Pinchas nods. "Certainly. Oh... one more thing." He seems like he's searching for words.
"When I first came to Phoenix, I noticed that some... mmm. Some dedications, some prayers.... did not have as much effect as I would expect. When I mentioned that to Ra'am, he explained that it was something about the covenant, and was able to take care of it by giving me an object. He called it a shield... no, an aegis token. If the token he gave me is specific to Phoenix, and does not work at Mons Electi, would I be able to obtain something similar from you?"
Fiona nods. [color=blue]"I remember reading In Flux Veritas when I was younger. Perhaps I should re-read it and write a commentary, or gloss the copy we have, to contribute to our covenant's fortune.
"But yes, I would love to teach Abigail what I can of Muto."" She purses her lips thoughfully. [color=blue]"It won't be right away, though. I've already got the rest of the year laid out. I can teach her, starting next March?"
((How do you say, "No, thanks, you would totally own my ass" in Latin? ))
Fiona looks thoughtful for a moment. [color=blue]"That would raise another question. Why would you allow Tranquillina to be claimed by Tria? I'm not sure that I see the conflict that would make her stronger, unless it's the conflict between her Tytalus teachings and her Bonisagus?"
Perhaps the conflict has not made her stronger, or at least not as long as I'd hoped. This phantasm she concocted, she did during apprenticeship. I saw that it was going to give it all kinds of power over her. She blamed me, the phantasm of me, rather, for everything she believed was wrong with her, and never considered that I was the reason for the things that had gone right. The conflict is for the last 40 or more years she has blamed me for her vis allergy, when it was innate to her. And she credits Maximanius with her gifts with Corpus, when she doesn't even stop for a moment to consider that it came from me. The conflict is that she's been playing a game of her own making, but hasn't yet won, and she's only playing against herself."
The sound of a huge beast is just outside Fiona's door, at the bottom of the door a large shadow can be seen along with the sound of claws scratching at the wood. "Donner! Be still! Fiona! Are you in? I have someone I'd like you to meet!"
Yes. The second season of 1230 will work. Abagail and I must travel as Redcaps next season and I want her to get a better basis with the other Arts before she concentrates on Muto. And with that. i think we could work on your Greek. Korvin recites a poem in Greek:
Love the tamer
And scarlet Aphrodite
Play with you King
And the Nymphs with their black eyes.
To you that wander on mountains
I sacredly bow
Listen to my prayers
And come to me
Give me what I desire
(( I'm basing Pinchas' answer on the fact that Aegis of the Hearth is a Mercurian holdover. ))
Pinchas frowns. "I avoided it when it was performed at Phoenix. Ra'am and myself talked about it, but could not come to a consensus about the halakhic implications. There was nothing overtly idolatrous about it, but I judged it best to abstain on the 'building a fence around the Torah' principle. Will that be a problem?"
((Not sure he can accept a token, which confers on him all the benefits of the ritual. It's one of the things I've thought about with Ra'am. Compare it to wines. As long as the wine isn't made for pagan purposes, wine is ok for consumption. While the ritual might be Mercurian in origin, it's not pagan in practice, but it might appear to be pagan, with a procession of magi walking around the covenant... But if he can't be involved in the ritual, accepting a token is probably right out, too.))
[color=blue]"The daemons that torment us most/are those our very souls do host." Fiona purses her lips thoughtfully.
[color=blue]"So every gift she has, be it blessing or curse, is in her mind someone else's doing. Her vis allergy, a part of her magical nature? And her talent for Corpus...is that from you, or is that also a part of her magical nature? Or both, in that it is part of her nature that you preserved when you opened her Arts? And since she's fighting herself, she will never win.. So...the only solution is to stop playing the game?"
Fiona pauses in her lecture on Muto that she's delivering Sheelagh, trying to figure out what that clamor is. Then she hears Alexei at the laboratory door, and grows even more confused. She looks at Sheelagh, then sighs. [color=blue]"We will take a brief break. Be ready in a quarter hour, please."
She then opens the laboratory door. [color=blue]"Alexei! What a pleas...what is that?"
Paul, who had been napping on one of the laboratory tables, opens one eye and then instinctively turns and arches his back when he sees Donner, but very quickly regains his composure and sits down to wash his paw.
((fwiw, this came up in Canaries with Rabbi Jonathan, and I think his interpretation was that although he could not participate in the ritual, he could benefit from the protection of the Aegis since the spell wasn't actually being cast on him.))
Cumhachd shakes her head slightly, "Not quite, but I'm sure she ascribes the worst of herself to me, and doesn't accept that I could have given her anything. Her skill from Corpus came from me, it manifested at the same time as her vis allergy. She blames me for the allergy, but she won't acknowledge that I am responsible for her gifts with Corpus. She wasn't placed with Maximanius because she needed to be better with Corpus, she was placed with him because she was good with Corpus. She has the entire narative of her apprentice ship wrong. And yes, she needs to stop playing the games. She's playing at the wrong thing, at best."
[color=blue]"Hmm...but how can she stop playing a game she doesn't know she's playing? You apparently need someone to hold the mirror before her...and she won't let you get within a league of her with a mirror. Or if she does, she'll assume that it's a painting."
Are you volunteering? Cumhachd chuckles, There is another way. Shock and awe. Expose the lie that she's made the narrative of her life. Tria didn't steal her from me, Fiona. It was a convenient fiction for the two of us. It set the precedent that allowed her to claim apprentices and pair them with better masters, something never done by a Trianomae before."
[color=blue]"So...what do you propose?" Fiona is carefully weighing everything that Cumhachd is telling her, judging it against what she knows of the two magae.
:Do what you can. I'm not proposing anything, I'm intending to force her to confront her past. She may not wish to do so, she might try and resist. She will need someone to support her."
[color=blue]"I understand," Fiona says. [color=blue]"Confronting the past is never easy. But I care about her, and I don't want to see her hurt unnecessarily. And I'll do my best to be there for her if she wants me to."
She moves as if to rise. [color=blue]"Unless there's anything else, I'd best be on my way. I have to find a place for your gracious presents before the cold gets to them."
The massive brown dog sits back when the door opens and he cocks his head curiously as he sees Fiona. After a moment of observation he huffs twice and then leans forward to sniff at the hem of her dress and snuffle about before bringing his head up to lick Fiona's hand.
Alexei seems a bit surprised at the reaction, he half expected (and perhaps mischieviously hoped) that the beast would enthusiastically tackle her as Donner had been doing to him. "This...is Donner." Alexei said as he patted the dog hard on his shoulder. "I intend to make him my familiar. I spent some time searching and finally went back through the regio I had gone in with that insufferable Bonisagus several years ago. I found a giant's homestead and their bitch had a litter of pups. This was the runt. He's taken a shine to you it seems." he says as Donner seems intent on trying to move his way into the cottage, but not trying overt force. "He definitely is magic, he actually grew when we exited the regio, I'll have to figure out what else he can do. The giant family had a young lass that doted on him." he said as he pats him again on the shoulder. "He might not have lived if not her, maybe that's what he sees in you."
))