Endemic Mummy Issues

Duin Manor lay on a rocky rise, surrounded by giant mushrooms that painted half of its walls with blue, and a distant, sluggish lava flow that painted the other half in burning reds and orange. It lay in a cavern some three hours by train and a half hour carriage ride from Pandemonium, and looked more like a fortress than a manor—complete with not only battlements, but cannons and demonic soldiers in smart armour, who saluted as the very embarrassed Saoirse made her way past them.

Marci was not actually there. That would have been much too suspicious. She was back in the Dreadfort, looking down on the ongoing excavations and keeping an eye on Saoirse while trying to get her 'sound scanning' spell to work.

"So, you are really a princess," teased Marci.

"Oh shut up, Marci," muttered Saoirse. "And no, I'm not, because we don't have monarchy in the underworld."

"You just have something that functionally resembles it?" said Marci. "Noble houses who aren't noble so much as just the biggest warlords around?"

Saoirse began to argue, then sighed. "Yes," she admitted.

"Efficient, saves on crowns," said Marci. "So you're more accurately a technically-not-a-princess."

"Why am I helping you again?" said Saoirse.

"Because I'm adorable?" suggested Marci.

"No, I'm sure that isn't it," said Saoirse as the cart rolled to a stop on a wide gravel turning circle in a large fortified courtyard.

Saoirse took a deep breath as a servant opened the door; Marci felt the succubus steel herself before, stepping down down from the carriage and onto the gravel beneath. The demoness' hands fidgeted with the edge of her baggy navy cardigan, and her arrow-headed tail alternately swished unconsciously, and then stilled again under Saoirse's conscious direction.

"Saoirse!" came a woman's voice, making the succubus cringe and turn towards the grand marble entrance, where a tall succubus with similar features to Saoirse, but a decidedly different sense of style moved towards her, arms spread: 'Shannon Duin,' according to Saoirse. "There's my little girl!"

"Hello, mother," said Saoirse as the older succubus, who was wearing what Marci would usually describe as fetish gear which Marci wasn't ashamed to say she found very appealing, wrapped her cardigan-wearing daughter in a crushing hug.

"It's so good to see you," said Shannon, giving Saoirse a surprisingly warm hug that if Marci was honest she was a big jealous of—her mother had never hugged her—before pulling back and looking her over with a faint hint of disapproval. "I see you're still wearing these ghastly woollen tents. I don't know where you get them from."

"Yes, mother," said Saoirse neutrally. "I knit them, mother."

"Would it kill you to have some decency and show a little skin?"

"No, mother," said Saoirse. "Sorry, mother."

"Hmm," said her mother, pursing her lips before lowering her voice. "And what is this I hear about you working for a Shardkeeper?"

The older succubus' tail swished violently, and Saoirse's spine stiffened. "I'm an adventurer, mum. I took a contract. The pay is good, and it will look excellent on my resume."

"Hmph," she said, peering at Saoirse. "And is she in there? Watching?"

"Look, can we… can we not talk about this out here?" said Saoirse.

Shannon regarded her levelly, before putting an arm over her shoulder and all but dragging Saoirse inside. Marci felt a bit guilty as she felt just how miserable Saoirse was to be back in her childhood home. Was she a bad person for pushing Saoirse to do this? She hadn't ordered her, but she had pressed when Saoirse quite clearly would have rather dropped the issue… Yes, that did seem like something a bad person would do.

They moved through a grand, if somewhat gothic entrance hall, up a sweeping staircase, down a blood-red carpeted hallway lined with paintings of various succubi and incubi, and into a huge office with a dark, reddish wood door. It closed with an ominous bang, and Marci felt through Saoirse a privacy ward go up.

"I assume that is the reason my daughter here, Shardkeeper? Since she has never before visited me unprompted." said Shannon sharply and she sat in a chair on the opposite side of the desk. "Marcelle du Valmont, isn't it?"

'May I?' asked Marci.

'Please,' replied Saoirse, seemingly relieved to no longer be responsible for any of this.

Marci reached out, and took control. Saoirse's already red eyes began to blaze with crimson flame, and Marci adopted the same sneer she had used with Shardkeeper Fiona.

"Good day, Lady Duin," said Marci, giving her a fairy curtsy. "And please, call me Marci. I am happy to leave the talking to Saoirse-"

"No!" thought Saoirse forcefully.

"-but if you wish to talk directly, I'm happy to as long as Saoirse doesn't mind."

"Well, 'Marci,' I do not appreciate my daughter being used either as a puppet, nor as a messenger," growled the elder succubus. "So say your piece, and then get out of my daughter's head."

"I believe we share common interests," said Marci carefully, using one of the phrases she'd written that were appropriately 'Shardkeeper-esque,' but hopefully wouldn't make the demoness feel threatened. "But if you'd rather not talk, I will leave you to enjoy each other's company."

'Oh, please, fuck no,' thought Saoirse. 'Marci! This wasn't the deal!'

"I'm listening," said Shannon thinly.

"You are aware that four of the Shardkeepers are planning to invade the south, yes?" said Marci. She was fairly certain that wasn't something that the Shardkeepers would be able to keep from reaching the rulers of the Underworld, since they didn't seem to be that bothered about talking about it in the presence of waiters at the Hellfire Club.

"Five," said Shannon after a moment. "You're one of them."

"Yes, and no," said Marci trying to radiate confidence even as under the influence of Marci's emotions Saoirse's heart began to pound in her chest as she prepared to take what felt like a rather big roll of the dice.

If Saoirse's mother decided to betray her to Callum and Dierdre and the Succubus twins, then Marci might be a little fucked. She trusted that Saoirse had a better handle on demonic politics than she did, and she had read quite a bit herself about how the Shardkeepers who dominated the surface were constantly running up, and perhaps even slowly eclipsing the power of the old rulers of the Underworld, the Demonic Council: a group of essentially warlords-come-industrialists who ruled Pandemonium and the other cities through a system of legal, economic, and military control. To put it simply, the Council was descendant while the Shardkeepers were ascendant, and many demonic 'political scientists' posited that it was likely the Council would fall within the century and the Shardkeepers would come to rule both the Underworld and the Overworld.

"I have no intention of letting them consolidate power over the South," continued Marci. "And I don't think you want that either."

Shannon stilled, and Marci could see the gears turning in her mind. "You still feel loyalty to the Overworld?" she said after a moment.

"I am Princess of Eladraine," replied Marci, dodging the question and trying to pretend she was her mother. "My family has dominated the south economically for centuries; I have no desire to see them carve it up and take what is already mine to inherit. 'Loyalty' doesn't enter into it."

Shannon drummed her fingers on her desk, regarding her possessed daughter carefully. Marci could see the fury on the woman's face, and part of her wondered if she would have been better off just leaving the discussion to Saoirse.

"So you want, what, material support?" said Shannon. "In exchange for opposing the other Shardkeepers? What is it you plan to do?"

Marci took a deep breath. "I plan to fight them, using a combination of my own forces, my mother's, and any local Southern forces I can leverage control over. I need money to pay for equipment, soldiers, bribes…"

"Money your mother cannot provide?" said Shannon suspiciously. "I was under the impression that Eladraine was one of the wealthier of the Southern realms."

"I am going to be fighting four Shardkeepers, Lady Duin," said Marci. "My mother is providing me with resources, but I will need every soldier and coin I can get." Marci crossed her arms. "The alternative to my success is that Shardkeepers in control of the entire surface, and four of them become far more powerful than the rest. How long do you think your power here in the Underworld would last after that? How long before this charming castle of yours was besieged by Shardkeeper troops?"

Shannon scowled, but didn't contradict her.

"I am prepared to authorise some funds," she said after a moment. "And may be able to get more of the Council onboard."

Marci exhaled. Great: she hadn't been sure that was going to work.

"But I want something: my daughter back."

Marci felt Saoirse's mind churn, and a moment later she reasserted her control, forcing Marci out.

"Mum, Marci needs my help," said Saoirse. "I'm not trapped, my contract has conditions that let me leave, and Marci is a good employer."

Shannon glared. "You are my daughter," she growled. "Heir to House Duin! You should not have an employer! You should be the employer! You should be here, running the House with me instead of gallivanting about with a bunch of hicks and some deranged machinating Princess from the surface! Do you know how embarrassing it is for you to- to-"

"-to have me as a daughter?" said Saoirse, tears pricking at her eyes. "Yeah, you've told me. Many times."

Shannon almost looked hurt for a moment, before her expression hardened again.

Huh. Saoirse's mother wasn't going to be winning any awards, but Marci had to say, she didn't seem nearly as bad Queen Adele. At least the elder succubus maybe cared about what Saoirse felt in at least the abstract. Marci would have to tell her mother that, next time they spoke: 'the bar for better mothers than you is literally beneath hell.'

Wait, was that demonist to say? Sort of implying that demons were bad mothers inherently? That probably was demonist. Definitely, even. Dammit, she was going to have to spend ages thinking about her vocabulary: now that she thought about it, there were a fair few curses that centred of demons being inherently evil and awful creatures.

"No, to have my daughter working for a Shardkeeper," continued Lady Duin firmly. "You hear me, Shardkeeper? I want my daughter back!"

Marci was jerked back from ruminating on the etemology of modern Middle Realms cursing by the succubus' angry shout. Oh, right. Important, life or death negotiation, not time for naval gazing.

"That isn't you decision to make!" shot back Saoirse. "My life is my own!"

"And my money is my own," said Shannon. "Those are my terms, Shardkeeper: material support in exchange for my daughter's release."

Marci didn't immediately reassert control, and instead turned the terms over in her mind. She probably should have guessed this was a possibility, it was very much the kind of controlling shit that her own mother would try to pull—or, well, it could also maybe come from a standpoint of concern, but to Marci that was such an alien idea of motherhood that it hadn't even occurred to her either.

From a cold, mechanistic standpoint, it was an easy trade: massive resources, the sort-of backing of the rulers of the underworld, in exchange for her necromancy tutor. But Saoirse was also her friend, and she could already feel that her delayed response was making her worried and fearful. Saoirse didn't want to leave the Dreadfort, Marci was sure of that, and wouldn't throw her to the wolves, wouldn't cast her out.

But that wasn't the only option, was it? She already had people who worked with her who weren't on any of her Shardkeeper leashes: Olaf, Tissa, and even Anke (although Marci still had demons keeping an eye on her). And she trusted Saoirse. Saoirse was her friend; she was a good person; she believed in the same things that Marci did, more or less. The fact that she was a demon didn't mean anything—or, at least, it shouldn't.

Was that the reason she hadn't broached the idea, even really to herself, to release Saoirse from her contract? Because she was a demon? Marci would have liked to have said no, that it hadn't played a part, but that probably wasn't true. She was still more than a little afraid of demons, ascribed ideas and behaviours to them that weren't necessarily commensurate with the reality even when her main pool of reference was her demon mercenaries, who probably weren't typically the most stable and ethical of individuals. Generalised demon cultured seemed to be a bit on the ruthless side, but so did a lot of the prevailing norms in Krefeld and the surface—wildes, just look at Velubos, or her homeland.

And yes, Gillian had betrayed her—wounded her badly, but Saoirse wasn't Gillian, and Marci certainly wouldn't have intrinsically mistrusted all dwarves because Gillian had tried to kill her.

'Marci, this is bullshit!' said Saoirse, desperation ringing in her mind at Marci's hesitation to respond. 'She's bluffing. Or- or it's not important; it's posturing. She's- she doesn't care about me!'

'I don't know that she is,' said Marci. 'May I have control back?'

Saoirse hesitated, before letting Marci puppet her again.

"I am prepared to release my hold on your daughter, to void our contract," said Marci.

'Marci! No!' said Saoirse, immediately reasserting control. 'You- you need my help!'

'It's OK,' replied Marci. 'Trust me.'

Saoirse hesitated, and her anxiety hardly abated, but did allow Marci to speak through her again.

"Excellent," said Shannon with a smile. "I am heartened to discover there is at least one reasonable Shardkeeper. Surprising, given you are a surfacer-"

"With a condition," interrupted Marci.

Shannon paused, before gesturing for her to continue.

"Saoirse is free to return with my to my Shardfort if she so wishes, as a free and uncompelled agent," said Marci. "You may think of her as a liaison, if you like; a representative of our clandestine alliance. I will guarantee her safety."

Marci could feel Saoirse's shock; clearly she hadn't expected that. Which sort of hurt a little, even though it was Marci's own damn fault and she should have relinquished her hold on Saoirse earlier.

"Without the Shardbond?" said Shannon. "You trust her that much?"

"I do," said Marci.

Shannon pursed her lips. "And you swear you will not re-ensnare her? That she may leave at any point? Or deal will be void: I'll let slip your little duplicity to the others and let the others eat you alive."

"She was already able to leave if she wished," said Marci. "But yes, you have my word."

Shannon regarded Marci sceptically for several long moments.

"You are a very strange Shardkeeper," she said eventually. "But I suppose I can spare some coin to stop the rest of those awful little upstarts getting too powerful. Now, release my daughter! And don't think I won't know if you don't."

Huh, so there was a way to check for a link? That was very interesting.

'Sorry for blindsiding you; but I don't think I could get her onboard any other way,' said Marci. 'You OK with this? She won't try and imprison you, will she?'

'I don't think so and… no, it's OK. Just a surprise,' said Saoirse, warmth radiating in her mind. 'Thanks for trusting me Marci. It means a lot. It feels good: I don't know, that maybe this world can be better—if a demon and a surfacer can be friends like us.'

'Of course we're friends, and I should have offered this to you earlier. I'm sorry,' said Marci. 'Oh, and can you try and find out how she detects "Shardbonds?" That would be incredibly useful.'

'Will do,' said Saoirse. 'Um, see you back at the Dreadfort?'

'See you back at the Dreadfort,' replied Marci, before turning her attention back to Shannon. "I am releasing the bond now. Good day, Lady Duin."

Marci took a deep breath, ignored the paranoid part of her screaming at her that this was a potentially disastrous move to give up her power over Saoirse, and then severed the link between them.

Her awareness of the demon estate and Saoirse's mind vanished, leaving Marci feeling a bit… empty. It was the right thing to do, having that kind of power over a friend wasn't right, but of all the bonds she had, Saoirse's was the one she had used the most—primarily to just communicate. Saoirse was a fellow wizard, a peer who she could bounce ideas off, and just a really nice person to be around. She had spent hours talking with the succubus, and although she knew that she was still going to be able to do that, it wouldn't be so effortless.

Although, maybe that was a good thing: Marci was worried she was becoming too used to being a disembodied consciousness. She wasn't sure how, but she needed to at some point figure out a way to sever her mind and soul from the Shard so she could destroy it. It wasn't something she should come to see as a permanent state of affairs. The world could not survive Shardkeepers, not in the long or potentially even medium to short term, and while she currently needed the Dreadfort's power to defend the South and perhaps even liberate the North, she would one day have to give it up: either by finding a way to sever her soul, or else… well, she hoped it wouldn't come to 'or else.'