Plasmatoris's smile is fragile but genuine at that statement. The manic Jerbiton always seems to skip sleeping when big issues come up. He does not however interrupt the maga's turn to speak.
"The Cathars," he says after a thoughtful pause, "are viewing this situation differently than us magi. I view this as a different life, others view this as a rebirth and opportunity, and - I should study more on the philosophiae of it-" he stops and shakes his head. "Distracted again. No, I think we need to speak with them as allies more than as masters. As magi, we are used to being placed on a mystic throne. Those who remember the arrangement with Al Kufra - Liberte - remember the bargain, the sanctuary, with other magi, with those who are not us. They cannot know we will have the same loyalty we have shown in the past."
"Our Cathar covenfolk have what appears to be two problems for us; One, a matter of their social standing in this covenant, another is the matter of their spiritual health. We have postponed one for our safety, and we have asked them to give the other to us on faith. In order to reconcile, we we should learn what their spiritual needs truly entail. We have evidence that we share the spirit and the magic of our other selves - evidenced through the continued bond of our familiars - but not the knowledge. It sounds like their Perfecti require both spiritual purity and knowledge to guide. We can possibly cover half of that, and need to figure out the other half."
"So aside from the philosophy, I take from this is that we should treat them respect, understanding, and curiosity as Plasmatoris emphasized, and not try to force it by magic or otherwise. Perhaps remind them that we all still have our place at and duties towards the covenant, as Argentius said, and seek to compromise. But, I take it, we are not willing to postpone vis harvesting entirely. We would prefer to retrieve a perfectus a bit later with Aetherius' magic, but if it is absolutely impossible, we might consider doing it by foot, as Zarkut implied. Are we all agreed on this approach? If so, it is about time to meet the Cathar leadership. Who wishes to accompany me?"
Unless someone objects, Lares sponts Aura of Ennobled Presence on himself (level 5 at personal, total 23, so 1 fatigue) and goes to meet the Cathars with whoever else comes.
Lares nods in return, and waits for the magi accompanying him to gather round.
"It has come to our attention that due to the rejuvenation of the perfecti, the Cathars have not been been gathering vis, contrary to usual procedure. As you know, the vis is not only very valuable, but also instrumental to keeping the covenant running in this hostile environment. We are therefore loath to waste any, and would like to search for ways of addressing this situation that would respond to your concerns without unduly weakening the covenant."
Lares stops to wait for a reaction either from the Cathars or from the other magi.
Plasmatoris at first is silent, thoughtful. Though he did not speak up, the Jerbiton does rise to his feet and go with Lares to speak with the Cathars - casting a formulaic Aura of Ennobled Presence as he does, in mimicry of Lares admittedly good idea. As he trails along behind the other magus, he restlessly fiddles with his paintbrush, thoughts wandering. He's spoken with the Cathar, the Berbers, and the Arabs on numerous occaisions, but he can't think of any times he's actually cast this spell first. He'll have to remember that.
In his distraction, he is almost surprised when hears Lares and the Cathar representative speaking, and steps as quietly as he can through the door behind them, having fallen further behind in his distraction. He watches them speak for now with wide, attentive eyes, but does not offer any comments from himself yet.
"There are a lot of issues involved, right now we are considering killing those who had become prefects before the rejuvenation before they have a chance to sin, some have even chosen to let themselves be slain. I think by comparison you can understand why the collection of vis is of much lower priority. But you are right that this is an obligation we have taken on, though when we agreed to do this for you we believe we were promised much more than what has been delivered in terms of our status within the covenant. We can understand bringing in the Berbers, since we will not fight, but the existence of the Muslim faction is something we still see as a betrayal of our agreement."
(OOC: @silveroak Lares would probably by now know what services the Cathars perform for the covenant aside from the vis gathering - what are those? Apologies if this has already been stated and I have simply forgotten.
Another thing: Does Lares know what the contents of the agreement they mentioned are? He has been meeting their leadership, so this might have come up before.)
aside from the vis gathering they fill a number of menial roles- some gardening, cleaning- they pretty well fill out the servants roles and most of the craftspersons that are not being taken care of by automatons.
Zarkut is nervous about this meeting and imitates the others in spontaneously casting an Aura of Ennobled Presence. He remains in the background, allowing the others who have spoken in more depth with the Cathars to lead the conversation, though as one who might be travelling, he wants to be present.
At the mention of the Muslims, he gets a pang of guilt - he's been studying Arabic to read his own notes, was it he who brought them in, and disturbed the status quo?
Lares seems taken aback. He pauses for a moment to think and gather his wits before replying.
“… kill them? But how can you be sure that slaying your own – or ordering such slayings – would not be sinful in itself? This strange rejuvenating effect seems to have reverted any spiritual and magical statuses, in addition to corporeal renewal. Our longevity rituals are no longer in effect. What if this is also true of the spiritual status of the perfecti? Would you not be committing the most heinous of sin by slaying ordinary Cathars?”
He pauses, stroking his beard.
“Your numbers are dwindling, and you have lost much knowledge of spiritual matters. Wouldn’t it be wiser to wait while we procure and consult an elder from Europe? We might also take action to guard the innocence of the former perfecti, if you would consider this necessary.”
Lares cocks his head to the side, studying the Cathars.
“As for your earthly status in the covenant,”
he gestures with his hand,
“we are doing our best to meet your needs and keep you safe from the Pope. What more would you ask? State your needs and the covenant will take them into advisement. I must say, however, that although I understand that you do not care for the Moors, their skills are indispensable to the covenant. This is especially true at the present time, when most of us have lost skills. Could the Cathars perform the same specialist service? Do they know the surrounding areas, and their peoples? We all depend on each other for survival here.”
"Of course killing them is a sin, but when th killers go through the ritual of perfection those sins will be shed, but each may only undergo the ritual once. Whatever this effect is we have only one soul, and nobody has an answer as to what it means with regards to the ritual Yes it would be better to have a perfecti here to answer our questions, but if we cannot do the ritual again and are being led anew into temptations due to our newfound youth, well we do not have the luxury of waiting for a perfecti. Some would rather risk dying now and hoping the ritual they do not remember still holds than risking being drawn into temptation and not being able to repeat it."
"So it is a matter of the temptations of youth. I think I can remove those. Would that suffice? No lust, no sin, hmm? How many people are we talking about here?"
"Lust is not the only sin, nor even the greatest sin. We are stuck in the world of the demiurge and to survive collectively sin is frequently inevitable. It is only the rituals of the perfecti which offer us a chance at salvation to escape the cycles of rebirth."
"Wait, what. So sin is inevitable. The rituals of the perfecti absolve previous sins. After those rituals they do not sin - because they are old? - although sin is inevitable and all sorts of things are sinful. But now that they are rejuvenated they are likely to sin because they are young? Why is it now likelier that they will sin, if it's not just lust that you are worried about?"
Plasmatoris idly rubs at his forehead with the back of his hand. "Hm. I have not spent the long time necessary to understand the philsophies your beliefs espouse, my friends and allies." The artistic man steps forwards, and to the side a bit, alongside Lares. "Our concerns are numerous, and hopefully concerns we can all alleviate. First, you are members of our covenant. We want you to thrive and succeed, along with other members of our covenant. Because of the current situation, I believe nobody can truly explain how we all came to the strange alliances we now hold - but these are the alliances we have, so I will hold confidence that we can make them work. No members of our covenant will be cast out without cause, because such a breach of trust will decay these necessary alliances."
Plasmatoris pauses, and stares off into the distance a moment. "I got off track again, didn't I?" he says. He sighs, and shakes his head. "We must find some way to assuage your spiritual worries without making the rest of Liberte vulnerable."
"The thing is that those among us who rejuvenated were not so old as the magi, and we have younger members who did not rejuvenate. In fact we do remember. We remember the promises you made to us back in France as we fled the inquisition. We remember the Berber compromise, the betrayal when you enlisted Arabs instead of providing education which you clearly have in plenty. Some of those who betrayed our trust have left the covenant before this event, and you may not follow in becoming the people you were before, but the only one of you who ever showed real interest in our beliefs was Silas, though Lares did learn enough to help build our relationships."
"I recognize that the covenant is burdened by past grievances, and that this rejuvenation has brought memory of them to the fore. We need to focus on resolving them, however. What is it that you request in this moment, concretely? Is it education? Is it the expulsion of the Arabs? I cannot promise we will grant requests without question or compromise, but I can promise that we will consider them. The person I am now has not yet inflicted any grievances upon you, as far as I can tell, and I hope to keep it that way. But you must tell me what you want, and then we must compromise."
"Do you know of any perfecti near here? I suspect we cannot get one from Europe soon enough to prevent these murders you are contemplating no matter what we do."