Oh Oh It's Magic [Musebox]

[ringoutyourdead]

Adjusting to the magical department proves, for Sabriel, to be almost as difficult as adjusting to the giant ship in the sky with the handheld radio things. The new forms of magic she's been introduced to are not Charter or Free Magic, or anything even resembling them. She has no ability to tell if they're things that she can master or just forms of magic she is innately incapable of. And yet, she has to work with them.

She stands before some of the magical artifacts - at least those make conceptual sense to her, as they are objects that have, at some point, been charmed (usually) and strokes her chin. She doesn't speak to many when they pass, preferring instead to mull, but she does wave a hand slightly in greeting when Morgan enters.

Comments

[morganknight]

"What else could I have possibly meant?" he said with an absolutely shameless amount of false innocence. "You shouldn't draw a weapon unless you're prepared to use it and all."

[ringoutyourdead]

Sabriel curls her lip a little and rolls her eyes. She can't tell how she feels about Morgan. One moment he's quite charming, the next, clearly indecent.

A shadow rushes through the water towards their feet.

[morganknight]

Morgan's senses... told him nothing at all, but his intuition sent a warning that shifted him from play to work with visible tension. "Is there anything in here at all that doesn't need to be attacked on sight?" he asked quickly.

[ringoutyourdead]

"No, nothing. Just the dead, warped beyond recognition."

[morganknight]

"Even us?" Morgan said jokingly -- then slashed a curving arc with his sword around his feet. The force of the strike lashed out past the tip of the blade, cutting a line in the water that Morgan kicked with his foot as a smooth part of the same motion. A solid pressure wall rolled out through the water from that arc in an expanding crescent.

[ringoutyourdead]

"Well, do try not to kill us-!" Sabriel nearly yells as the water rolls out, kicking up ghosts and shadow creatures that look as if they might have once been human corpses until they...melted. "Don't let them touch you!"

[morganknight]

"Or you," Morgan agreed, a subtle pressure still coming off him even as the force of his push faded. Rather than using the sword as a proper weapon for the moment, he simply pointed it at the creatures, stabbing chi at them like an extension of the weapon itself. It was impressive not so much because of the magic involved, but because he was holding the large sword at full extension, one-handed, without so much as a tremble of the muscles.

[ringoutyourdead]

And don't think Sabriel doesn't notice that upper body strength. She's just too lady-like to mention it.

A monster grabs Morgan by the foot and tries to yank him down into the water.

[morganknight]

"Hey! No TOUCHING!"

Morgan dropped the sword like a guillotine blade; even as his foot disappeared underwater he hauled back upwards with force of magic rather than raw strength, though it was hard to distinguish the difference sometimes.

[ringoutyourdead]

The hand releases from his ankle and flicks over to Sabriel's. She anticipates it and uses her own sword to dislodge.

"They're handsy today." She takes the tiniest bell from its holster. "Cover your ears."

[morganknight]

Morgan hesitated for only a fraction of a second -- the hopefully-understandable hesitation of a person who is about to render himself significantly more vulnerable by sheathing his weapon and busying his hands -- before sliding the sword back into its sheath and clapping his hands over his ears.

[ringoutyourdead]

The bell rings out with a dizzy, lullaby-ish tone, watery and thin and not echoing at all. But the water beneath them seems to slow. The shadows grasping at their ankles pause.

And then sink.

Sabriel collapses into Morgan's arms.

[morganknight]

Morgan completely abandoned all effort to plug his ears, hoping that the need passed with the end of the bell. Speaking of the bell, as he caught Sabriel he swept out a foot to kick it up into his hand. She might want it later, after all.

"Never the way I'd like then to swoon," he grumbled, shifting his arms around her so one hand dropped to the small of her back. Skin-to-skin contact would be easier, but this could suffice; he pressed his palm to her spine, then passed some of his own energy off to her.

[ringoutyourdead]

Her eyelashes flutter. She mumbles a bit.

"Ranna...sleepbringer..." she says, letting the bell fall into the water.

[morganknight]

Oh no, he was not letting that bell get away. Morgan quickly shaped the surface tension of the water with a quick gesture and an infusion of his own chi, ducking down to scoop up the bell before it could sink past the firmed surface.

"Sorry, Sabriel," he said as he straightened, careful not to let her fall or slump in his other arm. "But that name doesn't ring a bell."

...entire trip, officially worthwhile now.

[ringoutyourdead]

"You're funny," Sabriel manages to say sarcastically, before she falls asleep entirely.

[morganknight]

"You're hard not to like," Morgan told her limp form, perfectly aware she couldn't hear him. The words were a cover for his growing dislike of this situation; the bell had clearly taken more out of her than he could give back without dropping his guard and putting serious effort into the process, and this seemed like exactly the wrong place to do that sort of thing.

Quick assessment. The shadows had stopped moving, Sabriel hadn't warned of any further danger, and the person who knew anything about this place was out cold. All the factors added up in favor of a tactical retreat back to the other side of the Gauntlet. For now he could afford Sabriel some dignity, so he bent to lift her with an arm round her back and another beneath her knees.

[ringoutyourdead]

Sabriel stays asleep, but the things in the water do not. Shadows begin to move, not surfacing but clearly following the two of them, as if meaning to come back wit them past the gate.

[morganknight]

Oh, splendid.

Well, he could try ringing the bell himself, but he rather suspected it would end poorly for him. Sabriel he didn't dare force awake, through mundane or magical means; if she was this drained, then pushing her, even carefully, would very likely harm her.

If they could come back without someone opening the gate for them, they would, so Morgan figured that all he had to do was hold the gate against them long enough for the passage to close.

"Thank god everything is coincidental here," he muttered, as he drew on his focus. He slowed to perfect stillness, allowing himself to balance on the edge of the moment -- then exploded forwards as time distorted around him, racing for the gate.