A – 9
B – 4
***
Chapter 5.2: Curse and Blessing
You take back your coin from the thug leader, and toss it at the little girl. She catches it and runs off, without even a word of thanks. You grab the leader and pull his body further into the alleyway. The coast was clear.
It was time for a snack.
The meal did you some good; your senses became just a bit sharper, you felt just a bit stronger and faster – but more importantly, your hunger was satiated. Even though you ate as much as you could, you had to stop when you felt full. You wipe away the blood around your mouth, and dig out some chunks of gristle that were sticking to your teeth. The corpse was half-eaten, but there was no way to get rid of it for good. You would just have to leave it.
***
The rest of your search was surprisingly simple. The guards at the gate were lax. You weren’t dressed like a beggar, and so they didn’t bother stopping you. Some quick questioning revealed that Mehrune was put up at the residence of one of Marduk’s lieutenants, a man by the name of Nammun. Standing outside the well-tended gardens of Nammun’s house, you felt Sekhenun’s familiar, but slight, presence within it. In fact, it seemed nestled within a human shell… you would never have noticed it had you not known what to look for. It was a far cry from the telepathic beacon she was within her temple.
From there, it was a trivial matter to scale the walls at the back of the house, and enter through the windows.
Your feet make a small sound as you land in the room.
Sekhenun turns, still in her handmaiden form, and her eyes widen.
You raise a hand in greeting. “Hey.”
For once, she seems speechless. The next thing you know, she’s rushing you. A small tendril extends from her hand and stabs into your arm, taking you by surprise. You growl and put a hand on your sword.
“You’re alive?” she mutters.
“Of course I am. That tendril of yours is hurting me.”
“Sorry.” Sekhenun retracts the tendril with an apology. “I had to make sure you weren’t some disguised assassin attempting to catch me off guard. I couldn’t sense you.”
“Getting rusty in your old age?”
“I don’t have the luxury of taking three hundred year beauty naps. At any rate, I really couldn’t sense you. It’s strange. You’re standing in front of me, but you’re not there psychically…” Sekhenun thinks to herself for a bit, and then continues, her eyes suddenly hard as stone. “Anyway, I think you should be explaining to me why your breath smells of human flesh.” You do so, explaining what happened in the Labyrinth, what the voices told you, and how you came to be here.
“You have the statuette, then?”
You nod, and pull it out of your bag. Looking at it, she sighs. “If my theory is correct, this thing won’t help you anymore. With your leash gone, I do not know how to connect it to you so that you could take its power.” You look down at the statuette you hold. Was it possible that you could eat it? Almost impulsively, you bite the head. The metal is cold in your mouth, but nothing happens. Maybe if you chew it off and swallow…
“What are you doing?”
“Sorry,” you shrug. “Just wondering if I could consume it.”
She frowns. “Put that thing away, I’ll run some tests on it later. At any rate, I have never encountered a thing such as you. From what you say, I am relatively certain you have developed the cursed hunger of my species. Your former masters gave us the curse of cannibalism to try to control us. You will always desire, above all else, the flesh of your own kind. Without it, you will gradually weaken and lose your powers.”
“But if I eat more, I will grow stronger.”
“Yes. Feeding will strengthen you, but only to a certain extent. Think of it as… a container, with your strength like the water within. When you eat, you make the container larger. The water, your powers, will naturally increase fill up the container in time. If you starve yourself for a long time, the container begins to shrink, and you lose power. The water, however, remains – if you grow the container again, you will be able to access that water.” You try to understand her explanation, thinking on it. “That doesn’t really make any sense. If the container shrinks, but you can get the water again, where does the water go in between that time?”
“Figure it out on your own, smart one.”
“You said that your kind eat themselves. Why do they prey on humans, then?”
“Well spotted. We couldn't work out a way to remove it, so to stave off the cannibalism, we found alternate sources. Your species have proven to be one of the better alternatives so far.”
“So you mean I could eat Gieloth instead of other people?”
“Don’t stare at me like that when you say such things.”
“I’m taking that as a yes.”
Sekhenun waves off your line of inquiry. She doesn’t seem to want to discuss the matter. You shrug, and say, “Right, well, let’s get down to business.”
“What more business do you have?” she asks, surprised.
“You promised me my powers back in return for my help, didn’t you?”
“That didn’t work out in the end. You’ve become this very interesting abomination that I would love to experiment on, but that’s not what I promised you.”
“Doesn’t matter. It won’t hurt for me to hear what you have planned.”
She bites her lip pensively, wondering if she should share her plans with you. “Well, if you put it that way… I want both Zeus and Marduk out of the picture.”
You raise an eyebrow. That seems to be a very tall order. Sekhenun continues to speak, “Left unchecked, the two of them will tear this region apart in their bid to wipe out the other.”
“The war in Greece will soon tempt Marduk to turn his eyes west, flush from his victories in the east. Zeus and his fellow gods will turn the tide of battle against Minos, and that is when Marduk will throw Babylonia into the fray. Is that it?”
“Yes, that’s very astute of you. I planned to defeat Zeus first, but your disappearance frustrated those plans. I had to return to Egypt and go back to the drawing board. Now that you are here again, I have several other plans that might work.”
***
A. Sekhenun has tracked down a certain, old cult that is opposed to Marduk. Its members have been scattered since the defeat of their god more than three hundred years ago, but they have built up a vast relief network in recent years, earning the goodwill of the people. She thinks she can convince them to revolt. Your role would be to assassinate Marduk’s lieutenants and high ranking priests in the administration in order to make things easier for the revolution.
B. You adopt a plan of subterfuge. You will get close to Marduk by infiltrating his men and gaining their trust. A good chance is coming up. He has lost two lieutenants in the Indus, and plans to hold a tournament to select their replacements. Marduk is not choosy about who serves him, as long as they are strong enough; three of his current lieutenants are human – though of course they do not know that their comrades are not. You have a good chance of winning the tournament and getting close enough to place yourself for a direct assassination attempt later on.
C. There is no time to lose – Mehrune meets with Marduk at the end of the week. You take that chance to enter the meeting and challenge him to prove his divinity. God-King or no, you will destroy the faker in a direct duel and ruin his myth of godhood.
D. You do not intend to help Sekhenun with her plots. As she said, you have no obligation to her. You will do what you can for the people in Sumeria, but you will not act on Marduk’s regime directly.
***
1. It would be hypocritical for you to continue forbidding Sekhenun to eat people, if you plan to devour Gieloth. You tell her this, and free her from her deal with you. You will need her to be as strong as she can for the coming trials.
2. You cannot trust or control Sekhenun if she regains her powers. She is a Gieloth after all, and you never know what she’s plotting further down the road. You do not say anything about the issue.