a stack of weights, experimenting with how far she can take it. She's grinning, because she has a giant barbell with weights stacked on either end, a couple hundred pounds easy, and she's picking it up with one hand like it's nothing.

Comments

[summerdude]

"Oh, whoa," Magnus says. "That sounds... involved."

[sorrowandsorrow]

"It's so fucking hard," Janet agrees, almost laughing. "You've never been insane like my friends and I went insane around exam time at Brakebills."

[summerdude]

"I can only imagine," Magnus says. "Hearthstone always got really weird when he was picking up a new rune, too."

[sorrowandsorrow]

Janet raises her eyebrows. "Go on."

[summerdude]

"Picture a really intense elf who's given up everything to learn, like, the deeper and more intense magic and who has sworn fealty to Mimir, a body-less -- headless? He's only a head. -- god who acts kinda like a mafia boss in order to master the skill of using runestones, which have unpredictable but incredibly powerful properties," Magnus says. "And then picture him trying out something totally new and untested. He called Stanley, who's the eight-legged son of Sleipnir, once."

[sorrowandsorrow]

Despite her overall vibe of cynicism, Janet looks -- and, in fact, is -- genuinely interested by this description. "Runestones, huh? I don't know anything about those. It sounds like hedge witch shit, but I guess obviously not."

[summerdude]

"No," Magnus agrees. "I mean, I don't know what 'hedge witch shit' is, but runestones are the big guns in Valhalla. I think my alf seidr might be more hedge witchy. If it means what I think it does."

[sorrowandsorrow]

"Hedge witches are people who taught themselves magic instead of going to school for it." Janet makes an apologetic face, mentally pouring one out for Julia. "We're snobs about it, but one of the most powerful people I know is a hedge witch who didn't get into Brakebills, so we really shouldn't be. It's the culture."

[summerdude]

"Is there a category for people who can do magic but without any training or teaching themselves?" Magnus asks. "Runes take a lot of training, and Hearthstone has learned from Mimir and Odin. But everything I can do I've just... always been able to do, I guess."

[sorrowandsorrow]

Janet is really starting to develop a complex. Not that it's Magnus' fault, it just doesn't seem fair. "Before I got here, I'd have said that was impossible," she admits.

[summerdude]

"It's not big," Magnus says. "Like, I can't make myself super strong -- well, actually, being an einherji made me super strong. But all I can do is like, summer. And healing. Oh, and peace. Peace is a big one."

[sorrowandsorrow]

"Summer, healing, and peace." Janet tilts her head for a second as she looks at him. "So, what, you have good-vibes magic?"

[summerdude]

Magnus cracks up at that. He mostly uses these things in battle, but -- "That's probably a good way to put it, actually."

[sorrowandsorrow]

Janet smiles, actually, wildly and improbably, kind of charmed. It usually takes her longer than this to warm up to someone, but maybe she shouldn't look a gift American in the mouth. "Hey, why don't we say that people who know what Google is should stick together?"

[summerdude]

"I like that plan," Magnus says. "I think it's a good one."