Don't Forget

[Ashley] [...What's this, apprentice?]
Dice Rolled:[ 7 d10 ] 2, 3, 6, 7, 7, 9, 10 (Success x 5 at target 6)

[Morgan] [.....what's this, mentor?]
Dice Rolled:[ 5 d10 ] 2, 4, 7, 8, 10 (Success x 3 at target 6)

[Ashley] It's unusual for them to meet on a Saturday. Ashley generally tries to leave the weekends to Morgan: she pushes the girl hard enough through the week, and Morgan pushes herself hard enough, and Ashley feels it's important to know when to stop. To know when to back away. She's certainly gotten carried away in the past, and better that Morgan gets into the habit early.

Still, when Morgan called she didn't refuse the girl's company. For the past week, she's been a relatively uninvolved mentor; she's given Morgan some work, sometimes remotely. Up until Tuesday she actually went so far as to ask for a few days away. It's a bit of a surprisingly strong reaction, given how one might expect a woman like Ashley to react to the death of a friend and cabal mate. She's taking it hard.

In spite of how tired she still is, her senses are rather acutely attuned to the world around her today. She senses Morgan's approach before she even reaches the brick walk-up, and as she comes up the stairs, and goes to put tea on. Noting, as she does, that Morgan isn't different, but she's more. It makes her brows furrow as she goes about setting up mugs.

She's gotten used to immersing herself in those little mundane things, the past week. The apartment is unusually spotless, books all in their place, no scattered papers, no empty teacups.

[Ashley] Morgan hasn't seen Ashley much this week in person, so she just hasn't been given the opportunity yet. She's still relentless determination, she still thrives in conflict, but there's a longing to her Hunger now. Something sharp and sad, bittersweet: just poignant.
to Morgan

[Morgan] There's a knock on the door, of course, but Morgan's expected and has lived here - once her arrival is heralded (and she knows that may not even be necessary), she lets herself in if the door is unlocked, and goes about getting plates ready with the snacks she's brought for with tea (and puts away some extras - a loaf of sandwich bread, some cinnamon rolls in the freezer that only need be heated for breakfast or snack, some cookies, a half cheesecake); it's muffins again, the apple streusel ones she'd made before, only better. It's companionable quiet as she goes about this business, as she gives Ashley one small bump with her hip [I'm here, I love you, I'm not going anywhere]. To her, Ashley is the sister she never had; a good deal of her dislodged attachment and affection has been transferred to her mentor, someone who knew the psychology of such things might say.

Once muffins - huge, decadent things - are on plates situated on the coffee table (Morgan usually sits on the floor and plays with Zane), she speaks. "Doing alright?" She's seen the difference, of course, just as Ashley's seen it in her, seen that she's more. More Discerning. More in tune.

[Ashley] There are muffins, and a gentle bump from Morgan's hip, both of which draw a tired smile from the Tytalan. It's been a difficult summer. Hell, it's been a difficult year. For both of them, really.

She, too, sits at her coffee table, crosslegged on the ground with her legs tucked underneath it. Zane is happy to see Morgan today; Ashley has been tired and less active, and the dog is, perhaps, feeling a little pent up. She generally walks him several miles a day. He immediately moves to the floor next to the girl.

"I'm getting by," she tells Morgan, breaking off a piece of her muffin and nibbling at it. No hungry inhalation today. There's a glance toward the girl that, for a few seconds, almost mirrors Morgan's own discerning gaze. "Have you been practicing?"

[Morgan] "Of course. I've finally got a handle on the fundamentals of Ars Spirituum," she says, proud but in a way that indicates of course she did. "I think I may focus there for a bit. It's really interesting." It is interesting, but given her aspirations in the mortal world, she'll be back to Ars Mentis before too long - it's too useful not to become proficient in it, whatever her aversion to it may be. (And that aversion hasn't become any less, regardless of what happened with the court, with her Avatar. She'd made an effort, and managed to deal with it for a bit. That's about it.)

"And . . . I met my avatar. Spoke with her." Which explains the change in resonance, the scrubbed clean (pure) feeling of her, the red that isn't just in her hair and clothing anymore. "It was . . . pretty amazing. Which is just about the biggest understatement I could have come up with." The last is wry, amused.

[Ashley] Morgan tells Ashley that she's learned the basics of the Ars Spirituum, an Art that Ashley herself has not yet managed to learn, and there's the hint of a pleased smile from her mentor. Apparently her studies with Basil have led to something; while Ashley's perspective on Basil has shifted just slightly this week, she's still protective of her apprentice. "It'll be good for you, in Quaesitor. A lot of Quaesitori seem to focus their efforts there."

Morgan says she met her Avatar, and the elder Hermetic's eyebrows draw together before she looks at Morgan. Eyes her for a few seconds, absorbs this along with the sense of growth she feels from the girl, the way she resonates. "...Did you Seek?"

[Morgan] Here, there's a beaming sort of pride - so excited, so pleased with herself. "I did. I found a book, with a ritual, and I went through it all and it worked. You were there, in it. Part of it, anyway." That part's okay, despite the mind-invading that Morgan knows on some level was really her avatar, her self.

"Not to sound all Wizard of Oz-y or whatever. She's very . . ." Morgan muses for a moment, breaks off a bit of muffin to dip in her tea, chews, swallows - a few seconds' thought. "Red. Very right and wrong and balance between. Like Dike. Oh, speaking of. I have Greek and Latin this semester, will you tutor me? I'm awful at languages." She always has been, or so she thinks - which is to say she's roughly average, and her mother the linguistic genius had no patience with just average, not from her daughter (or her husband, or much of anyone, really).

[Ashley] In spite of the darkness that's painted itself beneath her mentor's eyes, in spite of the grief that's made itself visible on her face, Ashley, for a moment, breaks into a grin. Bright and proud and genuine, after Morgan confirms that she did Seek, that she took initiative and moved forward on her own. "Tell me about the rest," she says.

That brightness lingers in the blue of Ashley's eyes even after the smile has lessened, as she takes a sip out of her cup of tea and raises her eyebrows when Morgan requests help with languages. "I don't know Greek, but you're going to have to know Latin in order to grasp a lot of texts, anyway. Particularly a lot of magical texts."

[Morgan] "I know, believe me," she says ruefully of the need to know languages. "Most of the books I found, I couldn't use. The one I did, though, someone translated around the turn of the twentieth century - for his or her own use, I guess, or maybe his or her apprentice's. And . . . I'd like to learn Enochian, as well."

There's a pause, then, while she thinks of how best to put together the story - she's not a bard, far from it, though she can give reasonable closing arguments if pressed. Completely different skill set.

"The set up was as you expect it to be - circles, representatives of the elements, that kind of thing. And I thought it didn't work at first, thought I fell asleep and was having a weird dream. Was walking through a koi pond, like, underwater." Morgan is not particularly fond of decorative animals in the first place, by now Ashley knows this - she has an intolerance for dogs small enough to be kept in purses and pure bred show animals and so on. Her snarky commentary about such things is amusing, sometimes, and made more so by how much she obviously loves Zane. "But there were fingers and then voices, one male and one female. One of them said one of the fish looked like me, and as they talked, it became obvious they were Val and Bryan."

She's sad here, for this, but excited in a way, too - to know for sure what happened, beyond the shadow of a doubt. There's a relief, almost, despite how she'd rather she hadn't done it. There's a weight taken off with knowing, in this case, as opposed to one added.

"I saw what happened. What I did. I'm . . . not that great a person, you know. But after that, there was a kingsroad in a forest, and I followed voices off road - the dark was off, wrong, so I saw through it, and I wanted to know who I was coming up on before I got there, so I helped that out, too. You, Kage, Daddy, Uncle Zeke and Uncle Steve were there, and a red voice that kept talking through all of you - not all the time. Sometimes you were just you, but sometimes you were Her." She shrugs, not sure how to explain that, really, and sips her tea before continuing. "I had to explain why I matter, because you'd already judged me. And when I did to Her satisfaction, after I told her who I was really talking to - myself - and what it meant to be red, it was just the two of us. Dike and me, I mean. And . . . I understand some things better, and feel Her better."

There's a pause, and her right hand held out, palm up. "Oh, and I got this a couple days ago. Thomas was there." When Ashley looks, she'll see a tiny (roughly two inches square) monochrome representation of the scales of Justice, perfectly balanced. "It's a work in progress."

[Ashley] "Enochian is very important for you to learn," Ashley says. "I planned to teach you that anyway, because it's something you should know, if you're working with Words."

Ashley, who is a storyteller, who is a poet, isn't impatient through that pause. She can understand the need to gather one's thoughts, to think through the story and its telling. Briefly, when Morgan mentions the koi pond, the elder Hermetic's heart seizes, painful, but she wants this night to be Morgan's. There's a twitch of the corner of her mouth, and she just listens.

Morgan's Seeking is very unlike the ones she has had, with the masked Avatar, with the judgment. Hers just wants, and it is always clear about what it wants. She raises her eyebrows at the girl. "What did you tell her, for why you matter? Why did the red matter?"

And when Morgan extends her wrist to show Ashley the tattoo, the other Hermetic leans forward to look. Ashley has never been tattooed. "What else are you adding?"

[Morgan] "First was intent, I forgot that part - whether it meant anything. I said yes, because it pushes and drives, but it doesn't always end up the way you think it will. Road to hell, and all that. Then was whether or not I matter, and I said I did because I took what I was, and what everyone there had given me, and turned it into something different and different than the sum of its parts. And because I wanted to know the Truth and wasn't afraid to seek it. Uncle Zeke wanted me to run, and Uncle Steve thought I was going to fail." Here, her nose wrinkles briefly - she's not a coward, and she doesn't like being underestimated. "I guess Kage did too, but she was nicer about it. Anyway, so that's what I said about why I matter."

Another brief pause, and then, "The red matters because historically speaking, that's the color the great goddess Justice's followers - worshipers, whatever - claimed. Red or white, not black or white. And of course red thought it knew the best way to worship or follow, and white thought it knew the best way, and sometimes there was pink in the middle that thought it knew the right way. Because no one can ever deny Justice, regardless of how unjust their actions - they can only say that they're the only ones who know how to be just."

[Ashley] Ashley listens to Morgan's answer, and there's another thoughtful bite or two, washed down with some of the tea. She seems to be thinking, trying to connect, trying to imagine. "Why is the act of transformation valuable? Why is taking what everyone told you and turning it into something else inherently something that makes you matter?"

The Justice myth she hasn't heard before, and it earns Morgan a thoughtful quirk of the eyebrows. Norse myths are what Ashley has absorbed herself in, tales from those dark places in the center of Europe. "So why did you pick red, and not white? Or pink?"

[Morgan] "Because transformation is what makes everything. Regardless of which version of creation you believe, god-based or science-based, something came. And then transformed, and became something else. Because that act is the backbone of everything that was, is and will be. It's also why everyone matters, at least to some extent - because everyone is capable of transformation. Some are just . . . you know. Better at it." Here, she shrugs, a bit rueful and wry - the general attitude of her Tradition is not something that she's failed to pick up. Primals, Sleepers? They matter, but just barely. Certainly to a lesser extent than even the earliest of fledgling Hermetics do.

The question about red, though, gets a blush, and a bit of mumble. "Uther Pendragon's banner was red, with a gold dragon. King Arthur's was red with three gold crowns. And . . . I don't know. Red's always been my favorite color."

[Ashley] [Sneaksneaksneak. +2 diff.]
Dice Rolled:[ 6 d10 ] 2, 4, 5, 6, 7, 10 (Success x 1 at target 8)

[Ashley] "Is the transformation the point?" Ashley asks, and there's a skeptical quirk of her eyebrows here. "Just the act of transforming? Because like you've said, everyone can do it. What can judge better or best, if there's just - "

And she leaves off for a second, because Morgan hears a few soft footfalls immediately followed by a tug of one of the locks of hair behind her. Clumsy, but whatever small animal it was has managed some small amount of success. The kitten tumbles into view and scampers away to hide beneath the couch seconds later.

Ashley's gaze follows it, amused, and then she looks back up at Morgan. "...If all that matters is transformation, is what I meant."

A smirk at Morgan's explanation for liking red is her only response. Ashley understands this, really, better than might be imagined: she often goes with things just because they feel right. She doesn't admit to it around other Hermetics.

[Morgan] "....." It's not Zane pulling her hair as he walks by, Morgan knows, because he's still next to her, being petted and loved on whenever she has a free hand. (She'll offer to walk him today, before she goes anywhere else, and invite Ashley along - to walk in company, maybe, to cover some ground. Maybe fresh air and distraction will do her some good.) So she finds herself rather puzzled . . . and then there's an act of kitten, and Morgan looks almost . . . puzzled, for a moment.

"You got a cat?" And then said cat is hiding, and Morgan is watching. "I think it'll take a lot more than an apprentice or initiate to see the point, and that 'point' and 'Truth' may be close to the same thing. Transformation isn't all that matters, but it's certainly a step along the path to finding what does."

[Ashley] He's looking at her from where he's crouched under the couch: small, striped creature, gray and still covered with the fuzz of young kittenhood. Zane, too, is watching him; the kitten is a bit skittish of the dog, yet. "Kage gave him to me," Ashley says, with a glance under the couch at the small cat. She reaches under the couch, tolerates a playful bat and rubs him under his chin.

The sidelong look Morgan is getting in the meantime is a touch reproving, softened a bit by the fact that she is petting a kitten (it's hard to intimidate in such a situation). "That doesn't mean you shouldn't try for it. Don't impose limits on yourself based on your rank."

[Morgan] "Oh, I didn't say I wouldn't try. I have every intention of trying, and getting there. I just don't know that I'd understand it even if I did see it now. Like . . . like Russian literature. They make you read Nabakov in high school - at least my high school - Invitation to a Beheading in ninth grade. And I read it, and I tried, and I even caved and got the cliff's notes and asked my mom to give me her translation from the Russian. But I didn't get it. Then, I reread it last month and it made more sense, but I think there are still probably bits that I'm missing. So I'll reread it again in a few years and see what I can get that I didn't before."

She shrugs, still eying the kitten; it's not the same sort of dislike (and distrust) garnered by purse dogs and purebred beasties and the like, but Morgan clearly prefers the very large do(n)g next to her. "What's his name? He's cute."

[Ashley] "I didn't get to read Nabakov in high school," Ashley says, and her smile might be a little tinged with envy. "Red Badge of Courage and Shakespeare for us." Though it isn't precisely that she objects to either; Ashley's tastes simply lie along the lines of Russian literature, dense though it is. It's evident with a glance through her bookshelves.

"But, that aside, you've made my point for me all the same. There's still something you understand, and saying that you can't understand it yet is a lazy answer. Your answer might change but that doesn't mean you shouldn't try."

Her tone isn't harsh. It's teaching mode: she slips into this occasionally (often.) When she's around apprentices she almost can't help it; perhaps it's what comes of becoming an Adept. It's hard to turn that approach off. "Luka," she adds.

[Morgan] "We started with Shakespeare in fifth and had at least a part of a play a year all the way through, and Red Badge of Courage was seventh. We also read Metamorphosis, Great Expectations, Of Mice and Men, Moby Dick and The Great Gatsby. There were others, but . . ." She shrugs. Some stick out, some don't. Some she remembers easily, some she doesn't. "The point is to get there. Transformation is a part of that, but not all of that. And 'where' is 'Truth'."

Which is a less lazy answer, and makes it clear that she has tried (does try) to understand, despite her inadequacy at explaining what it is that she sees thus far, and the limitations inherent. They're limitations that she'll surpass, gates she'll jump or pass through, but for now, they're there.

[Ashley] Morgan lists the texts, many of them quite advanced for what she was reading at the same age. Then again, Morgan was in a private school, and this is ten years later; their mentality is quite different than the one Ashley grew up with (blue collar, daughter of a fisherman). She doesn't call attention to how very privileged Morgan has been, and it passes without comment. "I'll accept that answer, for now," she tells Morgan, "but you should think more on it."

Morgan's limitations are still very much there; she is only seventeen, after all, and there is only so much she can understand about what's going on around her. Only so far ahead she can think. "In the meantime, congratulations," Ashley says. "You'll be an Initiate soon."

[Morgan] She's eighteen, actually, since April - for now, Enid's and Morgan's ages match (because when she'd gotten the new ID, she'd still been seventeen - rather than having Jon make her an emancipated minor, she'd just given herself a birthday that made her eighteen already), and they will until February or so. "I intend to," she says of thinking on her answer - and she does. Morgan always thinks. She weighs, and discerns.

But then there's the rest, and Morgan smiles the biggest, most open smile Ashley's seen since she came back from China. "Thanks. It feels good. I've learned a lot of new stuff this month. Between hanging out with Thomas, James and Atlas, and Seeking, and getting ready for school . . ." She shrugs, but it's clearly been a good month for her - the journey's the thing, for this particular girl.

[Ashley] It's good to see Morgan smile that way; Ashley has, distantly, observed how different the girl is since coming back from China. She finds it worrisome, but also thinks it's Morgan's own battle, beyond what support she has already tried to offer. It's difficult for her to imagine that other people don't deal with things the same way she does, at times.

"I'm glad to see you interacting with other people more," Ashley tells Morgan. "Sounds like it's been good for you."

[Morgan] "I . . . think it has, some. I still don't . . ."

She shrugs, and doesn't know how to explain a general aversion to uninitiated tactility (though some people can get away with it - Ashley is one, and Kage, and maybe Atlas. Thomas is getting there) that rivals her aversion to Ars Mentis. She especially doesn't like anything that feels remotely like restraint, and shutting her in a room will get panic or fury or both, but . . . well.

"I like Atlas, a lot. Thomas thought he was my dad," she says with a wrinkled nose. "And you know I adore Kage." The Hollower, though, has crept up on her with his strange slang and his accent so like and yet completely unlike her father's - she looked down on him at first, and now he's taking her on dates and holding her hand at the tattoo parlor. It's odd, to her, and she doesn't even try to explain it.

[Ashley] Morgan would not really have to explain her aversion to uninitiated touch to Ashley: her mentor is not comfortable with it either. It makes her stiffen up, and occasionally it makes her panic. In Ashley's case, it's sometimes just overstimulation or the person not being well known enough to her. Either way, she just eyes her apprentice, listening to her talk about the people who are now in her life.

"Atlas is interesting," she agrees. She, too, adores Kage, but does not vocalize the sentiment; theirs is not a demonstrative friendship, with the rare exception. She asks, "What do you think of Thomas?" not because she can tell what Morgan is thinking but because she is curious. She rather liked the Hollower.

[Morgan] "I think I need a Cockney to English dictionary a lot of the time. And he's awfully rough around the edges." Morgan knows she's led a very privileged life, and that her parents have lived privileged lives, and back for several generations. She knows that not everyone has the benefit of a private school education, or a professor father and genius mother. This does not make it any easier to not be a bit of a snob sometimes; she's a pretty girl, was once a popular one. She has all the things that tend to propel people into the social stratosphere in adolescence. These things matter to her in ways she may never be able to articulate. "I also think it's sweet how he tries to look out for me, and really interesting to hear how he's mashed so many different theories - some vastly divergent - together to form his own. He doesn't think he has an avatar, you know."

This had surprised her greatly when she first found out, but as she learned more about him and his way of doing things it had come to make more sense that he might think that (even if she thinks he's wrong).

"And . . . he knows. I told him about China, because it doesn't seem right to not give the people who want to be around me a chance to avoid it. I mean, I'm sure Mama and the rest have better things to do than come looking for me, but it doesn't seem right to not give warning if people want to be friends or whatever." Morgan can count on one hand all the people who know all the details about that - Ashley is one. Emily. Thomas, and James. And that's it. Other people have small pieces, or suspicions, but those are the ones who know all of it. So, it's kind of a big deal that she's told.

[Ashley] A twitch of the corner of her mouth as Morgan says that Thomas is rough around the edges, that he believes he doesn't have an Avatar, that he's merged divergent theories. It doesn't surprise her to hear any of these things; she and Thomas had their own conversation, after all. "Thomas is intense," she says. "I think speaking more with him would be good for you."

A part of her can't believe she's telling her apprentice this about a Hollow One. It's a part of her that is diminishing by the day, the part of her that bonded so closely with an Akashic and is finding the city's Orphans to be her best friends. There's a pause. "He reminds me a bit of myself when I was younger, actually." And by a bit, she means a lot.

"What did he say, when you told him about China?"

[Morgan] ".....he hugged me." Which is actually okay with her now - at the time, though, she'd stiffened and grown even more distant than usual, though she'd forced herself to stay there and allow herself to be touched. (With Morgan, it's not a matter of overstimulation - or rather, it can get worse then, or when she's overtired. But really, it has to do with trust that's been betrayed far too often in a short span of time, and the trust necessary to allow someone to be that close physically. Mentally and emotionally are completely different issues, and require more hoops.) "And said he was sorry I'd been through that, but that I must be a pretty strong person to have come out of it so well. I don't . . ."

She shrugs, then grins, wry. "I don't always feel all that strong. But I try to be, anyway." She also doesn't necessarily know that she came out of it all that well - but she plays her part. She tries to keep how well she isn't hidden, at least most of the time, so it doesn't stick out.

[Ashley] That Thomas hugged Morgan and told her these things: it doesn't surprise Ashley to hear that about the young man, either. She likes Thomas, and it shows in the little half-smile Morgan gets. There's something wistful about it, something a bit sad, as though she's guessed at some of what's going on. The world doesn't stop for the grieving.

It becomes more pronounced when Morgan says that she doesn't always feel that strong, and Ashley says, "Well, that's all you can do. Will becomes reality." And Mind magic, she knows, thrives on the use of mantras: tell yourself you're okay long enough, and eventually you are.

[Morgan] Morgan looks at what's left of her muffin and tea, finishes both, and then moves to sit next to Ashley - only touching where she leans to put her head on the smaller woman's shoulder. "I know you've got Kage and Wharil and stuff. But don't forget you've got me too, yeah?"

And so she'll stay for a long moment (as long as Ashley's comfortable) before rising to take care of dishes. "I'm going to walk Zane. You up for coming?"

[Ashley] There's the touch of a head on her shoulder. Ashley's been unusually receptive to such things recently: it's difficult for her not to be, with how raw she is over Daiyu's death. She will be for a long time. "I...I know," she says, quiet. She seems comfortable to let Morgan sit like that for a long time, going so far as to wrap an arm around the girl's shoulders.

When Morgan offers to walk Zane, she too rises, after looking for Luka to make sure he hasn't gotten into anything. When she finds the kitten asleep under the couch pillow, she gives Morgan a nod. "Sure, thanks. He can probably stand to get out."

So can she.