Common Chant

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• She's a power.

• She ain't a power, she's just a tanar'ri.

• She's not a tanar'ri or a power, she's something else. Chant variously claims she is a reformed baatezu or a yugoloth...maybe one who's turned stag, or maybe a spy for the fiends.

• The Lady ain't a tanar'ri, yugoloth, or baatezu, but a fallen aasimon (archon, eladrin...) who lost the favour of the powers of Good and was twisted by the corruptions of the Lower Planes.

• There's more than one Lady of Pain. Nobody knows where they go when they're not busy flaying people's skin. They all look the same, of course, so nobody's ever supposed they're different. They are very different in personality, which is why the Lady seems to act so unpredictably.

• The Lady (or Ladies) of Pain are female Dabus, or perhaps the Queen of the Dabus. This is why she (or they) do not walk or speak.

• She is but one being who created the Dabus in her image. She is not female, nor are the Dabus male; they have no gender. They are her slaves, and she their mistress.

• The Lady is a product of the dreams of the Dabus; a solid image formed from their rebus-speak.

• The Lady was hatched from an egg of Io the Dragon Power in Sulfanorum in the Abyss.

• The Lady is a Power-to-be, much like the barmies of Harbinger House. The Godsmen have tried to trap her many times, but she always places them in mazes.

• The factols secretly report to her, and steer their factions based on what she tells them. They're all her proxies, after all.

• She uses successful Planewalkers as proxies turning them into living keys!

• The Lady is a clinging power. She has become one with Sigil and has lost much of her sanity (and personal power) in the process.

• The Lady has lovers who while divine, are driven to suicide by her "tender ministrations". She uses portals and traps to lure them into Sigil, and her embrace, while she bars unworthy lovers from the Cage.

• The Lady is insane or sad because she can't find a lover powerful enough to survive her blades.

• She's an "Over Power" like Ao, with a greater level of interest in things than he has.

• The Lady uses the Planewalkers to help her find a way to leave Sigil, or to keep the powers out.

• The Lady that people see is a mind-rendering of the dabus, who resent the trespassers in "their" city...her powers are minor and created with magical items nearby.

• The Lady's image is a mass hallucination carefully created with the use of ethereal swimmers and talented mindbenders...proxies and powers know the dark of it, but do nothing.

• The real Lady is insane and is kept in magical restraint in Sigil...the one who appears at random floating above the streets is an impostor.

• The Lady grants no spells because she is a Power who is Powerless. If enough barmies worshipped her at once, she would break free and destroy Sigil.

• The Lady of Pain was Harys Hatchis' biggest ever publicity stunt, to draw tourists from all over the planes to see Sigil.

Copyright 2000 by Jon Winter, art by Jeremiah Golden