blood sweat tear

[imeanforever]

He's moving her to a different court to see if it'll improve her attitude. She's allowed to fly. It's been a long, long time since she was allowed to -

She is only allowed to fly to her destination, not anywhere else. She notices that she is not where she should be, that she cannot progress to where she was told to go, and she careens out of control when her wings won't flap anymore, and she crashes.

---

with Miles (kappa)

with Minus (kappa)

Comments

[imeanforever]

"No, not really."

[eversomuchfun]

Snort.

[imeanforever]

"But it'll give me an idea if during moments I never had a look at there are clues to how people other than Thorn in the command structure would run things if they wound up the ranking non-incapacitated member."

[eversomuchfun]

"Yeah."

[imeanforever]

"But maybe it won't help or nobody who could take over would be any better. I could probably cripple the entire court, but you saw the kind of orders I was under...."

[eversomuchfun]

"Yes. There might conceivably be a scrying spell that could get you someone's fairy-relevant name, and I suppose if we're considering incapacitating most of the court already I could flood the place with tea... at last, a practical use for the multiplying potion!"

[imeanforever]

"That involves getting close. Thorn is very smart. I don't want to try to hit him with anything he could conceivably see coming."

[eversomuchfun]

"Well, I wasn't thinking of pouring barrelsful of tea over anyone without first turning them into flaming stone rats or similar. I suppose a flaming stone rat probably can't drink tea. There is room to refine this concept."

[imeanforever]

"I don't have even nicknames for some of the lower levels and other satellites of the court."

[eversomuchfun]

"Very thorough spying might take care of that for you," he suggests.

[imeanforever]

"Yeah, it would."

[eversomuchfun]

"But if there's another plan you like better, it's all the same to me."

[imeanforever]

"There's probably no tidy way to bypass Thorn and get the Queen..."

[eversomuchfun]

"Mm?"

[imeanforever]

"Well, she's got a well-known nickname, but I know dramatically less about the structure of her court and it'll be several times larger and she'll have every contingency all the smartest fairies in the world can have thought up for her."

[eversomuchfun]

"Exciting."

[imeanforever]

"So I'd have to spy on her a lot. It's probably worth doing."

[eversomuchfun]

"Can I help? It sounds like fun."

[imeanforever]

"Why not. There's no reason to expect I'll be able to get the Queen's name and I only might be able to feed her myself."

[eversomuchfun]

"Whereas I can apply barrelsful of tea to anyone I like?"

[imeanforever]

"More or less."

[eversomuchfun]

"You can also amass local minions fairly trivially," he adds. "Very few people guard their birth names closely in this day and age. Up to you whether you have moral qualms about conscripting a demon army, I suppose."

[imeanforever]

"I'd want to make sure I was equipped to treat them decently even if I supplied myself exclusively from the ranks of the soulless and morally deficient, which currently I'm short on resources to do."

[eversomuchfun]

"Fair."

[imeanforever]

"Bit of bootstrapping to do."