To Someone From A Warmer Climate (Nyra)

[Bran Viola]

The high court, a damnable maze it was. It was entirely possible that keeping an army was simply unnecessary when every official building possessed such an unintuitive layout. Bran had a penchant for scaling the outside of fae architecture, it was easier to navigate when you could see all of it contained from the outside, but the extent to which the folk delighted in open floor plans made it such that you could stumble into a rooms interior without noticing you’d even entered the building. This, with the many bridges and promenades spanning faerie’s elegant heart rendered the court indistinguishable from a city or a single gargantuan palace. He was already taking a roundabout route. There were several things he had to collect.



Guinivere Marcel? Was that an actual name or a pseudonym? Regardless, that was the name of the girl sitting at the base of a throne that threatened to impale her for her trespass. Only time would tell, though if this went as deep as Bran suspected, it was entirely possible that she wasn’t actually intended for the throne, merely to reserve it. Bran couldn’t imagine that woman desiring leadership. Where then, were the people pulling the strings? There were two distinct possibilities, firstly, that they were secreted away as far from their intrigues as possible, secondly, that they were hiding in plain sight, in the halls and flora of the high court itself. Given fae stylings Bran ruled that the latter was more characteristic, though a proper ploy would involve some agency in both of these blindspots. Maybe that’s what Guinivere was for. Bran ducked through an archway as a group of elegantly dressed fae ambled by, their slender bodies mantling one another’s arms and waists like invasive flowering vines. Perhaps a delegation from the south? The foul amalgamation of delicate limbs dispersed about a turn in the hall, their soft layers of laughter fading with them. The coronation was picking up. Bran clicked his tongue beneath gritted teeth. He should have done this earlier. Fortunately, his first stop was unlikely to be inhabited at such a time.



That woman had killed with poison, but there was a great elegance with which she chose to deliver that sweet passing. While a graceful hand passed over a drink reflected this properly, it was evident that either she, or her benefactor, had commissioned the weapons that served as her final resort for granting her gifts so that they would look the part. Those knives were unique, not only visually, but in their design, which seemed to hold liquid to the blade quite well. If these weapons had been made inside the high court, record of their creation would be in the forge. If not, it would be apparent the knives were made elsewhere. The date at which they were made could also give him a better sense of the timeline upon which these peoples little dance was being prepared.



Bran’s masked face was met by a warm, almost scalding breeze as he passed the door to the forge. It was certain that this place had been created to be worthy of its position. The forge was bathed in the warm writhing light of its grand centerpiece, an immense and ornate furnace whose mouth held a fire that was certainly not mortal fire just beyond its parted lips. Unfinished projects, weapons, and inventions Bran did not have names for lined the rooms interior and occupied spare alcoves. Bran paused as he watched the light from the rooms center whirl about the space, casting colorful shadows that obscured the chamber’s distant recesses.



Where on earth do they keep anything?



Bran paused again after several steps into the room. There was no way. The coronation had settled about the palace like an iron funeral veil. Who the hell would be in the forges?

tags- Nyra Charlotte Enigma

[Nyra Charlotte Enigma]

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@ Bran Viola

809 Words

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There are some things [break]

That no one teaches You

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A spark might have fallen and sent the palace burning down, as so long as the forge was untouched, Nyra would not have noticed. There was a coronation today. Juno was going. She had been in their rooms, her dark hair piled up, gold chains winding around her brow. She looked glittering. She looked plated in gold. Nyra did not understand why she was going. She did not understand why her engagement was broken off after so many years. She did not understand why Juno looked like she was entering a hunt. She did understand Juno's instructions. "Go to the forge," she said. "I will be at the coronation for many hours. You can come to the ceremony if you want. But if you'd like to stay, you can."


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Juno might as well have banned her from the ceremony. She had never been allowed in the high court forge before. It had been the stuff of dreams since she was a child. It did not disappoint.


[break][break]


While many just saw brass and silver and forges, she saw art. The forge was a hall, nearly fifty meters long. Small forges lined the walls, with two massive forges in the middle. Silver plating covered the wall. She walked in and brushed her fingers against the smooth surface. Solid sterling silver. Polished. Molten gold ran in the cracks between the paneling, dripping into vials and crucibles. Tools lined the back wall, every kind she could imagine. It took her some time, just running her fingers over the tools, studying their functions. But she had work to do.


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She called Rhea over to her. The fawn clattered across the marble floor, ears flapping. Nyra scooped her up and set her on the silver worktable. Rhea folded her legs under her obediently. By now, she had been updated many times over. Every time, her movement was too mechanical, overly repeated. Every time, Nyra was far too exhausted to add even one more charm, even when she knew she needed to. Every time, she got close, but never close enough.


[break][break]


She stroked Rhea's ears, wondering if all these repairs hurt. If she minded, or if she liked it. Nyra wished she could take people apart, lean their parts, change their oil to make them behave. She wished she could peer into her own mind.


[break][break]


Rhea was not how she had started. When Nyra first fashioned her, she was made of twelve different panels, all linked together with coils, oil flowing freely throughout. Now she was made of nearly two hundred, with tiny veins of oil everywhere, no coils but braided ropes of silver instead. It still wasn't smooth enough. She couldn't get the oil to flow right. Rhea's ears were dented.


[break][break]


Nyra had twelve hammers by her side, all descending in size from twenty-five centimeters on down to just eight. She did not know if that would be small enough. She did not know if that would be delicate it enough. There were hammers with heads as small as her fingernail. There were hammers that she wasn't sure she could lift. She could not think of running out of anything but strength. She could not think of running out of anything but energy.


[break][break]


She fell into a rhythm. She lost track of time. She only knew that there was a clattering noise. She only knew that her concentration was broken. She looked up suddenly. How long had she been here? Rhea's ears were fixed. Her left panels were now detached. Some of the wiring had been frayed. She was considering making her hooves joined. There was someone else here.


[break][break]


Nyra wondered if she had missed the coronation. She was not dressed for it. She was wearing a loose silver suit with a silver-plated wing design over her shoulders and thick leather apron and tight-fitting gloves. She wished they were dragonhide. Dragonhide prevented iron burns. There was no dragonhide left on land.


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She tilted her head around the massive furnace before her. A boy stood in the doorway. A secondary furnace burned behind her, haloing her in fire and gold. Her hair, bound up out of her face, swung behind her. Her face was streaked with oil. He looked very clean for someone in the forges. Maybe he just got here. She did not set down her tools, only studied him curiously. 

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"Can I help you?" she asked politely. She was not looking at his face anymore. He was attired in full armor, weaponry and all. She wondered if he was a knight. He did not look like a knight. He was wearing an odd mask. Her eyes fell to the weapons and she had to fight back a gasp.



Iron. He was carrying iron.







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[Bran Viola]

Bran's skin momentarily flushed cold when he saw her, his hand twitching towards its cradle at his blades hilt, his mind rushing to explain her presence and what he could glean from it as the rest of him fell into the pit of his bodies automatic preparation to take any eyes that had seen him.

She was polite. She saw me, and was polite. Someone who worked in the forges would know who’s supposed to be there. The high court forge should be well guarded. She did not know I am not supposed to be here. So she doesn’t work here.



The logic was very circumstantial and took several large jumps, all owed, perhaps, to the large amount of brans will that was, in this half second period, devoting itself fully to mapping the shortest path he could take to kill her, but even so, he stopped. The heat of the forges rushed back over him as his consciousness returned from its place at the girls throat to his body, and the cold sensation vanished. Brans reasoning and muscle memory had overridden each other, forcing him to immediately reevaluate everything in his surroundings. For the most part, he was extremely confused. The halt to his inner motion was so jarring that he barely perceived her shock at his weaponry.



What was she doing here? He was confident no one would be here, let alone someone who barely had any business in the forges to begin with. It was a distinct possibility she was still in the way but in the winding intrigue of faerie her presence here had some unforeseen relevance. Leaving bodies was also leaving tracks. Bran stared at the air behind  her head in silence for about a full second before he brought his hand up to his mask, and pulled it down to speak, wincing slightly in irritation as a fresh wave of hot air pressed to his face



“I’d ask you to show me to the product records, but I don’t think you belong here. Is there something you need help with?”



Hazarding this wasn’t particularly risky. Something was out of place, he could at least try to figure out why. He could always kill her afterwards. Brans eyes slipped past her to the great silver creature on the worktable, its innards gently mantling the silver workbench like ivy. They seemed to blend together, being all of the same metal, it looked more like a serene statue than a pet project. Not particularly risky. It likely can’t move properly in this state. This was only a guess. Bran had only seen a fae automaton two times, and both had only left him with more irritation over the faewild’s strange rule on mortal technology than any actual information about their workings. 

Bran eventually exited his own head for a moment to take account of the wispy creatures face. He felt almost like laughing. Now that he’d finally looked at her, this curious girl was all pale, just an ivory shadow against the marble, except she wasn’t, because she was staring at him like a startled deer, and was absolutely drenched in oil and grease. 

it was like looking at a very dirty and awkward ghost.

“I don’t think I’ve seen you here before. Sorry, shouldn't you be at the coronation?”

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[Nyra Charlotte Enigma]

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@ Bran Viola

676 Words

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There are some things [break]

That no one teaches You

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Machines were not at all like people imagined them. Just working with them was a type of art. You had to become used to their movements, to their inner workings, to the mechanism of it all. But once you did, they would do the same thing every time. Science was repeatable. Technique was perfectible. Machines spoke one language, and they were brilliantly predictable. Nothing like living creatures. Was that Rhea's fatal flaw? She was mechanical. How did one program unpredictability? Nyra wasn't even sure she could bridge that gap with magic. She stepped around her worktable, tightening her grip on her hammer. It did not change. It would not. It was predictable, like all good machines. Like all good tools. [break][break]

That predictability was what caused her to step back, to shift her weight away from the forge. It flared up. She had been expecting it. Smoke billowed around her. Sparks hit the ground. The fire was in this guest's face, and he did not move or step back. The sparks and fumes were largely harmless, of course, but something lit up in her mind. Wires connected. He was not from here. He did not belong here-- he did not know the mechanisms; he did not expect the smoke. Anyone from any forge would know not to stand so close to the fire. But any amateur would have flinched from the sparks-- even if they were harmless. What did that make him? [break][break]

An old word for mortals came to her: ironsiders. In the early days, before the fae truly interacted with mortals, when the earth was still freshly turned from them crawling out of it, they called the mortal land ironside and the mortals ironsider. He seemed a true ironsider, in the tradition of his ancestors, carrying iron even into a forge. Why he brought it she was unsure. She could not work with it. No fae could.
[break][break]
"Why should I?" she countered. "Ironsider. It's your Queen being crowned." He was a mortal, welcome in the palace. She knew that had to be because of the mortal queen. The ripples of her rule were being felt already. Nyra had seen her breifly-- she was beautiful, but the kind of beautiful that Persephone must have been, not Aphrodite. She was surprisingly solid. Nyra could not think much about her without her gut twisting with jealousy like it always did. Mortals could do so much that she could not, and now they were ruling her country. She could keep her rooted beauty. Nyra would take the iron.[break][break]

Beauty was all relative anyway. The beauty of a thing was in its function. Nyra's function was here. Juno had said she didn't have to come to the coronation because Juno would represent their house, and Nyra listened. She would have to attend the crowning part, but the toasts and the introductions would last hours before that. She didn't want to go anyway. What was the function of that?[break][break]

"I'm allowed." she said, putting down her hammer finally, stepping to the side so she was covering Rhea with her body. She did not want to share, not just yet. She did not know him and he was threatening her forge. What if he did work here? What if he made her leave?[break][break]

"What records?" she asked, tilting her head. "Maybe I can help," she said a little more cheerfully. Helping was good. Helping meant she got to stay. She turned on her heel to look in the back, and then stopped. "Only if you let me see your iron."  
[break][break]
She had nearly forgotten in her worry and indignation and excitement. Her emotions hit her too fast, and she had to make them slow down. She took one deep breath, than another. The forge was in front of her. Rhea was behind her. Her hammers were on the table. This would be fine so long as she didn't get ahead of herself. She might get to examine iron. He might know someone who could work it.
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No. She couldn't get ahead of herself. 






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[Bran Viola]

Bran paused for easily the fifth time in the past minute. He had yet again resolved killing her was his best strategy at the word ironsider, and had had to, yet again, perform a hard about-face as she cheerfully, almost flustered, asked to help. Was she stupid? ‘Your queen?’ Thats why she thinks I'm here? That barely justifies anything!



“Sure, if you could, I'm looking for the product records. Creation of weapons, their designs, and who they were sold to or commissioned by-“



Bran trailed off. She had asked for something in return. Had he heard her right?


“Wait. What do you mean? You can’t. It’ll burn you.” He said dumbly.



Ironsider. That was an old word. This little ghost had learning, in history as well as magic and metallurgy. Was she a noble? All fae were a bit, how would he put it, well learned? Perhaps ‘intellectually promiscuous’ was a better descriptor, fae had all the time in the world to pursue their hobbies but she looked young. Bran’s age. He racked his brain for the point at which fae ceased to age. It varied, but what, twenty five? He’d seen some fae eons old who looked it, but others who for whatever reason looked younger than he was. 

Bran cast the thought aside, how would he even know how old she was? why did it matter?

“Uh. Yes if you could help I’d appreciate it. If you get too close to me though the exposed iron will start to cause blisters, even if you don’t touch. Maybe there’s something else I could do for you? Your idea isn’t a good one."

Bran pulled his mask around to the back of his neck, to face it away from her, in a show of practical courtesy that he quickly realized meant nothing, because his chain whip was wrapped around his entire waist, along with his sword, and belts that wound his body like grapevines with dark metal fruit. Bran felt unwieldy in his own fatigues for the first time in a while. They were designed for him, but the fact that the cloth had been prepared even before he was born sometimes gave him the distinct sensation that the clothes didn't belong to him. An idiotic notion, really. His name was given before he'd been born too. Everyone's was. Writhing tongues of flame from the spat forth another sudden change in light, along with a flock of small embers that went out as they fell to the marble floor like a broken patch of dead skin. One landed on Bran's forehead, and was calmly brushed off with a gloved hand and the same haste bran employed when he woke up in the morning, something that usually took him about an hour. Bran flicked the fingers of the hand he'd wiped his face with, as though drying himself from water rather than flame.

"Oh, whoops. I should probably move."

Bran stepped about a foot to the right with the same apparent lack of urgency.

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[Nyra Charlotte Enigma]

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@ Bran Viola

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There are some things [break]

That no one teaches You

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Nyra blinked once, twice, slowing her mind down and forcing herself to study the situation objectively. Her immediate impulse was to argue with him. Her skin was prickling. She hated the word "can't" and she hated being told her ideas were impractical. They were never impractical and they were always just too far ahead of those around her. Rhea had been called an impractical project until she managed to randomize her ear twitches. Randomization was impossible to program, but Nyra had found a way to make an imitation of it with a rotating chamber. It was simplicity until you watched long enough. It was simplicity but it made her seem alive.


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She dragged herself back to the present. Nyra couldn't stand staying in the present. She was always daydreaming, always imagining, always innovating. Innovation was bringing imagination to reality. She loved innovation. Now she had to think of this like a puzzle.


[break][break]
Ironsider. Ironsider who looked nothing like the mortal queen. Ironsider with dark hair and dark eyes, who was not afraid of fire. Ironsider carrying iron.


[break][break]
That ought to have been intuitive, but there was nothing intuitive about him. She found herself in a state of fascination, not with him, exactly, but with all the things about him that did not make sense. The dark eyes that were scanning the room too quickly. The dark clothes and iron weapons. The lines she could see on his face. What was he looking for? If he wasn't afraid of fire, what was he afraid of?

[break][break]Mortals were something she had only heard about, folklore to a girl born into a fantasy. There were stories of their creation-- from the clay, from the dirt. There were stories of their destructions-- iron digging into fae skin, empires sent ablaze. He was none of the things she expected. She didn't know exactly what she expected.


[break][break]
Nyra watched him move the iron away from her. It was not the most dangerous thing there was. If she had dragonskin, she would be able to handle it. He looked like he had been carrying iron so long it had fused with him. She wasn't one to favor black, but clearly, he was. She could be called melodramatic, but the faewild was a world of color. She at least would have preferred silver. Iron had no value from its color, only its function. Only that it was forbidden. 

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"I know perfectly well what iron does." she said, her gaze on him more critical than anything. "I would not get close to it. I know my limits even if I can't stand them. But utility is not everything that matters." Her sister would tease her for her creations and her teachers called them effusive. It was irrelevant. She could see what they couldn't. She could see possibility. "It is the possibility of the thing that matters. Handling iron is not the same as bronze, but it could be." The superior weapon was rarely in the material and often in the craftsmanship. In the design. In the inspiration.


[break][break]
She studied his weapons from here, the design, the etching, the grip. She could make something that suited his hands better and he was wearing gloves. 'You should give me your knives and fire your blacksmith." She said dryly. "Did they use a mold? I could make an automation to do that." Mold-made knives weren't knives. They were big needles. "Tell your queen that if this is what she can get she should let me be one of her official weaponsmiths." She would not call the person who made those knives a weaponsmith. They didn't deserve the title.


[break][break]
He was carrying so many weapons, a multiplicity that she found impractical. One of each was more realistic, but she knew little about the Queen's guard. His sword was no better than the knives. She simply could see less of it.
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He was rather stuck on the product records. Idly, she wondered who else was released for the coronation, but her being an Enigma gave her special status. Maybe no other fae were. Maybe it was only the Queen's pet mortals. She truly hadn't looked. "Show me her seal," Nyra said. She did not really care who authorized this, but she could not get blamed for anything going wrong. She had to make a good show for herself. "And I don't want anything else but the iron. You have plenty of knives." Really, by now, he ought to know better than to bargain with the fae.








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[Bran Viola]

She looked upset with him. He had difficulty understanding why. All he’d said was that she shouldn’t touch something that would scorch off her own skin. He felt as though he’d said something obvious to a child, and the child had turned on him for suggesting they shouldn’t play in the street. Did she know what iron did? It really didn’t seem like it. Even if she’d heard stories he wondered if she’d ever been cut by a weapon that would only produce a sudden squall of scalding blood before the wound was cauterized. Bran removed a knife from his belt with a free hand before it began to slowly orbit each of his fingers in succession, wandering about his grip like a small baton. Utility? It was a tool. It was made for a purpose and it fulfilled it. What was so difficult about that? Even beautiful weapons satisfied the purpose of being beautiful, even if that wasn’t a purpose Bran thought had much value. He was beginning to become somewhat exasperated.



“What are you talking about? If you can’t come closer how do you intend for me to show you anything? You can see from there anyway, and-“

He stopped mid sentence as she began to evaluate the construction of his weapons.



“Yeah, they- yes they used a mold.”



He flipped the knife in his palm into his thumb and forefinger, gripping the blade to show her the objects outline.



“These are for throwing. The mold makes the way they fly consistent. They’re built to be thrown away. What would you make me if you were in charge of my tools?”

Bran scratched the back of his head with the hilt of the knife and sighed as he returned it to its place among its siblings.



“You seem to be under the impression I belong to Guinivere. I don’t, I’m just looking for records, and I can’t show you her seal. I don’t think she likes me very much anyway.”



Telling her this was a bad idea, but it wasn’t like he could realistically pretend to belong here. If she suddenly turned on him it’d make his life easier anyway. Maybe he shouldn’t even wait. Maybe he should just kill her. He honestly wasn’t sure why he hadn’t.



“The only iron I have are the weapons. Which do you want to look at, where should I put it, and will you please, for the love of god, show me the product records if I do.”

tags- Nyra Charlotte Enigma,

[Nyra Charlotte Enigma]

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Nyra was fully ready to see this argument out to the end. Not only was she confident she could win-- she saw nothing unfinished. She could not forget a project. She could not do any less than her best at anything. It led her to exhaustion and desperation. Finished was finished by her definition and no other.

[break][break]
But he dropped it. And suddenly, all the ideas about the knives came back to her. Iron. Someone had the chance to work with iron and they used a mold. The disrespect still galled her.


[break][break]

"It does not make them fly consistently." she said sourly. "It makes them fly the same for everyone. That is a terrible idea for a knife. You should have knives made to you. I can repeat the same process again and again. Anyone can repeat the same process again and again. So you have measurements for everyone, and you make the knives to the person. You would be able to throw them faster." It seemed like common sense to her. Lighter knives for the weaker throwers. Heavier knives for those who fought close range. Sharpness and curves. Weaponry was an art, and it deserved to be treated as such.


[break][break]
"If I were to make your knives," she said, studying his arms, studying the curve of his hands, the build of his fingers, the way he gripped his weapons even now. "I would make them heavier. No curve in them now, that's good. I would make them sharper on both sides. I would try to make the taper in width to make them more aerodynamics. I would study the angles of your arms when you threw and match that." She wrinkled her nose slightly. "I would not use a mold."


[break][break]
She said it like she was referring to mildew, and she might well have been. Molds were, in Nyra's view, largely lazy and careless options for those not dedicated to their craft. Then again, she could admit she had never dealt with large projects that might require one. But she could not see herself falling to such a level. 


[break][break]
Nyra froze, crossed her arms, and stopped. If he was not the mortal queen's, what was a mortal doing here?  Dressed in iron? Was he here to sabotage the coronation? Was he from any court at all. 


[break][break]
"Who do you belong to then?" she asked, furrowing her eyebrows. "Which court are you from?"


[break][break]
Technically, Nyra was a princess of the High Court, but she grew up in the North. She did not recognize them. She was not at all sure they would let a mortal knight in, even with a mortal queen. Things changed and she missed it, for sure, but that felt like a leap even she would see. 


[break][break]
"Put the knife on the table." she said. "And one sword." She was fighting to keep the excitement out of her voice. He was mortal. He could lie. He might yet. Or maybe he was lying now, but he had no reason to lie about that. It got him nowhere. "If you introduce yourself properly, and show me the weapons, then I can help you with the product records. I cannot promise to get them until I know more." She was no fool. Promises were binding and she could not break a vow. She stretched out the last words, making it clear to the air and whatever magic that held her that this was no vow, only an offer on the table like she hoped the weapons would be.


[break][break]
"I suppose I didn't introduce myself, though," she said thoughtfully. It had only occurred to her now. She was poorly trained in courtly manners. "My name is Princess Nyra Charlotte Enigma of the High Court. And you?"


[break][break]
She was technically like a princess, but she never felt like one. Six steps away from the throne. Maybe more. She did not want it. The last High Queen in Faerie had been her mother. Nyra was born not wanting it. If she was High Queen, it meant everyone was dead. 


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[Bran Viola]

Oh god no. The family tree of the royal line was an invasive sort of plant that happily jammed its roots into every corridor and bedchamber in the faewild, not to mention the high court itself. He really should have just assumed she was related somehow. On the other hand, the fact that she was here during the coronation was suddenly an even stranger prospect. The coronation. Right. He needed to visit the new high queen, he was wasting time here. His train of thought was broken as the girl’s rambling faded back in to his periphery and shattered completely when she started to pout her face like a vaguely disgusted art critic.



“Of course they fly consistently, it’s the same knife every time. I’d need well over twenty of these at a time for the way I fight, how are you going to make each of them fly consistently if you’re doing it by hand?”



Bran returned her sentiment with his own expression, scoffing as he broke eye contact to favor the floor from behind closed eyelids.



“Oh you’d sharpen my knives. Genius.”



Bran's expression settled into something more neutral as she moved away from her pointless arguing.



“Belong? I don’t belong to anyone. What a novel idea. Does your bloodline own you? Is that how this works?”



Bran sighed. ‘Until I know more,’ huh? Great. He walked directly towards her and drew three knives between each of his fingers, and at several steps from her, placed them neatly on the table.



“You get these. I'm not giving you my sword, you won’t be able to draw it, and I don’t feel like taking it out right now. My name is Bran, and while you do that, I’m going to look for the product records on my own. Have fun.”



Bran couldn’t remember if there was blood on the sword. It wasn’t as necessary to clean it given that the only blood it was used for would evaporate off of it, but that could leave stains on occasion. There weren’t any on the blade’s edges, otherwise he would have done maintenance, but the girl clearly knew her stuff. She might pick up something slighter than Bran could notice.



“Pleasure to meet you, princess.”



His words and actions held none of the necessary decorum
.

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[Nyra Charlotte Enigma]

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@ Bran Viola

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There are some things [break]

That no one teaches You

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Nyra found herself sometimes exhausted with the cold pragmatism that seemed to exist in spades in their world. While the fae were meant to be creatures of light and wonder, largely she found a world overpopulated by cynics. This boy– this mortal boy– seemed even more harshly burdened than the rest. Perhaps it was an unfair inheritance of his mortality.

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“If you knew anything about weapons, you would know that sharpness is just one factor.” Perhaps he was really trying to antagonize her. She didn’t see how that was productive for anyone, but when he dropped the knives on the table, she couldn’t seem to care.






[break][break]


The iron was dangerous, yes, but her wonder was stronger. Was it then, because of her bloodline that she was so curious? She could trace her lineage back ten generations and not find mortal blood anywhere in it. It was awful. She did not want her strange inheritance, to be hopelessly curious and forbidden from the one thing that truly interested her. Maybe he wasn’t satisfied. Maybe he just had set hands on the one thing that mattered to her. Maybe the iron would poison her like it burned her. It was a cruel irony that she could never find out.



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“Of course you belong to your bloodline,” she said. It was a silly question. “Why else would vows be passed down?” Or maybe it was different because he was a mortal. She could not imagine another system of things.



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Nyra had been born in the high court, the second daughter of the king’s beloved sister, the second heir to the Willowlace dynasty, and she felt herself drawn back to her birthplace like a magnet. She had been born in the high court and pulled away by circumstance, but every time she came back, everything felt a bit more right. Was this why?



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She pulled on her gloves, just leather, regular leather, not dragonskin. She still couldn’t handle the iron, but she could get closer. She had never seen dragonskin, not in person, only in pictures. They said the undersea still had some. They would never provide the land with it, not with the current state of things, not ever, probably



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The knives were ironically simple. If she had iron, she would create a masterpiece. She would outfit Rhea with plate armor. She would build a broadsword that could break mountains. Whoever had this iron had an embarrassment of it. She would have been furious if she wasn’t so awestruck.



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As the boy walked towards the product records, she could hear Rhea creaking behind her. While the plate on her side was still missing, she never seemed to truly power off anymore. Nyra turned, and Rhea was standing on the table. “You can jump down.” she said to the deer, nodding. Sometimes she wasn’t sure how much Rhea understood. But it seemed to be improving.





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The deer jumped off the worktable and trotted over to him. Nyra didn’t see any loose wires, so there shouldn’t have been too much of a risk. “That’s Rhea,” she said calmly, measuring the knives, trying to decide how to weigh them. “Maybe she knows where the records are? I think she can read now.”



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[Bran Viola]

Bran turned back to the girl, gradually stretching as close as she could to his tools, like a cat, afraid of a bath but tantalized by its own reflection. His expression softened a bit. He was so different from her. She was like a pallid sheet of velvet, barely even there. The fae folk had the look of a portrait of someone Bran had never met. Their form was clear in the paint, but they weren’t really wholly there. At the same time, these images would outlast him a thousand times over unless their delicate frames were disturbed. She really was baffled by him wasn’t she? Or rather, enamored by what he carried. What was it like to be so hopelessly obsessed with something antithetical to you? Iron was such a mundane thing too. Bran still didn’t really understand how fae enjoyed their lives.



She was pouting again. Something about the make of the knives? Bran always thought the simplicity of his things was rather elegant, but maybe he was wrong. When he spent so much time in the faewild it became very difficult to appreciate maximalism. It got tiring. He caught himself staring. Not at the girl, but at the automaton, an immediate flinch in his throwing arm as the thing woke. It was hardly like watching machinery sputter into motion, if he couldn’t see its innards he would have believed it was sleeping. ‘She’ was sleeping? Bran wasn’t familiar with how fae automatons worked, his only knowledge was that iron could disrupt the enchantments of their makers.



“It can- She can read? It’s a she?”



Bran directed every bit of willpower he had to willfully turn his back on the creature, and began to open drawers and cabinets. He hated how obvious it was that he had intended to just scour the whole room. He hadn’t counted on there being someone to watch him ransack the place. His stomach sank even lower when he realized that he was searching near the furnace, where paper would NOT be kept, and that he’d simply ignored another flare from the forge. He backed up and crossed to the other side of the room behind Nyra.



“Vows? Like a dynasty? As a matter of fact I’ve never really understood why fae still follow a monarch. It seems a bit antiquated.”



You’re a hunter, hunt. They probably commission works, and if that’s the case, they’d be somewhere they could be planned over. A drafting table, no a series of them, across the way. They looked less like a workplace and more like a row of vanities, flanked by tools that bran didn’t recognize. There? Bran approached and quickly found a structure, half buried in fae detailing, that resembled an old fashioned newspaper desk, covered in organized cubical drawers. If it was done by commission they likely ordered them by date. Bran searched prior to the day of the revel, but no knives. He flipped through some notes on the table before one caught his eye. Jin-hwa Mei. Two silver needles, wreathed in starlight. He didn’t think the princess wielded dual blades. They were described as dueling swords. For who? Bran took the note, and turned to leave before he realized he’d left part of himself with the girl. He couldn’t just leave those here. Bran put the note back on the desk, and walked over to Nyra, pulling up a chair to the opposite side of the workbench. Hand at his chin, elbow on the table. He waited for all of a minute. New record.



“So… how much longer will you be keeping those? I didn’t find what I was looking for. Oh actually, Jin-hwa Mei, the undersea princess. It looks like she commissioned dueling blades. Is there already a duel scheduled? I expected formalities to hold up a bit longer if I’m being perfectly honest.”

The silver deer was moving about behind her. it creeped him out a little. Rhea? Bran sighed.

"Hello, Rhea"

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Nyra shrugged. "Who can say? She knows some language. She knows her name. Perhaps I will teach her to write. I don't think hooves can hold pens very well. Do you think she'd look odd with hands? At that point, I have made an autonomation. I don't very well wish too. Synthesizing fae-- or even mortals--" Nyra trailed off, shaking her head. She was, for one, entirely unused to talking to anyone about her creations this much, and two, entirely unprepared to elaborate. She knew what she meant.
[break][break]

Nyra knew that synthesizing animals was simpler because the randomization that drove them was all instinct. Nyra knew that she could build something and program it with similar instincts and it would at least make a very good show at a living creature. Nyra knew that the trick with fae and mortals was their consciousness, and that was not something that could be mechanized, at least not yet. And Nyra absolutely knew that if anyone was going to do it, it would be her.
[break][break]

"Do you know what these weigh?" she asked. "Can you move them to the scale?" she continued, not waiting for him to respond. "Does the iron fly differently than silver? Have you used silver? Wait, I think I have a silver knife here somewhere. Rhea, can you get it?"
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And she was talking too quickly again, and saying too many things, which she probably should have been embarrassed about, but she was absolutely too excited to care. Rhea must have sensed it, because she got up and trotted over to the table where the silver knives were, picking one up in her mouth and carrying it back to him. Nyra grinned slightly at that. "If you haven't used silver, you can use that."

[break][break]

She paused her examination. "Oh, yes, dueling swords. Totally equal in every way. I have no idea who she was dueling, or why. It wasn't very well publicized, but then again, I suppose I didn't ask." Nyra didn't ask much. She asked to know what she absolutely had to know and she asked to know what she cared to know. Everything else was a wasted effort.
[break][break]

And now he was making a wasted effort, because trying to get the fae to forsake their vows and tradition was like trying to get them to take iron in their tea. It would never happen. Their vows and their traditions rooted them to the land-- to their livelihood, to their magic. They could not be themselves without it. Mortal were changeable. The fae were not. 
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"What else would we do?" she asked, almost laughing, returning to her examination as she spoke. "Should I argue against it? I certainly benefit, so long as this new queen doesn't decide to behead me for beings seventh in line to the throne, which I doubt she will. If she wanted to hurt the Enigmas, she would not have made my cousin heir." Nyra spoke of the half-mortal half-prince with no bitterness. She was not jealous. She did not envy him, or her sister. The only person she even slightly envied was this boy before her, and that was merely because he had iron in his very blood. 

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[Bran Viola]

Bran hesitantly took the weapon the automaton proffered his way, half expecting it to be wet with some imitation of saliva. When it wasn’t, he felt stupid, but incredibly relieved. He turned over what the girl had said of her creation in his mind as he turned over the silver in his hand. Light. Soft. It felt bad.



“I’m not sure exactly, like I said, mine are mass produced to the same standard. Except the engraving. That’s by hand. This definitely feels a lot floatier.”



There was no reason to mention that the engraving was ritualistic in nature. He probably shouldn’t have even mentioned something adjacent to the meaning of a hunter’s incantation. So she didn’t know anything about a duel? He’d have to check on that. It was definitely odd, although he understood that the Undersea princess, and indeed much of her creed possessed quick tempers. It wasn’t exactly surprising that they’d already found socially acceptable ways to kill people they didn’t like.



Bran stood up and sidled over to where Nyra stood, reaching past her to take the knives from the table where he’d set them before quickly exiting her personal bubble to place them on the scales.



“There isn’t much else we can do,” he said, his back turned. “We’re all just paper dolls. Is there any point in cutting ourselves from that pattern? Even if you were to argue against it you’d still be following a standard sequence. look at your cousin. He writhed like a trapped animal under the high court, but the high court is what made him. And look where he is now. The current status of the court is certainly an upheaval but to me it feels pretty much the same. The worlds just keep turning. I don’t understand why it has to be that way. But I benefit. So on we go.”



Bran smiled to himself as he looked at his reflection in the silver dagger. He’d been entirely correct about gemini. If he’d waited until now he wouldn’t have even needed to give the boy his name. Bran sighed. He needed sleep.



“I doubt any of Guinevere’s motivations are all that detrimental to the Enigma family at this point. Keeping the royal line intact under a new progenitor is a smart move. I doubt the surname itself has much of a meaning for her anymore.”



The silvery pale needle danced between his fingers before suddenly dropping from his hand to the floor, a mellifluous ringing quickly stifled against the ground. Bran lifted the knife he’d been given again, and threw it. a sliver flash, nearly imperceptible, bisected the air in a line between bran and his target, entirely too fast for anything that had been thrown by hand. Another rolling bell tolled as sparks shot from the silver casing of the wall above brans intended target, what appeared to be a sort of canvas for testing the sharpness of a blade. Bran had thrown the knife entirely too hard and overshot his target for the same reason he’d dropped the knife initially, the thing felt entirely too light and malleable. Bran approached the feather that now lay on the floor, torn from whatever celestial bird it had come from, the blade curving slightly off kilter in a testament to brans reckless mistreatment of it. The silver detailing of the wall was similarly marred, by a sizable dent. Bran clicked his tongue against his teeth as he lifted it for the third time.



“Eeesh. Uh. Sorry.”

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Nyra continued to study the knives before her, barely listening to him. "You remind me of my cousin right now," she said idly, trying to see as many angles of it as possible. "He talks like that." She tuned most of that philosophical thinking out. It didn't really matter to her. [break][break]



"I suppose that its a waste of time to try to break the mold. I suppose its even more of a waste of time when its suits you. I am almost certainly the wrong one to ask. At the same time, though, the fae are changeable, and they have still had monarchs for centuries. Longer than mortals can think of, much less survive. And if they can be persuaded to maintain it, why should they be persuaded to do anything else? What are the other options?"[break][break]



Her family home was one of the oldest seats of nobility that still stood. It had been built by her ancestors, the original Enigmas who descended from the North. All it took to break that dynasty was poisoned wine. So perhaps the real reason to stop it all was how fragile it was. She doubted there was much she could do about it. And anyway, no royalty meant no nobility. No nobility meant no knights. No knights meant nothing for her to do. What would she be creating for? Who would she be creating for? [break][break]





As he stood next to her, she grabbed his wrist to stop him from moving away. "Can you turn it over?" she asked. "The knife, I mean. What does the inscription say? What did you use to do it?"

[break][break]

She would have preferred a skilled metalworker to be walking her through this. Maybe even the maker of this knife, though their use of a mold still caused her to hold some disdain for them. Instead, she was here, holding his wrist. Mortals were supposed to run warmer than the fae, but he was cool to the touch. Her arm started to prickle, and it wasn't until she looked down at her arm was warm and red from being so close to the iron he was carrying. She pulled her arm back almost like it was a curiosity instead of a burn.


[break][break]
"Odd." she said more to herself than anything, and then looked back up at him.

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She watched him throw the silver knife with a slight smile on her face. He threw it entirely too hard. "You would be a terrible archer," she said neatly. "You throw knives like they have hurt you." It was obviously that he was used to something so much heavier, but if she made slightly lighter knives, they could have gone further and faster. It wouldn't have mattered if he was trying to slice through armor, that was fair. But he didn't dress like a knight.

[break][break]

"Do your opponents wear armor often?" she asked, and idea stirring under the surface. "Your sword isn't built like they do." For that matter, he didn't seem to have a squire or any other assistant to help him with his weapons or his armor, if what he was wearing could really be called that.
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He called the Queen by her first name and Nyra was unpleasantly reminded of the coronation. It all was a waste of time. That she did hate. Not tradition. Ceremony. The opening festivities had already commenced. The ceremony itself was not for another hour or two. And she would have to leave her forge soon and get dressed up just to be a curiosity in a fishbowl. She would rather stay here. She would rather not go. "Did Her Majesty give you leave to speak her name?" she asked. He was certainly not nobility, not half-fae. She had guessed already that he was pure mortal, and that he knew nothing of court, but this was proving it. She liked that. She hated courtly manners anyway. It suited her just fine to go without them.


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[Bran Viola]

Bran frowned in a manner reminiscent of bitter familiarity.



“We’re probably talking about the same cousin.”



He proceeded to break into a soft, rather wry smile.



“For someone who sees so little meaning in breaking the mold you’re certainly dedicated to avoiding one. Hell, more than just your offense at my weapons, I’ve never seen an automaton like rhea. Not that I’ve seen very many.”



Come the termination of her response, he turned away, and replied, half to himself; “Every other option. Who knows?”



He was about to walk away when she grabbed him at the wrist. Bran was generally very in tune with when other people reached out to touch him. It had saved him multiple times, that was the point of training that sense, but it also made him prone to a sort of twitchiness when people were near him. Bran had not moved. He hadn’t felt anything when she reached out to him, and when his hand twitched back reflexively, it was already in hers. He just hadn’t expected it. There was no way any fae would be comfortable enough in such a situation to do that. The only thing he’d prepared for was an attack, and he’d even dropped that notion several minutes ago.



Bran let her hold him. He’d reacted to his own reflexive jolt by suppressing it, as his reflex was a violent one wand would have wrenched back in a manner that would have assuredly antagonized her. After the motion had been muffled to a single spasm through his wrist and elbow, he realized it had been too long to pull away in a more gentle manner, and awkwardly surrendered. Her skin felt strange. Light. It was like being caressed by a cloud. It looked as though it had shape and substance, but when greeted by touch, it became far more amorphous, a transient warmth bound in matrimony to a faint humidity. It was only when she pulled away that he saw that ivory mist stained crimson.



“I told you it wasn’t a great idea. On second thought I probably shouldn’t have walked so close.”



It took him a moment to remember that she’d asked him a question. He hadn’t heard her. Another oddity.



“Oh, no I didn’t carve it. Someone else did. It’s just not a part of the mold.”



He met her eyes, perhaps for the first time in their entire conversation. They were surprisingly dark. Almost as much as his own. They did not share the same luster.



“Ill met by moonlight, proud Titania.”



His mind was still on her touch. It bothered him. He’d been so taken aback by it, so panicked by how unfamiliar it was. Bran, however, was familiar with the flesh of the faerie folk. He knew how it felt when it was peeled open. The spray of blood half evaporated by his own tools. He knew what it felt like when he touched it, and when he marred what was beneath it. He even knew the feel of his thrown blades piercing those he’d never even touched, that catharsis that echoed in his fingers along the invisible thread that sewed them to his weapon. He knew what Lucio felt like, when he performed wards on brans temples, when they fought together. He touched him in the same way someone might touch a doll, moving his wayward limbs out of the way, or lifting his hand from the piano keys as he made odd little attempts at chords. Perhaps bran had never actually paid attention to what any of these things felt like. Now that he did, it made him sad for a reason he didn’t quite understand.



“I don’t like bows. They take up so much space.”



Bran turned back to her again.



“I mean I’ve cut myself on accident. When I was first learning. As for armor it sort of depends. I have the luxury of using iron, and you’ve probably noticed, but fae craftsmanship often focuses on aesthetic and deigns to reinforce more fragile materials with enchantment. Unless it’s of particularly high caliber, the iron will generally disrupt the enchantment if I can hit it and with all the aesthetic compromises, I can usually just aim for skin.”



He caught himself.



“But it’s also not like I really need to be cutting through armor at the moment. It’s a new era, right?”



Peacetime was a perfectly good excuse for ineffective weapons. She didn’t need to know that he was less a knight, and more a sort of assassin.



“No, she didn’t. It doesn't matter. I met her before she was High Queen anyway.”

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