2021-12-26 - Asshole Ancestors

(TXT to Jules) Una : Sooooo elves on the shelf r alive and horny

(TXT to Jules) Una : And wanted a 3some w my roomies.

(TXT to Jules) Una : MERRY CHRISTMAS.

(TXT to Una) Jules : Wtf

(TXT to Jules) Una : it sat on my shoulder

(TXT to Jules) Una : sooooooooo creeepy

(TXT to Una) Jules : Sorry I turned off my phone yesterday but srsly wtf

(TXT to Jules ) Una : this place is fucked up

(TXT to Jules) Una : but its fine

(TXT to Jules) Una : no elf sex was had

(TXT to Una) Jules : Well that’s a relief

(TXT to Jules) Una : fr me too

(TXT to Jules) Una : not my thing

(TXT to Jules) Una : hope things r ok with ur x

(TXT to Una) Jules : Yeah he came over cuz he heard but it was ok

(TXT to Jules) Una : ugh ok.

(TXT to Una) Jules : Tell me more bout the elf

(TXT to Una) Jules : how did this happen

(TXT to Jules) Una : xmas party at #4. it kept moving around& then sat on my shoulder & played with my hair. R & Gail wr there. Kept flirting and chatting & asked bout roommates til it decided I wasn't into it. So it left. Then I came home & got drunk.

(TXT to Una) Jules : whos gail? also who lives at 4?

(TXT to Jules) Una : Gail does. She's the grandma-y lady? seems nice.

(TXT to Jules) Una : cept then I commented on 3somes and THAT was awful

(TXT to Una) Jules : havent met her

(TXT to Jules) Una : friendly. evry1s friendly here. itsnice.

(TXT to Jules) Una : u ok? ur going to cm back?

(TXT to Una) Jules : yeah cant sit at home 4evr

(TXT to Jules) Una : good. quiet here. itll b ok.

(TXT to Una) Jules : maybe come back today

(TXT to Una) Jules : not quiet here everyone and their mother stopping by

(TXT to Una) Jules : literally

(TXT to Jules) Una : cool. there's beer.

(TXT to Jules) Una : ugh

(TXT to Una) Jules : ill get ready tell nans

(TXT to Jules) Una : yay! ill b here. drive safe.

(TXT to Una) Jules : b there in about an hr

(TXT to Jules) Una : c u soon!

Roughly an hour later, Jules’ old Camry pulls up outside Number 5 as promised. She gets out with her backpack a minute later, heading straight in. She’s in fleecy pants and a sweatshirt with the hood pulled up—the definition of cozy and casual, like comfort food for the body. Inside, she heads straight for the kitchen (all good things start in the kitchen), greeting Una with, “So where’s your little elf buddy?”

(TXT to Una) Ravn : Are you guys OK in there? I don't want to be nosy, but our yard is full of very small footprints. Mind if I check yours?

(TXT to Ravn) Una : ohshit. hadnt looked. come on over, J just got home.

Una's equally dressed down, slouching around the kitchen in a way that speaks to her having been here a while: it is her room of choice. She's peering at her phone, typing furiously, and when she glances up? "Possibly mistaking Ravn's front yard with ours, as it happens. Hi, Jules. Merry Christmas, and welcome home."

Hopping the fence between the two back yards is no big deal when one is six foot three. Ravn does so -- and in not much longer, wanders up to the back door to knock on it. It's the polite thing to do, after all, when you wander around someone else's yard: Tell them what you're doing.

"Thanks," Jules says, dropping her backpack on the floor and then heading to the fridge to peer inside. As promised, there's the beer. She pulls out two, pops the tabs, and holds one of the cans out for Una. Right down to business, apparently. "I got it." She heads for the back door, pulling it open. "Hey. So I hear you have a horny elf problem too."

When better for day-drinking than Christmas (or those liminal days just following, for that matter)? Una accepts the beer, and tucks her phone into her pocket, hoisting herself up to sit atop one of the (scrupulously clean) counter tops. "Hi Ravn," she greets, her new position at least giving her the height to confirm the Dane's presence in the doorway. "Are there really footprints in your yard?"

"Mnah, looks to me like your yard is clean," Ravn says and glances over his shoulder. "Have had enough snow decide to not melt in ours that I could tell how many little foot prints we have -- but I'm not sure it's that weirdass elf, to be honest. We have a fairy circle -- you know, one of those circles of mushrooms. Might just be that the local whatevers had their solstice celebration in our yard -- in which case I appreciate how quiet they've been about it. Figured I'd better check, though."

He blinks as Una places that question though, and then cants his head a little. "Why, did you think I'd just come up with the most absurd pick-up line in the history of mankind, topped only by the 'want to share some Christmas magic' that that elf threw at you?"

Jules lets out a low laugh, then steps back with the door still open in invitation for Ravn to join them in the kitchen. "Want a beer? Merry Christmas." Those are the order of current priorities.

Una considers Ravn response for a moment - and then laughs. "Point taken. That would be ridiculously absurd, even for this town." 'Fairy circles' and their related solstice celebrations don't cause so much as the blink of an eye-- today, at least.

"Anyway: thanks for checking. I haven't been outside today, and honestly, wouldn't have thought to look."

"Not going to say no to a beer since I'm here anyway." Ravn can't resist a smile. "But trust me, great pick-up lines -- someone else's job. My idea of flirting tends to be convincing myself it's not worth the effort and going home instead."

He glances back over his shoulder and points a gloved finger at the lower end of the yard of number 3. "The fairy circle's real enough, though. I'm no botanist but I'm told that the two kind of shrooms that it's made up from shouldn't share the same biotope, and welcome to Gray Harbor, we don't do anything the normal way around here. I might put out a bottle of milk and a glass of Tylenol tablets for them tonight."

So Jules goes back to the fridge and pulls out a third can to offer up. "Flirting's not about pick-up lines anyway," she opines. "Not if you're doing it right." She opts for sitting on one of the counters, just like Una, legs dangling until she rearranges and pulls them up to sit cross-legged, mindful to keep the soles of her shoes from touching the top surface. "Why are there fairy circles here anyway? That seems like it should be an Ireland thing, not an Olympic Peninsula thing. I expect like...spirits in the trees. Talking animals. I guess Una's elf, because Christmas invades everything. Fairies, though." She shrugs and sips her beer.

"I'll drink to that," is Una's opinion on flirting (and/or pick-up lines; it's hard to tell), and her beer can is lifted in perfunctory toast to confirm it.

She casts Jules a thoughtful, side-long glance, and then supposes, "Probably because someone imagined them as such, once upon a time, and they sprung into being accordingly. But you're right-- the traditional thing would make more sense. 'Sense', however, is not exactly something Gray Harbor seems to do all that well, sooooo." She shrugs, easily. "I'm learning to deal."

"Why is there anything? Because there are people here of Irish or Celtic descent, and the Veil plucks our stories out of our heads." Ravn rests a hip against the kitchen table, opting to remain standing. He curls gloved fingers around the beer can and opens it. "If someone believes in it, or knows a story about it -- it seems that it can become real. I'm pretty certain I've been the spawn point for a couple of Scandinavian folklore themed stories. Also met the Thunderbird once -- definitely not of Danish origin, you know?"

He nods at Una and salutes her with the can. "I'll drink to that. Because sense is optional, and we just learn to deal."

"Huh." That's all Jules has to say for the next couple moments, sitting there with a hunch in her shoulders and nursing her beer. "Just learning to deal." Bitterness infuses her tone as she repeats Ravn's words. "So how far does learning to deal go? Little elf bastards? Raven carrying off your things? Hold-ups when you go shopping? Mind control?"

Una winces, her expression turning immediately apologetic, aimed first at Jules, and then, a little bashfully, at Ravn: failure to avoid sensitive topic, check.

"There was an... incident before Christmas," she says, by way of explanation. "But that wasn't part of the Gray Harbor weirdness. That was just some person being fucked up and thinking guns solve problems, and that is endemic across the entirety of this fine land."

"Dealing goes pretty damn far." Ravn wipes the grin off his face. "I'm told that mind control is very, very difficult, at least. But there have been dream experiences where I found myself to be someone else -- and I didn't always remember who I was supposed to be. Most of the time, though, you do know. Then it's more like acting out a part in a story, though of course there's the little aspect that when the story goes boom, everything explodes, the fire and the shrapnel is not imaginary."

He pauses and glances at Una before nodding. "And of course we got the same amount of fucked up people that anywhere has. Do I dare ask?"

Now Jules swings her feet off the edge of the counter again; she's restless, and she wants to kick her heels against the cabinets below. "Fucking white people and their guns." She mutters it with enough venom for it to be a curse. She does not apologize, even if Ravn and Una get lumped in, doesn't even look up with a trace of apology that would communicate 'present company excepted.' "How do you even know what's weird and what's just people being assholes? Couple days before Christmas, some guy at a store was ranting about how he wanted a PS5 and threatening to blow faces off with his shotgun."

Una is wise enough (in this instance, at least) not to protest her inclusion in this particular group (unless, of course, one counts the way she wrinkles her nose). What she does do is aim a sympathetic glance at the other woman, and agree, "It's a crappy thing, whatever the cause."

But the difference between weird and people being assholes? That bit is all Ravn's: she doesn't have an answer.

"I don't know, not when a dream looks like normal. Everyone's suddenly in medieval period costume and also, there is a dragon? Not hard to tell. Gremlins decide to sabotage the electrical wiring at Safeway, getting people killed? There's no way of knowing until you see one." Ravn shakes his head and seems to not really disagree a whole lot with Jules' disregard for solving problems by shooting at them.

"But speaking of Safeway, I was there just before Christmas when three absolutely not Dream gunmen decided to shoot the place up for some reason known only to them and possibly some police psychiatrist. And I will say this for Gray Harbor -- instead of random shoppers getting dropped by accident, they got chased off by the ghost of Jacob Marley and a bombardment of flying, frozen turkeys, thanks to Kailey Holt and Perdita Leontes. Having these powers sometimes solves bad situations, too."

He sips his beer. "Personally? I own a firearm because a friend told me I need one, but it stays in its box in my room. I am not going to start walking around town like some kind of gunslinger."

"No one needs guns," Jules answers fiercely, pinning a glare on Ravn. "I thought you Europeans were better about that." Her glare lasts several seconds -- Jules is understandably angry at the world, at present -- before she releases a gusty, stress-laden sigh. "Anyway. You're right, about powers coming in handy. The policeman did something to the guy with the gun, and he turned it over. No one got shot."

"... 'the ghost of Jacob Marley and a bombardment of flying, frozen turkeys." Una's gained a habit of repeating things other people have said often, as is the case now, in a slightly incredulous tone - though today's incredulity is largely overshadowed by a distinct impression of her being very, very impressed.

"It was lucky. That it wasn't worse. That in both cases, injury was averted. I wonder if all the people with," her finger-wiggle is the best term she's got, "mean that there are fewer actual gun injuries here... though you were shot recently, so maybe not so much." Una's glancing back towards Ravn as she says that.

"Well, for one we require a bloody license to carry a piece around Main Street. The way anyone's allowed to carry here, as long as they don't hide it? It freaks my European ass out, not going to pretend otherwise." Ravn hitches a shoulder lightly; he's already stopped wearing the sling, thank you people with magical healing abilities.

"I've been shot twice in a year," he agrees. "Once, it had nothing to do with the Veil and everything to do with some crime gang's sniper getting me and Chief de la Vega mixed up -- apparently he couldn't conceive of the idea of a POC police captain and figured that the tall white guy had to be the mark. The other time -- the dream was gangsters during Prohibition, and the whole point was shooting up the joint. I think that we might actually have less random violence here. Because so many of us are able to, well, deal with things before they get out of hand."

"Huh." Jules mulls over this, quiet at length. Then, still quiet, she admits without looking up, "I just don't want to be another statistic. Another missing Indian girl."

Una hesitates over her drink, then expels a long, low breath of air. "I don't get to pretend I know what it's like being you, Jules," is what she says after a few moments of pause. "But I know that I have no desire to be a different statistic, so I do get that much. So... we'll just make sure we can protect ourselves. Right?"

Beat.

"Without guns." Obviously.

"I'm going to quote one of the people in Gray Harbor who has the most experience simply on basis of living here most of his life: Guns are not the solution in dreams. Guns can be used against you -- and there are things that can screw with the laws of physics, too. Once you pull the trigger, that lead ball is extremely dangerous in an environment where reality is fluid." Ravn nods again. "I have been in one dream where shooting them all was the solution, but it is not the norm and it's a very bad first choice."

Finally, Jules smiles -- a real one, one that softens her expression as she looks up and over at Una. "Right." She holds her gaze for a moment as if to communicate something passing from one woman to the other: roommates, friends, partners-in-weird. "I'm not picking up a gun," she states. "Instead, I'll just--learn how to start fires with my mind." A pause. "A guy showed me how to do that."

Una lets the corners of her mouth turn up, meeting Jules' gaze with the slightest tip of her head: an acknowledgement in turn.

"I dreamed about that fucking elf last night," she pivots, the moment gone. "But not in a weird Veil dream. Just - a normal dream. With normal weirdness. No guns, either. Or fire, though that sounds pretty cool. Anyway, I think I'm pretty comfortable with guns never being the solution, in dreams or outside of them. Violence, in general, except that I'm not naïve enough to trust it'll never be required in life."

"Fire seems to respond to a number of people here, yes." Ravn smiles; maybe he's thinking that when push comes to shove, setting a would-be gunman on fire is probably more useful than hoping to score a vital hit with a bullet, anyhow -- if for nothing else, then for the shock value. "My room mate, Aidan Kinney, does that too. Usually not by accident."

He looks at both women over the beer can. "I'm a firm believer in not solving problems with my fists. Doesn't always work out in this town -- but a lot of the time, there are better solutions. I loved Holt tossing up the chain rattling illusion of Jacob Marley -- heaven knows how much therapy those blokes are going to need but no one got hurt. I consider that a win."

"We have a ghost," Jules offers up, while they're on the subject of Jacob Marley. A glance across at Una; it's information about her house, after all. "At least that's what we think. No chain-rattling, yet. It did drop some books for me, but I didn't have a chance to look at them before the whole gun-waving madman incident. Did you, Una?"

"A very seasonal-- not to mention appropriate-- illusion," approves Una, with an abrupt grin and a gleam in her eyes; clearly, she's attempting to imagine the scene, and whether her mental pictures come anywhere near the reality-- well, it doesn't matter, does it?

"Our ghost," and yes, she's quite happy to talk about the spectre in question, "has been awful quiet the past few days. Then again, I haven't been into the library to check on it, either, and that seems to be where it prefers to hang out. As far as I can tell, it only seems to do things when we're around."

"I don't think anyone's really going to look very surprised if I tell you that Gray Harbor has a lot of ghosts?" Ravn offers a lopsided smile. "Most of them are just memories, though -- not really aware. My room mate is haunted -- not the house, him. He's got a poltergeist of a sorts who enjoys messing with him. Myself, I grew up in a haunted house, and it's not all that unusual for me to find myself cheerfully chatting with someone until I realise at some point that no one else can see them. Most ghosts are really not dangerous."

"Ours just startled me is all." With that, Jules drops off the counter and finishes the last swallow of beer. The can is set on the counter, in the spot she's just left. "You guys want to check out what the ghost left us? I didn't really see anything more than the titles since you were showing Della around, Una -- do you think she'll notice it, if she's normal?" Glimmer-free, that is. There's a gleam in Jules' eye, curiosity sparked. It's got to be better than all the anger and fear.

No, Una does not look surprised; indeed, she laughs. "I'm beginning to wonder if there is anything this place doesn't have a lot of, aside from, say, 'people' and 'modern big city conveniences'. I wonder, though, what makes a memory strong enough to stick around... or want to haunt someone specifically, for that matter."

Jules' suggestion has her sliding down, too, beer can deposited alongside the other. Her nod answers the other woman's invitation, though the question leaves her to pause, one hand on her hip as her head tips thoughtfully to the side. "People mostly don't notice things they can't explain, right? And it is an old house."

Ravn nods again. "Also depends on whether your ghost is something the Veil conjured up or not. If it is, someone without the shine will rationalise it away, or not really notice anything. Ghosts exist everywhere, though, and if it's 'just' a normal one, your friend might see as much as you do. In which case you'll know, at least, that it has nothing to do with the strangeness of Gray Harbor."

As far as Della is concerned, Jules determines, "I guess we'll find out soon enough." Then she sallies forth, headed for the library with a kind of eager determination that might just be a little feverish. "Come on."

"'Just' a normal ghost," repeats Una, laughing. "God, that's not something I would've imagined myself saying a few weeks ago. I was a sceptic!"

Jules' determination is not precisely mirrored in Una-- she's rather a lot more laid-back, following the other woman at an easy distance, with a backwards glance towards Ravn that comes accompanied by a smile. "I wasn't sure, at that point, whether we should have convinced Della against taking the room or not. But I suppose it'll play out as it will."

Ravn wanders after because why not? A lifetime of pretty much being that kid from The Sixth Sense and ghosts are not his greatest fear; it's not even in the top hundred. "While I don't know the lady in question, one might argue that living with people with the power here is probably safer than not. Things happen to the 'normal' people too -- they just don't remember, or they rationalise it away. And substantially more often than us, they don't escape with a minimum of harm."

Jules knows precisely where she laid down the two books--the empty side table, near the door, assuming the ghost in the library hasn't moved them around in the intervening week or so. "Haunted houses scare me a lot less than the stories I grew up with, where your dead ancestors will come get you if you're alone outside at night," she remarks, quite matter-of-fact. "I wonder what the difference is. Between a ghost and a spirit. Cause, like, this ghost doesn't fit the category I'm thinking of, unless it's one of Una's dead relatives." She pauses right there in the train-of-thought to look at the house's owner, suddenly a little chagrined. "But still, that doesn't work if you go by the spirits-come-for-you-outside reasoning. I wonder if they're a Veil thing. Maybe that's the difference." Now she's trying to reassure herself, too.

Ruefully; "I'd hate for poor Della to come to harm because she answered a ridiculous room-for-rent ad. So hopefully being here with us will keep her safe and sound." Una's distracted enough by this thought that it seems to take her a few moments to track through what Jules has been saying, and work out why, exactly, she's being looked at like that.

"Hey, if it's my grandmother, maybe that means I'll actually get to meet her-- sort of. Though, right, still doesn't fit that whole outside thing."

"I'm not sure there is a difference." Ravn looks around; from the expression on his face, calm and honestly quite unbothered, he might genuinely not even be all that surprised to see someone's dead grandmother pottering around in the shadows. "In pure terminology, ghosts were once alive while spirits can be something that was never human. Exception made for Christianity's Holy Ghost who seems to have been ignored in context."

"If she's the kind of ancestor spirit I'm talking about, you definitely don't want to meet her." Good job, Jules; it sounds ominous, hanging like that in the death-like air. Standing just inside the library, Jules picks up the books, turning them over in her hands. She holds out the hard-backed one, the life of the frontiersman, to the others in order to concentrate on the handwritten notebook. "In your terminology," she corrects Ravn meanwhile. "In the stories I grew up with, you have beings like Raven and Bear, people like Salmon Boy, and then there's the spirits of your dead ancestors. Way back when, before the settlers came, the Salish peoples would be scared to go outside alone at night. After they die, they come to find you and take you with them."

"Well," says Una, after a moment's pause, gaze sliding from Jules to Ravn and back again, "ghost or spirit-- I hope it's the harmless kind, because I'm definitely not particularly interested in being taken away by my dead ancestors. If it's even still here." She's crossed her arms over her chest, one hand on each shoulder; evidently she doesn't mean to accept the book, though she gives it a quick, thoughtful glance.

"Not going to tell you that academia doesn't take an anglocentric view." Ravn has been annoyed by it often enough as a Scandinavian, and that's still a close relative. "The fear of returning relatives coming to take you with them is not unusual to any culture, though. It refers to the way contagious diseases, malnutrition, or starvation will appear to wipe out entire families. Vampires, in their original Slavic incarnation, refer to the same phenomenon."

Ask a folklorist. Or you know, don't. If you don't want a lecture, definitely don't.

"Have you read the books?" Of course he's curious. There's a ghost and there's what looks like an old journal or log -- and even, helpfully, a proper book that just needs to be cut open and perused.

"Well I don't know about vampires and all that -- for what it's worth, Twilight is full of shit and we don't believe in werewolves and vampires. But guardian spirits, and spirit dancing, sure. Some people think there's two types of soul in one person, and that's separate from the ghost aspect altogether. And maybe other cultures think some of the same things, but maybe it's actually real here, with the way that the world here gets...thin." Jules isn't quite showing off, but it's a pointed display of native knowledge in contrast to Ravn's. He might be the folklorist, but these are her ancestral lands. To get back to the main subject: "Anyway, the ghost here seems fine. It didn't abduct you while I was gone, and it's shown up in the daytime, anyway." Jules squints at the notebook she's holding, turning a couple pages to try to get a sense of just what it is. "Is this some kind of diary?"

Una is going to say... exactly nothing, in relation to this topic about which she knows very little. Instead, she takes a few more steps into the room, peering through the bookcases in an idle kind of way. "Can you read it?" to Jules. And; "I assume the contents of the books must be important, somehow? A message? Unless of course they're completely random, and the whole point was just to make a noise."

"The book was written by someone who might be a relative of mine." The surname is the same, at least, and this is her grandmother's house. "I don't know about the other."

Also? "Fuck, I hate this room. It's just creepy somehow."

"Twilight is pure and utter tripe. It manages to ruin or dilute every single myth it comes into contact with." Ravn trails a gloved fingertip over the cover of the old, uncut book, tempted. "I know entirely too little about First Nation myths. One thing I do know, though, is that the Veil doesn't give a fig about historical correctness, either. Don't be too surprised if you end up fighting Injuns and redskins out of a John Wayne movie some day, all how and ugh and me white man's blood brother. Some day, I'm going to find myself on the set of Vikings, and I swear to God, I will grab one of those medieval swords not actually invented for another two hundred years, and beat the script writers to a pulp with it."

That gets a laugh out of Jules, after the initial nose-wrinkling idea of ending up in a Cowboys and Indians script. She turns a kinder look on Ravn for the Veil's offenses on his own culture. "Me, I'd probably try to switch sides and beat some sense into those idiots." As for the notebook in her hands, she tries a few more pages, then ends up shaking her head and offering it to Ravn. "It's really hard to read." Cursive, not her strong point. "Here, you try, Mr. Ph.D., see if you can read it."

"Need a knife?" Una's nodding towards the old book, offering more-than-tacit permission for those uncut pages to be, well, cut. "Maybe we should take them into the kitchen, where the light's better? In any case--" She unfolds her arms, finally, dropping hands back to her sides. "I think we can all agree that Twilight did this part of the country no favours, not to mention the general quality of literature, and Hollywood is no better than the Veil at historical accuracy and..." She trails off, seemingly having lost her train of thought. "I'm just glad there's nothing I care about so much the butchery of its accuracy will bother me."

"I don't care very much about historical accuracy unless something tries to pass itself off as accurate. If it does that, it damn well better have done its research. Fantasy series based loosely on Norse sagas? Go for it. The cold, wind-swept mountains of Schleswig? Excuse me while I point out that that's my homeland, and that while we did name our tallest hill Sky Mountain, it does in fact not even reach five hundred metres above sea level." Ravn grins a little and then nods. "Let's get that book to proper light, and use a proper knife. It'd be a shame to tear a page by accident. Disrespectful, too."

“Tell that to the Twilight tourists,” Jules mutters, rolling her eyes. “I swear to God, working the tourist season around here is the worst. It’s not so much that they think any of this is real, it’s just that the hundredth question about my ‘pack’ and if I’ve fallen for any sparkling teens is fucking annoying. They all think they’re so clever and I’ve heard it all be for.” Grumble grumble, all the way into a spot with better light.

Una's mental arithmetic comes up with a figure-in-feet for the height of Ravn's so-called mountain, and her smirk says it all: mountain, ha. Of Twilight tourists she has nothing further to say, aside from the fairly evocative wrinkling of her nose.

Back in the kitchen, all the lights turned on against the dim light of this cloudy winter's afternoon, Una opens one of the drawers to hunt around for something with which to perform the incision. "Does it need to be sharp? Or blunt? I know of pages that haven't been cut, but I've never seen any, let alone actually cut them open."

Ravn snorts into his beer and then wipes his mouth with a gloved hand. "Sorry," he murmurs, chuckling. "I shouldn't laugh. I really shouldn't. I'm just reminded of a Canadian girl I travelled with for a while -- she was First Nations too. Told me how back home, American tourists would always ask them about the igloos and the polar bears. She lived half an hour from the border."

He pauses. "And of course, I had a Chinese exchange student in Copenhagen ask me once if we still have a lot of trouble with those Viking natives. Blunt and narrow, a letter knife is the best choice."

"People are such idiots." Rolling her eyes -- and, let's admit it, snorting out a little sneeze of amusement for the Vikings remarks, which hit less close to home -- Jules goes back to sitting on the counter (it's a favorite perch around here, it seems) and leaning forward to get a look of the operation Ravn's about the undertake.

"'Viking natives'," chokes out Una, still rummaging in the drawer, although at least she's now doing so with purpose: blunt and narrow, got it. "Something something, xenophobia and shittily insular education systems, something something."

Triumphant, she draws a letter opener out the drawer, a little over-dramatic: sword in the stone! "You want to do the honours? Gotta say, I'm a little afraid of accidentally tearing the wrong something."

"We keep them on special ocean reservations," Ravn replies, perfectly straight-faced. "Sometimes they sail in to burn down hotels and carry off rich tourists."

He settles properly at the kitchen table to inspect the old journal before tentatively inserting the letter opener into one of the folded sleeves. It may not be the first time he's cut open an old-fashioned book like this; at least the incision is precise, and the page does not tear. "I'll do my best," he promises. "At least the paper is decent quality -- some of the penny dreadfuls of the early 20th century were printed on what was basically tabloid paper, and they pretty much fall apart when you try to cut them open."

“Whoa.” Jules jerks back, staring wide-eyed at the now flying book. “You didn’t do that, right?” she thinks to check, briefly glancing at Ravn. After the initial startling, Jules’ curiosity gets the better of her. “Do you guys feel that?”

"I did not do that," Ravn murmurs and lowers the letter opener in case the thing feels threatened, somehow. "I think your ghost may be doing this, though. One could get the impression it does want you to read this book -- but also that it is not so keen on it."

He looks at the book. "Bob once for only Una gets to read you? Twice for Jules, three times for me being entirely off the mark here?"

Una takes several steps backwards in rapid succession: back from the table, further back from the book itself. "That doesn't make sense," she says, frustrated, her eyes trained on the book. "Why would it want, but also not want, to be read? That's completely counter-productive."

“It’s about your relative, right?” Jules asks as the book spasms in the air. “Maybe it’s embarrassed.” She doesn’t move from the counter, considering their options with a little frown. “I’m glad you’re here to think of stuff like that,” even if Ravn’s directions weren’t entirely successful. “If it was just me, I’d just try to grab it and hold it open. Which I’m now thinking isn’t such a great idea. Don’t want to force it.” After a pause, she addresses the book herself. “You wanna come sit with me?” Her hand pats the counter at her side.

The Dane nods his agreement. "Needing something to be read is not the same as wanting anyone to read. I think that might translate to -- residents only?" He hands Jules the letter opener. "You do the honours if it will allow you. If what's inside pertains to local history, I might be able to offer up some suggestions -- not that I'm a local by any means, but at least I've lived here more than a few weeks."

"It doesn't need to be embarrassed on my behalf," says Una. "I don't particularly feel any connection to them. Or this, whatever it is." If her voice is slightly louder than it needs to be, perhaps that's just to reassure the book (or rather, whatever is propelling the book, but books seem somehow easier to anthropomorphise).

She gives the book a wide berth as she edges around the table, reaching instead for the other book: the handwritten, if somewhat indecipherable, one, peering idly at its cover.

Taking the letter opener in turn, Jules proposes, “I’ll read out loud, if it’ll let me.” Her attention is on the book, then, and when it lands on the sealed section, she waits a moment to make sure it moves no further — or changes its mind, such as it may be — before reaching to take the book from the air and balance it on the counter. “I have to hold you to cut these open,” she murmurs, and then does exactly that.

Ravn reaches for his abandoned beer. As strangeness goes around here, books with avoidance issues aren't even registering on the scale of weird.

Una winces as the book makes that sound, but she also squares her shoulders against it: she's not looking at Jules, not looking at the book. Her tone, when she speaks, is very controlled but otherwise conversational. "How old is Gray Harbor anyway? Like, when was it founded? Because I'm sure the book talked about the 1860s, but Seattle is 1850s, if I remember my dates right, and..."

“Look, it’s okay,” Jules awkwardly tries to reassure the book. “No one’s mad at you.” Once the operation is finished, she sets the letter opener aside and, for lack of a better idea, pats the book at its corner. “There, all done. Let’s see what you have to say.” Instead of picking up the book again (it might spook), she leans over it to read.

"1880, roughly." Trust the local history guy to have looked that up. "The old lumber mill was built around then, and the town got officially founded at the same time. There were settlements here before that, though -- nothing worthy of the name of town, but the Baxter family was here earlier, at least. It was the Addingtons who built the saw mill, and they did that after whatever it was that tore the Veil wide open and started the feud. I imagine you need at least a handful of families in a place before you can convince anyone to draw up a town charter."

Una shoots Ravn a glance. "Ok, does that mean they did something that tore the Veil, or were they just there." Either way, she sounds unnerved by that-- maybe even more by that than the book itself, and whatever it contains.

“What feud?” Jules asks, but that’s before she stops paying attention to the others to concentrate on what she’s reading. Her frown deepens. “It’s not embarrassed because of Una,” she eventually says as she looks up. “It’s embarrassed because of me.” She pauses; let that sink in. To Una, she notes, “Sounds like your dead relative took things belonging to the Salish. Not sure which tribe, but most of us are related.” Her tone is as straight as her gaze; if she’s upset by the book’s revelation, it doesn’t much show beyond her downturned lips and the set of her jaw. Just one more old indignity.

"We don't know what exactly went down between the Baxters and the Addingtons back then. We do know the Baxters were here first, but the Addingtons built the lumber mill and made the money. And we do know that the feud between them goes that far back. But whether they somehow tore the Veil open -- or how, we don't know. My personal theory is that the Veil was always thin here, and somehow, the hotheads of both families managed to open a door to the ones we call dolorphages, the pain eaters. And they've been happily stoking the fires ever since, given they feed on human suffering."

Ask the local folklorist, etc.

Exposition done, Ravn focuses his attention on what Jules is reading. He taps a gloved finger against his lip and murmurs, "If this follows archetypal hauntings, our invisible friend here is either the writer or the last living -- formerly living -- person to know where these items are. Might want them restored to their rightful owners, peace in the afterlife, and so on. Making Things Right is a staple in this genre."

Does he view everything pertaining to the supernatural as essentially entries in an encyclopedia of the mind? Quite likely.

The exposition is fascinating, that much is clear from Una's sharp glance in Ravn's direction, the furrowing of her brow and thoughtfully pressed together lips. There are definitely more questions there, but for a later time-- Jules' explanation of the contents of the book have her pausing, drawing her shoulders back, and exhaling a lengthy sigh.

"Ok, my ancestors were trash, big surprise there. Does that... I guess that means it all probably still exists. So, yeah. Maybe we can fix it. 'Making things right'," a nod towards Ravn, "is a nice idea."

All of this — and most especially, Una’s assessment of her ancestor — summons a small quirk of Jules’ lips. It’s only a little bitter. “Are you Albert?” she asks the ghost at large, looking at the book. Definitely anthropomorphized.

"If you look hard enough, everyone's ancestors are trash, and the higher up in society you are, the more they were trash." Ravn shrugs lightly. "My family started cashing in on the early Crusades and they didn't lose money on the World Wars, either, so, I can probably trade you an asshole ancestor or two if you need to fill the bingo card."

Una is very much not looking at Jules apologetically right now: the ancestors have been disavowed, and that's clearly enough. "People in the past were fucked up," is her assessment. (Sadly, this means she doesn't ask whether Ravn's ancestors collaborated with the nazis or participated in the slave trade; that would be both rude and likely beyond her grasp of history.)

Jules reads out that title page for the others, then looks up. “So I take it that’s a yes.” Now she’s starting to sound a little pissed.

"At least we get a chance to make things right," Ravn points out to Jules. "It does feel good when karma wins in the end, doesn't it? Let's hear it. And then we go dig for it."

Una sounds only very slightly defensive when she says, "Ok, so my ancestor definitely was an asshole, but at least in death he's trying to make it right." Sure, it's only (as far as they know) when there's a native woman living in the house, but... "Right. So we'll figure out what he took, and we'll make it right. He's on our side now. It's late, but it's better than never."

“He is not on our side.” Jules’ tone is definitely a clue that Una’s in dangerous territory, here. She slides down from the counter she’s sitting on. “He stole ceremonial items for what he calls study while stealing our land. I don’t care if he feels bad about it now. The deed is done. Repatriating the things he stole is just a drop in the bucket.” To the book, voice flat: “Show is where you put them.”

Ravn glances at Una. "You're not responsible for your ancestors' crimes," he tells her, quietly. "But yeah. Let's find out what went down and where the stolen goods are, and get them back where they belong."

Jules' anger does not surprise him very much. Never in the history of western colonisation have the colonised people managed to express the gratitude that their colonisers felt they were due. It's almost like the myth of the white man's burden is exactly that: A very shitty excuse.

Una... winces. There's definitely a difficulty here: caught between acknowledging the fucked-up-edness of her ancestry and just generally trying not to take their failures onto her shoulders. She takes a breath.

"Ok. So he was fucked up. He did fucked up things. Now we get to-- ok, not fix it. Never fix it. But try to retrospectively make it... well, not right. But."

The book gets a small glare. “Not helpful,” she tells it. Then, to Una: “I don’t blame you. And restoring what was taken is the right thing to do. Obviously. Are you going to help us, or are we on our own?” The last goes to the book.

"Might want you to read it. Maybe skim through the bits where Albert tries to justify whatever he did and look for hints about what and where." Ravn glances at the book. "Maybe you could flip to the relevant pages?"

"We're going to make it tell us," is Una's conclusion, complete with a dark glance towards the book. "But Ravn's right: we probably need to get more context from the book. Whatever Albert," fuckwit, "did, it'll be in the book. And we can work it out from there. Do you.... want me to do the reading? Or Ravn?" It may be upsetting.

“No. I’ll read it.” Jules is quite definite about this, and she reaches out to take possession of the book. “Pass it around after, we can all take a turn, maybe we’ll pick out different things. But I want to know what he did. And depending on where he did it, and if there’s anything in the native languages he butchers in English that I can recognize, I can probably figure out which tribe it was.”

"I am fairly certain the local tribe's Yakama," Ravn agrees. "Isi Cameron is one, I think? We'll work it out between us. Anything in there refers to historical matters or European issues, I'll know where to look."

"Oh-- kay." Una's exhale is pretty audible. "Ok. We'll work this out. We'll make it right. Uh. Pass it on when you're done. I'll," need to, "read it after. Know what's what. And then we'll get this sorted."

Una's clearly caught between natural confidence and absolute overwhelming concern. Hopefully the former will prevail.

"We'll... reconvene, shall we? And there's the other book, too."

“No,” says Jules, shaking her head with annoyance. White people, always getting it wrong. “Yakama is inland, other side of the Cascades. This is Chehalis land, and Quinault a little further up. Some of the Chehalis ended up in my res. Quinault Nation. Then there’s the Tillamook, further south...” She trails off with a shrug. “Lots of smaller tribes here on the coast.” She leaves it there for now. “Why don’t one of you start with the other book and see what you can read?”

"Works for me. And believe me, I make no secret of my whiteness when it comes to First Nation matters. I am perfectly clueless." Ravn nods and reaches for the other book. "But if you ever need to discuss the various immigrations and settlements of Danish regions by people from elsewhere, call me."

Una is 100% happy to let the other book into Ravn's hands. (It's entirely possible she's willing to let all of this go into other hands, hands that aren't hers, hands that make her feel less guilt.) "Ok," she says. "Well-- we'll get this sorted. One way or another. Albert's deeds are done."

But more beer may, first, be required.