Part Two: Tea and Sympathy
[ House of Verdant Mysteries Revealed ][edit]
It's been almost a year. I think that maybe now the bitter ache might subside; maybe now I can appreciate the goodness of our time together, instead of just the horror of how things ended. Maybe now I'm strong enough to remember. So I lock my door, and open the chest where I keep my most treasured things, and from the corner where it hides, I pull out a small ebony box. Slowly, carefully, I pry off the lid and prepare to face the past.
It's tea of remembering, infinitely precious, now that there will be no more. I don't dare drink it. But as I breathe in its subtly distinctive fragrance, I am there again.
"What I don't know can get me killed. So, I'm asking you, please, teach me." He sets his tea back down, untouched. He seems surprised that I'm asking, but he shouldn't be. I need to understand what I am, and he's the only person I've ever met who can guide me.
The silence stretches on as I make my case. "You are comfortable with what I am- what we are. I need that. I...I don't know the glory of being a Solar Exalted; I only know the shame of being Anathema. Galen...only you can show me the way." I hate this sentimental plea, but it's true. I took my second breath, and ever since, I've been wandering in the dark.
He sighs and says, “No one has an easy time of this; even if I agree to let you become my student, you must realize that the road before you is difficult."
"Walking a hard road is better than wandering the wilderness. I know it won't be easy, but with your help, it won't be impossible, either." For a long moment after my pronouncement, we sit in the silence, neither moving, as the tea slowly cools before us.
He laughs, abruptly. "I should know better than to argue with an Eclipse. Very well, you will be my first student." The smile fades from his face, as he continues. "Before we go any further, there are some things that I need to know. Who are you, really? What are you running from?"
My insides knot up. This was not unexpected, but there are many things I'd rather do than tell him how I came to be where I am. "My name..." I start, but then falter. These are things I haven't spoken of in so long.
"My true name is Virra Lythia. I am twenty-six years old, and I took my second breath just over a year ago." Slowly, my secrets come to light. "I grew up in the Realm proper. My father was a patrician, and my mother died when I was five, the day my sister Amalia was born. For years we lived happily, And then, when she was fifteen, we discovered that Amalia was one of the dragon-blooded, with the aspect of fire. She left home, to the Cloister of Wisdom. She didn't come back for years, not until after Father died, and when I saw her again, I hardly knew her."
I take a deep breath and press on. "She came back so serious. And so sure of her superiority in the scheme of things. Before she had even been home a full day, she chastised me for not being properly respectful of her place in the natural order, as well as for my 'generally irreverent' attitude. It took my breath away. Ever since the day she left, I gave up so much, scraped together all I could, to support her and her glorious future. She may be dragon-blooded, and therefore the pinnacle, but still...the fanaticism...being away corrupted her."
"Time only made these qualities worse. I found out that even among the Immaculate Order her attitude was a hard one. She was particularly taken with the opinions of Peleps Deled before he left to join the Wyld Hunt. That should tell you exactly how conservative she became. Thankfully, she was not home often."
"Just over a year ago, she returned home, preparing to join the Wyld Hunt herself. Her attitude was as insufferable as ever, and I remember...one day I just had enough. I took the fastest horse we owned, and rode out the quiet places where our fields end and the trees begin. It was there...that was where I took my second breath."
"I stayed in the depths of the woods until I was no longer glowing, and when I thought it safe, I returned home. Thankfully, no one noticed anything amiss. She wondered where I had been, so I told her I went to the woods to contemplate the perfection of the Elemental Dragons, and then I thanked her for drawing me back to the correct path. She was so pleased to think of herself as one who shepherds apostates that she accepted the lie."
"Meanwhile, I waited for the secrecy of night. I wanted to find someplace hidden where I could see what had changed- what I was now capable of. So that night, when the servants slept, hours after Amalia left, under cover of darkness, I found my place in the forest clearing again."
"In the silence of that clearing, a wind was rising. I didn't notice. I had never really been one for meditation, but now I was miles away mentally, considering these changes. It was like-- like I was made of light somehow. The feeling, as if I was meant for so much more than the petty games I had contented myself with playing. For so long things have been wrong, but now, they could be mended. And I could be instrumental in setting things right."
"As the power washed through me...my anima flared to life. Silver light- then crystal flowers. At first there were just a few, then more and more filled the air. Flowers, irises so tiny and delicate, but made of cold, hard crystal. I watched as the light grew, lost in the feeling that this was so familiar... I should remember... and yet knowing that this was no elemental anima."
"I knew that it should bother me...but the immaculate order has been wrong about so much. It was easy, filled with that light, to believe that they were wrong about this too. 'Anathema' I tried my new name and found it lacking. 'No, not anathema. Chosen of the Sun.' She must have heard that, as she crossed the clearing, eyes wide-- and sword drawn."
"She stopped just beyond the reach of my anima, as if to cross that circle of light would be to become defiled. For just a few moments, neither of us said a word. She stared at me, eyes filled with both horror and rage. I still wonder what she saw in my eyes." (Sorry, so sorry. But I am who I am. And I will not die just because your philosophy says that I should.)
"'How long have you been this way?' she asked, through clenched teeth."
"'Two days,' I answered sadly. 'Not that it matters. What's done is done, and can never be undone. I love you, Amalia. But I will not throw myself upon your altar.'"
"My words, though softly spoken, had the impact of a knife in her heart. For just a moment her eyes shone with tears she would not shed. That was the last I ever saw of the sister I loved. I found myself facing the new Amalia, beloved of the Order."
"'Sister...' I breathed."
"'You are an abomination,' she spat. 'You are now my responsibility, my taint to cleanse.' She then assumed her form, and fire danced in the air around her. 'This is the way it must be,' she said with grim determination."
"We fought that night, and it was brutal. I had no real training, but Solars don't die easily, and my existence was at stake. She was a fire aspect from the sole of her feet to the roots of her hair, and had become a swordwoman of some renoun since she went away. It went on for hours; attack, defend, attack, wipe the blood from your eyes and find some way to go on."
"In the end, I was left standing. I beat my sister bloody, and as she wavered between conciousness and unconciousness, I found that I could not kill her outright, and that I dared not let her live. And then...I knew what I had to do."
"I leaned in close and told the first lie."
"She accepted what I said completely-- that I was not anathema, that she was working for the downfall of house Mnemon, that I discovered her secret revolution, that she tried to recruit me, and when I refused, fought me."
"I left her there unconcious, and raced back home, to enact the rest of my plan."
And this is the hard part. "I reported her to the All-Seeing Eye. I told them that she was a traitor, conspiring against house Mnemon. I showed them some excellent manufactured evidence, and I told them that I got my many injuries for not agreeing to aid my sister's foul plot. It was enough to get her arrested. When she was questioned, she corraborated my story nicely."
"She was tried in a matter of days. I was there when they led her from the room a convicted traitor, and she seemed to believe it as much as anyone. I knew I had to leave. To tell the truth, I was lucky the lie held for so long. I gave her a chance. Not much of one, I admit. She's constantly watched, so that's got to make it difficult for her to escape. And house Mnemon seems to take the allegations personally."
"It's been over a year now, and I've heard nothing of her. Something tells me that if she's alive and free, I'll be the first person she finds: either because she knows me for Anathema, or because I'm the one who sent her to prison. Or both, actually."
"Once that loose end was tied, I went back to the estate and started making my plans to leave. I took as many small, but very valuable, things as I could, including things that had belonged to Amalia. It felt good, I admit, to take back some of the fine things I had given up for her. I took all of our jewelry, and a considerable sum of gold (ironically, the very money that I had been saving up for Amalia, part of which would have gone to funding the Wyld Hunt.) I took my mother's wedding ring, and my father's sword, fresh clothes and food, and I booked passage to Port Calin. From there I traveled to Nexus."
"And that pretty well brings us to the present. I can still force people to believe my version of events, as you've seen. In all the time I've been Exalted, that's the only thing I've learned how to do with any consistency. It's...handy...but I'm sure that I can do more, if only you will teach me."
He said, “It’s called the memory-reweaving discipline, and it's not one of the things I can teach you, so it's well you don't need my help with that." And that was it. He said nothing about my past. "I can, however teach you a martial arts form that will make you even more persuasive than you already are. I can also initiate you into the first circle of sorcery. Oh, and then I can teach you demon summoning! Trust me, it's not as evil as it sounds."
I looked at him dubiously, and the first day's lesson continued.
-from Sapphire River at Midnight's private notes
