Iamblichos' Journey: It's a Secret
Amazing, Iamblichos thought to himself. At one point I found these halls disturbing. He paced behind his grandfather through the passages of Sanctumcoal, passing undead cleaners and errand runners as they walked.
"So, my boy!" the elderly dwarf exclaimed. "Are you ready? A great day, if I do say so, a very great day indeed!" They rounded the corner to see all the assembled nec... Researchers, Iamblichos reminded himself sternly. They... WE... are Researchers. Not the N-word. Dwarves and humans, all standing together. Their costumes were different, their features were different, but somehow in the greenish light it became obvious that they shared something greater. Goden and Logem, Inod and Zefon stood at the corners of the table, as grandfather had said they would. They were his sponsors in the Rite, though his official mentor would be the human Song Wickedpine. Elaborate divinations had been conducted to determine where Iamblichos would best learn, and Song had been the clear result. Ezum cleared his throat and bounced on his heels.
"Researchers, apprentices, teachers, and most of all, my dear friends." Pulling out all the stops, the old dwarf was using the amazingly archaic formal mode. Of course, for him, it was probably still current when he was alive, but still... "Today, no more pride could be mine than if my feet stood on a mountain of gold that reached from the Realms Below to the sky itself. Ezum Wheelscalled hight I, scion of that race that..." His voice droned on and on. Iamblichos could feel his stomach trembling with nerves. The ceremony was long and intense, and having Ezum state everything in excruciating detail using the formal speech was taking a long time even by dwarven standards. Even Song looked relieved when the old dwarf finally wound down. "... Now, let the Candidate stand forth and cite his lineage!"
Iamblichos stepped forward and spoke for the first time. "I am named Iamblichos, called Lettervises in this shape, and Fountainhand at my birth. I am the son of As Tourinched, son of Kogen Labordells, son of Id Helppaddles, slain in the flood, son of Udib Cobaltburied, who slew the great troll, son of..." The lineage he had learned spooled out into the silence. Even the zombies seemed quiet, listening; the hush of the tower increased, closing in on the deep inner room where the mysteries were in progress. "... son of Cog Geniuspages, son of Ezum Wheelscall, who stands before me now." Iamblichos expected his ancestor to look proud at this long line of descendants; instead the old dwarf looked vaguely disturbed. Perhaps the years sank in when the list was told in that way. Not for the first time, Iamblichos wondered if this were really a good idea. Not much point in wondering now, though, he thought sourly. There's only one way out of this room.
Tikes Sprinkledtrampled came forward, carrying a bundle of giant cave spider silk. Wrapped in that silk was the slab from the Times Before. When he looked upon it, the Secret it contained would be his; the transformation would be complete. The pile of bones on the plate currently on the altar would be his first revenant.
The dwarves began a deep-throated chant; the humans caroled a counterpoint in tenors and contraltos over the bass rumble of the dwarves. From behind Iamblichos, a cloth suddenly appeared and wrapped around his eyes as a blindfold.
"Atol kest ne?" Song's human voice sounded odd speaking old Dwarvish. What do you seek?
"Muzzag!" Knowledge. Always.
"Atol kest ne?"
"Muzzag!"
"Atol kest ne?"
"Muzzag!"
"To seek is to be awake. To awaken is to know. To know is to be enlightened. To be enlightened is the desire of all wise ones. Come then, and be enlightened, and become wise." The blindfold was ripped off and Iamblichos' head was seized from behind and pointed at the slab. It was a chunk of some unknown rock, carved with ancient symbols with what looked like someone's finger... the rock was melted and the symbols dragged into it like a finger dipping in mud. Iamblichos attempted to read the symbols; from everything he had been told, the symbols basically read themselves to you, unfolding into your mind as soon as your eyes touched them. That didn't seem to be happening. There was... nothing.
"Well my boy, raise your first servant!" The old dwarf chuckled, waving at the pile of bones.
"I..." his voice cracked. "I... don't know how."
***
Two hours of increasingly frustrated ceremony later, nothing had changed. They had tried additional bindings, fragments of other ceremonies, even performed something called Ngusmu's Ethereal Stitching that made Iamblichos feel like the marrow of his bones was on fire. Nothing made much of a difference; the symbols remained mute scratches on an old rock. Tikes sat wearily on the altar stone. Ezum stood beside him, arms crossed, scowling furiously. Song had long since given up and left, as had most of the other humans - their part was done, if anything was done.
"How could it not work?!" Ezum shouted for the hundredth time. "It's NEVER not worked! It's a slab! It's a secret! It ALWAYS works!"
Tikes shook his head wearily. "I told you, Ezum. We should have known when the bindings went awry. We just aren't paying attention; every step of the way, we've found more things we don't understand. Something about him being in ongoing possession of another is breaking the link. If he saw it in his own body, it would work; if the dwarf he is possessing saw it in his own body, it would work, but the boy seeing it in someone else's body just doesn't seem to have the metamagical resonance to awaken the symbols. We've never had a Researcher born in this circumstance... we are once again in completely untested waters." He stood up and patted Iamblichos on the shoulder. "Don't worry my boy, we'll figure out what went wrong, we just need some time." With that, the old human walked out of the chamber and left Iamblichos alone with the fuming Ezum.
"But... but... how...?" Iamblichos' mind was numb. "What... am I supposed to do now?"
"How the bloody hell should I know?" Catching himself visibly, the old dwarf stopped and shook his head. "Look... just go back to Doomforests for now. We need to do a lot of work, obviously. We'll figure it out, just be patient."
Back... to Doomforests. Iamblichos wasn't sure whether to laugh or cry.