41.1 Dream Wading
General Summary
Day 696
On our first day of travel, we all get a brief lesson in spiritual magic.
Magdalena starts by saying we have existed on the borders of spiritual magic for a while. Elves that can dream have a bit of it, one of the things that makes different kinds of Fae different is that some Fae have more of it than others, Fae of Day & Night have more than Fae of Seasons, that's why they have clearer inherited memories and live longer.
The ancestral magic that Mistress and Trilium use is a limited form of spiritual magic as well.
That said, you're in the Spirit Lands right now, where spiritual magic is much more developed than up North. Further North, we tend to conceptualize magic practitioners as wizards or mystics, but here there are also ritualists who call on spiritual magic. Where wizards view themselves as both source and conduit for magic and mystics use the energy of the world, ritual magic borrows power from outside of this world. There are many different planes or reals, including the Dreaming, the realm of Lost Spirits, the realms of Chaos, and many others. The Dreaming is the closest and easiest to reach, but things get stranger and stranger the further we get from our world. Traversing any of these realms is a practice known as spirit walking.
The Great River carries energy from beyond this plane, which is why the land in this area has been so transformed. There are three major source springs, but there are also other places where spiritual energy seeks into this land as well.
Spirit calling using body paint is a basic ritual, and the kind of magic practiced by Mistress and Trillium is more common here. Mistress draws power from the realm of Spirits into herself (spirit calling), while Uncle Red manifests those spirits outside of himself (spirit summoning). Using blood as a medium to create and bind spiritual energy is what Magdalena refers to as spirit binding.
My blood magic is a good foundation for spiritual magic, but we must all still be cautious with spiritual energy until we have a more stable way to integrate it. At the very least, we all learn some basic formal rituals to keep our own spiritual magic under control.
Qing Chen and Ausha will learn rituals to work with inscription and items that they create. Liliales will continue to work on Dream magic using rituals.
I’m curious at the applications for rituals in binding and merging spirits, particularly because the thought of No Moon is still close at hand.
Day 670
Travel is peaceful as we head towards the river gorge that will take us further out into the river. As we work our way West, we come across a massive tree that has been split in half by lightning and Magdalena beckons me over excitedly. The tree has provided nourishment for a lightning spirit to form, and since I have some affinity for lightning now, she can teach me to temporarily bind it.
The binding begins with a formal greeting - writing a salutation on the tree and infusing it with energy. Shortly thereafter, a small buzzing ball of electricity coalesces beside me - a young, friendly lightning spirit. Young spirits are weak, instinctive, not very intelligent. A pact with such a spirit might mean letting it respond to my emotional state or mirror my emotions, such as having it attack anything that frightens me. Older and more intelligent spirits can take on my complex tasks, and it’s common to form lasting spirit pacts with young spirits so that they grow alongside their partner.
For now, we form a temporary pact using a metal coin inscribed with a seven-pointed star. Just as easily, I release it.
That night, Bran finds me in the Dreaming to tell me about Sean. The young supposed half-elf is similar to Hella in that he can learn just about anything. Unfortunately he’s not able to reach as deeply as Hella, and Bran thinks it is because he is unbound and therefore incomplete. Hella took Imperial oaths but even before that, she bound herself to Kadia and probably opened a pathway for herself to deepen her magic.
Sean is open to learning more about his elvish heritage and Bran has given him some direction in how he might go about it. When he’s ready, he’ll probably come find the Outlands. I keep this idea in my head to relay to Rina and her teachers, as well. She was also struggling with blocks in her magic.
This is the first time I’ve seen Bran since I’ve mastered metal elementalism. He listens happily as I talk about the properties of metal, how dragons consider both metal and wood to be their own elements.
It’s easy to get lost talking about magic, about our family, and about the future. We take light-hearted wagers on who will be the first to add the next generation (Dawn and Andstella, I think). And I ask if he’s been to see Nucifera, since I’ve been thinking of talking to her about the idea of being free from fate. He has been avoiding her, unsurprisingly. He’s decided that she’s looking for an heir to her mission, not just a student. I promise I’ll wait for him to be present when I go to visit her.
Day 671
We tackle the waterfall on foot the next day but only make it halfway down the 6 or 7 switchbacks accompanying it before finding something unusual - a paved path with handrails and stairs.
Eventually we encounter other people who are evidently out for a leisurely stroll picking fruit and chatting. They all seem nervous about Skyen (they seem…cowlike) but downright frightened of Liliales, even after I call out that we’re dusk fae from up North. A single young man dashes off down the switchbacks and we wait patiently, not wanting to alarm any of the others. When he returns, it is with a finely-dressed young woman whose presence instantly calms the other spirit folk.
She introduces herself as Collarin and says that Skyen is welcome here, given that he is not a Winged Tiger (all of whom are tyrants and bullies, apparently). She walks us down the path to the deep lake at the bottom of the waterfall, where she and another water buffalo swim us across to their city. It’s harvest season and there are plenty of people (in both humanoid and buffalo form) moving about. The city seems very large, but only 20-30 thousand people live here now.
Weapons must be left in our rooms, and no Winged Tigers are allowed in the city. We are led to the palace to meet with her mother, the matriarch Kalasha. Strangely, the palace itself has no armed guards and no men at all, aside from servants.
Kalasha is a delicate elderly woman and we have a very pleasant conversation over tea. She and Collarin both tell us a little more about the area and I’m pleased to tell her about the headwaters being safe again. She and Skyen form a loose plan to send word back to the Mountain Lions by way of a Two-Coloured Moth courier (many of whom happily carry letters of good news just to see the recipient smile) so that the buffalo pilgrims can be guarded on their way to the headwaters.
Our hosts are the Dream-Wading Water Buffalo, and their connection to the Dreaming is such that they can exist consciously in both realms simultaneously. They can only do this in water, and it has become much harder with the dead water. It can only be done in by the most talented buffalo in the deepest parts of the lake, where there is still energy. Kalasha’s grandmother could apparently manifest Dreams into the waking world, but such arts are considered lost.
We also make sure to explain to Kalasha that our kind of fae are different from fae of the Red Thorn who live nearby. For any who have experienced fae of wrath, agony, hatred, or despair, the sight of fae is quite terrifying. Apparently a fae recently visited the moths in Silvara and rumours are that a hundred moths were killed.
Over dinner, we describe Dreamfall and paint illusions, augmented with music. The ladies of the palace are all enraptured by our stories and that there are fae who would happily share such visions of home.
