when they tell you you are made of stars, tell them you know.

[elegiaque]

WHO: Gwenaëlle Vauquelin, Petrana de Cedoux, Benevenuta Thevenet & Galatea Lourdes + SPECIAL GUEST: YOU.
WHAT: A Wintermarch catch-all.
WHEN: Wintermarch.
WHERE: Kirkwall.
NOTES: Somewhere for me to put planned, closed threads! Hit me up on keanuleaves or libbitybibbit#8828 if you desire one.

Comments

[overharrowed]

"Yes and no," he says, after taking a moment to properly weigh her question and push away the knee-jerk response it would have inspired coming from another source. (He's more inclined to admire than miss the deliberateness of her framing; he doesn't think whoever picked her for head of diplomacy picked poorly.)

"Blood magic is used for things other than demon summoning, but among its other qualities, it tends to attract those who believe they need more raw magical power than they could otherwise access. That much power draws demonic attention. You don't have to be a blood mage to be at risk of possession, the same way you don't have to be out wandering the woods alone at night with no weapons to be attacked by wolves -- it just makes it much more likely."

A pause, then to acknowledge what she's probably already guessed: "That's what happened with Uldred. It wasn't only that the demon escaped his control -- the demon possessed him, twisted him into an abomination. He killed many mages and templars outright, forced or tempted others into becoming abominations themselves. My understanding is that, had it not been for outside assistance, the odds were fairly even as to whether there would have been any living mages left in the tower to put down by the time Greagoir invoked the Right of Annulment."

[ipseite]

“In Lamorre—in Sulleciel, in truth—matters such as demons and blood magic are...”

She orders her thoughts for a moment.

“I would not say that demons are without danger, but for a witch, that danger would be...entirely self-created. I would be, there, at no more danger of possession than any other person—a demon that I had summoned might overpower me, in any number of ways, but I must summon it, it cannot simply arrive. Blood magic, in turn, is in large part no more dangerous than any other kind—as dangerous as the witch who wields it. It has different purposes, more.”

This isn't a refutation of anything he's said, more thinking out loud; explaining why it is that she asks.

“I wish to understand,” she says, after a moment. “But these are difficult topics to raise, casually, in search of understanding. I appreciate your willingness to discuss it—all of it—with me.”

[overharrowed]

"I have no doubt you would receive a very different answer from a magister, or even certain apostates; I'd rather, at least, contribute to the conversation. There are those who argue that if you stick to your own blood or the blood of a willing individual, what's the harm? If you keep it small and contained. Perhaps, on paper, that might even be true. But I've never seen it stay small and contained, once someone begins."

He exhales, slowly and steadily. "I did not see Uldred's rebellion first-hand. But I returned in time to clean up the tower. With Cousland's assistance, our First Enchanter survived. One of our senior enchanters saved many of the younger children. But I knew everyone in that tower to some degree. Everyone whose remains I found."

A pause, then: "It came out later that when Uldred thought he was risking discovery, he would expose one of his disciples as a blood mage to divert suspicion, with the predictable results for the one so exposed."

[ipseite]

It can come as no surprise that Petrana can easily imagine those results; the bleak situation of magic in her own world is not something she's kept secret.

“This ring is the product of blood magic,” she observes, pressing her thumb for a moment to the diamond that Marius had given her. I will keep you safe. And look where that's got them. Maybe it isn't so different. Maybe it's as corrupt, as—corrupting. Maybe she's ignorant and that's all, maybe they'd have known better if anyone who could have taught them so wasn't ash.

Children, she thinks, and does not think of her own.

I am going to follow you all the way to hell, she remembers saying, and shuts that out of her mind, too. That isn't what they're discussing. She looks up at him—

“What did he hope to achieve, do you think? He must have known the cost of his actions.”

[overharrowed]

Julius seems as if he might ask, or at least offer something comforting -- he doesn't hide a flicker of concern at the nature of her ring nor her reaction to his story -- but instead, he simply shakes his head.

"I cannot know his mind; I was not one he ever targeted for recruitment, though whether that was because of my politics or my skill set I've no idea. But if I had to guess, I'd say it was a combination of a sincere belief the Circle should be self-governing combined with a taste for power. Someone would have to be First Enchanter in a newly liberated Circle, or even Grand Enchanter, and it wouldn't be someone who'd been previously loyal to the Chantry."

Julius doesn't blame him, precisely, for either motivation, but it's a very vivid example of why the ends don't always justify the means, especially where magic is concerned.

[ipseite]

“It never would have worked,” she observes, after a moment, “pursued thus. He was undone already by his own methods—even had he succeeded. Such methods would not be secret long, and such a Circle—such a mage—could naught but expect to be a target. A symbol, in being put down.”

Whether that might have galvanized a different sort of rebellion or put paid to it entirely, they can only guess. Done is done, and none of that happened.

Still.

What it puts her in mind of doesn't bear thinking about too closely.

“One Circle. No, that would not have stood.”

[overharrowed]

"No," he agrees, "it wouldn't have. Even if he'd not turned to blood magic, even if he'd convinced the other enchanters... I can't imagine that the Chantry would have sat by and allowed Ferelden's mages independence, regardless of what Ferelden's crown had to say about it. But I suppose that evaluation is also much easier to make in hindsight."

Julius isn't entirely sure he would have seen the templars' decision to split off coming, either. Perhaps it was easier to imagine a bloodless sea change with powerful enough allies, years ago.

"It is a complex affair, as you surely know. For years, the Chantry assumed most if not all apostates used blood magic; it was a convenient excuse for putting them down on sight. That, clearly, I cannot excuse either. It is just difficult for me to be cavalier about warnings against blood magic when I saw firsthand the damage it can do to a man's character, even before the rebellion's violent end. Uldred was not always power-mad, I am reasonably sure."