06. 🗡️

[undread]

You and the rest of the Bell's Hells are gathered in an inn for the night. As you all come back at the end of a long day of shopping and exploring, you notice Orym with a different sword slung over his back than the one he usually carries. The old sword was a pretty leaf design, honouring its owner, Orym's deceased husband. It's rather large for a halfling, but Orym carries it well.

The new sword is immediately familiar to you; a sick sense of recognition washes over you. It's most familiar to you dripping with blood. Once, that sword belonged to an enemy, and she drove that sword through you and you lost your life. She's cut down many of your friends with it, though nearly all of you are still lucky enough to be here today. Otahan Thull is dead now, but she took your friend F.C.G with her, and that was only a week before. Orym is carrying Otahan's sword, the one that killed his husband and also the one that killed you.

It makes you uncomfortable. You don't like remembering that, your second death, or remembering her and all she's taken from you. And it also feels unfair. It's such a powerful item. Orym didn't ask if he could have it. He is the only one of you who wields a sword, but he didn't even bother to ask.

But you try to put it aside. You have to buy travel clothes tomorrow, so you get to work on designing a new dress and don't focus on it. But before you sleep, you see Orym settled in to his bunk to rest, the sword still tied to him by a vine, and your eye twitches, and that dark feeling of anger and resentment comes over you again.

It's a dark memory, isn't it, my dear?

The voice that speaks is a feminine voice, and it speaks only in your head. It's reassuring; at least, right now is it. When her mood is kind and understanding, sometimes you don't mind her presence.

To keep something filled with such terrible memories so close. She makes a disapproving 'tsk' sound. The wound will never heal.

In this moment, you especially don't mind her. What she says sounds right to you. Is is a dark memory. It still hurts. Why does he have to remind you of it like this? "It's cursed," you say. "Why is he carrying it?" Maybe not literally cursed, maybe there's no dark spell on it, but the things it has done, the things it's responsible for...

Maybe it's not Otahan that drove it through you, Delilah says. Maybe the blade drove Otohan. It wouldn't be my first foray with weapons that can possess and compel the user.

You hadn't been thinking it was literally cursed, but now that Delilah points out the possibility, you feel frightened. Orym - he may have been inconsiderate, but you don't want him hurt or possess or killed by the sword. He doesn't deserve that. "Do you think it could turn Orym?" you ask.

I don't know. She sounds indecisive. I'd have to hold it first.

A spike of nerves hits you. The last time Delilah had you touch a powerful magical item, she was deceiving you. She tricked you into touching it so she could absorb its power for herself. But you still can't shake this feeling - when you look at the sword, you get such a bad feeling from it. And also, it occurs to you, maybe it wouldn't be bad if she took it. If she became more powerful, you would be more powerful, too. You're one in the same, two souls forced to occupy the same body. Your enemies, like Otohan, are so powerful. You want to be powerful, too.

"You used to be in the Cerberus Assembly, didn't you? Did you know Ludinus? Were you friends?"

Your other most dangerous enemy, even worse than Otohan. A powerful wizard. But so was Delilah, you remind yourself.

He doesn't have friends. He surrounds himself with tools, things to be used and discarded. He doesn't have many allies. Few who spend their time in the Assembly do.

"It must be exhausting, spending your life around fair weather friends." Your voice sounds angry. You hate feeling disappointed or betrayed by your friends. You hate when they do things that hurt you without meaning to, you hate when they're selfish and don't consult you or consider you. Like Ashton, like F.C.G., like Orym. But you know, at the end of the day, they love you. You've experienced what it's like to be all alone, so desperately alone that you'd do anything for companionship, but you can't understand what it's like to be alone and not care. To be able to tolerate that is an unfathomable strength.

Maybe, but it's certainly a path to get things done if you're smart enough, Delilah says.

"You should help me more," you say petulantly. Orym gets a powerful new sword, and she gets nothing. Just lectured and manipulated by Delilah. She thinks you're so stupid that she can trick you into touching the sword, but you're clever enough to know better.

Give me more, and I'll help you.

You creep over to where Orym is sleeping. The sword is tied to his hilt by a little vine. You run your finger along the blade, lightly, as soft as a spider. As you run your finger over it, where your finger runs along it, you see this faint trail of purple, like a blade that had been heated, but it's a purple hue instead of an orange, and it fades slowly after. It hums with power, with history, with lives lost and blood spilled.

"So? Is it cursed?"

You have to wield it for me to know.

You try to grip it a little stronger without waking Orym. You don't want him to wake and see you, so you cast Darkness, creating a cloud of magical darkness around you. The vines binding it need to be cut to get it free, so you send necrotic energy into them, withering them so they decay into nothing. But you aren't careful enough. They're so small, and Orym wakes with a start with a gasp of pain as your necrotic energy hurts him as well.

It's pitch dark. You can't see him and he can't see you, but you can hear him. And instantly, automatically upon being attacked in his sleep by a stranger shrouded in magical darkness, he pulls out his other sword, the old sword, and he attacks. You try to skitter up the wall and climb away, but you're hit with his sword, three heavy slashes across your body, knocking you back into the wall. You're hurt, badly, in fact, but you skitter onto the ceiling and try to use magic to steal the sword from him. He still can't see you, but he can feel the direction you're pulling at him from, so he shoots blades of air in that direction, and they cut through you. You lose the ability to focus on maintaining the darkness. It's gone, and you're lying on the ground in a crumpled bloody heap. Orym stands above you, ready to bring the sword down on you, his face stoic and determined, but you watch as it shifts into confusion and worry.

"Laudna?"

He's about to drop his weapon, stop attacking, but you try once again for the sword. He's much faster than you. He rolls, grabs it out of your way, and flips back to standing with the sword pointed at you. A threat, if not a malicious one; it's clear he doesn't know why this is happening, but he's a trained soldier and he will defend himself.

You're angry at him. He hurt you. He's supposed to be your friend and he hurt you. He may not have known it was you, but that's no excuse. He's pointing the sword at you, the sword that killed you, and you hate him for it. You cast a spell on him, trying to frighten him into dropping it and running away. It doesn't work either. None of it worked.

"Laudna." He's less worried and more angry now, but in his calm, unflappable Orym way. "You want to tell me what the fuck is going on?"

"You're not safe," you mutter, your voice petulant, like this should be obvious.

"Yeah!" He agrees. "I don't feel very safe right now!"

"That sword will corrupt you, just like it corrupted Otohan," you announce.

You realize the rest of your friends are all awake now, watching, frozen and uncertain what to do or what even if fucking happening.

"Laudna, what makes you think that?" Imogen asks, her face worried, looking back and forth between you and Orym. "Orym, put that sword down."

"I sensed it," you say stubbornly. "It's an evil presence." Everyone looks between each other, unable to discern what you mean or how you would have sensed that. This just makes you even more angry. Not just at Orym, at all of them. Your tone gets bitter, nasty. "Why are you holding it? The audacity of you walking into this room holding that blade. It should be cast into the depths of the Lucidian Ocean, and you want to wield it."

"I'm going to need a little more clarification than that, Laudna," Orym says firmly.

"What more clarification do you need? I am telling you, it is a cursed sword. You saw your husband speared on it, you saw me speared on it, and you think wielding it is the correct choice to make. Why do you need it? You have a perfectly fine sword."

"You're right," Orym says sarcastically. "Why would I need help from some dark force." He looks at you while he says it, making a pointed comment about your reliance on Delilah. "But I think putting it through the gut of the man who caused every single thing you mentioned to happen would be fine by me." He snaps the sword back on his back, creates vines again to hold it. "I can be convinced, but I need convincing. And you know what's not very convincing? Being attacked in the middle of the night."

"I didn't attack you," you mutter. "It was incidental - I was trying to remove it from your sheath. I was trying to remove the vines."

"If Laudna says it's cursed..." Imogen sounds so uncertain. "Maybe there's someone who can look at it. Maybe Essek can tell us, or Pumat."

The tension sits for a moment, Orym still staring at you, disbelievingly furious. Your anger is there, but it's starting to give way to that fear you always feel when someone is angry at you. You're hurt. He hurt you. You don't want to be hurt. Ashton, tall and strong, carefully gets up and places their body between you and Orym, protectively. You aren't sure who they're protecting, though their back is turned to you, and you don't feel as frightened. They give you a gentle look, and whisper in your ear, "Start with sorry." You start to object - that's not fair, he's the one with the sword - but Ashton adds, "For hurting him. Nothing more, nothing else. Everything else is on the table."

Orym relaxes slightly, too. "I'm fine to be wrong, but let's just talk about it. Let's let that be the opening gambit."

You also deflate, no longer defensive now that you aren't feeling as though Orym might attack you again. "I didn't mean to hurt you, that's the truth. That is the truth." No part of you wants to hurt Orym, even if you're angry. Not really. Orym is one of the kindest people you've ever met. "But I find it quite a mockery and a slap in the face that you walk in with it on your back without any consultation with the rest of us."

At this point, Fearne nervously pipes up that she can identify magical items, and Chetney reminds them that he can read the history of items. They both use these abilities, but they get nothing conclusive. It's a sword that has been wielded by many evil people, with a dark and ugly history, but if there's an actual curse on it that could hurt Orym, it's not one either of them can identify.

Imogen stands near you while this happens, holding you, still uncertain. "This seems a little out of character, Laudna," she says gently. "You know you can always talk to us, you don't have to do things in secret." She hesitates for a long moment, like she wants to say something else, but doesn't.

"I didn't mean to hurt him," you insist. "It was just careless." But you're still angry. You don't like the sword. "But I want him to give it to me. I will take it in and destroy it. That will end the cycle." No one seems to understand this line of reasoning; that it makes sense for you to absorb the sword's energy rather than for Orym to carry it.

You get tired of arguing, and you open a window and try once again to pull the sword towards you with magic. This time, it comes to you. You touch it, and you feel Delilah's presence, her want and hunger pushing through you, pressing against your fingertips. That pull, that draw to the power, is so intense. But you hesitate; she can't absorb it without you letting her, and you hesitate.

"Stop!" Imogen shouts. "Let it go." She doesn't seem hesitant anymore, she looks angry. "I don't think it's you that wants this. It's just a sword, Laudna. Why do you want it to be part of you, if it's so awful?"

You let go of the sword, not wanting to hurt Imogen, but still wanting it, still wanting to convince her, just not wanting her to be angry with you.

Finally, Chetney points out that he has Otohan's dagger, also a powerful weapon. He tells you that he'll give it to you, but he wants you to let Orym keep the sword. "It's Orym's to do with as he pleases. He's lost a lot, and I trust him. But I also trust you." You're tired of arguing; the dagger is also powerful. It's good enough. You take it from Chetney, but angrily tell him not to speak to you about loss again. And then you climb out the window and skitter up the wall up to the roof of the inn, where you sit, holding the sword.

You hold the dagger in your hands, and you feel the power thrum through it, too. And you feel Delilah, hungry inside you, and you feed her. You stab the dagger into your chest, and it dissolves into purple light, pure raw energy. And you feel stronger. And it almost feels like you can feel Delilah, too, her arms around you in an embrace, growing stronger as well.

But then you turn, and you see Imogen there. She flew after you. And her expression is stricken, terrified. She reaches out and puts her hands on either side of your face. "Why? Why'd you give her more power?"

You're sick of apologizing. "It must be done. For us, and the fate of the world. What else do I have to give except for myself?" You hear Delilah's words in your head, echoing these words as you speak them.

"You didn't have to do this," Imogen says tearfully. "We fought so hard for you. I love you."

"I love you," you echo, absently. But then the words hit you. The feeling of Delilah's presence vanishes. And you just feel scared, and alone, wondering why Imogen is standing here looking like she's terrified of you. "I love you," you repeat, urgently. "What makes you think that might have changed? I love you." The sensation of hunger and power ebbs and falls away even more, and you're just scared and lost and terrified you're losing the person who matters most to you and you don't even understand why. "Why are you looking at me like that? Imogen?"

"She... she holds more power over you than you led us to believe," Imogen says.

"I didn't lie to you," you rush to insist. "I've never lied to you. Never. I love you. Do you still love me?"

"I'll always love you, Laudna," she says, heartbroken. "I just don't know what to do with it."

But she goes to hold you and you hold her back, uncertain, hoping you can make this right somehow, but not sure exactly where it went so wrong. You were so certain you were doing what was right until you saw her react like this, and now you're not certain of anything anymore.

"Was it you who took the sword, or was it her?" Imogen asks.

You hesitate for a long moment. As you were doing it, you thought you were in complete control, but you're not so sure anymore. "I don't know how much good it's going to be going forward to distinguish between the two of us."

"Okay," she says. "Did you take it because you thought it was wrong he was carrying it, or because you wanted to have that power?"

Again, you thought you knew the answer but you're not sure. "She...told me it was bad. And it made me uncomfortable seeing it. I thought I was doing the right thing."

"You know Delilah lies, right? You know she's not out for your best interests?" She shakes her head. "I thought she was gone, and now she's stronger than she ever was. I think if you want to get rid of her, you have to stop feeding her. But that's a choice, Laudna. If that's not what you choose..."

"Imogen, I already told you," you say, and you smile at her, wanting her to be less awfully sad. "I'm a dead end. This goal we have to stop him - once that's done, I just can't help but feel like I have to put everything into it, even if it will be the end of me. Which honestly, maybe it should. Maybe it should. I want to look at Delilah as a tool to use, and then discard when I'm done."

"I'm afraid she looks at you the same way," Imogen says, not able to look at you after you say all of this.

"I didn't mean to hurt anyone. I wasn't lying." It's important Imogen knows that much. "I don't like people being mad at me," you add. "Least of all you, I hate upsetting you. I'm terrified it's going to keep happening."

"I think she's lying, Laudna, and I don't know if you know the difference right now." She swallows and looks up at you. "I don't know where tomorrow's going to take us, or the next day. I don't know where all this will lead, Laudna. I don't believe you're a dead end, but ultimately, that's up to you. You're powerful without her, sometimes I think you might be stronger without her. She certainly would never let you think that, though. There's a reason she chose you, you know that, right?"

You wilt a little, uncertain. "I don't think I do..."

"You're so much more than her," Imogen says again.

"But I don't think I can make you promises that I'm going to be able to resist her," you say. "I feel like I've made those promises before, I've tried to tell you I can. And maybe that's what comes across as a lie. So I might as well just say it. Just as Orym wishes to wield that sword, I wish to wield Delilah."

"I understand," Imogen says, but there's something closed off about it. And then her voice cracks, getting teary. "I'm going to miss our little cottage, though."

You nod, also blinking back tears, thinking of the plans you had, after all of this, to find a place together and just lead a happy life. You don't remember when that stopped being your goal. But it feels like acknowledging it, acknowledging that your future is over, means acknowledging that everything else between the two of you is on unsteady ground as well. You kiss her hand, and let her lead you back down to the inn, and both of you go your separate ways to sleep that night.