Times they are a Changing: a note on
edition changes.
Seemings are
one of the biggest changes from 1st edition to 2nd as
their whole frame of reference has been inverted. In 1st edition
seeming reflected the role a human was dragged kicking and screaming to Arcadia
to perform: a Beast was quite literally a hunting animal or a beast of burden
at the beck and call of their keeper, a fairest was always an object of great
beauty given a so called ‘easy ride’ (mostly by spiteful and frightened
Darklings) as a polished jewel, a fine sword or a keepers consort. This is no
longer wholly true of 2nd edition – that’s what Kith is for –
Seeming is all about personal agency.
A Seeming is a moment of true clarity where
the Changeling truly sees themselves for what they have become. The Changeling
embraces the changes wrought upon them by their Keeper, forever casting out a
part of their soul and the shackles of their own humanity that had kept them
prisoner, and channels it into their escape. Seeming is about taking the power
invested in a Changeling and turning it around to spite their Keeper. Kith is
what Arcadia did to you; Seeming is what you did back on the way out.
Seeming, Make a Choice
It goes like
this: shit went sideways; a bad choice or an arsehole pushed your character
into hell. Into the Hedge. Into the hands of a Keeper. Shit goes from bad to
worse, and existence with her Keeper is hell by design or by accident. And
she’s pushed and pushed and pushed. Every week is worse than the last, and
eventually, something pushes her just a little too far. Her Keeper breaks her
down and changes her to suit its own needs, and maybe even takes her humanity
from her turning her into a monster. Or tries. That’s the kith. Changed, almost
destroyed, without hope, she decides for herself that something’s got to give.
She makes a choice, decides it’s time to get out, and on her own or with the
help of others, she breaks away some part of herself that the Keeper used
against her. She remakes herself, at least in part, to survive, to cope, to
escape.
She grabs
agency over herself, and changes the one thing she can – herself – and in doing
so, she finds a way to escape. That change, that survival mechanism is her
seeming, and it is who she appears to be.
What It Is
Seeming is
the change the Changeling has made to himself to reclaim his humanity, or else redefine
it. It is who he had to become in order to escape. It may or may not be a good
thing, it may make him worse for it, but it was necessary to endure and to get
away. It comes with baggage, like any life-changing choice we make. It’s as
much blessing as it is curse, and for some, it will make them better people
than they were before, somehow. For others, it will make them much worse.
Seeming is how you cope, and that’s not always pretty.
What it Isn’t
A seeming is
not a party. It’s not a club or a secret society. It’s not family. One Beast
owes another Beast jack-shit, and shouldn’t Darklings know well enough to be
cautious around other Darklings? A seeming is not a kinship; it’s a coping
mechanism. An Elemental may get on great with another Elemental, they’ve
learned to survive in similar ways, may have some things in common, but they
share no natural sibling ties. That’s what Courts and Motleys are for. It’s
also not really a badge one wears or a title to be thrown around. A man
marching into Court, declaring himself a Fairest (and shouldn’t you all be very
impressed) is bound to get more side eyes than nods of approval. While few
Changelings look at their seeming as things to hide or be ashamed of, they’re
not for bragging about, either. It’s how you got through, and while others can
probably guess based on the way you look on the outside, they could be wrong
and digging in too much risks digging in to your Durance, and that’s not just a
social faux pas, it’s dangerous.
Beasts
“Fear not, we are of the nature of
lions and cannot descend to the destruction of mice and other small beasts.” Elizabeth the 1st
“Evolution,
indoctrination, experience…these are
the false crutches of the herd” the Beast smiles to herself as she passes by
the grey suited men and women in their gilded cages. Her eyes burn wild, passionate and hungry.
Widening them to melt the hearts of others when she wants something…and if
she’s denied she doesn’t get angry. She goes feral. She’s an atavism, a throwback to something
more natural, more primal, more free than any so called ‘civilised’ being could
ever hope to understand. When her chance
came to escape the Beast reached inside, found her animal self, and embraced
her id. The animal inside of her kept her alive at the worst times. Humanity
failed her when she was the most in need, and so she rejected it.
Once upon a time: Many Beasts lived trapped and caged,
even before their Durance’s. Social bindings or literal incarceration can both
lead to an attempt to “escape”. For examples, a cog in the wheel of a big
corporation willing to make any deal to get out of his cubical, or a deadbeat
loser swinging back and forth, in and out of prison unable to cope on the
outside. Even a lovely, well-kept housewife in a gilded cage dreaming of some
other, wilder life, might fall into the clutches of the Gentry, anything to
escape confinement. That’s not to say that free spirits who lived life in the
wide open can’t become Beasts – they do – but most often, a Beast felt trapped
before his captivity.
In Faerie,
you were not just enslaved you were collared and muzzled so tightly that higher
thoughts, your very spark of humanity, was suffocated leaving you a primitive
husk. You learnt to hunt and hide, to kill and maim, to obey and most
importantly survive. The two pillars
of pain and pleasure ruled your life rather than right or wrong and the savage
arbitrary law of nature became your cruel mentor…
The Escape: From one cage to another, the Beast
has been pushed too far. She already knows what it feels like to be without
choices, to submit, to lean on humanity and civility. So she makes a choice,
she chooses to do something wild, something socially unacceptable, something animalistic.
She bites through flesh, claws through soil, smears herself with shit and blood
to escape the Huntsmen on her heels. She chooses to break a taboo, destroys her
civility, and in making that choice, she escapes. In making that choice, she
becomes the Beast, the frail captive she once was left behind, forgotten. She
tears out that bit of her stomach that quivers when she’s done something wrong,
and she leaves it in the Hedge to distract her pursuers.
Now: You do
what you want, whenever you want, and you won’t even apologise for stepping on
someone’s delicate toes while you do it. You don’t take orders and you’ll never
beg for anything again. When you act you act out on instinct because to think
is to hesitate, to hesitate is to falter and to falter would have kept you
trapped forever. You may not think things through, but that by no means makes
you a lone wolf – you put your survivalist skills to good use for your
comrades, keeping watch while they sleep and tracking enemies through the
concrete jungle. When your Motley is mired in complex intrigues and moral
conundrums, you remind them to take life one day at a time and savour the
little things. Your friends know that when cages need breaking and knights need
devouring, you’re the one to count on.
Nicknames: Coursers,
Grimms, the Savage
Regalia: Steeds
Blessing:
Gain an additional dot of one Resistance Attribute at
character creation.
Your character gains +3 to initiative rolls and Speed, and
may choose to do Lethal damage with unarmed attacks. This costs a point of
Glamour per three consecutive turns to enjoy this benefit if the Beast has the
Shaken or Spooked Condition, or another condition that imposes fear.
Curse:
In addition to your Characters other breaking points, the
Beast risks Clarity damage with a dice pool equal to half their Wyrd (rounded
up) whenever acting without thinking causes significant harm or complications
to someone else.
Tales
The broker’s made of teeth and
cunning. He’s figured out how to land the big fish; he’s a shark and he’s
always hungry. He’ll sell you your own grandmother and then eat the both of you
when the check clears the bank.
She’s free, running like the wind at
the first sign of danger, not out of cowardice, but because nothing matters
more than the freedom to run. She runs in a way that makes others want, no,
need to chase her. She knows where she’s going, them? Not so much.
He knows everyone whispers about him
luring mortals onto trods, kidnapping kids and selling them to the Gentry,
whatever else they think he gets up to. If they knew he was going into the
Hedge and enticing lost wanderers to stray from dark paths so he could take
them home, they’d call him a hero. He’s sure not a Hero. He’s a bloodthirsty
predator, and that’s a side of himself he shows them when he picks up a
Huntsman’s trail and stalks it right back. It hasn’t occurred to him yet that
he could be both at once…
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