The Candy Man Can

[whatamithinking]

'Hey, Emily, it's safe to take your imaginary fingers out of your mental ears.'

Comments

[iamnotpolaris]

'I know you like to consider yourself 'not a normal example of anything,' but I think there's a limit on how surreal you're supposed to make my life in one day.'

[whatamithinking]

'One, I don't think there is, two, it was an accident, three, how much of that did you catch?'

[iamnotpolaris]

'...Enough to have a pretty good idea what just happened. And, uh, it's not just that. There's a sort of...' she mirror's Edie's own mental signature back at her. If you didn't have any idea what was going on and you had never encountered Edie's mind before it wouldn't necessarily have anything obviously weird about it, but...that sure is not just Edie in her own head anymore.

[whatamithinking]

'Ah.'

beat

'So...'

[iamnotpolaris]

'You--snuggle. And adjust. And stuff. I need to--process. By myself. I think.'

[whatamithinking]

'Okay.'

...It's not exactly that love comes in amounts. But for a long time there was something that only Emily was to her, and that was someone with whom she could share her mind completely, and that all makes this whole thing Emily's concern.

That Edie isn't upset by this--in the long term, anyway, it was...certainly a surprise--isn't in question. That Emily will be okay in the long term too--isn't really a question either. Emily's flexible and resilient, and this isn't exactly something that's going to go away. But there's okay because she's okay and there's okay because she has to be and Edie really hopes it's the first one.

[endragoned]

They will see. (He is nothing if not patient.) It will be good if everyone is okay without having to bring necessity into it.

In the meantime, snuggles.

[whatamithinking]

Very much snuggles.

[iamnotpolaris]

Meanwhile: "Hey, Sivath," Emily says after wandering back over to where he is working on building-related activities. "Edie accidentally bonded to the dragon."

[not_only]

"...that's... quite an accident," he says. "Are they okay? What happened?"

[iamnotpolaris]

"...Apparently she could after she ate the mana candies and she didn't know what was happening until it happened. I'm pretty sure they're okay, but it was...sure a surprise."

[not_only]

"It sounds very surprising," he says. "But as long as everyone's okay, right?"

[iamnotpolaris]

"...Yeah."

[not_only]

[iamnotpolaris]

"It's just--a lot to take in. She literally met him today and now she's something significantly more binding than married to him."

[not_only]

Nod nod.

[iamnotpolaris]

"...I think I'm going to see if that other dragon, Saravasse, is still on that island. Seems like this whole thing might be--relevant."

[not_only]

"Yes," he agrees.

[iamnotpolaris]

So she opens a portal back to the island. She leaves the micro-wormhole open behind her so Edie doesn't just feel her mind vanish with no explanation.

...And since she is not the telepath she can't just know where everyone is. She floats upwards until she can see either Saravasse or enough island to be pretty sure she's not still here.

[pythbox]

A large red dragon sunning herself on a beach isn't very difficult to spot.

[iamnotpolaris]

Assuming Liselen isn't anywhere obviously near the beach to discomfit, Emily will land there.

[pythbox]

"Back so soon?" she says, mildly amused.

[iamnotpolaris]

"The universe we're staying in has acquirable magic. Which we hadn't acquired before we came here the first time, but have now. And my sister didn't know the warning signs for a Dragonbond."

[pythbox]

"Interesting," says Saravasse. "How acquirable is this acquirable magic, exactly?"

[iamnotpolaris]

"There are these candy things. You eat them and they give you twenty mana apiece and mana lets you operate a paricular kind of the weird weapons native to that universe."