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Lessons of Dynasty Part 2: Interlude Years	By : JohnDoe Category: +A through F > Exalted RPG Views: 277 -:- Recommendations : 0 -:- Currently Reading : 0
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Chapter List
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Winter turns to spring, and spring turns to summer. The girls redouble their efforts, translating obscure texts, experimenting with dangerous reagents, sitting in on lectures from obscure savants drawn from across the Realm. They see little of the Cynis boys across the hall. Reya wonders whether The Burning Lord might have something to do with that. Her elemental master spends much of the winter with them, personally providing the benefit of his instruction to the girls in their laboratory. The Burning Lord does not have much to say on the study of alchemy in general, but speaks at length on the mystical properties of flame – a more complex subject that any of them would have credited – before eventually returning south come spring. As promised, he does not abuse his position by setting Reya mundane tasks, but he does gently guide their studies in directions they might not otherwise have taken.

Hari has to work harder than any of them, trying to fit Shogunate History lessons under Mistress Montegnin into their already impossibly packed study plan. But somehow they all manage to get the required credits every season. Reya’s work is the most impressive: her Air assignment sees her purify a vitriol flame that burns away alchemical impurities; her Water assignment turns lead into gold, giving her the credits she needed with a full week to spare (and the others a topic to write about).

As summer begins, midway through Resplendent Wood, the girls become aware of a whole school sporting contest. In their first year, Resplendent Wood was filled with midterm exams, and they were kept far too busy for sports (outside of morning exercise and weapons training). But now, despite how heavy their course load is, there’s a pressing expectation that the girls compete. The girls enter as few events as socially acceptable, in order to focus on their studies. None of them perform spectacularly. They show their faces just enough to cheer on Padar and Kinesi, who do an excellent job of representing the second years, books in hand as they pay more attention to their reading than to the unfolding events of the competition.

****

In the last week of Resplendent Wood the girl’s are unexpected interrupted in their lab by Professor Duhalva.

“I hope I’m not interrupting,” The Head Librarian states as she lets herself into the room, obviously interrupting them. Hari’s experiment literally blows up in her face, releasing a cloud of black ash, which stains her face. Duhalva continues as if she didn’t notice, “Impromptu field trip opportunity. On the way back, we can collect some lichen from the Grove of the Everlasting – you’ll find it’s study useful for Mistress Sorrowful Leaf’s upcoming lecture.”

The girls know better than to turn down the chance to go out into the Isle of Voices escorted by one of the school’s top sorcerers: it’s a rare and valuable chance to have unrestricted access to the woman who decides if they pass or fail. They make safe their work and gather what they need to go out: the winter snows are long melted, and even this far north, the weather is pleasantly temperate (and blessedly fog free), but no-one wants to head out into the wilds of the Isle of Voices without supplies, instruments, and weapons (lack of fog, not-with-standing). Mnemon Duhalva awaits them patiently, and even gives their experiments a look over to make sure they’re not going to explode the moment they leave the laboratory, before leading them down and out of the tower.

The sun shines brightly overhead and the crisp sea air is provides welcome refreshment from the smell of sulphur and other alchemical reagents. It’s good to be out of the lab. Duhalva leads them past the defensive wards that mark the boundaries of the Heptagram and out into the Isle.

The Isle of Voices is a strange and magical place. Even the areas which are not obviously enchanted are disquieting in their normalcy. Reya doesn’t have her axe in battle position, but grips it firmly by the middle of the shaft in one hand, rather than having it slung over her back as might be more comfortable: memories of sharks swimming through the air as if it were water, closing in for the kill, still haunt her. Udi holds her other hand as the four girls follow close to their professor over craggy hill and dell. The girls are not idle as they walk, taking the chance to pick Professor Duhalva’s brains, quizzing her on elements of alchemy they find challenging, questioning about upcoming lectures, and desperately trying to demonstrate how much they have all learned already. Udi’s questions follow a single thought only: how can one initiate into sorcery. Duhalva seems to enjoy the lively conversation as she leads them, not just answering by rote but probing and taking a genuine interest. Her attitude isn’t usual for a teacher at the Heptagram, but this is the first chance our heroines have had to really have personal time with her, as she leads them over the Isle of Voices.

They don’t precisely follow a path as such. The only real road on the whole island is the one between the Heptagram and its jetty. But they follow a trail: not one made by wild animals, but a route cut many times before by students and faculty heading out away from the Heptagram towards a common goal. There are many locations on the Isle where experienced students go to work their magic or make observations about the mystic world, but as the day wears on and Duhalva shows no signs of reaching their goal, their destination becomes obvious to them all.

The Ruins of the Versino.

Even families like Hari’s, who openly despise sorcery and all it stands for, know the name of the Versino. The Realm’s first school of sorcery, founded by the Empress herself, here on the Isle of Voices – the most magical place in the Realm. Destroyed, or so the rumours say, by her eldest living daughter, the Great House Matriarch Mnemon, three-hundred-and-fifty-two. (Reya’s matriarch, of course, denies having a hand in the school’s destruction, claiming to have fled the school well before its destruction, pursued by assassins, but still the rumours persist.) The Versino ruins are not the most dangerous place in the Realm (whilst the likes of the Valley of the Ancients, the summit of the Imperial Mountain, the blasted desolation of the Tarpan Wastes, and the dreaded Fire Swap of Lord’s Crossing exist, it’s not even in the top ten), but it is perhaps the most feared. Here, the Realm’s most powerful sorcerers, aided by a score of trained monks of the Immaculate Order, and an entire school full of Dragon-Blooded, were butchered. Here, magical artifacts too dangerous to be contained anywhere else in the Realm were once sealed, but then unleashed with the deaths of their guardians. Here, the consequences of sorcery unbridled dealt the Realm a lasting blow.

At last the blasted crater of what was once a mighty tower comes into view. The wreckage of the school, a twisted and blackened hole, still smoulders (ever so slightly), three-and-half centuries later. Every sorcerous defence that marks the boundaries of the Heptagram – every ogham stone, every graven ward, every protective sigil – is duplicated here, only their power is inverted to keep the horrors of the Versino in rather than the dangers of the Isle out.

Ro falls silent mid-sentence as she takes in the sight before them. She lets out a little squeak.

“Ro,” Udi admonishes, “Did you just fart or did you shit yourself?”

“Yes.” Ro says simply, her eyes going wide as she tries to take in the sight.

A many limbed… thing crawling like a spider, if a spider had two dozen legs, crawls from the pit and races at the party. The girls ready their weapons but Professor Duhalva shows no sign of panic, watching the beast impassively. A carving on a weathered stone pylon shines bright blue and the creature erupts in spirit-fire, burning in ephemeral violet flames and shrieking, shrieking with the voice of a human child as it staggers and dies and is burnt to ash.

“Okay, fair,” Udi concedes, swallowing heavily, “So… uh… we can go back now, right?”

Professor Duhalva cocks an eyebrow, “This isn’t an adolescent prank where we sneak out of school and see how daringly close we can get to the Versino. This is an educational field trip: we’re going inside to harvest reagents.”

“What kind of reagents?” Hari chokes out.

“I’m going to guess anuhle blood,” Reya answers, “Given that we’ve got a lecture tomorrow on the properties of demon blood and, you know, it seems like we won’t have to go too far into the crater to get it.”

“Partial credit,” Professor Duhalva responds tersely, “The kangi are not demon-spiders, but the point of the exercise is to pass beyond the defensive runes, harvest some demon blood, then return to the school alive. Not forgetting your lichens, of course.”

“With, uh, g-greatest respect, p-p-professor,” Ro stammers, swallowing hard, “Are you sure this is safe?”

Duhalva hands each of the girls a glass vial attached to a large syringe, “It’s incredibly dangerous. You may stay on this side of the wards if you prefer, but five credits to any girl who can fill their vial.”

“Do you really expect us to risk our lives for a grade? And not a particularly good grade at that!” Udi harrumphs indignantly.

“I expect you to risk your lives in the pursuit of sorcery: alchemy being the art you have chosen to dedicate yourselves to the study of. But if you need a sweetener, I suppose I only need three vials: you may keep the fourth for your own study. If you can fill it. You shouldn’t have to go too far past the wards before another one attacks.” She rests back on a rock, making it clear from her body language that she has no intention of risking her life by entering the ruins.

Ro takes Reya’s hand uncertainly, “We’re… not doing it, right? It’s… like… a test of our judgement skills, right? We haven’t even studied demons! I mean, not officially, or anything…”

Reya ignores her and hands her vial to Udi, “If we stay two-arms width apart, only go a little past where the last one got immolated, stick the live bait in the middle of us slightly behind?”

“Chop off a dozen limbs, stick the syringes in the holes?” Udi makes a fifty-fifty gesture, “I mean… yeah, I think we could do it? I mean… whaddya want the demon blood for?”

Reya shrugs, “I don’t know yet, but if we’re going to have a whole lecture about it…?”

“You’re sure it’s not bait, right?” Udi asks, eyeing the ruins suspiciously, “Like… there’s not a hundred of those things waiting for us to get just a little too close before they pull us in and suck out our insides?”

Reya takes a moment to study Mnemon Duhalva, “I don’t think the professor would put all four of us in danger. One dead Dynast? That’s a bad student. Four dead Dynasts? There’d be legions marching on the school.”

“And we’re sure that is the professor? Not some face-stealing anathema, no offence professor.”

Reya shrugs, “I’m not entirely sure that a hundred kangi wouldn’t be happy with just abducting one of us and letting the rest of us run away. It certainly seems like a teachable moment. But we are four Princes of the Earth. We are in training to become sorcerers. In school, under the supervision of one of the greatest sorcerers of our time, are we going to refuse to stand on the threshold of a mystic site? Are we too cowardly to fight demons? If we can’t take this risk, we should pack our things and head to the Spiral Academy for a lifetime of stamping forms and writing eviction notices and whatever other asinine crap those pencil-pushers get up to! If we were at the House of Bells would you say ‘we can’t fight with a spear, we’ve only trained with swords!’? This is what real sorcerers do: those demons should be afraid of us!”

Ro and Hari nervously ready their weapons as they approach the Versino crater straight on. Reya grips her axe in two-hands and flanks them from the left, with Udi edging forward on right – her sword in one-hand and the vial-syringe in the other. Duhalva is right: as soon as they pass the point where the last kangi was immolated, another one of the beasts tears out of the depths of the ruins and charges directly at Udi.

Ro stretches out a hand and a blast of lightning leaps from her fingertips and smashes into the many-armed monstrosity. It howls, not with a voice like a human child, but with a wild and feral voice somewhere between a wolf and a hyena. Neither Udi nor Reya hesitate to leap into the fray, slicing and chopping at the demon’s flesh as they hack away limbs. The kangi is not dazed by Ro’s lightning for long, and lashes out, flailing it’s limbs in a wild attack. The demon’s inhuman strength knocks Reya back, and a stray hand catches Udi by the ankle, yanking her off her feet and dragging her towards the demon. From beneath the mess of writhing limbs, a mouth yawns wide in the belly of the creature, like the beak of a starfish. A kangi’s mouth is a maw of spinning, articulated, teeth that minces more than chews their prey.

Udi stays calm as she jabs the limb holding her with the syringe and fills it with blood, even as the demon drags her closer to it’s whirling teeth to devour her. She even hums a little to herself as she unhurriedly sees to her task.

“Hit it again!” Reya shouts as she charges back into the fray. She glows with power as she calls on the blessings of the Dragons to help her inspire her comrades.

“You’re too close! I might hit-” Ro starts.

“HIT IT AGAIN!” Reya and Udi yell in unison.

Ro launches another bolt of lightning. Hari and Reya both charge in its wake and hit the demon with a combined assault of three Dragon-Blooded, even as Udi finishes filling her syringe and jabs Reya’s into the demon. As intent as the kangi is on eating Udi, it can’t ignore the coordinated assault. It wheels its arms round again, knocking Hari back towards Ro, but kicking Reya towards the edge of the crater. Reya looks down into the depths. A dozen inhuman eyes gaze back at her, unblinking and filled with malice.

“Time to go!” Reya shouts heaving herself away from the edge of the ruins.

Hari and Ro don’t need to be told twice: they break and run as fast as they can.

“But we only filled two vials?” Udi complains. The kangi almost has Udi’s foot in it’s mouth.

“Udi! Stop fucking around!” Reya screeches as she runs past her.

Udi grins and launches her own elemental bolt attack on the kangi at point blank range. The blast of water gives her the opportunity to wriggle free of its grasp and run after Reya. Not having seen the horrors that lurk only a few yards away inside the ruins of the old school, she nonchalantly stops to pick up one of the kangi’s severed limbs before safely regrouping with the others. She tosses the arm at Ro, who fails to catch it and the bloody stump falls at her feet.

“See if you can get any blood out of that,” Udi says, shaking her head.

The wounded kangi screams at them, but does not pursue. It paces back and forth for a moment before retreating to the depths of the ruins.

Ro and Hari extract the demonic blood from the severed limb. It’s a nauseating task, but there is enough blood to fill both vials. Duhalva watches them dispassionately. Reya proudly presents her with the four vials.

“Not how I would have done it, to be sure. But I suppose one can’t argue with results.”

Udi folds her arms crossly, “Well how would you have done it!”

Duhalva looks down her nose at the petulant girl, “You’re asking me now?”

Udi opens her mouth to answer back before realising that they really should have asked her before risking their lives fighting demons.

“Kangi,” Duhalva continues, “Are fascinated by mirrors. As you will learn when you study at The Hall of Verdigris.” She produces a hand mirror, “But I could have told you if you had asked. It is a little embarrassing that four of you – one of you a sorcerer, one of you a Cathak – couldn’t subdue a single demon of the First Circle…” And at this a pair of tomescu, the same kind of warrior that killed their classmate Darknife, materialize at Duhalva’s side – it’s clear these powerful warriors could have easily helped the girls overpower the kangi, “But as I said, one can’t argue with results.” Duhalva takes three of the four vials of demon blood.

“Just… to be clear…” Reya says, pinching the bridge of her nose in frustration, “If we had asked you, you’d have given us two tomescu who could have done the fighting for us and a mirror that meant we wouldn’t have even had to have fought the kangi?”

“Yes.”

“Okay, just checking.”

Hari squints, deep in thought, “We are dumb.”

Udi shrugs, “And bad at fighting, apparently. Now I believe there was some lichen we were supposed to collect on the way back to school?”
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Lessons of Dynasty Part 2: Interlude Years