westwhere | the channeling

the channeling

THE CHANNELING

Image source.

WEALTH WHISPERS

Assignment: the Merchant fears that Matthias, alleged father of the undead Brotherhood, might be the ‘merchant’ who was due to receive dark water-infused grains by sea from the Hand. Chasing information, the Merchant routes party members towards the docks-side underworld district of Tibras, in the outskirts of Ephes. The Hand keeps grain warehouses nearby.

In Tibras, short and decayed houses are like parasitic growths toppling each other, plaster peels falling into rivulets of bloodshed. Tension thrives. Petrified, natives overwhelmingly number beggars, pleasure workers, crude bounty hunters and thieves, who look to cut throats or purse strings. Occasional bodies drift by the docks.

■ Just outside of Tibras is the abode of the merchants’ syndicate — a ring of warehouses, private clubs and houses of currency. Merchants here are protected via steep fees and travel freely. Inside the syndicate house, doorways are barred by inextinguishable living fire — which you can cross unharmed, if you rearrange the runes marked N, W, S, E on a nearby wall in a cardinal-point formation. You can also pretend to be a servant, a merchant or quality inspector to get to the Hand warehouses. Ask a clue.

Alternatively, the Merchant forewarns that a notable guest will join the syndicate for three nights: Captain Maximilian Hawk of the Dawn’s Reach Trade Company, which deals in magical artefacts. Hold him at knifepoint, seduce him, do your worst for knowledge!

■ By the entrance to Tibras is the shop of Apollonius, noted collector of supernatural artefacts and information broker. Crafty and sly, he will cooperate, in exchange for a pair of ‘eyes’ from the ghost Tykhe, who haunts the nearby anonymous burial grounds. Come midnight, Tykhe’s spirit — whose sight was gouged — appears and picks out and bewitches a pair of marbles, buttons or stones to act as her ‘eyes.’ With them in hand, she searches the graveyard for her dead sister, Cassandra. You can steal the orbs, or she’ll give them freely, if you escort her from tomb to tomb to reunite with the mute ghost of Cassandra. Return to Apollonius.

■ Deeper within Tibras is a gambling nest of sailors who were cursed by a scorned sea witch to assume the appearance of sea creatures. Led by the giant octopus Crassus, they charge protection fees from commercial merchant ships and even intimidate pirates, gleaning information from sailors and recovering drowned bodies. This illustrious group adores games of chance — as long as you can cover your losses.

You can decide or RNG how many tries it takes for your character to win — submit a finished thread to get a question! The higher the stakes, the better the information.

— a scantly informed junior goldfish throws dice. Lose, and you must share a highly embarrassing secret.

— a moderately informed catfish, offering Baccarat. Lose, and he steals your good luck for 24 hours.

— a composed, well-informed whale plays roulette. Lose, and you must share one of your most precious memories.

— a highly-knowledgeable shark, Aurelius Longus, plays a mean hand of poker. Lose, and he asks blood or a pledge to save his life one day.

Image source.

THE FLOORS

Senate leader Caius Justus exits his seclusion, ending weeks of prayer to convey the message of Ephes’ divine patron, the Chained God of chaos. And he says in a public speech:

Friends, Ephesians, countrymen…

”Friends, Ephesians, countrymen, lend me your ears. I come to speak for the Chained Father, not to praise him. The victory men reap lives after them; but cowardice is often buried with their bones. So let it be with Ephes. The noble Senate tells you, the Chained Father wishes only Ephes’ destruction. If it were so, it is a grievous fault, and grievously has the Father answered for it. Here, under leave of Messalina and the Senate – for Messalina is an honourable speaker; so they are all, all honourable speakers – come I to speak of the Chained Father’s wishes. He was my maker, faithful and just to us: but Messalina says, turn away from him. And Messalina is an honourable speaker. He has brought many territories under the heel of Ephes. In his name did the Hand rise: did this in the Chained Father seem unworthy? When now you weep asking empire, the Chained Father answers: tells you to be made of sterner stuff. Yet Messalina says the Father is unworthy. And Messalina is an honourable speaker. You all did see that I withdrew to his temple, where he spoke to me: Ephes, seize your path alone — was that unworthy? Yet Messalina says to turn away from him. And sure, Messalina is an honourable speak. I speak not to disprove what Messalina spoke, but here I am to speak what I do know: you are all children of Chaos, not without cause. What cause withholds you, then, to use the Hand yourselves? O, ambition! You have fled to brutish citadels. And men have lost their courage. Bear with me: my heart is in the temple, there with the Chained God, and I must pause and beg the Senate to vote against Messalina, til it comes back to me. ”

Returning to public life, Caius Justus advises the Senate to refuse Messalina’s proposal, but defers to a vote. Citing recent civil unrest, he imposes citadel-wide 10 p.m. curfews, bans congregations of more than eight people in the streets and sends the Hand to confiscate any visible weapons and to quiet or pre-empt unrest. Hand members — forced to present in large numbers — appear erratic, prone to violent outbursts and to taking out their anger on civilians. Hand leader Narula is excessively smug.

Newscasters are careful with their words, speeches decrying Messalina abound, and senators are‘escorted’ by Hand delegations, also for their protection. Caius Justus announces he will run again for Senate leadership — to begrudged murmurs among Senators, given his previous pledge to retire.

Assignment: lure Senators toward the position that the party supports. After Caius Justus’ return:

■ 51 Senators back Caius Justus to refuse Messalina’s proposal.

■ Maximus Faustus convinces 53 Senators to accept Messalina’s proposal

■ Caelius Silvanus persuades 47 Senators to vote to postpone a decision on Messalina’s proposal for another season.

Following the party’s previous interventions, Senators are open to considering Messalina’s cause. Many are skittish, fearing their careers or lives will end with disobeying Caius Justus. Optionally, party members previously assigned a political role might receive threats from Caius Justus’ supporters.

■ Persuade, bribe, threaten or blackmail a minor Senator to switch votes. Perhaps you can offer coin or rally supporters in the marketplace for their next election, or heal their donkey or get rid of that pesky boy mooning after their daughter. Or maybe prove their corruption streak, or place a polite knife at their throats. Hold the whole Senate floor hostage, if you want, of blockade Senators from entering the Senate on voting day!

■ Ask for a RNGed Senator if you want or submit threads of swaying votes. A final tally will be taken on 19 November

Image source.

INCENSE

Priests of the Chained God whisper that the god shows signs of awakening to trigger an apocalypse. Chained and warded twelve times to prevent the end of the world, the Chained God allegedly rests in the Halls of the Sleeper, in the underground belly of his main temple in Ephes. Above ground, the temple is silent, rife with milling priests, hummed prayers and cloying hallucinogenic incense that encourages lethargy. Access is unrestricted, but monitored.

To progress downstairs, you may need to convince guards that you are one of the groups of ferociously devout pilgrim worshippers, or a priest. Below, you feel overcome by creeping, paralysing dread.

■ You are haunted by sinister, saccharine voices murmuring intrusive thoughts only you hear, diminishing your worth and paranoically asking if your companion means you harm. You are more irritable and prone to violence.

■ The halls increasingly resemble narrow subterranean corridors with limited and overheated air reserves. You reach locked stone gates, covered in loose chains and crudely carved with the inscription, the Sleeper awakes. Instructions state the Chained God demands sacrifice and proof of chaos.

■ To enter the Sleeper’s Hall, instructions say, you must commit an act of betrayal, by: drawing your companion’s blood and smearing it over the inscription (lean into the corruption!), which prevents them from entering the halls with you; or chaining them to the door with the gate shackles, condemning them to watch as you enter; or pushing your companion away, verbally eviscerating or attacking them until they flee. With player approval, your character could get a sense of what theirs is emotionally or physically vulnerable to, then exploit it. Acts of betrayal cannot be faked.

■ The Sleeper’s Hall is narrow, nearly spherical and lit by thin rivers of flowing magma that cross cracked floors. Amid swelter, you hear the periodic gulps and quakes of stone trembling around you. The supernaturally sensitive feel the presence of great, if constrained power.

■ The black water previously associated with the undead also gushes from rifts in the ground. It has a cold, sinister aura.

■ Search the room for clues — and leave urgently, before corruption consumes you.

■ Towards the middle of the room is a large, nebulously shaped creature, fully fettered and covered in magical wards, chains and blood-painted runes. Anyone in the Chained God’s presence may feel overcome by emotional or physical agony, claustrophobia and bloodlust — but the divinity only speaks with the RNG winner.

Image source.

NOTES:

■ Some players have asked about potentially ~~stabbing~~ ousting Caius Justus and Narula in a coup — everyone can plot and participate in that, and a plotting post will go up on 16 November.

■ NPC inbox, if you need anyone!

■ QUESTIONS

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

at night, she seeks

( Nynaeve stood, feet planted firmly, eyes glancing over the expanse of the burial grounds. The make of it lies as unfamiliar as so much of this world, but not the intent; the poverty something understood from exposure, but no less pleasing, to see these markers for those passed and how many lie under recently disturbed dirt.

She wonders, briefly, if anyone has clawed back up, if the dark water has found fertile grounds here. She shoves those thoughts to the side. One task at a time. They need information, and by the Light, if it means dealing with more ghosts, so be it.

She breathes in, and out, tense in her waiting, forehead just shy of furrowing in the perpetual concern and frustration she seemed to exist within. The night stretches late, and cold, and the city fails to heal, and there are better things for her to do, but not more important ones for their ends in this particular moment. That frustrates as well, and she breathes out, sharp. She's not a woman for inaction.

Thus it is in the moment that the ghost begins to coalesce, moments of mist gathering to form among the tumbled stones and faded wood and hidden cairns below, the obvious ones low and visible above, Nynaeve straightens, and steps forward. Steps careful, but with firm purpose, along the avenues of the dead, while the sightless ghost pats her hands around, searching for something, mumbling about...

Right. Eyes. Whatever galls her in the vision of those blackened, ghostly sockets is swallowed down as her lips twitch in their frown. Nynaeve digs into her pocket, holding out one round stone, the second spilling out onto the ground, disliking and accepting this absurdity from the way Apollonius had smugly spoken, the words she'd later exchanged with the people who lived near the graveyard itself. Of a ghost who searches, first for eyes, then for something else, and how most would prefer to leave her to her hauntings, contained as they are. )

Tykhe.

( Nynaeve looks to her companion, holding out her other hand, expectant. The round stone that fell from her pocket and rolled toward them glints pale against the sepulchral ground beneath them. )

Will these help?

( ooc: hit me up here for a wildcard and i'll spin us a scenario! you're also welcome to wildcard in for me with any prompt you like, nynaeve is only going to be extremely bad if you need help swaying a senator and browbeating or intimidation isn't the way to do it, whoops )

( Well, this is a major switch for Ben. After being a ghost for seventeen years, he does feel some sympathy for the one that wanders around them, but he can't deny there's a satisfaction that fills him when Nynaeve holds out the round stone. )

( His eyes widen when the other rolls away. )

You're a life saver. ( He whispers the words, then lowers himself to carefully, but quickly, grab for the other one. )

( Ben stops and smiles as he looks at Nynaeve, again. She's pretty, he muses, but is wise enough to keep that to himself. This isn't the time, or the place. And they did just meet. )

( Ducked away, he doesn't feel comfortable with the idea of the ghost managing to find him, even if they have its eyes, he speaks again, in a whisper. )

How do you want to do this? I don't know if that thing is going to be happy, or have an easier time finding us to gut us.

( She's truly tired of dealing with ghosts, but the more practical one is about them, the more likely one gets done with their nonsense sooner. It's not always true: they're worse in some places than others, but the bodied dead have been the most troublesome, and also, no one's currently drugged and chasing down snake gods.

There's a scale of what level of ridiculous she's finding before her now, and it's acceptable. )

She doesn't leave the grounds. How fast can you run?

( There, the quirked eyebrows, the dry curl to her voice. If they can outrun her, she can't gut them. Simple, right? )

Or we can start by talking with her like sensible people.

( And adapt, however that then proceeds. There's no... blade, that she can hold to this. The One Power, the True Source, that which she's unhappily accepting has some relationship to herself, that might help, but in no way does she know the wielding of it, and so she discounts it entirely. Better to rely on what she does know, and if this young man helps, isn't that enough? Sensible steps taken in an insensible world.

Nynaeve doesn't have the stones, and leaves them with him, but she does take steps toward the ephemeral shape of the dead woman, calling out: )

Tykhe. Girl, what are you looking for out here like this?

( Sensible if she'd been living, only sensible now because the ghost startles and spins, losing aspects of herself that reform when her sightless face points more or less their way. She shimmers, moonlight on wind-touched water, and solidifies a touch. She doesn't breathe, and that more than anything sits as a sad weight in Nynaeve's stomach.

Still, the ghost responds, voice like winds curling through pipes, the rustling of leaves in autumn. )

A way. To see. My sister.

( Not a broken sentence: three individual driving needs. )

( At least Ben isn't a ghost, right now, then. He imagines his brother feels much the same as Nynaeve, tired of dealing with ghosts. Ben, though, remains almost fascinated. )

I run pretty fast. ( He smiles about that. )

( But any mild mirth is replaced by his own heavy, sympathetic emotion when Tykhe answers them. )

( Ben looks down in his hands and sighs. Then he looks to Nynaeve. ) Think we can trust her? ( After being parted from his siblings, he can't deny someone who just wants to see a sister. Or someone who wants to see. It seems cruel to do otherwise. )

( Her own lips are a thinned line, studying Tykhe. Her nod is short, brief, sharp, in answer to the question the young man asks. )

For this. For anything beyond it, no.

( She gestures to him, to step forward, join her as she stands, still watching the ghost. This is not the way that people should be caught up, trapped instead of woven into the greater turning of the Wheel, and yet it's what this place knows, what it thrives on.

How hollow, how wrong. How vulnerable, when any one ghost can be stripped of their own driving recollections and used by necromancers against their own wills. That's not seduction, that's not recruitment.

That's a danger even a sightless ghost in search of her sister will face, if the dead reach greedy here. )

Well. We have a sister to find. Who may be a ghost herself, or may be... the memorial to mark her having lived.

( She brushes her hands against her sides, tugs at her braid of braids once, frustrated, unhappy, and sets her shoulders back, looking for the angle of the moonlight to begin reading grave markers, moving up the line of them in their assorted shapes toward the mausoleums that sit, hunchbacked, higher on the hillocks. She doesn't wait to see if Ben hands over the stones, if the ghost accepts them, if either follow.

In a sense, she simply believes should they have any sense of their own, they will. )

( There is something that gnaws at Ben, the weirdness of being on the other side of it, the desire to help, but also the distrust that remains. Nynaeve's words help with that. )

Got it.

( He follows Nynaeve's lead. Ben looks down at the stones in his hand. )

Hey, maybe these will help? ( He offers them out to the ghost, and he will, indeed follow. Don't they need a name, though? Or will they somehow know when they've found the sister? )

( it's easily captured, the strong retrieved and offered out back into nynaeve's hand. moiraine watches between the two, the placating of the offering seemingly accepted )

It seems it may.

( her attention turns a little more onto the ghost now, a brief hint of curiosity crossing her own expression )

But our job is far from done. We have a walk to complete, Wisdom.

( she does not stop herself from grimacing: no, there's no joy in her heart to see moiraine, just as there's a stop before the anger that would have been full in force months ago. a little stop, but a stop nonetheless. how could you leave them, she doesn't say, because there's no choice in their abduction to this world of walking dead.

how could you play so careless with their lives is not, however, something she need refrain from asking. if she thought she'd get an answer, she'd bite it out now. )

Do we. ( a ghost with stones for eyes now, and how strange, because in no way are they held to the holes in her face. the ghost simply holds them in hand, and lifts them, soft glow around the rock misleadingly gentle in the night. ) You entertain the whims of the dead now?

( not that she fails to take steps, nodding briskly to the ghost like this were normal (and here it has been, but she doesn't like it, has no need to), practically next to the ghost who murmurs her needs, my sister, my sister, i must find her. )

Her name, Tykhe?

( the long pause, as if the words had no meaning, and the sigh that follows, aching: )

Cassandra.

There's wisdom in knowing where to help.

( and this, though strange, was a simple task that she (they) could do. but it wasn't simply about helping the ghost but what may also come from helping her -- not a boon but peace? knowledge, certainly, and perhaps a kindness. perhaps it was only a kindness. not that moiraine was in the habit of revealing her motivations )

A lost sister... you should understand her wishes easily.

( A slanted look, and: )

Responsibility for those you've watched grow? Is that something you understand as well?

( She frankly doesn't think so, and if that's bias or truth speaking, Nynaeve doesn't care to think on it. To the ghost: )

We look for her. Cassandra.

( Which turns into a scan of the dark graveyard, the mausoleums that scatter across it in their states of disrepair. Setting forward, she cants her head, reading stones for grave markers and then squinting into the shadows. )

Will you look for your Warder?

( Gone for whatever time it's counted as now, but not a surprise: the leavings are not a surprise to Nynaeve, but it's one less dependable someone around, and she rather wouldn't trade Lan for Moiraine — the two are meant to be a set, lamentably, but in singles, she'd take Lan any day. And not just for reasons she's opting to ignore. )

Lan isn't here.

( he hadn't been in moiraine's initial time here, though apparently in that unknown period between her disappearance and return he had been here. had nynaeve's time crossed with that or were they both unlucky? )

It would seem that what returned me returned him also.

( and moiraine says that confidently, knowing that he wouldn't have just ridden off somewhere -- lan didn't just leave )

If you hope for that to reverse it can't be counted on.

(Xie Lian scrambles a little to catch the round stone and pick it up, and hand it to her.)

They look similar enough, I think. Most ghosts would be satisfied with that.

... And if we ask nicely, she might give them to us willingly.

I prefer asking sensibly to otherwise.

( a dry statement, but she's seen how things work here. the dead who aren't already violent respond better to... what would she say. coaxing? which isn't her strength, until the times where it is. these might be those. )

So let's try. We'll deal with her response from there.

( a grim sort of small smile, and then she walks towards the ghost, holding out both stones as an offering. a murmur harder to hear, and the ghost fumbles at her hand, pats with cold not quite touch, until her fingers curl around the stones themselves, suffusing them slowly with pale ghost light. )

[Xie Lian still keeps an eye on the ghost, just in case, Ruoye at the ready, but she seems amicable enough for now, and at least Nynaeve isn't scared of her.]

Say, friend, can we help you look for what you're searching for?

[The ghost... rumbles slightly, and then starts moving. She didn't seem angry or adversarial, so after a look to his companion, Xie Lian starts walking after her.]

Is there someone in particular you are looking for?

[He has a feeling it's not just an object that keeps this one here.]

( the ghost, lingering as she does without feet touching ground, cries and reaches out toward... nothing. )

Cassandra.

( nynaeve frowns, even as the stones are finally lifted into the ghost's hand, held up as if she peers from them directly, moving her hand in lieu of her head. )

Cassandra?

My sister.

Is she here? In this case, we can probably find her.

[It's just a case of finding the right grave, so that shouldn't be too difficult.]

Is her name on one of those stones? I am not sure how well your 'eyes' will work, friend, so we could read the names on the stones for you.

[There is, however, one small hitch for Xie Lian and he turns to his companion again.]

... Can you read their script?

( A pause, and then she: nods. )

So long as I hold this.

( She holds up her communication pendant, for that measure. )

Can you keep speaking with her, while I read the markers?

Of course.

[In act, he'll keep a stream of light chatter going as if he's never done anything else in his life. The ghost is more tight-lipped, giving mostly monosyllabic answers, but she seems to enjoy the chatting nonetheless.]

... If you're sister is here, I am sure we'll find her. This place isn't very big after all. But you are the only ghost here?

....Yes.

A bit unusual for a cemetery but I suppose it happens.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

the channeling

nynaeve al'meara | the wheel of time (amazon series)

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject