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Lorraine of shadow Lorraine was in the early stages of pregnancy when she was murdered by her former lover Melkin while fleeing from Corwin. As she died the foetus struggled to survive; this activated the latent shapeshifting powers possessed by all Amberites, and the foetus went into Primal Form. Distracted by his emotions, Corwin apparently noticed none of this. At first the foetus lived in, and off of, the corpse of Lorraine until it was too decomposed to be digested, when it dug itself out and crawled off. The child was a carnivore because of that initial diet, and initially, knowing nothing else, lived as an animal in shadow Lorraine.
It grew, feeding off animals and people's livestock, and indeed people. For a while it ran with a pack of wolves, as a wolf. Still largely ruled by instinct, but now somewhat more social and intelligent, it was hunted by farmers and so on, who destroyed the rest of its pack. This made it even cleverer. The disturbances following the defeat of the Dark Circle in shadow Lorraine, and the shadow storms which followed the re-drawing of the Primal Pattern also made it cleverer, and also boosted it shapeshifting powers as it struggled to survive.
It started to mimic the psyches of people it encountered to better hunt them and survive encounters with them. It also began to absorb memories from people by eating their brains. But all of this also caused it to learn, and over time it began to become more human, until it felt the need for companionship and society in general, and so ventured into its first town.
So it joined human society. Of course, as it was ignorant and strange it faced a lot of difficulties and rejection from the people it encounters. As such, it almost inevitably fell in with scum and low-lives. It didn't like being in the freak-show, but whoring was all right. Sex, in all its forms, was good, and no-one ever hurt it twice. Dancing was also fun. It did thievery and murder for money too, though it became more circumspect in these sorts of activities as the possible consequences of its actions became clearer to it.
During this time it took the name of Belsalem for itself. If it is currently appearing female, it will refer to itself as 'Belle', if male, as 'Salem'.
As time passed it became curious, and wanted to learn more of the world and things in it. About itself, and why it was, apparently, unique. And so, although continuing to do the things it enjoyed, it also began to study and educate itself.
Then, when time allowed following the War, Corwin came back to Lorraine to visit Lorraine's grave and the people in the shadow there. He was not happy at the old desecration of her grave and body that he found, and sought out whoever was responsible. And in time he tracked it down.
Discussions soon broke down and Corwin, apparently thinking it was a Chaosite, attacked. Although Belsalem tried to defend itself, Corwin wiped the floor with it. However, at close quarters and with Greyswandir causing no burning of his opponent Corwin sensed something Amberite, and things clicked for him.
And thus it became aware of its origins as a member of the family of Amber...
Belsalem is an amoral, solitary, carnivorous animal wrapped in a thin skin of Amberite humanity. Its primary motivation is survival. It is aware of social rules and so on, but will still eat shit or raw human flesh from a living person without a qualm if it has to. It has no idea about things such as honour. In its own perceptions, Belsalem is neither male nor female, not human, and also not animal. It is itself, alone.
It enjoys sex but knows nothing of love. It is a bit unclear on mercy and compassion too, but certainly understands revenge. It eats raw meat, while it is skilled with cutlery and similar niceties doesn't always use them, depending on how it is feeling. It likes music and dancing. It is not too good at lying, tending to be very direct, pragmatic, literal-minded, blunt and tactless, as well as selfish. It acts on impulse then ignores whatever it was once it loses interest. It has no shame. It is quite poor on hygiene too, although its powers cover for that quite well. In all, it is rather cat-like.
It usually looks beautiful (though the details vary) but utterly androgynous. It does not know its 'true' gender; nor does it care. It will change its looks to adapt to the preferences of any current partner.
It normally dresses in accordance with local styles, unless it is dressing for an end of some kind.
The game being set roughly ten years after Patternfall, Belsalem is currently some fifteen subjective years old. This assumes a slightly faster rate of time-flow in Lorraine than in Amber. Mentally its age is ... strange...
Belsalem is the inspiration for the Soulless Ones.
The primary power possessed by Belsalem is Shapeshifting, which it has used since it was in the womb. It can take on any animal form, and combine the abilities of various animals at the same time. It can absorb and expel mass to change size. It can change form very quickly, and hold forms very easily, to the point that it will not revert to some 'base' form even if asleep or unconscious. It has used this to make its internal organs more robust and to give itself highly acute animal senses. Smell and taste are its primary senses, being the ones it has had the longest. It can also eat and digest anything, from garbage to the finest gourmet food, with pleasure; its stomach is very cast-iron.
It also heals very quickly, almost instantly. Beyond physical form, it can also mimic a person's mind or psyche and imitate them. It can also read the memory of a living thing by eating its brain; this only works with very fresh brains, and if the brain is particularly strange or alien the information Belsalem can extract can be of ... limited utility.
It is possible that Belsalem could use its powers on others, to change their shape or heal them and so on, but this is not an area where it has practised its skills a great deal. It can certainly shape-change its clothing and fairly small un-living items.
The only other power possessed by Belsalem is a touch of the Second Sight, inherited from its mother, Lorraine [see 'Guns of Avalon', chapter 2]. It has no real idea what this is. The Sight brings dreams and signs, but never of anything it can do anything about, and also allows it some sense of powers, magics and so on. [From the way the book describes it for Lorraine, this would be something very much at the GMs discretion and under the GMs control; it may also only work in shadow Lorraine...]
Physically and mentally, Belsalem is superior to everyone it has ever met other than Corwin. [This might translate to all of its statistics being the same, and mid-to-low ranked (perhaps 20 or so), in an Amber game using the conventional statistics.]
Belsalem has not walked any of the Patterns. [Though they would certainly like to should the chance arise...]
Part 1 - as told to Corwin
The first thing I remember is waking up hungry in somewhere dark and bad-tasting. I didn't have words or anything then, but I still remember it. There was no food. I was hungry. I was angry that there was no food. I hit out and then in came cold, and this hideous ... feeling. I know it was light, now, but then it was just this strange horrid ... thing ... happening to me.
But I wriggled out. I don't think I had arms or legs then. But I crawled off.
I think I must have been very small then too. Something attacked me. I don't really know what. It tried to eat me. It hurt! I hit back at it, and we fought. I won. It died. And I ate it. Then I was happy. I wasn't hungry any more.
Things kept trying to eat me, and I kept eating them instead. In those days I could only smell, taste and touch. But each time, I learnt a bit from them. Copied from them. Learnt how to make arms and legs, and proper eyes, and ears. I found that if I ate their brains I could make their memories mine, and learn that way, too.
Sometimes I met other things, grey, that I now know are wolves. They tried to take my food off of me. And I them. But they cheated. They worked together in groups. It was nasty. I could kill them, but they had numbers. And that made them better than me. So I learned from them as well. I became a wolf.
Or at least tried to. It took a while to get the idea of how they look and are. They kept attacking me. But eventually I got it right enough to become one of them.
I joined a wolf pack. That was in the second summer that I remember. Ran with them. Hunted. Learned about working with others and things like that. It was interesting. Some of the wolves tried to mate with me. I let them. I didn't quite get the whole fucking thing when I first did it. There was just rubbing and poking. It was quite a while before I realised it wasn't just the shapes of the bits, but the inside bits, the ... what do you call them? - nerves - that count too. Then I saw what it was all about. I liked it. It was strange. But physical pleasure was nice. The female and the male kind.
It was while I was a wolf that I met humans for the first time. They were hunting the wolves. And me. It was nasty. Running. Hiding. They were on the backs of other creatures - horses - a very odd thing. I'd never seen anything like that before. We hid in the deep wood. I was woken up by strange dreams. Dreams of fire and blood. I had no idea what was going on. And I ran. There were humans, with fire and pointed sticks. They killed the wolves, and it was only because of my dreams that I got away. My Second Sight.
I didn't like losing the wolves, but I wanted to learn how to hunt like these strange creatures too. So I hunted them to learn more.
Humans were a big surprise. So weak in ones. But so strong in the many. Like wolves, but more so. I remember eating human flesh for the first time. Somehow I expected it to be ... different. Special somehow. But it was just meat. The brain was different though. So big. And magnificent. So much more in them. So complicated. It took me a long time before I could get even bits of it. But when I did it was like starting to wake up all over again. Bits and pieces. Words. Thoughts. I didn't have a clue what was going on at the time though!
But by eating brains I became more human. And from them absorbed something of their need for society. Though I didn't realise it at the time. I just had a strange feeling inside me. Sort of like hunger, but not. I suppose loneliness, perhaps. This would have been somewhere around my fourth summer or so. Not like a wolf wanting a pack, but more. More complicated. Hard to explain. But I wanted it.
So I tried to be one, but my shape was no quite right then. And I didn't know any words. They tried to kill me. I fought back and ran off. This was in my fifth year.
Pretending to be a human is hard. Much harder than being anything else. I had to eat the brains of quite a few of them before I got the hang of it at all. And even then it wasn't perfect; I didn't look quite right, and my words were still bad. They thought I was mad. Looking back on it now I can see why.
At least they didn't try to kill me this time. It was not long before my wanderings through the town where I was led me from where I got a hostile reception to where I got a friendlier one. Some people were nicer. They said I could help them. And put me in a cage. It was a freak show. I know that now, but I didn't then. People came and stared at me. I stared back. It was interesting for a bit, but I got bored. They tried to stop me when I wanted to go. They weren't so nice after all. I killed them and left anyway. Then had to run as they tried to kill me.
They gave me food that was cooked there. The first I'd ever had. I didn't like it. Burned stuff. But I ate it anyway - I can eat anything, from shit on up, though I prefer fresh meat. It was different. Very strange. And other foods are even stranger. The rotted foods, like cheese. I like those even less. Though I'll eat them, of course.
Still, my strange dreams - my Second Sight - sometimes warned me of what was going to happen. They didn't really help me do anything about things, though.
I noticed that some people got treated differently depending on what they looked like. Some got treated better, some worse. I didn't know why, just that it happened. So I learned from that, too.
It went a bit better that time, early in my sixth summer. People weren't hostile about how I looked, but they still were, sometimes, about how I acted. So I ended up in the same sort of places here as I had in the other town with the freak show. People said they could help me again. I half expected them to try and put me in a cage again, and was ready to kill them and run off like I did before. But they didn't.
They put me in a room instead. With a bed. A man came in. He wanted to fuck me. That was all right, so we did. The people who had taken me to that room seemed surprised. I could hear others fucking through the walls. Most of them were less happy about it, so I suppose that was why. That was quite a nice time. They still thought I was mad, or at least strange, but I learned without eating people's brains.
They did try and keep me in the room most of the time, but I didn't like that. And they couldn't stop me leaving if I wanted. So they let me out, with them. The others in the other rooms weren't let out like that, but I didn't really care. We went to inns and things.
I'd never seen people moving in that strange way to those strange noises before. But there was something in it that pulled me in. And that was fun, too. Dancing. Music. I still like them now.
They gave me drink too, but I didn't like that so much. It's taste was odd, and the effects it had bad. I lost control of myself. My shape. They didn't give me drink after that, and I avoid it now. Divert it. Piss it out.
I never met another creature like me. I don't know why. It's odd. I still never have.
I needed the company of humans, it seems, but not their close company. Not a husband or a wife, or a job, or whatever. Just to be there, amongst them.
After a bit, during my seventh summer, I got bored with whoring, though not with fucking. I was a lot more convincing at imitating humans by then. They didn't try and stop me leaving, which was probably a good thing for them.
I wandered about for a bit. I noticed that humans got things from shops. I didn't know how; they wouldn't give me things. But as I was quite content to live off scraps and rubbish, and didn't need clothes or anything like that, that was not a problem. That is something else I still don't completely get about humans. They are disgusted with things. Smell and so on. Yes, some things are bad, and some are good, but that is just how they are. Being disgusted won't change that.
Weather is another odd thing. People dislike it. Why? It just is. You have to live with it.
I learned about the little human tricks, too. Their metal claws and fangs, and their distance weapons. Cheating devices. Bows and spears. That I'll use if I must, but still don't like. Writing reading is another interesting human trick. Little marks on things. What an odd thing to be like words. But useful too. I realise that. Which is why I learned it, even if it was very hard to do. To get.
But still, people came to know of me. They asked me to help them with things. They said they'd give me money, and didn't understand that I didn't understand. But eventually I got the idea. So I agreed.
They had me kill someone. That was fine. I did a few like that. Other people hired me to take things for them. That was fine too. Or to kill people in a specific way, 'as an example' they said. That was also fine. And fucking. There was always fucking.
The only problem was that people found out. They tried to kill me in return, and the Watch came after me. I had to run away. But the same thing happened again and again. It took me quite a long time to work out how to avoid these things by being secretive. That things can have consequences. But I got it in the end. By the time I was nine or so. One thing I learned is that humans object to other humans being killed, even if they don't know them. So I avoid killing them if I can, now. Of course, if I'm particularly nervous or whatever, I think killing is more likely to protect myself than otherwise. But that's only to be expected.
Whoring was a much easier way to get money than killing and thieving, but didn't get as much. But it was nicer. So I did that more. Not that I really needed the money. But I'd like things for a while, and want them in a way easier than stealing them. So I'd get some money and have them.
I did become more curious about myself and the world generally as time went on. Why I seemed to be the only thing like me. I talked to lots of clever people. Starting where I was. They told me things about the world, but when it came to me either they didn't know anything, or were too scared, or tried to get me killed, or all of those things. And eating their brains was little help. Too much was lost in doing so. I did learn a bit about the Second Sight, and was able to put a name to my weird dreams.
So I went further and further across Lorraine looking for people who knew more. I didn't find anyone who could tell me about me, but I did find out quite a lot about the world, and saw all sorts of things.
I did need money to pay the clever people I talked to. So I had to get it, by theft, or whoring, or whatever. That taught me about the judgement of others. Some of the clever people wouldn't have anything to do with thieves or whores. So I learned to hide my whoring self from my learning self when talking to them.
And then you came, and you know the rest since then...
Humans are complicated things. Too complicated, really. I don't like them much. They're mostly so weak and pathetic. Wouldn't last long without their cities and their armies and their weapons.
And their 'qualms', 'squeamishness', and 'scruples'. Their 'laws'. Grief. Love. Guilt. Shame. Pain from their emotions. What are they all about?
But they are so interesting, too.
So many tricks and toys. And nice things, like dancing.
Strong in numbers despite their weakness in ones.
And the hunting can be such fun, too.
But they are not all so weak. This Corwin. He hurt me more than anyone else has ever done, with that sword of his. I was afraid. But then he stopped. He says he's my daddy. And ... I believe him. His scent. My instinct. Everything.
So. Does that make me human?
No. No more than I was before.
Perhaps my blood is human, but I am not. But then ... I can only think like this at all because I have learned from them. Absorbed things from them. From their brains. Become more like them, even.
That would be bad. I don't want to be human. And I', quite contaminated enough with humanity as it is.
So I'll have to make sure their 'morals' and whatnot do not infect me with their weakness. Should be all right. I lived with wolves and didn't become one of them, so I suppose I'm safe.
Corwin still has weakness inside, though. He 'loved' some woman named Lorraine. She was my mummy. She was killed and I ate my way out of her corpse to live. That's why he came after me. Thought I had 'desecrated' her body. Whatever that means. Don't care really, as long as he doesn't kill me.
But I do care that he could kill me if he wanted. So I'll help him do whatever it is he wants in this.
That's why I'm in this other world now. Not Lorraine, but somewhere else. I didn't even know there were other worlds and we only came here by land, but by no road I ever knew or saw. Strange. Scary, too. How will I get back to Lorraine from here?
Daddy wants me to convince the daughter of one of his brothers, a what-do-you-call-it? - cousin, that's it - of mine, I suppose, to join him in getting rid of the King of some other world called Amber and replace him with Corwin. She's called Andromeda. She's a sailor. Quite salty-tasting.
I'll try. But not if it gets me killed. Corwin says all of his family are powerful like him. Like us. So I'll have to careful. But I don't know them, really.
He says that if I help him he'll let me walk something called the Pattern. He says it's how he goes from world to world. That's worth a bit of risk to get, I think...
And I need to now, I suppose. To get me home. Let me walk this Pattern. I never needed anyone before. But I suppose he needs me too. Does that make it even? Perhaps.
The Soulless Ones, that Belsalem inspired.
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