Written Wonderland

Raccoon heard Evan calling their name and heard Evan say that the goddess was close by to where the two of them had emerged, but Raccoon didn't feel like going back to face Evan if they could help it. And knowing that the goddess was with him--and perhaps preoccupied--was all Raccoon needed to feel safe continuing to get more distance from where the portal had been.

Peeking out from around the rock wall, Raccoon determined that the coast was clear and began maneuvering their way down the rest of the steps and toward the great building, noting with surprise the torches in a circle around a rock mandala of sorts as well as how much dead air there seemed to be here. There was no one else around as far as Raccoon could tell, and the thought made them shiver, but still, they continued on, slinking through the shadows quietly and curiously.

Raccoon had just about rounded the corner of the large building. They had never really liked buildings, but this one took them by surprise when they came around the front and took everything in. The opalescent palace was missing an entire wall where there might have been a door, and the design of it immediately put Raccoon at ease.

Walking into the meadow, Raccoon noticed that the grass--a sinister looking gray green, had been flattened by what must have been a large creature of some kind, much bigger than Raccoon had ever seen. Damn, guess Rutliff wasn't lying about there being at least some dragon.

Maybe that guy was more honest than he looked?

As Raccoon walked past the threshold into the building--palace, really--full of cozy blankets and warm fires, Raccoon decided to start trusting Evan. And that's when they heard it.

Raccoon! Run!

It was distinctly Evan, and it was loud enough to have alerted anything within half a mile of Raccoon's presence, if they understood the shout for a name. But, perhaps that didn't matter if Evan knew something was after them specifically. Yes, that was an entirely different story.

Really and truly spooked now and feeling like their hair stood on end, they ran a diagonal to the other side of the building and out of it the other side, thinking that the presence would be coming in from the same direction Raccoon did. If so, Raccoon could give it the slip and maybe run far enough into the woods across the stairs to get away. As quickly and quietly as they could, they peered around the backside of the building, on the other side of the torches now, and looked to see what might be coming. A reddish purple cloud was approaching, and approaching fast, flying rather than walking and honed right in on Raccoon, stealth be damned.

How did it know I was here? Raccoon thought, uncomfortable and frozen in place for a split second.

Raccoon decided, finally, that there was nothing left to do but throw themselves to the ground and hope whatever it was passed over them. Holding their head and their ears and getting as flat as they could to the ground, they braced for impact , preparing for some kind of pain or punishment. But, nothing happened.

After a moment, Raccoon looked up, the red-purple cloud of mist nowhere to be seen. Maybe it wasn't actually after Raccoon. They exhaled a sigh of relief and got again to their feet, brushing themselves off. Wow, even the dirt here felt magic.

"Well," they said aloud, "this has been thrilling." They wondered if they should make a sprint for the forest now or if they should go the direction they really wanted to go--toward a sweet and hazy smell opposite the hot pools--but before they could make much of a decision, a figure with light gray-purple skin emerged from the palace and came around the corner in their direction. Their long black hair was disheveled and wet, and there were parts of their body that Raccoon was convinced they could see through. The figure didn't look full of malice, in fact, they looked somewhat serene--in an almost terrifying way.

Raccoon cocked their head as the figure got close, entranced by the oddity of both breasts and a phallus on a feminine being, and didn't manage to get out of the way before the goddess grabbed Raccoon by the back of his neck and drug them back toward the circle of torches and the stone mandala.

Feeling very much like a sack of potatoes as they fell to the ground of the ceremony circle, they thrashed around for a moment before the goddess put them on their back with glowing bands, and Raccoon learned--after an electric shock that sent them whimpering--that struggling wasn't going to do them any good anymore. They went limp, so terrified that not even their shaking could get through the strength of the fear paralysis, partly out of determination not to move a muscle.

The goddess gestured, and a purple haze that looked like the shimmer but felt like a trap raised above Raccoon's head, only to then glow with the same light of the lightning bands. They were very trapped. The goddess then looked at Raccoon, at all the fear in their deep black-brown eyes, and dropped a heavy weight on their chest. They might have flinched if not for the paralysis, but instead, they were pulled deep, deep, deep down into themselves, and a thick blackness coated their inner vision.

What was this place? Raccoon looked around curiously with the sensation that they had all the time in the world. They were alone with this blackness. This blackness, and a mystery.

Whenever Raccoon thought about stepping, they imagined black tar or sludge coating their feet, and their heartbeat picked up considerably, their fear of being trapped dripping thickly through the warmth of the darkness.

Then, there was the goddess' voice echoing through. Help me filter this.

But... there was so much darkness. And Raccoon felt small in comparison. Very, very small, and in fact, the longer they looked at how big the darkness was, the larger it seemed to become.

No, no no, no, no, they said in their mind, certain that this was crazy. But, they had to try, right? They had to try. What was the alternative? Staying forever in the sludge?

Raccoon's body, so distant from the blackness, shivered slightly and then violently, and it took Raccoon's awareness a while to realize that they had activated a lightning band. The blackness turned white for a moment as the surprise and pain finally washed over them. But they felt the goddess' hands then, too, and they felt the goddess take the electricity into her own body, clean and pure and almost entirely absent in the second throb of what would have been pain.

So, a little bit of struggle, would more of that work?

But as Raccoon's body went limp again, the blackness and the sludge returned.

Raccoon wasn't exactly sure if they could communicate back to the goddess, but they had to try.

Let go of me.

After a moment, the goddess seemed to respond, her hands withdrawing, though there was still the weight of the blackness on Raccoon's chest. Hoping for a moment that this might make going through the portal up to Evan, Raccoon took a deep, deep breath that got his neck terrifyingly close to the lightning band around it before forcing each of his limbs up into the air and against the lightning bands. The shock of it all came at once, and Raccoon went limp almost immediately, the blackness searing into whiteness in their mind as the lightning worked its way through.

When Raccoon came to, it seemed like whatever they had tried had worked. The amulet was no longer on them, and the goddess was on the ground beside them, her expression unreadable. Raccoon's body still felt jittery from all the electricity, and they just wanted to run away. They didn't know this place, and the goddess felt foreign and confusing and maybe it wasn't such a good idea to go through the portal. Raccoon remembered Evan telling them to run, and they ran but not fast enough.

Raccoon was breathing hard and tested out their hands to see if the lightning bands were still there. Nope. Nothing. Raccoon sat up, waiting impatiently for their head to stop spinning. The goddess gestured in a direction, and Raccoon took that as their cue to go. As soon as their body would respond, they were up and out of the place, barely noticing that Evan was there on the ground, behind where Raccoon had been.

Raccoon ran past the palace and the meadow surrounding it, toward the trees. Soon, they came to a cultivated area with grape vines traveling up string. Weird. They plucked a grape off the vine and tasted it, almost immediately rubbing it off their tongue. Too bitter.

They looked around. Feeling alone and confused. The trees were black and purple. All the plants looked... alien. The sky was a stormy lavender with what looked like storm clouds above. What were they supposed to do here?

They could go back to the palace, they supposed. It looked cozy enough. But that meant being around Evan and the goddess, and right now all of that was just too confusing. Raccoon was grateful, on some level, that they had been useful, but... there was also a genuine sense of danger.

Impulsively, they scurried into the closest climbable tree, wanting to feel like they could do something. They looked around when they got as close as they dared to the top, seeing more trees for as far as the eye could see. But, then a glint of sparkle caught their attention. Back toward the palace and little to the northwest. There was something big over there. Some kind of glittering structure.

Eventually, Raccoon would need to find some shelter for the evening, they supposed. It would get cold here, right? It was already colder than they really liked.

Raccoon gave the palace a wide berth as they scurried and ran that direction, jumped up into a through trees where they could. They thought they saw some moving shadows out of the corner of their eye, but they just kept going, not giving their brain time to get too paranoid.

Finally, after almost two hours of walking, running, and climbing up trees to make sure they were still going the right direction, they were on the forested edges of what was a great city. No one ever said anything about a city in the stories about the goddess. What was this place?

Raccoon stayed up in a tree, watching the city and its distant movements for a long time. Well, long for Raccoon. There were people in the city, but there was something weird about them that Raccoon couldn't put their finger on. Well, that, and some of them could fly.

They must have been there for about thirty minutes before there was a voice below them.

"What're you doing?" It was a young voice, and when Raccoon looked down, they noticed an ashen-faced cherub-type youth staring up at them, wings folded neatly against their back.

Raccoon almost hissed with surprise--it had already felt a long time since anyone had spoken to them. They did jump up a branch in the tree before they responded.

"Looking. Why?"

The kid--maybe only eight or nine if age worked the same way for... whatever this creature was--shrugged.

"You look funny." Raccoon wasn't sure whether the kid was talking about their appearance or the way they were looking. Either way, they supposed it didn't matter.

Carefully, Raccoon picked their way down to the ground and landed near the kid.

"You're one to talk," Raccoon said, visually inspecting the kid. Their hair was shiny and black, and their hands were stained red as though they had just been picking berries. When Raccoon looked closer, they were a little red around the mouth, too. "Do you know where I can find some food?"

"Sure!" the kid said, running off into the woods. There was a small patch of wild berries, partially cultivated, in a clearing a short distance from the city.

"My mom planted these ones herself. She said I could come here whenever I want, as long as I come right back. But I'll make an exception for you." Raccoon nodded and immediately ate some of the berries straight from the bush, relishing in their sweetness. They ate several handfuls before the kid spoke again.

"You smell funny, too." This, Raccoon made a pouting, frowning face about. Rude.

"Wait..." the kid said, something dawning on them. "You're human! Mom told me about you! I thought you couldn't come here anymore."

"Oh, yeah? What if I am human, then what?" Raccoon asked.

"Then I would make you wear funny costumes and play tea party with me," the kid said, folding their arms. Raccoon laughed.

"I would make a poor tea party guest. Tea is gross."

"Yeah, it kinda is," the kid agreed.

"So can you really fly with those?" Raccoon said, pointing to the kid's wings.

"Oh, yeah! Wanna see?" Before Raccoon could say anything, the kid bent their legs and sprung into the air, spreading their leathery wings and almost hitting Raccoon in the face. Sure enough they flew around the clearing, and Raccoon watched in slightly jealous awe.

When the kid finally landed, Raccoon asked, "Where do I get cool wings like that?"

The kid scrunched up their face and thought really hard for a moment before they lit up--and maybe even glittered a little--with excitement. "I've got it! If I think realllllllllly hard about something I want, sometimes it just... shows up! Maybe you can make some wings!"

Raccoon looked at the kid incredulously at first. But, they were in a place with a goddess and magic amulets... maybe it was really that easy here.

So, Raccoon cleared their mind and started to imagine having wings, just a little bigger than the ones the kid had, maybe with feathers, because naked wings were weird.

"Are you thinking about it?" the kid asked.

"Yes, shush," Raccoon said, closing their eyes. Nothing happened. They tried again. They remembered the way the goddess had pulled the lightning into her own body and how the coursing electricity felt. And then Raccoon's fingers started to tingle. They got excited. And they imagined wings. And then there was this weird tickly sensation on the tops of their shoulders. They opened their eyes and reached back to feel... one single feather sticking out of the top of their left shoulder. They yelled and stood up from where they were, running around pointlessly for a moment while the kid laughed. Finally, taking a deep breath, they pulled on the feather until it came out in their hand, yelping with real pain. They stared at the feather in their hand with awe and horror.

They were gonna have to work on that.

Then, Raccoon looked up as they heard another person come into the clearing.

"Timin? Timin! There you are. Wait..." This was a full grown... creature who looked somewhat feminine to Raccoon. She had the same ashen skin as Timin, but her hair was much longer, and her wings flared a little at her back in what Raccoon thought was some kind of posturing. All at once, she was moving to grab Timin, holding them in her arms, and Raccoon's heart ached a little.

"How did you get here!" the woman demanded with a combination of anger and awe. Raccoon froze for a moment but then turned tail and started running back toward where they thought the palace was.

Too late, though, as the woman seemed to summon a net out of nowhere that came crashing down over Raccoon. Struggle as they might, they couldn't get out from underneath it.

Raccoon was in a room with no windows. No windows. And the door was locked. They had tried it multiple times, even banging on the door with their fists several times and calling out. Yeah, like that was going to work.

Timin's mom hadn't wasted much time before she had dragged Raccoon back toward the city. Raccoon managed to bite her when she was taking the net off, only to put a sack or something over Raccoon's head, gagging them when they tried to yell.

She said something about not knowing what to do, and Timin was crying. Raccoon wanted to comfort them but was, like, a little busy trying to get free.

And, from the little Raccoon could figure out, they'd been taken in a wagon to some musty old shop where Raccoon heard whispering voices negotiate. Another person came to handle Raccoon, this guy big and burly by Raccoon's sense of it, and they stood little-to-no chance getting free from that grip, though Raccoon was satisfied to hear something fall off the walls of the shop and break in the struggle.

Finally, after a long wagon ride, the burly guy came back and carted Raccoon up a number of flights of stairs--Raccoon stopped trying to count--before depositing them in here.

At least the sack and gag were gone. And they weren't tied anymore. And there was some cheese on the table that actually wasn't stale or moldy, so that was something. Raccoon nibbled it a little begrudgingly, even though they were hungry. They left half of the cheese uneaten--who knew when they would get any more food to eat.

There were a few comforts in the room--a table, two chairs, a tapestry, a few floor cushions stuffed to the brim with feathers, and some blankets. But the rest of the room was cold ground and too-close walls. And a locked door. Damn the locked door. Raccoon banged their fist on the door again for good measure and then jumped and landed on one of the pillows--bruising their butt in the process. But it was worth it because the feathers did in fact spill out everywhere. There. Somehow, it made Raccoon feel better to have the room match the way they felt internally. Like a bunch of plucked feathers all over the room. They sneezed and then groaned.

Adrianna held a small scrying crystal in her palm, watching with intrigue as the human pounded on the door of its room. She was delighted that her dealings with Serio had fruited into this, though she had yet to figure out what precisely this was. The human was rambunctious enough that Serio hadn't had the chance to get much information from its procurer--or, he or her courier hadn't cared to pass much information along; always had to allow for such possibilities, but she didn’t dwell in them.

After some time, the human settled enough to nibble on the cheese she'd instructed to be set out. She curled a sly grin, satisfaction settling in her chest. Of course, the human's confinement would diminish the effect--it wasn't as though it had stolen or trespassed, exactly--but there should still be at least some small air of debt when she went to meet the creature. Especially if it decided to eat the other half by the time she got there.

The creature looked positively morose as it surveyed the room. Adrianna felt a small bloom of pity for it, which she tucked away as a tool for later use. She could certainly understand feeling frustrated in the situation the creature was in, and she felt she had some notions of what its strongest desires were, at least given its present situation. She could work with that.

Finally, the creature got up to pound against the door again, and then threw itself into the air and down onto one of the pillows, ripping a seam and sending feathers flying from within. Adrianna laughed, surprised by the delight that bubbled up out of her. She covered her mouth, looking up at the party around her as though she were a small child afraid of being caught out by parents after bedtime.

Then, she giggled at her own self, half out of genuine amusement at the varied layers of absurdity colliding in that moment, and half in commitment to a familiar performance she'd begun from the very start of this party: that of a lush, giddily compromised by her host’s intoxicants. It served to flatter, disarm, and frankly, delight.

She showed off a different facet of the crystal to a nearby guest who had clearly gotten curious, seamlessly offering a view of a creek glistening in the falling twilight, brambled tree roots visible behind it. Of course, her interlocutor was a little confused, understandably--it wasn’t a particularly humorous sight. Adrianna took a “second” look at it, confessed it was rather silly of her, and proceeded to fib about a frog having gracelessly leapt for a rock and slipped right off of it into the stream. From there, she segued easily into her fondness for the view, how it helps ease her mind to look at it, and offered her interlocutor a moment to enjoy the view themself before slipping the crystal away and directing conversational attention elsewhere.

As eager as she was to get to the human, she didn’t feel she could leave her engagement just yet without causing more of a stir than she wanted. Granted, it was risky letting time go by with what was almost certainly property of the goddess secrety in her custody, but, well, rare was the time when she wasn’t balancing a few different risks.

She carried on her lush performance, within acceptable social bounds of course, until she felt comfortable excusing herself prematurely, seemingly on account of having overdone her intoxication. It was a blow of mild embarrassment, but well worth it at times like these. There was a chance that some of the sharper guests might have guessed at her ruse, but their curiosities would have been piqued no matter what she had done, and this approach at least trapped them at the party with their own decorum.

Freed from the party with minimal actional suspicion, Adrianna made haste for the room the human had been delivered to, conjuring a less eye-catching outfit for herself along the way.

((OOC: Okay, I think another post from Raccoon about the next hour or so would be helpful. Especially near the end of that period of time, as Adrianna will be scrying on them again before deciding on her approach to the encounter.))

Raccoon stared at the feather-strewn ground for a while, stunned into watching everything settle. Or maybe just... unsettled themself. They heaved a great, excessive sigh and sat on the ground, a little angrily. This was not what they thought would happen after going to the goddess' realm. And, surprisingly, Raccoon found that they missed the goddess. Even though she had been terrifying, there had also been a strange tenderness in her that was nowhere in this room. Except maybe in the feathers. They hadn't done anything wrong.

Oh, that gave Raccoon an idea. Maybe they could make something--out of magic--to get out of the room. They had made a feather come out of their own back, after all. They shivered.

Okay, what would help? A key, maybe? Yeah, keep it simple.

After a ridiculous number attempts, all they managed to manifest was an awkward lump of copperish metal that wouldn't even fit in the lock. And they were hungry again. Starving. Gods, even the army fed them better than this.

They popped the last of the cheese into their mouth, chewing slowly.

Maybe they couldn't make the key because they didn't know what shape the lock was. Maybe they could make something easier. Like... fire. It was a wooden door, after all.

After another long bout of trying, all they managed to do was get a small spark between their fingers--only once--and some wafts of smoke. It was, frankly, fascinating to be able to do any of this at all, and they might have enjoyed experimenting with all this in another context. But right now, they were just infuriated.

Finally, they curled up on the cushions and tried to resolve to sleep. They were getting sleepy. It had been the longest day.

Adrianna stole glances at her crystal as she went, checking in on what the human was getting up to. There shouldn't be anything to worry about really, but she was hungry for information about it. Unfortunately, her glances didn't seem to be giving her much. Best she could tell, the human seemed to be puzzling, or concentrating, or perhaps even meditating. And, well, what else would it do in the space it was confined to? It had at least decided to eat the rest of the cheese, which pleased her. By the time she arrived to where her custodian awaited, the human had laid down on the cushions, perhaps settling in to sleep.

Adrianna conspired with her custodian on an approach which she hoped might garner some trust with the human. It would try her patience a bit, but the ruse seemed likely to be worth it. She settled into a nearby room where she would have some privacy, and pressed the crystal to her ear, more interested in sound than sight as her custodian entered the human's room. Faint echoes of the creek rippled through the crystal's material, peaceful and quiet and drowned out by the sound of the door to the human's room slamming loudly shut.

---

"You, wake up. I need some answers from you." The custodian barked angrily at the human, their voice brimming with thick, icy rage. "Why did you attack that child?"

The custodian was tall and thin, bordering on unnaturally lanky. They wore a black suit, not a single pop of color on them--even their skin was almost grey, their hair long and dark and wiry and casting shadows over their eyes. The room seemed a little bit darker around where they stood, the temperature just a little bit colder. They stood still by the door while they awaited the human's reply, but there was a heaviness in the air like they wouldn't simply wait for very long.

Raccoon had almost managed to fall asleep in this strange place in this strange position when the door slammed shut, startling Raccoon off their cushion. What, was it a crime to sleep here?

"You, wake up. I need some answers from you." The guard had the same gray skin that Timin and his mom had had, but he wore no color at all, making the gray even more surreal. The guard was tall and thin, but Raccoon thought they could take them. Probably. Yeah.

Raccoon gestured to themself and scoffed, like, yeah, I'm awake.

"Why did you attack that child?" Raccoon managed to come to their feet, swaying a little as they were still sleepy, but on their feet nonetheless. They put their hands squarely on their hips and leaned forward from their waist. They weren't intimidated, no.

"What? Good gods, we were playing. I didn't touch Timin. I only bit his mom because she put a net over me!"