entry - Beyond the Purple
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I lost my nerve to submit an entry for awhile. I didn't think the story would be understood.
I've decided to submit it, anyway. The story is about Lulu and Pix, as told by Pix's perspective. There's more to the analogies than might be readily apparent.
Lulu is not insane. Her seeming random comments that people not in the champion are based on her ability to look at mundane things from several perspectives at once, as well as her ability to overlay what she sees with what's possible.
When she says "you sparkle like dust" in my narrative, it's tempting to think that she's either dense or is saying that Pix sparkles like pixie dust. That's not the case. Dust, when illuminated in a darkened room by shafts of sunlight, does sparkle as it moves. Her comment is my way of showing (concisely, since there's a word limit) that she is capable of viewing things in more than one light.
When Pix responds with his own analogy, his background needs to be considered. Fae in various mythologies can see in the dark. So a "hole" in something doesn't likely represent darkness to him, but possibilities - entrances to other places, or spaces that can contain much more than the surface appearance of the hole would first suggest. He does this because he's acknowledging Lulu's style of communicating while responding in a similar manner. He's showing that he speaks her language and that he respects her ability to perceive and imagine the world as far more than others might.
Thornwyngs and Beetlestaff are made up factions. But I don't believe that any fae in mythology do things for mere "whimsy." Often, those with little imagination tend to suggest that others do things for fun or random reasons when they don't understand and won't acknowledge their real motivation. Even in the fairy tales of fae capturing people because they're "tricksters," I imagine those characters do so for reasons. In this narrative, Pix's reasons were complicated. And while he justified it in claiming that another would've taken her if he hadn't, he really did, in fact, need her to help stop a war in his land. He just didn't predict how very effective she would be at it.
One of my friends balked at the implications of the closeness between Lulu and Pix because he was convinced that Lulu was underage. I couldn't find anything in Riot lore suggesting that Lulu was underage when she met Pix. The lore simply refers to her as being imaginative from a very young age, not that she was still a child when they met. She's not a child in this story.
Furthermore... if she was, in fact, a child in the Riot lore when she entered Pix's realm, then it would've been horrific for the yordles to ostracize her when she came back. They'd have endeavored to teach her limits, not kick her out of their community.
I've decided to submit it, anyway. The story is about Lulu and Pix, as told by Pix's perspective. There's more to the analogies than might be readily apparent.
Lulu is not insane. Her seeming random comments that people not in the champion are based on her ability to look at mundane things from several perspectives at once, as well as her ability to overlay what she sees with what's possible.
When she says "you sparkle like dust" in my narrative, it's tempting to think that she's either dense or is saying that Pix sparkles like pixie dust. That's not the case. Dust, when illuminated in a darkened room by shafts of sunlight, does sparkle as it moves. Her comment is my way of showing (concisely, since there's a word limit) that she is capable of viewing things in more than one light.
When Pix responds with his own analogy, his background needs to be considered. Fae in various mythologies can see in the dark. So a "hole" in something doesn't likely represent darkness to him, but possibilities - entrances to other places, or spaces that can contain much more than the surface appearance of the hole would first suggest. He does this because he's acknowledging Lulu's style of communicating while responding in a similar manner. He's showing that he speaks her language and that he respects her ability to perceive and imagine the world as far more than others might.
Thornwyngs and Beetlestaff are made up factions. But I don't believe that any fae in mythology do things for mere "whimsy." Often, those with little imagination tend to suggest that others do things for fun or random reasons when they don't understand and won't acknowledge their real motivation. Even in the fairy tales of fae capturing people because they're "tricksters," I imagine those characters do so for reasons. In this narrative, Pix's reasons were complicated. And while he justified it in claiming that another would've taken her if he hadn't, he really did, in fact, need her to help stop a war in his land. He just didn't predict how very effective she would be at it.
One of my friends balked at the implications of the closeness between Lulu and Pix because he was convinced that Lulu was underage. I couldn't find anything in Riot lore suggesting that Lulu was underage when she met Pix. The lore simply refers to her as being imaginative from a very young age, not that she was still a child when they met. She's not a child in this story.
Furthermore... if she was, in fact, a child in the Riot lore when she entered Pix's realm, then it would've been horrific for the yordles to ostracize her when she came back. They'd have endeavored to teach her limits, not kick her out of their community.
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I could feel the purple one's energy miles away, reaching out to me on humming violet tendrils. By the thorned gods, she was fantastic! I was drunk on her essence before she reached the birdhouse, clattering around the wood slatted prison, too overwhelmed by the sheer force of her mental power to control my limbs.
Unfettered imagination in an outsider is a potent modifier of fae magic, and can anchor fae constructs across realms. Too often, outsiders tether their minds with so much overworld "rationality" that they render their fantasy utterly useless to my kind.
Lulu had no such restraints. If not for me, another of my kind would have ensnared her. I did what I had to do to protect such a valuable asset.
"Ooh a pixie! You sparkle like dust!" The yordle exclaimed with infectious delight. The wood in her hands practically leapt aside at her touch, the fibers of recently-deceased tree spirits still retaining enough memory to fear the alchemy of her magic with mine. She must have felt the jolt of foreboding as her fingertip brushed my wing; I certainly did.
"And you, my dear, radiate like the deepest hole in existence," I replied, lacing my honeyed words with richest glamour. What mortals don't realize about fae magic is that what they consider illusion - simply isn't. The most carefully woven glamour shows things in their truest essence, expounding on the possible. Mortals who never encounter fae magic are the ones blind to the real nature of things. "Come with me and I'll show you that your imaginings bring life to worlds! Experience spectrums of color no others of your kind have dreamed."
And then, before she could answer, I let it slip. Our synergistic energies stripped me bare of any pretense. I could not contain the truth, not around her. "The unseen war of thorns and beetles will escalate into this world, as well, if I don't return with a bolster to my power. You are the only overworldian creature I've encountered with imagination airy enough to mesh with fae magic. Be my anchor, or my kingdom, and perhaps yours, will be lost." With a flutter of my gauzy wings, I showed her the ruination of my land, as well as the thorn-pierced currents of magic that would slowly but surely bring Runeterra to its knees if not for her intervention.
Once she was in my realm, her power amplified beyond comprehension. Every glance from my fearsome ally altered the fabric of our world. She was already used to wielding the creationist magic of "make from belief," but here, her impulses took form instantly. Vast armies of enemy fae crumpled before Lulu as her gaze sheared their weapons and nullified their spells with a simple alteration of hue. Beetlestaff Fae and Thornwyngs alike fell to their knees in terrified awe. I became their king, and Lulu was my queen.
Just as color and shape are as impermanent in our realm as a soap bubble is in yours, size likewise has no bearing for us - particularly when one has the creation power of an overworld being. Lulu, inexperienced as she was with our customs, entrusted me to shape and guide her, and I sculpted my queen into such exquisite beauty! Subjects gazed at her, hypnotized, as though her new wings were inscribed with hidden secrets of primordial magic.
I, too, was helpless against her magnetism, and I had her in every imaginable way. Every day, every night, far too frequently to count, I clutched her as agile movements descended into twitching spasms, and her glossy hair tangled with the thistledown. She was mine and I was hers. For over a thousand years of our time, we ruled our kingdom with joyous creation. Rivers and mountains sprung up overnight, innumerable creatures popped into existence. Fae sang with exuberance in the flower-lined paths whenever we passed. We were happy.
Happiness was my mistake. I couldn't perceive the danger.
Yordle children wander too far for their own good. I should have posted sentries, should have made sure my queen never heard a scrap of song from a mortal. Lulu was altering the flowers at the borders of our land when she heard it. Once the yordle child's song pierced the ethereal veil, I knew it was too late.
Lulu remembered.
For hours, I held her while she thrashed and screamed, demanding that I release her from a spell -- as if I would enslave my queen! I wept and pleaded with her, but she would not see reason. She wanted to leave, to become mortal again. The laws of nature would not allow the queen of the pixies to leave her kingdom, to become a mortal, while retaining her knowledge of who she had been, and all the secrets she'd been privy to. The severing of her new self would destroy her, body and mind.
I could not let that happen to my queen. I clung to her with every shred of strength, poured my love into her, and pled with the gods below that they might spare her sanity and her memory - of me, if nothing else. Strands of my life-magic intertwined with her soul as I embraced her in agonizing desperation. "Gods of fae and nature, I beg you - spare my love!" I sobbed. Pixies aren't known to cry, yet tears stung my eyes and soaked into her hair. Eternity passed in a moment.
And then it was over. I awoke in her hand. She was enormous, as she had been when I first encountered her. Our kingdom was gone. I will never be able to find the entrance again, nor will she. "Silly Pix! Why are you acting so sleepy?" Her cheerful query pierced my heart. I could not bring myself to tell her what she had lost. My partner of the infinities was still by my side, but had barely a scattered recollection of what had been.
Even so, I am forever loyal to my queen.