Hey, guys, I'm just playing in new waters here for the fun of it. I actually wrote this ages ago, back when Drowned Wednesday was kinda new-ish, but it's not like it doesn't really still apply. And I'm feeling the need to stretch my ficcage claws again. As such, this takes place between Tuesday and Wednesday, and doesn't really have too much of a plot, though it has a point. Very strange.
Not the Will's Way
"Hey, Noon, can I ask you something?"
The Superior Denizen didn't so much as raise his head, apparently intent on his reading, but a small smile did flicker over his lips. "It would seem so, as you have just demonstrated the ability."
"Huh?"
This time, his smile was clearly visible and, Suzy thought, would have been fond if it had been on a mortal. "The correct phrasing is 'may I ask you a question'."
She stared at him for another second, then rolled her eyes and jumped over the back of one of the two leather armchairs to sit crosslegged. "Fine. May I ask you another question aside from the one which I've already asked you? And this one?"
He bowed his head a little further, so that for a long moment his sleek black hair hid all of his face. He then sat up, smile completely gone, and folded his hands over the long and complicated letter he had been reading. "Certainly, Miss Blue. What is your question?"
"You know, you've been talking to Primey too much. She's always on about how my talking's not as good and proper as what it's supposed to be," she said, frowning at him. "You know she's set me another hour of lessons every day?"
"Indeed, I am aware of that," he said calmly, though there was a slight twitch at the corner of his mouth, and Suzy had been his assistant long enough to recognise it as a disapproving frown. "My lady Dame Primus informed me – that is to say, requested I relieve you of your duties so that you might take these lessons."
Suzy huffed, probably doing exactly what Noon wanted to do himself by folding her arms and scowling at Dame Primus' decisions. Stupid frog-bear was always forgetting it was just the steward, and that Arthur was really the one in charge, and he thought she knew enough already, so he wouldn't have made her take any stupid lessons.
"Your question?" Noon reminded her, and she jumped, suddenly remembering what she came into his study for.
"Yeah. I was just thinking on something Arthur said while we was down in the pit the other week," she said, pointing past her arm for no particular reason, though it did make Noon's eyes slide off to the side as he tried to see what she was gesturing to. She grinned, always happy to find new ways to annoy Denizens, but hid it when he looked back at her. "He doesn't want to be the Rightful Heir. I thought he just wasn't used to the idea or something, when we was fighting the old Monday, but he really don't want to be."
Noon pursed his lips but said nothing, his eyes shifting to glance at the open windows and door.
"He said he don't want to be, but he thinks he's got to, so he's going to, but I was thinking on that, and I was thinking that you know, I don't think it's such a great idea to have a Rightful Heir that don't want to be a Rightful Heir, 'cause then we'll eventually get a Lord of Everything and Everything Else that don't want to be a Lord of Everything and Everything Else," she said, only shifting around to watch when Noon suddenly stood up and walked to each of the large windows in turn, shutting and locking them. "And I was thinking on that, and the more I think on it, the stupider it sounds, so even as I like Artie, I was wondering whether this was really such a great idea, him what's being Rightful Heir."
Noon finished closing the windows and headed for the door, his steps slightly quicker than usual.
"And then I was thinking that if I'm thinking all this, then it's probably right to think that you've been thinking all this, because even as you's being Noon now, you used to be Dusk, and I reckon you've still got that habit of seeing problems with all the good stuff that's going on. So I was thinking that you would know everything that's the reason why and why nots and what we're gonna do –" She cut off as Noon suddenly slammed the door shut and spun around, his hands and back flat against it. His quietly calm expression was still in place, but the twitch at both corners of his mouth that indicated he was trying very hard not to frown were in full force. She grinned, pulling herself up onto her knees to look at him over the back of her chair. "And I thought you'd know what I'm not supposed to know, because I'd tell Arthur."
"I have no secrets from Lord Arthur," he said carefully, slowly turning back again to finish locking the door.
"Course not. You like him s'much as I do."
He inclined his head ever so slightly and started back to the desk.
"But having no secrets ain't the same as having stuff you can't tell him," she added, and his head inclined even further.
"I believe you had a question?" he asked, slowly lowering himself down into the chair.
"Yeah. What makes Arthur the Rightful Heir?"
Noon hesitated for a moment, a slight shadow passing over his face and making him look far more like the Superior Denizen he was made to be than the one he was slowly becoming. He took a breath, then sat back in his chair, hands still folded in front of him. "I believe you were in the vacinity when Part One of the Will explained as much to Lord Arthur," he said softly, but Suzy just frowned.
"Yeah. She pretty much said he was just in the right place at the right time, what with him almost dying and all."
"That is one part of it."
"And she said he was the Rightful Heir 'cause he beat the old Monday," she said, then sat back down with her legs crossed. "But that ain't why she chose him in particular, is it?"
"I believe that, at the time, Lord Arthur fit certain criteria the Will desires in its Rightful Heir," he said delicately. "I seem to recall you informing me that there were several that Part One of the Will listed for Lord Arthur."
"Yeah. He wasn't religious or nothing," she said, but continued looking at him suspiciously. "Wait on. You just said 'at the time'. What's that supposed to mean?"
He remained silent, and she leaned forward. "He don't fit all the criteria no more, does he?"
"Lord Arthur has been proven by blood and bone and contest," he said calmly, a slight smile flickering over his face and belying his apparent desire to distract her. "He is the Rightful Heir and will one day be Master of the House and all Secondary Realms."
"But he don't fit what Old Primey wants no more!" she crowed, and Noon remained carefully silent. She grinned, jumping back up onto her knees. "How come? What's she want him to be that he isn't?"
"It is not the place of Monday's Noon to discuss such matters," he said, and she blinked. Usually, Noon was really honest with her – more than anyone else in the House, anyway. And most of the time, he let her do what she liked, not even commenting as long as she didn't annoy Dame Primus. She was pretty sure he didn't care about her annoying Dame Primus, either, only she sometimes blamed him because Suzy was his assistant. Being stalled was new and weird.
She was so shocked that she only argued it for a few minutes before getting up and marching out of the study, only just noticing Noon's quiet sigh as she unlocked the door.
The next time she thought to ask him about Arthur, Noon was, coincidentally, using the Seven Dials to check on their Rightful Heir. Suzy stood beside him as they peered down into the room Arthur had been lying in for the last three months, the people around him moving in extra-slow motion as they did something to his shattered leg.
"You think he should've let Dame Primus fix it with the Key?" she asked, glancing up at Noon's blank expression.
"No. It is better this way," he murmured, and she nodded.
"Yeah. He doesn't want to turn into a Denizen. Not yet, anyway. I think he said he's okay with it, but not until he's all grown up and stuff," she said, looking back down into the Seven Dials. She wished Arthur's world would hurry up so she could understand what the people were doing and saying. Her friend looked weirdly small and paler than usual with that weird thing over his face.
"I believe that is a wiser choice of action than our lord knows," Noon said quietly, as he let the Dials' image fade and turned to look at Suzy, raising an eyebrow as if he had only just realised she were there. "Monday's Tierce, did Dame Primus not intend for you to be subjected – I mean to say, are you not expected at a lesson in grace at this time?"
"Yeah, she did," she said simply, and Noon's hidden smile flickered over his lips again. Suzy grinned and turned to follow as he brushed past her. "I was thinking about that talk we had the other week. The one about Arthur and his being the Rightful Heir."
Noon glanced at her quickly, silently warning her to keep her voice down as they moved through the halls of the Dayroom in the direction of Noon's study. He had to spend a lot of time in there, these days, struggling to make up the paperwork the old Monday had forgotten and Dame Primus no longer had time to do, now she and Monday's Dawn were occupied with the Far Reaches.
"I was just wondering," she continued, though she kept her voice a little quieter than usual, "how come Dame Primus doesn't like Arthur going back to his world. She doesn't complain about it as much as she used to – I reckon she likes having the Keys to herself – but she's always going on about how it would be so much better if Arthur would just come back and do his job as the Rightful Heir."
Noon was quiet for a moment, and Suzy suddenly realised he probably couldn't answer. But she'd thought about this over the last couple of weeks, and had figured out that it was all in what you asked that mattered.
"What's so different about Arthur being in the Secondary Realms for a few years, if he's going to come back eventually anyway?"
He nodded to her, smiling. "I see I am not the only one who spends too much time with my lady Dame Primus. You have learnt a trick of words," he murmured, then raised his head to look forward as they walked. "You are one of the Piper's Children, once a mortal, afflicted with all their weaknesses and strengths. You adapt to change easily, come to harm much more readily than a Denizen, and have an unfortunate height. You have been in this House for seven centuries, and not grown a day older. Physically, you are no different than you were when the Piper brought you here."
She blinked, but nodded silently. She had been around enough Superior Denizens to know that these long, stupid speeches of theirs weren't actually stupid, most of the time. Denizens just didn't have any good concept of time, so they liked to hide important information in a big lot of nonsense.
"However, mortals are afflicted with mortality. When in the Secondary Realms, they can fall to unaesthetic sickness, and eventually death. You see, in the Secondary Realms, mortals grow older," he said, then paused in his steps to look down at her. "Do you understand, or should I elaborate?"
"On your point or the growing up thing?"
"You understand what I mean when I say mortals grow older when you do not?"
"Uh… yeah. So don't repeat it," she said quickly, correctly guessing that he was finding it hard to grasp how quickly non-Denizens understood things.
He hesitated another moment, then continued walking. "Unlike Denizens, which were made by our glorious Architect fully formed to do that which they were created to do, mortals change as they grow. Humans in particular are wont to do this, and change both physically and mentally as they grow older. Lord Arthur, for example, will gain more height and width, and will come to think in different ways than he does now," he said, pausing again to let that sink in. "If he were to remain in the House, however, he would be as the Piper's Children: forever young in both body and mind. If allowed to follow his own wishes, Lord Arthur will grow to be fully formed in the next six earth years, and will be potentially very different from the… child that defeated the former Monday."
"Why's that a bad thing?"
"It is not."
Suzy waited a beat, but Noon didn't seem inclined to elaborate, so she sighed. Denizens were so very annoying! "Why doesn't Dame Primus want Arthur to grow up?"
"It is not the place of Monday's Noon to discuss such matters," he said vaguely, and Suzy stamped her foot.
"Noon!"
"I am but a lower Superior Denizen, and in no position to discuss such grand strategy," he said mysteriously, but Suzy hadn't thought far enough ahead to catch that hint. She just cried out in frustration and stalked off, missing Noon's sigh completely.
"Hey, Noon, about mortals changing as they grow up…"
She supposed, for a Denizen, a month wasn't that long, but she was still a little surprised when he put down his quill and folded his hands over his current stack of papers, looking at her as if they were just continuing a conversation they'd had only moments before. Holding her own towering stack of paper, Suzy hesitated a moment before putting it down in the armchair she didn't like to sit in so much.
"Are there any really big differences between children and grown up mortals?" she asked. "You said they think different. So… does that mean, if I had grown up, that I would've been a different person to who I am now?"
He paused, but for once it was more in thought than any reluctance to answer. After a moment he stood up and walked over to his bookshelf, picking what looked like a random book out of the dozens there. "Most sources are confused on the subject, in truth. For mortals, I believe, it would not be so much a different person as the same person with a different point of view, and different motives."
"Like as what you were as Dusk compared to what you is being Noon?" she asked, and he nodded, though clearly not certain.
"Yet not, at the same time. I am and always have been loyal to the Architect, and in that, to her Will. My motives remain the same – to serve to the best of my ability. In addition, I have retained most of my ability to see without being blinded by Noon's light," he said slowly, even less certain than he had been. "Mortals are guided by more than their minds and logic. They have… other needs. Needs Denizens do not. These needs cause them to act in ways Denizens would never consider."
"So what's the difference between Ar- I mean, a child and a grown up mortal?" she asked, leaning on her stack of paper, and Noon walked over to lean against his desk, opening his book.
"Mortal children are much closer to Denizens than fully formed mortal humans. They do as instructed, without question. This is due to an implicit understanding that they are still learning, and they expect to be taught," he said, flipping through the pages in search of something. "To use a vague example, our Lord Arthur was chosen as a Rightful Heir partly due to his age. A fully formed human would have demanded further explanation, would have had strong beliefs, and even with his latent powers as a Rightful Heir, most probably would have never been able to enter the House, as he would not have been capable of believing in its existence. As a child, he felt only panic when the Fetchers cast their plague on his world, and then a sense of duty to do whatever was necessary to find a cure. As a child, he never considered questioning anything the Will – that is, Dame Primus – told him to do."
He looked at her over his book, and she blinked several times, trying to figure out what he was trying to explain with his 'vague example'.
"Essentially, Miss Blue, mortal humans grow more complex as they grow older. They insist on questioning many things, which Denizens are, for the most part, incapable of doing."
"But you did that," she said blankly, frowning when his lips twitched in slight disappointment. "You figured out something was wrong with the Lower House."
"Over many millennia," he reminded her. "It took me centuries to even realise what I was thinking, let alone do anything about it. Mortal humans are capable of questioning and changing within seconds. To a degree, you are capable of this yourself, and, if you had been given time to grow another five or six years, you would have become a master at it."
She blinked again, hearing something there Noon was obviously trying to tell her. But she was just a child after all, and as Noon said, not particularly capable of really complex thoughts in only seconds. She nodded and picked her papers back up to move them into Noon's intray. At his soft sigh she looked up. "If Arthur stays in the Secondary Realms as a mortal, he'll grow up, won't he?"
Noon smiled, snapping his book closed with one hand.
They were out in the Far Reaches when Suzy thought of her next question, Noon writing in his notebook as they inspected the extent of the Pit. Normally, Suzy wouldn't have come when she actually had to do work, but revisiting the site of her latest adventure was worth following Noon around and searching out all the people he needed to talk to. The Commissionaire Sergeants were currently pacing out the perimeter for an estimate, so she and Noon were alone at the foot of The Dam, admiring Arthur's work.
He really had done well for someone that had only had the Second Key for ten minutes.
"Guess it's alright," Suzy grumbled, gazing up at the immaterial concrete. "He did do it without my help, so I guess it's alright."
Noon hid his smile, running his hand over the surface for a moment before returning to his book.
"He's not bad, really, is he? For someone that don't want to be the Rightful Heir, he does pretty good," she commented, and Noon nodded.
"He will be an excellent Master of the House, Keys and Secondary Realms."
"Yeah… too bad he won't be nothing like old Primey wants."
Noon's pen paused its scratching for a moment, before continuing. "You do not think he will?"
"Nah. Arthur's different than her. Got all these ideas and stuff," she said, glancing at him from the corner of her eye. "Primey thinks ideas are dangerous, you know."
"She is not entirely adverse to them," he said, smiling despite himself.
"I think Arthur's different than what he was, too," she said firmly, nodding. "He was completely hopeless when I first met him. Couldn't do a thing without someone telling him how. He's still hopeless, of course, but he's making mistakes without anyone telling him to, now!"
Noon closed his eyes, took a deep breath, and then opened them again, all without saying anything.
"Yeah… you know, I was thinking about him, and how Dame Primus didn't want him to grow up or nothing—"
"She has never said as much," he reminded her, and she made a face.
"—but you know what I think? I think he's doing it anyway."
Noon glanced over his shoulder, his dark eyes narrowing as he peered into the surrounding darkness. After a moment, he spoke, though he continued scanning their surroundings. "You believe so?"
"Yeah. Not so much in the height and stuff, but he's thinking a lot more, I think. He was getting a little annoying, back when we was fighting the Grim here. I mean, yeah, everything turned out alright, but he kept deciding what was right and what we was going to do. Like this," she said, rapping her knuckles against the wall. "He wouldn't let me come down here with him! And what with Saturday's Dusk here, he needed my help! Back in the old days, he would've wanted me right there with him!"
"He was concerned for your safety," murmured Noon, but it was in a strange tone, and the twitches at the corners of his mouth were moving upward, in a knowing smile he didn't dare show. "He was thinking of what may have happened, had he failed. Considering options. Questioning his choices."
"Sounds like something a grown-up'd do, to me," she muttered, but she looked up under her eyebrows to meet Noon's sideways gaze. "Not something Dame Primus'd like much at all."
"No," he whispered. "Lord Arthur does not act at all like Dame Primus would wish him to be."
"Hm," she said, and they turned back to their work.
Yeah... so... yeah.