02 . december catch-all

[necrolord]

Who: necrolord and you!
What: A necromancer enjoys Bone Season.
When: December.
Where: Throughout Trench.

Content Warnings: Will be marked as needed. Note all the usual warnings of this character.

(1) recruitment: OTA.

There is a man in the Archives. He doesn't look like much: average height, average build, dressed in simple blacks. He chews his lip as he thumbs through some borrowed tome. There's an untidy stack of ancient books beside him, the titles Rituals of Trench: Remembering Our Pasts and Legends of Trench: Curses and Causations glinting in the lamplight. The one in his hands seems to be The Sleeper Condition. If you've come to do some research on the current issues plaguing town, you'll have to approach this plain and faintly rumpled-looking stranger.

He drums his fingers against the tabletop as he reads, and at the approach of any passerby, he looks up.

His eyes are oil-black and horribly, weightily inhuman.

"I don't suppose," he says, by way of greeting, "you've run across much explanation for the squidly reincarnation? All our esteemed authors seem to take the tentacles as a normal fact of life."

(2) recruitment: existing CR.

It is, by and large, a quiet day in Trench. The God of Necromancers can be found ambling from Gaze to the Blood Ministers' District and back again, sometimes with his facepainted attaché and sometimes not. You might even spot him down by the docks, standing out among the brawn and bustle of sailors.

Regardless, he brightens when he spots an even slightly familiar face, and raises a hand in hello.

"Remind me," he says, bracingly, "how you feel about sailing?"

(3) wildcard.

[ Happy to match formatting! ]

Comments

[megatheorem]

Palamedes glances down at his squid and back up again, leaning his elbow on his notebook to hold it still while he engages in this conversation proper. Okay, fine, research is the magic word — he's listening. He chooses not to comment about how smoothly God assumes he's going to go on this boat trip, throwing in all the 'we's as if Palamedes is a colleague in this alleged research.

Hmm.

"You want to go out to sea," he says, slowly, just to be sure he's clear on this. Well, it's not the worst idea he's heard, if only because there's a boat involved. "To do research."

A beat; he cants his head to the side, squints just a little. It's odd, to think of God as a man who needs to do research. Palamedes thanks, well, this guy, he supposes, that he wasn't born to the Eighth, where they might have a big, embarrassing panic attack about that. Now, if going out to sea is involved in the research, he can only assume—

"You want to know how the squids work. If the process by which our souls are brought here, turned into squids for some reason, and then brought back to some semblance of ordinary is anything like the River. Am I on the right track? I've been thinking a little, myself."

[necrolord]

Well, it's certainly refreshing to be met with open skepticism. Harrow always clamps back down into faith immediately, and Gideon is a different can of worms.

"Got it in one." He looks patiently back. "I can't see the full shape of the thing from here. If we're to truly understand it, I may need to get a bit hands-on. It reminds me of the early days, really, when the Houses were young and we understood much less than we do now."

Another tilt of his fingers towards the squid drawing. "I'm always glad to hear a theory."

[megatheorem]

This is, and no doubt will continue to be, a weird conversation. Palamedes wonders for a second where Cam has gone, if she can perhaps see him from wherever that is (because it cannot be that far), and if she can see specifically the sheer height of his raised eyebrows as he navigates through, like.

Talking to God (actual) about research projects.

But then God (genuinely) says 'we understood so much less,' and Palamedes thinks about that, and then he thinks about that we in particular, and blinks. He closes the notebook with a little hum.

"I'd be remiss not to ask about the early days," he says, instead of anything about squids. Ah, but, "If you're asking Cam and I to come along on your boat trip, we'll come."

[necrolord]

"Think of it more as an open invitation, and less as a request," he says, as though an open invitation made by God is anything less than a request. "But I'll be glad to have you both."

He does not add that his Ninth Saint(s) will be in attendance, because it seems to go rather without saying.

"If we have me reciting ancient history, we may never get off this dock." This is said with the good humor of a man who is very rarely challenged when he sidesteps an open-ended question. "Better that we find an opportunity over tea. Harrow very kindly humors me, but in circumstances like these, I'll have need for more than one gifted necromancer."

Which is brushing rather close to the heart of the thing, isn't it.

[megatheorem]

"Nonagesimus humors you about tea, or about," he waves a finger around in a circle; All This, "going out on boats?" How many boat trips have their been already, exactly? He's not sure if a number greater than zero makes him feel better, but it's something.

"Cam's going to want to know what you need me to do." Has Palamedes already said they'll come? Yes. Will they, indeed? Yes. But she's going to Ask, and frankly, this is also Palamedes Asking, albeit with the helpful nudging reminder that he is not, himself, a Lyctor.

You know, if that changes anybody's mind about his giftedness. Just in case.

"What should I tell her? Let us at least come prepared."

[necrolord]

"Oh, very certainly both." This with the same good humor, the same gentle waving away of what all this might encompass. He notes the mention of the boy's cavalier with an understanding nod and the faintest creasing of the lines around his eyes.

"For the most part, you will be there to help me speculate at length about squid, and to tell me what you are able to notice. Harrow has her specialties, even now, and these things are always best approached from a few angles at once."

He regards the Sixth necromancer's notebook again, and adds: "Consider it a trip for data-gathering, from which we might launch more targeted efforts. We do have to start somewhere."

[megatheorem]

Cool, so that's tacit permission to do whatever he wants, he hears. Were he a different necromancer he might take it as a slight against his pride; reporting back on things he notices is not necessarily a great use of his many necromantic talents, unless God wants to know how old some rocks are, but Palamedes has no particular investment in that line of thinking. Ergo: he can do whatever he wants, which is good to know.

"More boat trips," he says, doing something uncertain with his eyebrows. What if he hates boats, after this? Tough to say.

"Alright." Squid notes. "I'll think about squid. We'll bring a fresh notebook or two."

[necrolord]

"Always more boat trips, I'm afraid," he says. He clasps his hands together, a sort of that's that gesture. "I'll be in touch, then. My regards to Camilla the Sixth."

He straightens to go, and gives a slight tilt of a smile under black eyes.

"And don't let me forget: history over tea."

slaps a wrapped bow on this thread

[megatheorem]

It's a credit to his own laser focused self control, Palamedes thinks, that he doesn't say something immediately hostile when God (actual God) has the gall to speak Camilla's name. Even for his regards, which Palamedes cannot convince himself would serve Cam well in any circumstance, knowing what he knows. He squeezes the spine of his notebook; he gives God a very mild look.

Alright.

"Tea." He manages, despite all odds, a wry little smile. "If Harrowhark humors you, so will I."