With This Ring (Young Justice SI) (Thread Fourteen)

17th February 2013
14:28 GMT

"Come, friends, and be welcome!"

Cernunnos's physical form immediately puts me in mind of a faun, only… Grown up. He's clearly larger, his horns are more developed and he seems calmer than the fauns in the stories Diana told me. I know that Olympians tend to be stronger than the gods of other places due to leeching power from titans, but I'm never sure what than means in raw numbers terms. Or how material or magical Otherworld is in relation to Olympus.

My own weak sense of such things suggests that he's more… Here, than other things, that at least in part there's more to him than what I'm seeing. But I don't know how significant that is. Could he ignore the Anti-Life simply as a consequence of his power? Or is he a faun who paid attention at magic school? As the others move to take their seats around the hall I palm a rune stone and-.

"If you want to have a cock-measuring contest, Lantern, I can just stand up."

He's wearing a kilt… Ah…

Mr. Marrack frowns at me. "Put that away, fool."

I put it away.

Not wholly unlike a faun, then. But that cup he's carrying is filled with water. He's a god of the wilds and wildlife, but… From a time when hunting and gathering were common ways to get food, when the wild was right next door. But I did a me because I don’t have anything he wants and I didn't think that he had anything I could want.

I take a seat, and decide to let people more familiar with the situation than me take the lead.

"I see that Brannan has recovered his wits. Good work, Graham. Did he remember anything?"

"Only the feeling of despair that characterises the spell. But it seems that Lord Cluracan may know a little more."

"It was a most memorable toadstool." Cluracan shifts awkwardly. "Come, come." Cernunnos gestures to the space in the middle of the seats. "Say your piece."

"Thank you, oh horned one."

Cluracan.. walks into the centre of the room, and I blink as my brain tries to tell me something about-. I think he's nervous enough that his glamour of a man striding confidently is only partially covering it, but I can't be sure without actively intervening. Our host doesn't seem bothered by it.

"We were... Ah, my sister and I… It…"

"Do not fear, Cluracan. On a matter like this, we can avoid word of any adjacent misdeeds reaching the ears of your king and queen."

"We were facilitating a trade between certain parties. Parties we had both dealt with before. There was, ah… Something different about one of the parties, but since it had no effect on the transaction, we…" He exhales. "I didn't enquire further."

Mr. Marrack narrows his eyes suspiciously. "What sort of trade?"

"Nothing grossly immoral! Some things are less valuable in one place than another. The corporeal world has a great deal of corporeal matter, the worlds of concepts and forms more… Abstract goods. And there's demand for each in each and we can easily relay them."

I'm not sure how to feel about that. I can respect them for their entrepreneurship, but at the same time the sorts of things an elf would trade could be things that would be highly illegal in the human world if we knew that it was possible to trade in them. The Dream City has a roaring trade in dreams and inspiration, and I saw first hand some of the monstrous techniques people there are willing to go to in order to get their hit a little more cheaply.

I certainly don't trust an elf when he says that something isn't grossly immoral. While I don't think he'd say it if it was grossly immoral according to his morals, those aren't human morals.

"Who were they?"

"Their..? Names..?"

"Human? Elemental? God? What realm were you trading in?"

"Earth. They were all-. I mean to say, I think they were human." He points at Mitchell. "I honestly thought that he was human."

"What were they buying?"

"Dreams of misery and despair, which isn't that unusual! People use things like that on their enemies all the time. And…"

Mr. Marrack slams his fist against his arm rest. "I swear on my line, that if you don't start volunteering the information we need to rescue your own blood, then-."

"The bones of false martyrs, some samples of soil from various places… A final scream or two…" He shrugs, shaking his head. "We didn't have to source any of it ourselves… There may be a thing or two which I'm forgetting, I didn't think anything of any of it at the time!"

"Is that normal?"

"Normal for a group of wizards living in an ancient castle on a blasted heath? In this day and age? It didn't strike me as strange."

Mr. Marrack leans forwards. "What was the name of the castle?"

"Nnnnnnammmmme..? Ahh…" Cluracan inflates his cheeks as he tries to remember. "Baal…? Something."

"Baaleskein?"

"Yes! Yes."

"Baalfield."

"That too!"

Mr. Marrack frowns at me.

"He doesn't remember it well enough for us to reach a firm conclusion. Always check a theory with counterexamples."

"When was your sister taken?"

"We had just completed our transaction, and they offered us a little something to drink, and I palmed it and took it with me, and… We were on our way home when-."

"On Earth or in Otherworld?"

"Otherworld. When we were ambushed by giant flies of all things. I made an appeal to the treaty between our rulers and the Queen of Insects but they didn't pay a blind bit of notice. It was all I could do to escape myself!"

Mr. Marrack nods. "We will need the names of your contacts on both sides, and to be taken to the precise route you took. And we will need to follow up with the fomorians as well."

I nod. "Robin, you take the Earth side. I'll take the deep arcane side. Cornwall Boy, the fomorians." The other three don't have directly applicable skills, but… "Miss Martian, go with Cornwall. Match, Robin. Superboy, you're with me."

He's still carrying Helios's blessing and Nth Metal armour, both of which should help out. Miss Martian can detect Anti-Life infections easily, and it'll be a little more gentle to her to have her do that in a place that isn't overwhelmed with the stuff.

Brannan's father nods. "We'll introduce you to our people, though I don't know how much good it will do."

M'gann nods sympathetically. "We've dealt with things like this before. At the very least I can detect them before they can take anyone else."

"I will accompany the Lantern." Cernunnos doesn't stand, but he does smile at me. "It has been some time since I have headed deeper into magic. It will do me good."

"And I will keep an eye on my great grandson. Cluracan? Take us to where you were attacked."

 

3rd Sigmarzeit 2512
Afternoon

"Hng."

Master Architect Buri dislikes it when I present him with a plan out of thin air. And I've learned not to refer to it as a 'rough draft' or request 'his first impressions'. He hasn't written anything in his Notebook of Grudges that I couldn't immediately make amends for, but I don't like antagonising allies and I suspect that it's been a close run thing a few times.

"As you can see, it's close to the design for the improvements to my manor, with added rooms for her staff."

And don’t ask him to 'suggest a site'. There are right sites and wrong sites, and he can tell me which is which and if I ignore him then it's Going In The Book.

"Are you magicing it up, or are you going to building it properly?"

He's not actually glowering at me, it's just that dwarfs have naturally glowery faces.

Now that's a tricky one. Dwarfs don't actually mind their allies using magic, even if they have no truck with it themselves. But Buri of Clan Ullek is here to do things the proper dwarf way, and that means not creating things with magic or Old One technology.

But. Using it as a tool is fine, so long as all of the pieces are properly constructed and put together. And since the Controllers are my liege-lords, flat out rejecting their tools is forbidden as well. So I can build it using the ring, or I can hire the dwarfs to build it, but if I'm going to create it from nothing then I shouldn't have involved him in that undwarfish nonsense.

I only need to be told once.

"I was intending to retain your services to build it while I transport the materials here according to your specifications."

Which is fine, as long as they're exactly to specification. I'm not supposed to create them through energy to matter conversion, but he hasn't asked and as far as I know there's no way for him to check. So peace is maintained another day, and if I provide substandard materials then that's my problem.

Contractually.

"Hm. After our current slate, or do you want me to move things around?"

"I regret the inconvenience, but the lodgings of the ambassador takes precedence over anything that can be paused without setting it back."

"So nothing, then."

And it took a while, but I've got to the point where I can tell the difference between a nothing-nothing, and a technically-nothing-but-we-can-move-a-few-projects-without-ruining-things-why-can't-you-be-better-organised-human, and that was the second.

"Thank you, Master Architect, I shall leave the issue and any improvements you feel necessary in your capable hands."

"Mm."

He's no longer looking at me, but he's got his drafting tools out and a sheet of parchment to draw a copy on. There'll be changes as needed based on where he intends to site it, but I've been paying attention and the ring's AI has been paying better attention; my draft is faultless for what it is.

Dwarfs are all for formal greetings, but leave-taking is much more informal. I've given him the job, he's accepted it, I can get lost now. So I leave his workshop and hope that Aranei hasn't done anything regrettable. Because when I edited her mind to remove her thoughtless malevolence I didn't try to make her incapable of violence. This is a violent world and people need to be able to defend themselves. Which means that she's still capable of deciding to kill someone on an individual basis.

But all there is outside is a slightly relieved-looking Lady Richilde, who favours me with a strained smile. "Have you agreed a contract?"

"It's covered by our existing contract, but you're being prioritised. Going by past experience, he'll have a list of materials by the end of the day, I'll pick things up and he'll get started tomorrow."

"And will you return me to Altdorf until the work is complete?"

"Ah. I can. But I assumed that you'd want to spend at least a day or so. I was planning to put you up in my manor."

"Your manor?"

I shrug. "I know it's not a palace, but it's perfectly habitable."

"Does your sorceress also reside there?"

"Yes. What did she… Say?"

"Nothing at all. I have had dealings with elves before, and there is a look they have when they decide that anything human is beneath them. She had the look of one who was insulted by my presence."

I smile, relieved. "Oh good. I was worried she was angry."

"You do not think that she is angry."

"There's a difference between being angry and being insulted. She was insulted when one of the beastwoman got her a cup of water but she wasn't angry about it."

"I misspoke. She is angry that I am here."

"Yeah, I… Thought so."

She looks at me expectantly. I look blank.

"Sir Paolo, why is a woman I have never met angry that I exist?"

"Okay, so, when I first got here, a ship of Dark Elf reavers were attacking the village. I stopped them, and offered them a choice between death and having me alter their minds to cure them of their evil. She chose the second, but I didn't fully understand some of the behavioural changes that would occur. To put it simply, she treats me as her patron, someone who she has to please in order to maintain her lifestyle."

Realisation dawns. "So she is your mistress."

"Well, where I'm from, she would only be my mistress if I was married to someone else. And while she's working under the assumption that I'm.. her social superior, so I'm going to eventually tire of her and move onto someone else, because that's how things work for Dark Elves."

"Do you intend to stay with her, then?"

"Oh, God no. I was clear about that from the start, but it's not about trading up for social reasons. It's because she's still a dreadful person held in check by the compulsions I gave her." I exhale. "But that's not how she sees it, and I suspect that she might have interpreted your presence here as an attempt by your uncle to…" Ah. How do I put-?

"To whore me out to win your alliance?"

"I was.. going to put it as 'form a marriage alliance'. I don't really know how things like that work, but… A knight who earns glory on the field of battle could reasonably expect a beneficial marriage as a reward. I have permanently killed a Greater Daemon, and a horde of lesser daemons and beastmen and orcs. And I have no family. I could see how she could reach such a conclusion."

"That is true. But I assure you that my uncle cannot arrange my marriage without the consent of my parents, and none of them have mentioned any such plan to me."

"But is that how it works?"

She considers for a moment. "Are you familiar with the writings of Prince Aleksandr Kloszowski?"

I briefly considered him as a potential successor, but after I checked it turned out that the man was far too self-absorbed for that to be a good idea. Maybe if I could train him with a second ring?

"Somewhat. He's a revolutionary Leveller, isn't he?"

"He writes about the failings of the Empire's rulers and the suffering of the poor. I don't believe that he has any actual idea as to what could be done to improve things. But one thing that rings true is that there is little room in our society for someone to advance themselves. A man born a farmer's son will become a farmer."

"Common men who join the army and perform superlatively can get knighted. In Bretonnia, if-."

She shakes her head. "How many ploughmen who complete their deed of errantry become dukes?"

"A duke will always have relatives to inherit his seat. It would never come up. Not unless there had been a huge slaughter."

"The great and the good of the Empire would tolerate a common soldier being knighted. And perhaps married to a third daughter of a minor baron. That is all. Anything else is a tale of the ballads. Tragic ballads, for the most part. While there is sense in what you say, the idea that someone who is not bound to them by blood could achieve enough to possibly justify so high a marriage is not something they would see as an opportunity."

"A threat. I could just upend the whole system."

"My uncle did ask me to learn your character. I would not be surprised if he implied to concerned notables that he was considering offering you my hand, but it is not…

She considers how to put it. I smile.

"It's not a serious offer, it's an idiot management technique."

"Just so. Regardless of your merit, that is all that it is."

Ring, monitor her response. "That's probably for the best." I gesture towards the pavement, and we begin our walk towards my manor. "I doubt that my betrothed would be best pleased, otherwise."

Ah.