2022-06-13 - Wine and Cheese Night

Everyone who knows Jules knows that she has been very excited about her first genuine trip abroad. Very excited. It doesn’t matter that said trip involved Veil shenanigans. She went to Paris, bitches, and even brought back tasty treats.

Some of those treats come courtesy of her partner in crime, Ariadne, and so it’s only natural that the two have plotted how to divvy up the loot. Their schemes involve a boat, a clear night, their bottle of Bordeaux and several wedges of cheese. Mikaere’s boat is bigger, even if only marginally so, so he’s been nominated to play host this evening. Given how he’ll be compensated in wine and cheese, surely it’s not such an onerous burden.

Jules is downright gleeful as she comes tramping down the pier with her tote bag over her shoulder. A baguette sticks out of the bag in true Parisian style. She’s dressed in jeans and a zip-up fleece, currently unzipped, hair left loose on her shoulders. “Bonsoir!” she sings out in the most atrocious accent ever.

Paris, city of lovers -- and talking skulls in catacombs and demon carousel horses, you know, no big deal.

Ariadne, being the other half of these shenanigans, is responsible for the wine and cheese elements of this gathering. As such, she too arrives in jeans with a light-weight long-sleeved hiking shirt, sneakers making little noise (sneakers, get it?). A thin vest still lined with fleece against the potential chill of wind provides contrast in black against the sage-green of her shirt; it's even got a hood and pockets. Winning! Over her shoulder is slung a larger reusable shopping bag -- light clinks betray the wine bottle. Within, the slices of cheese as well as a wooden cutting block and some cheese knives. Finger food otherwise, unless Mikaere has dishes and utensils on-board.

She's a handful of yards behind Jules and her laugh rises up at the questionable accent. "Nah, it's 'bahn-soo-are-eh', didn't you know?"

Murdering French gleefully, syllable by syllable, this one.

Wā Kāinga is dressed up for the evening, such as it is, with fairy lights twinkling about her-- perhaps an ineffectual attempt to be Parisian, made by a man who has travelled extensively through the Pacific, but has never actually been to Europe (Europe is, for the record, a very long way from New Zealand.). It's still too light for those tiny bulbs to be anything but ineffectual, but that's not the point, right?

The man himself stands on her deck, having gone so far as to add his usual sleeveless fleece over his t-shirt, though he's otherwise still in shorts and jandals, rather more casual than European chic.

"Et bonne soirée à toi aussi," he greets, in... actually, that's a very good French accent, and where did that French come from? Don't ask. He doesn't seem sure himself, blinking once before he dismisses it and adds, "Welcome aboard. I wasn't sure what you needed from the galley, but I have glasses-- not proper wine glasses, but whatever-- and plates and so on."

Paris, what? Ravn knows he's missed several chapters of the book here. There was a strange exchange of texts about Paris, and then another, telling him to turn up here at the given hour. Considering that he lives literally right over there on the other side of the pier, it's not like he's going to refuse.

He's just being quiet about it, the way only Ravn Abildgaard can. One moment there's nothing. The next, he's hopping on deck behind Ariadne. It's a warm and pleasant evening, perfect for sneakers (geddit?), jeans, and a t-shirt: Sometimes I use words I don't understand so I can sound more photosynthesis.

“Whatever.” Jules does not care one lick of her French is sub-par. Or sub-sub-par. Mikaere, though, gets an impressed look for his quality accent and reply as she hops aboard. “Ooh, say something else,” she demands, stepping straight up to demand a kiss as well.

She’s a demanding woman.

“We were told very seriously that we have to open the bottle and wait for an hour, but French dude said nothing about glasses.”

Somewhere, a Parisian wine merchant is dying a little death.

Ariadne grins like a fiend. Ooh, actual French from the boat's owner. She's busily listening for what will no doubt be some sassy quip back from Jules about the teasing correction of earlier and possibly other addendums and sure as hell doesn't realize Ravn's there at first.

It's his reflection in the waters of the bay beside the dock which garners the barista's attention.

Observe: baristas levitate by at least a few inches when successfully snuck up upon.

It rises in a bubbling laugh-screech: "RAVN, CHRIST CHEX!!!" Sneak skill tree, level up, ding.

"Sir, I am putting a bell on you!" she tells the Dane in an amused splutter for his ears alone once he's alongside her.

For Jules and Mikaere on the boat, "Jules tells the truth. Something about letting it breathe. I defer to anyone with more wine knowledge." It's easy enough to hop aboard and she's all easy smiles as she shrugs the grocery bag to one of the seats.

"Uh-- Tu es très belle ma... petite fleur?" Mikaere sounds exceptionally uncertain about this, and a little embarrassed; is that a flush in his cheeks? French, man. Who knew? He'll happily give Jules a kiss, though, for all that it ends up being not much more than a quick peck.

They do, after all, have guests, and he turns away from the woman he's seeing to greet them both, not without a quick smirk for Ravn's t-shirt, not to mention his arrival-out-of-nowhere. "I think a bell is an excellent plan," he confirms. "Does that mean we need something else to drink in the meantime? I'm sure I can manage that. And then you ladies better offer some proper explanations, mmm?"

"As the appointed wine connoisseur present, apparently -- I vote that we do indeed give a good French wine an hour in which to breathe. If we want to drink cardboard box fermented grape juice we can get some from Safeway. Let's not treat quality wine like that." Ravn smirks and wanders towards the aft -- there's a seat with his name on there.

He makes no comment about the bell. The aristocat in him wouldn't notice. The alley cat already got rid of one collar, and it will amputate any hand that tries to put on another on him. Ariadne's little shriek -- worth it, so much worth it.

He settles and crosses one leg over another. "Yes. I believe explanations are in order. Paris first. Please, tell us about Paris. Did he ever find Helen?"

“Merci,” Jules replies grandly in her extremely limited and poorly pronounced French. So she’s a beautiful flower today, whatever, it’s been said in French. However, she is not—repeat, emphatically not—a shrinking violet, and that little peck is weak sauce, Mikaere.

Jules lets Ariadne start arranging the goods and opening said wine while she launches into storytelling time. After, of course, giving Ravn a look like she doesn’t quite get what he’s getting at, though maybe she should. “We were celebrating me being able to go out without offending everyone and their mother. Though I think there was one mother who overheard me swearing, oops. So we went to the carousel in the park because why the hell not, and then we got dropped in Paris.” Like one does.

Jules flops into a seat after passing over her baguette to be cut up into slices. “In the underground catacombs. And the damn Door wouldn’t let us back through, so we had to find our way out, and I made friends with a talking skull who showed us the way, and then I put it in the fountain so it could gossip with the pigeons and we went to the bakery.”

This totally makes sense, right?

"Jules is correct," Ariadne confirms succinctly, " -- and I note that it's not only unwise to start a land war in Asia, but also unwise to launch a thousand ships because of jealousy." Gesture, gesture with the corkscrew opener she has in her hand. Putting the wine bottle down on a flat surface, she cranks the screw into place before utilizing its lever. Slowly, the cork starts to give up the ghost.

"But hey, what would I know." A wink at Ravn, given he's the local historian and folklorist. "Anyways. Now that I'm not cranky about being suddenly tossed into the Paris catacombs, I kind of miss the over-talkative little bastard. It had little fireflies for eyeball-light or something, it was kind of cool. It couldn't give a straight answer to save its life though. But hey, here we are, wine and cheese and bread and cheers."

Thunk -- cork comes out. "And this sucker gets to breathe for a bit." The bottle itself sports 'Chateau Sainte-Bellegrave' in golden lettering against a field of navy-blue; ruby-colored vines and leaves provide a splash of color.

Weak sauce? Maybe. But Mikaere has a bright-eyed smile for Jules anyway, and maybe that makes up for it? Maybe. And if not-- "Well, I have beer, while we wait?" It's a nice light amber ale, available in the can for anyone who wants it-- the Kiwi has his chilly bin all ready and waiting. He settles himself, beer in hand, all the better to listen to the story: all stories are better listened to on the deck of a boat, on a nice clear night, with a beer in hand. It's just the truth of things.

"A talking skull," he repeats, listening with amusement. "And so then you had to go and get wine and cheese and bread?" No judgement, here; it makes perfect sense.

"We," with a gesture towards Ravn, "ended up on the Orient Express, so I guess random weird experiences are going around. All we did was walk into Safeway."

"At least we know better than to go ride the carousel horses." Ravn smirks and takes Mikaere's cue. "Seriously, that carousel is the most haunted place in this entire town. To the best of my knowledge, it's currently guarding the soul of every Baxter that ever died in the county. Not that it's not all very confusing but, there you go. We should find out, sometime." Beat. "Sometime we're not going to drink beer first, wine later, and have a good time."

He glances at Mikaere. "Alternatively, we don't know better and we're missing out on all the fun. Maybe next time, you and I should try to get thrown somewhere nice. How about girl watching on the Copa Cabana, complete with paper umbrella drinks out of coconuts and steel drum music?"

“Skull would’ve loved to come home with us, but Una would’ve murdered me,” Jules reflects. “And I doubt it would’ve shut up long enough to let me sleep.”

No sooner has she sat down than she’s up again to retrieve a beer for herself. This is also probably Not Done in France, mixing one’s alcohols in a way that potentially deadens the tastebuds. Ah well. This here is America.

“The carousel horses are going to come back for me,” Jules says, matter-of-fact. “I promised them treats if they took us home. You realize you sound like my younger brother, Ravn? ‘Dude, girls in bikinis, maybe I can help one with their sunscreen.’” She modifies her tone into the most dude-like imitation she can manage. “So tell us about the Orient Express.”

"Dude, bro, bikinis." Ariadne's got a fairly good surfer-guy imitation herself and ends up making herself laugh. She rifles through the grocery bag now to pull out the cheeses; they're in Tupperwares now inside their wrappings because, of course, Tupperware.

"Side note that the cheeses are..." Pulling a slip of paper out of her pants, she reads off, "Langres, Tomme de Pictons, and Gruyere de Comté." An idle glance in Ravn's direction and small smirk; monsieur le Comté. "But yeah, I want to hear more about the Orient Express. We're talking like the book? Or like the episode of Dr. Who? Also, Jules, if those horses show up again and we don't have bread, I really don't want to be carted off a la Kelpie" she grouses in the woman's direction. No drinks are taken by the barista just yet.

"I... am never getting on that carousel," decides Mikaere, decisively. "Though I'm with you, if you want to find out sometime."

He's got a smug little smile for Ravn's latter remark, though, and can't help but laugh for it-- he lifts his beer in gesture. "A much better plan. I'd prefer that to accidental espionage... or whatever it was, on the Orient Express."

The cheeses themselves don't mean anything to the Kiwi, but he shrugs his shoulders easily: no doubt they sound perfectly delicious regardless. "We're talking the actual Orient Express. Not the murder, not some kids' tv show-- as far as I know. We were there, and there was a woman with a gun, and then we ran off and drank whiskey like the underdressed savages we were and are." Simple, really.

"It's the truth. Some murder and espionage story started around us and then we went and had excellent whiskey in the bar wagon instead. Do I look like Hercule Poirot?" Ravn smirks and reaches for a beer as well. "We never did find out what it was all about. Or whose spies we were supposed to be. Or who was being murdered. Or why."

He hitches a shoulder at Jules. "See, in that case, the difference between your brother and I would be, I'd rather prefer to not be recruited to help anyone apply sun oil. I'd be happy to lie in a comfortable lounge chair with a sticky-sweet tropical drink and watch the ladies flit past in their bikinis -- and that's it. I just want the mood of slacking off, drinking ridiculous drinks, and watching people have a good time."

Beat. And then because Ravn gotta Ravn: "Gruyére is a Swiss cheese, though. Monsieur le Comté must have nicked the patent, the sorry bastard."

“Note to self: carry snacks with me at all times from now on.” Rightly or wrongly, Jules does not seem overly concerned about the bargain she’s made with these guardian horses. They’ll come when they come, and there’s little she can do about it.

It won’t stop her from enjoying her beer, cracking the can open with a sharp metallic snap. “I have to admit, I’m kind of enjoying the trips to foreign locations,” Jules says. “Hell of a lot cheaper than a plane ticket. Only bummed we couldn’t stay longer, but we needed to make sure we could get back. But so far, let’s see: Paris, Orient Express, Rome, and time traveling in my own house. How long do you think it’ll last?”

"Hmm." A thoughtful sound for Mikaere's explanation. Simultaneously more fun and less fun than either pop-culture variant, the barista decides to herself as cheeses are set aside. She eyes the bottle set on the flat surface before then tucking it carefully away in the grocery bag at a lean; better to let it breath here than get accidentally slid off by a more vigorous wave-rocking of the boat.

A giggle though, for Ravn unable to help himself. "Poor Monsieur le Comté," she agrees. Cue pout lip. Now the redhead sheds her vest (too warm for it, even with the breeze). "Also, you drink terrible beer, seriously." A fond murmur for Ravn; they'll never agree on the best of the liquors, apparently.

"I dunno how long it'll last, but I'm starting to get suspicious of doors in general now," she adds on the tail-end of Jules' commentary. "Time traveling's getting a little insane for me."

"What," Mikaere wants to know, "is wrong with my choice of beer? I'll have you know this is the beer that is closest to what I'd buy back home, and while it's not quite as good as Speight's, it's not half bad." Sorry Ariadne: Mikaere is with Ravn on this one. Pale beers for the win.

"I don't want to be recruited, either, but I'll happily watch. Next trip: we're off to the tropics, and just going to sit back and enjoy the view. No spies, no murder mysteries, no ridiculousness. Seriously, though: this is definitely not the kind of Dream I'm used to, not least because I now have a very fine tumbler to drink out of, and-- until I finished it-- the very fine whiskey to match. I take it this isn't a normal summer in Gray Harbor kind of thing."

"No," Ravn replies, amused. "Usually the party line is, you can't bring anything back. You can try but it will turn into something mundane. Which is why no one's nicked the federal gold reserves or the Mona Lisa, or whatever -- the Veil doesn't let you. Though I suppose that a couple of crystal tumblers aren't that disturbing to the time line."

He holds his beer up in a silent salute to Ariadne. Suck on it, syrup lover.

"Some day," the Dane muses. "Some day I should buy up some decent French red, and have it rebottled with my own label. Chateaux du Comté Show-Off. Sound good?"

Jules promptly chimes in, “Nothing is wrong with your choice of beer. Although quite possibly with your choice of vacation entertainment.” Her tone holds a bit of an edge. She hasn’t yet picked up the metaphorical knife, but it’s right there, being sharpened as we speak.

"Diplomatically, it'd be the Dream enabling the particularly un-gentlemanly variant of this behavior, right?" Ariadne asks of the boat's current occupants. "No one needs to participate in such behavior even if it's on offer. Just because someone holds out a plate of brownies doesn't mean I'm going to eat one. I might admire how pretty the sprinkles are, but I've got better and real chocolate not laced with Dream substances at home, y'know?"

Her eyes flick about now, her brows lifted.

Beat. Second beat. Third beat. ... shit.

"Hey," he says, directly towards Jules. "I promise... that's a joke. I'm not chasing any girl but you, okay? You're kind of stuck with me."

See? Isn't it adorable? Kind of?

"Let's all go for the non-Dream substance brownies, yeah." Yeah.

"Might I suggest that if we end up in a Dream like that, you ladies join us on the lounge chairs? It's the Copa Cabana, there are bound to be gents worth admiring from a distance too. Not to mention enough steel drums, beautiful sea, blue sky, and tacky drinks to satisfy everyone." Ravn laughs softly and sips his beer. The thought that Ariadne might think him more interested in some bikini beauty than in her doesn't seem to cross his mind.

He does claim to be somewhat oblivious to some things. The brownie metaphor for one, seems to have gone over his head.

“Good.”

That’s that. That’s all Jules has to say, in much the same tone as before, but more settled. She isn’t lingering here. She puts down the knife.

“Well, we all know how I feel about Veil-laced intoxicants,” Jules says instead, attention widening to admit all of those on deck. Her nose wrinkles. “Hell to the no.” She’s not dignifying Ravn’s suggestion with a reply, clueless man that he is, because she’s moving on.

"Yep, no Veil brownies. I prefer admiring the current company anyways," the barista concludes with a glance over at Ravn and blatant eyebrow waggle. Because really, why not? Bold barista is bold.

Circling back around to an earlier, easier and friendly razzing point: "Also, Jules, I'm sorry, Mikaere has terrible taste in beer too, I can't help you. Maybe with time, he'll realize the error of his ways, but drinking dirty dishwater is a hard habit to kick."

Obvious look at the bottle in Ravn's hand.

"No Veil brownies," promises Mikaere, firmly. "No intoxicants that aren't purely from this world. Which includes," dark glance towards Ariadne, "this perfectly acceptable and entirely drinkable pale ale, thank you very much. You're on notice, let me tell you."

Oh dear. These are fighting words.

And, to Jules: "C'mere." Maybe he wants to give her a better kiss now? Or maybe not.

People are kissing. Always a good time to let your gaze wander out to sea and look at the nice, circling sea gulls. Something was off there and Ravn is entirely uncertain of what it was -- but he knows the sound of a bullet dodged, and he's not going to go retrieving it. "I'll just accept that I have everything I want in life except a woman with proper taste in beer."

Jules is perfectly willing, now, to slide over from wherever it is she’s sitting and come lean into Mikaere. Apparently he’s redeemed himself, especially given how Jules takes up his side with the banter over beer.

“Oh honey, if you want to know what actually drinking dishwater is like, then I have a Coors with your name on it. This is at least five steps above.” She lifts her can to demonstrate, then tips it as if toasting against Mikaere’s can. There’s no satisfying clink, aluminum on aluminum, but it’s the sentiment that matters.

Such a droll, disbelieving look given to all present imbibing the pale ale.

"As to quality of that stuff, I beg to differ...and besides, Ravn, I have to pretend I'm not perfect to blend in with the rest of humanity, remember?" Smirking to herself, Ariadne then can't help but laugh at herself. She knows how hubris-laden the statement sounds and how this, in turn, makes it all the more ridiculous. "Look, more for you all, more for you. I'll have half a glass of wine and be content."

Mikaere puts his arm around Jules, grinning as he clinks-- not actually clinks, yes-- his can against hers. "This is exactly the kind of beer you want on a warm evening, I'll have you know, particularly when there's cheese and bread to fill up on. I'm so sorry, Ravn, to see you're dating someone whose taste is so limited, but--" He shrugs. You can't win it all.

He's grinning, though, aiming it directly for Ariadne. She's hubris-laden, he's dismissive; everyone's happy and having a good time.

Ravn's smile turns ever more lopsided as he watches Ariadne build up her hubris over the edge of his beer can. "Well, then. Do we have good bread to go with our runaway Swiss count and his cheese? I think somebody was waving a proper baguette?"

He stretches his legs and pats the seat next to him -- and then his knee. Ariadne can have either for a seat, as she prefers. Or she can remain where she is, continuing to make statements to attract every Grecian goddess of hubris in existence. He's good either way as long as he gets to watch.

“We have baguette,” Jules confirms after rolling her eyes at Ariadne in fond good humor. “Not Parisian, because those got eaten immediately before they could go stale, but I found one at the bakery.” No soft crusts here, only baguette with a satisfying crunch. “You wanna pass it around, Ari? Or are we saving it all for the wine?”

After a sip from her beer, Jules nudges Mikaere lightly, noting, “I like the lights, by the way. Nice touch.”

Those Scullin dimples are endearing indeed.

Ariadne glances over at the collection of cheese and the bread nearby. "It's true, Jules and I couldn't resist the proper baguette, it was still sort of warm out of the oven. There's baguette otherwise, yes. I figured there's plates and you all could serve up as you feel so inclined. I'm good for breaking into things yet, since I'm waiting on the wine to breathe, but here." Tah-dah: baguette. It's handed off towards Jules. "I suppose it's finger food, in a way. Rip off a chunk, pass it around. Cheese is on the plate over here." A knife is likely somewhere nearby should folks want to smear or slice some of the cheese onto the bread.

Otherwise, she drifts over to settle on the seat next to Ravn and scootches over to insert herself up against his side. Mmm, warm.

"Oh, I see," teases Mikaere. "We get the normal, American baguette," his accent really is surprisingly impressive, "and you stuffed yourself with the French version." Never mind that it's been days; that's not the point here, ladies. Where's the love?!

"I'll take a piece, though, and some of that cheese. Are you really going to wait a whole hour for the wine, because that... feels like a really long time."

He seems pleased by Jules' comments on the light and admits, "I've had those things on board for years... always did intend to string them up. Seemed appropriate. Not something to stay up all the time, mind, but pretty enough for tonight."

Ravn mock whispers to Mikaere: "Real French bread isn't that great anyhow. They hate crust and everything has to be so fluffy it's like eating air. Go Italian or go home."

Sour grapes, no doubt.

He carefully slips an arm around Ariadne's back; the touch-phobic Dane is not actually touch-phobic as much as he is surprise-touch-phobic. He's not one much for public displays of affection either, but this is not quite public, and well, if Mikaere and Jules are all right with kissing with an audience, he can slip an arm around the woman who's come to mean a surprising amount to him in recent months.

Jules rips off the end of the baguette, sending little crumb flakes scattering that the seagulls will no doubt clean up in short order. “Here,” she offers, passing it to Mikaere, and the ripping off the second chunk for herself. “I prefer eating to starving myself. No, I’m not waiting. You don’t have to eat my baguette if it isn’t good enough for you,” she tells the men loftily. Nevertheless, the baguette can make the rounds across the way. Jules has to wiggle away from Mikaere’s arm just long enough to lay hands on the cheese board and cut herself a slice. She’s already forgotten which is which, but it doesn’t matter when she wants to try them all.

Blithe shrug for Mikaere. Alas: the best went to the women. She smirks back at his tease, comfortably within Ravn's arm now.

"I'm fine with getting into the wine earlier as opposed to later. I'm apparently without proper taste in beer, I might as well add wine to it too." Her cheeky curl of a grin is aimed at Ravn in passing before she sighs. It's a sound of contentment in good company. "The lights really are darling, Mikaere. It makes me think of how I had some similar lights strung around my dorm room and then apartment room. Time to dig them out of the boxes...somewhere...one of the boxes, they should be all bundled away. I like having them on at night in the living room wherever I live, it's soothing."

"Italian, eh?" Mikaere makes a show of considering this. "Maybe I'll convince the Veil to give us a trip to Italy next... though to be honest, I'd probably be going straight for the pasta and the pizza, and bypassing the bread itself even then." He grins across the 'table' (such as it is) to the other couple, Ariadne included in it: ah well.

Jules' handiwork with the bread is accepted, and he nudges at her, letting her out of his grip so that he can request, "Cheese, too, please?"

"They're good fun, ay? Sometimes you just want a little light, not all of it on at once. Feels a bit like Christmas, maybe... though that could be the weather, too, for me: evenings like this one."

"I deign to eat your baguette even if it is not a genuine, thoroughbred French baguette," Ravn declares to Jules, with a manner of an emperor showing mercy. "Those bloody thoroughbreds run through too fast anyhow."

Then he glances at the lights and nods. "I like it. It's a kind of -- Mediterranean feel? Or anywhere it's warm and dry enough most summer nights that it's worth setting up outdoors lights to any great extent. I'm used to Scandinavian summers -- it never gets properly dark like it does further south, and very often, it's raining."

“So almost exactly like here, then,” Jules quips in response to Ravn’s description of Denmark. “You know a bunch of the settlers around the Sound and Seattle were Scandinavian, right? They probably felt right at home.”

She’s happy to cut a second set of wedges from each of the three cheeses, holding out the cutting board to Mikaere for him to scoop up his portion. After she’s finished and the cheese board is passed along too, she resettles right where she was, though perhaps not in the warm curve of Mikaere’s arm; he might need both hands for the bread and cheese.

“So these would be your summertime Christmas lights? Huh. That’s kinda fun.”

"Add a few strings of fake grape vines and you'd have a floating vineyard," Ariadne muses as to the lights and weather both. Truly, it does have a Mediterranean feel, and it's with quiet appreciation that she spends a bit more time looking at the strings decorating the boat. Definitely time to go dig out those aforementioned lights from a box somewhere in the pile in the guest bedroom she hasn't broken into yet. A persistent creature of procrastination, this one, about unpacking.

"I just want to pick brains on this one, but I was just thinking...that skull, the talking skull Jules and I were dealing with, what would make that skull? How could it come to be? Because it's...it's a blatantly magical -- magical? -- thing in reality. We were in real France, Jules and I." Her furrowed brow is aimed at all parties present in passing.

"Auckland can be wet, too, but not-- not quite like it can be here," murmurs Mikaere, plucking up his portions of cheese and adding them to his bread. (He has to lick his fingers, too: it's basically required.) "And Christmas can be really nice. The pōhutukawa in full bloom, the sun shining; everything lush and green." Give him a moment to be homesick; it'll pass.

He's slower to respond to Ariadne's question, though by the expression on his face, he's giving it considerable thought. Cheese first, though, and then a sip of his beer to wash it down with. "You were in the catacombs," he points out. "Any chance there's a-- eh, what you call a thin spot, there? That'd make a difference, I imagine."

"Scandinavian settlers feeling at home here? Denmark has no mountains but Norway and Sweden certainly do, so it's entirely likely." Ravn nods. He's not really surprised. He's also not really surprised that Jules would resent the comparison -- because with it comes the inevitability, the fact that this land already belonged to somebody else. He decides to not rise to it -- this is one questionable business that the Abildgaard family has not been involved with, at least.

He shakes his head and sips his beer, and then nods at Mikaere. "Given the history of Paris, and what we do know about thin spots -- it doesn't sound all that unlikely, does it? The one great common denominator seems to be human suffering. Paris has seen several plagues, a pretty permanent typhoid epidemic for a few hundred years, the Seine being so toxic that people died from drinking from it -- and of course every joyful experience of being a capital during the Crusades, the witch burnings, the French Revolution. I'd be surprised if Paris doesn't have a thin spot."

Jules isn’t really trying to get a rise out of Ravn; she isn’t lingering on the subject, either. Instead, she’s quite happy to munch away on the bread and cheese, punctuated with sips of her beer and happy, satisfied ‘mmm’s.

“They’re not all documented, are they,” she asks after she swallows. “These thin spots. I can see why it’d be hard to assemble a list, given how they don’t seem to want people to spread the word.”

"That's what I was wondering, yeah," Ariadne firstly replies to Mikaere's supposition.

Her expression grows more sober and contemplative yet at Ravn's information. To hear the history succinctly like this, with the worst of human suffering highlighted, really does argue for a thin spot. She nods at Jules. "Right, the whole amnesia bit. Only let the flock of shinies know about it so things don't get out of control. There has to be a thin spot in the catacombs, yeah, what else can explain how people get so regularly lost down there? Even with modern GPS systems. Lost." This repetition of the word subtly capitalizes it for the extra spine-tingling reality. "I guess that's probably it...bleed-over to give the skull impetus to exist in the first place. I wonder if you took it elsewhere, if it'd go silent and look like a normal skull. Like when you're in a cellphone signal shadow."

"I'm half surprised anywhere isn't, or isn't close to, one," murmurs Mikaere, sucking a breath in. "I know where the big ones are, back home, but I know there are smaller ones, too; and that's no surprise, either." Now's not the time for going into massacres and wars, of course, and the Kiwi lets that drop, instead glancing briefly out towards the sea.

"It'd have to, surely," he adds, probably relating to the skull. "Like the way anything that gets brought back from a Dream does. Surely?"

"I don't think there is a list of thin spots," the folklorist agrees. "Assuming that the Veil would not stop us from making one, which it probably would -- we don't even agree on what constitutes one. Does it have to be somewhere people actually get Lost and disappear? Or just somewhere that strange things happen? If the latter is enough, then just about every manor house in Europe is a thin spot. I can certainly testify to one of them being a thin spot -- though to the best of my knowledge, no one ever got Lost at Engelsholm. We had few people turn up dead and I at least will argue that they got into something they couldn't handle with the ghosts of the place, but that's it. No mysterious disappearing into caves or catacombs and never coming back out."

He hitches a shoulder lightly and then accepts the not-Parisian baguette when it comes his way. "This turned gloomy. But a lot of the things we see aren't terrible or gloomy. There has to be other factors in play than suffering. Sometimes, Dreams are just outright funny. I'll never forget the Zorro Dream where I ended up marrying Scullin and Irving to each other."

“It was still chatting away when we left it,” Jules points out, where the skull is concerned. She falls quiet to listen to their musings and bite into her hunk of baguette.

Speaking up again, she says, “I hadn’t heard of that Dream.” Zorro, she means. “And you won’t hear me arguing that it’s all terrible. We know that it isn’t.” The ‘we’ is perhaps unclear. This little group? Jules’ native culture? “I still think it has something to do with something being out of balance. Why we end up with the bad Dreams more often than not, the spirits that flock to our pain. Maybe it’s the same when things are extra in balance, too. Maybe that’s also where the worlds get thin. Like the place you told me about, Ravn, in Scandinavia, where people went to die.”

Ariadne explains to Jules, "I'm technically still married to Una in that particular branch of Dream reality, yes, quite happily." She can't help the faint laugh and faintest blush for it. Dreams. What can one say. "It was a meandering around a pop culture lens of the legend. I got thrown off a horse in a dress, the Dream had no mercy."

She's not unfamiliar with the concepts of unlisted sites as well as the premise of suffering wearing down the thickness of the divisions between reality and Veil. It makes her sigh to consider, one of those things beyond her control which seem safe enough to mull over in broad daylight; sure as hell not safe in the darkest hours of the night.

"Has anyone managed to bring anything back through these Doors yet? Like, the more impossible stuff. The bread and wine and cheese, that was from Paris proper." Watching Jules and Mikaere enjoy these is enough to make her overcome the impetus to remain snuggled up into Ravn's side. A brush of a kiss for his cheek before she rises to her feet, intending to collect up some bread and cheeses for their combined nibblings. "I'm an impatient little shit, anybody else for the wine?"

"I'm not convinced it's a boolean question," look at Mikaere, bringing out the fancy words. "More-- sliding scale, yeah? Places where the worlds are closer, ranging from 'a little closer' to 'oh look, we're literally on top of each other'. And that maybe means there's no possible way to categorise. And-- for that matter, who's to say that just because the worlds are close now, doesn't mean there's not a way to make them drift, too."

He shakes his can of beer to test how much is left in it (a little) and then grins anyway, "I'll have wine," he confirms. "Thanks, Ariadne. And to answer your question... I have a very fine whiskey tumbler, but I'm not sure if that's what you mean really, is it? More than that."

"Those whiskey tumblers are the only things I have brought back that stayed what they were." Ravn nods his agreement. "I have experimented a little, of course. Anything I picked up on the other side always turned into some entirely mundane counterpart of our reality -- worthless, ordinary, non-descript. I guess that's the whole point -- that we can't really make dramatic changes to either reality."

He smirks lightly at his over-eager girlfriend and then nods. "I'll be honest and admit, I'm not enough of a wine connoisseur to really be able to tell if a wine has aired for forty minutes or sixty. And I strongly suspect that anyone who claims that they can -- is full of shit."

“Wine for me too,” Jules chimes in. She can toss back what’s left in her can with the best of them.

She also has no idea what the word Mikaere uses means, though she can figure out the sense of it from context. “Maybe that’s what we should be trying to do here,” Jules muses. “Seeing if we can make them drift a little farther apart, so we’re not growing blue babies and being poisoned by fruit.” Ava’s experiments will never not be her go-to examples.

The wine itself burbles softly into each glass as Ariadne pours. When brought to the nose, it's full of oak and spices with a more buttery note on the back of the tongue -- and apples and cherries if one's going to get nosey about it.

"I've actually been wondering about that too," the barista says, glancing over briefly from pouring. "If there's a way to patch up this separation between there and here. It'd be amazing to be able to patch it up. A door goes both ways, as the saying goes. Why can't we try nailing a board across one of them, proverbially-speaking?"

From the sounds of things, everyone wanted wine. As such, everyone gets a glass before Ariadne returns to cuddle up against Ravn's side again. It's easy to balance a plate of the bread and various bits of cheeses on her knees.

Let's be honest: Mikaere is not going to taste any of those things when he drinks the wine (particularly so soon after drinking beer). It's going to taste like wine, and it is going to like it.

That doesn't mean he won't lift his glass in acknowledgement of the other three, and interrupt their musings with a, "To not getting lost in the catacombs, or shot on a train." It's one way to toast.

Clearly he doesn't have an answer to the rest, though it's drawn a frown into his expression.

"To not ending up buried in the woods or abducted by extradimensional slavers," Ravn continues the toast. The night is dark and full of terrors, and the dangers of Gray Harbor are legion.

He's quite content to slip an arm around Ariadne. So far, he's made no move on the food beyond a bit of baguette -- but then, he's a picky eater at best. "I don't know whether we can shut the door to a reality we don't like," the folklorist muses. "That's an interesting thought, though. I do think we can refrain from jumping up and down and screaming pick me, pick me at the monsters -- and that's what happened that caused blue babies and Veil fruit, let's just call a spade a spade. Hopefully, lessons were learned. The kid seems pretty normal but for the strange skin colour, at least."

“And to travel abroad without paying for plane tickets. Cheers!”

Jules can identify two things: good versus bad. No, four (white versus red). This wine definitely falls into the category of ‘good,’ and that’s what her contented mmm is for after her first sip.

“She’s learned, I think,” Jules volunteers after a moment. She’s not given to lingering on the topic, but she will say this much, looking thoughtful. “It’s all being destroyed. She feels like shit about what happened. As well she should.”

"To not being eaten by sabre-toothed cats because I'm way too gamey for that bull." Ariadne toasts in agreement with everything else and sips. Her own sound of delight is soft like Jules' little hum.

"I'm very glad to hear something's being done about all of that. It was the next step, to figure out how to resolve things. It's definitely proof about what happens if you dabble too much...draw attention and all. I've been trying very hard not to do that, especially after watching it happen to others. I wish it wouldn't, but...I mean...you play with fire enough and you will get burned. All that's left is to heal and move on." Laying a thin slice of cheese on a torn-off piece of baguette, she offers it to Ravn.

Mikaere makes an uncomfortable face at that renewed reference to blue babies and unnatural plants, and seems disinclined to comment too much on the subject. "I'll stick to the shallows, that's for sure," he agrees. "I don't think any of us can afford to tempt fate like that. This place... it's like nothing I've ever experienced before. It's all so close to the surface."

He sips at his wine, reaching out for some more bread and cheese.

Ravn accepts the offered treat with a small smile of appreciation -- and a tinge of concern. He's going to try. He really is. This may take a while.

Then he nods slightly at Jules. "I'm not sorry to hear that Brennon is trying to sort things out. If she and her boyfriend -- Deacon, wasn't it? -- can get some quiet time, settle into being parents, maybe everything will seem a little less stressful. I have heard some people say she got quite busy along with a few others -- going toe to toe with the Vivisectionist and a couple of other entities. Irving described a dream to me, about it. I've heard others mention it as well."

A little quirk of Jules’ mouth, a lift of her eyebrows, accompanies Ravn’s reference to Ava’s boyfriend. “Hmm.” It’s the kind of noise, somewhat skeptical, like Jules has more she could say but is refraining.

“I don’t suppose the dream had something to do with a courtroom and Ava in it, did it?”

Ariadne looks between all present. She needs to finish out appreciating her own morsel of bread and cheese and washing it down with another sip of wine before she can speak again. See-food is not impressive or polite.

"What about a dream about a courtroom now?" Apparently, she hadn't been subjected to this secondary vision.

"Dream about a courtroom?" Mikaere shakes his head; he, like Ariadne, knows nothing of this particular Dream-or-otherwise.

He's cast a side-long glance towards Jules, too, frowning thoughtfully in response to something she's said-or-done.

Ravn glances at Jules as well, and then nods slowly. "I did not have the dream. Several other people did, though. Brennon, de la Vega, Kinney, and the veterinarian -- I only know her as Leila. All of them facing off in some kind of court, against the Vivisectionist and a number of other Veil entities. I haven't managed to catch any of them to ask about specifics. But I don't think it's a coincidence that so many people had this dream. Irving too, she was the first to tell me about it."

He has yet to touch his baguette-and-cheese but then, who's surprised. At least he's sipped his wine and apparently found it worthy of his refined palate. The same palate that accepts instant coffee and pineapple on pizza.

Jules is paying enough attention to the man next to her to catch his look and lift her eyebrows again, this time a little questioningly. Nothing aloud, though.

Instead: “The details are a little hazy for me,” Jules admits. “But it was weird. There was a kangaroo.” Among other things. “Kinney—that’s your roommate, right?” she asks Ravn. Last names, man.

"I...have no idea who the Vivisectionist is or why there was a kangaroo present, but this still somehow makes horrible amounts of sense to me and I kind of wish it didn't," Ariadne says in a bit of a subdued manner. She then puts more bread and cheese into her mouth because now is the time to listen to those who know more about this oddness.

At least the wine is good!

"I wonder..." begins Mikaere, but he stops himself. (He wonders if the dream travelled as far as his mother, back in New Zealand, and then thinks better of it: involving his ma in anything to do with Gray Harbor is asking for trouble, really, and just... don't do it, self.) He takes another sip of his wine instead, turning his gaze out towards the distant horizon, half-visible through the rows of boats along the marina.

"Well. Whatever it is, and whatever it means, it'll probably become clear sooner rather than later, right? These things generally do."

"Aidan Kinney, yes." Ravn sips his wine with a sheepish expression. "I can't say that what Irving described to me made a lot of sense. In part because she was already losing the memory of it as we were speaking -- she remembered the main things but a lot of the smaller things were lost. Maybe you had to be there for it to make sense."

He hitches a shoulder lightly. "The Vivisectionist -- I don't know a whole lot either. She's dead, supposedly -- at least twice over. She has been caught turning humans into food, and she's been caught infecting humans with a disease that ate up your shine, if I understood things right. She's definitely not one of the friendly ones. The other one -- there was a boy or youth. I think he represented Spirit itself, from how it's been explained to me."

"The main thing was the trial," Jules says, confident about this much. The rest, though -- the cause of the trial, the arguments, other assorted proceedings -- she's not so sure about. "I'm pretty sure Ava and Aidan won. So they're the people to ask. Or Leila or Javier de la Vega."

She's noted how Mikaere looks away, and she watches him for a minute before leaning against him just a little more. Jules has finished her bit of bread and cheese, and instead of immediately going for more, she sticks with slowly sipping her wine as they talk. It allows her to rest one hand on his leg, too, just a little light touch.

Ariadne wrinkles her nose at the description of the Veil elements in particular. Noticeably swallowing her sip of wine, she licks her lips as if she found these elements particularly unpalatable.

"Oh my god," under her breath. A glance at Jules and Mikaere, lingering as she catches the soothing gesture. "I'll see about asking if I cross paths with any of them, yes, but why would so many people share the echo of the actual Dream? Is the Veil trying to tell us something, somehow, in some frustrating and ass-backwards way?"

Mikaere turns his gaze back, giving Jules a little crooked smile in answer to that hand. He's slow to respond verbally, considering Jules for a moment, and then the depths of his wine glass. "It'd sound like it," he says, finally. "Interesting-- that some people got it, and not others. Not sure I could even begin to hypothesise why, though... if we're talking about a representation of Spirit?" He glances at Ravn.

"That's a grouping of the healing-related skills, yes? Jules has some of that, right? And your housemate, Jules?"

"Yeah. And Irving does as well. And I certainly don't." Ravn nods at Mikaere. "I'm guessing it echoed with people who have that connection. The healers, the fire bugs, the growers. But not the movers like me or the mind trick people like you."

“Mmhmm,” Jules confirms. “Una’s stronger than me when it comes to that. Her green thumb is pretty awesome. It’s not all fairies. Fire bug, hah. That’s me.” She lifts her wine glass to her lips again.

After a sip, she lets drop, “That’s how I first knew.”

"Huh." Consensus appears to be the message meant for a certain portion of the Shiny around here was received and translated per their abilities. Ariadne still frowns contemplatively as she sips at her wine again. She's become slower about picking through her bread and cheese now. It's delicious, she's just half-distracted by conversational topic at hand.

"The fire, you mean?" she then asks of Jules.

"That makes sense," agrees Mikaere. "Whatever the import of the message, it's got to go to the people it is most relevant for, no matter how curious the rest of us might be as to... what it implies, I guess." That, too, is food for another thought, but not one he seems inclined to share right now, instead turning a thoughtful glance on Jules in answer to her comment.

"And the rest of us may not be connected." Ravn hitches a shoulder lightly and sips his wine. "If this is how it works -- that there are forces who can manifest in the form of books or people, then I'm not connected to the book or person of healing. Because I have none of this talent. If there is a book or person of moving I expect it to be a construction manual or a construction worker, and he'll probably communicate in grunts."

“Mmhmm.” Jules isn’t immediately forthcoming, for all that she’s offered her comment up to the group. She listens to Ravn first with an amused smile. “Or with maps,” she chimes in. “Go here, do this, now leave me alone.”

Jules fetches herself another wedge of cheese. “Anyway, yeah. Bonfire on the beach, playing with fire, that’s how it happened for me. I was pretty pissed at the time, and I guess something just snapped.”

"Books or maps..." Ariadne too sounds thoughtful, looking between Jules and Ravn before she takes another sip of her wine. An interesting thing to consider, how manifestations of this Veil shenanigannery shows. Itzhak himself had spoken of his own abilities like Songs. Why not literature, the barista muses to herself.

Her eyes rise to Jules again. "High emotions, yeah, that sounds about right." By her tone, this was certainly the trigger for her own initial encounter with her Shine.

Mikaere's little snort is probably for Ravn's concept of a construction manual or construction worker and his grunts-- and it is continued, in turn, for Jules' suggestion of a map. "If there's one for mine, it's probably just a mental wallop to the face. Sure, we could communicate in words, but why not throw a bunch of abstract emotions and concepts at you and let you figure it out? Much more fun."

He sips at his wine and acknowledges, "High emotions, yeah. That's the way of it. My Ma, she tried to save the life of a whale that got itself beached, not realising she could... and then nearly drowned herself in the process. It was... quieter, for me."

Ravn steeples his fingers and glances at Mikaere. "There is a thing some people can do -- we call it the mindscape. I am tempted to ask if you can do this as well? Because that's what it is like -- a bunch of abstract concepts to be figured out. Everyone who is pulled in by someone with the mind arts has some kind of true form -- something that represents who they really are. Rosencrantz' unicorn -- he is one, a big, black fellow with a dappled backside. Me, I am two cats. Sometimes, an inbred, useless and helpless Siamese -- the kind that would find acting as a doorstop to be too much of an intellectual challenge. And sometimes, I'm a black alley cat -- the Chat Noir kind of cat. I don't really get a say about it, so I assume it depends on how I'm feeling."

He pauses and picks up his bit of baguette and Swiss cheese. "Anyway, what I was trying to suggest was that this is somewhat related to spirit journeys -- and for that matter, psychotherapy. It communicates in symbols and abstracts for the viewer to find out, and you can certainly learn a thing or two about yourself from it."

Curiosity colors Jules’ expression as she looks between Ariadne and Mikaere as they speak. There’s a moment where her lips part as if she’s about to ask further questions—and then she doesn’t. It’s not just that Ravn’s speaking now, introducing another subject to take over that curiosity. Jules is also a little more mindful of privacy, these days.

“That sounds fascinating,” she sticks to saying. “I hadn’t heard of that before.” The question’s for Mikaere, so Jules looks to him next: can he do it?

"I admit, I'm curious as hell about it too."

Probably not too shocking from the marine biologist who barely manages to keep her nose from getting shut in doors and fingers burnt in pies. Ariadne's attention is on Mikaere as well at this point. "It sounds like a deep-dive into one's subconsciousness. I bet a psychologist would have a field day riding along on someone's shoulder into one of these...mindscape trips."

Mikaere hesitates, just for a moment, and then acknowledges-- and answers-- Ravn's question with a slow dip of his chin. "Te pohewa," he says. "I was shown by my uncle, once. It's not something I've utilised with any frequency. It is... it can be..."

It's a question to mull over, an answer to shape carefully in his mouth. "It's something to be shared with people you trust, on the whole. Or out of need. It's easy to... end up sharing more than you intend, I suppose. To be more open than you intend. Unformed thoughts can be easier to express than actual words. Useful, though. Fascinating, certainly." The corners of his mouth turn up, ever so slightly, though there's a moment, then, of amusement.

"My uncle rolled his eyes at me for days. I'm represented as a Manaia, a sort of... part-bird, part-fish, part-man. Messenger between the earthly world and the spirit world. Talk about hubris."

"It's an experience. One that tells you a lot about yourself. And indeed, as Mikaere suggests, not one to be taken lightly. I was very surprised -- and very unflattered -- to realise that my self image is my mother's long dead, inbred disaster of a pedigree cat."

Ravn nods over the rim of his wine glass. Then he makes a little face. "And it's something that can create change. I used to wear a collar in there, with a bell on. I hated that collar so much. And somebody removed it in the mindscape -- and that's when my power finally started to come in. A lifetime of floating lighters and moving hazelnuts around under cups. And now I can do -- amazing things."

“Hmm.” Jules keeps comments to herself, for now. Something about the openness is bound to resonate. She does have a little laugh for Mikaere’s self-representation —and more than that, for the explanation that accompanies it. “That’s you,” she teases him with an elbow nudge.

Her response to Ravn is more thoughtful. “That’s really cool—that something you experience there can affect you in the here and now. The whole thing kind of sounds similar to my hiking trip a couple months ago.” That long ago, already.

Snuggled up against Ravn's ribs, Ariadne's nod can be felt. Losing the collar -- she knows of this and its consequences thus far; she can't argue against, it's been a literal life-saver and middle finger at the Veil more than once.

"It does sound like that though, doesn't it?" she agrees with Jules. "Just similar enough. I haven't had any experience like that myself, not just yet. I say 'yet' because...well...Veil." Her sigh is rueful if accepting. This requires more wine. Inevitably, the Veil is sure to machinate this into happening.

Mikaere can't hide the interest in his expression when Ravn comments on that collar, though it's the interest of a professional more than mere curiosity. "That's-- that both does not surprise me, and also, very much impresses me." (Jules' nudge, by contrast, earns a nudge in return and a somewhat rueful smile.)

"It's a powerful thing," is what he says, instead. "And one we have control over, which is... something, compared to so many other things. It is like a spirit quest type thing. Or-- can be, at least. I'm not unwilling to demonstrate," that, clearly, is for Ariadne and Jules: the two who haven't experienced this. "But it's better to go in prepared for what might be. You can't hide from yourself, there."

"You can't. You may not like who you see yourself as. I know I don't." Ravn nods slightly. "And others might learn things about you that you did not intend to tell anyone. I am not sorry that I lost that collar -- but it was not a pleasant experience. I was not ready for it, and I spent a long time terrified because of it."

He nods at Mikaere next. "Prepared and knowing where you want to go. What you need to see. What helped me after the initial collar loss experience was Rosencrantz taking me in to look for it, around the streets of imaginary New York. The procedure helped things fall into place. Everything in there is imagination, symbols, concepts that have meaning to you."

Jules listens carefully to the two men with experience of this thing. “Maybe some day,” she decides. “I think I’ve seen enough of myself for the time being.” It’s wry, that. “And it sounds like it’s something you should have a purpose for doing, not just cause you’re curious.”

There's a faint laugh from the barista with her plate now emptied of bread and cheese. There's still wine to sip; this sloshes slightly in the glass.

"Aw, man, Jules, being all logical. What if I just wanted to follow my own curiosity?" she asks with jesting rhetorical tone, her smile brightening and then lessening back down to something pensive. Her eyes flick to Mikaere for a second and then fall away, off to the waters beyond the boat. "I'll have to think about it though. I can play around with the concept as much as I want, but actually seeing myself? I dunno if I'm ready for that." It says much for the current company to have her admit this. More wine. Definitely more wine. She leans into Ravn more.

"And that," Mikaere agrees, acknowledging Ravn, "is why it's not something I use a lot. Though I know some people do, and are perfectly comfortable with it. My uncle, it's just the way he communicates, with people he's close to.I think... it's perhaps easier when you have a plan. Or-- equally, you don't have to drop fully into it. It can be a communication tool, too." More open, more deep than others, perhaps, but still.

The tall Kiwi seems faintly... not amused, as such, but there's a hint of something as he considers Jules and Ariadne, acknowledging both of their points with an additional nod. He, too, pauses to take a sip of his wine. "Well," he concludes. "The offer's there. No judgement, and no pressure."

Ravn sips his wine and nods slightly. "I agree. On both accounts. Some people use this to just communicate, without the barriers. I know Roen and Rosencrantz do. De la Vega certainly likes talking that way -- probably because it lets him see straight through someone's crap, mine included."

He looks at his gloved hand that has somehow found its way around Ariadne's. "I can't do it. I have no talents of that kind, either. And I am honestly not always sorry about that -- because the things I can do make sense, and all the things that don't make sense -- I can't do."

“Huh.” Each new remark is another piece for this puzzle. Jules considers, gaze shifting between one person and the next. “So there are levels? Fully plunging into the deep end versus just dipping your toes? How does it feel different?” she asks Mikaere.

Her wine glass is nearly empty. “Is there any more, Ari? Should we pass it around again?”

Jules winds her way back to conclude, “This thing sounds worth experiencing at least once. Some time.”

"Thank you." Mikaere gets a little nod sent his way. Perhaps Ariadne might take him up on the offer one day. Ravn's hand gets an unconscious squeeze back; her thumb starts up a slow sweep back and forth across what knuckles she can reach.

A good question from Jules. Gesturing with her glass still containing a third of its original volume, the redhead grins. "Have at it, Jules, there's still at least half a bottle. I can't have more than this, it'll give me a gnarly headache, but more for all y'all." What little she's had has eroded enough of her decorum to make her lean up against Ravn now in unconcerned affection. Her hair ends up against his cheek as her attention returns to Mikaere. Yes, how does it feel different with these levels?

"It's-- a lot," acknowledges Mikaere, wrinkling his nose for a moment then relaxing it again. He nudges his wine glass-- also nearly empty-- towards the bottle: Jules will need to fill it while he talks. "There's always ethical questions, about the mental skills. Consent. Lots of questions of consent. I've never experienced any other kind of power, but... I imagine that's less something you have to deal with, with the others, though I suppose there's still healing someone against their will."

He's slower to answer the rest, putting his words together carefully. "It'd be easier to show than to tell. If you dipped your toes in, we could talk, mind to mind, and our minds would be open, but... without the full body experience. I'd sound like the wind and the waves, but you wouldn't be... uh, submerged, I guess. Or you could dive in, and it'd be... more real. More all-encompassing."

His laugh is self-effacing. "It's not so easy to explain."

"It's worth it, when you are ready for an experience like it." Ravn nods his agreement with Mikaere, and then at Jules. "Much like a spirit quest or a walkabout. It takes preparation and indeed, consent."

He makes a face. "Lots of consent, indeed. In hindsight, I'm not sorry I agreed to enter the mindscape that day. I'm not sorry I lost my collar, and came into my power. But I am sorry that it was a very frightening experience, and I had to deal with a lot of emotional baggage around it, on my own, with no guidance. Spiritual experiences like that almost never are meant to happen without guidance -- whether it's finding an animal or spirit guide, or listening to your elders, or focusing on specific parts of scripture. It's all about consent and knowing what you're doing."

Jules goes about pouring the wine, first for herself, then Mikaere. While he speaks, she tilts the heavy glass bottle in Ravn’s direction with what’s left, a silent inquiry. She’s been careful to portion it out equally.

Otherwise Jules listens, nodding. Consent, yes. “I don’t think it’s ever that easy to put these things into words,” she quietly says in the end. “It’s too personal.”

"Nah, explaining a viewpoint from one's own mind is never easy. We don't live in each other's brains...and yeah, there's something...intimate, I'll say, about doing a thing like a deep-dive into a mindscape, especially if it is like the concept of a spirit quest. But...I mean, a quest isn't supposed to be guided, right? You're supposed to discover how to make things happen and overcome on your own? Otherwise, where's the personal growth?"

Ariadne glances around and then into her wine. "Granted, again, I've never done anything like this, so I'm just musing from a perspective of lack of knowledge. I'll be brave enough one day, I think, to try it -- but not just yet. Jules has it right. Sometimes, things are too personal," she agrees with a soft, understanding smile for everyone.

"Very sensible," says Mikaere, reclaiming his wine glass-- and with a nod of thanks for Jules, too-- then leaning back, resting one hand idly upon Jules' knee. "Words are... limiting, sometimes. We're afraid to use them for our innermost feelings in case they're misinterpreted, or wrong. But letting someone see the whole, unvarnished truth? That's another step, sometimes even a step too far."

He considers his wine, then the other three. "There's usually some kind of guidance in a quest. Not step-by-step instructions, no, but at least some kind of contextualisation. I suppose it depends, though."

"The only time I have been -- well, on some kind of spirit quest in the mind scape, it was terrifying, and it took me a long time to recover on my own." Ravn nods slightly at Mikaere. "The guide may not be in there with you. But no tribespeople, gurus, or monks ever sent the acolyte or quester out into the wilderness without any kind of instruction, with no idea what to expect. Personally, I don't want to go back in there again. I had to go one more time, with Rosencrantz, to help find out what it was that happened to me. I'll be happy if I never have to go back. If I am going back sometime, it will be with somebody I can trust to have my best interest at heart."

“I don’t know if there will ever be a full equivalent in the modern day for what we’re talking about.” Jules looks rather reserved when it comes to this discussion. Reluctant, even; she’s quiet while the others speak, dark eyes flitting from one to the next. She only speaks up to say this: “You can’t prepare in the same way when the cultures that had these traditional practices have had to change. You don’t grow up with the same day-in, day-out understanding.”

"This all makes sense..."

A quiet agreement from Ariadne, thoughtful now as she leans. Her eyes are downcast to her wine; the lights strung along Mikaere's boat faintly reflect on the surface of the remaining volume. "I guess if it happens to me that I end up on something like a quest, I'll just...do my best. What else can you do?"

"Mmm," says Mikaere, giving Jules' knee a gentle squeeze; he's picked up some of her reluctance, and whether or not he can trace it back to its source, he's disinclined to push it any further.

"All the more reason to not jump into this kind of thing without thought, and to not use it frivolously. I'm happy enough to show people, but-- if I can avoid it, it's best not to throw people into any kind of deep self-examination. Now-- let's talk about something else, eh? Too nice a night, at least by local standards, to get lost in those particular waters."