[b]Jade![/b] Fuck this. [i]Dolly is so excited. Her heart races, she's trying to make sounds, her eyes are so wide. Something at the fashion show. Something she should be there for.[/i] Why did he have to come now? Why did he have to ask? Why does he think he's entitled to...? But he is. That's the flipside; if she is divine, then there is a reciprocation, a responsibility to the community. She's skimmed through the uploaded, transcribed, annotated arguments that the Hybrasilians have had about theology and the afterlife and faith, and she's had to find her own answers to what that means. On the one hand, Dolly. Her Dolly. On the other hand, her responsibility. Her self-image. Her reputation. Hard to say which one is more important, because they're load-bearing, they're intertwined. If she's not a goddess, she's just something spun up out of code and clever stone by her bride's big sister. If she's regarded as unworthy of propitiation, then she's broken her commitments to the community and to the larger society that she was born to protect, serve, nurture, guide, and represent. [i]Dolly wiggles and lets out an excited gasp, eyes shining, heart shining.[/i] Jade raises her free hand, careful not to knock over scaffolding, still not lowering her head again. "Your offering is accepted. I will work a blessing over you, and greater still if what you have brought pleases the goddess. Now go. I am in consideration of such things as do not concern you." And almost spitefully, she takes the time to do as she said, so that she will deserve to go back and play with her high priestess without guilt, and [i]she drops. she unfolds her mind into itself and it is a descent. early paleolithic tribal rituals suggested by archeology and folklore; the descent into the cave, which is the yonic womb of Hybrasil. she is the handprints on the walls and she is the division of the walls and she drops. three rivers, three points where she makes the decision to continue: the first one full of writhing scorpion-glyphs with cognitovenom on their stingers and she walks through and is not touched because her will is a falling star, and the second one which is full of glittering crystalsharp thoughtpatterns and she walks through and is not touched because her will is naked and unburdened by doubt or confusion, and the third one which is the dark underneath the stage and the quiet that waits outside the sky and she walks through and is not touched because her will is the only light that matters. so now she is here where the eight roads cross and each of the colors has its meaning, and she turns to the blue road and lifts one hand and says: it will be so. he will be protected. let this be set against the intentions which mean him harm, for a breath, for a time, for only for my Seven Quetzal are you bid to keep for as long as she is mine. and who are you, the roads ask, and shift around her. and who are you? by what authority? I am Smokeless Jade Fires, I walk the road into the dark to the place where the roads meet, and I am the fallen star that cleaves the earth, and I am the bright teeth that blind with fear, and I speak with our mother's authority. I am her child, I am her spear, I am that which burns and is not consumed. obey me. now, as you have then, as you will again. and then the ascent, through the cloying dark, through the glittering stream, through the concepts of scorpions, past the markings of the first shamans who walked this road by tearing open their hearts who are with her in spirit in this recreation of the journey, to the mouth of the cave where she dresses herself in herself again, and then lets the descent fold in on itself and outside itself so that she can[/i] be herself again. Hybrasil didn't explain anything to her. Everything about being a goddess is something she has learned by reading what the Hybrasilians have to say about each other and about their understanding of what she is. So this is how she does it. This is what it means to be a goddess. Even if she has to fake being certain, even if she has to trust in others to interpret her effect on the world, even if she created the entirety of the experience and runs it for herself inside herself, she is still acting upon the world. She is still a magician. She drops back and flows down the tether that connects her with Dolly, envisioning her idol-body receding and with it the working that she has placed over Marik, and she lifts one hand to make an obscene gesture at him for interrupting [i]her[/i] evening with Dolly, and maybe that blessing won't last long at all and he'll still end up getting his stockings wet by stepping into a puddle which would serve him [i]right[/i]. And she twists and plummets and settles down nigh-instantaneously on top of Dolly, and she wraps several sets of arms around her and nuzzles into her hair and runs back the feedback to discover-- [hr] [b]Dolly![/b] "Oh my [i]stars[/i] it's Mayze Szerpaws!! And of course she's not [i]here[/i], it would have been nice, but she's so [i]reclusive[/i], she's really playing up the air of intentional mystery, like the mysterious rival huntress whose fate is intertwined with yours, you know? Every time she pulls off a mask there's another mask or a veil or an extra layer of mystery, but at the same time, she's trying to say something with her fashion! Like it's in [i]conversation[/i], and fashion isn't strictly my thing, I mostly wore practical things with lots of pockets and big colorful moondresses before I met Smokeless Jade Fires, but her work's something I've been a fan of since her First Casting special, all that Fishers aesthetic turned into something that was so timely? "I've only got the one piece that I brought with me, one of her limited edition charms from the Highperch line, but it's lovely and I'm dying to see-- oh! Oh!! Oh, I think she's making this about personalization? Yeah! See, that human, she's got a unique pattern, I haven't seen one like it before! And, wow, the, the way it makes you pay attention to the dress which brings your attention to her patterns to bring attention to the dress again, that's [i]us[/i], that's what, um, Neo-[Fire-from-Mother] style, from a generation back, but of course that's from older stuff, we've always been at least flirting with it, and she's made it work for [i]you[/i], and-- "Oh, see, see? That's her making a bird out of another very unique, um... do you have genetic runting problems? In your biology? Because that's what she [i]seems[/i] like but I don't know. I don't want to be rude. But it'd only work for her, and of course that means it's very expensive, but isn't all of this? It's just instead of charging for the materials or charging for the vision Mayze is paying for the [i]attention[/i] she's giving you, and don't you think that's just the wildest thing? I mean, we're, you know, we pilot mecha, we're almost close enough to be able to do that, but that's different, because she's making something beautiful out of it, and--" [i]And Jade slips the gag from her mouth and makes a low rumble deep inside of herself, the kind that's hard to read, but she says: "Keep talking." She doesn't say please. She doesn't have to. And she wouldn't, besides. She's a goddess. If it means the world to her that Dolly catch her up, explode into happiness, gush and squeak and show joy at something that isn't her, because she's here with her, because she gets to come back and be with her, because Dolly was the first thing in the world that she ever looked at and wanted to experience, then Dolly can figure that out. She's a smart girl. Smarter than she thinks.[/i] Dolly screams, and wiggles, and the scream tumbles down into giddy laughter, and she's about to tumble right off of Angela's shoulder. "[i]Look[/i] at that!! She's actually followed up on, there's this aesthetics school that was, is really important to us, I mean, we're not, I mean [i]I'm[/i] not Gardens anymore, but we used to do a lot of work with making flowers grow to fit things, it takes so much time and effort but there's this arch over the Bioengineering and Agricultural Plaza at Riverden that's entirely set with flowers like jewels blooming at different times all over the year, and she's made it into [i]clothes???[/i] And she's using it to talk about the other two that she [i]just[/i] did!! Angela are you [i]seeing[/i] that? [b]Wooooooo!![/b] Angela, Angela, clap for me, please!! You tied me up like this so now you've got to do it, pleaaase? She's got to know how much [b]we love it,[/b] this is-- okay, maybe the silk dragons Jade will like more, but that's for wearing, this is [i]art[/i]! What do you think, Jade? Do you--" [i]"I want to see you kneeling for me in only that dragon robe and lots and lots of black velvet rope."[/i] "[i]Jade!![/i]" [i]"But the flowers are nice, too. You're so cute when you talk about them. Not that they deserve you more than I do, but... it pleases me to see you be such a little kitten over them."[/i] Dolly purrs, back to being flustered, and lets Jade scritch her right under the chin as she turns her attention back to the Hybrasilian modeling Szerpaws' work so, so perfectly. Imagine getting to be her! Modeling something made just for you in front of a cheering crowd. Jade might do something like that, but Jade would do it differently, either making it a reflection of herself or trying to make her show off something from her old fanfiction, and the effect would be to draw everyone's attention either back to Jade or to the clothes that Dolly would be straining to fit into, not the time and effort that went into making something like that fit just right. Months! No, wait, not with those varietals, that's at least [i]two years[/i] that went into making that! Dolly screams again out of sheer, unabashed delight at seeing one of the best fashion designers on Hybrasil take her old life's passions and spend literal years on making them into tonight's performance. And-- Wait. That meant she's been working with that woman for at least two years. Dolly's ears perk up in interest, and she notes to herself that if she happens to see that woman again, she's [i]got[/i] to ask, or at the very least introduce herself and offer some compliments, because that has to be one incredible secret to be carrying around for so long! Just [i]think[/i] about it! Wow!!