Chapter 64: Demonic Verses
It is surprising how quickly you come to a consensus on this. Of all the many things you could ask for all three of you easily settle on the same request. You echo Nanshe's request, speaking as one, "Metal."
Morpheus' shoulders sag ever so slightly, "Are you certain?"
You glance to your witch and to your better half, each nods and smiles, you look back to the regretful Demon Prince and beam.
His wife rubs the back of his neck, "You gave your word dear, now live up to it."
He nods several times, staring at his hands, "Yeah, alright."
When he looks up he is all smiles, "My brothers are probably going to kill me for this but we can worry about that later."
He rises from his chair followed quickly by wife, he speaks calmly, that great grin of his plastered across his face, "Now, you probably are not going to like this next step but just remember to stay calm and breathe."
"Wait, what do you mean," you move to rise only to realize that you are unable to do so. Your chair holds you fast, rooting you to the spot, you shout, "Morpheus!"
He raises his hands defensively, "You want to learn Metal then I need to take you to a place that is a bit safer. No complaining now, this is what you wanted."
Sparassidae is quick to add, "Just keep still darlings, it will hardly take a moment."
Morpheus nods, "Exactly, one minute, two at the most but, ah, it will probably cause a bit of discomfort on your part, my apologies in advance."
Your chair begins to contract, it constricts around your bound wrists and ankles. You instinctively pull back, attempting to slip free, all to no avail of course. In the other chairs your three companions are similarly bound. Nanshe grunts and strains against he seat, Lyssa eyes the dream demons warily while Thaïs closes her eyes and does her best to suppress her anxiety.
You take a pair of deep breathes, doing your best to follow Morpheus' advice but on the third breath your chair snaps forward, forcing the air out of your lungs and rolling you into a tight ball. You feel a pressure, a pain, then nothing; broken ribs certainly, a broken back also in all likelihood. Lyssa lets out a gasp, Nanshe whimpers slightly, you remind yourself that none of this is actually real, that you can wake yourself up whenever you choose and the pain, the pressure, the loss of feeling are all tricks of the mind. No sooner do these thoughts pass through your mind then you regain feeling.
"Morpheus," you hiss, "What the hell are you-"
"Shhh," he instructs you, "I need to focus and you aren't helping."
Your chairs continue to curl round, bending into cylinders of cracking bone. Your head is pushed down past your feet, if this were real you would certainly be dead, and then these bone cylinders begin to shrink. For over half a minute they press in on you, forcing you into an ever tightening disk. You fully expect your bones to break, to puncture through your skin and leave you bleeding out on the floor but curiously you frame does not fracture further. Instead it begins to shrink with your chair. You shrivel away within your prison, first the table towers above you and then the very blades of grass proceed to do the same. By the time the transformation is complete you doubt you are bigger than a standard gold sovereign.
"See, that was not so horrible was it?" the booming voice of the now gigantic Morpheus rings out through the meadow. He laughs and your little container actually shakes at the vibration.
"Morpheus!" you squeak, "We want an explanation or we are leaving!"
A chorus of squeaking springs up to your left and right, seems your confederates agree wholeheartedly.
"Derryth?" he come around your position, scooping up Lyssa and Thaïs on the way. He lowers himself down to his knees to get a better view of you, "Ah, there you are. Now I know you are probably angry but I promise, I have a very good reason for doing this. So don't run away to the waking world just yet."
He palms you and retrieves Nanshe as well. He then proceeds to pass the four of your over to his Lady, "Dear, would you mind hiding our mortal friends?"
"Certainly," Sparassidae replies as she takes the four of you and opens a small velvet pouch, she dumps you in and you land together in the bottom of the purse, the jingling of coins replaced by a chorus of curses.
Nanshe's chair strikes you in the side and you groan, "Sorry," she whispers.
Sparassidae's voice drifts down to you, "We are going to take you somewhere mortals are not exactly allowed to go, so please keep quiet and try not to do anything that will draw attention to yourselves."
She does not wait for a response before closing the pouch and plunging the four of you in darkness for what seems like years...
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Light, light and freedom, finally.
You beam as the Lady's purse opens but your elation does not last, immediately she upends your container and it is a long fall to the floor.
Sparassidae has simply dumped the four of you out on the ground and with a whistle and a twitch of his nose Morpheus has restored you to your original size, but neither of them seem to have thought through the natural results of their actions.
"Damn it!" the young Empress curses.
"Watch it!" Lyssa exclaims.
"Shift a bit to the left please," your better half requests.
"I am trying," you mutter, before craning your neck to shout at the demons, "How about one of our hosts comes over here and lends us a hand?"
Morpheus' jackal grin lingers for just a second too long, a shiver runs down your back and you glare at him, thoroughly annoyed at his own behaviour and your own instinctive fear of the demon.
Sparassidae steps between you, "Dear, we should help untangle them don't you think?"
"Of course," he fixes his gaze on her, his smile softens around the edges into something a bit more human as he shuffles over and picks you and Thaïs off the top of the pile. He sets you down in your chairs and waves his hand over your heads, the chairs in turn uncoil and release you, none the worse for wear.
You stand in this chamber, barely three metres square. A single dim light swaying back and forth above your head, a sphere of glowing silver fire.
As his wife rights your allies Morpheus decides that an explanation is in order, "As I said, I had a very good reason for transporting you this way. We are currently in the heart of my palace estate on the shores of Peaceful Slumber, my brothers will not be able to easily spy on us here and-"
Nanshe interjects, "Wait, so everything we said in the meadow might have been heard by your brothers? Every scheme, every detail?"
The Prince nods, "Certainly, they rule this plane as much as I do and their influence and agents are everywhere but you are vastly overestimating your own importance if you think they were spying on you."
"Oh..." Nanshe replies, a little deflated.
Morpheus presses on, " Your words and deeds have been as secure and as secret as one could hope for in the Dreaming and they have certainly been more secure than they would have been had I tried to hide you. I meet with a great many mages, demons and gods on a consistent basis and my brothers leave me to my plots for the most part. Neither of them are overly concerned with diplomacy or governance and so they very rarely interfere directly, they leave me to represent our realm unless something gets their direct attention."
The Lady readily elaborates, "For example, a handful of mages learning how to cast our magic in clear violation of the rules of this plane."
Alright, so Morpheus has been hiding you in plain sight till now but you have to wonder. Now that he is actively trying to hide you will that not draw the attention of his siblings?
When you ask just that he smiles warmly, "Normally yes but they are currently distracted. Their acolytes are involved in a musical battle this evening and so long as their attention is directed toward that battle we can do just about whatever we want so long as we are not too loud."
He motions for you to follow as he leaves the tiny room you have been deposited in.
The first thing you notice is that you are outside.
Three great discs of resplendent light hang low in the warm, summer night. Eternal observers, wide eyed, hung in place upon hooks of starlight and forgotten hope by some clever craftsman. Or perhaps some conman, some purveyor of pretty little fancies, for every surface strung by the precious rays of those beaten discs shimmers and lingers in your mind, dancing in your memory and most impressive of all is Thaïs, crowned in the easy and inestimable magnificence of these triple bodies. The scent of citrus and salt water hits you then and the crash of waves from just beyond your sight draws your gaze out into the theatre before you.
"It is magnificent," the Lady remarks next to you. You nod in agreement as she continues, "Take it in for you are the first mortals to ever see this place, it is one of the only true temples you will find in the entire Dreaming. A place dedicated to something finer than power, something that can and did elevate and save an entire people."
You stand at the edge of the stage in a large depression, a sunken bowl with row upon row of seats carved into the rose rock of the cliff side rising around you but what immediately catches your attention are the instruments arrayed before you. Horns, drums, stringed instruments in a dizzying variety of shapes and sizes, and all manner of things from the mundane tools of the trade you have encountered in bars and taverns throughout the Empire to bizarre constructions you have never encountered before.
"Right," Morpheus steps out into the middle of the maze of brass, wood and leather, "If you want to learn our magic you will need instruments and you will need to decide how exactly you wish to focus our magic, you can of course learn metal as I cast it but you might also like to try on of the other genres my people pursue. For example, my brothers are quite fond of-"
The thunder of drums cuts off his lecture, your group spins to spot Nanshe, perched upon a stool behind an absurdly large collection of drums. Grinning she spins a stick in each hand, "I want these."
Morpheus blinks, "Are you sure you don't want to try-"
"Nope," she knocks out another series of semi coordinated strikes, it sounds... unrestrained, "Drums are fine with me but how am I going to carry them back to the waking world?"
Morpheus answers quickly, "You won't. I have no intention of letting you take demonic made instruments into the physical world and least of all
these instruments. You will have to figure out how to make your own or you will have to make do with what you can find."
The young Empress frowns, "I suppose I can make that work..."
She begins playing around with the set of drums, testing them, examining them, no doubt trying to figure out the best way to replicate them when she wakes up.
Morpheus sighs and directs his attention back to you, "We have some time to sort out what you want to do so feel free to test out the instruments and if you want I can explain so of the various styles of music my people practice."
Seems this will be a busy dream after all.
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"I suppose this is where we part ways," Ceannard states the obvious in he early morning light.
You decided to leave Nanshe's camp shortly after waking. Not because of her, mind you, she was polite and her people treated you with a reasonable degree of respect, at least until you demanded a cut of the loot from the battle. The ghôls grew quiet hostile at your demands and though Nanshe was able to convince them to give you everything you desired you deemed it wise to leave as soon as was possible.
It seems that the young Empress only have a loose hold on her people at the moment, a fact you will do well to remember.
The wind whips around your group, clustered together by your carriage. You, Thaïs and Ceannard say your goodbyes, hopefully it will only be for a few months but with the way things are in the south that is far from guaranteed.
"Looks that way, yeah," you extend a hand, he takes it, "Do you remember your orders?"
He nods, "I have been doing this for a long time ladies you don't have to worry about me but I wish you would take a few Arrows with you, someone to watch your back and-"
"That's what they have us for!" Uttu shouts from within the carriage.
"And a damn fine job you will do of it too, I am sure!" Ceannard calls back with a laugh. He plucks a black arrow from his quiver and extends it to you, "Something for the girl."
Thaïs laughs melodically and whispers, "If you go giving her gifts you will never be rid of your admirer."
He laughs, "I think I have enough admirers already-"
"Awww!" Uttu's voice rings out from the darkness of the carriage.
"But," he continues, loud enough for the young spy to hear, "For a star pupil and an excellent soldier I think I can make an exception."
He strides over to the carriage window and passes the arrow through triggering a series of squeaks and squeals from the younger girl and a matching series of muffled groans from her sister.
He returns to the pair of you, "Well, I had best be off, we all have a lot to do and not much time to do it in," he gives you each a slight bow, then turns on his heels and heads from the nearest wagon. He calls out over his shoulder, "Don't get killed! I would hate to have to avenge you as I doubt there would be much profit in it!"
He hops up next to the driver of the nearest team and gives the order to roll out, racing off into the distance, back to the capital and your operations there.
"I am going to miss him a little I think," Thaïs quietly breaks the silence.
"Yeah," you are forced to agree, "But it will only be for a month or two, if that..."
She nods, sharing your hope but also the uncertainty you feel in your very bones.
"Ready to go?" Berty calls from the front of the carriage, "I would like to link up with our people before some sort of horrible, sanity devouring beast locates us!"
That sounds like a fairly good idea to the both of you and as one you give the order to move.
---------------------------------------------
For once, you receive wholly good news. It is enough to bring a smile to your lips in fact.
The bulk of your relief force is exactly where you left it and it is in one piece. Honestly by now you half expected it to have been torn apart by embedded cultists, or infernal legions, or some other vague and menacing threat. Maybe your just getting paran-, ah,
more paranoid, but your people are fine, they are getting along about as well as can be expected and the only enemy they have had to fight lately is boredom.
You place your hands on your hips and smile at plan gone well.
Lyssa even goes so far as to declare, "Maybe everything is going to go smoothly after all."
Some little part of you wants to choke her for saying that...
"Soldiers on the road!" one of your grenadiers shouts from the edge of camp, "A whole bunch of them moving this way and quick!"
You snap your spyglass into place and scan the road. Sure enough six chariots, one of them you recognize as one of your scouts, are moving as fast as they can down the stretch of packed earth that serves as a road in this part of the Kingdom. It does not look like the other five chariots are trying to attack yours and as they begin to close you can make out the banner of the Royal Army hanging loosely from two of them, "Looks like they are on our side," you mutter.
"But I doubt the things chasing them are," Thaïs remarks with apprehension.
Flowing behind the chariots are a swarm of what look to be dogs, with a few key differences. Each is larger than a man and shifts in and out of your vision as it races along, snapping at the fleeing dwarves' heels.
"Tell the men to ready our defences," you mutter as Berty pulls up next to you, "I don't think we can outrun these things without losing the elephants."
You have trouble focusing on any particular hound long enough to catch more than the barest of details but you can catch the green and red trails they leave behind as they zip back and forth doing their best to tear the chariots apart. So far the expert driving of the dwarves is enough to keep them ahead of their pursuers but then, finally, fatally, one of the drives makes a mistake. On the hard packed dirt of the road your scout misreads the terrain, too concerned with the hound that has just torn his partner from the back of the chariot. He strikes a hole, likely the result of one of the many battles that have wracked the south for months, and careens off the path. He is thrown clear but the hounds have him before he can stand. They drive him back toward the wreckage of his chariot and keep him there, circling slowly. It is only then that you can make out their details, set upon short necks and broad shoulders each of these creatures has a bunt muzzle, wider than it is long and curled into an odd mockery of a man's smile. They seem to grin as they growl and every now and then one will turn to its fellows and let out a short, barking laugh.
The remaining hounds break off their pursuit of the chariots within thirty metres of your line and instead settle for eyeing your group. The largest of the animals, striped red and white, sits down at the back of the pack, throws its head back and you expect it to howl.
Instead it laughs. It laughs and its fellows laugh with it.
The chariots pass through your line and come to a grinding halt at the rear of your formation.
"Who is in charge here!" one of the formerly fleeing dwarves shouts, "I need to know-"
The dwarf's demands and the creatures' laughing are both interrupted by the sound of horns, hunting horns. Once more you look out over the hard packed earth and the dunes beyond. In the distance you can make out shapes approaching, five of them, shifting in and out of reality as they creep up over the horizon.
You have a handful of minutes at the most before they reach their hounds and your trapped charioteer. Not long after that they will be able to reach your own lines.
So much for things going smoothly.
Part 1: General Choices:
1. You choose to:
A) Negotiate - If these things are demons, which seems likely, then you think you might know who summoned them. You are still wearing Mazzarin's necklaces and you might be able to convince them that you are on the same side. Hopefully they will pass over your group but they might make demands as well. Alternatively they may not be capable of making such a distinction in the first place in which case you will be exposing yourself to even more danger.
B) Fight - Just as the name implies you will try to push back against this presumed enemy.
i. Focus on defence. Your wagon will proved some cover and your forces are well rested as a result of not having to do much for the last few days. Your could order your men to push the wagons together and use the chariots as a makeshift barricade. The small trench your men cut to help protect the camp should also help at least a little. You have the advantage of numbers and you might just be able to beat back any attack that comes or even route the enemy and wipe them out in pursuit. Of course if they group is just the vanguard of a larger host you might wind up fighting a much larger enemy if you stay too long.
ii. Attempt to retreat. You will have your people load into their wagons and attempt a fighting retreat from the back of your wagons. Hopefully the hounds will not be able to harm you if you can maintain a withering stream of fire directed at them. You do not know how fast their 'masters' are but you assume that since they have the dogs do the running for them that they will not be able to catch you if you run. You will have to leave the lone charioteer they have captured but realistically he is dead anyway.
iii. Focus on offense. You have a whole company of battle mages with you along with a number of grenadiers and elephants. If these demons think you are scared of them then they are sorely mistaken. You will advance on them with the intention of breaking their forces and killing as many as you can. You will also attempt to rescue your captured charioteer should the opportunity present itself.
C) PRAY! - If these are Mazzarin's creatures then you may be able to resolve the situation by reaching out to the Great Mage. Of course he is not terribly fond of you and there is no guarantee that you can even call him through his necklaces successfully but you are out of ideas.
D)
Operation: Two Ways
E)
freeform - something more complicated perhaps, it may well get better results... or cause you more problems...
2. Scheduling I: Awake - Should you survive you will of course continue south correct? If you do, you will need to choose how you want to spend your time. You are free to divide your attention between as many tasks as you would like. You are also, of course, free to suggest new tasks to pursue. (Any activity that is able to gain more than half the votes will be pursued, the more you try to do the harder it will be to progress at anything):
A) Studying with your commanders to improve your ability to lead soldiers on campaign.
B) Studying your magical texts all together improve your spells. You have a few mutually exclusive options here, they are:
i. Study by yourself.
ii. Study with Thaïs.
iii. Study with Lyssa.
iv. Study with Thaïs and Lyssa.
C) Work on your combat skills with Biliku.
D) Work on your aim with Uttu.
E) Enchant more items to improve the combat effectiveness of your soldiers (feel free to specify what you want to cast if you would like).
F)
freeform - In case I forgot something.
3. Scheduling II: Asleep - Similar to question two. You could spend your time sleeping actually sleeping which would be beneficial for your state of mind but it would also waste a perfectly good chance to improve yourself further so you have a few options. (Once more, any option that gets more than half the votes will be selected. If you simply want to sleep then write Sleep as your vote and I will count it as a vote against everything else):
A) Study musical magic - You will spend your time at Morpheus' secret theatre training as much as you can.
B) Work with Caoilainn to teach her Calm Casting and hopefully mellow her out a bit.
C) Analyse your dreams/nightmares for weaknesses that might be exploited. You will need a partner for this and Thaïs would be the best choice.
D) Split your time equally between sleeping nd learning musical magic.
E)
freeform
4. Training the Seekers - Do you want to teach the Seekers your enchantments? To teach a few will likely take a day, to teach them all will likely take two and once they know them they could take over enchanting your equipment, saving you time in the mornings. However do you really want to share your magical knowledge with outsiders? It will also use time in the short term that you could spend on something else. (If you choose to train them then be sure to specify which of your mages will do it, if you assign multiple people to the task it will likely go quicker at the expense of tying up more people).
A) No - you will keep your spells to yourself.
B) Yes - you will share your knowledge and let the Seekers take over enchanting duties.
i. Train a few (probably one day, maybe two)
ii. Train them all (probably two days, maybe one if it goes well)
C)
freeform
Part II: Musical Magic
A) Instrument selection: What, if any, instruments did your mages choose?
Note: Honestly you can list just about any instrument you want here, I will just leave it as a general freeform choice. Keep in mind that the instruments you are most likely to find in the real world will be ones appropriate to a vaguely medieval setting in the case of the Empire or an early modern one in the case of the Kingdom. It will be far easier to find period appropriate instruments than it will be to find electric guitars and in all likelihood if you want to have something demonic/modern you are going to have to steal it from the Dreaming or have it constructed in the physical realm. Additionally if you do not want one or more of the mages to play an instrument then they will simply focus on vocals. Both Derryth and Thaïs already have some experience when it comes to singing traditional/mortal music and they will retain that no matter what is chosen.
B) Choice of genre: Metal is the genre the ladies have seen Morpheus perform but there are many different types of demons and most of them practice different types of music.
Note: Once more I will leave this as a fully freeform choice since I could list dozen of options and still only capture a fraction of the world's music. If you want the ladies to pursue metal than Morpheus will teach them directly. If you would rather they pursue a different genre of music that can also work, everything is on the table from bluegrass, to punk, to swing, to psychedelic and everything in between. Alternatively if you want a more serious take on musical magic to appear in the story then you could choose to have the ladies forego learning an anachronistic/demonic style in favour of pursuing a more traditional style. Between their existing knowledge and Sparassidae's vast repertoire of mortal/traditional music the ladies could master a body of work that would be more subtle and harder to detect for those untrained in musical magic. The choice is completely yours and you can always branch out later but this will provide the foundation for your group to build off of.
Haven't been pissing on many archmages recently?
