By Dorian Winter
Dance to your shadow when it's good to be living lad
Dance to your shadow when there's nothing better near ye
-Dolores Keane, "Mouth Music"
Level 4
Gnosis 7
In the mid-eighties, Seamus O'Shaughnessaigh, a Fianna Galliard, at that time known by the name of Winter's Child, but after the time of his mad rage called Dearg Doom, passed his Rite of Passage. He protected a circle of stones in Connemara, which his sept believed to be a dancing place of the Tuatha Di Danaan, against destruction.
Critically wounded after his succsesful mission, he was recovered by the People of the Goddess, nursed back to health and recompensed. This had two consequences: First, he met his true love, Niamh Flamehair of the People, whom he longs to see again ever since, and secondly, he was presented a gift, a very old flute made of a strange metal and covered all over with beautyful ornaments and intricate ribbonwork.
He first noticed the powers of this flute in a rehearsal with his band Na Dorchadas by the strange behaviour of his fellow muicians and packmates: Whenever he played his instrument, everybody who listened was filled by a all-consuming happiness and felt the compulsion to dance, as long as the music was played. Even Kindred experience the uneasiness of feeling happy. Whoever is under the spell of the flute will not be able to do anything but dance. To resist the magic of the flute, a listener must hae three successes on a Intelligence+Alertness Roll (diff 8). If she succeeds this roll, she will feel incredibly sad, but else will be able to act according to her own will. If she doesn't, she will dance.