Announcement

[royal_obligation]

Edarial makes a list of necessities for a wife. He has Zevros check it over, who promptly rips it up and throws it at him. He is of the opinion that if Edarial doesn't actually want to marry a specific person, he shouldn't, and Zevros will have nothing to do with any of it. Edarial sighs, rewrites it, and keeps it and a copy of it away from his twin in the future.

He makes the announcement to various interested people that he will be looking for a bride. Just saying it makes him feel sick. Edarial manages to keep it together long enough to give a list of the qualities he's looking for before he flees. He says he's busy, no one will look twice at him being curt and disappearing to get work done. So no one comes after him when he hides in his room and locks the door.

Face buried in his pillow, he realizes that there's no way he can be personable to his - whatever they are. Potential brides, suitors - whatever, he doesn't care. He'll hire someone to vet them, so he doesn't have to torture himself dealing with women trying to persuade him to marry them.

Comments

[come_midnight]

Good.

She usually does her spell development in Marlese - she publishes, after all - but it's no harder to do it in Cricket's language. Spirit animals and familiars don't come with writing systems, but Iobel's always had a lot of private stuff to write down and it wasn't hard to come up with ways to spell Cricket's words.

She eats breakfast with a fraction of her attention while she tries to plot out a spell to walk through walls that will last long enough and combine well enough with invisibility to let her find Cricket.

[royal_pain]

While she works, someone has noticed some of the strange results of her captivity. Two guards that complain of splitting headaches, and a third is absolutely covered in - what are those, claw marks?

Zevros is of the opinion that something is up.

He goes to his brother's door, and knocks. "Open up, it's me!"

[royal_obligation]

"Not in the mood!" replies Edarial, muffled by application of pillow to face.

[royal_pain]

"Weird things are happening! Two people have splitting headaches and a third looks like he got mauled by an angry pocket-sized bear! You're the magic twin, you figure it out!"

[royal_obligation]

Edarial sighs. The door opens, and he looks at his brother. Edarial is not at his best - he's scruffy looking, his eyes are red and a little puffy, and he's wearing the same clothes from yesterday.

"Yes?" he hisses.

[royal_pain]

"... Um!" says Zevros, raising his eyebrows and eying the state of his brother. "You also look like shit. Are you in on whatever the thing is?"

[royal_obligation]

"No. And no, I am not in the mood for investigating things right now."

[royal_pain]

"Clearly. Way to bite my head off."

[royal_obligation]

"Not. In. The mood," Edarial sighs. "Please go away."

[royal_pain]

"Okay," says Zevros, "Fine. Leaving now, call me when you're off of your period."

Then he leaves.

[royal_obligation]

Edarial doesn't dignify that with a response. The door closes, and he goes back to burying his face in his pillow and wishing there was a simple solution to all of his problems.

[come_midnight]

Iobel works almost continuously on her spell. By the time the wedding day rolls around, she actually has something that she thinks might work, but has yet to succeed in cramming the whole thing into her head for the one minimum instant necessary to have it to keep. It's big. Contingencies for different types of walls, affordances to allow the subject to breathe, failsafes to prevent falling through floors, guarantees of awareness of when it wears off - maybe she should prune some of these, maybe she can just hold her breath every time she goes through a wall, she's in a hurry -

She doesn't get her pruning done fast enough.

[aestrix]

There's a knock, on her door, on the day of the wedding. Her wedding.

It's not people with her cat. It's a bright, perky young woman with a smile that looks like it's had a forced take over and is ruling over all other expressions with an iron fist.

[come_midnight]

"What?" Iobel asks.

[aestrix]

"Hi! I am here to make you look gorgeous for your big day!"

She sounds super excited about the marriage.

[come_midnight]

"There's no need to sound this obnoxiously pleased about it." Iobel lets her in.

[aestrix]

"But it's so exciting!" says the woman. "You're really lucky, the prince is really good looking and you'll get to be queen!"

[come_midnight]

"Maybe you didn't get the notice, but I'm here because he had my familiar kidnapped and won't give him back until after the wedding. I didn't wake up one morning and say to myself what say I marry a total stranger."

[aestrix]

"... Um? That doesn't sound like something he would do!"

[come_midnight]

"Then where," says Iobel, "is my cat?"

[aestrix]

"I have no idea! Do you want me to tell Prince Edarial, if you think he did it then he might know -"

[come_midnight]

"I imagine he does know where my cat is," says Iobel. "I really don't think asking nicely is the sort of thing that will help, though knock yourself out if you want to try it. I got as far as finding where they were hiding him, the other day, and I got my head slammed into the floor a few times by the guards for my trouble, and then they moved him I know not where, and if I annoy the wrong person the wrong amount the implied threat is unmaking."

[aestrix]

"What?!" cries the woman. "Unmaking? That doesn't sound like him at all, are you sure it's him?!"

[come_midnight]

"Do you want to read his proposal?" asks Iobel, plucking the letter from the bedside table. "Here, read that in the context of me trapped here, guarded night and day, cat kidnapped."

[aestrix]

Read, read.

Then she makes an 'Eep' sound, and drops the letter.

"Oh all-knowing one above, oh my god! This is against your will and the prince has forced you here?!"