entrancelogs | [OPEN] and you may ask yourself

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[OPEN] and you may ask yourself

Who: Evelyn O'Connell & YOU!
Where: The library, halls, kitchen, parlors, outside grounds - any public space.
When: Night/Early morning of January 7
Rating: PG, PG-13 at most
Summary: Evelyn has always had the occasional nightmares, mild hallucinations, and sleepwalking problems ever since she came to the conclusion she was a reincarnated princess, but there's something to be said for locking your door when prone to somnambulism.

The Story:

She never used to dream as much as she does now, vivid and sharp. On more than one occasion before Rick's arrival Evelyn has found herself on her balcony, in the foyer of her rooms, with no memory of how she got there.

Before her death they had been wildly distracting, a reprieve from the night terrors of old but no less concerning: another person in another time, memories seeping into her mind like dark, insidious floodwaters, emotions that did not belong to her. The wrenching pain, happiness, fear of someone else.

They had rationalized it as a past life, as if the explanation itself were a rational one.

With the smoke of torches in her eyes, lotus and honey thick on her tongue, in her hair, she slips from a bed of linen and carved wood - Hathor's image, wide and loving and lush. Lamps burning oil perfumed with blossoms from the Nile's bank, hold steady light in a chamber of swirling heat. In the far distance the sem'ayt play drums and cymbals, ney-pipes accompanying a carnal beat.

Bare feet brushing carpet and chilled wood, dressed in precious little else but a nightgown and absent the source of warmth still under the sheets, Evelyn sways in place for a moment in the bedroom, seeing and not seeing in the wake of so much loss. A new year and new hurt to compartmentalise, to measure, and she feels the pull of the music that isn't there. Her fingertips trail over a sideboard; she leaves the room.

A decoration of scented fat seeps slowly through her wig, melting into the fibers and dripping down her back, following the curve of her spine. She has become less circumspect of late, alone in the wide expanse of halls. A power in her own right as designated by the gods, by Pharaoh-and-Egypt, her father dotes but knows the will of his sloe-eyed daughter, his favored child.

The pipes are louder now, as she moves to the great hall and nods to the attendants to reach for the handles of the entrance, intricate cobras to mimic the form of Wadjet.

With her chin held high, visualising nothing but alabaster and flame, Evelyn turns the knob and pushes the door

Open.

[NOTE: Feel free to literally encounter her anywhere she might get to that isn't locked, and this is including outside, although it'll be cold as a witch's tit because it's still January. She can be startled to wakefulness but will also be incredibly confused!

Please specify preferred location of interaction in tag headers.]

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Sleep is hard to come by when you're trapped somewhere with no plan of escape, imagine that. Anders is yet another person who's had trouble relaxing the last few nights; like many people, it's a difficulty he's faced before even when he hadn't had the taint coursing through his veins, inflaming his nightmares with the putrid stench of darkspawn.

A year after being brought to the Circle, Anders had still found himself kicking his bed covers around in the middle of the night, anxiety turning his legs restless and his mind a churning sea of half-dreamed fears. To think that he'd be sleeping among strangers for the foreseeable future had been a difficult adjustment. It's no different here--he's slept in spurts not so much out of desire as out of need to keep mind and body sharp--except that he's older now, better able to control his fears.

Still unused to the bed and the sounds of the mansion shifting in the quiet of the night, Anders had woken up and dressed, creeping carefully out the door with his staff fastened snugly on his back. It would be dawn soon, safe to go looking around the grounds again.

"Safe." He has to wonder if there is such a thing. What ugliness could be lurking under this pretty facade.

He's sitting on the front steps, unfocused eyes aimed somewhere at the horizon, when the front door opens behind him. At first he thinks it's an early bird getting a jump on the day, or someone else come to sweat out their sleeplessness with a walk, but the first thing he sees upon turning around is a set of delicate toes.

Bare feet? In this temperature?

Edited 2016-01-09 20:13 (UTC)

Delicate toes are attached to delicate feet, summarily attached to a small, delicate person, who under normal circumstances would not venture outside into the chill of early January without at least four layers of clothing. A light breeze blows, catches the hem of the nightgown and she should shiver, she should, but all she feels is

Heat.

It is smothering in its fury, oppressive and thick with the lamps and stagnant air, choking her nose and lungs. Across the hall she can see Anck su-Namun, poised and polite not three seats away from Seti, head bowed. She is ignoring the meal, looking to her hands as though it absolved her of being Pharoah's favoured concubine.

The heat curls itself in the pit of her stomach and she approaches

Taking a step down and wobbling uncertainly for a moment, Evelyn lifts her chin and looks ahead. Another step. Another. Two more and frost gives way to snow, several inches thick under her and soft.

Struck by surprise, Anders' gaze follows the legs up to the serene, sleep-glazed face of a woman. Luckily, from this angle he can't see up her sleeping gown, but the gossamer-thin layer of clothing standing between her and the open air is more than enough to steal his attention. Of all the things to walk out that door, he hadn't thought an under-dressed woman would be one of them. An eyebrow lifts.

"Uh, are you...?"

All right? Before he can get the words of concern out, the dark-haired woman starts forward, trance-like. Seeing she's not about to stop before she hits the chilled cold stone, Anders leaps up after her, height giving him the advantage of being able to reach the bottom of the steps in two strides.

"Hey, lady, not to interrupt, but--"

The glazed look in her eyes tells him she's not hearing him, but she's about to have some very cold feet if she goes any further. He whistles a low note to try and get her attention, stepping out ahead of her with arm extended like a guard rail to guide her back around to the open sidewalk. A sleepwalker? If so, grabbing her arm and jarring her awake might startle her too badly to be worth the effort.

She is not all right.

The priest of Osiris, the god for whom the festivities are held, stands quietly next to Seti and rarely - so rarely - glances askance, down the row to the concubine with the painted flesh. In this attire she is not permitted to touch herself, a gift of Egypt-on-earth for Pharaoh to consume and rightly so.

Her birthright is one of sweat and dirt, a long-limbed girl from the fields with no claim to a lavish life. She is not made of Re.

Evelyn pauses, transfixed by something in the distance as the soles of her feet grow cold beneath her. Listlessly her arms hang at her sides and her brow furrows, suddenly hurt pricking angry tears at the edges of her eyes.

The priest and the concubine look at each other too often. Seti does not know.

"...tiyu."

Whoever this woman with the unfortunate night-time habits is, she seems to be deep in it. Are her eyes getting wet or is that just a trick of the light filtering from the windows behind them...? Either way, from the look on her face whatever she's seeing in whatever form she's seeing it in isn't doing much to warm her heart. (Or her feet.) Those are a lot of unknowns for Anders to try and puzzle out all that once. Perhaps he should be thanking her for shaking off the last of his tiredness because he's definitely wide-awake now that he has someone ready to charge barefoot into a snowbank.

It could be worse--she could be the violent type of person in a trance, pulling hair and spitting like a superstitious old crone at a passing hedge mage.

"Bless you?" he returns, tilting his head. With care, he brings his arm around and touches her elbow to steer her off the snowy grass with gentle force. "Easy there, my dear little Fade-walker. How about you and I head this way? Come, come, you're all right. We'll get you inside, yes?"

A quick fire spell warms the air in a bubble around them. At least that will take the bite out of the cold until he can get her inside again.

Shepsenut comes to her with a bright smile, a friend in a sea of drunkenness, and Nefertiri is grateful. The maidservant tends her often and notices her displeasure now, slipping one arm around her waist, another taking her wrist - fingertips slide over the oil on her back and she is mollified, permitting the genteel gesture.

"Come, I have figs and dates for you," Shepsenut urges, eager to pull her thoughts away from candour. Nefertiri acquiesces.

Evelyn does not startle at his touch, oddly persuaded by the nudge and taking its lead, swaying gently as her feet adjust to this new path. There are words and she only partially hears them, muffled with the music of the court and revolting chatter of courtiers. She hums in something resembling agreement, eyelids slipping to half mast while the temperature around them rises.

"Ana miš fahma," she murmurs quietly, leaning against the source of heat.

Keeping to her side, he leads them back toward the stairs like two people coming back from a perfectly average stroll through the garden. She seems content enough for someone who appears to have wandered out of her warm bed to live out her Fade dreams; just her luck that someone had been in the vicinity to turn her back around.

"Ah, and you speak in tongues. That's charming. I can't understand a word of what you're saying, but I love a woman with an accent," he says with unruffled humor as she leans into him as though he's a human shield from the cold. "If you weren't sure how to feel about apostates before tonight, I hope you'll come to see we're not all terrible blood mages with warts in unattractive places when you wake up. Some of us aren't so bad."

Yes, just a normal walk and a conversation between two people where neither party can understand the other. Perfectly average.

Once they get to the steps, the hand under her arm becomes a steadying brace. "Now comes the fun part. You made it down them all right. Can you do the same going up?"

Edited 2016-01-10 21:31 (UTC)

Mumbling her assent and utterly incapable of comprehending the words that the friendly, fur-clad man is saying Evelyn does precisely as he assumes: unconsciously staves off the chill with a new locus of warmth. What language escapes her now is old, very old and beyond his ken but not hers, spoken in vague recognition for her physical surroundings in spite of the fact that she sees something that differs.

Perfectly average.

The linen parts and Shepsenut pulls her through, a quieter room with a breeze that curls in from the outside, air that moves and breathes as she does. The revelry is not her own and she cannot abide it for long; the Porch of Drinking is stuffed with people, men and women basking in the new harvest, the rising of the river's many waters.

Dark earth, rich for agriculture, wheat, barley. Dark earth as black as the night sky, and Nut's embrace.

"Ana bekhair, shukran," she says with little defiance, finally a lucid acknowledgement to his query. With guidance Evelyn lifts one foot to the step, staring straight ahead before ascending with his assistance.

Edited 2016-01-10 22:39 (UTC)

Much to his relief, his readiness to stabilize her should she lose her footing isn't required; she starts up the ascent with an eerie poise for one so obviously not in their right state of mind. Makes him wonder what she's like when she is. For all he knows, she could be a noblewoman sitting pretty on a family inheritance and a small army of servants to help her in and out of carriages.

Of course, no servant could be as dashing as a apprentice having run from his tower and joined up with the Grey Wardens, but who's counting?

Anders follows patiently just slightly behind her while she uses the help of his hand to find her way. "You're welcome. At least I'm going to assume that was a 'thank you, my handsome rescuer'. I'll pretend it was." The spell still encases them in a pocket of warmth so that when he reaches for the door handle the touch of cold metal isn't quite as severe. "Not to worry, I'll get the door."

On the list of weird things he's seen in the last month, a sleepwalker doesn't even rate, but he'd feel a lot better once he got her inside and settled back... wherever she'd come from. With luck, perhaps someone's noticed her gone and knows which room she calls home in these seemingly never-ending halls.

Edited 2016-01-11 04:02 (UTC)

When another door splits before her, gentle fingers curling around her elbow to lead her through, Nefertiri is not surprised.

Shepsenut is her most trusted and has earned the right to touch. The favored daughter of Pharaoh is her own, constructed of the god's flesh and entitled to physicality when she pleases. Unlike her siblings, brood of her father's other wives, she is required by no edict to wed cousins or brothers, the arrangements for them have been made and she may bask in unadulterated freedom.

Evelyn steps past the threshold and back into the warmth of the foyer, her original path interrupted but harbouring no ill will toward the perpetrator. Consciousness creeps back in slowly around the edges, a sudden awareness of temperature and the thin slip she wears sending a shiver through her.

The breeze returns. Her skin prickles.

Closing the door behind them, he looks around. It's still early, and it's just them and the flickering candlelight in the entrance hall. "Now what am I going to do with you?"

If he were still in the Circle and had found one of the apprentices wandering around like this (which had been known to happen from time to time), ideally he'd simply walk them back to bed and let them sleep it off without them being the wiser. And maybe tease them a little on their nightly adventures the morning after. He can't exactly do that here--this isn't the Circle Tower where he knows every face, every room, every nook and cranny. He's an unwilling guest in someone else's domain again, but he lacks the same years of familiarity.

Take her somewhere a little more private? Wake her up? Those seem his best options unless he wants to wait for her to settle down on her own--and who knows how long that could take.

"What do you think?" he asks the sleeping woman beside him. Nodding down the hall, he says, "Shall I get a fire going and we snap you out of it before you walk into the fountain or off a balcony?"

Edited 2016-01-13 06:15 (UTC)

What Evelyn thinks isn't entirely up for civil discourse at the current juncture - not when she's perfectly content being partly-guided, partly-led through a foyer she knows very well by a person she does not know at all. Perhaps, were she conscious, she might agree that a fire does indeed sound like a pleasant and diverting activity and one which she would like to witness firsthand, seeing as her clothing is ill-suited for the weather.

(She would also agree that being awake might behoove her, but she can't exactly nod her assent either.)

Humming quietly, not so much incapable of forming words as she is incapable of processing what he is saying, Evelyn is sadly in the position of relying upon her good Samaritan for safe passage into a warm space, and her head lolls onto his shoulder in response.

Having poked his nose into the rooms on the first floor pays off now that he's in need of a less exposed venue to take his half-clothed companion. Put that way, one might think there's some fully-unclothed fun in his future. Sadly, between the sleep-wandering and the wedding band on her finger, Anders doubts his chances.

"Ahhh, it's been a while since I had a pretty girl on my arm," he still muses remorsefully. "When you're not busy counting druffalo, you'll have to let me know if you have a sister who's single."

But as enjoyable as this one-sided conversation's been, it can't last forever. Anders steers them toward the tea room where he can settle her down by the fireplace and retrieve a blanket to drape over her to protect her modesty. A flick of his wrist sets a cheerful fire blazing.

"Now let's see..."

Evelyn would happily inform Anders that while she doesn't have a sister, she has a degenerate brother with a gambling problem and an overworked liver (if that's his sort of thing), but at the current juncture her priorities are 'unconsciously making her way into whatever room Anders leads her.'

The tea parlour is warm and so is the localised bubble around her, which dissipates slowly as a swathe of fabric takes its place. When he begins his work, it feels like a vague tugging at the back of her mind, too distant to touch on her own in a state hovering between lucidity and forgetfulness. With a Night Mare the size of the great Sphinx sitting on her chest it feels a bit like gasping for air without anything to breathe: trying to inhale underwater, or through fabric.

Evelyn's fingers, resting on the ottoman upon which she sits, twitch anxiously while her eyes dart beneath closed lids. He pries gently and a hand takes Nefertiri's, Shepsenut again and they leave this great room, away from the scent of perfumed oils and melting fat, honey and meat, the cymbals still ringing in her ears as-

She gasps sharply and sits ramrod straight, looking about in wide-eyed shock with all the surprise one might anticipate from a woman who expected to awake in her own bed. Warily, and with no small amount of concern her gaze trails to the man not far from her, whose garb reminds her of medieval tapestries.

"...who are you?"

Ever since taking the darkspawn taint into his body and finding out for himself the kinds of skin-crawling nightmares Wardens endure as their unguarded, sleeping minds lay vulnerable, he has a new appreciate for how disconcerting it can be waking up with dreams grasping at him like slimy lengths of seaweed. Those few panic-stricken moments of not knowing where he is or who is aren't ones he relishes.

For that reason, the mage scoots back a ways when he feels his light brush of magic start to wake her, sitting back on his heels. When she snaps out of it, the first thing she sees won't be a long-limbed mage looming over her. Although he'd like to think his face isn't the worst a woman could wake up to, it's probably not the one a married woman wants to see.

Anders, still in his crouched position once her gaze settles on him, offers a humored smile. "I think the better question is, who are you? I'm Anders. You strolled past me on your way into the gardens for a walk. A sleepwalk."

And frostbitten limbs are a pain in the neck to heal properly, he can attest.

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