03-24-2014, 07:14 PM
Friday, 3/28/14
Friday afternoon is the last Friday Sid will spend leaving the Auraria campus parking lot because of...anything, actually. No more classes, no more work. She will have no more reason to come here unless it's to visit someone on campus. It's been a rough month, but this, this little marker signifying another end to the life of "Sid Rhodes?" This one she feels like she should celebrate a little. There is something that she wanted to do last week, but things got in the way. She didn't feel like it or she was out of sorts or any of a number of things that kept her from wanting to do something joyful or pleasant. It means she missed a date.
The turning of the seasons have become somewhat significant to Sid. It was around the time of a winter solstice that she Awakened and left her old life behind. It was around the time of the summer solstice that she got the job in the science department last year. She met her mentor on the autumnal equinox and she joined a tradition on the winter solstice.
These markers are important, but she missed the vernal equinox. She missed the first day of spring. This weekend she'll make up for that, and she'll celebrate a new beginning in her own way, a way that she can share with the people that she knows.
Friday on her way to Morrison she stops at, of all places, a Safeway. She picks out a number of seed packets, columbine and Indian paint brush and violets, climbing ivies and clematis, too, a whole mixture of whatever she can find. She also finds an assortment of herbs, one of every kind they have.
Later, while she still has the sun, she scatters these seeds around the Chantry house, pours the seeds into the palm of her warm hand, watches the little shoots crack free of their seed casings before scattering them in approximate rows along the sides of the house. The rest she throws out into the fields surrounding it. Then she goes inside, goes up to the room that she claimed for her weekend stays, and she tries to sleep.
Saturday, 3/29/14
Sid wakes while the sun is just a hair lighter than pitch black, well before dawn's first light. She makes her way quietly through the house, gathering what few things she needs for this ritual she has in mind. Her glasses she leaves on her bedside table, she won't be needing them. A knife from her bag, ordinary and utilitarian and folded closed in one hand. A towel from the linen closet. And that's it. Dressed only in a t-shirt and shorts, she opens the back door and slips out onto the patio. At the edge of the cobble stones she pauses, closes her eyes and breathes in deep the smell of pre-dawn spring. Her hand flexes around the fabric of the towel and her nostrils flare. It doesn't smell like spring should smell. It doesn't smell very green.
That will change soon enough.
Letting out her breath on a long sigh, Sid takes a step into the grass, the dry and brittle grass cracking under her bare feet. Later there will be a trail leading away from the patio, little wild flowers all in an erratic line leading out to the Node - where she leaves her towel for now - and off a ways to somewhere clear and open. The Verbena witch walks in a small circle, flowers springing in her wake to make a line in the grass, a place for her to sit and center herself, which she does. The grass pokes into the exposed flesh of her long legs, but she doesn't pay any mind to it. She sits still for a little while, eyes closed as she considers how exactly she wants to twist the Pattern of this place. How far she wants to go. Not very. She doesn't want this to be noticed by the neighboring properties.
After a few minutes she unfolds the knife in her hand. First she makes a cut in the palm of her right hand, then the left, neither going very deep, she doesn't need much of her blood to flow for this. Carefully she folds the knife and sets it on the ground between her legs. Then she sets her palms against the ground next to her hips. Eyes closed, she focuses on the Life seeping from her being, and she feels it spread out into the ground, feels it like the reaching tendrils of spreading ivy, or the roots of a tree.
She feels this for a long, long, long time. Her eyes closed. The feel of her magic twisting all around her as she weaves and weaves and weaves her Life with the Life of this place. Hours pass, and a few more. The sun is rising to about its zenith above her when Sid feels that it's ready, and when she lets her Working go.
It rolls out from her in a wave, spreading in all directions along those lines she's made in the ground. Life spreads like green water from the fountain of her person. The grass turns green and lush and tall. The flower seeds she planted, the ones that remain from last year, all of it explodes as that wave crashes past them. Vines desperately climb up one outer wall of the House. The buds of wildflowers unfurl and in a euphoric burst. Everything is lush and green, verdant. And it is empowered. The circle of green growing things extends for about five acres with the House in the center, and it will last the whole of the summer despite the fickle weather of the Foothills.
When it's completed at last she relaxes, tips her head from side to side to loose sore muscles. Picking up her knife, she rises from a seat of push green grass and returns to the Node. There she climbs into the hot spring fully clothed and she soaks for several more hours, not bothering to pull up her hair. She sinks down into the waters up to her chin and leans her head back, and she feels like she could stay there for the rest of her life but she knows she shouldn't. Finally, she drags herself up to her feet and climbs out, finds her towel and pats herself dry a little before laying it out and laying, letting the warmth of the sun dry her and her clothes.
And maybe she falls asleep out there for a little while, not caring who sees her scarred body, her long red hair twisted and fanning out beneath her head, face upturned to the sun like a flower herself, soaking in the light and the warmth until it finally clouds over and threatens to rain on her. Only then does she finally drag herself back into the House, where she makes her way back into her room.
She won't come out again until sometime Sunday.
[[so yeah! Sid did a Thing! or WILL do a thing as of the weekend. mechanics are as mentioned in the post, rolls are below: a 5 acre radius around the house will be green and lovely until probably September-ish. this should not be noticed by outsiders as the total property is 20 acres so no one should be close enough to notice.]]
=====
niko @ 3:35PM
The following rolls will not take place until Saturday, but I want to know now if Paradox is going to eat Sid for breakfast so here goes.
niko @ 3:36PM
Life 2: Spring Tidings [working title]
diff: 4+2-1 (Green Thumb/sympathetic magic) -1 (taking time) = 4
threshold: 1 + 4 (six months) + 5 (range: 5 acres) = 10
Roll: 3 d10 TN4 (2, 3, 10) ( success x 2 ) [WP] VALID
niko @ 3:37PM
diff: 4+2+1-1 (Green Thumb/sympathetic magic) -1 (taking time) -1 (quint) = 4
threshold: 1 + 4 (six months) + 5 (range: 5 acres) -2 = 8
Roll: 3 d10 TN4 (3, 8, 9) ( success x 3 ) [WP] VALID
niko @ 3:40PM
diff: 4+2+1-1 (Green Thumb/sympathetic magic) -1 (taking time) -1 (quint) = 4
threshold: 1 + 4 (six months) + 5 (range: 5 acres) -5 = 5
Roll: 3 d10 TN4 (5, 7, 10) ( success x 4 ) [WP] VALID
niko @ 3:41PM
diff: 4+2+1-1 (Green Thumb/sympathetic magic) -1 (taking time) -1 (quint) = 4
threshold: 1 + 4 (six months) + 5 (range: 5 acres) -9 = 1
Roll: 3 d10 TN4 (1, 6, 7) ( success x 2 ) VALID
niko @ 3:42PM
[spending the rest of her life in the node: percept+medidate]
Roll: 5 d10 TN7 (1, 2, 6, 6, 8) ( success x 1 ) VALID
niko @ 3:44PM
And those extensions should not have the "taking time" mod, but it does not affect suxx for the rote.* Sid is back up to 2 quintessence. If she can meditate longer/some more on Sunday then she will.
Roll: 5 d10 TN7 (1, 2, 4, 8, 9) ( success x 2 ) VALID
niko @ 3:44PM
Yeah-yuh! I believe that is all.
Samael @ 3:45PM
Witnessed!
niko @ 3:46PM
Thank you!
*Sam changed his ruling, but still! Does not affect successes because Sid is a badass.
Friday afternoon is the last Friday Sid will spend leaving the Auraria campus parking lot because of...anything, actually. No more classes, no more work. She will have no more reason to come here unless it's to visit someone on campus. It's been a rough month, but this, this little marker signifying another end to the life of "Sid Rhodes?" This one she feels like she should celebrate a little. There is something that she wanted to do last week, but things got in the way. She didn't feel like it or she was out of sorts or any of a number of things that kept her from wanting to do something joyful or pleasant. It means she missed a date.
The turning of the seasons have become somewhat significant to Sid. It was around the time of a winter solstice that she Awakened and left her old life behind. It was around the time of the summer solstice that she got the job in the science department last year. She met her mentor on the autumnal equinox and she joined a tradition on the winter solstice.
These markers are important, but she missed the vernal equinox. She missed the first day of spring. This weekend she'll make up for that, and she'll celebrate a new beginning in her own way, a way that she can share with the people that she knows.
Friday on her way to Morrison she stops at, of all places, a Safeway. She picks out a number of seed packets, columbine and Indian paint brush and violets, climbing ivies and clematis, too, a whole mixture of whatever she can find. She also finds an assortment of herbs, one of every kind they have.
Later, while she still has the sun, she scatters these seeds around the Chantry house, pours the seeds into the palm of her warm hand, watches the little shoots crack free of their seed casings before scattering them in approximate rows along the sides of the house. The rest she throws out into the fields surrounding it. Then she goes inside, goes up to the room that she claimed for her weekend stays, and she tries to sleep.
Saturday, 3/29/14
Sid wakes while the sun is just a hair lighter than pitch black, well before dawn's first light. She makes her way quietly through the house, gathering what few things she needs for this ritual she has in mind. Her glasses she leaves on her bedside table, she won't be needing them. A knife from her bag, ordinary and utilitarian and folded closed in one hand. A towel from the linen closet. And that's it. Dressed only in a t-shirt and shorts, she opens the back door and slips out onto the patio. At the edge of the cobble stones she pauses, closes her eyes and breathes in deep the smell of pre-dawn spring. Her hand flexes around the fabric of the towel and her nostrils flare. It doesn't smell like spring should smell. It doesn't smell very green.
That will change soon enough.
Letting out her breath on a long sigh, Sid takes a step into the grass, the dry and brittle grass cracking under her bare feet. Later there will be a trail leading away from the patio, little wild flowers all in an erratic line leading out to the Node - where she leaves her towel for now - and off a ways to somewhere clear and open. The Verbena witch walks in a small circle, flowers springing in her wake to make a line in the grass, a place for her to sit and center herself, which she does. The grass pokes into the exposed flesh of her long legs, but she doesn't pay any mind to it. She sits still for a little while, eyes closed as she considers how exactly she wants to twist the Pattern of this place. How far she wants to go. Not very. She doesn't want this to be noticed by the neighboring properties.
After a few minutes she unfolds the knife in her hand. First she makes a cut in the palm of her right hand, then the left, neither going very deep, she doesn't need much of her blood to flow for this. Carefully she folds the knife and sets it on the ground between her legs. Then she sets her palms against the ground next to her hips. Eyes closed, she focuses on the Life seeping from her being, and she feels it spread out into the ground, feels it like the reaching tendrils of spreading ivy, or the roots of a tree.
She feels this for a long, long, long time. Her eyes closed. The feel of her magic twisting all around her as she weaves and weaves and weaves her Life with the Life of this place. Hours pass, and a few more. The sun is rising to about its zenith above her when Sid feels that it's ready, and when she lets her Working go.
It rolls out from her in a wave, spreading in all directions along those lines she's made in the ground. Life spreads like green water from the fountain of her person. The grass turns green and lush and tall. The flower seeds she planted, the ones that remain from last year, all of it explodes as that wave crashes past them. Vines desperately climb up one outer wall of the House. The buds of wildflowers unfurl and in a euphoric burst. Everything is lush and green, verdant. And it is empowered. The circle of green growing things extends for about five acres with the House in the center, and it will last the whole of the summer despite the fickle weather of the Foothills.
When it's completed at last she relaxes, tips her head from side to side to loose sore muscles. Picking up her knife, she rises from a seat of push green grass and returns to the Node. There she climbs into the hot spring fully clothed and she soaks for several more hours, not bothering to pull up her hair. She sinks down into the waters up to her chin and leans her head back, and she feels like she could stay there for the rest of her life but she knows she shouldn't. Finally, she drags herself up to her feet and climbs out, finds her towel and pats herself dry a little before laying it out and laying, letting the warmth of the sun dry her and her clothes.
And maybe she falls asleep out there for a little while, not caring who sees her scarred body, her long red hair twisted and fanning out beneath her head, face upturned to the sun like a flower herself, soaking in the light and the warmth until it finally clouds over and threatens to rain on her. Only then does she finally drag herself back into the House, where she makes her way back into her room.
She won't come out again until sometime Sunday.
[[so yeah! Sid did a Thing! or WILL do a thing as of the weekend. mechanics are as mentioned in the post, rolls are below: a 5 acre radius around the house will be green and lovely until probably September-ish. this should not be noticed by outsiders as the total property is 20 acres so no one should be close enough to notice.]]
=====
niko @ 3:35PM
The following rolls will not take place until Saturday, but I want to know now if Paradox is going to eat Sid for breakfast so here goes.
niko @ 3:36PM
Life 2: Spring Tidings [working title]
diff: 4+2-1 (Green Thumb/sympathetic magic) -1 (taking time) = 4
threshold: 1 + 4 (six months) + 5 (range: 5 acres) = 10
Roll: 3 d10 TN4 (2, 3, 10) ( success x 2 ) [WP] VALID
niko @ 3:37PM
diff: 4+2+1-1 (Green Thumb/sympathetic magic) -1 (taking time) -1 (quint) = 4
threshold: 1 + 4 (six months) + 5 (range: 5 acres) -2 = 8
Roll: 3 d10 TN4 (3, 8, 9) ( success x 3 ) [WP] VALID
niko @ 3:40PM
diff: 4+2+1-1 (Green Thumb/sympathetic magic) -1 (taking time) -1 (quint) = 4
threshold: 1 + 4 (six months) + 5 (range: 5 acres) -5 = 5
Roll: 3 d10 TN4 (5, 7, 10) ( success x 4 ) [WP] VALID
niko @ 3:41PM
diff: 4+2+1-1 (Green Thumb/sympathetic magic) -1 (taking time) -1 (quint) = 4
threshold: 1 + 4 (six months) + 5 (range: 5 acres) -9 = 1
Roll: 3 d10 TN4 (1, 6, 7) ( success x 2 ) VALID
niko @ 3:42PM
[spending the rest of her life in the node: percept+medidate]
Roll: 5 d10 TN7 (1, 2, 6, 6, 8) ( success x 1 ) VALID
niko @ 3:44PM
Roll: 5 d10 TN7 (1, 2, 4, 8, 9) ( success x 2 ) VALID
niko @ 3:44PM
Yeah-yuh! I believe that is all.
Samael @ 3:45PM
Witnessed!
niko @ 3:46PM
Thank you!
*Sam changed his ruling, but still! Does not affect successes because Sid is a badass.