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MNEMOI

(Outlaw)

ARCANOI

A Mnemoi can learn the following Arcanoi at initiate and common level

MNEMOSYNIS            CASTIGATE        PANDEMONIUM  

Any other Arcanoi a Mnemoi  learns is common level only

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Passion may create a wraith but memory defines him. His identity is a product of his experiences — the sum total of every moment, bound up in a form that (at least at first) draws its shape from remembrances of the mortal shell. What power, then, derives from an Arcanos that shapes memory itself? What crimes might wraiths commit if they could erase the very knowledge of their acts? In modern Stygia, Mnemosynis is the most feared of the outlawed Arcanoi. Its reputation is one of abuse and manipulation, of misdeeds hinging on the erasure or alteration of memories, of a grand conspiracy aimed at usurpation of the Imperial throne itself. Among the recently-reaped, it’s edgy to name-check Mnemosynis as the cause of any memory lapse or change in behavior. For older Legionnaires, this is an abhorrent mockery of a time when fear of Mnemoi control edged any discrepancy in recall or records. Every Necropolis has urban legends of wraiths who ran afoul of a Mnemos and were stripped of their very self-images and personalities — or whose closest friends utterly forgot them over the course of a single night. Wraiths who dig deeper into unsanctioned lore — or who ask the few Gaunts willing to share their recollections — find that Mnemosynis was once an accepted, even respected, Arcanos. Its practitioners preserved historical records, healed the wounds of loss and hardship, and uncovered the truth of crimes for Stygian courts. But, of course, that’s how the Mnemoi would want everyone to remember them.

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Guildmarks

Basic Mnemosynis lessons use mirror or crystal metaphors to help nascent Mnemoi visualize their work. The Arcanos’ guildmarks reflect this in the wraith’s Corpus, though no two Mnemoi exhibit the exact same manifestation. One Mnemos has eyes with mirrored pupils, another’s fingernails and teeth are multifaceted gemstones, the face of a third shimmers into stained-glass perfection at one particular viewing angle, and a fourth’s voice carries undertones of shattering crystal. Mnemosynis guildmarks become more pronounced when the wraith activates his arts. Before its destruction, the Mnemoi’s Guild used the seal of a balanced scale weighing one eye, or one half of a bisected skull, in each pan. Today, Hierarchy officials find this symbol either revolting or alarming, depending on context.

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The Guild

The official line says little about the Mnemoi’s origins or former role in Stygia. They were wraiths with the power to read or alter memories, who once were a cornerstone of the Stygian legal system but succumbed to temptation and abused their arts for self-enrichment. Charon discovered their perfidy and ordered their destruction, outlawing their Arcanos to ensure it would never again threaten Imperial stability. Unofficial history provides somewhat more context. The Mnemoi predate Stygia, having originated as the first wraiths to make an organized attempt at recording events and phenomena in the Underworld. Initially, they relied on trained memory and oral history (few plasmics provide usable vellum, while attempts to produce paper from the trees lining the River of Death’s banks ended in gruesome disaster). The rites and exercises of this training gave rise to the first sparks of Mnemosynis, and the Arcanos’ first use was the preservation of accurate, objective records. As the proto-Mnemoi further explored their art, they developed methods for sharing their memories to ensure accurate knowledge transfers. By the time Charon founded Stygia, they were a respected order of teachers and loremasters. The discovery of methods for reading and altering other wraiths’ memories only gradually led to the capacity to reshape those same memories. Guild leaders quickly recognized the potential for abuse and clamped down on dissemination and use of such arts. Two officially sanctioned applications of those arts (requested, some say, by Charon himself) expanded the Mnemoi’s role in Stygian society. The first saw the Mnemoi working alongside the Pardoners to soothe or alter traumatic memories that provided fodder for Shadows’ abuses or led wraiths toward Oblivion. The second introduced Mnemos expert testimony (and, in some cases, direct transfer and display of memories) as a feature of trials for capital crimes. Most sources agree this latter role, and the access it gave the Mnemoi to the halls of Stygian power, paved the way for the Guild’s eventual fall. Accounts vary on the specifics, perhaps because the Mnemoi so flagrantly abused their arts to cover their tracks, but whatever they did was enough for Charon to outlaw Mnemosynis and Mnemoi membership. The resulting military and secret police actions shattered the guild, leaving only a handful of forlorn, low-ranking survivors. Even today, Imperial policy is to apprehend and soulforge any wraith caught using any Mnemosynis art. The Legions take great pains to avoid Harrowing such targets, as a Shadow-ridden Mnemos — or, even worse, an ex-Mnemos Spectre — is as horrifying as the rumor of renewed Mnemos organization.

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Factions

By preserving and sharing memories of the Guild’s heyday, the remaining Mnemoi retain a surprising degree of cohesion. The fugitive guildmaster Minos and his right hand Phaedra remain in constant motion through the Hierarchy’s hinterlands, making brief personal contact with each newly recruited Mnemos to ensure proper instruction — and sufficient loyalty. Beneath them are the Ancients, a council of Mnemoi who predate the Guild’s fall, ensure its unbroken continuity, and recruit newly reaped wraiths or the occasional exceptional lemure. Each Ancient inducts and trains new Mnemoi who are a good fit for his personal agendas. The Ancients themselves, and thus their students, self-divide by their goals for the guild. Strigidae advocate a return to the guild’s origins as historians and cartographers, covertly preserving records in case of Underworld-spanning catastrophe. Strigid Ancients seem certain such an event is imminent, though they refuse to share specifics. Alkionides prefer more engagement with wider wraith society, carefully providing solace and understanding as a combination of teachers and psychic healers. Some rogues among their number approach this as a business proposition, selling the memories of experiences as the ultimate addiction — or a powerful weapon. The few surviving Ancients who once worked with the Stygian judiciary now lead the Periphaeans. The Mnemoi’s militant arm, if they can be termed such a thing, they hunt the Underworld’s most reprehensible criminals and deliver them anonymously to the Legions, along with irrefutable evidence of their guilt. Their work runs the constant risk of exposure but they also maintain the Mnemoi’s last few ties to the Hierarchy.

 

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