Laetitia regards Korvin coldly. "I would never suggest turning you out of your home for so spurious a reason, my friend," she declares.
"You answered your own question. The ritual requires the sacrifice of a member of the group to be cursed," she replies coldly.
[color=blue]"Divide and conquer," Fiona says as she glances at Alexei. [color=blue]"Isn't that what this is called? It may be dangerous for Laetitia to stay here. I feel it would be more dangerous were she to leave...for her and for us. I feel that her place is here. We stand together, we fall together, and I would oppose any move to expel her from the covenant."
((I thought we didn't have any vassals anymore – that Jacques was now a member and that Atsingani had disbanded, its remaining members going their own ways.))
[color=blue]"So, to destroy the magi of Mons Electi, it would need a magus of Mons Electi...not one of the mortal servants? Forgive me, I'm not that familiar with how far-reaching death curses work."
She then looks down at Laetitia, standing next to her in the antechamber, and at the others in Apollodorus's sanctum. [color=blue]"May I suggest that we move our meeting to the council chamber? And, Renault, would you care to join us?"
At Fiona's request to remain in council he seems pained, but understanding, and stops from returning to his quarters.
"Very well. I forgot to mention, Apollodorus' lab is in a room above this chamber, but it is inaccessible without magic, or without traveling to his pied-à-terre in Autun. He had modified the spell Hermes Portal in such away that he could create the portals individually, and if necessary singly. Several untranslated lab texts exist up there. Some lab texts he had translated and given to me, including new Aegis of the Hearth rituals of differing strengths."
You are misinterpreting my meaning Laetitia. It is my understand that House Guernicus is very close knit House. If you were to leave it why would most of the members want to talk to you? Even your friends withing the House may think twice about someone who left. They would be more guarded. I say it would be dangerous for you Laetitia to stay within your house to act as an agent for us. It is your call I'm just bring up possibilities.
As to the vassalage question. My purpose was just to understand a ritual that I have never seen and have barely heard about. If Laetitia were to stay within House Guernicus it would be dangerous for both her and us. If they could use that ritual on her it would destroy us. But thanks to the laws of this Tribunal we have an answer which does not involve throwing Laetitia out into the cold. She forms her own Covenant. Take the Atsingani tropaeum as a seisin to start and we shall build a council chamber for you. I sure we could write a vassalage agreement that would allow you to live and work here as long as you would like. You would just have to follow the rules of having a meeting once a year. Florum does this with Spider's Place to the north. So for all purposes you would work and live here but you would be a member of your own Covenant. This could be short term or longer. It could exist now but we would not have to declare your Covenant a vassal until the next Tribunal that is held here in seven years.
But it is all up to you. Most of the danger would be on your head.
"They don't need me to place a Curse of Thoth on Mons Electi; it could be done using ANY ONE OF US. I don't hear you proposing to dissolve the covenant entirely out of paranoia! The risk is no greater that the covenant be cursed by my murder than that the covenant be cursed through the murder of any one of us. But thank you, I find it quite charming that in calmly discussing my hypothetical murder, you're only worried about how my death might affect you." Laetitia stands up, angry tears welling up in her eyes. "Perhaps Father is right to see the rest of the Order as irascible self-serving juveniles who can't be trusted," she shouts, and storms out of the council chamber.
[color=blue]"If you don't feel up to it, I will understand." Regardless of whether he stays for the meeting or retires to his quarters, she will check on him later.
Fiona watches Laetitia leave, jaw agape, then turns to Jebrick. [color=blue]"What did I say, not five minutes ago?" she shouts, her eyes narrowed. She points at Korvin with her talisman. [color=blue]"We will talk of this later!" she says, then follows Laetitia.
She's not going to run after her, but her long legs should close the gap before too long, and she will be there when Laetitia comes to a stop...wherever.
[color=blue]"Laetitia?" she says softly as she stands next to her. [color=blue]"I'm sorry that you went through that. But know that not everyone feels as he does. Ifrinn, he may not feel that way. But that's for him to say, and for him to make right. I will say this: I meant what I said back there. We must all stand together. We cannot let our fears cloud our judgment, as it seems to have his. I hope and pray that what you say, that what we've learned is wrong, that it's a misunderstanding somehow. That our world is the same today as it was yesterday. But it's not, is it? Everything we know, everything we've ever been taught, everything we believe has been turned upside down. And some of us are not handling it as well as we would like."
Fiona looks down for a minute. [color=blue]"I hope that this isn't a sign of things to come, that we're not going to spend what little time we may have left at each other's throats."
Laetitia knows that she is the most vulnerable of all the members of Mons Electi, though. Intra-House matters can be handled extremely discreetly, and almost no one in the Order would ever know or raise a fuss. She suspects that the plan was to declare her orbus, hold her for a year, conduct a Tribunal with her in absentia after having been declared Orbus for a year. And then once the House was complete, the Inner Council would have ritually murdered her. Human sacrifice! The very thing that House Diedne was accused of doing, but never proven, is the very thing that the House entrusted with keeping order within the Order of Hermes did, and it is almost certainly a fact. Why else would Apollodorus, or Xenophon have been murdered? Why does the House have a ritual like the Curse of Thoth? Why has the House continually destroyed evidence after matters have been adjudicated, but keep such a heinous ritual around?
...The only thing making her particularly vulnerable is why she will leave the house. Just as soon as she can swallow her pride.
Since they seem incapable of understanding what I'm proposing I must drop it.
"Master Korvin, put yourself into her place. Consider how you would feel if you felt responsible for the murder of a magus, were likely to be murdered, discovered your House was built on a foundation of lies, and then someone asked you to just walk away from what you believed." He takes a deep breath and continues with a general scathing of magi. "You magi never really consider deeper motives, just spend years in your labs trying to develop new ways of tossing magic about. I've been around magi longer than you have, Korvin, and I've come to believe that what you describe as Gently Gifted is really Strongly Gifted, as these magi do not tend to put up walls between themselves and their fellow man. Most magi cocoon themselves, spending decades pursuing their own interests, peccadilloes, or even mortal sins, if you believe in such destroying their contacts with humanity."
Alexei was uncharacteristically quiet as different theories as well as new information was tossed about. When Laetitia suddenly left with tears in her eyes, he wasn't even quite certain what was the reason for it. He hustled out after her as well but saw Fiona had it in hand. He'd try to reconcile with her later. He turned to Jacques and Isen.
"Brothers. The Flambeau and the Milites will be the force that ultimately ends this corruption, but we need to act quickly and decisively. We will back Lucius for Primus. Once we are organized on this front we can turn to the treachery we have been victims of. I would prefer decisive action sooner, but our sodales are right, without proof we would simply be renounced. That may still happen any way, but for now we should do our part to mobilize the Flambeau and the Milites. Are we agreed?"
The petite Welsh woman sighs heavily. "You're right, of course. I'm acting irrationally, same as he was. It's just-- I'm so alone. I feel like it's just me and Glau against the world. Moebius is with us, but-- he's old, he can't fight this battle, and shouldn't have to. And the rest here..." She frowns. "I just don't know where I stand here anymore."
Fiona rolls her eyes. [color=blue]"You'd think, as big as I am, that my voice would carry a little better," she mutters in Scots.
[color=blue]"I will tell you out here, just as I said in there, that you are not alone. We are all in this together. We have to be. If Guernicus is going to destroy us, they're not going to care that one of us has gone their own way...they would see that as a ploy.
"As far as where you stand? You stand the same place you've stood for months. At our side. If anyone feels different, they'll have to deal with me as well."
Fiona sighs as well. [color=blue]"Right now, we need unity more than anything else. We need to protect each other, and I think we'll most certainly need to protect you and the baby. Besides...Viviane will need someone to play with, and that won't happen if anything happens to ye, now, will it?" Fiona says with a smile.
[color=blue]"But...um...yeah...where was I? Oh yeah. I think we're all acting a little irrationally. Under the circumstances, that's to be expected. But we need to pull together soon and start working out how we're going to make it through this in one piece. Not just us, but the whole Order. If this gets out..." Fiona shakes her head. [color=blue]"I don't see how the Order can not be completely changed if they find out what Guernicus has been up to for so long."
Laetitia squeezes the big woman's hand tightly, with a wan smile. "I know you're with me, mea amica," she replies. "But you're the exception, and certainly not the rule. I... suppose that, even though I have so much BIGGER things to worry about, I can't help but worry that... well, I'm in love with someone, within the House. And-- I expect that's over now." She sighs softly.
Viscaria has been brooding silently through all of this, taking in all that has been said, fuel for the forge of thought inside her. Now she hisses out a breath, like a molten blade dipped in water.
"I will go mad if we continue trying to make plans against an enemy of unknown size and capacity. Let us be practical. Let us aim ourselves at destroying Valerian.
"It seems to me that this can be accomplished quite easily. He was seen here. He could not enter Apollodorus's sanctum. Clearly, this must be because the sanctum was warded against his kind. And since the notion of a ward against a particular house is clearly ludicrous, then the ward must have been against something else.
"So, what do you think of this plan: we write to the Quaesitors and inform them that my familiar saw Valerian as he was repelled by a demon ward and that we therefore suspect him to have been possessed by Infernal power when he slew Apollodorus. If they refuse to investigate such a matter in a manner pleasing to us, then we should declare the entire house suspect of Infernal taint, and revoke their invitation to the Tribunal. We would have no choice but to inform everyone of this choice and why we have done so -- the ward is in fact, still intact, and anyone who cannot cross it must therefore be a demon - we would be glad to invite people to take the test for themselves.
"That ruse should be sufficient to, at the very least, get us Valerian's head on a platter in due course.
"As to the rest, I say we are in no position to make rash decisions about how to sway the greater houses. Rather than continue to make such suggestions, we should talk to Andru and Murion, and accept their guidance. They have played this game far longer than we have."
She pauses then to hear the advice of these new allies of hers, feeling the weight of this conflict already begin to crush her. This journey away from Iberia had meant to be an escape, a respite from the war she'd been fighting all these years, a chance to finally seek out the Truth. But it seems clear to her now that the Coins were not just in Iberia, that the Infernal corruption had spread throughout the Order.
"Idle speculation of learned minds is so fascinating.". Reynault says dryly. Changing his tone to a more serious nature "Viscaria, Laetitia cannot pass the line. If, as you say, a ward protecting from an entire House is ludicrous and the players have a commonality of demonic possession, then it follows that you think Laetitia is demonically possessed."
Reynault pauses for a coughing fit, "However House Guernicus has been demonstrated to have a spell that targets a group if one of the members is ritually murdered in the ritual. If that exists, is it so hard to believe rituals for protecting against a group exist?"
Isen stayed silent all the while, due to both the grim prospects and what he perceives as incomprehensible and irrationnal personnal drama.
So, when Alexei speaks, he is quite glad of it.
Supporting Lucius is of the upmost importance, I agree.
I'm of 2 minds regarding the milites. On the one hand, I think we should warn them, and have them ready to defend both themselves and the order. On the other, this may tip up the enemy, and some milites may, sadly, refuse to believe us.
...
Overall, we probably need to take the risk, if only because, if he is to be elected, lucius will need all the help he can get. But we must avoid at all costs anything ressembling a preemptive mobilisation. At least fot now.
Alexei also seems troubled. "Please take no offense Isen, your counsel is wise, but not warning the Milies seems like lying, like betraying our Oath we took to them. While it might give our enemies information about us, how shall we face our Brethren later when the truth, as always, becomes known? We are men of honour, oaths can be sworn to keep us secret and use discretion. We also value strategy and know that if we lull the vipers into complacency our counter strike will be more effective. I'm one of the worst hot heads in the Miles and even I see the wisdom in this."
He pauses and lays a hand on Isen's shoulder. "Let us be truthful with the Miles, as we swore to be. Cowards lie, but brave men have nothing to fear from the truth. And seeing the truth I know the Miles will swear to be discreet so that we can strike when necessary."
Fiona raises a brow. [color=blue]"Does he love you, Laetitia? Or is this simply an unrequited love? And does he know about...?" She gestures vaguely to Laetitia's belly.
[color=blue]"If he truly loves you, and you him...don't you owe it to each other to at least try to find out where you stand, instead of letting it die because of a maybe?"
Laetitia smirks. "He's 'loved' me before, but no, I do not believe he has any true feelings for me. It was just politics for him, I think, though... it threw me quite a surprise. You've also enjoyed Jormungand, yes? He does that pretty much professionally, and Aristarchus could teach him a thing or two, plus he's got him beat on stamina. And in any case, I can never trust him now. Even if his sympathies do not lie with them, they will try to use him to get to me. He is Proctor's filius, and Proctor is Valerian's puppet."