185 - Death's Carnation

Ritual: Death’s Carnation

Cost: 4 minor charges.

Ritual Action: Take white roses to the gravesite of someone you hate every day for a month, skipping the fifth Sunday of any month and those that fall on a weekend in which a full moon occurs. Unburden yourself when leaving the flowers by verbally telling them one new thing or recalling one new incident on each visit. Every fifth visit chalk a specific blue and yellow symbol on the grave marker, if it is ever not washed away by rain on your next visit leave immediately and postpone further visits for three days (which extends the timetable, if it’s still there three days later you’ll have to wash it off yourself).

Effect: If the ritual works at the end of the month you will find a single red carnation sprouting from the grave on your last visit. It will grow in and through any medium: dirt, gravel, concrete, steel. The petals feel thick and surprisingly fibrous, examination or taste indicates they’re made out of meat (specifically the flesh of the departed grave owner). Once picked the flower lasts about 3 or 4 days, this can be extended out to a couple of weeks by placing the stem in a container of blood (any kind, it isn’t picky).

Anyone wearing death’s carnation as a corsage or in their hair or pinned to a lapel is inured to violence and may flip-flop any stress checks experienced on that gauge. However the flower also acts as a magnet for injury and death, people gain a +20% shift on all physical attacks against a wearer who also gets -20% on other rolls to avoid harm. If charges were spent in performing the ritual it does offer limited protection from Thanatomancy, each charge can absorb 1d10 damage from an effect from that school spent at the discretion of the wearer.