Maliketh's Vignettes

•:•.•:•.•:•:•✧:•.•:•:•:•:• ✦ ───── ⋆⋅✥⋅⋆ ───── ✦ •:•.•:•.•:•:✧•:•:•:•:•:•:•

I | Hedonism

───── ⋆⋅✥⋅⋆ ───── ✦ •:•.•:•.•:•:✧•:•:•:•:•:•:•

Petrus mentioned a word at the bar tonight: hedonism. He used it for Cadayle… “hedonistic and reckless.” I think it’s funny. Hedonism is a philosophy of sorts, or so I’ve been told. The prioritization of pleasure. The idea of this... narrow, self-interested motive: get the most pleasure and the least pain. I found that people motivated by this ideology surely met their downfall in due time by the very self-indulgences they surrounded themselves by. They did not have satisfactory lives, and worse, they had the worst deaths. Shameful, embarrassing ones. Often they had a lack of interest in even helping those around them, let alone having much interaction with the world except when it served to fill their mind with euphoria.

So where am I in this?

It seems knighthood is a life that rejects hedonism at its core. There is no pursuit of pleasure. There isn’t a pursuit of pain either, per se - but there is an acceptance of it, and if I am to think out of my body… yes. A pursuit follows, by nature. It’s impossible for it not to. Once I let go of my aversion to pain, I found it more, and more, and more. “Pain” here is just… it is everything, it is all of it. The whole of knighthood is. Pain. The other day, fighting the Tellurgist, I was set aflame by an explosive spellcast. But I didn’t care. I felt myself growing faint as the heat sunk deeper through the Valkian steel, down to my skin - and yet, my motive was clear. I stuck to my duty. Even as I sustained more burns than I otherwise would’ve if I prioritized the minimization of pain. Today, I opened the wounds that had been healing from that fight; I saw Cadayle attack the Twinbird shrine, and it was nonnegotiable to act. Blood stained my tunic, my own self causing me pain while Cadayle didn’t even lay a hand on me. I think I hone in on these opportunities for pain and seize on them. Otherwise, what do I have?

It's hard to dissect myself in pieces. Each piece exists to justify the other, and viewing one alone simply doesn’t make sense. Did I adopt my vices to cope with duty? Or does duty exist to keep me from succumbing? I’m not sure which. Maybe I’ll never know. 

With my smokes, it’s always been this way. The more things are present on my mind, the more packs I burn through in a week. “I need a smoke.” I say it thirteen times a day now, it seems. This is my oldest vice, and I suppose that’s why it’s the one I’m most numb to. It’s second nature now, and for some reason, it still doesn’t elicit the sort of labored wheezing it did for the older knights I knew. My friends, even the ones who hated the smell, have simply gotten used to it at this point. Some of the women I see, I even teach them to indulge in it. A bad influence, maybe. My mother would smoke, and so I became accustomed to the smell very early on. It made her voice strange, a scratchy quality to it - not the labored wheeze, but you could tell. I’ve expanded my selection now, sometimes smoking the sort that Kaho sells, fragrant and supposedly good for the body. I reckon my mother would find these pathetic. Too much of a “comfort,” she’d call them - the smoke should be raw, the scent should penetrate. It shouldn’t smell soft of lavender. 

I think I could get away with this as my pleasure. No one really thinks smoking will kill me. I could have one every hour and no one would bat an eye. You only dissuade people from smoking if you think they’ll grow old, after all. It’s hard to feel much more than comfort from it now, it isn’t as exciting anymore, it doesn’t fill my mind with the same rush. Still. Without it, I’d find no peace. This is one vice I have.

I think, simply from my nature, my vice of taking lovers won’t ever bore me. I doubt it will kill me, either. This one, they’d lecture me about for all those sappy reasons that just seem… unattainable for myself. That my attention flicks too fast from one to the next. This vice brings a rush to the head that smokes simply don’t. A unique sort. There’s of course the gratuitous details that I’d rather not spell out - this isn’t one of those sorts of entries, after all - but I mean something deeper. The feeling of fingers through my hair… it dazes me in a way where the world almost blurs. Or the warmth from laying near someone, waking up in their presence. These are fleeting sensations, almost forbidden. If I could have that hand in my hair at any moment, would I wear a helm again? If I could wake up to such warmth each day, would I even leave the bed? The time I let it linger and blossom, I felt it beginning to consume me. Of course, she had to leave before it took me over. But what if?

There were so many that wished they could provide this forever. But I would rather push them away and let my eyes wander. I admit that, as of late, it’s been hard to pull my eyes away from a particular woman. I must still grapple with what this means. But aside from such… it’s always the same. Another comes into my life, and as quickly as she does, I make her leave. So that is my second indulgence, the many lovers I’ve sought over my years. If not for the physical gratification, then for the peaceful, caring reprieve that nothing else compares to.

Almost everyone has the vice of drinking. In fact, I’ve known a few alcoholics here in the Spire. I’d never succumb to it, though. It would keep me from my duties if I was a drunkard stumbling around, not of right mind. Though, once more, I’ve begun keeping more and more bottles in the house, dozing off with the aid on certain nights. I’ve dwelled on this, and I believe I’ve stayed safe from the consuming nature of vice due to its effects… the spinning of my mind, the vomit, the way it burns down the throat. This isn’t comfort, this isn’t peace. If only for that reason, I think I’ll be protected from becoming a drunkard ever. I don’t wish to numb myself. I just want reprieve.

So, despite these things. Despite the unimaginable amount of smoke I’ve inhaled. Despite the empty bottles in the basement, the ones I’ll sometimes throw Reflection at. Despite a gaze that wanders and a silvertongue that somehow keeps them coming around. Despite these things, I’m… still not what I might’ve thought. I don’t seek pleasure above pain, I don’t wish to overindulge.

I am not a hedonist. I am simply a knight. And knighthood is a burden. My mother told me that such a burden would lead me to seeking comfort, as did the other knights in the encampment. They asked me that I’d swear off it, but then again, I saw her smoking all the while I grew up. So I take the little brushes with it where I can, just enough to keep myself sane… not enough to let my thoughts waver from my responsibilities. Never enough to let me forsake my duty. Comfort is a luxury. I will never have it, not in the true sense.