Mage/Theme/Legacies/Tears of the Martyr's Tree

Tears of the Martyr's Tree

Be the change you want to see in the world.

Many Lands, Many Peoples

It is an unfortunate truth that trauma defines the history of the Children of the Tree. They were founded during a genocide. They gained global prominence during another series of genocides in WWII. All across the Americas and the Pacific rim indigenous peoples were being colonized and brutalized by imperialist powers, and out of that crucible the Children of the Tree managed to rise and thrive.

But it hasn't been due to a lack of confronting their history. On the contrary, Children tend to be some of the more clear-eyed folk you're likely to meet. Precisely because they outsource their grief and make communal the sufferings modern society would rather we keep private. Part of the reason why this value is so enduring is that legacies like the Tears of the Martyr's Tree exist, do their jobs, and demonstrate the positive impact of addressing generational and territorial traumas directly and resolving them. It's not a perfect system, obviously, but the Children seem to feel it trumps rugged individualism and going it alone.

With that said, it is a rare child indeed that takes on the mantle of a Tear of the Martyr's Tree. Assuming that role for the land itself is almost an unfathomable task. The charges are, in general, thankless spirits that would as soon devour you as treat with you. You're opposed on all sides by corporations and governments, polluters and abusers of people, animals, and the environment. But lands under a tear's supervision thrive. Spirits get back to doing what they're supposed to do, emotions are kept in check, and on a very rare occasion the mistakes of the past are righted.

The work is overwhelming and ceaseless and involves confronting the very worst of society's sins written on the corpi of the axis mundi. And so there are very few Tears, and they tend to arrive at the role rather than having sought it out. One very rarely aspires to the work. One finds themselves doing it, reluctantly, until someone puts an arm around your shoulder and informs you that you're not doing it alone.

Origins

Parentage: Acanthus, Children of the Tree

Background: Survivors, Veterans, people who lived on the fringes, lost souls

Appearances: Tears come from all walks of life, drawn to their work because the Tear could do nothing else. Most tend not to have much use for fashion, preferring functional attire that lets them go to where the work is. Expect good footwear and expensive tools on a body wearing a $6 shirt from Old Navy.

Doctrine

Prerequisites: Spirit 1, Empathy 2, two dots placed into the following Skills in whatever amounts; Subterfuge, Persuasion, Occult

Initiation: It is almost unheard of that someone asks to assume the burden of healing the land under the people's feet. It's too big. There's too much. Wounds exist. Rather, through the circumstances of life some Mages just find themselves doing it because, for whatever reason, they've decided that's where the fight is. Governments fight dirty, people have wills of their own that you can't just go around subverting, but those who wind up Tears realize that if you just reach behind the scenes and prepare the way, you very often don't have to. Tears are people who recognize that you must interrupt the cycle of trauma at some point for healing to begin. For whatever reason, through whatever circumstances, Tears have decided that creating an environment that doesn't reinforce destructive cycles is the best way to do that. And once someone starts down that path their compassion leaves a trail and before long, a Tear will turn up and offer community. They say that Tears don't fall alone, after all.

Organization: One part support group, one part found family, the Tears of the Martyr's Tree are fairly ride or die for one another. There's no 'in charge' in the organization, though typically the most senior Tear in the room is expected to chair whatever meeting results. This often involves being the one to make sure there's coffee and donuts, so it's not a duty without responsibilities. But otherwise, the Legacy realizes that there are more important things to worry about than esoteric nonsense, and each Tear is assumed to be fully capable of seeing to their own affairs. Each Tear tends to have an area or areas they oversee, and they never overlap with other tears for obvious reasons. The support group meets weekly at the Lodge of the Children, and if a member does not show up for three consecutive months the Legacy will look in on them. The work is often a lot, and a lot can often become too much. For that reason, entry into the Legacy comes with that understanding. You check in, or they will come and find you. You waive your right to complain when they do. No tear falls alone.

On their own, Tears are typically the kings of their local spirit courts, playing shepherd to their various choirs and trying to keep all the pieces operating with minimal disruption. Each Tear, upon attuning themselves to their claimed territories, begins to gather their own Spirit Courts. Those courts may contain a number of different choirs equal to the Tear's Gnosis. Each choir should be written up to detail where it fits in to the local power structure, who its prominent members are, who its rivals might be, the rough power of the average member and its figureheads. In addition each choir should have three common numen and up to three common influences chosen for each choir. When generating NPC members of those choirs, they should be created with at least 2 of the 3 common numen before different ones are issued, and at least 2 dots of influence in common influences before different influences are assigned. The Tear's court, being effectively a bunch of NPCs, will need to be submitted to staff for approval, may be featured in plots, and may even be changed with your input through plot activity. An up to date copy of your choir should be available to staff at all times.

Theory: The spirits of the shadow form feedback cycles with the world around them. Too much of anything, even good things, can tip the balance in a location and lead to all sorts of unwanted consequences. Wounds occur when malignant cycles feedback upon themselves. Violent people do violence, drawing spirits of violence who, now hungry for more, inspire further violence. There are people in the real world doing the work of opposing systems of violence and oppression, but they are also opposing without being aware the spiritual forces feeding upon and reinforcing those same systems. Tears address this. They right spiritual wrongs and pave the way for the good works of others to take root. Their work is rarely seen, seldom truly appreciated, but-- to their minds --absolutely essential to a healthy and happy people.

It needs to be noted that the Tears take the long view on almost everything. Like the Mother herself, sending messages through the fruits, and toying with fates in the Supernal, Tears play this role to the Spirits of the shadow. You can fill your head with knowledge, but you can't fake the wisdom that experience and, most crucially, repeated failure provides you. There is a steep investment in plain old fashioned know how to climb to power in this Legacy, and that is because every person in it wound up a member by finding the start of a journey at the end of a road. Magic can't fake that with the snap of the fingers, and power is derived from acquiring that wisdom. People who can't truly empathize, who can't manifest curiosity in the motivations of their enemy, who aren't true students of the human condition and how it impacts the spiritual realm simply cannot reproduce these effects in the world without putting in that work. No matter the soul study, no matter the Mind magic, no matter the stomping of feet. Tears are shed to ease suffering. So suffer enough to earn wisdom, then we'll talk.

Magic

Ruling Arcanum: Spirit

Yantras: Burning valuables +1 to +2, items grown or produced from your the tear's chosen protectorate +1, objects acquired from a spirit in gift (+2) or in trade (+1), any dedicated tool that aids in spirit work +1, naturally occurring perfected materials +2.

Oblations: Cleaning rubbish in an area, gardening, improving the condition of your territory in some fashion, walking in the shadow, getting to know a new spirit.

Attunement: While it is technically true that a Tear could make anywhere their home, that simply isn't possible with a snap of the fingers. It requires at least a month of intense study and genuine investment in getting to know the spirits that inhabit the area to properly attune a Tear to a new territory. Moreover, it is impossible to maintain your connection to your old territory and establish a connection to a new one. So claiming new territory is rarely done lightly, and presents the Tear with a period of vulnerability their community may need to cover for.

Attainments

First: Know the Mother's Sorrow

Prerequisites: Initiation
Tears know better than most how our pasts shape us. And in the 'as above, so below' sense, the past shapes the shadow, too. Understanding one's surroundings holistically requires understanding the spirits that inhabit them. And understanding the spirits that inhabit your surroundings requires understanding their pasts. A wise person wouldn't insert themselves in an ongoing argument without knowing what it's about, so what right have the Wise to go barging into spiritual disputes willing things about without context? The base version of this attainment functions as Know Spirit with save that Tears get two more answers than their potency would otherwise provide. This means that at Spirit 5, the Tear receives answers to all questions.
Optional: Time 2
Intimately familiar with trauma, Tears have an innate understanding of the relationship between the Fallen World's agonies and the dangers of the Shadow. They know that the first step in addressing those traumas is to understand what caused them. With this optional attainment, the Tear gains insight into the historical causes of the target spirit's issues. A magath will have its cause revealed, a distressed water spirit will reveal the pollution leaking into the stream in the real world. Functioning a bit like the Time 1 effect Postcognition, the Tear is delivered visions of the formative and key events that shaped the spirit into what it is, and allows the Tear to understand the spirit holistically and in context. It does this even for very old spirits, serving it up to the tear in a rush of sensory input. So long as the Tear maintains line of sight on the spirit, they can take their sweet time examining the spirit's history, rewinding and fast forwarding at will. While so doing, the Tear is vulnerable to attack and loses their defense. (1 reach to instant cast, 1 reach to quick review.) Using this attainment with this optional effect grants the Tear the Informed condition about the Spirit.

Second: Two Eyes Two Worlds

Prerequisites: Spirit 2, Empathy 3, two additional dots in initiation skills.
Those with Spirit Sight are accustomed to seeing ephemeral entities out of the corner of their eye, but for the work a day Tear the spirit world seens very much manifest and present. Similar to the effects of Exorcist eye, this attainment reveals entities in Twilight, slumbering entities dormant in objects such as bindings or fetishes. It can detect possession, pools of essence within objects, manifestation conditions in areas and on objects and persons, reaching conduits through the gauntlet, and even detect the lasting effects of numen used in the area. The acuity of this vision allows the Tear to discern the resonance of a single spirit's essence from another spirit's, even of the same court and choir. This uses the same system as scrutiny, dice pools included, with the spirit's Rank standing in for Opacity. Revelation provides the same information as Know Spirit, and allows for the spirit to be tracked by its resonance. If the Tear elects to begin a chase on the spirit, they gain a -2 modifier to the chase target if they perform this action first.
Optional: Fate 2
Similar to the effect of interconnections, if the Tear spends a scene in an area inspecting its resonance and spiritual ecosystem, they can develop a fairly thorough picture of the interrelations between the spirits there and how they interact. The tear can identify the dominant choir in the area, discern any local spiritual conflicts between this spirit court and that, identify areas of potential magath infestation, or any disturbance generally that will knock the area out of spiritual equilibrium. This provides the Tear with the Informed condition about the location, which must be used during the scene in question or it will be lost.

Third: A Mother Always Knows

Prerequisites: Spirit 3, two additional dots in initiation skills.
Imagine being able to get to the bottom of a complex social, spiritual, and political problem by monitoring the actions and inner thoughts of all parties involved without them knowing you were ever there. Quite without their knowing you had done so, you step into the breach to offer the perfect solution, garnered simply by monitoring how the system worked when you weren't there to be reacted to. This is the reality for the Tears. It is possible for them to travel unseen by ephemera, even in either Twilight or the Shadow, moving unseen and unremarked upon.. Supernatural means of detecting ephemeral entities provoke a clash of wills, however the Tear achieves a dramatic success with three successes during such clashes. This does not permit the Tear to interact with the spirit world in any fashion beyond observation and innate powers such as numen or attainments. Any action that would draw conspicuous attention will disrupt the effect, and the Tear may not receive such a warm welcome when it drops. So almost all tears use this ability for either safe travel through the shadow, or as intended; to gather information about a problem in the shadow before addressing it. Taking a scene to do so provides the Tear with a condition akin to the Triumphant persistent condition found in M:tA. Until the condition is resolved by the Tear failing a social roll against a spirit in the area they surveyed or the acquisition of this condition for another location, the Tear achieves an exceptional success with three successes against all spirits within the location studied. This can make an effective one-two combination with Warming the Iron Heart.
Optional: Fate 3
If the Tear so chooses, they may confer the effects of Warding Gesture to an area they have studied. In practical terms, this shields the area of study which may be no larger than a city block, protecting all it contains from having its fate and destiny tampered with. The Tear's effects are of course immune to this barrier, and the Tear may elect to withhold this protection from certain individuals within the area of effect if the Tear succeeds in a clash of wills against the target. This is automatically successful if the intent is to protect the individual rather than harm it. Simply put, once a Tear has set their mind to putting an area right, it becomes much harder for others to set it wrong.

Fourth: Warm the Iron Heart

Prerequisites: Spirit 5, two additional dots in initiation skills.
Sometimes it becomes necessary to break the cycle directly, to intercede with the iron fist of the technological world and knit closed the separation between the spirit world and that of the fallen one. The spirits that plague wounds and spread the sort of violence and decay the Tears oppose have a much harder time doing so through a gauntlet thicker than steel. It's a short term solution, and it's very likely to piss off the spirits trapped on one side or the other, but once the flow of essence is cut off, the Tear buys the human victims of spirit predation a rest, time to breathe and begin the process of healing. Plus, it gives the Tear a great deal of leverage going into any negotiations that may result. In a practical sense, this raises the gauntlet both coming to and leaving from the shadow by five in an area the size of a city block. Irises become like busy city streets, and busy city streets become like the inside of Steve Job's iMac. Spirits caught where they would prefer not to be enter any social interaction with the Tear as Hostile, though deference is still shown to rank. Such spirits gain the Leveraged condition to the Tear responsible, and may shed the condition for passage through the gauntlet to the other side by performing a service for the Tear or agreeing to a new Ban. The Tear must still find the spirit and get it to agree to the terms, but this power makes the latter a much easier discussion. This power lasts for a week.
Optional: Fate 5
This is not a subtle power, and it is never undertaken lightly. Accordingly, there's always an underlying purpose behind putting up such a wall between the worlds. This effect, similar to Strings of Fate, provides daily opportunities to pursue that objective while the wall is up. One invocation of this effect is rarely enough to fix a problem. And, depending on the situation, it can make a situation come to a head rather than easing it. But for people committed to doing "the work", whatever it may be, and supported by a community able to act on the opportunities these powers provide, this effect can be a potent force for change in a neighborhood in short order.

Fifth: Elder and Emissary

Prerequisites: Spirit 5, Empathy 4, two additional dots in initiation skills.
Sometimes it becomes necessary for the Tear to intercede as more than a mediator, nurturer, shepherd, or advocate. Sometimes they need to grab some gafflings by the neck and establish a proper pecking order. To some degree, any Spirit Adept can throw their honorary title around and will things into short term arrangements to suit their purposes. But creating the sort of lasting change that the Tears seek to establish takes time, a great deal of investment in essence, and a whole lot of spiritual diplomacy. It's this connection to their territory that makes the connection so potent. Similar to the spell Twilit Body, this effect turns the Tear's body into spiritual ephemera. The system used is similar to that used for Astral Travel as detailed below. Each use costs a potentia at activation with the potential for additional maintenance costs. (See below.)

This alteration provides the following benefits:

• The Tear's Power is the higher of Intelligence and Presence.
• The Tear's Finesse is the higher of their Wits and Manipulation.
• The Tear's Resistance is the higher of their Resolve and Composure.
• The tear's health is Resistance + Gnosis Stat Max + Spirit, reflecting their bolstered tie to their land.
• The tear has Rank 5, and assumes the mantle of King of their territory's Court if they do not hold that title already.
• The tear chooses 5 dots of influence selected from among those common to their Court. These may be allocated to several influences or just one, but once those influences are chosen the Tear may not select new influences without first re-activating this power.
• They may choose a number of Numen common to their Court, up to their Gnosis as a maximum.

While on their land, they gain their Spirit dots in additional Power, Finesse, and Resistance, as well as entering their form with additional essence in their pool equal to their Gnosis.

• When the tear's corpus reaches 0, the tear may make a clash of wills with the entity that struck the telling blow. If the tear succeeds, they discorporate as per a typical spirit and will reform somewhere on their territory within 12-Gnosis hours. If they fail, the effect ends with all the drawbacks detailed below. This may mean (and likely will mean) the Tear drops dead.

This power is not without its drawbacks:

• The tear acquires a ban that requires them to be on their territory. They can use this form elsewhere, but doing so always costs one willpower and two essence per turn to maintain to do so. This counts against per turn expenditure limits.
• If the cost cannot be paid, the Tear will fall out of their spirit form with the Beaten Down condition. Being Beaten Down with no willpower is dangerously limiting, and unless the Tear manages to acquire additional willpower they will need to find a compelling reason why the Tear isn't fleeing to their territory with their tail between their legs. Trying to stick in a fight with this condition in place brings with it the understanding further consequences could include the death of the character.
• When this effect ends, corpus damage will transfer into the flesh and blood body of the Tear. Any essence still stored in their pattern is not converted into potentia, however. It is returned to the spirit court in thanks for the bolstering. (And to prevent abusive potentia farming.)

Optional: Fate 5

Spirit and Fate are often accused of being fairly subtle arcana. The Tears are happy to prove that wrong. With this optional effect, the Tear can will environmental tilts to manifest in the world around them. These effects can appear in twilight, in the shadow, in the fallen world, and indeed all three at once. Similar to the power Swarm of Locusts, the Tear is able to conjure truly fortean events and seemingly impossible environmental tilts at will. The player may replicate the environmental tilts found in M:tA starting on page 319 in whatever fantastical manner they choose, and are encouraged to work with the ST to create new ones on the fly. They may conjure a number of such tilts equal to their gnosis divided by two, rounded down. Enacting the tilts costs one potentia, as does changing the tilts and establishing new ones. However maintaining them incurs no additional cost unless the Tear attempts to use this power outside of their territory. Doing so costs a willpower point at activation and incurs a one potentia per turn cost to maintain as well. It should be noted that because this is an attainment it does not cause a breaking point in sleepers, incur paradox, or trigger disbelief. Sometimes the ents just march on Isengard. Obviously this means that irresponsible use of this power can often put the Tear at odds with the Diamond orders, particularly the Guardians of the Veil who take such things quite seriously.