The dance between the two of them didn’t last for too much longer. After their dance was over he climbed onto one of the stil standing tables and scraped his throat, he was a very easy target right now.
“Ladies and Gentlemen, I’d say our own little Holi, the Colourful Carousel, is over right now. Now let’s pour into the streets towards the Honey-Dens of Veilgarden to Parabola! The Kaleidoscopic Cortège will start, let’s colour London!”
He announced proudly as he was pelleted by floury colour palettes.
Well, we won’t be the strangest thing Veilgarden has seen today, though Jolanda wiping the colours off her face.
Huh. Probably should have yelled something sooner. Oh well. Swan, you still up for that dance? We can do it at Parabola!.. Would that count? It’s a dream, but not a dream, but also a country, but… Ugh.
Marching towards Veilgarden, eh? I’ll try to see if I can get the urchins to throw flower petals from the roofs, since this is a wedding march. Romantic, and all that. Though knowing them, they’ll chuck a Scream that screams romantic-ish and probably cultish poems.
What kinda of march is this? Will we need instruments? I can play percussion, and maybe a flute…? Walking or riding? Can we still throw flour?
Nullman was short to follow up and now shared the same table as her husband. She wanted to make some things clear as there were certainly many questions present.
“H-Hello! Over here! Here I am…!” she yelled, but then tugged on August to make him do the calling. Once she finally got the attention she took out a tiny paper from somewhere under her neathbowy dress and cleared her throat. “Okay as for the questions, uhm, we will be heading down the streets that have been pre-marked by the Ministry! That is sadly a must, yes! But everyone is more than welcome to colour the houses with flour! Well, okay the uhm-The Ministry also insists that we do not fling flour at lamp posts. Also please no tossing of anything that is not colourful flour, please! We don’t want to be responsible for any shattered windows!” She then looked down at the paper. “There has also been a small thing I kind of want to mention. Uhm-Can we please avoid colouring the house of…Mr K____? Yes, er, his sister recently permanently left for Venderbight and I don’t really want the old man to be cleaning flour off of his front yard after this tough week of his. That’s uh-That’s all, yes.”
Nullman looked up at August and smirked with her frail and scarred lips: “Wanna go first and leave the most beautiful scar London ever had?”
Ixc listens intently to Nullman’s pronouncement. He turns his eyes to the windows and gaslamps that line the streets. An idea begins to form…
“Ι am up for a Parabola dance, of course, Eliza. We will just have to mind the tigers.”
August nodded Nullman delivered the speech spot-on as if she had read it over and over again a couple hundred times, which she probably had, as had August. He raised his glass of now coloured wine. “Onto the streets! Show London what it means to be colourful! Turn the city into a Kaleidoscope!” He proclaimed as he stepped down from the table and helped Nullman down as he grabbed a small pouch filled with Apocyan flour, this was without a doubt one of the most expensive colours, but it was so darn beautiful he had to use it! The doors flew open as they marched through the streets, constables guarding the way, not to keep others from interfering, but to try keep the wedding party contained.
As the couple strides hand in hand, the nearest windows flash silver. A rose petal gently drifts downward. Then another, and another, until finally petals rain as a gift to the newlyweds. Ixc carefully watches to ensure his illusion continues, but for now the miracle’s creator remains unrevealed.
As August had his fun in painting the city apocyan, Nullman had a small pouch on her, that she left stashed somewhere back at the party, which was bulging with her favourite neathy colour! The one not many can recall. Even with all the destructive capabilities that this purplish tint had in it, Nullman had managed to grow some resistance to it through the years. Surely behind those irrigo-speckled irises of hers some memories were still fading at alarming rates, but she certainly hasn’t fallen victim to it as of yet! A___ would spend many evenings painting her room, her pets, her messages irrigo, but now she finally has the opportunity to legally paint London in it! And boy does she have fun doing so, too!
The rose petals prove as a pleasant surprise to everyone, and especially Nullman - who thought that this is August’s doing for now - as she seemed to have picked up a side-quest of trying to assert dominance in painting as many of the petals as possible with her trademark shade.
Even though everyone was having a jolly time, the same can’t be said for the animals of our patriotic city. Cats, mice, bats all fled congruously away from the blanket of semi-intoxicating colours, but as the whole hassle was settling down and as the colours began to be more on the ground and less in the air, a new arrival has perched itself on Nullman’s shoulder. In fact, a permanently-stained irrigo-bat of larger size now had his claws in her dress! She looked at it and proved the impossible by recognizing it. It was one of the many chiropteran messengers that she adored! Also the only currently alive one that hasn’t succumbed to irrigo…Anyways she greeted it with a quick kiss on the snout and now really couldn’t contain her joyful giggles as London was slowly starting to look like a dream and with her having the joy to share it all with her two favourite boys.
Rose petals! Jolanda gathers some carefully in her hand, looks around. Do they linger?
August was blissfully leading the parade of people to the streets he had frequented so often, and still does. Usually after long talks at the Horse-Steak Club or a drink at the Bridge Without he returned to Veilgarden, to the one Honeyden that had not banned him after the event that gained him his name and had the streets reek of honeyed wine weeks after. Having coloured every window, lamppost and more with all the orange and apocyan flour he had, at least the amount he didn’t want to keep of it, they finally arrived. The owners opened the door and lead the entire group to their largest room, which was the entire second floor. August raised a glass of wine, filled with cheap wine and golden honey.
“Ladies and gentleman and other gentlefolks, I will see you in Parabola!”
He proclaimed as he downed the glass in one go, before laying down in the cushions lining the entire room, before cracking open an eye and drinking more honey than could be considered normal in order to step over into Parabolan, preferring the hangover to walking in through a mirror.
Welp, time to start our reign of COLOURS! COLOURS for you! And you! -Cough- We’ll paint this town all the colours of the Neathbow! Hahahaha! This Knight of the Neathbow shall not fall!.. How’d in the world did August get permission to do this? How?!
What’s this?.. Rose petals? How romantic. And a neat trick. They even feel real! I should try this trick later myself. I wonder who’d done it? And if they’ll share their secrets?.. Looks like I won’t have to do that anymore. Doubt the wind sing-screaming ‘Here Comes The Bride’ be more than maddening. Would be fun though. The urchins came anyway. Even if they don’t know what’s going on, they seem happy to watch from the rooftops.
We’re here already!? Looks like time does fly when you’re having fun. I’ll have to find Swan and dance her across the ball, while not getting eaten by tigers, Fingersticks, and what else Parabola has to offer… Soooo… Umm. Shoot me already. This is embarrassing… How do I get into Parabola? Thought the host would tell us, rather than pass out on the couch like a common honey addict, Honeyaddict.
Through the crowds that were eagerly waiting for a sweet transportation one person stood out: the bride, who was juggling around tiny honey jars, handing them over to everyone alongside a spoon, and equally trying not to let any of them fall. “One spoon’s enough!” she repeated, “One spoon is enough!”
It’s a shame that August already dived right into the dreamland before taking care of the guests, so A___ did so! Her irrigo-bat has already nested itself in a cushion, shared by August, while also wondering why the groom is dead.
Nullman now stopped in front of Eliza and smirked unexpectantly. “Oh! H-Hello there, knight!” she snickered and handed over the spoon-jar combo. “One spoon’s enough, please!” she insisted as with everyone else, and rushed away.
She was more glad to be helping out with sharing honey, and more worried about inevitably consuming it herself. Her austere lifestyle has kept her away from honey for good. Ah well, that comes to an end now, too.
Once everyone was supplied she snuggled up next to her honey-addled husband and very carefully took the tiniest sliver of honey. Sweet…Quite sweet. Very sw-And she’s gone, eyes opening on the other side.
Ixc accepted a jar of honey from his host, and waited for the others to pass into dream. He pulled out a hand mirror, and looked not at its glass, but past it, to vined jungles and skies aglow with remembered light. His own face stared back at him, his eyes silver, his body wrapped in a silver snakeskin suit and the gentle embrace of the Silver King.
“It’d be best if you leave. Better that no one sees you, behind the glass.” Ixc said. Its voice rose in his mind. So be it. Enjoy our home and its wonders. Ixc picked up a bag from the proprietor as well. The first of its contents was a machete, useful for hacking away vegetation. It’s second occupant was a pith hat, which Ixc set on top of his head. Finally, he was ready. He licked the spoon, and watched the walls fall away into the jungle.
August was already in the jungle where the Honeyden would be in Parabola, orienting himself as he had climbed into a tree, looking for the clearing he had created over the time he decided to make a church in Parabola. He had cleared a large area for it, the deal with the Fingerkings he had made for that patch of land had been expensive, having cost him a lot of memories, reflections, an Impossible Theorem and dreams… dreams so many to understand what was.
He quickly had oriented himself and used his Knife of Lost Sky and a large blade to cut a path straight to the opening as the first of the guests arrived. He realised just then he had forgotten to share the Honey.
“My apologies for going into Parabola first, that was rather rude of me!”
He said hacking away still at the dense jungle, and would have to keep at this until they reached either the clearing or the less dense woods surrounding it.