RP:It's Just a Seance

From HollowWiki

Part of the What Dreams May Come Arc


Summary: Josleen and Alvina met up for another catch up session where they discuss Hildegarde's opinions about the young prince, Macon's soft(er?) side and Uma's plan to revive Valrae. Alvina tries to spin the truth to avoid suspicion, the barrier still needed to be repaired and if Josleen knew...All of Cenril's hope would be lost. But tricking a Queen is never easy...let alone one that knows you -quite- well.

(Gigi and Guilliam also have mini adventures!)

Private Royal Garden

Alvina had sent word days in advance to Larket that she’d like to visit. She’d neglected to bring the girls along because...being nearly 7 months pregnant makes everything a hundred times harder. Ain’t nobody got time for that. So when she arrives, she waddles into the gardens and waits. It’s empty save for some soldiers passing through on rounds. When Josleen arrives, she’ll struggle to stand up off the concrete bench she’d lowered herself onto. She waves off any concerned remarks. “It’s fine, It’s fine.” A smile breaks the distance and she reaches out to hug Josleen while angling her son out of the way. “Sorry, it’s impossible…” A nervous laugh pierces the quiet space before she moves to sit down again. Every time they meet, Alvina can’t stop herself from thinking - ‘Look how far we’ve come’. It’s comforting and equally tragic, in some ways more than others. Ah but they have the life now right? Living the dream. “How have you been? Tell me everything.”


Josleen doesn't make Alvina wait. She rushes to the garden as soon as she can, and brings along Guillem, her pride, and Gigi, the put-upon babysitter. "Oh, don't get up," she protests much too late. They embrace. Josleen does the obligatory belly rub of awe. "He's so big!" Guillem mumbles a hello, lets himself be hugged and kiss as the adults demand. He looks to be about 6--can you believe it? Once freed from social niceties, he runs with Gigi in the garden and climbs a playset. Josleen sits on the cushioned bench with Alvina and gestures towards a servant that trailed her. "Anything you want. Any craving, it shall be satisfied, no matter how odd." Then she adds, "And for myself, the usual." Once orders have been taken and the servant bows out of the garden, Josleen answers her friend in earnest. "I'm as happy as can be inside these walls, so long as I don't think about what's happening to..." She nods towards Guillem who is pushing Gigi down a slide. "Aside from that... weathering the latest political drama fairly well." Perhaps that is a white lie. Hildegarde's criticisms of Macon and Josleen have cut her very deeply, but she can't bring herself to talk about that just yet. Perhaps soon. "But otherwise I am content. Guillem is a delight and Macon and I have just celebrated one year of marriage. It flew by quickly, happily. And you? How's Hudson and the girls? And your baby? Have you decided on a name?"


Alvina waves back at Guillem, answers his 'Hi' with her own enthusiastic response before he rushes off. "So is he! My goodness!" Alvina requests tea, it's her new go -to, along with a slice of strawberry cake and a side of pickles. Not ideal but the servant doesn't question her, just nods politely. She's mid laugh when she dropped back down onto the bench again with a groan. "Sven," She huffs, watching Guillem climb. Josleen's admission about blocking out the rest of the realm's problems resonates with her. Alvina nods with understanding. She doesn't call Josleen on this possible rouse regarding politics. "I try to stay away from it, if I can myself. No offense intended." She smiles watching the two play. There's a twinge of remorse when Josleen mentions her and Macon's one year anniversary. She'd sent a metallic, wind up Larket with their wedding date engraved on the breast. A nice piece of work, she thought. "Congratulations again," She offers, "It really does all fly by." A swallow breaks the sentiment while Josleen continues speaking. "Oh, the girls are wonderful. It's beautiful to see their personalities bloom now that they are truly talking and moving about the house. They aren't entirely on board with this idea of a baby brother. They've ask if we can take him back." Another chuckle. "We haven't decided a name, we thought we'd wait to meet him first, hoping to be struck with passionate inspiration." How like a bard, so romanticized. "Hudson is...well busy. Busy working with Uma. She's...got this plan to reinforce the barrier in Cenril and..." A sigh. "I don't know Jos, it's a lot to deal with still."


"Fly by, indeed. Thank you for the gift, by the way. Gorgeous craftsmanship. I put it on a shelf in my sitting room." You know, the room for sitting. Josleen catches the emotional break and the fragility in Alvina's voice and knows this call isn't purely social. Rarely do they meet just to catch up. Circumstances have forced open a gap between them, but a sense of sisterhood, loyalty, and friendship keeps a bridge precariously perched across that gap so that they may cross over to each other in times of need. The traffic moves in both directions. The arrangement is pleasant. "What is it?" The food and drinks are served. Now Gigi pushes Guillem down a slide.


Alvina'd never seen Gigi push Guillem. It's...rather amusing and amazing to watch. "It's complicated, isn't it always complicated?" She laughs again but it's hollow, mirthless. There's a substantial pause. "It was constructed by a handful of witches." She clears her throat, it's suddenly tight with nerves. "She's just looking for witches to reinforce it." The topic still feels tender though she hasn't heard any news of witch persecution from Larket recently. But then, it might have taken a backseat to the overwhelming destruction nearly everywhere. "Are you sure you're alright...?" It's easy to deflect the topic, to not want to discuss the inner workings of her unforgiving heart.


Josleen doesn't allow her face to react to the word 'witch'. While she believes herself to not be prejudice against witches and to appraise each one as an individual, in truth she is very much biased. She is suspicious of the new Cenrili Mayor simply because she is a witch.Though she is glad Cenril has a barrier to protect itself, she can't help but wonder where the catch it. And here's Alvina, torn up about this barrier. See? There is a catch. Now she must know what it is. "I'm fine, please. What's complicated about the barrier?"


Alvina frowns. She’s been bouncing several guilty ideas back and forth about the whole thing. It wasn’t -her- that caused Valrae’s death. Technically, it was her terrorism . Hudson has said so himself in a convincing way! If he believed it, she should too. “The barrier is weakening because some of the witches who constructed it have died.” It was said cautiously, to avoid the presumption of blame. “One of those witches was Valrae…” She pauses, gauging the name like testing a bruise. “So Uma is trying to find a way to tap into Valrae’s power...from beyond. So she might be able to buy them - really us - more time with a quick repair.” Guilt swims through the forefront of her mind. Was there any secret she could keep from Josleen. “Obviously...if it can be done to keep Cenril safe, I should want that...right?” Surely petty jealousy isn’t enough to damn a whole city. The city she and her children and family all live in together.


Josleen openly scowls at the name 'Valrae'. Why should she hide that? Valrae, by her own (false) admission is behind the curse that afflicts her son, not to mention the terrorism and attempted regicide. The bruise still hurts. "Of course Cenril should be safe. Innocent people live there, including your family. But what do you mean by Uma wants to tap into Valrae's power? Like a seance?"


Alvina hesitates now. Josleen's voice snaps a little on the end, she can tell she's touched a delicate nerve. "Yeah, basically. They are gathering ingredients for a séance, so they can get Valrae to help fix the barrier and then...go back to...being dead, I guess. I don't understand it all but I also don't want to be a huge part. I..." She looks towards Guillam, trying to imagine Valrae's attack on Josleen during her pregnancy. Hudson's never told Alvina about the plot to kill Macon, that he or Valrae was involved. The 'trial' had so many listed accusations, Hudson hadn't bothered to read them all to Alvina at the time. She didn't want to hear them. "Uma's very nice, I think you'd really like her Jos." Hey, not all witches are a certain way! "And she knows about everything with Valrae too so I think she's only doing what she has to for the city. Out of concern for their safety but...it's rough to have her name floating around again. She's become this ghost we can't ever shake. How long has it been now? When will I ever be free of her?" She sighs, exasperated by her selfishness and careful navigation of both truth and lies. "I thought when she died, it'd be over. Buried. Dead and gone, but still she haunts us. Is an irreplaceable part of something that people are depending on, even after her death. Why can't she just...stay..." It's a strange sentiment. She'd been on non-barbaric terms with Valrae before she'd gone over to the terrorist side of the law.


Josleen's opinion of Valrae is uncomplicated, and her face twists in confusion as she watches Alvina twist herself in knots about how to speak of Valrae. Shouldn't Alvina's opinion be just as uncomplicated? "Alvina... you try so hard to be good, but you are already so good, you don't need to prove yourself to anyone. You're torturing yourself. Valrae was a terrible person. She cursed Larket's children, attacked its people, attempted to murder Macon, hexed me, and the cherry on top is she was also," she pauses to glance towards Guillem to see if he is listening. He is not, but just to play it safe, she whispers, "a homewrecking whore--or a wannabe homewrecker. You didn't let her." Perhaps a rosy revision of Alvina's personal history, but that's what friends are for. "Alvina," she sighs the name as if to give Alvina permission to sigh too, to unburden herself a little. "Whatever Uma's intentions are--and I believe she wants to save Cenril, of course she does, it's her home too--but whatever Uma says or thinks should in no way affect how you feel about Valrae. You have every right to how you feel--more than most. And I can see why this bothers you... Valrae on everyone's mind, including His. I would be unhappy in your shoes too. I am unhappy. But perhaps take it as a consolation that it's only a séance. In a way, if you think about it, Uma is sapping Valrae's ghost of whatever power it has left, then dumping her, right? Valrae stays dead, you stay alive, happy with your family, protected by the barrier. Valrae is literally just a ghost, and that's all she'll ever be."


Alvina wants to tell Josleen just how much power a ghost can have over a person. Valrae isn't even thinking about Alvina but she's haunting the hallways of their home, the cenril market streets, each tense bedtime conversation with Hudson, every single time he comes home a little later than usual. She haunts Alvina's waking world and nightmares and if she concentrates hard enough, she'd swear she's here right now. But of course, she can't be. It's just paranoia. "If I'm so good, why do I care?" She asks with clear discomfort. "If I'm such a good wife or fiancé or woman - why did I lose out to her? Why isn't Uma asking -me- to help restore the barrier? It's not like non-witches don't have skills. I'm an engineer for Sven's sake! But no." Here she does sigh, the weight of the experience leaden and only increasing in weight. "No, it has to be Val. It always has to be Valrae. That woman is a curse and even though I know the barrier has to be fixed, I'd...rather they find another way. With someone who isn't a criminal or a...homewrecker." She says the word slowly, testing the taste and finding it oddly bitter. "She's done enough, why should she be brought back to do more? It'll only end badly, and I know Hudson's thinking about her. How could he not be?" Guillam's cheeks have become rosy with effort. Alvina drinks her tea and dips a pickle in the hazy peppermint before eating it. "When does it end, Jos? When do the demons that haunt us really die? When do people realize that -we- are the good ones, that they are wrong and have always been wrong? When do we get out justice?" Wasn't that what Valrae's death had promised?


Josleen frowns when Alvina wonders why she lost to Valrae and reaches out to touch Alvina's arm gingerly, briefly. "You didn't lose, my dear. Hudson made a huge, foolish, hurtful mistake, but he ultimately chose you. You won." As for Uma, Josleen grimaces reluctantly as her stereotypes about witches are confirmed. "Uma may be a very capable woman, but witches are very insular. I know that's a stereotype, but it's a stereotype for a reason. Their very culture is broken into in covens and trades in secrets. I'm not saying she's a bad person, just that she is incapable of thinking of help outside of what she knows." Then the subject moves back to Valrae again and Alvina says a peculiar phrase: 'brought back'. It brings Josleen up short, but she doesn't interrupt the speech because Alvina needs it. She'd been bottling up so much inside. When Alvina says 'When do people realize that -we- are the good ones' she inadvertently speaks the lines that Macon and Josleen recite to each other every night. She's not felt this close to Alvina in over a year. This feeling of kinship forms a key that unlocks Josleen's own rant,. "I know what you mean. Macon and I have been maligned for seeking justice in Valrae's well-deserved death. And yet... Gods, even Hildegarde treats me like a monster now. She..." Tears spring from seemingly nowhere. In an instant Josleen goes from a dry eye to a ruddy and damp nose. This pain was burbling just beneath the surface, a shallow grave. "I confronted her about it. I demanded to know why she sided with Valrae, the woman that cursed my son and other innocent children and mothers. Why her? Why not side with me? With the mothers of Larket? With Guillem? And... I told her what I have long suspected. She doesn't love Guillem. And you know what she said?" Josleen turns her back towards Guillem so that he cannot see her cry. "She said that Guillem is an aberration of nature, that he should have never been born, that she doesn't love him. Gods! I didn't know what to say. I was so shaken by that. She thinks him a monster, Alvina. A monster!" Though the fact Valrae will be 'brought back' is not far from Josleen's mind, her pain over Hildegarde takes precedence over politics and justice, for a moment at least.


Alvina hates the front. The exact thing she’d discussed with Uma, pretending like you aren’t wounded by transgressions. Carrying on with dignity and grace. It’s exhausting. Not that it doesn’t have it’s moments where it’s worthwhile. Just as a whole, not recommended. Saving face isn’t worth it for the sake of sanity. What is life but a little chaos? Josleen starts speaking and Alvina feels teary eyed. Hudson had said it was deserved. If he’d said it, it must be true. How could Hildegarde disagree? The bard wasn’t as close to the dragoness as she was to Josleen so immediately, without all the facts, Alvina can decide Hildegarde is wrong to treat Josleen this way. Her empty hand curls protectively around Josleen’s forearm. “You aren’t a monster.” She whispers with harsh urgency, the same words the Queen is feeding back to her. They are just two women, two mothers, fighting for the safety of their children and peace of mind. “People died, Josleen.”A pause, letting that needle perforate the surface of the skin, and it does. Why wouldn’t Hildegarde side with those harmed? Why wouldn’t she side with the victims of crimes? Her breath hitches when Josleen weepily repeats Hildegarde’s remark about Guillem. It’s enough to make her ball her swollen fists. If she’d been less pregnant, she’d have risen instantly. “What?!” It’s a roar for her, by all means. “You aren’t a monster! You’re a –mother- and why don’t you deserve that right Josleen? Why should you be punished for it? Why?! Is infertility a crime all of a sudden!? We aren’t any less deserving because of our struggles.” She’s shouting passionately, eyes blazing on Josleen’s reddening nose. A servant steps beside them and hands Alvina a handkerchief which she offers to Josleen without thanking the nearby maid. “Jos, she just has a bee in her bonnet about something else. You know she loves you, loves Guillem. She’s just as prone to anger as anyone else. She didn’t mean it…” How could she? She must have looked to mean it, to have Josleen this upset.


Josleen accepts the handkerchief and quickly composes herself for Guillem's sake, and for the staff. "No, she said she doesn't love Guillem, and she didn't understand why she should." Josleen shrugs long and slow, as if these things cannot be helped. "She is a dragon. Perhaps that is why. Dragons lay eggs, they don't carry their children in their bellies like we do, don't feel them toss and turn, develop personalities before they even open their eyes. All the same... I couldn't believe it." She gazes upon her son as he tries to feed Gigi some pebbles as part of an incomprehensible game of pretend. Gigi sniffs the pebbles. Guillem is sated. "Good job, Gigi!" The sadness melts off Josleen's face a little. Who can be sad when gazing upon such innocence and happiness? "I told Macon what she said. He's livid, as you can imagine, but also..." She hesitates before divulging Macon's vulnerability. But it's Alvina, she can be trusted. "People seem to think he's such a monster, but this hurts him too, even if he won't show it." She shakes her head sadly. "He feels guilty. He doesn't say so, but I can feel it in the way he embraces me when I tell him these things. He feels responsible, as though it's his fault key people don't like him and therefore his fault they've forsaken Larket's children. Of course it's not! It's people who lack empathy, I say. Most of his detractors are foreigners, people who live outside Larket. Within Larket he is well loved by the people." Except by witches, but they aren't accounted for when Josleen uses the collective noun 'Larketians'. "And Larketians stood with him when he had Valrae executed. It's people who don't have to live with the consequences of her crimes who cry for her. They have no empathy for the suffering of others. Well, I've suffered and I care for those who are suffering with me, so I'm glad she's dead. Long may she stay that way." That's when she recalls the phrase 'brought back'. "What did you mean when you said she will be brought back?" Perhaps Alvina was speaking figuratively, but Hildegarde was brought back from the dead. It isn't impossible.


Maybe Josleen is right. Perhaps it’s different for different cultures – maybe there’s more detachment from laying eggs; it felt a little racist to think but maybe. “I’m putting my money on her changing her mind.” Because, even if it was true…even if Guillem was an anomaly, he was still a child. You can’t punish the child for the sins of the father. Nor could anyone blame Josleen for wanting to have a child. Josleen’s admission of the outside opinion of Macon isn’t shocking. She’s fairly sure Hudson’s muttered those same words, called Josleen and Macon a few choice things in his time. To hear he feels guilty twists her stomach in knots. She nods along in time, solid agreement that it’s only people who know part of the story. People that want a martyr, who want heroes and villains when the world isn’t so black and white. It’s harder to really know from the outside how things are. She thinks that about her marriage frequently, when Josleen told her to leave after finding out about Valrae the first time. But she hadn’t. They’d been messy together and now they had a solid foundation, a loving home…when her paranoia wasn’t twisting shadows and teasing her imagination with explosive scenarios. ‘I’m glad she’s dead’. Hudson had said something similar, it rings clear in the hollow of her chest with emphasis. She –smiles-, not wickedly but with purpose. With the fulfillment that she’s supported. Josleen’s question pulls her back to the surface, out of her thoughts and into the present beside the Queen she never truly thinks of as a Queen. Just a mother, a companion, a confidante. A twinge of guilt twitches her fingers. “I meant she’d be brought back to repair the barrier.” She holds firm to what she’d said before. “Her spirit is supposed to be summoned, so Uma can draw from magic directly from her as a source and repair the wounds in the barrier. It’s mostly gibberish to me.” Not exactly true. “But this is supposed to be the end of it, the same way her death was supposed to be the end of it. With more time, they can think of a way to sustain the barrier for the future. For now, this is the fastest and most trustworthy method, so I’m told.” There’s a pause while she considers the young prince in the distance, Alvina holds up both thumbs and wiggles them back and forth as if repeat her sentiment, ‘good job’. Even though she feels her heart swell with love for Josleen, she can't make her self surrender the full truth. Alvina doesn't want to believe it, maybe if she doesn't say it outloud it won't be real.


Perhaps a life dedicated to being good has made Alvina a bad liar, or perhaps Alvina is an excellent liar when she wants to be and this is not one of those times. Either way, something about Alvina's demeanor tips off Josleen that her friend is withholding vital information. "Well, just a seance then," Josleen repeats with a little chill. Normally, friends are afforded their secrets. It would be rude otherwise. However, when it comes to Valrae, there can be no secrets. One way or another, Josleen will learn what Alvina withholds. She can sense the engineer won't be forthright, won't budge from her party line now. No matter, a Queen (which Alvina so often forgets that Josleen is) has other resources. With a word to her husband, intelligence agents in Cenril and other places will put their ear to the ground and listen for the ghostly scrape of Valrae's passing. For now, Josleen plays the part of the duped. "I'm sorry this is happening. I know Hudson's businesses keeps you-" The Elimdori governess comes for Guillem. The six month old needs to practice writing. Josleen kisses her son goodbye. Gigi stays with the women, enjoying the much needed break and adult company. "As I was saying, I know Hudson's work keeps you in Cenril, but have you considered buying a second home here? It's a short trip, and a nice way to escape whatever you need to escape." And so on, and so forth they'll talk about their families and lives for another hour or so. If Josleen seems impatient in that final hour, it's because she is. She is itching to tell Macon of her suspicions, to determine whether or not Valrae may be ressurected, and if so, to ensure that her husband crushes that witch underfoot again and again and again, so long as Guillem and the other children suffer, so shall Valrae.