open post: further up and further in

[magicianking]

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.

Comments

[magicianking]

"Oh, he's the worst. He's fucking pretentious as shit. Several times I've been in the middle of saving the world, and he's like, excuse me, no running in the library." Eliot pushes imaginary glasses up his nose and does a nasally nerd voice, even though Penny has neither glasses nor hands. "That kind of guy."

[onthewillowsthere]

Unlike Magnus, Galahad isn't sure that he likes Eliot. "I don't understand," he says.

[magicianking]

"So obsessed with rules that he doesn't let us bend them to do what needs doing unless we spend like forty-five minutes convincing him first. Which is rich, by the way, since he totally punched my friend Quentin back at school."

[onthewillowsthere]

"The school you attended with Queen Janet?"

[magicianking]

"Yep. Brakebills. North America's premiere post-grad experience for depressive magical smartasses."

[onthewillowsthere]

"She said it is a difficult course of study."

[magicianking]

"It is. I don't know exactly how magic is worked for you, but for us it's a pain in the ass. And the fingers."

[onthewillowsthere]

He considers Janet's reaction to Crowley while he was a cat, and says, "It annoys her that it's easier for other people here."

[magicianking]

"Oh, god. Don't tell me people here just wave wands and say fake Latin words."

[onthewillowsthere]

"Crowley doesn't do anything. He just makes things happen."

[magicianking]

Eliot shakes his head disapprovingly. "Very unfair. At Brakebills we have to learn a million languages and hand positions and Circumstances. Luckily Janet and I are very smart and good at it."

[onthewillowsthere]

"Queen Janet is very skilled. She also turned me into a cat."

[magicianking]

"How was it? I've been turned into a goose, and a bear, and an Arctic fox. None of them were much fun."

[onthewillowsthere]

"She said I wasn't as cat-brained as she was when she was a goose. I could speak to my friends. But I was distractable, and my husband was able to intoxicate me with catmint."

[magicianking]

"Hold on, hold on, you're married? What are you, like, twenty-three?"

[onthewillowsthere]

"Yes." As of Monday!

[magicianking]

"That's young. When I was twenty-three I would never have gotten married. I feel like I was barely a person yet." Eliot still isn't married, but whatever.

[onthewillowsthere]

"I'm not you," Galahad points out sensibly.

[magicianking]

"No, you're Galahad from Arthuriana," Eliot agrees. He's a little disappointed that Galahad's married, since he's so pretty, but it figures he got snapped up young. "Well, I bet being high on catnip was sick as hell."

[onthewillowsthere]

"It creates a combination of arousal and aggression. Claudius took notes on my condition for me since I couldn't write."

[magicianking]

"Maybe I was high on catnip for my entire adolescence," Eliot jokes.

[onthewillowsthere]

"Really?" Galahad asks, blinking, as if he's seriously entertaining this possibility. He's aware that Eliot is joking, simply because of the sheer absurdity, and he's attempting to play along, but this is virtually impossible to tell.

[magicianking]

"Oh, yeah. I made some terrible decisions with boys," Eliot says. He's, like, seventy-five percent sure Galahad is going along with the joke. He's reminding Eliot a little of Julia, now. "Only explanation is catnip."

[onthewillowsthere]

"It is often the culprit," gravely.

[magicianking]

Eliot laughs. "Okay, now. Have I made sufficient small talk to see this tramp stamp? Or will you at least describe it to me? You have me dying of curiosity."