timebethine

The telescope stubbornly remains broken, despite Laertes's game attempts to repair it; still, though, the many windows of the observatory offer both shelter from the wind and an unmatched view of the night sky. Having seen the calendar's forecast of falling stars, he's gathered up blankets and sleeping bags and made a cozy little nest at the top of the tower so that he and those he loves can observe the meteor shower.

Laertes and Sagramore had idly mused about tiling the bathtub a few weeks ago, and in most cases, their idle musings are forgotten without fanfare when some new project comes along. But the next time they'd bathed together, Laertes had remembered the proposal again--and later, when he went to fetch some tools for Lancelot, he'd come across all of their unused tiles sitting in (slightly dusty) stacks in the workshop.

He'd loaded up a wheelbarrow with tiles, mortar, and grout, and then he'd promptly forgotten them at the mansion for another week.

Then one day, while washing Sunny's hair, he'd thought to himself how nice it would be for her to bathe on a gentler surface than the hard concrete--and that had reminded him again of the loaded wheelbarrow.

So it is that, on a hot early-summer day, Laertes sits in the bone-dry bathtub in only a pair of shorts, smearing all-set mortar all over the floor and walls while Sagramore chooses between the tiles. Many of these are flawed in some way, unbeautifully glazed or warped or broken, but there may yet be enough salvageable tiles to see them through the project.

As the summer rolls inevitably toward autumn--as the days grow short, and the morning breeze off the lake now and then has the faintest bite--Laertes's thoughts turn toward the practical problem of winter. Their walls keep out rain and wind well, but Laertes knows that the long winter and the heartstopping chill of Dark will be more than he can bear.

So it is that he's set up a sawhorse, dozens of planed boards, and a huge stack of straw. He nails the boards into place over the exposed studs of the interior, then drops the straw into the gap between interior and exterior walls. Come winter, that straw will keep his little family snug as dormice.

Somewhere around midnight, a migraine descended on Laertes like a thunderhead, and he still hasn't come out from beneath its anvil. He's spent most of the day hiding in bed with the curtains drawn, feeling as though he's about to be sick--and that feeling's only grown worse as the sun has drifted sluggishly to a low apex in the sky.

It isn't until mid-afternoon that he feels well enough to make progress on all his plans. He needs to speak to SecUnit about its drones, to Dionysus about whether Avernus (that is her name, isn't it?) is a goddess, and to Nightingale about whether he can offer magical support in case their confrontation goes sour. He needs to talk with Claudius about what to say when he does speak to her.

So it is that he starts making his rounds through the mansion and its grounds, seeking out friends old and new, clinging grimly to the thermos of coffee that smells sickeningly strong but also helps drive back the pain. His face is wan, his eyes shadowed. He would rather be doing anything but this.

Laertes has at last managed to finish building the set of stairs and the adjustable gates for Szarka. The gates were complex, requiring him to measure and drill precisely so that the locking mechanism could hold them steady in the doorframe. The stairs, on the other hand, were simple, and he's taken the time to sand them smooth so that Szarka won't get splinters in her paws.

Now, if only she wanted to climb them.

He pats both knees again. "Up, Szarike, up!" She glances at the stairs, full of doubt and misgivings, then turns her gaze up at Laertes atop the bed and whines. Then, with a great leap and a scramble, she heaves herself onto the bed and ignores the stairs completely.

Laertes is bundled up in a slate-grey peacoat and a bright red scarf, tromping across the grounds on a mission. He's still rattled by the day when he woke up next to Asmodean in Sagramore's body, and if he's rattled, then certainly Sagramore is doing worse. There are some comforts that not even a husband can offer, no matter how small and sweet he makes himself or how well he wears a collar.

Thus, Laertes has set himself a task. It should not be impossible--after all, Magnus and Galahad found Drosera in a shed, and they weren't even looking for her. He dutifully pokes through all of the sheds by the orchard, but all he finds are piles of dusty boxes and a truly absurd number of slim wheeled vehicles. Undeterred, he continues the search for new outbuildings, on the hypothesis that they might spring up after a mischief like mushrooms after a rain.

He is fully determined to find Sagramore a dog.