Private Finished Finding a Flower in the Fog

This was probably against the rules. That was why Ganymede didn't ask permission first. He just appeared, one night, in Carmin's empty room.

Carmin had been missing for days, and Ganymede considered him a friend. He had the power to find him, to see if he was in danger. Of course he had to exercise that power. He didn't want to give anyone the opportunity to tell him otherwise.

So, first, Ganymede spent some time in Carmin's room. Drinking in every detail, imagining how Carmin might carry out his life in here. Books, soil, sunlamp. He could feel the connection this place, and all of these things, had built with Carmin.

Then, Ganymede knelt in the center of that room. He retrieved several small candles from his pockets, setting them to either side of himself and lighting them with his magic. He set down the mirror that Monday had given him, and he whispered his way through his ritual. He would take his time, to grasp and pull on every thread of connection to Carmin that he could.

The mirror before him no longer reflected the room around it. It became foggy, impenetrable. With a motion of his hand over the mirror, the fog cleared. Ganymede could see him through the mirror now.

Ganymede stared, confused. His mind swirled with questions. What was this place? What was Carmin wearing? What was he doing? Why didn't he tell anyone he was leaving?

The fear that gripped Ganymede most tightly, now, was that Carmin didn't go willingly. Maybe he had been kidnapped. Maybe he was a slave now. This might have just been Ganymede's own traumas talking. He kept watching, hoping to learn more.

Ganymede froze up. A soul trap plant!? Why would this woman want one of those? Who was she? He focused on that face, trying to commit it to memory.

Something terrible was going on, here. Ganymede had seen one of these before.
If you fed a human soul to one, it could become very useful for certain types of alchemy. He had seen it in action, or at least the start of the process. The victim had been a young woman Ganymede's master had brought to the house, a "traitor" if he was to be believed. Ganymede remembered the way she begged and pleaded, before the NEK0 couldn't take it anymore and fled to the other side of the estate.

Carmin was around *several* of those.

Ganymede had to focus, though. Focus on details that could help him find Carmin. The portals. The woman's face. The way the pots looked. The fact that the woman was calling Carmin "Pansy." Why was she calling him that? Ganymede didn't like that either. He didn't like that woman's face, or her voice, or the name she had given Carmin, anything. All of this was making him feel sick, but he had to keep watching.

Eventually, it became clear that Ganymede wasn't going to get any more information about Carmin's whereabouts by watching.

He took a moment to clean up after himself, putting the candles away in a platsic bag, putting his mirror away, and magicking away any residue he might have left behind. Then, he disappeared. He would reappear seconds later in a bench outside, considering his next steps.

Carmin was involved with someone terrible - and now that Ganymede knew about it, he had to do something. But what? Was it a good idea to go to the police? Should he find some way to deal with this outside of the law?

The next day, after discussing it with some people he trusted, Ganymede would go to the police with what he found.