Interlude DCCXXIV: Common Ground
Common Ground
Thirteenth Day of the Twelfth Month 293 AC
Yin, Golden Empire of Yi Ti
Valaena read the coded note a second time carefully. Her first reaction had been disappointment that she had not been named among those taking the fight to the Golden Company's spies and their Oni allies. Dawnfyre could use a challenge he could sink his claws into, for that matter so could she. Her second reaction had been a hollow sort of lurch in her stomach. How the Hells do we explain all this? A Demon, a Devil, and an Asura. It took the young mage a moment to even recall what an Asura was. A living blasphemy against all gods that took pleasure in casting down their servants and defiling their altars. Well at least she would get along nicely with Glyra, even if the Fey were not usually so active in their dislike of gods. She swallowed an inappropriate laugh tickling the back of her throat.
"Any ideas how we are going to sell this?" Diana asked the room at large, her gaze moving from face to face... to the Herald's fearsome steel visage. It did not usually offer much in the way of creative thought, but its vast store of knowledge and peculiarly detached perspective had aided in negotiations before.
"Enemy of my enemy?" Theon half-asked. "The Bitch Queen isn't the worst thing out there, but there's certainly cause to gather unlikely allies against her..."
"I don't see why we can't be honest about it," Asha said in a studiously serious tone that was practically a guarantee she was japing. "Our King just likes to collect weird shit."
Though she snorted in amusement at the jest, Valaena shook her head at Theon's suggestion. "We do not want the Emerald Magistrates and Shugenja worrying if they are going to be betrayed in some way subtle or overt in the middle of battle, and we certainly do not want to give the impression that the King makes alliances of convenience with Fiends lightly. Given their thoughts on blood magic I do not think we should add one more reason to be suspicious."
The image of a young woman throwing rice and bone ash in her face to ward off supposed possessing spirits was still too fresh in her mind, not least because she had to spend the rest of the day convincing their escort of imperial guards not to execute the poor woman for 'causing such loss of face to the honored envoy'. The superstition was certainly common enough, but the Inquisitors had agreed that the whole charade had been staged with her 'attacker' being nothing more than the final unwitting pawn. Striking the right balance between mercy and avoiding the appearance of weakness had been hard, and it might well have been impossible if it had not been delivered through the Herald's booming steel voice.
"The world is greedy..." Diana mused, her expression momentarily very like her 'mother'. "Yi Tish texts mention time and again that mortality infects spirits, be they infernal or sublime. That is why the God-On-Earth was on earth and not in the heavens with his divine parents. So we expand on this right, say the King has found a way to harness this property with relic and ritual, to make deathless spirits part of this world while also securing their fealty. It's perfectly true after all, just a little neater than the full truth. After all, I do not think the King is planning to send any of these Fiends back to their respective realms."
"Why would that make any difference when we're still using Fiends to fight our wars?" Asha asked doubtfully.
"Cultural context, they are more likely to trust something from their own holy lore than foreign and probably bloody magics," Diana explained. "Entertaining as it is to present too many new and interesting concepts to these lands we are guests here and it behooves us to speak the local language more than just literally."
"I hope the translation doesn't get tangled, then," Theon said, miming a toast with his wine goblet.
OOC: A small spinet from Yi Ti in light of what you guys decided to send there as well as some background on what has been going on there these last two weeks.
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