Soul Bound

1          Soul Bound

1.2        Taking Control

1.2.4      An Artful Carnivale

1.2.4.27   The embers of books

Inside, surrounding a colonnaded courtyard, were layer upon layer of niches, each crammed full of the charred remains of bookshelves. On the ground floor they could see where a great bonfire of scrolls had been made, from the crushed remains of decorative scroll tubes, however the desecrators must have gotten bored, because they’d settled for dousing the upper shelves in oil then lighting them. Some spell, perhaps the shadow aura, kept age and weather from harming the scrolls, but it hadn’t protected them from the flames, nor replaced the words now lost forever. Charred fragments danced in the occasional eddy of wind.

Kafana turned from the sight feeling tears in her eyes just in time to see the joyful expression on Bulgaria’s face freeze and crack. The sense of loss pouring out of him was unbearable. This was a man whose passion was preserving and passing on knowledge, who had a deep love of ancient history, who lived for ideas. She didn’t have words to reach him, but she couldn’t do nothing. She drew out her violin.

It didn’t need an amplification spell. The bare stone walls were better than any orchestra or accompaniment. This demanded solo playing, a single spirit, loneliness and loss. She played Maria Grigoryeva’s interpretation of An Irish Lament, pouring her heart into it, expressing for Bulgaria the feelings that he was too reserved to, abandoning all sense of self, submerging herself in the music and the moment. *weep* she silently urged him, let the first tear fall and the dam will crumble. You need this.

His eye blinked, his cheek glistened, then a drop, just a single drop, fell to the stone.

To her Truesight it was like the opposite of a grenade: an implosion. Vast amounts of mana were sucked towards the point of impact and from the centre of where the great bonfire had been, a transparent figure coalesced. It was human in size, but all skin had been burnt off, leaving the remains grey and charred. Still, she could make out the shape of the eyes and nose - a noble profile and a thoughtful one, though that wasn’t the impression it gave at the moment, it spoke in a rattling exhale of breath that blew through her like she was the insubstantial one.

Ulpian: “Who summons Ulpian, last guardian of the Library of Rac?”

Bulgaria: {Kafana, that’s a spectre - an undead that drains your constitution stat. Don’t touch it!}

[Forced Quest: Survive the Spectre! Difficulty rank C.]

Chill blue flames whipped around the figure and a wave of piercing chill froze all moisture from the air, leaving patterns of frost upon the ancient stones that sparkled in the dying light of day. Sweat froze upon their skin and the breath from their mouths was quite visible.

Kafana: “Loyal Ulpian, I am guardian of Rac, and I cannot bear to see this house of knowledge remain desecrated thus. Will you permit me to sing a last song of mourning?”

For once she wasn’t annoyed by the aura from her divine blessing, the Imprimatur of the Deities, that indicated their approval of her actions. It blazed forth, not with light, but with Rac’s shadow, adding to the effect from the temple until it seemed as though night had fallen. Ulpian grew more solid, and his voice grew stronger.

Ulpian: “Guardian, Necromancer, Last Singer and Twice-Born Bard. None could be more fitting to sing it, and this is a tale that deserves remembrance. Listen then, to my words.”

“In ages past, Torellans were free to choose whether to worship at the Pool of Mor, the Grove of Dro, the Ring of Krev, the Sanctum of Cov, the Beacon of Zer, the Tower of Lun or the Library of Rac. People were wary of necromancers, but only worship of Bel was outlawed.”

“We were careful who we allowed to enter, not wanting a maledic necromancer to sully our reputation further. But scholars from across Covob would journey to our collections of maps and tales from travellers who had survived inside the area now claimed by Seth’s forces, the better to learn how to oppose them.”

“After Thalimus was lost and the Etruscan Kingdom was cut off by the Alpinus intrusion, the secular authorities waned in power, and into the gap spread Covian fanatics from Mezelay, looking for someone to blame. Their ‘great revival’ was more than a hundred years of bitter religious warfare and persecution, that only ended after it caused the ceremony renewing the seals upon Seth’s sleep to fail, leading to, well, that’s not relevant now.”

The lecturing tone of the Spectre reminded her of Bulgaria so strongly it brought a lump to her throat. Surely there had to be a better solution than banishing this being? She carried on listening while thinking.

“Eventually they came for us. A new priest in town wanted to gain a reputation in Cov’s hierarchy and he roused a crowd, making up incidents or blaming us for things we had no hand in. I tried telling them the truth, but it fell on deaf ears - I never was very good at politics. For two days I held them back, pouring into our barrier all the crystals that had been saved by myself and my predecessors, while my subordinates smuggled every scroll they could carry out along a secret passage behind the altar, leading under the canal. They saved maybe one scroll for every twenty they had to leave behind, but it was enough to fill a cart.”

“On the third day I could stay awake no longer. The barrier ran down and the mob captured me. But killing me wasn’t enough, oh no. The priest wanted a spectacle. He wanted me to recant, to renounce Rac and say that Rac worshippers were in league with Bel. When I refused, they constructed a pyre of scrolls, bound me with chains, and burned me alive. I remember that the scroll next to my head was a love poem, an Ode to the Bright Wanderer, by an ancient Hellenic poetess. It was the only copy still existing, and it seemed ironic that after surviving so much it got destroyed to fuel such a petty ego.”

“The last laugh was on him. If he had read more, he would have known that higher level necromancers do not need bells and candles, or even their hands, to cast their magic. And I was very high level indeed. I could have given up morality or independence of action in order to retain my power and body, but instead I chose to give up my body in order to retain my allegiance to Rac, becoming a spectre bound to this location by a duty to prevent further desecration. Neither priest nor rabble left the mound intact.”

“The bitter thing is, despite the sacrifice, despite the eternal burning cold I feel, I have not succeeded. Only at night and the first or last hour of day is the light weak enough for me to manifest. By day souls full of petty evil creep in to leave money and requests upon my defiled altar, and by night come assassins with bright lights that drive me back, to pick those packets up and steal back down the secret passage. It was all for naught. These days I generally kill every being who enters that I can, be they bird or Covadan. If they do not show respect, why should I?”

“Now sing, little nightingale, and if your song does not do justice to the memory, the same shall befall you all.”