Fractal Selves
Ninth Day of the First Month 294 AC
"So how screwed are we if the damned devil took my blood?" Aradia was never one for small talk, or dancing around unpleasant truths. That the belier devil did not recall ever having the time to do so did not mean much, since before the hand of its master its own memories were no more sacrosanct than Aradia's own.
"Less than you might think in some ways," her maker looked sad and a little wary as she explained that. "Teasing aside, calling you my daughters is more accurate than
simulacrum, which I used for the basis for my work. It is a well known fact to transmuters that the body influences the expression of the soul, the transformation Viserys gets so much use out of uses that by reducing foes not only to the physical capacities of a turtle, but also their mental acuity. Temperament and personality tends to take a little while longer to wear away, but in the end even it is lost." She paused, taking a sip of her ginger tea and waiting for Aradia to do likewise.
It was good tea, but she would rather know if she was about have her soul torn from her body, or worse, be turned into a puppet again sooner rather than later.
"There are of course edge cases, mostly regarding beings of the Far Realm, discoloration and softening of the flesh, excess eyes..." she waved vaguely towards the bookshelf on her right, the one with several books bound in chains of silver and cold iron. From Naria's descriptions, Aradia knew those chains were not there to keep would be thieves from walking off with them, but rather to keep the books themselves in. She was coldly pleased that this would likely be the fate of the fiend that had possessed her.
"And that," Lya continued. "Is where the inverse applies, the soul influences the body. Your material form may be physiologically identical to mine, but the particular admixture of elemental power and the life you have lived divergent from mine makes it more like the kinship of parent to child. Someone could use your stolen blood to lay a bloodline curse on me and your sister, but by the very nature of the degrees of separation it would be weaker than what could be cast on..."
"Me," Aradia finished bluntly. "I'm fucked but the rest of us aren't, or at least not as bad."
"For the moment yes, but I did consider a contingency against something like this. I could transfer your consciousness to a different body..."
"How is that going to help?" Aradia asked. She might not the the greatest magician among her sisters, or even by the standards of most Scholarum masters, but this was hardly xeno-interpretative symbology. "Still a body like yours, still the same
me, pattern holds."
Lya took a deep breath, obviously not liking what she was about to say "By enacting a partial transfer, part of your consciousness in your old body, part in the new. It would be an unstable bond, lasting minutes at most, more likely seconds, but enough for you to sever the connection, by an act of
your own will."
"I have to
kill myself, conscious on both ends?" the incarnate asked just to be sure she got the explanation right.
A small nod and a sympathetic look met the question.
"Alright, let's get to it so I can stop worrying," Aradia replied.
For some reason that drew a look like she'd grown a second head, followed by a rueful laugh. "You know, for all I just talked about how different you and your sisters are from me, I still forget how deep it can go."
"You can't actually forget things, mother," Aradia said, doing her best to channel Kira. Judging from the eye-roll she got in return, she was at least somewhat successful.
Lost 960 IM (Body and Ritual Cost)
***
Twenty First Day of the First Month 294 AC
Not quite two weeks later, a different sort of doppelganger was walking the streets of Mereen, and if her stride was just a touch too soft, barely a ripple across the puddles gathering from the recent unseasonal rains, well there were hardly many abroad this evening to measure her steps. Meereen, like most slaver cities, had slums for those freemen clinging onto that freedom by bloody fingernails, though Teana Strycos, the woman behind the shadow, was glad at least to see they were not quite as terrible as those of Pentos, even with the city's trade taking the poor turn it had of late.
What exactly it said for the magisters of Pentos that even the 'Great Masters', a byword for decay and poor treatment of the populace as far as Volantis and beyond, Teana could not rightly say, not having curse words vile enough in any of the many tongues she knew, but it was perhaps a good sign that she might be able to have a conversation of some worth and substance with those who awaited her here
The sound of a gloved hand knocking on wood rang a little deeper than it aught... the door had been enchanted, but not so deeply as to make her suspect this was a safe-house of great use to the Sons of the Harpy. They probably could not stand the bare clay of the walls, the buzzing thatch, or the smell of rot wafting in from the river for long.
The door opened to reveal four figures, robed as she was to hide as much of themselves as they could. All wore metal masks, brass, iron, bronze, and copper forged in the image of bird skulls that allowed only their hair 'wings' to show, though even those had been painted a uniform blood red.
"So you have come, but you are not the shadow, only
a shadow," the one of the iron mask said after closing the door behind her. "Whom do you serve then, who would slay the servants of corruption so brazenly..."
"And spill the blood of Masters so readily," the one wearing the copper mask added in a slightly less courteous tone.
What does Teana reply and what does she offer the Sons of the Harpy?
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OOC: This is a lot more two interludes than one, but I figured it was best to handle the Aradia matter sooner rather than later since it would be urgent in character. Not yet edited.
