Digging Deeper
30545
THREADID
16
POSTS
1 - 10
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Daniel walked along the street with book in hand. He’d practically memorized it but he’d brought it along anyway. The early sunset made it feel later than it was. Ava’s store was still open, though only a couple minutes to closing. He entered to the smell of paper and specks of dust illuminated by the last rays of sunshine.
“Hello?” he called. His voice didn’t seem to echo back, instead being absorbed by the stacks.
The Nix emerged from between two shelves, a small jumble of books in her arms. Dressed simply in black jeans, a button down and a chunky grey sweater, she looked a little small in her own clothes, and the faint silver scale-sheen on her skin didn't do her any favors. Spotting Daniel she wiggled a couple of her fingers in an abbreviated wave, trying not to jostle the books. "Hey, Daniel. Come on in, there's a sort of nook, back," she jerked her head back toward a corner of the store, "Thataway. Just let me get the door."
Ambling over, she dropped the books somewhat unceremoniously on the desk before going through the basic ritual of flipping the sign and locking the door, tugging on the handle a couple of times to make sure it really caught. That done, she gathered the books back into her arms in a more orderly stack and gave the Gravewight a friendly smile. "You find the place alright?"
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“Hey, Ava. Yeah, found it no problem.” He looked in the direction of the nook she’d indicated and then back to the Nix with an armful of books. It reminded him a little of Morgan with groceries, though not quite on that scale. The books still looked heavy and bulky though. “Do you want some help with those?” he asked politely.
"Ah, sure; thanks." She paused beside him to allow the Darkling a chance to grab a book or two, eyeing the familiar one he already held. The titles in her arms were a mishmash of different things, but clearly collected with ghosts on the brain; modern folklore, a compilation of ghost stories with a terribly cheesy cover, a compendium of spirits, a very dry looking academic book, and several other things. One corner of the Nix's smile tugged up into an amused smirk. "Some of these might be more useful than others."
Once back in the nook, she set the books down on the table with a satisfying whump and set herself down in a comfortable chair with a little less force. "How did that one work out for you?" she asked, gesturing to the book he had come in with.
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Daniel took a couple books to ease Ava’s burden and added them to the one he was already carrying under his arm. Placing the books down and sitting at the cozy table, Daniel promptly sank six inches into the chair’s cushions. He struggled a little before sitting forward. The upholstery creaked mournfully, disappointed at not being able to embrace and envelope.
“It was good. Did some internet research too; ‘cause you know,” he gave a knowing smile “everything on the internet is true. Lots of interesting description and some history. Lots, at least compared to what I knew before. That was actually kinda my main question.” He rummaged the book he’d bought from Ava out of the stack and got down to business.
“How do you know what’s good information? Like I said, lots of information but I think I got more concrete info from Morgan’s notes. The book gave lots of different possibilities of how things work. Liiiiiiike...” Daniel flipped to near the back of his bestiary “Vampires. Assuming they exist, there’s no set way of killing them. Sunlight is pretty common but going back to Brom Stocker’s Dracula it just weakens him so he can’t change shape. Stakes are a go-to as well but can be impermanent. The most complex ritual I found involved staking, beheading, stuffing the mouth with garlic, burying the body with the head upside-down at a crossroads, nailing the hands and feet into the ground, and putting a razor wire above the neck. Even then they had to be buried at a busy crossroads or they’d still eventually come back. Contradictions and multiple options like that seem to be everywhere. I don’t know if I should be concentrating on older more ‘traditional’ myths or the most ‘popular’.”
Amusement glimmered in her eye as Daniel fought the chair, busying herself with spreading the books out so it wouldn't show too obviously. The internet wasn't a place she got much information from, partially because anything beyond the basic functions of a computer confounded her, and because she was well versed in gathering research from books; gathering information from the internet was very different, and in her experience almost nothing had properly cited sources.
"Hum. Well, personally I'm skeptical about 'facts' I read unless they're corroborated by at least one other source. That doesn't necessarily mean it's completely accurate, but there's a better chance. On the internet that can be an issue because a lot of sites have the exact same information copied and pasted, until it feels like there is no alternative to that information, that's just how it is. So, I guess what I'm saying is, you only know good information for sure by experience, and the second best thing is reading as much and as widely as you can on the given subject; and, from there, making a value judgement."
It wasn't an answer she thought would thrill him, but it was how she operated herself. In the end it all came back down to judgement about what you chose to believe and question, based on the other information you had.
"As for 'traditional' versus modern media, I'd say a mixture of both. If you were looking more specifically at folklore, there are clear shifts in the stories dependent on the time period and who's telling them. One version of a story warns against the sexuality of women, the next is a warning about trusting strangers, with the characters in either having various levels of agency. So, in the end they're more telling of the society that conjured them than of anything supernatural. In those cases, I'd stick to the oldest telling you can find. Not saying it won't have its own subtext, but it hasn't been manipulated quite so thoroughly."
Indicating the pile of books with a flourish of her fingers, she continued. "But, some of the key facts remain, if can manage to pick out the agenda. I suppose, too, that I should admit to a bit of snobbery about some of the modern texts. The popularization of witchcraft has lead to a remarkable amount of drivel, some of it rooted in valuable information but broken down and polluted in ways that make it essentially worthless. Everyone is so excited about knowing a 'secret' they don't stop to question why someone is spoonfeeding it to them. While I suppose there's a chance some of those people might surprise me, from the way they write I seriously doubt it." The Scrivener's usually friendly features took on a look of withering scorn the longer she spoke until finally she stopped, paused, and got back on track.
"Anyway, that's beside the point. For ghosts, I'd say look to the older materials first. Most of the modern ones are based on them in one way or another; the deviations from the norm are what I'd look for in modern texts. They might be worth noting down and seeing if you can find any references elsewhere."
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Daniel listened as Ava explained some of the finer points of occult research. At her comments over the reliability of internet sources his smile widened slightly. Somewhere in the world an author was crying out for a hero to cite them and here sat that hero. He was a little disappointed at her not having a more clearcut why of differentiating between facts and fictions. Looking over the table and then at the shelves around the shop, there was a lot of reading he could do.
Her talk about themes and subtext went a little over his head, though he remembered some stuff about archetypes that sounded similar. Her change in demeanor talking about modern books on witchcraft took him a little by surprised but he didn’t let it show other than a look of concern and sympathy. He wondered if something had happened in her experience to make her feel so powerfully about the subject. Had a dabbler been responsible for her Durance somehow? He felt it would be rude to ask further, so he didn’t return to that subject.
“So about ghosts, this kinda goes with what we were talking about at the Fair, it’s sometimes not clear when something is a ghost. Like with banshees, barghests, and the sidhe. In some legends they’re fairies and in others they’re spirits. And a lot of ghost stories are similar to fairy tales. I’m not sure exactly what I’m asking; more just bouncing an idea really. Do you think it’s possible Arcadia and the afterlife are connected, maybe even the same?”
Leaning on the arm of her chair, the Scrivener looked pensively beyond the Darkling for a long moment before her eyes slid slowly back onto him and she cocked her head. "I'd been thinking about that a little bit too, honestly, especially after what we talked about at the Fair. I think its completely feasible to assume there is a connection between Arcadia and the afterlife, or whatever there is, especially for you. I'm not sure if I could believe they were the same place, but if a living person could be taken, why not a spirit? So many things that weren't originally Fae can be taken and twisted by Arcadia. But, I think if ghosts were exclusively the Wyrd-touched remnants of Lost who had died in the Hedge, there would be more evidence of that in myth, though there are plenty of ways that information could be misplaced."
Pausing for a moment, she tapped the point of her chin with a finger. "I think part of this lies in language, for me: I understand ghosts as coming exclusively from the remnants of human lives. Spirits, on the other hand, seem to have wider stories of origin, and I see more possibility for overlap, like you mention with banshees and barghests. Of course, you could argue that that's just semantics, but I suppose things like that just help me sort information. And, you're right, many ghost stories have the same basic components as fairytales."
She pursed her lips, eyes narrowed in consideration and locked her eyes back on his. "What's your feeling?" As much as it frustrated her to essentially think outloud, there was also something very exciting about such a discussion, a space to posit ideas and immediately dismiss them in search of a slightly less leaky theory.
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“I’m still not sure. I have to admit I’m probably more than a little biased because of my time in Arcadia. However, if Arcadia isn’t the source of ghosts, what would be?” That wasn’t something he had really considered. Another place beyond the world besides the Hedge and Arcadia. That would complicate his world view. It seemed simpler to think that an afterlife existed in one of many worlds of the Fair Lands. Of course thinking that wasn’t truly a comforting thought either.
“When I’m reading about stuff I tend to focus on the more morbid aspects. Heck, I’d go so far as to say I’m as much drawn to it as it is to me. However, the stories and discrepancies are all over the board. Even when it most definitely a ghost they sometimes have physical presence. Which isn’t too far-fetched; a clause I know can grant that. But then I get to thinking, what if it were some sort of hobgoblin or even one of Them that was just using that form? Or what if it were a changeling that had a close connection to death? Or even just a normal changeling whose fetch had died and the ‘ghost’ wasn’t even ever dead. Or death being used as a metaphor for the Durance. Those could all be the case.
“As for spirits versus ghosts, I’m a little less inclined to think of them as distinct in that way. The contract I have that deals with the dead, it’s with both Shade and Spirit so to me they're either synonyms or very closely tied together.”
"Hmm. Well: what qualifies as a discrepancy? Would it be more useful simply to expand the definition of ghost or spirit, to embrace those things? I can see where you could start to question whether a ghost was a ghost or some sort of Hedgebeast, though you lost me a little about the Fetch. The lore that I know, independent of the Hedge, is all about ghosts, or spirits, being created by traumatic death; and, in most of the stories, those spirits hanging around to get some element of closure before 'Going On', or turning into malevolent forces that often reenact their own death on other people."
"I would be tempted to begin there, and introduce the added aspect of the Hedge later on in the process; I know that may not even be possible, knowing what you know, but in all honesty there are no real absolutes about the Hedge, aside from the fact that it'll fuck you up." She made a small gesture with her hands that simulated a shrug. "If trying to keep the Hedge out of your understanding for now isn't feasible, maybe you could work toward doing more field research: come up with an approach so that, when you come into contact with spirits, you can ask or test something about them that will help your understanding. I don't have any real frame of reference for how chatty they can be, so correct me if that's not a reasonable thing to suggest."
Ava pursed her lips, drumming her fingers lightly on them as she looked at Daniel. She wasn't feeling especially helpful, but this seemed more like a brainstorming space than a 'give me all the answer, now!' sort of talk; hopefully that held true.
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