> What she's come up with is the following: A Lhankor Mhy sage, her
clan is struck by a
> series of bad omens and ill luck. She links this to a prophecy from
an ancient text from
> when she had done her studies (she specialized in prophecy).
Of .......it means the newborn son of the clan chief will be
> the doom of the tribe, and she doesn't think anyone will listen.
>
> So she steals the kid and gets rid of it. (she's a bit of a
hothead) Even so, she can't
> bring herself to kill it, not outright. We haven't yet decided
exactly what she does. One
> theory is throw it in the river, the other is leave it on a
mountaintop. Both classical ways
> to do infanticide. The last is the rather disturbing idea of her
secretly bringing it into a
> heroquest and using it as something that is sacrificed or lost
during that, thus stranding
> it in the otherworld.
>
> What I want to know is what would be the expected punishment for
this? Would it be
> considered kinslaying and she slain on sight? Would she be branded
as a traitor of
> some kind and exiled? In the end she gets away, although not
unscathed. I'm trying to
> figure out what the Orlanthi reaction to this would be.
First of all: cool!
Second: I suspect of all things, prophecies are more apt to get written down than almost anything else in Sartar. Prophecies could be important, so sages are apt to record them. One question is, since it is a foreign prophecy, did her book have it already translated? If so, how accurate was the translation. If not, how well can she read that language? You live in Montreal, you know how amusing translations can be at times!
I think writing is viewed as holy and magical to most Orlanthi--it is a secret of the LM cult, and hence no less special than the secrets of working bronze or brewing good beer. When someone says "This was written down long ago, and I read it to you now" it is not a light situation, in fact to many ordinary Orlanthi it may be creepy and spine tingling, like hearing a voice from the grave.
Now, LM worshippers are notorious for thinking they know better than anyone else. I could imagine her taking the child (who was how old?), leaving him somewhere suitably hazardous, then returning to proclaim what she has done and why and the rightness of it. The chief would of course be furious, but there were all those omens people were worried about, disposing of her out of hand could create even worse feelings--not to mention, it was the fate of the TRIBE, not just the clan, so the king may care what the clan does to her.
One possibility would be to outlaw her, but give her guest rights (or else the tribal king does), and then bring her to trial in the classical way. This way he thinks he can clearly establish his right to punish her. She might even have believed at first that she could win, after which she might even have been re-adopted by the clan, and so she may have stayed for it. But then the bad omens continue, and it becomes clear that she was wrong. She will lose the trial, and the chief will demand something that amounts to her death (maybe that she be exposed as the child was, maybe trial by combat with no champions, maybe simply demand a fine she can't pay, cut off her guest rights, and have her killed once off the tula).
This could be the ego breaking moment....she is LM, they know procedures and laws more than anyone else. After all, that is why and how she got rid of the child and thought she could survive the process. She clearly knows what she should do, and knows it will be the death of her. So she breaks and runs. If she'd stayed and faced her punishment it all would have been tragic, but done inside the rules, and so not too disruptive, things would in time have recovered.
But by running she admits her guilt, admits the weakness of her case. Now some people start saying she actually did kill the child. Others say she lied about the prophecy and is actually an ogre who ate the child, and that she had help within the clan. Yet others say she was in the right, and only ran because the chief had threatened to kill her no matter what happened at the trial.
Now the clan starts suffering more curses, and is breaking apart from internal recriminations. (you could leave it hear, the chief's son actually being the seed of the conflict that will destroy the clan and eventually the tribe). Possibly someone, probably someone she loves, decides to take the guilt onto themselves (this is in Storm Tribe somewhere), taking in all the curses, and dying of it.....except that doesn't stop all of the problems, just patches them over for the moment (so that not only has she probably destroyed her clan, she has killed someone she loves, albeit indirectly).
Of course most people would think her error was taking the child, and that her guilt stems from that. But by her lights, her error was not staying for the trial, and her guilt stems from that....it was her own cowardice that broke the system, resulting in all of the escalating problems.
I have one suggestion too on what she could have done with the child (given that they are now in Karse). She took him into the fringes of the Kitori wilds, tied him there, lit a fire, blew a horn, and generally tried to attract attention, then fled. Everyone knows the Kitori destroy those who trespass in their lands, and they are trolls, sort/partially/some of the time (aka to Orlanthi: they are trolls), so will eat anything. Then you can drop rumors of great change amongst the Kitori, that some ancient prophecy has been fulfilled....which may or may not have anything to do with the poor tot, but it should keep her guessing. Works especially well if the original prophecy was somehow troll related (was given to the clan when it lived in Heortland under the Only Old One, for example).
I hope these speculations have helped to give you a few ideas.
--Bryan
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