Chapter 98: Day 97

Day 97,

Morning thought:  Judging by the moon last night, there should be another mist night any day now.  I wonder what everyone will do if it falls on the equinox two days from now?

By the way, I need to figure out what to wear for the festival.  I’m thinking one of the more colorful outfits that I picked out shopping with Lin way back when that I haven’t worn much.  That reminds me, I still need to get proper swimwear.  And also figure out if microscopes exist, or could be made if they don’t.  And go back to the cathedral, with Maiko in tow this time.  Probably some other things too.  So easy to just keep putting off things like that.  So little is ever really urgent around here.  Then again, we’ve only got a couple weeks at best before the rainy season returns and makes any sort of outdoor exploration difficult.

 

The streets are filled with people putting up decorations and setting up stalls today.  Normally that would all go up the day before the festival, but with the high chance of a mist night tomorrow everyone’s getting their preparations done early.

In that vein, Vernon stopped by just a bit ago and asked me if I was interested in being a shade for the morning festivities.  It’s apparently half-ritual, half-traditional game.  I’d put on a big black hooded cloak and go out just before dawn (or right at dawn if tomorrow ends up being a mist night) and spookily stalk the streets and alleyways in search of “victims”.  Anyone that I catch has to put something they have on them into the black sack that I’d be carrying with me or else put on the robe and take the sack themselves, becoming the new “shade” and freeing me to go on about my day.  And then there’s the additional catch that the “shades” aren’t allowed to step outside of shadows, so their movement gets more and more restricted as the morning goes on.  That said, a lot of people seem to consider it good fun to try to tempt fate and see how close they can get to “trapped shades”.  Then at noon, once all the shadows disappear the shades all run to the market forum, shed their cloaks, and turn their sacks inside out to reveal colorful interior linings as they toss sweets, small toys, and whatever “offerings” had been made to the gathered crowd.

It seemed like a fun enough time to me, and a good chance to further integrate myself with local customs, so I accepted.  Here’s hoping I’m not regretting my decision an hour in when I’m covered head to toe in black cloth and the temperature is rising with the sun.

Vernon was most enthused by my decision and went rushing off to go retrieve the cloak and sack.  He should be back sometime soon.

 

I now have a cloak and sack.  And a bunch of sweets that I’m not supposed to eat.

He’d rushed off too quickly for me to bring it up before, but this time around I managed to tell him about Maiko getting back in and what she’d told us about her time on the other island.  He was glad to hear that she was alright and lamented missing out on the opportunity to get to know her better.  Still, the similarities between what she’d found on the other island and the ruined cathedral interested him.  In a novel adventure sense if not an academic one.  Perhaps he would join us whenever we got around to investigating the cathedral again.  He’d never actually been himself.

With his mention of wanting to get to know Maiko better, I found myself wondering if I should mention that Lin seemed… interested in her just in case he meant it that way, but ultimately I kept quiet.  With all that Lin had mentioned her parents wanting her to find a husband I wasn’t sure if she was “out” or if that was even a thing here, and I didn’t want to put her in an awkward position by mentioning.  Being “out” or not I mean.  That said, while such pairings definitely seem to be a minority around here, I haven’t seen any evidence that people have a problem with it beyond perhaps disappointment in lack of grandchildren.  And that’s both with my own observations and what I’ve noticed in archival records of marriages and other relationship/family events.  Seems to mostly be seen as normal-just-uncommon if that phrasing makes any sense.  Even the gossip I hear about Vernon himself being something of a “ladies’ man” usually gets accompanied by mention of him being the same way with other men without that addition coming across as scandalous.  Still, it just didn’t seem like my place to say anything

I wonder if I should have?

On a brighter (ironically?) note the cloak is surprisingly breathable.  It’s actually a whole bunch of layers of remarkably thin veils.  And good thing that they’re so thin individually because there are no eyeholes.  I’m told that with the noontime disrobing, you’re actually supposed to rip the veils off a layer at a time, and afterward someone will very loosely stitch them back together for next year.  All in all while wearing the ensemble I look like a giant flapping pile of dark leaves or seaweed and terribly unlike a shade at all.  If anything, I resemble the nature sprite hunched under its cloak but sans antlers.

I wonder if there’s any significance to that?  Cultural drift changing what the disintegrating costumed threats are supposed to be over the generations, or merely an acceptable divergence from accurate representation in favor of a more dramatic spectacle?

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