Chapter 64:

Chapter 64: You do not meddle with whatever priests do for they stand above insanity.


Returning home from a doomed campaign is an incredibly tiresome thing, especially when everyone knew they would lose it and yet the disaster was worse than expected. I and my men knew it but the bonds of fealty and family prevented us from refusing to come on it.

The Songs of my ancestors remembers of the farseers and their origins still, for they are mighty and were created by Cegorach-as-he-was to bring the downfall of his enemies by asking both the future and the past 'How?'. The children of Cegorach when he was not called as such have not forgotten or forgiven them for their treachery when they've decided to ask this of their own people and learned how to bring their downfall.

They brought the downfall of my Father-in-law's Warhost too, as two of them had planned the defense of their home and like the miserly bastards that have forgotten their father's name that they are, they have spent the least amount of resources that they had to to bring our downfall.

A farseer, a jetbike and a flamethrower were thrown at a host of ten thousand and won the fight in a single charge as he killed most of its leadership in that fateful charge and the entire host splintered into groups that were then easy to pick up one by one by hidden blades and individual warhosts.

I did the smart thing and signaled my surrender and agreed to pay tribute to Craftworld Anaen in exchange for my and my men's life, and so paid them in our first installment all of our weapons and armors and came back home dressed in our undergarments unlike the rest of the host which did not return at all. The next payment would be paid in five void faring ships and soul stones and at least the payment is more insulting than actually harsh.

Five ships is insultingly low for my life and one soul stone for each of my men was a slap in their face and in mine but my fools can't complain now. They were defeated by a madman with a flamethrower and a bike and the insult is the least they and me deserve for that embarrassing performance.

And the dead got the better end of the deal still, for they did not have to deal with my problems.

A world strangled slowly by pleasure cultists and priests, a disease slowly weaving itself in-between the cracks that healers noticed by its effects more than by actually finding it and a daughter that couldn't dance even as she wished to were the most pressing matters on my attention and now more awaited me, because a priest of Cegorach managed to find a cure for the disease before I even noticed it exists. The madman then proceeded to make a play of it that was so horrific the Pantheon passed an Edict he and his fellow medicine peddlers can't be held liable for healing given to others when they gave it freely and with the expectation that it will help.

Naturally, nobody told it to the priests and they were stopped at all points from figuring it out by themselves from others, for it's up to them to figure it out or die for it as is tradition, and it seems that the one in front of me is either aware of it or the cause.

Two songs met me as I returned from my campaign and authorized the payment to Anaen to go through.

The first was the song of a monstrous madman that abused the Laws as easy as he breathed and killed as he walked in honor of his Silver Handed father and God he held most dear. He brought with him death to the priests of the New Divine to such an obscene extent that they had changed their allegiance out of fear and did all of this to such startling ease that he made the Elder Priests of Slaanesh err and start a war with those of Cegorach and at the same time caused squabbling between the New Divine and its priesthood and now all of their rituals result in them dying or suffering so greatly they'd rather die. And to add salt to injury he made it seem that it wasn't him that started this war either.

This song was that of a madman that caused discord and infighting as easy as he breathed and he killed as easy as he walked and did both at the same time.

The second is the song the priest, Bessar Agail, sang of himself and he sang of a poor and foolish medicine peddler that got taken advantage by the mentally ill women who tricked themselves into his family and that now ran off to a better life. He sings of his poor performance as a healer as he kept on killing the poor and the desperate that came to him for healing and that rarely survived this mistake and he continues to mourn the fact that he had taught his apprentice nonsense and so left him a house and some trinkets as an apology to which the man himself was so foolish as to call less useful than the lessons of a fool, for the house was left empty of people but not their guns and armor and swords and the boy was already a lord with a small host. It is the song of a priest to his trickster god and the fact he continues to sing it proof of the favor said god has for his priest, for Cegorach does so enjoy protecting and tricking his lovable fools.

This song was that of a fool getting taken advantage by all who met him and that failed at all he attempted with the rare exceptions that would allow him to continue walking to find greater ways and things to fail at and continues doing so by Divine Providence.

Both songs were true and sang of the same man and the same man was in my hall and each demanded I treat him differently.

I decided to do the most normal and expected thing a prince in my position could do and settled on Pretending to Ignorance, for I will ignore both songs, pretend I'm too tired to understand them and am just receiving a priest in my hall to tell me a story or help me with my daughter and her dancing issues and not care for the nonsense he caused.

The priest was even kind enough to give me the time to get drunk to sell the lie, which is a gift I'll have to find how to repay him for.

'Husband.' My first wife whined in song to me.

She was the one that wouldn't deal with the priest when he came to this world, for she is scared of all priests and would rather never see them. My second wife acting by herself sounds like a joke even to my ear, for the woman can barely dress herself without being ordered around, but she knew how to sing so well I had to take her as my wife.

You don't let the most talented and able singer on your world leave your sight or you'll soon find yourself without a princedom, that's just common sense, and so I took her as my wife and loved her ever since.

I used my right hand to take another glass of alcohol my tongue is too numb to tell what it is, and used my left hand to pull her closer into a kiss after which I emptied it into my mouth.

'Play along my dear, for I am keeping the priest from taking offense by picking a way to treat him based on two contradictory songs that are true by pretending to be a fool incapable of hearing or caring for both. Get your sister-wife to stand near him and serve him his food as he won't be harming those that provide him food.' I sang to her as our souls became one before separating.

She sang her obedience fearfully and I realized my glass was empty and that won't do.

"Bring me more to drink my love" I said among hics.

I did not trust myself to walk now, for my body had more alcohol in it than blood, but the healing crystals kept it from killing me as they filtered it out and healed me.

'The priest won't harm those that bring him drinks either' I sang.

She nodded shyly and did as I asked as the priest continued to sing to a terrified audience that was told to explicitly not show it and instead spend most of their time laughing at me where I can't see them. And they had plenty of chances to do it and I would continue to give them more.

He was singing about the women that 'tricked' themselves into his family as his concubines and about how he barely managed to keep them at 'only' four concubines as opposed to six and I needed my own response in our contest.

"I should have done as my father did and become a pirate! I would have had more respect than as a prince like that as I sailed between the stars and reality and unreality in search of loot and glory! I should have never allowed my older sister to leave and join an Exodite community, no I should have thrown this crown on her head and ran off with father and call him captain!" I bemoaned my fate to my audience.

The priest took a glass of wine from my first wife's hand and drank from it as she returned at my side with more drinks for me.

I looked at my feast hall, filled with Mahogany colored woods from a thousand worlds I or my ancestors have been on. Wood is delicate compared to Wraithbone and yet is is so much more pleasant to look at. At my table were myself, my mightiest warriors, some of my courtiers, my wives which moved among the guests to bring them food and wine and my daughter who cannot dance.

She was the only one of my children I didn't manage to trick into running, for she was too young and too prim and proper to leave her foolish father alone. The fool was too loyal a child and so she'll be left with the throne if I can't trick her to run for safety before the New Divine is born.

"I know my friend, but I am even more foolish, for my First Daughter had sent me a letter, a letter containing a death threat and it was so bad. 'I will end you.' she wrote, how did I fail her so much she can't even threaten me properly! I am a failure of a priest and a failure of a father!" The priest cried as well.

We have been crying at each other for how bad we were at our positions and pretended to bond to each other over it and I swayed in both soul and body as I considered his words. The priest wasn't even tipsy and he drank more than me too.

'How do I top that?' I wondered as I drank more.

The First Daughter of a priest is the first daughter they had taken for themselves and it is a position of privilege and respect as she is the one to look after the family when her priestly parents can't do so or die as they often do and can't do so themselves anymore. Sending a letter to her father was already a sign of a rift forming, but her being bad at something all priests consider so fundamental to their profession as death threats? Shameful does not even begin to cover it.

I considered the priest in his black robes as I prepared my response. I didn't have much of a reputation to tarnish anyway, so I might as well go with my final solution.

"Nonsense my friend, this sort of thing takes personal experience and it's probably that she has had no reason to learn how to threaten somebody properly, I am sure she will find people that will hone her blade properly, but I have no such excuse, for my daughter can't dance and she's been trying to learn and I to find her tutors. I have a filial daughter I can't help, I am the biggest failure of a father this world has ever seen!" I cried.

All plays of the God of Fools have a fool in them, and the greatest of them always lives, and so I must become the greatest fool of the play to ensure my survival.

My wives are already serving food, and whoever serves you food you generally speaking don't kill, for it does not do to kill those that are gracious enough to feed you, for only animals do that, and priests must pretend not to be animals and so they don't do that.

I am fighting for my life now, and if I fail or succeed I'll probably be able to save my daughter too. Her loyalty and propriety is touching but she is foolish, boorish and too set in her Discipline and because of this I have no role to give her that would let her live.

Nobody thinks of the servants that bring you food and alcohol, and so they can slip by beyond your notice when danger comes. In the plays of the Laughing God it is the greatest fool that always lives so that they can go continue to be foolish some more until they find a new fool to replace him, but the too serious ones? They die first, and I am not letting my child die before me or before she is an adult at the very least, and she's three years from that day.

The man's song-story involved taking an apprentice, and from the three rings he wore on his black hand it told me he has had three successful apprenticeships. The songs that remembered him before he took the apprentice told me he did not have any rings on his fingers before he finished his last apprenticeship, which meant he added them now intentionally.

A glowing sword on a stone tablet represented the first apprentice and semeingly the most talented due to the fact it was made purely out of Wraithbone. The second was a kind sword, a plain copper sword made to kill as fast as possible and that smiled as it did so and it was the one the priest was most fond of for it stood alone unlike the other teo which shared a finger, and the third was of the former slave called Asdrubael Vect and it was a black heart made out of obsidian. The third has no Wraithbone in it, and this meant that the Master did not much like the student even as he succeeded in his apprenticeship and made him proud of it.

Three successful apprentices he showcased now, and the fact that he didn't before meant that he was proud of them and wished for me alone to know of it properly. It was something I could use and now I would use it to ensure my daughter's survival.

"Would you be willing to help her priest? I am at my wits end, for I am a prince, a foolish prince and father to a boorish daughter and I… I can't have my daughter not be able to dance!" I continued.

The priest valued teaching others, so it might allow her to be spared his wrath if he could teach her. It was the only way I could think to save her from whatever the madman was planning.

He came to this world in peace as far as the Priesthood of the New Divine was concerned, and now the priesthoods of Cegorach and the New Divine are at War, for the priesthoods of the New Divine were tricked into breaking their agreement and due to their actions they have lost the favor of the New Divine before she was even born.

My Murderous Shadows' words meant nothing, no matter how he managed to convince the priest to say them, for the creature could turn friendly agreements into war and civil war for the ones he enters in agreements with, and unless I can get his willing assistance and friendship, I run the risk of being on the receiving end of his ruinous schemes.

"Father!" My too serious daughter shouted.

She wore the white plain dress she favored for some obscene and unknowable reason still, but it did not fit her red eyes or her blonde hair, or her fer soft features that looked like my own mother's and I did not understand why she wore it when she had so many more prettier dresses I had tailors make for her.

Some of the courtiers laughed at her outburst and it gave me hope that she had caught on to my plan. My daughter is far too serious for her own good and if she can make herself entertaining enough to be kept alive then she will continue to live without needing the priest to teach her, which meant I might be able to keep the favor to save some of my family that are not on this world.

A foolish dream, but fools can dream still, for their dreams are the most likely to not turn into nightmares.

"My daughter, you speak! These are the first words you have spoken to me Laciena Fiora, oh how much I have missed your voice!" I shouted as I drunkenly swayed.

I have drunk too much, not quite at the level the healing arcana would fail me, but enough that I needed a break or my body would break before it could be prevented to. Speaking would provide the break I needed.

Somebody probably slipped in poison too, but this is how things go when you return defeated. I'll find who and shame them for it if I'll remember it when I wake up.

"Father, a defeat is no reason to let yourself go like this, what is with this foolishness? Stop this at once!" She all but cried.

She rose from her seat to my left and joined me and tried to look over my body as the priest remained silent and looked on in amusement as he too drank. I only saw his eyes twinkling for a fraction of a heartbeat, but it was enough for me to come to a conclusion.

It knew what I was trying to do and he approved, but unfortunately my daughter didn't for I have been too indulgent with her as she learned the Precepts of Discipline to try and learn what she was deficient in.

"I am fine my daughter truly, I am merely trying to get the priest who is far less foolish than he looks like to teach you how to dance." I said as I tried to swat her hand away from me.

I should have failed, for it was the hand of a drunk and it moved lazily across the air and yet it found its half intended mark on her left shoulder and it hit. She couldn't even block it and my heart fell further, for I realized my daughter was still just as serious and meant what she was doing.

She caught me as I was close to falling from over-extending myself and I ruffled her hair as she helped me seat myself and she was silent as a grave for it.

I do not ruffle her head normally, for she does not like it, and so I promised her five years ago that I will only do so when her life is in danger. She was so happy that day when I stopped and her happiness lasted little, for from that day I started pinching her cheeks to have her remember that I am her father and she is my daughter and I have an infinite amount of ways to embarrass her as is my right.

"I will teach her my friend, for if it is one thing I am not deficient in is teaching!" The priest all but shouted.

I was relieved, for he accepted my peace offering for keeping him waiting for months, and it was a shame I could not express it properly and instead I burped.

I was very glad I had no more reputation to tarnish after I had lost and paid tribute to Craftworlders, I would not have survived the shame that burp brought me otherwise. If he can top that then I am well and truly at a loss at how to win, for I do not think I can actually sink any lower.
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'This world is strange.' I thought as the daughter of the prince in whose castle I was in came to me.

All of its inhabitant feel that there is a deadly trap where there was none and I wonder what made The World of Three Faces to make its inhabitants think like that.

The castle was tastefully decorated at least, for it wasn't bare wraithbone or the stone and coral my wife's people favored and I found obnoxious but subdued Mahogany colored woods. They were very pleasing to my eyes and it made me wonder if the prince actually chose the furniture because I found it tasteful.

The prince is from an old bloodline and the level of nonsense they could get up to is beyond logic, for to be of the old bloodlines of the eldar is to survive enough nonsense that would make galaxies quiver in fear and from the song of his home the man's bloodline did. His bloodline were nobles before the War in Heaven and now were princes and I could feel the truth of it in my bones and soul and it was complete and total nonsense for our species had died and been reborn multiple times since then and yet this family yet ruled its domains on this world.

I wished the Exodites would have been chosen as the path for our potential revival, for covering star systems in endless forests that spun across the void was far more appealing to me than the isolated bastions of the Craftworlders. They won't even make more of them, but the Forest always Grows.

I also wish I could say I came up with that one.

Unfortunately the exodites are too stubborn to develop into an expansionist view without far too much meddling we can't guarantee it would be successful and so we're stuck to craven craftworlders.

But back from what could have been to what could be, for what has just happened is that I was defeated by the prince in his contest of having the least respectability between the two of us.

That burp after slapping his own daughter topped whatever I could think of, and so I admitted defeat and offered my services freely to the prince. I cannot match that, his slap equalled the letter my daughter sent me, and I am not shameless enough to be able to sink lower. And so, once again a priest loses to a prince in a contest of their choosing and the prize is shame and a lesson in dancing.

Truly a victory worthy of Song.

It is also a completely unnecessary one, for I had no intention of harming them and the prince really should have known better. It is insultingly easy to not get a Follower of Hoeth or even Cegorach to not harm you without the need to pick up roles in their plays they can't kill off.

Enter a deal with us and be more generous than you have to be or is expected of you and we'll do our best not to screw you over and if you do that we won't do to you as we did to the True Priesthood of Slaanesh.

All the fools had to do was leave me be, and maybe give me some props like they did with that Greater Blasphemy and orbital bombardment and I would not have taken the first chance I was given to screw them over. They did not take their chance and instead sicced Slaanesh on me and now they pay for it.

This requirement for Generosity is quite literally the basic requirement for good will, and yet 99% of all life in this galaxy refuses to partake in it and like always falls prey to our trickery for it. Truly all those that wish to enter into agreements with us need to do is be a bit more generous than we were and most individuals instead try to get around it or do nothing but the bare minimum they agreed to and they pay for it.

The local prince, won a competition that made me as the loser look better than him, and is now giving me his child to teach, truly the man has his head straight, even if he's a bit paranoid but such is fine. He knows how to treat a priest and a diplomat at least.

Now it's up to me to fulfill my part of the deal.

"Show me how you dance Laciena Fiora. I need a baseline to see if your issues are something I can fix or are familiar enough with that I can guide you to a path that can help." I asked the woman in the pretty white sundress.

She looked at me with barely suppressed fear I pretended not to see.

'Her father let her know of the danger they are in.' I thought in amusement.

It was probably the slap, it couldn't have been anything else.

She nodded and proceeded to do the second most horrible mimicry of a dance I've ever seen. It was only the second for I've looked at a recording of myself once and I was worse. Her steps were off, her hands looked more like flailing than moving and her equilibrium was so horrific I was stupefied at how she didn't fall as she spun.

'Her soul and body are out of sync.' I thought in amusement.

The only other species I've ever seen with that much lack of synchronicity between their souls and bodies was my old one, which meant the woman in front of me is a reincarnated human and this possessed a difficult issue.

The solution for her issue was easy, however to give her the solution I would have to let her or her family know of it and act upon it, and to do so would mean that I had to barge into her family and trample all over their agreements on how to deal with their filial daughter's situation and one bad move and comment that would bring squabbles between family members could get me killed, for I would have gone against my word by bringing misery to my hosts when I promised friendship.

"I have seen enough, please stop, it hurts just to look at someone almost as bad as I was at dancing." I told her and she thankfully stopped.

"Are you able to tell us what is wrong holy one?" The girl's father asked me.

Her mothers were still acting as servants in order to avoid my notice or the fallout of my schemes and so I had to ignore their hopeful looks and focus on the worried look of the father. He noticed I found something concerning and was fishing for information.

"I have found the issue I believe, I'll need to verify it, but it looks like a disharmony between her soul and body. I need to check how she handles a rhythm meant for those like her and a few other things but such looks like the most likely solution. Young Lady I will Sing to you a rhythm, please try to move as it demands, and please do not try to think about it, just act." I instructed the woman.

I sent her a rhythm for a dance she can dance with me and I took her hand as we proceeded to dance.

The dance itself was nothing special, 624 steps taken one after another and divided among two individuals, The only interesting part of it was that required the less experienced dancer to step on the feet of the more experienced of the pair and for the more experienced individual to avoid it.

The Dance of Fates it was called, and it was invented by my Father to help me when I became old enough to dance. It was a dance meant to also be a game of whack-a-mole where you had to step on the feet of the one you danced or pretend you do not notice it when your partner tried to step on your toes and manage to avoid it at the same time.

She performed it flawlessly as I barely managed to avoid getting my feet trampled, but unlike her previous showing she was actively graceful as she danced, even if she did not notice it and instead only noticed that I barely managed to avoid her feet that acted like blades ready to cut, maul or stomp my own feet.

"And done, you did great young lady." I observed encouragingly.

She looked at me with annoyance at what she considered false praise. I gently moved her head to look at her own father who looked in wonder still at the grace with which his own daughter danced.

The man is incredibly lucky he already offered her to me as a student before I noticed her soul was half human, for a request for dancing lessons is a request for joining the service of the priesthoods of Cegorach, and for those of Hoeth it is a request to learn some specific information on a specific topic that the one you ask it of is intimately familiar with, and the two have so much overlap we can easily pretend one or the other happened whenever we pleased.

She was already offered to me as a student in dancing and as a patient, so this means that I can't recruit her too. Asking for more when I was already given so much would be quite rude.

The prince clapped and he was followed by the rest of his frightened court, for they've seen the very clumsy woman dance with grace she's never once shown in this life.

"What?" She asked stupefied.

She could feel the joy of her father but she found no source of it and so she was forced to bow slightly and return to her seat in confusion.

"That is the most graceful I have ever seen my daughter dance Bessar Agail, is it possible for this to be replicated without a priest's intervention?" The prince asked.

He suspected it was something only a priest can help herwith and thought I was trying to create a dependency. It is a good thing that I was not, I just needed to be able to talk to him of her nature in a way that would not cause offense and then she would be able to dance… somewhat.

I am not a very good dancer myself. I can offer a partial solution at best, but it is better than nothing still.

"It is only possible to be replicated by those that are just as addled as her or the most beloved of Gea and Cegorach, and I am among the first. I can provide other means to help, but they must be done in privacy, for the girl does not even notice her own issues or how to alleviate them and the reason why is not something for those that are anything but beloved family to hear." I informed the prince as I bowed slightly.

"I know of a withdrawn place we can talk at with some privacy, please follow me. My loves please handle the guests while I and the priest talk." The prince instructed me and his family.

The two women nodded and obeyed wordlessly as I followed the prince deeper into his castle, for he finally started acting as a prince now that our sham of a contest was done.

AN:

Laciena Fiora= Bláth cineálta agus fíorálainn→ Kind and beautifully delicate Flower