text / un: starkov

[peasant]

the good news first: rhys and i found the princess of kilnan in the castle and woke her. she's with us right now. the castle was designed to protect her against her mother's soldiers trying to force her back home, which is why it's been so tricky. it's meant to alert remi — her uncle, and the wizard we came looking for — to any unwanted guests, which would be us.

the reason he hasn't come to greet us is that he's asleep. aureliah — the princess — should be able to talk her uncle down before he throws us all out into the mud. he's trapped behind an entrance sam's group found, but aureliah should be able to unseal its magic.

i think more of us should be there when it's opened, just in case something goes wrong with the orb.

the bad news: the orb's name is phyllie. remi made a deal with her and fed his own arcane energy to her in exchange for curing a curse that was placed on aureliah and her mother, but something went wrong during remi's bargain and that energy was transferred from the orb to aureliah instead. that's the reason she has her uncle's magic, and why her mother is so eager to use her daughter as a weapon against kilnan's neighboring countries.

the queen thinks kilnan will be better protected if she can force her daughter to learn war magic. it sounds like remi has been searching through dimensions to find the "right world" (for him and aureliah to hide? we don't know what he meant) but the orb has been draining him of his energy.

from what aureliah said, he feeds "phyllie" monthly. the princess and i think that's the price he's chosen to pay for keeping the curse at bay.

the worst news: i don't know what will happen if we break the bargain remi has made, but i'm sure it can't possibly be anything good. aureliah's life force was given to her by the orb, and the wizard who cast the curse in the first place was killed in the war. so that's a dead end, but maybe someone has a better solution we can offer remi once he's awake.

[ as per this npc thread! feel free to threadjack and hop around threads here to your hearts' content. ♥ ]

Comments

Text. un: Sabriel.Abhorsen

[bindsthedead]

How long has he been sleeping? We might need to wake him up soon, in order to avoid the Orb trying to feed on the mages among us- it's tried to feed on one of our number already.

As for the curse... We have several magic-users among our number, we COULD try to lift it ourselves. Especially if Remi explains how it works.

[peasant]

he wouldn't let aureliah fall under a sleeping sickness if he was awake, so — weeks? i'm not sure. when we found aureliah's footsteps, they looked old. it's not unusual for remi to sleep for days, apparently, but this doesn't sound like his usual pattern.

have you worked with curses before? all i know about this one is that it was meant to kill aureliah in childbirth to prevent the queen from having an heir.

[bindsthedead]

So if we don't wake him up soon, the orb will be past its feeding time, and will either try to find something else to feed on... or possibly terminate its bargain with Remi, which might kill Aureliah in the process.

They're not my area of expertise, but I don't think we have much of a choice.

[peasant]

oh. i hadn't considered that.

[ two new fears to add to the collection. ]

ti'shaaz collective had books on curses, but i don't know how to work with any of them. i used to think they were just stories. but maybe if remi tells us how the curse came to be, we can figure it out.

unless we get lucky and we have a secret curse expert among our number?

[bindsthedead]

Perhaps. It would certainly be fortunate.

Although I just want to be clear- right now, the theory that the wizard's been feeding the Orb to keep Aureliah alive is just that- a theory?

Do you know if he's been using the orb for anything else- I had assumed the sleeping curse was its doing, which suggests a bargain that extends beyond simply keeping the curse from killing Aureliah. Is it possible that he actually was able to cure it completely, and then chose to keep drawing on the orb's power to augment his own- or out of curiosity, to try to understand the orb?

[peasant]

it's half a theory. the only other use i think he could have for it is finding a new world for himself and his niece to escape to. if his ongoing bargain is about protecting aureliah, all we need to do is find somewhere they'll be safe.

[bindsthedead]

We could direct them to Gyeonje? I have a dagger I bought in that world, perhaps we could use that to help him learn how to reach it?

Between the two other worlds we've visited, I'd say it's by far the safer one.

[peasant]

it's worth a try. if someone has something from their homeworld, do you think that might work too?

i forgot to mention — i don't know for certain what else he's used the orb for other than curing aureliah, but she did mention that "phyllie" keeps "going a little overboard with the things she does" and misunderstanding his orders.

[bindsthedead]

Perhaps the bargain was less to save Aureliah, and more for it to help him? Saving her would fall under that, and it would also explain the regular payments of energy- not paying a debt in installments, but paying a salary.

[peasant]

maybe. she did mention that he went scouting through worlds to find a solution to her curse, though.

whatever deal he's made with it, i don't think it's a selfish one. he only seems to want to be left alone after what happened in the war.

[bindsthedead]

Could you tell me exactly what she said? Was this before or after he used the Orb? It's clear that his ability to traverse worlds is through his own study, not an orb-granted power.

I doubt it's selfish, but the orb does nothing without a price. If he's able to use it for other purposes, then those were also part of the bargain.

[peasant]

"mother was cursed. the curse was supposed to have killed me in childbirth, but uncle scoured all the worlds he could get to for a cure and found one. he made a deal. he fed his arcane energy to this jewel he found in exchange, but something went wrong. it was supposed to absorb all of it, but when curing me, it ended up transferring all that magic to me. even mother doesn't know what really happened. uncle only told me when i was old enough, to understand why i have magic when mother doesn't. and why mine is exactly like his."

she also mentioned she didn't have enough life force when she was born, and that's what remi says the orb gave her.

[ thank the saints for her mind doing most of the messaging, as she sorts through that fresh memory. ]

when i asked why she hadn't left kilnan, she only said remi keeps telling her he hasn't "found the right world yet."

[bindsthedead]

That sounds rather like what the Orb did was transfer a portion of Remi's life force into his niece, or transform his magic into life force, to make up for her own deficiency. If that's the case, then I don't think we need to worry about Remi breaking his bargain killing her. Although I'm not sure how REMI'S death would affect her, if that's the case.

He needs to either hurry up and choose one, or we can try directing him to one we know of.

[peasant]

if remi dies, then she'll be alone. there will be no one protecting her.

[bindsthedead]

I meant that if it's Remi's life-force, or magic, is what's sustaining her, it's possible that his death would kill her as well.

But hopefully we won't need to find out.

[peasant]

oh. well, that's reassuring.

[ somehow, simple text likely does the job of conveying her dread and dry sarcasm all at once. ]

you don't actually think that's going to happen if he gives the orb to us, do you?

[bindsthedead]

No. If that theory is correct, all the orb did was create a connection- one that won't be severed even if his bargain is ended. The Orb being passed to another doesn't undo previous bargains, as we saw in Gyeonje.]

[peasant]

[ — oh. that is, genuinely, a reassurance that eases some of the dread churning in her gut. ]

let's hope you're right.
it would be nice to end a mission without any bloodshed or sacrifices, for once.