15 May 2023
Finally went back to Elsenaia. I’ve been working on it recently (as in, beginning of August), as well, and I’d like to turn it into a proper story. So here’s my attempt to redo some of the early bit. There’s going to be a lot less time spent inside the mind dive, I think.
Elsenaia hadn’t participated in many mind dives, and certainly never a human’s, so she hadn’t really known what to expect. Still, every other mind she’d visited had been neat and orderly, whether it was a carefully planned garden of thoughts or something more like her own stately palace.
They definitely weren’t like this. This was… What else could she call it but chaos? Some kind of instrument–a piano, he called it?--was covered in bits and bobs of memories and hopes and dreams, with few if any of them actually about music. There was a cupboard under the stairs that tried to dump her into a whole other world where people rode around on broomsticks, and a greenhouse inside the house that not only stretched on for infinity, but seemed to constantly shift its layout every time she looked at it.
She eventually wound up in some sort of dining area that itself was full of junk. On a counter sat a small group of figurines; Elsenaia picked one up, and nearly fainted at the notion of half-elves, before she realized it was all made up. …Wasn’t this Nicholas a bit old to be playing pretend? Strange.
Nothing, though, could have prepared Elsenaia for th things she saw when she sat down at the table. It was… Nick’s family. His siblings. His father and mother. Even now, they still flirted as they prepared dinner. There was laughter at the table. When his parents asked how Nick and his siblings were or what they were working on, they meant it, and they listened, no matter how small the concerns seemed.
And Nick’s brothers and sister! There were no sly looks, no competing for affection or prestige. When they teased one another, there was an undercurrent of fondness, not spite.
Elsenaia tried in vain to prevent tears from forming in her eyes. Why couldn’t she have had this? Why was this man, with no particular renown, so loved, while Elsenaia had been left alone?
She tried to banish the thought; she knew it was unfair. But before she could, she felt Nick grab hold, and indignation warmed the room around her to uncomfortable levels. To Elsenaia’s shock, Nick wasn’t mad at her, despite her rude thoughts, but at her family. And… at Tairsi?
Suddenly Elsenaia had a flashback, clear as the moon of the day Tairsi had left. The day they stopped being friends, and were merely a princess and her subordinate.
After all, princesses aren’t allowed to have friends.
Then Elsenaia saw him, eyes burning. Nick was there. Nick was watching her memories. Somehow, Nick was inside her head.
Panicked, Elsenaia cut the spell off, and they snapped back to their bodies. Tairsi and Darrett stepped forward protectively, but Nick wasn’t intimidated. And to the shock of everyone present, when he opened his mouth, he spoke in perfect Elvish.