Crystals; OTA

[aestivation]

FORM: crystal
SENDER: casimir
RECIPIENT: y'all
WHAT: bum dum dum dum dum dum
WHEN: time is a flat circle
WHERE: wherever
NOTES: threadjack as you please

I found a book in the library, 

[ hello inquisition. the words are distant, drifting; the accent as obviously foreign as it's peculiarly-intoned. think: extremely chill dracula ]

It describes the interpretation of dreams — I don't believe it belonged to the Circle, the author was no mage. 

The perspective is new to me. That a dream of squash might symbolize success is, [ pause ] Unorthodox to my understanding.

I require your assistance: What do you dream of? 

Comments

[strangel]

Dancing bears.

[aestivation]

What sort of bear? [ the faint, methodical rasp of pages ] Where did you observe them?

[shri]

[ My sons. My daughters. The desert against my face and the river at my feet. Walls enough to protect me, and memories enough to believe that. Home, home, home.

All of which is far too obvious and especially, personal, and absolutely boring to someone else. ]

A fortress.

[aestivation]

A refusal to change. [ pause: ] I think that's irony.

[ if that's phrased as a bit of a guess, it is. an abstraction to grasp it now. still. they are in the gallows, and everyone keeps telling him how much has changed —

(the fade, and those who dwell within, are always about a state of flux) ]

private.

[dashing]

Why are you preoccupied with dreams Casimir?

infinity

[aestivation]

Should I enter the Fade again, there's no guarantee that I will do so in the manner I was accustomed to.

[ pharamond had emotion, yes — what scant records they've collected indicate that much. but they don't speak of spellcraft, never ask after his dreams. ]

It seems wise to prepare.

[elegiaque]

I had a recurring dream before my debut that I'd be presented to the court entirely nude, and thus start a new fashion.

( hi cas you don't want to hear about what she dreams of now. literally no one wants to hear about that. )

[aestivation]

Nakedness for vulnerability, [ that follows. the winter ball was attacked, wasn't it? easier to get cut without clothes. ] Fashion for shallowness. A ball is a new beginning, and Orlais is,

[ well, ]

The author seems to be Fereldan.

[thunderproof]

Dragons. Failure. Cute boys.

The stuff every young woman dreams of, essentially.

[aestivation]

What type of dragon? They've classified it by breath.

[ another time, he might suggest classifying the boys by that. alas. ]

[rathercommon]

Oh!

[ With a bit of a laugh - ]

Dream interpretation is just for fun. It never really means anything. It's like astrology.

[aestivation]

The ancient Imperium held astrology highly,

[ not that he's any real details to offer about that. you live on the tevinter border long enough, and you hear things; you live on the border, and the world is careful about what they let you hear. ]

And now we face an ancient Magister. Invented meaning may still matter.

private ∞

[elegiaque]

( after listening to some of kitty's exchange with casimir— )

Casimir is Tranquil and he takes things very literally.

[notacrow]

Dreams are tricky things. Sometimes they can help you with scrying the future but other times it's just a lot of nonsense. Th' best seers can sort that out.

[ A pause. ]

I was never too grand at that part.

[aestivation]

Are you one of the best seers?

[ why else could she be expected to be good at it ]

[circleprodigy]

I often dream of caring for a large litter of mabari pups. That said, I am Fereldan so it doesn't take much interpretation to see where that comes from.

[aestivation]

Does it? Most Fereldans speak far less of them.

[gatheringstorm]

Big-chested mermaids.

Or sometimes an aban-ataashi, but the mermaids are a lot more pleasant.

[aestivation]

I'm not familiar with that term.

[ guess which ]

[earthbones]

Fire beneath the earth that forgets itself and twists, that might be rolled up as a map when all things are said and done inside an eye, inside threefold wings beating down with a mouth open bright and wide to scream down ruin--

The fire doesn't burn but all of it cracks, splits, pops, hisses.

[All her dreams are variations on a theme.]

[aestivation]

How do you roll fire?

[faithlikeaseed]

Same as ever. [wings, eyes, promises of heaven; the pride demon was always overt,] More oceans than deserts lately, [you can't drown in the desert,]; wonder if it's to do with the sound of the harbor.

Does your author have anything on environmental influence?

[private,]

More research?

private;

[aestivation]

No. But there is a section on diet, perhaps you've eaten too much salt tack.

[ probably not an issue. a pause, and then: ]

An outsider's perspective isn't outside the Fade. To know how others think of it may benefit us, when there's so little precedent to draw upon. The Rifters here act as spirits, but they dream. Have you ever known a spirit to dream?

[ they don't, so far as he knows. only dwell in the fade or beyond it, a binary state. ]

[in_death_sacrifice]

Mostly nightmarish things. Although there are the occasional good dreams as well, which tend to involve dragons.

[aestivation]

Nightmarish, but not true nightmares?

voice.

[hornswoggle]

It's not too late to start collecting a small fee in exchange for your generous work.

[ #priorities ]

[aestivation]

That would discourage replies.

[the_cleric]

Well, obviously a squash means success. Because you are squashing anyone who is competing with you and standing in your way! And a lot of squashes are yellow, which is a happy color! Or green, there are green squashes, right, and green is the color of stuff that is alive and new, which means it was successful in growing.

Okay, okay, okay, but-- [an abrupt shift in tone to the Very Serious] --but what if I told you that there was a dream of really tiny pastries, like éclairs, but you know how on the éclair's butt there is a little bit of extra custard where they put the filling in? It looks like a bunny tail? Okay, so in the dream, that was a wing. And the éclairs were flying around, and around, and around, and no one could catch them to eat them, no matter how hard they tried.

What does the book say that dream means.

[aestivation]

There are orange squash — gourds, I suppose — I've seen them carved into faces. Perhaps it's related.

[ this all seems very reasonable. good, sound argument, jester. ]

Pastries seem to be, [ flip. flip. that's the sound of pages. ] Jealousy. If the focus is on their hind ends, that might follow.

[divineshadow]

Worlds.

Worlds like this one, with air to breathe and light and living stars, where there is room for the hives.

It is a promise without need of interpretation but not so far different from waking.

Your books say it is otherwise here on this world. All sleep utterly and most dream without coherence. [an implied "is this so" lurks beneath the words.]

[aestivation]

I couldn't say. I've never dreamed another way.

[ at least that he can remember. which comes first, the sleep or the spell? immaterial. ]

All men sleep. The ferryman claims that fish don't, only swim and swim, until they can't. Did you make the promise?

[esquive]

Sounds like a useless book.

[lol reading]

[aestivation]

For what purpose?

[ cmon man you can burn a book. you can stack things on it. you can point and laugh at people who have enough time and money to memorize what stupid little pictures mean when they're strung all together in a line. ]

[sorcerised]

Going home, most often. But sometimes falling.

[ Pause. ]

I never really used to dream about that, but I do here, all the time. Sometimes...more grisly things, too. Like terrible injuries, and I don't really know why.

[aestivation]

Have you taken a change in diet? [ the faint rustle of pages, ] It suggests shellfish promote an unsettled mind.

[ — and then the book shutting. ]

I have found that any change by day, is likely to disquiet by night.

[castintoflames]

Steep, jagged cliffs, Eagles, Elven ships sailing from paradise towards the unknown. Other times, I dream of naught but the sky.

[aestivation]

What were the eagles in, if not sky?