Fading Spring

[Quick]

Plums. That's what he remembers. How strange it must be to smell like a food. All this Season nonsense is strange to him. Being changed in Arcadia is no less strange. Radiating an aura or smell or whatever based on a season of the year? Super strange.

That's why Quick feels so strongly about investigating. These new people - friends, now, maybe - all seem to be bound to some Season and the emotions they invoke. Spring is fading into Summer, now, and the window to catch one of these Desire bound weirdos in their element is getting thin. Or so he imagines. Springs have to be Springiest in Spring, right?

The Elemental blinks a few times, snapping out of a spiraling circle of nonsense. He'd asked Ingrid to meet him in an unusual place: a run-down motel. It may not offer creature comforts and a sense of security, per se, but it is private. And let's face it; one doesn't go blabbing about supernatural nonsense over coffee. So Quick puts his James-face on and waits outside the door to the motel room. He'd told her he would be standing outside in a red shirt plastered with a big 'smiley face' and dark jeans (in case she didn't remember what he looked like).

Five minutes in to waiting and he whips out his phone. Thank God for social media. Waiting is incredibly boring.

-1 Glamour to Harden Mask

[Ingrid]

Ingrid arrives, fashionably late. She spills from a taxi hauling an oversize bag. Today she has attempted to blend in with a light dress of blue cloth, patterned with tiny white dots. Maybe... just maybe... a little too high above the knee. Closed healed shoes. Broad brimmed hat and sunglasses.

She pays the driver what she owes and saunters off.

Hunting Quick.

She finds him, of course. The Vernal Queen had the Levinquick's description and she definitely remembered the boyish charms of his Mask. A pulse of plum drifted off her aura.

"Who is a pretty boy, then," the Darkling cooed as she found Quick, seemingly lost in his phone. "Your choice of hideout is... exemplary. No. Really. No one cares what happens in places like this. Oh they'll make up stories about what we're up to, but by the time they're done with that, I bet they'll have forgotten what we look like."

Well... Him, maybe? Gorgeous example of Faerie womanhood here... not a chance. Or at least, that tantalising voice at the back of her mind told her so, anyway.

[Quick]

Quick, startled from his total lack of attention to the outside world, takes in the scene of the ethereal Palewraith. Pretty, in an otherworldly sense. Smelling of - what else - plums. He smiles coyly at her greeting after recovering. One last 'swipe left' on his phone and he gives his full attention to the 'swipe right' in front of him.

"Don't sing praises yet. It probably smells. Cigarettes and..." he gives a dramatic shudder "whatever the last guests left." He smiles, pulling the key from his pocket. "Thanks for coming, though." If rumors were true, Ingrid has become something of a big deal to this merry band. Especially in her Season. With a little flourish, he unlocks the door and gestures for her to enter ahead of him. "By your leave." He chuckles lightly under his breath, having fun with his little quip.

"Probably want to drop that bag. Wherever." As to whether it's part of her disguise or if she has some plans, the Levinquick can only mentally shrug. All in good time. He absently wonders if she'll chose a chair or the end of the bed for her 'throne'.

[Ingrid]

Ingrid slides past Quick in a bubble of aromatic plum. Her breath catches slightly once she is inside the room. The net curtains are yellow stained and the thread bare curtains are partially closed, creating a sense of dimness. She crosses the space where motes dance in the musty air, thick with cheap air freshener.

There is a seat: wooden, tasteless green upholstery, relic of a previous time that had been repurposed for the room. She takes it, hauling it around so it faces away from the window. Her bag slips from her shoulder. Sitting, she fidgets, uncrossing and crossing her legs; in the end she simply curls up into the seat.

"How have you been? Settled in?" Ingrid inquired.

Her eyes roamed the room, dismissed it. Turned them on Quick with a calculating air. Rather than ask if this really was the Elemental's lodging, she let the question hang in the air unsaid between them.

A coy smile played on her lips.

[Quick]

Quick follows shortly after, settling in on the edge of the bed as she takes her seat. She seems restless, and he can't blame her. This place really is tacky. He gives her a pained look - his unspoken apology for subjecting her to it.

"Me? Fine, I guess. Getting to know everyone still."

He follows her glance around the room. Shifts a little in his seat. "Temporary. I'm looking for an apartment." Which is more complicated than he remembered. Too many background checks. He can't imagine why one place expected him to have renter's insurance when he hadn't even moved in yet. He blinks a few times, righting his gaze that had slipped sideways and off to nowhere.

"Settled in, though?" he repeats, chewing the thought over. "I still feel like an outsider. Haven't pledged myself to a cause. Never have. Want to know what makes you tick." He absently smooths his thumb over his fingertips. "To see if it's for me. Spring." Or any season's court, for that matter. He fights a feeling of impatience (with himself) over droning on about it. "Been moving around for a long time. Don't know why. Makes it hard to commit to anything."

[Ingrid]

Ingrid's face lurches into a grin then abruptly deflates into something more serious. And then crumbles into something that might be called suspicious.

"Well thats an interesting opening," she began. Then she appeared lost for words.

"Your Desires Are Your Own," she spoke again, carefully articulating her words. A proclamation. A statement. A piece of advice.

She paused again and shifted into a more comfortable position. Her eyes hidden behind the sunglasses, became suddenly predatory.

"How much do you know of the Vernal Court? What have you heard?"

[Quick]

He scrunches his face a little, trying to recall what he's heard. "Court of Desire, right? Bunch of hedonists or something?" He frowns. Poor choice of words. "Or you play off the desires of others. Feed off of it." This isn't working... everything he comes up with makes them sound like a bunch of degenerates. He clears his throat, covering his mouth with his hand.

"Half the Springs I meet are friendly. Bubbly, you know? Love to have fun. Other half are like Sirens... luring people in." He'd played his own share of rubes, both before and after Arcadia.

He sighs. The rest of what he'd seen and heard seems tedious to repeat. "Strong ties with nature. Do better around green things, right?" Its all he can do to not roll his eyes.

[Ingrid]

Ingrid watched, her lips twisting into something that lay between a smile and predatory show of teeth.

"That is one way of looking at the Court, yes. Hedonists. Sirens. Also lovers of nature and the growing of things. And then there are those like Brigid - who find the Desire in serving... In making Things run smoothly. A lot of our kind see only the hedonists and the sirens. They don't realise how our lore makes a lesson of life: all life - from people to the green things and cute little animals Spring is the time of growth; of fresh starts and new beginnings as much as it is about the simple joy of living."

A pause. Ingrid leaned forward.

"They don't know of the tale of Mother Susan, the one who founded the Emerald Court. What she desired most of all; and what she did to get it. Desire can and does have a hard edge. You think a street tough bleeding out in a back alley isn't pulsing with desire? Think again."

A threat lay hinted behind her words; a glimpse into the dark of the Vernal Court. How her eyes hungered. She leaned back.

"How a Courtier collects the dew from Desire's fragrant petals is up to them, as it is in any Court. There is no one way to go about Harvesting. I grab it when it wells up around me - thats because I've been wandering around for a while. I've known other Courtiers to buy shops, clubs, anything that fosters the Desire's they want to promote - and they cultivate it like you would a field or a vineyard."

She giggled.

"You are not convinced, are you? You know why we do it? Because the past is the past and its... over. We have our own lives to lead. Because we are free."

[Quick]

A nagging urge to end the conversation swells, then plateaus. He shifts now and again as Plums continues - his only relief from how long it takes her to say what she had to say. Her sheer intensity is what saves him. She seems to radiate a warning and an invitation all at once. Intrigue wins out over the urge to speed things along. All up to the very end, when intrigue sours into dismay. Disappointment is clear on his face when he finally speaks.

"You give up, then?" He shakes his head in incredulity. "You don't want your lives back?" In half a moment he's standing, and for once he's quite sure his movement serves a purpose. The boyish facade melts away as he drops his James mask. Eyes - crackling like tiny Tesla Coils -alternate between the Spring Monarch and his own hands. "Look at me. Look what They did to me! You think anyone Desires this? I don't look human anymore! I do things I don't understand. The thing they left in my place? It took my family away. My home."

He finally inhales after what felt like 10 minutes but probably only spanned half of one. He seems to deflate, sitting back down on the end of the bed. "My friends were my family. I couldn't go back to them. Not like this." He clutches a fist and releases it, staring down at the glowing filaments on his wrist. A popping sound gives way to tiny wisps of steam as tears vaporize on his face.

[Ingrid]

Ingrid let out a sigh. Or was it a breath?

"Oh honey! We all been there."

She deflated into her seat, watching him while she bit her lip.

"What do you want your old life back for? You can't unmake what happened. Life here went on without us. It is what makes us the Lost you know? Take back your old life and its still won't be your old life: you'll have your Fetches shit to deal with. You'd end up stealing the life that thing has made."

Her eyes were on Quick now.

"You say your body has changed and you do shit you don't understand. We all do. One way or another. I live for the darkness now. Sunlight can get mildly painful and its always too bright. On bad days it feels like my eyes have been dilated and I can't see straight. It why I have the sunnies. And the hat."

She pulled off her glasses, squinting despite the gloom.

"Its not about wanting our old lives back. Its about knowing what we can and can't change. We all want to go back to being normal again. Spring is recognising that is nearly impossible. And looking forward. So we lost a life. Guess what? We move on. Make new lives. Point is, don't let your loss break you. We been through dark shit. We made it out. Dwelling on it won't help - and it just lets the wee folk win by default. Rise above. Look forward. Make your life your own again."

She stared at the Levinquick, now revealed in his true form. A smile quirked at the edges of her lips. She leaned forward, conspiratorially.

"But if it means that much to you... There are ways to get your old life back..."

And she let that thought sit in the air like a fragrant flower, heady with tempting nectar, between them.