Book of Bone and Ebony

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Void Cocoon Warrior is a Void Circle version of this spell. When cast, a burgeoning black nothing grows out of the necromancer’s chest and slowly wraps itself around her legs, her arms, her chest and, finally, her head. Growing still, she pilots a towering 20-foot-tall machine made of black steel and the Void: a mighty noble warstrider or a massive juggernaut. Should the necromancer desire, she can sacrifice a lethal health level to the Void as the machine forms around her — the black warstrider takes on a ruddy red color and swells, until it is quite possibly the tallest thing on the battlefield, becoming a royal warstrider. The health level cannot be healed until the spell ends. Void Cocoon Warrior is more flexible than Rattled Bones of War: It costs a minimum of 28 motes (committed), and the warstrider appears with a grand daiklave that hums softly as it sucks the air near it into Oblivion. It has the option of being summoned adorned with ancient artifacts of war. Any weapon that can be mounted on a warstrider can be summoned with a Void Cocoon for an additional cost (and commitment) equal to the amount of Essence that would normally be required to attune the weapon. Expendable ammunition for such weapons can be created out of dull-gray Oblivion for a single mote apiece. The Void Cocoon Warrior remains for only two hours, but the duration can be extended for an additional hour for a number of motes equal to half the originally cost. (See the appendix of Savant and Sorcerer for more details on warstriders and their weapons.) REBIRTH INTO DARKNESS Cost: 25 motes Target: One ghost As this spell is cast, the ghost who finds himself its victim feels an invisible collar fasten around his neck. The sensation fades after a moment, and the ghost can continue with his regular habits. The next time the ghost is slain or suffers some other loss of form, the spirit feels the collar again, tightening around his neck to the point of suffocation. The strangling sensation persists until the ghost reforms. There is no opportunity for him to enter Lethe nor any danger of Oblivion, and when the spirit returns to consciousness, he finds himself in the presence of the necromancer who laid this spell upon him. Despite his best efforts, the ghost cannot manage to pass on. He will always return to his second existence only to find himself before she who cast the spell. Ghosts who suffer dissipation while possessing a permanent Essence of • do not lose that Essence if under this spell. Instead, the necromancer must immediately pay 10 motes to keep the ghost from dissipating forever. If a necromancer does not or cannot forfeit the cost necessary to maintain the ghost’s existence, the ghost’s collar drags him into Oblivion. Deathlords and Abyssals commonly use this spell to repeatedly torture ghosts to “death” while ensuring that it is 137 CHAPTER FIVE • NECROMANCY not an escape. It has proved to be a less costly method than seeking out and guarding the victim’s Fetters. The collar remains for two days as marked by the Calendar of Setesh. SEVEN VISIONS WISDOM Cost: 34 motes Target: One ghost The necromancer holds his hand flat in perspective so it appears to him that his target is resting in his palm. He closes his hand and focuses thin flows of hot Essence upon the ghost now captured within. Short minutes later, he opens his palm to reveal a small medallion of soulsteel. The ghost’s name is etched into the front. Seven Visions Wisdom can capture any ghost within 100 yards and bind her into a medallion. This medallion qualifies as Artifact •• and requires a commitment of 2 motes to be used. Any person wearing it with such a commitment can choose to substitute any one of the captured spirit’s Ability ratings instead of his own while performing a relevant task. Someone who “borrows” a rating in an Ability he does not himself possess (i.e., his rating is 0) still suffers the two-die penalty — his muscles and his mind are simply unable to perform with the familiarity the ghost’s would have. Any Ability the ghost possessed may be used. This spell can only be cast upon a ghost with an Essence less than that of the necromancer. The medallion loses its integrity when struck by countermagic or after a number of months equal to the necromancer’s Essence. It blossoms over the next few seconds into the form of the ghost it once was, who is again in command of her own facilities. She remembers all actions that her Abilities were used to assist during her imprisonment, but little else. The necromancer may, at the casting of the spell, spend six points of experience, making the enchantment permanent and rendering the spell immune to all but Obsidian Countermagic. Only one such medallion can offer its bearer wisdom at one time. If any more are worn simultaneously, the different intuitions and skills contradict with one another. These silent arguments cause all actions attempted by the one who wears them to suffer a two-die penalty, whether or not he intends to use the skill of either. SHADOW STONES TRAVEL Cost: 24 motes Target: Area of effect As she completes the spell, the necromancer cuts her palm and lets a splash of blood paint the ground at her feet. Immediately, a stiff breeze blows outward from the stain of red. A few seconds later, a gust of wind that carries with it the scent of grave rot billows forth from the center. Scant seconds disappear before the breath of decay dies down, and as it does, the world ripples out from the center of the spell. Where the ripple passes, grasses become dead and
EXALTED • BOOK OF BONE AND EBONY black, stones grow chalky, bright colors pale to near gray, and the sky becomes drained of all color. The necromancer has opened a temporary shadowland around herself, encompassing a small portion of Creation with it. Its borders waver uncertainly as far out as the necromancer’s power can hold it. After a short time, the borders snap shut about their center as Creation reasserts itself — but all sentient beings within the boundaries of the spell find themselves in the Underworld, their positions analogous to where they stood in Creation. The spell takes a short time to affect the stability of Creation. The turn in which the spell is concluded lets through a breath of the wind that travels between worlds and Elsewhere. The next turn casts out the odor of the Underworld, and in the next, the wind dies away, and the world changes. In the third turn after the spell is cast, the shadowland spreads outward up to 50 yards, and the caster can keep the portal open for a number of turns equal to her Essence or let it snap closed after the first. The shadowland always becomes fully open on the same initiative as when the spell was cast and closes on the same. When it closes, everyone within the shadowland will be in the Underworld — so the necromancer must take care of whom she allows within its borders. This spell, when cast in the Underworld, has similar but inverse effects. The wind between worlds smells sweet, and when the shadowland disappears, all within its borders find themselves in Creation. SHIELD OF SHATTERING BONES Cost: 18 motes Target: Caster A common tactic for a necromancer to take when in battle is to divert the damage inflicted upon him into the enduring bodies and frames of the animate dead who fight for him. This spell enables such behavior. Upon completion of the spell, the caster is momentarily surrounded by a blood-red halo that then bursts out onto the field of battle around him. Each skeleton or zombie touched by the expanding ring glows with a brief red cast of its own before the light fades. Thereafter, until the sun next rises in Creation, the necromancer can reflexively spend 3 motes to shunt the damage from a successful attack onto one of his targeted undead. The motes are spent before any damage is rolled but after soak. No more than (the necromancer’s Essence x 5) dead are so marked, and all must be within (the necromancer’s Essence x 5) yards at the time of the casting. Only these may be called upon to take a blow for the necromancer, and the target must be within line of sight. The effects of this spell are plainly visible. A blow to the necromancer’s chest with a goremaul results in the collapse of a nearby skeleton’s ribcage, and the cut of a scimitar closes up as the blade passes, opening instead in a 138 grinning zombie. All health levels of damage done to the necromancer are instead afflicted upon the unfortunate walking dead. Once the last marked zombie falls, the spell must be recast for it to have any further effect. SILENCED WHISPERED PRAYERS Cost: 27 motes Target: Varies As the necromancer casts this spell, the whispered prayers of all who give her target worship and obeisance becomes audible, rising to a deafening pitch at the apex of the spell before the caster’s eyes flash with white light and the prayers are cut off, replaced only with silence. Victims of this spell find themselves severed from their followers, unable to dip into the flow of Essence provided by worship. Any Cult rating a ghost possesses, Underworld or Ancestor, drops to zero for the duration of this spell. Those who offer worship feel no difference and continue to give their prayers as always. This spell may also be cast into an area. As the spell is released, all ghosts within 45 yards of the necromancer find the prayers upon which they draw grow audible before sharply dropping in volume. Each ghost affected loses one dot in any Cult he possesses. Living creatures affected by the focused version of the spell lose half of their Cult rating, round down. The areaeffect version does not affect living creatures at all. This spell lasts until the sun has risen in the Underworld seven times. SWEET VOICE FAMILIAR Cost: 32 motes Target: Area of Effect Crafted by the first Abyssal necromancer of the Labyrinth Circle, he created this spell to share with the world the words of Oblivion as they echoed in the back of his head. When a necromancer casts this spell, all his conscious motor control ceases. His body slumps downward, his legs bend, and he balances impossibly on the balls of his feet. His head lolls back and his jaw drops open, and from his unmoving mouth issue all the unending and mad words of the Malfeans, hideously magnified by the spell’s power. All ghosts within the caster’s Essence in miles hear these maddening whispers, and the players of all who do must make a Willpower roll against a difficulty of (the caster’s Whispers rating + 5). Any whose players fail have been poisoned by the sweet spell of Oblivion with all its black-honey promises — their minds will soon belong to the Abyss. See the sidebar on page 284 of Exalted: The Abyssals for more details. Players of mortals who hear this seducing insanity must roll their characters’ Willpower against a difficulty of the caster’s Whispers rating. For every success by which they fail, their characters lose a point of temporary Willpower. Mortals severely or repeat-
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AND A Compendium of Necromantic Lor
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Book of Bone and Ebony

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