There is only so much she can learn about her heritage, and her abilities, from her mother and through experimentation.
The Elder Continent is, if not precisely off limits, not somewhere she even wants to try to go until she knows more. So: London, which is much closer anyway. She'd have to pass through to make it to the Continent anyway.
The stalagmites thin, and she blinks as she steps out into the lights of Mrs. Plenty's Carnival.
"...perhaps. Sometimes it's easier to say you don't want something than to admit you can't have it."
"Yep. Also, they used to work for the Judgments until they stole a Judgment egg and used it to make Parabola."
"...huh. So the Judgments were their 'Old Masters'. I thought they might be, but it's tricky getting a straight answer from a devil."
"Something the devils mention sometimes. They talk about their exiled Princes a great deal, but they also sometimes mentioned these 'Old Masters'. 'How the Old Masters would spit if they saw this,' that sort of thing. All very tongue-in-cheek, usually, as with most things devils say. I intend to imply heavily that I know what they mean, next time they say it around me, and watch their reactions."
Giggle. "Good to know. ...The word for 'devil' in Correspondence means egg-thief. But the word that was used for them before the theft means pollinator. For whatever that's worth."
"Ah, that I did know. I don't know how my brother came by his knowledge of the Correspondence, but I've bled him for all the etymology he's good for. Though I did think the 'pollinator' bit was more literal, given they're actually bees."
"They're bees. Did you not know? They think like men, they walk like men, but all that's in a devil's skull is a single honeybee."
"Man, I didn't know anything when I came to London, that's the entire reason I came here in the first place. I don't even have the context to find my earth-shattering revelations particularly earth-shattering."
"Yes. It's rather charming, actually."
They finally reach the University campus, and the Provocateuse hops onto a pedestal, balancing with her arms out. "I believe you have an appointment with my brother. Unless there's anything else you'd like to reveal?"
"Probably, but I can't think of it right now. See you later."
"Au revoir."
She heads into the University and makes a, heh, beeline, for the Investigator's office.
He's in there, talking with a middle-aged woman wearing a sensible hat.
"-believe so, but I'd have to ask- Wastelander! What a coincidence."
The woman with the sensible hat inclines her head slightly. "Wastelander. The good professor has just been telling me how you hung the moon."
"Well, not quite, but I did get the Bazaar to give up on persecuting Rubbery Men." She brandishes the papers.
The Principal takes a look. Then she looks up and raises her eyebrow. "This is... astonishing. Dare I ask what you did?"
"Let's just say that healing old injuries is easier than raising the so-called permanently dead."
She nods slowly. "With the cooperation of the Bazaar... Professor, has your sister taken care of the devils?"
"She hasn't gotten back to me just yet."
"Then I wonder why she didn't just come in with me, she and I were talking on my way here and she said she had."
"Ah, then she was telling me through you. She usually doesn't bother meeting me in person. Too busy with her various perfectly licit activities."
The Principal sighs. "Yes, thank you. Well, if the Bazaar and the Embassy are taken care of I'll send a few letters of my own, sound out some members of Society... Wastelander, how many corpses are you willing to resurrect for the Department of Thanatology? I'll settle for as few as three, but I'd like them to have a decent sample group.”
“Oh, we’ve got hundreds of cadavers, mummies, skeletons and so on rattling around the archives. Probably they’ll want you to do about a dozen - various stages of decomposition and preservation, a few historically relevant corpses from cities past, et cetera.”
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