TRP: Goro and Luci (Cleric Fables)

[SETTING: Day 273, early morning.]

Luci woke early and sought out a quiet spot. The roof of the inn turned out to be convenient -- there was a small garden with some root vegetable and flowers, and she crossed her legs to sit and meditate. She didn't set up her altar, straight away. It was nice to just have a silent moment, after the chaos of the past days.

LINA

A few minutes after Luci had sat down, someone whispered, "Psst. Hey."

Goro was at the corner of the building, peering at her over the gutter, only visible from the eyes up.

IZZY

She opened her eyes and stared at him. "Can I ... help you?"

LINA

"Mind if I join ya?"

IZZY

She shrugged one shoulder, feeling that her quiet time was going to be delayed.

LINA

She did mind, then, but he really wanted to show her something before there were other people around. He dragged himself up the rest of the way onto the roof and crawled over to sit by the garden with her. "You sure you're alright up here by yourself? What if some creep had followed you up here, eh?"

IZZY

She gave him a pointed look.

LINA

"Ain't secure, is all I'm saying. I'm not the most nimble guy out there and I still got up here without any trouble. You know how to inflict wounds, though, right? Best fuckin' way to keep some asshole's hands off you. I speak from experience."

IZZY

"Mmhm." She nodded.

LINA

"Alrighty, then. Just making sure. Don't ever hesitate with that shit. And hey, Luce, you ever need me to fuck a guy up for you, you let me know. 'Course, your dad and brother probably made you the same offer, yeah? Well, now you got me, too. Yet more backup. No questions asked, just--" He mimed stabbing someone, with a sound effect not particularly evocative of stabbing.

IZZY

"Goro," she said, hoping he would stop. "I appreciate the offer. I feel very safe. Thank you."

LINA

"Yeah, so anyway. You wanna see something interesting?" He was already reaching into his robes to pull it out.

IZZY

Since he was already going for whatever it was, she just waited and watched.

LINA

He pulled out a stack of papers he'd folded a few times, fiddling with it a second before handing it over. "City's got a Maskarran temple, so I paid them a visit last night. Asked to look over their texts. Found this one fuckin' weird story. It was in the middle of a book but the color of the paper was different, and the script was different, so I didn't think it was by the same author. The cleric who was showing me around there, he told me it was a bunch of fuckin' rubbish, but I didn't buy that. Went back a couple hours ago to copy it all down. I wanna know what you think."

IZZY

"Oh." She put down her staff to take the pages, interested suddenly. She'd never read Maskarran scriptures before -- there were none stored in the Sanctuary's library.

It seemed to be a fable of sorts. She tilted her head and read through it twice, absently saying, "I wonder why it was hidden in a different book."

LINA

"Eh, you know, Maskarrans--some of us like to fuck around. Play tricks. Didn't wind up there by accident, I'd wager. But the cleric who thought it was nonsense, he really seemed to believe what he was telling me. Just a prank, and nothing special. But the thing you gotta know is, a lot of times, in Maskarran scripture, these kinds of stories have spells hidden in them. They're like riddles, and if you can figure out the riddle, you can learn the magic."

Goro fidgeted, worrying the hem of his sleeve. He was afraid he was gonna sound nuts if he said what he was thinking... but also, he kind of had a feeling Luci would see what he was getting at. "It talks about raising the dead. I never read a Maskarran story before that talked about raising the dead. Granted, the girl fuckin' failed, but."

IZZY

"Only because she didn't heed Mask's warning," she said thoughtfully, not looking up from the pages. "Because it wasn't a shard? That seems like something Mask would reward, though, doesn't it?" She looked up then, frowning slightly at the way he was fidgeting. "That sort of ... outside-the-box thinking?"

LINA

"Yeah, nah, I was scratching my head over that. I can't figure out what the warning was. Don't think it was because she brought the whole window. You notice the part, though..." Goro scooted closer so he could read alongside her, jog his memory. "It mentions she gets back right after the sun sets, and he told her not to delay because the master of the house would return at sundown. She got away with the theft before then, but... eh, I dunno. Feels significant, somehow."

IZZY

"Hmm. Failed to heed his warning ..." she repeated, looking back up to the text ascribed to Mask himself.

Bring me a shard from the windows of the house Agatha could not rob,

and I will send you her soul, so that you may place it back into her body and raise her from the dead. But do not delay -- the master of the house returns at sundown.

"The warning was about the master returning." She read it backwards. Sometimes that helped, with fables like this, to get the true meaning. She skimmed back up to the big black house with big clear windows that sparkled like gems. "Who do you suppose the master was? Is that relevant?"

LINA

"Uh." Goro frowned and rubbed his chin. "Hmm. Didn't really think about that part. Might be relevant. Shit like that usually is in these stories, right? I don't have a fuckin' clue, though."

IZZY

"Well, not necessarily," she admitted. She'd read a great many stories and fables with completely inane details thrown in at seeming random. Folklore could be like that. Historical and local context could be lost -- perhaps there was something to the black house, and the windows resembling gemstone, or perhaps it was --

"Oh." She straightened. "Oh. Big clear windows that sparkled like gems. She couldn't break them. It was diamond. A black house with diamond windows. If it's -- an encoded spell, perhaps the spell needs a diamond shard. Something else, too, though." She chewed on her thumbnail, and murmured, "Failed to heed his warning ... but she didn't get caught. Returns at sundown. Maybe it has to be cast before sundown?"

LINA

"Oh, hey. Yeah." Goro straightened up too. "Yeah, you know, a lot of those nutty spells Amari casts, the real high-level shit, some of it requires gem dust, and shit. Gods are greedy bastards." He traced a glyph over his heart, quickly, so Mask would know it wasn't anything personal. "I never heard of a spell that had to be cast before sundown, though. Maybe just... y'know, limited timeframe, in general. Revivify you've only got a minute, and all."

IZZY

She nodded. The teleportation circle spell that Mishka could cast -- it required emerald dust. It was reasonable that a spell to resurrect someone would take something more. She traced a fingernail back up the page.

"Agnes wept for nine days and nine nights," she read. "Mask came to her on the tenth morning, and told her not to tarry past nightfall. So ... ten days, instead of a minute?" She looked up to Goro hesitantly. Ten days and a diamond. That was ... powerful. It seemed too good to be true.

LINA

"Shit. Yeah." Goro skimmed over some of it again, still fidgeting. "Hey, uh... I don't really know how it works, for other clerics. What I mean is, ever since Amari started teaching me magic, I've been faking it some, making things up here and there. 'Cause she'd teach me the prayers to Helm, and later I'd try the same shit but praying to Mask, instead. And you can't pray to Mask the same way you'd pray to Helm, you know? Well, you don't know, but I bet you can imagine. Feels like... eating soup with a fork, or some shit.

"Anyway. Point is, being a Maskarran, it's been a lot of trial and error for me. But sometimes, I think Mask just kinda... shrugs, and gives me a freebie. Like he can tell I'm trying my best, and he gives me the power to do things even when I don't have just the right words or the right gestures. Because he's just... in me." Felt fucking awkward, putting it like that. God, he hoped Luci knew what he meant. "I don't know. How do you learn new spells? You ever experiment?"

IZZY

Luci tilted her head at him. He seemed so uncomfortable talking about it. She'd never really considered how a cleric faked following a different deity when they were so ... very different. Eldath and Eilistraee had more in common than Helm and Mask, and she'd genuinely followed Eldath for essentially all of her training -- she was still learning new things, of course, but she sensed she'd reached something of a plateau. She hadn't had to piece her worship together from the beginning, and even now, there was a great deal of overlap in the way in which she regarded and communed with her goddess.

It would be the same way with Selune. Selune, who valued righteousness and knowledge. Selune, who had blessed Hansel.

Thinking about it distracted her. She remembered that Goro had asked her a question, but not what it was, quite, and shook her head, refocusing. "Um. Sorry, what did you say?"

LINA

"Uh. Just. Y'know." No, Goro, she obviously didn't fucking know. "You ever experiment, to learn new spells? How do you learn stuff?"

IZZY

"No." She looked back down to the paper. "I didn't know it was ... possible. I just learned by watching the Eldathyn clerics and mimicking them, I suppose. They didn't know I had magic, at first," she said absently. "We didn't tell them."

LINA

"Oh. Heh. Sneak." He smiled crookedly. "But, uh, anyway. All that was to say. I kinda wanna just... try this shit out. Get a diamond, and a body that's been dead a couple days. See if Mask'll work with me. And uh, if you learn by watching..." He shrugged.

IZZY

She blinked at him. "Where are you going to get a body that's been dead for a couple of days?"

LINA

"Eh, you know. They're around."

IZZY

She narrowed her eyes.

LINA

"Pff, listen." But he didn't have much else to say. "You wanna watch, or not?"

IZZY

"Well, yes."

LINA

"Well, then. You leave the body-finding to me--actually, you know who I bet's real good at finding bodies?"

IZZY

She waited for him to answer himself.

LINA

He raised his eyebrows and made the sign for kitty.

IZZY

She blinked and kept waiting. He was a bizarre person.

LINA

"Uh. Jonn." He paused. "Do you not know Nighthand? You should learn, you know, 'cause Theo." Then he looked away, realizing he was making some assumptions. Like Luci being interested in having anything to do with his sister. She was trustworthy, though, so he hoped so.

IZZY

"Oh. No, I don't know, um." She made a vague gesture. "The thief ... thing, either. Jonn offered to teach me but I didn't want to, then." She paused. It had only been because she'd found it ... unsavory, at the time. It wasn't typically like her to not want to learn things, and she felt slightly embarrassed about it. "Could you teach me both?"

LINA

"Uh--b--ah--hm." Goddamn, Luci and her... thinking he knew shit. Which, he did, but he always figured people thought he was a fucking dimwit. "Uh, sure, I guess."

The thief thing. God, that was sweet. He still couldn't believe this girl was related to Jonn.

"Well, uh--might as well start with that." He signed kitty again. "Means kitty, but it's Jonn's name sign. Might also need that for your dad, now, too. Hah."

IZZY

She signed it back at him. Kitty. Hm. "Why is his name -- kitty?"

LINA

"Ah. Don't know, actually. I think Asya gave it to him."

IZZY

"Oh. What's yours?"

LINA

He pinched his thumb and forefinger close together and swiped them next to his mouth. "'Cause this--this here's a g." He showed her the handshape. "If you were gonna spell it. There's a whole alphabet. Hey, y'know, you've got a name sign, too. I've seen Jonn and Theo talking about you." He showed her, making an L shape and shaking it by his shoulder.

IZZY

"Oh," she said again, processing these things. It was odd to think that she had a different name in a language she didn't even know. After she'd copied both the gestures to set them in her mind, she shook her head again. "At any rate. Um. Yes, I imagine Jonn could help you find a body."

LINA

"Hell, we could test it on an animal, I bet. Dunno. Have you ever tried to revivify an animal?"

IZZY

She shook her head.

LINA

"Hot damn. I gotta test that out." He frowned at her. "You touchy about killing rodents like your dad is?"

IZZY

She frowned back. It was difficult to imagine Hansel being touchy about killing something. "I would prefer not to."

LINA

"Just, y'know, what are the chances of finding one right when it dies, unless you're the one doing the killing." He paused. "Uh, I don't mean you you. Just in general."

IZZY

"Well, theoretically, we would have ten days," she pointed out. "With this spell."

LINA

"Yeah, yeah, but--I mean if we're gonna use an animal, we'd wanna make sure reviving them worked, first. You know, making sure it can be done at all. But, eh." He shrugged. "Maybe human's the way to go after all. Surprise!" He pretended to wave his hands excitedly in the air. "You're alive again! Whoever the fuck you are."

IZZY

She mulled it over. "Do you think it would be immoral to resurrect someone and then just kill them again?"

LINA

"Dunno. Depends on if they were a shit or not."

IZZY

"Mm. I was just thinking, you know -- typically resurrection magic doesn't heal someone's sickness, or severe injuries. It would be ..." She searched for the word. "Easiest, I suppose? To test it on someone who had been killed. Cleanly, so to speak. Someone who had been executed by hanging, for instance. That would be, um. Replicable. For experimentation. But I wouldn't want to resurrect a dangerous criminal and then just let them ... go about their business."

LINA

"Yeah. Yeah, no, I getcha." And then, unwillingly, he was imagining what it would be like, if it were him--caught, arrested, sentenced to death. Hanging probably fucking hurt. People usually struggled for a while, if they didn't fall hard enough to break their necks. It'd be frightening.

And sad.

Then, suddenly, you're back. For a minute or so, before the random fuck who raised you saysokay, thanks, and slits your throat.

"Nah." He shook his head rapidly. "Never mind. I wouldn't wanna do that." Well, except. "Maybe if it was one of those fucks from Shepherd Hills, who fucked with Hansel."

IZZY

Luci didn't say anything for a moment. "If they were ... just a thief," she said quietly. "I wouldn't either. We could just raise them and let them go." Her hand fell onto her staff, fingers curling around it for comfort. "Only if they were dangerous, you know?"

LINA

"Yeah. Uh huh. Or." He grinned at her. "What's say you and me go find one of those refugee fuckers from Shepherd Hills, and make ourselves a body to experiment on?"

IZZY

She gave him an unimpressed look, then considered for a moment. "Well ... do you know which ones Hansel was going to kill, anyway?"

LINA

"Nah. I'll just go up to each of 'em, one at a time--well, just the older ones, y'know--and ask if they remember Marion Granger's kid, Hansel. And then if they get a nasty look..." He sliced a thumb across his throat.

IZZY

"Maybe I should do the talking," she suggested.

LINA

"Oh yeah? Tell me your method, then."

IZZY

"Not having pointed ears," she said. "They'll all give you nasty looks. We can't kill all of them. At least, we shouldn't."

LINA

"Oh. Yeah. Goddamn. Y'know, Luci." He shook a finger at her. "You're a smart cookie."

IZZY

She narrowed her eyes a little. She'd never understood that phrase. "I am, yes. Thank you."

LINA

"You're welcome. Thanks for the help with all this." He tapped on the papers she was still holding. "Knew if we put our heads together, we'd figure it out."

IZZY

She nodded. "It was ... interesting. Do you have any Maskarran scriptures at the castle that I could borrow, some time?"

LINA

"Well, yeah. Sure. Why? You thinking of converting?" He snorted.

IZZY

"No. I'm just interested in learning about other deities."

This was the truth, but she also wondered if perhaps she could learn enough about Mask in order to pitch his worship to Jonn. Maybe Goro could help with that; Jonn liked Goro.

LINA

"Well, you're talking to an expert, right here. Sure, though, I can lend you some shit. I'll warn you, most of it doesn't come with annotations and shit. But you could always ask me if you're stumped on something."

IZZY

"If I were thinking of converting," she said thoughtfully, "is there ... anything in particular you would share?"

LINA

"Huh. Well." He relaxed back, leaning his weight on his hands. "I'd wanna make sure you didn't have any illusions. I doubt this'd be a problem for you in particular, but a lot of people, they think, oh, Mask can make me rich. Ain't how it works, though. Wealth rightfully belongs to whoever can acquire it, but all that translates to is here one day, gone the next. You could be rich for a while, sure, 'til some other fucker comes along and takes it away from you."

He shook his head. "Mask ain't about hoarding, and getting richer. He's about surviving, day to day. People have this image in their heads of the classy, fancy thief, right? But the reality is, the vast majority of Mask's followers--and definitely the ones who are actually out there praying and making offerings to him every day--we're nobodies. We're in rags. Mask is a patron of the downtrodden, more than anything. He's a protector. He has domain over what falls in shadow, and if you pray for his help while you're hiding there, he'll give it to you. But if you wanna crawl out of the shadows, get yourself a big fancy house and a fancy horse and ride around flaunting your jewels and shit? Nah, Mask ain't the god for you anymore."

He shrugged and smiled at her. "There's my words of wisdom, and I'm betting they won't resonate, but maybe you learned something new, anyway."

IZZY

She listened attentively, rolling her staff in her hands, a little. After a moment, she quietly said, "That all sounds ... good. Thank you."

LINA

Goro snorted softly. "Sounds good? You sure you're not thinking of making the switch? I gotta tell ya, I can't see it. Lucienne Sterling, the Maskarran cleric. Admittedly, you'd have a better cover than me."

IZZY

She smiled a little and scoffed faintly. "Yes. It does sound ludicrous."

LINA

"Alright. Well." He climbed to his feet. "You let me know if you've got more questions. I'll leave you to your meditation, um--mm. Ah." He realized he'd been about to call her some kind of pet name; motek or sweetheart or something. He hadn't got as far as actually picking something, just realized his mind was headed in that direction, and caught himself in time. The fuck. He'd have to go back to Sienna Springs and throw himself in the volcano if he started pulling shit like that. "Anyway. Yeah."

IZZY

She blinked at him. What an odd way that sentence had ended. "You could stay," she pointed out. "If you haven't done your morning prayers yet, we could do them together."

LINA

"Oh. Uh. Well, sure." He took his seat again. "Don't have any of my stuff on me, but I can make do."

They'd prayed and prepared spells together a few times before, and he always found it... nice. Satisfying. Before her there'd only ever been one other cleric he could really stand, and since that was his mentor, it really wasn't the same as true communion.

It made him feel kinda lonely, sometimes, listening to the way Mishka and Ombre and Roddy--and now even Hansel--talked about their magic. He just couldn't ever relate. Any you know hows were inevitably a no from him, and vice versa when he was trying to explain shit to them.

He and Luci weren't quite the same, either, from the sounds of it; at least not in the way they learned spells. But he knew she at least must experience the same feeling of conducting divine power, that indescribable flash of oneness that happened when you cast cleric spells. She understood the importance of rededicating yourself to it each morning.

And that was good. That was really good, having someone who shared that.

[end]