Tin Man: Letter Read (Interlude)
Title: Letter Read
Author: Vashti
Fandom: Tin Man
Character(s): DG, Cain, mentions of everyone, OCs
Rating: PG-13
Summary: In a distant future, all that will be left for one of Queen Dorothigale's descendants are letters read.
Length: ~655 words
Disclaimer: I don't know you. You don't know me. Let's keep it that way. The title is from Rachael Yamagata's song, "Letter Read." The idea that "Dorothigale" is long for DG is from chibi_kaz
Author's Notes: This is a work in progress. I have a vague idea of where it's going (always essential to one of my stories) but I don't know how or when or how fast it's going to get there. If for some strange reason you happen to like, please feel free to poke me at will if/when I slow down. Please also feel free to spot-beta as need be. And if it starts getting scary you can even suggest I get an actual beta. meep!
AN2: "Annual" numbers correspond to years since the Cains left the service of the royal family.
AN3: My continued thanks to everyone on ohzeebooks. Your comments will be helping for far into the future :D
Chapter 1: Annual One: January to March, March to April, May to June, July to September, November to December
Interlude: Big Purple Eyes
§§§
Tears closed up her throat even though she had read the letters dozens and dozens of times and could recite some of them by heart. Particularly Wyatt Cain’s.
She’d stumbled across the letters hiding way back in the royal archives of the library when she was ten annuals old, and had sped through them twice before she realized that they were her Great-Mother Dorothigale’s actual letters. Since then she’d read them all at least once an annual for the last six. Those first couple of annuals she’d read them several times. Now she tended to just read them in sections-sometimes her favorites, sometimes the ones that seemed to speak to her at the moment, sometimes whichever annual she’d neglected longest. Usually she’d read them all by the end of the annual.
Reading the letters was also one of her favorite ways of getting “lost.” The magic in the library could sense the age and fragility of the letters, and though they could be handled without fear in the archives she couldn’t take them beyond the archives. She couldn’t even take them out into the rest of the library. It was either read them there where they were safe, or not read them at all. Which wasn’t too bad. Since it wasn’t like the letters were the only fragile pieces in the archive, it was made so that the scribes and researchers could work in the room with lots of tables and chairs and reading lamps and stuff.
She didn’t bother with the tables and the chairs and the lamps. She liked reading the letters right where she’d first found them: way, way in the back of the section devoted to her family. She’d snag a couple of cushions from the library proper, set a couple of light globes floating over her head, and pull out the two letter glasses. It was no wonder that most people hadn’t read either sets of letters in forever. And she wouldn’t have read them either if she hadn’t accidentally knocked one over while trying to reach behind them for genealogical scrolls. Since there were scrolls all over the place with all sorts of information, she hadn’t even been sure that the scrolls behind the heavy rectangular glass stands were the ones she wanted. And, since she hadn’t exactly inherited the tall family aspect, it had been a bit of a stretch. Luckily the glass top had fallen on the cushioned chair she’d dragged over just in case she needed the leverage…spilling its hidden contents.
She remembered exclaiming over the find-she’d heard of letter glasses but had never seen one-and immediately digging in. She would have kept right on going, too, except she had been in the archive for a purpose. And that purpose was calling her name, wanting to know what was taking her so long to find those genealogy scrolls.
Wiping her eyes, she stood and stretched. Her corner was comfortable but it was a corner, after all, on the floor, up against two converging bookshelves. The light globes bobbed and danced around her head like small suns, moving as she did. With a final stretch she gathered together the first annual’s worth of letters to put them back.
The thing about reading the first annual was that she had to read the second as well. No way she could just leave herself on a cliffhanger. And even knowing what came next, she needed to read the rest of it. Needed to. Still, it was tempting to read some of Great-Mother Azkadellia’s letters next. But they were nowhere near as orderly as Great-Mother Dorothigale’s. It was always a bit of a memory game trying to figure out what came when and how one letter related to another, or even if it did. She should have started with those first. Later then.
Standing in front of the letter glass, she sorted through the ribbon-bound annuals. Every now and then she wondered who had put the letters together (clearly not the same person who had put together Great-Mother Azkadellia’s) and if any other of the Great-Mother’s correspondence was hiding in another letter glass someplace.
Author: Vashti
Fandom: Tin Man
Character(s): DG, Cain, mentions of everyone, OCs
Rating: PG-13
Summary: In a distant future, all that will be left for one of Queen Dorothigale's descendants are letters read.
Length: ~655 words
Disclaimer: I don't know you. You don't know me. Let's keep it that way. The title is from Rachael Yamagata's song, "Letter Read." The idea that "Dorothigale" is long for DG is from chibi_kaz
Author's Notes: This is a work in progress. I have a vague idea of where it's going (always essential to one of my stories) but I don't know how or when or how fast it's going to get there. If for some strange reason you happen to like, please feel free to poke me at will if/when I slow down. Please also feel free to spot-beta as need be. And if it starts getting scary you can even suggest I get an actual beta. meep!
AN2: "Annual" numbers correspond to years since the Cains left the service of the royal family.
AN3: My continued thanks to everyone on ohzeebooks. Your comments will be helping for far into the future :D
Chapter 1: Annual One: January to March, March to April, May to June, July to September, November to December
Interlude: Big Purple Eyes
§§§
Tears closed up her throat even though she had read the letters dozens and dozens of times and could recite some of them by heart. Particularly Wyatt Cain’s.
She’d stumbled across the letters hiding way back in the royal archives of the library when she was ten annuals old, and had sped through them twice before she realized that they were her Great-Mother Dorothigale’s actual letters. Since then she’d read them all at least once an annual for the last six. Those first couple of annuals she’d read them several times. Now she tended to just read them in sections-sometimes her favorites, sometimes the ones that seemed to speak to her at the moment, sometimes whichever annual she’d neglected longest. Usually she’d read them all by the end of the annual.
Reading the letters was also one of her favorite ways of getting “lost.” The magic in the library could sense the age and fragility of the letters, and though they could be handled without fear in the archives she couldn’t take them beyond the archives. She couldn’t even take them out into the rest of the library. It was either read them there where they were safe, or not read them at all. Which wasn’t too bad. Since it wasn’t like the letters were the only fragile pieces in the archive, it was made so that the scribes and researchers could work in the room with lots of tables and chairs and reading lamps and stuff.
She didn’t bother with the tables and the chairs and the lamps. She liked reading the letters right where she’d first found them: way, way in the back of the section devoted to her family. She’d snag a couple of cushions from the library proper, set a couple of light globes floating over her head, and pull out the two letter glasses. It was no wonder that most people hadn’t read either sets of letters in forever. And she wouldn’t have read them either if she hadn’t accidentally knocked one over while trying to reach behind them for genealogical scrolls. Since there were scrolls all over the place with all sorts of information, she hadn’t even been sure that the scrolls behind the heavy rectangular glass stands were the ones she wanted. And, since she hadn’t exactly inherited the tall family aspect, it had been a bit of a stretch. Luckily the glass top had fallen on the cushioned chair she’d dragged over just in case she needed the leverage…spilling its hidden contents.
She remembered exclaiming over the find-she’d heard of letter glasses but had never seen one-and immediately digging in. She would have kept right on going, too, except she had been in the archive for a purpose. And that purpose was calling her name, wanting to know what was taking her so long to find those genealogy scrolls.
Wiping her eyes, she stood and stretched. Her corner was comfortable but it was a corner, after all, on the floor, up against two converging bookshelves. The light globes bobbed and danced around her head like small suns, moving as she did. With a final stretch she gathered together the first annual’s worth of letters to put them back.
The thing about reading the first annual was that she had to read the second as well. No way she could just leave herself on a cliffhanger. And even knowing what came next, she needed to read the rest of it. Needed to. Still, it was tempting to read some of Great-Mother Azkadellia’s letters next. But they were nowhere near as orderly as Great-Mother Dorothigale’s. It was always a bit of a memory game trying to figure out what came when and how one letter related to another, or even if it did. She should have started with those first. Later then.
Standing in front of the letter glass, she sorted through the ribbon-bound annuals. Every now and then she wondered who had put the letters together (clearly not the same person who had put together Great-Mother Azkadellia’s) and if any other of the Great-Mother’s correspondence was hiding in another letter glass someplace.