Ionu's Mercy

[Distortion]

Ionu’s Mercy Please Read : Ionu's Mercy is not an ambulance. It will reveal itself to those who need it, but there must be effort made on the individual's part to get to and inside the building before help can be administered. Ionu’s Mercy is a palatial building, with floors of white marble shot through with threads of gold and airy, high ceilinged rooms heavy with gilding and hung with rich tapestries depicting the healing arts. It is also a rundown shack, with a sagging roof that looks like it might leak during a hard rain and a persistent smell of harsh chemicals. And a plain gray building with one door and no windows, its only identifying feature a small sigil carved into the wall above the door, an unrolled bandage with an intricately styled inverted triangle. Like the God it shares its name with, Ionu’s Mercy is impossible to confine to one concept. There is one aspect that remains constant, however: you do not find Ionu’s Mercy, it finds you. Never remaining in one place for more than a handful of chimes, the building is always on the move, searching for those with need and evading those without. Sometimes the only staff on hand is Mistress Caene, wearing a different face each meeting but with an easily identifiable serene calm, unfazed by even the most grievous of injuries. At others, the interior of the building is bustling with activity as other healers and menials go about their work. The fact that the healing house, and its chief healer, has never been seen to wear the same form between two appearances has led to an ongoing debate in the city as to whether or not Ionu’s Mercy is a single building, or if there are dozens of healing houses in Alvadas bearing the same name. For as long as Alvadas has been a proper city, Ionu’s Mercy has served the health needs of its people. Incredibly persistent rumors place its origin during, or immediately after, the Valterrian, when the people who would become the citizens of Alvadas took shelter in the Ristage Caverns. In such an inhospitable climate, faced with the destruction of all that they had known, those blessed with Ionu’s gnosis discovered that just as Illusion could cause someone to feel, it could also cause them not to feel. While the precursors of groups that would become the Inverted and the Womiyu tended to the minds and the physical protection of those sheltering in the Ristage Caverns, those with medical skill maintained a constant vigil, dealing with the ever present issues of malnutrition and the after effects of less civilized denizens of the Caverns. When the Djed storms of the Valterrian passed, and the people emerged one more onto the surface, that same restless energy found a home in Ionu’s Mercy, maintaining the same vigil in modern times as was kept during the Valterrian. As with all of Alvadas’ officially sanctioned medical stations, Ionu’s Mercy is a member of the Department of Succor for the Indeviant Body, the city’s government center concerned with the physical and mental wellbeing of its citizens. Headed by one of the top surgeons in Alvadas and vigorously active, Ionu’s Mercy is best known, if most difficult to locate short of grievous injury, houses of healing in the city. With the level of skill of its medics and its frequency of travel, it is no surprise that Ionu’s Mercy is frequently witnessed nearby the most horrific accidents and injuries in Alvadas. Irene Caene : Irene Caene – Skills: Herbalism: 65 Medicine: 80 Philtering: 35 Play Musical Instrument (Flute): 60 Writing: 20 Two Marks of Ionu Irene’s appearance changes to suit her mood, thanks to two marks of Ionu’s favor granted in her youth. However, no matter what form she may appear to wear, she cannot (or chooses not to) hide a look of calm serenity that cannot help but reassure her patients. In her bedside manner, she is unflinchingly honest in her assessments, believing that offering false hope is the cruelest torment that you can inflict upon a patient. Irene Caene was not always a healer. Born the daughter of a successful artist and an even more successful merchant, and raised in the lap of luxury, she was a prodigal flautist, performing and even composing haunting, soul stirring pieces before she aged into the double digits. For her first twelve years, with the wealth of her parents and her own innate talents, Irene lived a life that many would consider blessed. These blessings were both figurative, in an overabundance of talent and the wealth of her family, and the literal, as those same talents prompted the God of Illusion to grant her Gnosis marks on two separate occasions after hearing her play. That blessed life ended with the Blue Fever. Claiming the lives of both her mother and father, and leaving her bedridden for over a season, this marked a turning point in her life. During the few instances that she could bring herself to play, her melodies became darker, dirges and funeral marches, stretched out with a forlorn longing that would move listeners to tears. Gradually she realized that her parents’ wealth, now hers, brought her no pleasure, nor did her flute. Her life was ashes, stolen from her by something as pointless as disease. And so she turned her family’s fortunes to an attempt to eradicating their killer, not just the Blue Fever specifically, but all disease. Becoming a student member of the Department of Succor for the Indeviant Body with a single minded determination to learn all she could of the medicinal arts, she quickly proved that the same mind that had shown itself was a gifted flautist was also a gifted healer. In just three years, she had graduated to full membership and found herself assigned to the wandering Ionu’s Mercy. From within the self-imposed confines of her wandering house of healing, Irene Caene has spent the last forty years using her talents to save the lives of her patients. Her knowledge of medicine, surgery, and most especially the symptoms, diagnosis, and treatment of a host of diseases is encyclopedic. Over time, she has come to terms with the death of her parents, but the mournful music of a flute can still be heard, calling the sick and injured to receive Ionu’s Mercy.