[Log] O you Soul, greatly majestic, I have come that I may see you

[logosmaxima]

Who: Miracle Max & the Sewer Cryptid -- or, Magnus & Curze
What: Following the apocalyptic vision Curze shared with him of Prospero's fall, Magnus enacts an idea to help with his brother's seizures.
When: Late on the night of the full moon.
Where: Eventually, a field away from all the chaos.
Content warnings: Blood, almost certainly. Daemon summoning (shhh).

It is rare for Magnus' intense focus to be distracted from something he puts it to -- but distracted he has been, from the Story, from his game of being "Miracle Max", from all the half-real lives lived and lost in Montica.

The revelation of Prospero's fate had burned like an ember in his hearts. Concern for Roboute -- "Roberte" -- had suppressed it for a time, as had the delight of finding a willing student in Jadis. A smoldering fire, though, was a fire still and soon the thoughts of what awaited his world -- his precious sons -- had eaten through his willingness to play along with the tragicomedy the Library cast him in.

But he could do nothing -- yet -- to affect that awful future, so he had turned his attention to something he could change. Konrad believed his prophecies were immutable, but Magnus could -- would -- show him otherwise. It was the absence of a certain detail from Prospero's fall that suggested the solution, calling back to a notion he'd had and set aside before he'd stepped into that hellish vision.

There had been no Tutelaries present.

A plan of action had assembled itself feverishly in his mind after that. He had settled what other affairs he'd had in Montica, at House Guildulf and in the market, capping his good deeds with the gift of his wagon and all its contents to the woman Miracle Max would gladly have taught more. But alas, a missive from his far-distant home called him urgently away --

Then he'd gone hunting, and stayed at it until he had all he needed, well into the night of the full moon and the chaos it brought with it. Only once he had all in readiness for his planned ritual did he seek out the most important component: The other participant.

Unlike those of his brothers who are buried in their roles, Curze's aura blazes through Montica with dark intensity. It is no difficult for Magnus to follow that black beacon in his wolf-shape, making his way arrow-straight for it in complete disregard of whatever fighting he must pass through. Fires quench in his wake, disputants find themselves thrown far apart from each other with titanic kine-thrusts, but with the whole city in turmoil the trail he cuts is a narrow one.

It terminates at a bonfire garnished with scents of burning sugar rather than roasting flesh. Magnus sheds his other-self in an unostentatious swirl of light, assuming "Miracle Max's" smaller form, and studies his brother. That Konrad has divorced himself from the wider struggle is not surprising -- he had an intimation of his brother's pact with the Orlock, to keep those most precious to them unmolested -- and that Konrad still has managed to cover himself in blood is, likewise, no surprise, but the marshmallows are ... a little unexpected.

"I feel I must ask where you got those from," he says, first, and then follows with: "I have the first part of the solution to your affliction. If you are willing, we may enact it tonight."

Right now. In the middle of a burning city.

The Story does not matter, in the face of the suffering to come.

Comments

[curzed]

It's been a lively evening. He'd crossed paths once or twice with the attacking vampires, but they were maintaining their side of the bargain, so he did too - he wasn't going to interfere with what they were doing. That said absolutely nothing about the safety of werewolves.

Which might be where all that blood came from. It's not the first time he's loitered somewhere stained in gore, red to the elbows at minimum and once more in desperate need of soap, but there is none, and he'd fight it anyway. There's a message to it now, even as he sits on grimy heels and patiently sets fire to another marshmallow. He has two kinds now, the ones he'd made himself, and some far more uniform cylinder-shaped ones that aren't getting eaten quite as fast as the ones he'd come up with.

They taste about the same to him, save for the undertones of flavor that came with exactly where he'd gotten the gelatin from.

It's not hard this time to hear Magnus coming, the Crimson King is leaving a wake behind him, and going anywhere to disrupt that beeline is ... not in the cards for the rest of the night. A charred, oozing marshmallow is offered on the end of a burnt stick found somewhere, the swirl of light turning wolf to man almost but not quite drowned out by the firelight. It's all still too bright, and reflects cleanly in the back of his eternally too-wide pupils in a silver sheen. "Do you really want to know?"

Soylent marshmallow has a non-vegan origin.

The rest is considered for a moment before he rises to bare, bloodstained feet and stretches languidly. There's a new series of thin injuries, mostly healed, but very little of that blood is his own. "Guilliman and Sanguinius should be reasonably safe til sunrise. I suppose I can spare a few hours. What is your solution?"

His concern is more the brothers trapped in the Story than the Story itself.

[logosmaxima]

Magnus accepts and consumes the offered marshmallow so quickly that it almost looks a gesture without consideration behind it. It is not -- a primarch, after all, may consider his situation quite rapidly, and a gift of food before a ritual that does not require one to be fasted is not to be turned down. To reject a token of hospitality would cool the fellow-feeling that should burn warm between the celebrants, and that would simply not do.

Besides, the taste of hominid-derived gelatin is unmistakable, though it's been processed and blended enough he gets only the most fleeting trace of dying outrage from whoever once wore those proteins. He licks a last smear of gooey char from his thumb, and replies, "I do now, whether I will or not. Very clever."

Though how Konrad had time to render the raw material for his confections, ah. That question he won't pursue.

Not now, anyway.

"We will summon you a Tutelary," he continues, in response to the other question. (That their brothers remain safe is noted with relief, but he will not permit himself distraction to discuss it.) "A guardian shaped of your own soul and nature. My sons have found them useful companions, amplifiers and filters for their own workings with the Great Ocean. They have also proven guardians against its worst distortions.

"In your case, it would serve to dampen your visions and shape the flow of the power that burns through you. It will buy you peace, and stop the worst of the damage."

[curzed]

His grin is a brief flash of teeth and little more..some things he'd been working on since a day after arriving! "Don't try it with a werewolf, the foulness of the blood lingers so." Part of him is tempted to burn another; he's aware most people probably would prefer them something other than gooey and on fire, but his tastes had always been.. different in a lot of respects. Maybe some part of him didn't register food as food even now if it wasn't likely to be refused by others.

How the Thousand Sons did things, what tutelaries even ate, eludes him. He'd never cared to know the inner workings of another legion so closely. That there's already warning flags the likes of Roboute would have noticed will remain a mystery for a while yet.

Only daemons exist in the warp.

"A pet." Could they really do such things? Magnus would know now, he supposed. Deferring to someone else is not something that comes easily to him, but no vision etched the edges of his awareness with warning, so either this was useless or simply didn't count as a terrible fate. "Very well. What is required for this? The city is restless tonight."

[logosmaxima]

There was a part of Magnus that had always known the Tutelaries had something in common with the predators that swam the Great Ocean, and something in common with the massive not-so-benevolent Entities that lurked in its depths. Roboute's shattering revelations of his own future -- his betrayal of all their Father created -- had called his attention sharply to what he'd so long refused to acknowledge, except in isolated cases. He had pledged to do better, to strive to throw off the noose around his neck --

But change, even for him, is not enacted completely and in a moment.

Tainted by relation the Tutelaries might be, they are still useful, and with Konrad's other solutions few and far between, summoning one to help is a risk Magnus is willing to take. A risk he means to take with an eye more open to what such a creature could do, and the intent to bind it against the worst harms it could cause ... but a risk, all the same.

"A pet in the same sense Russ's canine companions are," the sorcerer replies dryly.

"I have located a suitable field outside the city, away from the fires and the fighting, and secured all the materials we might need. I assume you have one of your knives with you still."

He had debated over whether plain steel or adamantium would do, or whether he ought to seek something more exotic for the ritual. Ultimately, the significance of the knife's relationship to Konrad -- the blood it had drunk in his brother's flawed pursuit of justice -- weighed larger than a piece of meteor-steel would.

In another eye-blink he's back in his lupine shape. "Shall we go?" the giant wolf asks.

[curzed]

"A pet then." It's pointed. He didn't care for the canines that followed the Space Wolves around, and connected no great meaning to the shaggy beasts. For all that the wolves were dangerous, they didn't seem to be for their masters, and he'll draw that parallel easily enough. Magnus wouldn't be offering one of these ... creatures, if it was likely to make his situation worse.

That Magnus seemed to relish that form, even with the revelation of what was to happen to Prospero is for a moment diverting. Maybe it was a choice, to spit in the eye of the Wolf King and claim something of Russ' fully for his own. "I have several." He's always got knives! He did give one away, but the ones that were weapons and not for skinning were still tucked away on his person. "..Lead the way."

He doesn't bother with claiming the bat-form this Story has lent him. He doesn't need that in order to keep up.

[logosmaxima]

It was fully a choice to spit in the eye of the Wolf King. (Perhaps, also, in the smallest way, to try and understand him better. Magnus had not expected Russ' anguish at Prospero. There ... was something there to discover.)

The sorcerer-werewolf does not require more than lead the way to take off at a ground-eating deer-like lope. His track is unerring for a gate furthest from the invading vampiric forces, and their path is thus largely without obstacles or enemies to slow their pace. A solitary fire that has half-consumed a townhouse does wink out as Magnus races past it, smothered at its base.

The gate they are headed for has -- tragically, but usefully -- been left open this night. Passing out of it, the giant wolf leads his brother down the road stemming from it and into Montica's surrounding fields, at last stopping at one left fallow for the season and sewn over with clover.

This is the spot. The Magus' mark already lies on the field, in lines and arcane symbols denoted by places the clover has been forced into early flower.

[curzed]

It's not hard to keep pace, not with a primarch's speed and stamina. While he wasn't as fast as he should be, but it's enough, combined with simply never having to stop for the duration, to get out of the city quickly. He'd been content to ignore the fires.

Still was. Though the pair are spotted by a watching Orlock, they're not interfered with; a wolf that big alone was a Problem, dealing with the Night Haunter too was compounding stupidity. Besides, wolves weren't their targets tonight.

His thoughts aren't on Prospero. That was ... a long time away, if it hadn't yet happened to Magnus, and thus nothing to be done about it now. Not that anything could be at all.

What could be done are the gaps in knowledge that didn't come to him in visions. Like any of this. It's a mystery, beyond the telegraphed second to second of where to put feet to keep balance and maintain his pace, the impression of where they're going instead of where they are - and the clover field thus isn't entirely a mystery.

The arcane lines are, though. He had very little to do with his Librarians, and all of this.. means nothing to him. When he slows his pace, neither particularly winded nor sweaty from the minor exertion, it's to step a bit more carefully in case touching any of it might go .. badly. "Flowers?" An interesting choice.

[logosmaxima]

The wolf steps delicately around the symbols he's bloomed, placing each dark foot with studied deliberation until he stands within the center of the arcane design. Then he once more resumes his human form -- his true human form, taller than a house and glorious to look upon -- before beckoning his brother to join him with one hand. The path he'd picked through the flowers was winding, intricate, and ritual in its focus, but there is a wider and more inviting way to where he stands coincidentally (as if anything ever were, with the Crimson King) near where Konrad has stopped.

"Flowers," he replies. His voice has resumed its normal dimensions as well, deep enough for infrasound undertones that only add to the uncanny aura afflicting mortals in his unshielded presence. Now is not the time to temper his own nature, not any longer.

"The journey to awaken and bind a Tutelary is ordinarily that of the Philosophus alone, as he approaches the Lord of the Threshold to complete his journey to adepthood. The symbols he chooses to ward himself with -- their materials, meanings, and colors -- set the course of his seeking as he enters the Great Ocean, and dictate much of what he will find.

"We two conduct the Katabasis, the Descent, together. You cannot yet swim the Great Ocean so I will provide that power, but you must be both my navigator and defense, as best you can -- for it is your own soul's companion we seek. You will be the one to recognize it.

"Flowers," now they're back to that part of the lecture; he sweeps a hand to encompass the field, "the humble clover in particular, in a field lying fallow for the season -- symbols of renewal from the death that is to come, of hope and the tenacity of all that lives. There is danger and loss in its season, but we endure it and are refreshed with spring's arrival."

There is a pause -- a sense he could go on at a great deal more length -- before he adds, more softly, "The other option would be to have burned the lines, and I am sick to dying of the taste of ash."

Prospero's ashes, clotted and bitter on his tongue. Konrad deserves that truth from him.

"But come, Neophyte -- enter the circle and bring your knife."

[curzed]

How much of this is necessary and how much is just .. frivolous overtones to make it seem more impressive, he can't begin to guess. There was no ritual and art to the visions he endured, but perhaps if it had been less an exercise in suffering, he'd have been more inclined to seek ... what, methods of settling his mind beforehand? Something restful, centering.

But that wasn't how it worked, and so this outline in the clover is studied with a critical, judgmental eye.

Even at his height, he's still dwarfed by his crimson brother; he lacks the sheer weight of presence Magnus has - or at least, the psychic weight of him. A killer, even the so-called King of Terrors, by necessity had a different metaphorical footprint. But he is no more swayed by his brother's presence than his own instilled fear in Magnus, a convenient loophole of their transhuman natures.

It would do no good to be cowering, crippled by the influence Magnus has over his vicinity. Although he might not take any great measure in the symbolism and colors and such here, he makes note of the parts which are sensible to him, a concrete thing he can work with, like somehow recognizing the creature they're looking to conjure up.

Maybe he would. If this is something he would do, would always do, there would be inevitably.. a sense of rightness to the timeline. A flicker of vision. Maybe he would know when he found it.

"Hm. Perhaps I should not have offered you a marshmallow after all." Sweetness and ash, all. The taste of flames. It sets a tone.

There's going to be more trust in this, that he's still reluctant to give to anyone at all. A lifetime of relying on himself and only himself means such trust is always difficult, requires deliberate effort .. and in this, what sounded awfully like jumping into the Immaterium and rummaging about until something interesting happens, is going to take a lot of faith.

Gellar fields exist for a reason.

As he steps closer, from somewhere on his person are drawn a pair of darkly gleaming blades, one serrated, the other smoothly curved, both meticulously clean. Anywhere else it'd be an ominous sight, the approach of the blood-crusted Night Haunter and his favored implements of inflicting suffering. "Which knife? The tool, or the weapon?" One for skinning, the other for killing, a flaying knife and a micro-serrated throwing knife.

[logosmaxima]

From a certain point of view, anything a psyker did above and beyond exercise his will on the Immaterium was unnecessary. The words, the gestures, the talismanic objects that focused power -- outside certain very specialized equipment that could truly increase a psyker's might -- were all simply dispensable methods that helped the sorcerer bring his will to bear. Any of the Thousand Sons, and Magnus himself, could enact great works of power without so much as lifting a finger to show they were doing so.

From another point of view, all the trappings were indispensable -- for anything that brought the sorcerer to contest directly with the Great Ocean, and the creatures therein, for all of that world was exquisitely tuned to the intent and mood of those who traversed it. What seemed mere frippery on the material side of the Veil could be shield and weapon on the far side, holding a psyker strong against the worst of the predators that swam the Sea of Dreams.

(There is no questioning, however, that Magnus enjoys a certain amount of melodrama in his presentation as the Magus, in much the same way Curze's flayed skins and slaughterhouse patina contributed to the image of the Lord of Terror.

They both get it from their Father.)

At the mention of the marshmallow, an un-Magus-like smile creases Magnus' face, still tinged with the melancholy of his confession. "Perhaps. But it was a gift accepted in the spirit it was offered. That's no small thing."

Then, returning to his more ritual mien, he continues: "The tool. You do not need another weapon to be effective at what you do. If you will stand here --," he gestures to the very center of a circle-within-the-circle, where waits a small silver bowl filled with something that shines in the moonlight, "I must ask of you one more thing that may be the most difficult you do this night."

There's a gleam of mischief in his eye when he says that. That ... might ... be teasing. Of a kind.

[curzed]

The Widowmaker slips back into its unseen place, alongside several of its cohorts. He didn't need a bolter and never would carry one if he had his way, those wicked little knives did just as well.

Anything like mischief stops him in his tracks though, before he crosses the little array of circles as bidden, suddenly and intensely suspicious. The circles are considered, the silver bowl also eyed, and then Magnus eyed also with sudden deep mistrust through the curtain of lank black hair. "Which is?"

[logosmaxima]

"I must divest you of the vestiges of blood and recent violence you wear."

He says it so seriously, but that gleam is still there in his eye.

"It will not change the state of your soul, but it will reduce the chance of certain unwanted encounters with the predators of the Great Ocean."

He reaches down with a swirl of kine force to loft the bowl into his hands. It would be a sizable laving basin for a mortal, and it's decorated like it came from a noble house, but it barely covers half his cupped palms as he holds it. He's not going to dump that on Konrad is he --

[curzed]

Almost absently he upturns the hand not currently carrying a knife and considers the dried layer of blood and grime he'd been collecting for the past week. "You people and your delicate sensibilities," he rumbles, displeased. He didn't think about it. It simply wasn't important. There were always more vital things to be concerned with than being presentable.

He didn't enjoy the last round of being doused in water, and the new threat of the same tilts the mistrust towards prickling hostility. But his voice is still as serene as the grave. "These 'predators'. They are the daemons Sanguinius spoke of?" And in his way, Guilliman as well.

Hungry things. Things that wished to corrupt and kill. Black eyes narrow. "Let them come, and put to the test if the never born can ever die. If there is a creature for me in that place it will share my nature, will it not?"

One might hope not, if the goal is calming the storm that was his 'gifts', and aiding in stability instead of further violence and mayhem.

[logosmaxima]

A cluck of the sorcerer's tongue meets his brother's grumbling. "A rude field-cleanse is nothing to the washing and anointing a true Philosophus would undergo before attempting this ritual," he says. "A day's preparation, from midnight to midnight."

But they do not have the leisure of that time or space, and aside from that, Konrad ... does have a point. Magnus' expression goes from teasing to thoughtful as he listens to his brother's argument -- it is so, that he is not one of the urbane, studious sons of Prospero who would ordinarily embark on this ritual. His sorcery -- if he is given leave, and structure, to develop it beyond his awful wild talent -- will not be their polished ritual magic. The Tutelary he attracts to aid him in gaining control of his talents will not be the same as those the Thousand Sons call to them.

So why should he not go to find his soul's companion still reeking of blood? He should have as much say -- or more -- in this ritual than Magnus.

At length, the sorcerer nods, gravely. "That is the intent. You are right, then, that seeking it covered in the blood of the slain should be no hindrance."

And then he sighs. " ... Yes. They are the same daemons. Things with that name should not exist, in the world Father has decreed, but we have long dealt with them by other names."

It is ... good, in its way, to be able to acknowledge that. Good, and painful, because he does love his Father. He loves the world his Father would build.

But it is impossible. The Primordial Creator is real. The Primordial Annihilator is real. Daemons are real, and no amount of stubborn disbelief would obliterate them.

[curzed]

"I am no Philosophus. I never will be."

He doesn't understand, really, what these daemons are, and if thus, a tutelary is one of them, but assumes it will be more clear as time goes on. Every wild beast is dangerous, but some can be tamed, brought to heel, even domesticated over time. Was it similar for these creatures? Were some simply more inclined to be cooperative?

Answers for later. Perhaps it would be more obvious when seen in practice.

Finally he steps on still-filthy feet into the circles drawn for him with something approaching grace, though that water is still being eyed with suspicion. It wouldn't be beyond Magnus to agree and then do whatever he wanted anyway. "Not hard to see why." The skinning knife is rolled like a coin through his fingers, a flash of bone handle and dark adamant. "Tell Russ there's foes in the Immaterium beyond foreign psykers, do you think he'd sit back and do nothing? Do you think Alpharius wouldn't investigate? Or Lorgar?" Crowned in fire, screaming at an uncaring sky. It's shoved away, hard, in the hopes it wouldn't grow overwhelming. "Or any of us, faced with a new enemy? It would have to be studied."

And that's terribly dangerous, isn't it, if the IX were nearly brought low by such things. "If even some of the tales of old horrors are true, then that would be disaster. Keeping us ignorant has kept us safe for .. how long? But not much longer." The flicker of images, of places and times far from here, threaten to rise to overwhelming, stifling coherence. "Call them by a different name. Creatura sine corpore. Res immaterialis malevola."

[logosmaxima]

When Konrad steps into the circle, Magnus relinquishes his hold on the bowl, leaving it floating in midair. He takes a vial of oil and a small silken bag from somewhere within his voluminous robe, bringing with them faint scents of cedar and myrrh. From the former, he taps seven sweet-smelling drops over the water in the bowl, smoothing its surface until it is mirror-flat and spangled with reflected stars. From the latter, seven precious lumps of resin are sent kinetically spiraling down to an offering bowl hidden amidst the clover and set to smoldering.

Then he dabs the oil on his fingers, anointing his own crown, forehead, and eyelid. Thought and sight of two kinds, before wading into the Great Ocean. The abbreviated ritual preparations give him time to listen to Konrad -- and more importantly, require such exactness that he remains silent as he conducts them, rather than interrupting. When he does speak, it is -- at first -- only, "If you would permit me to anoint you," and he will wait for permission to apply oil to his brother's head and face as he had his own. This time, he murmurs invocations to principles of Will and Thought, seeking to open the seeker's eyes to the companion that awaits him in the Great Ocean.

Only when that is done, does Magnus respond to what Konrad has said. His tone is oddly subdued, for him, devoid of his usual passion. "For all that you are right, I fear Father bought us that peace at our own future cost -- and for little permanent gain. And," he holds up a hand, "that is a debate we must have after this, for there must be no disharmony within this circle."

Not anymore than they brought with them, with their mutual history and roiling souls.

[curzed]

More things of unknown purpose beyond show. Was this specifically necessary? Oils and strange scents he only ever really encountered on Fulgrim's ships; he understands none of it but will remember all of it. In time perhaps he will get opportunity to observe his own Legion's sorcerers and determine how much of these processes were used by even his sons, and how much is Magnus.

Mysteries for another time. Allowing that concoction to be put on him as Magnus had done to himself is the barest of nods, unflinching when touched though it takes effort. One day, perhaps, the learned habit of treating every touch like an imminent threat won't be necessary.

Maybe. Until then it's easy to keep curiosity subdued, and resist the impulse to rub the oil off or lick it and discover what exactly is in it. "There's time for 'debate' later." True but not, the lore quickly cooperation is learned between this city's houses, the more likely the required ending of peace is at risk and thus .. an ending is achieved. "But harmony.. is an unfair challenge."

Calm could be feigned, but genuine? He'll do what he can, but he's back to fidgeting with the knife in an absent, restless way. Curze is as ever a thoroughly unmystical soul. Even if none of this is truly necessary, if it relies on Magnus and Magnus finds it important to the task, then so be it. All of this requires his brother's knowledge, including these creatures of the Warp.

If it worked.. then maybe..

No. Baseless hope has never done him any good before.