Location: Floating Is— GODS DAMMIT.
Right. Deep breaths. Trying to maintain that 'serene ancient wisdom' facade, mostly for my own sanity. Which is difficult when your house apparently has the timing of a malicious trickster deity and the spatial awareness of a drunken badger.
Things had actually been… quiet for a couple of days up here in the void. Almost peaceful, if you ignored the vertigo and the existential dread. Finished the basic sky-wards (pointless now, obviously), tidied up the potion lab after the 'Calm Nerves - May Cause Sarcasm' incident, even managed to coax one of the sad chamomile flowers into looking slightly less terrified. I was feeling productive. Optimistic, even. Which should have been my first warning sign.
Decided to use the relative stability to do something requiring actual concentration: scrying. There’s a particular strain of bioluminescent algae I need for an improved night-vision draught – Glowkelp Minor, grows only in very specific deep-sea thermal vents. Thought I’d try to pinpoint a likely location for whenever the house decided to head somewhere with actual fucking water again.
Set up the obsidian scrying bowl, filled it with spring water infused with pearl dust (for clarity), lit the silver focusing candle, added a pinch of dried navigator’s seaweed. The whole ritual. Needs quiet, needs stillness, needs concentration. I settled myself, cleared my mind (mostly – hard to completely ignore the Hair currently trying to 'helpfully' polish the scrying bowl with itself), and began the locating chant. Softly, steadily, weaving the intent into the water’s surface.
An image started to form. Murky depths… volcanic smoke… the faint, tell-tale greenish glow of the Glowkelp… Yes! Got a lock! Just needed to fix the coordinates, maybe get a sense of nearby currents or potential grumpy leviathans…
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WHAM.
The entire house lurched like a startled hippogriff. One second I was focusing on a deep-sea vent thousands of leagues below, the next I was nearly thrown from my chair as the view outside the window dissolved from endless blue sky into… deeper, wetter blue. The scrying bowl jumped, water and pearl dust sloshed everywhere (mostly onto my notes and the Hair, which shrieked in surprise – yes, still sounds like dying mandrakes), the candle snuffed out, and the delicate image shattered into nothing.
There was that familiar, disconcerting pressure shift in my ears. The light filtering through the window turned greenish-blue and rippled. Floating particles drifted past outside. Son of a bitch. Underwater. Again.
Took a moment to untangle myself from the Hair (which was now plastered across my face and sputtering indignantly), grab a cloth to mop up the scrying water before it ruined the floorboards again, and take stock. Peered out the window. Okay, new location specifics: seems we’re parked near a rather vibrant coral reef this time. Lots of colourful fish ignoring the sudden appearance of a misplaced witch’s house. Very picturesque, I suppose, if you’re not actively trying to achieve anything requiring a stable environment or dry land.
So. Scrying attempt: Fucked. Notes: Soggy. Hair: Annoyed and damp. House: Sitting smugly at the bottom of the goddamn ocean. Again. The Glowkelp I was just locating is probably leagues away in a completely different trench now. And the sky-wards I just finished are about as useful down here as waterproof toast.
You know, for a structure supposedly untethered from conventional geography, it seems remarkably fond of inconvenient bodies of water.
Right. New plan. Forget the Glowkelp. Today's task is now 'Assess Hull Integrity', 'Deploy Aquatic Wards (Again)', and 'Try to Convince Hair That Pufferfish Are Not Toys'. Maybe I need to brew more of that calming tincture after all. Assuming the ingredients haven't been entirely traumatised by the sudden pressure change.
This fucking house. Honestly.
