apostatised | [log] set their sights on something new while there's still something left

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[log] set their sights on something new while there's still something left

When Doul arrives, he'll be met at the guarded nexus door by a young Arum man by the name of Ewar, who introduces himself as his Lordship's swordmaster and informs the older man he'll be escorting him to aforementioned Lord.

Castle Valdis is...an interesting place. Old, very old, but much of it seems new or at least fresh clean; recently renovated, much of that only recently complete. It's a life's work, this place, and Martel is happy to make it his. The lights that follow through the building are seemingly glass torches, lit up with enchanted fire by a command. (Some of the Arum men seem more used to it than others, but they all take it roughly in stride.)

The staffing is sparse, only the necessities, and Doul is led to Martel's library - to which the most effort has been devoted in restoration. It's an impressive room, and large. Martel, lately Lord of Valdis, is at one of the tables nearer the fireplaces and their cushioned armchairs, bent over a choice of maps and family histories.

"Thank you, Ewar," he says, without looking up and almost before the door is quite open.

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Doul takes a moment to pause and reflect before answering," I know that you haven't seen any proof of this, but I am a competent soldier, comfortable with teaching, although it may not be in the styles known on this world."

"That being said, I've been out at sea for more than a decade, and I've never been overly fond of horses. Although, if needs be, I can work with them. Just as if you need someone to just haul stone and rebuild, I can do that too." He's not sure if he really ought to offer the last of his skills, but it's too tempting not to. "But, all of that aside, if what you need is a man to work in your library, I would be more than happy to help there. I love knowledge, books, and I was an accountant for a time. I am also familiar with books that cannot and should not be read by the untrained or handled by the unwary."

And we have a winner - the last sentence is probably one of the more important when one considers the sort of man Martel is and what some of the books upstairs likely contain. "An accountant, truly."

...he can manage his own money, but it wouldn't hurt, now, would it? "That aside - it is what I need, yes. It needs maintained, and give me a hundred years or so and I might have things slowed down enough that I can handle that myself," wry, rueful, not entirely kidding, "but in the meanwhile, yes. There are books such as those in the collection, and I'd prefer not to hand them off to someone who'll damage or be damaged by. Your experience?"

"I was the third son of a well-off Livehouse, so I went into trade, and it turned out that the man I was apprenticed to was involved in a few of the odder mystery cults and for whatever reason, he moved me from the business side of things to the cult library." It's not a particularly glamorous story, but nothing really is when you're fifteen. "They hadn't really done anything to sort their books other than box them by size, and I learned how to care for them through trial and very dramatic errors."

"Livehouse," Martel murmurs, echoing, curious - given his own mix of blunt honesty and reticence, he's not instantly interrogating Doul about his own universe of origin. It interests him, though, the notion of it.

"I have an inventory of the collection as it is presently - books that require a warning are marked on it, and I store them locked in the upper level - that you might look at. Some of the languages will be, I suspect, very foreign to you - some of them I'm only learning now myself."

"As opposed to a Deadhouse, which we may well be by now, it's been quite some time since I went back and they had been doing quite well for themselves." Everyone knew it when Livewife Doul had herself put down and became a Deadwife.

"I will do what I can, with the ones I can read, and those that I can't, I will leave in as good or better condition."

"Very, very good." Martel is pleased, quietly. "Then we should discuss the matter of payment."

Which will, in fact, turn out to be pretty decent money, as well as naturally the offer of room and board.

A small young woman with reddish curly hair, a long sleeveless dress, and a hefty box of books in her arms comes in at that moment. She obviously isn't aware of the current occupants' presence, as she is focused on something else, which is scolding a handyman with her in her heavily accented broken English.

"No! I carry, you go outside. I am the boss of this house when Master goes away-" She still slips and uses 'Master' on occasion, though she isn't any longer a slave and certainly has never been the property of anyone in this household. "-and I know you."

Langler stop trying to get fresh with Eirene, she will seriously hurt you. She shuts the door in his face with a kick, and then turns, eyes widening slightly when she sees Martel- she hasn't yet spotted his company at this angle. The box, you see, is still partly in the way.

"Lord?" Ah, there's the correct title.

Doul is very reasonable when it comes to matters of payment; so long as he's able to save for the things Nuala wants and he can keep himself fed, housed, and well provisioned, there's little else that he wants.

"I would also like the chance to practice outside, with the others, if that's agreeable?" It wouldn't do to let his skills get too rusty by spending all his time buried in stacks of books, scrolls, and curious tomes.

It's also worth mentioning that his voice is probably unlike Pullo's in that it's constantly being described by his original author as being ridiculously beautiful. No, really.

"You're quite welcome. I'd be more than happy to join you, as a matter of fact-" Martel likes to keep himself sharp against opponents who might actually equal or even in some respects better him...teaching is interesting, but a man of his skill bores without challenge.

Eirene's entrance distracts him, and he rises with a sort 'one moment' gesture. "Eirene. You have neat timing, madam, I'm in the process of acquiring this library management of its own."

He refrains from offering to help her with the heavy load, perhaps because he's aware it's only a matter of time before she actually hits him with her wooden spoon.

She starts to set the box down, smiling a little in acknowledgment of Martel (a rarity- she's a solemn creature with all she's been through, and her expressions, though present, are subtle things), and then she sees Uther Doul and the box of books goes crashing to the ground.

She's quite pale.

Doul starts in place, but to his credit, does not immediately reach for a weapon. Instead he cocks his head to one side and looks between the Eirene and Martel; what's going on here, has something happened?

"Ma'am?"

...something is going on in Eirene's head and Martel has no idea what it is, but he follows her gaze sharply back to Doul before he shakes his head shortly and moves forward for the books. "You recognize this man?" Marvel at his uncharacteristically gentle approach to this; possibly he didn't much like the last time he made her cry.

Eirene won't cry- or, at least, not in front of anyone else. She doesn't, easily, except after her death, when she was processing; even refused to on her deathbed. Now, of course, she's staring at both men like this is some kind of insane, sick joke. Certainly she'd briefly entertained the possibility of Pullo appearing in the Nexus, but she never wanted to think about it for fear she'd pin her hopes on it.

Except It didn't sound like him. That would be both better and worse.

"Pullo?" she tries, uncertainly. "Titus Pullo?"

Yes, the have the same face, but there are many other differences; no laidback confidence, but a more serious, introspective man and the armour he's wearing isn't the same; it's some sort of light, grey shirt with heavier, odder things woven through it in bars that reflect light.

"No. My name is Uther Doul, formerly of Armada and before that High Cromlech. I am sorry, but I ... I do not know anyone by that name."

...Martel thinks damn it all and kneels to shuffle all those books that spilled back into the box so he can lift it himself with relative ease. "Master Doul is entering my employ," he says, mildly. If Eirene objects, and has fair reason to object, for all gods' sake let her do it quickly and not after it'll be more difficult to be rid of the man.

'What the devil is going on' is implied.

No objection comes- rather, another one of those silences of hers. Though she's not really a talkative thing under any circumstance, is she? Eirene breathes out, and nods, as though to herself. That's not Pullo. That's someone who looks very, very like him, and she needs to get over it.

Or suppress it until she can deal with this.

"Eirene," she says, "Sorry I--drop this--"

Martel already has the books handled. She thinks she should get out of this room, which requires walking, which requires coherent thought and not shattering into tiny pieces, even though that sort of feels like what's actually happening. She looks to Martel for dismissal.

He's racking his own memory to see if he can place her face at any point in his life, but there's nothing. "No, please, forgive me. I'm trying to think of anyone I know by that name, or.... I look a little like my brothers, but none of them would give up their family name."

Looks like someone has not heard about alternates or cognates or whatever you want to call this. Doppelgangers?

Martel regards Eirene for a few silent seconds, studying, and then he inclines his head, getting better a grip on the book box. "Go back to your duties. I'll be in my tower this evening if you have anything you'd like to discuss." If not, he's choosing not to press any further than that - for the time being.

Doul will get an explanation of alternates - and the nexus and its dead - very shortly, most like; he's briefly ignored while Martel dismisses her, though.

"You are not Roman," she informs Doul, stiffly, like she's afraid of herself- being too emotional is not acceptable, "you are not him, nothing is your fault. Sorry. Going."

So she goes, but- not without a long look over her shoulder at the man who is not her husband but bears the strangest resemblance. That wasn't smart of her to do to herself, but she's always half-scared she'll forget Pullo's face once enough time passes.

If Langler tries to talk to her when she walks down the hall, she is going to punch him.

"No, nor do I know Roman." This would be the exact moment that Doul first decides that he might well hate the Nexus and all its damn oddities of time and space. He's used to having an air of tragedy around him, but this is something new and painfully unpleasant.

He watches her go before awkwardly sitting back down. Now what? At the best of times he's not very good with people and their real emotions, and this is no exception.

Martel sets the box on a table, exhaling (not quite a sigh) in Eirene's wake. He rejoins Doul, with a slightly pensive expression. "Let me explain something about the nexus to you."

"Please. I have been trying to get my head around this place and it's not easy." Doul is perfectly comfortable with theories of multiple realities, but only in so far that they exist and then collapse the waveform to create one, true world.

"The multiverse has many, many universes - some are similar, most aren't. Unfortunately, it only seems to have so many lives to be lived or faces to be worn. You share one, apparently, with a man in Eirene's past." He grimaces, briefly, and goes on, "A bad habit of the nexus is resurrection outside of reality. I was killed in my own universe, awoke in the nexus, and later I came here. Eirene had an experience that I wouldn't hardly call similar, but yes, she's died once before. I found her in the nexus and brought her here, she manages the household."

He considers how to finish this. "From what I've discerned, her death was horrific and her life previous had been largely as a slave. I don't know who it is she mistook you for, and I'm not going to ask her unless she feels the need to share it."

"I only ever worked on theories of parallel realties that closely mirrored my own - nigh-worlds that collapse upon interaction with the daily, stable reality - but what you're saying makes sense." The fact that the dead can reappear here is something that worries him a little, but if the Lovers re-emerge from wherever dead, sadistic fucks go, Doul is confident that he'll be able to take their heads before they get too far.

"I don't know how you would like to work around this, but I will trust your judgement on what's best." And if it goes against what he's comfortable with, he'll leave.

It irritates him a little; not personally directed at either of them, but that the situation has to exist in the first place. Martel's an irritable sort of man, though, and he's very good at covering it up when he wants to. "The duties you take here and hers needn't overlap much at all. For the moment, I'd like to let our agreement stand; I'll speak with her myself if it's necessary. If it can't work out after an initial period - a month or so? - then I'll pay you for your time and you can take your leave."

"That's more than reasonable," he says in the tone of voice that hints at fact that he had been used to dealing with previous employers who were not so fair. "Now, would it be the wrong time to ask for a brief tour of your library? I know very little about this place and your world."

Martel can be a ruthlessly vicious bastard, but he tends to find he gets better results treating his employees decently. "I'd be happy to show you. We'll see which of the languages you recognize, first of all-"

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[log] set their sights on something new while there's still something left

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