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laleiaThese are all fanfic ideas for Illusion by Paula Volsky, a book I'm pretty sure there exists no fanfic in the entire world. If someone knows of any, and could point me towards it, I would be SO appreciative.
When I first saw Elli again, I thought I was seeing a ghost. I would say I hadn’t given her much thought since our departure, but that would be a lie. I thought about her, from her childish and whimsical ideas, to whatever it was that inspired her to free me, to the look on her face when I left forevermore. I never wondered what her fate was amidst the ever-bloodier revolution, perhaps because I forgot that she would be in the City. I did watch the executions, though, and she was never attended to by Kokotte, of that I had been sure.
When I first saw Elli again, I had been expecting to come across some poor girl with almost no means of survival who Jounisse’d found in gaol and had decided was too stupid or too obedient or too desperate to peek inside a message. And then Elli stood up, so gaunt I didn’t recognize her at first, until she called me by the name I had left behind, and then she seemed to lose all her energy.
If she had not spoken, so confused and so concerned, I might have thought her newly-risen from one of the graves around me, come back to haunt me for leaving her to an abysmal death. As it was, I ran to her immediately to make sure she did not swoon.
She didn’t, but came close, for she seemed remarkably ill, and while trying to help her walk, the situation fully struck me. The Eliste that I remembered, so bright and vivacious and full of life, unrepentantly spoilt and selfish and self-centered with no concept of anyone besides herself, had become the poor, miserable creature before me who had probably spent a good deal of time in gaol. Her once-fine hands were chapped, her one-prized hair was matted, and the figure she had watched so carefully was no nothing more than skin and bones. I could only guess at the experiences she had been through.
As I hurried to get her back to my lodging, so I could take a better account of what damage she had experienced, she retained her muddled confusion, and barely seemed able to walk.
Her refusal to stain my clean bed with her presumably filthy self almost broke my heart, simply because I remembered who and how she used to be. And then later, when I questioned her, and she broke down before me, I could not bear it to question her any further. I could only imagine what she had faced, especially considering how little she knew of hardship before the Revolution.
Instead, I shared my stories, acting out what seemed like an ages-old role as entertainer. She seemed to enjoy it greatly, but I noted that she almost seemed to regress, showing a childlike delight and curiosity. No doubt because of her trauma, and perhaps a little because of her physical state, and because she was finally safe and in the presence of a childhood friend, she was choosing to dwell in a safer and kinder past for a brief while.
And then she surprised me, with her serious face, as she explained how she would have to find employment. Her, in this state? Do housework? It had once been unthinkable that Elli might ever sully her hands with work, and now she was the one suggesting it when she could barely leave the bed.
And then her suggestion, her declaration that she could not stay, and her scandalized look upon realizing others might consider her my wench. I would have thought her back to her old self, oh-so-far above me, had she not almost immediately afterwards voiced concern for my life. If I were to call upon the Lady, it would be far more serious reasons than acquaintance with a Bonbon.
I smiled, instead, and distracted her with the bath.
Her listless attitude at the beginning worried me, because she had once been a far-from-listless girl, and I wondered if something had not happened to her while she had wandered the streets, and I wondered the worst. But her appetite seemed hearty, and she was just healing, for I soon began provoking her into conversations, working for that smile. After so much work and secrecy outside, plotting and planning with Shorvi while Whiss Valeur turned the world upside down, it was nice to come home to Elli, who always seemed to happy to see me.
Elli seemed to have changed a great deal, although she still seemed to have kept enough of her Exalted hauteur to cause me to lose his temper on occasion. I had to watch myself, however – losing my temper no would no longer be defiance against the Exalted system, but more like the bullying of a young girl, a pang I felt sharply when she shrank away from me one day after a careless comment and looked around the room pensively.
To make it up to her, I bought her a length of cloth, which she worked diligently on for the next few days until I came home one day and she was beautiful again. It took a bit more to convince her to look in the mirror, which I had noticed she never did anymore, but the genuine delight on her face was worth it.
Then, I convinced her to leave the boarding house, and although she began by almost cringing every time she met so one, so fearful of the Van Guardsmen, she soon regained her vigor, and even shared with me a little of what she had been through.
Of course, the reignited vigor and vivacity almost meant her curiosity knew no bounds, and she began asking about my peculiar habits she’d surely only noticed before.
And then Nirienne was arrested and my world seemed to end. I returned home, where Elli immediately took care of me, but our different worldviews and the way she just didn’t understand meant, of course, that we quarreled. She had not changed quite so much as I thought she would, and I was too consumed with despair to rein in my pronunciations for her sake. But she did come up with an idea, of her uncle Quinz, and it ended up being a good thing.
I had been fond of Elli for a while, and found myself truly attached to her as she healed within my home. And of course, that kiss, well perhaps it had been a bit presumptuous of me, and afterwards, seeing the confusion in her eyes, I felt badly, as if I had taken advantage of her.
I knew I truly loved her when I returned home, and learned that she had been captured. Taken to the Sepulchre.
----
“And how did the politicking go today?” Elli asked as she finished sewing her last ribbon and move on to the beads.
“Not quite so well,” Dref sighed. “Tomorrow, we’ll negotiate with your very own Exalted Feronte, and we shall all try to rein in our tempers as his counsel seems most exasperating. Can you tell anything about the man himself?”
“He …” Elli’s hands stilled. “I had forgotten he was alive. He is somewhat of a proud and arrogant man, and he is only willing to covet something for so long before he takes decisive steps about the matter. He is ruthless and unscrupulous, and at least before the Revolution, was not afraid to use magic to get what he wanted.”
“That is not what I had heard about his politics,” Dref observed, eyeing his wife carefully.
“Oh, I don’t know anything about his politics,” Elli said with faux cheer. “That was the attitude with which he approached women. What are the negotiations about?”
“His lands, and whether he is entitled to any of them, or his possessions. He unfortunately has quite a few foreign dignitaries on his side, and holds a position abroad as well, so we cannot dismiss him as summarily as we might like.”
“Hm, I might bring you your lunch tomorrow, in the midst of the negotiations,” Elli said impishly. “I have not seen him in so long.”
“Elli, the negotiations are a serious matter.” He hesitated. There was an odd look in her eyes, and he gave up. She would do what she will.
The next day, everyone else shot him dirty looks when Elli interrupted the ever-important procedures with his lunch.
“Oh, Your Grace,” she addressed Feronte with what seemed like genuine surprise, “I didn’t know you were here.”
Feronte did not seem to recognize her.
“Oh, don’t you recognize me? I am, or rather, was, Eliste vo Derrivalle,” she said in a delighted tone. “We were at court together shortly before the Revolution!”
Dref noted with interest as something flashed in Feronte’s eyes. Perhaps negotiations would go better because of Elli’s timely intervention.
“In fact, you courted me for quite a while,” Elli tittered. “I was so flattered, but of course, you were so old and the last suitor I would want.” Dref didn’t wince internally at the slight, because he knew Elli must have uttered it on purpose.
“I think I do remember you,” Feronte said. “The willful and spoilt girl from Fabeque with the dreadful accent who didn’t know what was best for her.”
“Heavens, I still don’t do what is best,” Elli trilled. “But I remember how furious you were everytime I refused you. You had such a look on your face. No wonder you tried to use magic to coerce me into your chambers.”
At that pronunciation, all motion stilled.
“I’m afraid-“
“Oh, I remember the locket you sent me, with the perfume that clouded my mind and that convinced me to accept a dinner invitation in an inappropriate situation and even almost forced me into your room. You know, even considering my life on the streets after the Revolution, what with all the crimelords wanting me to work whorehouses, that is still the closest I came to losing my virtue?”
Dref was very carefully not clenching his fists.
----
The first time Elli threw a dinner party, it was almost a disaster.
----
“I didn’t know Dref was keeping a girl in his lodgings,” Bulaude said, “and now he’s marrying her?”
“What sort of girl is she?” the other Bulaude wanted to know.
“She’s a Bonbon, I heard,” __ said, “which I think is so surprising.”
“Out of character for Beq,” Bulaude observed. “I didn’t expect him to go for one of those wispy, helpless types.”
“Come now, we should not gossip,” Shorvi admonished them. “Besides, Elli is a sweet, courageous girl. I think she will be good for him.”
“Have you met her, Shorvi?” Bulaude asked, surprised.
“It would be like Beq to parade her before you for your approval,” __ noted. “He idolizes you.”
“Beq is perfectly capable of making his own decisions about his betrothed,” Shorvi admonished. “Anyway, we’ve all met her.”
“We have?” Bulade asked, surprised. “I don’t think I remember.”
“It would be a hard day to forget,” Shorvi smiled. “She was to be the first executed the day Kokotte fell.”
They were all silent for a moment.
“You mean, that girl, with the blonde hair and the brave eyes who was to be executed with us?” Bulaude asked surprised. “I do remember her being a Bonbon, yes. That is Beq’s sweetheart?”
“So we weren’t the only ones he was rescuing that day,” the other Bulaude smiled.
“In fact, as far as I understand, she had been captured in the process of rescuing us,” Shorvi continued, “for Beq’s sake of course – she didn’t know us and couldn’t really care less about us.”
“Is she not a Nirienniste? I don’t see how Beq could stand for that.”
“She’s Exalted – communism is against her very being,” Beq said wryly, entering the conversation. “But I knew her before I knew of Nirienne, so you will forgive me this lapse in ideology.”
“Shall we meet her?” Bulaude wanted to know. “Formally, I mean, not in a cart about to die.”
“Of course. In fact, you are all invited to my place this weekend for some sort of dinner.”
“You must tell us how you met.”
“Why, as I said, we practically grew up together. I was a serf on her lands – and when her father was about to kill me, she set me free.”
“How romantic!” Bulaude fake-swooned.
“Except, of course, that she, in all her Exalted arrogance, assumed I would come back once my shackles were cut, and of course I didn’t. I didn’t see her against until after the Revolution.”
“And what had she been doing?” __ wanted to know.
“Oh, she had been making do on the streets, when I came across her, and she has stayed in my lodgings since. I did not, of course, realized she loved me until yesterday, when she proposed.”
“She proposed? Beq, you must be getting too slow.”
“I had not realized she would say yes if I did. But now I am to be happily married,” Beq smiled.
“Well as long as you are happy, that is most important,” the other Bulaude said dubiously. “Only, will she be able to withstand all the politicking you shall have to do – it’s not quite for the faint of heart.”
“She was trained for Exalted politics, and has lived through street politics, and she has yet survived and gotten stronger, and truly, I’m not planning on going quite the full extent in politics.”
When I first saw Elli again, I thought I was seeing a ghost. I would say I hadn’t given her much thought since our departure, but that would be a lie. I thought about her, from her childish and whimsical ideas, to whatever it was that inspired her to free me, to the look on her face when I left forevermore. I never wondered what her fate was amidst the ever-bloodier revolution, perhaps because I forgot that she would be in the City. I did watch the executions, though, and she was never attended to by Kokotte, of that I had been sure.
When I first saw Elli again, I had been expecting to come across some poor girl with almost no means of survival who Jounisse’d found in gaol and had decided was too stupid or too obedient or too desperate to peek inside a message. And then Elli stood up, so gaunt I didn’t recognize her at first, until she called me by the name I had left behind, and then she seemed to lose all her energy.
If she had not spoken, so confused and so concerned, I might have thought her newly-risen from one of the graves around me, come back to haunt me for leaving her to an abysmal death. As it was, I ran to her immediately to make sure she did not swoon.
She didn’t, but came close, for she seemed remarkably ill, and while trying to help her walk, the situation fully struck me. The Eliste that I remembered, so bright and vivacious and full of life, unrepentantly spoilt and selfish and self-centered with no concept of anyone besides herself, had become the poor, miserable creature before me who had probably spent a good deal of time in gaol. Her once-fine hands were chapped, her one-prized hair was matted, and the figure she had watched so carefully was no nothing more than skin and bones. I could only guess at the experiences she had been through.
As I hurried to get her back to my lodging, so I could take a better account of what damage she had experienced, she retained her muddled confusion, and barely seemed able to walk.
Her refusal to stain my clean bed with her presumably filthy self almost broke my heart, simply because I remembered who and how she used to be. And then later, when I questioned her, and she broke down before me, I could not bear it to question her any further. I could only imagine what she had faced, especially considering how little she knew of hardship before the Revolution.
Instead, I shared my stories, acting out what seemed like an ages-old role as entertainer. She seemed to enjoy it greatly, but I noted that she almost seemed to regress, showing a childlike delight and curiosity. No doubt because of her trauma, and perhaps a little because of her physical state, and because she was finally safe and in the presence of a childhood friend, she was choosing to dwell in a safer and kinder past for a brief while.
And then she surprised me, with her serious face, as she explained how she would have to find employment. Her, in this state? Do housework? It had once been unthinkable that Elli might ever sully her hands with work, and now she was the one suggesting it when she could barely leave the bed.
And then her suggestion, her declaration that she could not stay, and her scandalized look upon realizing others might consider her my wench. I would have thought her back to her old self, oh-so-far above me, had she not almost immediately afterwards voiced concern for my life. If I were to call upon the Lady, it would be far more serious reasons than acquaintance with a Bonbon.
I smiled, instead, and distracted her with the bath.
Her listless attitude at the beginning worried me, because she had once been a far-from-listless girl, and I wondered if something had not happened to her while she had wandered the streets, and I wondered the worst. But her appetite seemed hearty, and she was just healing, for I soon began provoking her into conversations, working for that smile. After so much work and secrecy outside, plotting and planning with Shorvi while Whiss Valeur turned the world upside down, it was nice to come home to Elli, who always seemed to happy to see me.
Elli seemed to have changed a great deal, although she still seemed to have kept enough of her Exalted hauteur to cause me to lose his temper on occasion. I had to watch myself, however – losing my temper no would no longer be defiance against the Exalted system, but more like the bullying of a young girl, a pang I felt sharply when she shrank away from me one day after a careless comment and looked around the room pensively.
To make it up to her, I bought her a length of cloth, which she worked diligently on for the next few days until I came home one day and she was beautiful again. It took a bit more to convince her to look in the mirror, which I had noticed she never did anymore, but the genuine delight on her face was worth it.
Then, I convinced her to leave the boarding house, and although she began by almost cringing every time she met so one, so fearful of the Van Guardsmen, she soon regained her vigor, and even shared with me a little of what she had been through.
Of course, the reignited vigor and vivacity almost meant her curiosity knew no bounds, and she began asking about my peculiar habits she’d surely only noticed before.
And then Nirienne was arrested and my world seemed to end. I returned home, where Elli immediately took care of me, but our different worldviews and the way she just didn’t understand meant, of course, that we quarreled. She had not changed quite so much as I thought she would, and I was too consumed with despair to rein in my pronunciations for her sake. But she did come up with an idea, of her uncle Quinz, and it ended up being a good thing.
I had been fond of Elli for a while, and found myself truly attached to her as she healed within my home. And of course, that kiss, well perhaps it had been a bit presumptuous of me, and afterwards, seeing the confusion in her eyes, I felt badly, as if I had taken advantage of her.
I knew I truly loved her when I returned home, and learned that she had been captured. Taken to the Sepulchre.
----
“And how did the politicking go today?” Elli asked as she finished sewing her last ribbon and move on to the beads.
“Not quite so well,” Dref sighed. “Tomorrow, we’ll negotiate with your very own Exalted Feronte, and we shall all try to rein in our tempers as his counsel seems most exasperating. Can you tell anything about the man himself?”
“He …” Elli’s hands stilled. “I had forgotten he was alive. He is somewhat of a proud and arrogant man, and he is only willing to covet something for so long before he takes decisive steps about the matter. He is ruthless and unscrupulous, and at least before the Revolution, was not afraid to use magic to get what he wanted.”
“That is not what I had heard about his politics,” Dref observed, eyeing his wife carefully.
“Oh, I don’t know anything about his politics,” Elli said with faux cheer. “That was the attitude with which he approached women. What are the negotiations about?”
“His lands, and whether he is entitled to any of them, or his possessions. He unfortunately has quite a few foreign dignitaries on his side, and holds a position abroad as well, so we cannot dismiss him as summarily as we might like.”
“Hm, I might bring you your lunch tomorrow, in the midst of the negotiations,” Elli said impishly. “I have not seen him in so long.”
“Elli, the negotiations are a serious matter.” He hesitated. There was an odd look in her eyes, and he gave up. She would do what she will.
The next day, everyone else shot him dirty looks when Elli interrupted the ever-important procedures with his lunch.
“Oh, Your Grace,” she addressed Feronte with what seemed like genuine surprise, “I didn’t know you were here.”
Feronte did not seem to recognize her.
“Oh, don’t you recognize me? I am, or rather, was, Eliste vo Derrivalle,” she said in a delighted tone. “We were at court together shortly before the Revolution!”
Dref noted with interest as something flashed in Feronte’s eyes. Perhaps negotiations would go better because of Elli’s timely intervention.
“In fact, you courted me for quite a while,” Elli tittered. “I was so flattered, but of course, you were so old and the last suitor I would want.” Dref didn’t wince internally at the slight, because he knew Elli must have uttered it on purpose.
“I think I do remember you,” Feronte said. “The willful and spoilt girl from Fabeque with the dreadful accent who didn’t know what was best for her.”
“Heavens, I still don’t do what is best,” Elli trilled. “But I remember how furious you were everytime I refused you. You had such a look on your face. No wonder you tried to use magic to coerce me into your chambers.”
At that pronunciation, all motion stilled.
“I’m afraid-“
“Oh, I remember the locket you sent me, with the perfume that clouded my mind and that convinced me to accept a dinner invitation in an inappropriate situation and even almost forced me into your room. You know, even considering my life on the streets after the Revolution, what with all the crimelords wanting me to work whorehouses, that is still the closest I came to losing my virtue?”
Dref was very carefully not clenching his fists.
----
The first time Elli threw a dinner party, it was almost a disaster.
----
“I didn’t know Dref was keeping a girl in his lodgings,” Bulaude said, “and now he’s marrying her?”
“What sort of girl is she?” the other Bulaude wanted to know.
“She’s a Bonbon, I heard,” __ said, “which I think is so surprising.”
“Out of character for Beq,” Bulaude observed. “I didn’t expect him to go for one of those wispy, helpless types.”
“Come now, we should not gossip,” Shorvi admonished them. “Besides, Elli is a sweet, courageous girl. I think she will be good for him.”
“Have you met her, Shorvi?” Bulaude asked, surprised.
“It would be like Beq to parade her before you for your approval,” __ noted. “He idolizes you.”
“Beq is perfectly capable of making his own decisions about his betrothed,” Shorvi admonished. “Anyway, we’ve all met her.”
“We have?” Bulade asked, surprised. “I don’t think I remember.”
“It would be a hard day to forget,” Shorvi smiled. “She was to be the first executed the day Kokotte fell.”
They were all silent for a moment.
“You mean, that girl, with the blonde hair and the brave eyes who was to be executed with us?” Bulaude asked surprised. “I do remember her being a Bonbon, yes. That is Beq’s sweetheart?”
“So we weren’t the only ones he was rescuing that day,” the other Bulaude smiled.
“In fact, as far as I understand, she had been captured in the process of rescuing us,” Shorvi continued, “for Beq’s sake of course – she didn’t know us and couldn’t really care less about us.”
“Is she not a Nirienniste? I don’t see how Beq could stand for that.”
“She’s Exalted – communism is against her very being,” Beq said wryly, entering the conversation. “But I knew her before I knew of Nirienne, so you will forgive me this lapse in ideology.”
“Shall we meet her?” Bulaude wanted to know. “Formally, I mean, not in a cart about to die.”
“Of course. In fact, you are all invited to my place this weekend for some sort of dinner.”
“You must tell us how you met.”
“Why, as I said, we practically grew up together. I was a serf on her lands – and when her father was about to kill me, she set me free.”
“How romantic!” Bulaude fake-swooned.
“Except, of course, that she, in all her Exalted arrogance, assumed I would come back once my shackles were cut, and of course I didn’t. I didn’t see her against until after the Revolution.”
“And what had she been doing?” __ wanted to know.
“Oh, she had been making do on the streets, when I came across her, and she has stayed in my lodgings since. I did not, of course, realized she loved me until yesterday, when she proposed.”
“She proposed? Beq, you must be getting too slow.”
“I had not realized she would say yes if I did. But now I am to be happily married,” Beq smiled.
“Well as long as you are happy, that is most important,” the other Bulaude said dubiously. “Only, will she be able to withstand all the politicking you shall have to do – it’s not quite for the faint of heart.”
“She was trained for Exalted politics, and has lived through street politics, and she has yet survived and gotten stronger, and truly, I’m not planning on going quite the full extent in politics.”
