Paradigm Jam: Nicholas Hyde, Ars Mentis

Giametti

There is a puddle of light streaming in through a window, which has succeeded in dodging the drape of the curtain and clambouring over the swell of the couch arm and gathering into an oddly shape cut of warmth against shadow and it is in this puddling, this near-Spring gleam and goldeness, that Ari is sitting, legs crossed and skirt making a basket of her lap, back leaned into the couch for support, a sheaf of handwritten pages, loose, arraying around her and beside her, brow creased in thought and heel of her stylus caught up between her teeth. She looks very Bonisagus, Pen might say, were she home at the moment. And there, safely away from the papers but within arm's reach, on the corner of the coffee table -- or whatever dead man's trunk may pass as one, box that locks and secrets swallowed up inside it (Or just a coffee table, maybe, but that seems so un-Penelope) -- is a glass of whisky, poured and sipped off of but not consumed entirely. Beside it, a few pieces of cheese and two slices of prosciutto-wrapped melon. These on a cutting board, not even a plate, with a sharp blade and a fabric napkin, scrunched not folded, nearby. Study snacks, and their living room made into a library.

The light doesn't make the wisps of her hair into a halo, like it doesn't Penelope's, but it calls out the quieter warmth of it, emphasizes the gentle curls. She is not painterly, but this is what passes for Ari in repose -- quiet and collected; focused.

She turns a paper over, traces the margin of it with one finger. Taps twice. The stylus is released into her hand so that she can practice the movements as she is reading; shorthanding them in the air before her. This is not her wand; this is not her Working; but it is the echo of it, in the puddle of sunlight, in the circle of their living room.

Hyde

From upstairs: Ari can hear the soft hiss of hot water being pushed through pipes, sluiced onto the stone bed of a shower, and - stop. Nick hasn't been home for very long; he left this morning to go ride his bike, and to do his own Work in one of the parks downtown. More difficult for him to Work inside than it is for them, though she will have noticed as she has been living with them that this is precisely what the basin in the corner is for, and perhaps has begun to notice when he fasts, or subsists on little.

She cannot hear Nick himself moving around upstairs, but she can hear the sounds he creates, of a closet door as it opens and shuts, of bottles or jars being picked up and set down. And eventually he will make his way back downstairs, cleansed of the dirt and sweat of the morning's work and with his hair in particularly tight ringlets since it hasn't yet had time to dry. It is dark, dark when wet, pulls in the light and clings to it.

"Hello again, Ari," he says as he comes back into the main room. He passes through, and she'll hear him then in the kitchen, because he is probably ravenous, and filling a glass with water.

When he again arrives in her space it's to stay, with a plate of reheated black beans and rice, dotted here and there with specks of cilantro and tomato. He sets his glass down on the coffee table, away from her papers, and seats himself across from her. "What are you working on?"

Giametti

Listening for Nick is like listening for the wind itself; not the touch of it rattling branches; not the sweep of it pushing around leaves; but the movement of the Air and atoms, the secrets it carries along, the sense of it. She does not work with Spirits, so she has not ever conversed with the Wind itself, but Ari imagines it speaks in silences and echoes, the way that Nick moves, the way that is observed as much by the shadows he casts as by the presence he brings.

Nick, like Penelope, is a creature born of magic -- at least to Ari -- and creatures born to magic have this way about them. Silence, in his case, to compound the hallowed shallows and shoals. Gleam and fire-bright to Penelope; shift and silvered light to Ari. They three are the stuff of legends, though early in their legacies each and building toward a tomorrow where they will stand like Giants, lifting up the ones that follow after. They will be all city on a hill, she knows it; she denies it, but she knows it; but for now they are: The Silver Bough.

He is polite enough to greet her when he enters, and she, less polite today, pauses mid-gesture to look over -- hand on papers lest they shift and fall -- and with a little trick of well-wrought wizardy shifts her stylus from wand to something less threatening before she waves to him -- finish the word in your thoughts, don't leave it hanging -- and then smiles.

"Well met and good afternoon!" Called after him as he pursues the kitchen.

There is space for him when he returns, and she eyes the rice and beans with a certain sort of unsure interest. It is common food, though Nick has a way of making common food uncommonly alarmingly-bright-hot. She suspects it is a regional thing, or that all of Arizona has lost part of its tastebuds; she isn't sure, but she almost likes it. Still, suspicion, wariness, as if he might have hidden half a bottle of Tapatio (it isn't even hot, Ari) between the layers of rice and beans -- that's what makes Spanish rice red, is it? Quipped once, long ago -- and tomato and cilantro.

Her mouth curls, a little, and he has just time enough to wonder if he's wandered into some sort of Hermetic trap. "I was hoping you'd ask," she says, and trap it is. Tap tap goes the un-inked end of her stylus. Tap tap, pleased, tap tap, trap.

"Pen has set me to a bit of a project and I think -- If you're of a mind to" HAH! Wizarding Witze (jokes)! -- "That I might like your help."

Hyde

Were she to eat any of it, Ari would indeed find it alarmingly bright-hot: there were several chilis that were cooked in with the beans at the time they were made. It is common food, but most of the time that seems to be what he eats: Nick did not grow up as poor as Pen did, but a person's palate likes what it likes, and childhood certainly has influence on what it likes.

"There's more if you want any," he says, perhaps having misinterpreted her interest. As he transfers a forkful of it to his mouth, he meets her eyes and there is this immediate wariness to him that indicates that he suspects a trap here and now. She is tapping her stylus. Warning.

His eyes are steady on hers, considering, and it seems perhaps apt to ascribe colors to each of them: Ari's silvered light, a will o' wisp that dances in the dark and could lead men astray; Pen, her burnished copper and gold; and Nick, coal (which is another way to talk about ash, what is left after a burning.) Coals are plain, common even, and he does not sit as easily with the magic he holds within him. Not yet. But they are the stuff of legends, aren't they?

He chews and swallows before he answers her, about her projects. "Pen told me she was having you make charms. Is that what you mean?" Maybe Ari will be disappointed that he knows, if that's what it is - still, he and Pen share most things together, space and secrets and...well, a lot. Ari knows this about them. "What can I help you with?"

Giametti

She does not seem disappointed. Tap-tap goes the stylus, but in less of a trap-pattern and more one indicative of thinking. And the bright of her eyes is not diminished.

"I thought that you might help me choose a suitable form for them, something that will be in keeping with the way you Work, and your understanding of Ars Mentis," she can't help it, urgh, the Hermetic name for the sphere slips out. But then she commits to it, owns it, because, truly, she could be cut from no other cloth; dyed in the wool with it; she is Order (better Order than Union), and there are no two ways about it.

"It will be easier for you to use them, if they speak to you. And easier for us to work together in fashioning them, should you wish to help."

They have already spoken of Circles, of the season of Air and Darkness, of the
shapes she has considered (the yew trees; the guardian) in the dark soil of the sleeping garden. It would not be untrue to think that Ari might have been shaping this eventuality even then, though she would not admit to it.

"I've made these before, but for a different audience. We must consider the audience as Artists," she says, before devoting her attention to separating a piece of melon from the rest of its crescent-sickle shape. They'd spoken to this, too; dual-truths: the author and the audience both shape a symbol. Melon in mouth, she turns her attention back to him as she chews.

Hyde

Nicholas does not bat an eye at her usage of Hermetic terms. He hears these all the time from Pen; he also heard them often from Robin, who cared less to tailor his speech to the other Traditions. Nick, too, is used to adopting certain terms with ease and reflecting them back, to adapting language to audience; this is tied up in some of his work as a counselor, which can never be wholly separated from his Work as mage.

There is this little noise of acknowledgement that he makes as she speaks and suggests that they shape the charm so that its form speaks to him. Maybe his reply would have been more immediate were they not fashioning magic for the Sphere he commands that he also finds the most difficult to grasp. That is the way of it sometimes: Nick's nonmagickal skill here is such that he struggles to understand why other people would need magic to do what he does already without it.

He is only thinking, though, about how he conceives of it and what will be easiest for him to use. "Some sort of meditation stone, maybe," is his suggestion. "I will be glad to help you craft them."

Giametti

This seems to surprise her, the simplicity of his suggested form, and so she sits back a bit and -- tap tap, thoughtful -- goes her stylus again. She mulls it over for a moment and then -- hah! -- considers the suggestion worthy. Perhaps approval is not what he first expects, but it comes nonetheless.

"I like it! I was thinking rings or bracelets -- because encircling, like armours or enchantments -- or possibly oils applied to the third eye -- but that brooks the argument over whether the shields of the mind are externally applied, and thus not integral to the Mind that they protect, or internal, as manifest of individual Will and therefore more fitting to be bolstered by elixers or droughts -- and then, again, I do not like to work with ingestibles because of expiration of constituent compoments. And you go and say stone, which is stalwart -- quite fitting -- and immoveable -- again, in keeping with the resonance -- and portable -- hah! convenience is key -- and can be decorated or inscribed."

This is quite the ramble, but it gives him a little insight into how she navigates this space of symbol made manifest. She fires off a follow up question, quick on the heels of the tumbling of words:

"Is any particular stone especially suited?" Though this is more loaded. She would say Jade, or possibly Obsidian. Maybe Hematite, depending on the specifics of the ritual, but she would have to do research. Amethyst is often of the mind, but in focusing and in making more receptive -- not in warding off. There are references for these sorts of things, but the whole of her library is not here at the moment.

Hyde

As Ari Hermetics (yes, this can be made a verb - see how appropriate a verb it is just now), Nicholas fixes her with this lingering look. Not one eyelash bats as she moves between rings or bracelets or ingestibles or oils, and finally she moves on to whether or not a particular type of stone is fitting. It does indeed give him insight, though Nick himself is less likely to intellectualize the symbols and tools he uses. "A bracelet or ring would also be acceptable to me," he says. "Some sort of...well, beads, maybe. I mainly work with Mind through meditation, or through...hm. Some kind of scented oil or...something else that could serve to expand consciousness could also be used."

He has, on occasion, used drugs in this fashion, though it was typically when working with other Traditions and typically when he was younger than he is now. He finds it perhaps wise not to share this with Ari. Hermetics: they are rather particular.

"If we're using stones...I'm not sure. Some sort of river rock, maybe, something smooth and shaped by its environment. The sort of stone matters less to me than the stone's source." He talks as he eats, and his chewing has become contemplative. "It would be easy for you to inscribe them, and for me to use them if they were inscribed. What do you think would be easiest for you?"

Giametti

Yes, it is fair to say that Ari Hermetics, as a verb, as a form of communication and self expression. Which is still better than, say, a particular Tytalan, who seems to Hermetic as a form of locomotion. Ari often thinks, a Tytalan, when she means Rob, but doesn't want to give Rob the satisfaction of explicitly thinking about him. Nevermind the Law of Negation; never mind it all damn day.

"Hmmmmm," she says. She very studiously does not say the rest of whatever her initial reaction may be to river rock, or things found, foundling things, things of suspect quality. "It is usually preferred," she Hermetics, "To source materials of known quality and providence."

"I think it might be difficult to me to claim this of river rock, given I am unfamiliar with the merits upon which it is judged and graded," this is said carefully, thoughtfully, as if she is trying to bend her paradigm around to something more primal and, just, outright failing to make the ends meet up. "Though maybe you can acquaint me, and that might help."

No jest. No mockery.

Hyde

Known quality and providence, Ari says, and the look Nick gives her is - well, whatever his initial reaction might be, he is studiously not saying. There are times when Ari will comment on something, offhand, that make it evident that Ari comes from money; this is a thing that he sometimes forgets. It's easy to, when Pen, being from the same Tradition, does not.

"Preferred to whom?" he asks, and this question is light and eliciting, and it manages not to be too pointed.

He takes in another mouthful. More thoughtful chewing. "When I go to find items like that," he says, "I just look for something that feels right in my hand. In this case I suppose it would have to be a rock that would seem to have the kind of shape and form that would assist in meditation. Heavy, balanced, without crack or blemish. You want the qualities of the stone to reflect the Working."

Giametti

Preferred to whom?

(Everyone.) Yes, there is a distinct difference in their socio-economic background and yes, Ari has clumsily thrown that into relief, but she is thinking of the coursework she has down on this sort of ritual and binding, thinking of it academically, in the way that generations of Hermetics before have framed and asked these questions and that Nick would point to the thought, however gently, as something out of place ruffles as many feathers in Arianna as it does in him. She does not-quite-her-best but well enough at keeping it unspoken.

She sits with the question for a moment, but it does not find any calmer place to roost. And the realization that she is discussing the merits of river rocks likewise does not help. There is a bit of pink to her cheeks, but it is not out of embarrassment at having misstepped.

"Truth," she says, to his last point. Though the quickness of it is diminished; there is no pleased taptap of the stylus. Instead she gathers the papers in her lap into a neater pile, squares their edges; the page she was most interested in is buried in the middle somewhere. Hidden.

"I can't argue with any of your measures," she says. Which is not the same as being in agreement with them. "And how would you envision the working?" she asks, as much in a feint to move away from this topic of materials as for any other reason.

Hyde

For much of his early Awakened life, Nick worked on his own. He did study with a mentor, for a while; he also sometimes would join Tradition members in their magic even when he was a Disparate. There were times when local events necessitated it, as ever. This was always his choice, and he contributed what made sense to contribute. Both of the cabals he has been in, too, were multi-Tradition, and so he recognizes some element of the discussion they are having right now, discomfort and all, as essential to bridging those gaps.

Ari does not answer, and he finishes what is left in his bowl and does not watch her while she thinks. Perhaps his intent had been merely to challenge the assumption.

She cannot argue with his measures, and to this Nick simply nods. "I can't argue with yours," he says. "But if you would prefer to use some other kind of stone, I can go with your suggestion. It doesn't have to be a river rock."

He sets the bowl aside and now he settles back in his seat, his shoulders resting lightly against the back. "How do you envision the Working? I imagined myself assisting you," he says. "I haven't the skill to create charms on my own."

Giametti

She has been thinking (rue [and other things]) in this space, about how not to let this space become an angry thing, about how to bridge it back again without compromising either of them. It is delicate, and Ari is only sometimes good at avoiding the indelicate. It matters, mostly, on how what she means to say is received.

"How about -- just as a thought, and on the vein of meditation -- and if this doesn't work, then we can come back to meditation stones -- how about knots? If I take a length of fabric, and embellish it with the symbols or words we are intending, then I could take a more-common thing, known and knowable but not in extraordinary or too rare, and improve it with the Investiture," this is a Hermetic word and a Hermetic thought, and it allows her to use more readily available things. And, really, she could do this with a river rock if she could only make it sit right in the pit of her stomach.

"We can choose a natural fiber, if that would better suit you, perhaps even one you can know directly the source of, and then braid and twist and knot it once the calligraphy is dry into a sort of meditation tool. Like beads on a string, but knots instead -- I am certain we could find precedence and pattern for this in both of our studies. And in twisting them, we could bind the Effect into the very shape of the charm, so that it would resonate with your meditation?"

It is, it is a stretch. This is not offered up with as much confidence, but it tries -- in her own Hermetic way -- to bridge the things she has heard him say with the things she knows to be true. It is mildly uncomfortable territory for Ari, but not as unworkable as foundling rocks -- which she might one day be able to wrap her working around, but probably not on a time scale which would benefit any of them in Denver.

"Might... that work?"

Some bright scion of the House Bonisagus is she. Surely a Tytalan is somewhere, laughing, laughing perhaps until he pees -- which would be some slight amelioration.

Hyde

Knots, Ari suggests, and Nick's eyes flick up to meet hers again, and here she can see this spark of interest. It is not something Nick would have considered on his own, and perhaps he appreciates this way in which she is trying to bridge the gap and find something that is workable for them both. Nicholas is somewhat flexible in his own Working and in his acceptance of what works for others: this is some element of having remained Disparate for so long that has stuck with him. Perhaps, too, his mundane work influences this, lends him a sort of comfort with the idea that reality is mutable.

"I've never used anything like a knot," he says, "but I think using one the way you're describing would work. They're easy enough to count, in the way you would count beads."

A little smile to her, then. "It doesn't have to be a natural fiber. Use whatever you prefer to use, Ari."

Giametti

This seems, then, a teneble mid-ground, where neither of them is true on the steady but, by the time the Working comes they may be. It is better, then, than either being well and truly out of their depths -- than asking Nick to wear robes and wave wands in anything other than Halloween jest, and better, by far, than asking Ari to wade in the river shallows and seek enlightment there.

But she might, she might attempt that, were the matter less pressing and time bound. She might. Though she would never let word of it reach back to her Traditionmates. He smiles a little, and the tension threaded through her shoulders gives a little, and this -- this is the magic of working together, binding not just rites and magics but minds together. It is paramount to their undertaking, but, also, it likely benefits their friendship more.

"I haven't use them either, but the form seems sound enough. I think it can encompass us both," which, for all her Hermeticking, is perhaps the least Hermetic thing ever uttered in the service of personal Will.

Tap tap goes her stylus, thoughtful, again.

"And I... I think I do prefer natual fibre," she tells him, not as a concession, but as a reasoned thought. "It is more pleasant to touch and its providence," that word again, but this time lighter and used with a touch of self-mockery, "Is less convoluted."

Hyde

He notices the way in which the set of his friend's shoulders eases. Mark, Nick was not tense during their conversation himself; it is less likely though that he would show it if he was. He has an arm draped over the armrest and has for a little while, has gone to rest one ankle on the other knee, this thoughtful sort of repose. It might just be that he is aware of how Hermetics work at this point, and is aware of how different their Workings are from his own.

Nicholas was called a penny mystic during the time he worked with his first large gathering of them. He understands the baggage that comes with these sorts of conversations. This little touch of self-mockery though, it amuses him and perhaps it touches him in a way, and it earns her another quick little smile in her direction.

"Maybe something strong then, like flax," he says. "And we could...I could put a river rock in mine, and you could put whatever you prefer to put in yours, or in Pen's."

Giametti

Flax. She is relatively certain she could find precedence for working with flax, as it had been around for practically forever and, so long as Nick does not expect her to spin it and loom the cloth herself, she can probably find a derivative material made of flax fairly readily. Arianna breaks the problem down to constituent parts and rearranges them back into a (hermetically) pleasing whole.

And then back to river rock -- which, she has now noted, is of particular import. And there is precedence in accepting a more knowledgable party's truth in stead of her own truth so long as necessary so this, this too, this could work for Nick's of the charms. At least one of them, she imagines, will be specifically his. So that, that too, well, that will work.

She nods, slowly, as if she has come around to some sort of stable footing of her own. Ari looks down at the spill of papers still laid out around her, the culmination of days of research by her former self, revisited again in the present, shining and erudite examples of Hermeticism -- she breathes out a little, steadying -- only to be confounded by river rock.

"I think, perhaps, you should ask Pen if there is something particular she would like in hers," Ari offers, with a little smile. It is occluded, this smile, but not unkindly so.

"I'd offer you the opportunity to look through my notes," she says, looking down at the sheaf that is carefully guarded beneath the flat of one hand, "Though I have a habit of keeping them in a tumble of languages -- mostly to confound the others of the Order. Who have a history of borrowing without asking, see," she thinks, but doesn't say, Clever Bastards. "So I'm not sure how much good it would do."

Hyde

Ari suggests he ask Pen, and Nick's eyebrows arch a little, just so - because he perhaps falls into the trap at times of assuming that the Order is a monolith, that they all Work in the same way and using the same instruments. He shouldn't; he has Worked with Pen (and with other Hermetics too) to know better. And yet. "I should ask her," he agrees.

The notes she has laid before them get another once-over, and perhaps Nick is contemplating whether or not a Hermetic's notes on this particular sort of art will do anything other than make his head spin. This would be an incorrect assumption, but not an unreasonable one to make. "I don't really know any other languages," he says. "How much sense do you think I could make of them?"

Because this is a benefit to working with Hermetics: they know a lot. They know so much. They know enough that sometimes it bogs them down in details when generalities would do. But anything one has compiled on any sort of topic is probably nothing short of fascinating, and he will learn.

Giametti

Nick looks at the papers that are strewn about her, still, but Ari -- after the sort of momentary pause that comes with relinquishing anything significant -- hands him the sheaf from her lap. It is treated with reverence, all written in her own hand, all painstakingly and utterly beautiful handwriting, absolutely correct diagrams.

"This is the meat of it, and there's more English to these pages than the other," she says, but she doesn't say why. It has, possibly, occurred to Nick by now that English is one of Ari's foreign languages, however playful she is with it; however easily it comes to her.

And then, because it may help them in understanding one another, she says: "Within the Order, I belong to the first House, we go back to the Founder," she tells him, and not the Founding. "We have witnessed the coalescence of languages, the investiture in symbols, had a hand in the codification and structuring of magic. We have taught our own apprentices and those of others, so that the mysteries are not lost to time. We are stewards of the knowledge of millenia -- and I know, it is not as flashy or head-lining as Pen's House, the Flambeau, but we have regrets and tragedies of our own.

"Imagine if you knew even half of what Alexandria had held, what it stood for, and then had to watch it burn." This is hushed. They do not talk like this often. She does not show her respect or her reverence for her House openly. "I know my ways seem old, or fixed in their fundamentals; I know it is easy to turn Hermeticism into a smirk or a joke; but I carry it forward because I believe it makes us better Willworkers. Within the Order, and in those outside it that we touch."

She releases the pages into his keeping.

"I'll translate whatever you need, except the Enochian. I think they revoke my pointy hat and wand if I do that." This is teasing. She'll translate the Enochian. Maybe.

Hyde

Nicholas is good at reading people (and sometimes he reads them a little too well). There is something in the way Ari hands over this stack of papers - handling them as though they are heavier than they are, perhaps, or delicately, as though they might shatter and her words be swept away to dust should they be dropped - that Nick picks up on. And that thing says that to Ari, these are hallowed pages. So he cannot treat them as any less, as he takes them from her.

Some say that the Avatar is a shard of divinity within the Willworker. Nick may struggle to believe in his own, but that of others: that he sees readily.

So he takes the pages from her, and he brings them into his lap, and he too is careful with them as he would be with anyone else's holy book or sacrament. "I'm glad we have you as stewards of those mysteries," he says, and his voice too is quiet. Then, "Ari, I would never turn your practices into a joke. They are important to you, and you are important to me, and anything you find worthy of reverence I find worthy of reverence also."

He runs his thumb lightly over the outside of the pages, feeling out their corners and edges. "It's only that my practices are ancient too." A beat. "Thank you for sharing this with me."

Giametti

"I know they are," she says, and this is still quiet. As if maybe the floorboards would swallow these secrets and offer them back as recriminating evidence some day. It could probably be done, by the right sort of Quaesitor -- terrifying thought, that.

"And I know that I don't understand that, but I am trying to make space for them in my heart and to honor them, because you are important to me, too. But this is not something that they teach us to do. The Order is quick to point out that we have fought for lifetimes so that all of the Traditions are free to practice what they practice, but they are slow to teach us how to approach anyone outside of it with respect." They leave out the Join Us Or Die campaings, or frame them in a kinder light.

A little pause.

"I think it is wrong."

For what it is worth, she has never called him a penny mystic. Or a Primal. Or even a Death-Mage.

"I know it is."

Giametti

((Edit: And I know that I don't understand *them, but...))

Hyde

The smile he gives her then glows at the edges with affection for Ari, who knows this is wrong and who, one must remember, has never known anything outside the Order of Hermes. It is as much a part of her as being mixed or being male or being a person who is solemn and thoughtful is to Nick: these things are intrinsic parts of identity, so tightly wound around one's core that they have grown into it and been absorbed by it.

It is difficult to call those parts of identity into question, after all.

"I think you're doing well at being respectful, Ari. You're asking questions and you're trying to work with me. Comfort with it will come in time." He sets her stack of pages in his lap and holds them there. "Do you think being open to other practices is contradictory to the Order's teachings, on a fundamental level? Or is it just that many within the Order get too comfortable with power?"

Giametti

Her lap is empty and her task is, for the moment, complete. This means that she can gather her glass of scotch to her, as a thing to hold, a chalice as it were, and also she can pick at things off her cutting board of vitals. This she moves to place it more between them. It is an offering.

"I think..." No. There is a stitch in her brow and she is thoughtful for a long moment. One arm alights on the couch behind her, so that she can fold it just so and rest her head on her fist. She watches him, or rather the space just beside him.

"I think that it conformity is an instrument, which, for the most part, serves the Order very well. Common tools, common symbols, common ritual -- all to bind together magic built on the primacy of individual Will. When outside ideas filter in, it changes the uniformity of these common things. It makes it harder to act as a singular thing, an Order, a praxis; individual Will wins out; it becomes unstable.

"I think it is less that we are too comfortable with power, than that we are terrified of it tearing us apart." She doesn't say again. She doesn't have to. Doissetep has fallen; this is fact.

"But, on a fundamental level, the primacy of Will allows us choice, so openness is, at least in theory, a matter of the individual godhead." She hazards this. She is not immediately consumed by flames as a heretic or summoned to Inquisition.

Hyde

The cutting board appears between the two of them, and Nick reaches out for a piece of cheese. He might have sated himself with beans and rice, but cheese, it is a dark temptress. He takes a bite from the slice, and his eyes are not on Ari; they are in fact fixed on some other point in the room, and if she follows his gaze she will find it tied to nothing specific.

"I suppose it makes sense, that it would function best with that sort of unity. Personally, I feel that I...I don't know. I become better when I listen to what you have to say. When you talked to me about circles, it made a lot of sense, and it was something it might have taken me much longer to arrive at on my own." A beat. "I've heard that there are people within the Order that look outside that unity of purpose, or that look outside those common tools. I've heard there are Houses that aren't based in European thought. There was rumored to be a Hermetic Adept, um, Major in Boston who also was initiated into the Verbena. And both you and Pen still work differently."

He rubs at his jaw, then, still this sort of ruminating. "I've never known you to be a conformist, Ari, about anything. So I'm curious about what your Will tells you to do."

Ari has not yet been consumed by flames. There is still time.

Giametti

"Perhaps you take my meaning a bit more literally than I intended. Conformity is an instrument, like language is an instrument. You and I may both speak English, but we shape it differently, and Pen weilds it differently altogether than either of us, and yet, through agreeing to its strictures and rules, and in breaking them creatively when necessity so provokes, we come to understand one another."

She glances at the liquid in her glass, but doesn't drink it.

"My Will," there is a soft curl at the corner of her mouth, a fondness that is not expounded upon. "Is not bound to conformity, but it values the Truth that is echoed in the practices of the Order. And convenience is a powerful thing, but it does not shorthand enlightenment. So I've studied symbols and ritual, the way that I've studied languages, the way that I've studied riddles -- because there is something under all the noise, and creative departures; there is some resonance to the tools."

She has trouble putting too fine a point on it, but she tries.

"I'm a sucker for a mystery," she tells him, the corner of her mouth curling a little further before she drinks, at last.

Hyde

Ari is drinking a glass of scotch, and Nick finally notices that she has this in hand; it makes him wish that he had brought a glass out with him. It is still afternoon, though, and he needs to be cautious to rehydrate. And so even though he would rather be drinking scotch with her, he takes a sip from the water glass he'd brought out with him instead.

"So what about mysteries and symbols and ritual that aren't part of the things the Order usually embraces? Are you curious about those as well?"

And perhaps this is a leading question, and yet even if it is he is also simply curious.

Giametti

It is a leading question, but it has an easy answer.

"Oh, Nicholas, dear to my heart, I am curious about everything," she tells him, flash-bright grin, twinkle to eye. It is not entirely true, but it is more or less on point.

And she suspects, as they are having serious magical conversations, the kind that push boundaries and cause migraines, that he might want scotch as well as water so she, ever magnanimous (who are we kidding?) reaches forward to offer the glass to him, tipped toward him slightly in questioning. There is knavery to this, a sort of mischief muted and kept mostly at bay.

Hyde

There's a twinkle in Ari's eye as she leans forward to offer him a sip from her glass of scotch, and a returning spark in Nick's as he leans forward to take it. He takes a swallow from the glass, which he then hands back to her.

"I'm glad to hear you say that," he says. Then, his smile is quick and this is a reflection of the knavery she often turns upon others as he says, "Maybe you can come help me look for a rock."

Giametti

"Maybe I can," she says, approving of the mischief in his smile. It warms her eyes, which have been altogether too serious throughout this talk. Too old for the Arianna he has known.

"Though not now, dear Mr. Hyde! Not today!" She is gathering the rest of her papers, and the cutting board and pressing up to standing with a sweep. She does not take back the scotch; he gets to keep custody of that it seems.

"Today I must gather calligraphy supplies and coffee -- I have found a place with coffee I will drink and I must bring you some in tribute! -- and attempt to keep my temper whilst in Aaron Brothers." Because Ari is a Master Penman, or as close as she can come in her early thirties, and the thought of buying inks and nibs and such things in a Box Chain is deplorable, but necessary, given the meagerness of what she has brought along so far. Paper, at least, she imagines, will be sufficient there.

She will also bring home groceries and even make dinner, because, while she is privileged, she knows the deepest of those blessings are her friends and she does not wish to trample on their hospitality completely.