Work Text:
First Letter
This letter is written on thick parchment in a steady and beautiful hand, despite the light blood splatter. The edges of the page are severely singed.
Amongst the most recent batch of recruits there is a strange young fellow swept up from the mines raids. We lost track of him for a short while, but once found was desperate enough and lost enough to be easily brought into the fold. He seems very well suited to the cloth, perhaps not the fodder I assumed when first he was targeted.
I have had my subordinate Adepts grace the initiate with the usual trials and tribulations, yet he seems to take everything with enthusiasm. Glee, even. His chores are completed to impeccable standard, no matter the circumstance or restriction placed upon him. I must say, I am impressed. Once he has been broken, I will be able to rebuild him into a most satisfactory form.
Sister Rashira
Second Letter
This letter is written on thick parchment in a beautiful yet slightly uncontrolled hand. The edges of the page are lightly singed.
The initiate still retains his exuberant enthusiasm. In spite of my orders, my Adepts' efforts to break him have been ineffective. While such willingness to offer his own pain and discomfort to the Scourge Mistress is commendable, and shows he will go far within our ranks, in order to progress to the next stages he must experience true suffering at our hands and offer it before the Maiden. He revels in the tearing of the flesh and excels at each tedious task lain upon him. This will not do.
I have realised that I must take a personal hand in his preparation for progression. As much as I am loathe to admit it, I see the issues my Adepts have had with him. My primary methods have not yielded results. I shall have to become more creative.
Sister Rashira
Third Letter
This letter is written on thick parchment in a steady and beautiful hand. A thick smear of blood mars the right-hand side along with several scorch marks.
In a triumph and a tribute to the Maiden herself, I have succeeded where my Adepts have failed. Pain of the flesh could not break the Kneeling One, nor lack of sleep and abundance of work, nor humiliation, degradation, cold, hunger. My subordinates though did not think of the most obvious of choices.
Darkness. Complete and total darkness.
As an extra finishing touch, I included the thick scent of iron and dirt. The man was a howling mess in no time at all. Pathetic really, after how well he had weathered everything else. Still, this is promising. If he can be broken, he can be rebuilt as I wish him. And he will be broken.
He is not beyond my reach. No one is.
Sister Rashira
Fourth Letter
This note is written in wild, spidery handwriting on thin wood paper. The bottom is curled and scorched.
I grow concerned with Sister Rashira. She has taken a specific interest in Kneeling One Abdirak, and her methods have grown… particularly cruel. This initiate's aptitude for our ways seems to have merely highlighted her own inadequacies. She seeks to break him, not mould him, and I fear she may have succeeded had I not intervened. The Kneeling One now reports to me, and me alone.
That beautiful spark he had was fading swiftly, his enthusiasm quashed. He is hollow behind the eyes once more, as he was when I first found him in the mines. I pray it is not too late to set him back onto the right path again.
I wish this was the first time Sister Rashira had done such a thing. Such thoughts should not be voiced aloud, but it hardly surprises me. Those of her background rarely have the capability to grasp Loviatar's gifts the way someone who has truly suffered can. The broken and the destitute who come to our doors know more of the Maiden's loving embrace before stepping foot in our temple than some bored, idle noblewoman with a sack of coins and a desire for power could in a lifetime.
I digress. She has been reassigned, and those under her tutelage now fall under my wing.
Caressor Milarn
Fifth Letter
This note is written in wild, spidery handwriting on thin wood paper. The paper is half the length one would expect, and the top edge is scorched.
My fears were unfounded. The passion within this young initiate's heart could not so easily be quashed by a bitter pretender. He is a light within the temple, and his adoration of the Willing Whip seeps from every pore. He is an inspiration to his peers, and a point of pride for myself.
Maiden, I wish I shared his enthusiasm. His certainty.
His methods are slightly unorthodox, shall we say, but his exuberance and offerings are more than sufficient to let one turn a blind eye to such things. I have, perhaps, even encouraged them slightly. His control and skill are unmatched. It makes me most regretful that I shall not be here when he is elevated to the rank of Taystren.
I sense an end coming within the temple. The winds of change blow strongly, and grim rumours whisper upon the air. My initiate takes no interest in politicking, which only makes me wish he did. It is only the ones without sense who would seek power, as I did once. How foolish we all were back then.
The other Caressors are beginning to suspect. I do not have much time, I fear.
Caressor Milarn
Sixth Letter
This note is written in wild, spidery handwriting on thin wood paper. Several words are difficult to read due to becoming particularly trembly. Burned pockmarks stain the sheet.
The time has finally come. I must leave dear Abdirak behind. Such an unusual young man. A bastion of kindness in this abattoir of hope, this den of cruelty and ambition. He is well established now though. I hope that he will continue his ways in my absence. Sweet Abdirak, my final gift to the Maiden.
Loviatar herself clearly approves of his strangeness. His power has grown impressively in the time that I have mentored him, while my own strength, my own gifts, have dwindled to barely anything at all. She knows. She knows where I am going. Too late was my realisation that it could be this way. I leave the boy to carry on my legacy.
I go tonight, to never return. I will miss the familiar halls of the temple. With my temperance gone, only one Kneeling One shall balance the pool of vitriol here.
I pray to the Lord on the Rack he will survive it.
Milarn
Seventh Letter
A small note with a single order written on it in impeccable script.
Burn the heretics scrawlings. Scrub every memory of her.