[ For some, snakes are terrifying creatures, all fang and scale and murder; for some, even those with little enough experience with reptiles, it's surprisingly easy to recognize when a snake/omen/brother/cavalier is smiling back at you, replete with a sorrowful fondness and a hope that maybe, in this generation, things could be better; maybe Gideon is dead, maybe Ortus is dead, but are either of them truly dead? can both of them not stand together to support poor frequently-overwhelmed Harrowhark? are they not both, in their own ways, learning to be the immovable objects she needs at her back?
But Augustine — Augustine looks like he isn't listening, as Ortus speaks; Augustine looks like he's watching skeletons pick through the dead and brittle weeds in the yard, five-minute looped patterns of autopilot, good enough to fool someone walking down the street into thinking they're actively at work and wretched for anyone who's spent any real length of time watching them: it's a cheap trick, profoundly unimpressive to anyone who's watched the farmers of the Ninth House at work, and only about as interesting as an endlessly-flying-into-the-stars screensaver to someone from the First.
Augustine is listening to every word, every aspect of each word's timbre, studying those phonemes with every bit of fascination that slowing down the universe might offer. Augustine already knows how much he'll need to replay them, in the coming days, when he's wondering what the fuck is wrong with him, that he chose — is choosing, now, in this exact moment — to remain here. ]
Well. I suppose there's always the chance of visiting for dinner sometime, perhaps. Wouldn't need to be formal, [ he adds, quickly, eyeing Johnny Lawrence, askance. ] At some point, in the future.
If the weather holds, you might say.
[ He hesitates another moment, gaze flickering away from the skeletons and back to Ortus Nigenad, Cavalier Secondary of the Ninth, as he smokes silently, with those hands that aren't shaking. ]
If nothing else, I hope you'll send me an invitation the next time you're doing a reading somewhere in town, whether or not — [ Again, cutting himself off, using that cigarette more like a crutch than a drug, or maybe it's both —
It's a different voice that finishes the thought, as the snake's expression turns markedly more rueful. ]
no subject
But Augustine — Augustine looks like he isn't listening, as Ortus speaks; Augustine looks like he's watching skeletons pick through the dead and brittle weeds in the yard, five-minute looped patterns of autopilot, good enough to fool someone walking down the street into thinking they're actively at work and wretched for anyone who's spent any real length of time watching them: it's a cheap trick, profoundly unimpressive to anyone who's watched the farmers of the Ninth House at work, and only about as interesting as an endlessly-flying-into-the-stars screensaver to someone from the First.
Augustine is listening to every word, every aspect of each word's timbre, studying those phonemes with every bit of fascination that slowing down the universe might offer. Augustine already knows how much he'll need to replay them, in the coming days, when he's wondering what the fuck is wrong with him, that he chose — is choosing, now, in this exact moment — to remain here. ]
Well. I suppose there's always the chance of visiting for dinner sometime, perhaps. Wouldn't need to be formal, [ he adds, quickly, eyeing Johnny Lawrence, askance. ] At some point, in the future.
If the weather holds, you might say.
[ He hesitates another moment, gaze flickering away from the skeletons and back to Ortus Nigenad, Cavalier Secondary of the Ninth, as he smokes silently, with those hands that aren't shaking. ]
If nothing else, I hope you'll send me an invitation the next time you're doing a reading somewhere in town, whether or not — [ Again, cutting himself off, using that cigarette more like a crutch than a drug, or maybe it's both —
It's a different voice that finishes the thought, as the snake's expression turns markedly more rueful. ]
«God used to be very fond of poetry.»