Fil Rouge, Part 2 [self mod]

[Amelia Lynsdaughter]

Early Immanis, 14 PF

Lightning, four flashes of it in quick succession, cast a faint, blue light upon the hooded face of the Adjurator. Once again, she started counting in her mind. One, two, three. She counted to eight, and thunder struck her ears with its great roar. The storm was getting closer, and the rain only worse as time passed. Hardly the ideal darkening to be spending outside, which was precisely why she had chosen it.

"No... um, no. It's not really here. Sorry, sis, I got a little confused. You aren't angry at me, are you?" A look of mock-guilt crossed the little girl's face as Amelia's face turned towards her, water dripping off the hood as well as her face and bangs. She had an umbrella in her room, but being more of an ornamental item with a concealed weapon, such heavy rain and wind might very well break it or just stain the cloth beyond salvation, so she had not brought it along. "Do you think I should be?" the half-elf replied, somewhat dryly. "Not calling me 'sis' was part of the deal, if I remember correctly. I am not your sister. And you said you knew the place like the back of your hands. That was three holes ago."

The little girl giggled and stuck her tongue out in embarrassment. Rain passed through her lithe form as if she did not exist. Her chest was still torn and marred, with what had been her internal organs dangling out in points, just like when she had been buried. She had been run over by a cart three brightenings earlier, dying instantly, but she hadn't even realized she was dead until Amelia told her. It had been a rainy evening, as well, and there had been no witnesses. The little girl, Mabel, had lived in a farm in the Ariumite countryside; her death had happened on the road to Nexus Prime. The cart owner had panicked, picked up the little corpse, and buried it somewhere nearby, though the rain had quickly deleted all traces of it. Mabel, distressed that her parents could not see her anymore no matter how much she yelled and waved at them, had entered Nexus seeking help. It was fortunate that she had met Amelia before any other Adjurator.

The deal had been along the lines of Amelia relaying her last message to her parents, so that Mabel could finally ascend to Aetheria, in return for the location of her body - and her abstaining from calling Amelia 'sis', of course. "Sowwy," Mabel said, "it's the first time I make a deal with one of you Adulators." "Adjurators," the girl sighed, leaning on her shovel to catch her breath. Would her own children be like that, too? It sure took a lot of patience to be a mother. Amelia smiled a little. "It's alright. We'll find the place and then I'll deliver your note. It's just a matter of doing that before I catch something nasty in this rain."

"Can't we return tomorrow? I'll teach you a lot of games, sis... I mean, Mrs. Amelia. Can you play find-the-Vyssie? It works like this, one of us is the Vyssie, and the other is the guard. The Vyssie hides and..." Amelia pulled the shovel out of the freshly moved, muddy earth. "I know that game, Mabel, but by a different name. Everyone does." The girl explained patiently, looking around for a likely spot where the killer could have buried the child. "And which did you like to play more, guard or Vyssie?" The young witch sank the shovel into the ground and looked at the ghost through her deep, crystalline blue eyes. "I don't know, I never played. The other children wouldn't let me." The smile died on Mabel's lips, which pursed in surprise. "... they wouldn't? Why?" Amelia took a few steps forwards, inspecting the rather bare patch of land. Finding the corpse here without the ghost's help would be impossible, she concluded.

"You are a full human, Mabel. You can't understand," the Adjurator replied tersely, "the world you have left is a complicated place, driven by blood. Your own and that of others. Can we get back to our search now? I'll throw more Ambrosia into the deal. Does it sound like a plan?" She resorted to a cheap bribe to move the conversation away from a touchy subject that she was still uncomfortable with, deep inside. Cheap or no, the stratagem worked. Mabel pointed her arm in a new direction. "There, sis! That bush looks familiar! We're burning hot, I can just feel it!"

Speak for yourself, Amelia thought, not without some amusement.

[Amelia Lynsdaughter]

Three holes later, and under an even stronger rainstorm, Amelia's shovel actually hit something. Within minutes, the girl dug the poor little body out of its miserable resting place. As she had predicted, the nature of the soil, the lack of a coffin and the wet weather of the last few cycles were already taking their toll upon Mabel's body. Early into her training, the Adjurator would have felt, perhaps, sick in the stomach, but none of that sensitivity remained now. Bodies and gore no longer impressed her in any particular way, though the half-elf's eyes saddened and she forgot about the incessant rain.

"I told you it was around here!" the child said, though she grew thoughtful and silent as she looked at herself, the body she had called her own. "Um, what happens now, sis? I, um... why did you want to dig it up to begin with?" Mabel watched as the witch produced a pair of sharp scissors and began to cut locks of hair off. Mabel had had spectacular blond hair, gently cascading like silk. Amelia had noticed it immediately upon meeting the girl, because she had been looking for such perfect hair. "Beautiful hair. Most noblewomen in Nexus would kill to have hair like yours. Some already wear wigs. If you were still alive, I would be pretty jealous, too. It feels so much better than mine."

She was careful about cutting the locks. She did not want to rip or damage the beautiful strands of silk. She had a small sack on her to contain the hair and protect it from the rain. "Why... why do you want my hair?" There was a note of despair in her voice, the tone of a child whose favorite toy is being stolen. "I need it. I don't expect you to understand, but I can promise I'll never use it to recall you from Aetheria, if you want." "My hair... you... you can't... I want my hair... everyone says my hair is lovely..."

Amelia froze on the spot, her grip on the shovel tightening ever so slightly. She bit on her lower lip, realizing that she had overestimated the ghost's self-control. Mabel was very recent, and a child on top of that; the Adjurator should have been more careful, and was now walking a very fine line. When her hooded head turned to face Mabel, the child's dead eyes were bloodshot and her wounds bleeding profusely. "Give my hair back." The girl's heart skipped a beat, but her training took over and she managed to analyze the situation. The first conclusion she came to was that salt would be utterly useless in this horrible weather. Amelia was practically defenseless now - but the newly made ghost did not know that.

"Why?" Amelia asked calmly. "I want it!" Mabel retorted, blood dripping down the corners of her mouth. "Do you want me to leave it here to rot? That's exactly what is going to happen." She dropped the sack into the newly dug hole. "Done. If you are happy with that, I suppose there is nothing I can do. I'll just close the hole now."

The child hesitated. Amelia looked at her through her deep, sad blue pools. Mabel lacked the cunning of more experienced ghosts, and still possessed the volatile mind of a pre-teen girl. Compared to other ghosts she had dealt with in the past, the Ariumite farmgirl was but an exercise for the reader, and hopefully no tools would be needed with her.

[Amelia Lynsdaughter]

Lightning flashed once more, casting a ghastly glow upon the half-elf's face. She lifted her booted foot and pushed on the shovel, moving a chunk of wet, muddy earth and tossing it upon the miserable corpse and the sack with the hair. Mabel watched in confusion, not knowing what to say or do. "Wait... what's going to happen now?" Amelia did not stop covering the hole. "Judging by the conditions of the burial site, the body will rot fast. It has already begun to. It is a shallow grave, as well, and as soon as the weather gets better, it is likely that wild animals will dig it up." It was a merciless analysis, carried out in front of a child and in a rather emotionless tone, but it was all true.

Was it the rain, or was Mabel crying? It was difficult to make out. "Can you... do anything about it?" The witch shrugged a little. "I can't stop nature. That which belongs to this world, returns to this world. It's one of the rules. Earth, air and water claim what is not touched by fire. I can give you a Vagaran funeral. I will burn your body on a pyre and scatter the ashes where you want them. Their bodies being buried or not properly disposed of is a rather common cause of souls not reaching the Other Side. This would probably help you." She stopped digging. The girl was panting a little from the effort.

"Burn? Oh..." Amelia leaned on the shovel, water and mud smudges on her cheeks. "Let's rework our deal a little, Mabel. I will relay your message and give you the final rites you deserve, in return for your hair. I want to make it into something... beautiful. If you had lived on, you'd have found your purpose in life. As it is now, you were denied the chance. But what you are can live on and help someone else - me - fulfil her purpose." For the first time, the instinct-driven child looked truly thoughtful. She also started floating, where she had previously walked. An evolution in her mindset as a ghost, Amelia supposed. Mabel had probably reached a higher awareness of her status and the fact that she wanted to move out of it. The Ariumite girl would never have the philosophical outlook that Melnich did, and she would never accept being a lost soul. She definitely wanted to move on.

"Do you know what is a legacy, Mabel?" Amelia pressed her further. The child shook her head a little. "It's something passed down from a person to someone else. People come and go, but what they live and die for, that doesn't change. Ideas are here to stay, so people pass down tokens of their ideas to those who take their place. They pass down their ideas and the responsibility that comes with them." The half-Vagaran smiled at the ghost, something melting in her blue eyes. "You are innocent in a way that I have long lost. I only have a shadow of that innocence left, myself, so little in fact that I defend it any way I can. That's why my hair is useless for what I want to do. I need yours. I'd like, if not innocence for myself... at least its legacy."

Amelia had realized it almost immediately. As soon as she had explained to Mabel the nature of her new state, and her first thought had been that of comforting her family with a message. Revenge upon her killer had never even touched her. This was the person she needed, someone with a clean soul to match the purity of goat's blood. Meeting her exactly when Amelia had been looking for someone like her had been a veritable sign. "I don't really understand much of that, sis," the ghost murmured, her voice almost lost in the roar of thunder, "but if you really want my hair that badly... I suppose you can keep it. But... Iwantmoreofthosecandiedalmonds!" The Adjurator nodded and smiled. She knew Mabel was not the meatball type - offering her Ambrosia in the form of candied almonds had worked wonders on her.

[Amelia Lynsdaughter]

Half a candlemark later, Mabel's hair had been collected and stored for later use. Amelia dug up the body and closed the hole once more. She abandoned the shovel nearby, feeling wet beyond imagination, but unwilling to give up till the deal was complete. "What now?" the child asked. "Follow me." The girl's answer was very economical, for every little bit of energy must count. She carried the little body over her shoulders, completely unimpressed by having a corpse on her. It would not be the first time that it happened.

They trekked, painfully slowly, through muddy wilderness and under heavy rain. Each step cost the Adjurator a great deal of effort, but she did not relent from the task. She had promised she would be strong, and as with all Vagarans, her word was her law. There had been a time in her life when the mere prospect of such suffering would have made her cringe and fall down to her knees, trembling. That time now seemed so far away... Mabel herself was surprised at seeing the young half-elf march with more determination than one could give her credit for. Things flashed before Amelia's blue eyes; faces, events... duty.

They journeyed North, into the woods that separated Nexus from Paxia, where they would find shelter from the rain. They were hard, unforgiving woods, just like the rest of the Ariumite wilderness, a place of survival of the fittest. The girl had seen these places once before, the brightening that she had become a true Adjurator, passing the deadly entrance test and gaining her special eyes, blessed or cursed with the vision of the dead and the non-living. It was here that she brought Mabel and her dead body. There, against a large evergreen tree, the hooded girl finally rested her back and let herself slip to the ground, panting heavily with exhaustion.

The child looked at her for what seemed like an eternity. Why did she want her hair so badly that she was willing to accept any sacrifice in return? What drove her so? Amelia sat against the tree, her breath growing more regular. "Are you... all right, sis?" The hood rose slowly, tired blue eyes nodding slowly. "Yes. Soon there will be daybreak, and the rain should stop. Then we can look into ways to get a pyre going. I have charcoal... but your body and everything around us are drenched wet, so fire will be a problem for a while. I didn't really have a choice, though. We'll have to come up with something."

Certainly she could not go back to the gates with a dead girl on her shoulders. Nor could she have abandonded it where she had found it; as she had mentioned, it was a small prodigy that wild animals had not gotten to it yet, but even luck had its limits. Burning a body here would pose its share of problems, though. For now, Amelia needed to rest. Her body felt sore and tired - yet she had promised.

Two candlemarks later, at daybreak, the rain had stopped falling. The girl rose up from her improvised shelter, her bones complaining every inch of the way. She was not feeling well, and she would probably develop a fever later that brightening. "You look very pale, sis," Mabel pointed out. "Thanks for letting me know, Mabel," sighed Amelia.

Now, how to set up a Vagaran-style funerary pyre here. There was a clearing in the woods, not far from there, and probably enough wood and kindling to start the fire... but with puddles the size of small lakes, good luck getting it going. Where was Skay's magic when you needed it?

[Amelia Lynsdaughter]

In the eerie quiet of the woods, a hooded figure transported a dead body to the small, roughly circular clearing. A smattering of feeble light filtered through heavy clouds, still swollen with rain. Amelia laid the corpse down carefully in the middle of the open area and looked around for... rocks. Mabel did not really understand why the Adjurator was collecting rocks and arraging them around her body to form an elongated figure of sorts. "Um, sis, what are you doing now? What are these for?" "It's a ship," the half-elf replied, "or it would be if I wasn't so bad at placing them. Since we don't have a real ship to burn your body on, what we have must suffice."

The child sighed. She could care less about the method, she just wanted a respectful end for her body; but Amelia apparently wanted to do things the Vagaran way. Within a few minutes, she had arranged the rocks in a reasonable pattern around the body. Then, she gathered what wood she could find around there and arranged that, too, under the body. Half a candlemark or so later, in that deserted part of the woods, the pyre was ready. "Good," the half-elf said, rummaging somewhere around her corset and producing a little wooden box of matches whose contents seemed relatively dry - unlike Amelia herself.

"Here we go," she said, lighting a match and moving it toward the wood. Fssssh. The flame died instantly, and the match emitted a sad spiral of grey smoke. Amelia sighed. "This is going to be a problem," she commented laconically. Mabel floated around on her back and added, "no fire, no hair." "I promised," the girl quipped back, slightly annoyed that the ghost did not value her word as much as she did. "And when I promise, my word is my law. I do not change my deals halfway through, you know - unlike some." Mabel whined, knowing all too well what she was talking about.

The Adjurator rose to her feet and took a few steps toward the edge of the clearing. She found an appropriate spot and poured a small bottle of Spirit Water onto the ground. "Yummy!" Mabel exclaimed, though the witch shook her head. "But not for you. I'm looking for help." The dead girl pouted and folded her arms in an annoyed fashion, but realized that the drink was not part of their ongoing deal, and she did not want Amelia to accuse her of cheating again. "Fine, it didn't smell that good to begin with!" And with that, she chose silence, which the soaked half-Vagaran appreciated as she stood near the puddle of liquor, waiting for a sign.

This was pretty much her only option, and if no-one showed up, she had no idea what she could do. She prayed to Materna, hoping that she would be able to return to the comfort of a home soon, and with her tasks complete. Whether Materna did something about that was debatable, but after a while a presence did appear at the edge of the clearing, hovering toward the Spirit Water. It was the ghost of a middle-aged human, and Amelia's blue eyes went wide as she saw him. He was wearing a crown and an ermine mantle, and wielded a scepter and scales - yes, weighing scales much like the symbol of justice. Not only that, but a small procession of spirits trailed after the ghost, three abreast and maybe fifteen deep.

"S-serale," Amelia greeted him tentatively, head tilted to one side in surprise. The man held his scepter out, as if bestowing his magnanimous blessings upon the blinking girl. "Serale to you, o fair maiden," the man proclaimed, "we are the Emperor Constantine."

[Amelia Lynsdaughter]

Mabel giggled insanely upon seeing the man followed by a small cohort of spirits. "Who's this old geezer, sis?" she asked in between fits of childish laughter, though Amelia seemed much more careful around the apparition. "Nice to meet you... Your Imperial Majesty?" she hesitated, her voice slightly shaky and broken by the horrible darkening she had spent outside in the rainstorm. She tried to adjust her wet, disheveled hair as best she could. The royal figure nodded graciously, standing proud like an Emperor would. Behind him, the spirits showed a few signs of restlessness, as if about to break formation, but a single, over-the-shoulder look from him was enough to keep their ranks from dispersing.

"I was scouting these woods, you see. You were lucky to come across us, for they are full of dangerous creatures. I would expect nothing less of these barbari lands. This will change when I finally annex them to the territory of the Aelyrian Empire, of course." Amelia blinked and pointed out the obvious. "Um... these lands are already part of the Empire..." The man laughed all of a sudden, almost giving the girl a heart attack in the process. "You're so funny! Do you really believe that propaganda? It's a clever ploy, I'll give it to you, claiming these lands already belong to me so I won't conquer them. So clever, in fact, that it sounds like something I would do, myself. But still a ploy, o fair maiden. As soon as I find my way out of these woods, I will conquer..."

He suddenly raised his scepter and roared: "... the world!!!" The spirits, as if taking the cue, began to bob up and down, giving a well-rehearsed show. Amelia, who was feeling too tired to even protest, merely blinked some more. At last, the man regained his composure. "So, would you like to join my army, fair maiden? Together we will march and conquer..." "... the world, the world," the girl was quick to add, fearing another round of scepter-waving and overall stupidity. "I must respectfully decline due to previous commitments," she put it nicely, "but I was wondering if you could perhaps help me?"

"Help? Help? Why would you need help?" The man seemed strangely upset by the word for some reason, looking at Amelia through wide eyes that never blinked. "I remember it as if it were yesterday! Just before my exile... I was surrounded by people who said I needed help. Then they imprisoned me somewhere cold and lonely in Prime, it was full of scoundrels and imposters. There was a woman who claimed to be Diana in there - Diana! How can such insanity exist in this world? Diana is my boss, making up that story with me was really dumb, don't you think?"

"I... I suppose it was," Amelia admitted, nodding slowly. "At long last, my supporters liberated me so I could continue to wage wars all over..." "... the world," the witch finished, almost a mechanism by now. "Well, it was an... interesting story, yes, interesting." So the guy had broken out of an asylum, died in these woods and the power of his own insanity was strong enough to attract spirits to him. "All right, what I need is not really help, but a few minutes of your army's time, Your Imperial Majesty. I will... I will become your double agent in Nexus. You need those, don't you?"

The ghost pondered over the offer and nodded vigorously. "A most excellent deal, fair maiden. Please help yourself to my humble servants. Are you married, by the way? I was thinking of getting myself a new wife to run the Empire in my stead. Would you be interested?" "Maybe next time," Amelia smiled tiredly and stepped forward, pretty much ignoring the man and focusing her attention on the spirits, which she prepared to address.

[Amelia Lynsdaughter]

'Constantine' looked a bit disappointed at the refusal, but simply floated back and allowed the girl to address his spirit platoon. Mabel crossed her arms curiously, watching in silence as the events unfolded and the wet Adjurator stepped before the assembled crowd. A raven landed upon a branch at the edge of the glade, seemingly joining in the strange reunion of living, dead and non-living. "You should all lay on the grass for a little while, if you please," she said, slipping into the spirit tongue to address the beings.

The madman's ghost nodded once, confirming that Amelia's order was kosher, and slowly the spirits floated closer and closer to the ground, until they finally touched it. She waited patiently, a serene expression lingering on her pale face. And then, she motioned for the spirits to float once more with a simple upward gesture of her hand. In the utmost silence, Amelia began walking among the spirits, examining the grass they had lain upon, one row after another. Mabel frowned, though she was starting to see the reasoning behind the act. Instead of asking the spirits what they did, which could prove a problem, the half-elf had requested a practical demonstration.

And so, a smile on her part was inevitable as she spotted the one patch of grass without any sign of morning dew, because the spirit floating above it had absorbed it all. The Adjurator had found her Dry Spirit - how fortunate for the 'Emperor' to keep one in his entourage. "I need your help there," the girl pointed at the makeshift pyre where Mabel's body lay.

The spirit hesitated, quite unwilling to break formation for Amelia's sake, but another nod from the madman convinced it to go. It slowly hovered past the rest of the brigade, headed towards the body. It did a remarkably good job of it, brushing along the skin and clothes, removing water and humidity. Wet wood became dry wood as the spirit loaded itself with the precious liquid. The half-elf smiled and nodded at both the spirit and its master. "Thank you, I believe this will be satisfactory."

"Well then, it was nice getting to know you, fair maiden. I will be sure to call upon you when the time comes to wage war on..." "... the world? Sure," the witch nodded. Constantine waved and ordered his spirits to perform an about-face, then leading them to new conquests (never mind that he had roamed the same woods for at least a couple of eras now). "What you looking at, child?" Amelia teased, visibly relieved now. She did have a light-hearted side that she craved to use, and right now she looked exactly like the teenager she was, a genuine smile dancing on her lips.

A few minutes and some matches later, the pyre was burning and devouring Mabel's body with it. The child watched with strange fascination as her physical shell turned into smoke and ashes, the flames reflecting on Amelia's blue eyes. The ghost felt a strange sensation of completion. The Adjurator took the time to dispose of the pyre afterwards, and that clause of the deal was finally taken care of.

[Amelia Lynsdaughter]

The other clause was definitely easier to accomplish - it involved relaying Mabel's final message to her family. They returned to Nexus first, because Amelia needed it badly; even the child knew that much. She did develop a fever just like she had correctly predicted, but that did not stop her, and once bathed, changed and fed something hot, she only allowed herself a few candlemarks of sleep in her room. Then, she penned the message Mabel had phrased out on a piece of parchment. It was a naive little thing, and Amelia felt her eyes mist ever so slightly as she put it on paper, and did not alter a single word.

Some time later, she was out again. She showed Mabel the hair she had taken from the body - she had not used it yet, nor would she dare do that before her end of the deal was met. Then, the two of them left Nexus once more to deliver the message. They left it by the door of a small cottage, after Amelia made sure no-one was around. The message contained enough personal information that her parents would not be able to doubt the truth in its words. The girl turned around and walked down the path leading to the main road, wondering if Mabel would follow her... which she did.

"Well then, I have kept my end of the deal," the Adjurator began. "Can I use your hair now? I assure you I need it, or I wouldn't have asked you in the first place."

There was a brief moment of silence, after which the younger girl nodded. "I guess yes, but... you never told me why you wanted it. Well, you told me all these things about 'legacy' and 'purity'... but... what you really want to do with it... that, I don't know. And, and I think it's going to be bad, or dangerous, so you won't tell me."

Amelia smiled - Mabel sure was smarter than she first appeared. She had gotten the basic idea just right, and the witch supposed she could tell her more. "This life of mine... it doesn't really belong to me anymore, Mabel. If it ever did. It may well have always been outside my grasp, but it is so obvious now. All of my life... I have never been free. And it has taken me so long to understand that freedom is something worth fighting for..."

Mabel said nothing, and Amelia continued. "The person who gave me life once put me in front of a choice. She gave me a dagger. The dagger of my sin. I could either end my own life right there and then, or I could keep on living, somehow. That was the most important choice I ever got to make, even though I only chose to live because I was too much of a coward to plunge that blade into myself. I decided to cling to life, and death came to me to show me the bill of my mistakes. Still, I lived, and that dagger was the symbol of my choice."

"Then..." she looked down at the ground, frustration in her eyes, "even that dagger, that choice was taken away from me. And that, I can't forgive anymore. Even if I must fight power with power... I hope you can understand this, Mabel. My heart wants nothing more than a family, a house and a warm hearth... but that is but a distant land with a cold ocean in between. And one I need to cross... one I will cross."

There was more silence. "I see..." the child said. "So it -is- dangerous, sis." Amelia nodded gravely. "Yes. Very. I doubt I'll survive to see my oaths fulfilled, but one still has to try." Mabel sighed. "Go to your family now... spend some time around them before you leave for Aetheria." And with that, the girl began to walk down the road away from the cottage, without turning back. The last thing she thought she heard from Mabel was a faint "Good luck, sis."

[Amelia Lynsdaughter]

They were beautiful silken gloves, bought at Nexus Fine Clothes. White as snow, worth 150 Crowns, fitting her hands to perfection. Amelia loved the feel of the cloth on her skin as she took them off and on. Silk was a great invention. It had another advantage, it was an animal product unlike cotton or linen, and she had ruled out wool. As for leather, she had considered it but it would have been too difficult to embroiden at her skill level. Moreover, she wanted perfect mobility and she did not need physical protection from these gloves. Silk would be perfect for this.

She had never worked with human hair before, so she studied the material carefully. Mabel's hair was beautiful, straight, long - everything she could have asked for. It was a little on the thin side, though, so a single hair would not make good thread. She would have to spin a few hairs together to make a usable strand out of them.

First thing first, she grabbed a kitchen knife and took blood out of a goat. It had become almost second-nature to her, and while she strived for it to be as painless as possible while leaving the animal alive, it was by far not a pleasant or tidy process. She emerged from the goat's room with bloodstains on her apron and face, and a bowl of goat's blood in her hands. She brought the blood to the Room of Conjurations in the basement, fetched a sizeable lock of hair and dipped it into the life juice. She stirred the thing with a spoon. Over the next few candlemarks, she kept stirring at regular intervals, to prevent the blood from clotting too soon.

When she was satisfied with the process, she carefully extracted the hair from the bowl and hung it to a wall, above the container, so that it could dry. Mabel's blond hair had become blood red now, a dark crimson. Red thread. It looked beautiful in a very special way, ripe with possibilities. The purity of the child was enriched by the purity of the goat whose blood had been shed.

Amelia had no access to a spinning wheel for making thread. Thankfully, she did not have to spin a large amount of it and the individuals hairs were well defined, so hand-spinning would work just fine, even though it was a bit time consuming. She had read about it in a book from the Library, and practiced the technique on regular thread before trying it on the precious material. Once the blood had fully dried on the hair, she separated the filaments in groups of three or four and spun them into single threads with her hand, by twisting them between her thumb and forefinger and then moving down slowly. The result was a single strand, thicker than an individual hair. Still crimson.

[Amelia Lynsdaughter]

Meanwhile, the girl had traced the basic design on her gloves with a very faint line of charcoal. She had pondered over the problem for many cycles now, studying the patterns Shiandi used to shield the Ablutos' manor from unwanted ghosts and spirits. She knew that there were two basic sacred figures that Adjurators used: the circle and the triangle. The circle was Materna, in Amelia's opinion, the beloved goddess of the hearth whom the witch worshipped (though she was sure Materna had not even noticed she existed). The circle was a shield from unwanted change. The triangle, on the other hand, was Ioannes of the Three Faces. He who had established the rules Adjurators exploited to their advantage. The triangle was a constant reminder of the rules.

In addition to those, there was the sacred script decorating some walls of the manor, which Amelia did not know how to decipher. It was probably beyond her current skill, and a transcription of the Spirit Tongue that the Glossalia ritual had bestowed upon her. It seemed to coil and twist if one looked at it for some time. Certainly it contained powerful chants, and was best left untouched for the time being. Circles and triangles it would be, then.

The basic idea behind Adjuration Gloves was twofold; on the one hand, a tool of protection when handling spirit-infested material such as cages or other haunted items. It would defend her hands from aggression. On the other hand, it was a tool of expression - and this was the novel idea. If shapes drawn in blood had an effect upon ghosts and spirits, it should be possible to reinforce a request or command with appropriate handsigns reproducing important blood shapes and symbols from the craft. The triangle came to mind... people made the Sign of the Triangle all the time to ward off people they perceived as evil or dark. That sign, performed with blood thread on one's fingers actually forming the shape of a triangle, would have a lot more significance in reminding a ghost or spirit about the rules. These signs could accompany a chant or invocation to strengthen it and add power to the witch's words. She would experiment with those later.

Using the charcoal and a piece of string, she traced two equal circles on each glove, one on the palm and one on the back. Inside each of the circles she drew a triangle, the ones on the palms pointing toward the arm, the ones on the backs pointing outwards, at the fingers. Perfect balance. Then she connected the two circles with two lines to provide protection on all three dimensions. The three letters L, O, and I (Lex Ordo Iustitiaque) were placed at the corners of the triangles.

So much for the protection. Now, on to the next part. She traced a line down the index finger, starting from the fingertip and stopping roughly near the point where the thumb connected with the hand. The line continued towards the thumb, though this occupied the side of this finger instead of the flat part, like the index did. It was meant to be visible when one made a triangle sign with one's thumbs and forefingers, both touching at the tips.

Next, Amelia made a tiny dot in the middle of each fingertip. This would be the center of a small circle. More lines, similarly to the index finger, ran down from the dots to the hand. These three additional lines did not continue much further than this, and instead stopped early on the palm. The endpoints themselves formed a triangle, with the line from the ring finger being the shortest. Amelia made it so that the thumb could touch the very center of this triangle. Similar lines ran down the back of each finger, though they did not form triangles there. And with that, she was satisfied.

Time to actually embroiden the design onto the gloves with her new red thread. She did so in her room, which was better lit than the Room of Conjurations and also a more secluded place. She went about it on her desk, carefully threading her needle and delicately piercing the silken cloth. It was not easy, working on a piece of real clothing - and one with such an irregular shape. Yet the pattern itself was absolutely simple, consisting of lines and nothing else, which made it considerably easier. The only challenging part was the lettering, but she had been careful to only put that on the flatter parts of the gloves, so that was not very different from her practice linens.

Carefully, and ever so slowly, Amelia stitched over the lines she had traced. She knew she could have used simple stitches for this, such as the running stitch or backstitch, possibly even whipped with a second thread, yet for the curved lines she decided to go with the stem stitch. It had a uniform, vine-like look in which the individual stitch lost itself in the ensemble, and curved beautifully. Unlike other stitches, this ran left to right for a right-hander. The basic idea was that the embroiderer inserted the needle further to the right and pulled it out just where the last stitch had entered, so the individual stitch still moved from right to left but the sequence moved towards the right side of the cloth. It was a beautiful and cute-looking stitch.

It took her almost a cycle, as she proceeded with great care. In order not to damage the silk, she coated the thread with a very light amount of beeswax, to facilitate the embroidering but also to preserve the thread in time - Mrs. Burlywood had been a precious teacher. Progress was painfully slow, but the possibility of a mistake had made Amelia very cautious. The girl got more headaches from this project than she thought possible, but in the end, every line had been covered with Mabel's now crimson hair.

The witch was practically glowing with satisfaction as she admired the creation in the mirror. She extended her arms and made the sign of the Triangle in front of the reflective surface, noting how the thread framed the geometrical figure. There was something deeply artistic about making a useful tool that actually looked good - because in Amelia's opinion, this was looking very good.

Finally, she descended into the Room of Conjurations once more and retrieved a bottle from one of the shelves - a spirit cage with a minor, weak cold spirit inside. She uncorked it and immediately put two fingers inside. The spirit inside, surprised for an instant, tried to get out, but it failed to pass through Amelia's gloved fingers. Great. The girl felt no sensation of cold, either. She removed her fingers from the bottle and corked it again before the spirit could escape - for its own good if nothing else, as the ghostly guardian cat was keeping a watchful eye on it, ready to assault it if it tried to leave the room.

"Some brightening..." she whispered, "when I don't need it anymore... I'll definitely give your hair back to you." For now, though, she was feeling like baking a cake.

Secrets : The Gloves: Normal silken gloves Provide hand protection from contact with spirits and ghosts Handsigns for use as part of chants and invocations, effectiveness to be researched separately

[Labyrinth]

All approved!

1 XP in Adjuration.
1 XP in Embroidery.
Item approved.
Thread approved.