ChildOfAB 2012/08/02(Thu)19:08 No. 438672 ID: 885ee8
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You wake up on the cool grass to the smell of sex and the ubiquitous sound of dull thrumming that seems to permeate the iron fields. Beside you sits your clothes, your broken flashlight, your wet deck of cards, and your knife. Recently cleaned, if your eyes are making it out properly in the dim light.
You rise and look around, only to find Elle missing. The multicolored pinpoints of light above and below do little to stave off the darkness around you, brought about primarily in the form of what seems to be a dark rolling fog--presumably another feature of this surreal environment.
You feel small and useless. You have no idea what's happening, and it seems like that fact is enforced by the machinations of an unseen hand. You might as well just sit back and wait for the only person who knows what's going on to return and swoop you up into the next atrocity you have to commit.
You could call her first, you suppose. Speed up the process. She's been known to come when called before. Or you could explore here or...
...well, anywhere, really. As far as destinations go, pretty much anything is open to you. Except, if Elle is to be believed, places which require invitation.

Explore the iron fields a bit, see what the fuck is even out there. DO NOT stray beyond the light of the fort's candles, though.

Previous chapters can be found first here:
http://archive.foolz.us/tg/thread/19363045/#19363045
then here:
http://suptg.thisisnotatrueending.com/archive.html?tags=Fair%20Folk
Discussion thread here:
>>/questdis/57966

perhaps you can force the field to bend to your will? try thinking hard at something.

>>438672
Perhaps it would be better to limit your choices in destination to those that you actually know.

For now, let's look around and familiarize ourselves with this place. Where's the human food?

>>438676
Let's go with this for now

>>438676
>>438704
While doing this try to look for the thing that looks like a throne

ChildOfAB 2012/08/03(Fri)19:05 No. 439035 ID: 885ee8
File 134404593105.png - (201.79KB , 720x2319 , 73.png )

You put your clothes on and gather your things, noting that your flute is conspicuously absent. You absentmindedly click the button on the flashlight and are a little surprised to see it turn on; it must have dried out while you slept. With little else to do, and not wanting to call Elle, you stroll around the grounds.
The lights in the ground are just like those of the Iron Fields, as is the fog, so you suspect that is where you are presently located. The torches seem similar to your fort, but they've grown into monolithic, looming stone things. The fire perched atop them seems less a fire and more a burning white pinpoint of light affixed in space somewhere above the heads of the silent stone guardians. You watch it twist and spiral around its apparent respective anchor points, tiny white sparks escaping their whorls and evaporating into the air, mesmerized momentarily.
Snapping yourself out of it, you note the presence of a stone basin like the one Elle used to convert her blood into fruit, placed conveniently behind the throne.
The throne itself is a massive vertical affair with two seats upholstered with something red and shiny. It ascends into the hovering canopy above and seems to disappear into a blackness that resists your persistent attempts to quantify it.
Walking a ways form the center, you soon reach a point where the grass and canopy just stop. Beyond this line, the uniform metallic floor and random lights continue into the far distance.
After a few moments of study, you do note that the white lights in the ground seem to permeate the black fog regardless of distance, while the lights overhead and the lights from the torches by the throne do not. Those lights fade to black as they get further away, while you can see the white lights in the floor illuminating strange, tall shapes in the distance, like misshapen towers.
You sense that the end of the grass at your feet makes an easy border, but you're sure that, given your apparent propensity for cheating the system, you could imagine a way to make a border nearly anywhere, anyway.

Do you have anything useful that you left at school? In your locker or desk, maybe?

what else could you need... go get your cat and give him a proper burial.

Go check out them towers. Can't make a safe haven if you don't know what's out there.

Yeah, let's go look at the shapes off in the distance.

>>439188
>>439168
Before we do that we might want to call Elle for all we know those are watch towers

Wait is this supposed to be our new home? It might help if we start thinking it as a new home considering we can't go back to the old one

>>439202
Then again it's a court so I ain't to sure

Apparently I'm only slightly late hopping over from /tg/. Anyway, I put forward we try out our new throne, see how it suits us.

>>439278
Yeah let's go with this. I don't trust those towers. In the case of a tie just go check out those towers

ChildOfAB 2012/08/05(Sun)06:19 No. 439528 ID: 5033e8
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A few other options wander through your head. You think about your locker at school-- you've got a sketchbook there, and some textbooks, but other than that you can't think of anything worth salvaging. You absentmindedly wonder whether the school would be caught in the fire you saw in the city.
Your thoughts also go back to poor Rodrick, your cat. He was the sweetest cat, and you've had him as long as you can remember. It doesn't seem right to leave him skinned on a tree by your house. You're not sure if there are still tall dark things looming over what remains of the incinerated trailer.
A small voice in the back of your mind wishes that you could still muster the tears at Rodrick's death that you had when you learned he died. You're a little disgusted with yourself that they won't come anymore. When you try to think about it, you see your knife going into that man's neck.
Shaking your head, you realize you've already started absentmindedly wandering out into the darkness. Turning back, you see the two torches by the throne, just barely visible through the black fog. You know this is home now. It has to be, you do't have anything left.
You want there to be some profound reason for why you leave anyway. If this is your home, you just want to play in the yard. No, home is only home because it's where you start your journey. No, you want to see what your home isn't so you'll know better what it is.
Really, you just want to walk.
The constant thrumming, churning sound seems to grow a little louder as you approach the towers. You reach the closest one soon enough. A flat surface, solid metal, hints of rust. You can barely see something higher up, like a lip extending out, but that's all. Circling the base of the tower, you find what looks like it should be a doorway. It seems to be an arch in the otherwise flat surface, covered from the inside by several lumpy metallic pillars.
You are about to go inspect another nearby tower, when you notice something unusual. There is a large, circular area to one side where the lights in the floor stop. You can see them again on every side of the circle, but the circle itself is just black.
Approaching cautiously, you find a deep sloped groove in the ground, which you assume circumnavigates the circle. Stepping down into it, you see what seem to be stairs going up into the center.
The sounds are definitely more noticeable here. You feel the iron ground vibrating slightly to a rhythm under your feet.

Is it music, or something else...?

>>439530
>>439528
Better be prepare to run at any moment but or now try to figure out where the sound is coming from a.k.a. the vibrations

>>439530
>>439537
Let's go up the stairs but before we do that try to find as many borders we can find just in case the worse happens

>>439544
The edge of a step itself is a border, so STAIRS provide us with many many borders~!

Advance with caution.

>>439574
Here to hoping that is true

Now that I think about it, we have a rare opportunity here, being left alone. This may be the first time we've been alone to experiment with our abilities since we learned we have them without being ushered by Elle into another nightmare scenario. And what do we do with the opportunity? We blunder off by ourselves into another nightmare scenario. I say we experiment.
If I'm understanding right, your strength is cheating the system in creative ways. When you put the shirt on the ground, Elle didn't see it as a border until you explained yourself, even though she presumably has the same sense for where borders are that you have. This tells us the border wasn't created by the shirt, it was created by your interpretation. What else can you define as a border? The path you just walked along? Maybe you can do a little twirl to double back on that line and use it as a border. The border between the inside and the outside of your clothes? Your arms and neck and legs are always crossing that one. The border between in the beam of your flashlight and out of it? It's a circle, those have worked before, and it has to do with light and dark, which has also worked before. We could even start getting metaphorical with it. Hop in the air, use the border between being off the ground and being on it again when you land. The border between opening your eyes and closing them? The border between one second and the next?
How specific are your targeting systems? Do you visualize a destination, or qualities you want your destination to have?
What about what comes with you and what you can send? When you're wearing clothes or carrying things, they follow you. You've brought people with you. You've been shoved places before by people who didn't follow you. Can you do the same with objects, shoving them elsewhere, even inside someone else's body? Can you take parts of things with you, but not the whole thing? Could you grab someone's head and push it elsewhere, leaving their decapitated body where it is?
SOMETHING about your power is supposed to be terrifying to all of demonvampirefairykind, but we haven't figured out what it is yet. Maybe this is it.

>>439686
So let's just start our way up with the stairs and see if they have any borders.
Work our way up you know and try to break the system in little ways

ChildOfAB 2012/08/07(Tue)19:00 No. 440288 ID: 885ee8
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You are a little anxious to proceed, and you hesitate while a thought strikes you. You know you're supposed to be able to do terrifying things with your power, but you don't feel very terrifying at all, blood on your hands or no. You decide to take a moment to experiment with your abilities before proceeding.
You focus on the idea of a border, honing your sense for where they are and what you could cross to teleport. There seems to be a strong one here already, encircling the dark area. You recall sensing something similar in the circle around Savannah's bed. Besides that, you don't sense anything else. But, all borders must not be naturally-occurring, or the shirt wouldn't have worked, or anything really. Houses aren't built around borders, borders happen when houses are built. What about the steps? Passing from one step to the next could be considered crossing a border, couldn't it?
You focus hard on the idea of each step as an individual area through which you have to pass. Each step lights up with your border-sense. That's it! Your conception of what borders are is what makes them exist, not some preexisting property. You quickly think up some more examples.
The flashlight, of course! The border between light and dark, you've used that on before. It takes no effort at all to visualize a border around the circle of light projected by the flashlight. You decide to get crazier with it.
You turn around and look back on the path you walked to get here, but it's hard to discern among all the randomly-placed lights in the ground. You've already forgotten where the path was, so you can't discern what counts as being on different sides of it. However, you bear the idea in mind and take a few steps out, away from the dark circle. If you focus on the idea while you walk, after a few seconds you can envision a border formed by the path you take. Spinning around quickly, you sweep your foot across the line and blink several meters back towards the dark circle.
Your excited laugh echoes out across the empty landscape. You feel a little giddy with the power and try to push it further. what about the path you plan to walk? You focus intently on one of the lights on the ground out in the distance. You're having trouble envisioning the path, so you break out into a sprint.
As your footfalls pound against the iron, it suddenly comes into view. Yes, you're walking a path. A completely arbitrary path between yourself and your destination, but a path with two sides nonetheless. You turn and skid, blinking across the line and appearing a few feet away, where you take off again towards a random light.
Turn. Blink. Run again.
You grin and pull out your deck of cards, drawing one and running again. You fling the card across the border and it disappears, reappearing a few feet ahead where you intended. You laugh loudly as you keep running and lunge, catching it in the air. You run again, thinking of the card as something you want to leave behind, and skid across the border again, blinking a short distance away, your hand now empty. You look back just in time to see the card fluttering down to the ground, presumably where you left from.
You smile genuinely and laugh as you blink again and come to a stop, your breath a little short from all the running. This is it. This is why you're supposed to be terrifying. All these other people like Elle have so many rules regarding how they can deal with borders, and in a few short minutes alone you've rendered the entire concept essentially meaningless. Borders are arbitrary and, given a moment to concentrate, you can make one out of anything. Could you break it further? Tear something or someone in half by pushing part of them across a border? Put something inside another object or person? You're not sure, but you don't have any test subjects now. Maybe you could go out and find some?
And what other rules do they have? Iron? It doesn't mean anything to you. Invitations? That one might be trickier. There are other things you don't know about yet, too. Bending people to your will, looking like something else...you don't know the rules for those so you don't know how to break them, but you're feeling pretty good about it anyway.
You look up at the stairs, where you seem to have ended up with that last teleport. You could leave to experiment more, or call for Elle to help you, or explore more with the confidence that you can probably escape if you need to if it's dangerous somehow. You can't identify the source of the still-vibrating floor from here, it just seems to be deep and rhythmic, coming in waves.

Hmmm. Teleport back to the throne, and leave a playing card on the chair. The border between the card on the chair and the air above it can act as a teleport homer. THEN we can explore.

man you didn't just bend the rules, you broke them in half.
i don't see what can capture you now. go, and get your important things.

The destination isn't a border. The means of departure is a border. So...we don't need a teleporter.

Oh, man. Do NOT call Elle. In fact, don't even tell her about this in the first place. She doesn't need to know, and it's always good to be underestimated. Keep this one close to your heart.
I see no reason why it shouldn't be exploration time. Proceed with caution. Let's figure out what's still churning in this place after it's been lifeless for who knows how long.

You know what, I think it's just plain foolhardy to go into this thing without knowing what it is. Call Elle. Ask if this thing here's dangerous. Then give her a demonstration of what you just learned.

Wow thanks to 036ce7 the rule of border are now cut in half but let's forget the scary tower for now. We gotta go give our cat a proper burial so let's find it.

>>440311
Elle doesn't really need to know if you do something like this. She kinda expected you to break the rules in all sorts ways.

>>440316
That's a good idea. We'll need a shovel, though.

>>440320
Well we can probably go into some shed to get one. I don't know anyone who would consider a shed a "home" anyways.

>>440324
So yeah just sneak in any suburban neighborhood and steal a shovel from the shed while getting there should be no problem with border walking unless we have trouble finding the destination.
If that does happen well we need to practice on finding destinations anyways so this doesn't happen in the future.

ChildOfAB 2012/08/16(Thu)02:24 No. 443787 ID: 885ee8
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You catch your breath and stand at the edge of the stairs, flashlight straight out ahead of you. You feel your previous confidence drain. No, you're not ready to face this alone. Your exuberance deflates and you turn away from the dark circle. There's something you have to do first.
You try just focusing on the idea of a shovel when you run again, away from the circle, and turn across your path.
Your eyes squint in the sudden light as you stumble to a stop in a small crowded room. You find yourself in your father's shed by your trailer at home. Were you thinking about the shed to start with? You don't think so, but it's hard to tell. You pluck a shovel out of the pile of tools along the wall and peer out the small windows to make sure the coast is clear.
Your eyes adjust to the mid-afternoon sun and you have time to take in the state of your yard for the first time since you fled last night. The trailer is a smoldering wreck, one side collapsed in and the rest blackened. One of the nearby trees seems to have partially burned, but the fire doesn't seem to have spread very far somehow. You cautiously step out into the light and set off in the direction where you think you saw Rodrick.
It doesn't take long before you find him around the far side of a tree, still skinned and pinned by what look like large thorns. You stand there staring for a long time, just staring, feeling nothing. You're part of something bigger now, bigger than the kid with his cat. You killed a man. You feel the echo of the scrape as the knife entered the back of his neck. Wait, he said. This is a dead cat. You can't cry at this.
Your knees suddenly buckle and you vomit on the base of the tree. What the hell are you doing? It's been less than a day and your life has gone out of control. You've got no house, no family, no conscience. You're not even human. What do they call inhuman killers in the stories you read and the games you played? Monsters. You're a monster.
Rodrick's body seems so small and frail as you carefully remove him from the tree. The congealing blood sticks to your hands and the shovel as you cover his hole with dirt. You're finally crying, but you can't even feel better about that, because you know you're not actually crying over your dead pet.
You feel like you need someone to talk to, or at the very least something to keep your mind busy.

>>443787
Then we need Elle. Call out for her.

>>443788
we need anything but her. she wont understand. where is your mom?

>>443787
>Your knees suddenly buckle and you vomit on the base of the tree.

You are seriously affected by this.
Make a note of that; it's going to be relevent.

>What the hell are you doing? It's been less than a day and your life has gone out of control.

Yes, it has.
>You've got no house,
You lost your home, but you have a new one.
It doesn't feel like it, but that's loss and trauma.

>no family,
You're probably off your dad's christmas card list, but the rest of your family may not feel the same way.
Your mother doesn't, at least.

>no conscience.
Then why are you paying respect to a loved one? Why are you so worked up over his loss that you're vomiting?
Why do you keep thinking back to the man you killed?

You DO care, you DO feel terrible, you DO know the difference between right and wrong. You feel nothing because you're numb; you're to overwhelmed to handle what you're feeling, so you're blocking it out. Compartmentalizing the pain because you can't handle it all now.

>You're not even human.
Define "human", then ask again. Humanity is relative.

>What do they call inhuman killers in the stories you read and the games you played? Monsters. You're a monster.

You've been pushed to do things you don't like, but before you pass judgement on yourself I have a question: Are you going to avoid harming innocent people?

We are defined by our actions. Being a killer doesn't make you a monster. It's sadistic or needless killing that does that.

Savannah is at least partially aware of this, right? Find her and bring her back to the fort, then call Elle.
Tell Elle that Savannah would make a good attendant if she was bound to the will of one of you, and it would be nice to break whatever holds were on her already.
Watching the process will help you figure out how it's done, if it CAN be done, without Elle having to tell you directly.
Also, Savannah might be better at figuring out the rules than you. Or at least have more education on how all this works.

I'd expect people under your dominion are protected from the influence of others; it would serve as a way to protect people.

>>443789
Going to our mom seems like a bad idea to me due to the fact how "interested" the prince was in our family.
Calling Elle would probably keep us busy but odds are she has some task on hand that will make us feel even worse than we do now.
We still gonna have to deal Elle eventually but getting this out of our system is good for us so just let it out and then call Elle.

>>443797
Yes to calling that girl from school, no to calling Elle too. That whole "is she prettier than me" thing makes me uneasy.

I do not wish for Savannah to know that we're alive. She is under the prince's thumb.

>>443957
That's why we would be kidnapping here and taking her here, where the prince has little power and no subjects.
That's also why I want to bind her - if we can undercut his control then we can free her from him.

Beautiful update.

Really, your only choice is Elle. Go back to the court and call for her.

We could always try to meet someone new. It's no good to get too reliant on one person~

>>444015
I can dig this. I wanted to get our cry on, return to the court after we calm down, and then call Elle.

>>444017

Meet a new fairy? I don't really feel like that's a wise plan. We (as in Evan) are still not really familiar with fairy customs and their round-about ways of communicating... I think we'd get into trouble pretty fast.

Stay the FUCK away from Elle until we are ready to demand answers. She had us kill someone, rob people, she's leading us around by the dick. Enough is enough.

Lets go talk to the tooth fairy.

1. She isn't Elle. We don't have mixed feelings & trust issues.

2. We left things on an awkward note. The least we can do is apologize for any unintended offense.

3. She is nice.

>>444108
I support this proposal

ChildOfAB 2012/08/18(Sat)17:36 No. 444914 ID: 5033e8
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After a few minutes of silence, you pull yourself together a little and stand up, deciding that having someone to talk to would really help you out. You consider several options. You could call Elle, but you feel like you might have gotten enough of her to last you a while. Your mom springs to mind, but given the prince's interest in your family that feels like it might be a bad idea. Someone from school, maybe? Savannah seemed to have some idea what was going on, and you didn't feel particularly good about leaving her the way you did. You don't like the sound of that Orion guy, though.
What about Maia? She seemed unusually nice for one of those pale, black-eyed things. If Elle was any indication, you could probably contact her by calling her name.
"Maia?" you call out aloud. You don't notice anything unusual. "Maia of the grey court?" you ask again.
No reply. Well, you think maybe this would be a good test of your border-walking power. You keep the idea of "place containing Maia" in your head and step across the shadow of a nearby tree.
You feel like your brain hits a wall, but your body keeps moving. Your foot lands in the shadow of the tree and you stumble a little. What was that? Something went wrong, but you're not sure what. Did it have to do with Maia in particular, or can you just not seek a destination that way?
To test it out, you think about Savannah, and step back out of the tree's shadow. The forest disappears and you find yourself suddenly inside a house, with Savannah siting on a nearby couch reading a book by the light of the window.
She looks up at you and her eyes widen a bit. You are a little surprised and confused about how that worked for Savannah and not Maia, and you realize that you didn't actually have anything in mind to say upon your arrival if it did.

maia could be in a place you can't fit inside. like inside a tree. so going into the place she is in is impossible. so you were prevented from telefraging yourself.

anyway, say "hey" and "is he watching?" if he is watching then grab her and take her to the field. also, you are in her house, and unless the invitation from last time is still valid you may be able to ignore the house rule.

>>444914
"Hey, Savannah. Are you still crazy? Any news about what the heck is going on?"

"Sup? Just uh... testing out something. Do I have, like, a standing invitation to be here?"

A place containing Maia could probably be her or someone elses home. You've been told a few times that it is impossible to use boundries to enter homes like that uninvited. Best thing to do is to go to a place that is just outside where Maia is.

Anyway apoligize to Savannah, say your practicing your abilities then try going to the place outside where Maia is.

>>444914
"Just dropping in."
Then step back out and leave her to wonder what the fuck.

Also no more sexings, seriously, it's getting grotesque.

>>444947
I hardly think we're going to have much choice in the matter, when our instincts take over. Remember, we are the very image of a young Satyr!

Oh for crap's sake we can't just pop in then pop out! Then she'll tell the Prince we were here!

Ask her questions. If we're leaving she's coming with us. Likely to have her mind dominated by Elle or whatever the fuck, but that's better than leaving her behind to blow our cover and have an army pop in at our doorstep in five goddamn minutes.

>>444923
>>444947
We could have tested the invitation thing literally anywhere.
We came here because Savannah has information and we want that information.

We will, of course, need to insure that we leave no witnesses that aren't on our side. If possible.
That means we either recruit her or have Elle wipe her memory of our visit, meaning we either learn how Elle steals memories or we gain an ally who knows a lot and can freely share that information.

>>444987
Yes this, if anything we want her spying for us. Get some info before we deciding if to leave.

...We should do a quick check if she is actually alone here, though.

First things first, give her a "howdy". Ask her how she's been. The usual courtesies, but she might be inclined to say stuff of relevance about how she's been lately. Probably less has changed for her than for you. Do find out how alone she is, under the mostly true premise of figuring out how at liberty she is to talk about the supernatural.

So Evan is suddenly in Savannah's home? Uninvited?

I can think of three explanations.

1: Her previous invitation hasn't expired yet (do invitations have expiration dates?).
2: Evan is exempt from the invitation rule, or is capable of circumventing it via teleportation.
3: Savannah invited Evan again somehow. Wishing that Evan was with her at that moment, accidentally granting him passage or summoning him. Speak of the devil and he shall appear.


Evan needs to talk with her though.

Best case scenario is that she can help Evan.

Worst case scenario is that he will need to spirit her away to keep her quiet or practice his telefragging skills to silence her permanently.

He should probably start by apologizing about his appearance. I know I'd be freaked out if a classmate spontaneously appeared in front of me covered in blood.

ChildOfAB 2012/08/26(Sun)20:09 No. 448120 ID: 4b44fc
File 134603698011.png - (192.35KB , 720x824 , 77.png )

You quickly take a nervous look around the room, seeing no one else. Trying to remain calm, you say quietly, "Uh, hey Savannah. Are you free to talk?"
"Holy shit Evan," she responds, "how the hell did you get in here?"
"I was wondering the same thing. You invited me in last night, but I guess, does it carry over forever, or-"
"Oh my god! Oh my god, that wasn't a dream? I thought that was a dream!" she responds. She looks like she's about to hyperventilate.
You try to look sympathetic. "They got you with the whole 'is it or isn't it a dream' thing too, huh?"
She suddenly turns beet red and looks away. "Oh god, then that means I really-uh, you saw me naked and I, uh, I am so sorry..."
"Look, it's fine. Everything worked out. Is it safe to talk right now? Is that Orion guy around?"
"He's REAL?" she asks, her pupils shrinking to pinpricks.

"Sadly."

Show her your open palms and take a single step back.

"Please, don't panic. I promise I'm not going to hurt you."

So when and how did you even meet that Orion guy to begin with?

"everything is real"

>>448120
"Apparently."
Put a hand on her shoulder to comfort her.
"Look, Savannah, I need your help. Everything has gone strange, and you seem to be the only person who can tell me about these... things!
Please, will you help me?"

>>448120
Tell her yes, and he is very dangerous. She should never invite him in again, and if possible she should forbid him from coming into her house right now.

>>448168
I kinda doubt she knows much more than we do. Can't hurt to ask about what Orion has done or said, though. Aside from, like, all the sex.

Tell her to revoke her invitation to him.

ChildOfAB 2012/08/29(Wed)13:42 No. 449263 ID: 4b44fc
File 134627295051.png - (188.94KB , 720x894 , 78.png )

"Apparently so," you say. "Please, try not to panic. I think we can help each other. Everything has gone strange, and I need to figure stuff out. But first, can you, I dunno, revoke your invitation to Orion?"
"Does that work?" she asks. "Hang on, I remember that he had to follow the rules I laid out in the invitation the first time. I guess that means it would. How do I do it, though?"
You shrug. "Just say it out loud, I guess. I don't really know, I'm new to all this."
She puts her hands on her temples and says "Orion is no longer invited into my house, ever," then stifles a giggle. "This feels really silly. I mean, it would, if, you know, you didn't just teleport into my house. And if it wasn't so terrifying." You try to shoot her a sympathetic look. "Look, my parents left to go get a bunch of bottled water from the store down the road. They're gonna be back any second. Can we go somewhere else?"
You smile. "We can go pretty much everywhere else."
"Oh!" she exclaims, "Oh, right. Let me write a note for my parents telling them I went to hang out with my friend down the road. That will buy us some time."
While she writes, you start thinking about places to go.

the iron court is impervious to every fae except elle, but not sure how she will react to you bringing Savannah. already have a quick simple explanation for her though.

your power to bend the rules comes from thinking human, so you need to stay grounded in the human mindset otherwise you wont be able to out-think properly.

other place is your house.

We could go to a public park and border walk our way to safety if needed. We could also go to our fort if that hasn't been destroyed or absorbed by the Iron Court somehow (Stupid Fairy Magic)

Ask if she has any place she wants to go and tell her to stay close if we need to run I guess. Better safe then sorry

>>449263
"Ok, some place safe where we can talk...
I know a place that only one other person seems to be able to get to, but I don't know how she would react to you. She's not bad, but she's dangerous and unpredictable like most of these things.
I need to know how to make sure she can't harm you, so we're going to stop by some place almost as safe to figure that out."
Take her to just outside your fort. Tell her "Wait five seconds, then follow me in."
Then walk in and say "I hereby revoke all invitations to this place."
Then wait for her to enter. If she's human she won't have any problems, but if she's fae then it would keep her out.
Once she's inside:
"I can't do much more than that. I need you to promise to keep this secret. More for your own sake than mine; these things are scary."
Then proceed to tell her about Elle, give her a quick run down of what happened, and ask what Savannah knows about that whole drinking blood thing and how to make sure Elle can't hurt her.
If you're the prince of the Iron Court and she's bound to your will that would make it easy, which is why that isn't the case.
Once you know how to keep her safe from Elle, take her to the court and find out everything she knows about the Fae.

>>449291
Sounds like plan I can agree with

>>449291
Works.

>>449273

I was thinking a public park, too... maybe one with woods nearby.

>>449383

Sorry guys, Sketchy used my computer to update. Forgot to clear the username field.

Man, 4chan and tgchan handle this a lot differently. Plus, I can apparently check up on this thread once a month and not miss a thing.

ChildOfAB 2012/09/05(Wed)16:42 No. 452027 ID: 4b44fc
File 134688853234.png - (780.63KB , 720x2268 , 79.png )

You quickly decide that the safest place to talk would probably be your fort. You take Savannah's hand and visualize a border along the strips of flooring. "Okay, I think I have a place in mind that would be safe," you say. You step across the border, pulling Savannah along with you, and materialize instantly in the woods by your fort.
"Woah!" Savannah yelps excitedly. "Ha ha! Jesus! That was amazing! Can you go anywhere you want?"
You look at the fort, only idly taking notice of what Savannah says. "Most places, yeah. Maybe. I haven't really figured that out yet." Your fort looks completely empty, and you can see some dark marks on the ground and wood. You turn to Savannah. "Listen, I'm gonna go in there. Wait five seconds and follow me in, okay?"
"Oh, um, okay," she says. "There was a second where I was standing there in the room and I was like 'he's not actually going to teleport, this is crazy,' and then you did, and it's still crazy! How does it work? Is it magic?"
"Yeah, I guess," you respond, stepping up to the fort.
You step inside the crude wooden archway, half expecting to see your bigger fort with the pillars of fire inside. Instead, you see exactly what you saw from the outside: it's empty. The dirt is a little blackened and there are marks on the logs outside that look like scorch marks. There is no sign of your table, the candles, or your tub of stuff. Stepping inside, you announce into the air, "I revoke all invitations into this place," and look out at Savannah, who smiles and steps in.
"Neat," she says, "I kind of expected something crazy to happen when I walked in. Did you build this?"
"What? Oh, yeah. Took me a while, mostly got branches from down at the creek. Listen, Savannah, I need you to promise to keep this meeting a secret. These things are scary, and they think I'm dead. I'd rather it stay that way."
She looks surprised. "Wow. Yeah, of course. I won't tell anyone. And you can just call me Anna. This is exciting! It's like a real life fairy tale or something."
"Good," you continue, plowing on. "Can you tell me anything about these creatures? You called them demons?"
"Oh! Um, aren't they? I'm sorry, I really don't remember everything from last night. It's like it was a dream, it's all kind of fuzzy. Actually, I thought they were all dreams, but, I mean..." she trails off, pinches herself on the arm, and laughs nervously.
"So, no specifics at all?" you ask.
"Let me see. They like blood, hate iron, need an invitation to get in, they can make you forget things and teleport... I don't know. Like I said, it's all fuzzy. You know how you remember dreams way later if something reminds you of them? Maybe I can remember stuff like that."
"Let's start at the beginning, then. How did you meet Orion?" you ask.
"Oh, um, I kind of like occult stuff, like witches and vampires and stuff. Ouija boards and weird prayers and stuff like that. I found this website that had a whole bunch of rituals and things, and I tried a bunch of them that night. I think the one that worked was at midnight, I put a paper doll in a bowl of milk on the table, had some candles, counted to twelve and hid, like it was hide and seek. I had to write some things on the paper too, and sort of focus on them," she shrugs. "I guess he found me? Or maybe it was the circle thing I drew and did the prayer over, and he just took a little while to come out? I really don't remember how it went. It was kind of just for fun. I don't think I really thought it would work. Hell, I didn't really think it DID work until just now." She looks suddenly upset. "So, wait. All of it was real? None of it was a dream? Because I, uh...I mean, what I did, what I tried to do with you, um...I had to be naked when I hid, that was part of it, I re-" she chokes a little and swallows audibly. "-remember."

By the by, there's an archive of the first five chapters up here >>/questarch/448478

"it's fine, i've already gotten over that. and since i don't care nether should you. now, it sounds like you set up a physical invitation. such as, the tooth-fairy, think i met her, if you place a tooth under a pillow it becomes a invitation to her, letting her in, what you did must of counted as an invitation for Orion."

Ask her what he looked like. His mannerisms, if she remembers.

Tell her it isn't her fault, that's what they do. Manipulation and selfish games. Real fairy tales are not nice. But with any luck that's all behind her now.

Tell her there is someone here in your place now, living your old life. He may be up to something, could be something soon or he'll act normally for years. You have no idea, but to be safest she must not trust him or have anything to do with him.

>>452027
Hug her. She needs it.
"Shh... It's ok. Taking control of peoples minds is some sort of sick game to them, and they love their games. I found that out the hard way.

Savannah, lets team up. I'll can help keep you safe, and you can help me get these creatures under control.
Even if you can't remember much you're still a pure human, so there are things you can do that I can't. Like go in places completely uninvited and stuff.

The next place I would be taking you is basically an impenetrable fortress. On the moon. You would have to meet my, well, I suppose I'll have to call her an 'ally' even though I can't trust her. She's unpredictable.
Savannah, I promise that I'll do whatever I have to do to keep her from hurting you while you're in my moon base. Do you want to go?"

Wait for her to respond, then: "I've needed to ask since... what happened, but wanted you to decide to help or not without mucking up your head... I need to know. Do you really like me? Like, like-like me?"

>>452084
>hug
Sure, why not?

>Savannah, lets team up
What, no.

>moon
No.

>Like, like-like me?"
DAMMIT NO.

Just so you guys know, when we looked at her, that counted as an invitation. YOU MESSED UP, EVAN.

>>452153
Savannah is human, so the whole invitation deal goes right out the window

>>452160
That makes two assumptions which I wanted to test.
The first assumption is that she is human.
The second assumption is that she is Savannah.

>>452173
take her to the iron court, if she falls over screaming she isn't human.

"Yeah, but don't worry about it. They have a sort of a mind manipulation they do."

>>452179
Unless she's like Evan, or has tasted his blood, or etc...

>>452232
Less paranoia please. NOBODY else is like Evan. Her eyes would give her away if she were fae. Evan is the only one who can make them look normal. That's why Elle wore sunglasses when taking on a human form.

I wouldn't put it past her being fey. Totally possible. We already blew our chance to test it in an inconspicuous way, so whatever, opportunity missed. If this bites us in the ass later, we'll deal with it then. Let's not alienate her.

jesus she is not a fae. if someone knocks on your window and you look at them, that is not an invitation. also fae can't make that good of a disguise. evan was raised human, so he has human mannerisms ingrained into his very being. any other fae could MAYBE pull off acting human for a little bit but they will make mistakes very easy.

I would be very surprised to learn that our doppelganger planted a fake Savannah meant to deceive us in the event that we accidentally teleport into her living room after we were executed. This isn't a shitty M. Night Shyamalan movie.

The odds are in our favor that she is legit.

It is important to be very supportive of her. Her world is shattering around her right now. She's been violated by the fae. At the very least emotionally and mentally...and perhaps physically as well. If Elle is any indication, the fae like to fuck like rabbits. There is a sickeningly real chance that she may be a rape victim.

For her sake, I hope that Orion's violation never went that far.

Oh yeah also don't forget that other fae can't tell us the rules! She just did.

Bam, proven.

>>452251
Looking at someone isn't necessarily an invitation, but he gave her a look. Totally different.

>>452285
What rule did she explain? I see a lot of describing actions, but nothing that directly says how things work.

>>452277
>our doppelganger planted a fake Savannah
If Savannah was like Evan then his doppelganger couldn't have done that, since he would have been an infant at the time.
Further, the antagonist we know about couldn't possibly be responsible for Evan's situation. In fact, based only what we know to be true you could reasonably consider both of them victims of some as-yet unknown entity.
For all we know, that entity could be this Orion person.

>meant to deceive us
The world doesn't revolve around Evan. It would be more likely that Savannah would be part of some other and/or larger plot.

>>452303
>what rule?
>need an invitation to get in

>>452319
Elle explained that too, and the Tooth Fairy started to explain the rules before she realized she isn't allowed to explain them to Evan. That means it's likely a rule imposed on them by the prince. If so then somebody beholden to a different court wouldn't be bound by that rule. If Savanna were like Evan then she would obviously be from a different court.

I would like to point out that Evan is free to explain the rules to others. That means that unlike requiring an invitation it's not something intrinsic to being Fae.

>>452392
That's because Evan is awesome at breaking rules. Not being able to explain rules is an intrinsic element of being fey. Look this stuff up, guys. ChildOfAB is working with pre-existing mythology here.

>>452027
Just make sure she does this on her own time. Be calm, don't even HINT that we blame her for anything.

The last thing a girl that age needs is a guilt trip over being maybe-raped.

Sympathize. Don't patronize.

Maybe make it clear that we feel lied to as well?

ChildOfAB 2012/09/09(Sun)01:54 No. 452904 ID: 4b44fc
File 134718085656.png - (292.72KB , 720x893 , 80.png )

"Listen, Anna, it's okay. It's not your fault, it's these things. It's all manipulation and games, that's all they ever do," you say sympathetically. You think back to Elle, and can't really think of her as an exception. Rather than keep talking, you decide the best thing to do would be to sit up and hug her.
She quickly wraps her arms around you and hugs you back sweetly, holding it a few seconds longer than you think most hugs tend to last. It's nice, though; it somehow feels like there's more emotion involved in this simple hug than any of the stuff you've done with Elle.
Anna lets go and you sit back. She gives you a strange look and laughs awkwardly. "Listen, Evan. I have something to tell you, and you're not going to like it."
Your heart drops a little. "Oh. What is it?"
She waves her hand in front of her nose. "You really smell terrible," she says.
You laugh, feeling the heat rise in your face as you recall all the things you've done since you last bathed. "Haha. Yeah, sorry. It's been a long day."
She smiles, clearly blushing as well. "Well, then we both forgive each other, I guess. And, thanks. Your stinky hug made me feel better."
"Haha. Yeah, okay. Can you tell me anything else about Orion, or do you not want to talk about him anymore? Like, what did he look like and stuff?"
"Weren't you there when he was?" she asks.
"I couldn't see him. You were talking to someone and then the window closed, is all."
"Huh. Well he's real tall and kind of thin, black eyes and pointy ears and sharp teeth and white hair. Not like old person white, but like white white. Wings, too, or else some kind of feathery cape thing. Oh, and whenever he opens his mouth, it's like there's a light inside it. I remember he would stay by my bed and tell me stories...weird stories, and that light would sort of blink because he was opening and closing his mouth. I don't remember them though." She snaps her fingers. "That's right! I saw your flashlight outside and I thought it was him, I remember now. And then, when he really did show up, he said he was going to go get someone else, and I should...um...make you stay."
"Go get someone else? Someone else named Evan? Or, maybe he called him the prince of the black court?" you ask.
"I don't think that was it," Anna replies uncertainly. She thinks for a moment, then shrugs. "I really don't remember. Maybe that was it, but he didn't even say who he was going to get at all. There's someone else named Evan?"
You nod. "He looks like me and says he has the same name, and I think he took over my place in the family. He's the one who I hope still thinks I'm dead."
"Woah, okay. I think it's your turn for story time. What happened to you?" she asks.

tell her what's up. gloss over what happened with you and elle.

>>452905
Yep.

May as well give her the story. There's no reason to tell her you've been banging a fairy, and you should leave out the part where you killed a dude, and you don't really need to go into that much detail about the whole thing, but otherwise you may as well tell it all.

>>452904
You can tell her about the sex. Specifically, how Elle has been using you for it.
It doesn't matter if it was intended as enticement or for her enjoyment; you didn't have a choice in the matter.

After what Savannah has been through, she won't doubt it one bit.

>>452904
Well why not have a little storytime? She's been through enough of the manipulations of fey to deserve the real fairy tale. Let knowing the truths be her reward, lesson and punishment for messing with things beyond her understanding. Hold back no truth but do not dwell on what is unpleasant. And besides, who else will we ever be able to tell it to?

>>452914
While I don't think we have to omit it at all, but details aren't needed. I'm not sure "using for sex" is the right way to describe it anyway.

Was she using him for sex? I mean, yeah it's reprehensible and all, but he did agree to it. Hell, the first time he actually dared her to do it. The issue is muddied by age of course, so I as an outside observer would say it was non-consensual, but I don't think Evan would see it that way. He took what was offered.

"WELL. I played a game of truth or dare, and things got crazier from there..."

Hey, I just realized that if our enemies ever catch wind that we're alive, they can just teleport right to us. To prevent that, we have to be somewhere they don't have an invitation to. From now on we should stay in uninvited locations whenever possible.

As for telling this girl about what Elle did, do not tell her anything that would clue her in that you are fae as well.

>>453215
Why not? It isn't like we have any reason to pretend otherwise.

>>453215
We've got nothing to gain and a lot to lose by deceiving her. We could lose her trust if she finds out about Evan has been deceiving her.

Evan should be honest with her. Everything has been happening so fast. Magic is real. There is a huge fucking fire and all the electronics are broken. His house was burned down. He has an evil twin that wants him dead. Elle has been helping him stay alive...but she obviously has her own agenda. Is it in his best interest to continue playing to role of a pawn in Elle's plan? His cat is dead. He killed a man...fae....thing? Apparently he's magic. He might be a fae? Half fae? Is this some convoluted scheme to make him think he's a fae? Turn him into a fae? Are his parents actually his parents? Evan is very confused and is reaching out to Savannah for help. I believe that she will be sympathetic towards his cause if he is honest with her.

Alternatively, you could go with your plan and hide your heritage. Then when she finds out, she'll see you for what you are. Just another fae deceiving her for your own personal gain. I imagine that she will take that very hard, and Evan will probably lose her as a friend and ally.

ChildOfAB 2012/09/10(Mon)16:01 No. 453389 ID: 4b44fc
File 134731807451.png - (565.71KB , 720x3502 , 81.png )

You take a deep breath to calm your nerves and decide to tell Anna everything.
You tell her about that first game of truth or dare. She giggles at your confessions of hand-drawn pornography, but slowly begins to lean forward in rapt attention as you describe how the game with Elle turned into something else entirely.
You describe the events of yesterday, starting when you climbed the tree at your grandfather's. She listens intently as you describe your pursuit by the minions of your doppelganger, and her eyes widen in shock as you tell her how they burned down your house.
You tell her your side of the events at her house as you remember them. She points out that her window isn't broken anymore, and her homemade ladder was stashed behind her dresser where she usually leaves it. She apologizes again, and you reassure her. She doesn't remember anything from after you left.
You tell her about waking up with no memory of Elle, with the wound in your neck and the missing tooth. You choke up a little as you describe finding your cat dead, and she voices her sympathies. When you describe being threatened by your father with a shotgun, she recoils in horror. You tell her that it's par for the course.
You recount how you found Elle again, and tell her about the Iron Fields inside the moon. You describe how you created your own border to get out, and about the fruit. When you get to the man at the store, you hesitantly tell her what Elle told you to do, but go no further.
Anna is silent, looking off into nothing. "Did...did you..."
You're not sure how to say it, but you want to tell her the truth. It feels important. "I hesitated. She made me think it was a good idea. I didn't think I would do it, but then she told me to, and...I didn't feel like I had a choice. I just..." you trail off.
Anna sits for a moment, silent and unmoving. You have a hard time looking at her, not knowing what she's thinking. You decide she must be disgusted with you. Why wouldn't she be? Why did you tell her all this? Your heartbeat starts to rush up to your ears and you want to stand up and run away. Leave her here to judge you, and never come back. Why the hell did you even get her involved in the first place? You're so-
Anna sits up and hugs you again. You're too shocked to reciprocate at first. "It's like you said," she says quietly, "all manipulation and games. I'm so sorry, Evan."
You hug her back, and are a little surprised to feel a tear run down your face and soak into Anna's shirt. You choke and laugh a little. "I thought I smelled terrible," you say.
You feel her smile against your shoulder. "Not terrible enough to make me let go," she replies.
After a minute, she lets go and sits back. "Evan, I-well, do you think this Elle girl is really trying to help you out?"
"I don't know. If she is, I think she's got her own reasons. I definitely don't trust her," you reply.
"After all I've done for you," says a quiet voice from outside.

"Yeah Elle. Is it REALLY that surprising that I can't see this mess as an entirely good thing?"

Oh fuck.

Wait, is it our father? Because if so, we should just teleport away. If it's Elle, we're beyond fucked.

Don't let them in either way. Elle's been leading us around by the dick and made us a murderer.

>>453389
Go to the door and see how angry she is with you. (probably very angry)

Right now what we could use is motivation. What is your doppleganger planning? There's no way he can simply take over the world, surely. Why would going along with Elle's plans help? We don't know why Elle is even helping you.

We should explain Anna as just a friend, really. We needed someone to talk to, that wasn't fae. Plus, it would help to have another ally, even though she IS open to compulsion. In fact, if we keep her in our base, any fae that tries to teleport to her will likely die. She could be very effective bait.

>>453392
Why would evan's father's reaction to "I don't trust elle" be "after all I've done for you"? It's definitely Elle.

This is a time for diplomacy. We still need Elle. Just tell her you wish you could but it's hard because you don't know her motives.

Dont act surprised or upset at all. Just speak plainly to her.

"...And I appreciate it. I trust you as much as I can trust what I don't understand, which isn't yet enough to say that I do. But I am putting my life in your hands again, because you're all I have to guide me now. I just... wanted to feel human one last time. I'm sorry for the delay and for what I said. I am ready now."

>>453389
Is that Elle? It seems like Elle.

"Yes, after all you've done for me. My life's a mess, I don't understand most of what's going on, I'm killing people, and you've told me what to do or arranged for me to do things, almost every step of the way.

"You're beautiful and clever and you've saved my life more than once, but you're planning something that will shake your world in ways I don't understand and I'm at the center of it. I don't like being an ignorant pawn in someone else's game, Elle. Even for you.

"I'm with you, maybe until the end of this. But I can't trust you until I can trust what you're doing and why you're doing it, and that can't happen until I get some answers... and I don't know that even you can cheat well enough to give me them."

also, being human is what let's us bend the rules so hard. if we stop being human, start thinking like a fae, we will lose.

>>453407
Not exactly. We were thinking like a fae when we completely broke border rules, as evidenced by his eyes being black.

>>453389
"Anna, this is my ally Elle. Elle, this is my friend Anna.
I'm not ungrateful for your help, Elle, but you have an agenda. You've been dragging me blindly along to some goal, and you haven't much cared for telling me what's going on. If it weren't for you I'd probably be dead, but that man would still be alive. I trust you not to harm me much, but I care about other people.

What is it you want? What's your goal? What am I to you?

Unrelatedly, what can you tell me about Orion, Elle?"

Oh, also, whatever you go with, add this:
"You want me to trust you, Elle? We can start working on that right now.

Anna is mine, but I don't know enough to keep her safe and happy. If you want to earn my trust, you'll help me keep Anna safe and happy.
You'll have some trust just for agreeing, and earn more over time. If any harm comes to her or her happiness, then you'll lose trust.

You won't be able to do it if you don't have a few specific qualities, and I can trust in those.

Are you willing to earn my trust?"

She'll have to at least have humility, empathy, and trust in Evan to do it. Humility for treating Savanna with respect, empathy for being able to respond to her needs, and trust in Evan to let Savanna into the moon base and such on his say-so.

Stay in the fort until this mess can be sorted out. Elle is a wild card and has the potential to be very dangerous. She likely still needs Evan for her plans, so that should keep him safe and give him leverage in a negotiation, but I fear for Savannah's safety.

If I recall correctly, the fort is our home while we are present inside it. We also revoked our invitations to the fort recently. That should keep Elle at arms length until this situation has been defused.

Best case scenario: We learn a little more about Elle and we all become one big happy party.

Worst case scenario: Elle is a threat to Savannah's safety and we teleport her back to the relative safety of her own home.

Let me reiterate. STAY INSIDE THE FORT while you sort this mess out.

>STAY INSIDE THE FORT while you sort this mess out.

Agreed.

"You mean all I've done for YOU. You're using me Elle, don't pretend like you're not."

ChildOfAB 2012/09/13(Thu)20:36 No. 454426 ID: 4b44fc
File 134759377397.png - (588.56KB , 720x1753 , 82.png )

Anna looks frightened and grabs your arm. You try to stay calm, shaking off the sudden feeling of cold dread, and scan the gaps in the walls for any sign of Elle outside. "Elle?" you call out, "I don't-"
"Twenty one," she says, cutting you off. Her voice is unnervingly upbeat and singsong, made even more discomforting by its apparent lack of source. "Twenty one times you've called me by name in this conversation. I came running to your side for the first, of course. I will always come when you call, my love."
Something about her intonation in that last word chills you. "Elle, it's not that I don't appreciate what you're doing for me, but-"
"Of course it's not!" she says, cutting you off a second time. The cheerful quality of her voice seems especially forced now. "You're just hiding in your little playhouse, talking about me behind my back. I think I'd like to join the conversation. May I come in?"
You and Anna both meet each others' gaze with equal quantities of wide-eyed unease. You know that would be a bad idea, but a flat refusal seems unwise, too. "You said I was terrifying because I think like a human, right? I needed to talk to someone who wasn't one of you. I want to trust you, but I feel like you've got some other goal, like I'm just a piece in a bigger game you're playing."
"Oh, what does it matter, darling," she asks. "I'm giving you what all you people want. A tale to tell, a thrill, secrets, sex. Men fall in love for less. I know they do. Evan, you're going to invite me inside now."
Your heart skips a beat. She doesn't want you to have a choice, but you do. Inviting her in seems like enough of a bad idea. "No," you respond.
She laughs, quick and sharp. A low rumbling sound rises in intensity on all sides. "Evan, love, you have a much nicer home. You have a real fortress, a place where you are truly safe. It is not this place. You are sitting in a pile of sticks and string."
There is suddenly a loud and terrible rushing noise. Everything starts to move around you. Anna screams. Without even thinking, you grab her and duck, shielding her. The branches of your fort shatter and crunch, shards and splinters rush by in a terrible gust, and all is silent once again.
Elle looms over you. The light of day is not kind to her. Her pale skin seems sickly or dead, her white hair seems several shades too far from anything natural, and the sunlight glints off of too many teeth in her much-too-wide grin. "I was just being polite," she says, calm and quiet. She reaches down and traces one hand down your jaw, and puts the other one roughly on Anna's shoulder. Anna recoils and whimpers, and Elle jerks her away from you. You don't let go. "It's time for the whore to go now," Elle says, nodding her head as if miming her desired reaction from you.

don't blink, stare her in the eyes. she is borrowing your immunity to iron. it's yours, not hers. take it back. then go to the iron court.

There is a boundry between you and Anna and Elle make it real. She cannot touch you as you are mortal and she is not. She cannot touch Anna because she is mortal and Elle is not. When she does she goes... elsewhere.

>>454426
"I'd very much like to know how exactly you think you're going to get anything done if you make me resent and distrust you."

>>454426
Smile at her. "Now that's just mean. I'll take her home and be back with you in just a moment. Promise." Then slip borders with her to her house and say goodbye. Elle doesn't know about our little extra trick yet after all.

If you can look inhuman for the smile, that would be a plus... and Anna seeing that would be a nice touch. Drive the point that we're not meant for a simple human life anymore.

>>454426
Don't let her cow you into submission.
"Anna is my friend. Anybody who harms my friends is an enemy. If you harm Anna, you will become my enemy. You will not harm her in any way.
These are statements of fact.

If you trusted me you wouldn't try to control me. I've shown you more trust than you've shown me."

>>454435
Wait... Drinking blood is taking a person into yourself. I think providing blood might actually be the dominant role here.

Grab Elle and tell her she will treat Anna with respect.

She's been calling you "Love" this whole time. If she really loves you, you just CRUSHED her heart. The fact that she didn't just outright kill Anna in that case means she's restraining herself.

First, send Anna home. I remember several times that other fae pushed you over borders to teleport you without them following. Do that with Anna. Second, ask Elle if she really loves you. If she does, then you just really REALLY fucked up. Think back to everything she's done recently keeping that fact in mind. That should change how you look at her actions.

Don't take back Elle's iron immunity. This situation is not unrecoverable!

You know what, it seems like Evan's feelings for Elle changed drastically as soon as he woke up from the daze he was in after killing the hobo.

Maybe Evan should yell at her about it, to get it off his chest so they can cooperate like PEOPLE again.

>>454430
>>454445
Okay we need to go into appeasement mode without giving up ground. If we can do the fae face, do it. It might help mollify her. Get her to let go of Anna, so you can push her back into her house. Maybe phrase as showing her a little bit of what you learned you can do! Also, apologize for the abuse of her name. You were being silly and didn't realize how OBVIOUSLY important that was (No sarcasm. A fae's true name is SRS BISNESS)

>>454426
For being immortal she certainly is acting more -human.

Hmm, we may also want to mention that another fae (Orion, probably shouldn't say the name out loud though) was named prior to Elle during the conversation. For all we know there may be more unexpected company around. Also not sure how effective a barrier on Anna would be, I could easily be wrong but are we sure it would protect against Elle attacking with a mundane object?

>>454459
we cant create barriers, what we do is imagine/find borders to teleport... don't know where the barrier thing came from.

>>454445
I got the impression she doesn't know how love works, but she's trying anyway. She thinks if she throws enough sex and adventure at Evan then he'll love her. She doesn't think using him should affect how he feels about her. She's missing the human element of love. Her entire emotional spectrum is very foreign to us.

If we're going to start opposing Elle, I don't think talking is going to do much good. Just grab Anna and teleport with her to her house. I really don't think we're ready for that, though.

A better plan would be >>454445 send Anna home while not moving, yourself.

Go, "You're right, I /do/ have a real fortress. Do you want your invitation from that one rescinded, Elle, or are you going to let me have human friends? It's your choice."

>>454445
The kind of one-sided "love" that one stranger forces upon another is only damaging. We don't want it if we can safely escape it.

She seems pretty clearly an enemy at this point, working for her own best interests with complete disregard to our own, but we still have use for her, so don't kill her outright.

>>454445
REALLY. The fact that, due to her being restrained from explaining anything to us, perhaps due to her own nature, we went to a fellow human who might know more, crushed the poor, delicate man-killer's heart.

"'The whore'? She's the one in this clearing I haven't had sex with." and "You've done much for me- but if I keep stumbling from fight to pitfall to ambush without understanding anything, I'm eventually going to get myself killed." don't seem out of place here.

WE CAN STILL RECONCILE THIS SITUATION. She is really pissed off, and does not operate on our morality, but she has an investment in us and we in her. Elle is our one ally in this new world, stop trying to make her an enemy. EVAN NEEDS ELLE. For now.

>>455031
We're not trying to make Elle an enemy. She's accomplishing that on her own just fine. We know nothing about her motives. For all we know, she needs Evan to build her a court so that she can takeover the world and begin her reign of terror as the death queen of the universe.

We know very little about the fae. They are bound by rules, but we don't know the rules. Perhaps she truthfully can't tell us the truth because of fae rules. Alternatively, she could be taking advantage of our ignorance and is feeding us bullshit false rules in order to keep us in the dark. If the later is the case, then Anna is a huge threat to Elle's plans. That would explain why she is so desperate to split Evan and Anna apart.


We saw what Elle did to that monster thing. She is extremely dangerous. I am extremely worried about Anna's safety. I believe that Evan should do everything in his power to safeguard Anna. We could teleport her to her home, but Elle could potentially destroy Anna's home or endanger Anna's parents. I think the best way to protect Anna is to negotiate her safety. Make it very clear to Elle. Anna stays with you. If Elle does anything to harm Anna, her family, or her home, then you won't help her build her court.

Ideally we will be able to resolve this mess and keep them both as allies. If forced to make a decision, I'd throw my cards in with Anna. She's less likely to dispose of us the moment we cease being useful.

"I have a real fortress. It's right here. You are not invited. And the whore does have to go."

Stare at her.

"I'm done, Elle. I'm done being manipulated, pulled along, told what to do, being a part of a janky whatever-you-are conspiracy. You will leave. You will not come near me again. Or so help me god, I will find a way to use your name against you.

"You used your slim form and your tender lips to control me, once. But talking to my friend, I've discovered what a monster you are, what you've MADE me do, with words and assurances. I live for myself and my friends. If you want to be a part of that, earn it. No stealing, no tricking, you will WORK for my trust, with promises fulfilled and good will given."

We know Elle is dangerous. We also know that if shit does go down, we can't take her. We CANNOT PROTECT ANNA FROM ELLE. We need to get Elle to back down ON HER OWN. The only way we can do that is if we get her to calm down. Do you guys WANT a BAD END? No matter what we say right now, Anna will understand. Even if we appear to sell her out or side with Elle, Anna will forgive us. We don't know what kind of grudge Elle can hold, but you guys are about to turn her into a woman scorned. I Guarantee that will not end well. SIDE WITH ELLE.

Elle destroying that monster does prove she's a more VALUABLE ally than witch girl, though. We have a prince trying to kill us- he won't exactly be gently hugged to death (probably?).

>>455144
I'm with the 'teleport her home, stay to deal with Elle' camp.

when she destroyed the monster she waited until we dared her to, but the fact she blew up the fort means she could have at any time but WOULDN'T. she could of easily earned more trust by doing it freely.

>>455318
I don't really know how this stuff works, but I feel like there's an order of magnitude difference in the energy required between breaking something a child made out of materials he found in the woods and rendering a large, dangerous living creature into a completely unidentifiable bloody paste. On the other hand, maybe magic doesn't really care about the energy involved and just cares that something is being broken. Elle's explanation at the time was "Games make us stronger together", but I suppose it's entirely possible she's yanking Evan's chain. I've been operating this whole time under the assumption that the fair folk don't lie (at least not directly) but on re-skimming the prior chapters I don't see anything to indicate that that's the case in this setting.

I still think that Anna will be more valuable than Elle in the long run. We should do what we can to keep her safe. Evan certainly seems to be an important player in whatever the fuck is going on, but for the moment the extent of his abilities is teleportation. I doubt that he could protect Anna from Elle's wrath if things become violent. His best bet for keeping Anna safe is probably negotiating with Elle for her safety.

Evan's cooperation is his biggest bargaining chip at the moment. If he has to continue playing the role as a pawn in Elle's game for the short term, fine. But it should be on his terms. If Elle wants Evan's help, then Elle will have to guarantee the safety of Anna (and her family, and her home. The devil is in the details).

I'm assuming that Elle desperately wants that new court. I'm under the impression that Evan is supposed to play some key role in the creation of the court (If she doesn't need Evan, why is she involving him in its creation at all? Why go through all this seduction and manipulation to try and get him wrapped around her finger?). His refusal to cooperate with Elle may very well be suicide for Evan. While I don't think that Elle gives a fuck about Evan's safety, his demise would most certainly completely ruin Elle's court plan. From where I'm standing, Elle doesn't have a choice in the matter. If she wants her court, then she is forced to agree to Evan's terms.

This could buy Anna the time she needs to do some more extensive research. Evan's deal should probably include some means of keeping in contact with Anna (I'd push for the freedom to visit whoever he wants whenever he wants). Her research is next to useless if we can't learn the results.

I'd still prefer a solution where we become one big party of 3, but that might not be possible at this time.

ChildOfAB 2012/09/21(Fri)21:40 No. 456627 ID: 4b44fc
File 134828880167.png - (716.77KB , 720x1910 , 83.png )

You shake your head numbly. Frustration, pity, and fear make terrible battle for control of your actions. Something clicks into place. Whichever wins, you know what you have to do first. There is a border now, between you and Elle. That's all it takes. "Sorry, Anna," you say, weakly.
"EVAN! Don't let go!" she shouts, fearful. You are helping her, she just doesn't understand.
You push her away, towards Elle. She disappears back to her house.
Elle, suddenly unencumbered, tips over backwards. Her black eyes grow wide as she falls. You realize this is the first time you've seen her shocked. The forest seems to have gone silent around you, as if it shares the sentiment.
You rise to your feet as Elle scrambles to hers. "Wh...WHERE WAS THE BORDER?" she yells, her head darting from side to side.
You take a deep breath. Your voice stays quiet. "Why do you think I will tell you when you've done nothing but make me resent and distrust you?"
"STOP IT!" she screeches. "STOP DISTRUSTING ME! After all this! What else do you want? TELL ME!" Her voice cracks. You think you see the glint of a tear in her eye. She suddenly throws herself at you, pushing you down. "Tell me...tell me you love me."
She doesn't want you to have a choice, but you do.

>>456627
"I think I did, until you had me kill that guy."

"i want to"

she can't give you a straight answer for no reason. she CAN'T. so say "truth or dare" and if she picks truth ask "do YOU love me?" if she says yes then i'll trust her, the games restrict as much free as they grant.

"You don't know what love is, Elle."

Sex isn't love Elle, and saving a person's life doesn't make them like you. And power? What use does a boy have for power? I was happy being just a boy.

To love someone is to care for them, to take their own thoughts and feelings into consideration. You've never done that for me so how can I feel love for you?

Quit Shutting Elle down. I honestly have no Idea what to do in this situation. I know we shouldn't just shut her down.

Lets go the fae route and be indirect. Say that you Don't love anna. or something.

No lectures, though.

>>456627
"You want me to trust you? To be loyal to you? To obey you?
Love isn't expecting trust, loyalty, and obedience; it's giving them. Love isn't exploiting weakness in somebody else; it's making yourself weak against them.

Love isn't certain. When you give somebody your love you aren't sure they'll you love back. You give them your loyalty and obedience and make yourself helpless against them, because you trust them.

If you love me, with real love, then you will obey me and you will be loyal to me, because you trust me.

I loved you, Elle, but you never showed me love. You used me, and things that made me feel terrible.

If you want me to love you again, then first you'll have to show me real love. For humans this would be a long and difficult process, but you can skip most of that.

You can make yourself unable to break an agreement, right?
Swear you'll give me your obedience, loyalty, and trust. You can chose how strongly you wish to be under my control, and how strong that is tells me how much you love me.

If it seems like a one-sided deal, that's because it is. Like I said, love isn't certain. You'll just have to trust me."

>>456651
>Swear you'll give me your obedience, loyalty, and trust.
She cheats the rules, and her promises. They all do. This is not going to work out smoothly, even if she did it.

>>456627
"Love comes from understanding, not sex. I'm trying and I'm here for you but it needs to go both ways. I know it's hard because we're so different We'll work on it, alright?"

Then just hold her for a while.

>>456627
How can you trust her when she has consistently avoided explaining anything to you, when she condescends to you, when she serves her own interests, when she takes what is yours?

oh oh. say to prove that she loves you, she must give you something, without expecting anything in return, because after you get the gift, you will only think about if you love her, not guarantee you will. and it must be important, not a flower from the field or something.

>>456731
Eh I think she'd just say she's already given us our own court or something

Idea: Ask why she wants us to love her.

>>456733

This sounds good.

well, fuck.

After rereading a couple times something popped out at me: she's trying to command Evan there, to make him say he loves her. But the command isn't "tell me if you love me or not". It's "tell me you love me".
We know that people can choose not to follow a command if it goes against something they feel strongly about, right? At least, that's how I am interpreting it. Failure to obey "tell me if you love me or not" means you feel strongly that she shouldn't know whether you love her or not, which is an edge case sort of thing with a low chance of happening. In other words, she would be pretty much guaranteed a "yes" or "no".
On the other hand, failure to obey "tell me you love me" indicates not only do you not love her, but you feel strongly enough about not loving her that you can't even say you do to make her feel better. And that's a much worse situation for her.
So why didn't she command, "Tell me if you love me or not"? I think it's because she already knows the answer is no. She's not going to take an "I love you" response to mean that we actually love her, she's going to take it to mean that we're not so far away from loving her that we can't even bring ourselves to say it.
tl;dr: say "I love you" but you don't have to mean it.

ChildOfAB 2012/09/23(Sun)23:13 No. 457468 ID: 4b44fc
File 134846718684.png - (490.59KB , 720x1258 , 84.png )

You look Elle in the eye. "Do you love me?"
She recoils a little. "You can't even say it," she says, quietly.
"No, Elle, listen. This is important. Love can't be one way," you respond.
She looks angry again. "WHAT? YES IT CAN, EVAN," she yells, "Of course it can! You don't even know what you're talking about! It happens all the time! I've seen it!"
You take a deep breath. "So you're saying you don't? But you want me to love you? How does that work?" Elle sits back, taking her weight off your shoulders. She mumbles something under her breath, but you can't make it out. "What?" you ask.
"You're asking a cloud to go swimming," she says.
It takes you a second to parse the saying. "Clouds can't swim, is that what you're saying? You can't love?"
"Of course I can love!" she snaps. "It's you! You and all the humans think love means something stupid and weird. You don't even know what it means! You all think it's something different. I tried to figure it out, I tried to learn, I tried to do everything. For you, all of it. But it didn't work, you don't love me, and you're running off sharing all your secrets with the other stupid girl because she's got the same stupid ideas you do."
"I don't love-well, I'm not in love with Anna," you say. "I don't think I've ever been in love, really."
Elle droops a little. It's hard to tell with her black eyes, but it seems like she's staring off into space. "If...you ever do decide to try it, will you try it with me?" she asks.
You sigh. "Why do you want me to love you so badly, anyway?"
She runs her hand through your hair and looks sad. "I just...I don't know. Don't you want someone to love you?"
"I guess," you respond, "but you don't love me, not even with whatever definition you use."
She finally shakes her head. "No, I don't. You wouldn't want that, anyway."
"I wouldn't?" you ask.
She slumps over on your shoulder and sighs. "Trust me," she says. "Please?"

"What I'm getting from this is that we're both WAY out of our depths. So it's confession time."

We need more information.

"well, since you admitted it, i can give you another shot."

>>457468
Sure, okay, now that she's dropped the big act she seems a lot more trustworthy. It seems like that was why she was all mysterious and manipulative- she was trying to engage you with mystique and adventure.

But we're not gonna trust her completely yet. She should understand that takes time. Ask her about that weird wind power she's got. Can she give you any hints on how to use it yourself?

Well the poor girl is trying, I'll give her that. I think right now is her being more honest and human than we've ever seen her.

Answer her "Sure." Then hold her a bit closer and give her a kiss on the forehead. Because that's a lot more like the kind of love we understand. Then to show trust, tell her about what you've learned about barriers.

Tell her that we aren't interested in giving up all our power by being in love with someone who doesn't love us. At the very least, there ought to be equality in love.

Privately, to yourself, understand that if she loved you and you didn't love her, that'd be fine, too.

>>457478
This guy is right.

>>457468
"Trust is part of the problem. We're not in love, but we can still be friends. I'm going to need you to trust me more, though"
Sigh
"Ok, you want to know why I went to Anna? Because she's been abused by one of your kind, and I wanted to help her protect herself.
That's something friends do - they do what they can to help each other.
I hoped she might be able to tell me more about the rules since they don't apply to her, but she didn't know anything more than I did.
Of course, the reason you would care about is that I need human contact to think like a human. That's like my entire superpower, right? Being able to bend the rules so far they look broken? I can't do that if I stop thinking like a human, and I can't think like a human if I don't spend time with them. You keep trying to pull me away from humans, but they're where I get my strength.
I trust Anna. Trust in my trust of her.

... That guy who was toying with Anna. You heard the name he went by, but I dunno if that's a fake name or not. You know anything about him?

What should I call your kind, anyway? Anna thought you were demons, at least one of you is known as a fairy.

What I'm hearing from this is she wants Evan to love her exclusively, because if he loved anyone else she would get jealous. Even though she can't/won't love him back. May I be the first to say, "Fuck that."
It makes me wonder what fae love is, since she seems to think Evan wouldn't like it.
I recommend friendzoning her.

Well at least Elle is no longer in murder-mode. She also seems more talkative than usual. Take advantage of that. Keep her talking. DO NOT LET HER SILENCE THINGS WITH A FUCK.

Let her know that you want to trust her. While she has done a lot for Evan, he really knows next to nothing about her. Opening up about herself will be a huge step towards earning Evan's trust.

What is the fae definition of love? How does it differ from human love? Which type of love does she want from Evan?

What is Elle's motivation? What are her goals? What are her plans for the new court?

Elle is our friend. So is Anna. We might still be able to form one big happy party. We may be able to convince Elle that Anna is a potential ally rather than a rival. Anna has been hurt by the fae. Fae that are probably aligned with the fae that have hurt Evan. Evan, Anna, and Elle all share a common enemy.

Ultimately we may be able to get Elle to realize that her outrage at Anna was a misunderstanding. We may even be able to get her to apologize to Anna for frightening her. The definitions of love and friendship may vary between humans and fae, but I bet that the concept of an enemy is the same in both cultures. For the time being, it might be easier to focus on the angle that we are allies because we share a common foe.

>>457468
sorry, Elle. just a 'please' isn't going to cut it.. trust has to be earned.

>>457478
Yes. Might want to point out that right now she was being honest, and that makes trust.
Maybe she has some issues with the whole love thing, you should know by now how easy it is for bad things to happen to someone... even someone of your and her kind. So maybe you shouldn't be too harsh on her and shouldn't push her too far.

Its worth breaking this down things too. She protected you, she has helped you gain power, build your other fort which she calls the red court, she seems honest in her desire for you to love her. where you are having issues is the secrets, and wondering the reasons for why things are done (the fruit, the blood, the fort, etc). More answers are needed.

But remember the rules, iron hurts them, they can't enter places, they can't answer many questions... They can cheat, and you can cheat. but there are rules. She couldn't answer your questions so she asked you questions that made you guess the answer. So the rules could be part of why she is keeping so many secrets, so ask her more questions and guess more answers. And maybe their love has rules too.

>>457540
What? you barely know anna. You ARE one of Elle's "kind" (or at least, half of you), and you went to anna for answers and someone who can talk to you not because you have some "trust" or "love" going on with her.

"I'll trust you as far as I can throw you" and leave it at that.

How much trust is she asking you for anyway? There could be very good reasons for her to not love you. There are creatures in folklore whose love kills and that is a strong candidate for what she's trying to say without directly saying it.

A more productive line of questioning would be to ask what she can tell you about why it's so hard for you to get answers.

God damn, I haven't checked on this quest in months and it hasn't progressed too far. Guess /tg/chan really is a lot slower. Anyway, good read as always OP. Keep up the good work.