(no subject)

[downswing]

WHO: Lan Wangji, a triad of misfits, perhaps everyone ever — OPEN FOR BUSINESS payments cash upfront
WHEN: first half of July
WHERE: canyons, mountain roads, encampment
WHAT: in which stone is struck (badly), ghosts are drawn into conversation (worse), and small children cry (inevitably)
WARNINGS: blood rains, talk of harpies, Lan Wangji
NOTE: happy to put up a starter for you, if you want to join in on this dubious fun, or feel free to bring your own! Lan Wangji is... drifting... between phantoms, investigations, watches and the stone canyon.

Comments

[downswing]

Creatures, absent where Archeval's strength betrays them. Where Lan Wangji's senses, his knowledge of the quartz stone, intuits they should lie. He hesitates, hand soft and mind emptied, thoughts liquefied and cold and moulding. A mind's temple, no different than this, and the Lady's hands wet before, and Lan Wangji's dripping with tension, crackling through pores like the breath of dust that washes over the walls.

He says nothing, unto no one. Retreats, and only finally remembers — vengeance, then. Let him lead with that, as Wei Ying's powers have woven before, wrenched from nothingness into being. Let him use, as he summons his zither with the pass of a hand and whispers it alive, the first ring of his music rousing a turbulence of sound in the small confinement. He must play with caution here, where waves of strength can fracture walls, where rock holds itself too brittle.

No matter. Play he will. And with the music, force and compelling spirits to answer, the hundreds of voices that fragmented off living bodies once, to combine in one voice here, whole. Qi language, rightfully exerted.

Eye-slanted and jaw stiff, it occurs to him, after a few exchanges, to translate for Archeval's pleasure:

"My son and his companion are unharmed. Not in this room." And without sparing a glance away from the state, hands drifting over the zither string. "The spirits here. If you have questions, name them."

...after, he might wish to explain just how Lan Inquiry performs its duties.