Occult stories speak of “second sight” as the ability to perceive the spiritual realm via sight and sound. By attuning her senses, a thaumaturge temporarily gains the ability to see and hear Twilight. Second Sight allows a performer to see and hear ghosts, provided they exist within Twilight and lie in normal visual and audible ranges for the caster.

Of course, the ability to perceive the immaterial doesn’t guarantee that there is something to see. If a ghost hides behind a desk, the caster must try to spot him with a Perception roll, as normal. Spiritual fog or ephemeral darkness hampers second sight as much as the physical versions of such things hamper mundane sight. Likewise, the mad screams of a tormented ghost can make it hard to hear cries for help from his eternal, ghostly victim.

While using Second Sight, a thaumaturge can still see and hear the physical world around her, but with less focus and a great degree of distraction. All rolls for actions affecting the physical world suffer a –2 penalty, including Perception-based rolls. The caster’s Initiative rolls also suffer this penalty.

Second Sight does not allow a mystic to perceive spirits in Twilight, only ghosts. The See Spirits Merit is required for that awareness.

Dice Pool: Wits + Occult
Ritual Length: One minute
Duration: One scene

Roll Results
Dramatic Failure:
The thaumaturge fails to gain a clear sense of Twilight, but still loses focus and is distracted by odd perceptions. She suffers the normal penalties for the rest of the scene, but cannot perceive ghosts. Alternatively, the Storyteller may choose to have the thaumaturge imagine ghostly phenomena even though they aren’t really there. In any case, she cannot try to use the Merit again during the same scene.

Exceptional Success:
The thaumaturge succeeds at activating her special senses and does not suffer the normal –2 penalty to actions involving the physical world. Suggested Equipment: The character can see some physical evidence that something ghostly currently happens (+1), a physical link to one of the ghostly entities currently present, such as a photograph of a being while he was still alive (+1)

Ritual Details: Rituals for Second Sight are usually very simple. The caster may close her eyes and focus her will, stare at the patterns of tea leaves or swirls of smoke, or mumble a short mantra.

Drawback: Once one has seen beyond the physical realm, it is hard to forget that there are invisible forces at work all the time, and that some of them don’t have humanity’s best interests at heart.