Rotten Record of the Hidden Few
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ROTTEN RECORD OF THE HIDDEN FEW
[The grimoire is untitled. The above moniker us applicable but not official, certainly not written anywhere.]
[It was written an age ago, if not more. Its cover is rotten leather, whatever symbol once displayed long gone. Its pages' parchment worse yet. What little you can read follows, in dated entries using a calendar you do not recognize and which is of no assistance in precisely and objectively dating the text, but is nevertheless of crucial assistance in chronologically ordering and comparing the entries to one another in terms of relative time.]
... that there would be two, palter. But one, sooth. Only one, then and now, with twain wings and twain countenance, each of a shade and gleam respective.
[ ... The parchment is rotten. The next entry is dated a few days later ... ]
Our numbers, weak; our sooth, denied; shunned into latibulate. Oh, but they are blind; they blind themselves, in their certain zeal. It is we, the precious and hidden few who have ...
[ ... The parchment is rotten ... the next entry a few days later ... ]
... soon, She will grant us our blessings, having passed her tests of ignorance and neglect, we her loyal and precious few, who endure the lack of divine grace; we, who Know.
[ ... The parchment is rotten, the next entry a few days later ... ]
We are chivvied.
Not only by the misbelievers or the dotes. Not by the slayers or even the priests.
No, by something else.
It has ended Silas.
Taken with it what were in his head. Left it without the contents.
Seen, empty, through a hole.
What wicked test is it, dear Lady?
Silas. My dear friend. I am sorry.
[ ... The parchment is rotten, the next entry several weeks after ... ]
We cannot remember a thing, from yesterweek. Not a single day, or hour. Why is it, my Lady? Why? A test of privation, from thy harsher side?
[ ... The parchment is an indecipherable combination of shapes, lines, letters and words in the typical archaic spelling but which form no coherent thought or sentence. There are a few pages of this, and then some torn free, followed finally by clear lettering on the next.]
Remembrance fails no longer. We are and have been under mental siege. But lo, there is a method to resist. We have gathered to confer upon defense. We know now what it is not. It is not of divine test, no, not after all that. Though we are denied yet, even we know so. And nor is it of thaumaturgy, precisely, in which we are all versed and competent. It is neither. It is something else.
Something which requires a quaint defense.
[The next entry is immediate.]
The defense is a combination of thaumaturgic magic and inherent will, but also the necessity for calm made most or at least more facile by certain precautions.
To be in a group, and not secluded nor sequestred, or on one's lonesome, is the best defense, if combined with diligent incantations to enhance and protect wits, to protect against the wicked, as well as, in tandem, to clear the thoughts.
All, again in tandem, and at once, while remaining calm, unafraid, and certain.
That is our defense.
And it has proven successful.
[The next entry is immediate.]
Though we are tested, and denied divinity yet, our material thaumaturgy is potent, our sorceries undeniable.
Not even by that thing, which we have enscorcelled in chains, after protecting our wits and understanding as agreed.
Lo, our thaumaturgic ritual: cool waters, which flow and not still; ashen of black from on high; sopoforic mousheroms, which grow upon graves; and four small white golden steel chains, one for each limb, all of which incanted with a group of no less than at least three, which command it: 'DAIMON, WEIVE, HUSH, ERE ABANDON!'
[The next entry is dated two months later.]
Now, it serves. By our thaumaturgy, we can ... and, ... through ... control it. To hunt our enemies, via the catacombs and our derniers ...
And in its service, we can see it is the blessing we have prayed for, sent by our Lady.
Our divine beast, its abilities under our command, to show our deniers the soothe face and potence of our ... ruin them if they ... and in time, let the weakness of their faiths lead to ...
[ ... The parchment is rotten, the next entry a few days later ... ]
Silas is alive!
In blest silhouette, among the cool dark, at night, he speaks.
I knew our Lady would not take him from me. He lives, now part of the blessing.
Ready to serve, within this new form, O' boon of ours.
Silas, my dear friend. Speak to me again. Won't you?
[ ... The parchment is rotten, the next entry a few days later ... ]
The veneur, wrongful seeker and clodded believer in half Her countenance -- O, those foolish ones, who hide in their towns, clinging to their falsities and mendacity --
He who has sealed us in our temple, accused us of harboring a feend.
A futile thing to attempt, to seal us in moonstone.
For we are with our blessing.
Already we complot our means of breach.
[The next entry is dated two months later, following many rotten and illegible parchments. The quill is shaky, lines of letters drawn long.]
Silas, I always knew you would be so in the end.
By my side.
Together.
As we and the siblings,
of our hidden church,
in the pale light of the cool dark,
those guiding twin eyes,
united and binocular,
in the gleam and the shade.Our siblings do not understand this new sooth but you have shown me clearly.
I see how they fear. The very same sort professed by false churches, who prosecute we precious and once hidden few -- fewer now, it seems, than ever.
[None of the entries that follow are dated.]
They can see now, Silas.
As part of our blessing.
Together with you.
United as we are each meant to be, in this boon of ours.
Your tactics sound as ever, to dull their wits. The method you shewd me, to bless the blue moonstones and turn them into gleaming swarth.
But oh, no, it does not dull the mind.
No, I am wrong on that.
It shews it the sooths of the blessing.
It was providential to watch you open their minds.
The holes in their skulls the shape of our hallowed symbols.
Dear Silas. Edith. Atticum. Lillema.
I knew you would yet live.
That I would see you, as I see Silas.
As I see all of you.
As I will soon see myself.
[DM Xanatos Gambit]
[The Waning Moon]
Rising Action/Penultimate Events
2025/07/26
