Lucky had fallen asleep in Zion's lap. Zion looked at her and said. "In a certain way I'm almost jealous of you. You're so much braver than I ever was. Do you know what I was 6 lifetimes ago? I was a mother who died in childbirth. I felt the need to nurture and care for everything trying to fill the void of the child I could never have. Sometimes I worry that he loves me for my vices, or rather the ones I just don't have anymore. Maybe it's the same vice with just a different manifestation. I really don't know. Once upon a time, I put everything I had into learning magic because I thought if I was powerful enough I could overcome the cruelty of nature, I could make a world that was undying and kind. But here I am thousands of years later, the world has changed, but not how I've wanted it to. Instead of advancing I've retreated. Having been undead so long I think I'm actually afraid to be alive, because living hurts, and in the process I've hurt others, I've hurt myself. And here you are just wanting to live your life. You're such a brave little chipmunk, well werechipmunk now."
Cerberus heard Zion talking through the crack under his door. He quietly opened it slightly to listen closer as Zion talked, resting his head against the frame. For a moment he smiled lovingly looking at Zion with Lucky in their lap. Then he backed up quietly and closed the door again.
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Zion had fallen asleep in their chair when they woke up to Cerberus making tea. They noticed a blanket had been wrapped around their shoulders while they were sleeping.
"Good morning." Cerberus said as they handed Zion a cup.
"What's this?" Zion asked.
"Green tea and methadone. Rehab starts today." Cerberus smiled. "Lucky told me while you were asleep that they couldn't remember anyone or anything that seemed even remotely magical prior to meeting us.
Zion sipped their tea and thought for a moment. "I'm not entirely surprised. You saw how when I applied the fairy dust and ginger it turned magenta. Magenta isn't a real color. It's a phenomenon of the mind trying to rationalize two wavelengths from the opposite ends of the visual spectrum: red and violet. Combining opposites is the realm of chaos magic. Not many can practice chaos magic. It's a very difficult art form, most practitioners go insane, and crazy is hard to predict."
"Don't you practice chaos magic?" Cerberus asked.
"Well yeah. Being undead is sort of its own paradox. But necromancy is a specialized art. It's like the difference between a nurse practitioner and a brain surgeon. Both deal with medicine, only one of them can remove a tumor from your head. I guess being undead as long as I have been has lent me enough time to have decent mastery of most magical styles but even within a style there's room for specialization just like you can have an auto mechanic or a diesel mechanic, etc. And while mechanics work on machines their skill set differs from say machinists. Because of what I do and what I am, I'm exceptionally good at conjuring, resurrection, soul grafting and separation, transmigration, dispelling, divination, etc. But along the way I also got very skilled in alchemy, herbalism, sorcery.. you get the idea. In the same sort of way that you can guess a condition by the drugs prescribed for it, you can tell a lot about a spell's purpose based on its ingredients. While Lucky was infected with parasites likely from untreated water, she also had a magical infection made with a tapeworm and a goose feather. Tapeworms are parasites that as adults live a long time and reside in a particular host, but gestate and grow up in still others. Essentially their life cycles require many hosts. Geese are birds that mate for life. Whoever infected Lucky was using her as an intermediary to develop a love spell. It's also of note that just as you can often tell a book by its author, spells reveal a lot about their caster."
"What do you mean?" Cerberus asked.
"Well, for one, this particular caster is an idiot. You can't make someone love you by magic without fundamentally changing who they are. It's a whole lot of toil for what basically amounts to a half baked mind control spell. Why do you think only the trashiest magic markets ever sell them? They're like the penis enlargement pills of the magic world. Beyond that is just poor research and design. I mean, if I was going to labotamize my soul to be stupid enough to decide to make a love potion I wouldn't use a tapeworm. Something that requires an intermediary is just making another step that someone else can screw up. I'd just cut straight to the chase and use a heart worm." Zion answered.
Lucky chirped.
"I honestly don't know why a tapeworm was used, maybe a misappropriation of the old adage 'the way to a man's heart is through his stomach'. It's hard to say. Whatever the case, the witch that made this is a try hard. While not very effective at magic, you can see the harm already caused. It's something we should probably look into...see if other animals have been infected. Speaking of other animals, has anyone heard from Corvin lately?"