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lesmodsalouette) wrote2025-03-16 03:54 am
lesmodsalouette) wrote2025-03-16 03:54 am
Graveyard
Graveyard
The garden is still sprawling and green – despite having entirely lost all its riotous flowers and colors, along with any sign of wildlife or birdsong – though one thing stands out more than anything else: from Monday to Thursday, you can’t see the castle anymore. All that remains where it once stood (or perhaps, usually stands) is an incongruously large tree that towers over everything else and somehow looks larger and more imposing than the castle ever did. The tree’s branches are bare, without any hint of life nor leaf – however, on the weekends (that is to say, Friday through Sunday) a faint projection of the castle appears around it, cradling the only things that the denizens of this alternate garden can see in detail from the other side: the flurry of activity around the investigation, the circus-like dimension that holds the trial, and the mirrors and the grassy dimension that display the execution.
For those curious what the land of the living are up to, a mirage-like and upside-down reflection of the castle garden in its original arrangement can be spotted occasionally overlaying the sky. This strange illusion may sometimes show those in the garden on the other side, flitting in and out of view like stray clouds; but much like the weather, their appearance is mercurial – they cannot be reached and cannot be heard.
Water, Flower, Everywhere
The fountains remain active somehow, though their features seem to have eroded, obscuring the identities of the deities and the wings of the birds, cracking pottery down into nothing but worn shards and handles. At night, only maybe half the lights work (and here they are real candlelight, rather than magical), plunging most of the garden into crepuscular darkness. The trellis walkway looks quite overgrown (mysteriously, bamboo is taking over), entirely covering some statues and other features along its length, and it’s no longer walkable – a miniature canal runs the whole length underneath the arches, feeding into other new waterways around the garden that cut off footpaths seemingly at random. There are small footbridges here and there, but the lack of logic to the whole arrangement makes falling into one of the streams or canals a real hazard.
The waterways do all manage to converge at the pond by the pavilion – neither of which are all that soothing or classical anymore. The pond is only half-full, and entirely lacks water lilies or any dragonflies; its banks sit jagged above the dark waters, and perhaps that’s why the pavilion, too, is half collapsed down into it all. Gone are the curtains and ivies; only dead curling vines and half-collapsed columns are left, but there’s still someplace to sit if you put your mind to it.
Most of the flowerbeds sit fallow or overtaken by weeds – there’s signs here and there that someone might have tried to clear them out, but the bulk of the effort seems to have gone to the orchard by the gardener’s cottage. It might be more accurate to say cottages, given that there are a few of them dotted around that area for some reason. None of them are locked, but all of them have only minimal furnishings apart from the original; they’re also all provided with the full complement of gardener’s tools. Next to them, there are new saplings and half-grown flowering trees: some pear and apple, but also some not. There are new shoots in the kitchen orchard that have just barely taken root, the dirt recently turned.
The waterways do all manage to converge at the pond by the pavilion – neither of which are all that soothing or classical anymore. The pond is only half-full, and entirely lacks water lilies or any dragonflies; its banks sit jagged above the dark waters, and perhaps that’s why the pavilion, too, is half collapsed down into it all. Gone are the curtains and ivies; only dead curling vines and half-collapsed columns are left, but there’s still someplace to sit if you put your mind to it.
Most of the flowerbeds sit fallow or overtaken by weeds – there’s signs here and there that someone might have tried to clear them out, but the bulk of the effort seems to have gone to the orchard by the gardener’s cottage. It might be more accurate to say cottages, given that there are a few of them dotted around that area for some reason. None of them are locked, but all of them have only minimal furnishings apart from the original; they’re also all provided with the full complement of gardener’s tools. Next to them, there are new saplings and half-grown flowering trees: some pear and apple, but also some not. There are new shoots in the kitchen orchard that have just barely taken root, the dirt recently turned.
Hedge Maze(?)
The other most eye-catching feature is what once was an ornamental hedge maze: instead of being a tame height here, it has seemingly grown wild and completely unchecked, towering above the rest of the garden almost like its own overgrown mountain. The hedge walls go up and up and up, making it entirely impossible to see the center or even how far it goes despite the fact that sections of the hedges have also died, reduced to the branches underneath, bristling with interlocked thorns.
Part of it had even spilled over into the garden itself, huge gnarled branches spreading out like burnt-blackened fingers all the way to the edge of the pond – wherever the branches touch, even the greenery is withered, and any statues look more ruined than those in the rest of the area. As of the end of Week 3, however, the branches have retracted entirely and the way into the hedge maze has opened even more. However, there is now a storm brewing over what might be the center or the general area of it. Getting close to the hedge maze or any of the hedge(?) branches is... unpleasant, though it doesn’t usually go beyond a buzz of wrongness and a slight headache.
Part of it had even spilled over into the garden itself, huge gnarled branches spreading out like burnt-blackened fingers all the way to the edge of the pond – wherever the branches touch, even the greenery is withered, and any statues look more ruined than those in the rest of the area. As of the end of Week 3, however, the branches have retracted entirely and the way into the hedge maze has opened even more. However, there is now a storm brewing over what might be the center or the general area of it. Getting close to the hedge maze or any of the hedge(?) branches is... unpleasant, though it doesn’t usually go beyond a buzz of wrongness and a slight headache.
no subject
Love's...if you put everything into somebody, what happens if things change? I never really believed in soulmate bullshit or fairy tale romance. Not even magic being real changed that.
So he's not my true love, but...we had something good for a while, you know? Fuck, I begged my dad not to make Tom the fall guy for the stupid cruise scandal. Why the hell would I do that?
no subject
[ That's a fact. Regardless of Siffrin's own feelings on "change". Soulmates are silly, but-- they don't... really mind the idea, of the Universe granting them a boon. It owes them anyway. For all the bad. ]
I think it's nice. That you have someone who'd like to see you smile, and you'd like to protect them in turn.
no subject
I don't know if we'll ever go back to that.
Did I ever tell you what my wish would have been, if I'd taken out Ayaka?
no subject
What was it?
cw familial death
He wouldn't have known to do that if Tom hadn't ratted us out.
[Shiv breathes a humorless laugh.] Then Dad starts giving him the numbers of all the best divorce lawyers in New York. First you fuck me to get an in with my dad, then you throw salt on my twitching corpse?
Not that it fucking matters now. Dad's... [She folds her arms, digging her fingers into the fabric of her sweater.] He collapsed in an airplane on the way to seal that stupid deal. If it was somewhere else...I don't know what would happen, but maybe...
[Maybe there's a version of things where Shiv gets to know for sure that the last thing her dad heard from her was "It's okay. I love you."]
I wasn't gonna try to bring my dad back from the dead. I just wanted the six months Tom took from me.
no subject
Siffrin listens quietly, noting the way her arms fold and their tightness, and... gently reaches out, easily telegraphing the movement, to carefully curl their hand around the one digging so hard into her sweater.
Easy, easy. Let... them comfort, in their own awkward, clumsy way. ]
I'll teach you how to make a wish without relying on The Witch.
no subject
She gives a light, sad chuckle at the offer.]
Magic can be taught? Damn, where do I sign up?
no subject
[ (You can do this much.
You don't know if it'll help in the long run. But you want to see her smile.)
Siffrin looks up at the large, barren tree. ]
... People in my world visit the largest tree in the area, called Favor Trees, to make a wish. From there, you take a leaf that feels right, to represent yourself. You breathe that wish into the leaf, and repeat it... three, six, seven times -- as many times as it feels right to do so -- and then fold it up with your wish inside. That tethers you together. Then you let it go, and the Universe finds the means to grant your wish.
[ Like it's easy. ]
no subject
[The concept sounds nice, though. Like making a wish on birthday candles or fuzzy dandelions.]
So what's the catch? There's always some sort of catch when people write stories about magic. Like I say "Give me more time with my dad," then I get hit by a meteor and put next to him in the mausoleum. I'll need to think about the wording.
no subject
It just gives you the means. For example... um. For example, with that-- it could be that your "computers" [ WHATEVER THOSE ARE ] have a way for you to step into a split timeline, before everything happened with Tom, and you can have those months before he passed.
[ It sounds ridiculous, sure, but.
She is talking to someone who literally has been living through the same few days for who knows how long so. ]
I'm sure... there's something like that, that's happened before. It's not impossible. It just takes a lot. You might not... be able to go back, to your timeline -- but that's a risk you have to weigh.
cw brain damage talk
I'll have to think about it. With the timeline split theory especially, would I have another Shiv I need to swap with? Or maybe it'll be like turning back a clock and the past six months'll just crumble to dust.
I could try to get my dad to go get another brain screening in this timeline. [She gives a little scoff.] It might not change anything. He'd probably just fucking yell at me. Still.
no subject
I don't know what'll happen to you or the other Shiv in another timeline. But if it did just bring you back, and you could do that, then I think you should keep pushing for something that gives you more time with him.
[ ... Still, still-- ]
Why would you want to have more time with someone who yells at you, though?
[ (Maybe it's because you don't remember having a family.
But it doesn't sound very nice.) ]
cw abuse implications
Well, he yelled at everybody, not just his kids. He was a harsh guy in general. ...that's not like, an excuse for yelling at your kids. We were kind of terrified of him when we were growing up sometimes. Plus he wasn't great with women, either? He came from an old values generation, but--he wasn't all bad, either. There's a reason I went with him instead of my mom in the divorce.
[She sighs, not sure if she's explaining it well.]
And he's still my dad. I don't get another one.
no subject
yeah, to Siffrin, it's alien. But he'll nod anyway. Because it isn't hard to understand having just one of something, of someone. ]
I hope your wish can come true then, Shiv. Maybe he won't yell as much as you think.