Dressing Down - Some time ago.....

Speaks walks along one of the paths, seeing a couple jog past he waves.

Rounding a curve he sees Darien standing naked peeing into the creek.

Sighing he walks over, "Darien, you really need to wear clothes."

Darien steps down from the log and looks very confused. "Hm, I guess I could find something to wear." With that his face lights up in realization, "Ah, I know," and he steps sideways, running off after Rhia.

Rhia can be found near the campfire, asleep.

Darien slows as he sees Rhia and picks her up, "Rhia! I need you to do something."

Rhia yawns and stretches, one eye opening to look at Darien. "I was have a good dream..." she whines. "I was in Crinos, and I was actually pretty, and all the Corax looked up to me as their Legend!"

She sits up, rubbing her eyes. "What do you need?"

Darien pauses for a moment lost in thought and still holding Rhia at arm's length. Then shaking his head, "I need you to perform some rites for me."

Rhia yawns again, and nods. "Alright. What rites do you need?"

"The rite of spirit summoning and the rite of the fetish. I need you to be strong for this." Darien pauses as she nods. "I'm going to make some clothes for my fetish. There's a Get of Fenris fetish that requires you to skin yourself and make a coat out of it. This coat protects you from harm as if you had another body. I need you to summon some spirits of pain, more specifically two of them. I need you to tell one of them to agree to enter into my sword, making it a grand klaive, and tell the other one to agree to enter my skin, both in exchange for watching me flay myself. Do you think you can handle that Rhia?"

Rhia blinks at Darien, her face clearly making it obvious that she thought Darien was insane. "I...can try. I think I can do it." she says, and then nods more confidantly. "Yea. Yea, I can do it."

"Alright." Darien sighs in relief and sets her down. "Make your preparations. We begin immediately."

Rhia nods, and looks thoughtful for a moment. "Let me go grab my stuff. I'll be back in a few minutes." she says, and steps sideways.

About ten minutes later, Rhia returns, her shirt bulging with various bumpy items. "Ok, I'm ready."

"Alright. Let's begin." Darien steps outside of the circle he knew would come. He'd seen this rite done a good many times.

Speaks walks up to the two, standing off to the side and watches.

Rhia nods and empties out the contents of her shirt. There were various stones, a bottle of water, a lighter, and a few black tail feathers. Carefully picking up the feathers, she takes one and tucks the other three into her hair for later use.

She picks up the lighter and carefully sets the feather on fire, walking around in a circle. She let the ash fall in a circle around her, chanting softly in a strange, cawing language ((I doubt any of you know Corax! XD)). Then, she took the stones and carefully lined them up on top of the ash circle. Then, she took the bottle of water and sprinkled some of it around the circle as well.

She stepped out of the circle, and cawed loudly, looking to the sky. After a few minutes of silence, a Pain Jaggling materialized in the circle.

Rhia nodded to the spirit, and talked to it for a moment, and then repeated the process, managing to summon the second Jaggling as well.

She explains what Darien wants to do, cringing slightly at the thought of it. The two Jagglings give sinister smiles, and nod their heads.

She turns to Darien. "They agree with your terms Darien..."

Darien nods, pulls a small diamond from behind his ear, and sits crosslegged on the ground. The diamond takes the shape of a scalpel between his thumb and forefinger. Looking up to the jagglings for confirmation, they shook their heads. The scalpel's edge grew to a dagger, the blade wickedly serrated. To this the jagglings nodded. Darien breathed deep, preparing himself for the task and stretched out his legs. Starting at the feet he worked quickly. With little more than a wince he made the first cut, a thick solid circle around his ankles, deep into the tendons. He moved to the wrists, repeating the process carefully and expediently as if he'd done this many times. Moving up, he cut a large clean swath around the neck, far enough to avoid any arteries. Then, sighing as the blood poured from him readily, he stood and began cutting a large line up the inside of each leg moving in a circle so as to avoid the more delicate areas of his body. He repeated the process along the back side. Then, breaking his arm with a solid umph!, he reached behind his back and cut a straight line up to the circle at neck. He waited a moment, letting the lack of blood dull the excrutiating pain. He gestured to Rhia to look away before, he let out his breath and shifted to crinos. With a roar, he moved with the speed of his rage and tore from him all of his furred skin making a sound like a tearing bedsheet. Feet first, legs, back, arms until he stood breathless, more naked and in more pain than he had ever been.
He dropped his skin at his feet, stretching it out. With two shuddering breaths, he growled, "Get.... Speaks..."

Speaks slowly walks over, "I don't know what the fuck you think your doing, but why should I fucking heal this?"

Rhia watched carefully as Darien began the process, the blood not phasing her much, even in the mass quantities that it came in. It wasn't until he broke his arm that she felt as if she was going to cry. She fell to her knees as Darien shifted, telling her not to look, but looking didn't matter. The sound of skin ripping from flesh was enough to pull tears from her eyes.

She didn't dare sob loudly though. no. She had to prove to Darien that she was strong. That she could do this. So, she suffered silently, and when Speaks asked what it was exactly that Darien was doing, she stood and wiped her eyes of the tears.

"He's making a Fetish Speaks...that's why he asked me to summon the pain spirits..." she explains, her voice betraying the fear and sadness she was feeling. "That's why he needs you to heal him."

"Fine, but it best be a damn good fetish."

Speaks walks over and heals Darien. (6 gnosis + 1 to stop the accumulative Agg bleed)

Rhia takes a deep, shuddery breath, and walks over to the two, stopping for a moment to wrap her arms tightly around Speaks. After a moment, she takes the skin and the blade and walks over to the Pain Spirits, offering the skin to one of them. The Jaggling lets out a maniacal laugh and picks up the skin, wrapping itself it in. Then, the Jaggling disappeared.

Then she offered the blade to the other. The Jaggling takes the blade, examining it, and the rears back and stabs itself in the gut with it, disappearing as well. The now Grand Klaive clattered to the ground, and Rhia walked over and picked it and the skin up, nearly dragging the blade from the weight, walking back over to Darien.

"It worked...they both worked..." she says weakly, offering both to him.

"Thankyou, little Get." Darien says, taking hold of his skin and his Grand Klaive. The skin morphed in grasp to a heavy leather, furred coat. Shrugging it on, he slumped under the pain and itchiness as his skin slowly grew back. "There Speaks, I'm clothed."

"Now.....Tell me, what's so grand about this fetish the almost cost me my Beta?"

Darien grinned, wincing. "It's me, another body of me. As tough as I am, so is my coat. No bullet or blade can easily pierce it. It is my spirit."

"What does it do?"

"It is the strongest armor you will ever have. You would have to kill me twice over to bring me down once." Darien sighed. "I'll be right back. I need to tan it before it falls apart."

Rhia looks dully at the fur coat, and then leans against Speaks again. "Well good...now we'll be even less likely to lose you Darien..." she says softly, and then smiles slightly. "Little Get...I like it..."