#earthrunes

"miss May's turn offs are manbuns, backhair, and cat haters" Bronte explains

"Someone... someone dared..."

"And you saw them? Oh, Bronte..."

Bronte blinks confused

"Something bodes ill?" She asks worried for her friend who seems upset

Zara collects the magazines, gone from pink to bright red.

Coradel looks quietly delighted. "Oh, now, there's room for all types of reading pleasures...." Then a look at Zara's face. "But perhaps this could be kept elsewhere."

"She is growing up."

"Th-they.. they do not belong here..."

"Bronte, I'm wondering whose stash you raided."

The dragon seems offended "“If all the world hated you and believed you wicked, while your own conscience approved of you and absolved you from guilt, you would not be without friends.”
― Charlotte Brontë, Jane Eyre"

She does not seem to considder the magazines to be worth RAIDING. It's not like they are books.

Zara shrinks, shoulders curling protectively.

Bronte flutters to Zara and nuzzles. Clearly she did not mean to upset her. She was just telling her the odd things added to the collection

"Let me rephrase. Where did you find these?"

"I didn't know these were here."

"I was hoping Bronte might say. Though...I have a suspicion. Bronte, did you bring these here?"

A huff and shake of her little dragon head

"Mmmm... Well, I think I can locate a suitable space for them that won't offend the librarian's sensibilities. May I?" She offers to take the stack of smut.

The spiders in the corners agitate. They sense their friend's distress

Who, they seem to ask Zara, silently, needs envenomed?

"They should not be here." She manages.

"Then they won't be." Coradel gathers them up easily enough. "I'll relocate these. Now, do let me know when you here of the arrival of Talia Amur's next work. And thank you for the tea." A nod to Zara and another to Bronte, and she turns to go.

Bronte says gently to Baroness "Parting is such sweet sorrow"

"Aye. Forgive..."

"Oh, nonsense, Zara. Nothing to be forgiven."

And she goes...in search of Shalimar.

A sort-of nod from the sluagh.

And, when Cora departs, she finds some shadowy crevice to squirm into and hide.

And a spider, we wont' say which number, goes out to find Earl. He needs to be useful if he wants to keep the blood in his husk

And...well, there is Shalimar at Jack's pub. His bells looking a bit worn tonight

And that is where Coradel helps herself to a seat near him, whether it be at the same table or at the bar. She sets the stack of magazines in front of him and reaches up to tap one of his bells.

The bell chimes, and he turns, then blinks looking at the magazine "But darling, I didn't get you anything"

"Mmm, and I suspect you've read this one already." A smile and she taps him on the nose with the same finger.

And to her surprise, Shalimar says "While I understand being rounded up, I'm afraid I'm not part of this equation." He sorts through the magazines then blinks "My liege, are you trying to have my moth dust me?"

She's surprised. "It wasn't you? Somebody put these in the library. Bronte made them part of the horde, and now Zara is beside herself in embarrassment. I thought you were trying for comic coup and deathwish all in one."

Shalimar actually looks embarrassed , nay, distraught "And there we have it, the final nail in my coffee.... a perfectly perverted poke and is it Shallmar the once funny? Nay, not even shallimar trying too hard. But rather it's the heir of Shalimar, won't Vashti be surprised... she's in love with a skunk butt rug while some stinker steals MY job"

Coradel blinks. "Well, whoever it is ended up being more cruel than funny, so I'm rather glad it wasn't you. I would have questioned your taste."

She moves the magazines aside and touches Shalimar's hand.

"Taste? " Shalimar says and he says "I fear my deer, that my funny bone is broke. I don't make folks guffaw, snort, or laugh any ever. "

Jack turns "hey, Boss. What do you want to drink?"

To Jack, she says, "I am at your mercy, serve what you'd like me to have."

Then to Shalimar, "I'd wondered. You haven't seemed yourself for a time. Did something happen to start this?"

Shalimar says "Who knows? I thought I was with the mojo but no onee was lighting up. It's not me, it's everyone else right? But as it stands lately I've been nobody's fool"

Jack says "Ah, sometimes I love to hear..." A blink "Who put my magazines out here?"

She's about to answer Shalimar when Jack speaks. "They're yours? Somehow they ended up in the....library...." A sigh as she trails off. "Well, I have another suspect now."

"Suspect for what? I keep them in a box in the back of the inventory " Jack moves to the magazines "These were some of my young wilder guilty pleasures"

"Somebody decided to relocate your guilty pleasures to the library, and while I don't have a problem with that, Miss Zara just discovered that young Bronte has been expanding her reading materials."

"Oh boy, " Jack says "Holy shit. She's not coming after me is she?"

Shallimar actually smriks at Jack's alarm