Thedra nodded. "They're the best we have when it comes to memory issues. Once we're done sightseeing we're going to bring Ariela and Eythil back here to see if they can help with their memory stuff. If anyone can, it's them."
"Then I for one will withhold any judgement of them for their pursuits." Ariela says quietly.
Eythil looked confused. "Huh, why would I need that? I think my memory's fine."
He then looked at Ariela.
"Wait, is it not?"
"Where did you learn how to fight?" Ariela asks gently looking at Eythil.
""Huh? Learn to fight? I... I don't... I don't really know how to fight. Watching the rest of you."
"What were you doing at this time last year." Ariela continues unfazed.
"Last... year?" Realization finally began to sink in as Eythil found himself at a loss for words.
"What do you... that sounds distant. Nothing before you pulled me out of that cold darkness. I think I understand what you mean.
Yes, I'll have to come back here."
"It's okay, we'll figure it out." Ariela says putting a hand on Eythil's shoulder.
Prime trundled on through Shepherd's District taking a turn that put them in front of a river than ran towards the Temple and the Towers. Gondolas were poled expertly through the water transporting people or supplies. The riverside streets bustled.
Shepherd Manor straddled the river, built up against the Door Street wall so that it looked like the river sprang forth from the manor itself. The water flowed beneath a low bridge built into the foundation of the manor house.
A torii arch spanned the river and both adjacent roads at the entrance to the manor grounds. Lounging languidly atop the arch, it's tail coiling down one side, was an enormous, multihued cobra with a human-like face. It hung down from the archway above and appeared to be having a conversation with two passers-by.
That's a Guardian Naga. They are powerful magical creatures drawn to sites of great knowledge or historic importance. They see themselves as the guardians of antiquities, and sages of sorts. They tend to be kind, seeing humans as sometimes misguided children in dire need of direction (and sometimes a firm hand)
The ground floor of the temple was open to the air, supported by sturdy square columns. The manor courtyard was stone, with occasional square depressions in the ground. Each depression held something different. In one was still, pure water. In another, manicured black and white pebbles. Another a large stone sphere floated above, slowly rotating. A three tiered pagoda topped the manor house, nearly reaching to the top of the door street wall.
The grounds were full of children playing, running around in packs, playing a game with a wide ring of wood, trying to catch something at the river's edge, or playing at being warriors with sticks as makeshift swords.
Adults were few and far between on the Manor Grounds. Instead enormous, fluffy dogs padded alongside the packs of children keeping a watchful eye on them. They were fully barded in leather and plate, their fur shades of white and grey, with occasional hints of of a strange bluish aura as their fur moved, but in spite of their war-like appearance, the children seemed comfortable. One dog was patiently allowing it's droopy ear to be pulled on. A lanky young girl was even riding one of the furry beasts.
Those are blink dogs. Really. Big. Blink dogs.
A look of frustration crosses Ariela's features as she studies the serpent creature, sure that she should know what it was, yet drawing a complete blank.
Upon seing the manor courtyard though, she relaxes, a small smile crossing her lips at the somewhat familiarity of the place, the sense of both the age and peacefulness that could be found here.
"Wow, those are.....blinkdogs." she says with a hint of victory in her tone. "They're huge."
Garridan enjoyed the beauty of Shepherd Manor; however, seeing all the children running about made him wonder what their motive is for having so many children. After hearing their thoughts on mind control and reading of thoughts, he clearly had disdain for the Shepherds... The strange creatures about fascinated him though and he found himself staring openly at the strange snake-like woman and her beautiful coloring.
Talas watched Eythil and Ariela's exchange in sympathetic silence, then peered over at the new site, the strange (to his eyes) architecture and unusual beasts.
"Those dogs look like fur coats exploded," he murmured with mild whimsy. "Is this... a school? With all the children?"
"Kind of. More like a child care facility. I can't really think of an analog that exists in most places. School is close. More like an orphanage, I suppose, or a park. Focus isn't placed on education, just on care and socialization." Thedra said with a whimsical smile on her face. "The children go home in the evenings, and during the day they play. The dogs look after them and keep them from hurting themselves or each other, but mostly they are left to their own devices. The the squares, like that one with the floating orb, are puzzles or knowledge repositories, so they are learning, but it is mostly self-guided."
Eythil watched the children and the dogs play with only mild interest. He looked at the strange orbs with a little more focus and glanced back at the manor house.
Puzzles, knowledge repositories? Can I learn more about what I've forgotten here?
He was quiet for a minute. Then he looked up at the manor house and over at Thedra.
"Do all of the Houses have one of those big... also, what house do you belong to?"
"House Kale." Thedra said. "But, I was born a Shepherd."
"And yeah, every house has a manor. Well, we call them manors, but not all of them are overblown houses like these two have been. Really, this one isn't much of a house. It's more like a park with a shrine in it, with the Shepherd Senate chambers on top. None of the Senators actually live here. Just a few groundskeepers and the dogs."
Teral raises and pumps a lazy fist in the air as Thedra mentions her House, murmuring, "Better Lucky than Good."
"Hmnn," Talas murmured. "Learning by exploration. Pleasant enough."
He crossed his arms. "So do people switch Houses often, or are you an exception?"
"It happens more than you might think. Once a class graduates the academy, the students choose a house. Scions are people who were born into one of the houses, and they don't always chose their birth house when they graduate."
"The Houses all look for different qualities and skills, and if they see a promising student, they might make offers to them to entice them to join."
"In the end it's more or less the individual's choice."
"If bloodline doesn't matter all that much, aren't they more factions than houses in the traditional sense?" Ariela asks.
"They're both. Bloodline does matter. It's lineage that doesn't matter."
"Socially speaking one really cares who a person's parents are. The city is a meritocracy more than anything. The only reason heritage important is that it allows the houses to track certain traits from generation to generation."
"Who ones Parents are... huh?"
"Why does the city need to track these traits?"
"To make it more likely that they'll be passed on. Take House Solar. You saw all those folks walking around Solar District with angel blood? Two people with angel blood have a kid, that kid has more angel blood."
"If you're house Solar, and you want to fill your ranks with people who have the power of angels, but the free will of mortals, you have to keep track of who has the celestial heritage and powers, and who they're having kids with. Just about anything hereditary about someone can skip generations, so record keeping is pretty important."
"Do they try to influence the outcome? Like breeding?"
Talas listens with a frown, seeming uncomfortable with the talk of bloodlines and lineage and the passing-on of hereditary traits, though he says nothing.
"Well, yeah. I can see where you're going with this though. Selective Breeding is about a half a step away from some of the worst things people can do to each other, so your concerns are very important."
"Every house has different methods, and some of them make people uncomfortable, but no one is forced, coerced or deceived. The closest to any sort of coercion that I can think of is House Fell, which still practices arranged marriages. Of course, because of how the Academy system works, anyone who joins House Fell knows that part of the deal is that a marriage will be arranged for them. Anyone who isn't comfortable with that just joins a different house."
"House Solar has a system that is probably best compared to sacred prostitution. Men who are willing to father children go to a particular temple. Women who are ready to conceive go and pick a mate from those men."
"House Shepherd hosts parties where people looking for long or short term relationships show up. People find what they're looking for pretty fast in a room full of empaths, either with their own gifts or with the help of psychic matchmakers."
"It's all pretty complex. It kinda has to be, because every house has a significant interest in making sure children are born, but the population of the city has to be tightly controlled."
"All human mating habits are uncomfortable." Prime rumbled. "The Maug way is a lot better. If we want offspring, we just build one."
"That is... odd..." Whether Garridan is replying to Prime or Thedra or both is not entirely clear. "This may have already been answer, Thedra, but all this is just so overwhelming. Just to clarify, to be a citizen of Arch you aren't required to join one of these Houses, right?"
"Well, as far as I know, there's never been a citizen who didn't want to join any house. What are your concerns?"
Talas rolled his head side-to-side as if popping some stubborn knots in his neck. He waited until Garridan had had a chance to answer Thedra's question, then raised a hand like a student in class. When Thedra glanced at him, he offered a crooked smile and said, "I remember in our initial meeting, one of the things we brought up was that whole 'citizens expected to reproduce' thing. Since we're tangentially talking about that again-- Does the city have any provisions for those gentlemen who... may not gravitate towards the fairer sex?"
Back in Varisia, Talas might have couched this more discreetly. Here, the city seemed so otherworldly, so full of things beyond the pale, he couldn't imagine anyone blinking.
Thedra didn't miss a beat. "I can't speak for everyone in the city, but for the most part no one around here cares who someone is attracted to. We have more important things to worry about."
"Citizens don't have to reproduce. They just have to be able to. Or be long lived enough that there's no danger of dying off and taking your Talent and Experience with you. Because of the overpopulation issue, most citizens don't have to worry about reproducing. I've even heard of people who's names come up giving away their turn to someone else who really wants a child."
"If someone were to manifest some incredibly important talent that the city was very interested in passing onto another generation, but that person wasn't attracted to the opposite sex, there are ways around that. Alchemical insemination. Use of one of those gender swapping curses. Various Polymorph effects. I'm sure there's other ways I'm not thinking of."
"The point is, whatever your proclivities, this is an issue your House, whichever you choose, will be willing to work with you on. I would be stupid not to."
Talas smiles ruefully. "Well, then, all well in hand, ha."
Somewhat more at his ease, he leans back, arms crossed, gazing out to see what else the city might hold.
"I guess I see the point. Losing a talented bloodline or gifts would be as bad as losing some valuable knowledge and watching it fade into history. It's a bit of a higher burden on women thought isn't it? More than a quick bit of fun and a contribution to society you...leave behind." Ariela comments.
"It is, yes. That's the case everywhere though. Women still have to carry the child and give birth, but after that, it becomes a lot more of a group effort." Thedra said, pointing toward the manor yard full of children to illustrate her point.
Teral scrunches his brow a bit at that last, trying to remember something. "If memory serves - I know, I know!" He laughed off Thedra's raised eyebrow.
"Anyway, I think there was a side project with some House - probably Creed, now I think about it. Well, whichever, they were working on something to get around that particular limitation a while back. Trying to come up with a way to bring a child to term outside the mother's body, to avoid potential down time for valuable agents. Something with creating a soul link to the father, or an artificial womb..." he shrugged and spread his hands.
"The specifics escape me, but if I recall, they mostly wrote off the project. Not cost-effective. Too much magic and effort involved to justify pulling it off, most days. Still. If you're really hellbent on something, it's a big multiverse. Somebody somewhere probably has the juice to make it happen."
"I... hadn't heard that." Thedra said, looking a little disturbed. "Does sound like something they'd try though."
Prime added his rumbly, hollow voice to the conversation. "A while back House Stark proposed a plan to the council which would essentially have them raise a pregnant woman who had died as undead in order to save the living child. I don't think it got approval."
Eythil was looking more distinctly lost and uncomfortable with the conversation the longer it went on.
"Well, as far as I know, there's never been a citizen who didn't want to join any house. What are your concerns?"
"Let's just say I haven't been particularly impressed by what I've seen thus far." he stated. While the Solars seemed responsible and meant well, there was something about breeding houses that set him ill-at-ease. And then...
"An undead woman to raise a living baby?!?! What sort of maniac would think of such a thing?"
"Byron." Teral said the name with a mix of revulsion and respect. "The Starks aren't all bad, they're just...gah. We'll pass by Stark Manor sooner or later. You'll see."
"The undead woman wouldn't be raising the baby. Just birthing it." Prime said. "I assume someone else would raise the kid after that."
"I think the idea was that it was better to save the baby's life than let it die with the mother. I understand that people seemed disturbed by the concept, but to save a life I can understand the benefit. I've noticed I less of an aversion to undead than you fleshy types. I mean, if they're evil or destructive they need to be gotten rid of, but if not I guess I don't see the problem."
Thedra patted Prime on the top of his head. "That's because you don't have a nose."
"And haven't waded though a sea of them." Ariela says with a shudder.
Talas gave Garridan a sympathetic look at the other man's discomfort with the concepts being discussed, then wrinkled his nose at the talk of the undead.
"Yes, well.... there's something a bit fundamentally creepy to us 'fleshy types' about... one's body being used as a husk, or for anything at all, when you're no longer 'there' to be in charge of it."
"I can see how that would be an uncomfortable thought." Prime said. "As a golem, I've had to become used to the idea of not being in charge of my body, and with not being what I once was. I was formed by an elemental spirit being bound to a chassis of stone and metal. I do not remember the elemental I used to be, and I am not entirely free willed. I never have been. I do not know if who I am is a product of who I was or not. Perhaps I would feel differently if I could remember my former self, but I like who I am so at some point I decided it did not matter."
"I do know that if I were offered the choice of becoming undead in order to save my offspring, I would be tempted. It is a moot point though. I have never heard of an undead golem."
Talas peers down at Prime's carriage body, vaguely disconcerted by all this.
" 'Not entirely free-willed?' " he echoes. "Were you... created to serve this city?"
Prime laughed. "Of course not. I'm a Maug. This city didn't even exist when I was created. I was built by a wizard for a war that was waged on another plane a very long time ago."
"For most of my existence I was a slave-soldier. The city rescued me from that. House Solar took me in as a Bondsman. They've been helping me chisel away at my directives, giving me more and more free will as time goes by. Sometimes, the imperatives removed are very hard to deal with. Every time I go to have more of my directives removed so I can learn to replace them with my own choices, I wonder if that will be the time I have to be destroyed, or if that will be the time I destroy myself."
"I didn't handle it very well at first. Freedom is very challenging, and extremely dangerous. I found the Godstone, though. Ever since then, it's been a lot easier."
Talas laced his hands behind his head, absorbing all of this with a frown.
"What does this Godstone mean to you?" he asked carefully.
Prime thought for a few moments as he slowly rolled down the winding streets, sometimes pausing for foot traffic. The city seemed to have very few horses.
"Anywhere you go, there are gods who promote ideas, who accept the worship of their followers and give power to them in accordance with what they represent as spiritual forces. They pedal ideas, morals, power, and purpose in return for devotion."
"It is never an equal relationship. Whatever power a member of a congregation receives from their faith absolutely pales in comparison to the power a god receives from prayers, worship, and the commitment of mortal souls collected in the afterlife. That is the end game of any god. Even the most noble. They are vying for souls. The most precious thing in all existence given away for a few miracles and sense of purpose. Often all this happens without a mortal ever really understanding what the machinations of the god they serve actually are. They must take it on faith. In many ways, is what faith is."
"I have existed for more mortal lifetimes than I can count. I have fought in countless wars on dozens of planes for all manor of causes. I have been a weapon of good, and of evil. I was given consciousness, but not agency. Understanding but not reason. Knowledge, but not wisdom."
"After all the things I have done and seen, I refuse to ever take action simply because someone else has decided I should. Nothing anywhere in existence deserves that power over my actions."
"So I had to learn how to trust my own choices. It was not an easy thing. There are many temples on door street, many preachers and many gods who claimed they could show me the way, but I have fought for far too many causes that claimed to be righteous to believe so easily."
"The Godstone does not ask anything of those who come to it. It only requires that they question themselves. The tests of the Godstone are not divine trials or tests of devotion or faith. They are simply choices, and everyone's answers are different. By the time the innermost circle is reached, a person will know who they are and what they want."
"What I wanted never mattered. Now it does. I refuse to allow it not to. The Godstone gave me that understanding. I matter."
"I do not matter because of what I believe, or what I have fought for, or what God I serve, or what I am made of, or what I have done. I matter because I exist."
"Now, through the trials of the Godstone, I have the wisdom to trust in my own choices and the ability to question those who would give me orders."
"I found faith. In myself, and in others, and a reason to continue to exist. What more is there?"
Talas listened with his brows slowly climbing. He'd never given particular thought to the gods beyond the generalized prayers that everyone in the caravan had thrown up to Desna-- supplications for safe travel, for luck on the road. He'd surely never thought of it as some sort of transaction of prayers, souls, and power. The gods were just... the gods. They were there, you prayed. Perhaps the truly devout did more than that, but...
He shrugged a little, crossing his feet at the ankle. "You've devoted more thought to it than I have, master Prime. I tend, by and large, to worry about my own affairs, and not ask the gods for terribly much in any case. But is your Godstone, then, an entity so perfectly selfless that it has no need for the souls and prayers you claim the other gods collect like women collecting jewels?"