[SE] Out, Damned Spot!

The reaction Jigano had wasn’t what Peter had expected. Which was saying something, considering there were a lot of reactions he had been expecting, an immediate recoil amongst them. But it made sense when the other man spoke, Peters face dropping just the slightest in response. ”I’m not... I don’t joke, uh...” His eyes fell, and he couldn’t bring himself to lift them again, focusing instead on his work. ”I was... adopted in. S-so... no, not Northhaven.” He couldn’t bear to watch the reaction this time, though every part of him was still acutely focused on the other man, knowing for a fact there was going to be some kind of drop. The story of what happened three hundred years ago seemed like it would be a good distraction, a good change of pace, but Peter was disappointed. It wasn’t something he could understand, though he had never understood grand gestures for power. He had been a little cog in a big machine, and that was all he would ever be. He was interested in the specific way Jigano phrased something, and had learned enough boldness to speak up about it. ”What... what do you mean the the Voice and... and those like her? What was she like?” Honestly, he doesn’t know much about the Voice, or the gods in general, but if someone was willing to teach it, he was willing to learn. If Jigano was even willing to teach him more. If there even was more. ”Oh, I thought...” Peter shook his head, stifling the idea that Jigano was a natural. ”Nothing. Nevermind.” It seemed the other man wasn’t too eager to talk about himself anyway, the subject very quickly coming back to him, his interests, or rather, his lack of focused interests. All he did was shrug in response. Perhaps something would grip him, perhaps not. ”With everything I’ll uh... I’ll never run out of things. Right?” It still wasn’t a joke, not really. It was the truth. His shovel came up excitedly as Peter whirled, flecks of mud flying everywhere. ”Yes! In the red Lake!” The loreseeker had been the first person to actually know what he was talking about. ”Undine? Is she the only one?” Clearly not, but his outburst had come before the other had finished speaking. ”Mermaids? No, they... they’re not the same.” At least not what he knew of mermaids. Seeing Jigano’s seeming mastery of the earth, Peter doubted that he’d ever to get any kind of similar skill. He resigned himself to helping the townsfolk and shovelling the mud into barrels, slowly but surely reducing the mess more and more. ”I... don’t know if I... I mean, a little, but... it doesn’t feel better.” Most of his talking was being done over his shoulder now. He leapt in action as Jigano shouted, reaching out with his magic and his bucket, holding the water back just enough that he can scoop up the wayward muck into the bucket, skidding to a stop too sharply to stop all his momentum, and tumbling forward, the mud that wasn’t now on him tucked triumphantly in the bucket. ”Got it!” Peter Perfectly able to hold my own hand, But I still can’t kiss my own neck;