voicetest the voiceless

[focusedvoid]

They're not dead.

Less dead than they'd felt, at least. Their shell doesn't normally take so long to reform.

Then again. Their shell doesn't usually break of their own violation as they ascended in a boiling rage, ate at least one realm, a god, and all the Godseekers.

(That last point is debatable, actually. There's some odd sense, deep under their...shell? Void? Wherever they once stored things like Isma's Tear, much deeper now...that the sea-mind is still there, sluggish and held in a stasis. They're already adjusting enough, and they don't seem to be dying or trying to kill them, so that problem is neatly sorted as 'for later'.)

They push their body to stand. Their horn clangs uncomfortably loudly against the grate they've apparently woken up beneath. They're somewhere in the Royal Waterways. A quick check of the map--or, not so quick, as it takes time to locate where it had been--shows they've risen about halfway through, closer to the City of Tears than the White Palace. They'll go to the Stag Station in the City Storerooms next.

So they think. Complications arise on the way.

The Infection is gone, leaving dead Flukes, Pilflips, and Hwurmps in piles enough it takes time to force their way past. Their body seems too small. No, their body is fine--there's something wrong with perception itself. That will take time to adjust to.

Then, they discover the Monarch Wings now stretch and warp when used, twisting around the nearest pipes after landing before the Knight forcibly calls them back. Shade Wings, they decide to call these.

Once they're high enough to hear the rain above, they realize a noise they'd ascribed to water running in the distance is, in fact, something swirling behind their mask. Many somethings. All the fragments of Siblings with enough self left, staring out from their eyes. It's disconcerting.

By the time they actually get out of the Waterways, they're using their Shade Wings to grip ledges and drag themselves up, with those holding onto things better than their own arms are with the Mantis Claw. 

The Knight faceplants awkwardly onto the floor of the building Lemm's shop is in. If the City is the same as below, there's little left to try killing them in the area.

They'll just take a moment here, thanks.

Comments

1/2

[capitalcurator]

Lemm takes some necessary time to himself.

Sleep should come first, but it stubbornly refuses, so he finds himself locking his shop door as the usual precaution and then just pottering about for a while. Tidying up becomes a bit of a ritual, though perhaps it's more accurate to say moving stuff around since it doesn't result in much more clear space than before.

He does make some space around a small stove that he barely uses, and digs out a near-empty tin of something almost tea-like (a lot more bitter than most prefer, and herbally-scented to a heady degree) and performs the rare act of doing something for himself - and not his relics - that isn't the bare minimum. The honey candies are inspected again, and with some trepidation he eats one. They instantly pass this inspection, so another one is dropped in his tea.

Lemm stands quietly in the back room, leaning on a cluttered counter and letting his drink warm his hands and sifting through the day's information. It keeps coming back to the Knight, of course, no matter how much he tries to comb through the stuff about Ze'mer. Everything circles back to the feeling of a small paw holding his hand (over and over) and the moment on the stairs and being part of something, understanding not wishing you like everyone else in this fucking kingdom properly for the first time, the risk of being missed.

He inspects his hand, as if anything about it has changed. He wipes his eyes with the back of it. Stupid. All warm like rotting wood. He will never let anyone see him like this.

He goes to bed, after a while.

2/2

[capitalcurator]

Routine resumes when he wakes centred enough to go out. He clears his counter, makes a trip to the Pleasure House (key tucked behind the sign, with a certain amount of mental ceremony) to soak and clean off grave dust and Mansion dust and - well, the ink still won't come off completely yet, but he manages to get it sufficiently faded that it's reduced to a faint, blurry impression. Good enough for now.

Millibelle seems to have adopted a managerial suite on one of the upper floors, if the mouldering stuff stripped out of the room and dumped in a corner is any indication. He does not see her - and hopefully she is still too afraid of the Knight's wrath to try and squeeze any more Geo out of the Relic Seeker, anyway. He is not keen that she's staying, but it's not like he gets a say. The City is dead empty, free game, none of Lemm's care who else takes a place.

Then it's back home, back to the quiet of rain on the window, the shop door habitually left open to a near-empty city, and bouts of tailoring the history of Hallownest in an ongoing attempt to produce something that will fit on fewer than a thousand stone journals. So much would have to be cut to commit the most important stuff to stone. He is forced to admit that maybe there's some merit in paper records, but it's still the long-term storage where his problem lies -

Lemm thinks he feels a tremor. He lifts his new Nail-shaped quill from the latest redraft and waits, momentarily unsure. Whatever it was, it does not reoccur. It had better not have been his hand...



...There is someone outside. Dutifully Lemm packs his papers back into the tray and stows it all on a shelf; a stranger does not get the privilege of that project before it's complete. He still runs a shop, though, even if it's been a while since the last new face. (A particularly hefty journal is kept close to hand. As always. Same old bug, despite everything.)

[focusedvoid]

Cornifer's gotten that tune from the circus in his head. He doesn't notice, and wouldn't mind if he did. Iselda was wary and requested he keep from speaking to them, but they've got such striking presence!

He has more important things to consider right now, however. A task, requested from his best customer, and someone both he and his wife have grown to view quite fondly--though he would've done the same if he barely knew them, after the past little while.

He somewhat recognizes this place now that he's mde it. He sold one of the curiosities he picked up to this Relic Seeker when he passed through, now he remembers. And now he's learned his name, scrawled in large text on the outside of the sealed scroll he holds in hand.

Still, he pauses at the doorframe and knocks once, politely, before entering. "Relic Seeker Lemm's residence?"

[capitalcurator]

Occupying his hands with working the road dust out of the grooves in a commemorative badge, Lemm fixes his eyes on the bug that steps into view and offers little in the way of decorum.

Who's asking? ... Ah.

"Relic Seeker Lemm's residence," he confirms flatly. "Cartographer Cornifer?"

They were not on name terms before, but Lemm is not about to politely pretend they haven't been introduced when the Knight has already given him the names of everyone in Dirtmouth. However it might worry Cornifer himself to hear his name in the voice of a bug he never told it to is not something Lemm particularly cares about.

This is not the Knight, but there's none of the unease that comes upon him in a Stag Station. They're in his shop here, and he has a certain measure of mutual professional respect for a mapmaker.

Regardless, Lemm is about as friendly and welcoming as a dead tiktik.

[focusedvoid]

"That's me," he says with some surprise.

Lemm's shop is given a mildly interested once-over as Cornifer comes to the counter. There hadn't been any lingering the last time. He's the first to admit he can be oblivious, but it was obvious this one wasn't interested in either a chat or purchasing a map, and he had the latter to work on, after quickly sketching the design for a pin Iselda might make to mark this place.

"I see my reputation's spread further than I realized! Likely through our mutual wandering friend?" he guesses, holding the letter out. It's sealed with fine string they'd bought from Iselda, to turn around and shove into his startled hands the moment he came by. "Who's requested this letter be delivered directly to you, alongside insistence I don't return until you write a reply."

Which he might not need to say, with the fact that alongside his name is clearly written RESPOND IMMEDIATELY.

[capitalcurator]

Lemm already decided Cornifer was not a troublemaker the last time he was here. He pays no particular attention and reclines in his seat a bit, eyes on the artifact he's polishing. "Likely. If they're small, quiet, and spirited."

No, wait. He stills, and his eyes flick up to stare intently at the scroll.

Cornifer does not get to see the sudden shock of terror that rolls through him in that instant, because Lemm has a very good poker face. He will however be subjected to even less effort at being proper or sociable as that drops very quickly out of importance.

He drops the cleaning cloth suddenly and makes a sharp, rather impolite come-here gesture. "Give that over."

The scroll is - it's not quite snatched, because the poker face is still holding just fine, but there's some urgency when he unseals it and snaps it open.

[focusedvoid]

Cornifer doesn't protest. He's not completely sure what's going on, but the urgency was unmistakable. Remarkable, and bizarre to see after watching them wander through places even he'd found fairly intimidating with perfect stoicism.

The letter is extremely short.

Lemm
I found myla. The colosseum took her. The lord of Shades rescued her but she was hurt and there are others hurt I dont know what █ ███ was done fully. Answer as soon as possible so you're known not to have been taken and caught up as well.

Your, Knight

[capitalcurator]

Myla. Friend's name is Myla. She is unlikely to be alive -

...And he as good as told them she wouldn't be, didn't he?

Lemm lunges for his new quill, flips the paper over - and thinks better of it, and sets it aside to keep and plucks a fresh piece of paper from a drawer instead. Yes, he could just send his reply by word of mouth. But it wouldn't sound like him, wouldn't be his handwriting, and these things are important no matter that the Knight trusts Cornifer with this task.

"Wait there." Still no pleasantries. The Knight is prone to emotional outbursts and their mess of a letter has Lemm in no comfort about this.

Fine    news to me
keep safe
        ^both
[Relic Seeker Lemm]

His writing is the first-draft scholar's shorthand, but his signature is as concise and as compacted as a stamp. Lemm pauses, pen poised over some empty space on the page as another thought occurs to him.

Just for a second, he looks up at the only source of context in the room.

"Did they seem they - company would be unwise, do you think?" Asking a stranger for advice. What a situation he finds himself in.

[focusedvoid]

Cornifer doesn't try to catch sight of the letter--they were incredibly insistent about the string--but he is watching Lemm carefully.

"I don't know. I missed most of whatever happened," he says honestly. He'd just returned from a trek around the Peak when he was informed hurriedly of the circumstances. "From what I've heard from my wife, they appeared quite suddenly, rattled and possibly injured, and brought a few wounded strangers in through Dirtmouth. Most of those moved along immediately, but they've shut themselves and someone else in their home and only come out to purchase meals and lights. They haven't been receptive to anyone stopping by since."

He sounds apologetic, and on the edge of worried, now. He hadn't tried, but Iselda had, and got only Geo pushed through a crack in the door for her trouble. Giving little response isn't particularly unusual for them, no, but under the strange circumstances, she'd been upset.

[capitalcurator]

He hangs back, staring at the paper with his wrists braced on his counter. Right.

Rattled and... injured he doesn't like much at all. Closing themselves into their home... Well, home, they have somewhere to go. That's news, and good news at that. He'd do the same. (Has done the same.) He would let no one in, either.

Hurry up. They're waiting.

Lemm makes a small addition below his signature:

need want anything : write

He blows once at the ink to dry it faster, scores the page in half, and... he does not have anything to seal this with. It is offered to Cornifer between tightly-pinched finger and thumb.

When Cornifer reaches for it, he will unfortunately find that Lemm is holding that thing very firmly indeed. He has something to say before he'll let the letter go.

"You're a friend of theirs?"

[focusedvoid]

He's slightly startled to feel the paper catch when he comes to pull it away. He stops, of course, before it has a chance to tear.

"I'd consider us friends, yes," Cornifer says, meeting his eyes through his spectacles. "I don't think they'd ask just anyone to come here for them." This is not completely certain in how panicked they seemed, but they'd grown a camaraderie--or so he felt, noticing at times that they stopped to listen to his cheerful humming before and after picking up a map in their many encounters throughout Hallownest's fascinating terrain.

Still. He's concerned for them, no matter their specific feelings on him.

[capitalcurator]

More than good enough.

Lemm is slow to convince himself, but he eventually lets go of the paper. He turns to retrieve something from his shelves.

The closed box of the board game set is pressed into Cornifer's arms over the note. (Pressed hard. Implicitly. Do not break or lose this.)

"That's a very close associate of mine," he tells him, and pats the top of the box decisively. "I've a great deal riding on our partnership, you see."

[focusedvoid]

He takes it and tilts it very slightly, to find a hint as to what's inside. "I see. They've been a good ally to quite a few faces, I've been learning! There's a stranger outside of Dirtmouth who nobody knew was there until recently, Jiji, but they've apparently met..." It rattles, so full of something small--Cornifer swings his bag from his back to the counter, bereft of most of his mapping supplies, and sets it in flat with the short letter under some of the rest to keep it from being shaken too badly.

"I'll be off, then?" he asks before putting it back on, a light prod in case there's more.

[capitalcurator]

Lemm reacts to the rattling by casually settling back down in his seat, daring Cornifer to ask about it. (Jiji, the... shade-wrangler? He is quick to tear his mind away from this topic.)

"So I've heard." He folds his hands in front of his face. He'd say more, but there is absolutely nothing of the Knight's affairs that Lemm considers anyone else's business.

Lemm would let him leave. He flaps a hand to dismiss Cornifer like anyone else with no relics to offer him.

...He lets him get to the door before the anxious weight settles heavily enough on his chest.

"I've some of your work," he pipes up. An understatement, because he has that and some of his wife's work besides, along with paper supplies and more. "You've a fine profession."

[focusedvoid]

Cornifer doesn't ask about it. He might ask his short friend later, whenever things stabilize. He'll keep his pronounced proboscis out of this particular business, though he isn't sure about it for others back in Dirtmouth.

"Oh!" Genuine delight colors his voice as he pauses in the doorway. "Thank you. It's one well-suited to these caverns! It appears you've found a good amount for your efforts here as well."

[capitalcurator]

He wasn't expecting reciprocation. Nonetheless Lemm begrudgingly offers the same.

"Yes." He tries not to glance around at his own clutter, and instead nonchalantly picks up the cloth and badge again like it's pressing work. "Hallownest is well-suited to both of us."

A mapmaker's curiosity is similar to a Relic Seeker's. Lemm is not blind to this.

"Hm. Go safely, then." More casual polishing.

[focusedvoid]

"Of course!" Cornifer would like to stay and discuss their trades, but the letter--and this box, apparently--are anxiously awaited above, and so he only waves jauntily and calls farewell on the way out.

He doesn't take the Stagways, though he's become aware of them. He's got a strong pair of legs that serve him well, and a shell thick enough that even acid can't bite into easily. He's back in Dirtmouth in a short time.

The door nearly rips off its hinges when he knocks. The little wanderer takes the delivered items with a bow he can barely see of their silhouette before it's closed back in his face again.

Cornifer blinks stars from his eyes and sighs before wandering back home.

Inside, the Knight reads the paper frantically. The most important sentiment is confirmed. Lemm is alive and unharmed. They had to know. They had to.

The rest is difficult to understand. Safe, both. They'll be safe. They're safe. Myla...

...Myla's not safe. They're doing what they can. They're giving her food. They've built a nest of blankets bought and stolen. They drained the Void that was clinging to her like miasma. They're surrounding her with lights all over, because she sounds better in her sleep when there's more of it.

She's not waking up very often. She's disoriented and frightened when she does.

The Knight is afraid. They don't know what they did to her. They don't know what the Fools did first, either.

They stare down at the game for a long, long time before they numbly set it down at the edge of the room. There's kindness behind it being brought to them, for distraction or reminder. They can't stand to look at it, or to consider his offer. There's nothing Lemm can do anyway. He's already emphatically told them he's not a doctor, in memories that they have trouble connecting together.

(Their sibling. When they told him about them. That's right.)

The Knight goes back to their place, seated on the floor beside the couch, and waits for whatever Myla needs next.

[capitalcurator]

As soon as Cornifer is gone and there's no one around to witness, Lemm rises from his seat. He should go. No, he'd - he'd hate that, unexpected visitors when he was feeling off. Is it different when someone is hurt? How badly? Is anyone in Dirtmouth any good with medicine? How upset are they, to write all disjointed like that?

- He thought he made up his mind not to go, he scolds himself as he tucks the key behind the sign. Lemm will be of no use and in this state he'll snap at someone. Maybe he'll - just walk the other way. Around the City.

Walk he does, at the same pace as someone absolutely on a mission, stopping abruptly at the ends of streets and picking directions randomly and horns-first. He thinks it's random, but he keeps ending up at elevators. Once he catches himself striding meaningfully past the Spire in the direction of King's Station and has to swing himself back around the other way, muttering colourful curses learned from journals.

He could check the Colosseum. He knows more or less where it is from the things he's heard, has heard the distant sound of drums and crowd-roar at least once when he strayed that way before. That way he'd have something to report to the Knight... Idiotic, no, it's too far and he'd be torn apart and anyway what if they came looking and he wasn't home?

...In his haste, did he leave a note? Lemm doubles back to the shop.

He ends up standing outside the door, dripping wet with city rain, horns clunked against the sign and arms hanging limply at his sides, deliberating silently to himself for a long time. Eventually he unlocks and goes in. Useless to go. Useless to sit in his shop or wander around tidying. Either way.

[focusedvoid]

They aren't used to this. The Knight was given the moniker of wanderer more than throughout Hallownest alone.

Myla's important. Myla's safety is important, because some of it is their fault. They may feel guilt for not realizing she was taken, sickening and swirling, but they understand they couldn't have known. Her half-sleep state, however, they must have done.

They are not incapable of patience. They know this.

They wait. They pace. They briefly, very briefly, disappear to the edge of Crystal Peak to fetch a shining crystal to see if she might like it.

Later, there's a shattered mess of pink out behind their hut. It's not where anyone can step on the shards, so Elderbug doesn't bother sweeping it up, no matter how he eyes them in concern.

1/2

[capitalcurator]

Lemm retrieves his cache of the Knight's handwriting and combs through all of it. It is not the first time he has done so, not even for this reason. The longer he stays in his shop the more anxious he feels, but another walk around the block does nothing for him either.

He finds none of the comfort he's looking for in their kinder words, and only a rising unease in the implication he may be alone in knowing so many of their truths. It was a point of selfish, hidden pride before, but now it only makes him feel strange and guilty.

In the end it is their final, discombobulated letter that breaks through the tension in his chest. What is he doing? The Knight was panicking when they wrote this - he knows this as surely as he knows their handwriting dragging off the page when he upset them in his shop. They ought to have someone - no, enough of that. He ought to check on them. Dirtmouth doesn't know. No one knows, and he is hiding down here being a tremendous stubborn coward. Enough, then. Enough.

The note he leaves is simple enough: Gone on an errand. Lemm is still rain-damp when the ringing of the Stag Bell echoes through the tunnels, and a little out of breath. Cornifer came from Dirtmouth, so the letter came from Dirtmouth. The Knight wouldn't want him to walk alone. There are still rules.

(The Old Stag does not make a fuss of him riding alone, though he senses the Relic Seeker's apprehension of it. When his passenger disembarks and seems too tightly-wound to articulate himself, the Stag is a little surprised to get a very familiar-looking bow instead.)

2/2

[capitalcurator]

The first thing he sees through the open doors of the Dirtmouth station is a familiar bench with an equally familiar figure standing next to it.

Heavens help him, but he tries to sneak past.

"Ho, there!" (Lemm freezes in his tracks.) "Oh - do my eyes deceive me, or do I know those horns of yours, traveller?"

Reluctantly, Lemm turns around with all the stiffness of a creaky gate.

"We've met."

"The treasure hunter! My, but I'm surprised to see you up here again."

"As am I." Lemm recalls their meeting perfectly well. "Though not for the same reasons, I'd imagine."

"My warning was fair, but I meant it kindly. It was terribly unwise to go down there at the time, though it seems the worst has finally passed. Did you find trouble?"

Plenty. "I found what I was looking for. As I knew I would," he adds pointedly. Lemm is tense. Seeing Elderbug about to pry further, he holds up a hand to interrupt. "Now I'm looking for something else. Have you seen a small wanderer with symmetrical horns and a decorated Nail?"

Elderbug walks him to the door, to Lemm's mixed relief and dismay. On the way, Elderbug finds him unwilling to offer much in the way of proper responses, and switches to telling him things instead. He gets little in return there, either. Lemm doesn't have the patience; there is something much more important on his mind.

Curious (nosy, in Lemm's somewhat biased opinion), and perhaps feeling slightly protective, Elderbug would very much like to stay and be a part of whatever this exchange will be. But Relic Seeker Lemm stares at him with such hostile expectancy that he can do little else but leave the bug on the doorstep and retreat back to the middle of town.

Only when he's by himself again does Lemm tighten his resolve and knock on the door.

[focusedvoid]

The Knight is up immediately. Their own desire to ignore the knock is immense, but the fear of noise rousing Myla outweighs that. It might be someone with a meal, too. They've requested food and ingredients, and assume that the residents of Dirtmouth know better of when they should be brought.

Lemm is outside when they crack open the door.

They freeze, staring, a circle of black against a backdrop of whites and reds.

Relief and irritation rise. They knew he was fine. It's good to see. Why is he here. They don't want him--anyone--here.

But he is, all the way from the City, to check on them. Because he cares. Because they both do, and they're friends, and he likely was concerned.

Dirtmouth is buffeted by its usual winds. They're not going to leave him outside.

They lift their paw to the base of their mask, shhh, and open the door just wide enough to let him inside.

The house is full of lumafly lights, the Delicate Flower one still hanging awkwardly from the center of the ceiling. Some they bought, most they stole, a few they somewhat did both when Elderbug protested their plucking them from the lightpoles outside in the more distant streets of the town. There's a torch burning in the middle of the room, alight with red flame.

A head pops up from the nest on the couch to eye the new visitor.

Not Myla. Grimmchild, resting next to her. They mrrr quietly before sinking back into the blankets.

[capitalcurator]

Maybe they're not here. (But there is light coming from inside.) Maybe they are here and they'll be terribly upset with him. Maybe they're here and they'll hate having a visitor. Like he would. (Would he? If it was them?) Maybe -

The door is mercifully opened before those thoughts can really get going, and Lemm suddenly realises he didn't plan what he was going to say. He's just kind of here, now.

"I-"

They indicate for him to be quiet, and it is a relief. It is more than a relief when they seem to invite him inside. They're not too upset with him, then. Good. That's good. Without really knowing how he's going to handle this, Lemm fidgets with his bag and crosses the threshold, coming inside just far enough that they can shut the door behind him. He stands still, then, and takes a cursory look around the room.

The movement of the creature on the couch has him flinch. What is that? It's in here with the Knight and that means it's probably not going to bite him. Maybe. Serves as a good deterrent from going anywhere near the sleeping bug, though.

Myla, he thinks. That's Myla. Don't stare.

Lemm quietly dips into his bag and pulls out a stack of clean paper. His pen scratches softly in the quiet room.

Was worried about you. Came to

...What did he come for? Lemm stalls, glancing at the Knight with his pen hovering.

see you. Sorry to interrupt.

The paper is held at the Knight's eye level, his handwriting now much clearer than his more efficient (messy) shorthand.

[focusedvoid]

They take a few steps in, not quite between Lemm and Myla, and stop.

Uncertain. They've been feeling that way often lately. Now, primarily for mundane reasons--they weren't prepared for inviting anyone inside, and they have no chairs or cushions. The couch has room, technically, but they're not going to risk that.

Lemm using his own paper is...sensible, and still odd to watch.

They tamp down irritation. Yes, he is worried. This is reasonable. Their letter was likely incoherent in their panic. They only recall asking for his reply, and crossing out blatant incrimination of themselves just in case it was read by other eyes.

It's fine. as long as you can keep quiet. I'm doing little.

The vast array of lights and such point to the opposite, but it feels they haven't done much. There's nothing to hunt down or cut down to fix this, as far as they're aware. The Knight's already tried what they could think of already, up to tearing off one of their own Charm Notches and pinning Joni's Blessing and Hiveblood to Myla periodically, hoping it'll do something.

Her body has healed. Her mind...

Even the Dream Nail has been little help. She's afraid, and she's singing through it from the inside. This is all they can tell.

[capitalcurator]

He nods. Yes, he can keep quiet.

The obvious thing would be to ask about Myla. That's what a sensible bug would do. His gaze traces back to her for a moment, then he sighs softly and shakes his head. He wouldn't even know where to start.

Don't know if I can help with her. Are you hurt? What happened?

More hesitation, then. There's more to this than just asking questions. He already offered this in his letter, but there's no harm in clarifying a bit:

The mapmaker told me you've been shut-in. If there is anything either of you need or would like I will bring it for you. I don't know what else. Not usually a visitor.