Daydreaming (Anna)

Prompt: Daydreaming

 

 “Are you daydreaming again?” A voice asks and draws me out of my thoughts. I must have spaced out, though for how long I have no clue. Looking in the direction of the voice I find Farkas watching me with a slight smile on his face. “Remember what I said about windows and studying?” he asks after a moment. “Too distracting.” I reply with a sigh. He’s not wrong, looking out the window as I’d been doing can be distracting, but it’s infinitely better than attempting to read whatever’s in this old tome. At this point I only just realize he’s been doing his own work the entire time we’ve been in the library. “Where’d that come from?” I point to the pile of papers stacked in a haphazard pile nearby, to which I only get the reply that I’ll find out later, maybe, and if I manage to get my work done. I’m convinced he has some sort of enchantment on that satchel of his based on how many seemingly random objects appear. I wonder what else one could enchant to store more than meets the eye?

 This book doesn’t offer much information on the matter, only an overview of basic ward spells, a majority of which I already know. Between pages I look around the library, there are a few of my classmates sitting about doing their own reading, professors come through every now and then, and the old, rather grumpy, and sometimes even rude librarian patrols like a dutiful watchman. Farkas looks a bit out of place among the mages, yet not too out of place, enough that one may be confused for a second upon seeing him there but go about their business quickly once realizing he’s doing exactly what everyone else is- working. Or…everyone except myself I suppose. The architecture of the library provides its own sort of distraction with the stone carvings and my favorite part, the large blue stained glass windows. Do they provide the best insulation? No, of course not. But there is a certain quality that makes staring at them and getting lost in one’s own head remarkably easy.

 Watching the wind swirl the snow outside begins to draw me back into my earlier daydream, something I can’t quite remember aside from a weightless feeling and my head feeling heavy at the same time, foggy almost. Pictures float across my vision, abstract at first before falling into place and beginning to take the form of a narrative while the rest of the world falls away into a quiet nothingness, with only the howling of the wind in contrast to the silence of the library. Then, another sound breaks through the silence, a snapping sound, and the images in my mind recede back as quickly as they’d appeared. “Oh would you stop that?!” I question Farkas with a tone bordering on minor annoyance. “I’d like to daydream in peace.” I add with a crossing of arms and the most convincing frown I can manage. Unfortunately my efforts to continue to distract myself seem to have failed, as Farkas gives me a look that is difficult to describe and can perhaps be best explained as a cross between amusement, minor annoyance, and a bit of outright confusion. He recovers himself quickly however, mumbling something to himself and begins to pack up whatever he’d been working on for the companions while I had avoided doing my readings. Within a few minutes everything is packed away neatly and he gets up from his place at the little circular table across from me as I sit there silently staring, still processing everything.

“Are you coming?” Farkas asks after a minute more of silence, to which I begin rapidly packing what remains of my own things. Having stacked my books and collected my papers I stand and give him a joking salute “ready!” and we begin walking, first across the library and down the stairs before it dawns on me to ask “where are we going?” as you’d think the magic using person would be the one navigating around here. “Somewhere you’ll be less distracted…or more distracted, depending on how things go.” is the only cryptic and unspecific answer I get until it becomes clear the target is the dormitory across the courtyard. The boring, old, windowless dormitory, with nobody there to talk to or listen to or look at. Everyone at this time of day is occupied elsewhere, in a class, or trying not to destroy their research. Inside the building it’s clear that not even Ancano, the rather suspicious Dominion figure who’s been snooping around, is present.

With perhaps the lightest push humanly possible I’m nudged into the dormitory room, and the door softly kicked closed before being locked. With the door locked Farkas watches me for a moment with what can be stereotypically called a rather wolfish grin, and seems to be waiting for something to happen. Probably looking like an idiot I stare back confused and with a face likely growing redder by the second, if other past situations involving particular dreams, thoughts, and acting upon them are a point to go off. Abruptly I drop the pile of books on the floor, just to make sure this isn’t a daydream. The clatter, and Farkas’ covering his face to keep from laughing inform me this encounter in fact is real. He was right, I’m suddenly much less distracted and interested in what will happen here compared to the old book in the dusty silent library.