The Perils of Power
5nd of October 2006 A.D.
Though your dreams are filled with shadows none of them take shape and if you wake a little out of breath, well that can be put down to the fact that you have to admit to your parents that you just ate a soul... spirit, whichever. Something tells you mom and dad's reactions are not going to be dictated by that distinction, no matter how fine Usum decides to split the thread.
Thankfully you do not have to jump right into the lion's den, not with the roar of one of the cubs so near your ear. "Mom! Mom this stupid hairdrier is busted again!"
Leech has been growing out her hair over the last few months, eliciting a brief bout of teasing from Matthew about the supposed desire to attract boys which had been fixed by a few kicks to the shin and constant complaints about the hairdrier which sadly is not amenable to being fixed with judicious application of violence.
"Hold on. I'm coming to help!" you shout back, quickly ducking into her room.
It's only once you had 'fixed' the hairdrier by turning it on properly and had almost finished helping her dry off that your sister asks: "So what are you buttering her up for?"
"What makes you think I'm...?"
"You hate it when I wash my hair in the morning, there's no way you'd be encouraging me if you didn't have some other devious purpose in mind. Do you need to visit the Sunken City R'yleth for a shopping trip or something?"
The question shocks a laugh out of you... and an answer. "It's not something I want to do, it's something I did."
"Well, what was it? Tell!" she commands, with all the imperiousness she could muster. The fluffy Sponge Bob socks do not make for a very impressive stomp
Struggling to keep a smile sure to be poorly received off your face you shake your head. "It'd be dangerous for you to know, I'm not even telling mom half of it."
"But you are telling her the other half right?" she insists. "Come on I told you about falsifying school records. Your secret isn't illegal... it's not illegal is it?" Your sister sounds more excited that worried. Maybe giving her a demon assistant was not the best idea.
As though reading your mind Leech raises her voice in the direction of her phone. "Wraith what's my sister going to tell mom?"
"I am not authorized to provide that information," comes the pleasant but implacable reply.
"Boo," Leech makes a face at the phone and the spirit within then to your surprise she turns around for a quick hug. "Whatever it is I'm sure it'll be fine." With that she splits out of the room, taking the stairs two at a time to breakfast.
Heartened by the vote of confidence you wait until everyone else is out of the house before meeting with mom and dad in the living room. "This is starting to become a habit isn't it?"
Mom briefly struggles with a frown at your tone, but still in a good mood overall from the fact that you had managed to get back home from Southworks without a mark on you. the fact that Harry had gotten hurt might have lead her to believe that he and dad had been taking most of the risks a fact which dad himself had not seen fit to contradict. After all risk was in the eye of the beholder...
As you think back to how relieved she had been you almost hold the secret back. Would she get anymore than Leech out of knowing really? And for what? She so can know just kind of weird powers you have? When it that going to help? You shake the thought off. Mom deserves to know and from you not someone else. Harry isn't going to say anything but the next person who notices might not be so well disposed
"This is about the hotel?" Dad breaks the awkward silence. "Something that vampire said?"
"I... can't talk about that part with mom here." You raise a hand to ward off the angry response. "Please, trust me, it's not safe for... practically anyone given who its a secret from, dad only qualifies because of the Sword."
The two of them exchange a familiar look, the sort all children know and dislike in equal measure parents conspiring. Just this once you are fine with it. Mom will be more at ease knowing that if it is something she has to know dad will tell her anyway "What about the other part?" she asks.
"The mastermind behind all of this, the akuma I dueled that was worse in some ways that the Denarians, they just let something in that given some time, long or short can wrench the wheel away. The vampires of the Jade Court are not so lucky, they are made from those already damned to Yomi Wan, a kind of hell and a kind of test. if you pass the test you can beak out, break back into the world of the living with your corpse as the key, but no matter that this is a test that confers powers upon the one who passes it it is also breaking the rules. Each soul escaped from the Thousand Hells can give itself back to its dark lords for power, for knowledge, for skill and lordship, it matters little in the end. What does matter is that these unfortunates condemned once by divine diktat, twice by their own folly are far more in the hands of their masters than any human could ever sell themselves. The demon does not take the wheel, it makes of them a ship, the Ship of Theseus, cutting, molding, adding as they please."
Mom is watching you like a hawk, so much so that you wonder guiltily if she can somehow see where this is going. No, you realize as you listen to the words that are flowing now through your lips as though of their own accord, it's just that this does not sound quite like you, at least not the you that is Molly Carpenter. Much like when you had written the Big Book, knowledge, insight bubbles up beyond words, only lightly constrained by the grammar and syntax of English.
"The one I killed at the end... my crown called him the Will of Kakrui and it does not lie, that was all that was left, save perhaps some kernel of the man he had been, enough to feel degradation, to know without knowing what it had once been so I... destroyed it."
Seeing the confusion on dad's face you sigh. "I don't mean I killed it, I mean I destroyed it,
nothing will return to Kakuri-Wan to be send once more on the errands of the Daimyo of the Dark, the spirit that was once a soul is gone. I tore it to shreds of essence. That is not something I can do with any mortal soul, thank God, only deathless spirits."
Before either of your parents can answer a thought so preposterous comes to mind you almost let out a nervous laugh.
Could I do that to one of the Fallen? Yet in that place within deeper than Usum's resting place whence metaphysical certainties come you do not hear a 'no'.
"This power it... came from the same place didn't it?" Mom asks, carefully. The horror you had been half afraid to see in her eyes is not there, just the struggle to understand, to make the pieces fit. Alas you do not think she will have much luck. "Maybe it has power, authority over these things?"
That doesn't seem right, you think, you're sure that you could unravel spirits that are not of Yomi Wan that are not dark at all but bright, but if it helps your mom sleep at night what harm is there in nodding? No, again you close your eyes. I can get through this. "It's broader than that."
Your parents are quiet a long moment, then dad speaks up: "Alright." Not 'be careful' not 'promise not to use it for this or that', just 'alright', an ocean of trust in one word. He always does like to think the best of people, you think. Your smile is more than a little shaky, but it is a smile nonetheless.
Mom reaches out across the table to take your hand. "You shouldn't use it, I don;t know much about spirits and demons, but this much..." she gives a long rattling breath and for one terrifying moment it looks like she might start to cry, you have no idea how to react to mom crying. "Those that can't die fear death more than any mortal man or woman can. If they know you can give it to them they will come after you."
What do you reply?
[] Promise to exercise caution in the use of Murder is Meat
[] Do not make the promise, it is a power like any other, if something is dangerous enough, evil enough it should be destroyed, not for a season, not for a year, not for a century but forevermore
[] Write in
OOC: This was going to move on to the next action, but then I got into Molly's head as she described this and into her parents and it felt like disfavor to all three of them to rush though it.