8. Entering and Breaking

 “You two should be in big trouble.”

The tall woman, her hair flickering with amber flames, calmly poured steaming tea into three earthenware cups. Caela and Freija sat meekly before a desk covered in potted plants. Leafy strands trailed down almost to the floor. Barely visible between the leaves was a plaque that read “EMBER ATWATER. GUILD SECRETARY. MAGISTRIX OF ARCANOFLORA.”

More greenery hung around them, draping from pots that hovered in the rafters. Every minute or so, a bubble of mist formed in the rafters and silently popped, showering the room with humid perfume. Caela found herself captivated by the sight, but had to force herself to pay attention to the woman behind the desk.

As they were chaperoned into the cramped office, Freija had motioned frantically at Caela behind the Magistrix’s back - the universal gesture for don’t say anything! Despite this, though, a lifetime of honesty was hard to shake off. Caela had told their captor everything. From Ember’s ironic tone, at least, it seemed that guileless honesty had paid off.

“In all my years as Secretary of the Guild,” Magistrix Ember mused, “I’ve never seen anyone have the stones to sneak in here. Most burglars are too scared of being turned into a newt.”

She finished pouring, and set a cup in front of each of them with a clink.

“So - you must be either very confident, or very desperate. Based on your story, Caela, I suspect the latter.”

Caela looked up at her hopefully, wrapping her hands around the warm cup.

“I am sorry to hear about your problem,” Ember continued, taking an immediate sip of the scalding liquid. “For what it’s worth, it does sound like a rogue mage.” She sighed. “I’m sure you think the worst of us.”

Both intruders shook their heads emphatically.

“No, really! You’re the nicest person we’ve met here,” Freija assured her.

Ember accepted the compliment with a head tilt. “Unfortunately, I’m not sure what I can do to help you. This hasn’t been on our radar, and it’s not exactly my area of expertise.”

“What about this ‘Vozloc’ person?” Freija asked. “The tall drink of mayonnaise on the front desk said he ran a zoo or something.”

“…A zoo? Not quite.” Ember smiled politely. “Regardless, he retired recently. I haven’t seen hide nor hair of him since.”

As the two elves failed to hide their disappointment, she turned her attention to Freija.

“Now, you haven’t told me why you’re here. You’re not hunting these abominations - and I assume you didn’t help Miss Caela just out of the goodness of your heart.”

Freija hesitated. “Not… exactly,” she said, slowly. “I was telling the truth when I said I came to see you. I’ve come a long way over the sea, searching for someone who can help.” She breathed in dramatically. “You know about magical plants, right? Ever heard of the Sarciel?”

Ember shook her head with a frown.

“You might know it as ‘Shar-seal’ or ‘Elftrae’,” Caela cut in, reciting the foreign names her uncle had taught her. “The sacred trees of the Elves. Each community is built around one. Or on it, in my case.”

The confusion in Ember’s face cleared.

“Elftrae, yes! They look magnificent in my scryings. I’ve always dreamed of seeing one in person.”

“Mine is over seven miles high,” Freija replied, with a sudden coolness, “but you’d better hurry up if you want to see it. It’s dying.”

Caela gasped. “But… then, your people…”

Freija nodded, her lips thin. “When the people of Nabal pass on, that’s it. No afterlife. No worship from your descendants. Nothing.”

“But that’s impossible!” Caela protested. “What could possibly kill something so…”

Her hands attempted to convey the majesty she couldn’t put into words.

Freija shook her head. “I don’t know. But, whatever it is, I think it’s going for your Sarciel next, Caela.” Her solemn expression sharpened. “As soon as I overheard you talking to the skeleton on reception, I knew I needed to talk to you.”

She turned to Ember, all her bubbly energy now turned to sharp accusation. “I hear Sarciel bark is in high demand for potions,” she said acidly. “But you’ll find no more on Nabal.”

Her eyes grew distant. “Just imagine what my Sarciel looks like now, all bare, oozing pink sap like pus.”

Caela and the Secretary pondered the mental image for a moment.

“That is… fascinating, Miss Freija,” Ember began. “I’ve always dreamed of seeing a Sarciel, and to think they’ve become this rare… well, suffice it to say my heart breaks with yours. I’m not sure what I can do about your tree, but at least I can help stop the situation from getting any worse. I’ll put an order in to the botanical stores to halt use of Sarciel bark for the foreseeable future.”

She stood, retrieving an ash wand from her pocket. With a flick of her wrist and a hollow ‘pop’, a dusty tome appeared from thin air and dropped into her waiting hand. Leafing through its busy pages, she chuckled. “You know, the alchemy department loathe my stranglehold on botanical ingredients, but they need some oversight. Otherwise, they go overboard, and we run…”

The page-turning stopped abruptly.

“...out.”

Ember peered closer, frowning at the cramped pages of the ledger.

“This can’t be right,” she mused. “I’m sorry, but it seems there’s not much point in putting in a hold order. Our reserves of Sarciel bark have been completely depleted.”

“It’s all gone?” Freija asked with growing panic. “Who took it?”

Ember continued flipping pages, looking for an explanation, to no avail. “I’m sorry. I usually need to sign off on requisitions, but I promise that I haven’t put my name against any of that. It looks like these orders were approved by my delegate - my colleague Vozloc.”

Freija took a deep breath, seeming about to say something, when Caela smiled sweetly at the bewildered Secretary.

“Well then, that’s that. Thank you so much for your time, Magistrix Ember.”

She gripped Freija’s hand forcefully, dragging the protesting woman to the door.

“What are you doing?” Freija hissed, maintaining a frozen smile as they closed the door behind them.

“There’s something not right here,” whispered Caela, almost to herself. Freija leaned in conspiratorially.

“Why did Professor Vozloc request massive amounts of this rare ingredient, just before suddenly retiring - right as we discover magical beasts hidden in this city? Why does his colleague know nothing about it?”

“And why,” she finished breathlessly, “is this the second time pink ooze has come up today?”

Freija put a hand to her mouth, eyes wide.

Caela led the way, creeping down the row of offices until she reached an unmarked door. The sign had been freshly scraped, but the ghost of the letters ‘PROF VOZLOC’ still lingered on the sun-faded wood. She tried the handle. It clunked against a deadbolt. Locked.

Freija groaned. “Ugh! Why don’t we just break it down?”

Caela shook her head, locking eyes with Freija.

“No. We need to get in quietly. And I know just who to ask.”

—

Hellebore peered into the keyhole. “Not much to it. Just strong enough to deter prankster students, I reckon. I’ll have it open in a second.”

“The security here doesn’t seem very tight,” Caela noted, keeping watch at one end of the corridor while the thief got to work.

“No kidding. Your new friend got me past the front desk by knocking over a vase and fake crying. This place is a joke.”

“Yeah.” Freija smiled fondly at the memory as she squatted behind Hellebore. “My guess? They think no one will dare rob a wizard. In case they get caught, and the wizard gets mad and turns their bones to jelly!”

The three of them considered the prospect.

A definitive click cut through the silence, and Hellebore straightened up. “Easy.” They held the door open for Caela.

“Thank you!” She pushed past into the musty air of the office.

Following close behind, Freija attempted to sling a friendly arm around Hellebore’s shoulders - an olive branch the thief ducked like a strand of poison thorns. “Nice outfit! Love the mask. Can I see underneath?” Caela turned just in time to see Freija’s reaching hand rapidly deflected.

“Try it and perish.” Hellebore’s acid tone had no hint of a joke. Caela wondered if they’d had the time to pick up a knife since she saw them last.

Freija drew her hand back with a pout, though her tone stayed playful. “Too bad. I bet you’re prettier than people think.”

Hellebore was unmoved. “And I bet you’re more dangerous than people think.”

“Who, me?” Freija winked, then into a sagging armchair that puffed up a cloud of dust. “Ugh! No way this room has been cleaned in ages.”

Caela silently agreed. The office had an air of abandonment. Enterprising spiders had spun webs in every corner of the ceiling and across the laden bookshelves. There was a layer of dust covering not only the solid oak desk, but the loose papers on top. She sifted through them, but couldn’t make head or tail of the scrawled Gnomish script.

“There has to be some clue as to what he was doing,” she insisted.

“Like a secret passage!” Freija leapt up and began pulling books off the shelves with abandon. Spiders fled for their lives. “One of these has to be a lever.”

Somehow, Hellebore managed to convey an eye-roll behind their mask.

“Forget it. If he left voluntarily, he’s not going to have left incriminating documents out in the open - or in his desk, for that matter,” they drawled. “And a bookshelf in a Mage’s Guild is quite possibly the worst place for a secret passage. What if someone wanted to pick out some light reading and accidentally found it?”

Freija threw her hands up and flopped back into her armchair. “You’re no fun!”

“No,” Hellebore continued, lifting a corner of the drab rug in the centre of the room. “This kind of room always has a secret safe, and it’s usually under… Oh, fuck.”

Caela spun around to see the underside of the rug become a web of interlocking runes that glowed a violent red. There was a flash, followed by an ear-shattering concussive wave.

She threw herself under the desk, feeling the heavy slab of furniture shake, and mentally logged a new record for explosions survived in one day. Peeking over the table amidst a shower of scattered paper, she saw a crumpled pile of black fabric unstick itself from the splinters that had once been the bottom bookshelf. Hellebore pawed at their mask, assuring themselves it was still attached. The only evidence of Freija was a pair of legs sticking up from the overturned armchair.

No sooner had the trio of burglars staggered to their feet than the office door flew open. Through it strode an older human man, with tattoos covering his bald scalp and only a few liver-spots on his strong, leathery hands.

He was closely shadowed by a nervous-looking Magistrix Ember. “Caela, Freija, this is Councillor Mysen.”

Caela cowered a little behind the rim of the desk..

“Is that ‘Councillor’ as in ‘Council of Twenty’?”

The Councillor folded his wiry arms with a knowing smile.

“That’s right,” he said with a twinkle, his bassy voice like melted chocolate. “I’m sorry I couldn’t introduce myself earlier. You see, I was frantically opening a position for Master of Archaic Runicology.”

Freija had the good grace to look embarrassed. Hellebore seemed like they were calculating how much concussion was too much for an escape attempt. Caela decided to resort to her old reliable.

“We’re sorry! We just wanted to talk to someone who could help us. But then we found out that Master Vozloc has gone missing suddenly, and we wanted to see if something had happened to him. We weren’t going to take anything. And then…”

She gestured vaguely at the blast radius.

The Councillor picked his way over to the scorched circle. He snapped his fingers, summoning a staff of crystal that grew like an icicle in his hand. With the staff’s point, he poked aside a flap of carpet, appraising the now-dull magic circle drawn on the underside.

Ember gasped. “Mysen, that’s an Explosive Rune!”

The Councillor furrowed his brows. “Strange,” he murmured, “and stranger. What have you gotten yourself into, Vozloc?”

He turned from his examination, bearing down on Caela. Within a few well-placed questions, Councillor Mysen had extracted the full details of her monster hunt, and the workshop now buried under the Colosseum.

“Ember is right to be troubled,” he nodded gravely. “This box you mention is not to my liking at all. Perhaps I’ll look favourably upon your… rare enthusiasm for learning, if you can check up on our esteemed colleague.”

A parchment tube flew across the room into his hand, and he unrolled a map. The carefully drawn lines of ink sketched out San Aria and the area surrounding it. He pointed a leathery finger into the middle of the northern swamps.

“Here is his retirement estate. I’m afraid it’s quite remote.”

Caela committed the location to memory. “I’m sure we can find it.”

The Councillor smiled warmly and dismissed them with a wave. “Off you go, now. Ember and I must check to see if any other “surprises” have been left in here.”

Nodding gratefully, the trio of intruders dipped underneath his arm and escaped back to the lobby.

They arrived to find a furious Johannes, whose silver beard bristled like an angry cat. He thrust a sheaf of papers at the ginger receptionist, who by now looked to be severely regretting his career choices.

“Unbelievable!” the sweater-clad wizard cried as soon as he saw his companions. “These… quill-pushers say I do not cast my spells like the books say. But I do it better, I tell them! They do not want to hear. These examinations are foolish.” He raised his hands, letting the forms fly in a flurry of rustling paper across the reception desk. “Good day to you, sir.”

Brandishing his cane at the harried mage, he angrily clacked away towards the exit. The others, not keen to push their luck with the Guild, hurried after him.

—

The sun hung low and fat in the sky, like an overripe orange. Lux chopped overhead, stepped, and swung again, visualising his enemy being driven back onto their heels. He ground his feet into the sandy stone and lunged forward. Stab. A drop of sweat flew from his soaking curls and splashed onto the quivering tip of his sword.

“One hundred! Nice work, my intrepid student,” Rose bellowed exuberantly. He was sitting in the long shadows of the shipping crates, holding a frosted pewter tankard in each hand.

Lux, enveloped in the hypnotic training repetitions, hadn’t noticed him leave and return. Glassy-eyed and panting like a dog, he wiped the salty sweat from his forehead and staggered over to collapse in the shade.

“There’s a guy over there whose only job is to cool ale with magic,” Rose chuckled, shaking his head wonderingly. “Wizards, man.”

He held out one foamy stein to Lux, who gratefully accepted it with a clink of glasses. Rose eyed his student keenly over the rim of his mug.

“Do you miss the shield, Lux?” he asked.

The younger man swallowed a big gulp of cooling liquid, feeling the bubbles tickle his palate. He tilted his head thoughtfully.

“Yes,” he said, after a while. “I miss the protection.”

“You’re faster now,” Rose pointed out, but Lux shook his head through another sip.

“Protecting other people. Intercepting blows, taking hits for them.”

Rose clapped him on the shoulder. “You’ll still do that,” he said encouragingly. “Your whole body’s a shield now. Look! Mine’s got a few dents, but it’s holding strong.”

He slapped his chest in demonstration, only wincing a little.

“Don’t you get scared?” Lux asked. “You don’t even wear armour.”

Now Rose was the one to shake his head. “No, and I’ll tell you why. Because I will never die.”

Lux gaped at the bandaged fighter, then laughed weakly. “Here I was thinking I’d found someone normal in this group - now you sound like Mr Valerios.”

“I’m serious,” Rose insisted. “My story cannot end until I perform a heroic act. Even if it costs me my life.”

Lux levered himself up onto his elbows, incredulous. “That’s crazy!”

“No. What’s crazy is agreeing to fight for crooks, to lose on purpose, to make your fights someone else’s last. To do whatever they asked.” Rose was deadly serious now, staring a hole into the stonework.

“It cost me a lot to leave that life. But I needed to escape. To prove that there’s such things as heroes who win, villains who lose, true love, happy endings…”

He spread his hands wide as he turned to Lux, eyes wild.

“I think you’re looking for the same thing. That’s why you picked up a sword and shield, just like the heroes in the songs you heard. That’s why you care more about protecting others than yourself.”

The duo lapsed into silence as the shadows grew long and cold. Waves rasped at the dock, drawing Lux back to another time and place.

“You’re right,” Lux muttered, thoughts a thousand miles away. “But I know one thing you said is true. Villains are real. My brother was one. And I killed him.”

9. Where Do Mages Retire, Anyway? >>