tampered | OPEN FOR MINGLING

When; Saturday and Sunday, November 3-4
Rating; Individual threads may vary!
Characters; Everyone is welcome! This is an open log for Polyites and 4th Wallers alike, so just specify if it's an open thread or if you have 4th walling rules in the comment or subject line!
Summary; Whether you're a regular or a first-timer, here to stay or just passing through, the Blue Light is the place to be for good music, good food, and a sea of friendly faces to encounter. SO GET IN HERE AND MINGLE.
Log;

As she's now grown accustomed to doing on days when the visitors come, Rosella is manning the Blue Light with as many of her staff on duty as can spare the time to be around, making sure that residents of the City and visitors alike have a warm and cheerful place to stop in, sit down, have a chat, and enjoy the opportunity to spend time together.

The music is merry and there's the chatter of conversation in the air as the booths and tables fill with people; nearby, a space on the floor has been cleared for dancing, should any guests find themselves with the urge to cut loose.

It's looking like it's going to be a busy few days. But really, that's quite all right with her.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

No, I suppose right now I'm not alone. You're here with me.

[She nudges him a little]

I would be very sad if you left me.

I know a hint when I hear one.

[He nudges back.]

You know I'll have to go eventually. Are you still going to be upset with me?

No.

No, I won't. I'll be going soon, too. Back to Narnia, I suppose, although it's a bit like a dream now. When I'm there I dream of you, when I'm here I dream of home.

You don't have anything better to dream about than me? Narnia really must be a fantastic place.

[She laughs and runs her free hand through her hair. The cakepie is forgotten]

It is! But don't you know, you dream for what your heart longs for?

That's not how my dreams ever went.

[The precious thing was a night without dreams, really. What she's suggesting is a luxury none of them were ever entitled to.]

Dream up a way to take me with you.

[She considers it for a moment, and takes his other hand]

Oh, it doesn't work so easily in Narnia. What I imagine; I would be sitting court one day, terribly bored, and I would go to the beach - the one beside Cair Paravel is beautiful, you know, with water so clear you can see each fish to the bottom, and so blue the sky gets jealous - and I would come down and you would be sitting there, rocking in your sailboat.

I've sailed through worlds you would tell me, and found the only path here, and risked my life, and you look like a Queen.

And that's how you would find me, with the bottom of my skirts drenched in seawater and my crown missing and my hair blowing with sea-air, and you would look like some god of the sea.

Does that suffice?

Edited 2012-11-04 06:09 (UTC)

You're the only queen I know, you know. Any other one I meet is going to have to measure up to you in my perception. Which almost makes me feel sorry for every other queen out there, really.

And it's a good dream, but that's not what I want to see. Most every memory I have of you is tied to a beach, and there's nothing wrong with that. But if we're dreaming anyway, I'd rather have the one that I can't picture for myself. What it's like for you when it's not me and the beach.

Castles and horses and racing through the countryside, and drinking toffee-apple brandy?

Is that what you imagine?

Without you?

[It's a very soft stillness, the one Lucy has]

[Castles and horses--he barely knows what a castle is, save for the fact that it's something like a mansion, something large and tall and not altogether unlike the home she and her brothers had here, but different. And it's only then that he really stops, and thinks, and lets his eyes close as he tries to picture the elusive Narnia he's heard so much about and yet never tried to put into images painted with words.]

When I think of Narnia, your castle in Narnia, I think of it like Mags' house down the way back home. There aren't ballrooms and chandeliers...though I guess there are feasts. Plenty to eat, always, and the chatter that comes with having lots of people all in the same place at once. But it's white boards and a gray roof and a tower on there somewhere because your room is in the tower, and there's a little door that lets out right onto the beach, and your thrones are made of wood salvaged from old ships that still smell like sea salt, and there's a set of brown wooden steps--circular steps, and the third one creaks, but they're polished smooth so you can go barefoot--that go upstairs to cozy little rooms with low ceilings and small round windows that look out over the water. And then outside, it's the beach on the one side and a forest on the other, and that's where your lion lives, to the east, by a cave hidden in the woods.

I guess that's not really what a castle is like, though, is it? Or any of it, probably. But that's what I imagine.

[It's the happiest thing he can think of.]

I think I like your image better.

[She holds onto his hands, her fingers tightening their grip for one moment]

I think it's more honest.

Honest? I'm not the one who's been there to see it for real.

[She tilts her head to look at him, and shakes it]

No, I don't mean what's really there. Narnia isn't about trappings or fancy things, really. I'm Queen there, of course, but it could be a rabbit hill and I would still be happy.

I don't think anyone has ever seen me quite as clearly as you. No one who isn't Aslan, anyway.

I could say the same thing, almost.

[He presses a kiss, affectionate, against her head.]

It's about being where you belong, right? The place where it feels most right to be.

Yes.

But you have someone else.

[She says it without judgment.]

Had someone else.

[Equally without judgment:]

Strong as you are, sometimes I still think you need me as much as she did.

[She looks at him for a long time, her eyebrows raised.]

What makes you think so?

Sometimes you hold on to me like you think I'm the only one you'll ever have to hold on to in the first place. Sometimes I tell you you're beautiful and you act like you think I'm talking about someone else. Like a word like that doesn't belong to you.

I'm not your anchor or your shield. But I'm something else, and it's something that makes you afraid to let go.

[She looks at her cakepie. It looks delicious.]

Does that matter?

Maybe. Not really. At least not to me, but I think it might to you.

[She shrugs]

It's not always so simple. I've had many princes ask me for my hand. I've had many kingdoms desire me to be their queen.

And all of them were empty, because you never said yes. Right?

[He gives her hand a squeeze.]

[She considers it for a moment, like this is something she doesn't like to talk about. But Finnick makes her talk about these things.]

They all think I would make a lovely queen.

[But none of them think she would make a lovely wife.]

OPEN FOR MINGLING

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