A Day in the Life (Part I)
“We will commune soon that you might continue your path back to spiritual rightness and you can then offload some of these feelings you have been carrying around. I suggest writing a diary of your daily experiences that I can better understand your perspective.
It is perhaps hard to imagine, but the Holy Inquisition cares deeply for those who are faithful, but even more so for those who are not. It is not correct how you are being treated if how you are being treated is in fact so. I will follow up other leads and ensure that you are not mistreated.”
-Deimetes ab Corban Grand Inquisitor
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Eldes Augustus, Year 362 in the Sun Cycle of the Lord
None of the other priests have felt compelled to follow up on actions taken against me, your Holy Honor – part of me wishes you would not. Society works off the majority. Should the majority wear checkered-patterned pants, wearing such pants will be the accepted trend. Should the majority kick the ‘murdering heretic’, kicking the heretic will become the accepted trend. With that said (or written) please don’t make me write upon past wrongs, for there are far too many to count, and I will run out of money before I have enough ink to pen them all. By the same token, I refuse to write about the small wrongs given to me – the snide comments about how I should kill myself, how I’m worthless, along with my whole family. It just seems like sniveling.
No, as you stated in your missive… I will write about my day. These past few I have been waking up later and later as my mood grows darker. I’ve avoided rushing into the tavern for drink, but only just, Ariel’s words echoing about in my head – cautionary against imbibing liquor. Apparently, some think that it turns me into a lesser man. Myself? I think it’s a perfectly good anesthetic to blot out the world. But what have you – Ariel might be my only friend, and I don’t want him to hate me more than he already does.
It is late evening, with the sun just kissing the horizon and the moons growing brighter and brighter – most of them waning or in various forms of new. I take heart in the phases of the moon since my possession and the recent change in my interests – from leading men, to plotting ways to kill demons. When the moons wane the link between this realm and the Tainted one is indistinct – fuzzy. I can rest a little easier. Thus, immediately I was given a ray of hope – and so I went on down the street from the small, abandoned lean-to I’ve been squatting in and ran into Orlando dul Cavallari, Lady Bryn, and the Hillperson Sawyer.
It was a good conversation, at first – but when the subject got around to darker themes, Sawyer showed an immediate want to leave my vicinity. I think she believes that I make it my hobby to kill people and eat children. To facilitate her leaving, and indeed to give myself some small token of joy, I waggled my fingers at her and invoked the power of lightning and fire… by saying as much. “I invoke the power of lightning and fire!” my voice rang through the square.
She stumbled backwards, scared out of her mind of course – and a man named Karston came on the tail end of this. Needless to say, heated words were exchanged… would it make me less faithful if I admitted my overwhelming urge to chop off Karston’s legs? I wasn’t purely there to spite her – but nobody seems to understand the varied nature of anything I do. No, they see only what they want to see – a heretic being bad. If anything we should celebrate that the girl Sawyer doesn’t know what real magic looks or sounds like. It means that the Holy Order is doing its job, and all is well in the world.
But I… I know what magic looks and sounds like. I’m sure you’ve read the files on me, Your Holy Honor, but I never told the Cardinal the full extent of what happened when Gordon Stewart and I met. Admittedly, she never asked, and I didn’t want to relive it. Through my dealings with him, he revealed himself to be a mage… by casting on -me-. By transporting me over a great distance. Through the threads of reality, I was tossed, and when I reappeared into the material realm it was all I could do not to vomit. Not to scream.
I know what magic looks and sounds like. Forgive me for making light of it, to satiate my own anxious fear.