[PM to Join] Noise Inside My Head

[Madeleine Gosselin]

Late Evening, 16 Loshis 2719
An Unused Classroom, Brunnhold

Madeleine had cried a lot. Really, a lot. She knew she had cried a lot, and she felt a little sorry for it, but how much hadn’t really occurred to her until she saw the wet spot on Fionn’s shirt. She felt odd about it, suddenly, where she hadn’t before. She had – made that. It looked, Madeleine thought, embarrassed, like she’d spilled a glass of water on him, except she’d done it by crying. She’d cried enough to wet her pillows before, of course, and she thought – she couldn’t remember if she had made a wet spot on Niamh.

Did hugs always make you cry? Madeleine wasn’t sure. She didn’t think they were supposed to. Or was it that people only hugged her when she was already sad? People – Maddens. Or – Niamh and Fionn, because… Madeleine knew that they were related, but she didn’t quite think of them the same, or maybe it was just that it was strange, somehow, for her to think of them together. She didn’t quite know why.

Madeleine waited after she made her offer to Fionn, and even she couldn’t mistake how excited he was. It felt – good, and the middle Gosselin’s face had slowly lightened – lit up – her shoulders straightened out, and there was something straight and even in her posture, like when she danced, at the look on Fionn’s face. She wasn’t exactly sure why he was so happy – it wasn’t like he could do magic himself, poor thing – but he was, unmistakably, and even if Madeleine didn’t know why, it made her smile too. She didn’t know the why of that either, but she was very sure that she was smiling.

“For dancing!” Madeleine confirmed, enthusiastically, because Fionn seemed confused. She hopped to her feet, then remembered she was a lady, and walked carefully across the room to get her notebook, crouching and picking it up from where she had left it across the room.

“That’s right!” Madeleine said, enthusiastically, and beamed proudly at Fionn, as if he was a particularly intelligent child who had mastered the saying of a very difficult word, at his suppositions about balancing her weight.

“For glorification, of course,” Madeleine said, dismissively. She shook her head a little, as if it was a very silly question, and bit her lip, sitting back down and setting the notebook on the desk. “But your other questions are very good!” She said, more than a little kindly. “That is, I – ” Madeleine hesitated, then, a little, her bright smile fading slightly.

“It’s tricky,” Madeleine said, slowly. “I mean, it should – it should… be possible. I’ve done a lot of research – but – I – you wouldn’t understand without lots of physics, there’s – quite a lot of thinking about gravity, of course, and it’s terribly complicated, but there are different ways to…” Madeleine scrunched up her nose. “I suppose it won’t make sense when I cast either,” she said, slowly, and frowned slightly.

“It’s – um – ” Madeleine sighed. “There are different ways to do the same thing? I think? And so – it’s – I know that some ways would be bad and I couldn’t cast them on myself because if you make one part too heavy, then it – your bones could…” Madeleine glanced down at the small hands curled together in her lap, and made a worried little face, glancing back sheepishly up at Fionn. “But there are other ways, I think, and I think I’ve found them, and I…”

Madeleine’s shoulders slumped back down, slowly, and hunched in a little. She glanced at her notebook.

“Nobody’s ever done it,” she said, slowly, and looked back up at Fionn. “But that doesn’t mean it can’t be done. It doesn’t. It doesn’t! But it – that’s why I was crying,” she swallowed, hard, and continued on in a small voice. “Because you scared me - because - because I think it will be hard and I don’t… I don’t know if I’m brave enough.”

It was funny to say it aloud. She couldn’t have said it to a real person, of course, but Fionn didn’t exactly count, not really. He was only a passive, after all. She couldn’t have hugged him if he was a real person, and so – somehow – it didn’t feel bad to tell him these things. Madeleine was very sure that she would have died of embarrassment rather than say any such thing to one of her classmates or professors or anyone else, but she could say it to Fionn, somehow. Maybe she would be able to say it to any passive? But, of course, she didn’t think most of them would understand even this much, like Fionn had. He really wasn’t as stupid as she’d thought! If only he’d been born a galdor; it seemed very sad to her, that he had to live without the mona.

"You won't tell anyone about any of this either, will you?" Madeleine asked, worriedly, looking back up at Fionn. "Please," she added, very politely.

Only once Madeleine had secured Fionn's promise would she flip her notebook open, and turn carefully back to the spell. She took a deep breath, and began to cast, reciting the mona in a high, clear voice, her gaze fixed on the weights before her. The spell seemed to flow easier this time; she could feel the mona stirring in the air around her. One of the weights grew lighter, and the lefthand side of the scale lifted, slowly, steadily, and held.

Madeleine curled the spell, and she held too, holding her breath without even realizing it, the spell trailing out in her mind, the upkeep easier this time. She ran out of breath and gasped, and lost the upkeep, and the weights leveled out again. She giggled, reaching out to touch the scale, slowly, gently pressing on the weights with her fingers, and turned back to Fionn, bright-eyed and excited.

"Did you see?" Madeleine asked, happily. "It worked!"

Rolls

Gravity spell: SidekickBOTToday at 3:22 PM
@moralhazard: 1d6 = (3) = 3

[Fionn]

Loshis 16, 2719 | Late Evening
An Unused Classroom, Brunnhold

.

She’d been reluctant to discuss magic with him, that was clear but she had definitely grown more relaxed now, the change in her demeanour obvious to him. It was good to see her smile actually, her happiness something sweet to behold and he hadn’t seen it before - not up close at any rate. Given that he hadn’t seen it before in his presence, he had to wonder if she’d had no reason to smile previously or if she’d been too tense to do so. There didn’t seem to be any reason for her to be doing so now but maybe his response had elicited it; a genuine smile sometimes made others smile along with you. It was possible that she was just very excited about what she was doing and glad that he was interested too. Madeleine had been dancing around giddily when he came in after all. It was odd to see her this enthusiastic but he didn’t think that it was a bad thing.

She went to get her notebook and then his smile froze in place, fixed stiffly to his face while the emotion in his eyes changed.

The way that she replied… was incredibly patronising and he felt as if the girl had done the equivalent of patting him on the head and calling him a ‘good boy’. It wasn’t an unfamiliar tone but it seemed particularly ridiculous coming from this- this fucking child! Hadn’t he just opened his mouth and made intelligent- Did he really sound that stupid or had she just not registered the signs of his intelligence because she wasn’t expecting to find them? Damnit, it wasn’t as if he was familiar with this stuff, not really, so it wasn’t as if he was- was… rehearsing answers or something!

The student wasn’t really paying attention though, not to him and so he remained quiet on the matter as she continued to treat him like an idiot who’d made a lucky guess. He said nothing about it but his face altered by degrees, the displeasure winning out on it. His lips did manage to retain some sort of uptilt, quite vague really but it wasn’t a smile, it certainly didn’t reveal any pleasure.

Fionn could admit that he didn’t know anything about physics although he had encountered the term… somewhere, he couldn’t remember where actually. Something to do with the natural laws of the world, not like nature but rather how the world actually worked. It wasn’t about the mona either; the sentient particles could disrupt all sorts of natural orders. Gravity, he was a bit more familiar with, although all he knew was that it was what made things fall down, some sort of downward pull on objects. It was specialised knowledge though, it wasn’t as if he was an idiot because he didn’t know it! He almost definitely knew more about anatomy and things than she did! He didn’t think that she did Living Conversation like Niamh did.

Maybe he might have understood if she succeeded in performing complete sentences consecutively instead of stuttering and changing her mind. The passive wanted to understand something before she actually cast but it didn’t seem as if that was going to happen, which was deeply frustrating. Part of him was actually worried that she’d cast and he wouldn’t understand anything from that either. He was worried that he’d turn out to be as stupid as she seemed to thing he was.

The teenager was nervous about this though and his attitude softened in spite of how small she’d managed to make him feel. He had sympathy for her. When he’d called her young before in relation to her experimentation, he hadn’t meant to suggest that she was incapable, just that it was a rather large deal for someone who hadn’t even completed her Brunnhold years yet. Niamh had talked about research and maybe being able to come up with her own spells in time but she had talked about post-graduate studies, had talked about the necessary years so what Maddie was attempting to do was quite exceptional - and potentially dangerous.

“You’ve obviously taken quite a few steps to get this far and you’re actually testing your theories so I’d say that was plenty brave,” he pointed out quietly, folding his arms across his chest as he hovered close by her, eyes shifting periodically between her and the scales.

The young man was less obviously rankled now and more sombre, waiting to see this demonstration and not wanting her to grow faint of heart before she could do as she’d offered. As such, when she tried to extract a promise of silence from him, he was quite grave. He placed his hand on his chest over his heart, inclining his head solemnly.

”I won’t tell anyone about any of this. In the Lady’s name, I promise. I’ll say nothing for as long as you do,” he swore, well aware that he’d implied that his silence was only guaranteed as long as her own was; he wasn’t sure that Madeleine would notice. Despite that though, he didn’t really intend to tell anyone; he couldn’t be arsed frankly.

He felt the gathering of the mona, jaw tensing slightly as his frown deepened, remaining still and quiet so as not to disturb her as those exotic syllables began to flow from her tongue. Monite, the language he wasn’t allowed to know in spite of the fact that he couldn’t use it - apparently. He found himself listening for familiar sounds, trying to identify something within it that he might be able to work out. In truth, the teenager was paying more attention to the actual spell rather than its effects. Even so, when the shift occurred, it did register and he had a few moments to change his focus to the scale instead, scrutinising it for the duration that the spell persisted before Madeleine gasped for breath.

Brown eyes darted to her first, the gasp a potentially worrying sign but she seemed to be in good spirits. Very good spirits. He smiled despite himself, smirk a little on the wry side.

”It did, yes. Well… I assume that it did as you intended but I certainly saw something,” he commented, crouching down so he could examine the scale more closely. He found himself examining the weight markings, as well as others that she’d brought.

”You adjusted the weights themselves but did you make them heavier or lighter?” he asked, recollecting her earlier disjointed words. ”You were talking about how if you made a part of your body too heavy then- Well, it’d make sense, of course your bones would end up fracturing from the stress of it, or they could just shatter. That’d definitely be messy,” the boy commented, half-talking to himself as he plucked up a smaller weight and held it poised by the scale.

”So lighter? Easier to lift and therefore easier to maintain?” he hazarded. ”Could you try to balance it if I made the scale uneven? Harder to do, I’d imagine, you’d have to be more precise but… could you do it, do you think? I mean, do you feel ready to try it now?” Fionn questioned softly.

Was weight part of this physics business? Seemed like it. Weight and gravity weren’t one and the same. After all, airships were heavy but they managed to get off the ground in spite of gravity. Though perhaps that was simply because they had magic to do it. Then again, he’d once heard stories about pirates in the sky, humans and wicks and they didn’t have golly magic so… perhaps it wasn’t just magic after all, just a matter of knowing how to find a balance between the different factors. If you were baking, you had to strike a balance between ingredients, too much of one thing or too little of another able to ruin the whole culinary composition. Precision then? Was that what physics was about?

If she agreed then he’d swap one of the weights on the scale for the smaller one in his hand. Regardless of what she said though, he would end up frowning at the desk for a moment, almost glaring at it as he spoke so quietly that she’d probably have to strain to hear him.

”I’m not stupid by the way, in spite of what you seem to think. I’m magically impaired, not mentally.”

[Madeleine Gosselin]

Late Evening, 16 Loshis 2719
An Unused Classroom, Brunnhold

Fionn had promised not to tell, in the Lady’s name. That seemed to Madeleine like a very good promise; she couldn’t imagine anyone ever breaking a promise that they had sworn on the Lady. Surely even a passive must know how terrible it would be to break such a promise.

She had cast, then, and it had worked! It had worked, brilliantly, and she had held it much longer this time. Fionn commented that she had done something, and Madeleine had gasped a little, a flicker of hurt crossing her face. She had not just done something - she had done the spell perfectly - and even if she was a sixth year it had been quite a nice spell and she -

Oh, Madeleine thought, looking down at the passive as he crouched at the desk. Well, naturally it would be difficult for him to follow. Perhaps she shouldn’t have shown him at all; Madeleine really wasn’t sure it had been such a good idea, now.

But Fionn was examining the weights, and looking up at her with questions. Lighter, he asked; as if it were so easy!

“No,” Madeleine said with a little giggle. “No - I mean - I thought of that at the very beginning. Well - all right. When you... most gravity spells work through decreasing mass temporarily, really. To lift someone off the ground, you make them lighter than air but only just a little, basically. And it isn’t that - you can make them heavier instead! Lots of spells do it, and they’ll sink into the ground instead. So it isn’t that being heavier exactly - well -“

Madeleine flipped her notebook to a new page and began to write, glancing up at Fionn. “Can you read?” She asked with a little frown, and went back to it without letting him answer.

F = G(m1m2/r^2)

“This equation,” Madeleine said loftily, “describes the force of gravity. That’s F. And m1 is the mass of the first object, like me or one of those weights, and m2 is the mass of the second object, which for our purposes will be Vita. R is the distance between their centers. So the further apart you are, the weaker the force is! And the closer you are, the stronger, and because it’s a squared term it’s quite important. So - mostly what people do is to change m1, do you see? If m1 is less, then you could float,” she grinned at him, “even if you’re just as close to the ground. Because naturally you can’t change the force of Vita! And you can’t change your distance to the center of it, really.”

“And that works well when you cast on the whole of something. It doesn’t matter if your arm has more mass - or less mass - if your hand does too and your shoulder and your - all of you. But it doesn’t work if you change only the mass of one part, whether you make it heavier or lighter. It could - you could get hurt.”

“But,” Madeleine circled the cursive G she had written, and grinned at Fionn. “G is the other part of the equation, the gravitational constant. It governs the strength of all the other parts. And nobody changes it any more but they used to! There are all these books I found where people used to experiment with it and they said that - it should be safe. To cast on a person. So it... but I’m just practicing on the weights for now, to get the spell right.”

“But I can do it again!” Madeleine said. “Actually that would be a good experiment, to make it equal.” She turned her book back to where it had been before, and waited for Fionn to adjust the weights, reading the spell over, her attention focused on it. She blinked up at him when he said he wasn’t stupid, and smiled, kindly. “Oh, no, of course not!” Madeleine said, reassuringly. “I didn’t think that.” It wasn’t his fault of course, and she didn’t think he was stupid for a passive, not at all!

Madeleine took a deep breath, and began to cast again, chanting the now familiar syllables of monite, tempering the spell to find even more precision. This time, and she didn’t know exactly why, the mona around her stirred and responded more strongly. She curled the spell, and, slowly, the scale began to shift, wobbling back and forth, until, slowly, very slowly, the two sides came into alignment once more. They held, balanced, and Madeleine’s eyes shone. She held the upkeep of the spell as long as she could, and then exhaled and the scale shifted uneven again.

”Oh,” Madeleine whispered, sitting back. She was shaking a little now, from the strain of it; her head ached, and her bones too, but it was nothing against the joy of the spell. ”Oh, that was wonderful,” she grinned at Fionn, and giggled.

Rolls

Gravity spell: 4

[Fionn]

Loshis 16, 2719 | Late Evening
An Unused Classroom, Brunnhold

.

Fionn had thought her joy a pretty sight but it quickly became less so as she appeared to gain some pleasure at his expense. The notion that he was stupid, it was still there in her eyes, he could see it. The giggling was also irritating and made him feel idiotic, as if he’d said something ridiculous or had clearly missed something obvious. It made the back of his neck tingle and prickle, the discomfort of it making him twitch slightly, the urge to run a hand over it overpowering. The youth didn’t like being so unnerved, especially by some giggly schoolgirl. The fact that there was only a scant few years between them didn’t soften the blow much given that she seemed so much younger; it still felt as if he was having a child treat him as if he lacked mental faculties. There was no clearer sign that she did indeed think that he was stupid than when she asked if he could read and so casually! The passive stiffened.

“Yes, I can sodding well read,” he muttered woodenly so low that she probably didn’t even hear; he didn’t think that she needed confirmation from him because she was ready to carry on regardless. Aside from his slightly rude comment — which he hadn’t delivered with the venom he’d felt like using — the youth remained silent, somehow swallowing his pride so that he could focus. Maddie didn’t speak in a linear fashion, he’d found, and what was more, it was lucky if she managed to get an entire sentence out without stuttering or changing direction somewhere along the way.

In fairness to her, once she jotted down the equation she was doing a wonderful job of explaining what it meant as Fionn’s brow creased, the middle Madden doing his best to hold all the different variables in his head. The force of gravity involved the mass of an object multiplied by the mass of Vita (How do they know the mass? Who worked that one out and how? he wondered) divided by the square of the distance between their centres. All of that was multiplied by G, which the girl was slow to get to but which he impatiently awaited her to fill in for him. He wasn’t entirely certain that he’d interpreted what she’d written correctly because while his grasp of arithmetic was pretty fair, it wasn’t as if he’d had many opportunities to put it to use, even if Niamh was helping him with such things; arithmetic wasn’t the young woman’s best subject either. Not that he wanted to ask Madeleine for confirmation. If he could commit the bits to memory though, he was inclined to ask Harper about it; the monic theorist wasn’t likely to be patronising if he asked questions.

The teenage girl seemed to be doing all right with her explanation though — Fionn could follow along at least although he questioned some assumptions that were made — but then they approached the matter of the G and her teaching abilities took a nosedive. She actually began her more disjointed speaking before they reached that part and he could understand her excitement — he could hardly string words together when he was overly excited — but that didn’t make it any less annoying. And she started talking as if he knew what she was talking about, which of course he didn’t because it seemed to involve specialised knowledge about gravitational spells. So people typically altered the mass of one object, the non-Vitan one, and they didn’t affect this gravitational constant thing, whatever that was. Knowing that it was constant didn’t really help matters. However, by reading between the lines of her words, he was able to surmise that she’d altered the gravitational constant to make her spell work — not so constant after all!

In spite of the guesswork he’d had to make, he was glad that he’d managed to make a valuable suggestion about the weights. He’d been taking something of a stab in the dark and it was hardly his fault that she’d talked about making things heavier or lighter but hadn’t actually been doing that. The student seemed to like talking around a subject, circling what she was getting at instead of saying it directly. It was enough to try anyone’s patience albeit the passive had less patience than most, he suspected.

Having set up the weights for Madeleine, the blond watched as she cast again, chewing on the inside of his cheek as he did so. Yet again, he saw the effects but of course, he couldn’t see what she changed. Oh based on her words, he knew that she’d changed the gravitational constant but there was no way to see that or guess at it. Additionally, if it wasn’t done anymore and was atypical then perhaps few galdori would have guessed at what she’d actually altered. That made him feel a bit better.

Brown eyes moved to the redhead, noting the tremble in her limbs, subtle but still noticeable. It was the effect of the magic he assumed. Did he have any sweets? He often smuggled boiled sweets, wrapping them in little bits of paper to offer as treats to the youngest gated passives; Fionn had a soft spot for the children. None in his pockets though, not a one and while he could frown all he liked, it wasn’t going to change that fact. There would be no boost to her sugars then.

“Yes, it works even when the masses are different,” he commented, stating the obvious as he allowed his fingers to rest on one of the weights as if trying to feel some residue. “Do you want to sit down? You’re looking a little shaky and I would have given you something sugary if I had it but I don’t. You have been doing a fair bit of casting.”

Without waiting for a response, he went to get a chair to move close to her, face full of thoughtful creases.

“I couldn’t see what you did, miss. Oh obviously, I can feel the mona move and I see the effects but… I can’t actually see what you used magic to adjust, you understand, right? No one could. You can see the effects of the wind but you cannot see the wind itself,” Fionn explained, self-conscious enough to wonder if he was making himself sound more idiotic with that comparison. “I assumed that you changed the weights — originally I mean — because you talked about making things heavier or lighter but I didn’t know about the gravitational constant. Would… another galdor have realised it though, or would they have made a similar assumption? You said that people don’t change the constant anymore and obviously it isn’t commonly taught or you would have known about it without having to look at experiments in books-”

The young man paused. What was he getting at here? Was he simply trying to show that he wasn’t as stupid as she might think or might there be a valuable point here? Assumptions could be dangerous things, he knew that. No one had noticed nexi because they assumed that there was nothing there and so they were blinded to the possibility as a result. Maybe there was something similar here. Perhaps it might be possible to get Maddie to realise that she shouldn’t make assumptions about his kind either and-

Sweet Lady, you are seriously clocking selfish, aren’t you? Self-centred prick, focus! he berated himself, feeling his cheeks warm as he realised that he’d been entertaining self-indulgent thoughts.

“What I mean is… you learned about the gravitational constant but you probably didn’t learn about being able to change it or… you were told that people did that but don’t anymore so… don’t bother looking into it. Something like that? Unless I read into it incorrectly, it’s not done anymore so… people don’t even think about it. It’s an assumption that you just alter the mass so… why did you look into altering the constant? I’m not saying you shouldn’t challenge an assumption — I think challenging them is pretty important and clearly it works — but why did you choose to look into something that other people had abandoned?”

He leaned against the desk that held the scales, staring down at it, scrutinising it as if half-expecting something to erupt from it.

“Why did people stop changing the constant? Do you know?”

[Madeleine Gosselin]

Late Evening, 16 Loshis 2719
An Unused Classroom, Brunnhold

Madeleine felt tired, as if she’d been dancing; tired, all through all her muscles, and somewhere deeper, like it was in her bones. She was glad to sit, but she didn’t curl up; it felt better to sit straight, with her back in a long line, and her shoulders square, and her chin lifted, and her feet flat on the floor, together, with her skirt draped over her legs.

There was quiet for a moment, and Madeleine lingered in the wonder of the spell. It had felt – amazing. She sighed a little, thinking back over it, the feeling of the mona moving and swaying around her. Like a dance, she thought, and she couldn’t help smiling, studying the little weights. Like a dance. It would work; Madeleine knew that, it would work. Right now, she couldn’t believe anything else.

Fionn was talking again, and Madeleine blinked at him, and frowned a little. Of course he couldn’t see what she’d done. She didn’t really understand what he was going on about. There was a question, somewhere in there, and she frowned a little more, because she’d been having a really nice time thinking about the spell, and now she had to think about how to answer them.

Would a galdor have known what she was doing? Of course, Madeleine thought, irritated, if they knew the monite you needed for physical conversation. Anyone would’ve known – she wrinkled her nose. It was quite forbidden for passives to know monite, naturally. It would be terribly cruel, really, for anyone to even think of teaching them. She was glad Fionn could read, at least; she wouldn’t’ve known how to explain otherwise.

Madeleine’s frown had lessened a little, in the quiet, as she tried to think how to explain – and then Fionn started talking more, again. She’d explained that, Madeleine thought, and she sighed. Hadn’t she told him why she was changing the constant? Now her head was hurting, a little bit, and she rubbed it with her hand.

“It doesn’t work as well for moving big things, I guess,” Madeleine said, slowly, answering his last question first. She frowned at Fionn.

“Mostly… mostly with gravity spells,” Madeleine said, slowly, “you move a whole thing. You move a – a person, or a rock, or a weight,” she reached out and touched the scale with her finger, pushing very slowly, very slightly, until the scales were perfectly aligned once more. She held there, studying it, and turned back to Fionn. “Something heavy,” she explained. “Something you can’t move together.”

“Didn’t they tell you, when you were little?” Madeleine asked, curiously, her eyes searching his face for a moment. “I mean, before your… um…” She blushed. “Before they… you know… knew? I mean, not about gravity spells and all but – you know about the noble uses, right? Yes, you said earlier. And what that means is - so – you don’t… you shouldn’t ask the mona for small things, not on their own.” Madeleine frowned.

“Nobody writes this stuff down,” she said after a moment, lips pressing together in a pout. “There are… there are all these rules, and nobody tells you. You just have to…” she looked up at Fionn, and she shrugged, and twisted her hands in her lap. “It’s – I don’t know. I think… what I read is that people found that spells altering mass worked better. Only no one says that, not exactly, but when you read old works, like really old – hundreds of years – they alter the constant, but in more recent stuff, they just don’t even bother to discuss it. And then in the middle, they just – they talk about moving larger things, and they say what spell works well, and it’s not like they explain every time why other approaches didn’t.”

“But I think…” Madeleine poked at the scale again, and sat back. She tucked her legs up onto the chair, carefully, tucking them sideways beneath her and tugging her skirt back down over them, and looking at Fionn. “I think that’s why. Because I mean – mostly for gravity spells – you usually move large things, things you can’t move any other way. Like lifting a person, or a heavy stone for the caverns in Qrieth, or an airship or something, unless you’re a student and learning, and that’s when you practice on other things.”

“Except…” Madeleine hesitated. “So – if you change the mass,” She glanced down at her hands again, and looked up at Fionn. “You said you noticed when I was posing, right? I mean – if I – I was leaning forward, and I wanted to lean more, further, I’d overbalance, because my hand would be too heavy, and it’d pull me down. I mean, there’s a point when you just can’t shift anymore, and you’d fall over. Unless your hand was lighter. So you could…” she extended one small hand, turning it over, carefully.

“So you can change the mass of it, but… if you change the mass at the hand and not the wrist…” Madeleine cringed, glancing up at Fionn, eyes searching his face. She tucked her hand back into her lap. “So I just – that’s why I looked into it. Because I knew I couldn’t do it the way they say to, not for a part. Because I mean – there are tendons and nerves and things that run through, you see? And if they suddenly have less mass…” Madeleine was hiding her hand away, now, beneath the other one, shoulders tense with imagined pain.

“But,” Madeleine said, slowly, untucking herself again, “I don’t think it’ll be like that with the constant, because you're changing how much Vita pulls on you, not your - not your hand or arm itself. So I’ll… but I haven’t… I haven’t tried it on myself yet.” She shrugged, looking at Fionn, and then back at the scale. “I thought I’d better do it on the weights yet, I… I don’t… it’s only a theory, do you understand? I don’t know.” Madeleine shivered, shoulders hunching up a little more again. The last of the pleasant glow of the spell was gone, leaving only the tiredness behind.

[Fionn]

Loshis 16, 2719 | Late Evening
An Unused Classroom, Brunnhold

.

Was that… irritation in her field? Yes, he thought so. Fionn probably shouldn’t have been surprised. He could try the patience of most people sooner or later, even Niamh. Actually, he usually succeeded in driving his sister to a snapping point sooner or later, irritation bursting out of her when his questions came to be too much or when he was too persistent. Despite priding himself on his intelligence, he supposed that sometimes his questions were unavoidably stupid or the young man unaccountably dense when it came to understanding, his attempts to clarify often quite repetitive. At least his sibling understood his limitations; Madeleine just thought that he was a regular passive and presumably not a bright one. Well, she probably wasn’t used to passives talking to her either, never mind asking questions; he was probably too vocal for her. He didn’t want to piss her off though, not when she was a source of information.

The teenager was going to have to watch his mouth if he wanted to avoid irritating her further. Holding himself back wouldn’t be easier, even if he was aware that he needed to behave himself.

He sat, hands folded neatly before him but unusually tense, the blond resisting the urge to fidget as he listened to her. It was apparent that he was doing his best to be patient but failing. It was difficult for him to just wait and listen, to ask more questions to clarify precisely what he wanted to know about. He was actively listening to her — the intensity of his attention couldn’t be denied — but he was doing it in order to find an opening.

“I wasn’t told, no. Not exactly. My father did eventually decide that it was a conversation he might need to have with me before I came of age but it was hardly necessary by then — I’d read about them,” he explained, straightening as he swelled with a small degree of pride. He was no idiot. It was stupid of him to say though — no, childish. The youth was trying to show off again, overcompensating really and unable to stop himself from doing it.

He did succeed in falling silent though as she spoke again because there were no more questions, only explanations and thus, he held his tongue as a good passive ought — or tried to do so. The youth allowed her faltering explanations to run around in his head, chased by his own thoughts as he considered the true substance of her words. People who knew things, who understood them intimately frequently forgot that that knowledge was not shared by all. It was hubris in a way, hubris that prevented them from noting down knowledge that would serve as instruction for others forever after. In this way, the chain of evidence was broken, the scientific method a flawed one indeed. For the sake of thoughtless pride, the student before him was left guessing. He did not think it a flaw on Madeleine’s part; he believed that she had done thorough research and that it was not her who was found lacking here.

“Yes, I understand. The body is intricate and there are so many parts that you would have to adjust and continue adjusting, the smallest slip or inattention and…” he finished the sentence by making a sound with his mouth that was between a crack and a pop that mimicked what he imagined would happen.

“If you adjust the constant then it should be balanced. Based on what happened with the weights — uneven or balanced — it works to manipulate multiple parts at once, which is what you need if you plan to use it on parts of the body. Presumably if you haven’t got the full pull of Vita on it then… there shouldn’t be enough force to break anything or cause damage,” he explained, stroking his chin as he considered. He became momentarily distracted by the subtle yielding of stubble — if it could be termed as such.

“Theoretically. You won’t know if it’ll work that way until you try it on flesh. Just because it works with the weights… well, metal isn’t exactly the same,” Fionn pointed out with a soft laugh, the smile that he offered a grim one.

“Obviously, I can’t do magic so it’s not like I can speak from experience but I understand that magic on oneself is more difficult, especially if it involves pain so if it caused damage… It’d be rather difficult for you and could have consequences — you wouldn’t want to brail after all,” the passive explained rather matter-of-factly. Then he paused, nibbling on his lip, considering his next words carefully. It was logical, the best course of action, he thought. Sensible.

“I’m sure you’ve done enough magic for the time being and you’ll want to do some more experimentation in any case but when the time comes…”

He hesitated, reconsidering it yet again. Did he really have misgivings about potential pain? He was no stranger to pain but it wasn’t that. Why should he make the suggestion? It wasn’t as if he owed her anything. It was no benefit to him, not really but…

“When the time comes for you to move onto flesh, I’d be happy to be a test subject. I’m a test subject for Professors Moore and Devlin for their research anyway and I’ve experienced plenty of pain so if something went wrong…”

He shrugged.

“Better me than you, right? I know that I’m only a passive so any damage done would be- Well, I’d be a lower priority than a real galdor when it comes to healing but Niamh is more than competent.”

He regarded her with a frown, nodding to himself as he went back over his own words, considering if he had anything else to add. The offer was there but whether she’d accept it or not.

“Yes, I’m sure about that. Nobody’s going to allow me to learn Monite — not that I can do anything with it — and I won’t have a chance to experiment, so it’s going to be as close as I get, isn’t it? To magic, research, all that.”

He sighed, his expression a glum one as he rose to his feet. He stuck his hands into his pockets, shoulders slumped as he peered down at the floor, frowning deeply, nodding again.

“Well, I suppose that I should leave you to wrap up your clandestine affairs. You can consider my offer — it makes more sense for me to be the first subject than you — and of course, there’s no rush and you know where to find me. I won’t say anything but you know where you can seek me out. Go to Keyes or Laboratory Beta. I’m sure you’d rather go to Keyes than encounter my sister again, I understand that um…”

He chewed his lip, the servant humming softly to himself.

“Obviously going to either would make them wonder why you wanted to talk to me but just- It’s none of their business. They can ask but what else can they do?”

[Madeleine Gosselin]

Late Evening, 16 Loshis 2719
An Unused Classroom, Brunnhold

Madeleine nodded at Fionn’s explanation of learning about the noble uses. She didn’t think anybody had told her. For a moment, the thought made her frown a little. She glanced down. She wasn’t sure, Madeleine decided. Maybe they had. She didn’t think so. No, Madeleine thought. They must have. They must have told her; it was such an important thing to know.

But there was so much to explain, and Madeleine was happy to lose herself in the discussion of gravity spells. Fionn said he understood, and Madeleine beamed at him. She must have done a very good job explaining, she thought, happily. She grimaced at the popping sound he made, and she nodded appreciatively even though it was a little vulgar. She wasn’t exactly sure it was appropriate, but she couldn’t have said why.

“I did it only on one weight at once,” Madeleine corrected, shaking her head. She frowned. “It is easier to cast the spell on a defined part, because you have to be very specific. You have to describe it properly. If you make a mistake with what you say it’s very bad. Usually it would just be backlash,” Madeleine said the word with a hushed sort of wide-eyed reverence, “but... if it works with the wrong words...” she shuddered. Every physical conversationalist knew the limitations, knew the risks; even before sixth year, they had been taught. It was a heavy responsibility, to ask something of the mona. It was a dangerous responsibility too, but Madeleine was proud to bear it, even if she was afraid too.

Madeleine nodded, glad Fionn understood. “Theoretically,” she said with a tiny little sigh. She smiled at him, tentatively. She was still very tired, all through her, but she was relaxed and comfortable in her chair. She nodded a little, uncertain, when he said how difficult it would be to cast on herself. She was frowning again, just a faint pinching at her brow. If it hurt - and she did brail - she could hurt herself very badly.

Madeleine curled up a little more in her chair. She was a little afraid again. There was a tightness in her chest, as if she had run out of air to breathe; she couldn’t seem to figure out how to draw it in. She straightened up, made a long line with her spine as of she were dancing, and that seemed to help, at least a little.

Madeleine’s gaze jerked up when Fionn made his offer and said he’d been a test subject before. She gasped aloud, and shook her head, just a tiny little shake. Fionn charged onwards through his explanation, talking about - healing? Niamh?

There was an awkward pause, and more words, and a pause again, and Fionn was starting to leave. Madeleine was staring, wide-eyed. She wanted to say something; she didn’t know what to say. She stared a little more. It sounded so wrong; Fionn was talking about it, casually, as if she would just show up at Professor Keyes’s office and cast a dangerous, experimental spell on him, as if that was perfectly all right, as if that was the sort of thing a galdor should do.

“No! That isn’t right,” Madeleine blurted. She was on her feet then, her hands helpless and to tight at her sides, her small face twisted in a heavy frown as she looked up at the passive. Didn’t he know anything? Madeleine felt confused, deeply confused, and afraid; there was a tightness in her chest.

”No!” Madeleine said, and there was horror sharp in her voice now. Her eyes were wide; the loose wisps of hair around her head were trembling softly. “No, I wouldn’t. We’re supposed to protect you, not - I couldn’t. It’s dangerous! It’s very dangerous. I could hurt you,” Madeleine shook her head now, firm. “It would be wrong.”

[Fionn]

Loshis 16, 2719 | Late Evening
An Unused Classroom, Brunnhold

.

He’d assumed incorrectly. The young man had believed that the weights had been moved simultaneously — it had looked that way to him — but if she had moved each separately then the complexity of the spell was higher than he had believed. By the sounds of it, it was still necessary to manipulate individual components as with the other kind of gravity spells that she’d described but she wouldn’t have chosen this approach if she thought it more dangerous so therefore, it must be safer. It was something worth noting for future reference if they discussed it, he supposed — assuming that she sought him out, of course — but it wasn’t hugely relevant. As such, he chose not to query her about it, simply letting it slide. He understood that backlash was the real danger, the matter of real import here although it wasn’t his concern; it wasn’t as if it was something he could bring upon himself. However, he knew that backlash was a serious and very real possibility, something that could still occur even if Madeleine used the spell on him. If she screwed up in its execution then it would be liable to turn on her rather than affecting her target so in that instance, he would not be in danger. However, if the student cast on herself and caused a backlash then he imagined that it could be far worse. It was one thing to cast away from oneself and have it turn on you but what if you were already aiming inwards? Fionn could only imagine that it could turn far nastier. The youth didn’t know that for certain but he did know that if she cast the spell correctly and it had an unintended and painful effect then she would almost certainly brail and backlash as a result.

How the spell worked had been a matter of interest but the offer that he had made had been prompted by a careful weighing of risks and had hadn’t made the offer lightly. There was only so much that theory could do for you, only so much that you could predict and that was why she needed to test the spell out. It made sense that the person who carried out the spell would need their wits about them so they could analyse and understand everything that was going on, which meant that they couldn’t afford to feel ill-effects. The only person who could carry it out was Madeleine of course so he was only being sensible really, logical. Otherwise, who knew what the fool of a girl might inadvertently do to herself. She was a sweet thing — she didn’t deserve bad things to happen to her.

Thus, he was casual about it, nonchalant because there was no sense in making a big deal about it, especially when the student probably wouldn’t come calling, even if it did make sense. It was something about which he could shrug and just walk away from — or so he thought. However, she launched herself to her feet to voice a protest, the blond turning his focus on her with raised brows. His expression of mild bemusement changed as she spoke, his face hardened, lips pressed into a taut line.

“We’re supposed to protect you…”

Her words made fury surge within him, hands balling into fists that began to shake. What the fuck did she know? What the fuck did she care? She was hiding behind pretty words, empty words, fictions that they told themselves so that they’d feel better. Madeleine didn’t care about him or his welfare, about protecting him. All she cared about was the idea of protecting him and the other passives. As far as actions went, if she really cared, if she actually wanted to protect them then she’d do something. That was the case with all the galdori; all of them spoke empty words.

“Protect me? Is that really what you think you’re doing? Do you really think that you—that any galdor—has ever protected me? Protected any of us in here?” he snapped, approaching her so that they stood near to each other. “You have us in here for your own sakes, not ours! You’re ashamed of us, we’re an embarrassment to all good galdori because we’re disappointments! And you’re scared of us. You pack us together and hope that we don’t explode but if we do, at least it’s only some passives that take the blow — no real loss, right?”

His voice had risen, his breathing growing heavy as he panted with emotion, and he had to force himself to quieten down. He shut his mouth, glaring at her before releasing a breath through his nose, nostrils flaring before he turned his back on her and walked away a few feet. His fingers found their way to his shirt collar, fumbling at buttons as he undid them one after another. He had his back to her but she might guess what Fionn was doing all the same.

“You gate us and you don’t really keep an eye on us. You don’t protect us, not you and not the other galdori. You think that we’re children and yet you’ve allowed other passives to mind us — the patrons and matrons — the clever children but you told them that it was okay to hurt us. You want to talk about hurt? I’ve been hurt, see?” the teenager explained over his shoulder before shrugging his shirt off. The fabric rolled off his shoulders, the sleeves sliding down past his elbows although he held the cuffs so they didn’t come off his arms entirely, but it revealed his back, the criss-cross of scars, some thicker than others where the skin had been torn open again and again. Some were thin and white, but some were knotted and knobbled, pink even though they must have been older. Some of them were reasonably fresh, less than a week old in fact although the skin had knitted and scabbed. Where the skin had been split, there were now dark, ragged marks, ugly and painful looking. The skin looked taut, pink along the edges of each partially healed wound. Some of the older scars had been torn open when the new lashes had been administered although these had healed better.

The young man gave her a chance to survey the damage before wriggling back into it, flipping it up onto his shoulders. He started buttoning it again.

“That’s an example of what galdori protection has done for me. I’ve more scars than that — not all of them are physical,” he told her bitterly. “These are galdori sanctioned and do you know what? I’m lucky. I’ve seen passives die, I’ve known of passives who died by their own hands and I’ve known of those that just disappeared. As long as you don’t have to see it, as long as you don’t have to know anything for sure, you can believe that we’re being looked after — protected.”

He let his words hang in the air between them, tucking his shirt back in properly, ensuring that it was smooth.

“I didn’t choose this but I did choose to volunteer for your spellwork. Your spell might hurt and if it does and you cast it on yourself then you could end up hurting yourself a great deal more. At least if you cast it on me, you’ll be clear-headed enough to know what went wrong. If it goes wrong. It shouldn’t but just in case,” Fionn explained softly. “I volunteer of my own free will and I understand what I’m offering.”

[Madeleine Gosselin]

Late Evening, 16 Loshis 2719
An Unused Classroom, Brunnhold

There was a scary expression on Fionn’s face. Madeleine wasn’t sure what it was, not at first, but when he started talking she could hear it in his voice. Anger. He was angry at her. She flinched, and took a step backwards, and another one as he approached, her eyes wide. He was snapping at her, and Madeleine didn’t know; she shook her head.

It wasn’t like that! It wasn’t – Madeleine didn’t think – passives were gated to keep them safe! To keep everyone safe, but especially them, because they weren’t – it wasn’t Fionn’s fault, she wanted to tell him. She wasn’t – ashamed. They weren’t ashamed. That wasn’t right, it wasn’t…

Madeleine didn’t know what to say when Fionn turned away. She thought he was leaving; she had thought he would go then. He was touching his own shirt, and Madeleine frowned, trembling, trying to keep an eye on him. Was he – was he taking his shirt off? Madeleine gasped. No, surely he wouldn’t do something so inappropriate, would he? He was only a passive, but even he must know that he shouldn’t take his shirt off in front of her.

All those thoughts fled at the sight of his back.

Madeleine had never seen anything like it. There were scars – thick masses of them, long, like ropes beneath his skin. Some of them were dark and awful, others of them were scabbed. Madeleine gasped for breath; she could feel heat building behind her eyes, and then tears were streaming down her cheeks. She pressed her hands to her mouth, crying quietly, shaking. Fionn was talking again, telling her – awful things, awful, awful things.

They’re not true, Madeleine wanted to say. They can’t be. They can’t be. It wasn’t – it wasn’t what everyone had told her. She didn’t understand. Why would anyone do that to him? Had he done something very bad? He must have, Madeleine thought. He must have, otherwise they wouldn’t – they wouldn’t – her face crumpled, and fresh tears streamed hot down her cheeks.

Madeleine sobbed a little more. Fionn went back to asking about the spell, and Madeleine wailed and turned away, burying her face in her hands. No, she thought, no; it was wrong. It was wrong, and just because there were other things that happened that were also wrong – just because passives weren’t taken care of properly, as she’d been told they were – it didn’t mean she should do wrong things too.

Madeleine sobbed a little more, and rubbed at her eyes, but the thought steadied her. She took a few, deep, gulping breaths, and straightened up. No, she thought; no, it didn’t make sense. Galdori were meant to look after passives, to protect them. Fionn must have been mistaken, have been confused. There must be some reason for that – that awful – a few more tears slipped down her cheeks. Madeleine sniffled. She couldn’t think of any reasons, but that didn’t mean they didn’t exist. It didn’t; it couldn’t. Could it?

“Just because other people behave badly doesn’t mean I should,” Madeleine said, looking at Fionn across the dark classroom. She was scared that he would be angry again; she didn’t want him to shout at her anymore, but she didn’t know what else she could do but be honest. She stepped back again, and bumped into the wall, rather hard. She stayed pressed against it, looking wide-eyed at Fionn. “I’m sorry you were hurt,” Madeleine whispered. She rubbed at her eyes again, and sniffled.

“I know you want to help,” Madeleine continued, tentatively. Her shoulders trembled. “It's only…” she looked down. He volunteered of his own free will, Fionn had said, and he knew what he was doing. He knew it was dangerous. She looked up at him, then down again, and wiped her nose on her sleeve, long past remembering that she wasn’t meant to. “I wouldn’t like to hurt you. It’s – it’s my spell. It’s my dancing. It’s right that I should… that I should…” Madeleine lowered her gaze. He wasn’t wrong that it would be safer not to cast on herself; he wasn’t wrong that that was what scared her most of all. It would be helpful to try the spell on someone else, and he did know it was dangerous; he did know.

“I’ll think about it.” Madeleine promised, softly. There were tears trickling down her cheeks again, and she sniffled a sob away, breathing a little hard. "Thank you," she said, politely, dutifully, uncertainly, glancing up at Fionn and then back down at the floor.

[Fionn]

Loshis 16, 2719 | Late Evening
An Unused Classroom, Brunnhold

.

Displaying his back had cooled his temper. The boy was still bitter, still hurting — psychologically more than physically really — but he didn’t feel as if rage was bubbling in his blood anymore. He was done shouting but even if he hadn’t been, he wouldn’t have been able to muster enough force to do so, not after he heard her wail. The sound made him flinch, the teenager realising that he’d crossed a line, gone a step too far.

He turned around now that his shirt was tucked back in and he was presentable. He’d felt that he needed to illustrate his point but if he’d been clear headed then Fionn wouldn’t have been quite so aggressive about it, so cruel. His temper had done it and now the poor girl was bawling her eyes out, the vicious marks on his back and the violence that had caused them were probably the worst thing she’d ever seen; she’d probably never had to see such cruelty before. Her distress made him regret it, the blond finding himself steeped in guilt as his face crumpled in a pained expression.

“I’m sorry. I didn’t think you’d believe me if I just- I’m really sorry, I shouldn’t have… I shouldn’t have shown you,” Fionn explained, quieted now. Now he almost sounded soothing, something he wanted to do, although it was perhaps too little too late. The teenager wished that he had another handkerchief to offer her because he didn’t like to see tears spilling down her cheeks again. It was all his fault, all over again. And it could have been avoided if he’d used his brain instead of allowing the fire in his blood to channel his actions. The student was sensitive, that had been made abundantly clear to him by her readiness to start crying at the drop of a hat. So of course seeing something so brutal would set her off and if he’d possessed one brain cell—one!—then he would have known not to do it.

As things now stood, he wasn’t sure if he should approach or keep his distance. The only thing that Fionn knew for certain was that he needed to remain calm — no matter what Madeleine might say. She appeared a bit better now, no doubt helped by the removal of the offending sight and he didn’t want to imagine what she’d looked like when she’d been looking at the lash marks. Horrified no doubt, terrified. Most of the tears that had wet her cheeks must have fallen while he wasn’t looking, probably when she’d made that wounded, wailing noise. If that was how she responded to seeing wounds, it was a good thing that she’d never had to suffer them as he had. Lucky for her.

The first thing out of her mouth made him wince, his face flushing red with shame. “I’m sorry, I admit that I wanted to… to shock you. It was… it was cruel of me. I don’t have to behave badly either but...” he trailed off with a sigh, shrugging as his gaze dropped to the floor.

She didn’t want to do something bad to him just because others had and maybe he could put it down to naivety or her sheltered existence but really, it seemed as if she was a better person than he was. He might have suffered but that didn’t mean that he had the right to repay bad behaviour with more of the same. But it had always felt good to indulge in those little bits of nastiness, to get payback and have something like control. He’d learned the hard way to be a better person — he hoped he was better anyway — but it didn’t mean that he was as good as others were — like Madeleine.

The servant allowed her to say her piece, not wanting to interrupt her. He was worried that when he opened his mouth, he’d end up saying something that upset her and she’d stop talking altogether. Unfortunately, the teenager would probably say something upsetting now but that couldn’t be helped. After all, he couldn’t say nothing and silence was probably the only way to ensure that he didn’t shove his foot in his mouth. Then again, he had been known to fuck up by saying nothing at all. Based on his track record with the galdor, he could probably make her cry by looking at her funny.

“Thank you… for acknowledging it. And for n-n-not blaming me for it. That it was my own fault, I mean,” the blond explained awkwardly, risking raising his gaze, his fingers roving through his hair as he cleared his throat. Every mark on his back had been his own fault, of course — they were marks of punishment after all — but it wasn’t as if he’d deserved such viciousness.

“And I appreciate that you’re willing to uh… to think about my offer,” he added. “I’m not saying that your first attempt on a person will go poorly, especially as I’m sure that you’ll take every caution beforehand to ensure that you have things right but it seems pragmatic. Especially as uh… you probably can’t ask another golly to be your test subject. If it wasn’t a secret then you wouldn’t be working away here in the dark.”

Even after everything, he found himself trying to sell this idea to her. Yes, there was a very high chance that she’d never want to see him ever again after this, let alone seek him out but she’d shown a willingness to listen. Maybe she didn’t see it as a good idea but if she kept listening then maybe she’d be convinced. Oh she might not go along with it but she’d see the wisdom of his plan.

It was pathetic really, as if he was seeking praise from this girl, a head pat but if she’d been willing to give as much ground as she had then well… couldn’t she come to admit that he was smart? Gods, it really was pathetic but he couldn’t help it — couldn’t help himself.

“I’m already in on the secret but also well… who would I tell and who’d believe me? No one listens to passives,” Fionn explained with a shrug.

He rooted in his pockets again, even though he knew there was no handkerchief there as if hoping one would just grow in the lining for him to pluck when needed.

“I’m sorry, I don’t have another handkerchief. I’d offer my shirt but uh…”

The teenager chuckled weakly. It was a very bad joke and he didn’t think that she’d appreciate it.