Fandom Island Museum, Thursday Daytime

[hasaknightjob]

Steven was a little late that morning. He'd made a new friend at Llewellyn's! That was bound to lead to staying longer than a brief visit. Which led to...

... look just never mind when Steven managed to make it to work. The important thing is that he was there and currently trying to draft something for the downstairs display on weekends when people turned into children. This was not helped by how currently there wasn't anything to display. Steven wasn't entirely sure what might work. Toys? Tiny mannequins?

No, not mannequins. No telling what the island would do to them.

Regardless, Steven was at his desk and actually doing something work related. This didn't mean he couldn't be interrupted. Luckily visitors were work related as well.

[open!]

Comments

[hasaknightjob]

"Good idea now that the weather's getting cold as well," Steven pointed out. "Weather outside is frightful but a play could be delightful?"

[mylandmyrules]

The song reference was lost on Nell (but not on the mun!), but she smiled at the idea. "I'm not sure how frightful the weather will be, but it will certainly be nicer indoors."

[hasaknightjob]

"Good time to get cozy at home at least," Steven said. "Is that going to be nice? Your first winter in a place entirely your own?"

He knew she'd been on her own for a while after she'd been widowed, but Steven imagined it might feel different when it was her place and not one she'd inherited.

[mylandmyrules]

"It will be very strange not being at Soulwood," she admitted. "Sometimes I think I felt less lonely there than I do here where there are so many people. Relatively speaking at least. If I was by myself it was more for lack of options than anything else. I'm still working at getting myself out around here."

[hasaknightjob]

"You and Marc have that in common," Steven said. Which she knew, but it hopefully went to show that Steven sympathized with the difficulty. "Since you're connected to the land did that make it feel more like home as well? Less lonely, because your land was there?"

[mylandmyrules]

Her eyes got a distant look in them as she remembered. "Mmm... my house was all built with lumber from Soulwood, so as soon as I set foot on it I was connected."

She really had no idea how to explain that connection well. "It was, it is, a part of me and I of it. I always knew if someone or some thing was approaching, even if I wasn't paying attention. And it cared for me as much as I cared for it. When I first got there after leaving here, it's like it rose up around me and wrapped me up. I'd go out and sit by the married trees on my little blanket and dig my feet into the soul and just be a part of the wood. I was never truly alone on Soulwood. Not with the land and the creatures all there and a part of me."

She looked over at him. "I brought land and wood from Soulwood and put some in my house and shop - and the greenhouse, of course - and some of the soil I've scattered through parts of the woods here. It helps, but it's not the same."

And wouldn't be unless she claimed the land. Which would involve here feeding someone to the land, so it wasn't going to happen if she had anything to say about it.

[hasaknightjob]

"Is it - sorry, I hope it's all right to ask, I want to learn," Steven said. "But it's all right? Making things out of the wood? The plants don't... mind?"

[mylandmyrules]

"The house was built before Soulwood was really as sentient as it is now - as aware, but, yes. If I take wood or soil from Soulwood I tell it that I am and what I'll use it for," Nell said. "Also, a lot of what I brought with me was deadfall that I collected from the ground."

[hasaknightjob]

"That makes sense," Steven said. "At least - how you've described it before. Hope that means I'm getting the hang of it all. Though, raises the next question: Does it have opinions on what you make? Like would it prefer being a lovely bowl to eat out of instead of a rubbish bin?"

[mylandmyrules]

Nell considered that. "I don't know that it cares, as long as whatever it is it's made with respect and care. But it's hard to say."