Post by Beets The Beetle (Feenix) on Nov 7, 2023 22:36:19 GMT
Co-written with equally wonderfully wholesome and awesome Toothy
The unexpected warm spell had brought the people of Daring Heights out in enthusiastic droves to enjoy the weather while it lasted with one another, whilst of course not forgetting to indulge in the seasonal pastries that were now available to them from the ever popular Paradise Frost patisserie.
The sweet scent of freshly baked pumpkin pies nor the warm shafts of golden sunlight in her eyes as she exited out of the tinkling door with a covered basket did nothing though to stir Beets from her thoughts. As she flitted her way skyward above Castle Road towards the address on the ‘For-Sale’ ad she had torn from the notice board earlier that morning, Beets reread the now very crumpled parchment clutched in her hand for about the twentieth time that day.
‘1x Great Club for sale! But this is no ordinary great club, oh goodness heavens no. This charming weapon is constructed of the horn of a great horned beetle from the Witching Court. So strike down your enemies whilst also incurring the wrath of chitinous nature. Hoping to accept bids of ~500Gp. Please bring all bids to Toothy Wynraek, who can be found at Lucan's Leathers in DH.’
‘Great horned beetle…’ Could it perhaps be a remnant of the swarm that had attacked her village almost two years ago now? The Witching Court after all was somewhere in the Feywild too Beets recalled, though she couldn’t recall if she had actually been there. What if that’s where the swarm had spread from in the first place? She still had no idea where her old home-and the village-was in the Feywild. What if they were close by? What if…
‘What if she was just jumping to conclusions?’ She tried to calm herself as she made her way into the air above the Swampside District. There were probably loads of giant insects flitting all around the Feywild, The Dawnlands and beyond. Surely they weren’t all controlled by a dark malignant force that had ties to her mother.
And yet…
The bell sounds on the door to the aromatic interior of Lucan's Leathers and Beets enters the shop tentatively on foot, glancing about.
Nothing strikes her as out of the ordinary in the shop. By the door is an array of belts, bags and leather armour, all hung up neatly against the wall and on various shelves. Further in behind the small counter is where the workshop begins, and it's here she sees a pale half-elf diligently sharpening his leather working tools. At the sound of the bell he turns a bald head, covered in scars older than Beets, towards her. "Good day and welcome to Lucan's Leathers, what you looking for?" He does eventually put the tools down to give Beets his full attention with a scrutinising look, a full assessment of the barbarian now in front of him.
“Oh yes, hello! I’m here to see Toothy!” Beets replies, a little uneasy about the assessing stare the shop-keep gives her. She’d had a long unpleasant history with people staring at her before coming to the Dawnlands, so it was hard to shake the stigma sometimes.
"I see, you a friend then? Don't think I've seen you 'round before but you certainly look like the determined fighting type he'd associate with."
There's another long awkward pause, Lucan purposely making the atmosphere tense, before he silently moves through a door to the back of the shop. At a volume that can probably be heard in Portal Plaza he shouts "Toothy! A friend is here, don't keep them waiting.”
There's a cacophony of heavy footfalls above Beets' head as someone frantically starts moving upstairs. Lucan reemerges into the shop with Toothy rushing in behind him, at seeing Beets a large friendly grin lights up his face.
"Beets! Long time no see, I wasn't expecting you round. Or was I? Oh shit did I forget something?"
“Uhm. Beets’ wings give a nervous little ‘Vrrrb!’as she tries to compose herself. ‘I-I’m here about the Beetle ad-horn ad-beetle bug horn ad!” She stammers, before pulling a bulging coin pouch from her belt. “I brought the gold-Oh and food-” she lifts the basket in her other hand, “to make you talk-for us to talk-talking food that is! Uh..” This was not going well, and as if to end her shambling episode in spectacularly terrible fashion the coin purse she held upside down unknowingly decided to suddenly give out, spilling a heavy chinking gush of gold coins to the shop floor around her. “Oh Flit.”
"Oh! Wait wait lemme help you, then we can go upstairs and chat if you like?" Toothy moves over and crouches down to help scoop up the dropped coins back into Beets' pouch, a small ferret emerging from his shirt collar to assist. As he does so he shoots a look at his dad over his shoulder. Beets can't see what the drow's expression is, but Lucan only shrugs slightly in response and goes back to his tool sharpening.
Standing back up, Toothy steps over to open the back door, sweeping an arm out to indicate the way to the stairs. "You mentioned food, right? In the basket? So let's go sit in the kitchen." In a very loud stage whisper he adds, "And we can get away from the mean gargoyle that patrols the shop down here." There's minimal grumbling from Lucan, but he doesn't look up from his work.
“T-thanks…” Beets smiles embarrassed as she drops her own handfuls of coin into the pouch and climbs up to follow, stopping to give a nod and another quiet, “Thank you.” to Lucan before passing through the door.
“Gargoyle?” she asks as she follows Toothy down the hall, “Oh you mean-?” She gives a glance back towards the shop door as it closes, leaving her words hanging.
"Lucan, my dad.” Toothy interjects, “Over protective, stoney and will happily stand there really still and watch your squirm. Don't worry he does that to everyone but really he's a major softie at heart." Now at the top of the stairs Toothy leads Beets into the house, through a small entryway that leads into the kitchen. Here he pulls out a chair from the small kitchen table, lightly jostling the decorative bowl of daggers that adorns it. "Make yourself at home, I'll quickly go put Ferdinand in his nest and get the greatclub so you can look at it and stuff okay."
At the mention of Lucian being Toothy’s father, Beets's face grew a little overcast as she took a final glance back down the stairs, before then quickly hovering into the kitchen after Toothy with a steady drone of her wings, taking the seat he offers her. “Thanks,” she nods, almost forgetting the basket that hangs limp at her side which she slides up onto the table beside the dagger bowl with barely a look.
Toothy acknowledges Beets’ behaviour for a brief moment before disappearing briefly into the back of the house to retrieve something, upon his return revealing it to be the beetle horn great club, replacing Ferdinand the ferret in his hands. Carefully laying it on the table in front of Beets he nods, "Though it's an unusual material it's defo a good weapon, glad to see you have an eye for it." Glancing to the basket joining the daggers on the table he adds cautiously "And it's wonderful you brought snacks! A little unusual for a weapon sale but I won't complain."
Beets almost doesn't hear Toothy's words as she looks over the vast thing now set in front of her, a piece of thick bone like material shaped in a sweeping curve, its surface an iridescent coppery sheen. The snapped end has been fitted into a carved heat sealed wooden hilt, making the whole thing about a head taller than herself. Beets puts out a hand and touches it, her fingers tingling at its cold surface, before she then reaches into a pouch and pulls out a large shard of a much darker toned beetle horn. A broken curve tip ending in three large prongs, a piece Toothy recalls as a piece of the large characteristic horn that Beets used to wear affixed to her forehead.
"Different…’ Beets says after comparing the two for a moment, finally letting herself breath as she sets her own broken shard on the table beside the larger. ‘...It's different."
'But, just because it was a different type, didn't mean it didn't come from the same place said a darker voice' in her mind, a chill prickle creeping up her spine as she recalled the writhing legs and hissing maws of those giant centipedes acting in place of the arms of that..that thing… "W-where..Where exactly did you get this?" Beets asks with a swallow, turning to look towards Toothy across the table.
It was plain to Toothy from Beets twitchy nature, from the flick of her eyes between the two horn pieces to him and back and the nervous bouncing clacking of one of her beetle legs, that just getting an ‘on-brand’ weapon, wasn’t Beets’ main reason for coming to see him. The shaped brass band that now replaced the iconic beetle horn on her brow was also a dead give away too that something had changed about Beets in the last months Toothy had seen them.
In a calming way, with hopes to also distract Beets' thoughts, Toothy places a gentle hand on her shoulder. "Where me and the others got it is a bit of a longggg story. How about we crack out the food you brought first, you think a cuppa will go well with it?"
He moves to the small stove to put the kettle on, with the water set to boil he moves to get plates and add them to the growing pile of things on the table. Toothy slides the weapon off, leaning it upright against a chair and slightly out of sight of Beets.
"S-sure." Beets pulls the chequered cloth covering basket and starts to lay out the treats she bought from Paradise frost: Apple Cider Pies, Gingersnaps, Caramel Apple Tart, a Pumpkin Cheesecake Roll, Mooncakes and a loaf of Pumpkin Bread. The kitchen is soon filled with a mouth watering scent of autumnal baked goods.
Toothy chuckles slightly and stares in awe at it all. “Wow Beets you brought the whole spread! Now I feel bad we don't have any fancy tea or something. But hopefully this will suffice." He plops down a simple tea tray and pulls out another seat for himself.
“Well I’m afraid I still don’t know much about you so didn’t know what you’d fancy. And then Jorious and Casilla were very convincing with their new autumn menu so I just got a selection.” Beets admits with a small embarrassed smile.
“Tea is fine, thank you.”
He nods in acknowledgment, his reassuring smile still not gone. "Right, so story time.” Toothy begins as he starts pouring them each a cup. “You ever heard of the Witching Court in the Feywild? Cause that's where this started, more specifically near a place called Osar Breach."
Beets’ head had been itching furiously trying to recall if she had visited the Witching Court before. Directions in the Feywild had never been her strong point, but she put that down to her very isolated upbringing. Living for 20 years inside a dense Feywildian Wood would do that to you. But, as she reached for a ginger snap as Toothy began to fill her own cup with tea, the trickling sound of the water suddenly surfaced a memory. One from one of her earliest Dawnlands adventures. One which quite flittin' frankly could have been her last. A strange trickling sound and sensation, as all the strength in her body had seemed to have begun to leak out of her, her wings going limp bringing her sagging down to her knees in front the immense figure before her, a woman cloaked in green with rich coppery hair and intense green glowing eyes.
‘Do you wish to fight me still child?’ Had spoken the voice of Queen Nichenvin, Witch Queen of the Witching Court.
Beets' biscuit snaps in her hand, and the two halves fall to the floor with a scattering of crumbs... "Ohh..Yeeeah.." She manages with a stammer of realisation, the fallen biscuit quite forgotten. "B-been just the once."
"A memorial time I take it?" Toothy swiftly glances at the scattered biscuit crumbs. He clears his throat, trying to move on for Beets' sake "Well where we went was quite far from the Mountain Palace, but it was still visible on the horizon, and three substitute hags had asked us to investigate some local disappearances and it had something to do with beetles?"
He tries to covertly replace the dropped biscuit onto Beets' plate as he continues. "And so we did! Turns out the local land spirit, a big boi beetle, had been infected and corrupted by ‘something’. This like, corpse reanimation green goop. It had also done its work on some of the locals who had died there too sadly."
"Oh! And the beetle not-beetle swallowed me whole yah know! And inside was more green goop. Like it was inhabiting the shell of the beetle and..." Toothy hesitates and sheepishly looks down to the plates of treats they are eating right now. "Shit sorry, not the best thing to describe in detail right now is it."
Beets had been listening intently to Toothy's every last word as they'd spoken. The generous baked spread lay quite forgotten on the table and she hadn't even batted an eyelid at the return of the broken biscuit pieces to her plate. It wasn't a scrutinising look like the one Toothy's father had given her upon her arrival along with likely many customers past. This was the look of a person who had already seen or unexperienced rather too much, and was unable to find it in themself to look away. Beets wore a look of fear...But also with a hint of something somewhat equally unnerving...Longing.
"S-so this beetle, this big beetle. Y-you said it was..dead?"
"Yeah. Had come out of the ground apparently, they were called Gigit, before the green ooze ‘something’ infected them. Do you know about them?"
Beets shook her head, and after a moment of hesitance moved forward in her seat, her small hands reaching out to gently clasp one of Toothy's own as she looked him earnestly in the eyes. "Toothy. I-I didn't come here for the weapon. Wel-well I did, b-but I'd rather have information. I need it. I'll pay for the weapon. Bug It I'll give you double what you're asking for I don't care. But I need to know. This beetle, or any of the people you met or talked to. Did any of them mention another beetle named Bogar. Or a force called The Swarm, led by someone called the..the G-Grand Her-ror-rophant? Any interactions with c-creepy masked f-t-things made ou-outta bugs?”
Toothy could feel the tremble of Beets' hands in his own as she spoke, her black..stained fingernails very stark against her pale goose-pimpled skin.
"No, no nothing you mentioned is what we encountered out there. But I'm not sure if you'll be pleased or upset by that news." Keeping both her small hands clasp in one of his he moves the other to her shoulder very gently, visibly concerned.
"But all that aside, are you alright Beets? I thought you were a lil' jumpy cause of my dad, but there's obviously something else going on."
“I’m aware we don't necessarily know each other enough to be spilling all our secrets, but if you need to get something off your chest I'm happy to listen." He looks to her with as open an expression as he can muster, sincerely worried about her right now.
Beets draws deep calming deep breaths at Toothy's assurances and touch. Good - It wasn't 'them' She supposed she should be thankful, happy even. Her new blissful Dawnlands life could continue in peace. She shouldn't have let it bother her, she berated herself. See, just a creepy green-ooze infected undead beetle carcass. Completely flittin' different-if buggin' gruesome in its own horrible way. 'And Yet'.. Rose that voice of doubt once again from some dark recess of her mind. 'And yet it doesn't mean your troubles are gone though, does it?' It was right of course. In fact truthfully in some small way Beets would've actually been glad of news relating to her curse or its originator. Anything, anything but this ongoing silence since her last-and first really-encounter with the beetloid creature known as Bogar or the eerie emissary of The Swarm.
Bogar had said he had apparently managed to put enough distance between himself and The Swarm during their never ending chase to fill her on his side of the story regarding her mother and Beets' true origin during that first encounter. But since then.. Nothing. No more talks inside her head. No more night time rooftop visits. Bogar had well and truly buggered off. Just like that snooty tightlipped sphinx. And all the while her transformations, her battle-driven rages continued to manifest all the wilder. Feral. Primal. What could be the cause, and-how much worse would they continue to get?
"Well there's nothing to hide really." Beets admitted to Toothy. After all, whole groups of adventurers had now seen her progressively transform into more and more monstrous beetle-like forms during her last adventurous outings according to Lolli and Kavel. "I'm either waiting for a big beetle creature named Bogar to show up again somewhere, or for some curse inducing insectoid ruler to turn up and try to recruit me into his..his 'Swarm.' "
Toothy just blinks for a few painfully slow seconds as he absorbs the information. "The Swarm? A curse? That sounds very very cult-like, especially the whole forceful recruitment thing. Fuck Beets that's a real bad time, and now you're just waiting for something to possibly happen? No wonder you're so jittery."
He sighs and he collects his thoughts for a moment. "I've had experience with a group kinda like this, followers of Loviatar, who tried to disrupt everything I was and say I was claimed as theirs. It's not the same and I'm not trying to compare, but say I understand somewhat. You can't let this hang over you like a dreaded weight and wear you down, it's ultimately what they want. It's what they always want."
Beets listened to Toothy as they spoke before reaching a hand out to rest it on their own shoulder, whilst squeezing Toothy's hand in hers as gently as possible. “I may not know what a ‘cult’ is.” She started, “But it seems like I'm not the only one who's facing or been faced with a..a dark m-manipulative force… Both led by folk with equally flittin'stupid hard to say names. I mean Lo-Lovi-taur? The Grand Hero-ro-pant Almek’ira-whatever!” She grins as she tries to break the tension with her kidding. "Do-wou..Would you like to talk about it?" She inquires cautiously though after a few quiet moments, stroking her thumb gently across the top of Toothy's hand as she holds it.
Toothy can't help but laugh slightly at that. "Beets you are stealing my line! Thank you for asking but I'm okay now, I've made peace with the fact that there are memories I will never get back. That I shouldn't have focused on the forgotten past so much, cause making new memories with the ones I care for and love is much more important."
"So I'm going to throw the line right back at you now. Do you need to talk any more about it? Or...." He leans back further in his chair, a grin sneaking onto his face as he starts imitating some throwing motions. "Do you want to join my Auntie and me in some axe throwing on the edge of town? Sometimes you just gotta let some emotions out by throwing axes at stuff yah know."
Toothy’s words struck a chord with Beets. Their choice not to focus on what they couldn’t change, what had already passed, and instead focus on the here and now and the people that brought his life joy. It recalled other words to her mind, her own words written in emerald green ink in that last letter she had sent to Marto only a few weeks past. Her swear that she would not let her past or any preconcerted ideas about her or her origins dictate what she did now.
Axe throwing. S-she hadn’t done that since she was a kid… Pa had been an expert, herself not so much. But it hadn’t mattered. Spending any time with Pa and Gramps, it was as if their small secluded world had felt perfect. “Yes..yes I’d like that.” She responded with a smile.
"Nice! Well Auntie Gilda will be round soon, so eat up and then we'll head out all together." Toothy chuckles a bit as he thinks to himself for a moment. "She's gonna be so excited for more company, or more competition in her eyes. Mind she's very loud but in a good way, or at least I think it's a good way."
He holds up one of the many pastries while facing Beets, poised to make a toast. "Here's to strange pasts and using violence to work through our emotions."
Beets grins as selects and lifts her own pastry, “She sounds like my Gramps, so I think I’ll like her! To us!” She proclaims, tapping Toothy’s pastry with her own before taking a big bite. “Omgh!” She says through her mouthful before swallowing, nodding towards the great club propped up against the chair. “I’d still like to buy the club if I may? I have a feeling my friend Jeremy-of The Rooftop Beetles-may like it. Still kinda need to make it up to him too after a little ‘accident’ involving a birthday cake and a dwarven warhammer,” she grimaces.
"Ha! Of course, I might have physically taken it off the table but the deal isn't off." Toothy forgets all manners and inhales his own treat, somehow not choking in the process. "And I know you said you’d pay for the info about the beetle or something along those lines, but I didn't really help you in the end did I? The horde of pastries covers it more than enough."
Beets laughs at Toothy's disregard for table manners as she places the pouch of coin on the table between them, before reaching over to grab another Caramel Apple Tart which she then promptly devours with her own equally uncouth display of gusto.
"I'll agree pastry-based transactions definitely are my favourite kind!" she agreed with a nod towards Toothy, "Especially when they're made with a friend."
The unexpected warm spell had brought the people of Daring Heights out in enthusiastic droves to enjoy the weather while it lasted with one another, whilst of course not forgetting to indulge in the seasonal pastries that were now available to them from the ever popular Paradise Frost patisserie.
The sweet scent of freshly baked pumpkin pies nor the warm shafts of golden sunlight in her eyes as she exited out of the tinkling door with a covered basket did nothing though to stir Beets from her thoughts. As she flitted her way skyward above Castle Road towards the address on the ‘For-Sale’ ad she had torn from the notice board earlier that morning, Beets reread the now very crumpled parchment clutched in her hand for about the twentieth time that day.
‘1x Great Club for sale! But this is no ordinary great club, oh goodness heavens no. This charming weapon is constructed of the horn of a great horned beetle from the Witching Court. So strike down your enemies whilst also incurring the wrath of chitinous nature. Hoping to accept bids of ~500Gp. Please bring all bids to Toothy Wynraek, who can be found at Lucan's Leathers in DH.’
‘Great horned beetle…’ Could it perhaps be a remnant of the swarm that had attacked her village almost two years ago now? The Witching Court after all was somewhere in the Feywild too Beets recalled, though she couldn’t recall if she had actually been there. What if that’s where the swarm had spread from in the first place? She still had no idea where her old home-and the village-was in the Feywild. What if they were close by? What if…
‘What if she was just jumping to conclusions?’ She tried to calm herself as she made her way into the air above the Swampside District. There were probably loads of giant insects flitting all around the Feywild, The Dawnlands and beyond. Surely they weren’t all controlled by a dark malignant force that had ties to her mother.
And yet…
The bell sounds on the door to the aromatic interior of Lucan's Leathers and Beets enters the shop tentatively on foot, glancing about.
Nothing strikes her as out of the ordinary in the shop. By the door is an array of belts, bags and leather armour, all hung up neatly against the wall and on various shelves. Further in behind the small counter is where the workshop begins, and it's here she sees a pale half-elf diligently sharpening his leather working tools. At the sound of the bell he turns a bald head, covered in scars older than Beets, towards her. "Good day and welcome to Lucan's Leathers, what you looking for?" He does eventually put the tools down to give Beets his full attention with a scrutinising look, a full assessment of the barbarian now in front of him.
“Oh yes, hello! I’m here to see Toothy!” Beets replies, a little uneasy about the assessing stare the shop-keep gives her. She’d had a long unpleasant history with people staring at her before coming to the Dawnlands, so it was hard to shake the stigma sometimes.
"I see, you a friend then? Don't think I've seen you 'round before but you certainly look like the determined fighting type he'd associate with."
There's another long awkward pause, Lucan purposely making the atmosphere tense, before he silently moves through a door to the back of the shop. At a volume that can probably be heard in Portal Plaza he shouts "Toothy! A friend is here, don't keep them waiting.”
There's a cacophony of heavy footfalls above Beets' head as someone frantically starts moving upstairs. Lucan reemerges into the shop with Toothy rushing in behind him, at seeing Beets a large friendly grin lights up his face.
"Beets! Long time no see, I wasn't expecting you round. Or was I? Oh shit did I forget something?"
“Uhm. Beets’ wings give a nervous little ‘Vrrrb!’as she tries to compose herself. ‘I-I’m here about the Beetle ad-horn ad-beetle bug horn ad!” She stammers, before pulling a bulging coin pouch from her belt. “I brought the gold-Oh and food-” she lifts the basket in her other hand, “to make you talk-for us to talk-talking food that is! Uh..” This was not going well, and as if to end her shambling episode in spectacularly terrible fashion the coin purse she held upside down unknowingly decided to suddenly give out, spilling a heavy chinking gush of gold coins to the shop floor around her. “Oh Flit.”
"Oh! Wait wait lemme help you, then we can go upstairs and chat if you like?" Toothy moves over and crouches down to help scoop up the dropped coins back into Beets' pouch, a small ferret emerging from his shirt collar to assist. As he does so he shoots a look at his dad over his shoulder. Beets can't see what the drow's expression is, but Lucan only shrugs slightly in response and goes back to his tool sharpening.
Standing back up, Toothy steps over to open the back door, sweeping an arm out to indicate the way to the stairs. "You mentioned food, right? In the basket? So let's go sit in the kitchen." In a very loud stage whisper he adds, "And we can get away from the mean gargoyle that patrols the shop down here." There's minimal grumbling from Lucan, but he doesn't look up from his work.
“T-thanks…” Beets smiles embarrassed as she drops her own handfuls of coin into the pouch and climbs up to follow, stopping to give a nod and another quiet, “Thank you.” to Lucan before passing through the door.
“Gargoyle?” she asks as she follows Toothy down the hall, “Oh you mean-?” She gives a glance back towards the shop door as it closes, leaving her words hanging.
"Lucan, my dad.” Toothy interjects, “Over protective, stoney and will happily stand there really still and watch your squirm. Don't worry he does that to everyone but really he's a major softie at heart." Now at the top of the stairs Toothy leads Beets into the house, through a small entryway that leads into the kitchen. Here he pulls out a chair from the small kitchen table, lightly jostling the decorative bowl of daggers that adorns it. "Make yourself at home, I'll quickly go put Ferdinand in his nest and get the greatclub so you can look at it and stuff okay."
At the mention of Lucian being Toothy’s father, Beets's face grew a little overcast as she took a final glance back down the stairs, before then quickly hovering into the kitchen after Toothy with a steady drone of her wings, taking the seat he offers her. “Thanks,” she nods, almost forgetting the basket that hangs limp at her side which she slides up onto the table beside the dagger bowl with barely a look.
Toothy acknowledges Beets’ behaviour for a brief moment before disappearing briefly into the back of the house to retrieve something, upon his return revealing it to be the beetle horn great club, replacing Ferdinand the ferret in his hands. Carefully laying it on the table in front of Beets he nods, "Though it's an unusual material it's defo a good weapon, glad to see you have an eye for it." Glancing to the basket joining the daggers on the table he adds cautiously "And it's wonderful you brought snacks! A little unusual for a weapon sale but I won't complain."
Beets almost doesn't hear Toothy's words as she looks over the vast thing now set in front of her, a piece of thick bone like material shaped in a sweeping curve, its surface an iridescent coppery sheen. The snapped end has been fitted into a carved heat sealed wooden hilt, making the whole thing about a head taller than herself. Beets puts out a hand and touches it, her fingers tingling at its cold surface, before she then reaches into a pouch and pulls out a large shard of a much darker toned beetle horn. A broken curve tip ending in three large prongs, a piece Toothy recalls as a piece of the large characteristic horn that Beets used to wear affixed to her forehead.
"Different…’ Beets says after comparing the two for a moment, finally letting herself breath as she sets her own broken shard on the table beside the larger. ‘...It's different."
'But, just because it was a different type, didn't mean it didn't come from the same place said a darker voice' in her mind, a chill prickle creeping up her spine as she recalled the writhing legs and hissing maws of those giant centipedes acting in place of the arms of that..that thing… "W-where..Where exactly did you get this?" Beets asks with a swallow, turning to look towards Toothy across the table.
It was plain to Toothy from Beets twitchy nature, from the flick of her eyes between the two horn pieces to him and back and the nervous bouncing clacking of one of her beetle legs, that just getting an ‘on-brand’ weapon, wasn’t Beets’ main reason for coming to see him. The shaped brass band that now replaced the iconic beetle horn on her brow was also a dead give away too that something had changed about Beets in the last months Toothy had seen them.
In a calming way, with hopes to also distract Beets' thoughts, Toothy places a gentle hand on her shoulder. "Where me and the others got it is a bit of a longggg story. How about we crack out the food you brought first, you think a cuppa will go well with it?"
He moves to the small stove to put the kettle on, with the water set to boil he moves to get plates and add them to the growing pile of things on the table. Toothy slides the weapon off, leaning it upright against a chair and slightly out of sight of Beets.
"S-sure." Beets pulls the chequered cloth covering basket and starts to lay out the treats she bought from Paradise frost: Apple Cider Pies, Gingersnaps, Caramel Apple Tart, a Pumpkin Cheesecake Roll, Mooncakes and a loaf of Pumpkin Bread. The kitchen is soon filled with a mouth watering scent of autumnal baked goods.
Toothy chuckles slightly and stares in awe at it all. “Wow Beets you brought the whole spread! Now I feel bad we don't have any fancy tea or something. But hopefully this will suffice." He plops down a simple tea tray and pulls out another seat for himself.
“Well I’m afraid I still don’t know much about you so didn’t know what you’d fancy. And then Jorious and Casilla were very convincing with their new autumn menu so I just got a selection.” Beets admits with a small embarrassed smile.
“Tea is fine, thank you.”
He nods in acknowledgment, his reassuring smile still not gone. "Right, so story time.” Toothy begins as he starts pouring them each a cup. “You ever heard of the Witching Court in the Feywild? Cause that's where this started, more specifically near a place called Osar Breach."
Beets’ head had been itching furiously trying to recall if she had visited the Witching Court before. Directions in the Feywild had never been her strong point, but she put that down to her very isolated upbringing. Living for 20 years inside a dense Feywildian Wood would do that to you. But, as she reached for a ginger snap as Toothy began to fill her own cup with tea, the trickling sound of the water suddenly surfaced a memory. One from one of her earliest Dawnlands adventures. One which quite flittin' frankly could have been her last. A strange trickling sound and sensation, as all the strength in her body had seemed to have begun to leak out of her, her wings going limp bringing her sagging down to her knees in front the immense figure before her, a woman cloaked in green with rich coppery hair and intense green glowing eyes.
‘Do you wish to fight me still child?’ Had spoken the voice of Queen Nichenvin, Witch Queen of the Witching Court.
Beets' biscuit snaps in her hand, and the two halves fall to the floor with a scattering of crumbs... "Ohh..Yeeeah.." She manages with a stammer of realisation, the fallen biscuit quite forgotten. "B-been just the once."
"A memorial time I take it?" Toothy swiftly glances at the scattered biscuit crumbs. He clears his throat, trying to move on for Beets' sake "Well where we went was quite far from the Mountain Palace, but it was still visible on the horizon, and three substitute hags had asked us to investigate some local disappearances and it had something to do with beetles?"
He tries to covertly replace the dropped biscuit onto Beets' plate as he continues. "And so we did! Turns out the local land spirit, a big boi beetle, had been infected and corrupted by ‘something’. This like, corpse reanimation green goop. It had also done its work on some of the locals who had died there too sadly."
"Oh! And the beetle not-beetle swallowed me whole yah know! And inside was more green goop. Like it was inhabiting the shell of the beetle and..." Toothy hesitates and sheepishly looks down to the plates of treats they are eating right now. "Shit sorry, not the best thing to describe in detail right now is it."
Beets had been listening intently to Toothy's every last word as they'd spoken. The generous baked spread lay quite forgotten on the table and she hadn't even batted an eyelid at the return of the broken biscuit pieces to her plate. It wasn't a scrutinising look like the one Toothy's father had given her upon her arrival along with likely many customers past. This was the look of a person who had already seen or unexperienced rather too much, and was unable to find it in themself to look away. Beets wore a look of fear...But also with a hint of something somewhat equally unnerving...Longing.
"S-so this beetle, this big beetle. Y-you said it was..dead?"
"Yeah. Had come out of the ground apparently, they were called Gigit, before the green ooze ‘something’ infected them. Do you know about them?"
Beets shook her head, and after a moment of hesitance moved forward in her seat, her small hands reaching out to gently clasp one of Toothy's own as she looked him earnestly in the eyes. "Toothy. I-I didn't come here for the weapon. Wel-well I did, b-but I'd rather have information. I need it. I'll pay for the weapon. Bug It I'll give you double what you're asking for I don't care. But I need to know. This beetle, or any of the people you met or talked to. Did any of them mention another beetle named Bogar. Or a force called The Swarm, led by someone called the..the G-Grand Her-ror-rophant? Any interactions with c-creepy masked f-t-things made ou-outta bugs?”
Toothy could feel the tremble of Beets' hands in his own as she spoke, her black..stained fingernails very stark against her pale goose-pimpled skin.
"No, no nothing you mentioned is what we encountered out there. But I'm not sure if you'll be pleased or upset by that news." Keeping both her small hands clasp in one of his he moves the other to her shoulder very gently, visibly concerned.
"But all that aside, are you alright Beets? I thought you were a lil' jumpy cause of my dad, but there's obviously something else going on."
“I’m aware we don't necessarily know each other enough to be spilling all our secrets, but if you need to get something off your chest I'm happy to listen." He looks to her with as open an expression as he can muster, sincerely worried about her right now.
Beets draws deep calming deep breaths at Toothy's assurances and touch. Good - It wasn't 'them' She supposed she should be thankful, happy even. Her new blissful Dawnlands life could continue in peace. She shouldn't have let it bother her, she berated herself. See, just a creepy green-ooze infected undead beetle carcass. Completely flittin' different-if buggin' gruesome in its own horrible way. 'And Yet'.. Rose that voice of doubt once again from some dark recess of her mind. 'And yet it doesn't mean your troubles are gone though, does it?' It was right of course. In fact truthfully in some small way Beets would've actually been glad of news relating to her curse or its originator. Anything, anything but this ongoing silence since her last-and first really-encounter with the beetloid creature known as Bogar or the eerie emissary of The Swarm.
Bogar had said he had apparently managed to put enough distance between himself and The Swarm during their never ending chase to fill her on his side of the story regarding her mother and Beets' true origin during that first encounter. But since then.. Nothing. No more talks inside her head. No more night time rooftop visits. Bogar had well and truly buggered off. Just like that snooty tightlipped sphinx. And all the while her transformations, her battle-driven rages continued to manifest all the wilder. Feral. Primal. What could be the cause, and-how much worse would they continue to get?
"Well there's nothing to hide really." Beets admitted to Toothy. After all, whole groups of adventurers had now seen her progressively transform into more and more monstrous beetle-like forms during her last adventurous outings according to Lolli and Kavel. "I'm either waiting for a big beetle creature named Bogar to show up again somewhere, or for some curse inducing insectoid ruler to turn up and try to recruit me into his..his 'Swarm.' "
Toothy just blinks for a few painfully slow seconds as he absorbs the information. "The Swarm? A curse? That sounds very very cult-like, especially the whole forceful recruitment thing. Fuck Beets that's a real bad time, and now you're just waiting for something to possibly happen? No wonder you're so jittery."
He sighs and he collects his thoughts for a moment. "I've had experience with a group kinda like this, followers of Loviatar, who tried to disrupt everything I was and say I was claimed as theirs. It's not the same and I'm not trying to compare, but say I understand somewhat. You can't let this hang over you like a dreaded weight and wear you down, it's ultimately what they want. It's what they always want."
Beets listened to Toothy as they spoke before reaching a hand out to rest it on their own shoulder, whilst squeezing Toothy's hand in hers as gently as possible. “I may not know what a ‘cult’ is.” She started, “But it seems like I'm not the only one who's facing or been faced with a..a dark m-manipulative force… Both led by folk with equally flittin'stupid hard to say names. I mean Lo-Lovi-taur? The Grand Hero-ro-pant Almek’ira-whatever!” She grins as she tries to break the tension with her kidding. "Do-wou..Would you like to talk about it?" She inquires cautiously though after a few quiet moments, stroking her thumb gently across the top of Toothy's hand as she holds it.
Toothy can't help but laugh slightly at that. "Beets you are stealing my line! Thank you for asking but I'm okay now, I've made peace with the fact that there are memories I will never get back. That I shouldn't have focused on the forgotten past so much, cause making new memories with the ones I care for and love is much more important."
"So I'm going to throw the line right back at you now. Do you need to talk any more about it? Or...." He leans back further in his chair, a grin sneaking onto his face as he starts imitating some throwing motions. "Do you want to join my Auntie and me in some axe throwing on the edge of town? Sometimes you just gotta let some emotions out by throwing axes at stuff yah know."
Toothy’s words struck a chord with Beets. Their choice not to focus on what they couldn’t change, what had already passed, and instead focus on the here and now and the people that brought his life joy. It recalled other words to her mind, her own words written in emerald green ink in that last letter she had sent to Marto only a few weeks past. Her swear that she would not let her past or any preconcerted ideas about her or her origins dictate what she did now.
Axe throwing. S-she hadn’t done that since she was a kid… Pa had been an expert, herself not so much. But it hadn’t mattered. Spending any time with Pa and Gramps, it was as if their small secluded world had felt perfect. “Yes..yes I’d like that.” She responded with a smile.
"Nice! Well Auntie Gilda will be round soon, so eat up and then we'll head out all together." Toothy chuckles a bit as he thinks to himself for a moment. "She's gonna be so excited for more company, or more competition in her eyes. Mind she's very loud but in a good way, or at least I think it's a good way."
He holds up one of the many pastries while facing Beets, poised to make a toast. "Here's to strange pasts and using violence to work through our emotions."
Beets grins as selects and lifts her own pastry, “She sounds like my Gramps, so I think I’ll like her! To us!” She proclaims, tapping Toothy’s pastry with her own before taking a big bite. “Omgh!” She says through her mouthful before swallowing, nodding towards the great club propped up against the chair. “I’d still like to buy the club if I may? I have a feeling my friend Jeremy-of The Rooftop Beetles-may like it. Still kinda need to make it up to him too after a little ‘accident’ involving a birthday cake and a dwarven warhammer,” she grimaces.
"Ha! Of course, I might have physically taken it off the table but the deal isn't off." Toothy forgets all manners and inhales his own treat, somehow not choking in the process. "And I know you said you’d pay for the info about the beetle or something along those lines, but I didn't really help you in the end did I? The horde of pastries covers it more than enough."
Beets laughs at Toothy's disregard for table manners as she places the pouch of coin on the table between them, before reaching over to grab another Caramel Apple Tart which she then promptly devours with her own equally uncouth display of gusto.
"I'll agree pastry-based transactions definitely are my favourite kind!" she agreed with a nod towards Toothy, "Especially when they're made with a friend."