The Opposite of Empathy.
Posted: Wed Sep 01, 2021 12:38 am
84th Searing, 121 Steel
Hall of Reconciliation
Hall of Reconciliation
"...and per my instructions before entering the Warrens, he turned a low-grade discharge upon me to shock me out of the wraith's influence and then we were able to destroy it. All in all, a suc—"
"A risk, Mr. Angevin."
"Yes, Vigilant," he replied with as much crisp respect as he would offer an admiral.
"Perhaps a necessary risk," she allowed, considering him over steepled fingers. Her shock of platinum hair was severely cut, though her eyes cut more severely still. "But now he has turned his curse against his Watcher once; you might have set him down a slippery slope."
"Perhaps, but I believe that—"
"Yes, I've read your report," Richter replied. "What I'm trying to understand is whether you chose not to ward the both of you before going down into the Warrens as some scheme to see whether he would react per your expectations, or if you simply miscalculated the danger an empowered Lysanrin in the thrall of a rage demon might enact upon the populace before he could be put down."
"I was confident that I could prevent him from reaching the surface before I could bring him back to himself. In any case, I was never taught to ward against—"
"Bore someone else with your inadequacies, Mr. Angevin," she said with a dismissive wave of her hand.
"Yes, Vigilant. I intend to go to a training salle as soon as we adjourn our meeting to work on adapting wards against Mesmer to ward against the influence of wraiths. My specialization was geared toward what would be most useful to the Corps and society parties—"
"Ah, that reminds me. Fverard House has now been legally acquired by the Order, and there has been some discussion of selling it to you at a reasonable price to give you more freedom within your social sphere."
Angevin blinked. It had occurred to him to move out of his father's home, even though he spent more time in the barracks or his berth, but nothing had pushed him beyond considering it until his superior dug right into his personal business.
"I would consider an offer," he allowed.
"We shall see."
"Indeed, Vigilant." When she didn't immediately lay into him, he continued, "But it seems as though our relative power is matched. Our skill, however, is not. He is letting himself do more now that he has the State's approval under my supervision. But even over the course of our short partnership, both of us seem to be growing by leaps and bounds." This troubled him somewhat.
"Partnership?" she asked archly.
"Clearly, he is the junior member of the partnership, but I am not a torturer nor am I equipped to break him. And I don't think he would be as effective a tool of the State if we were to break him. But as I was saying... there is the issue of him growing more powerful, but also of me growing more powerful. I agreed to take on this burden a decade ago and sought to be skilled more than powerful. I will ride out the experiment in perpetuity if that is the will of the Order, but I have questions."
"Ask."
"First, am I just fattening him up for the slaughter?"
"Are you growing attached to him?"
"Enough to work well in tandem; not enough to subvert my loyalty to the Order and the High City."
"No," she said after a moment. "There are those who opine that this experiment is folly, but the consensus is that you are best equipped to form a partnership with Albrecht that will keep him in line while also allowing both of you to grow more powerful in service to the State."
"Second, is Dreyfus Monteliyet attached to this experiment?"
"No, why?"
"His creature approached Albrecht claiming to be from the Order." His lips twisted slightly, not sure whether the thing was considered an actual member or just Monteliyet's pet. "Through my aura glass, it was a confusing mess, but I didn't engage when they showed up at the Michaelis début."
"Likely his mentor is just being a meddling idiot, per usual." She scoffed. "I will look into it. If Monteliyet or his creature threaten the experiment, address it."
"Yes, Vigilant."
"Third..."
"Third," she prompted.
He sighed. "If the decision is made that my curse has become too great to control, I would respectfully petition that Commander Brenner Dornkirk be the one to euthanize me."
His superior tsked. "Giving up so easily, Mr. Angevin?"
"No, Vigilant, but if I cease to become a useful tool of the State... If instead, I become a threat to the State, I know my duty."
"And it is my duty to ensure that you always remain useful to the State, Mr. Angevin. We shall have you evaluated when you return from your holiday in Ash. Of course, you will be as open with them as you are with me—at least with regard to your mental state."
"Yes, Vigilant."
"Any further questions for me?"
"No, ma'am."
She was already pulling a sheaf of papers in front of her to review, her hand once again waving him away. Angevin stood, saluted, turned on his heel, and left her office. Her two assistants eyed him on his way out, one hard-eyed, the other with some compassion. He bid them a good day and headed to another part of the Hall of Servitors where he could peruse the library of all things magical.
These effects range from the subtle power of suggestion to, on the extreme end, fully-fledged mind control. The saving grace is that Mesmer’s power lies not in overt displays of overbearing force of control but in subtle manipulation. A person who is unaware they are being manipulated is far more receptive and vulnerable to a Mesmer’s gifts than someone fully cognizant of the fact that the wizard is attempting to magically influence them.
He ran the back of his fingers along his jawline, then crossreferenced what he found with another manual—he would not call it a grimoire as it was a scientific study of working with the Rune of Negation. There were mathematics referenced, and a great deal of talk about resonance. He knew a brilliant but socially inept Orator in the College of Minders who would expound upon it for him for hours, but he was still trying to persuade her to join the expedition without asking too many questions. Plying his spycraft against those who had taught it to him was challenging, but considering from whom the order came from, secrecy was paramount, even with regard to Vigilant Meike Richter and people of her rank and station.
He would seek out said Orator after he ensured that he could protect himself and the rest of those who would be on the expedition from the influence of Warrens wraiths; rage was only one flavor of their corruptive force.
Then he read about necromancy because nobody was sure exactly what the wraiths were which made it more complicated to ward against them. He didn't know a necromancer among his brethren here, though he imagined there must be someone knowledgeable on the subject. He might petition for help if he could not figure out a solution to the problem himself.
In an empty salle, its walls warded against any and all sort of magical backlash, he built a little soap bubble of a ward. The sphere was an easy shape for him; it supported itself well, and made sense in his mind. First, he tasked it against the influence of Mesmer. It had been some time since he had tried this one, though a Mesmer could do serious damage in the circles he swam in: intelligentsia; military; Order; society. It was a subtle and nefarious practice.
From there, he layered on a new task against spirits. He hadn't encountered any himself, so he was focusing on the idea of not-life. The aetheric remains of a person or some other living thing might be blocked out. It was layer upon layer, his work, the soap bubble becoming more of an onion in his mind's eye. He couldn't see his own work exactly, but he could sense it in a way that tickled at his natural senses as his mind sought to make sense of what it learned through the rune. He supposed there must be Minders who focused on the philosophy of all this. So much of tasking a ward had to do with imposing his idea of reality over the aether, holding it against anything that sought to alter that reality.
It was certainly a rabbit hole one could fall into, and his mind shuddered away from it.
Finally, he did what he was most loathe to do: he recalled the visceral feeling of the rage wraith's influence inside him. Holding that in his mind, he tasked an onionskin layer of warding against that. It made him want to vomit, but he tried it again and again, until he was certain he could do it again at a moment's notice. He wouldn't let his friends and followers be subject to that taint as he had been.
He would not empathize with the rage of some twisted wraith. He would remain apathetic to its hungers. He would remain as pure as he could with a rune burned into his soul.