I Wish I'd Grown Up...
By James Walker
There's one band a demonling cannot choose to be.
"I remember Lurz.
"My memories are scattered, disjointed. I remember him wandering the streets
of Shal-Mari wearing a battered, stinking raincoat; but I don't know where
he got it or why he wore it. I remember him being kicked out of a casino on
The Strip; remember him eating at a grotty restaurant. I remember the first
time he saw a Lilim.
I think he ended up owing her in return for finding out where Tempters come
from. I think. It was after that meeting that he travelled until he found
the Guild House. He spent years watching it; he even acquired a few geases
in return for all of the essence he acquired over that year. Eventually he
mustered up the courage to go inside.
His geas gems acted as a passport of sorts. As he wandered the main room,
seeing what was on offer, the desire to be a Lilim, to be courted and
desired grew to too strong to deny. He smiled as the demons running the
stalls offered to buy his geas gems; easily avoided the demons who hoped to
force him to invoke the geases on their behalf by threatening to invoke them
by having the Lilim make the demon's life misery.
He learnt about the Waiting Room; that anybody could queue to seek a boon
from Lilith. He found it; he waited. His handful of geas gems ended up being
frittered away, as he bought his way forward on the queue; essence was spent
as fast as he acquired it. Eventually he was in the first third of the
queue, but despaired of getting any further. A Lilim, entering the waiting
room, and sweeping the queue, came up to him: 'you are tired of waiting? You
will owe me greatly if I take you to Lilith!' He nodded, and left the queue,
following her. She smiled, and turned to the petitioner who had been
standing behind him - a small geas chain appeared on the petitioners wrist,
and the Lilim wandered off, pocketing her new geas gem. Sighing, Lurz headed
back to the start of the queue.
I think Lurz ended up owing a geas to a Lilim to let him stand in front of
her, so that only the mightiest demons could push past them. Certainly he
was in the queue a shorter time; and for some reason his guardian Lilim
listened to him as spoke of the tricks which were used in the queue. When he
finally got to the front of the queue the geas he owed was gone; but I got
the impression that she didn't mind.
And so he met Lilith, who smiled sadly and shook her head when he made his
request. Begging, crying, he spoke of what he had learnt; the deals he had
struck, the potential he had. And Lilith listened. The Calabite bouncers
moved nervously; should they have already thrown him out? But they waited as
Lilith listened. And finally Lilith nodded, and picked him up, enfolding
him, taking her inside herself - and that is how Lurz died."
"Yes, I have his memories. Yes, his Forces became mine. So? Do you really
think I would buy his smelly old raincoat? Ah! You think that I would want
it destroyed, that I am ashamed to have once been a demonling. Silly girl,
why would I be ashamed? I am not Lurz, never was, any more than you are
whatever Damned Souls were used by Mother to make you. You'll have to try
better than that, sister......"
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