Concordia discors

As you may have noticed, I haven't posted a June update.

2009-06-24T19:47:00Z

This, dear readers, is because RL events have been eventing at a pace that's left my actual, real-world self somewhere beyond exhausted. June's update, at this rate, will be lucky if it gets itself done by August. D:

I have, however, found time for a spot of non-con f/f erotica. Well, I mean, really: who doesn't have time for a little noncon f/f, am I right? (No, this isn't Minaverse, except insofar as the next update will briefly mention it.)

So as a peace offering, I've thrown it up as a free download, available via Mina's lulu shop. It's the last item listed there, and for the love of your wallet make sure you download it for free as opposed to paying lulu.com for few pages of erotica.

It's been beta'd by some long-suffering Clives; any remaining errors are my own. Also it contains explicit nonconsensual sex, and I hope you'll take that warning seriously, as it took me all of ten seconds to type it. Not that I'm trying to make a point here or anything.

The first of a series of alt!pov fics by 1angelette

2009-03-27T22:31:48Z

PrinceC and an Excess of Chech'tluth

Case!

2009-03-27T22:28:24Z

The Beginning of the End, or Winds of Change

Kissing Cousins

2008-12-30T16:02:09Z

[Note: I owe scifantasy for suggesting the Baldur/mistletoe myth, amy_star_ for reminding me of the Magic Box Of Hair Metal Cassettes and for making me write a closing paragraph, ap_aelfwine for the codpiece, and, as always, The Clives for turning this from me-ese into readable English.
Also, this post is being left unflocked so I can show it to a couple of people who wouldn't otherwise see it; apologies in advance to any puzzled Supernatural fans who may note Occult is a bit...familiar.]

Title: Kissing Cousins
Fandom: Occult
Author: Anon
Disclaimer: These characters and settings belong to their creator, not the author of the fanfiction, and Princely Plots disclaims all responsibility for copyright infringement.
Warnings: Some readers have pointed out that this sounds like slash, and therefore has no place in the PP archive, but a careful reading shows that all events are necessitated by the plot, so we're letting it stand. Also, it is canon that Jab sometimes wears a magic codpiece. ~Warr1or

The road stretched out before them, empty except for the Fury, which purred and throbbed beneath their thighs. The radio had long since died, the one functional classic rock station dissolving by degrees into static, until finally Jab had wordlessly acknowledged defeat by reaching out to switch it off. The missing Magic Box Of Hair Metal Cassettes, recently stolen by some skank of a demon, was a sore point right now. They drove in silence for a while, until his impatience peaked. "So tell me about this case."

Pierce shook his head. "I'm not so sure this is a case."

"There've been, what, two attempted kidnappings? Sounds like a case."

"There are kidnappings every day, and most of them aren't our kind of case," Pierce pointed out. "Besides, I'm not sure this is even real."

Jab waited, and Pierce explained. "I mean...mall kidnappings? Of teenage girls? It sounds like an urban legend. There have been rashes of this sort of story since back in the eighties, and they never trace back to anything real. It's probably just some rumour, blown up out of nothing."

"Teenage girls?" Jab asked, looking less ready to fall asleep at the wheel.

"Down, boy. But, yeah: the two attempted 'kidnappings' involve girls from the local high school, who were hanging around the Mistletoe Grotto."

"Do I even want to know what a Mistletoe Grotto is?"

"According to the high school website, it's a sort of kissing booth, and they're using it to raise money for the local food bank," Pierce said, shrugging. "And now two girls--not volunteers, they were just hanging around--are claiming to have been drugged by someone who tried to kidnap them."

Jab said nothing, and didn't lift his eyes from the road ahead, but Pierce saw the tiny smirk on his face and sighed heavily. "Jail. Bait," he said tersely through clenched teeth.

"What? Did I say anything? I said nothing," Jab protested.

"You didn't have to. You had that 'teenage girls at a kissing booth' look."

"I have a specific look for that?"

* * * * * * *

"Jab Smith and Pierce Wesson," Jab told the hotel clerk. Pierce struggled, unsuccessfully, not to roll his eyes.

* * * * * * *

"So just before you started feeling sick, you were doing what, exactly?" Pierce asked, trying to sound patient. Even Jab was starting to look as if the tedious self-absorbed reality of teenage girls was wiping the fantasy version from his mind.

"I was just standing around the, you know, the grotto."

"Were you, uh, in line to buy a kiss?"

"God, no." She made a face indicating this was the stupidest thing anybody in the history of the world had ever asked. "The grotto sucks. I mean, mistletoe, how lame is that? We were just making fun of it."

"And then," Pierce consulted his notes, "That's when you said you felt a little prick?" Jab snorted, and Pierce glared at him.

"A whole bunch of little pricks." Jab turned away, entirely losing the battle for control over his own facial expression. "They jabbed me in the neck. And that's just what happened to Kate, too, you can ask her. Except it got her in the arm. But there was this sharp pain, and then I felt really dizzy, so I went outside. And while I was sitting out there trying not to puke, this huge hairy white guy asked me to get in his truck. If you ask me," which Pierce hadn't, and had had no intention of, "it's some sort of kidnapping ring, and they're, like, drugging all the hot girls with syringes. I mean, none of the dweebs volunteering for the grotto have been attacked. What does that tell you?"

* * * * * * *

"What does that tell us?" Pierce asked, once they'd politely dismissed the girl, who'd promptly grabbed two of her BFFs and headed for the mall washrooms for whatever it was girls did in groups in public washrooms. He and Jab were standing near the Mistletoe Grotto, at the edge of a crowd composed equally of people waiting in line and people standing in small clumps, mocking the grotto itself.

Jab shrugged. "That she over-estimates her own attractiveness?"

"That's not helpful. Look, do you think she's telling the truth? Was she drugged by a would-be kidnapper?"

"You're the one who said this was just an urban legend, dude," Jab reminded him, knowing even as he spoke that this was the part where Pierce would pull some complicated explanation out of thin air.

"Yeah, but listen," Pierce said, suddenly whipping out a laptop, "this is all happening around the Mistletoe Grotto, right? And there's a lot of mythology surrounding mistletoe."

"Which you're going to tell me about, whether I want to hear it or not."

Pierce ignored this. "For instance, Baldur was killed by being shot with mistletoe. Norse God," he explained, in response to Jab's blank look. "Thought he was immortal. Later he was resurrected, and his mother demanded that everyone celebrate by kissing whenever they passed under the mistletoe. Which is what our victims have in common--they weren't honoring the mistletoe tradition, they were mocking it."

"Could his mother, by any stretch of the imagination, be described as a big hairy white dude? Because otherwise I'm not seeing the connection."

"Maybe that's Baldur," Pierce said reasonably.

"Zombie Baldur is pissed at these girls because they aren't kissing under the mistletoe and proving they take his death seriously?" Jab considered this for a moment, then nodded. "Cool. I like it. So if you were an angry formerly-dead dude, what would your next move be?"

Simultaneously they turned to look in the direction of the mall washroom, where the latest not-quite-victim had disappeared. "Ah, crap," said Jab, in answer to his own question, and they started to run.

* * * * * * *

The girl was sitting on the tile floor, wearing a gown and cape completely unlike her own jeans and sweater--which were, Jab saw, neatly folded on the bathroom floor next to her. Some huge guy with shaggy shoulder-length hair and clothes made of leather and coarse wool, sort of like an escaped Viking cosplayer, was patiently cutting her hair while she sobbed and slumped dazedly against the wall. Her two friends--already shorn and redressed--were lying with their heads in her lap, completely unconscious.

As Pierce and Jab entered the already-crowded washroom, the kidnapper jumped to his feet with a roar, and pointed one hand at Pierce, who had uncharacteristically pushed his way ahead of Jab. A handful of white and green glittering, sparkling points spun toward them, dazzling them both. It was a bit like being in a snowglobe when someone had shaken it, except the swirling bits of sparkle were all headed directly at Pierce. Jab, standing behind him, was entirely blocked from the spray.

"Son of a bitch!" Jab exclaimed as Pierce slumped to the floor. Jab knelt tenderly behind him, and saw that there were a handful of tiny spears embedded in the smooth skin of Pierce's face. The hairy Viking guy turned threateningly, and Jab held up his hands in a conciliatory gesture. "Nothing personal, dude, just an expression. I don't even know your mother."

After an ominous pause the guy hoisted the two sleeping girls to his shoulders and left, not so much walking away as vanishing.

"Freaky," Jab said, and then struggled to sling Pierce over his shoulder. The girl on the floor had stopped crying and was watching him, wide-eyed. "Do you think you can walk? I've kind of got my hands full here." She nodded, and he pointed her back to the mall, where there were already policemen at the grotto. "Go tell them what happened, will you? My partner and I will, uh, catch up to you later on." He slipped past the washrooms and out the back entrance--no point in hanging around a crime scene looking suspicious.

* * * * * * *
"Now it's time for you to research us up some more information," Jab said, caressing the wheel of the car. Pierce was already consulting their Journal of Convenient Stuff.

"They've probably been taken to the Hall of Frigg," Pierce said. He rolled his eyes at the smirk that spread across Jab's face in response. "It's the home of Frigga, the Norse goddess of marriage. She's Baldur's mother, after all, and responsible for the whole mistletoe thing."

The smirk was still there. "Marriage as in..." Jab prompted expectantly. Pierce sighed.

"It's not a euphemism. Marriage as in marriage. Vows, children, home and hearth? All that domestic stuff?"

Jab looked unconvinced. "Are you sure? Because that name really sounds like..."

"I'm sure. These girls are being taken from the mall and forced into a life of wedded bliss, fidelity, and domesticity."

Now Jab looked appalled. "That's horrible! We have to put a stop to this!" Sighing, Pierce buckled his seat belt.

"Do you even know where we're going?"

Jab pulled a crumpled brochure out of his pocket.

"Frigga's B&B offers Old-World Charm?" Pierce read, in tones of complete disbelief. "Are you kidding me?"

"I picked it up at the hotel." Jab squirmed, slightly uncomfortable. "I thought maybe she was running, you know, a...not really a B&B." Pierce looked momentarily blank, then revolted. "Hey, c'mon," Jab protested. "With a name like that, she's pretty much asking people to misinterpret her. Anyway, there's a map on the back."

* * * * * * *
"Yes, the girls are here." Frigga had let them in without question; now they were seated in her overcrowded parlour, refusing cookies and hot drinks from a succession of young teenage girls. For kidnap victims, they looked strangely happy. Maybe they were employees. "They're happy here, you know. Their only punishment will be to make early marriages, and bear children. You'd be surprised how readily they embrace their fate, these days--I blame Twilight, personally. But it makes my job easier, and I do have to enforce the rules about mistletoe, after all."

"And you," Frigga went on, sounding more formal and Goddessy, "are, here in my household, subject to the same law." She pointed upwards, over their head. "Scorn to pay proper tribute to my son, and you will meet the same fate."

Pierce looked up. Sure enough, he and Jab were seated beneath a high ceiling spread with mistletoe. "The same fate? You mean...wives? Happy marriages, and children? Families of our own?" His eyes and voice were wistful.

Beside him, Jab shuddered. "Not a chance," he said decisively, and swept the younger man into his arms, tilting him backwards across his bulging lap before Pierce could do more than sputter weak objections, and silencing him with a punishing kiss.

* * * * * * *
"What about the girls?" Pierce asked, after Jab had dragged him to the car.

"The girls?" Jab reversed carefully, then tore out of the parking lot in a cloud of dust.

"The teenage brides-to-be? The young women we were here to rescue?"

"Pierce," Jab said firmly, "some days, it's enough of a victory just to save yourself, you know? She said they'd be happy. She seemed like a nice enough lady, for a goddess. Hell, I believe her, okay? And I think the girls are in way less trouble than we'd have been if we stayed there any longer."

Pierce didn't answer, but for some reason the faintly wistful look was back on his face.

This cannot be said too often:

2008-07-11T05:34:51Z

Oh, Case. Footnotes. *swoon*

Does anyone else here love Nancy Drew?

2008-07-10T10:57:13Z

You know you do. And now expectare has written a Nancy Drew/Minaverse crossover: The Mystery at the Adjectival Library. It's wonderful (as is the 'outline of every Nancy Drew novel ever' of cleolinda's that it's linked to); do go read it.

Something to warm up with.

2008-03-28T11:35:56Z

Courtesy of jackiejlh: Something...Performative.

Further Minaverse

2008-03-25T12:46:58Z

That Untitled Mina Fic, Part Four.

Am also eagerly anticipating other new fics. ♥

The Dreams of Angels (Chapter Three)

2008-03-24T00:34:02Z

Title: The Dreams of Angels
Chapter: Three
Author: Warr1or
Pairing: PrincessB/Jab. Sammich forever!
Dedication: For all my fellow sammiches: may the purity of PB/J illuminate your lives as it has my own.

The next day PrincessB rose from her midday prayers in the castle's rose-scented chapel, and made her way to the courtyard where she knew she would find her cousin Pierce. Yesterday at their humble evening meal he had most kindly reassured her that their bulging stockpile of goods had grown to meet Jab's requirements. When she had pressed him to tell her to what manly task they would next turn their energies, he had been unable to resist her innocent enthusiasm. Too, her willing acceptance of the plain fare on which he and Jab had dined had impressed upon Pierce on obvious truth: PrincessB had allied herself with them, and fancied herself part of a trio. It could never be, of course. She was a delicate girl-child, not a warrior. By every standard, she was unequal to Pierce and Jab. They were stronger and more skilled and, although she was the princess royal of the de St. Aubyns, Pierce was conscious that Jab possessed--and that he himself had begun to acquire--a nobility of soul that, refined by trial and struggle, would be worth more than mere lineage could ever supply.

Still, PrincessB was a loyal supporter, and she was doing her best to fall in line with Jab's requirements. And, Pierce well knew, she prayed for them, sweetly and diligently, without ceasing. She deserved to accompany them, as long as in so doing she was not placed in harm's way either physically or morally. So Pierce had suggested that she might, if she so wished, witness their early afternoon training session.

She had never, PrincessB quickly realized, seen anything like this before. Few if any maidens had. Pierce and Jab, stripped of superfluous clothes and glistening with sweat, were engaged in fierce exercise--all part, the princess realized, of their training. Her heart beat faster at the sight of their exertions, and she trembled with sympathetic excitement.

For what felt like an eternity, the courtyard was silent except for the rough panting of the two men, their occasional grunts of effort, and the princess' own gasps of excitement. They wrestled near-silently, muscles throbbing, hands gripping and sliding along slick, sweat-soaked flesh. PrincessB clasped her own hands together so tightly her knuckles were white, and felt weak with innocent girlish enthusiasm.

And then the sacred near silence of the two godlike men was rudely and abruptly broken by a chorus of frivolous laughter and silly jokes as a group of finely dressed young noblemen burst into the courtyard. PrincessB shrank shyly into the shadows. She recognized these men. They were the peers of her cousin Pierce, the wealthy heirs of half a dozen noble houses, and had stayed at the castle before this. She had always found them both annoying and intimidating. Their jokes were shallow and inane, and their boisterous behavior and overindulgent lifestyle were worthless at best, and dangerous at worst. Now, however, she found that even the sight of their costly garments and the sound of their upperclass accents repelled her. She had, unknowingly, learned to so admire the worthy Jab that anything different from his honest speech and homespun clothes was, in her eyes, less. I bet this is how Pierce feels, she thought.

But whatever Pierce felt within his heart and soul, his actions now fell short. Jab had only just pinned him to the ground, holding him firmly in place for one long lingering moment to prove his victory. Pierce had wriggled and writhed in vain, unable to free himself. Now he opened his eyes in horror at the voices of his friends, and blushed crimson at being discovered in such a position.

Jab, expressionless, watched his face carefully and understood. However disappointed he might have been at Pierce's reaction to being seen, Jab did not react other than by relinquishing Pierce and getting to his feet. Jab bowed once and left the courtyard without a word or a backwards glance. Pierce felt both relieved to be able to straighten up and act as if nothing had happened, and queerly disappointed that Jab had walked away.

He leaped to his feet and tried to cover his discomfiture by greeting his wealthy friends loudly and jovially. They seemed not to have noticed anything peculiar in his choosing to exercise with Jab. Probably, he realized with relief, they all took similar exercise, and certainly they had no way of knowing Jab was anything more than a personal trainer, so there was no reason to be embarrassed by his friendship. "That your manservant?" drawled one of them now in an affected accent. "Skillful brute. I wouldn't mind taking a few pointers form him m'self."

"He doesn't give lessons to anyone but me," Pierce said quickly.

"Aha, trying to keep an edge, are you?" said another of his friends, punching him cheerfully in the arm. "Good plan. Don't give away all your secrets, eh? You might want to go a few rounds with one of us, after all."

Chattering loudly and pointlessly the group left the courtyard in search of strong drink and comfortable chairs. PrincessB waited until she was sure they were shut away in her cousin's study, and then entered the castle herself.

She found her father standing in front of one of the windows, smiling in a self-satisfied manner. "Sire," she said meekly, "how came these louts and ruffians to the castle? I thought perhaps Pierce had outgrown their company of late, and learned to set himself higher standards."

"I invited them," her father said carelessly. "I thought it would do Pierce good to spend some time among his own kind, so I sent for his friends." PrincessB fled to the safety of her rooms feeling appalled and anguished, locked the door, and burst into overwrought tears.

The Dreams of Angels
I. Introduction
II. Chapter One
III. Chapter Two

The Expanding Minaverse Expands

2007-08-09T02:28:32Z

scifantasy's Case Study provides a fascinating look behind-the-scenes.

Spoilerific. Meta.

2007-07-21T00:35:56Z

[Again: if you don't want to be spoiled for Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, don't scroll down or click the lj-cut or anything. Mina's essay contains, along with a lot of fake-facts, some trufax spoilers.

This is a public post; please do feel welcome to link to it. It's meant to be an amusing and tongue-in-cheek look at fanon, and is not intended to bash anyone.]

Warning: My betas have told me that this essay contains possible spoilers for Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows. I don’t even see how that’s possible, unless this J.K. Rowling person has been ripping off The Tortured Tutor, but just in case you’d better not click if you don’t want to be spoiled.

Title: The Dark Schoolmaster: Chavalrous or Chivalrous? A Prince’s Mirror of Aspiration.

Fandom: The Tortured Tutor series

Acknowledgments: I am, as always, deeply indebted to the Clives for their input and feedback, and for their research skills. This couldn’t have been written without them. A handful of them deserve writing credits, really, although they seem reluctant to claim credit. They’re sweetly modest that way.

Second warning: This essay contains possible spoilers for Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows. Don’t scroll down if you don’t want to be spoiled.

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Dedication: For my friend Mrs.Sev., who is understandably distraught, and for those of you who share her distress, even if only to a lesser extent. I don’t usually do meta, but I know you need something to smile at, so consider this my tribute.

The Dark Schoolmaster: Chavalrous or Chivalrous?

The Dark Schoolmaster is, his friends and detractors agree, an ambiguous character. After all, he himself is a hybrid, but he shares many of the tastes of the pur laine Sages. When we first see him at home, the contrast between the squalid poverty of the public rooms and the luxury of his boudoir is striking. And, of course, he is a masterful virgin, an expert in the ars amor even though technically innocent of real, soulbonded satisfaction. He stands at many thresholds, defying easy categorization. Obviously one framework for contemplating the magnificent contradictions embodied in this man is that of chivalry and courtly love. Is he, as superficial readers might assume based on his poverty and lank hair, a chav? Or is he an embodiment of the chivalric ideal?

Common conception links chivalry with the moneyed, but this association followed from the ‘over-elaboration of chivalry into costly fantasies (playing Acadia, paseos de honor, etc)’¹ and not from the lofty literary ideals which are the more suitable guide to the Dark Schoolmaster’s personality. Scaglione² describes the essence of chivalry as ‘the need for self-sacrifice, the devotion to a distant ideal, and the satisfaction in chastity and frustration,’ and devotees of The Tortured Tutor series will recognize that description. The Dark Schoolmaster’s devotion to his unobtainable beloved--foolish girl!--is legendary, and now, alas, so is his final act of self-sacrifice.

In the Sage Society of The Tortured Tutor series, the nominal ‘elite’ are the pur laine Sages, and of course our Byronic hero cannot be counted amongst them. His ancestry casts a wide net, and so many of his attributes--his unerring taste in food and wine; his instinctive grasp of the intricacies of any number of languages; his cool analytical logic and prodigious feats of memory; his innate musicality--are reflective of his mixed Italianate, Russian, French and Romany heritage. As a hybrid Sage with a complex ancestry, he is barred from easy access to his deserved place in the top ranks of society, but this injustice only adds to his scornful pride. Perhaps it is his haughty demeanor and supreme self-confidence in his countless abilities that make him the envy of other men, and the secret desire of women.

The Dark Schoolmaster is noted for his apathy towards these women. He appears not just totally self-controlled but indifferent towards the lady Sages, and most fans and readers agree he is a virgin in spirit if not in the flesh. Oh, there may have been any number of fortunate and willing offerings to assuage his powerful physicality, but this is surely the author’s way of pointing us towards the parallel use of peasants by knights, and is a clue that chivalry is the key to the series. It doesn’t undermine the essential purity of his devotion to his one true love.

And that devotion is essentially courtly. We now know the name of the woman he has loved for his entire life. His devoted fans knew it long before this point, because they saw the clues the rest of us missed. And this steadfast but unrequited love follows the chivalric conception of courtly love. To quote at length from Barbara Tuchman:

Courtly love was understood by its contemporaries to be love for its own sake, romantic love, true love, physical love, unassociated with property or family and consequently focused on another man's wife, since only such an illicit liaison could have no other aim but love alone. ...The fact that courtly love idealized guilty love added one more complication to the maze through which medieval people threaded their lives.³

The Dark Schoolmaster's life was shaped by unrequited love. His worst memory is of being goaded by circumstance into betraying that love with careless words. He indirectly upbraids himself for a life steeped in rather sad memories, even while his devoted readers sob their assurance that these sad memories are the source of his strength. The readers are right, as they so often are. His love is what has led him to strive for continual improvement of his natural abilities.

As its justification, courtly love was considered to ennoble a man, to improve him in every way. It would make him concerned to show an example of goodness, to do his utmost to preserve honor, never letting dishonor touch himself or the lady he loved. On a lower scale, it would lead him to keep his teeth and nails clean, his clothes rich and well groomed, his conversation witty and amusing, his manners courteous to all, curbing arrogance and coarseness, never brawling in a lady's presence. Above all, it would make him more valiant, more preux; that was the basic premise.⁴

Disloyal readers will argue that the Dark Schoolmaster is not, in the The Tortured Tutor series, shown to be particularly well groomed or clean. Admittedly his skankiness worsened following his lady’s death, but he disdained middle-class standards of tidiness early on. Most likely he took his inspiration from Templar Knights, who used to wear sheepskin breeches in all weather and never bathed or changed them. His outer disorder is a contrast, and probably a necessary balance, to the perfect control and order he has established over himself in the realms of mind and soul.

The Dark Schoolmaster’s self-control is notorious. Only now have his worshipful readers been offered a glance at his private indulgence of his romantic side. The wooden trunk in his room, symbolic of treasure and of secrets, has been flung open in the latest installment of The Tortured Tutor. His devotees have been allowed to learn that is was his practice, each evening, to write love letters to his lost lady, wringing tortured drops of emotion from his overburdened soul. More touchingly still, he wrote his unsent love letters with a punishment quill, allowing the words, already etched in his soul, to etch themselves in his flesh. His heart’s blood poured freely from his hand while his tears spilled. What potent potion could be brewed from such elements! Certainly it has enchanted and enslaved his readers, who mourn him sincerely. May he be resurrected in their hearts and in their fanfiction.

References

1. LH Nelson, The Sundering of Society. (http://www.vlib.us/medieval/lectures/sundering_society.html)

2. Aldo Scaglione, Knights at Court: Courtliness, Chivalry, & Courtesy from Ottonian Germany to the Italian Renaissance. University of California Press, 1992.

3. Barbara Tuchman, A Distant Mirror. Ballantine Books, 1987 (reissue).

4. Ibid.

index

The Dreams of Angels (Chapter Two)

2007-04-14T22:45:53Z

Title: The Dreams of Angels
Chapter: Two
Author: Warr1or
Pairing: PrincessB/Jab. Sammich forever!
Dedication: For all my fellow sammiches, especially lady_earwig: may the purity of PB/J illuminate your own lives as it has my own.

In the days that followed Jab was pleased to see that Pierce, though possessed of a naturally frivolous nature and ill-accustomed to hard, simple labor, worked determinedly at stocking the castle’s storage areas with supplies. Jab knew that Pierce’s eyes often followed his own efforts, and he read in that gaze a straightforward admiration for the muscled ease with which Jab hoisted even the heaviest kegs and boxes. Jab kindly proffered praise of the prince’s own weaker efforts. He had learned early in his life as a landsman that the recognition and respect of one’s manly peers can ease even the most difficult task. “You’re doing well, my prince,’ he said now, laying one large hand on the prince’s shoulder. Pierce trembled, doubtless with fatigue from the day’s tasks.

Pierce himself, though trained since birth to set his own opinions above those of any mere peasant, felt a renewed rush of heated admiration for this most steadfast of friends. It can’t be wrong to look up to Jab, he consoled himself, although admitting even in his thoughts that he looked up to Jab, both physically and spiritually, made him blush warmly. It’s not as though I make mental obeisance to some unworthy bumpkin. Jab may be of peasant stock, but he is as quick witted as any noble I have ever known, and well learned. He is honest, and loyal, and a skilled and talented man. There is surely no shame in my appreciation. I don’t admire the peasant class in general. I’ve never felt aught but pity or amusement for any provincial lout before now. So it isn’t some unlooked-for change in myself. It’s just that Jab, however rustic his background, exemplifies all that is most excellent in a man.

“Thank you,” Pierce said out loud, his voice hoarse and low. Silently he reprimanded himself. That’s going too far, he told himself. You command armies and servants. You do not need to thank this man. But he knew, at a level much deeper and more instinctive than class prejudice could reach, how very worthy Jab was of his fullest gratitude. Without Jab’s stalwart care and practical suggestions, the de St. Aubyn court would have languished, unprepared for attack. For far too long the royal household had been lulled by contrived treaties, choosing the coward’s path and ignoring the black-veiled threats behind the vampires’ agreements. It had taken Jab’s blunt, honest assessment of the castle to awaken Pierce to the dangers of his family’s situation. The de St. Aubyn wealth and privilege were a false facade of strength. It was shameful to reflect that his family had left themselves so exposed to mortal and moral danger just to secure their life of ease and pleasure seeking. With Jab here to guide him, Pierce intended to relinquish such flimsy, glittering pursuits for the truer, fuller, deeper pleasures of virtuous manly interaction and the most vigorous red-blooded endeavors.

It was a measure of the revolution in Pierce’s attitudes, though a measure unmarked in his own consciousness, that even here at the de St. Aubyn’s ancestral home he continued to resist the pressure to cast aside his workmanlike companion in favor of more elite peers. Pierce’s uncle the king had openly mocked their efforts to assemble supplies of food and weapons. PrincessB had, with her instinctive sweet childlike sympathy, begged her father not to bully her cousin. The king had laughingly protested. He wasn’t singling out her cousin and his oafish friend, he told the princess; he just had a lively sense of humor, and so he mocked everyone without bias. The princess, dear innocent maiden, had allowed herself to be persuaded. Pierce had not, though he did not stoop to argue pointlessly: he had more important calls on his time. But he was fully aware that his uncle’s attacks were no mere mirthful pass-time. The king had a hidden agenda. It was obvious. Why else would he be deliberately heaping scorn on their plans and, even more, on their firm, pure friendship? Pierce could not stand by and let that happen unopposed.

Even now, as he and Jab stood in the cool air of the storage room beneath the castle and admired their growing stockpile, the king approached with a supercilious smile. “Your Highness,” said Pierce through gritted teeth, inclining his head correctly but resentfully.

“Nephew, if you’ve developed a low taste for sweaty, agricultural labor, I have cornfields that need harvesting,” the king said derisively. He opened a cask standing next to him, and dipped the bejeweled gold tankard he was carrying. He sniffed the contents curiously, and then laughed scornfully. “Water?” said the king. “Have you forgotten, my brute-bewitched nephew, that we have ample wells here at the castle?”

“That water is special,” Pierce said firmly, thankful that he had had the foresight to store the bulk of it in his own chambers, and Pierce’s, safe from prying eyes. Only this one cask had been set down here, accessible to the unappreciative king. “We had it brought in specially from the countryside.”

“There is nothing special in the damned countryside!” shouted the king in a fit of pique. He threw his tankard against the far wall, spilling its contents and spattering Jab with the spray. Pierce felt an untamed, stormy anger rising within him.

“Uncle, it is blasphemy that even a drop of that pure water should be wasted,” he said. “I cannot save that which has seeped into the floor; I only pray it can cleanse the taint of bartered privilege from this accursed place. But I can save these few precious, glistening beads.” And so saying he stepped towards Jab, lowered his tongue to Jab’s bare shoulder, and licked the water that lay on his tanned skin. The king shuddered with anger or revulsion and fled. Even the usually dauntless Jab shivered at the unexpected physical contact.

“What strange alchemy is this?” Jab asked huskily. He smiled. “The unworthy recoil from the countryman’s strengths, or falsely equate the rustic with the base. But you, my forthright and courageous friend, embrace the husbandman in perfect resonance. Our attachment does you great credit, my prince.”

The Dreams of Angels
I. Introduction
II. Chapter One
IV Chapter Three
index

2.3 Mina de Malfois and the Seasonal Goodwill

2006-12-24T12:25:30Z

[I know it isn't Tuesday, but I thought I'd do this one early, in case anyone ~~else~~ out there could use some extra distraction today.]

The holidays were upon us, but not to worry. I had all my shopping completed, and had solved most of my fandom-giving needs by converting some carefully-hoarded cash into points and paid accounts for my nearest and dearest.

Other people had been majorly stressed over finals, but not I. I’d had other worries. It was time for our quarterly Sanguinity reports, and I was anxiously awaiting my points statement. The St. Schol's exams had been vigourous, but not impossibly so, and I intended to reward myself with lots of gaming during the break. I should have some nice, peaceful evenings for it: most of the students went home for the hols. The campus kept up hot and cold running mail-service and meals for the rest of us. In fact, I’d had a package from PrinceC on the afternoon I finished my last exam.

‘I didn’t wish, Lady Mina, to risk offending you by uploading this to Penn’d Passion’s RPF section until you’d seen it,’ ran PrinceC’s black-ribboned note, ‘so I had it privately bound for your perusal.’ He’d sent me a gift wrapped volume of a Cafe Press-enabled zine of his fanfiction. I was touched, notwithstanding my natural apprehension about anything that could be considered suitable for PP’s Real Person Fic section. On the one recent occasion I’d ventured into that particular den of iniquity, all the highly rated and wildly popular stories had featured Josh, most often portrayed improbably boning a Gay Unicorn. I still hadn’t fully recovered: I had some retinal scarring. Whatever PrinceC had written, I consoled myself, it couldn’t possibly compare.

A half-hour later I let the copy of Angst and Cheese slip from my nerveless fingers, and let the cold chills overtake me as I stared blankly into space. ‘You all right?’ Jen asked, breezing into the room. I nodded weakly. In truth, two hundred pages of extremely graphic hurt/comfort featuring myself and PrinceC had left me suspended between nausea and arousal, but I didn’t feel like talking about it. Jen pounced on the abandoned-in-every-sense book, and raised an eyebrow at the cover art. I didn’t blame her. I couldn’t imagine who he’d got to draw that for him.

‘PrinceC crossed the boundary into RPF?’ she asked, sounding amused. I nodded numbly, and she chuckled unsympathetically. ‘Don’t get hung up on it,’ she said. ‘I’m sure he likes you too much to really mistreat the fictionalised version.’

It was true that the worst the fictionalised Mina had had to endure was witnessing a car accident--the fictionalised Ciyerra had been hit and hospitalised, traumatising the f. Mina and providing an excuse for the f. PrinceC to demonstrate his kindness by taking her home and whipping up some noodles. I brightened slightly.

‘Are you going home for the holidays?’ I asked. Watching Jen pack, I almost regretted having decided the nearly-empty dorm would be preferable to crashing with my mum and sisters. Almost, but not quite.

She looked evasive. ‘Not exactly home, no,’ she answered, closing her suitcase and easily lifting it and a large brown box. ‘I’ll be with friends. Oh, wait.’ She stopped in the doorway and set her stuff down long enough to retrieve a silver-wrapped package from the box. She tossed it to me. ‘It’s a cd of filksongs,’ she said cheerfully. ‘Don’t worry; most of them aren’t about you. I thought you’d enjoy the Weirdling Minstrel’s Sanguinity.’

After she’d left I drifted to the window and watched as she reappeared below. The driver of the over-full car stepped out to stuff her suitcase in the trunk. He looked, at least at this distance, suspiciously familiar. I was almost certain I’d seen him on IMDb.

I wondered how everyone else was celebrating the hols, or even which hols they were celebrating. I’d asked PrinceC, not that his answer was enlightening. ‘Mostly we keep up my mother’s family’s customs,’ he’d said. ‘They’re a lot more observant than my father’s side of the family.’

‘Oh, yes,’ I’d said encouragingly. ‘So what sort of celebration do you have?’

‘’We’re very traditional,’ he’d told me. ‘It’s a bit embarrassing, really.’

Traditionally what, though? I wondered how rude it would be to ask. ‘How so?’ I typed, opting for vagueness.

‘Oh, you know, we do all the usual things. We spend the twelve days hosting parties and watching the original series, and Aunt Susan makes her Gladst and Uncle Peter usually drinks too much Chech’tluth. And there are round-robin letters from the relatives that can’t be there; some of them spend months creating art and fic for those.’

There was a longish pause. I had no idea what to say. He misinterpreted my stunned silence. ‘We’re not fundies or anything,’ he assured me. ‘I mean, we don’t stick just to the original series. My parents are quite critical about canon, even--they participated in the Gaylaxian letter-writing campaign, you know!’

I assured him it all sounded lovely, but really, after that conversation I’d been a bit afraid to go around asking anyone else. Who knew what murky fannish depths I might uncover if I kept prying? Clearly for some it really was AWOL, and one best left undisturbed by idle questions. I mean, what if I caught Arc indulging in some orgy of unheard-of Tolkienistic revels? I’d be mortified.

Bored and lonely, I headed online, and immediately gave in to that irresistible urge to go look at the most recent horrid thing to have been brought to my attention--in this case, Penn’d Passion’s RPF stash. I noted with pride and horror that PrinceC/Mina fic was now nearly as popular as Josh/actorfic. A number of even less likely pairings were represented, to say nothing of the threesomes. There was also a note from Arc pinned at the top of the page; it asked that anyone wishing to submit an anon fic do so via the ‘request for privacy’ queue, which, she promised, they would make every effort to respect. I wondered what sorts of things people didn’t want their usernames attached to--given the things they were willing to put their names to, it was baffling in the extreme.

By now caught up in full-blown trainwreck syndrome, I did a search for all the fics containing my name, and promptly regretted having done so. PrinceC had, as he’d promised, withheld his contribution to the field of Minafic, but seemingly no one else had. I found PrinceC/Mina, Josh/Mina, Rabbit/Mina--of all the unlikely things!--and others too embarrassing to mention, including a multi-chapter fic in which I was run over by a motorcycle and Josh and Rabbit rekindled their romance over my bleeding body. At that point I decided I’d had a long enough immersion in squickitude, and headed in-game instead.

When I walked into the Manor kitchen Ciyerra was sitting at the table crying again. She’d been doing that a lot lately. She was in spirit form, but since we’ve all also seen her walking around in-game as a normal person, or as normal as Ciyerra’s ever going to manage, that’s a lot less creepy than it used to be. Stasia was polishing the silverware and making soothing noises--whether to comfort the dessert forks or to shut Ciyerra up I can’t really say.

‘What’s wrong?’ I asked.

Ciyerra solidified for a minute to talk to me. ‘It’s livejournal,’ she gulped. Well, I didn’t like some of their recent changes either, but it didn’t seem worth dissolving in tears over. I pointed this out.

‘No,’ she said. ‘I mean it’s my friendslist at livejournal.’ Therein, I well knew, lay plenty of potential for sorrow, so I pulled up a chair and prepared to listen to a tale of woe and bitchery.

‘I decided to do a friendslist cull,’ she explained. ‘I just had too many people on there to read them all, and some of the ones I was reading were writing things I didn’t approve of, so I felt it was really necessary. You must know what that’s like, Mina.’ She looked up at me through lashes heavily bedewed with tears. Stasia made the admiring noise of one aesthetically pleased by an artistic icon or avatar, but then, Stasia collects Candybar Dolls, so her tastes might trend a little downscale.

And frankly, I didn’t ‘know what it was like.’ When I defriend someone it normally means I’ve found out I can’t bloody stand them. Otherwise, if you’re on my friendslist you’re on there until you defriend me, and that’s that. I mean, people are probably aware I never so much as glance at my friendslist most days, because I’d never have time to do anything else but read it. I don’t hold with snubbing other people because I don’t have time, though.

‘Were the people you defriended upset?’ I asked gently. Perhaps she’d never thought about how harsh a defriending could feel, in which case this would be a valuable learning experience.

‘Some of them were,’ she admitted. ‘But, you know, I gave them a ‘comment if you want to stay’ post, so I don’t see why they’re complaining now. But most of them,’ she burst into tears again, ‘didn’t even notice!’

I suppressed a smile. ‘Maybe a few people were away from the computer that day?’ I suggested.

‘It wasn’t a few,’ she sobbed inconsolably. ‘It was over three hundred.’

I was a tad confused. How could someone--even someone ‘dead’--defriend over three hundred people without there being any notice of it, anywhere? I knew she hadn’t done anything wildly attention-whorish lately, but surely she wasn’t utterly invisible.

‘Had you been on their friendslists long?’ I asked. Her wailing increased, rendering her completely incomprehensible.

‘She wasn’t ever on their friendslists at all,’ Stasia told me quietly.

‘What?’ I asked, not sure I followed this last bit.

‘They were people she’d friended along the way, but who never friended her back,’ Stasia explained. ‘She finally decided to drop them, because they hadn’t ever responded to her comments by mutual-friending, but they didn’t respond to that either. Look on the bright side,’ she said more loudly, addressing Ciyerra, ‘at least you’re no longer close to the 750 friends limit, so you can add more people now. A lot of LNFs wish you’d friend them back.’ Ciyerra gave the anguished roar of someone who doesn’t want to friend back LNFs, then faded back to ghostliness and disappeared completely.

‘The girl’s an incurable loon,’ I said, with more honesty than tact.

‘She’s a sensitive, delicate, artistic soul,’ Stasia insisted, clasping her hands together and dreamily dropping her chamois. ‘I bet lots of real artists are just like her.’

‘If lots of artists were just like her, the galleries would be empty and the psych wards would be full,’ I said. ‘Actual artists have to emerge from the abyss of self-induced grief long enough to paint something.’ But Stasia continued to look starry-eyed.

‘Nothing matters more than friendship,’ she proclaimed. ‘That’s why every truly sensitive girl needs to surround herself with people who really care about her happiness.’ She had kind of a point, no matter how emo its expression. One does need real friends, not just a friendslist, or fangirls, or people to shove wishlists at.

Bloody fandom. I glared at the screen. Why did any of us even bother? It was all too obvious Ciyerra’s ‘friends’ had let her down, and who knew what kind of fall Stasia was setting herself up for.

On Christmas Eve I found myself alone, reading fanfiction to pass the time, with my IM window left open in case Arc was lonely and needed to talk or anything.

Instead I got Warr1or. ‘Do you ever feel like everything’s pointless, and nobody understands you?’ he asked. ‘Or as though you’re invisible to the people you care about?’

Well, if I did, I was hardly going to tell him so. I’m fondish of Warr1or and all, but not to the point of soul-baring.

‘I don’t have time for this right now,’ I typed, as patiently as I could manage. ‘I’m waiting to talk to Arc.’

‘I am also waiting to talk to your Archivist,’ Warr1or answered stiffly. ‘I have things to discuss with her privately.’

‘Me, too!’ chimed in an unwanted sparkly pink text, and I groaned out loud at the sight of Ciyerra’s username. ‘I want to talk to Arc too!’ I rolled my eyes, but someone else answered before I could.

‘Why are you people hanging around a message board on the holidays?’ It was, to my deep relief, Archivist12 herself.

‘I just...’ I hesitated, reluctant to say this in front of the others, and then thought, why the hell not? If I had to suffer seasonal angst, I might as well infect them too. ‘I just...dash it all, Arc, I’ve just been feeling that everything is pointless. All this. Fandom. Why do we do it?’

There was silence: no text at all.

‘Is that what’s wrong with you two, too?’ Arc asked, finally.

‘Yes,’ admitted Warr1or.

‘Kinda,’ typed Ciyerra, and her text barely sparkled at all.

‘And you mean to tell me that all three of you, in spite of years of observation of the gap between holiday t.v. specials and real life, somehow expect me to come up with some kind of last minute wisdom?’ Arc asked. ‘That’s what you’re waiting for, a meaningful holiday episode?’

I felt my throat tighten. I couldn’t think of any adequate defence, and neither, apparently, could the others.

‘Okay, but I’m only saying this once,’ Arc said, ‘so listen. You still there, Mina?’

‘Yes,’ I assured her.

‘You’re paying attention, Warr1or?’

‘Yes,’ he answered.

'BalletChic?' Arc continued.

'Yes,' typed Ciyerra. Aha! I thought, but said nothing, and Warr1or remained likewise silent about this admission.

‘Good,’ Arc said. ‘Have you all read the Velveteen Rabbit?’ We all admitted we had. I fervently hoped no one was saving a transcript of this chat. Soppiness looks awful in the cold light of day.

‘Then you all remember the bit about the toys who don’t usually become real,’ Arc went on. I didn’t, actually, until she started listing them; I’d forgotten there were any toys that didn’t make it to real. ‘The ones that break easily, Warr1or; the ones with sharp edges, Mina; the ones, BalletChic, who have to be carefully kept.’

I was holding my breath, and I rather suspected the others were, too. My eyes, I don’t mind admitting, had filled up a bit.

‘That’s why we're here,’ Arc said patiently. ‘To wear off the sharp edges, and repair the breaks, and to keep each other. Here we all are, the staid and the hysterical, the sound and the silly, and it’s almost irrelevant how well we’re getting along at any particular moment: all fans belong in fandom, and we’re all becoming real.’

‘Goodnight, Arc,’ I typed, sniffling.

‘Goodnight, Mina. I’ll see you in the new year. Goodnight, you lot,’ she signed off cheerfully. ‘I have to go approve some anon fics.’

‘Happy Holidays, guys!’ said Ciyerra, in giant pink sparklefont, and I smiled in spite of myself.

‘Goodnight, Mina,’ said Warr1or quietly once the others had left. ‘BTW, I didn’t know what to get you, so I chipped in the last ten points you needed.’ That’s right: it was past midnight. The points reports would be out! He was gone before I could thank him properly.

Though, honestly, I don’t know what could possibly have constituted adequate gratitude. Thanks to the events I’d hosted, the sea voyages I’d participated in, and the generous contributions of both the Tented Tartanists and the Malfois Manor staff, I’d tied with PrinceC for highest point standing in the game. As the current most highly ranked players, PrinceC and I would, the report informed me, be granted one night of bliss with Lord Henri Antoine Silvestre de Gravina himself.

I almost swooned right there in the dorm room. This looked set to be the most erotic and meaningful sexual experience of my life to date.

footnotes

index

1.12 Mina de Malfois and the Reality Check (part two)

2006-09-29T11:39:02Z

[The author wishes to thank all those of you who've stuck with her (and with Mina) this far, especially those who've commented, emailed, linked other people here or created Minaverse things. Thank you all very much.
Oh, and the footnotes for Reality Check will be up next week.]

Disclaimer: This is a work of fiction. No resemblance is intended to any person or persons living, dead, or online. No BNFs were harmed in the making of this fic.

Permissions: All rights reserved. All other reproduction, transmission, or storage, in any format, is prohibited unless the author is contacted beforehand and grants specific written permission. The author may be contacted at mina_de_malfois@yahoo.com.

‘And you mean nothing’s burnt down yet?’ Ciyerra messaged.

‘Not a thing,’ I confessed, hating to disappoint her.

‘Never mind, dear,’ she typed, as though she thought I might be disappointed. ‘A group of girls are planning a sea voyage to the Patricic Rim for some time in September. I’ll put in a word for you and see that you’re invited along.’

It was the last week at camp, and reality continued to be less well-plotted than the Girls’ Dormitory set had hoped, although some of my campers had formed friendships and played smallish pranks, so there was that to report on. The daily routine of camp was as reassuringly timeless as any Hockeystickser could have hoped, but the casual motley of the ‘uniforms’ had been a sad disappointment on the one occasion I’d managed to upload pictures, and without a single fire or life-threatening drowning to report I sensed I was letting the side down.

They, on the other hand, had behaved marvellously, sending me a Girls’ Dormitory Care Package complete with cookies and a bound copy of this year’s Virtual Girls Annual. It was particularly touching when you remembered that I’d never posted at their corner of Penn’d Passion. I suppose they viewed me as part of their wider circle of acquaintance, or maybe my hosting Ciyerra’s spirit-raising had won them over. It was sweet of them, and I was a little bit homesick for the web, and therefore inclined to get teary-eyed over kind gestures; I’d sniffled over that Annual more than one likes to admit.

My reduced net access had made it even more difficult to open the envelope from St. Scholastica’s than would otherwise have been the case. Say what you will about the limitations of online friendships--such as how one never really knows who’s at the other end of those electrons--the fact remains that they’re a source of moral support. It’s easier to face real life disappointments if you know the squees of happy fanfic readers await you. It kind of takes the edge off rejection.

I’m sure I’d have eventually worked up the nerve to open the dratted thing, but as it happened Jen sprang unexpectedly into our bedroom and caught me gazing at the still-sealed envelope. I’d been counting on privacy for the nightly ritual of not reading my mail--she usually disappeared after we’d got the girls settled and the lights out, and returned after I was asleep. But, as I said, on this night she caught me suspended inertly between hope and despair. She plucked the envelope out of my fingers, glanced at the return address, and said easily, ‘College admission jitters? Want me to open it for you?’ She hit just the right note of callous compassion, and I nodded.

‘Well done Mina,’ she went on, once she’d glanced at the contents. She handed over my acceptance letter, laid the rest of the contents on the bed beside me, and ruffled my hair with a casual intimacy that in other circs would have irritated me enormously. ‘St. Schol’s have let you in. Very elite school, that: they don’t take just anybody.’

I almost couldn’t believe it. Of course it seems silly now to think they could ever have turned me down, but the truth was, I’d been worried. I know it’s difficult to believe, but I’d had a crisis of faith once I’d sent off the forms committing me, should they accept me, to my place at St. Scholastica’s and my half of a dorm room. I’d been out of uni for a while now, and not exactly improving my mind via my career, either. St. Scholastica’s looked poshly austere and serious. What if I just wasn’t good enough?

The relief was so enormous I was trembling. Jen noticed, and though she quite decently looked quickly away and pretended not to have seen, she did say, ‘You shouldn’t care so much about other people’s opinions.’

Bloody cheek! It’s not as if she knew me well enough to make that sort of enormous judgement--and anyway, who was she to talk? It was probably easy for her to shrug off things like university acceptance, but I had a reputation to keep up. I’d have felt awful if I’d had to admit to Arc that I’d been turned down, after she’d got me this job. And since the camp had put me up for the scholarship, if I’d been rejected by St. Scholastica’s I bet they’d have told Ms. Hamill. I’d have had to worry that she might accidentally have told PrinceC, in which case I’d have literally died of embarrassment, or that she’d discuss it with Arc, which would have been too utterly awful for words. I glared at the back of Jen’s head. She’d probably never had to keep a secret or worry about her reputation in her life. She couldn’t begin to understand the sort of strain I’d been under.

Still. She had opened the envelope. I relented, though she’d been irritatingly oblivious of both the glare and the relenting. ‘I really wanted to get in,’ I said, as calmly as I could manage.

‘To an all-girls university?’ she asked mockingly. ‘Where, no matter how stellar the education you’ll be getting, you’ll be surrounded day and night by a pack of women? Hard to tell if it’s worth it.’ I hadn’t really asked for her input, so it took a rather major effort not to snap at her. It never so much as crossed my mind that she mightn’t be addressing me at all. I knew very little about my co-counsellor, really, other than that the campers senselessly adored her.

We endured one afternoon when we couldn’t get the girls settled down at all. They didn’t want to do anything online, not even browse teen wizard porn; they just wanted to surround us at the front of the room and gossip about the mysterious stranger who’d arrived by landing a seaplane on the lake, and who was now shut up in Ms. Hamill’s cabin. Jen and I had missed all this excitement.

As soon as we had a free period Jen grabbed me by the hand. ‘Come on,’ she said. ‘We have to go ask Ms. Hamill when we can expect our pay stubs to be mailed out.’ It was as good an excuse as any. I followed her.

We’d no sooner stepped onto her porch than Ms. Hamill’s door swung open. ‘But how did you guess?’ she was saying, and then fell abruptly silent when she saw the two of us. She eyed Jen curiously, almost as if she didn’t recognise her. ‘Did you want something, girls?’ she asked, still with that strange expression on her face.

‘No, Ms. Hamill,’ Jen said meekly, abandoning our alibi without warning. I couldn’t have spoken, myself. I was rendered temporarily speechless by the sight of the person who’d followed Eva Hamill through the door.

The stranger was tall, broad shouldered, and dressed in a black tuxedo and a ruffled white shirt. It took me a confused couple of moments to realize she was female. Her hair was mostly reddish-blonde, but there were locks and strands of every shade of gold and silver and copper.

‘It’s nice to see you,’ she said, sounding amused. She seemed to speak to Jen, but then she grinned at me. My knees wobbled, and I had a moment of not knowing where to put my hands, and feeling that my feet had grown to gigantic, unmanageable proportions. ‘Perhaps you two could row me out to the Otter?’

‘I’ll row you out to the Otter,’ Ms. Hamill said firmly before we had a chance to agree, and the stranger’s grin deepened. She made a very neat, formal bow to our chief of staff, sort of both courtly and mocking, and the two of them left. We watched them closely all the way down the trail, but they walked without speaking, at least until they were out of view.

‘Well,’ said Jen, sounding awed. I didn’t answer, but I knew exactly what she meant.

On the last evening at camp the computer lab was almost deserted--I guess the campers preferred to spend their last bit of time with each other rather than emailing people they’d see tomorrow anyway. I slipped into a seat and messaged Arc.

‘I’m having a bout of nerves,’ I confessed, my fingers trembling on the keyboard.

‘Don’t,’ she advised, calmly and impossibly. ‘Don’t even think about it. Just get back to your apartment and concentrate on all the things you need to do--terminate your lease and pack up your things and sell the things you can’t pack--and before you know it you’ll be there.’

‘But what if I’m not good enough?’ I typed. ‘I mean, who am I, really?’ Then I looked in horror at what I’d written and logged off, even reaching out one ice-cold hand to shut down my computer, making absolutely certain I wouldn’t see her answer. What had I done? Why had I written that?

Jen stood up from her own computer near the door, looking distracted. ‘Turn out the lights before you leave, will you, Mina?’ she asked, hurrying out before I even answered. She must have been having as bad an image-management night as I was; she’d forgotten to shut off her computer. I leaned over to flick it off on my way out, and inadvertently read the screen. ‘Please click to complete Sanguinity Online logout, Josh Amos,’ it said. I nearly shrieked out loud from sheer shock.

I was, as you can imagine, entirely distracted from my own problems for at least fifteen minutes. It wasn’t until I was getting ready for bed, against a backdrop of overexcited chatter from the tightly-wound overly-energetic denizens of Cabin 13, that it hit me. ‘Just get back to your apartment,’ Arc had written.

But that meant--that meant--Arc knew I really lived there. She knew I’d been lying all along. Why was she even friends with me, then? How could she even stand me?

My heart felt like lead.

I crawled into bed hoping to die in my sleep, and eventually fell into troubled dreams, and woke at some ghastly hour of the morning. I couldn’t re-achieve drowsiness, so I gave up on it and got up, dressing quietly so as not to wake ‘Josh’ or the campers, and went for a walk along the lake.

Now that I was awake and, if not bright-eyed, at least clear-headed, I thought I understood. She’d alluded before to her expectations that someday I’d move on to creating original fiction. Perhaps Archivist12 had got in on the ground floor, so to speak, by friending a future Real Live Novelist. That, I thought, had to be the answer.

I went on thinking that I’d figured it out all through helping the campers with last minute packing, and hugging them goodbye as their parents drove up, and gathering my own things together. I was waiting for the bus when Jen caught up to me. I’d been carefully avoiding her all day, out of the sheer awkwardness induced by knowing the truth about her screen name, but she just thrust something at me. ‘This arrived for you at the main office,’ she gasped, and dashed off to the carful of friends that had come to pick her up.

I turned it over in my hands, curiously. It was a telegram. I’d never had a telegram before. I hadn’t been sure they still existed, even, outside of books. I waited until I was sitting on the bus to open it. If it was something bad I wanted to be sitting down.

‘Who are you, really?’ it read. ‘You’re Mina, of course: the girl who can sit all alone in a grotty little apartment and still summon up the will to build Manors in the clouds, and then fill them with friends. Of course you’re good enough. Much love, Arc.’

footnotes

index

Squid and Squickability

2006-09-25T22:46:13Z

Title: Squid and Squickability

Fandom: Sanguinity

Author: Josh Amos

Summary: A one-shot in which I attempt to envision the reunion between PrincessB and Pierce after the latter has been away at school.

PrincessB gave the punt one last hard shove, and felt it suddenly lighten as it entered the water and bobbed to life under her hands. Her skirts were wet up to her waist, even though she was only standing in knee-deep water--why, she wondered irritably, did water do that? The fabric clung to her, cold and heavy and in the way, making her struggle for a ridiculous length of time before she was finally able to climb into the little boat. She lost both her shoes in the process, and damned near unshipped an oar. But it didn’t matter.

As soon as she was certain she couldn’t be seen from the castle, she hauled off the layers of sopping silk, toweled herself dry with the upper part of her shift, and pulled on the things she’d stolen from the back of Pierce’s wardrobe. These clothes hadn’t fit him for years, since long before he’d gone away to school, so she knew he’d never miss them. She almost tossed her own clothes over the side, but then decided it would be more sensible to hang onto them, and settled for bundling them out of sight under the seat. After all, however impractical they were as clothes, miles upon miles of silk might be somehow useful.

She felt an unexpected pang of regret when she cut off her hair, but it had to be done. Boys didn’t usually wear theirs much beyond shoulder length. She hacked hers off even shorter, just about level with her cheeks, reasoning that it was better to wear as unfeminine a style as possible within the bounds of acceptable fashion. Her thin face and slender body were liability enough, even with the short hair.

When she stopped staring at the long locks of her hair coiling like seaweed in the water and resumed rowing, she prayed, the rhythm of her efforts making it easier than usual to lose herself in the prayers. ‘Dear Storyteller,’ she pleaded, ‘please help me to set my own genre. Let this not be some pre-ordained novel of manners concerned only with the tedium of court life, and not a predictable princess-marries-prince romance…unless that be Thy will, in which case, please reconcile me to my role, but grant me the strength to shape my story. Send your Angelic messengers to protect me, and to give me hints. Bless those I love, through each and every chapter. Send them joyful plot twists, and resolve the conflicts that oppose them, but not too easily.’ Then she lapsed into meditative silence, ignoring the dull ache that was working its way into her arms and shoulders and back.

It was dusk before she’d finally made her way far enough along the coast that nothing looked familiar, and nearly dark before she’d bypassed the first unfamiliar village and reached a small harbor, hidden from view until she was right at the mouth of it. She brought the boat into the cove cautiously, clumsily poking one oar at the rocks to keep from hitting them. She dragged the punt ashore with relief.

There was no one in sight on the tiny, rocky beach, just a narrow path heading up hill and vanishing from sight. Beta curled up in the bottom of the boat and tried to sleep, but it was colder than she’d expected, and things buzzed in her ears and tried to bite her. The best she could manage was a fretful doze with her arms wrapped over her head and her hands pulled inside the sleeves. The stars whirled overhead, and the wind in the trees made a noise like pages turning. She felt giddy and queasy with exhaustion.

‘The strangest things wash ashore here,’ said an amused voice. Beta, dreaming, heard it but didn’t answer, thinking it was part of the dream. A hand grabbed her shoulder and shook her roughly awake. She opened her eyes dazedly, and saw a pirate: the most beautiful pirate imaginable. The woman’s red hair was a wild mass of every shade from copper to blood, and she wore a gaudy but impressive imitation of gentleman’s clothes, with leather boots that gleamed in the moonlight. She looked sympathetically down at the princess.

‘You’d better come with me,’ she said. ‘You look half frozen, and there’s plenty of room at the Briary for those willing to work--and to keep their mouths shut. Can you do that, boy?’

‘Yes,’ said Beta, still wondering if she was really awake. ‘But what’s the Briary?’

‘A refuge for the right sort,’ said the lady pirate, ‘a fortress against the wrong sort, and a thorn in the side of all the others. Here, carry this.’ She tossed a bulging burlap sack at Beta before lifting a second sack to her shoulders. Beta caught it obediently, but then wrinkled her nose at the smell.

‘What is it?’ she asked.

‘Dried squid,’ came the answer. ‘Hurry up. If we have to wake the gatekeeper he’ll be livid.’

The warmth and light of the kitchen came as a shock, but not as much a shock as the sight of cousin Pierce sitting on one of the long wooden benches sharing a plate with a rough-hewn peasant. Pierce glanced at her with mild interest and no sign of recognition. 'A stray?' he asked.

'A guest,' Beta's rescuer said shortly.

'Care to share our room, boy?' Pierce asked, earning him a look of reproof from the other man. Beta nearly snorted with laughter.

'Don't feel obliged to enter that den of iniquity,' the woman said. 'We can find you space to bed down alone.' For one fleeting instant Beta's impish curiosity almost led her to accept Pierce's offer, but she thought better of it...for now, at least.

index

1.12 Mina de Malfois and the Reality Check (part one)

2006-09-22T13:46:23Z

[Many, many thanks to all of you've who've read, commented, linked and recced. Also, the author urges you to check out summercon].

Disclaimer: This is a work of fiction. No resemblance is intended to any person or persons living, dead, or online. No BNFs were harmed in the making of this fic.

Permissions: All rights reserved. All other reproduction, transmission, or storage, in any format, is prohibited unless the author is contacted beforehand and grants specific written permission. The author may be contacted at mina_de_malfois@yahoo.com.

I spent the bus ride to Camp Silver Lake wondering whether I was experiencing full-blown paranoia, or if I really had caught a fleeting glimpse of some sort of behind-fandom machination. I mean, I’ve always prided myself on being sensible in spite of my BNFdom. I’d made rather a point of not falling for the more sensational fandom rumours and fads, and I’d always dismissed the whole ‘Secret Masters of Fandom’ wheeze as a slightly lame joke. After all, if a fanfic author as well known as I am wasn’t pulling invisible strings, then surely no one was.

But jouncing along the near-interminable highways, byways, and dirt roads I had plenty of time to ponder, and ponder I did. Assuming I survived the trip, I was about to embark on the strangest employment episode ever, and I speak as one who’s had to acquire experience in the, if you’ll excuse the phrase, service industry, which is neither as pervy nor as industrious as it sounds. The ‘information package’ the camp had sent me had included, to my bewilderment, application forms for a university called St. Scholastica’s. Further puzzled shuffling had disclosed a letter promising that the Computers and Creative Writing posish offered, along with the expected minimum-wage reimbursement, a full scholarship.

A full scholarship, that is to say, to a uni I’d never heard of but was now being invited to apply to, and all because of a job I’d only gotten, if I may be perfectly frank, because of Arc’s friendship with the woman running the camp.

It was all a bit peculiar. Peculiar in a good way, obviously. I mean, I was looking forward to the camp, and I’d filled out the uni app in a spirit of mild optimism; if I lucked out and they recognized my as-yet-undisplayed academic potential, naturally I’d be happy to accept the Camp Silver Lake scholarship. But I admit to being puzzled as to why I’d been offered it. I had the strangest sense of wheels within wheels, as though some unseen hand were reaching out through fandom to...

...to do what, though? Give out scholarships? It was an awfully benign conspiracy, if that were the case. Unless maybe I was being recruited for some sort of espionage, in which case I really must start exercising regularly, and learn to climb ropes and things.

I’d come to no firm conclusions beyond the necessity of losing a teensy bit of weight, we’ll say ten pounds, and then of toning up the remainder, when the bus pulled up at camp. We were hustled off, shown our cabins, and then started right in on a series of meetings about camp policy and responsibility and schedules and I don’t know what all--I was barely listening, honestly. My co-counselor wasn’t there yet; our chief of staff mentioned in passing that my partner was an ‘old girl,’ a former camper and junior counsellor, and so was being allowed to arrive later that day. And speaking of our chief of staff, Eva Hamill was disconcertingly cute, with bobbed black hair and a glowing tan. She bore a definite family resemblance to her photogenic son.

When we left the dining hall the parking lot had filled with cars and busses, all of which were disgorging horrifying numbers of girls. They milled around us like that scene in zombie movies where the few surviving humans are trapped by the brain-munching hordes, although I guessed that shooting my way out would be frowned on. It was more or less terrifying, though. Until that exact second I hadn’t fully understood that children would be involved. I’d always assumed I’d get on well with children, but I’d never felt much inclined to test that theory, and now the realization that I’d be amongst them for weeks hit me like the slap of a cold wave.

I set off through the sea of girls, charting a course back to Cabin 13. Cabin 13, I’d seen earlier, contained six bunks for campers and, in a small adjoined room, two beds, one each for self and counterpart. I’d already claimed one bed by dumping my luggage on it. When I entered the cabin now, I found an impromptu fan club had formed: a girl of about my age, presumably the other comp person, stood blocking my way, surrounded by a gaggle of young teen-things.

The girl standing in the doorway was boyishly slim-hipped, depressingly tall and slender, and had a mass of short, dark, curly hair that reminded me of fauns. What really caught my eye, though, was the Sanguinity t-shirt she wore. ‘Are you Mina?’ she asked, and I temporarily lost my head.

‘Are you one of my fans?’ I gushed, and impulsively hugged her. Several of the dratted campers giggled. The girl didn’t hug back. She didn’t stiffen or pull away in revulsion or anything, but she came as close to ignoring me as anyone can while actually being embraced. I realized at once I’d made some sort of ghastly error, and stepped back, trying but not quite pulling off an air of nonchalance.

‘No,’ she said, raising one eyebrow. ‘I was told my co-counsellor was here already, and that her name was Mina. I wasn’t told she had fans.’ She achieved a level of sardonic amusement on that last line that put me in mind of Mrs.Sev’s Dark Schoolmaster. I could have admired it in a fictional character, but it’s a lot less attractive when you’re the recipient, somehow. The campers giggled again. You know, those people who babble about the innocent laughter of children have probably never met a child. This lot were gazing at Sarcasm Girl with a kind of fearful, sycophantic devotion that filled me with foreboding. Visions of homicide danced in my head. I struggled to regain control.

‘My mistake,’ I said frigidly.

She shrugged. ‘No problem, doll,’ she said, sweeping me with a slow glance that lingered pointedly along the way. That glance couldn’t have been any more intrusive unless it had somehow sprouted tentacles. She reached out and shook my hand firmly, holding it just a fraction of a second longer than protocol required, and smiled knowingly. ‘I’m Jen,’ she said. ‘Ami Jenever. Let’s head over to the computer lab, shall we?’

The door to the computer lab had, we were informed by the deputy head, to remain locked at all times, not because of the value of the equipment--some of the computers were so old that in place of a scroll key you expected to see actual parchment--but to keep the campers from unsupervised net access. Jen and I accepted our keys, nodded agreement to the rules, and gazed over our domain proudly. Well, reasonably proudly. I’d lost better electronics than these, honestly.

Still, internet access was not to be sneered at. I missed everyone already. Of course, I wouldn’t be able to spend time in Sanguinity from camp, but I hoped to be able to touch base with everyone at Penn’d Passion regularly. They’d all been awfully nice about my summer plans, offering heartfelt congratulations and best wishes. One of the Tolkien purists had shared, at length, his tales of the ‘good old days’ (a phrase I assume he used ironically) when their summer vacation had consisted of playing tennis in somebody’s attic. The Girls’ Dormitory set, both Hockeysticksers and Hollidays, had been ‘no end of chuffed’ that I’d be at a real, live girls’ camp, and had made all sorts of predictions about japes and pranks that I hadn’t the heart to tell them were unlikely ever to occur outside of books. In fact I half hoped the camp infirmary would burn to the ground, requiring one girl to daringly rescue another, just so I could thrill the Jollies by confirming their fondest expectations.

But I didn’t get much time online. I was around computers for much of every day, but not able to give proper attention to keyboard or screen. The darling children, or little demons--usage varying according to whether you were a parent, or one of the people hired to care for their spawn--couldn’t be left alone for a second. I hadn’t had a clear idea of what sort of interests I expected girls from families well-enough off to afford Silver Lake to share, but I certainly hadn’t guessed the primary one would be porn. In the first day alone I had to block three sites I hope to entirely erase from my memory, and one I secretly bookmarked to look at later. Jenny didn’t help matters. The girls leapt to obey her every order usually, and fought for the privilege of making her bed and doing her chores, but her ‘don’t browse porn’ lecture lacked conviction, and they bloody well sensed it.

I swear, nothing they were supposed to be doing, like writing letters home or keeping an online camp diary, held half the fascination for them that illicit sex did. When I wasn’t pacing back and forth nervously and peering over their shoulders to monitor the level of filth on the screen, I was escorting herds of them to and from their other activities--a precaution I’d thought silly when I’d first heard it, but not any longer. Now I’d seen them in action I knew they were fully capable of charging a pack of gigolos to their parents’ credit cards and having them shipped up by express post. Jen’s frightening theory that the girls ‘needed their privacy,’ and her insistence that we ‘relax and enjoy ourselves,’ were entirely irresponsible. They couldn’t be left alone for a second.

Jen was a computer genius, though, and a much worse addict than I am. Every time I turned my back on her she was logged in somewhere. I could never quite see what she was doing, either, as she logged off and shut down the instant she sensed anyone looking. I fervently hoped it wasn’t too pornographic or illegal, and left it at that. On the bright side, she did seem able to write well, and the sessions where we helped the girls compose and edit stories were enormous fun. The Jenny-worship got old fast, but the girls were gratifyingly willing to like me as well. One grew fond of the campers in spite of oneself. They were such bright, enthusiastic, amusing creatures, determined to enjoy everything--a bit like our online selves, only offline. I envied them a little. They hadn’t learned to be insecure yet. Not that I was insecure. Not at all. But, you know...most other people are.

Speaking of which, I’d had an envelope from St. Scholastica’s.

footnotes

index

1.11 Mina de Malfois and the Spiritual Renewal (part three)

2006-08-28T19:05:22Z

Many, many thanks to everyone for their kindnesses and consideration. You’re a pleasure to write for, and your comments mean a lot. As soon as I can, I’ll be back to entertain you (or at least, to do my level best in that direction).
In typing this up, I realized that this chapter sounds ‘coincidentally morbid,’ if you see what I mean. It wasn’t meant to--I wrote it weeks ago, and the rough outline for these chapters has been in place since the beginnings. It’s just one of those ‘the universe is gently poking fun at me’ coincidences; please don’t allow it to put you off. The person I’m mourning had a merry heart, and would have been the first to laugh.

Disclaimer: This is a work of fiction. No resemblance is intended to any person or persons living, dead, or online. No BNFs were harmed in the making of this fic.

Permissions: All rights reserved. All other reproduction, transmission, or storage, in any format, is prohibited unless the author is contacted beforehand and grants specific written permission. The author may be contacted at mina_de_malfois@yahoo.com.

On the evening of the spirit raising, it was overcast and gloomy in game, the first unseasonable hint of fall being the wind that rustled through the trees and tore off twigs and leaves. The cybermoon was full, gleaming eerily as clouds scudded across it. It was, in other words, perfect, and I wondered if the huge number of players who’d showed up for this ghostly event had somehow reset the atmosphere to ‘haunting.’

Because the number of avatars who’d paid to enter the grounds of Malfois Manor was astounding even by my standards, and I’m used to a lot of attention. They milled around in sombre mourning attire, more or less traditional: jet beads and hair jewellery were everywhere, along with frock-coats and top hats and pearls, but there were also lots of black ballet shoes and Ouija-board pendants, which I’m pretty sure people don’t wear to real funerals. There was a huge crowd milling around in Dread Lane, too broke or too unknown to have gained admittance, but still appropriately dressed and whispering excitedly among themselves as they stood en pointe and strove for a glimpse of Dr. Zerubbabel. I knew, I just knew, that somewhere out there in the real world all these people had gathered in tearful awe at their keyboards, drenched in appropriate scents and probably playing BalletChic memorial podcasts in the background as they willed Ciyerra into full game participation.

Sanguinity’s religious factions were out in full force. The C of M and the C of N were being icily polite to each other, but were taking notes for later. There were also furries everywhere, sporting sombre-hued pelts. The blonde who’d wanted to partner Josh was there, surrounded by her friends. They were rather prettily attired in black sailor suits, each with a single band of colour adorning their skirts and collars. ‘You need to calm down,’ one was saying, sounding more scornful than comforting.

‘I am perfectly serene!’ shrieked Rabbit in response.

Once they’d moved past, Josh himself stepped out from behind a nearby oak. I snickered. ‘It just seemed better to avoid her than to set her off again,’ he said, coming to stand beside me. ‘Everyone’s overwrought enough without that.’

‘Maybe you should just agree to attend Kawaiikon with her again,’ drawled a deep voice behind us, and I spun around to discover PrinceC looking absolutely to die for in full Victorian mourning. Really, top hats ought to come with warning labels. He reached for my gloved hand with both of his and lifted it to his lips, causing my knees to liquefy. ‘Lady Mina,’ he said theatrically. Josh Amos made a choking sound.

‘Do you know one another?’ I babbled, remembering as I spoke that they did.

‘We’ve seen each other at cosplay events,’ Josh said coolly. He made a slight bow in PrinceC’s direction. ‘Your costumes, allow me to say, are always impeccable. You gave a very masterful performance at Kawaiikon, I recall.’

‘I give a very masterful performance everywhere,’ PrinceC said sardonically. There was a sort of strangled group shriek from some women standing next to us, and Mrs.Sev gave me a little wave and a half curtsy when I glanced their way.

Josh looked annoyed. He gave one last bow, in my direction this time, and murmured, ‘If you’ll excuse me, Lady Mina, it’s getting a bit clichéd around here. We’ll talk later, I hope.’ He headed off, soon disappearing into the crowd. I noticed a couple of the Tented Tartanists detached themselves from their group and trailed hopefully after him. Not that I was particularly watching him walk away, or anything. I just happened to notice.

PrinceC snorted quietly. ‘What an ass,’ he remarked, momentarily startling me into a mistaken belief that he was psychic. ‘An utter young idiot,’ he went on, unconsciously clarifying the matter. ‘If I recall correctly, he spent his time at Kawaiikon too embroiled in ridiculous scandal and hysterical females to have possibly noticed my costumes.

‘What sort of scandal?’ I asked, interested in spite of myself.

‘The sort no gentleman should allow his name to become attached to,’ PrinceC said firmly but uninformatively. He tucked my hand around his forearm. ‘We should make our way to the monument,’ he declared. ‘The ritual must be starting soon, and you are the hostess.’ I refrained from pointing out that he wasn’t the host. He made an awfully handsome escort, and a fittingly dressed one; well worth a ringside seat, really. We weaved our way through the masses, PrinceC’s broad-shouldered presence seeming to part the way with miraculous ease, until we were standing in front of the winged ballet dancer. Dr. Zerubbabel was there, flanked by Neo-Table Rappers and various cultic representatives. They were standing around what looked like a freshly filled in grave. Warr1or stood at the foot of this, leaning on a shovel and looking impossibly rustic. We emerged from the crowd to stand next to him, and he tugged his cap to us and nodded. Dr. Zerubbabel cleared his throat.

The ceremony proved much more subdued than I’d expected. Dr. Zerubbabel gave us a short homily on how one of the paradoxes of online life is that the pursuit of universal popularity often leads to isolation, but by being oneself one can find a supportive tribe. Then he muttered a short chant in some arcane language, and Ciyerra’s ghost was suddenly in front of us, hovering just high enough above the grave so that everyone could see her.

‘And now let us have the grains of salt,’ instructed Dr. Z., and one by one each of the religious and cultural representatives stepped forward: Arc, a C of N counterpart, a multiply-breasted catwoman, Darla, a Gay Unicornist, an enormous wolf in a wizard’s robe, what looked like twin boy scouts, a knight in chainmail, a Druid Priestess, three uniformed schoolgirls, and a gauze-clad feedback whore.

Ciyerra, who had started out in her usual misty form, grew more and more solid, and less ethereal and idealized, as each representative dropped a single grain of salt on the grave. Her avatar bobbed lower and lower until finally it was firmly on the ground: a perfectly ordinary looking young woman, standing there like the rest of us. She looked tear-stained but relieved, and a pack of her friends raced forward to hug her.

I was gratified that we’d had such a spectacular, and well-attended, success, but once it was over I was left feeling a bit flat. It’s like throwing a birthday party for someone else: a lot of fun to plan, and of course you’re happy for them and everything, but at the end they leave with the gifts and you have to clean up.

Arc must have noticed my avatar was moping. ‘What’s wrong?’ she asked. I explained as best I could.

‘I suppose I’m an awful person, really,’ I concluded glumly.

She smiled. ‘Of course you’re not,’ she said. ‘Everybody feels a bit that way sometimes. You’ll feel better once you throw yourself into the next thing.’

This cheered me slightly. ‘You’re probably right,’ I agreed. ‘Tomorrow I’ll head down to the harbour, and check in with the others. It’s about time I got to work on remembering who I am.’

Her smile widened in a way that gave me the distinct impression she wasn’t taking my new spiritual interests seriously, an impression bloody well confirmed when she replied, ‘Remember who you are? Mina, if there’s one thing I knew about you right from the start, it’s that you have a firm sense of who you are. It persists even in the face of who you want to be.’

She had to leave soon afterwards, so I didn’t get time to formulate a rebuttal, but I reopened the conversation the next time I caught her on IM.

‘Are you familiar with the phenomenon of soul bonds?’ I asked her haughtily.

‘No, but I’m conversant with the phenomenon of imaginative young people spending too much time indoors and needing to get out into the fresh air,’ she replied. ‘You don’t know anyone who’d be interested in a four-week stint as co-counsellor of Computers and Creative Writing at a summer camp, do you?’

I paused in mid-indignation. ‘What sort of summer camp?’ I asked.

‘It’s an all-girls camp for ten to fourteen year olds. Eva Hamill runs it.’

‘PrinceC’s mother?’ I asked, both intrigued and horrified.

‘Yes,’ said Arc. ‘She’s been involved with summer camps and after-school programs for years. All her projects are aimed at supporting and empowering young girls, and she’s pretty rigorous about keeping her son well away from it.’ I fancied I could sense Arc smirking, but her font remained impassive.

‘Would this co-counsellor have to have a lot of experience?’ I asked, my hopes rising in spite of my best efforts to suppress them. I’d never been a counsellor, but I just knew I could do this. And it would be the perfect break from my routine--I could always pick up another McJob in the fall.

‘Not if she came with strong recommendations,’ Arc typed. I held my breath. ‘Are you interested?’

‘YES!’ I said.

footnotes

index

1.11 Mina de Malfois and the Spiritual Renewal (part two)

2006-08-16T15:56:16Z

Sanguinity/Minaverse things by Other People

2006-08-12T14:27:32Z

Just to reiterate: Minaverse fanfiction and fanart has the author's full support. If you'd like yours linked here, just drop me an email or a comment.

1. cesario has written At Her Grace’s Behest. Part two is here.

2. mutecornett has drawn Mina.

3. dreamer_marie has written Resting On His Muscled Shoulder.

4. narcissam has written a Mina entry for the fandom wank wiki. Thanks to jabberwockypie for pointing that out, and rickybuchanan for telling me how to find out who's authored a wiki entry.

5. tmartian42 is keeping The List of characters roaming around outside of the stories. I approve wholeheartedly, though it is a tad disturbing to see how many innocent people (the real ones, that is) have accounts that fit in. I can only hope they're pleased by the accidental inclusion, rather than appalled, if they ever find out about it. (Sadly, I don't own or operate any of the in-character sockpuppets. I do love them, though, and applaud their creators.)

6. invidereliana runs mdmfans for all your icon and discussion needs. Footnotes can be found there sometimes.

7. temaris, who contacted me about this a while back, has podcasts available at her livejournal:
Snailmail Affair
Charitable Impulse
Young Blood
Twee Little Maids.

8. euqen has written Something Simple, Something Sleazy and I Left My Body Lying Somewhere.

9. liz_darkheart has written Fear and Fascination and the Courtly Dance, which are Sanguinity fanfiction.

10. gnatkip has created a sampler like the one Mina wants to make.

11. thedorkygirl has written the Contender.

12. The romantic Kadorienne has written Midnight Oil.

13. wminstrel has written and performed 'Sanguinity.'

14. vuirneen has posted a copy of her semi-private email to me, which I’m sure you’ll all find instructive. Really, the things that go on at cons are outrageous, aren’t they? Too Many Minas Spoil the Con is a warning to us all.

15. grey_bard has written A Paen to Sanguinity (a song) by RavenKelVamp. Or maybe I should say “RavenKelVamp has written...”

16. A missing scene, courtesy of tmartian42.

17. kyuuketsukirui has written Dream Diary, and the tone and characterization are perfect, if I do say so myself.

18. If you have a close look at Chapter Ten of rose_and_lizard's wonderful Marlowfic, Term of Duty, Miranda's aunt might look familiar to you.

19. jackiejlh has written an untitled Mina story (which should be read just after the first installment of 2.7, Brides of Fictionstein, if you're reading these in order). Part two is here, and part three is here.

20. The inspirational Mina poster, features mutecornett's art.

21. Nocturne has written Rainy Monday.

22. scifantasy's Case Study provides a fascinating look behind-the-scenes. Check his journal for further Case updates.

23. expectare has written a Nancy Drew/Minaverse crossover: The Mystery at the Adjectival Library.

1.11 Mina de Malfois and the Spiritual Renewal (part one)

2006-07-30T15:50:32Z

a tastefully understated announcement

2006-07-28T19:44:12Z

I'm terribly pleased and excited to announce that temaris, who contacted me about this a while back, has a podcast available here, at her livejournal.

The Dreams of Angels (Chapter One)

2006-07-22T18:56:55Z

Permissions: All rights reserved. All other reproduction, transmission, or storage, in any format, is prohibited unless the author is contacted beforehand and grants specific written permission. The author may be contacted at mina_de_malfois@yahoo.com.

Title: The Dreams of Angels
Chapter: One
Author: Warr1or
Pairing: PrincessB/Jab. Sammich forever!
Dedication: For all my fellow sammiches: may the purity of PB/J illuminate your own lives as it has my own.

On his first night in the de St. Aubyn castle, Jab was woken by a noise so faint a less cautious man would have dismissed it as part of his dreams. He lay for a moment on the floor of his room (featherbeds were a pleasure he didn’t often choose to indulge in while maintaining his training), listening. There it was again, on the balcony. Jab rose silently, letting the white sheet slip from his taut belly, and walked out into the moonlight.

The creature standing there was like a man, but for the huge leathery wings that unfurled to beat the air when it took flight. It hung there, grotesquely, for a moment, looking hungrily at Jab’s naked form. Jab gazed back, upright and unafraid. Then the vampire for some reason made an admiring bow, laughed lightly, and flew away.

‘This castle is under siege,’ Jab informed Pierce the next morning while they broke bread together. He described what he had witnessed in the night.

‘I’ll set a watch tonight, and slay any of the creatures that dare approach here,’ Pierce swore, half rising from the table in his anger. Jab reached out, and laid a calming hand on Pierce’s arm, wordlessly pulling him back down on the bench they shared.

‘I admire your bravery, my dear friend,’ Jab said, ‘and the anger that heats your blood is a righteous anger. But we must prepare. This could be a long, hard battle, and it will take more than valor and physical strength to win it. You must prepare for all eventualities. If we were killed, my prince, the princess and your father, and all your household servants and retainers, would be defenseless. We need to proceed slowly. These people rely on you. We can stockpile food and water so that, however long we are occupied elsewhere, we at least know the castle can shut itself up safely. We can begin to train men at arms, but secretly. And we can get word to the households of this island to store food and water, and supplies, and to keep their locks and shutters in good repair. Before we can fight darkness, Pierce, we must look to our own standards and correct our own weaknesses.’

Pierce sat beside his friend, and hugged him manfully for a long moment, too overcome with emotion to speak. At last he released his tight hold and sat back. ‘It shall be as you have outlined,’ he promised. ‘My dear Jab, you’re right: we are under siege. The bloodsuckers aren’t content with their stranglehold of the mainland. They envy what we possess, here on this island, and they hunger for us. I think our very lack of corruption tempts them somehow, and it enrages them that we set ourselves apart and hold to a higher, more pure ideal. We must make plans to protect ourselves, before we engage with them.’

He broke off quickly when PrincessB entered the room, not wishing to frighten her, but her gentle gaze saw the worry in his face. ‘Cousin, what troubles you?’ she asked, reaching for the blue stoneware jug full of fresh, still-warm milk. She poured a mug for Jab, and then one for Pierce, before filling her own.

‘Nothing you should trouble yourself with,’ Pierce said, but Jab shook his head.

‘The child should know, Pierce,’ he said, his voice low and somehow reassuring. ‘How can we trust her not to stray from the castle’s safety, unless we give her some good reason? Princess Beta,’ he went on, turning to her. She blushed, unused to being addressed by men, especially commoners, but he could tell from her expression that she was listening intently to his words. ‘The creatures of the de Gravina clan, who infest your father’s former stronghold on the mainland, hover around this castle at night.’

‘You must be very careful,’ he warned her. ‘We all must take precautions. Do not go outside after dark. No one should sleep alone. Even by daylight you should not go outside unaccompanied. We don’t know what their precise intention is, but it cannot be good. They are evil beings. They know hungers you cannot begin to understand; they are in the grip of appetites such as you have never even imagined.” He fell silent abruptly, sweat beading his handsome face. His strong arms, which looked to her frightened eyes near as thick as Beta’s own waist, trembled slightly.

He must, she thought, be shaken by his loathing and disgust for the fiends that flocked through the night air. She, too, had seen them. They flew past her windows; she had crept from her bed to watch them, curiously. They looked, she had decided, like her cousin Pierce, but their skin was even more pale, and of course the creatures were winged.

‘I wish I could make you forget all about them,’ she said impulsively, moved by a sudden sympathy for this rough-clad stranger who valiantly struggled to conceal how badly the vampires disturbed him. She blushed then, confused and embarrassed to have spoken, and even Pierce looked taken aback by her boldness. Jab, however, merely smiled.

‘Your cousin will help me,’ he assured her, and gave Pierce an affectionate glance. ‘Not help me to forget them, but help me to resist them—and, if our hearts are pure, to defeat them, and rise above them to our own triumphant victory.’

PrincessB, though frightened by the memory of how the vampires outside her window had looked, felt reassured to be in the presence of men possessed by such simple, yet noble, virtues. It was as she had always thought: simplicity was united with true worth. With Jab and her cousin Pierce in the castle, surely no harm could befall them. ‘I shall pray for you,’ she said, her still-childish voice solemn.

‘To whom do you pray, little cousin?’ Pierce asked her playfully, and she tossed her hair.

‘To the angels, of course,’ she told him. If we are in danger from winged demons, then surely the angels will come to help us.’

‘We must help ourselves,’ Jab said, seeming to answer her, but looking meaningfully at Pierce as he spoke.

Pierce laid one hand on Jab’s rock hard thigh. ‘I’m willing to do all that I can,’ the prince promised. ‘Honorable men may still achieve memorable deeds, Jab, even in these troubled times. We shall protect the Princess, and those who live on this island, at all costs.’

‘Are you sure these creatures are a danger to me?’ PrincessB asked, as she buttered a slice of toast. ‘They’re only ever here when you’re home, Pierce. I don’t think they mean me any harm at all, even if they are evil.’

For a moment the prince did not respond, ignoring her prattling voice, but then he realized what she’d said. Tearing his gaze from Jab’s, he turned to her. ‘What do you mean, they’re only here when I’m home?’ he demanded.

She shrugged. ‘Just that. When you were last here, the servants whispered that they saw the vampires at night. The whole time you were away, no one reported any sign of them.’

Jab looked concerned. ‘Perhaps, my prince,’ he said to Pierce, ‘it is not your young cousin who is in the gravest danger, after all.’

The Dreams of Angels
I. Introduction
III. Chapter Two
index

1.10 Mina de Malfois and the Attempted Coup (part four)

2006-07-15T18:21:40Z

[Isn't everybody glad that Arc made Mina take full responsibility for her inadvertent quotations? Such an easy mistake to make, Mina's, but luckily easy to fix as well.
Also, Mina keeps getting Vox invites; she has two now. Does anyone want these? She'll gladly give them away to anyone who responds with an email address.]

Disclaimer: This is a work of fiction. No resemblance is intended to any person or persons living, dead, or online. No BNFs were harmed in the making of this fic.

Permissions: All rights reserved. All other reproduction, transmission, or storage, in any format, is prohibited unless the author is contacted beforehand and grants specific written permission. The author may be contacted at mina_de_malfois@yahoo.com.

When PrinceC and I arrived at the gardener’s cottage, we found Warr1or staking out tomatoes. He looked, I could not but note approvingly, every inch the part. He was dressed in a slightly old-fashioned gamekeeper costume of dark green velveteen and gaiters. He hadn’t lost his dragonherd buffness, either. He doffed his hat respectfully when he saw us.

‘We were just on our way to visit the BalletChic memorial,’ PrinceC told him, and Warr1or instantly offered to pluck roses for PrinceC to lay on the ‘grave,’ his face softening with emotion as he spoke.

‘Come with us,’ PrinceC said, sounding more commanding than inviting. Still, though, I was mildly surprised when Warr1or complied; I hadn’t realized he’d taken the servant role so much to heart. The scent of jasmine grew stronger as we approached the shade-shrouded statue of the winged ballet dancer, and I shivered in the cool evening air. Warr1or wordlessly draped his jacket around my shoulders, unasked, which was thoughtful even if it did smell of dragons.

‘Is there anything either Mina or I can do,’ PrinceC asked abruptly, ‘to dissuade you from mailing your slash collection to TPTB? We’ll do anything to protect the reputation of our fandom.’ I opened my mouth to tell him that actually, there were a lot of things I wouldn’t do to protect the probably non-existent good name of Sanguinity fandom, but Warr1or spoke first.

‘You’re too late,’ Warr1or said triumphantly. 'I’ve already mailed out the bound copies, and emailed back-up copies. No matter how much the slashers harass and persecute me, they can’t undo what I’ve done. They can denounce me publicly, they can mock my views and my religion, they can even stalk me and check my livejournal constantly, but I’ve won. I’ve revealed the Truth.’

PrinceC sat down patiently on the monument. ‘What, exactly, did you hope this would accomplish?’ he asked wearily. I sat down next to him, and Warr1or promptly sat down next to me.

‘I wanted the game’s creator and contributors to see what they were responsible for,’ Warr1or said. ‘So many young people, particularly emotionally fragile young women, are being led astray. I can’t just watch as they’re tempted down the twisted, base paths of slash. They need a man’s guidance and protection.’

‘I hardly think the game’s creators had any intention of encouraging P/J slash,’ PrinceC pointed out reasonably.

‘It doesn’t matter what the authors intended,’ Warr1or insisted. ‘The subtext is there. They included elements and scenes that could be interpreted as slash, and they’re responsible for that. They need to be aware of the inevitable outcome.’

PrinceC sighed heavily. I knew how he felt. There’s no way to argue with someone happily bent on martyrdom.

‘How explicit was it?’ I asked, hoping he hadn’t been able to find anything really juicy. ‘I haven’t read much Sanguinity slash.'

‘I know you’re not interested in slash,’ Warr1or said to me kindly, placing a condescending hand on my knee. ‘You’re a nice girl, Mina, though I worry you’ll be led astray by dark influences.’

‘I have no interest in slash at all,’ I assured him, trying to scoot over so I’d be less pressed against him, and only succeeding in pressing myself up more tightly against PrinceC on my other side. I glanced thoughtfully from Warr1or to PrinceC and back again, wondering how truthful I was being. ‘I was just wondering how bad it could be.’

‘It opened with a multi-chapter fic in which Pierce and Jab are forced to degrade each other repeatedly at a Vamp Revel,’ Warr1or informed us, ‘and ended with an mpreg family saga.’ PrinceC groaned, looking as appalled as I felt. Our meeting broke up almost immediately. PrinceC headed gloomily down Dread Lane, looking defeated, and I walked back to Malfois Manor unaccompanied. Warr1or had said he wanted to spend some time alone, in prayer and contemplation.

When I got back to the Manor no one was visible. I followed the hushed sounds of conversation to the dimly lit kitchen, where I found Stasia and Liz seated at a Ouija board-laden table--Liz looking slightly abashed--with, to my astonishment, Arc.

‘You’re attending a séance?’ I asked, bewildered. I nearly swallowed my tongue to keep from adding, ‘with my servants?’ I didn’t want to appear excessively snobbish, especially not in front of the people I was being e. s. about.

‘Pull up a chair,’ Arc said, so I did. I admit, I was curious as to how this would work. Besides, Ciyerra had a well-developed sense of self-interest, so the presence of her employer would probably hugely increase the success of the summoning.

Stasia instructed us to join hands, which we did, and then she intoned in a solemn but ethereal voice, ‘Ciyerra, dearly departed spirit of BalletChic, are you present among us?’ Liz and I caught each other’s eyes, and then promptly had to avoid each other’s eyes to keep from laughing out loud.

A bored-looking and nearly entirely transparent Ciyerra drifted sulkily into the room. Without ceremony she leaned over the Ouija board and nudged the planchette with her ghostly fingertips. It moved, but slowly, to point to ‘YES.’

‘What message do you bring to us from the other side?’ Stasia continued.

‘T-H-E P-A-T-I-E-N-T H-A-S M-A-L-A-R-I-A B-U-T W-I-L-L R-E-C-O-V-E-R,’ Ciyerra spelled out, looking furious at the length of time this was taking.

‘What patient?’ Arc asked.

‘She probably means Xena,’ I said hastily, unable to face the prospect of having to watch Ciyerra spell this out one tedious letter at a time. ‘She showed up earlier and she’s been in bed ever since. She didn’t mention malaria, though.’

‘I brought her up some soup earlier,’ Liz chimed in helpfully, ‘and she did seem feverish. She said all sorts of over-heated things.’

Arc shot me a bafflingly exasperated glance. ‘You didn’t mention Xena was here,’ she said in what sounded frightfully like restrained tones.

‘But Arc, we haven’t spoken since our last conversation, which was about plagiarism,’ I reminded her helpfully, and added, ‘and she wasn’t here then. She’s only just shown up.’ Arc said nothing, but raised one graceful avatarial eyebrow. ‘Plagiarism is a very serious matter,’ I informed Liz and Stasia, by way of a conciliatory gesture.

‘So’s poaching,’ said Arc obscurely, and stood up. ‘Where is this sickroom, exactly? I think I should look in on the patient.’ Liz excused herself with a curtsey and led Arc off in the direction of the stairs.

Stasia sighed a sigh of frustrated mediumship while Ciyerra drummed silent spirit fingers impatiently on the edge of the table. ‘Do you have any helpful advice about Josh Amos?’ I asked her. ‘Or about Warr1or?’

‘T-H-I-N-G-S A-R-E N-O-T W-H-A-T T-H-E-Y S-E-E-M,’ Ciyerra spelled out. ‘W-A-R-R-1-O-R S-E-N-S-E-S T-H-E T-R-U-T-H O-F T-H-E M-A-T-T-E-R B-U-T K-N-O-W-S N-O-T W-H-Y.’ Evidently answering my questions concluded her household ghost obligations, because she faded from sight, a peevish expression on her face as she vanished.

‘Platinum RavingWench says only the spiritually gifted can hold conversations with those who have crossed over,’ Stasia said, sounding thrilled by this evidence of her giftedness.

‘Ms. RavingWench probably never met Ciyerra, the ghost who livejournals,’ I muttered to myself.

PrinceC was plunged into a blue funk by our conversation with Warr1or, and alternated between moody silence and pessimistic predictions. I was exposed to the b.f., complete with m.s. and p.p., because we spent the next few evenings hanging out together in one of Sanguinity Online’s finer blood taverns. PrinceC said he preferred not to face the inevitable shutdown of our fandom while sober, and Malfois Manor lacked charm and restfulness just then. Arc had taken to storming in and out, silent and white-lipped with strain, at all hours of the day and night, and Xena, fever-ridden, was deliriously regaling the household with sea shanties of unspeakable lewdness.

But in spite of being rendered nearly homeless by these goings-on, I was feeling hopeful. Each day we sat there, crimson pints in front of us, my mood lightened perceptibly. I’d noticed, you see, that by some odd coincidence Josh Amos had taken to frequenting the same tavern, and that, far from pulling his usual centre-of-attention gambits, he was keeping as low a profile as he was able. He appeared to my attentive eye to be more or less avoiding most of his friends and hangers on. I’d seen this behaviour before in fandom, and forgive me if I seem to gloat, but it was pretty damned obvious that he’d suffered some major humiliation or upset, and was waiting for the news to hit and then blow over. Had he had a bad review? Had a pet theory been jossed by canon? Had he fought with the wrong person, or worse yet, made a friend of the wrong sockpuppet? I longed to know.

I tried to raise PrinceC’s spirits by sharing this theory, but he remained uninterested right up to the moment the pages arrived. The pages were Non-Player Characters who went round handing out important notifications to permanent paid account holders. I suppose the Powers That Be consider this cute.

The pages who showed up now were handing out envelopes so heavily embossed that they gleamed even in the murk of the tavern. PrinceC used his as a coaster, but I broke the seal and opened mine. It was a message from the game creator Herself.

‘Dear Sanguinites,’ it read.

‘It has been recently brought to my attention that for some devoted fans Sanguinity is not merely a game, but a source of inspiration for your own creativity, artistry, and self-expression. Please know that I admire your devotion to the game, and laud your efforts to make it a meaningful part of your lives as you roam across its landscapes. No efforts to curtail your actions will be officially sanctioned.’

I had to reread it twice before the full impact hit me: she was on our side. I looked across triumphantly to where Josh Amos was sitting, his own copy of the memo crumpled in front of him. He caught my eye and raised his chin defiantly.

‘Of course I expected all along the Creator would side with the fanfiction set,’ he said loudly to his companions. ‘Everyone who knows her will tell you she’s a total Henry Jenkins fangirl, after all.’ I said nothing. Let him save what face he could. I knew he was a fake, and from now on I’d be watching him.

footnotes

index

1.10 Mina de Malfois and the Attempted Coup (part three)

2006-07-13T20:02:06Z

Disclaimer: This is a work of fiction. No resemblance is intended to any person or persons living, dead, or online. No BNFs were harmed in the making of this fic.

Permissions: All rights reserved. All other reproduction, transmission, or storage, in any format, is prohibited unless the author is contacted beforehand and grants specific written permission. The author may be contacted at mina_de_malfois@yahoo.com.

It’s just as well I went to bed feeling confident of victory, because when I made it home from work and logged on the next day, intending to leave a politely worded comment on Warr1or’s eljay urging him to leave off the sexual slurs, I found he’d updated with a veritable screed of insanity. It was as if he’d nailed the Ninety-Five Symptoms to fandom’s front door, and then gone off to eat worms, as is traditional.

Someday, when I have an idle hour to fill, I intend to cross-stitch myself a sampler and hang it on the wall above my computer, after the manner of the pioneers. At the top I’ll set my most oft-uttered prayer: Thank you, internet, for letting me observe so many crazy people from a safe distance.

But I digress. I was looking, as I say, at an impassioned rant by Warr1or. If I was correct in my assumption that Josh Amos was a spy, sent among the fen to report back to the Powers That Be, what, I wondered now, would he make of this?

‘I am a proud Sanguinity fan,’ Warr1or had written, ‘but my devotion to the one true canon and to my fellow fans cannot extend itself to include those who, with wilful perversity, debase, degrade, and besmirch the manly, vigorous honor of Pierce and Jab. I refer, of course, to the unnatural filth that is P/J slash. Surely it is self-evident to anyone possessed of a soul or a glimmer of intelligence that only evil personages would stoop to slash Pierce and Jab.'

'Naysayers may argue in vain that P/J slashers are not deliberately embarking on their chosen course of wrongness. Perhaps the apologists, who no doubt do not resemble Satanic cannibal child-diddlers in any respect, would like to argue that the elevation of base, dirty lust over pure, loving friendship is not wrong but merely ‘different.’ They are wrong to make that argument. God, the dictionary, and common sense are on my side, as Chesterton, Lewis, and Tolkien would attest had they the misfortune to live in this irreligious debauched age. It is useless to plead for mindless tolerance when all points of view opposed to, or even slightly different from, my own are so self-evidently sick, wrong, jejune, perverse, and nauseating. She is a fool who even tries it!'

'Pierce and Jab exemplify a warm, caring, spiritually correct friendship. Perhaps this is what drives the P/J slashers to soil the purity of the text with their twisted, abhorrent interpretations: never having known true friendship themselves, the slashers are driven to frenzied, jealous, furtive attempts to sexualize this portrayal of a higher, more meaningful relationship. I pity and scorn them.'

'Do not let my natural, healthy outrage mislead you into weak-minded efforts to label me homophobic, or you will surely feel my wrath! While I have not the privilege to speak professionally for the one true faith, my thesaurical and entirely logical devotion lend me the authority of the spiritually correct, and from this lofty position I can assure you that you are, once again, wrong. I myself am not averse to writing slashfic about the drunken, abusive, mentally ill members of the de Gravina vampire clan, at least not in such cases when it has been clearly demonstrated in canon that the vampire in question lacks family support, a normal father figure, a sound upbringing, or any notion of friendship, patriotism, or religion.'

'So you see it makes no sense to say I am homophobic. I won’t say that everyone who has ever suggested otherwise is a Fascist, elder-murdering mealy-mouthed Liberal spinster with a festering skin disease and an urge to prostitute herself as a cheerleader. Draw your own conclusions. I will just point out how unlikely, and upsettingly unexpected, it would be to have a manly yeoman farmer turn out to be gay. Real life may abound with such unlikely upsets: true art does not, and Sanguinity is art.'

'But, sadly, just as an immoral musician may so taint his compositions that all who listen to him are compromised, so, too, in its translation to the internet has Sanguinity been tainted. The dissolute, slyly suggestive performances of the Voices have, it is abundantly clear, hastened the corruption by encouraging P/J slashers to ply their filthy trade. The Voices have prompted a new era of fannish debauchery.'

'To help me prove my point, not that Truth requires proof other than its own rightness,’ Warr1or concluded, ‘I ask anyone who reads this to link me to as many examples of explicit P/J slash as can be found--the more lurid the better. Thank you.’

Well, that was certainly special. I cringed briefly at the thought that the Voices were probably laughing themselves sick at Sanguinity fans right now, but then common sense prevailed. There was, after all, no reason to assume they’d take Warr1or’s opinions as representative of the entire fandom; there was no real reason to assume they’d even see, much less read, his post. Warr1or wasn’t a BNF, or even an MNF. Surely his ranting would go unnoticed by anyone who mattered, and with any luck his friendslist would shower him with links, leaving him submerged in P/J slash and too preoccupied to cause trouble.

I turned my attention to happier matters, and began sending out invitations. I’d decided to host a tea party and strategy session at Malfois Manor, and was inviting every avatar who seemed properly concerned with protecting our fandom from meddling by the Voices and the Powers That Be. Even the Mean Girls were on my mailing list: I’m not one to put personal disputes ahead of broader issues, particularly when I’m winning. Let them eat cake and choke on beautifully precise footnotes, was my new motto.

I set Liz to work making preparations, and she in turn set Stasia to work polishing my silver tea service. Stasia breathlessly promised me she’d spend the evening casting a circle to ensure my party’s success.

The next couple of days passed in a happy blur of planning and RSVPs. Almost everyone I’d invited had said they’d be there. Of course I hadn’t been worried, but even if I had been it would have been needless. By happy coincidence, a profic author notorious for both the amount of time he spent reading fanfiction and the paucity of wit in his anti-fanfic drivel had editorialized in favour of the Voices. I say ‘editorialized in favour of,’ but what I mean is he’d written a fawning, compliment-strewn love letter of an editorial. It was beyond ludicrous to be chastised for writing fanfic by a man who referred to it, and quoted from it, so regularly that he obviously fondled his happy place to RPF-induced fantasies about the Voices, but he’d long been known to hate fanfiction with a deranged energy.

This latest effort meant he was angling for one of two reactions: either he was hoping for a contract to write Sanguinity tie-in novels, or his recent self-googling had failed to turn up enough mentions of his own name and he wanted the fen to berate him. Both possibilities were nauseous, and several previously uncommitted ficcers had instinctively recoiled in distaste and rallied to our cause, promising to show up at my party.

The only refusal I’d had was from Warr1or. I’d invited him because I’d hoped to avoid being targeted as one of his ‘enemies.’ Warr1or’s shippiness tended to polarize his views, not just of fandom but of politics, religion, and dating. I could sense from his latest outburst that he was only too willing to find targets for his relentless anti-slash campaign, and his shipmates were probably encouraging him. I had no intention of converting to Sammichism, so my general policy was to avoid all PB/J shippers whenever possible. Warr1or’s apology--he would be unable to attend, he’d written, because he was busy showing the Voices the error of their ways--came as a great relief. I felt sorry for the trials he’d doubtless endured during his captivity amongst the Tented Tartanists, but still, there’s something uncomfortable about a committed antislash PB/J shipper in possession of one’s IP address. He’d asked for the day off ‘to take care of things,’ and I’d agreed, feeling there was no reason for a Gardener of Uncertain Temperament to put in an appearance at an indoor party. The guests would see the immaculate lawns and gardens on their way in, after all, and could draw their own conclusions about the well-staffed state of Malfois Manor.

And so on the evening of my party, or the morning of my party for those Sanguinites elsewhere on the globe, we were an entirely female gathering. We’d just gotten seated in the front parlour when I heard the front door open abruptly. Stasia, who’d been helping Liz hand round virtual cake, dashed out to greet the late arrival. We heard her collide with something in the hall and stammer apologies to someone who neither answered nor slowed their stride, and then the sliding doors were flung wide. There on the threshold stood a pirate.

Several guests shrieked, and a teacup smashed. My own heart made a sort of attempt to escape via my throat before I recognized the dashing but heavily armed intruder.

It was Xena.

No wonder I hadn’t recognized her, though. She was tanned a much darker coppery amber than when I’d last seen her. The long reddish-blonde hair she’d used to try to conceal under her hat now hung in loose, tangled curls; some locks were wrapped in gold and silver thread, or adorned with tiny beads and bells and bits of ribbon. Her eyes glittered strangely. She looked gloriously, expensively trashed and debonair, and sported a new scar down her left cheek--which served more to draw attention to her cheekbone than to mar it. She was also, I saw with mild annoyance, dripping seawater onto my floor from her velvet jacket. It needed washing--her jacket, not my floor.

‘What’s this, a hen party?’ she asked me with amusement, helping herself to a literal handful of cake. I saw that my panicked guests had backed themselves against the furthest wall. Several were actually managing to flee via one of the windows.

“It is not a hen party,’ I told her indignantly. ‘It’s a resistance movement.’ She grinned at that. I admit my gallant girls had looked more convincingly politicized before they’d started shrieking in terror at the mere sight of Xena, but she still had no business smirking at us. ‘We’re organizing to protect Sanguinity fandom from the encroachment of overbearing industry representatives,’ I told her haughtily. She lifted her non-cake-bearing hand in a dismissive little half-wave.

‘Easy there, Miss Author,’ she said. ‘No offence meant. If the fen are revolting, that’s their business. I just need a bed. I promise I’ll stay out of your hair, and I don’t expect to be staying here more than a couple of weeks. Less than that, if I can track down Arc and convince her she needs some downtime.’

She’d taken the stairs--my stairs--two at a time and was completely out of sight and voice range before I’d even begun to wrap words around my many naked objections to her presence. My guests had stopped fleeing and were tittering and smirking. And then Stasia came in, dropped a sketchy curtsy, and announced, ‘Prince Choronzon Erik Vladimir de Gravina.’

PrinceC staggered in, looking dashing but exhausted. ‘I’m looking for Lady Mina,’ he began, prompting dark mutterings from the Mean Girls, and then he caught sight of me.

‘Rough day on the high seas, dear?’ I asked waspishly. My opinion of him hadn’t quite sprung back to pre-Tartan levels.

He ignored this, or perhaps didn’t notice; teenage boys aren’t all that sensitive to nuance. Scarcely adequate to the task of rational discourse, really, I reminded myself sternly, trying not to notice just how well breeched and handsomely booted he was.

‘Mina,’ he said, his voice firmer, and strode manfully across to me accompanied by a chorus of hisses and giggles from the Girls’ Dormitory lot, their responses polarized according to whether their affection for me or their self-insertiness towards PrinceC were uppermost. I looked up at him, telling myself firmly to ignore the tilt of his hat, and not to even think about his sword. He leaned closer, and Liz dropped her tray, shattering a plate. I hadn’t the heart to scold her. Poor dear: she’d been struggling valiantly against her initial poor choice of a sky-high ‘sensitivity’ reading, but it would take a lot of hard-earned ‘sense’ points to erase her slight tendency to inadvertent histrionics. ‘Have you heard what Warr1or is planning?’ PrinceC asked.

I blinked. I hadn’t been expecting Warr1or to come up between us just then. It took me a moment to recall Warr1or’s latest communiqué.

‘You mean the anti-slash rant,’ I said calmly. ‘Yes, I saw it, and it alarmed me too at first, but honestly: what are the chances of the Powers That Be ever seeing it? Miniscule, I should think.’

‘I don’t mean his anti-slash rant,’ PrinceC corrected me. ‘I mean his printed and bound collection of explicit Jammie slash. He’s threatening to send copies to all the Voices, and to everyone listed in the Sanguinity credits. And to this Josh Amos person,’ he added, an extra note of irritation entering his voice.

‘He’s going to mail them hard copies of his slash collection?’ I repeated, horrified.

‘He’s planning to mail them copies of his extremely explicit slash collection, as some sort of protest,’ PrinceC confirmed. ‘Everybody on the docks is talking about it. The minute I heard you were employing him, I came to let you know.’

‘Uh, thanks,’ I said dubiously. I wasn’t entirely sure I wanted to know, really, but I suppose PrinceC was looking out for my interests.

‘We should go talk to him,’ PrinceC continued. Not the kind of invitation a girl feels torn about turning down, that.

‘I am hosting a party,’ I said coolly. ‘I don’t have time to interrogate the hired help just now.’

For the first time PrinceC appeared to notice that there were other people in the room. He apologized, and then somehow managed to persuade me to accompany him to Warr1or’s cottage that evening. This sparked much hushed hilarity amongst my guests, and I’m willing to bet none of their whispered conversations were about the Voices or our anti-coup strategies. PrinceC strode out, and when he was lost to view we resumed our much-interrupted meeting.

I tried to call my remaining guests to order, but they continued to be unnervingly giggly and frivolous, and I caught a few of them composing anonymous RPF on scraps of paper. They tried to deny it, but it was perfectly clear which of them had written it.

And then a fight broke out over lawn care, during the course of which one of them insisted hysterically that another guest had threatened her with a metaphor. Her friends, sobbing with outrage on her behalf, insisted they couldn’t possibly feel safe unless I banned metaphors and hired extra security, and at that point I lost patience with them all. How can you have a serious conversation, let alone organize a resistance movement, with people so steeped in silliness? I coldly informed them that I employed a full-time gardener who owned not only a lawn mower but also hedge clippers and gloves. A whole pack of them fled in terror at this news.

The sensible remainder, having been thus weeded out, lingered for a while to discuss the Voices, but all we could really agree on was that we Sanguinity fans needed to behave sensibly and create the best possible impression on the Powers That Be. It went without saying that this would mean dissuading Warr1or, and I felt more charitable about PrinceC’s proposed mission.

index

1.10 Mina de Malfois and the Attempted Coup (part two)

2006-07-13T20:00:08Z