magicianking | open post: further up and further in

open post: further up and further in

Eliot hasn't been depressed, per se, because it's sort of impossible to be depressed in Fillory. There's too much to do, these days: rebuilding Castle Whitespire, helping Josh and Poppy with the baby, and generally trying to run a post-apocalyptic-but-now-pretty-much-fine magical kingdom. Being High King of Fillory is, not to be totally cliche, Eliot's calling, and he's found a peace that he never had before. But it still sucks absolute balls that both Quentin and Janet are gone.

When Janet had first disappeared, Eliot had devoted all of his kingly resources to trying to find her. None of their world-jumping buttons had been missing, so he'd promised a knighthood and a castle to anyone in Fillory who found the missing Queen Janet.

"She won't love being treated like a damsel in distress like this," Poppy had told him.

"Well, if you have a better idea," he'd snapped, and that had been that, until a letter had arrived in the gazing pool. It had been frustratingly contextless, but obviously from Janet.

"Where is she?" Josh asked at the next meeting of the monarchs.

"I don't know. She's trapped, but she seems more annoyed than in danger."

"So she's in another universe? Since she had to use your telegram thing?" Poppy asked.

"Seems likely."

All of them had lapsed into silence.

"Should we call off the Queen hunt? Some of them are getting a little Don Quixote out there," said Poppy.

"No," Eliot had decided. "Just in case." Damsel in distress, Janet was not; but hell if he would ever be the one to give up on finding her.

--

Eliot's on his way to check on the progress of Castle Whitespire, wandering up the path from the comfortable townhouse he's been staying in, when the ground changes abruptly beneath his feet. He stumbles, and when he looks up--Dorothy, he is not in magical Kansas any more. Not in Oz any more? Whatever. The energy of wherever he is is totally different. He doesn't think it's Earth, either, despite the fact that he's in front of a huge Earth-style mansion.

"What the fuck," he mutters, and opens the door.

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Fortuitously, maybe, or whatever, Janet's walking past the front door, staves strapped to her back and boots up to her knees. Mostly, she's thinking about how she's supposed to make Crowley, of all people, look sexy for a nude calendar -- and then she's not thinking about that even a little bit.

"You!" Her face tries to split into a giant grin. It also tries to turn thunderous with annoyance. "I've been waiting forever for you, asshole!"

"I've been waiting for you," Eliot says back, grinning. More relief than he thought he'd feel courses through him. Of course Janet's okay, she's Janet, but he feels like he can breathe again. "Do you have any idea how hard it is to be on Josh and Poppy duty by myself? I've had to babysit, for god's sake." He pulls her into a tight hug, then releases her. "Where the fuck are we?"

"Oh, you poor baby," Janet drawls, still grinning into the force of that hug. They've been apart for long stretches of time before, Eliot off on his stupid quests while Janet actually kept the damn kingdom running, but shit, she's glad to see him. "We're in -- it's so stupid. It's another world, but I didn't go through the Neitherlands to get here."

"Curiouser and curiouser," Eliot says. "I didn't think all this magical world shit could surprise me any more, but what do you know." He looks around. "This your place? I didn't think this was your decorating sensibility. It's very English."

"Ugh, isn't it?" Janet rolls her eyes. "I live here, but it's not mine. It's communal. Like being in the Physical Kids' cottage forever, but bigger and weirder. It grows rooms when it's bored."

"Well, how fun of it," he says sarcastically. "Now, don't tell me you've found somewhere better than Fillory and have decided to stay forever." He tries to sound flip, casual, but he can't think of many other reasons Janet hasn't come home yet.

"Aw, would that hurt your ego?" Janet pauses. Slipping into sincerity isn't exactly the easiest thing to do around Eliot, but fuck it. She missed him. "No, I just can't figure out how to get the fuck out of here. And trust me, I've tried like hell."

"It would, just a bit. Huge blow to the Fillory tourism board. But shit," Eliot says. "This place must have insane security, if you can't get out."

"Tighter than that club in Soho where you snorted too much coke and ended up flat on your ass in the gutter," Janet agrees. "I thought it was some master magician or something, but now I don't even know. We've got literal gods who can't get out."

"Shit," Eliot repeats, dismayed. "Am I stuck here, too? God, if that makes Josh High King, I'm going to lose it."

"Oh my God," Janet says with a groan. "I'm pretty sure you're not. Sometimes we get a fuckton of visitors for a day, then they're all gone again. There's a lot of new kids around today, so it's probably one of those. It's Bring Your King to Work day."

"How lovely. This place sucks balls. Do you think we can work a spell to get you out together? Or what if you just, like, hold my hand when I'm supposed to go back? No hetero."

It seriously pains Janet to admit, but Eliot's a better magician than she is. Bastard never even had to try. It used to make her want to brain him with a textbook. "We can try a spell if you have ideas. I ran out eventually." The next smile's a little less sharp at the edges. "Or the hand-holding thing. The Fillorians will go nuts if we materialize at the castle like that."

"I wish I'd brought a button," Eliot says bitterly. "You'd think I'd learn to carry things like that, but I sort of thought I was done with magical whisking after the world ended. We can try a portal, maybe? Please tell me you've already worked out the Circumstances."

"What do you think I am, an amateur?" Janet holds up both hands and wiggles her fingers demonstratively. "It was a pain in my ass, too. This world's even smaller than your dick."

"Oh, so the size of your tits," Eliot says amiably. "Pretty damn small. How long do I have here? A day? We should get started on a portal, then."

Obviously, Janet's already tried a portal. Roughly a thousand times. But two magicians are better than one, and two magicians where one of them is Eliot Waugh is better than pretty much anything. "A day, yep. Your Spidey-Sense tell you anything about where we should try?"

"Hmm," Eliot says, to cover for the fact that he's getting absolutely no Spidey-Sense tingles whatsoever. "Why don't we try to find a grandfather clock, or something? Could bring out the Fillory-ness of it all."

"Sure, why not. Come on, this place'll spit one up eventually if we go looking. It's, like, semi-sentient." Janet loops her arm through Eliot's and tugs him away from the welcome table toward the giant fuckoff stairs to the second floor.

Eliot takes the house in as they go looking. It really isn't anywhere he'd picture Janet living. It's so... dorm-y. There are clear signs of a bunch of people living here--laundry in the laundry room, half-finished food in the kitchen.

"Does it like you?" he asks. "The house?"

"It must like me okay." Janet pulls a little face at having to acknowledge it. "I wanted a Jacuzzi, and then I found one about a day later. I don't think it existed before that." When two queens of fantasy kingdoms want to have a sexy hot-tub experience together very, very badly...

"Hmm. You don't want to look a gift jacuzzi in the jets, and yet..."

"Listen, I know. I made myself crazy in the library for weeks after I got here trying to get out or at least flip a giant middle finger to whatever master magician tossed us into his fish bowl."

Eliot squeezes her arm against him, briefly. "Fuck that guy," he agrees.

"Without lube." She snorts a little laugh. "So, yeah, I took the Jacuzzi. I had a hot date."

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