~ [closed post]

[quote_gentle_unquote]

Now that the Mansion is producing goods again, it's very easy for Susan to compile a picnic basket full of, essentially, the makings of a rather international charcuterie board. Four cheeses (a good British cheddar, a French camembert, an Italian sheeps-milk ricotta, and a wedge of Dutch Leyden), three meats (jamon Iberico from Spain, mortadella with pistachios, and something labeled as an American bison-blueberry salami), along with some honey, fruits and fruit preserves, a baguette, olives, nuts, and crackers. She tops this off with nice linens and silverware and all the necessary ingredients for French 75s. It's definitely more than enough for two people.

Something about the end of that dreadful month has her considering wearing color again. As a first step toward moving past mourning clothes, she experiments with a very flattering deep navy dress that's definitely not black, though it looks it in most lights. She adds a coat of lipstick, and then takes herself and her basket to Janet's room, where she raps lightly on the door.

NSFW!

Comments

[sorrowandsorrow]

Janet turns a smile on her, a slow and easy one, and shifts a little so her leg is pressed to one of Susan's. "You know, alliances are how kingdoms make it through hardship -- or through shitty little months that are some asshole god asking, hey, what if we did winter, but it was even worse?"

[quote_gentle_unquote]

"So I've heard," Susan says, letting her hand brush against Janet's.

[sorrowandsorrow]

Well, if Susan's going to be so bold. Janet curls her fingers around Susan's wrist, loose and casual for now. "Thank fuck that's over."

[quote_gentle_unquote]

"You can say that again," Susan says, with feeling, and then: "Do you know, I got the queerest invitation to a party Bacchus is throwing?"

[sorrowandsorrow]

"Oh, Dionysus?" asks Janet, who went to boarding school and then to wildly pretentious magic university. "You don't mean the invites he sent everyone." She can't believe she even got one, after how their meeting went.

[quote_gentle_unquote]

"...no," Susan admits. She knows Lancelot didn't receive the other invitation, so it does seem a more select group, but she can't imagine what the criteria must be, particularly if - as it sounds - Janet wasn't included? "It seems there's to be a... continuation. Of the sort one might expect from Bacchus."

[sorrowandsorrow]

Janet's eyebrows shoot up, her mouth twisting into skepticism and deep amusement at the exact same time. "The god of wine, fertility, and insanity is throwing an orgy, huh? I was a real bitch to him, so I guess I didn't make the cut."

[quote_gentle_unquote]

"He's nothing like the Bacchus I remember from Narnia," says Susan, thoughtfully. "I haven't the faintest idea why I got invited. We've barely spoken."

[sorrowandsorrow]

"You had Bacchus in Narnia?" Huh. Fillory had its own gods, but you weren't likely to bump into Zeus on the way to the tavern. "Maybe he just looked at you and couldn't resist. I wouldn't blame him."

[quote_gentle_unquote]

"The Bacchus in Narnia was an unsettling wild boy who always traveled with his maenads. He was the only one with a name; the river gods were just river gods. None of them held a candle to Aslan, of course."

[sorrowandsorrow]

"Oh, sure, of course." Janet pauses, her fingers tightening around Susan's wrist just a little bit. "Aslan?"

[quote_gentle_unquote]

"Oh, the great lion. I'm fairly certain he was God."

[sorrowandsorrow]

"God," Janet echoes. She narrows her eyes. "Capital-G God? Monotheistic God?"

[quote_gentle_unquote]

"I haven't been able to think of any other explanation."

[sorrowandsorrow]

"Why--" Janet's expression now shifts into a frown, hard and skeptical. "God was a lion in Narnia? Why? Why was Narnia even his business?"

[quote_gentle_unquote]

"Why, Aslan created Narnia, of course," says Susan. "And when Lucy was here..." she trails off.

[sorrowandsorrow]

Oh, sure, of course. But Janet doesn't say it aloud again. She tries to rearrange her face into something a little less obviously disbelieving, a little more welcoming. "When Lucy was here...?"

[quote_gentle_unquote]

For a split second, Susan is surprised that they haven't talked about this yet. Then she remembers that being around Janet has always made her want to seem more with-it, more put together, than she's necessarily felt. Rising to the occasion, rather than languishing.

She glances at the skepticism written clearly on Janet's face, and takes a sip of her cocktail. Lightly, she says, "She spoke to me of what it's like in Aslan's true country. Heaven."

[sorrowandsorrow]

This Aslan sounds like the biggest load of bullshit Janet's ever heard. Not that he doesn't exist -- she's learned by now that almost anything can exist, whether you want it to or not, whether it should or not. But, come on, give her a break. Aslan's true country? Heaven? Pull the other one.

"Okay," Janet says carefully, "and what's it like there?"

[quote_gentle_unquote]

"Absolutely bloody horrible, if you ask me," says Susan. Oops, her tone slipped.

[sorrowandsorrow]

Janet laughs, surprised and a little -- okay, a lot -- relieved. She drums her fingers lightly against Susan's wrist. "No surprise the stupid eternal kingdom of some dictator god turns out to be horseshit."

[quote_gentle_unquote]

"I hate it," Susan says, grimly. "Lucy loves it, of course, but then she always had the greatest faith."

[sorrowandsorrow]

"Just because some asshole created a world, what, we owe him all our respect?" Janet rolls her eyes. "What's this so-called Heaven like? Cherubs with little harps?"

[quote_gentle_unquote]

"Everything is 'all right' and shall continue being 'all right' forever, so nothing ever changes and no one ever changes and no one cares and there are never any problems to fix," Susan says, mouth tight around the words.

[sorrowandsorrow]

Janet's own mouth is tight for a moment at the thought, lips pressed together. She knocks back a slightly less careful sip of her cocktail. "Okay, horrifying," she says in the wake of that. "Not only does that sound like a fucked up 1984 situation on the face of it, it actually sounds designed to be hellish for you specifically."