Jonnie ⚜ Merritt (angryjonnie) wrote in thegalaxy, @ 2016-06-20 10:54:00 |
|
|||
Entry tags: | !locale: space, dee, issan ren |
what'll it be now?
Who: Issan & Dee
What: Dee turns over the Haruspex Requiem. The road to Hell is paved with good intentions.
When: shortly after this
Where: in orbit, off Naboo
Rating: PG
The weight of Delilah's pack was heavy, to say the least. The Haruspex Requiem, death mask of countless priests of N'Rygoth before her, rested uneasily in its cloth case. Dee had wrapped it with purple fabric that reminded her of home; she had drawn white markings on its surface to match those she had long stopped wearing. The mask was hers more than any other's. It had shown her the secrets of her ancestors, the truth of the grave burden they bore, and yet all she felt toward it was loathing. She had begged her estranged husband to destroy it. He had not listened, and now the responsibility rested with her. Or it did, at least, until she released it to someone greater.
She had faith in Issan. A faith untested, to be sure, and recently called into question by none other than a fellow Rat Queen. That this questioning had left her shaken was an understatement. The path forward, once so clear, now seemed a pothole-strewn path choked with fog. But she had gone too far to turn back now. She drew a deep breath. Exhaled slow and steady. Then she turned to Issan, one hand wrapped around the strap of her pack.
"It's here," she said. "And you're certain this will work?"
Cloaked in her usual dark robes, Issan's pale face seemed to float ghostlike in midair between the black of space and the shadows aboard the ship. She gave a brief nod, forcing her hands to her sides instead of grabbing at the treasure Dee was keeping from her.
"I won't know for certain until I see it, and weigh it for myself." She had spoken to Dee of a spell she'd read in her book, how it would bring the mask to life once more and only once so that she might speak directly to her goddess. Such a connection would embolden their powers, grow them tenfold and gift them with abilities beyond measure that would truly give them a chance to bring the First Order to its knees. How could it go any other way? The initiation ritual had been a success, the ring had been a success -- she was so full of her own pride that she could not see any potential dangers that might lay to the sides.
She offered Dee a benevolent smile. "Have I done anything so far to make you distrust me? I only ask to see it, Dee, and from there we will know how to progress."
"It's not that I don't trust you." Dee toyed with the buckle on her pack, unfastening it with a steady but hesitant hand. "I just need to be sure you understand the gravity of this. This is…" She shook her head, searching for the right words and finding only weak approximations. "This is the culmination of my people's work. All our knowledge. All the terrible sacrifices we've made. It's everything in us, for better or worse."
The pack opened, and Dee's hand reached inside. The purple-veiled mask she withdrew from it seemed little more than a helm of dead bone. Still the priestess flinched when she touched it, a thousand memories flooding back that she knew she was better off without. She thrust the wrapped artifact out to Issan, a plea in her eyes.
Issan accepted the package with a careful hand. "I know," she replied. "I also know there's no way to put into words that I understand." She brought the mask to her chest, cradling it carefully with one arm as she used the other to pull back the the mulberry-colored cloth. She could not help the excitement that pricked at her eyes and lips, though she did her best to tamp it down somewhat. Soon and yet not soon enough the mask was naked in her grasp, staring up at her with empty sockets. Issan uncurled the rest of the cloth, bundling it up and setting it to one side with as much courtesy as she could muster, her focus ever on the item itself.
She wrapped thin, pale fingers around its edges, holding it before her. She felt nothing, which dampened her anticipation. Glancing up, she met Dee's eyes. "Tell me again how it's been used in the past. I want to be sure we haven't missed anything."
Dee nodded. "It belongs to the high priest," she said. "The high priest puts it on after their predecessor's death, and it shares with that person all the knowledge of all those who came before. It was so much, so quickly. I…" She wrapped her hand high around her left bicep, squeezing tight, as though to hug and thus console herself. "I was not meant to have it. I was not prepared. But I had to know." For all the humility in her posture, there was no regret in her voice, no remorse over what she had done. She straightened up, watching Issan as she held the mask.
"Until I die, I'm not entirely sure it will work for any other. I hope we can still use it all the same."
Issan's gaze flicked back down to the mask. "I'm certainly hoping to avoid that measure." Her thumbs drew small circles where there should have been cheeks on the mask, but it was too reptilian to be named as such. After a moment of consideration, she looked to Dee. "Put your hands on the mask, and repeat after me. Channeling together will make the spell stronger, and hopefully more effective." She paused, hoping that Dee could sum up the strength to do what was needed.
The priest-turned-Nightsister drew a deep breath. Her soft exhalation stirred a tight curl of hair from her face. She raised her hands, and laid them on the mask's naked parietal bone. Worry knit her brow: worry for Kiah, for Issan, for the future that now seemed so uncertain. But her course was set, had been set since the moment she had seen all the horror that N'Rygoth truly entailed. Her fingers curled to fit the skull's broad arc. She looked to Issan, her lips parting to speak the words of power.
Issan held Dee's gaze as she began to enunciate, speaking in an old tongue that had been written for her before she had even been born. The words flowed from her throat with a practiced ease, out into the darkness and down into the mask. The phrase was repeated, reverberating between the Nightsisters, growing in power and sinking into its target with precision. After a few moments of this, the mask began to warm beneath their touch; something seemed to come alive behind its sightless eyes, but nothing else changed. Issan's pulse quickened as her gaze fell to the mask, but she did not relent; repeated once more, twice, five times, until her throat went dry. Silence filled the space between her and Dee, but seemed to pool most around the mask. She held her breath, waiting to see if the warmth would dissipate, but it did not.
"Is this how it felt...before?" She did not look away from the mask in her hands, handling it gently as though she were either afraid of being burned or of loosing what she had created to the ether.
Dee's lips drew to a thin, pursed line. "I…" She studied its empty eye sockets. Touched the smooth bone beneath her hands. "It's similar," she said. "But not entirely the same. Perhaps you should... put it on." She raised her hands from its surface, fingers flexing as she adjusted to the cool air against her palms. She drew her lower lip between her teeth. Her throat felt rough, abraded by the words they had spoken. Fear lingered in her eyes, uncertainty lingering in its shadow. But her mind was made up, her course already set. "This... smaller touch might not be enough."
Issan gave a small nod, her grip already pulling the mask away from Dee's touch. With little hesitancy, she turned it around and brought it to her face, slowly raising it over and onto her head. Her vision went black, then narrowed as pinpricks of light were allowed in through the eye holes. For a moment, she could see Dee standing across from her, and then...
A galaxy exploded before her, and she was falling. The black dotted with stars, swirled with red and blue and yellow, streaked past her; Issan tried to use her Force abilities to slow her fall, but it was useless. Her mind could not grasp what was happening, if she had been removed from the ship or if this was merely something the mask was showing her.
Then a great hand snatched her from the air harshly, long fingers wending around her middle and bringing her before a huge, largely human face. Issan's own hands pressed against the flesh that she could not wholly see, holding herself up against the vertigo that whipped past her. The thing's eyes glowed a stark white, red nebulas streamed from its head like hair, its body a blue cloud of dwarf stars and gases. It smiled, and for the first time in a long time, Issan felt afraid.
"My inimioară," it crooned, its voice a hideous cacophony of jet engines, exploding stars and black voids. More light spilled from its mouth, escaping as the opportunity presented itself. "I welcome you; I did not think the mask would work, but I should never have doubted you. You have never failed me before."
Issan's mouth gaped, and the goddess smiled again; it was jagged, cruel, and nothing like what her follower had expected. The goddess adopted an amused sympathy, moving Issan through the air. Little around them changed for miles.
"I've been trapped here for so long, but I knew I had a way out once I heard you," it continued. "Now, together, we will rebuild everything you desire, and I will reclaim what should have always been mine."
Issan swallowed, her eyes struggling to understand the form before her. Words jumbled in her throat. Finally, she spoke.
"You're not her, are you?"
The goddess laughed, the sound raking inside Issan's skull like nails on a chalkboard. Her hands clapped over her ears but could do nothing to muffle it.
"Does it matter? Have I not led you to the path you wanted, given you everything you needed? I will give you so much more, inimioară, if you only let me in. And now you have; the door is open." Issan pressed harder against the grip the goddess held her in, a small denial.
"No," she said, shaking her head. "This...this is wrong. This isn't how it's supposed to be."
"It's too late for that, inimioară. Even if you deny me now, you won't be able to fight me forever." The goddess pulled Issan closer to her mouth, the light dabbling down her chin and spilling over her follower. "It's easier to give in now. You know prudence; you know you will lose to me, and lose everything you've worked so hard for in the process. Submit to me, inimioară. There is so much more to be gained if you only give in."
The goddess brought Issan to her lips and swallowed her and her screams whole. The light burned Issan's gaze, blinding her.
Suddenly she was back on the ship, on her knees, the mask hurled away from her as her hands seemed to scratch at her eyes. She heard screaming, but it was only a moment later that she realized it was her own voice.
"--okay, it's okay," Dee was saying, her hands wrapped tightly around Issan's wrists. She worked to pull Issan's hands from her eyes, to draw her sharp nails away from tender flesh. "I'm sorry, I'm so sorry, oh Issan…" Tears stood in the priestess's eyes. Their glistening tracks marked her cheeks. She remembered too well the pain that had come with her own hideous unveiling, the knowledge that had pressed itself into her, body and soul. She had demanded the mask be destroyed; now, more than ever, she knew it would be necessary.
Once N'Rygoth is gone, she told herself, and immediately felt a wave of guilt at the thought.
"Issan, speak to me. Say something, please. Are you all right? What did it show you?"
Yes, inimioară, tell her the good news, the goddess's voice reverberated in her head, the slithering feeling of something alien moving within her brain making Issan shrink back from Dee. She realized what she was doing after a beat, and calmed herself.
"It... I'm fine. I'm fine. I was...startled." She extricated her hands from Dee's touch, wiping tendrils of black hair away from her face as she struggled to separate herself from the parasite now entrenched firmly in her mind. Where there had once been a window that she had looked out of to gain her deity's favor was now a warped hole, and there was nothing she could do to mend it.
"I saw...her. I..." Her brow knit as she pressed fingers to the bridge of her nose. It felt like the thing in her head was trying to get comfortable, rearranging her thoughts in a haphazard manner. She grimaced, pushing back, but doing so felt like fighting a tide of sand; pieces trickled through her grip, reforming on the other side. The goddess giggled, clearly amused by this play. Issan ground her teeth.
"I'm fine," she asserted again, her voice unduly harsh. "Do you have my spellbook? I need it."
Dee nodded, her brow furrowed with lingering concern. The pack still hung at her waist; she reached inside it, pulling the heavy spellbook from within. Its heft was a comfort to her, one she found herself loathe to give up. This, though, was not hers to keep, and so she handed it over to her teacher after what felt a long hesitation.
"What now?" she asked. She reached out, but drew back her hand before it touched Issan's skin. "Are you sure you're okay?"
Issan ignored her questions, taking the heavy tome and letting it fall to the floor with an undignified smack. She hurled back its cover, flipping through the pages with the abandon of someone who knew exactly what they were looking for.
Do you really need more convincing? Since when were you so full of doubts, my inimioară?
"Shut up!" Issan spoke aloud before she realized it, attempting to divert her attention to her search. Dee started, and moved away from her. Finally, Issan found what she was looking for -- the descriptions of the Nightsisters' deities, the ones who lead the covens and bestowed their abilities upon them. Nothing here was what Issan had seen, or felt, or known. Everything was wrong.
No more so than it already is; no more so than it already was. You said yourself that you would make them new, for this age. Why does it matter where it begins?
"Because that is everything," she whispered, more so to herself as her eyes scoured the pages as though they would reveal something she had not yet seen.
"Issan?" Dee spoke softly, one hand extended, as though approaching a predator whose fangs were tightly bared. The Haruspex Requiem had taken something from Dee as well, had changed her in ways she was still slowly discovering, but it had not made her cruel. "You're starting to scare me a little. Will you talk to me. Please?"
Issan glanced up as though noticing Dee for the first time. Her mouth gaped, then set in apology. "I'm sorry, I... It was not what I expected." She clapped her spellbook closed, rising to her feet somewhat unsteadily. She reached out a hand to urge Dee to rise with her.
"You will continue your studies. I need time to...make sense of this. To see what it will mean for us." It was more of an answer than Issan was sure of, but her tone of voice, she hoped, seemed reassuring. She offered the spellbook to Dee.
The priestess took it, though her uncertainty showed in the slow motions of her hands. Using both hands to steady herself, she returned the book to her pack. Her hand smoothed over its cover as though she might coax back into it whatever damage it might have helped to cause. She nodded. "And the mask?"
"Take it. I don't care what you do with it. You said it was your people's; I have no more use for it, and no claim on it." If she were honest, she wanted it destroyed. Maybe doing so would have stopped Abeloth, but Issan knew it was too late for that potential resolution. She felt the slithering in her head again, and clenched her jaw.
"I'm...I'm going to rest. If you hear from Madelena, or if any sensors go off, wake me." She didn't wait for Dee's response, immediately turning and walking toward the quarters area of the ship. She held herself rigid, unwilling to lean on the walls as she wanted to, but as soon as she was safely ensconced in one of the sleeping areas and the doors had swished closed behind her, she all but fell into bed. She could feel hands around her wrists, an attempt to control her fingers. Issan gritted her teeth, pushing back against it all.