Karla's Office, Saturday

[glacial_queen]

This was weird. This was very weird. Karla was used to having Saetan and Lucivar tromping through the halls to interrogate her teachers, not to be one of the teachers about to be interrogated. Sitting behind her desk, she made sure to have some papers out that she could shuffle through in order to look appropriately busy and important.

She'd decided that if any parents asked her questions she couldn't answer, she was just going to lie. Lie creatively and well. Sure, she'd gone to college. Graduated Magma Come Loudly, or whatever. Experience? Loads of it! Her age? None of your damn business, that was how old.

Maybe she'd send the adults she didn't like to Hannibal. Or Eric. With little signs that said, 'I'm delicious!'

Yup, this was how your teacher prepared to meet your parents, class. By making plans to have them eaten.

Look, everyone needed a hobby.

[Open to everyone, guests, students, and teachers alike! Will pick up pings in when awake!]

Comments

[glacial_queen]

"Jono has ways of dealing with Julian," Karla assured him. "They have some weird history involving a dress and a Ring and that's as much as I know or want to."

In fact, some days it was entirely too much, like when Jono mentioned it, smirking, and Julian slunk away, embarrassed.

"There are cleansing herbs that Black Widows can infuse with Craft that are good for erasing psychic scents," she said. "You can scrub things clear of psychic scents without Craft, too, but it's a long and difficult process. The cleansing herbs are like an astringent, almost. Jono might still have some, if you ask."

Karla used to need to scour his room when the stink of his nightmares started seeping through the doorway.

[sharp_as_knives]

"I will have to do that. And we really must have that discussion about herbs and medicines some time, you know."

[glacial_queen]

"Things just keep happening," Karla said, making a face. "Though we should likely start with safframate, if Raven didn't tell you everything about it. That's what the older children in that placed were dosed with."

Her voice hardened when she mentioned it. Thank the Darkness, Karla had never been given straight safframate, but the two second-hand experiences she'd had with it had left marks in their own ways.

[sharp_as_knives]

"Raven mentioned it's an aphrodisiac." Hannibal's lips thinned; he didn't particularly approve of it being given to children, either. "It seemed also to have some psychedelic and sedative effects."

[glacial_queen]

"It's..." There was a sharp snapping sound from her desk. Karla frowned and glanced down; she'd broken a pencil she hadn't even realized she'd picked up.

Yeah, safframate was a fraught topic.

"It's less an aphrodisiac and more a straight up sexual stimulant. We use it in Night of Fire brews, given at Virgin Nights and on wedding nights. Consorts, who can sometimes be called upon to perform for their Queen when they're not really up to the challenge, also sometimes take it. Safframate seeds are about the same size as snapdragon seeds. They swallow one seed with a glass of warmed wine, two, if their Jewel is fairly dark, and that grants them enough stamina to be able to see to their lady's pleasure."

She licked her lips and took another long swallow of the drink Hannibal had brought, wishing it were alcoholic. Pregnant or not, she needed a drink when talking about safframate.

"Obviously, no one with the least bit of morals or ethics would give such a thing to a child, but if these children were lucky, their captors followed those instructions. In Terreille, safframate seeds are often crushed into a powder and used by the spoonful. You have an imagination," she said, voice harsher than she meant. "You figure out what something like that could do to a person."

[sharp_as_knives]

"I saw Raven duplicate its effects," Hannibal answered, his own voice flat with displeasure. "I think that anyone who would do that to a child is despicable."