#and there are others that overlap so he’s not the capital g god of them

[ashestoashesjc]

A Necromancer & His Zombie Boyfriend On A Couple's Retreat

Short Story 1/2/(3)/4/5/6/7/8/9/10

"RrRRrrrr... grrr? <Hey, uh, babe... seen my arm anywhere?>" rang Sett's voice throughout their cigar box of a house as he rummaged through closets, opened cabinets, overturned couch cushions. 

Shutting and latching the front door behind him, Ulrick began flipping through the stack of envelopes clutched in his right hand. "Huh? Oh…”

“Okay, so… don’t get mad,” Ulrick began, as meekly and guilt-tinged as one can make a shout. “But... there was this huge, I mean HUGE silverfish…” 

“GRrrr! Rrrrr. <Dude! Not cool,>” could be heard as Sett stomped his way to the foyer. 

“I know! I’m sorry! I’m weak!” moaned Ulrick. 

Sett sighed as he entered the cove and laid his single remaining hand on Ulrick’s left shoulder, the other sleeve draped flaccidly at his side. “Grrrr. <Well, yeah.>” he said. Ulrick snickered. 

“You know, having your boyfriend kill a bug for you is exceedingly normal,” Ulrick said, separating the bills from the letters that weren’t bills. There were very few that weren’t bills. “Almost conventional.” 

“Rrr. <True,>” Sett replied. “Rggrrrr. <Probably while the arm’s still attached, though.>”

“A mere quibble.” 

“Rrrrgrrr? <So, where is it now?>” Sett asked. 

“Ugh. Still getting cozy with the silverfish, I’d imagine,” Ulrick admitted, guilt creeping back into his voice. He covered his eyes with his free hand and shuddered. “In… the shower.”

Sett sucked air through his teeth in a compassion-filled cringe. 

“Yeah,” Ulrick sighed, resigned to his trauma. 

“Grrrr. <Don’t worry,>” said Sett. “Rraarr. <I got it.>” 

Ulrick slid his hand down his face with a grateful groan. “God, I love you.” Sett pulled him forward by his collar and pecked his forehead.

Continuing to sort through the mail, Ulrick came to a red envelope and, seeing it addressed to Sett, handed it over. “Looks important.”

Confusion clouded Sett’s eyes for the first few, slow moments spent undoing the envelope’s seal flap, until suddenly, a surge of realization like lightning drove him to violently tear the crimson paper away.

As he scanned the contents of the letter contained within, words failing to do his emotional state justice, Sett began to fist pump wildly, God help anyone in the flight path of his singular elbow. Ulrick looked on in entranced bewilderment.

“Was there itching powder in that envelope?” asked Ulrick.

Sett shoved the creased letter in Ulrick’s face, his manic energy not yet dissipated. Ulrick took it and held it out at arm’s length until his eyes brought the words into focus. 

“A couple’s retreat?” he wondered aloud, lowering the paper enough to peer over the top at Sett.  

“Grrgrrrr. <An all-expenses paid couple’s retreat.> Rrrrrr. <At a swanky resort.> GrrrrRr. <Complete with water skis.>”

“This is from a contest?” he asked, rotating and inspecting the sheet. “When did we enter a contest?”

“Rrggrrrr? <You know those entry slips we’re getting in the post all the time?>”

“The ones I’m always throwing away? I’m familiar.” 

“RrrRrrrrr ggrrrr. <Well, your aim could use some work, because some of them wind up in the mailbox,>” said Sett, with a shrug.

The sound that next filled the room, colored with exasperated mirth, was one Sett was used to Ulrick making, though one that never stopped bringing a flush of heat to the place where his heart used to be. 

He grabbed Ulrick by the hips and the two began to sway back and forth. “Rrrrrr. <Just imagine it,>” he purred dreamily. “GrrrRRrrrr rrrrRrrr grrr...arrrr? <Massages, rock-climbing, a luau. And… did I mention waterskiing?>”

Swaying still, Ulrick looked up with his head cocked. "I've... never heard you mention waterskiing before."

"GrrRrrrrrr. <I enjoy a lot of things I don't talk about.> Rgrrrrgrrr. <Like country music, or bad chick lit,>" Sett said before twirling and dipping Ulrick in a blur. "Rraarrrr. <I'm a multi-layered zombie.>"

Breaking clumsily away from the songless dance and squeezing the bridge of his nose, Ulrick set down the remainder of the mail on the side table by the entrance and looked his boyfriend over. “It’s totally free?”

“Grrarrr. <It’s totally free,>” confirmed Sett. 

Ulrick raised an eyebrow. “No catch?” 

“Rrr… <Well…>”

-

“And streeetch! That’s right! Streeetch!” 

At the front of Meadow Grove Resort’s famed yoga studio balanced - one foot planted on the ground, the other hooked deftly behind her neck - Chrysanthemum Smith, a remarkably limber 60-year-old instructor, urging her out-of-shape contest winning students to achieve the same feats of flexibility.   

All around Ulrick and Sett, a pretzel factory’s soon-to-be-discarded collection of heinous, gnarly undesirables had been given life in the form of sweaty middle Americans. 

That pretzels went through a less agonizing process being baked at 500 degrees was a fact Ulrick was both confident in and envious of. His legs were angled in a way he was sure he’d feel for weeks to come. 

Sett, on the other hand, had apparently been a contortionist in a past life, the way he bent himself into poses, well, a pretzel would gawk at, holding each position stoically before moving gracefully on to the next. It also helped that he couldn’t feel what would leave most tendons shredded rags.

Ulrick gave up the pursuit of dislocating his pelvis and instead went to poke Sett in the cheek. Through his mask, Sett made a chomping motion at the finger, though remained otherwise totally still. "Okay, but this kind of bites, right?" Ulrick signed. 

"A little. And not in the fun way," Sett signed back.

On a pair of blue, rubber mats to their left were two women - one in a biker's jacket and tattered, patched jeans, short red hair tied into a haphazard ponytail; the other a dark woman donning a shaved head, flower-patterned maxi dress, and combat boots - the former of whom suddenly grabbed Ulrick's attention with a nod. 

"You're telling me," she signed. 

And in an instant, they were no longer alone in the hazy, secluded sphere that made their reality.

So taken aback was he that he blurted aloud, "You sign?" 

The yoga instructor shushed him from her place at the head of the wide room, leading him to duck down sheepishly. With the forced inclusion of an overly casual air, he said more than asked, "You sign."

"Oh, yeah," the woman chuckled gruffly. "Mom's Deaf." 

Taking a sudden interest in the conversation, Sett's head swiveled to the leather jacket-clad woman. "Shit yeah!" he signed with fervor, eliciting a harsh snort from the woman. The instructor's head whipped around to glare her way, but went ignored. 

Sett's hands jumbled for a moment before he continued. "I mean, I'm sure that must have been very difficult for your family and--"

She gave a dismissive wave of the hand. "Nah, don't worry about it. She's capital 'D' Deaf. A congenital thing. Whole family's been signing forever."

Her wife - Jen, they later learned - chimed in with, "Di does it at home, too. She's taught me half the lyrics to Boys for Pele." 

"Wow!" Ulrick said with teeth-clenching enthusiasm. "That's so great! Isn't that so great, Sett?"

The mask did nothing to conceal Sett's raised, beaming features. "That's so great!" he signed. 

"I'm sorry!" bellowed the lithe yogi, shattering all delusions of serenity. "Am I boring you?" 

Several overlapping voices came to the general consensus of "Christ, yes."

One of the husbands, portly and somewhat resembling the famously affable capybara, asked, somewhat less affably, why they were being stretched into taffy when they should be outside taking one-on-one lessons with the beach volleyball instructor. He was joined by a few surly “yeah!”s. 

They were met with an unimpressed crossing of the arms. Though it should be noted Smith’s foot was still being held comfortably behind her head. 

"I would suggest, in the future, that you more closely scrutinize contest entries," Yogi Smith advised in as calm a manner as it seemed she could now manage, though with an unmistakable edge to her voice. "In order to partake in our facility’s more... physically involved activities, you’ll first need to align and cleanse your mental, emotional, and spiritual energies.”

This provoked a studio-wide groan, with the exclusion of Jen, who seemed just eager enough to cancel out the cloud of grim impatience encircling her. 

“Unless, of course,” Smith said, shifting poses to something favoring the letter ‘G’, “you’d prefer to construct your own schedules. In which case, a full price admission to Meadow Grove Resort remains available.”

She sleekly extended her right leg, pointing its foot pin-straight toward the sliding studio doors. “Don’t, as the masters of yore were wont to say, let the door hit ya.” 

When no one moved and the room went quiet enough to hear an acupuncture needle drop, Smith resumed a standing position and bowed three times to each division of the studio. “Namaste. Namaste. Namaste.” 

Chrysanthemum Smith had in no way undersold how ‘aligned and cleansed’ couple’s therapy and its airings of dirty laundry and subsequent ferocious dissolutions of decades of marriage; couple’s pottery, the same thing but with clay vases; and couple’s finger-painting, a bonding exercise in shared humiliation, would make their minds, emotions, and souls through sheer gut-rending hilarity.

Ulrick almost didn’t want to stop watching people who, hours ago, seemed all confidence and bravado, now being brought to tears by an instructor’s criticism of their macaroni art lacking ‘depth.’ 

But their confinement was over and they were free to roam the grounds as they saw fit and Sett, without even feigning to look for a map of the resort, made a beeline for the largest body of water (and the largest gathering of humans) he could sniff. Ulrick was still surprised at times by how agile Sett could be on his feet when on the hunt for blood - or recreational watersports - and struggled to keep up. 

Their long-awaited waterskiing adventure began almost as soon as they arrived at the lakeside, the instructor needing a volunteer at that instant to man the skis while he lectured another guest on the controls of the boat. At nearly a head taller than anyone else present, Sett didn’t need much more than a raised hand to stand out. 

Things were going great; Sett mounted on skis as long as he was tall, the boat revving greedily for take off. At Sett’s thumbs up, the runabout hammered off in a thunderous roar. And then, all at once, things were going wrong. 

The envisioned majesty of skimming the motionless calm of the crystal river was halted abruptly with a leaden Sett stumbling mid-lake in his skis, trying and failing to correct himself, going feet-over-head, and sinking like an anchor to the agitated silt of the riverbed below. 

Ulrick, though he jumped with concern at the first hint of a misstep, expected a brief swim back, perhaps slowed a bit - but not much - by Sett's stoney limbs. He’d been the star diver of his local swimming hole as a teen and still maintained some of the underwater dexterity, though nowadays tended to lurk the floors of bodies of water like a carnivorous bottom-feeder; eating habits included.

But then a few minutes passed, and nothing. A lifeguard and two of the more experienced swimmers among the guests plunged into the river and searched for fifteen minutes, cracking the surface now and again for a gulp of air, all to no avail. The water was too cloudy with sediment to see past a certain depth, and the orange-purples of dusk were beginning to settle in. They'd need to return in the morning with a diving team.

It'd now been forty-five minutes, and three of the resort’s other guests were consoling Ulrick, one herself on the verge of waterworks. They'd just witnessed a man - someone's significant other - torn tragically from life's teat, and in front of the man he loved, no less. 

Ulrick, for his part, was positively miffed. 

"When I get my hands on him..." Ulrick started, before one of the grievers tossed him a teary-eyed questioning look. "Er, that is... would that I could only put my hands on him... again..." he corrected. 

Just as Ulrick had begun mentally reviewing the basics of the Arts of Throttling, a movement, barely noticeable, shook the surface of the lake. Then bubbles, then the full break of the water as a head rose into view. Then the screams of onlookers as, in the fading light, a ghastly lake monster began its murderous approach. Then screams of a different kind as people began to make the connection proper. Then there was weeping, fainting, more than one declaration of faith renewed. It was a miracle!

Later, after insistences for medical attention were politely but firmly refused and the religious stragglers begging for just a smell of Sett’s waterlogged clothes were shooed away, Ulrick asked why he waited so long to resurface, to which Sett said, "GrrrrRRrr. <Well, at first I was just sort of embarrassed.> RrrrrrrGrrrRrrr? <Then I thought, "How often do these people see miracles?>"

"Oh, sure," groaned Ulrick. "A man comes out of a lake after half an hour and it's a miracle. A man comes out of a grave after a few months and it's "Grab the torches and pitchforks, everyone!""

"Rrrr. <Babe.>"

Ulrick gave a pouty grumble. "I'm just saying. One's a little more miraculous, is all." 

Sett pulled Ulrick's head into his chest and stroked his hair. "GrrrRrrrRrrr. <Shh, I know, dude, I know.>" His heavy, soaked clothes and lack of body heat didn't chill Ulrick as much as they should have, and though a fine coating of sand covering him from head to toe gritted against Ulrick's cheek, it only made Ulrick rub his face in rebelliously. 

"Okay," Ulrick said, resting his fists on Sett's chest and gazing up into his eyes. "What's the next activity? I think we’re... due-au for a luau?" The moment the words left his lips, his face collapsed into disgusted regret.

“Rgrrr... <Actually…>” Sett said, wrenching off his mask and shaking the excess water from his hair, teasing a blush out of Ulrick. “GgrrrRrrrr? <Doesn’t watching the stars by the lake sound pretty relaxing?>”

Ulrick grinned and took a seat on the shoreline, running his hands through the tufts of ryegrass stretching out in waves around him. He tapped a spot to his right and Sett, half-cocked smile in tow, came lumbering over to take it. 

Hours flurried past, changing nothing about the image of the intimately silent pair but the number of stark white pinpricks in the sky they beheld. 

They threatened to sit silently basking in each other forever. 

And then Sett said, “GRrrrrgrrr, rrgrrr, graargrr. <So, Diane and Jen gave me their number, and they want to plan an outing.>” 

Unease shot through Ulrick’s veins, but he held his tongue in search of the correct words. “O-oh?” 

“Grrr? Rrgrrrrr. <Isn’t that cool? People want to spend time with us,>” said Sett, ensorcelled with the twinkle of every new star. “Rrrrr. <With me.>”

“That might be…” began Ulrick, before noticing the glimmer in Sett’s eyes and faint lift at the corners of his mouth as he stared up towards a great unknown. He sighed. “It’s going to be great.” 

Sett rested his hand on Ulrick’s, their fingers interlocking. He smiled, and the two gazed into an ever-darkening firmament, speckled with a thousand stars and a thousand futures. 

#A Necromancer & His Zombie Boyfriend #short stories #supernatural #mlm #wlw #queer #series #A Necromance #original #fiction

[tlaquetzqui]

I know you talk about henotheism and you have said maybe there are other spirits doing beneficial things besides the God of Abraham. But isn’t that against the articles of faith? The Nicene Creed says we believe in(!) One God. Not that we only worship(!) One.

One God with a capital G. He is not a god with a lowercase G at all, so he can’t be the only one, whether there are any or not, or whatever they are. It’s not henotheism. It’s more like Buddhism: there is only one Ultimate Reality, and the gods are just conditioned, contingent beings, same as we are, and thus cannot save us from our separation from Ultimate Reality. (Interestingly the Shema Yisrael, the Jewish creed, does not actually say “one god,” eloah echad. It says “one ‘word used for avoiding the Tetragrammaton’”, adonai echad. Neatly sidestepping whether there are any other elohim. And obviously there is only one Adonai.)

God is only “God” in relation to the Israelites because for some reason (I have a couple possibly overlapping theories), he chose to approach them as if he were some little Ba’al, like Marduk to Babylon. But that is no more his real place in the Chain of Being than the Queen of England is just a duke, even though that is her title (gender invariable) in the Channel Islands.

[nightblink]

Blink Reads Oathbringer - Chapters 55-57, Interludes 4-6

Chapter Fifty-Five – Alone Together

I'm calling it, it's Sazed. Balancing Preservation and Ruin ain't easy. SAAAAAAZE~

RLAIN. RLAIN RLAIN RLAIN OH FUCKYEAH WE'RE GETTING A RLAIN CHAPTER BLESS U BRANDOSANDO

It'd be really cool if that became a thing, if humans (Rosharan- variant 'humans' at the very least) could somehow learn to hear the Rhythms and get a better understanding of the Listeners/Singers/Parshendi. A step towards peace.

[winces] Yeaaaah, I noted back in Rock's chapter how watching the humans 'invade' and build in Narak must be really, really difficult for him.

The last. Oh, Rlain.

He still feels heavily ostracized. Even with him being Bridge Four, he's still set apart from them in ways they'll never be able to truly understand.

(okay, but an archer squire Windrunner. that could be really cool and useful.)

Please take Rock's advice. Bounce some stones off of their skulls when they deserve it.

Sando please let Rlain fly with the others.

Yeah. They were so afraid of becoming those things once again that they assassinated Gavilar and brought the wrath of warlike Alethkar down upon their heads.

Can we get more Renarin+Rlain scenes and friendship can we please-

Okay but with Rlain attuning to Rhythms and now with Rock's family around (we at least know that Rock can pick up on them ever so faintly) I'll bet one of them starts humming along with him, even if they don't realize what they're doing.

!!!! Skin patterns have/had an importance or maybe even function among the Parshendi? Can they change, with or without changing forms, or are they genetic?

Oh come on, guys, you're getting worked up over Renarin maybe learning to read? Kaladin, please talk some sense into them.

EXTRA MANLY. LOPEN I'M WH E E ZI NG

(though tbh that's actually a great way to put it)

Thank you Kaladin for putting things into words that they can all understand and mull over on their own. Hopefully they'll even start internalizing it.

Rock is the unofficial psychiatrist of Bridge Four, apparently. Ahhh, but they're all a big support group for eac other in the end (yes, Teft, this is a feelings-sharing party, now join the club). Alone together indeed.

[winces] Save for the one even more alone. You can't blame Rlain for his frustration.

At least Kaladin's willing to admit that he doesn't know, but it willing to try anyway.

Chapter Fifty-Six – Always With You

Ooo, this is the first time Hoid's chatted with Harmony? No interaction before this letter. Not that Hoid would have reason to do so, but you never know…

“How do you know so much about Adonalsium” HE WAS KINDA THERE, SAZE

oh shit oh shit oh shit Dalinar's going back to the Feverstone Keep vision, Jasnah and Navani with him. We're gonna find out something important, this chapter, this is a Recreance vision-!

He's getting a lot better at the vision-transfer, but I don't think it's technically part of his Surges? That's a complete unknown, though, since it was Honor himself that left the visions.

Timeline note for the Recreance – maybe 2,000 years ago.

(side note, but listening to the Journey OST during this part is jiving really well. it's shiver-inducing.)

False Desolation. What. Jasnah, plz continue your elaboration.

Mmm, that makes sense, especially with what we know of the Parshendi so far and their efforts to fight off the Voidspren. Of course Vorin teachings would deny there were any survivors. But how the Recreance, then….

Oh, hey! Gawx! You've gotten a lot snarkier over time in these visions, at least from that fist quip.

I wonder if Honor included the dying screams of the spren into this vision, and he's feeling it at the very edge of his senses.

Speaking of which, this must mean that Honor was Shattered at some point after the Recreance.

Gawx honestly does have it hard, and now he's pulled at in different directions by the people who want to see their homeland safe and the Blackthorn who wants to save Roshar. It's not an easy place he's in.

Shivers there, Dalinar. Good speech.

Technically, Gawx, Dalinar owns up to what he's done – or at least what he can remember? He doesn't deny the Blackthorn, but he is trying to be a different man than he once was.

….what's happening. The vision's not ending. And this man in white and gold….?

ODIUM

FUCK FUCK FUUUUUUCK

AND WHAT DO YOU MEAN YOU'VE “ALWAYS BEEN WITH [DALINAR]”

ARE YOU SPECIFICALLY THE REASON THE BLACKTHORN IS AS HE WAS. NOT ONE OF THE UNMADE, BUT YOU YOURSELF

FUCKING HELL

Chapter Fifty-Seven – Passion

Oh good it's another Dalinar chapter, because if it had changed POVs I would have rioted

Oooo, calling Hoid back to Scadrial, Sazed? To speak with the kandra?

YEP BACK THE FUCK AWAY DALINAR, HE IS BEYOND YOU RIGHT NOW

g o d the Stormfather is whimpering and if that doesn't tell you how much you need to fear…

Dalinar looks like he's gonna drop on the spot of a panic attack and tbh I already would be

Don't you dare call Dalinar 'son'.

And there's Odium himself confirming that this Stormfather-bonding is different than all the others before it; I was right.

What shackles you, Odium. What is it specifically.

SHIT, DALINAR, WATCH YOUR WORDS

'Intent' is capitalized and obviously means just that but does it also mean that it has something to do with the broader spectrum of power

Consequences aka probably ridding himself of Roshar a la Alderaan

Oooo, not only are you bound by the Shards themselves, but even the Splinters here somehow have power wrapped up with you.

Now see, here's where we come to Odium Blatantly Fucking Lying, because if the embodiment of Honor cared only for bonds and oaths themselves, then you wouldn't see any difference between Honorspren and Highspren. Not to mention the Passion thing (likely subtly sliding in a tie to the Thaylen Passions there as well). You, care? Love? HAH.

[squints @ Odium] While I can believe you had something to do with the Recreance, it's definitely not as you're explaining it.

Ohhhh, is that confirmation that the Nightwatcher is Cultivation – or at least an avatar of hers?

Oh shit, oh shit, a vision of sorts, touching the power of the Odium-shard itself-

...what's there. Something Not Of The Vision. Oh man is it Lift. Please let it be Lift. Let her flip off Odium himself.

It IS.

But. Odium couldn't sense her? Not entirely? Cultivation DID give her something special

“What was that thing, tight-butt?” Lift you are the pride of Roshar and the gem of all worlds

oh my god please make the first thing you do in Urithiru stealing Dalinar's lunch

That's… definitely a way to end Part Two with a bang.

Interlude Four – Kaza

Oooo, we're back out on the ocean!

!!!! Someone else with visions? I don't think this is another Bondsmith, but maybe another Truthwatcher…?

'hirelings out of Steen' Steen, Steen, where's that map… ah! South of Shinovar, east of Aimia, and probably the closest country to Aimia, save that island chain stretching out from Tukar

Ahhh, she's an older lady, too! Good, we need all the older ladies we can get.

Soulcaster? But does she have one or is he calling her that as a title?

So, they were braving the slower Everstorm winds, huh – or… not the Everstorm, but a strange, strong storm that has nothing to do with either? Either way, they're aiming for Aimia. Now there's a land that we need to know more of.

Ahhh, so she's a Soulcaster (but probably not an ardent because Not Vorin) and looking to reverse the whole turning-to-stone bit. ….understandable, but you think Aimia holds the answers? Maybe? Why? Is it because it's the last place you have to look, or do they have some sort of rumoured super-medicine there?

Well, there's a rumour of some kind, at least.

…..not stone, smoke.

Oh that is interesting. The transformation with Soulcaster use must be dependent on certain variables – what kind of transfigurations they most commonly do, perhaps – considering that all of those we saw at the Shattered Plains were turning to stone, not smoke, and most of their job would be to make buildings and food.

Ooof, a prisoner of her own family, kept for their use. Even without the whole 'dying' issue, it's no wonder she fled. (Assuming she wasn't just making up the story to scare off the sailor.)

Huh. I wonder if extended soulcasting starts to connect one to Shadesmar each time they use it, or if it's only when the person starts getting closer and closer to death-by-soulcasting.

“Each would have required several Soulcasters in concert.” Or maybe just one Elsecaller or Lightweaver with a fuckton of Stormlight.

Again with 'something larger' that's attached(?) to spren that normal people can't see.

That is a powerful call that she's almost losing herself to, and quite possibly a spren that's interested in her backing the Soulcasting. Hmmm.

So, the Soulcaster devices came out of Aimia and Akinah in particular. Huuuuh. Were the Soulcasters an attempt to mimic Radiant powers, if so, and were there any Aimian Radiants? Or were they an attempt at balancing power?

Wait, what. Everyone's starting to go unconscious? And Kaza feels like she's being pulled to Shadesmar? Is there an overlap here of the Physical/Cognitive realms…? Also the shadow stretching in the wrong direction like all the Aimians have – does that mean that whole people have/had some kind of presence in Shadesmar that can be seen in the Physical realm?

The sailors are all dead? ...well, shit.

Wait, and the sailors were right about greatshells coming here to die? That wasn't just a pirate-treasure sort of legend? (not that it matters, as none of them are left to even see it)

The cook? (Always, the cooks are so important in these books…) Ahhhhh, another cremling-person, fffffftttt- We need more information on these people, stat.

“The cost would be the ends of worlds.” Plural. Something exists in Aimia that could affect the greater Cosmere. Well then.

Interlude Five – Taravangian

FUCK OFF YOU OLD MURDER-MAN

“Today, Taravangian was a storming genius.” I can't help but laugh at the phrasing, even as a corner of my mind just goes fuckfuckfuckfuckfuck-

He is not wasting time here on pleasantries of any sort, but just powering ahead and being a complete ass as he does.

Well, that answers my question of 'does Malata know bout Taravangian and his plans' though I did not expect that she'd already been a member of the Diagram before she'd become a Radiant. I am somewhat pleased at knowing 'the Dustbringers would be the Radiants most likely to accept their cause', not because it gives me any pleasure to know that goddamn storming Taravangian is getting any Radiants on his side, but because it's another step closer to confirming my suspicion that the Dustbringers are the I Will Do What Must Be Done order, closest of the Radiants to the-ends-justify-the-means.

GIVE US MORE DUSTBRINGER INFO, SANDERSON, I DEMAND IT

H e r alds but smart!Taravangian is an insufferable ass, both to other people and in his own head

“That day, he'd been God. Today, he could be God's prophet.” I'd start to wonder if you were Odium-influenced too, but this seems different – too detached even in your moments of grandest self-glorying – to be Odium's touch

And here we have the complete opposite of Jasnah, who's a beautiful example of atheism done right; this is the kind of atheism that glorifies ~~science~~ and spits on others' beliefs while holding itself above all else – its' own manner of extremist fundamentalism

'the Dalinar paradigm' sounds foreboding

Wildcard Renarin! Oooo, is he a blindspot in more than just Taravangian's Diagram, I wonder?

Well, that's just unnecessary. Storming hell, Taravangian.

Reference note – Vargo. Probably Taravangian's given name.

Okay but indoor farming would indeed explain a good part of Urithiru's self-sufficiency – which it had to be – and is probably related to the existence of the uber-fabrial that extends through the whole city.

“the part of the world that mattered” aaahahahahahahah fuck you Taravangian

“Then we force him to step down, so that I can take his place at the head of the monarchs.” AAAAHAHAHAHAHAH WELL GUESS WHAT YOU'RE GONNA GET HIGHKING KHOLIN SOONER OR LATER SO EVEN IF YOU DO IT'S NOT GONNA FUCKIN' MATTER

To be fair, pushing Dalinar until he collapses isn't a bad plan, considering the pressure the world is exerting and the weight he places on himself, but he's still the Tank, come on.

[rolls over laughing at the thought of Taravangian thinking he has any bargaining power against Odium]

Fuck off, you senile psychopath.

Interlude Six – This One Is Mine

Another Venli chapter, and thins time she's going to open herself for a Form of Power. And yet, with that title as well as the spren that followed you last time… I don't think this will you the way you think it will. Just a hunch.

….do the Parshendi actually have gemhearts. I mean, I would make sense considering their change of forms, but… still.

No rainwater from this storm. Just ash. (But didn't the Everstorm bring rain when we saw it in Edgedancer?)

[hums] Have we seen Demid's new Fused-form yet? The ridges under the carapace sounds like a form we might have seen in one of Kaladin or Moash's chapters, but perhaps it's different.

Mmm. Though Venli's form changed, indicating a new kind of bonded spren, she retained her mind. Not a Voidspren, then. Handful of sapphires says that the little comet-spren had something to do with it.

“grand of the Fused”? Ooooo, you're important, you have a title

...or maybe you just have a tendency to crush anything that doesn't pay obeisance. That works too.

[winces] What an awakening for Venli, and what a truly horrible way for it to happen.

Well, even if you didn't bond with the little spren, it's there. Not 'one of the same' spren you saw near Eshonai, but the very one, there's no way it isn't.

And you protected it.

#blink reads oathbringer #oathbringer spoilers #//holy fuuuuuuuuck #[ROLLSROLLSROLLS]

[the-voice-of-hell]

Rent is Theft, part 10

Read from the beginning here, read the previous chapter here. Note:  My MC is a Filipina trans woman.  If you have any feedback on that or anything else, let me know.                                                         ***

     We went door to door.  I was slipping and tripping - feet clumsy on the warped floor, hand sliding through a barely perceptible film of mucus on the walls.  At last we got everyone together in Olivia and Knobby's living room.

     Methadone Mike said, "What's this about, Courtney?  I bet we all thought the same thing - that the dicks had us."

     Grime said, "I don't think that's what's going on, but just, everyone stay quiet until she's done, OK?"

     Perry started to bark something but Patrick caught him.

     I said, "I almost died just now.  We've been having some problems on the floor here and trying to ignore them, but if it's this dangerous, we can't do that anymore."

     Grime looked more confused than anyone, but stifled himself.  Good boy.

     I continued, "The building is somehow allergic to us.  I don't get it, but my bedroom window opened and my fucking bed got sneezed out.  It's probably in the alley right now, unless it caught enough air to land on the building across the way."  People were quiet, straining for something.  Understanding?  "Does anyone not believe me?  Who needs to go see my room?"

     Leimomi shook her head, followed by Patrick, Marcie, Deandre, Mike, Olivia, and Knobby.  Perry and Richie didn't gesture but seemed to be in silent acceptance.

     Grime said, "Maybe I should look at your room.  You're totally convincing, but I'm having trouble accepting this - it's too bizarre."

     Marcie said, "It could be real dangerous.  And how can you not believe it?  You see the floor out there today?  It comes and goes but it's real bad right now."

     Patrick said, "Allergies though?  I can see it's all fucked up, I don't get it, I kinda don't wanna get it, but where do ya get allergies from?"

     Grime said, “What’s wrong with the floor?”

     Deandre said, “Are you kiddin’?  How can you not see that, feel it under your feet?”

     Grime shook his head and threw up his hands.

     “Look,” Olivia said in her usual blank way, “He’s different.”

     Everyone followed the direction she pointed - Grime’s feet.  They looked normal enough.  But he was standing between Deandre and I, and the carpet around our bare feet was swollen into little ridges.  The floor at Grime’s feet was flat and smooth.

     “Oh god,” I slapped my head.  “Stand where I’m standing, Grime.”

     “What.”

     I stepped aside to vacate the spot, leaving light swelling and foot shapes in my place.  “Stand there.”

     “OK, but my name is Graeme, Courtney.”

     “Oh, shit, whatever.  Please, now.”

     He stepped onto the spot, and the flooring smoothed out beneath his feet, laying perfectly flat.

     Everyone started chattering among themselves.

     Patrick asked, “Why?  What’s he got?  We all covered in human dander and godda take more baths?  Is he a fuckin’ Portuguese water dog?”

     Momi said, “I can’t tell the difference in how it’s pronounced.  Greeme?”

     Deandre said, “This is officially fucked up.”

     Knobby said, “Is it because he’s white?”

     Olivia said, “No, so is that guy, and that guy.”

     Deandre added, “Maybe it’s because he’s got a job and none of us do.”

     Patrick said, “Naw, I’m working.”

     Methadone Mike said, “We broke the rules.  This has to mean God hates us, man.”

     Richie said, “No gods, no masters.  If that guy is immune, we can find out why and do it ourselves.”

     Marcie said, “How?  We can’t know anything.  It’s magic, isn’t it?”

     Perry said, “It’s more like Graham, isn’t it?  I don’t care.”

     Grime said, “Graeme.  It’s spelled with G-R-A-E-”

     I said, “It doesn’t matter!”

     Momi said, “There ain’t no words with E after A.”

     I reiterated my point.  “I have it!  Graeme, you have allergies, don’t you?”

     “Yes.  I do.”

     “Maybe you aren’t affected by the building’s allergies because you have allergies?  Like a double negative thing?”

     Deandre said, “No, I got allergies too.  I got shook out of bed last night.”

     Patrick and Marcie started to speak, but then Grime, who had been looking at the way his feet smoothed the carpet, silenced them with an idea.  “I take medicine.  Do you?”

     Deandre shook his head.  “Living downtown I don’t have to.  It’s mostly plant shit, worse in the suburbs.”

     I flared my nose and stamped my feet.  The ground blistered at my touch.  “That’s it!  That’s it.  We need allergy medicine.”

     Methadone Mike said, “I don’t like the feeling, the drowsiness.”

     “I have another idea, but we’re going to need a lot.  We’re going to need a fucking lot of allergy medicine.”

     Knobby said, “Just like starting a meth lab!”

     Grime said, “Yeah, that’s what it’ll look like if we go out to lay down a bunch of money on Benadryl.”

     “Then we steal it.”

                                                        ***

     It was time to take care control of our lives again.  The Myrmidon Apartments would have to take their medicine.  We all got into our rich bitch drag and strolled out in groups.  Olivia and Knobby looked like they were going to play racquetball.  Marcie was the church lady with young Richie in a tweed suit at her side.  Momi was going with them, but in hipster drag with a skirt over leggings and puffy ski vest.  Methadone Mike was in a navy blue blazer with an anchor on the lapel, over pastel clothes and sockless boat shoes.  He wanted a hat like Alan Hale on Gilligan’s Island, but we couldn’t find one and I thought it was a bit over the top anyway.  Deandre was in his purloined dapper queer style.  Patrick, Perry, and Grime were already well groomed and dressed enough to not look too out of place.  I was in my apartment people disguise from back when I got the keys.  Wherever possible, we were rocking sunglasses.  It was what the occasion called for.

     Grime and I took the express bus north to a car rental place, in preparation for a day of hitting every place we could find.  With that we could go farther afield than the rest, which would help keep us from overlapping in our travels and wasting time.

     I did some research to see which area would have the fewest meth labs, so the store clerks would be less suspicious.  I’d heard that the south end of the county was the meth capital of the planet, so we went north.  Claims of the south side being the meth capital yielded forty thousand search engine results, and the north side only got twelve thousand.  Very scientific.  Sadly methy.

     Grime drove dangerously, like some kind of California asshat.  Turned out he was from San Dimas, of Bill & Ted fame.  I had always been told that people in Washington were more careful about breaking the speed limit, preferring to do it when traffic was light enough to have some car lengths between.  But that as soon as you cross the border from Oregon to Cali, everyone is doing a hundred ten, right on each other’s tailpipes.  I’d never traveled to witness the spectacle, but with Grime at the wheel, I believed it.  I didn’t want to get arrested with a trunk full of allergy meds - or at all - but how annoying would it be to nag him about it?

     He tore ass up I-5 all the way to Snohomish County, then hopped off onto highway 99 to start the mission.  We pulled into the parking lot of a strip mall and parked.  I held my baseball hat in hand.  “How much of your money are you willing to waste on this?  I think we should be stealing.”

     “Yeah.  I never wanted to be a thief - not like this.  It seems low.  And I know that’s some lingering classism on my part, like, why shouldn’t people steal the shit they need?  But it feels… embarrassing.  Trying not to seem like meth heads while doing meth head shit.”

     “I know.  What’s the least embarrassing job?  Grabbing the stuff, or running distraction?”

     “Grabbing the stuff, definitely, but I’ve never been slick before.”

     “Well, you’re also a medium young white guy in clean clothes, so people will be less focused on you.  I’d rather be filling the bag myself, but whatever your lack of experience?  Seems like you’d be best for it.”

     “Yeah.”

     I put on my hat and we got out of the car.  Grime went into the back seat to grab a reusable Whole Foods bag I’d modified for a similar job.  I crafted a fake pile of clothing on a flap.  Stolen goods would go in, the flap could be easily pulled up over them, so a glance in the bag would look like it contained goods from elsewhere.  The hardest part was cutting a package of socks in half and gluing it into place.  I’d made it for another foolish quest.  Today it would get a more important use.

     We walked into the store and split up, doing a few rounds of the aisles to case the locations of employees.  Seeing Grime had a decent opening, I decided to corner the nearest employee with some bullshit.  They were one aisle away from him, could walk around that corner at any moment.  Not with me in their grits.  “Hey hey, I need to know where you keep your batteries.”  I knew where they were, of course.

     It was a young white lady who tensed visibly at my voice.  That made it easier to burn her, for sure.  “They’re on aisle 12 A.”  She kept about her business.

     “Hey, hey, how am I supposed to know which one is 12 A?  Where are the signs?”

     She sighed.  “Right up there.”  She pointed them out.

     “Oh?  They’re so small.  Are they in the same place on every aisle?  Why don’t you just show me?”

     In between breaths, between words, I could hear a clatter of thin cardboard boxes, a rattle of pills, of Grime filling the bag.  It was maddening and I added words to my fast-talk just to cover it up.  “I mean I think it’s very rude.  I don’t feel like you’re giving me the same customer service you’d give anyone else.”

     She tensed and tried not to glare, by focusing awkwardly on my shoulder.  “I apologize, sir.  Let me show you to the batteries, OK?”

     “Gee, thanks.”

     She walked that way in a huff and I followed, a Marx brother following someone who told me to “walk this way.”  I hoped I wouldn’t get misgendered everywhere we went.  At the batteries she pointed, wheeled, and walked away without saying anything.

     I noticed someone looking at Grime as he walked out the door, so I made enough noise to pull that person’s attention back to me.  “Thanks for nothing, bitch!  I’m not even going to buy your shit!  I’m taking my business down the street!”  She hustled out of sight, into a back room.

     I started toward the door and the other cashier was glaring at me like daggers.  “You better leave this store, sir, or we will call the cops!”

     “Yeah, fuck you too, Jack!”  I gave him the double deuce as I went.  That was probably a bad idea, but felt right in the moment.

     Grime whipped up to me and opened the passenger side door from inside.  I hopped in, the cashier coming out to give me the business.  Yeah, the double deuce was a mistake I wasn’t going to repeat.  Grime drove fast enough to hopefully keep the man from clocking our license plate number.

     He said, “Are you nuts?  The distraction can stop when I’m out, can’t it?  Shouldn’t it?”

     “Yeah, I’ll do better next time.  What did you get?”

     “A wicked case of the heebie jeebies.  Just a moment.”  He pulled up to a red light, then reached back for the bag, handing it to me.

     “This is the reason we should hit up multiple places.  This isn’t enough.”

     “I’m just doing everything you tell me and trusting it’ll work out, but why?  This is gonna get me a record, baby.  I can’t fuckin’ wait.”

     “I can’t believe you’re gonna gripe about a little property crime while driving the way you do.”

     “What?  I stopped at the red.  I hear in Kansas they consider red lights more of a polite suggestion than an absolute.”

     “Why, you’re just a model citizen.  I didn’t mean to impugn your righteous ways.”

     The light turned green and he started out along the highway again.  “Nyeh nyeh nyeh.  So next time you’ll distract smaller?”

     “If you’ll make less racket with the pills.”

     “What?  How loud was it?”

     “It was loud.  Like Carmen Miranda with maracas.”

     “You think you can do better?”

     “You know how bad the distraction game was?”

     “How bad was it, Courtney?”

     “The distraction game was so bad, I got misgendered twice and had a dude fixing to assault me.”

     “Damn.  Damn,” he got serious, “I should be doing that part.”

     “No, I shouldn’t have mentioned the serious stuff.  I can handle it.  You learn and adapt, right?”

     “Yeah, but--”

     “I can guess what you’re going to say and I really don’t wanna talk about trans stuff with you, even if you’re a good boy.  It’s just awkward.  Like someone can be ninety-eight percent right and that two percent becomes maddening.”

     “Mm, OK, I can see that.  But seriously, if this hurts you, I’m taking over.”

     “I need you on bag patrol.  The guy at the front was watching you leave.  Your white boy -ness bought you the seconds you needed to get out the door without getting caught with the goods.”

     “You think?”

     “I know.  Here.  I have a good feeling about this one.”  I pointed to a ramshackle Safeway with garbage bags blowing around the parking lot.

     “Good call.”

     A few hours later, Grime stopped for lunch at Shari’s.  He ordered fries and a chocolate milkshake and I ordered a steak salad with blue cheese dressing.  He was drinking water, I was having coke.

     When we were sitting at the table waiting for the food, I tried to relax my fluttering ragged nerves.  A day of repeated confrontations, brushes with violence.  In that dark booth, maybe I could forget it.  The man sitting across from me sipped his water and regarded me with gentle grey eyes.  Grime.  His nose was five percent eagle beak, but more heroic than goofy looking.  His cheeks were soft, but the stubble was beginning to come back from the daily abuse.  His lips were firm and his teeth perfect in there.

     I hadn’t thought about that before.  Perfect teeth are an artifact of money, almost every time.  Who raised this San Dimas commie?  No doubt the kind of creeps that had once made Reagan governor of the state.  But this was a gentle wolf boy.  His dark hair had a few strands of silver.  I think he figured out that I like it hanging out, so he lost the pony tail.  Devilish.

     I wanted to put my leg on his leg under the table.  Lose my shoe, work my foot up to his thigh, see if I could reach closer.  I imagined myself going for that dick and accidentally pushing my toes into his belly and it amused and aroused me at the same time.  Maybe if we hit it again, I could ride on top and rub his body with both hands.

     OR NOT.  My foot hadn’t even inched that way.  Exhaustion helped, but there was a queasy feeling of moral horror settling into me at the same time.  It wouldn’t be a sin to get fucked here, not a bad thing in the least.  But I couldn’t forget how I felt when I told Leimomi.  My head sunk, my shoulders slumped.  I felt that ice in my belly and stinging heat in my face and in my skull.  I rubbed my forehead, made like I was having a headache.  I wondered, if I was more headache prone, would that pain distract from feelings like this?

     He looked at me with concern.  “What’s the matter, Courtney?  My offer still stands.”

     I shook my head and fake smiled.  “Nothing, just a headache.”

     “If you say so.”

     I felt like I wanted to say something but not anything that would lead to particulars.  I puzzled it out a few moments and came up with, “Why do fools fall in love, Graeme?  Sometimes people get really emotionally invested in making something happen, or in some crazy dream about something that was never gonna happen, and then… Sad.  Shouldn’t people be able to manage their feelings?”

     “Oh?  What brought this on?”

     “No one is in love with you, dude.”

     “Heh, a boy can dream, can’t he?”

     “Besides, I just mean it generally,” I lied.  “So yeah, why can’t people check themselves before they wreck themselves?  Heartwise.”

     “Oh, I don’t know.  I haven’t fallen uncontrollably in love since I was in high school, so it’s easy to imagine it’s all hormones or something.  I heard that teenagers have thinner coats of insulation on their neurons, which makes them more impulsive.”

     “So why would a grown-ass adult do the same thing?”

     “Lots of things can mess with impulse control.  You hear it in drug commercials, like the stop-smoking pills whose side effects can include gambling and suicide.  Brain damage.  Hormones can change a lot during a person’s life, I’m sure you know.”

     “Let’s say my abstract subject of conversation love fool isn’t a slave to nature.  Let’s say there’s hope.  Let’s hope there’s hope.  How do they rein it in?”

     The food came.  The waiter said, “Enjoy.  I’ll be back to see if you need anything else, OK?”

     I said, “Thank you.”

     Grime said, “Thanks,” and resumed the subject without missing a beat.  “That’s the trick, isn’t it?  We all have to learn that because all our songs and stories are about love and sex and romance, but no one tells you how to approach it realistically.  How to give yourself permission to get over a broken heart, or anything.  Probably we all have to figure that stuff out for ourselves.  I think I did OK.  You’re not so sure about yourself?”

     “It’s about someone else, man.”

     “Of course, I meant, you don’t feel sure because you asked me about what advice to give them, right?”

     “Oh yeah, right.”  The salad dressing had come in a little ceramic dish and I glopped it onto the leaves unceremoniously.

     He finished a sip of the shake with an unconscious “mm” and continued.  “So if I’m thinking back, trying to remember, what did I tell myself, that helped me stop feeling heartbroken?  After the worst time I resolved to always withhold a bit of myself when I go into a new relationship.  To always have something that’s me, that’s… I don’t know, maybe it’s kind of hard or cold.  But it was useful.  Now keeping a level head about infatuation is just second nature to me.  Not that it’s always easy, but I can get through it.”

     I ate a single leaf while he talked.  When he was finished I said, “That’s like a love prophylactic.  You use it to keep from falling hard.  But what if you’ve already fallen, and prevention is not an option?”

     “That’s just going to be brutal no matter what.  But your love fool has to realize they aren’t always going to feel the same way.  That’s one thing in life that can always get better.  I know you’ve seen movies that say the exact opposite, but fuck that stuff.  Life should be healthy and happy.”

     “Maaan, I should fall in love with you, Graeme, but I won’t.  You’re such a good boy.  I hope your parents are proud.”

     “Haha, oh that burns.  I think they’ll be happier when I somehow magically pull a million dollar startup out of my ass.  How ab-- mm, whatever.  Want a french fry?”

     “No thanks.  Graeme?”

     “Yes--”

     My cell phone rang.  It was Momi.  My heart skipped a beat.

     “I have to take this.”  I stood up, tripping over myself and staggered out the front door.  Having forgotten my hat and sunglasses at the table, I was as blind as I was sad and twisted.  “Hello?”

     “Courtney, hey.  Richie is in jail.  We could use help.”

     Oh fuck, I thought.  It’s all going down.  Everyone is gonna get busted.  Oh god, Marcie… She’s gonna kill me.  She should kill me.  Poor Richie.  Fuck!

     “Courtney?”

     “Um, yeah, that’s horrible.”  I had to plug my unused ear completely against the noise of the highway.  “What the hell happened?”

     “We ran into Walter.  Marcie and Richie beat him up but he beat them up too.  And the cops...”

     “Beat Richie too, didn’t they?  Is he alright?  Fucking pig bastards.”

     “I wish I knew.  Maybe Grime can help them?  With his, uh, white guy thing.”

     “Oh yeah, definitely.  We’ll be there in no time.  Give me an address...”

     It was a massive relief.  I couldn’t deal with it being about us in any way.  I got my head on straight in a hurry.  It was time to save the day.

                                                        ***

     Read the next chapter here.

#Rent is Theft #part 10 #nanowrimo april 2018