[Well, not glad. But it's Vira, so it's fine; she doesn't mind telling her what happened.
Though it's perhaps necessary to start sooner than after.]
The purpose of my travel to Canaan House was to study the path of ascension to Lyctorhood - an invitation of great honour by the Emperor. However, that invitation necessitated that I bring a cavalier. [She's aware this terminology isn't familiar to everyone so - ] A necromancer is accompanied by a trained swordsman, and the cavalier to the heir to one of the Nine Houses is the cavalier primary. Ortus was no skilled swordsman, however. He was granted the position because - because his father was cavalier primary to my father, and because frankly there was no one else in my House with any skill at the sword anyway.
. . . There was a reason we were asked to bring our cavaliers, however. The key to becoming a Lyctor was a human sacrifice. The death of the cavalier; the consumption of their soul, transformed into a battery for everlasting power.
In order to defeat Cytherea, I was forced to kill and consume Ortus. And so she died, and so I ascended, and was brought to the side of the Emperor to carry out his work.
[. . . But she did ask what happened after. And besides; as clipped as her delivery is, she doesn't want Vira to think her so cruel. She had no love for Ortus, nor he for her, but she still wishes she hadn't been forced to do something so terrible.]
My transition was. . . troubled, I'm afraid. My convalescence after the battle long and painful. After that first time, when I fought Cytherea, the techniques of Lyctorhood never worked so well for me again. I could never again access the remains of poor Ortus' soul, and I was plagued by hallucinations and fainting spells of the kind you witnessed.
no subject
[Well, not glad. But it's Vira, so it's fine; she doesn't mind telling her what happened.
Though it's perhaps necessary to start sooner than after.]
The purpose of my travel to Canaan House was to study the path of ascension to Lyctorhood - an invitation of great honour by the Emperor. However, that invitation necessitated that I bring a cavalier. [She's aware this terminology isn't familiar to everyone so - ] A necromancer is accompanied by a trained swordsman, and the cavalier to the heir to one of the Nine Houses is the cavalier primary. Ortus was no skilled swordsman, however. He was granted the position because - because his father was cavalier primary to my father, and because frankly there was no one else in my House with any skill at the sword anyway.
. . . There was a reason we were asked to bring our cavaliers, however. The key to becoming a Lyctor was a human sacrifice. The death of the cavalier; the consumption of their soul, transformed into a battery for everlasting power.
In order to defeat Cytherea, I was forced to kill and consume Ortus. And so she died, and so I ascended, and was brought to the side of the Emperor to carry out his work.
[. . . But she did ask what happened after. And besides; as clipped as her delivery is, she doesn't want Vira to think her so cruel. She had no love for Ortus, nor he for her, but she still wishes she hadn't been forced to do something so terrible.]
My transition was. . . troubled, I'm afraid. My convalescence after the battle long and painful. After that first time, when I fought Cytherea, the techniques of Lyctorhood never worked so well for me again. I could never again access the remains of poor Ortus' soul, and I was plagued by hallucinations and fainting spells of the kind you witnessed.