Double Trouble (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
oohforeshadowing) wrote in ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png)
wondrousplace2023-03-22 07:25 pm
oohforeshadowing) wrote in wondrousplace2023-03-22 07:25 pm
olden times for Tommy
The great country pile isn't their speed, really.
Double had their lovely house in London, bought and paid for by their adoptive father - a High Fae of some high regard, who'd been fretting about their lands and accounts falling into strangers' hands when he passed on. It was a heartrending story, of course, and Double was...well, positively delighted to be anything the old man wanted them to be. For the right price.
Shapeshifters have long since had a bad reputation for sliding into the upper echelons this way. They hadn't been in penury to begin with, by any means, but 'lovely house in London' money and 'vast estates with mining wealth and hundreds of rate-paying tenants' money is not the same by some order of magnitude.
The old man died peacefully in his bed, well over a century old, and left the manor house and everything that went with it to their sole heir. Who is going to sell it all, eventually, but it feels tasteless not to even let their 'father's' body grow cold.
They move in after the last of their furniture has been transported, and lets the housekeeper give them the tour. They cut quite the figure: long blond hair pinned up in curls, a jacket and blouse tailored tightly to a corseted waist, the snug high-waisted breeches favoured by most males. Their tail is the most exposed part of them and the woman they're following keeps eyeing it like she's not sure if it's obscene or not.
"...show you the stables, your grace," she says, as she walks ahead to the outbuildings.
"Ah. I suppose we ought."
Double had their lovely house in London, bought and paid for by their adoptive father - a High Fae of some high regard, who'd been fretting about their lands and accounts falling into strangers' hands when he passed on. It was a heartrending story, of course, and Double was...well, positively delighted to be anything the old man wanted them to be. For the right price.
Shapeshifters have long since had a bad reputation for sliding into the upper echelons this way. They hadn't been in penury to begin with, by any means, but 'lovely house in London' money and 'vast estates with mining wealth and hundreds of rate-paying tenants' money is not the same by some order of magnitude.
The old man died peacefully in his bed, well over a century old, and left the manor house and everything that went with it to their sole heir. Who is going to sell it all, eventually, but it feels tasteless not to even let their 'father's' body grow cold.
They move in after the last of their furniture has been transported, and lets the housekeeper give them the tour. They cut quite the figure: long blond hair pinned up in curls, a jacket and blouse tailored tightly to a corseted waist, the snug high-waisted breeches favoured by most males. Their tail is the most exposed part of them and the woman they're following keeps eyeing it like she's not sure if it's obscene or not.
"...show you the stables, your grace," she says, as she walks ahead to the outbuildings.
"Ah. I suppose we ought."
no subject
"Of course." Their serious tone concerns him a little, but if it's information they're giving he's not going to hinder them from doing so. He gets off and helps them tie the horses to a nice robust tree, then finds a nice patch of grass to sit down on.
no subject
They sit down next to him, exhaling deeply as they relax. For all that they're growing more accustomed to riding, it's never entirely stress-free.
"...So this is what I understand of what humans were given to believe, of the breach between realms," they say. "We came here as...conquerors. Opening the way to the New Realm gave us the opportunity to seize more lands, more resources. And those ways are still open, at least to some."
They hadn't been certain of whether humans still thought that was true, but Polly's fear that Tommy had been removed to the Old Realms was confirmation enough.
no subject
He nods, confirming their thesis. "Right. Expanding your territory, laying claim to resources, land, the service of people unable to do much in the way of resisting. I admit I have thought about the reason why I never hear about anyone returning to the Old Realm."
no subject
Double tilts their head, strands of pale hair sliding over their shoulder. Maybe he's already got a sense of the reality, here.
"What would your best guess be?"
no subject
"I thought- a rift, between some clans? Perhaps some groups decided to find another place to stay, and opened up opportunities for other Realmers to come. Cultural differences, perhaps, or feuds."
He looks at them and frowns. "But I would suppose now that that is not what you want to tell me, something that has been kept so secret."
no subject
They shake their head slightly.
"...The truth of it is that to all intents and purposes, the Old Realms no longer exist. They were...swallowed. Some great, dark power simply overcame everything, and the smallest fraction of my ancestors were able to force open a breach and escape. We came here as refugees, not conquerors."
no subject
It catches him totally off guard. He looks at them like they've just fabricated an elaborate lie, only he knows they're not lying. The world turned upside down when the Fae came, and they've always seen them as the new powers, the magical beings who came to rule and did.
To learn that they don't have anything to go back to is shocking. "I - I had no idea. Do they not tell us out of a fear to appear weak?"
no subject
A small nod in answer.
"It didn't take long for the Fae and other magic users to realise the power they could wield over your people. If they'd tried to plead charity, or ask for an equal chance within human society....they'd have nowhere to go if they were refused. They...decided they wouldn't risk giving the humans time to organise any meaningful resistance."
no subject
"So we have to find a way to reach equality, if they can't return to the Old Realm. Not that I would have expected them to do so easily, but the messaging..."
He rubs a hand over his mouth and shakes his head.
"A complicated matter. Once in power, who would give that up?"
no subject
"Someone who doesn't have a choice," Double reflects, glumly. "There are ways to resist magic. If whatever gave cursesilver its power could be replicated at scale..."
But the secrets to its production have been assumed lost for over a century.