triangularity | Open RP post for Auri

Auri is careful never to take things from the same place too often. She subsists on a diet of tiny luxuries, eaten and kept. She'll never loot your pantry, or your jewelry box. No. One or two small things go missing. Things lost or left out vanish. Things taken from proper storage are replaced by whatever Auri feels most fitting.

Perhaps a bit of lace in your cold box, a perfectly round flat stone in your pantry. Three teeth of a big brass brass gear gleaming where a down-stuffed coverlet used to be. A fitting exchange, everything in its proper place and happy to be where it is.

Auri is a girl of many well-founded fears, so sensitive to the turning of the world and everything in it that the least thing wrong can rub her raw. And yet, when the world turns true, and everything falls into place, you would be hard put to find anyone quite so joyful.

She plays a tiny prank that will brighten someone's day in the morning. Mischief brims over and Auri turns cartwheels. She dances gleefully among the trees, or the gravestones, or on top of a roof. It would be quite the feat to catch a glimpse of her in the dark, and a hundredfold times more difficult to keep her from bolting if you do.

The first time a wheel of goat cheese goes missing, Prim thinks she simply misplaced it. The second time a wedge goes missing and she knows she didn't put a round flat stone in its place. It's an interesting sort of thing, not the kind most people would do. Something like maybe what the morphlings might have done.

Curiosity drives her more than anything else. She isn't mad and it isn't as though she and Katniss will go hungry without a wheel and a wedge. So next time she makes goat cheese, she leaves another wedge and a glass of goat milk out with a piece of lavender. An offering of sorts. She won't necessarily be ready to pounce, but she's tending to Lady in her goat pen and that isn't very far away from the tree stump where she's placed this little gift.

Dusk is falling by the time Auri stops by. She clambers nimbly up an oak tree and eyes the offering. An odd thing, that. No one sets out to lure a fairy here. But oh, the sprig of lavender. A nice touch. An offering or a trap? She stays up there, draped over a branch and patient as a stone, watching the branches sway and smiling at the nearby sound of a goat. The source of her good fortune.

An hour or more passes before Auri drops down from the tree, making no more noise than a the soft breeze has been as it ruffles the branches. She freezes, poised on the balls of her bare feet and ready to turn and run, for a moment, then darts the few steps to the stump and considers it. The milk she leaves, in case the offering is for fairies after all. The cheese, she tucks into her pocket. The lavender? That was thoughtful, and deserves thoughtfulness in return. She feels in her other pockets, looking for something that belongs on this stump, or with the sort of person who offers sprigs of fragrant flowers to a stranger, sight unseen.

It was the lavender that lured her out of the tree, after all. Lovely lavender isn't needed, and wouldn't be thought of, by someone hoping to harm her.

The thing that almost certainly draws her is the meowing, only made worse by the echoes. It's the meowing of several cats, all of them plaintive and demanding and the soft murmuring of a human voice clearly trying to hush them a little as he shuffles around and separates the food he'd gotten from the day's labors among six or seven cats who he's clearly fond of even if he's starting to sound a little flustered.

The man himself, once he comes into view, is enormous, made all the larger by a heavy coat and big boots but honestly, there's no way of making him small. There are scars on his face, one massive one and a pair on either side of his jaw, a couple of spots on his neck visible despite the coat, and he moves like a man who's got more under his clothes.

Prim manages to miss her “thieving” friend this time, too. By the time she turns back to check the stash, most of it is gone. She frowns slightly, glancing through the trees. Finding nothing, she goes about the rest of her evening work.

The next day, at the same time, more milk is placed out on the stump, along with a cutting of a mint plant. Prim is out with Lady again, taking care of her animal like she takes care of her people.

Auri doesn't mind meowing, though she generally doesn't hear so much of it. It's not uncommon for animals to find their way down into the Underthing. She usually fetches them and helps them on their way. The thing is, ordinarily only one adult cat would make it down, not what sounds like an entire den of them. She comes to investigate, but she freezes stock still when she hears the clump of heavy boots.

A man. A man in the Underthing, trodding with his heavy boots. He's going to find her, and he might catch her or lead other men down here. This is her home. It's... safe is not the right word for the twisty Underthing, with its dark corners and its dangers, but it's untouched by other people. The dangers here don't come from aren't the sort of willful harm that people inflict on each other.

She turns to go, but cats' sight and smell are stronger than a human's, and one is already here in the dimly lit tunnel, investigating and meowing and, if Auri stays where she is, perhaps even twining around her ankles.

Yesterday Auri left a smooth river stone on the stump. Today, she has a silk ribbon already in hand when she arrives. She approaches with slightly less caution, pockets the mint sprig, and raises the glass to take a single sip before leaving the rest of it for the fairies. She lays the ribbon down first, and then sets the glass over one end of it so the remaining end flutters in the breeze.

Then Auri turns to go.

Prim kept the smooth stone last time, debating how best to use it. In the end, she'd set it in the house, on one of the shelves. This time, she happens to glance over with just enough time to see someone turning away from the stump. She hesitates, assuming this is her mysterious "thief," before calling softly, "You don't have to leave."

The last thing she wants is to frighten the girl off, but she really does want to talk if they can.

Auri turns to face Prim, her hair drifting around her in a wispy cloud. She's not running, but she looks like she could be startled into flight at any moment. Prim, at least, is less threatening than a man would be. And Auri is fairly certain that the other girl is the one who's been leaving gifts for her.

Still, she stays silent.

"The milk is for you, too," Prim offers, staying right where she is so as not to frighten the girl. "It's goat's milk. From Lady. I can get you something else, if you want."

She isn't really sure what the girl is looking for or what she needs; Prim has just been guessing so far. Maybe something will turn out to be the right thing.

"Everyone wants things, but it's especially selfish to want anything here, where the whole world might twist itself to give it to you."

Deep down, Auri has known all along that the milk was for her, not for the fairies. She just left it there because she was being selfish and wicked and wanting. It was easier to pretend that she was just taking the very edges of a fairy offering, while leaving plenty for the fae themselves.

She hesitates a second, the breeze blowing her hair forward and obscuring her face as she watches Prim. Auri waits. Then she slowly bends to collect the milk. "Thank you kindly. The ribbon is for you."

As she speaks, Auri raises the glass, and the wind picks up the ribbon, blowing it right toward Prim. Auri laughs.

Edited 2017-06-15 19:44 (UTC)

Prim nods seriously, understanding what the girl means about that. The world always has seemed to twist and change and sometimes it's hard to keep from wishing something into existence. All they can do is try. Prim, and likely Katniss too, suspects that there might be some catch to all of those wishes being granted. Nothing comes for free.

Prim's smile is as much because of the ribbon floating along the wind as it is because of the girl's laugh. It's such a nice laugh and she's tempted to laugh alongside, but in the effort of not frightening her, she refrains. Instead, she smiles brightly as she reaches up to catch the ribbon. For a few seconds she pauses with it in her hand and then she lifts her hands to her hair. In a few quick moments, she braids a piece of it at the side and ties the ribbon onto the end.

"Thank you," she says warmly. "My name is Primrose. Everyone calls me Prim. What's yours?"

Auri doesn't worry so much about the cost to herself. She worries about the cost to the world. About how far it will end up from what it ought to be. From what it wants to be. It's so eager to please, like a puppy, tail wagging, ready to be trained however its master pleases. Auri doesn't want to see it warped by people who don't stop to think about the consequences.

She clasps her hands together happily when Prim clearly appreciates the gift, happy enough to offer an answer. Another exchange.

"Auri. It wasn't always, but that's my name now. My friend gave it to me."

Primrose is a good name, and Prim, an interesting one. Good too, and less common.

"If that's the name you like and it feels right, then it's yours," Prim declares. It doesn't matter who gave Auri the name, not to Prim. A person should use the name that feels like theirs, no matter how they got it.

"I named my goat Lady and my cat is Buttercup because he's the same color as the flower," she continues, still smiling. By now, Lady has meandered off, unconcerned with the two of them and more interested in grazing. "You can come meet them if you want."

"Some people don't realize that," Auri says approvingly. "They get so caught up in what they think a name ought to be that they forget to listen when it changes. Or they give the wrong name in the first place."

Auri's wasn't always wrong. It just became that way after time and circumstances conspired. "My old name was too heavy to carry with me anymore."

This is remarkably talkative for Auri, who hardly ever speaks to anyone on first meeting. Prim is easier than most people would be. She doesn't set all of Auri's nerves jangling quite so badly. She isn't loud, or brash, or frightening. ...Well, no more frightening than any person is simply by virtue of being.

If Prim wanted to introduce her to more people, Auri would turn and run without another word. But she likes goats. And she probably ought to thank Lady. Slowly and silently, Auri nods.

Prim can feel something of a connection between them, an understanding. One traumatized person to another, whatever form that trauma might manifest as now. She can tell that Auri needs someone calm and quiet, as she once had when she had first woken up to the news that her sister was dead. If she can give to Auri what no one had really been able or willing to give her, then she will. It's the least she can do.

"People get caught up in a lot of things that have no meaning," Prim points out gently as she shifts to look for her animals. Buttercup's eyes blink up at her from near the fence, while Lady is just a few steps away. Sometimes she doesn't feel like a Primrose, like she's too damaged to be that sweet girl anymore, but there's no other name that's hers. So Prim she is. At least for now.

She coaxes Buttercup out and into her arms very easily. Her cat always did like her. Lady takes a firm hand on her halter, mostly because she's a goat so even she can be stubborn sometimes. But Prim is calm and quiet with both of them, obviously loving them like family, and soon she's settled down with Buttercup in her lap and Lady's halter in one hand. The goat continues to graze, clearly not worried about anything in the least.

"You can stay there or come closer," she offers. "They're really sweet. Buttercup seems to like everyone who's nice to me."

"Nothing is meaningless," Auri disagrees. "People are just too loud and stubborn to pay attention."

Her gaze on Lady is utterly unafraid, but Auri glances from the goat back to Prim with trepidation. She doesn't like coming within arm's reach of people. Nevermind that Prim isn't big or aggressive, nevermind that she hasn't any arms free to reach with, nevermind, nevermind.

Auri manages all of one step forward before she halts, poised on the tips of her toes, once again ready to run.

That's fair. Prim has to admit that.

She's paying too much attention to Auri's movements to respond verbally at the moment, though. Even though she doesn't know the reasons why the other girl is so hesitant and afraid, she has a feeling it has more to do with the human presence than the animals. Slowly, she stands again, scooping Buttercup up in one arm. Just as slowly, she lets go of Lady's halter, the goat is utterly unconcerned with her, and moves herself and her cat well away from Lady before she settles back down on the ground again. They're both close enough to talk, but far enough away that Prim isn't anywhere near arm's reach of Lady.

And then she continues the conversation like nothing happened. "That's true. I guess a lot of people get caught up in things. They're so used to how they think things should be that they don't realize or care when things change."

During her time in this strange new District, with all the people she's met and the second chance with her sister, Prim has blossomed just like a flower. It's been a slow and quiet bloom, but she really has turned a corner. Her demons and fears still trouble her, and life here is anything but quiet, but with Lady and Buttercup and Katniss here to keep her company Prim really feels content for the first time in years.

As a direct result, or maybe just because she feels more comfortable reaching out again, she has done her best to be a friendly and steadying presence for Auri. Prim remembers what it felt like to be so lost and afraid. So she's done her best to leave useful things for her friend. Milk and cheese to start. Sometimes ribbon and the one that Auri gave her during their first meeting is always tied into her own hair. Sometimes Prim braids it through her hair, like a colorful trail through her blonde strands. Over time, doing so has become second nature, a physical symbol of a friendship she has come to treasure.

Today, she decides to settle on the ground with Buttercup while Lady grazes nearby. Her cat settles in her lap while the goat wanders happily around the pen. The milk and cheese are resting on their normal post on the fence a ways down, far enough that if Auri decides to let Prim know she's around, there's still enough space between them that Prim won't be seen as a threat. She's done her best to be nothing less than friendly and a safe presence, but she of all people knows that that sort of fear doesn't go away easily.

For now, she simply rests against one of the fence posts, petting her cat calmly. "This place isn't perfect," she murmurs quietly to Buttercup, "but it's a lot better than Panem. I kind of like it here."

The cat doesn't respond much beyond yawning. Prim smiles anyway.

"I don't," Auri murmurs as she steps out from behind a tree. She hoists herself up to perch on the fence not far from Prim; experience has shown that she leaps to her feet in an instant if startled, and that she won't tolerate being touched without initiating it herself. The times she does are excruciatingly rare. "Like it more than Temerant, that is. I can't say that I like it worse, or it will try and change my mind. It's always trying. I wish it would rest, but then, that's the one thing it doesn't know how to do. It isn't in its nature. So that's a wicked thing to wish."

She studies Prim, as if trying to see through to all the ways Panem harmed her. She has a few inklings. No one is this gentle without some measure of pain. That was obvious from the beginning of their quiet, cautious friendship.

Prim glances upwards at the sound of Auri's voice, smiling to see her perched there on the fence. Auri has a unique way of looking at the world around them and though her words don't always make perfect sense, Prim has gotten used to figuring out the meaning behind them.

"I guess so," she admits. "Maybe we'll be surprised one day and it'll stop." Always the fountain of optimism somehow. At least, when it comes to everyone else. If Katniss is involved, Prim is a lot less stable. She'd lost her sister once before. She can't lose her again.

"It does rest some days. Like today. But you're right that it doesn't like to rest a lot. It's... always changing."

Like an Arena, which is something Katniss has pointed out a few times. Having been forced to watch the Hunger Games once a year every single year of her life, Prim can easily see how it might be an Arena. But she doesn't like to imagine that, so she pushes that thought out of her mind and pulls a smile up once more.

Auri knows her most well-traveled rooms and corridors in the Underthing as well as she knows her own name. Her new name, that is, given by a friend, all bright and shiny and unburdened of the weight in the name she laid aside.

And so she also knows when something has changed. When the air is disturbed and something is here that doesn't belong. It isn't the sort of grating, awful sense of something wrong, when whatever has come in is a threat to both Auri and to the possibility of the room ever being set right again. When what came changed it unalterably for the worse.

Whatever this is, it doesn't belong here, but it doesn't feel like it's scraping her raw. She creeps closer, bare feet silent on the warm stone floor. Peering around the corner, she draws up short. She's never seen one of these before.

A mooncalf stands there on its four webbed feet, its long neck swiveling as it turns to look at her.

"What are you doing here?" she murmurs very softly. "I don't think anyone's seen the likes of you before, except perhaps in faerie. Be sure you don't venture out On Top of Things when anyone is looking."

Open RP post for Auri

An odd sort of theft

Turning cartwheels

no subject

no subject

a new resident

no subject

Re: a new resident

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

a binding friendship

Re: a binding friendship

no subject

for Newt