[PM to Join] When You're Strange

[Tom Cooke]

The Plover’s Song • The Stacks

In the Evening of the 67th of Roalis, 2719

It was a good feeling, clasping that natt’s hand firm-like – his second proper handshake this evening. It was good, too, that look of surprise in Jean’s pale eye, that sliver of a grin. Tom didn’t blame this Robart kov for looking surprised, two gollies descending on him like hungry birds, asking after a hand of Rooks. It’d taken Jean’s prompting to shake him out of his bewilderment, but in spite of his gruff manner, he seemed amenable enough. If he’d recognized Anatole’s face, he hadn’t registered a hint of familiarity on his own, and Tom felt, for the first time that night, halfway safe.

Soon as they’d done with the pleasantries, Tom pulled up a chair and dropped into it.

Maybe he had been recognized; maybe he hadn’t. Whether it was the drink or something else, Tom had stopped caring. He hadn’t expected to find welcome company in this tall, pale stranger, but despite all his fine toffin phrasing, he thought he was starting to like Jean de Silver a fair mant.

So Jackson Robart handed the Gioran his worn old cards, and Jean started shuffling. Tom watched his long, pale fingers flutter through them, silver ring flashing.

“What brings me here any evenin’, Jean?” Jackson settled back with his arms crossed, but he looked to Tom like he was starting to warm up; he wasn’t smiling, but Tom thought there was a little mirth in the set of his eyes. He scratched at the pale stubble on his worn cheeks, looking thoughtfully at Jean. “Better to ask what brings you jents to a place like this,” he rumbled, looking at Jean, then Tom.

Tom caught his look with a shrug. “I’m visiting Brunnhold, and I wanted a decent drink,” he replied as Jean started to deal. “Reckon that rules out the whole east side, eh?”

It didn’t quite get a laugh out of Jackson, but he shook with something like a quiet snort. He wasn’t letting his guard down, even still; he kept his eye on the two gollies, more than a little distrustful, like he expected them to start casting any minute.

Tom slid his cards toward him, but he didn’t look at them yet. He caught Jean’s eye instead, and he raised his eyebrows at that wicked grin; he snorted, helpless to do anything but smile himself. He thought perhaps he felt his spirits lifting.

The kov’s field brightened up, something like anticipation shifting through the quantitative mona. He wondered, for a second, if de Silver planned on using his voo, but he didn’t seem the sort, not when there was a natt at the table. Maybe the noble uses could justify a high stakes game; Tom didn’t think he was the kind of galdor that could get away with that, but maybe Jean was. Regardless, using it at this table would’ve just been petty.

“You, Jean? Don’t think I seen you round here, neither.” Soon as he’d looked at his hand, Jackson put it face-down again. There wasn’t a glitter in his eye, or much of a smile on his face – no more than there’d been before. Tom suspected he was a good hand at this.

Tom took a look at his own cards, then raised an eyebrow at Jean again. “Gentleman says he’s from Gior, I believe,” he replied without a trace of humor. Jackson laughed.

[Genevieve De Silver]

67th Roalis, 2719. Evening

Her eyes went from Tom’s face to Jackson’s they checked their cards, she left hers sit where they were and took a sip from her tankard. A slight grin danced on her lips, she looked at Jackson, the grin fade and her eyes went flinty cold.

“I’m sorry Jackson, is my homeland humorous to you?”

She held his gaze for a second, just long enough for the man to start to look nervous and then she let out a laugh and grinned widely.

“Relax Jackson, I jest. Actually I am only half Gioran, the rest of me Anaxian. But enough of that, shall we make this interesting gentleman?”

She let twin plums of cigar smoke coil from her nostrils as she took a tally coin from her waistcoat and dropped it on the table and pushed it towards the middle of the table.

“A Queen ante?”

Her cards still sat, face down un looked at, Genevieve knew she was showing off, but she didn’t care. This was Jean De Silver in his element.
She took the cigar from her mouth and ashed it in a ashtray on the table and took another sip from her tankard.

“Oh, and as to why I’m here Jackson it is for distraction. I find what passes for ‘high society’ in Burnnhold is frankly clocking dull.”

She laughed and stuck the cigar back between her teeth.

[Tom Cooke]

The Plover’s Song • The Stacks

In the Evening of the 67th of Roalis, 2719

Tom reckoned he knew what Jean was getting at before the tension broke, and he couldn’t quite bring himself to play along, not with that nervous look on the natt’s face. His own smile was flickering, uncertain. Gentleman, he thought again, looking at de Silver’s thin, delicate face, luminous-pale in the candlelight, those hazel eyes cold as ice. Then a grin danced out across his thin lips, a flash of white teeth, and Tom let himself laugh along all hearty-like.

He tried to exchange a mischievous glance with Jackson – bring him into the joke, hey? He sat still, and he was smiling that grim, reserved smile again, but Tom thought there was something hard about the way he met his eye. Something mistrustful, still.

He was overthinking it, he thought, hiding another twitch of uncertainty behind a long draught of whisky. Except maybe not. It was funny, oes, but he’d’ve found it funnier – it would’ve been a benny joke, he reckoned, if they’d all been natt. ’Course, he could feel this kov’s quantitative field loud and clear against his own; neither of them were the sort that could cast the kind of laoso spell a natt’d be scared of. But how would Jackson know that?

Wasn’t like if it’d been a human, making that joke, with just his fists to back him up. There was something else here, something about power and rank, even in a hole in the wall in the Stacks. Ne, Tom thought, setting his tumbler down near his cards with a satisfied sigh. Ne, ne.

It was in the past soon enough, and when Jean dropped a clinking tally on the table, pushing it into the middle from behind a whirl of fragrant cigar-smoke, Tom grinned again. Kov hadn’t even looked at his fucking cards.

He glanced over at Jackson, who let a halfway kind of smile curl his lip for just a second. Whatever his feelings on gollies were, he liked gambling enough to let it go. Tom reckoned he should’ve known that, looking at his worn clothes; he wondered if that was how this Robart’d lost whatever fortune’d afforded him those, once, a long time ago.

“I’ll drink to that,” slurred Tom to Jean, fumbling in his own waistcoat and adding a tally to the pot. The liquor’d loosened his tongue, and he knew it, but by now, he was fair confident he was as much a stranger to any of them as they were to him. “I’ve been holed up in the library with my nose in a bunch of old books for a flooding week now; this is a damned good change of scenery.”

“Clockin’ strange couple of gollies you two are,” muttered Jackson as he put his own coin into the pot.

Tom raised his brows at Jean, now, expectant. “Oes, I reckon we are,” he said, the Tek rolling off his tongue, with a thoughtful little mock-pout of a smile.

He had a flooding terrible hand. Being honest, he didn’t much care. He reckoned he had the money to lose, anyway; he’d barely paid attention to the coinage. There were more interesting things about this Rooks table than the pot.

[Genevieve De Silver]

67th of Roalis, 2719. Evening

Genevieve regarded the two men, cigar smouldering in the side of her mouth. No tells from either of them, a smile pulled at the side of her mouth. This was what she had been missing, the last decent night of cards she had had been last time she'd visited Vienda.

She looked over to Tom and said in a friendly tone.

"Research is it Tom, may I ask the subject?"

At Jackson's words she gave a bark of laughter, nearly dropping her cigar.

"You are certainly right of it there Jackson, yes indeed."

And you don't know the half of it, she thought to herself. Genevieve took another two shill from her pocket and set them with the others, the betting had begun and she got that old fizzing in her blood and grinned slightly.
Her hand hovered over her cards as if she was going to pick them up, but instead she raised her tankard and took a swig of ale and grinned at the two men.

"The stake is two Queens gentlemen."

She put her tankard down and took the cigar case from inside her waistcoat and opened it.

"Also, would either of you gentlemen care for a cigar?"

[Tom Cooke]

The Plover’s Song • The Stacks

In the Evening of the 67th of Roalis, 2719

Y ou a man of books, Jean?”

Tom looked over at him, not for the first time tonight, with some surprise. Then, he supposed it made sense, what with all that toffin learning, with the soft, precise way he spoke. A gentleman of leisure, thought Tom, but one who’d paid attention to his letters. A – what’d you call it? A subtle smile played out across his face for a few seconds as he tried to remember. A well-wound man; a proper timepiece.

When he upped the ante, Tom raised his brows. Then, his elegant white hands flickered over his cards – still face-down; he still hadn’t looked at them, far as Tom’d seen – like he might take a gander, then flickered over to his tankard of Neverbetter. This time, Tom let out a snort, then a deep, genuine laugh, taking a drink of his own Gioran whisky.

Looking at the two shill in the pot for a moment, he husked, “Hell,” then added his own with a good-natured (if put-upon) smile. He was still smiling when Jean took out his cigar box, and he brightened just a pina mant at the offer.

“Thank you,” he said with genuine warmth, taking one. As Robart betted and took one himself, Tom fumbled again in his waistcoat, taking out his pocket-knife and cutting it.

If Jean offered the two men a light, they’d take a moment to get their cigars lit, albeit with an incredulous grunt from Jackson. “Thought you gollies used voo for shit like this.”

“It’s the principle of the thing,” Tom replied lightly, emboldened by the buzz and the first drag of that benny cigar. At that, Jackson burst into husky laughter, the tension broken for just a scattering of seconds; Tom laughed for himself, feeling a quiet swell of satisfaction. The table was full of drifting smoke and glittering coins and laughter, and the low hum of the Plover around them was a sort of music.

The cigar was pleasantly rich; at first, he’d thought it’d remind him of the Pendulum House, but it was dark, and the twist of sweetness wasn’t overpowering.

Jackson gave Jean a subtle smile, then. “My thanks, Mr. de Silver.” His worn, lined face was still pinched and grim, but he looked more relaxed.

Suddenly contemplative, Tom sat back in his chair, scratching his jaw. He turned his gaze on Jean. “To answer your question – history, boring as it sounds,” he continued, taking another drag. He spoke through a puff of smoke: “Hard to believe, but I’ve become something of a bookworm, lately. Afraid if I tell you what kind of history, you’ll laugh me out of the taproom. It’s a little eccentric. I haven’t, uh, had much luck.” With another wry smile, grey eyes glittering, he reached for his whisky.

[Genevieve De Silver]

67th of Roalis, 2719. Evening

"Iam indeed Tom, after all one can't drink and gamble all the time. I have tried, positively exhausting."
She laughed, research and history were still her passions after all, why she became a lecturer. Though the strain of her double life was starting to take its toll. If only there was a way that she could just live as Jean? Genevieve pushed the thought away, it would mean leaving the university.

She grinned as Tom snorted a laugh, time to live in the now, be present.

As the three of them smoked, the last of the tension seemed to fade from the table.

She laughed again at Jackson and Tom's exchange.

"Indeed, actually I recall a gentleman I know once set his moustache on fire when attempting to light a cigar in that fashion."

Genevieve chuckled at the memory.

"He had not found it funny at the time, but everyone else around the gaming table had. Once they had doused the blaze with a glass of a most excellent port. Now however, he does see the funny side, and there was no lasting harm."

She shook her head grinning.

To Jackson she said, her tone warm.

"My pleasure Jackson, and please call me Jean."

Tom's words piqued her interest the cards forgotten for the moment she leant toward him.

"History you say, well now that is interesting. I'm happy to help if I can, though in that regard you might have the wrong De Silver."

She laughed a little bitterly, if there was any such thing as the right De Silver.

"My sister, lectures in history at the university you see ."

She made a dismissive gesture with her cigar before putting it back between her teeth

"She is a frightful bore however and we can't stand each other. Anyway, perhaps I can help?."

She smiled and sat back, then she turned to Jackson.

"That is as long as such a discussion wouldn't bore you Jackson? And of course you wish to speak of it Tom."

Another round of betting came and went, she matched whatever went before, with a grin.

[Tom Cooke]

The Plover’s Song • The Stacks

In the Evening of the 67th of Roalis, 2719

That was true enough. Tom smiled, but there might’ve been something wistful about that smile. If only you knew, he couldn’t help but think – and maybe this Jean kov did know, ’course. Tom’d spent most of his life drinking and gambling, on the job and off; it’d all blended together, back then, one day to the next, one part of his life with another. A clocking mess, he’d made of things. And now, to think of it, living a double life, being some mung caricature of himself a fraction of the time, being a dead man the rest of it, and always wearing a stranger’s face.

He wondered what it’d be like to be a gentleman of leisure, like Jean. Jean, he thought with a sting of bitterness – with another drink – Jean de Silver knew who he was. If he wanted to gamble, he could gamble; if he wanted to take an interest in some academic subject or another, he was free to. But he was always Jean.

Maybe, maybe not. He looked at that silvery signet ring contemplatively, but he couldn’t focus on it long. When Jean spoke again, he snorted loudly, then let out another cascade of warm laughter. Even Jackson was laughing, now, a dry, raspy sort of laugh, like the crackling of leaves.

A most excellent glass of port, Jean’d made sure to specify.

“Ah, shit,” slurred Tom, coughing and waving away a little smoke. “I don’t envy static conversationalists. I don’t know how you’d – I’d be setting more than my hair on fire,” he went on with another few wheezing chuckles, scattering a few more coins in the pot like betting was an afterthought. “Guess the mona wanted to make sure that fellow had a sense of humor.”

Jackson bet, then, the last of his laughter petering out. Tom glanced over at Jean, sucking at a tooth as he thought over what he said next. A spark of interest glittered in his eyes. He raised an eyebrow.

For his part, Robart waved a hand. “’S’fine, Mr. – uh – Jean,” he replied. He sounded a little uncertain. Wasn’t used to calling gollies by their first names, Tom reckoned. “You folks aren’t usually so open about the, uh – arcane, an’ all that. Interestin’.”

Tom shot him a faint smile, that wistfulness back. “Well, I’m not one for secrets. Hey, Jean?” He turned that smile on Jean. “I didn’t know you had a sister that lectured. I think I’d know if I’d met her.” For a moment, he sucked at a tooth, glance straying back to the table; he stared thoughtfully at the scattering of cards and coins and drinks for a moment, then looked back at Jean. “Say, you think your sister would have the time to lend a hand? Bore or not, I don’t know a damn thing about history, and –”

He broke off, thinking again.

“It’s, uh – it’s niche. I’ve been looking into the history of – unusual – monic occurrences.” He took another long drink, set his glass down and looked at Jean evenly. “In and around the phasmonia, or in the crypts under the Church of the Moon. I don’t necessarily mean ghosts – don’t laugh” – there was a crooked smile on his face; he fumbled through his words, cursing his thick-tongued drunkenness – “just monic disturbances, anomalies. Your sister wouldn’t happen to’ve studied the quantitative conversation, too, would she?”

[Genevieve De Silver]

Evening, 67th of Roalis, 2719

Genevieve watched the two men, Tom in particular. There was something about the galdor that seemed strange, but that called to her in a way, given her own strangeness.
Jean the social reformer, Jean the rake, Jean the bachelor for who could love such as her? Neither one nor the other, maybe in Gior, but again she was neither fully Gioran or Anaxian.

Right now however, that did not matter. Now was only the gaming table, the turn of the cards, the risk and the chance.

She was Jean De Silver, gentleman of leisure and rake and that was enough.

She turned her attention back to Tom.

"Unusual monic occurrences you say? I mean yes my sister is a practitioner of
quantitative conversation. It's one of the few things her and I have in common."


She laughed and it came out more bitter than intended. She drained her tankard and emboldened by the alcohol said, a slightly mad and mocking grin write wide across her face said.

"In fact, if you were to picture me in some forsaken frock. Then you've the spit of my sister!"


Genevieve laughed again, her grin still wide.

"Although, I reckon she'll not look half as fetching as I!"

She looked into her tankard and saw it was empty and stood.

"Well gentlemen, I don't know about you, but I find myself in great need of liquid refreshment. What say you?"

Jackson piped up.

"Aye, Jean I'll have a pint of Clever Fellow."

Genevieve grinned broadly.

"An excellent choice Jackson, tell me would you care for a chaser? And Tom what will you have?"

She held up a finger and said.

"Regarding your other point Tom, I shall have a think. I'd rather spare you the trial of my sister and help you myself if I can."

She laughed, she wasn’t lying after all. The way she would have to act with Tom as compared to how she acted now would have to be different. Thus was the problem with society, as Genevieve she had to act in a certain way, speak a certain way. However as Jean, she could say any damn thing she liked, more or less.

“Jackson my good man, would you care for a chaser with that ale?”

Because to hell with it, she was going to get drunk.

[Tom Cooke]

The Plover’s Song • The Stacks

In the Evening of the 67th of Roalis, 2719

What a strange man. Tom watched him a few moments, brows raised. There was something, he thought – something bitter about that laugh, off-kilter, something that almost made Tom regret he’d asked about the sister at all, even though the kov’d brought her up. He wondered if Jean’d had some kind of falling-out with that sister of his, that terrible bore who lectured in history. Godsdamn, but something didn’t add up. Then again, Tom’d known a few pair of twins, and it seemed like they never got on.

Then a grin spread across that macha face, wild and mad and dashing all at once. Tom couldn’t help but grin back; he couldn’t help but laugh, equal parts bewildered and charmed – more than a little charmed.

“Ah, what the hell,” shot back Jackson, nodding. “Rodriguez.”

Tom sat back in his chair, taking another pleasant, darkly sweet drag, watching the candlelight drift on a whirl of smoke. There was still a glitter in his eye when he said, “Gioran whisky – neat, eh?” It was a pina more than a buzz now, he had to admit; the Plover felt warm and close, seemed to shimmer with light and life, and he felt like something’d loosened inside him. He wondered, again, why he’d ever given up the drink. For the past few weeks, dry as a bone, something had been missing; now, it was as if he’d found it.

So he watched the slender, pale figure of Jean De Silver move off to the bar, and he wondered. He was still wondering, wondering and smoking, when Jean came back with the drinks.

Tom sat up in his chair, ashing his cigar. “Mujo ma,” he drawled, mock-Uptown posh, with a wink. He sat back with his whisky, swirling it round. He shut his eyes and breathed in deep for a stretch of a moment, holding onto all of it: the oaky notes, the twist of apah; the twinge of caramel in the smoke; the pleasant numbness. Then he raised his glass. “To Jean flooding De Silver,” he laughed, “who’s twice as fetching as his sister in even the ugliest of frocks.”

Jackson Robart creaked with laughter again, raising his pint.

Tom took his first drink, then set his glass down with a satisfied sigh. He turned his sharp, curious gaze on Jean. “If you insist,” he said more softly. He wouldn’t press Jean about getting in touch with his sister; he reckoned she’d’ve been a damn good resource, but there was something there, Tom thought, something he oughtn’t pry too deeply into. And Jean himself seemed interested enough, and Tom couldn’t say he didn’t want to spend more time around the kov, strange as he was.

Strange as they both were.

“Cyclical anomalies, maybe.” He propped his head up on a thin hand. “Monic imprints of souls that’ve slipped out of the Cycle, or something like that. Places where it’s hard to cast, mona behaving in ways they shouldn’t. You ever felt something you couldn’t explain?” A wry, dark curl of a smile, then. “I told you, you’d laugh me out of the taproom.”

[Genevieve De Silver]

67th of Roalis, 2719. Evening

Back at the table drinks handed around she sat back down. Genevieve grinned at Tom's tek, it might actually be better than Cadoc's own.

At the wink she raised an eyebrow, still grinning. She felt a slight rush of heat come to her face. At Tom's toast she almost snorted Neverbetter out of her nose, she laughed and coughed tears of mirth in her eyes. Once she collected herself she toasted Tom with the shot glass of Gioran whiskey she bought to go along with her pint.

Just before she dropped it into the tankard and then took a long draft, slender throat working. She wiped the back of a hand across her mouth and grinned at the two men before retrieving her cigar and placing it between her teeth.

Better she thought, the heat in her face had been joined by the start of a pleasant numbness.
Genevieve turned her attention to Tom and listened intently, her interested well and truly piqued now.

"Monic blackstops I've certainly heard off, there's a number of sights document. Though I couldn't name any off the top of my head."

She was fairly sure she had a book in her library at home, if not then she would certainly be able to lay her hands on one at the University.

"As for the rest, monic imprints. Echos in a sense yes?"

She tilted her head slightly and regarded Tom.

"We live in a society where magic is commonplace. To twist and manipulate mona, to someone who can not perceive it, but only see it's results. That would perhaps be inexplicable, would it not?""

She turned to Jackson.

"Would you agree?""

The man looked thoughtful and said.

"Not gonna lie Jean, everything you gollies do is damn inexplicable to me.""

He toasted Genevieve who laughed and returned the toast before returning her attention to Tom.

"However, I do not think that is what you are getting. You mean, to use a crude term, ghost?""

She held up a hand and gave a warm sincere, if a little lopsided smile.

“Of course, forgive me if I’m wide of the mark on that. However, no I will not laugh at you. The seeking of knowledge is always laudable. I may even have a book that might be relevant at my lodgings. Though I would have to check"