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[personal profile] ontology
I've just been out on the lawn, basking in the sun like some sort of cat or reptile or what have you; I have never been so ravenous for sunlight. My skin grows impatient when the sun ducks behind a cloud for a few moments. (I am wearing this, which is very apt for daydreaming in the sun on a day full of breezes, not to mention listening to acres of New Weird America and freak folk. Speaking of which, Daddy got me Steeleye Span for my birthday, "for old times' sake". ♥) Lying in the sun gets the brain to wandering over all sorts of odd paths, and I have just realised several things about my poor messy Evangeline story, which I shall set down because a) for some reason some of you lot seem to miss hearing about it, and b) someone might even have an idea which I will gladly take for a test run.

Let me see -- when I was discussing the story with Kyra last month, she helped me to realise that the library is protected -- I've been running with the vampires-can't-cross-threshold-unless-invited myth and working out how the magics would work mechanically, so to speak, and you can't make them, they have to be -- a psychic barrier of lived-inness protects a house from undead intruders; a house that's just been moved into would be less protected, the older a house is the more difficult it is for vampires to get in, temporary lodgings might be susceptible; it is entirely possible that vampires could get into Mr Caruthers' rooms without much trouble as he is hardly ever there and has no attachment to the place, nor has he really lived there. Anyway, the library is loved and lived-in by so many people -- especially Evangeline and Mr Caruthers -- that it does have that threshold protection, but it becomes significantly weaker when Mr Caruthers is absent. I'm not quite certain why he is so strongly tied to the building; perhaps it has something to do with the reservoir-of-magic/ley lines/something important that is built into/under/around/something the library, and probably Mr Caruthers having mucked about with unpleasant and too-powerful magics in his youth. Because the library is so tied to Mr Caruthers, at this point Evangeline's strong attachment to it does not affect the barrier much. He goes off on some Mysterious Plot-Important Errand at the beginning of the story, vampires break in, plot happens, people die, yay.

And then! While lying in the sun I realised that the vampires were looking for Evangeline when they broke into the library: and they got Lottie instead, because of some sort of misinformation, I don't know. I don't want to make this obvious on the outset, either. (They may have been interested in Mr Caruthers as well, I don't know, but understood they couldn't breach the library if he was there -- and Evangeline has something that they Need.) I think what they want Evy for is her story-sensing -- there's some kind of unrest, quite possibly related to the slow-building unrest which will only need the murder of Archduke Franz Ferdinand in less than two years to ignite the tinder for war, which may or may not involve governments trying to figure out how they can use vampires for things. (Rubbish, this is getting too complicated! I want a smaller story! Stoppit!) I am beginning to think that there is no useful future-seeing amongst the vampires because their unlife puts them out of time in a way -- so while some of them may get glimpses of the future it's not necessarily distinguishable from past or present or hallucination and is usually very random and unlikely to be at all connected to anything that the vampire could find useful -- since they absorb memories from the people they drink, they may be getting a glimpse of one of those lives, or perhaps the future of someone known by those people, and memories may tangle together as there is so much mixed blood. (There's a running idea of memory existing in the blood, and I must commend [livejournal.com profile] cherise for setting me on that path. ♥) Anyway, Evy has the ability to see storylines, or something like that, and the vampires either want to turn her or consume her with the idea that by one of them drawing all of her blood into themselves they will acquire her ability. I don't know, this is the first stage of that idea.

But then Mr Caruthers is also very very important and in some way key, and I'm beginning to understand that part of the end everything is leading to is the vampires wanting him or Mr Caruthers offering himself up as a tithe for some ritual/ceremony/use of magics -- a la Tam Lin. It is entirely possible that he would offer himself up out of sheer guilt -- he has this dangerous more-than-a-residue of the black magics that he toyed with irresponsibly as a youth and they could very well explode and do terrible things and he can't really control it, but willingly sacrficing himself in a situation in which a great explosion of magic would actually be a solution, well... And self-sacrifice would also cleanse the magics of their destructiveness. However, I have no plans nor desire to kill him, so that end will have to be worked through somehow.

There's also something about the trees of London coming to the aid of the city, in a way -- [livejournal.com profile] shadowempress suggested something having to with the essence of London that led to this idea. That fits with my idea that trees, as representations of life, are why stakes of wood can kill vampires, though I'd like a better understanding of why certain plants ward better than others (holly, for example, and, hey, garlic?). if wood is dangerous, imagine how well the trees could overcome the vampires. That's the germ of the germ of an idea, though.

Oh dear

Date: 2009-06-23 09:35 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] lady-moriel.livejournal.com
Mr Caruthers offering himself up as a tithe for some ritual/ceremony/use of magics -- a la Tam Lin. It is entirely possible that he would offer himself up out of sheer guilt -- he has this dangerous more-than-a-residue of the black magics that he toyed with irresponsibly as a youth and they could very well explode and do terrible things and he can't really control it, but willingly sacrficing himself in a situation in which a great explosion of magic would actually be a solution, well... And self-sacrifice would also cleanse the magics of their destructiveness.

Um...n'awwww. ...What? Self-sacrifice is like my favorite story trope/writing kink ever. I may have mentioned this once or twice. Or so. :p

Date: 2009-06-27 01:38 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] faeriemaiden.livejournal.com
Well, it's one of mine, too. Especially if the self-sacrifice bit negates the actually-having-to-die bit, because my favourite characters dying upsets me just a little. ^-^

Date: 2009-06-23 10:19 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] goddessreason.livejournal.com
Oi! That looks like my shirt, only with grey in the middle.

Date: 2009-06-27 01:39 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] faeriemaiden.livejournal.com
STOP TAKING MY CLOTHES YOU BINT. :P

Date: 2009-06-27 01:50 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] goddessreason.livejournal.com
Haha! That's two people that resent my having that shirt. My work here is done ;)

Date: 2009-06-27 01:53 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] faeriemaiden.livejournal.com
Actually, which shirt is it -- the black one with the chequered sleeves, or the brocade bodicey one? Cos I bought the bottommost shirt at Rue21, so it would be less creepy if you had it or something similar. :p

Date: 2009-06-27 02:22 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] goddessreason.livejournal.com
The bottommost Rue21 shirt. Alas. I have it. Sarah wanted to get it, but it wasn't in her size :P

Date: 2009-06-23 10:22 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] trollywoodqueen.livejournal.com
Blimey...you're brilliant.

Date: 2009-06-23 11:35 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] burningstarsxe.livejournal.com
I do hope that this is a novel which gets finished, that I may read it!

Date: 2009-06-25 04:03 pm (UTC)
ext_17473: (Default)
From: [identity profile] missbaxter.livejournal.com
Oh dear, I have nothing helpful to add story-wise at the moment, but I'm so excited to hear that you're novelling again! I still have the draft that you sent out after last November's insanity, which I read and enjoyed very much, and then failed to red-pen in any way at all, but if you'd like any feedback on either that or anything new, feel free to let me know, as July is looking rather slow...And really that's just an excuse for me to get my grubby little mitts on more of your work, which (again) I liked Very Much Indeed, and which I would love to become better acquainted with...

Date: 2009-06-27 05:25 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] cherise.livejournal.com
My jaw dropped lower and lower the farther I got into the post, excepting a small "meep!" when I saw myself mentioned. It's brill, darling, and I know you'll spin a wild and lovely story out of these ideas. I really love Evy's power (librarians ftw!) and oh, Mr Caruthers. Oh you. :D

I was going to say something but I've forgotten entirely. Most of my brain is feasting on this entry. x.x

edit: Of course I remember as soon as I hit post - I just wanted to say, I haven't been reading my flist at all due to ... emotional issues ... but reading your journal has honestly straightened me out updating-wise - just remembering that I can talk about myself and be honest without being downright depressing and gross, and that others do want to hear about me, and that they care, and all that. So, thank you. You are far too marvelous. ♥

Date: 2009-06-27 07:24 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] lady-moriel.livejournal.com
So you remember (uh, probably you wanted more brain bleach to forget...) my semi-suggestion of exactly what might have happened with Mr. Caruthers', er, explosion of magic at an extremely inopportune time, happening along with/because of the...you know...release of other things? Right, well, no matter what, this kind of unstable and dangerous magic is probably tied in very closely with any kind of emotion, right? I mean, there's power in stories and memories and blood and life and everything, but what really gives those things power is emotion--the hate or love or anger or possession or hurt or whatever that comes about through/because of those events, memories, life stories, etc. Emotion gives it meaning. So it must have a major influence on certain kinds of magic, too--like, say, threshold magic. The more emotionally attached to, invested in, etc. you are to a place, the stronger its protection while you're there, but conversely, the less its protection any time you happen to leave. And Mr. Caruthers, whether for his love of books or his clinging to something normal and familiar or trying very very hard to bury his past under the relative respectability of librarianhood, is insanely attached to his library, way more than he is to his own home (that's probably another part of it--one person can only make one strong threshold, and it's not something that happens on purpose; depends on other factors too, like all the people that love the library and all its stories and stuff, but still). He might not even realize that this is the case until the break-in, in part because maybe he's been trying not to think about it in general, but that would help explain why he'd leave the library virtually defenseless in the first place (bonus: more guilt for him!). Heck, for even more guilt, maybe he's somehow the reason the vampires became aware of Evy and her power in the first place, though again by accident.

...hm. Vampires get some flash of memory/life story through drinking a person's blood/life, right? At least some sensations, even if it's not specific enough to be helpful? Well: say Mr. Caruthers is mooning over Evy at some point and is off his guard for that reason, or he was patrolling and still off his guard for that reason, whatever, and he gets attacked, probably by multiple vampires. At least one gets a good bite in and gets enough of his blood--especially with his magic bound up in, like, his life essence or some crap, and that being tied to emotions, most of which were focused on Evy at the time--to get a sense of Evy and her power, and although Mr. Caruthers obviously manages to fight off and stake most of them, at least that one gets away.

Of course, if he realized that was why they hit the library, he'd probably tell her stuff sooner, but maybe he didn't realize that, I don't know--maybe he/they thought at first that the vampires were actually looking for him, and he just happened to not be there then.

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