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unfinishedlibrary2026-04-10 07:09 pm
libraryassistants) wrote in unfinishedlibrary2026-04-10 07:09 pm
Entry tags:
They say the gods never give us more than we can handle - Library Log
Who: Editors, with a guest Assistant or two
What: The Library begins to change once more
When: The two weeks leading up to the next Story
Where: The Library, obvi
Content warnings: Please add content warnings to threads!
Once again, the Library begins to change. The wooden floor becomes more like cobblestone (complete with ‘the ability to trip you up easily if you’re not watching your step’), and there’s some little flags that look like the kind of things you’d get handed at a festival. As the week goes on, little carts and stalls pop up around the Library - most don’t have anything, but there are a few where some familiar ‘faces’ pop up to offer their wares. It’s mostly rocks. Some of them are shiny, at least?
The customary ‘Back In 5’ sign is now missing from the assistant's desk, and in its place sits one of said Assistants. Additionally, there is the now expected sign on the circulation desk: “This week’s Recommended Reading: Paladin’s Grace!” Unlike the previous readings, it seems this one is fairly straightforward in that there’s no mix-up of copies or alternate forms of media. However, on request, it does seem that there are some sequels available for reading as well.
Available are also an assortment of other books, such as What Kings Ate And Wizards Drank by Krista Ball, Livre de Chevalerie by Geoffroi de Charny, and Life In A Medieval Castle by Frances and Joseph Gies. There is a waiting list pinned by these; the intention is clearly to share and not squirrel them away. Off to one side is The Forme of Cury, which the Library is NOT automatically translating into something more legible; some may have to ask for help to riddle out its many, many recipes. Religious symbols of countless faiths sit on walls or propped on top of bookshelves and even in the kitchenette and sleeping area, from a set of ornate old-fashioned merchant's scales to the Eye of Horus and even ... a colander full of spaghetti … ?
There's a new door added to the rotating locations, a scrawled note taped to it reading "Stop breaking things!" This door leads directly to an endless forest, with a cheerful clearing, soft grass and pleasant birdsong. Some lucky souls will recognize it as the current iteration of the Safe Room, now freely accessible from inside the library; coming and going is now effortless! That is, unless someone's sent there via destruction of property or injuring someone else, at which point they must wait out the usual duration. The day and night cycle remains, but now and again the sky clouds over, and pleasant spring rains sweep across the forest. These same rain showers are a regular occurrence in the garden for the next two weeks, at a rate of one every two days or so, lasting a little while before fading back to the usual climate and "weather".
The kitchenette is offering a change in food items; there's now a variety of hard cheeses, breads and salted meats to pick from, as well as dried fruit, pickles, eggs, river-fish, porridges of assorted forms, and uncooked roasts. Unfortunately things to actually cook the roasts with, like ovens or even a fire, haven't been provided alongside them. Drinks have changed to a small selection of rustic wines and extremely watered down ales. (Water is of course freely available.) The Laundry has acquired a large wooden tub and a washboard.
What: The Library begins to change once more
When: The two weeks leading up to the next Story
Where: The Library, obvi
Content warnings: Please add content warnings to threads!
Once again, the Library begins to change. The wooden floor becomes more like cobblestone (complete with ‘the ability to trip you up easily if you’re not watching your step’), and there’s some little flags that look like the kind of things you’d get handed at a festival. As the week goes on, little carts and stalls pop up around the Library - most don’t have anything, but there are a few where some familiar ‘faces’ pop up to offer their wares. It’s mostly rocks. Some of them are shiny, at least?
The customary ‘Back In 5’ sign is now missing from the assistant's desk, and in its place sits one of said Assistants. Additionally, there is the now expected sign on the circulation desk: “This week’s Recommended Reading: Paladin’s Grace!” Unlike the previous readings, it seems this one is fairly straightforward in that there’s no mix-up of copies or alternate forms of media. However, on request, it does seem that there are some sequels available for reading as well.
Available are also an assortment of other books, such as What Kings Ate And Wizards Drank by Krista Ball, Livre de Chevalerie by Geoffroi de Charny, and Life In A Medieval Castle by Frances and Joseph Gies. There is a waiting list pinned by these; the intention is clearly to share and not squirrel them away. Off to one side is The Forme of Cury, which the Library is NOT automatically translating into something more legible; some may have to ask for help to riddle out its many, many recipes. Religious symbols of countless faiths sit on walls or propped on top of bookshelves and even in the kitchenette and sleeping area, from a set of ornate old-fashioned merchant's scales to the Eye of Horus and even ... a colander full of spaghetti … ?
There's a new door added to the rotating locations, a scrawled note taped to it reading "Stop breaking things!" This door leads directly to an endless forest, with a cheerful clearing, soft grass and pleasant birdsong. Some lucky souls will recognize it as the current iteration of the Safe Room, now freely accessible from inside the library; coming and going is now effortless! That is, unless someone's sent there via destruction of property or injuring someone else, at which point they must wait out the usual duration. The day and night cycle remains, but now and again the sky clouds over, and pleasant spring rains sweep across the forest. These same rain showers are a regular occurrence in the garden for the next two weeks, at a rate of one every two days or so, lasting a little while before fading back to the usual climate and "weather".
The kitchenette is offering a change in food items; there's now a variety of hard cheeses, breads and salted meats to pick from, as well as dried fruit, pickles, eggs, river-fish, porridges of assorted forms, and uncooked roasts. Unfortunately things to actually cook the roasts with, like ovens or even a fire, haven't been provided alongside them. Drinks have changed to a small selection of rustic wines and extremely watered down ales. (Water is of course freely available.) The Laundry has acquired a large wooden tub and a washboard.
Hisako
Hisako had found some fun in Twilight but had struggled to imagine the world and hadn't given the sequels more than a glance, and there had, frankly, been such an overwhelming amount of Shakespeare that she had barely touched it. Paladin's Grace, while certainly not set in a world she knows and quite strange in places, is brisk and enjoyable, with a few moments of profundity. There are ways she relates to Grace. And there are three more in the series! And the back covers mention three more in the setting, which she's able to request! And the main characters aren't in their teens or twenties!
Of course, there's an awful lot of annoying pining. She'd... okay, Jadis had engaged in that, but Hisako doesn't, because it's different, she knows that there are actual, legitimate reasons people wouldn't find her attractive, she's a Stormwing. Additionally, for books with this much yearning and sensual interest, they're not all that explicit. Lots of phrases like "uncomplicated things happening below his waist" and "touched her in ways neither Phillip nor the artificer's apprentice had ever managed". Hmph.
You might find her reading somewhere, up on a catwalk or perching on the back of a couch. The lack of hands and limits of the art of the grasp mean some issues with holding a book in front of her face for hours, and she doesn't like looking down at it for that kind of time either. Or, you might find her writing, the inkbrush dancing across a sheet of paper and pausing as she considers.
Eventually she takes them to the Main Desk, folded over and neatly labeled with the correct book, the page number of a particular scene, and a note like "If Stephen hadn't broken the kiss to apologize to Grace, they might have muddy woods sex like so". Hisako's prose is rather more explicit, not dancing around the names of body parts. It's also a bit purple and some of the same descriptions are overused. Most notably, while she never outright says which Immortals she's covertly AU'ed one or both participants as, hooves, tails, wings, or mobile pointy ears start factoring into later scenes.
Scry Times
On the bulletin board, Hisako offered to let people watch as she tried to scry Montica, the upcoming Story, and the home of whoever asks nicely. You can find her on a backless bench in the garden at some point when it's not raining, using the darking she made as a scrying tool. A glossy black, semifluid mass that had been around the base of her neck like a thick choker, she bids it to pool before her and flatten into a large disc with a highly reflective finish. If you have a very good sense of smell, you might pick up on a bare whiff of blood as it's changing shape. When it's a mirror, she lifts it up with a whorl of crimson fire edged in gold, like a lace doily under a platter, spreads her wings wide, and breathes across the surface. Red-gold mist forms. After some coaxing it clears to reveal...
a) Moonlit Epilogue
Scrying Montica works! Just as in every other world she's looked into, time seems to have stopped. The still moment takes place shortly after the end of the Story as any Editor experienced it. Hisako is able to shift where she's looking in the city and looks at several scenes. The invading vampires have been vanquished, any fires have been controlled to a smolder at worst, and hostilities between natives of the city have not immediately resumed. She pauses at the sight of a recognizable werewolf nursing a silver burn and a recognizable vampire hooded and flinching against the early morning sun. The werewolf has opened his door and is gesturing inside, evidently offering the vampire shelter from the day. They both look uncertain and a little disbelieving.
[Players of former Actors, feel free to come up with something your character's role is doing! This is a moment from minutes after the Readers vanished and the Actors woke in the Library as themselves. You can comment responding to that, or to...]
When Hisako goes to look up her role she makes a startled noise. Roberte and Jadis are both on the horsehair couch in Jadis's stillroom, but instead of sitting side by side talking, as she remembers, they're turned towards each other, leaning to bridge their disparate heights. He is cupping the side of her face in one hand, she's grabbed his shoulder as if to pull closer, and... they are kissing. Inasmuch as can be determined from a single still image it's incredulous and quite tender. There is, perhaps, also just a bit of tongue.
b) Breaking Prologue
Scrying the next Story works! It's more difficult. Hisako has to breathe more clouds across her darking mirror and is sweating by the time it reveals a single image: a rough cobblestone street crowded with frozen activity. People are setting up for a street fair or a festival, with a number of hanging banners and flags. Four different emblems are most commonly repeated. In the foreground someone clutches a piece of cloth to their chest, the folds and their hands hiding just what the emblem on it is. Did they take it down, are they finding a place to put it up? Their head is turned such that their face isn't quite visible but their shoulders are hunched.
After a moment Hisako loses her 'grip', and the picture fades. She frowns down at her reflection. "That's... I get the feeling something bad is about to happen, but why?"
c) Wildcard Want Hisako to look at your character's canon point or find someone for them? Want something else?
I Scry when (A)ngels deserve to - (is elfshot barraged)
“This looks… promising,” he says, and it seems some of the tension in his shoulders eases.
hucks a book at you
"Too soon to tell, but it's something," she says. "I'm glad. I'd totally lost track of what was happening by the end."
substitutes Intuition defense, rolls a 2, eats paper
Hikaru sighs.
“Victory would feel anticlimactic. It would be averting a dramatic moment, not causing one. I choose to take that as a good sign.”
no subject
She nods. "There's that. A further-out epilogue might tell us more, but then again it might be during the day and then it'd be hard to tell much."
no subject
Was he an Actor?
After a while he bows his head.
“I shouldn’t assume everyone important was an Actor,” he says, at last. “God knows Iris wasn’t.”
no subject
"They were all of them important to someone. Jadis cared a lot about some of the Guildulf servants and staff, and I think only Loic was an Actor." She'd checked Loic, but her scrying efforts here don't show the true selves that Jadis had been able to see. This is all what's visible to regular people.