A t E: Session 13 - Epilogue
Pethro speaks to the dead!
General Summary
"I am confused."
"I understand your confusion."
"This is not my usual confusion."
Pethro the deathcaster sat quietly contemplating his able corpseman. His manservant had small ability to comprehend the natural world in his reduced condition. Corpsemen were the unwitting result of an unexpected, accidental death. The corpseman's 'unusual confusion' came from the unnatural events of the past few hours. From Pethro's point of view it was the city's condition that formed much of the issue. Pethro had summoned a green cord only twice in the last day and on both occasions, the Colour had been weak and diffused. The Grey wanlight was everywhere he looked in Alone. This was why the fiends were running rampant throughout the place. Alone, being the city of healing, was located on one of the world's great cordal concentrations. It was a small wonder that no caster had long ago seized the place for his tower. The Profane and their servant fiends might be meaning to make the city their own, for once and all.
Pethro shook his head at his thoughts. It might have been the case that a caster had built a proprietary tower here at some point in the past. In fact, it might explain some things both above and below the city. Pethro had seen the extensive chambers below Alone. He also knew of the more natural tunnels that led from those underground rooms, to at least three lens portals of the Races. There was even a portal below that made its way to the plane of the Monstrous. So there was no end to the city's natural strength and unnatural formations. In this aspect Alone suited Pethro's own manner. Being a Greenlight caster meant he too was gifted strongly with the natural and unnatural. He wanted to help the corpseman understand the occurrences of the day.
"I'll try to explain... I can imagine the first area of unknowing would be the meeting of the one who called himself, Skskeevys?"
"Before that."
"Really? Before that eh?"
"Yes. We went upstairs inside the rooming house. A standard stair. A standard door. It opened and there was spectral Black and little else. I do not understand this."
"The door was a temporary portal. It's unlikely to be there if we were to return and look for it."
"How can that be. If it is made a real thing in that room, how can it be made unreal?"
"I said 'temporary', yes? ... It is something that requires a large amount of caste ability. That, or a chantried object specific to the creation of such things."
"But the lens portals are, "...unbreakable, immovable and invulnerable to harm.", the corpseman intoned this as if by rote.
"You remember that one's speech, eh? Good! This was not a lens portal. It was a created portal. As I said, a much rarer and in a certain sense, much mightier thing to witness. I am unnerved to think of this Skskeevys and the power he must possess to make such a thing real."
"This one was kindly disposed to us."
"You thought so too? Yes, it was his last words that made his treatment of our party make sense."
"How so?"
"When Skskeevys said that he despaired for the cleftyck race and their future in the Realm. That was when."
"That was depressing."
"Ahh, certainly a hard thing to see and hear... There are those that we are traveling with that might make this a less dark future though. That is why Skskeevys took the time to speak with us all. The one of the cleftyck? Eddivaine? He is going to try and right the cleftyck course."
"He sets a new course?"
"Yes, I believe that is his mind on it."
"Where will this course be made. Is there a map of the course I can look at?"
"Ever the tracker and chart maker, aren't you?"
"I...I suppose."
"Apologies my friend. I should be more careful how I say things... No, there is no chart of the course. This is not something to line up on a parchment, overlaid with a grid and plottings. This is instead a course set by the heart of one person. If this person can show the path to where he heads to others, he may succeed."
"Succeed in what exactly?"
"Well, in Eddivaine's case, success will be measured in how many of his race can be made to see that they must first come together and then put down the cadavivva. Simple as that."
"Seems it."
Ahah-hah, yes!" Pethro decided this might take a while. He pulled a chair over and sat. This, despite the fact that he had only an hour ago regained the ability to stand. At the realisation that he had chosen to sit, Pethro smiled at the world and his own tendencies. Some things can never be made to change. Comforts were always of value it seemed.
"So we arrived through the temporary portal, yes?"
"Yes. I did not understand the place we were in?"
"No it was a strange place indeed... Unnatural. In that, it made sense as this one who abides there was also a being of unnatural quality."
"Skskeevys seemed natural to me. How do you mean?"
"He was unnatural in his thoughts. His person might have been natural enough but his mind was other. That was uncomfortable to see...Still, he was nice to us, eh? Took the time to explain what he was and was about. Both Eddivaine and Surtice and myself gained from the meeting. Eddivaine with his ring, Surtice with his Coloured view and me with my legs."
"Your legs I saw made better. The cleftyck's chantried ring made it so. The cleftyck received knowledge too from this elder cleftyck being."
"Good you understand then."
"Surtice gained a Coloured view? What does this mean and how do you know this?"
"Skskeevys offered Surtice a choice, remember? To head one way was to visit a place with the original Seynse Or'Rahn. The founder of the healing order. The other way led to a Spire of Gold. Surtice chose to meet the Spire. I do not know if I would not have chosen the founder, as this would have allowed much of Surtice's past to be better known. He chose the opposite so I can assume that he instead learned things about his own future. I look forward to hearing from him what he now knows. What we do know is that he was instructed by the Gold Spire to ask why the cleftyck lored, had done this and we know Skskeevys's answer."
"You think cleverly as usual."
"My upright posture does not affect my mind, my friend. Less confused now?"
"Less but I still do not follow. Where do all the fiends emerge from? What is their purpose?Also the female fiend? What was her difficulty?"
"No wonder you're confused. There is a muddle even in the words you say... The female was not a fiend, although she could be mistaken for one, I guess. No, she was a harpy. These are constructs. As Surtice is a thing made of human and metal, so the harpies are made of flesh and metal."
"I do not see the difference. Does this mean Surtice is the same as this female?"
"Not in any but the largest sense. The harpies are a group first off. Secondly, they are not formed, as he was, from the stuff of a single being. Harpies are an amalgam of many beings, combined with the smithing artifice of the Seddarans who made them."
"How is that?"
"Consider a meal, alright?... One meal is a delicious steak. You call it "steak" but you also can see that it is part of a creature that it came from."
"Yes..."
"Wait! Now, this is a beef steak, say. Across the road, another house has a different meal on the stove. The meal there is also beef. But this is a meal of beef cubed and thrown together with other meats of other creatures'. Then there are vegetables cubed and thrown into this as well. So on opposite sides of the road we have; two meals, both beef, both delicious but one is more intrinsically beef while the other is an amalgam of beef and other varied things, making it less certain and less unified."
"Stew."
"Ahem, yes... Stew is a very mixed up meal. Where the steak dinner is more singular. In a similar way, Surtice is singular while the harpy creature is made from a variety of parts. She is not at all singular. Surtice is as he was, only prepared somewhat, if you will... Actually, I'm kind of peckish..."
"I shall bring you food."
"Only if we are done here. I like you to be clear."
"I am clearer. I still do not understand the incident with the flying wagon."
"The wagon is called a 'star-span'."
"No."
"No?"
"No."
"It is called something else, you think?"
"Yes. It is called, wreckage."
"Mmm, yes, you're not wrong there, friend." Pethro removed his wide brimmed hat and rubbed his eyes with the back of his glove. "What about the incident involving the wreckage do you fail to get?'
"Kade. He acts now as if he did not die. I saw his crushed form. He fell from a great height that few would survive. He was not among the few."
"You have a way with the morbid."
"You have mentioned this to me before."
"So I have, so I have... Kade is not to know that he might have been dead. Understand? This is vital... so to speak."
"Understood."
"His better nature and way in the natural world will be best served in this way. Later, he will be armoured against this practical turn of events. For the now, in Violet terms, Kade needs to be innocent of what truly transpired. His future is secure and in that future, he will be proofed against this type of thing. It his natural self that must be unaware. That is Kade's place in the natural order that has been established. His role if you will."
"I might begin to misunderstand again."
Eh? That's no good... See, as a deathcaster I have spoken to my fair share of corpses. It is a professional requirement and something of an honour. Most of the time, I think only of what these poor souls are leaving behind. It is not worldly cares that they happily abandon but instead, all that they value. This is no easily shrugged at matter, not for me anyway and most certainly not for the departed. A deathcaster has to learn early to be private with the words of those passed and private with the sadness that he feels from the departed. It is hard to have to pick and choose from among all those that pass away, yet it is what I have learned to do. Once in a very rare while, a spirit can be returned to the world. This is not a time frame of random length. It depends much on the caster's skill and the period of time previously that they did so for another. If the skill is high and the period is lengthy, then the caster can attempt a spirit revival. I am pleased to say that my last such was over five years ago. This meant that tonight, when Kade was in need, I was able to apprehend his quiet passage and detour it in a circular fashion... But this is the end of the beginning. Does that help?"
"I... I don't think so?"
"I will try again tomorrow. Nothing to Kade on this subject, yes?"
"No... Yes..."
"Good man. Now something to eat, eh?"
"Yes... Stew?"
"..."
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