Schemes all around

5/30 Late Afternoon

“Of course Lucas. Anyone can serve the light if their heart is true and their intentions are pure. I believe yours are.” Talaada soothed the young man’s anxiety as she spoke, and his lust with it. Like many of the young men she’d met, he desired her. Of course, her visage had been built to be desirable. The Prophet deserved the best.

Talaada still held the ritual as a point of pure bliss and purpose in her life; she wasn’t sure if she ever needed to take another lover. Oh, perhaps someday she would find a dear partner like her mother and father had found in one another, one that she could serve the prophet alongside. But not yet; for now she was more than happy to find fulfillment in other things and take sexual pleasure only when the Prophet called for it. What little time limit one of her kind would have had was gone now.

Lucas was one of the servants here. Ostensibly he was a trainee, but everyone knew that the only use the crusade had for a stick of a boy like this was as a menial laborer. He wasn’t quite smart enough to be a mage, quite faithful enough to wield the light, quite strong enough to be a worthy warrior, or quite dextrous enough to be a scout or huntsman. Useless, and so effectively a slave.

Talaada had pulled him to the side for tea after visiting the new recruits and gathering six declarations of love on the wrack; it was something she intended to do more often going forward, as the Worgen were growing less important and the high elves were mostly all captured or set in their ways. Better for the ghosts to handle the rest of those. She enjoyed hearing the whispered words of devotion throughout the day, nearly silenced as they reached her so as to not alarm those outside of the Brotherhood.

She’d seen weakness in Lucas, weakness that she could tear out and replace with strength. Now. He was as close to the target as he was going to be, the guidance of the prophet told her so, and so she charmed him.

“Tell me you love me.” Talaada smiled sweetly at the kind man. It wasn’t his fault that he was weak. All were weak until they felt the Prophet’s love. As the charm worked it’s magic, Talaada allowed him to have his lust back. All at once. That made it easy for him.

“I do! I love you, Confessor Talaada!” Good boy.

She cut off the charm, to allow the rush of far more genuine warmth to replace it, as she saw him become his truest self. “I’m glad to hear it. You will report to Abbott Arabella for further assignment.” She smiled as she watched him go, his baggy second hand clothes now quite ill fitting. Arabella had been the first for Sally’s sting to convert. A sweet girl, and a strong priestess.

Talaada hoped that Lucas would not develop some manner of self doubt over the fact that every aspect of himself that was of value was gifted to him by the amulet. It would not consume him, as the prophet had seen fit to inure them all from the ravages of doubt with stress defense, but perhaps he did need someone to slake his lusts with and distract his mind. She had more than one new recruit from the halls of penance currently undergoing silent vigils.

Perhaps Lucas could be assigned as a mentor for them, to show them around. He was blessed by the prophet, and a new sister would see the prophet in him. The shadow of that desire would be more than strong enough if Lucas had the courage to act upon his own wishes. If he was not greedy, indiscreet, or unkind, he would have Talaada’s full support, and she had been given authority over discipline. The light of love inflames the passions, and it’s best that those within the Brotherhood find appropriate mates if the Prophet doesn’t desire them.

Now then, enough musing; she was as bad as the Prophet sometimes. Talaada stood and went to find the old archivist that had caught her eye, the one who’s hands shook too much to be a proper scribe anymore. His mind was still keen enough to feel horror at what was happening to his body with age. After that would be the arrogant young lady that resented, rather than admired, Lividia’s meteoric rise. She had been the darling of the priestly initiates before Lividia’s arrival, and would do anything to regain that position. Of course, it wouldn’t do for her to dislike the prime consort, so she’d need to be made to feel special somehow. Either that, or she’d need to have her will broken and put in her place.

Soon, people would be seeking out these little chats with Talaada. After all, they were invariably the most important conversations in the lives of anyone that Talaada chose. People did notice when their peers suddenly became beautiful, strong, and magically proficient overnight.

••••••••••

Nefarian hated his sister sometimes. He felt as much fondness for her as he did for any living being, but she was supposed to be competent in her own area of expertise. He tried to feel sympathy for her, since she’d been caught off guard, but there was no excuse for such a categorical defeat. It was endearing to think that she honestly saw his lack of overt interest as a lack of awareness, but she always was less intelligent than she thought she was. Mere days after she had tried to obfuscate, he had realized that she was hiding something in a flash of inspiration. A quiet whisper issued from his own innermost thoughts.

He had managed to convince her to give him a proper name for the dragon that had bound her to his cause. Netorareon. That said, the being that called itself Erich Bismark had been smiling in such a way as to possibly have been joking when he gave her that name. Nefarian didn’t understand stupid person humor.

The most majestic dragon of the black dragonflight looked over his map, the one he had attuned to the strange signal given off by the amulets, noting that the dots were spread quite far afield now. Like all of his ideas that came to him when his mind wandered, it was pure genius. He also had a live feed of his sister and several of her servants on a crystal ball, and an enchanted stylus which transcribed her surface thoughts. One could never be too careful; just today he found evidence that some of the energy was being channeled through to the stylus, potentially invalidating the entire method of observation.

Naturally, nobody else could possibly comprehend the research he had put into this signal. It was an entirely new type of magic, distinct from arcane, shadow, holy, elemental, Druidic, necromantic, chi, and fel energies while containing threads and aspects of each.

It would be easy to mistake for arcane, if one were feeble minded and simple, as it was structured upon absolute lines. Much like how shadowflame was a combination of elemental and shadow magic which magnified the powers of both, this “high magic” was a combination of all forms of magic. That was the working theory, anyway, and Nefarion was never wrong about such things. He could sometimes later become more right, however.

It was infuriating to have to divide his attention between the Chromatic Dragonflight and this threat that, by all rights, Onyxia should have caught and dealt with herself, but at least it was intellectually stimulating. The knowledge that the amulets themselves were trapped was perhaps the most irritating discovery of all; he might never be able to directly study them. Instead, he kept a running analysis of the signals being sent to and from all of the amulets he had found with his scans. It was enough to make some discoveries, to learn some possibilities.

The whispers of inspiration drove him to find a counterattack. A solution to this threat. A defense. A countermeasure. Anything more reliable than to send waves of his minions at the bastard and hope. Such an inferior strategy was beneath him, and though he had several countermeasures and protocols in play already, he wasn’t foolish enough to think he was safe.

No. He wouldn’t be safe until he could turn the amulets against his enemy. In time, he should be able to master them. Soon, he would be able to replicate the process. Ideally, he would develop a way to reverse or subvert it. He did love his dear sister, after all, and he would like it very much if she could be given a clearer understanding of their relative power and intelligence while he saved her life. Also, he’s always wanted to take a mate from another dragonflight. The sleeping ones would make excellent test subjects.

The enemy was getting stronger very quickly; something would need to be done soon.