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 Posted: Wed Aug 27, 2008 11:06 am
Rojiza pauses in her writing. She looks up and around the wagon. The air has turned strange to her. She glances over at her mother, who gives no indication she detects anything amiss. She thinks she can hear the tinkling of bells in the distance. She goes to the door and looks outside. Her Banya are silent--no squawks of pleasure to see her, even."What is it, love?" asks Caroline as her daughter looks around the wagon, and goes outside. "Is somethin' wrong?" She glances at Solas to make sure he's safe. He's sleeping right peacefully in his little basket adorned with pink ribbon. She shakes her head at Rojiza. "Calm down, m'lass. We'll be back in the forest b'fore ye know it. Now shut the door, everything's fine."Rojiza shakes her head. Everything is not fine. Magic is at work here, she just knows it. Just as she goes to close the wagon door, a bright light swoops in from outside. Swirls of sparkling brightness fill the wagon; the force of it closing the door anyway. Rojiza gasps in awe. She recognizes this force: it's the Meij. Some transformation would take place right now, in their wagon. She watches as the light condenses down around Solas, surrounding him and obscuring him from the women's vision. After a few long moments, the light explodes outward, but only gently as it ruffles Rojiza's hair and clothing. And when they look, Solas the pink flamingo is gone, but in its place...a rather pink boy."My word..." murmurs Caroline when the magic fades. "Ye'd think I'd be used to this by now...but nay. The beauty of the Meij strikes me by surprise every time." She smiles over at Rojiza. Her daughter is wonderfully gifted, even if she doesn't know it.Rojiza stares at her brother. She can now really call him brother, as he's no longer a bird. Aren't babies supposed to be fat? He's thin. Thin enough that his pants are hanging off his body. Couldn't the all-powerful Meij give him clothes that fit? But she supposes he's cute, in a baby kind of way. Maybe he'd be quieter now.Solas looks up at the two big-persons looking down at him. He knows them instantly for family, and he laughs and claps his hands. Bumblingly he stands up and toddles over to the one on the soft thing. "MAAma!" he squeals, and giggles, holding tiny hands up to her.
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Posted: Fri Aug 29, 2008 3:56 pm
"Well!" declares Caroline a few days after Solas' transformation. "I've been inside this wagon for far too long. We've been camped here a spell, it's time to go outside!" She gathers Solas up and goes outside, Ro trailing her with her two new Banya chicks. Caroline's taken the bird news better than expected, and has let Ro keep them. She's so proud of how mature her daughter is getting, and the wheels are turning in Caroline's mind about finding or building Rojiza a wagon of her own. After all, she'll be a woman soon, and a proper woman needs a her own wagon. And the space to keep all those bloody birds.
Caroline sits on the grass outside the wagon steps and sets Solas in her lap.
Rojiza sits near her mother, letting Anjou and Daliea squabble in her lap. She smiles at them and giggles at their behavior.
Solas leans forward, fascinated with the blades of grass, and starts plucking them from the ground. He holds a handful up to his face and then shoves them into his mouth, chewing for a moment before spitting them out and wailing. He scrapes his tongue with a pudgy hand and looks up appealingly to Mother Person.
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Posted: Fri Sep 12, 2008 9:03 pm
Taniel the Banya master has disappeared.
He hasn't been in his wagon for several days. The third day I went to check on the Banya, Taniel's own bird, Vahe, broke through the very window! He has yet to leave my side since then. I think he was lonely, the poor creature. Still, I'm doing my best not to get attached, because when Taniel comes back he'll undoubtedly want Vahe back again.
Where could he have gone?
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Posted: Wed Nov 19, 2008 1:50 pm
 Taog had been listening for the wind for quiet some time. The bird was eager to be the first to catch a phrase and speak it, hoping to gain further favor from it's masters... this wind was a strong one, and the message was easy a clear.
Once a boy was saved,
by traveling into the north,
perhaps another can be saved,
by traveling into the north.
Finnean shifted into the wind and spoke the meij fortune almost as soon as the words hit the bird's mind. Eager to outshine Taog, the bird's word fell into the first fortune.
The darkness can hear you,
even though you say nothing,
the only way to stop it,
is to call it by it's name.
Aurelia waited patiently as the wind surrounded them all and twisted it's way through the wagon. As the other birds finished speaking their fortunes, this one wound it's way out of her mouth.
If you say nothing...
The gypsy mother is dead.
If you say something,
you may yet save a friend.
Iagan twisted it's head back and forth trying to catch a sentance not spoken, but the other birds were speaking aloud and making it difficult to hear, even something as intangible as a meij wind... but Iagan did hear something.
As the wind blows north,
so does the fortune.
With a deep breath and a desire to impress, Anjou puffed out it's chest and spoke as loudly as it could.
As you were told,
nothing comes of nothing,
But I have news for you...
you were told wrong,
and the nothing,
it coming.
Daliea flapped around the room in something akin to panic. everything was happening so fast, all the other birds were speaking, and there seemed almost nothing left in the Meij song that remained unspoken... all but one phrase lingered.
Be careful what you say...
it can hear you.
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Posted: Mon Nov 24, 2008 8:25 am
Rojiza's mind reels from all of the prophecy thrown her way. The pessimistic nature of all of it makes her feel....a little betrayed. She knows that her precious friends are subject to the important bits of magic they catch, but still. She takes such good care of them, and loves them so much....and they all spout off doom-and-gloom prophecy.
Ro sighs and writes down what she can remember in her journal. Which is a good deal of it since all the birds' warnings had burned themselves into her brain in one continuous phrase.
Solas stops playing when the birds begin to speak. "Sharp softees?" he asks inquiringly, only to be shushed by his mother. He gets up and wanders over to Iagan's perch, watching him curiously. When they're all done speaking, he looks back to Caroline. "Sharp softees go talky?" He'd gotten the name for them when he'd tried to pet Aurelia and she had bit him. He's still fascinated by their bright colors and the feathers they drop. He has a whole little sack full of discarded, multi-colored Banya feathers. "Talky talky talky!" yells Solas, trying to make the sad mood go away.
Caroline picks up Solas. "My," she breathes. "That was...quite a bundle of Meij, wasn't it?" Her heart breaks a little for her daughter, whose shock is splashed across her silent face. "They still love you, Rojiza," Caroline assures her. "They're only prophets. They've brought ye the bad news so ye can do somethin' about it, ken?" She shifts Solas to her hip and goes over to kiss Ro's head. "No te preocupes, quierida. We'll make right by it."
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Posted: Mon Apr 20, 2009 1:18 pm
A very pretty bottle of wine appeared on our step this morning. No note, no sign of who left it. At least, I think it's wine. I've never seen wine this color before. Perhaps it's made of peaches or apricots. Still, I'm nervous to try it, especially since there was no note or tag.
The other odd thing is that when I uncork it, I hear music. At first I thought it was coming from another wagon, it being so faint, but it went away as soon as I corked it again. Whenever I listen for it it's a different tune. Sometimes a pipe, sometimes a voice, sometimes a whistle. Never the same. If this is magic, then I won't be drinking it anytime soon. Perhaps I should take it to Valelldia and ask about it.
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Posted: Wed Apr 29, 2009 8:33 am
Menelie Caroline frowns at the swirling, orange-gold liquid in the bottle. The singing bottle. She decides to ask Valelldia about it. Approaching the gypsy-mother, Caroline gives a small cough to alert her to her presence. "Hallo, Valelldia. I was wonderin' if ye could tell me about this bottle, here. It rather...appeared for no reason on me wagon step this mornin', no tag, no sign o' who left it. It looks an' smells like wine, but when I uncork it it makes music." She uncorks the bottle to show Val.
"Now, if I'm jus' crazy and it's only wine, I'd like to know, so's I can drink it." She grins. Valelldia Valelldia looked at the bottle as if she'd never seen it before. With a smile and a questioning reach, she gently took the bottle from the other gypsy's hands and brought it up to look inside of it. "Well, it is quite interesting after all." She uncorked it and listened to the soft tune, simple and almost haunting... it was the kind of tune that you could get stuck in your head for weeks. "It's pretty." She grinned at Caroline. "It is in a wine bottle, but I'm not sure that it's wine..." she put the cork back in it and gently rocked the bottle back and forth. "It may be a potion that's centered around wine..." She shook the bottle a little more heavily and watched the liquid dance and leap around the glass. When she uncorked it the tune was still the same only a little jauntier. "I wonder... " corking the bottle again she then shook it wildly until the liquid swirled and splashed around in the container. When she uncorked it again it was still playing a tune, but it was hacked and skipped around unpleasantly, as if it were being played by a novice. "Well." She said with a smile as she handed the bottle back to Caroline. "It doesn't seem to have any ill intent about it, since it doens't seem to work if you abuse it. I can't quite say what would happen, though I imagine it might make a person who wasn't musically inclined, much more acceptable in a tavern after a drink... It may even make a person more vocal and more likely to talk to you if you needed information..." She almost shrugged. "I would hazard to say that while you can probably drink it, it might be more useful to you if you used it on others." Menelie "Aye, so's a potion, then," says Caroline, reclaiming the bottle, cradling it gently. "A singing potion that makes folk talkative. Well, clearly I've no need for it for meself. It's gettin' me to stop talking that's the trick!" She looks down at the liquid. "But who woulda left it? An' why?" Valelldia Val smiled at her. She didn't lie. "I left it. I figured that if there were anyone who could have use of a singing potion it would be you or Ro." She turned and patted a horse on the neck, picking a twig out of it's mane. "I came across two of these potions, the other was much the same, only with severe differences. I put that one in a place where it might be useful as well." Menelie "Aye, then thank ye. And thank ye for tellin' me about it. I'll be keepin' it in a safe place. Good-bye!" She smiles and nods to Val before wandering back to her own wagon to put the wine bottle away.
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Posted: Sun Nov 01, 2009 9:45 am
Sometime during the night, the light in your jack-o-lantern goes out, and inside the pumpkin is left 20 couplets and a delicious caramel apple.
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Posted: Thu Dec 30, 2010 1:09 am
A few days after Anezka's beautiful transformation, the Meij once again disrupts Valelldia's trance. She opens her golden eyes and follows its lead. This time it leads her to Mountain Air. It's abnormally silent--usually this wagon is filled with squawks and music and a child screeching about one thing or another. She knocks softly on the door.
Caroline opens the door, wearing a nightgown and holding a book. She yawns. "Val! Didn't expect to see ye this time o' night," she says. "What can I help ye with?"
Val herself doesn't know, precisely, but she does her best not to let it show. She glances around for an answer, and finds it--her eyes settle on the gold-orange bottle of 'singing wine,' as Caroline had called it. "Good evening, Caroline. I hope I'm not disturbing you. I was wondering if I might borrow that bottle of wine. I'll return it tomorrow." She hoped she was right.
Caroline blinks, obviously not expecting that answer. "O' course!" She agrees readily. "You gave it t'me after all," she says. She retrieves it from its basket, nestled among blankets so it wouldn't break. "What d'ye need it for?" she asks, curious.
"I'm sure I'll find someone who needs some singing wine," says Val, amused. "Thank you," she says with a little bow. "Goodnight, Caroline."
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