ataraxionlogs | ( open ) i am not made of porcelain pleasantries; you will find that these things are my armor

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( open ) i am not made of porcelain pleasantries; you will find that these things are my armor

CHARACTERS: Severus Snape, Princess Nuala, and you.
LOCATION: The Oxygen Gardens; the flets.
WARNINGS: Updates if necessary.
SUMMARY: Nuala has arranged for Severus to ward the women's flet against certain Dark Lords. Magic ensues.
NOTES: If you have no reason to get at the flet itself, feel free to find Nuala working on her sewing at the bottom of the tree; she will probably be down there to head Nuada off at the pass if he gets the wrong idea about a human male in the ladies' household.

The request is made in person, rather than through the network; she doesn't entirely trust it, particularly as something she's so unfamiliar with, and when the matter is one of safety...she had rather be prudent, all told. More than that, she'd rather be able to tell Nuada that she was so prudent, when (if) he takes issue with her actions.

Specifically, inviting Severus Snape to apply his warding prowess to the flet in which the ladies of their small community live. They've heard little stir of Morgoth or his ilk, but the weight of years and fear in her own brother's eyes haunts her and while she mightn't presume upon how he goes about protecting his king - would Thranduil tolerate such protection?she doesn't know, but she has a suspicion that Nuada might not like it terribly much - she doesn't see any harm in drawing on her own resources to look after those women she shares her new home with. Galadriel, Tauriel, Luthien-- Elizabeth, who is most breakable among them, and whose mortality she is acutely aware of. They weren't so far from mortals, then. She's not so unaware of the girl she's taken charge of.

Sitting in the grass with her ever-present sewing in her lap, at the bottom of the tree while they plot out ideas, she makes a face suddenly-- "Perhaps it wouldn't be entirely unwise to include some protection against fire."

Her brother, the diplomat.

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Severus is sitting quietly, unused to things like social sewing circles; he drifts in and out (mostly out) if the other women are around, not wanting to interrupt and not knowing what to say or do otherwise. He's happy to do this - so to speak, it's not as if he ever actually seems happy - and it's interesting work, so he doesn't mind. (He minds the potential for her brother to send a spear through his chest at thirty yards, but hey, occupational hazards happen everywhere.)

"That one's simple enough." About fire. He's got his notebook, the one that came with him when he arrived, and has been taking down notes in slanted writing that's half-word half-runes, the results probably indecipherable. "The trick is going to be making it so that you know when your wards have been violated." And not just him, which only distantly helpful and not the point.

The kind of warding that Nuala wants would take time even at home where his magic is unhindered - here, working within limitations and with the requirement of weaving it into the princess's own awareness, it's going to take even more time. So as this isn't a project where he gets to walk around the flet in a circle, say a few magic words and then leave, Severus is going to be around for a little while. He makes every effort not to be working when anyone is actually in the dwelling, and even when he visits Nuala to check something or to work on fabric, he's as unobtrusive as possible. Though part of him is definitely intimidated by elves, his attempt at invisibility is more courtesy than fear.

Sometimes he's inside, sitting on the floor near the walls and etching invisible instructions into the wooden seams, sometimes he's outside down below-- once he's on the roof, which is necessary for a while and something he hopes he's not going to ever have to do again, after. (You goddamn acrobatic tree dwellers, what the eff.) If someone returns home he'll leave, mannerisms ever-distant, but he's not going to bite anyone's head off if they approach him.

It's not the sort of thing that one can do without catching Galadriel's attention- and her interest. She doesn't have all day to sit about and watch him work, of course, but she does seem to linger a little longer than necessary whenever she drops back by. Eventually, though, when she's finished with all her errands for the day, she returns to the flet for the day, settling herself in a common area.

When Severus moves toward the door in response (predictably, at this point), she calls after him.

"You needn't leave, you know. You have me rather intrigued, in fact."

Conveniently (...or not), it's Galadriel that's got Severus the most potentially unnerved. What intimidates him about elves is what intimidates him about Dumbledore - just on some serious magical steroids. The perceived ability to see right through him. And what is there to see? Not even Severus is completely sure, some days.

But he stops. He knows who she is and she knows who he is, so he doesn't bother deflecting her opener about intrigue with an attempt at introductions. Or anything else. Severus watches her from near the door, quiet, and waits for some indication about what he should say. Why? is implicit in the absence of other words.

She gives him a curious look for a moment before saying anything more, as though what he should say should be perfectly obvious. And, to her, it is- he should say whatever he wishes to say; it is not as though she is looking for a particular answer.

"I have long kept company with the wizards of Arda, but they seem to bear little resemblance to wizards elsewhere."

He doesn't actually want to say anything, is the issue here. Not until she speaks, anyway, and even then he makes a concentrated decision instead of flowing into it naturally.

"The only consistency of magic is that it is indefinable," he says, voice low. Severus is used to people listening to him and paying close attention, even if he doesn't consciously expect it. "I'm unsurprised that different worlds have different wizards and witches."

A light smile crosses her face and her head tilts lightly to the side. "How, then, are we to say what is 'magic' and what is not?"

If he is used to people listening closely, she demands it. Her voice is soft, but somehow commanding all the same- the sort of voice that carries even when not raised.

"Even in my own world, there is little agreement on the definition. I have been called a witch myself, though I would not consider myself one."

He listens. Severus has great respect for Galadriel, and beings like her - but his respect does not extend to encompass affection, or trust, or ease. Of all the representatives of his world that are and have ever been aboard, Severus is the least likely to be demonstrative, the least likely to form alliances or make friends, the least likely to involve others in any part of himself. Even with Nuala, he caters to her in a way that only mimics revelation. He doesn't think she minds.

He thinks Galadriel might mind. He also thinks everything she just said sounds extremely rhetorical. Severus watches her for a little while longer in silence, and wonders if she can tell there's a dead curse embedded in his skin and bones (and heart).

"I was recently called a witch," he deadpans. "It was meant as an insult."

He does not bother explaining a.) that he wasn't insulted by it or b.) why in either case. It's self-evident that witch is thrown at women as a slur while sorcerer is tacked on to men out of fear or respect, and that the label being affixed to him was the pinnacle of maturity.

"Words are mortal constructs."

Magic cannot be defined by them.

[ He tires of talking with the passengers, especially when the mentioning of crew sounds insanely close to servant in his estimation and they seem to expect him to grovel and gush over basic needs being provided for or the chance to 'do something' and take the farcical idea of seniority amongst other passengers seriously. No, he steps away from their delusions, for the time being. Elected from nothing, raised from dust, not even dirt, no one bar a handful on this floating trash-can has his respect. Nuada's magic is tethered hatefully on this ship, what little power remains is covetously and jealously guarded, meted out only when he is at his strongest.

Or his most embittered, such as now.

The Glamour is a simple thing, given he doesn't really change shape; it's the perception of the world around him which alters enough to give form to a giant black wolfhound, six-feet tall with the same narrowed golden eyes, treading the gardens like the spectre of Black Shuck himself. Quite honestly, he feels like his life would be better spent ripping out throats. He has gathered an elongated list of Arrogant Expendables, as of late, and it ought to be trimmed, but there's little enough effort that goes into avoiding their inane approximation of wit and saving himself the bother; the Aes Sidhe version of throwing on a bathrobe and pretending to be a wizard. A trick, but a useful one.

Unlike the spell which removed the lips and teeth of a guard, prior to his incarceration on the ship. Something on that scale, he's saving up for the right ~~person~~ moment.

Large paws the size of a man's face tread silently through the foliage which parts around his shoulders as he follows Nuala's scent to a glade. Sitting primly beside her, tail curled around his feet, he watches her sew as his ears tick around, following the nuances of noises here and there. ]

[ Well, maybe it'll make Nuada feel better to scare the absolute shit out of somebody.

Severus can't work on warding all the time or his brain will figuratively melt out of his ears (normal exertion and being aggravated at the ship's meddling playing equal parts), and after several hours at it, he takes a break. It's nothing noteworthy; he vanishes (literally) from the gardens, gets something to eat, checks his messages, then heads back down - he walks from the garden entrance to the flets instead of Apparating, and it's mostly out of respect instead of anything as practical as stretching his legs.

At first, he's not sure what he's looking at. There's a half-second that seems to be suspended in time during which his brain tries to find a way to reconcile the sight of Nuala sitting peacefully besides a massive wolf and a massive wolf. His subconscious checks off that she's fine and, utterly unhelpfully, lets his kneejerk reaction of complete terror take over. Suddenly he's sixteen in an underground hallway and a shadow is about to devour him and-- Severus takes a step backwards, not realizing he'd stopped walking. His foot hits a rock and for the second bloody time he finds himself toppled over in an embarrassing display of tragic human graces in front of elven royalty. At least he's a little further away this time? Merlin. ]

( it doesn't-- nuala doesn't understand, at first. or, in fact, as it's happening and indeed afterwards, but there is a moment where she leans forward, puzzled, and then a moment later he's on his back and could be hurt and she's moving, fists hitching her skirts clear off the grass to hurry over without entirely thinking it through.

she has, by the time she reaches him (it doesn't take long), been able to put the obvious together enough to realize that he is extremely unlikely to have had such a bad reaction to her needlepoint. )

Please, Nuada, for me?

( --the slightly harried request that he throw off the glamour probably doesn't need to be fully stated to be clear, in context. )

Have you hurt yourself? I wish you'd sit up, let me look--

( ... fussing. )

[ He watches the boy draw near, then skitter like a rabbit. A growl threatens from the back of a wolfish throat, but then at Nuala's request the Glamour dissipates like a black fog, leaving Nuada seated on the grass with an arm draped over a bent knee. ]

Leave him be, he is no babe to be coddled.

I'm not hurt, just stupid. [ - is gritted out in a remarkably un-Severus-like way, more embarrassed that Nuala's rushed over to him than he is over tripping in the first place. He sits up under his own power though he isn't so rude as to brush the princess away (mindless of her bare hands on his). ]

Sorry.

[ It sounds even more flat and deeply uncool out loud than it did in his head, where it already sounded pretty lame. (Oh god his subconscious is being taken over by the 80s slang of his students, kill it with fire.)

Of course it was a glamour, he can see the seam of it in his mind's eye now in retrospect. Had he not startled he'd have seen it in realtime. Good going, professor of magic. He reminds himself of every iron moment stood before Greyback, unflinching and cold.

It doesn't really help. He's still sitting on the grass next to a fairy princess who's worried he might have sprained his damn ankle. ]

( without so much as glancing back at her brother-- ) He is a friend, Nuada, I know you to be at least passing familiar with the concept.

( they're an affectionate pair, these two. usually she just pushes his head in the dirt, but that would require taking her attention away from the peculiar nothing that is all she finds within severus when he fails to divest himself of her fussing.

she wants to ask. this is not, however, the moment to do so-- that isn't a conversation she wishes to have with her brother as its audience. he's difficult enough about the company she keeps without deciding that the limitations of her gifts here justify reopening negotiations on how and where she spends her time, so it will keep. but her head tilts, and her expression is more measuring than it was before. )

You needn't apologise; my brother is a nuisance, and he surely won't.

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( open ) i am not made of porcelain pleasantries; you will find that these things are my armor

nuala.

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