closed starters || Part 2

[makemeasong]

WHO: Clara Oswald + some closed starters
WHEN: Part two of the arc!
WHERE: frozen forests, the caravan, probably other places eventually.
WHAT: gathering the maiden veil, looking tough, and other misc. things.
WARNINGS: Will update as needed, but so far none needed.

Comments

𝐀𝐧𝐝𝐮𝐢𝐧 • 𝐟𝐫𝐨𝐳𝐞𝐧 𝐟𝐨𝐫𝐞𝐬𝐭𝐬

[makemeasong]

[ When Clara and Anduin both realized they were heading into the forest, it only made sense to team up together. Clara's purpose is two-fold: she also wants to at least try and find anything that can be eaten. Not by her, at least not first, but for the kids.

God this is a shitty situation, which is the lightest way to put it.

In any case, she shouldn't have been considering trekking out alone, but Anduin's saved her from that. She has her magic sword in her pocket, which she's been slowly learning to use in between, well, everything. She is by no means good at it, but she has the stance and her grip down. It's a start. Looking over at her company while they hike, Clara considers a question before speaking up. ]

How much of this are we supposed to look for? Is one flower enough? For people asking a favor, they're really vague on the finer details.

[chosenbylight]

[Anduin shakes his head at the question, offering her a helpless smile of his own.]

It would be more convenient if they had shared... Any such relevant information whatsoever. I got the impression that they did not really know, however. This remedy may be as much folk legend as it is actually of use to Prince Haiva.

[Though at this point, anything is better than nothing. And seeing as how nothing has helped the man so far...]

We had better see if we can collect a few, if there are that many to be had. To be on the safer side.

[makemeasong]

[ Clara nods, and though she wishes they had more to go on, she tries not to let that discourage her. ]

Right, agreed. Hopefully, it isn't a pain to get.

[ She's ready to tackle whatever might need to be done. After trekking through the desert for Mother Death, Clara's realized it's better to follow the scouts' creed of always being prepared. ]

This is a nice break from haggling with merchants, I guess. And hopefully, you don't have to fight anything out here.

SORRY FOR THE DELAY the weather gave me migraines ;;

[chosenbylight]

[Anduin gives her a smile that clearly suggests he believes they very much will have to confront something out here, but isn't about to say so for fear of summoning whatever that might be on command.]

It is... A welcome break from the Wards as well.

[He winces.] I -- that came out wrong. I enjoy the work I am doing there. It can just be a bit... Much, at times.

oof, fellow migraine sufferer here, you never have to worry <3

[makemeasong]

[ Maybe if they don't say it out loud, it'll all be fine.

When he seems to feel bad for his phrasing, Clara shakes her head. ]

I understand, you don't have to explain anything. It would be, and this, for now, a way to catch your breath. I get it.

[ And she does, for the most part. As they walk, her feet crunch under snow, until a thinner layer gives way to mud and she stumbles with a soft gasp, hand shooting out reflexively in search of an anchor. They must be closer to water than she thought, but the change under her feet catches her off guard. ]

<333

[chosenbylight]

[Anduin appreciates her not pressing the point. Anyone with a pendant would have seen him begging for aid several times over by now, and even if she hadn't, the dark circles under his eyes are hard to miss.

As she begins to slip, he reaches out a hand to take her arm, his gloved grip on her arm gentle but firm. The snow has given way to icy mud, which is -- a promising sign?]

Easy -- are you alright?

[He takes a few tentative steps forward once he's certain she isn't about to fall flat on her face.] This flower -- it's supposed to be at the bottom of a river. Isn't that what the townspeople said?

𝐍𝐚𝐜𝐡𝐨 • 𝐜𝐚𝐫𝐚𝐯𝐚𝐧 (will switch to prose if you like!)

[makemeasong]

[ So far, Clara thinks that along with the others, she's been doing a decent job trying to keep the kids occupied. She hates that most of them have eyes that look like they belong to people quadruple their age; hundred-yard gazes on children shouldn't happen.

At the moment, Clara's walking with a child who needed help going to the bathroom (no room for modesty here). She's holding the small child's hand, and she's just looked up and met Nacho's gaze, beginning to smile, when she hears a crack.

Turning, her eyes widen when she sees a mountain of ice moving. She can't make out anything distinct except for a large hand reaching out. It all happens in a matter of seconds; Clara shouts at the little kid to run, literally turning him around and shoving him toward the rest of the caravan, toward Nacho. It's the last thing she does before she feels herself being grabbed up and surrounded by the cold. She shouts, trying to wriggle her way out of its grasp.

It isn't hurting her, except for the extreme cold, but that's the only (probably temporary?) positive thing she has going for her.

She can't even reach the sword in her pocket with the way she's being held, like Jessica Lange in King Kong with less fur. Someone will come, Clara knows that much, trying not to let panic settle in. ]

Sorry for being late! (No, this is good!)

[nachocheese]

[Nacho meets Clara's gaze and nods a little, with an expression that's not-quite-a-smile, but close. His thoughts mirror hers. Kids shouldn't look like this. They're kids.

He hears the cr-cr-crack-ing sound too, at the same time she does, and turns upwards. He eyes widen slightly, very slightly, but enough for the stunned expression to be visible on his face. What the hell?

For a second, everything's a blur. He hears Clara shouting, although it almost feels like her voice is muffled from the sound of his own blood rushing to her ears. He both hears and feels the kid running to him, hears the sound of a child's voice screaming as he realizes he's hoisting the kid into his arms. His body, trained from years of high stress situations, knows how to act on its own without his mind's permission.

The caravan isn't far from them by now, fortunately, and Nacho is passing the frightened child off to someone else, who frankly will probably do a better job comforting the little one than he could.

Which is good, because he has something else has to do! Once the child is safely in the arms of another adult, Nacho follows the sound of a now-familiar voice shouting. Somehow, he manages to find purchase on the slippery, icy side of the underground tunnel, hoisting himself with deft speed towards the sound of Clara's shouts and the Cold-Heart that has her in its grip.]

no worries, we're all on Life's timetable lol <3

[makemeasong]

[ The less Clara struggles, the lighter the grip becomes, which is good for her, because she could hardly breathe. Her problem now, is being exposed to so much cold directly against her body. Even through her warmer clothes, she feels chilled. The Cold-Heart makes a series of sounds, guttural as if trying to talk to her.

Does it...want to be nice to her? She has no idea what to do, she can't stay. She has a distinct feeling she can't stay within such a cold grasp for very long. That's when she sees Nacho and hope sparks. Maybe together, they can come up with something. She addresses the creature loudly, so that perhaps Nacho can hear. ]

You don't want to hurt me, do you? You wanted a child, you...think...I'm a child.

[ Cool, cool cool cool. She's been taken hostage as a surrogate child. She's pressed against an icy body and the cold makes her shiver immediately. ]

Can you understand me? I'm cold, yeah? I can't stay.

[ There's tight squeezing around her again and the message is clear: she isn't leaving. But it does place her on a high ledge for safekeeping. Then, it begins to lumber away, going deeper into its dwelling. ]

<3!!

[nachocheese]

[Nacho's breath is visible with every heavy exhale as he scales the slippery side of the mountain. That thing is huge! The enormity of it would overwhelm his senses if he weren't so intent on compartmentalizing to keep himself sane enough to get to Clara.

He can hear her talking to it. That it thinks she's a child? That it wants to... keep her???

He will be entertained by that later on, but he's too focused on his goal for such things.

Every lumbering step it takes away shakes the ground. Nacho is undeterred, hoisting himself further up the side of the canyon until he's able to extend a hand to Clara on her ledge.]

Hey! [He's breathing hard.] C'mere. Before Frosty the Homicidal Snowman comes back.

[He thrusts out an arm to reach for her, intent on helping her onto his back so they can slide down the slippery ice cavern walls together. And maybe she can borrow some of his body heat, too. He's cold, but she looks freezing.]

[makemeasong]

[ She feels like she's been in a meat locker built on an iceberg, but when Clara sees Nacho, relief makes her sluggishness dissipate a little. ]

You're insane, you're gonna break a hip.

[ She whispers her words even as she begins to carefully move, reaching out for him in return and trying not to slip, causing them both to go down. ]

The kid, is the kid okay?

[ Clara only asks once she's safely beside Nacho, still holding onto his hands tightly. It's only here that she almost slips, but at least she didn't slide down and right into him. ]

[nachocheese]

[Nacho almost laughs when she tells him he's insane. He doesn't laugh, though, but he smile just a little and hiss back, almost playfully:]

I'm insane? You're ungrateful. Next time I'm just leaving you up here with that attitude.

[He keeps his hand held out until he feels her fingers brush his. He's cold, sure -- his breath visible as white wisps in the air can attest to that -- but her fingers feel like solid ice.]

Kid's fine. I handed him off to somebody else. They're with the caravan now.

[He'll pull her close as gently as he can, trying to ease Clara onto his back as he slowly, slooowly starts to ease himself down. Somewhere distantly in the back of his mind, it occurs to him that this entire situation is fucking insane; but that idle thought is completely blocked off by adrenaline and the knowledge that he needs to do what he has to do.

He whispers again to Clara.]

Ready?

[Somewhere, he thinks he hears rumbling, maybe feels shaking? Oh God, not a-fucking-nother one. Please, please let that be his imagination...]

𝐛𝐞𝐬𝐭 𝐰𝐨𝐥𝐟 • 𝐠𝐮𝐭❜𝐬 𝐛𝐢𝐧𝐝

[makemeasong]

[ She shouldn't be here. Every alarm bell is sending warnings to both her heart and her head, but Clara is drawn in, eyes focused, and moving forward. A voice at the back of her mind (that sounds very much like The Doctor) tells her to turn around right now, but she doesn't.

Instead, she hears the request, can almost feel the desperation behind it in her bones, and she agrees. There's a momentary delay where she realizes she isn't sure what that means. Then, there's something else in her head; not the Doctor's voice anymore, but something else that coalesce around her better thoughts.

No one is safe. There are people she's loved but couldn't protect. Her mother, killed in an explosion, her best friend, mother of her godkids, killed by a drunk man. The Doctor—the version of him she knows and has fought for time and again—gone because she couldn't really help him. She tried, but it wasn't enough.

There's a whisper; she has a sword for a reason.

The paladin has to work for it, she has a strong heart, but in the end her better sense takes a back seat. Before it's too late, one pull of her sword across a particular throat could change things for the betterment of everyone. She can see it, she can almost hear the sound of skin tearing. Pulling out her weapon, the look on her face is almost one of disconnect, her eyes vacant. But the grip on the sword is true.

Once the decision is made, she happens to see something out of the corner of her eye, and she turns sharply, calling out in a voice lower than her normal register. ]

Who's there?

[bravelyrunsaway]

( Licyn peers around the turn of the tunnel he's in, ears swiveling forward. The voice is familiar and yet off, enough that when he walks forward, head held low, eyes staring up at Clara where she stands, well aware of the sword in her hand, he moves slow, slinking. Tail down, but not curled under.

He presents at least half of himself, facing her directly, ears perked forward. Canting his head the to side, he huffs, watching her reaction. Something about her feels off, in a more immediately familiar way. One he's just recently had to deal with, but— )

Aooou?

[makemeasong]

[ A part of Clara remembers the wolf by the fire, when she spoke with the Child. It seems like such a long time ago, a lifetime really. So much has happened since then. She's fascinated by this wolf that seems friendly, not like the ones from the snowy woods that had surrounded the inn.

Another part of her, the newest part that's still learning how to coalesce around the soul already occupying the vessel, only sees an obstacle to overcome. Her hand grips the sword so tightly it shakes subtly. ]

Out of my way, or I'll kill you, too.

[ Clearly, the paladin doesn't realize the size of the body it's in. But the voice is still lower in register, no undercurrent of perpetual hopefulness. ]

Your choice.

[bravelyrunsaway]

( His ears both angle back, the whine in his throat pointedly exaggerated when he sits his fuzzy rear end down on the ground and stares at Clara. This is where the wrong scents make sense, by being nonsense. Senseless killing has always bothered him, if he'd even thought it would be sincere when stated as such from Clara. Who'd spoken with that child in his own broken misunderstandings that night on the tower, as the fire flickered and fluttered and darkness seeped in close, lapping at their feet.

Now there's a different darkness still linked to the old, looking to swallow any number of them whole. He whines even louder, staring her down. Love, what in the world do you think you're doing with that sword? Your balance's all wrong for your frame. )

[makemeasong]

[ When Clara the possessed tries to lift the sword and look intimidating, stepping forward only looks clumsy. The part of her still there would laugh, but it comes out as a frustrated grunt. The paladin is agitated and steps forward, no less deterred. ]

You aren't so big I can't move around you, wolf. Just a wolf with no bite, apparently.

[ She goes to do just that, to walk right around him, refusing to let an animal stop her. ]

𝐜𝐚𝐬𝐬𝐢𝐚𝐧 • 𝐡𝐞𝐥𝐩

[makemeasong]

[ Clara's done the best she can with the few gems in her pocket, to keep getting food. Even with merchants scattering, she uses sheer determination and aggressiveness to try and force more bartering.

Then there's a sound that seems to vibrate right through her bones as everyone scatters. The dragon is prowling, and she pushes herself against a wall in an alleyway, though she's still able to see out. She wishes she couldn't when someone selling wares is frozen while running, and then, in another's haste, knocked over. They shatter, and Clara watches, horrified. It all happened so fast. She can't stop looking at the pieces, missing an opportunity to run for a better clearing.

Clara doesn't even see Cassian as she stares and wishes she could unsee at the same time. She doesn't want to move, and when the dragon makes some kind of awful noise again, her hands slam over her ears, eyes squeezing shut tightly.

A man was there, and now he's in pieces, and her mind just isn't sure what to do with that. ]

Re: 𝐜𝐚𝐬𝐬𝐢𝐚𝐧 • 𝐡𝐞𝐥𝐩

[allforthecause]

[ He was on his way to meet her - her company the comforting light in a foreign world of darkness and death - so he'd even had something of a smile on his face as he made his way through the crowds. But that smile vanished as soon as the dragon cast it's shadow, the air filling with screams as people started to scatter and run.

He should run, he knows. But he also knows that she's here, somewhere, and whatever stubborn little part of him that had him go back to Ferrix again and again despite the danger - that part of him that had him go right into the proverbial dragon's den to get Bix - that part of him starts running toward the dragon, into the crowd as he desperately searches for Clara's familiar face. He feels the viscera of the man who was near him smear across his skin in the explosion, streaking his cheek with blood, but he doesn't care. Because he spots her - standing there, out in the open, eyes shut tight and hands over her ears as if she can keep the world out by pretending it's not there.

He doesn't even call her name, he just sprints across the street, almost tripping over a chunk of the body that landed between them, and grabs her elbow as he reaches her, pulling her as sharply as she can to try to get her to break into a run with him. ]

[makemeasong]

[ The sudden grab makes her gasp sharply, eyes popping open as she's pulled along. It's only once the running kicks in that Clara realizes it's Cassian she's running with. They aren't safe yet, but relief floods through her anyway.

She can hear screams seeming to come back in their direction, like a slow-moving echo, signaling the dragon circling back to a higher perch. Clara isn't sure her legs can move her any faster, her heart thundering against her ribcage. ]

Cassian!

[ With her free hand, she points to an empty alcove just to the right, but still a a few yards away. She isn't sure if she's imagining it, or if she really can feel the air fanning toward her from the dragon's wings, but it gives her the boost her legs were looking for. ]

waterrrrr

[downswing]

( White of their white thunderous, roiling, glistened. Less peace than absence, a sterile hell. No, that is what sleeps beneath our floor boards, that is what waits.

Here, in the forest's cradle, only the dissonance of steps either weighted and strong, or airily skidding. Their breaths clumsily spelling out betrayal in condensation. The animal stench of blood and soot, and the strange gravel of saltpetre that the watch towers line in their cannons to retaliate against fresh flame from enemy catapults. They reek of their despair, the futility of Alem's dwindling defences. Its starvation.

Throughout this, the defenceless suffer. Even the royal-born unspared, the prince Haiva — the man, crippled by years of sickness — begging relief. A fraction of Lan Wangji wished to lend himself to the hunt to resolve his plight. The remainder merely keeps his eye trained on the chasm of white nothing at the woods' periphery, thickets drowned under the evening's snow. Rare berries line the land like pox marks. He has foraged too little, his purse starved.

And then there is his ward, his companion. Clara, who never earnestly complains of a given task or circumstance, but is still frail and small despite herself, betrayed by her bones. Who all but cursed Lan Wangji's wraith-like resignation to the ebb and tide of another war. He haunts her like a scavenging bird, never far from her shadow, while their path deepens in the woods, ever silent to excuse her from the displeasure of his company —

Until they hear it, blood-curdling susurration. Not yet within reach, but close. So very... close. Invisibly so. Perhaps the river... buried beneath snow? Then, they must take caution, as they near a ravine, with their footsteps. )

Running water. To the north.

[makemeasong]

[ As always with Wangji, Clara wonders if he's actually happy to have her for company, although there have to be points in her favor, in that she hasn't needed any sort of saving. Yet.

She's always brimming with questions, wanting to talk to him, and yet always so puzzled by him. He's maybe not so unlike the Doctor, except the Doctor says a lot of words without saying much at all, sometimes. But she's slowly learning more in the time she spends with her reluctant friend.

When he speaks, it pulls her out of her thoughts and she stops to listen. Nodding, she moves with him and says aloud what probably doesn't need to be said. ]

Be careful. I don't wanna have to drag an injured man through the forest.

[downswing]

( Be careful. It stings. Then, sweetly, it flatters. He startles in his step, murmurs behind myself: )

At ease. ( Scratchy, when his blade's whispers a crown of branches aside, and he can see, at last, see the heartache of the frozen shore and how ice takes root in flimsy filigree, and their steps are likely to slip and sink between silken, clammy mud and snow. ) I bear no wounding.

( Healed, within hours of the One-Armed Man's retrieval of his bludgeoned, tattered, bruised up person. He remembers: Wei Ying's insufferable objections, the wave of public indignation, his saviour's own reluctance. He has been... doubted in more ways than he cared to itemise, to consider.

No matter. Now, they face the ravine, the trip down, the scattered sheets of ice dwarfed by the possibility of sinking. He frowns down, knowing — as Clara must know — that the only way to study the site for flowers is to come near, to peer in. )

Do you trust yourself to descend? ( She is... untried, after all. Too often challenged, here, for a woman of what he suspects is little preparation. )

[makemeasong]

[ Clara smiles, just a touch, until it fades at his question. She's thinking; if she has to get into the water or she falls into it, Wangji won't leave her, so she at least knows that. And if she has to get into the water, it isn't like she'll be soaking.

She nods, looking at him. ]

I'll be alright. Besides, I'm not going all the way back now.

[ She might as well prove she can brave all extreme types of weather. Carefully, maybe with. more care than he thought she'd take, Clara judges her steps, isn't running with abandon. Here, she has to break the tension. ]

Other than your family, who do you think you go on these adventures with the most?

[ Maybe he doesn't, that's a possibility, too. She'd want to try and keep her family away from it all, as much as she could. ]

[downswing]

We warm your clothes after.

( Talismans, clandestine stretches of threadbare parchment lining his purse, steadfast and ready. He does not presume her cooperation: foreign magic too often invades, wars with one's balance. If she permits, and only then.

They start down, the shoreline slanted, abrupt and harsh. Beneath his foot, snow disintegrates, shifts tectonically to pour down into the wail of running waters. On instinct, he holds a hand out to balance himself — and offers the other to Clara, before a fresh trickle of snow weeps down from the crown of branches above, carrying a powdered glaze into the waters.

The susurration maddens him, keeps him alert. Better, distracted: )

I often travel alone. ( 'He who goes where the chaos is.' He remembers, a moniker too plain, too long. For well past a decade, devastating. What it means to be the ghost that haunts a forest before its dead, a village before its sins. ) You accompany the Doctor?