During our lockdown-era Glorantha campaign, our GM, Chris K. suggested we put together an entry for the God Learners podcast's competition to make some sort of Glorantha-related audio product. Weirdos that we were, we (Chris, myself, and Liesl R.) decided to make an in-universe guided meditation for the Lunar Empire - over a frantic couple of weeks before the deadline, and with the assistance of Tim H. (on psychedelic guitar), we put something together. And we won!
As context - in the Glorantha universe, the Lunar Empire are a hyper-syncretic, hyper-imperialist anatagonist faction who seek to bind the world into their semi-egalitarian empire, beneath the Red Moon. Depending on who you ask, they are either an empire of decadent fools who perform mass human sacrifice out of a misguided belief that you can reach a peaceful compromise with the corrosive forces of primordial Chaos, or they are progressive mystics who teach tolerance, mutual understanding, and transcendence, that we are all us. Probably both.
For the art, the only coloured paint I used was cadmium-free scarlet, an uncompromising, suffocatingly rich fire-red-orange. The whole image - and the overwhelmingly RED light, with only a cold night sky behind it - is meant to mirror the heady and overpowering nature of Lunar transcendent philosophy.
A man dressed in white robes with two golden stripes stepped into the GHQ pavilion one day in the Zeroth. He spake, saying, "As you are antinomians, tell me. My brother's uke disrespected our family, by eating at the same table as his wife. Shall I then transgress the old laws, and kill him?"
Deneskerva began, "That's not what-"
The Living Goddess rose from her chair. "I've got this, honey," she said. "You can keep working on the grain dole with sweetcheeks here." And she did lightly smack Etyries upon her ziggurat of repose. Teelo Estara faced the man of quality, and plucked some cherries from a bowl. "You can do whatever you feel like in life," she said, eating them. She smiled, teeth stained red with their juices. "Such have I said, but it is a simple truth. I suppose a man of quality like you understands the necessity of one speech for the lowly and another for the mediocre orders and still another for the high and mighty. Just as you might beat a lowly slave girl to the point of death for mixing up the robe of authority with the robe of dominion, but merely deliver ten lashes with the whip to a scribe who fumbles his B's."
Eserela closed her eyes and covered her mouth. Doskalos stuck his head in, saw what was happening, and turned and walked out immediately. The man of quality shifted uneasily, for the first and second manumissions had happened already. "I suppose," he said, thinking that perhaps this fraud was also a hypocrite.
"So, then, here is a speech for a man of quality such as yourself." Teelo Estara spat one of the cherry pits into a wooden spittoon. "Behold the prison of the conventional order!" she said. "The pit of the cherry is the seed of the tree, and yet we gather them into one place where they cannot be sown. Should they not instead be scattered freely, such that many trees could grow and their fragrant flowers blossom? I imagine many maidens of virtuous heart would agree with the proposition, that they ought to scatter seed more freely." And Eserela choked at this.
In a moment, though, she raised up one hand and said, "I'm fine, I'm fine, Teelo you don't need to squeeze me so tightly, I'm not going anywhere."
And the man of quality avoided looking at anyone else while this was happening. Finally, when all was settled, he said, "I suppose it is hard to disagree with the reasoning there."
Teelo Estara spat the other cherry pit at his face, where it hit the bridge of his nose and bounced off, leaving stains of red. "And yet," she said, "It has brought you nothing but hurt and loss of dignity. Perhaps the prison of the conventional order is only such because of the chains, and not because the building is built wicked, yes?" She sighed at the expression on the man of quality's face. "Pick the pit up."
He did so, and at her further direction, put it in the spittoon.
"Now as for ukes and other catamites, they have the privilege of favor, and of defiance, and so it is well and good for them to sit at the high table and make merry with their seme's wife. But for a man of quality, defiance is not a privilege but rather a crime, a blasphemy against the gods. So, are you a man of quality and a blasphemer?" The Living Goddess smiled.
The man of quality looked around. No help was to be found. "I'm a catamite," he said, helplessly.
"An unattached, despeate catamite, too," Teelo Estara said. "A pitiful and lonesome being." She smiled. "Accept this boon from me," she proclaimed, "That you will go unattached no more! Doskalos, get in here."
Her son scrabbled in and saluted his mother. She said, "Rouge your cheeks. Stain your lips. Outline your eyes. And when you're done, take this newly appointed catamite somewhere and bless him repeatedly. With rest breaks, if necessary."
Doskalos looked at the man, who looked back at him. He smiled gently. The man cringed. "Oh, look at that," Teelo Estara said, "he looks like a naughty puppy! After you've blown out his back walls, get him a collar too."
And the man of quality lost his quality and became, after some exploration of his self, a very happy catamite and uke.
