Chapter 26:

Chapter 26: Warnings are lesson and lessons are valuable and people should learn well when they are given.



"Gua Bis will not be happy brother." Aesan said, a smirk evident in his song and voice

He said this in both song and speech, and this meant that it was both a portent of doom and not something given to him by his future selves because absolutely no one who has met the women needs to see the future to be told so.

We had requested from our slaves a small room for ourselves in order to discuss in peace and quiet things, and when they offered us the royal bedroom we told them that if they don't take our words seriously we'll sleep in a storage room.

They then asked for clarifications and provided us a barracks room that would house twenty people, proceeded to remove the bunks then put a bed in it.

"I know, Salara-Sao is now known to us as our godmother and as we learned of her machinations only after she arranged for my marriage, she now deserves it." I said with a grin.

That beautiful madwoman Gua Bis will be so mad when we tell her that. I just imagine the horror on her face when she realized we were tricked and she now needs to find some Harlequin of Cegorach to trick into marrying her family and it is enough to clean the infuriating nonsense of this world from my soul.

Salara-Sao is a Time Walker, a sub-specialization of the Followers of Hoeth that deal almost exclusively with time nonsense and prevents it by creating her own time nonsense to counteract it.

I am not yet experienced enough for a specialization but I think I'll settle for a Gods Grief, for causing annoying gods annoyances sounds appealing, but I'll wait and see what we need the most before deciding.

She created from her own people a species, or perhaps even better, a culture that for the first time in fifty million years will gladly serve Hoeth willingly and by doing so tricked both myself, my new wives and united my clan to that of theirs under her and created the Clan of Salara-Sao the Slithery. By doing so, she fulfilled one half of the nonsense required of having the Sirens recognized as people again, and made her bid to consideration for her own people as a secondary species in the Empire of the Ten Million Suns.

Secondary species are a theoretical fiction-not-yet-turned-fact created by design by the Pantheon and the Followers of Hoeth as a gambit to permanently kill Gorkamorka. The plan was to create a legal argument that would allow us to finally stop any and all chances for Gorkamorka to be reborn by integrating Gork and Mork into the legal framework of the Great Wheel through adoption and fully separate them from Gorkamorka. This would both bring back the Krork as they were made and would be granting us access to all the shiny new nonsense to exploit that the Old Ones put in them, and also get rid of an ever approaching threat that wants to kill everything.

Oh and destroy the orks once and for all too, but their small Whaaghs don't concern us much as long as they are short lived. It's them adding more nonsense to their arsenal that worries us greatly, which is something that they've been doing a lot recently.

That plan failed miserably because Gork and Mork did not care to try and just said that whoever wins their scrap would become their father again, so they refused and the Pantheon lost two possible members and still hasn't found a way to stop that monster from being reborn. And we have no other clue how to even go about it, and we have no other plan except to continue keeping the two eternally fighting and support whoever seems to be losing to make sure that doesn't change.

It's not even a holding action, just maintaining the status quo and even that is failing as the two now want to adopt humanity the same way we wanted to adopt them because they like my former people's guts.

I did not like knowing my new people stopped trying to exterminate my old one because Gork and Mork threatened that one will throw the fight if we intervene in the process and thus we stopped. Thus humanity are considered in the process of being adopted by Gork and Mork and considering how the two learn from each other I don't like it at all.

The orks did not use guns, even if they did use other ranged weapons rarely, nor have choppa-shoota souls or stormboyz before they met them and now they do and they continue to learn more.

Humanity is changing too, as my former people are getting more focused on melee fighting when before they avoided it and are more warlike and divided, yet are also becoming more and more willing to accept the rule of the Strong as Right and as time passes they will change more.

I can only hope the Anathema's gambit to stop it works, because otherwise the orkoid biosphere will gain a new species in it and they'll be specialized in knight and titan scale warfare and long range weaponry and the orks and krorks were scary enough when they were limited to melee and the rare ranged specialists and light vehicles on the ground. We don't need or want more nonsense from them, for we can barely deal with what they can do already.

The Anathema certainly has our support for his idea to deal with the adoption and its why I wished for a meeting to see if we can't help even more, as his is the only plan we've got left and we are willing to give it a shot and heap support for his scheme.

We're being taken for fools most likely, but we're desperate for a solution to this problem.

But besides that, the precedent and legal fiction-not-yet-fact remains and we can introduce other people and species as being the same as Eldar and, even as we have not done so before, the legal infrastructure exists and if we go with this plan and manage to Resurrect Hoeth, then when Cegorach is reborn again he'll be son of Hoeth and have a tail and love to swim in the water and the void and prank all he can find there and in-between the two.

I'm all for it, as Cegorach would enjoy it and I do wish him to be happy because he deserves it and more, and the idea that his second birth will bring joy and hope and not sorrow like his first will surely make him stop feeling sorry for being born from the death of his father and causing sorrow to his brothers and nephews.

The Followers of Hoeth are monsters, we have cleansed the galaxy clean of life several times, but we still care for each other, even if some of us have never met in person, and we do love our people in our own way and wish them well. We just really wish they did better decisions and weren't ill anymore and its why I don't hold it against Salara-Sao that she tricked me into marrying, as the Time Walkers are also our closest equivalent to therapists and if she prescribed me marriage then I'll take it. We're tools of Hoeth after all and their job is to prevent us from breaking before we've finished doing our job.

But back to the present, we now have our scrap metal and if they are to become more then they have my support for it but that's in the future. Now I need to determine how do I use my gifts and I'll think of a gift for her later.

"We all agree that our original plan is no longer viable and we need to think bigger?"

They all sang in agreement and we begun plotting, for we need to figure out how to cleanse multiple scrap worlds clean of eldar life as my plan is no longer enough for what is needed.

Our original plan was to create a third faction of sirens and their taken lovers that would be based around a large flat area standing at around sea level and surrounded by mountains on all parts and that holds one of the seven Webway gates on this world.

We would cleanse the place of eldar life and it would help us plenty, as the place is mostly controlled by cultists. We'll then flood it and put all sirens there and create the conditions to keep the place filled with water for a few million years as we started to dig down. The civilization there would have eldar we've raised ourselves from among the healthy population in the rest of world and whose sole purpose is ordering the Maton out by creating a princely bloodline and forbidding them on this world once we've done so, to allow for enough time that a civilization spawns properly.

We would then allow the sirens to organize properly and exterminate all independent eldar on the planet in a day and flooding the world after we were gone and they developed enough to resist pirate incursions and the like. We would make a new planetary prince or princess to make sure things are kept well, ensure that the sirens now have equal or better treatment than the surviving eldar on this world, and ensure proper practices to make sure none of them are losing their citizenship again once we gain theirs back.

We would then take some followers with us and get to the next stage and create a chain or web of bastions leading out of the Empire protected by my Wards of Darkness and maintained by masters of my craft that I'll train to allow for a massive exodus of the Sane and Healthy outside of the blast radius then hold till the Necrons or a few other of the Apocalypses we have planned for finish Slaanesh off.

Once that's done we will rebuild outside of the blast radius, deal with any treachery and reward loyalty, move back and see if we don't need to recreate the Eldar species again because if this is not enough to kill off Slaanesh for good I don't know what is. We killed her several times before being born and she comes back and if we can't fully kill her once she's born and in the metaphysical stabbing range of several god killers I don't know what will. The others don't know either but I'm hoping my possible cure will prevent her rise or give us options we don't have yet.

My part of the plan is no longer enough, we need to think bigger because better tools always means we got more work to do, especially if we want to help my new godmother's case in turning the Sirens into a secondary species and helping Cegorach stop blaming himself for causing his brothers sorrow.

This is also my first warning from my brothers and sisters, and it means that while my plan has promise I need to think bigger because my approach does not provide enough results, and if I'm not able to provide them the apocalypses on the scale they need them, them and their consequences following me will catch up and I will die from it.

I might not get another warning and I don't know how much this cost and now I have to make up for it.

~~~~

"It is difficult adjusting to the balance my love." I spoke to my now sister-wife.

I was now re-learning to dance on land as opposed to the sea and it is difficult because I am now shorter, my tail is thinner my center of mass is off and I cannot properly control my body yet because my muscles don't move like before.

They told me I should get used to land first before water as it will speed things up.

My sister-wife continues to love me even as I am changed and I love her for it. I'll just need to learn love myself again from her too.

"You're doing great my love, you remember how to move, your muscles are just changed and you need to control them well, you'll get it right in one or two days and then we can go dance in the water and then air."

It as been three days since the change, and four since we have earned the right to remember our god and creator and our people have never been more motivated and happy. Many will lose the ability to remember him as anything but his beloved son Cegorach once we leave, but that is fine as we'll still have the knowledge that we have a creator and a mother and she gave us worlds to call ours before we even existed.

The food the seven food fabricators and three liquid ones produce are enough to feed double our numbers and can work in perpetuity with only a one day break once every 50 years according to the instructions our masters gave us before they retreated to start plotting the death of those who feast on our people.

I stum- my sister-wife caught me again before my face could hit the floor. She always manages to catch me.

I looked upon her and sang in gratitude as she caught me.

We looked like sisters now.

My face is the same as my mother's now with only slight adjustments, but I can't help but think of her again each time I see it now and what it would have meant if my now master-husband would have found us 500 years ago.

I might not have been made an orphan at five years old, and be raised by my family and not that of my wife who married and loves me so.

We're cousins, which is not unusual among the noble lines as we die fast and so we intermingle so often to keep the traditions and training and conditioning we have put our bodies and genes under, to ensure so there's less chance of the sacrifices being rejected or causing offense for 'lacking the right taste'. Better this than losing eight or more individuals, and not merely one, each time we need to trade for favors and fail.

"I think I finally managed to figure out how." I said as I finally managed to find a rhythm that did not cause me to stumble.

All that's left is figure out how to smooth things up and not fall as I try to turn.

My wife was joyful and our entire people are so too.

We remember still the words of our ancestors that were once eldar, for they spoke of how we were loved by the gods, how they truly and deeply cared for us and wished us to succeed even as we stumbled and failed, for they were always willing to help us back up as long as we were willing to put in the work.

Once we were abandoned by the Maton it did not matter how willingly we were to put in the work, nobody cared for it, for we were just things to killed or eaten but now we have hope again and soon our pride will fully return to us.

I continue to stumble in anything but a straight line and the softest turns, but progress is progress as yesterday I couldn't even do that.

My wife sang, our master and husband approaches.

'I hope I'm not going to mess it this time, I don't want to stumble while bowing.'

"We greet you master." My sister wife and I spoke and sang at the same time.

I stumb- two pairs of hands caught me this time.

My husband was on my right and wife one my left.

'Curse my control over this blasted body.' I cried to myself.

I was proud of my body and my ability and now I can barely walk, but the price I paid for this is worth it. A new family, a new god and a new hope. I'll deal with the price because it was worth it.

"I'm-" I tried to speak but a finger covered my lips.

"Don't apologize for that which is my fault, my dear wife. Come and lets put you somewhere comfortable, we need to discuss important things and give each of you names."

I didn't trust myself to speak or sing so I just nodded and followed.

" 'She who sings of the beauty of the seas and waterfalls' please show me where we can sit and talk as equals, I'll carry 'Mighty Tide' there to not waste time and make sure she stays comfortable, we have a lot to discuss and prepare."

He lifted and carried me easily and I coiled my tail around his body as he allowed me to and dropped his hands as I finished doing so fully, and headed to one of the conference rooms used by the song-keepers to congregate and exchange knowledge and songs.

I uncoiled and was once again in his hands. I was put down gently on the wide seat so that I may half-coil comfortably.

The entire room, furniture included was the color of Wraithbone as this settlement is a temporary dwelling so we didn't bother decorating and we don't have much to decorate it with either.

'Hopefully that changes in time.' I thought to myself.

This world is meant for us and I long to one day no longer have to look upon our dwellings as temporary but as mighty cities filled with joy and song.

All three of us were seated now.

"Right, first we'll handle names, then some conjugal issues, then administrative, then our plans for this world and then more. Do you have anything you think we should add to this?"

We sang to each other, we both had something but my sister-wife is willing to let me go first and I sang to her in gratitude

"Yes, our dwellings will we be staying here long term or will we move?" I asked.

"No, this location is not ideal, we'll stay here for a few months, then we'll move all of you to a small sea nearby and then we'll stay there for some five to ten years while my siblings gather knowledge of the political climate and favor networks of the clans while I try and teach some crafts I am allowed to. When we have the information we need we can migrate to where I'll make the seat of your power on this world. We'll discuss more depending on what the issues and opportunities we find are."

"Thank you for answering my question, I really hoped we could finally settle permanently now but at least it's close."

"You're welcome, 'She who sings of the beauty of the seas and waterfalls' do you have anything to ask of me?"

"Yes, will we be going to other worlds to help our people?"

"I'll discuss that in our plans but yes, I might need to kill a star or two depending on what I learn in the future, because the situation is worse than I expected but first names."

He turned to my wife.

" 'She who sings of the beauty of the seas and waterfalls' as my beautiful wife I call you Sian Ceasanna*, may you bring beauty and grace to the song of your people."

"I thank you master, I will treasure it!" My wife said and she rejoiced.

I sang to her my joy and she sent me her songs of gratitude.

" 'Mighty Tide' , I name you Cuhacta Iamara, may you regain your might and make your enemies drown in their blood and fear."

I liked the sound of that very very much.

"I thank you for the name, I will prove myself worthy of it."

"I know you will both of you, you can name your own children now, for you are queen and sister-queen and are no longer nameless and as they came solely from you I will leave the honor to you, and do the same for the rest of your people. Just focus on blessing the oldest pairs and tell them to name their children and them their children."

We sang our agreements, now comes the conjugal part and those had me the most worried.

"First of all, how do you wish to handle it? Do you wish for me to learn how to dance as you, for you to learn as me or to mix and match depending on our moods? I'll let you decide on this as I barged in your marriage and messed it up."

We sang with each other, I did not wish to have to modify my body again so soon, even if only for making children. Eventually we reached an agreement and my wife spoke it.

"We would like to see if we can't achieve it and enjoy it as we are now. If that doesn't work out we'd like if you could turn like us, then we'll learn it ourselves later and mix and match as we please later."

Our husband just nodded with a smile. His grey eyes were so pretty, a pity they don't fit his black hair for they remind us too much of Khaine.

"Excellent, I won't bother you with the children you had before me. If you wish for me to be a part of their life that is up to you, I make no demands that those we have together be separated or treated any differently."

"We thank you, but they will be born slaves and pets, do you not mind?"

"I care little for that, especially when they won't be either. Getting your people's citizenship back should be easy." He said as if that was the easiest thing in the world.

"How can we do so?" I asked.

"On this world it's surprisingly simple, you are nobility, I am an Eldar citizen and thus entitled to princely audiences and favors if I can earn them, and princes and princesses can grant citizenship or restore it. I'll usurp any princely position and give it to another or create one, and demand as my favor for doing so that the subjects of myself and my noble lady wives get their citizenship renewed as their ancestors lost it and now they want it back.

Your people will have to be able to hold an eldar form during the ceremony and during pregnancy and giving birth but you will be able to live the vast majority of your lives as yourself with the eldar form being something of a ceremonial garb only worn for the swearing of the oath once and during pregnancy and child birth."

That… that's not exactly easy but simple I suppose.

"Is there any way we can keep citizenship without doing that?" My wife asked.

We did not want an eldar form, we wanted to continue being ourselves as we worked very hard to survive in this shape and have made it our own.

"No, not unless the gambit of the woman you call creator does pan out and your people are recognized as a secondary species of the Empire of the Ten Millions Suns, but you would be the first to be so, even if you have my support for it. There is the possibility of settling outside the Empire as a reward for services rendered but I have need of you in the Empire, as thanks to the gifts that you represent to me from your creator my timeline accelerated and now I might need to do some rather large amounts of nonsense and many more apocalypses than I had planned."

"What gifts husband?" I asked.

Our creator hasn't even been on this world, what gift could she give?

"You, your creator for arranging our marriage is now my godmother and she has also crafted you and ,I cannot stress this enough, as the only culture that look upon what the Followers of Hoeth are and do and cheer. The normal reaction is fear and horror and pleading for their lives or trying to run."

Why wouldn't we cheer? The Followers of Hoeth give us all that we would want, from dead Eldar to a home to call our own, food and safety and even more. What more would people want?

I decided to ask my husband because he likes people asking questions he can answer and I wish to earn my position as wife now, not merely be an accessory to my sister-wife's coronation and I need to make him happy for it.

"Why wouldn't we cheer for our holy mission my husband? Hoeth ordered that we exist and made sure we would have our revenge on those that wronged us while granting us a home made for us. He did not command Eldar to eat and hunt and kill us, and neither did our creator or our creators' god.

Each day they woke up and chose violence and to inflict horror upon us, and now we learn our creator had foreseen it and wished us well as she helps us in our revenge."

It was the truth, our creator and god were tricky but the lives of eldar and those possessing the souls of eldar is only determined by ourselves and nobody can order us to do things that we do not want to do, or that we have not agreed to. It's why trickery is so important in our society, because if you don't use it then nobody is going to do what needs to be done.

The only exception is when you are weak and can't defend yourself from those that wish you harm but while we are weak, the other eldar on this planet aren't compared to us and so they chose to kill and hunt and eat us and destroy our dwellings. Now we have a chance at might and we will take our revenge for they are our enemies and they need to die for it.

Everyone should understand this but maybe there's something we missed?

My husband face went through happiness then hate, then switched between the two and to disappointed then back to pride as he beamed at us.

"Your creator gave you wisdom that I wish my people would remember they possess, because they don't understand it anymore and when Cegorach tries to remind them they refuse to listen. I am proud of your people and proud to be able to call myself lord-husband of the queen of such a wise people."

"Are you not our king my husband?" My wife asked confused.

He is our master, shouldn't he have the greater position?

"By divine decree no, royal bloodlines are passed through descendants and your people did not call me king, they called you queen Sian Ceasanna. I am just your lord-king husband and Cuhata Iamara you sister-wife but you are the head of the household that rules the Sirens and you will be given the proper respect you deserve by both myself, my adopted daughter and her future children and your people."

"You have other family my husband?" I asked, that was news to us but it shouldn't surprise us.

Our master and husband always seems to bring us good news.

"Yes, I used to be a part of a large clan of over one thousand Eldar named the clan of Lestean Bairu the Crafty, who at 32 years old managed to trick both myself and the clan of his own mother Gua Bis the Mighty in such a sublime and sneaky way we had to be told by the Divine that we had been tricked and that I now call her my sister and her son clan leader. Now I am part of the clan of Salara-Sao the Slithery for she arranged for our marriage as well."

That's... a child managed to trick a woman who had earned the moniker the Mighty and our master who creates apocalypses by trade? We dearly wished to have the boy marry one of our daughters but more importantly we are clan now? By the will of our creator too?

"How?" We both asked at the same time and with the same smile on our faces.

We were very proud of our godmother and creator for she knows our hearts and showers us in them. We need to find a way to repay her for it.

"She arranged for you to call queen or king the first individual that would convince an Eldar to take your people in and created the conditions for marriage, for kings and queens can only be slaves to spouses who are their equal in marriage or other kings and queens."

I thanked our creator in my soul once more for her kindness, love and willingness to help her people and give us all we need to be mighty and prosperous and take happiness for ourselves from the corpses of our foes.

"Thank you for letting us know master." My wife said and bowed.

I tried to do the same but still stumbled it. I was thankful I had nowhere to fall for I was already seated.

"Please stop bowing for such things, you especially Cuhacta Iamara, you don't need to bow for me explaining things, and especially not while it harms you to do so."

His hands danced across my body to steady me back.

"Now Administrative plans, I need to make an Orphanage to observe proper ritual and see if any of the local orphanages observe proper rituals so that I may learn if the other Followers of Hoeth have anything planned for this world or if I have to use my machinations to kill some stars and sterilize some worlds with their blast radius."

Another piece of knowledge and words we had no knowledge of to even guess at what they mean.

"Could you please explain what an orphanage is and why are they so important that proper ritual helps you?" My wife asked.

That was the more important piece of information, nobody cares about dead Eldar, not even them.

"Orphanages are houses and homes for the abandoned children, so that instead of being given to a family that may or may not want them, they are put in one where they are wanted and loved by all inside of it and are surrounded by those who are like them and love them for it.

The Followers of Hoeth also use them to leave each other knowledge, messages and instruction, but only Older Brothers are allowed to create and learn of them, while Younger Brothers only to learn and Nephews be granted whatever the two decide they need to know.

Cegorach and his sons protect them for its his job to remind people of what they need to know, we drop knowledge in them and plunder them of it when we find them, and Isha ensures they continue their purposes in healing gods and assisting us in god-forging and reforging. I also need to make at least one dedicated to Hoeth to repay the debt of my adoption, and I do so so that we have a better chance of him being reborn."

'Oh, another holy mission, that makes sense.' I thought to myself.

Fitting I supposed that our creator enjoys giving lost children a home and gifts in the service of his schemes, he gave us ours for the same reason after all.


AN:

Sian Ceasanna=Sí an bhean a chanann áilleacht na farraige agus na n-easanna→ 'She who sings of the beauty of the seas and waterfalls'

Cuhacta Iamara=Cumhachtach ian mara→ 'Mighty Tide'