Worldbuilding Month Day 6: More Roots of the Aunt Tree

Mar14

March is Worldbuilding Month! Leave me a question about any of my worlds, and I will do my best to answer it!
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This third one is from [personal profile] kelkyag:
where did the American branch of the family, Carrie and Sarah, come from?

Okay, so I’d originally thought that the immigrated from Away, but I probably shouldn’t have named aunts I was thinking of as German Carrie and Sarah if that were the case.

Also, that doesn’t quite match with what I said to Rix.

So, let’s see.

Wikipedia says:

In the 1670s the first significant groups of German immigrants arrived in the British colonies, settling primarily in New York and Pennsylvania… Between 1820 and 1870 over seven and a half million German immigrants came to the United States

Since that story takes place in 1802, let’s say that the branch that thought of itself as the root branch came over to downstate NY in the late 1670’s.

That means there was an established branch downstate when Carrie and Sarah decided to come up north.

Which changes something – they may BE the root family, but they moved with no family at all. Were they part of a split; i.e., did they have the power of the family but were, say, the only children of an only surviving child? That would explain the move, too; if the power split off between them and another Aunt, a cousin.

So: Carrie and Sarah came from Downstate. *nods firmly*

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Weekend, with Hibernation

Mar13

So… I like winter. I actually do. The layers of clothing, the cozy feeling in front of the fire, hot cocoa and marshmallows. I like it. Yes, there’s also shoveling, brushing off the car, taking twice as long to get to work, hauling the firewood. But there’s always things like that.

What I like most about winter is the feeling of hibernation. You can spend an entire weekend or two just not leaving the house, and it seems perfectly reasonable. (Winters that I don’t get this, I get a little cranky, actually — long warm winters, winters without enough snow…)

(In my case, “enough snow” is gauged on a chart involving feet of snow, not inches, because I grew up on Lake Ontario, where the snow comes not in snowfalls but in giant snow dumps.)

This weekend, last weekend, I don’t have that much to blog about — because we hibernated. The weekend before this most recent one, we didn’t leave the house at all. This weekend, we got take-out (Nobody delivers to where we live) and went grocery shopping.

Exciting, right?

Very restful.

We fixed our stand mixer – it needed a new worm follower gear (I used to play White Wolf/World of Darkness a lot; the urge to think of that as a Wyrm Follower is strong), so we cleaned it out, replaced the gear, and packed grease into it.

We vacuumed the stairs and the hearth – we have three cats and heat with wood, making both of those weekly chores.

I made a bit loaf of bread and we ate Chinese take-out leftovers all weekend.

The house looks a little cleaner, my wordcount looks amazing, and all in all, I feel refreshed and recharged – never mind Daylight Savings Time, grumble grumble.

And that’s why I like hibernation. I get some quiet time, I get some stuff done, and there is very little that has to be done.

Spring is coming soon, and that will change the whole equation, but until then, I’ll enjoy my time trapped inside by the cold and the snow.

Stay warm, everyone. We’ve got a little more hibernation left.

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Funeral: Silence’s Inheritance

Mar13

This follows The Funeral and Further Funeral and Funeral: Will-Reading and Funeral: Senga’s Inheritance. It’s set in Fae apoc, pre-apoc era, possibly 2010.

Senga stared at the lawyer. She didn’t dare look at Mr. Silence; she didn’t dare look at the rest of the room.

Clause Seven. That was the clause which had kept her alive. That answered a question she hadn’t wanted to ask yet – did Great-Aunt Mirabella’s protections continue after her death? It appeared that they did, or at least that they might.

If she agreed to Own someone who was clearly averse to the idea and clearly dangerous.

Well… he might be less dangerous than the rest of the family and of Mirabella’s empire.

“Now. Erramun called Silence, Mirabella here leaves to you one million dollars from the general fund, these three blue envelopes here, and her 1963 split-window Corvette, under the requirement that you agree to serve as Senga Monmatrin’s bond servant for no less than six years under the Law of the People. In addition -”

“Why does she get him?” The voice was shrill and loud.

“Miss Muirgen, if you engage in one more interruption, I will be forced to remove you from the premises and from the will, as allowed for in provision three of the will and as you have already been warned.”

“I’d like to see you try!”

“Very well, that does count as another interrupt. Joseph, Henrich,” he nodded to the two large men.

Muirgen was removed from the room with a surprisingly small amount of fuss.

“Now, as I was saying, Mr. Silence. If you do not agree to those terms, not only do you not receive your inheritance, but I am ordered to publicize the contents of what is referred to as envelopes A, B, and C.”

He said nothing, but Senga could see the way his shoulders tensed and twitched. He nodded his head very slowly.

“Please see me when the will reading is completed to discuss these terms.”

The lawyer moved on to the next person on his list. Erramun-called-Silence stood up and stalked out of the room.

Senga considered for two or three heartbeats before she followed him out.

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Lady Taisiya and her First Husband Discuss – a continuation

Mar13

after Lady Taisiya’s FIRST Husband – a ficlet, to [personal profile] thnidu’s commissioned continuation.

Taisiya couldn’t stay turned around for long, which was probably best for her pride and self-esteem. She turned back to face the horses before she’d come up with anything to say.

Her husband repeated, very politely, “what do you want, Lady Taisiya?”

The first thing that came to her mind this time was what should I want? That wasn’t, however, the sort of question one asked one’s husband.

She cleared her throat. “I want… to be comfortable in my own home.”

“Well then,” he answered, his voice gentle, “I shall attempt to provide you with that.”

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The Uncle re. an Aunt

Mar12

First: Visiting the Family
Previous: The Powers that Be

Uncle Willard let Eva’s words hang in the air while he opened up his sun porch to them and brought in a pitcher of cold lemonade.

There was something like a ritual to it, the clean glasses, the glass pitcher, the cold, sweet-tart fresh lemonade. In the winter, it woudl have been tea. Their family had things that they did, and they all did them more or less the same.

The thought made her smile, her lips just starting to curl up as Willard answered.

“I think Asta was a changing of the guard. She had a lot of things she did. None of them, well, were any use to me, but I think they might be of use to this nephew of yours.” He sat back in an old armchair and lounged, looking at Rosaria and Eva over his lemonade.

Eva wasn’t fooled by his nonchalant glance. This, too, was a test.

She was growing a little tired of tests.

“Let’s see. Asta left Aunt Rosaria free to pursue a different path, one that involved a family, which places Aunt Rosaria as the tale-teller. That’s not a small thing. She let the older generation get complacent, because she let them push her around, and yet, if you read her diaries, she was supremely good at doing what needed to be done, when it needed doing.

“So she wasn’t holding on to as much power, probably – the legacy has a feel to it, you know, and she passed down a smaller part of it. Then again, the whole thing about the legacy is that it comes from the family, and that’s been changing in the last few months.” Eva took a breath. “But Asta holding less of it left more of it in other hands.” She lifted her chin. “Do I pass, Uncle Willard?”

He laughed, cheerfully but with an edge. “You’re an Aunt, all right.”

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Cat’s Mystery – the beginning of a story of the Aunt Family

Mar12

This is entirely because of the way Stone has been shaping up in my mind
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There were any number of mysteries to Cat’s new school.

Some of them, she’d been expecting: from things she’d heard, and from the last two times she’d changed schools, she knew that every school had its own slang, and that every locale – city, town, village – had its own places that you couldn’t find on a map. The Quarry. The Old Grocery Store. Down by the Tracks. This one, Demville-Latta, was pretty rural, a good thirty-forty minute drive to the nearest so-called city, so in addition to needing a Demville-to-English dictionary, you pretty much needed a car to get to any of these mystery places.

Her parents were not yet convinced of this necessity, which meant that her mystery-detangling was pretty much limited to school and the bus, at least until either her parents gave in or she made some friends with cars.

Among the other mysteries were Track, really? This school’s only good team sport is track? and What the heck is going on with the Cunningham-Bauer-Talbot-Green-etc. family? That family encompassed two teachers, a bus driver, and, at last count, at least ten students, nine of whom rode her bus. They were the closest-knit group of cousins she’d ever seen – and yet sometimes they seemed just like any other family, arguing and sulking and teasing each other.

She’d been warned on day one not to “mess with” that family. That, of course, only intrigued her more.

That would be a nut she would take time to crack. Not too much time, of course, because, after all, she didn’t know how long she’d be here, but enough time that she didn’t come off creepy, stalkerish, or needy.

(By this point, she had how-to-deal-with-new-schools down to an artform. The problem was, new schools didn’t really have how-to-deal-with-new-kids down to anything but a mess.)

The mystery she decided to focus on first was much simpler, although it touched tangentially on that Cunningham-Bauer-Talbot-Green-etc. family mess, in that Miss Cunningham seemed somewhow to be involved.

It was: What is Mrs. Realle doing on lunch break, and why does it seem like Miss Cunningham and Mr. Fentner are involved?

It wasn’t so much that she thought it was anything bad, it was just that she was curious, and she learned far more about a place by sneaking around than she ever did by just going to classes.

So she slipped out of PE and went down to the girls’ room instead of to the cafeteria, which put her in the right place to walk back into that hall with teachers’ offices, the maintenance closet, and an abandoned classroom with 50’s-era science equipment. She slipped into the classroom, hid behind one of the giant lab tables, and waited.

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Landing Page: The Hidden Mall

Mar12

Abby and Liv were just trying to get away from their least favorite bully, Vic Carter, when they ducked into the back hall of their local mall.

Now they’re more lost than they’ve ever been, and they may need Vic’s help to get home.

All The Stories

Consumer Worldbuilding 

  • nothing here yet.  Ping the author if you want to know about this world!

Lady Taisiya’s FIRST Husband – a ficlet

Mar12

This is based off a bit from the beginning of Lady Taisiya’s Fourth Husband:

“It’s all right to be nervous. I was nervous, the first time I wed. And the second,” she added wryly.

Sefton peeked at her. “Nervous?” He had never heard of women being nervous at their weddings!

“Oh, terrified. My first husband, he was much older than I was, and he had lost his entire family. I was barely older than you are now, and I was meant to be Honored Wife over a man who could have been my grandfather.” She wrinkled her nose, and then let the expression slide into a wistful smile. “We became friends, eventually. It was he who found my second husband.”

Her husband had no family to stand up with him, and she, the Honored Wife, was meant to stand on her own.

Her mother and her fathers, her sisters and their husbands, they all sat in the audience, because this was her First Marriage, and it was meant to be an important step out of her natal family.

But Diafel walked himself down the aisle and bowed before her. “Lady Taisiya, I come to you.”

The rest of the words were supposed to be spoken to his mother and father, but Diafel was long past his eggling days, and his parents had no sway over him – if, indeed, they still lived.

“Diafel, I accept you. Come into my home and stand as First Husband over my lands.”

The ceremony was short. Diafel was meant to steady her, not to join her with other families or to create an alliance. He was meant to educate her in manners her mother felt she hadn’t let been taught, not to grow her household.

She brought him home in her carriage, driving herself. He said nothing, watching the scenery go by. She said nothing, uncertain what a girl like her said to an old man like him.

His hair had gone grey! He had been married his first time when her mother was still an eggling! He was still strong and still handsome, yes, but he was old.

“So.” He cleared his throat as they neared the home that would now be theirs. Hers. “It isn’t within protocol for me to speak first, and for that I apologize. But now that we’ve done what everyone else wants – the question is, what do we want? Which comes down to – what do you want, my Lady Wife?”

Taisiya turned and stared at him, utterly without any idea what to say.

next: http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/1274648.html

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Trying again, Cya

Mar12

After Cya gets ready for a date and Almost Out the Door for a Date.

The first date was… awkward.

No, the first date wasn’t. The second one was awkward.

The first date, he’d looked at her, dressed up instead of the way he’d met her, and cleared his throat in a sort of panicked noise. “I didn’t realize you were the Mayor!” He stood up so quickly she thought that he might have a speed-based power. “I, uh. I have to go – I have to go. I’m sorry. But I – no. You’re the Mayor.”

She’d gone running after that, back into her “plain-clothes” with her hair twisted up in a scarf so its trademark red wasn’t visible. The guards along the city wall knew who she was, of course, but they weren’t going to gossip about the Mayor and the angry look on her face. They liked their jobs.

The second one, then. She’d been a little poised for trouble. She’d made sure he knew she was the Mayor. She’d picked a place that her power said he and she would both enjoy.

And she’d Found him, after all. He was someone who could like her, who she could like.

And they found they had almost nothing to talk about. She worked in education, urban planning, and the explosive business of protecting her territory. He was a wanderer, a vagabond, who fixed things as he wandered through. “I like your city,” he said, and probably meant it, “but how do you – I mean. Don’t you get bored, being in the same place, year after year?”

“But it’s not the same place,” she’d protested. “It’s always changing. Always evolving. That’s the trick. A city, one with people, is never static.”

They’d stared at each other in mutual incomprehension and found safer topics to cover until the check came.

The third one had lasted several dates and a few trips home. The fourth one had even met Leo.

This time, she’d let one of her friends in the Guard set her up. It couldn’t, she figured, be any worse than her own attempts.

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