Issue 1 Downtime

Nailah had moved operations to her room in the Lighthouse. That included the spread of tarot cards that continued to sprawl on one side of the room. On the other side Nailah was sitting on a pillow, the urn she had borrowed from Roland sitting in front of her while she is busy transcribing the contents of the accompanying scroll, occasionally adding annotations where the scroll is too deteriorated to read.


((open))

Gemma approached the door with a little bit of trepidation. She'd heard the rumors about what Professor Weaver kept in her office out here. She didn't really believe them, but rumors were around for a reason, right? She knocked on the door with one hand, her other hand balancing the small package she was delivering.

"Come in." Nailah's voice comes from inside.

Gemma slipped into the room, "Professor Weaver, there was a package..." She stopped short for just a brief moment, before finishing, "... delivered for you."

The room, as strange as it might be to walk into, actually is fairly open and well lit. It looks a bit like an exhibition in a museum and smells faintly of incense.

"Ah, Miss Sloan, was it?" she says, putting down the scroll before standing up to take the package from Gemma. "Thank you very much."

Gemma handed the package over, looking around at the items in the room. "It's really nice in here," she said, then covered quickly, "You have some nice pieces."

"Oh, you're interested in that kind of thing? I've had to make due with some reproductions, but an increasing amount of pieces are real." she says, slicing the package open with one of her fingernails.

"Still waffling between majoring in history and majoring in English," she said. "Maps are my particular fascination, but historic objects always interest me. May be the dragon in me," she managed a smile.

"I don't have any maps, but I can show you some of the things I managed to accumulate if you want."

"I'd appreciate that, but I wouldn't want to take up your time. It looked like you were doing something important." She gestured toward the urn and the scroll.

"Just a... project I'm working on. Nothing that needs to be done immediately." she says, opening the package and pulling out what looks like a large vial of murky water. She walks over to one of the tables and places it next to a variety of boxes, vials and bowls. Also, for some reason, a small cage with a black rat inside.

Gemma tilted her head at the rat, but righted it again and looked around. "I'd imagine not many people get vials of water in the post."

"Water from the Nile. Professor Bowen would let you know that it's a waste of postage but that's just because he's afraid of things he can't measure with his machines." she smirks faintly.

"Some of the people at Muir were like that," she said. "Not sure how to handle things when they didn't fit into their frame of reference. I don't know that I blame them." She walks back over to look at the urn, "New acquisition?"

"Borrowed it from Professor Sackville to study it. It's an unused burial urn of some sort. That by itself makes it remarkable already, since the only ones we have are the ones that are dug out of tombs, but it's unlike any that I'm familiar with. From what I can tell it's meant to store a person's shadow. In itself that's not unusual, because the Egyptians believed a person's shadow or image to be part of their soul so you often find boxes holding small effigies in tombs along canopic jars. But this one seems different. It's inscribed for one, which they usually aren't but it's also the wrong shape and seems to be imbued with spells of warding like you would usually expect from a coffin itself."

"Unused but warded? That's like putting a nice padlock on an empty lockbox. Kinda pointless."

"It was probably prepared in advance and ended up not being needed for some reason. Possibly the intended recipient ended up being buried without proper rites as a punishment."

"That would stink. Everyone deserves their proper goodbyes." She inspected the urn carefully without touching it.

The urn is covered in hieroglyphics, though a couple areas are left blank.

"True, but some might take offense at, say, giving a criminal a twenty-one gun salute. Burials and the idea of the afterlife were a serious concern compared to the modern day. Even Christianity would shy away from proclaiming someone a damned soul for not being buried properly today. But I won't bore you with theological musings." she chuckles.

"I suppose it's all in how you define proper," she said. "Did they leave these blank areas to finish off the inscription or is that a significant choice?"

"It seems to be deliberate. As for why I'm not quite sure yet. If I read it right then they are meant for the 'recipient' to inscribe themselves, presumably in the afterlife. Why someone would want to bring their Shadow along is beyond me since it's generally left behind and symbolically preserved along with the body and a person's name."

"Would the shadow symbolize having an additional dimension? As in, indicate being more than just a normal spirit in the afterlife?"

"No, it's a very particular concept that is almost tied more to the living world. Statues and pictures of you are part of it. I suppose you could call it a person's image, both literally and in the sense of public opinion. It's part of the impression that you leave behind in the world of the living, along with your name."

"So what you're like in the afterlife is heavily tied to what you leave behind?"

"In a sense. A lot of this also ties into not wanting to be forgotten. But yes, who you are to others is one of the things that make up someone's 'soul'. It's a little misleading because our modern concept of a soul is very different. Modern thinking considers the soul the sum of all that we are that isn't physical. The Egyptians considered the body a vessel for a number of things that make a person. Heart, Name, Shadow, Essence and Personality. The last two are the ones that pass into the afterlife after your heart is weighed while your Name and Shadow are, hopefully, preserved in this world."

"I can get the concept of multiple things making up 'you'. I've had to live with that for a while."

Nailah quirks an eyebrow, then seems to remember something. "Ah yes of course. Obviously it's not quite the same. These are more concepts and beliefs rather than distinct things. Codified ideas."

"Yes, just something I can relate to," she said, glancing at the scroll. "Does the scroll go with the urn?"

"Yes. I think it describes rites to perform but they're hard to read and some parts are missing. I'm trying to reconstruct enough of the text to make it readable."

"Just out of curiosity or wanting to finish this?"

"I am wondering if it could be used for something, but mostly curiosity."

"Used for what?" She said, obviously curious. "Like flowers or something?"

"Goddess no. It's an artifact, possibly powerful thanks to the spells on it. I might be able to use them, especially if they're protective wards." she says. It's close enough to the truth to not really be a lie.

"I didn't think so, but I just wasn't sure what you meant by 'use'."

"It'd feel wrong even if it was 'just' a vase that's thousands of years old. Just like I hesitate to actually use this..." she says, gesturing at a khopesh hanging on the wall, "...to fight. It's a perfectly serviceable sword but I feel it would sully it's memories."

"Makes sense," she said, nodding. "So you'd use it to house someone's shadow, I'd guess, if you used it at all."

"Makes it sound rather underwhelming, when you put it like that." she chuckles.

"I tend to be the open minded sort. I'm not sure how to give it the appropriate gravitas."

"That's alright, even though at least half of it is in the gravitas."

"I'd be interested in learning, if you ever need help. I find historical artifacts fascinating."