literature

TLoS: UAA 43: Confronting Crazed Conspirators Prt2

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Hermit's cave was pretty cramped for a fully grown dragoness; the cheetah fit alright, as would two small pre-adolescent dragons, but Ddraig almost found herself crushed in the small space. Still it left her with enough space if she sat down, which Hermit was at least good enough to offer her to do so...

He too sat down upon a small, wooden stool, next to a silver chest, which Ddraig assumed contained the armour which Hermit claimed Cynder and Spyro stole, for it looked as though it was designed to contain a piece of armour, only now it contained many stacks of drakemark bills; upon seeing Ddraig looking at the container, he quickly shut it with a swish of his stick.
"I know what you want from this." Hermit spoke. "...You want me to wave my hand, and your jewellery falls off and you turn into a male again, I'm right, aren't I?"
Ddraig found herself nodding slightly. "Whatever point you were trying to make, you could've simply made to me through a proper dialogue. I don't see why you think me a monster as to curse me." Ddraig snorted. "I assume the EAM put you up to this?"
"Not all of them..." Hermit responded. "...The ones who decided to take more 'questionable' action against you were a minority. Most of them were human women, but a few dragonesses. They're best known for use of magic. And this had to give a message."
"They still could've use the proper channels!" The dragoness growled.
"...You were doing nothing about it."
"I didn't know about this corruption or misogyny!" She protested.
"Perhaps... But perhaps you weren't the only one they wanted to send a message to." He looked around, but his cave was barren, perhaps he was trying to distract himself; it wasn't working. "...In any case, you're lucky."
"Lucky!" Ddraig spluttered. "In what way am I lucky?"
Hermit smirked to himself. "...You don't even see it yet? No matter, you will. But there is one way you won't have seen until you spoke to me..." He paused. "Originally, the curse was going to be far worse than this."
"Go on?"
"Originally, the curse wasn't going to be a gender changing spell at all." Hermit informed her. "Originally, it was going to be a body control spell."
Ddraig's face turned downright hostile. "...What?" She snarled in a dangerously soft tone, even with the coronet, that prospect enraged her.
"...To begin with, we were going to use each piece of jewellery you were wearing to take control of the respective body part. So leg bracelets allowed us to control the legs, wing bracelets the wings, and so on." He paused for breath. "...We would've made you do whatever we wanted. Legislate whatever we pleased, and you'd do so. Because if you didn't, we could make you do horrible things, either to yourself, or others, or let others do horrible thigns to you... But, the people in charge decided against it though. It was too much for them, the changing of your gender might be forgiven in time, but to hex you and use you as a puppet? That would have been a far greater treason, none of them wanted that."
"This is still treason!" Ddraigtanto shouted at him. "You cursed your ruler!"
"...Well, yes..." The cheetah shrugged. "...And I suppose I should let you in on the full details of what you should expect now."
"I know the details." Ddraig spat. "I'm a woman, the doctors can't reverse it, it's the most powerful curse they ever saw, and the magic is draining from the jewellery and fusing to me, and I can't get them off!"
"You know part of the details, not the full details."
"...Then enlighten me."
"My pleasure..." The Hermit stood up, returned to his chest, and pulled out a document. He took a few seconds to read it through, and then returned to his seat.
"...You know most of the details of the curse, and guessed a few yourself." The hermit shuffled around under his cloak. "...Well, tell me more of what you think is happening?"
"This curse is playing with my mind. I'm thinking like a dragoness, I'm acting like a dragoness."
"And people are treating you like a dragoness?"
"Obviously."
"...Like you've always been a dragoness?"
Ddraig paused. Now she thought about it, that was weird; a lot of weirdness has emerged from people who knew she wasn't always like this.
"...What aren't you telling me?"
"Memories, Ddraigtanto! Memories!" Hermit shouted this line as though it was praise to heaven. "...The biggest obstacle to you accepting this change was people. How people saw you, and how they remembered you." He paused, smiling quite eerily. "...Your uncle Logan mentioned he thought his brother had a son, not a daughter, then shrugged it off as a mistake. He had come to remember, and believe, that your mother had given birth to a daughter, not a son! Even now his sister has proven that you were turning into a dragoness not long ago, his memory is unchanged; you were born a girl as far as he remembers. Even Fylar remembers it this way, or she will..." Another pause, this time, he took a wineskin out from under his cloak, and downed a large amount of the drink within. "...You see, in time, people will forget the news stories, and the people will move on from them to other things. The memory of you changing will fade from the minds of everyone, even those closest to you, eventually, but the memories of you being a dragoness will remain. In a sense, the memories people have of you will change, people will believe you born a dragoness, and always a dragoness."
"...But why?!"
"...So they, and you, could adjust to it, and live with it until death."
"But that's not going to happen. Because you're going to reverse this for me."
Hermit frowned. "...Well, that's the thing. Why would we try to make it as comfortable for you, and as easy for you, as possible if we intended to reverse the spell."
"...Because you knew I would come looking for you. You saw what was going to happen everywhere else. You saw my uncle tell me he remembered me as a girl. And you saw I was coming to find you."
"...And my answer would still be the same even if I didn't." Hermit snapped. "...The truth is, we tested it. But we made it too powerful. turns out, if you have tweleve extremely powerful spellcasters all curse the same jewellery with such a well designed curse,  those twelve would later find it impossible to remove the curse from the jewellery again."
"What!" Ddraig spluttered. "So you made a curse which had no countercurse!?"
"We did." Hermit nodded. "...But, have things not been going well for you following the curse?"
"You cost me my girlfriend."
"...But you gained a long lost family in your uncle and aunt, and your aunt's family in the Hunters? You're now the empress of an empire, and your claim to Avalar's throne stronger than ever before." He gave time for Ddraig to mull this over, but she still wasn't happy. "...things could change. Your men might find a solution we didn't have the resources for, but by that point, you might not even want to change."
"You don't know that." Ddraig growled.
"And you don't know it either. All I know is, the future has changed, irrevisably. I remember seeing your god-daughter's future a few years ago. Somehow, I doubt that will still be the case..."
"What do you mean?"
"...Did you ever even consider to ask if Cynder wanted to be empress of Avalar? What were you to do if she said no? You'd be without an heir. Eve can't be empress, she's a guardian. You'd be in trouble."
"...So you did all this just to ensure I'd have an heir..." She paused, the penny dropped. "...No. I'm not having this conversation."
"Not now, but you will. As for me, I'm glad. The day I see that tretcherous runt come to any power is the day I walk into the ocean and let the ancestors take me in their embrace."
"Fool. She'll still have the throne."
Hermit chuckled. "No she won't."
"Then she'll have a throne! Her hard work and her heart will be rewarded if I get my way!"
"You might be right. But that throne will never be Avalar... And so my work is done."
Ddraig puleld a face. "I could have you done for treason you know. I could either have you thrown in a dungeon to rot, or I could just have you executed for this."
Hermit shrugged apathetically. "You could, but you won't..."
"And why not?"
"Because you don't. And believe me, I know."

Ddraig scowled, she couldn't bare to be near this foul person any longer. She stood and left, her heart sinking as she went. That was it. She was stuck this way. Deep down, Ddraig knew this from the start, but she'd got her hopes up, only for them to be dashed.
The others saw Ddraig, the daylight had shrunk, leaving an evening glow as moody as she.
"Come on..." Ddraig spoke sadly. "Let's just go home..."
The others wordless nodded, following suit; they knew. They could see it in her face...
"We'll have him arrested." Sol spoke to Ddraig, trying to comfort her in his own, official, servant soldier way. "...We clap him in irons and charge him for treason. He'll rot in an Avalarian prison, where he belongs."
Ddraig sighed. "There's no point. We'd only be giving him the satisfaction of knowing he's gotten to us... Lets just get out of here..."
Sol looked concerned, but obliged...  
Part two of our little chapter, and Ddraig finally confronts the Hermit... And gets some news she didn't want to hear...


Ddraigtanto (Ddraig), Eve, Cystal, Duke Logan, Fylar, King Elwynn and Captain Vitality 'Via' Sol belong to Me.
Spyro, Cynder, Malefor, Hunter and Hermit belong to Serria/Activision
© 2014 - 2024 Ddraigtanto
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eemhp31's avatar
On the joys of being Seer of the future, causes so much oddities. I was wondering about the the vision from way back when, well good to know you remembered as well. Which means you tie up lose ends quite well. Well done.