Pedro

"But soft! What light through yonder window breaks?
It is the East, and Juliet is the sun!
Arise, fair sun, and kill the envious moon,
who is already sick and pale with grief
That thou her maid art far more fair than she."
-Romeo and Juliet

((OOC: Hiya, Flo here. I'm sure you recognized the quote immediately. I suppose my entry won't be quite like that, but what's a good story without a little romance, even for a cranky witch?))

Tap...tap...

"Myrtle, I thought I told you to go to sleep."

Tap...tap...tap...

"Myrtle, I swear I'll-"

Tap...CRASH!

"MYRTLE!!" Vera sprang out of bed and grabbed a candle. She had trouble lighting it at first, because there was a breeze coming from the open -- wait. She hadn't opened the window! She squinted at it. Sure enough, it was broken. Shards of glass littered the ground beneath the window sill, and a largish stone lay on the ground beside it.

"Myrtle, once again, you and your clumsiness -- Myrtle?" Myrtle was not in her cot. Come to think of it, Vera realized that she hadn't made a sound all this time. She crept silently over to the window, aware of the apprehension that tinged her annoyance. If Myrtle wasn't standing lurking under the window (and why she would be there, Vera had no idea), well...let's just say it could be anyone.

"Who's there?" she called in her most authoritative voice.

There was a rustling of bushes, a thud and a muffled curse. Then someone cleared their throat and half whispered/half shouted, "Is that -- is that you, Vera?"

Vera frowned. She knew that voice. Where did she know that voice from? Hold on...it couldn't be..."Pedrito?" She stood up and leaned out the window, careful not to cut herself on the broken window pane. Squinting, she could barely make out the scrawny young man from her village. "Pedrito, why have you thrown a rock through my window?"

"Actually, I go by Pedro now. Is that just you up there, or is Myrtle with you?" Pedro asked, ignoring her question.

"That's none of your business, and you didn't answer my question. What are you doing down there, throwing rocks through people's windows?"

He shuffled awkwardly. "I didn't mean to break your window, I'm really sorry about that. The pebbles didn't seem to be working, so I opted for one that was a bit heavier...sorry. Can I talk to you, Vera?"

What?! Myrtle was missing, this idiot had just shattered her window with a rock, and he wanted to talk? She voiced these thoughts aloud.

"Myrtle's gone?" asked Pedro, genuinely surprised.

"Yes, she is. I'd thought you might have had something to do with it. If I remember correctly, you two were practically betrothed."

"Yes, well," Pedro scuffed his foot nervously against the ground, "that's sort of that I wanted to talk to you about. Do you think I could come up there? It's very cold out here."

"So sorry, but I can't, seeing as Myrtle's off and disappeared. Again. If you'd like to come along to help me find her, you're welcome. I'll meet you down there in half a second." And before Pedro could protest, Vera ducked back into her room. She gathered a few essential tracking materials (most significantly, her Myrtle-ometer, a device that was far more efficient than a tracking spell, which her mother had made when she realized how prone Myrtle was to wandering off), donned a traveling cloak and made her way out of the inn.

As she walked, she thought about Pedro. It had been years since she had last seen him. He hadn't grown much. He and Myrtle had played together often as children. They both came from significant, well-to-do families, and everyone sort of assumed that he and Myrtle would end up marrying each other. He still kept in contact with the two sisters, even after they were orphaned and sent off to be raised by the League of Witches. Of course, he didn't know that: he simply thought they were sent away to boarding school.

Vera herself had been betrothed once. (This was when it was just about to go out of fashion. Myrtle had never been traditionally betrothed: it was merely assumed that she'd settle down with Pedro.) It was ironic, she thought, that now, years later, she should be pursuing this man not to marry him, but to kill him. Ahhh, how things had changed.

Wait till Myrtle finds out she has a stalker. Of course, she'll probably be overjoyed that her beau came all this way to see her. They do get a bit ridiculous at that age, what with the raging hormones and whatnot. I'm sure I was never like that, of course.

As Vera approached the clearing, Pedro's face lit up. (No, not just because Vera had a lantern. It was more of an internal thing for him.) "Vera! Excellent! Now can we talk?"

"Yes, talk while we walk, and make it quick. By the way, this had better be very, very important. You're a great nuisance, you know." At this, Pedro looked genuinely hurt, but Vera took no notice. At least, she pretended not to. "Now, be quiet a moment." She pulled her Myrtle-ometer out of her pocket. The instrument comprised of a swiveling triangle mounted on a stand. She held the device firmly in her hand, bent her head over it, and muttered something to it. The triangle began to spin very fast, until it suddenly stopped dead, pointing straight down the street. "Come. This way," she ordered, before taking off at a brisk pace.

"What's that?" Pedro pointed to the strange instrument.

"A Myrtle-ometer."

"Oh. What's it for?"

"Finding Myrtle."

((OOC: Ok, well, that didn't go exactly as planned, but what can ya do? By the way, I tried to avoid just dumping a bunch of back story into this post, so there's still some stuff I'll explained later. Me an' Ruby plotted a bunch of it out, and I'm not sure if I remember it all properly. I hope I got it right. 'Twas very entertaining to come up with it. Mwahahaa.))

when the sun's out

“It’s not too bad when the sun’s out, but the sun only comes out when it feels like coming out." (J.D. Salinger, Catcher in the Rye)
((OOC: I thought I'd mention that the blog title--sleep tight, ya morons!--also comes from Catcher in the Rye, which (in my most humblest of opinions) is a brilliant book and, if you haven't read it, you should. What's my post going to be about? A man's search for identity and for love as he battles to recover from a tumultous past. Yeah, I just made that up, but who knows it could be. How will you know? Read on, brave soul.-Ishack))
Kyrus hesitated before raising a hand to knock on the porch door--
"What do you want...sir?"
He turned to see a young woman, gazing at him with cold black eyes.
"Just a room for the night, if it's available."
"I doubt it," the girl said quickly.
"Well I'd prefer to rely on your father's word and not yours," he proceeded to knock.
"My father is not home."
He turned back to look at her. "I can wait."
"No, he is not coming home any time soon."
"Who is your guardian?"
Without directly answering the question, she said, "I live with my older brother, Ben, and my mother."
He was becoming rather irritated at the extent of the conversation, "Then may I speak your brother?"
"No."
"Pardon?"
His words, so polite, were growled, but Gemma held her ground. "You may talk to me, or you may leave. I have as much authority in this house as anyone."
He laughed.
She glared at him.
He stopped laughing abruptly and asked in a truly stupified voice, "Oh come on, you cannot be serious."
She said nothing.
"You are." For a moment he just eyed her incredulously. "Well then...ma'am, may I use one of your spare rooms for the evening."
"No."
"On what basis can you say no to a weary traveler!" he roared angrily.
"On the basis of your having insulted my authority, raised your voice to me, and expected for no reason that my family would serve your every need."
"I said nothing about 'serving my every need'. I am a weary traveler, I want somewhere to rest."
"There is an inn at the village."
He sighed, "They turned me away."
"Then why would we want you?"
He hit the porch wall angrily, "If you don't give me a room I'll be dead by dawn!"
"What?" she said, quieter.
He gazed elsewhere, "Nothing, I shouldn't have said that."
"Dead?"
He looked her in the eye and growled, "Yes, dead. Murdered by a sisterhood of witches. Sound good?"
"That's a rather awful circumstance, isn't that." Gemma was truly worried, somewhat against her better instinct.
"Only for one night." It was as close to pleading as he could come.
For a moment she was silent, then she sighed, "I suppose, for tonight only. And you will stay away from my mother, she has not been feeling well of late and I do not want you to disturb her further. It is my house and you will follow my rules. If I ask you to fetch firewood, you will, if I tell you to leave the room, you will."
"There isn't another house within the next few miles, is there?"
"No, why?"
"Just making sure," he said regretfully.

((P.S. Sorry Ona that I took such control over your character's finer points. We can change them if there's a problem, e-mail me.))

The Great Escape

"When I came into the room, I told the man that a lady would like to see him; to which he simply answered: 'Why?' 'She is going through the house, and wants to see every one in it,' I answered. 'Oh very well,'he said; 'let her come in, by all means; but just wait a minute till I tidy up the place.' His method for tidying was peculiar: he simply swallowed all the flies and spiders in the boxes before I could stop him. It was quite evident that he feared that he feared, or was jealous of, some interference. when he had got through his disgusting task, he said cheerfully: 'Let the lady come in.'" --from Dracula, by Bram Stocker

((OOC: Ruby here. As you may have guessed, i had some difficulty finding a meaningful quote to go with what I had written, so I found one about eating bugs, which could be said to relate slightly with what is written here. Judge for yourself. In any case, this quote comes from one of my all time favorite books, Dracula, and is about one of my all time favorite characters within that book, which is the main reason I put it in here))

The room was dark and drear, and Myrtle could hear Vera snoring lightly close by, while she tried vainly to fall asleep. Myrtle rolled onto her left side. Then she rolled onto her right side. She rolled back onto her left side. She tried lying on her stomach with her face in her pillow, but this too failed because it made her nose hurt, and she couldn't breath at all that way. The worst thing that happens when you cant fall asleep, but you stay in bed anyway, is that for no reason at all, your feet start feeling really hot and sweaty. Myrtle the unfortunate was experiencing this at that very moment. Suddenly she couldn't stand it any longer, and sat bolt upright in bed. she but her feet onto the cold wooden floor, and they felt much better.she followed up this motion by getting the rest of herself out of bed as well, then getting dressed, putting shoes on her ever so much happier feet, and walking quietly out the door. she just had to go do something, she just couldn't lie in bed with hot feet for the rest of the night without sleeping. So, out of lack of anything else to do, she went out in search of the guy she had seen in the bar that night.

Myrtle went out to the stables to go get Transjotr. She may be a witch in training, but she still wasn't planning on going out in the middle of the night in the streets of the town alone. Although most of her attempts at training Tranjostr to be an attack goat had failed, she figured it couldn't hurt to bring him along just in case. she took him everywhere anyway. If anything, all the bad drunk people would be too weirded out because she had a pet goat to bother her.

Myrtle went quietly out of the now quite tavern, and pushing open the heavy wooden door, stepped out into the warm night air. It was a nice night, warm and clear, with fire flies buzzing all around, and fairies buzzing along with them. Transjostr, who had a peculiar habit of eating bugs, snapped at the fireflies and fairies alike. Myrtle started heading down the main street in town, and out away into the country.

Quick to Anger

“It is only our bad temper that we put down to being tired or worried or hungry; we put our good temper down to ourselves.”
-C.S. Lewis

((OOC: Flo here, not really sure where I'll go with this, but we'll see...))

Vera rummaged through her bag for some ingredients. She intended to make a simple aromatic to soothe the oncoming migraine she felt. Unfortunately, there was no instant spell for curing headaches, so this was her best bet.
She always got these awful migraines when life was particularly stressful, so it came as no surprise when, a few hours ago, she began to feel the all-too-familiar acute pressure in her right temple. She was, after all, under a huge amount of stress these days. This runaway prince scandal was really fraying her nerves. They'd been on his tail for almost a month, and Vera was terribly worried that if he hadn’t spilled the beans by now, it wouldn’t be long before their secret was out. And if that happened, she couldn’t imagine what the League of Witches would do...
Suppressing her nausea, she found the herbs she needed and had just begun grinding them when the door banged open. It was her sister.
"Myrtle, I thought you were downstairs!" Vera snapped irritably. She had been looking forward to some time to herself. Myrtle simply let out a deep, mournful sighed. "What? Don't you know how to talk anymore? Speak up, girl!"
"I was downstairs. But they wouldn't let Tanngnjóstr in. I grew so lonesome, I even missed your company. So I came up here."
Vera rolled her eyes. If you asked her, the world was better off without that wretched goat.
"You're telling me there was absolutely nobody worth talking to?"
"Yes, well, the only half-decent person around was a big guy in terrible need of anti-depressants. I don't blame him -- one of his eyes was missing, and he was covered in all sorts of horrid scars. I kept thinking he looked sort of familiar..." she trailed off thoughtfully.
Vera became very quiet. One might have assumed that she, too, had become lost in thought, but Myrtle knew better. She took her sister's flared nostrils and rapidly increasing breathing rate as a sure sign that she was headed for an explosion.
"You...didn't...happen to notice...if he was wearing...an eye patch...did you?" Vera asked through clenched teeth. By this time, Myrtle had pulled a pair of earplugs out of her pocked and was casually inserting them into her ears.
"Yes, he was, the poor man. I can't imagine having to-"
"You imbecile, you just described the prince we're after! Did you stop and think about that?! No, not once!"
"Well, I never actually-"
"Don't interrupt! I wish that just once you wouldn't make a mess of things, but no. You let him escape again, and all because of your IDIOCY!" By now, her anger had built itself into uncontrollable rage. "YOU FOOL! YOU DIMWIT! MY LIFE IS MISERABLE BECAUSE -- OF -- YOU!" With this last word, she sent mortar, pestle and herbs crashing through the wall.
"Finished?" asked Myrtle, reaching for her earplugs. She was used to this sort of verbal abuse, and hadn't been paying any attention to her sister.
"Yes," said Vera, breathing heavily. She stood up from the bed, and with a snap of her fingers and a muttered incantation, the wall was mended and the mortar and pestle flew back into her open hand. She immediately felt her head spin, and sat back down. All that shouting had worsened her headache ten fold. She would be capable of next to nothing in this condition. "What time did you say the prince left?"
"You mean that man with the eye patch? About ten minutes before I came up here. Perhaps a quarter to ten?"
"Good. We'll get on his trail in the morning. In the meantime, I need to sleep."
"Vera, if you wanted, I could follow him right now. I'll bet he's not far off-”
“No.”
“But-”
“No! You don’t know how to work a tracking spell, and I don’t want you getting lost. You’ve caused enough trouble already. Now, I’m going to sleep. Do try not to get us killed.” With a flick of her wrist, she extinguished the all the candles in the room. After a moment, Vera mumbled something into the darkness.
"Hmmmm?"
"I said I was sorry."
"What?"
"Sorry."
"What?"
"Sorry, OK?!"
"Oh."
Silence.
"Sorry for what?"
"Go to sleep!"