Day Two-Ninety-Four: Tucked away for safekeeping

Maaaaaan, I'm outta the tournament. Lost to Grylock. He's poised to face off against Libby and Robert in the finale. Gonna be a fierce battle tomorrow evening, lemme tell ya.

Not… not Robert the Librarian, of course. This is Robert the Noble. Y'know? Has a wife named Giselle? The Noble? The Noble family? Yeah, I guess they're ALL the Noble family, but I'm trying to be personable, here. Getting to know all these stupid nobles is tough.

Maybe I shouldn't call them 'stupid'. I have to get along with 'em.

…

Meh. My diary. I call them what I want. 

BUT ROBERT! The Librarian, of course! I made some headway with him today, in that I VERIFIED HIS CONTINUED EXISTENCE! Yep, Robert's travelling along with us… in his own little way… and is quite content with his new life. June has him convinced that he's in a thriving library. The way she's doing it has me concerned, but…

Libby's been confined to bed, what with an increase in cramps and her overall mellowness (which is plain weird, I gotta say), and I went to June's wagon to ask her advice. I missed the pregnancy last time, so I don't know what to do. Does the baby fly out of Libby like a cannonball? Or does it split open her belly for a split second and leap out like an action hero? 

I don't know. I missed it. I figure, though, that June's old enough to have learned something about the miracle of birth, bein' a healer and all. Who better to ask?

Nobody enters June's wagon. Understandable, 'cause it's guided by an intelligent tarantula that can somehow control two oxen with its tiny… front… arm… thingers. Not ACTUAL thingers, that would be gross, but spider thingers. Anatomically different, and if they have a name, I don't know it. Arms'll do. Either way, it's a creepy little thing, even if Libby vouches for its manners.

And it IS polite. It waved as I approached the wagon, and ushered me through the flaps on the front. Offered me a cup of tea, too. I passed, but I tried to restrain my disgust. Doesn't do to be cruel.

The spider pointed me to the central pole holding up the wagon's cover, and on it was a tiny door. It looked just like the door in June's hut. After some more prodding from the spider I gripped the wee doorknob and turned -

- and was immediately sucked into June's hut, my floppy hat sailing across the room and RIGHT into June's roaring fireplace. I scrambled to grab it, 'cause not only am I afraid that June will KILL ME for ruining her gift, I'm kinda fond of the stupid thing. It's slicker than I originally thought, and the nobles seem to like it.

June laughed from her desk as I stomped the flames out of the hat and planted it back on my head. "Your entrances always give me the giggles, Mayormir. Can I call ya Mayormir?"

"I'd prefer not," I replied, brushing soot off my shoulders.

"Right ya are, Mayormir." June swept away from her desk, pointing a now-airborne scroll towards a hole in the far wall. "ROBERT! INCOMING!"

"On it, ma'am!" a cheery voice whispered back through the hole. Definitely Robert.

I ran to the wall. "Robert!" I called through, trying to peek at what lay beyond. "Are you okay, buddy?! Speak t'me!"

Silence, for a moment. Then, chirping as happily as it ever had back home, Robert's voice. "Dragomir! Is that you, my lad? Good to hear you again! My, it's been a while, hasn't it? Would you like to visit my library?"

"I'd love to! Just… gimme… gimme a minute…" I searched the wall in vain for a doorknob. "June, um, is there…?"  

June shook her head, but said nothing. Instead, she walked to the wall, turned to stare me full in the eyes, and smiled. The whites surrounding her crazy pupils swam, turning a deep, familiar orange -

- and a loud POP! pierced the air, a sudden, sharp intake of breath from my lungs, MY lungs, forcibly floating out of my mouth and swirling, mixing, becoming a steam tinged with orange at June's side.

The steam shifted. Changed. It became… me. Me, in my old guard outfit, before… everything. That me, smiling, floated through the hole in the wall and out of sight.

"Hi, Robert!" a hauntingly familiar voice cried. "Man, I missed ya! I'm so sorry 'bout what happened last time! I… hell, man, I didn't -"

"It's okay!" Robert cried back. "It's fine! I shouldn't have yelled! No problem! Welcome, come in, enjoy my new library! I love it!"

Robert and the Phantasm Me reconciled. I, still standing in June's little home, listened in silence. Eventually the two voices on the other side of the wall faded away, and June pulled me back to the door.

"You can't go over there," she explained. "There ain't enough room. He's basically crammed into a closet full of books. He THINKS it's a full library, but… nope. Don't worry, that shape I sucked out of ya will say everything you woulda."

I wasn't hung up on that anymore, though. "W… why did… why did your eyes turn… why are they still kinda…?"

June cocked an eyebrow. "What, you callin' me ugly?"

"No! No! I just… um… why… orange…"

Too late. June was on the defensive, which as she advanced on me quickly turned to an offensive. "What? What? You think my eyes're too white? You think I'm too old? My skin too sallow? Hmmmm? You come into my house to say that my irises look like a swirling, stylized sun? You married man! How dare you call an old woman ugly! I could crack your head open with a touch of my finger! Yes, you keep backin' up, thou withered jelly, thou clouted rough-hew bugbear, thou burly-boned motley-minded maggot-pie, why don't ya just get thee to a nunne -"

"I'M SORRY I'M SORRY!" She'd backed me into a corner by this point, waving a jagged fingernail in my face. "I JUST WANTED TO ASK YOUR ADVICE ON LIBBY 'CAUSE SHE'S PREGGERS AND I DUNNO WHAT I'M DOING 'CAUSE MY FIRST BABY EVE CAME WHILE I WAS ASLEEP AND THERE ARE NO NURSES OR NUTHIN' AND I FIGURED YOU'RE SO SMART 'CAUSE YOU HAVE A LIBRARY AND MAYBE YOU MIGHT BE ABLE TO YOU KNOW HELP WITH STUFF AND PLEASE DON'T HURT ME I'M GONNA BE A DADDY AND I'M RUNNING OUT OF BREATH AND I CAN'T KEEP THIS"

Eventually I peed myself and passed out. I couldn't stop talking! My vocabulary, everything I'd learned, flowed like desperate diarrhoea in an effort to keep me alive! I doubt I needed to go that far, but dammit, I do what I must to ward off witches!

When I woke up a few hours later, June was tending to Libby. Provided her with a bunch of herbs to ease the birthing. She's staying in our wagon tonight, to keep an eye on my wife, while Grylock, Edmund and I stay in HER wagon.

With… the tarantula.

It has its own cot 'n everything.

I wait. The pregnancy, June says, should happen tomorrow. She KNOWS it'll happen tomorrow. I'm fine with that timetable. Didn't even have a PREDICTION last time. The night will give me a chance to ruminate over the rather troubling bit of magic I witnessed today.

June is keeping Robert in her 'library' to maintain his sanity. From what I heard of him after the fall of the castle, he needs therapy. I'm cool with that… though I'm sketchy on her methods. Ghosts? Fooling him into THINKING he's in a full library? Troublesome…

… yet that's not the big thing here.

Her eyes.

They went… orange…

I only know one other person whose eyes could turn orange… and he's dead.

It was the exact same colour.

Sincerely,

Dragomir the Mayor