( closed ) don't listen to all you've been told

[weifinder]

WHO: Wei Wuxian & Lily Evans
WHEN: Tombs during the laying to rest of souls
WHERE: Stairs of Sighs
WHAT: They collect information and items and bones in order to help lay the former caravan members to rest.
WARNINGS: Death; implied child death. Murder. Approved by the dead grave robbing.

This wasn't easy work. Wei Wuxian kept a certain grim fortitude going, smiling as was appropriate, which was very little right now. Soul after soul, scattered bones and goods, names and relations and the lamentations of those who came to realise, slowly, they were not simply dead in recent time. There has been time enough that generations may have passed; that they had loved ones who lost and never knew what happened to them, never knew how to mourn, never had their souls to send onward, ever onward.

It does not make this an easy business. Not as the souls of the undead hug their children close, and they're left with toys gone dark and brown and dusty with blood shed decades ago, one more gift for the pyre.

"Take a moment to breathe," he says to Lily, offering her his water satchel. "It's never easy, dealing with the pain of so many innocents that couldn't be saved."

Comments

[lancifolium]

Under different circumstances perhaps getting to watch Wei Wuxian work would have been fascinating, and while initially it still bore some curiosity - this was grim work. Every soul that had difficulty grappling with the reality of their situation before passing on hurt her heart, and she followed the example of offering a sympathetic ear and a willingness to hear them out easily. It was the right thing to do, no matter how much she hurt for them, it wasn't nearly a whiff as much as they hurt. She could help them, so she would press on.

Seeing the children was especially brutal, and when We Wuxian spoke, thus breaking the cadence of the somber route they were on her shoulders slumped, following his instruction and drawing in a deep breath. She knew she needed it. "Have you ever had to work with so many at once before?" Taking the offered satchel she had a drink before sticking her notebook under her arm in order to draw her wand and refill it for him before passing it back. Her face drawn in a dour frown Lily looked around them again at all the remains they had yet to sift through.

"Thank you for doing this, though I think our work's only just begun." Pocketing her wand Lily went back to her notebook, opening it to the page or so she had filled with the souls who had let go so far.

[weifinder]

The water refilling was fascinating, because in the things he did that particular skill wasn't one he had a talisman for. He should, he decided. It was another project to work on, clean water. If he could create fire in the same way, some concentrated form of water condensing from energies in the air should be possible.

It was distraction, and he knew it. Wiping the mouth of the satchel, he took his own drink, capping it once more and settling against a carved wall for a moment.

"It'll be longer tern," he said, "For the ones we're writing for, since we'll have to send once we're in Taravast. Most these effects we might make paltry trade with our caravan host, such as they are."

[lancifolium]

Frowning at the thought of trade she looked back over the tidy rows of small goods left behind by the departed, restored and cleaned by magic, as best as she could. "Trade?" Her nose wrinkled slightly, but she shrugged, "I suppose we could, and add it to the group's money." Making a personal profit over ghastly circumstances was not a thought that sat well with her, but the lot of them did need resources.

"Though I think we ought to keep that little ring you found, it looks important," signet rings were quite old-fashioned and distinguished where she came from. "I'd be curious to see if the sigil on it turns up in Taravast." It was intriguing, and if there was some inadvertent closure they could grant by bringing the ring somewhere, all the better.

[weifinder]

"Do you think?" He smiles, a half-curl of his lips. "It's worth bringing along and seeing what we find. If nothing else, some family might be missing it, ghost surrendered or not. Shall we put our heads to it once we're there?"

A better focus, being the near future, being progress toward home.

"Mm, adding to what the group has as a whole. Preferably without it getting burnt to ashes this time."

[lancifolium]

"We should," Lily nodded in quick agreement. "We should do what we can for these people, even if it takes us a while to make it as right as we're able to." It wouldn't have sat right with her otherwise - the idea of leaving good work unfinished would have worn at her in time. Had he been less willing to help it would have been more of a challenge, but she was glad to find that he was likeminded when it came to paying the dead their overdue respects

"I've still got those boxes if what the group has needs to be kept safely."

[weifinder]

"Which ones?"

Wei Wuxian tracks a decent amount of detail, but other things slip by, when he's distracted and concerned with so much of the rest. He takes another sip of water before tightening the mouth of the water satchel again, hanging it off his hip and breathing in the stale air, more freshened than when first they entered, but now heavier for reasons other than blistering anger.

The grief weighs down.

[lancifolium]

Explaining the nature of the boxes would have taken them much too far off course. The sooner they finished what they had set out to do the sooner they recuperate from it. Lily already felt like she could sleep for ages, she couldn't imagine how tired he would be by the end. "I'll show you later, they've been charmed to hold a lot."

Turning to look at the remains they had yet to reach she gave him a firm nod. "Ready? Next time we take a break I'll make tea." She had been working on her conjuring and while it wasn't perfect, Lily had been getting the hand of drawing a full tea pot and cups out of thin air.

[weifinder]

He nods, checking the cap of his water satchel, then stretches his arms overhead. "Tea, what a wonderful thing. Did you know, I once had Lan Zhan as a guest when we had only water to offer? Serving hot water felt like sinking so low..."

He offers a wink and a smile, making it the jest it wasn't at the time. The ghosts were on hand, and there was more work to do, handling them each individually. Not the neat bones in the coffins, but the ones scattered and strewn.

He sighs, and sets to working again, music a coaxing lure, and the spirits here speaking, sometimes so he hears, more times so they both can. Haunted, by the crying of the children, who still don't understand what dead is, but who understand their dead parents crying is not good. Not good at all.

[lancifolium]

Not expecting the moment of brevity, Lily laughed in response, shaking her head bemusedly at the smile on Wei Wuxian's face. "Your sparkling company was clearly enough to make tea irrelevant."

Whether or not it was actually possible for something as fundamental as a decent cup of tea to be irrelevant was up for debate, but she supposed it was a matter of love - and that struck her as terribly sweet.

Returning to the solemn work of helping the souls trapped here move on, scribbling notes if the spirits had last requests, and stooping to where their remains were strewn to repair or clean what she could, hoping it would give them a parting sense of dignity.

[weifinder]

"I have it on good authority," he said, hands shifting to bring Chenqing back into place, "That I make for a charming host."

He had no such authority, but he kept his smile as he began to play, soul by soul, splintered bones that sort themselves under the eyes of the dead. What affections he held for his soulmate were long borne and long tried, and not long resolved. Not short, either, in regard.

He called for another break before they continued, and the skies were streaked in natural dark and cloud by the time they finished. The collection of odd goods for 'trade' were set to one side, and three sets of bones meant for transfer back.

"We have the room for all three?" He asked, surveying the situation at hand.

[lancifolium]

On the other end of their task, she was weary but gratified. There would still be more to accomplish once they reached their destination, but for now, there were only a few loose ends left to see to.

"We do, the box we'll use is on the supply wagon, but we can get them there without much trouble."

Looking around them to see what there was to work with, Lily picked up a few rocks, setting them by the skeletons they had to bring along with them. Kneeling on the ground beside the bones, she frowned and lifted her wand.

Shrinking the skeletons down to no more than a few inches in height before transfiguring the stones she had set down into little boxes, she took a moment to look over her work. "Sorry everyone, it's the best I can do for you right now."

After levitating the remains into their respective boxes she sealed them shut and looked back at Wei Wuxian. "I hope that doesn't offend anyone, I don't know how we'd get them back to the caravan if they remained their regular size."

[weifinder]

He watches in fascination tempered by his creeping tiredness. Then shakes his head, since there had been unease, there had been a lack of joy, yes, but there wasn't sharpened anger, only the grief that stains them both like the tar had the harpies.

"They can understand we're taking them to where they requested."

The rest, no. No desecration as far as they could tell, only an oddity, and magic, for a people born to expect magic will be its own largest oddity in their lives. "I think that'll do very well, Miss Lily, and I thank you for your efforts in all this. Shall we see about that tea somewhere a little less... heavy, ah?"

[lancifolium]

As long as there's something of an understanding she feels better about altering them too much, finishing quickly by sealing the boxes up and stashing them away in the small zippered bag tucked inside the larger one that hung strapped across her chest.

"I'm going to conjure us the nicest pot of tea I can." She had been practicing, and hopefully, the necessity of a decent cup would help her manifest one that was more than suitable.

"Are you ready to go back?" Lily offered her hand, willing to apparate them back to the caravan so they could get these little coffins out of her purse and actually enjoy their tea away from the lingering chill of death that hung in the air here.

[weifinder]

He nods, and drums up a brighter smile than the ones he's had earlier.

"At this point, that's the only way to go." A nod of his head to the shadows that hold few voices now, the unsettled, dead hearts here now quieted, while his and Lily's are now full. Overfull, spilling past the cup of their chests, and down their nervous systems, to their heavy feet.

Or he was tired, and his mind caught up in extended metaphors. The hike back out to the caravan and its restless, living members, is a smaller, less vivacious sight. Funny, when over two hundred of it had been ghostly before recent events.

But tea, and rest, and onward to Taravast: these are all part of what their day should continue to be, and then onward, to what life brings next, and to where they can lay these bones to rest.