Updated: 18 October 1998


Hekau Path of Necromancy

                    This Path is fully Described in World of Darkness: Mummy, p96. Kindred praticing it will find some Rituals for original Hekau won't work, like anything that affect the Ka or the Ba of a Kindred. Others Rituals inspired other well-known Rituals or Discipline Powers.

* Detect the Wraith's Presence

Difficulty: 5
Cost: 1/3 Sekhem


                    This power enable the magician to see Wraiths as if they weren't invisible.

                    System: 1 Sekhem for 1 Scene or 3 for 1 Night.
This power was created in the 16th Century, when the Giovanni's outrageous uses of Wraiths as spies became known to Meryt-Neith. only Wraiths who had crossed the Shroud can be detected.

* Eyes of the Wraith

Difficulty: 4
Cost: 1 Sekhem


                    This power enable the magician to peer into the other world (i.e.: the Shadowland from the land of the living, or the land of the living from the Shadowland). The magician can switch which world she wants to see.

                    System: 1 Sekhem for 1 Scene.
This power was absorbed by some obscure Bloodline of the Tal'mahe'Ra into their Bloodline Discipline (See Nihilistics, from the Dirty Secrets of the Black Hand)

** : Consume the Dead

Difficulty: 6
Cost: None


                    This power is usable only by Kindred using the Hekau Thaumaturgy. With this power, the Kindred can feed from a Wraith's Corpus. The Kindred must be able to drink from the wraith's body, and this DOESN'T incapacitate the Wraith with extasy.

                    System: 1 Corpus equals to 1 Blood Point.
This power was be absorbed by some obscure Bloodline of the Tal'mahe'Ra into their Bloodline Discipline (See Nihilistics, from the Dirty Secrets of the Black Hand)

** : Whispers from Beyond the Grave

Difficulty: 6+
Cost: 1 Sekhem per question


                    This power summons the shade of a corpses, enabling it to appear in the skinlands (i.e.: the real world) to answer questions. Note that time since the body's death is important, as Wraiths tend to Transcend or to disappear in the Oblivion. Worse, a Specter can appear instead of the body's soul...

The Wraith is only able to appear in his now normal Wraith form, and talk in a eerie voice, nothing more (unless the Wraith itself has this power). The Wraith won't automatically tell the whole truth unless the number of successes in the Path Roll is greater than the Wraith's Willpower. This power can be combined with the Path of Veille's Dark Truth Ritual.

                    System: 1 Question per Sekhem.
The Magician must have at least some remains of the body whose Wraith's he want to question. Not every remain will do. At least the skull (or head) or the heart must be possessed.

A Botch will call a specter, who will be able to materialize himself totally through this Ritual's power (i.e.: The Specter is material, gathering matter from the Sekhem used by the magician: 1 sekhem equal to 1 Health Level). The Specter can try to masquerade as the Wraith called, and then attack (or flee) when she will believe she is material enough. Those Health Levels are treated as Corpus Levels. The Specter will loose 1 Health Level each sunrise.

*** : Mummify

Difficulty: 6
Cost: 1 Sekhem


                    This text enable the magician to take the almost invulnerable form of a Mummy. The problem is that only a great influx of magical energy will revive him from his death-like state (i.e.: a drop of Kindred Vitae, 1-Point worth of Sekhem/Quintessence in any form, of even, for Kindred only, a single drop of Blood.).

                    System: See Serpentis *** in the Vampire Player Guide, p141, or Vampire: The Dark Ages, p163.
This Ritual was absorbed by the newly created Followers of Set into their Serpentis Discipline (some still wonder why...).

**** : Shadow Gate

Difficulty: 8
Cost: 3 Sekhem


                    This Ritual enable the magician to disappear from the Land of the Living, and enter the Shadowlands in the ''same geographical spot''.

                    System: 3 Sekhem.
This power was absorbed by the Sorcerers of the Tal'mahe'Ra, who created a Thaumaturical Ritual version, as well as other enhanced versions. (See the Dirty Secrets of the Black Hand)

***** : Familiar

Difficulty: Animal's Willpower
Cost: 1 Sekhem


                    The magician chose a Familiar. The chosen animal conscience will be removed (i.e.: the animal will be killed in some way), and the conscience of the magicien will inhabit the two bodies in the same time, controlling the two without problems of coordination. This power was created by Kindred, and so, Kindred Vitae is needed to transform the animal into a Familiar.

                    System: 1 Willpower Point, plus 1 Blood Point per Animal's Willpower point
Every goes as if the magician wanted the animal to be Embraced: She uses a Willpower point and removes (a Kindred would drink) all the animal blood, and waits more than the five minutes (less would make an animal-Kindred). Should the magician kill the animal just for using as a Familiar, then she would have to succeed a Conscience Roll if his Humanity is greater or equal to, or suffer Degeneration (Conscience/Integrity and Humanity loss).

Then she must feed the blood on the tongue of the animal and succeed in the Path Roll.

• Should the roll be failed (or the Blood not be enough), the animal is dead, and the Ritual is failed.
• Should the roll be Botched, the animal wasn't dead, and is now a Vampire (See Berlin by Night for animal-Kindred description!!!).
• If the roll is successful, the the animal is now the magician's Familiar: It can't move away more than 1km from its magician per Willpower point of the said magician, or it will die (see after...)

The Player must now create a new character sheet with his animal's Traits in the physical Traits, and his own in the mental ones (The Social are left to the Storyteller's whim).

The magician win the following benefits:

• Her mind inhabits the two bodies in the same time, whitout any difficulty. She can control them as she wants. She uses the senses of the two bodies without mistakes.
• The magician and her Familiar share the same mystical bond: When she uses Blood (if she is Kindred), she can heal her own wounds, or the wounds of her Familiar, as long as it is in the range said before. If she heals naturally, then the familiar heals, too.
• The player uses the Traits of the body she controls. She uses the Stamina/Fortitude of the body who suffer the wounds to Soak Damage made to this particular body. He can use Experience points to raise the Familiar Traits.
• The magician and her Familiar share the same Willpower and Sekhem (If the magician is Kindred, she can replace a Sekhem point by Blood point without using Senef Hekau only to fuel or heal her familiar. The Blood Pool physical situation is still in the Kindred's body).
• The Familiar has the same level in Auspex and Veille than its magician. If one of them (or the two) call by using the Veille **** power, all Veilleurs will know if (and from where) the Familiar or/and the Veilleur is calling.
• The magician can teach the Familiar Disciplines she knows herself by spending Experience Points. Any physical Discipline (Celerity, Fortitude and Potence) will cost the same as a Clan Discipline, and that any other Discipline will cost the same as a non-Clan Discipline, no matter the Clan of the Kindred-magician). Dominate, Thaumaturgy and Hekau are right out, as well as any Discipline/Gift/Power the Storyteller will consider too silly to have a cat or a crow mastering it...
• The magician always knows in which direction he will find her Familiar. In the same way, she knows in which direction to move her Familiar to find her.
• If the Familiar is staked, the magician is still free. If the magician is staked (if Kindred), or inconscious, her conscience can still move his Familiar if the Familiar was active at the moment (see after).

Of course, there are disadvantages, too:

• The Familiar is considered as a Kindred of the same actual Generation than its Kindred-magician, or of the same Generation+1 of the Vitae used to created it if the magician isn't the Kindred who gave the Vitae (note that in this case, the familiar is considered the Childe of the Kindred, and its ''Sire'' will be able, at Storyteller's whim, to exerce some influence over it). The only difference is that the sunlight doesn't hurt it, even if all Dice Pools of the Familiar are still limited by the magician's Humanity Rating.
• If the magician is Kindred and wants to use her Familiar by day, she must use a Willpower point, and succeed an Humanity roll each hour her Familiar is active. If she fails, then the animal start to enter torpor, but the Kindred-magician has some turns before it falls asleep (perhaps enough to find a suitable spot to sleep), and the animal can be awakened, either by massive exterior stimuli or if the Kindred-magician try again, by using another Willpower point. If the roll is botched, then the Kindred-magician and her Familiar fall imediately alseep and nothing but the sun going under the horizon (or massive stimuli, like damage on the Kindred body) will wake them. Note that if the Kindred want to keep her own body active too, she must succeed in TWO humanity roll. Any roll failed is considered as a failure for the two bodies. The normal difficulty is 8, but it can be raised or decreased if the situation comands it (like in combat, or if the Familiar is simply waiting...).
• Should the animal be killed (Aggravated Damage that moves the Health Levels beyond Incapacited, the Kindred-magician falls into Torpor (A Mummy will have to succeed a Roll her Ba against a Difficulty of six, as if she had been Incapacited, see Mummy, p76; a Mortal would fall into Coma) and suffer a mental shock. He must succeed in a Courage (Joy) Roll or be afflicted by a Derangement. A Botched roll means two Derangement. Possible examples are phobia of the kind of animal used to make the deceased animal, etc.. The Kindred-magician will awaken in the period shown in the Humanity table of the VAMPIRE: The Masquerade rulebook. A comatose mortal would come back to life in the same period, but as if her Humanity was multiplied by two.
• If the Familiar is moved beyond the range said before, it dies.
• If the Link is broken (the Familiar is Killed, is moved beyond the range or the magician voluntarily breaks the Link), the magician loses a Permanent Willpower Point and a Point in his higher Physical Attribute. This is in addition to any other maluses said before in each case.
• A magician can be influenced through his Familiar's senses: One can Dominate, use Presence, etc. the Familiar and thus affect the magician.
• To keep the familiar active, the magician must feed it with Sekhem at sunset. (So, if the magician is Kindred and if her Familiar is active, the Kindred spends TWO Blood points per day: One for herself, and one for her Familiar.) Should the magician refuse to give one Sekhem/blood point to her Familiar, then it falls into Torpor and is, then, inactive. To wake it, the magician will have to use one Sekhem/Blood point per night for 2 nights. The Familiar will awaken in the third night, when the magician will fed it once more with the last Sekhem/Blood point.
• The Familiar's Aura is the same as the magician's. One can use Auspex on the Familiar as if it was the magician!

Authorized animals are: cats, dogs, falcons, bats, crows, ravens, mouses, normal birds, lizards (!), etc.. Forget the tigers, Garou, normal humans etc..

Note: It is said that a High level Ritual can enhance the power of this Level of Necromancy, and so, affect greater Familiars, and perhaps even humans. Most the veilleurs believes it to be impossible, but some wonder at the possibility... Few know that this kind of Rituals were created thousands years before the creation of the Path of Veille...

***** : The Test of Maat

Difficulty: 3
Cost: 3 Sekhem


                    This power was created by Kindred, and for Kindred only (even if it is believed a more powerful Ritual enable the use of this power on mortal creatures!). The magician can remove the Heart via this Hekau Ritual, without any problem (unless the victim is mortal: In that case, the mortal will die because of the stopping of blood circulation in his system. Note that even if an artificial heart was used on him before his death, his own heart would have to be protected from decay. Another Necromantic Ritual can be used...). But with the heart is destroyed, so is the victim. Note that if a mortal heart start to decay, the mortal will seem to suffer from a general gangrenous desease, uncurable, of course...

                    System: See Serpentis *****.
This power was absorbed by the newly created Followers of Set into the Serpentis Discipline. For all but the comments written above, the power is the same (including the calming effect of removing one's heart!).

***** * : Great Animal's Familiar

Difficulty: Animal's Willpower
Cost: 1 Sekhem


                    This ritual is similar to the simplier ''Familiar'', with the exception that now greater animals, like apes, wolves, tigers (!), eagles, dolphins, etc., can be ''used''.

                    System:
See ''Familiar''.

***** ** : Breath of Anubis

Difficulty: 6
Cost: 3 Sekhem


                    This power permits Meryt-Neith to kill all living creature whitin the zone of effect. Only the ones she choose to no affect are protected, if she can touch or see them. Forensics will show that their heart is totally necrosed, and unless someone has an artificial heart, he is not immunized to this power.

                    System: 1+ Willpower point
The Kindred must use a Willpower Point and then succeed in the Path Roll. The zone of effect is equal to 1 meter per success. Anyone within the zone (unless protected, see above) must then roll Stamina+Athletics, Diff: 8.

• Botch, or 0 success: The victim is dead.
• 1 success: The victim is automatically Crippled for the Scene. Any effort asked to his heart will ask another Stamina+Athletics Roll, for the same Difficulty. Failure is death (note that this particular roll is not affected by the -5 Dices Malus of the Crippled Health Level.
• 2 Successes: The victim is considered Wounded. Any effort will ask for the same Roll, with a Difficulty of six. No success is death, and 1 means that the effort hurt the victim: He is considered Crippled (see above).
• 3 Success: Even if the victim felt something like a pain in the chest, he is unharmed.
Note that people with weak heart will need more successes than normal to resist. Note, too, that the damage made by this power can be healed. It is considered separate damage, so someone who was Crippled with this power will have to heal 6 Damage to be free from the Heart failure efect. Someone Wounded would have to heal 4 Damage. Thus, Lupines recover fast (if not fast enough...). Note finally that using this power more than once in the same Scene asks for more Willpower use:

This power affect the heart, and so can't affect a mortal unless his heart is in the range of the power...

***** ** : Human familiar

Difficulty: Human's Willpower+3
Cost: 1 Sekhem


                    This ritual is similar to the simplier ''Familiar'', with the exception that now non-awakened or semi-awakened (like Kinfolk, Ghouls, Sorcerers, etc.) humans can be ''used''. The semi-awakened lose their powers, through. Most mortals would be able to learn Disciplines at the cost of a Caitiff Discipline, trough Ghouls could learn Potence and the other Disciplines it mastered at the cost of a Clan Discipline, and that Hedge Mages could learn Hekau or Tremere Thaumaturgy at the cost of a Clan Discipline.

                    System:
See ''Familiar''. Of course, the Humanity Roll should be harder...

***** *** : Awakened Familiar

Difficulty:Awakened Willpower + 5
Cost: 1 Sekhem


                    This ritual is similar to the simplier ''Familiar'', with the exception that now, awakened mortal creatures, like Lupines and Magi can be ''used''. The Awakened lose their powers, through. So a Mage would lose her mastery over True Magick (but would be able to learn Tremere Thaumaturgy and Hekau Thaumaturgy at the cost of a Clan Discipline), and a Garou would lose her Gifts and Rites (through it would keep her metamorphosis powers).

                    System:
See ''Familiar''. Of course, the Humanity Roll should be harder...

***** *** : Enhanced Test of Maat

Difficulty: 3
Cost: 3 Sekhem


                    This power is the same as the level 5 Hekau Ritual Test of Maat, but can be used on mortals who still need their heart to live. The heart will continue to beat, and the blood will be magically propelled into the victim's artery. There is no need to protect the heart from decay, as it is mystically fed by the blood it mystically propels...

                    System: See Test of Maat.

***** *** : Judgement of Thot

Difficulty: 9
Cost: 5 Sekhem


                    By using Sekhem and Kindred Vitae, the magician can give back semblance of life to a corpse, calling back its soul from the Realm of the Dead. The body must no be older than one year, through that can vary with its degree of decay (if the body was preserved, or mummified, the lenght can increase greatly). This power is the one behind the existence of Neith-Iqeret, known by the greek name given to her by the ptolemaic historian Manethon: Nitocris, last (female) Pharao of the Sixth Dynasty, and the first Knight of Hecate, serving her Lady as a Wraith from the Realm of the Dead...

                    System: At least 7 Blood Points
The Kindred's vitae must be poured over the body by night, at the end of an hour long ritual under a storm's raging effects (it can be a sand storm, a snow blizzard, or a rain storm, it does not matter). After 24 hours, the body, inhabited once more by its soul, animates itself, with all the traits he had when alive, but for the following exceptions:

• A Kindred comes back with full power, but he can't anymore drink Blood to sustain itself.
• A Ghoul comes back as a ghoul, with the same restriction than the Vampire.
• A Lupine comes back with all his powers of shapechanging, but will probably loose any other power.
• A Magi will lose all his mastery over True Magick, but win in exchange a Numina related to one of his more powerful Sphere (For example, see World of Darkness: Sorcerer).
• A Mortal keeps his Numina.
This ''Revenant'' is unbondable like a Wraith, and will probably try to finish something he couldn't before his death. If it is a vengeance, he will win a new Trait called Vengeance, chosen by the Storyteller. The Revenant will win the powers of Fortitude, Potence and Celerity equal to the successes of an initial roll of Willpower+Vengeance, difficulty 6. the ''Revenant'' uses a Blood Point per night, has as much Blood Points as given by the magician minus 7, and this Vitae can only be recharged by casting once more the same Ritual.

***** **** : Immortal Familiar

Difficulty: ?
Cost: ?


                    This ritual is similar to the simplier ''Familiar'', with the exception that now, Kindred and Immortal Sorcerers (See World of Darkness: Sorcerer) can be ''used''. They Awakened lose their powers (all but Celerity, Potence and Fortitude), through. So an Immortal Sorcerer would lose her mastery over Hedge Magic, and a Kindred lose Disciplines like Thaumaturgy, Auspex, Dominate, Protean, etc. (through it could raised them up to their former level at the cost of a Clan Discipline). Note that in this Ritual, the creature must be alive when the Ritual starts, and she is symbolicaly killed before its completion.

                    System:
See ''Familiar''. Of course, the Humanity Roll should be harder... A Kindred used as such would keep its Generation. Note that the Kindred used must be weaker in Generation than the Kindred who will become her ''master'', and it keeps its true Generation (and so Generation limitations but into the Path of Veille and Auspex).

***** ***** : Mummy Familiar

Difficulty: Unknown
Cost: Unknown

                    This Ritual is only speculation, as no one ever created it. (Set could have, if he cared to explore this Hekau Path). Mummy would not be immune to its effects, but other powerful creatures, like demons, banes, etc. would be affected too. Note that the results could surprise the magician (And what if the Mummy body keeps its cycle of Life and Death, and bring its magician Master through it?).

                    System:
None, as this Ritual's existence is pure speculation.

***** ***** : Rite of Dark Rebirth

Difficulty: Unknown
Cost: Unkown


                    While Meryt-Neith never succeeded reaching this level of power, Set succeeded, and created by using this Hekau Path the Mummies known as Bane Mummies. Still, the results were considered partial failures, and Set only created seven Bane Mummies.

                    System: Unknown.

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