Hi all! Please remember to post something for this cycle before the deadline, now that we're moving back a bit more to forum-based. It doesn't have to be long, but this is effectively a check-in for this arc.
Force and Fury Member
Actually kind of mellow
STATUS: Shilling a good medieval fantasy: roleplayerguild.com/topics/… 3 yrs ago
- Last Seen: 1 day ago
- Joined: 8 yrs ago
- Posts: 755 (0.27 / day)
- VMs: 1
-
Username history
- Force and Fury 8 yrs ago
-
Latest 10 profile visitors:
-
Most recent →
Suicharte,
Jumbus,
Fallenreaper,
pantothenic,
Lildear18,
BlackRoseSiren,
Carlyle,
Ti,
Silly,
Echotech71
Status
Recent Statuses
3 yrs ago
Current
Shilling a good medieval fantasy: roleplayerguild.com/topics/…
3 yrs ago
Don't mind me. Just shilling a thread: roleplayerguild.com/topics/…
3 yrs ago
So worried right now. My brother just got admitted to the hospital after swallowing six toy horses. Doctors say he's in stable condtion.
8
likes
3 yrs ago
Nice to meet you, Bored. I'm interested!
7
likes
3 yrs ago
Ugh. Someone literally stole the wheels off of my car. Gonna have to work tirelessly for justice.
4
likes
Bio
Oh gee! An age and a gender and interests and things. Yeah, I have those. Ain't no way I'm about to trigger an existential crisis by typing them all out, though. You can find out what a nerd I am on discord, okay?
Stay awesome, people.
Stay awesome, people.
Most Recent Posts
Ch. 1: Age Old Equation
It was Lepdes the eighteenth, and bells were ringing. Puffy white clouds drifted lazily across the blue sky and signs of the coup that had taken place in Ersand’Enise a mere week and a half earlier were visible only to those who sought them out.
Kaureerah Wenhan, the eeaiko songstress who had contributed her all to the uprising, now sat, cross-legged, upon the battlements, plucking at a cello. The instrument was new to her, but what was life if not an opportunity to try new things? Besides, she understood the fundamentals. The rest could be learned.
Yet, as that young woman sat there, sun on her skin, wind in her hair, and an exciting new instrument at her fingertips, all was not well in paradise. To one side she looked, and there was the city: busy and bustling. Reaching out with both senses and vision, she picked out what she thought was Leon, having an outfit tailored. They’d spent the morning together before going their separate ways and she couldn’t help but think metaphorically.
To the other side lay Bath House, but it was not as it usually was. All along the Godsroad, from the foot of the Queensgate, on past the Animal Farm and Wildside, past the Vermilion Swirl and into the distance, lay hundreds of tents and hovels. Bring me your wretched, your wounded, your starved and your wanting, said Oraff-Zept, and I shall take them in my arms and make them whole. Kaureerah had always thought the Quentic, Darhannic, and Chosen gods a contradiction. In holy books and sermons, they spoke in ways that sounded almost absurdly altruistic. Yet, their actions were all too often self-serving, vindictive, and neglectful.
This, then, underlay the issue of the refugees: both of their similar religions at once decreed that they should be cared for, leaving them with an expectation of charity, but also tacitly encouraged self-serving behaviour from their would-be saviours, guaranteeing that they would receive little. Her gaze roamed across the tents before turning away. It was twice as bad on the other side of the city, even if it was less visible. Belleville had been flooded with refugees, and there they remained, barred from passing the White Walls but for a privileged few who had the wealth or connections. She scowled and plucked a few sour notes, pizzicato.
“Penny for your thoughts?” asked… Penny. Usually, it was Yuliya up here with her but, ever since being outed as daughter of King Rouis, the Perrenchwoman had been increasingly avoidant of the greater scrutiny she found herself under. “Joost daumpeng aun yoor Quenteec releegeon,” Kaureerah replied with a snort, “Een my head.” She tapped her temple with a finger. Penny shook her head and smirked ruefully. “Charity?” she questioned, and Kaureerah nodded. “Eye heve meexed feelengs ebaut eet,” she admitted. “Helpeng peepel when yoo cen end eef yoo feel lyke eet es e good theeng. Eye theenk et’s e paurt auf oos.” She brushed some hair from her eyes. There was a bit of a breeze up here. “Baut mekeeng et en obligation…” She shook her head.
Penny seemed to consider, the wind catching her bronze-coloured hair and swishing it about. Sitting ‘cross-legged’, she pulled her foot in a bit close before fixing the mess. “It’s never been anything but an obligation for people like me,” she admitted, “but…” She shrugged. “I think you can enjoy even things that are obligations. The one doesn’t automatically rule out the other, right?”
Kaureerah considered as they sat, the sun momentarily disappearing behind a bank of clouds. “Yeah,” she allowed. “Meybee.” She nodded slowly, mulling it over. “Sey, Penny.” She turned quite suddenly to regard the other. “Yoo ever theenk ebaut Vaussooreeya?”
The Perrenchwoman furrowed her brow and nodded. “It’s hard not to. I died there, or I should’ve.” She threaded and unthreaded her fingers. “And I can’t help but think -” She paused and gazed out over the city. “That we left that place worse than it was when we arrived.”
Kaureerah plucked idly at a couple of strings and evaluated Penny. She swallowed. “Eye heve seemeelaur feelengs ebaut Retaun.” She stopped for a moment, watching as, down below, two men found themselves in a violent shoving match. “Why doo yoo theenk they sent aus?”
The one-legged girl shrugged, but then she paused to consider. “I think it was a way of having a force they could control on the ground, but one that they could also deny. We’re capable, but we’re young - naive in their minds, and bound to listen to them.”
Kaureerah snorted. “Shoold we heve?”
Penny shook her head. “They were stunningly incompetent, or just rotten otherwise.” Her eyes flicked over towards the Violet Enclave: under new management partially thanks to her martyrdom. Sometimes, Kaureerah thought that she liked Penny: the girl was smart, a good conversationalist, and a decent enough person. Sometimes, however, she couldn’t help but feel wary. Penny had known what she was going in for when she’d followed the Centuries at the soirée. She’d known and she’d done it. She was friends with almost everyone. She always seemed to be there when there was something to be gained in terms of power, and she’d managed to come out of the entire revolutionary ordeal squeaky clean: an innocent victim but not a pathetic one. While it was true that she’d emerged from her Tan-Zeno interview without an offer, Yvain had gotten one instead: a cousin who she cared about and a potential rival to the throne. Oh, how he would rise through the ranks here at the school: valued, respected, and safely apolitical. “I’m glad they’re gone,” she concluded, “at least as long as the new ones are better.”
“Whaut ever heppened too te ege oold equetioon thet ege eequels weesdaum?”
Penny smirked. “They did.” She shook her head. “They happened all over it. But, seriously, there are a lot of dumb old people. Age just gives you more experience. I don’t think it makes you smarter.”
Down below, the fight had been broken up by a trio of other yasoi. The city’s guards had refused to intervene in a matter outside of their walls. Kaureerah couldn’t help but think that it was about setting a precedent. The fight had been a fake or, at least she hadn’t sensed any of the anger biochemical signals that she should’ve. Intervene and you’ve acknowledged that they’re under your jurisdiction. Something about it disgusted her. She wasn’t sure why. How long can you just leave people that desperate, just hoping they’ll go away?
“Ya know,” said Penny, “I think the new admin is gonna act on things.” Kaureerah looked her way, arching an eyebrow quizzically. “I think they’re looking to reset some relationships and precedents: reassert themselves.” She nodded, unfolding her single leg, and stretched, letting out an unfiltered yawn. Her mouth stretched wide and open for a good couple seconds.
“Dregen Penny!” Kaureerah joked, and the other smiled. Another gust caught the eeaiko’s hair and caused it to billow. “Kaureerahbird!” Penny teased back, and they shared a chuckle. “Soo, prauphet, whaut doo yoo theenk thet’s goonneh look lyke?”
Dragon Penny smirked. She just smirked at her. “I think they’re gonna send us back into the field. I’d bet my title on it.”
“Yoo doon’t eeven lyke yoor tytel!”
“Well, that’s the point, birdbrain.” She flicked Kaureerah on the shoulder and the eeaiko shook her head. “Better then ‘feesh’ aull te tyme.”
“Nobody dares make fun of my leg anymore,” Penny sighed. “I kinda miss it and kinda don’t.”
“Shaut aup, creepel.”
“Fuck you.”
They both laughed, as Oraff gave way to Eshiran and ribbons of white smoke rose from the vast camps outside of the city: cooking fires at dinnertime. Kaureerah could see Penny watching them as well. Both young women watched. Soon, however, her mind wandered. It wandered back to what Penny had said: back into the field. Who would be stupid enough to accept after last time? Kaureerah pursed her lips, humming Green Perrence, and Penny punched her on the shoulder. Both grinned and shot sidelong glances at the other. Who, though, would be brave enough to refuse?
Ch. 2A: An Offer you Can Refuse
They were seated in the arboretum, with one of those nice antipasto boards laid out, and a good deal of wine. Motherfucker, Kaureerah couldn’t help but think. You were right. Giancarlo Silvestri sat across from her, answering a question from Maura. Of course, she, Kaureerah, and Penny had gotten together yesterday and discussed the latter’s theory. It was easy for her two friends, who’d ended up in the same apprentice group after the reshuffle. Kaureerah had been placed with Leon, Tku, and two others who already bored her. Regardless, each member of their trio was prepared.
“It’s a situation that requires some care,” the High Zeno was saying. “It’s an unprecedented wreck: easily five hundred feet in length and many thousands of tons. While salvage is a significant portion of the islanders’ income, it’s beached on an outlying atoll and they’ve no de jure right to the wreck.”
“But de facto?” Maura prodded, and their host scowled. “Traditionally, yes, but it’s something of a novel situation,” he explained. “The currents wash a lot of derelicts up in that area, but it’s remote, even for the islanders, and most salvage companies never bother. This find is incredible, though, and unique.” There was a twinkle in his eye, Kaureerah thought: a thrill. “The Royal Asper Salvage Company has filed for salvage rights with the crown of Palapar and been granted them.”
“Isn’t this in Kiluaho, though?” asked Mahal. “How does Palapar have jurisdiction there?”
“They don’t, per se,” Silvestri responded, rubbing tiredly at the bridge of his nose, “but what they do have is a naval protection agreement with most of their Parynesian neighbours, Kiluaho included.”
“That’s just a Virangish tool to have a navy in the area.” She scowled.
The High Zeno shrugged, not disagreeing but not engaging either.
“And they’re exploiting that somehow,” Maura observed, “right?”
He nodded. “There are at least three pirate vessels on scene, including the notorious Black Adam, which I think you may be familiar with.”
It struck Kaureerah, immediately, that this could be a tangled web indeed. She glanced over at Penny and Maura. All three, in fact, exchanged glances.
“The Aspers are well armed and have resources, and the pirates and locals are unlikely to make common cause.” He stabbed at a piece of cheese with a tiny fork. “Caught in the middle of it all - likely to be fought over and lost, portioned, and damaged - is what could be the most valuable maritime find in a century.” His gaze swept over each student in turn. “This isn’t a clandestine mission like they were in the past. We’re done with that.” He bit down on the cheese and swallowed quickly. “You would be official representatives of the school: neutral arbiters listening to all sides and protecting the find, first and foremost. You would receive a full briefing and academic credit as well as being paid a handsome salary for your services.”
“Ersend’Eneese needs too reessert eetself, dausn’t eet?” Kaureerah observed.
Giancarlo Silvestri sent an examining look her way, and then nodded. “We have a vital role to play in the politics of this world, like it or not: a neutral and empowered one, and we cannot remain absent for long. People are looking to see what we’re about after our recent changes. We need to show them. That’s why I’ve personally requested each of you: you’re the best and the brightest this school has to offer. You’re experienced, and you deserve better than you’ve gotten in the past.” He regarded them each in turn. “I neither can nor wish to compel any of you to pursue this offer, but it is my hope that you do. Tomorrow morning, at 2:00 HS, I shall be waiting in the gazebo on Hedda’s Island.”
Ch. 2B: Standoff
It was the dead of night, and moonlight lay upon the reefs like jewelry. This was not a quiet time, however. Hundreds of torpedo threshers remained, in various stages of mating, spawning, or death. In truth, they were the sideshow this year.
All around the waters of Moatu Suva lay ships: great Virangish galleons and tenders, local catamarans and trimarans, Tarlonese thiis’elaaz, and even a Nikanese shuinsen. They were not alone, however. Hovering about the periphery were pirates: at least three ships, though it was hard to tell, for they often kept their distance and flew proxy flags. Not a week earlier had arrived the notorious Blue Adam, scourge of the West Ensollian, and it had proven the harbinger.
Now, it was a standoff, and torches - both magical and mundane - burned into the night. Crews moved about the decks. Spells and guns were kept at the ready and pointed at possible enemies, although who favoured who and which parties represented threats to which others remained unclear.
In the midst of all of them lay the object of their curiosity and desire, the very thing that had caused this entire standoff: an enormous rusting hulk, beached on one of the atolls, its massive slab sides towering above the broken palm trees and smaller ships. Five days ago, it had been claimed by the Royal Asper salvagers, after they had arrived and unceremoniously booted a small group of locals out at gunpoint.
But then, more had arrived, and the pirates with them. Now, the Nikanese and the Tarlonese. As of yet, none of the interested parties had gotten a look at what lay inside, and the Aspers had contented themselves with circling their ships and building a small fort and depot of reef rocks. They had not been seen to enter the wreck since they had started.
Maybe it was because they feared the pirates’ guns. Perhaps they were worried about angering the Tarlonese and Nikanese, both of whom had received permits from their own governments. Perhaps, however, it was something else. Some whispered that there were eeaiko in the water, but this atoll was too remote and their kind had never been seen around here.
Still, the torches and lanterns shone into the night. Focused beams swept the surface of the water. Every once in a while, they caught a glimpse of something moving. Rocks tumbled, occasionally, from the makeshift fortress and its still-setting mortar: too many to be incidental. Sailors gathered on deck, muttering amongst themselves that this place was foul and cursed. Locals warned of the ‘kanaka nahesa wai’ and left brightly coloured offering baskets on their quays and boats each night. Eerie noises, not unlike singing, could be faintly heard among the waves and wind, though there was every likelihood that they were merely manifestations of a growing paranoia. Yet, in the morning, when people woke, the fortress had been set back nearly a day’s worth of work and the offerings were gone.
Still, the immense wreck loomed over all, its metal hull burning with tropical heat, gulls and seabirds circling overhead, sharks and threshers hunkering in its shade or prowling about its battered lower reaches. Still, it held most of its secrets. It beckoned. It promised. It threatened.
Ch. 3A: Victims
“It’s a situation that requires some care,” the hooded man was saying. “They’re important people: merchants from Oiyac and the only ones who still ship to and from human lands.” He shook his head tightly. “They got to jump the queue because they had connections within the school’s admin.”
“Old admin or new?” prodded Penny.
“What business of mine is it?”
She did not voice her suspicions, though she knew that precious little had changed. This man was a zeno - just who, she could not quite determine - and this was another clandestine bit of dirty work for the school.
“But I don’t think their innocent son should suffer because they might have some unwarranted inside connections,” he continued. She could feel the subtle disapproval radiating off of him and allowed that there was a chance this wasn’t just more of the academy’s skullduggery.
“Whatever your experience with the school,” interjected Seviin in that holier-than-thou voice, “Our mysterious friend here has a point: the baseline good is saving a life from some murderous criminals.”
Niallus nodded along, giving away nothing about his intentions or who he was agreeing with. Penny could’ve rolled her eyes but she did not, for this was his custom, after all, and she was well used to it.
“If nothing else, it pays well,” Abdel observed, leaning against a wall nearby. He’d developed a surprisingly revolutionary streak of late, and this seemed like more of a conscious return to his mercenary roots. Penny scowled.
“Well, here’s the notice,” said the hooded man, thrusting it into Dory’s hands. The Feskan nearly fumbled it, but she managed to hold on and open it up a moment later. “If you’re interested, you’ll be making the world a better place and helping a family.” He took a few steps back as the youths leaned in and read. “I think the academy will understand, maybe even be grateful.”
“Gone,” said Oksana. It was a single word and, when the majority of the group looked up, their contact had disappeared. All that was left to do was to either respond to the plea or not. Weighty glances passed between them until, finally, Seviin broke the silence. “I will be going,” she announced. “These people, wealthy or not, are victims of my nation’s cruel war. I will not let them be victims again.”
Ch. 3B: Brothers (and Sisters)
“I’m sorry, Mr. Emerii, but we have given you an entire month to pay us what you borrowed.” Cherii made a pouty face. “It makes Mamah ever so sad when her friends abuse her generosity like this.”
“What Cherii means, Emrii, is that we’s gonna break yoah knees.” A tall, mean-looking yasoi with ginger hair and a crooked nose grinned and pounded a fist against his open palm. “Well, Daiyet is, anyway.”
“But the funds!” wailed their victim. “I’ve almost got them! Only two more days ‘til my next paycheck! I swear it!”
Cherii shook her head sadly. ”I’m sorry, Mr. Emerii, and I hope this doesn't hurt too much, but that’s what you said last time, and I just don’t believe you anymore.”
“No!” the makeshift shop owner wailed. “No no no! I have a family! Please! I’m an asset, please!”
For a moment, Diayet, absolute giant that he was, looked over at his sister. Cherii pursed her lips. Then, she shook her head tightly, turned on her heel daintily, and walked away. “You got it, bawss.” Daiyet set his jaw in a businesslike scowl and stalked forward. Mr. Emerii scrabbled back until he was grabbed, quite roughly, by a grinning Fantas. “This’ll go a lot easiah if ya stay still, ye know.” He wrenched the man square. “No!” he screamed. “I beg you, if you’ve any decency at all! I beg you in Oirase’s name! Please no!”
“Say, youse got a kinda… limited like… numbah of woids. What’s that called again?”
“Vocabulary,” grunted Daiyet, as he swung his bat. It connected with a satisfying crack and their truant debtor shrieked. “Yeeeah. Yeah! Vocabulary. Youse got a real limited vocabulary, Mistah Emrii.” Fantas held tightly onto him as he thrashed and Daiyet wound up for another crack: all seven feet and five hundred pounds of him. “Ain’t nuttin’ pehsonal there, chief,” He huffed, connecting again. “You just decided to fuck with Cola Brothahs -”
“And sistahs,” amended Fantas, thinking of Cherii and Coca.
“Doesn’t have the same ring.” Daiyet stepped back and scowled. Mr. Emerii lay broken on the floor, whimpering. “Anyway, you decided to fuck with the Cola Brothers, and Ma.” Daiyet crouched, handing Fantas the bat. “and we can’t juss let that go, yuhsee, or everyone’s gonna start doin’ it.”
Fantas nodded. “Now you uh… quit yoah whinin’ an’ go find yuhself a good bindah, ta patch you up, eh?” He paused and scowled for a moment. “Oh, and that’s two moah Magus ya owe us.”
Daiyet crossed his arms. “Labouh an’ service fee.” Fantas twirled the bat jauntily. Daiyet let out a snort. They turned and left the alley for their next task.
Cherii, of course, had left it some time ago, remanding Mr. Emerii to the care of her brothers. She stalked through the port district, a few of the yanii shooting her dirty looks, a few dirty old men following her a bit too closely with their eyes. She kept an eye out for who of course. That meant she had a lever she could use to manipulate them.
Eventually, she reached the print shop. Stopping and scowling, she buttoned up her blouse, fixed her hair, and tried to hide her pointed ears beneath her hat a little. The Colas had been here for months before the refugees started streaming in. It was why they were so well-positioned and even integrated, but a particularly acute bout of racism had gripped the town outside the city of late, and yaniis’ memories were as short as their ears. She took a deep breath, forced a smile, and pushed the door open. “Good morning, Sarah!” she chirped, and the girl at the front desk looked up at her warily, tucking something behind it. “Morning, Cherii.”
Despite the less-than-friendly greeting, Cherii kept up her smile. She’d find out what was behind the desk later. “Is your dad in right now?” she asked, as if it were just a casual request, and Sarah’s eyes met hers. For a moment, a powerful urge to violence welled up inside of her. Those looks - those fucking looks. They’d been friends at first - two girls around the same age - until the refugees had come, until Sarah had found out what the Colas did to make ends meet. Judgy little cunt. Let’s see you walk a mile in my shoes.
“I think he’s in the back. He might be in the middle of something. I’ll go get him.”
Quickened breathing, sweat, paling. Cherii translated body language in her head and waved off Sarah’s offer. “Oh, no need for you to waste your time and leave the front desk empty,” she replied cheerily. “You might have more customers Besides, one would hope I’d know my way around by now.” She met the huusoi’s gaze and smiled, rolling her eyes.
“Well, I don’t really mind and he’s um -”
Cherii brushed past her. “You wait here, Sarah.” She laid a hand upon the girl’s shoulder and squeezed it reassuringly. “This is business.” She strode into the back, alone, undoing the top button on her blouse and freeing her hair.
Mr. Marchand was at one of his machines, but he looked up when Cherii arrived. “Ah! Cherry darling!” She came to a stop, eyes flicking down toward her boots and then back up. She batted her eyelashes. “Good morning, Claude!” she replied in a singsong voice. “I got your summons.”
“Oh, hmm, yes!” He leaned in to embrace her, planting a kiss on each cheek. “So very nice to see you.” He drew back and his eyes swept over her from top to bottom. Cherii darling remained smiling, as she always did in the sight of others, and waited. “Ah, mhm! So, I had a job sent over from the city - rare these days, you’ll understand.”
Cherii stalked about the room, turning on the spot, her face hiding none of her interest in the topic. “Oh, truly?” she inquired. “Well, colour me intrigued.”
Claude nodded, his eyes on her before they flicked to the window and then to a shelf full of papers. He made his way over and plucked one out. “A missing boy - well, young man,” he amended. “Jackson Soul Doridax.”
The yasoi tried not to grimace at his butchering of her people’s names. Jaxan’suul’doridax She pondered for a moment. The Doridax name was well-known. Jaxan, though… who are you? Maybe he was the rich boy who’d come here slumming. She’d seen him once or twice, the last time in the company of some one-legged harlot. If scuttlebutt was to be believed, he’d been feeding the addicts. “Mind if I take a look?”
He looked down at the paper coyly and then up at her. There was the tiniest little flash of magic, and the door's lock bolted. “For you, ma cherie, anything.” The toady little man licked his lips and, all at once, she lunged forward, muscles augmented by the Gift, and snatched the notice from his hand. Claude’s eyes widened, and he stumbled a step or two back. Cherii’s eyes scanned the page and they widened as well. Promptly, to make amends, she leaned forward and kissed him on the cheek. “You are worth your weight in gold,” she chirped, And that’s quite a bit, in your case. “That’s why,” she continued, “We take care of you for half-price this month!” Cherii backed up a step, brandishing her smile. “This is very helpful, Mr. Marchand. We have to stay abreast of what happens in the community so we can protect it!”
If he was disappointed by her lack of interest this time, he soon got over it upon hearing that he’d only have to pay half of his usual protection fee. A rich kid gone missing in Mudville. Cherii’s mind was racing. Parents looking and willing to pay. She grinned. Pepsii, Coca, and Mama would have to hear about this one, posthaste!
Ch. 4A: The Enemy, Including Our Friends
“This is a genuinely urgent matter,” Penny decided. Zarina was there as well, looking over one of her shoulders. Yvain was looking over the other. Guy, she knew, would have already heard about such a thing and would be desperate to stop her from going. She would go anyhow. Ren Baykara, who Zarina had warned her about, was somewhere within the Groove, though the Perrenchwoman had not yet spotted him and had only description to go on anyhow. “And if we know,” she continued, “it’s likely that the enemy does as well.”
“The enemy, including friends of ours?” Zarina countered.
“Friends of yours, maybe,” Penny allowed, but then she considered Maura and relented. “The people we know on the other side wouldn’t be involved in something like this. They’re decent and sensible.”
“So does that mean we aren’t?” Zarina replied.
“You’re just racking up the points on me today, aren’t you?” Penny shot back.
Zarina grinned for a moment, but it didn’t last. The situation described was a serious one: a colossal raging beast that had destroyed ships in the region and threatened the welfare and perhaps even survival of a friendly port. A Revidian ship had been sunk and now the enemy was sniffing about. To what end, Penny did not know, but it bore investigation. “Says we get a portal to and from. Should be a short matter.” She glanced about at the others. “And I think all of us could use the coin around this place…” She’d settled upon it, in truth. She was going. She’d seen a similar notice for the Revidians and allies. There was more to this than there appeared to be and there was nobody whom Penny trusted better than herself and perhaps Yvain to handle it.
Ch. 4B: Endgozu Coast
It was early in the morning. The fog rolling off of the ocean still coated much of Zengali in a thin, clammy layer of dew that sparkled as the nascent sun reached it. Yet, already, people were moving about. The last of the fishermen were still trickling in with their catches - sparse, as of late. The city’s three monasteries, up in the mountains, were already hives of activity, some monks and nuns bustling about on their morning errands, others praying with special fervor given what had been happening of late.
In the terraced fields of the foothills, where the jungle had been hacked and burnt back through the efforts of man, farmers were already hard at work, weeding the fields, planting what needed to be planted, and cutting what needed to be harvested. The city had become more dependent than ever on what they grew, after all.
Ships hunkered in port, well within the protected waters of Zengali Bay, and market stalls began to open. Print shops hummed, their presses stamping out the news and notices of the day and a couple of notaries dashed about, pulling old or unauthorized fliers from posts and notice boards, reusing the nails where possible to pin the new ones, still warm from the machines. While they would not last long in this climate, so hostile was it to paper, they were of the utmost necessity, given current circumstances. Already, insurers, travelers, and those ship captains who could read were gathering round. Hunters, sellswords, and whalers looked for any updates.
Out on the Endgozu Coast, on the far side of the peninsula that protected this great, remote city from the ocean swell, was a boy of about twelve. He was one of a dozen or so people - most human, some yasoi or eeaiko - who came down here each morning, as the tide rolled out, to pick through the detritus of the sea for all of its hidden treasures. The job had become grim, of late, given what was happening, but the finds had still been there, and so he and the others had continued to work.
The deep grey waters of the Australic Ocean frothed and pounded against the cobble shore, occasionally lapping over his feet. How many planks were now strewn across the beach! How many nails he had pulled from them, virtually unrusted, for resale! The fog gradually receded and the boy was not the only one who glanced uneasily out at the ocean. Planks! So many planks, and occasionally barrels. He glanced, and then he froze. The large rucksack he slung over his shoulder clattered to the damp ground and he just stood there. There were things - dark things - bobbing up and down on the waves. Presently, one thumped dully against the shore some twenty meters down. Already, crabs were picking at it and birds circling overhead. Bodies: dozens of human bodies. The beast had struck again.
Ch. 5: Instant of Insanity
It was a large, dark room. Its walls, floor, and ceiling were stone and there was something unnaturally cool about the place. Perhaps it was a wine cellar of some sort, though the series of steel doors, each one semicircular, each opening from the bottom, each regularly spaced along one wall, made for a rather odd place to store wine.
Then, there was the large locker. Separated by ghulthite bars from the rest of the room, it was filled with carefully separated articles, labeled and kept distinct. They were all sorts of things, really: clothing, weapons, personal keepsakes, cash, swabs of blood and samples of hair. Most queerly, perhaps, there were two apples: pitch black but not rotten. Each had a single bite taken out of it. These were kept near an unusually-designed pistol, in something like a small cage, with a note tied to its lock.
Every once in a while, this strange, dark little world was visited by people in uniforms and scientific types, one of the semicircular metal doors was opened, and a cadaver was slid out upon a bier and wheeled into another room. By and large, however, it had remained undisturbed since the flurry of activity immediately following the overthrow of the city’s administration. Of course, such a boast is an open invitation and, naturally, that was when there came a loud ‘clank’ - quickly muffled. The door opened, just a crack.
They were, by the reckoning of both Dami and Reshta, people utterly abandoned and, yet, they gathered in their multitudes before the Seagate these days. They were a sore sight: addicts, destitute, prostitutes, urchins, and war-wounded. Many were more than one at a time. Precisely why they had chosen Ersand’Enise as their refuge was the cause of much speculation and consternation alike, but the fact was that they had.
During the calamity of the uprising a week or so previous, hundreds had slipped into the white-walled city. Some had managed to stay. Most had been tossed back out, even angrier and more wretched than before. It was not easy for yasoi to fade into a human crowd and go unnoticed, after all. Even the school’s handful of yasoi students now had to carry around identification cards at all times. Already, there were fakes being sold in Mudville so that those young enough might have a chance of slipping through.
The night guard, following a brief reshuffle after the revolution, was back at full capacity, and they took their job seriously. If they were supposed to be more empathetic and equitable, the refugees would never have known it. So it was that, on this rainy night, they responded enthusiastically to the attempted robbery of a wagon waiting outside of the gate for the first hours of Shune. So it was that they left the regular guards to be temporarily supplemented by junior replacements. Finally, so it was that, when a fight broke out among the beggars closest to the gate - those too elderly, infirm, or juvenile to pose a threat - the junior replacements stayed at their posts but were suckered in and watched, while their seniors refrained from getting involved and moved to form a perimeter.
Thus, for a window of approximately ten to twenty seconds, depending on the potentialities of a number of confounding variables, only two lamplighters were left to keep watch over the Seagate. They did not pay much attention to the one-legged figure that rose unsteadily to its lone foot, hunched over and swathed in filthy scraps of cloth. Instead, they shouted as a second figure made a dash for one of the other guards, and the guard to the west side of the gate peeled off to go deal with him. That left only one and, when he noticed the beggar headed in his direction, he blinked and began to turn her way.
She found his kidneys. Adrenaline down eighty percent. She helped bind much of it away. In truth, she’d already been working on the guards at this gate, on this particular shift, for the past three days, passively altering their hormonal production. Their reaction times were a solid five hundred milliseconds slower than human average, and human average was already poor. In short, they were pathetic. Serotonin up three hundred percent. She helped spread it through the target’s circulatory system, and his production had already been spiked over the past hour. She bent the light around her, he blinked, and she was back sitting by the side of the road. He blinked again, considering sounding the alert but, all that emerged from his mouth was a long and drawn-out yawn. He’d barely slept the past two nights and the problem had resolved itself. He glared at the one-legged hag crouching by the roadside for a moment longer before yawning again and turning his attention back to the fracas before it was broken up.
Meanwhile, Ailet’yrash’andarii passed through the gate, her own adrenaline production up two hundred percent. She slipped to the side as quickly as she possibly could, disappearing from the main street and slinking through the back alleys of the Crafters’ District. After counting twenty seconds traveling at an estimated rate of 2.5 meters per second, she felt herself far enough from the gate to find a barrel, sit on it, and toss away her rags. She had optimized her breathing and heartrate using Tecniito models, but her heart still pounded and sweat still beaded on her forehead. The young woman scowled. Such were the energy inefficiencies of crutch-dependent ambulation.
Presently, she reached out with the Gift, sensing for any buildups of energy that might indicate a strong magic user, but there were none outside of the gate area and the rain dampened her own. The yasoi breathed and brought her heartrate under control, tamping down on both the adrenaline and endorphins. She drew from the materials of the raggedy outfit to both confiscate the evidence and create a pool of workable matter. Ailet did not wrinkle her nose at much - she simply inhibited her olfactory bulb when needed - but spending close to a week playing the role of beggar in those filthy scraps had done it. She stood, naked, in this stinking back alley, and synthesized a fast-acting soap on her skin. She let this seep in and drew the rain in a sudden cascade to rinse herself clean. A quick blast of heat finished the job before she pulled her clothing from the knapsack she had spent the past week using to simulate a hunched back. Not thirty seconds later, she was dressed and ready. Almost reverently, she extricated a pair of large, round-rimmed glasses from a little pocket and pushed them up her nose. She smelled faintly of lavender now, while the alley was a delectable miasma of smoke, mould, and the mixed excrements - both urine and feces - of a half-dozen species. Presently, she slipped on her gloves, adjusted the headband that conveniently hid her ears, and inhibited her sense of smell. There was a line, here, between alertness and masochism.
Emerging onto a larger road, Ailet had a good idea of where she was and, when she located Landmark 1A - the public forge - this solidified in its entirety. Senses alert, she made her way down the street at her standard walking pace, adjusted upward for some degree of excitement. All about her rose this supposedly great yanii city, and it was, to some degree, a wondrous moment. She had never been to one before, and Ersand’Enise was profoundly different from the Osaian town where she’d grown up. Her curiosity demanded that she glance in the direction of that colossal tower that seemed to hang above the rainy city like a sword. She scanned the little storefronts, translating in her head. The houses were so overlarge and singular, though, and the yasoi scowled. She was not here as a tourist. Perhaps someday, when the thousand year mission was complete. Then, she might relax. Then, she might travel as her ancestors had.
Reaching Rossoneri Street, she walked one further and turned right, taking the back route. Once again, her energy sense swept her surroundings, and there she felt two guards and an unnatural cold amid the constant disruption of the weather. One hundred meters west on Rossoneri. she remembered. This had to be it.
Stealth was easier in the dark and rain, and Ailet bent what little light she needed to as she walked. Coming to a stop some thirty meters from her target, she set down her crutches, sat beneath an awning, and created an energy amalgamation that could be a person heading into the house she was using for cover. Meanwhile, she diffused her energy signature as best she could and reached out with her senses. One guard was stationary, by the door, eating betel nuts out of a bag. The other patrolled the square complex clockwise in cycles of fifty seconds, with a standard deviation of two point five in either direction. That was… a lot of variance. Ailet pushed up her glasses. Fucking amateurs. She grinned, allowing seven minutes to tick by where she incrementally raised the serotonin levels of both guards while encouraging the patroller's cochlear hair to solidify. At the five minute mark, she began lowering and strengthening a sonic negation bubble around the complex. Finally, she waited until the half hour, when some change in routine would have been most likely and, when it was not forthcoming, Ailet palmed her crutches, rose, and strode briskly over, timing her approach to coincide with the patroller disappearing around the corner.
Kinetic for thrust. Arcane for heat. Binding for insurance. The door guard perked up, noticing her approach, for it was too much to maintain so many magics at once and her light bending failed her. Then, with a bit of help, the betel nut he’d just popped into his mouth shot back and lodged itself into his throat. He coughed and wheezed and, quickly, she drew the sonic bubble in tighter. Thirty seconds. Then, the other idiot would pass into visual range. She swept for his energies. He was tired. Good. Slow. Even better. The nut expanded, its fibres popping under a flash of heat. She encouraged that growth with her binding and, the next thing that the target knew, he was hammering at his chest and his eyes were bugging out.
Ailet bolted forward. Twenty-seven seconds. She passed the edge of the bubble. “Are you okay, sir!?” He was sinking to his knees and clawing at his throat. “I’ll use the Gift! I-I’ll squeeze it out!” Instead, she got behind him and slammed his head into the landing step. He slumped, unconscious, and she grabbed his keyring. Eighteen seconds. She’d already felt out the lock from afar and there were only two keys here that could fit it. She tried the first. Nothing. She tried the second. Pay dirt. Ten seconds. The door opened with a light creak and she returned the key to his belt. Hastily, with little time and expertise paling in comparison to Tarlon’s other agent in Ersand'Enise, she shut off his cortisol, scrambled some of his neural signals, and hoped that it would pass for short-term memory loss due to cranial trauma. Three seconds. She slipped inside and closed the door behind her just as she sensed the other guard rounding the corner, pausing in shock, and running over to his fallen companion. She’d already released the sonic bubble and, now, all that remained was to avoid detection. The eagle has landed. There was no hiding her smile, and it grew to truly enormous, even grotesque proportions. Ca-caw!
Quietly, the Tarlonese operative took a deep breath and exchanged her round-rimmed glasses for a pair of sirrahi ones she had found as a girl. Then, she went still, trying to diffuse her heat signature across the area. If nothing else, the rain all-but guaranteed that any kinetic energy from her direction would be near-impossible to detect. She waited in uncertainty, counting two full minutes in her head and wondering, absently, if the patroller would manage to save the door guard. Generally, Ailet only killed in the name of science. It was quite meaningless otherwise.
Once the time was up, she did a tentative energy sweep and, satisfied that there were two living figures outside - lucky bastard - and that neither was paying any attention to her, she set off down a pitch black hallway, navigating by energy sense alone and occasionally using her crutches as makeshift feelers. A little light won’t be the end, she counseled herself, conjuring a Torch of Shiin.
At the end of the hallway was a staircase, leading downwards, and that was where the bodies were. That was where all of the interesting things were. She made haste for it, barely remembering to stop and sweep for security measures, taking the stairs two at a time.
At the bottom was a door: a locked door, but it wasn’t going to stop her. Reaching out, feeling the mechanisms inside, she turned one, and then another, and then slid a bolt. It took Ailet a good three minutes to get matters right, and so fast did her heart beat during this period that she failed to even count them out.
Then… pay dirt. The door opened with a surprisingly loud ‘clank’ until she hurriedly dropped a sonic negation bubble. It swung open and a cold light from her fingertips illuminated the fog of her breath. The yasoi’s pupils dilated and she switched to her third pair of glasses. Her eyes flicked about the room. First, came the body. After a few false starts, she found it, perfectly preserved in Vault 7B. With a binder’s expertise, she went over it, but nothing was out of the ordinary. He’d been killed by a gunshot, clean through the head, at an angle, velocity, and spin rate that suggested a ricochet. She scowled and slid him back in.
It would have to be the articles, and it took her no more than a minute to jerry the simple padlock. Already, within a second cage, she could see the items of interest: two apples, each with one bite taken out of them. Ailet’s pulse quickened. They were perfectly black. She could feel the sweat from her palms on her crutch handles. She made haste over, cut the lock with a tiny, focused blade of fire, and tossed it aside. Already, she could sense the magics on these: dark and profound. How they hadn’t ended up in the city’s greatest vault was beyond her. There wasn’t a trace of rot and she took them, eagerly, in her gloved hands before sweeping the room for anything else of interest. The pistol was better than mundane, she supposed, though it did not particularly interest her. This, she strapped to her single leg in a thigh holster. One apple was carefully tucked into her bag. The other… she held onto for a moment longer.
She took a deep breath, allowing herself a triumphant smirk. Extraction time. She’d refrained from using higher order magics until now, as they might’ve alerted someone more formidable than a pair of regular guards. Besides, she’d always been rubbish at them anyhow. Ailet held the black apple up to her mouth mischievously, but she reached for the threads of space and time in earnest, finding them, seizing them, and…
Then, he stood before her: a monster among monsters. Though he was no taller than her, Joshe Intaba seemed to loom over the girl with a power and presence she could not dream of matching. “Put your stolen goods down and you don’t die here, Tarlonese.”
In what seemed an impossible small instant, he drew to capacity and Ailet could feel her stomach turn and her vision swim. How had he found her? How had he known or arrived so quickly!? Had it all been a trap!?
Joshe Intaba regarded Ailet’yrash’andarii, mighty and merciless. Ailet, whose reflexes had always been preternaturally fast and who could now, dimly, sense the surge of adrenaline roaring through her veins, suffered an instant of insanity. She began to raise her hands but, in the moment the apple was no more than two inches from her face, she lunged forward and bit it.
Act Six Particulars
Welcome to Act Six of The Hourglass Order! The dust has begun to settle following the revolution. Is the new administration any better than the old one? While they certainly seem to think so and are asking some of us to help them prove it, many seem skeptical, and not without cause. Ultimately, however, the world doesn't keep safe and orderly of its own accord and, once more, we are called into the fray? Will you answer or have you finally had enough?
This arc will cover the rest of our sophomore year and consist of a pair of short missions, separated by an intermission period that will see Jocasta's and Yalen's wedding (finally!) take place and will also see us undertake some... social activities. In terms of the missions, characters filtered into each have been selected based on preference or, if none was given, based on storyline potential and group distribution. While some positions are pointedly flexible, others are definitely preferred. If you'd like to make any changes or are new and wish to be placed, talk to myself or a Co-GM before the missions start and tell us why. We'll try to accomodate you if at all possible, of course!
That said, from this point onward, though we'll be coordinating, the two halves of White Thresher will be handled by none other than our own @dragonpiece while Ransom Demand will be run primarily by @Suicharte and @Jumbus. Please be nice to them and communicate if you won't be able to post for whatever reason. As this arc will be largely forum-focused as opposed to discord, there will be strict deadlines in effect to keep things moving, and players are actively encouraged to post more and shorter content. While longer posts that sum up discord events and add new material have the advantage of being rewardingly literary, they do not work well for quick back-and-forths and multiple actions that involve coordination with other characters. Keep this in mind and we should all have a great time with these missions and our sixth act. Below, you'll find the apprentice groups reposted for your convenience. Happy writing!
Clunk.
Clatter.
Thump!
This was war in the Empire of Tantiac, and it looked surprisingly normal. The wagon train between Tanythen, Soisanda, and Yandreluul saw business even at the worst of times but, with the ban on unsanctioned teleportation, it was suddenly booming. The nineteen-year-old leaned back in her seat, trying to catch something like sleep, but she'd have needed to chemically douse herself in serotonin to have so much as a chance.
Clunk.
Clatter.
Thump!
And then, a new sound: "Hah. Aaahah. Aaaaah Aaaahah. Whaaaaa!"
Momentarily, she thought about turning off her ears. On some level they still rang with the words of the general: equal parts commendation and rebuke. You charmed them, Dichora, like we hoped you would. How approving he'd sounded, for once. But these Ersand'Enise yanii have very short memories when it comes to the good and very long ones when it comes to the bad. She'd not known what to say, so she'd simply nodded. You sure you didn't let them charm you back? She'd spoken against the accusation, for that was effectively what it had been, even with its somewhat informal tone. She'd requested that she be sent into the theatre with Chad and Miret. Nowhere else I'd rather send you, kid, but I craft the tactics, not the strategies.
Request denied.
And so she'd asked if she might return home for a week, as a morale exercise, but Chad had been sent in her stead, as a member of the winning team at the Trials. Her performance, in comparison, had been an embarrassment. Fuck your embarrassment. Those people were tough. Plus, she'd sworn she'd do things differently from last time: no big dark magic, no intimidating or bullying people. She, Miret, and Chad had been sent there to both charm and succeed. They'd decided that Chad would succeed, and the cousins would charm. Tyrel would always be granted her gilded cage. Chad's status depended on his personal success.
Request denied.
They had been seen too much together recently, as if they were exclusively each other's in the fashion of yanii and some consoi. It was scandalous and, like a child, she needed to be managed for her own good and the two of them temporarily separated. Chad had done his part, bedding Juulet, Seviin, and half a dozen yanii girls. He'd have made a pass at Penny too were it not for Ashon. He'd done it to be convincing, she knew, and because it was right to share oneself and one's love, even if one kept a luush'elar. And yet... Tyrel thumped her head against the side of the passenger car, groaning as a baby continued to wail over the desperate coos of its mother, two old men yammered loudly in the dialect of Osai, and a trio of children continued to chase each other around halfheartedly, with nothing better to do. Who had Tyrel given the gift of herself to, the general had asked. If she were a bit more generous, he had added, then perhaps her leave could be considered...
Request denied.
She'd been offered leave for Saliac, where her aunt, uncle, and a few cousins lived. She'd been denied teleport permission, hence the wagon train. Avatar of the Fallen Goddess she scoffed inwardly, but it was something. Most people couldn't simply request leave for nothing other than a desire to see family in the midst of a war. All around flew the banners of the Siip'suuras. Children painted them in school between making maps of Consoi lands, learning about the people and the animals there, and training in war games. Jaadas, Juuras, Tan'daxii: the words were on everyone's lips. Victory, Justice, Deliverance. They were so eager to give up their luxuries. They were so eager to drill or work extended hours. They were so united in imagination at what they might finally achieve now that the thousand-year plan had been put into action. Tyrel knew, as she watched a little boy tag a little girl on the soldier - "Caught you, Yanii-jexoff!" - that it was not so simple a picture; nothing ever was. And yet... maybe they could do it. The consoi might hate them for it for some time. Some might fight back - she'd already seen where they had - but their kings were cruel and corrupt. Their nations were failed. Addiction, pestilence, poverty, and chaos stalked their lands. What did they fight for? Why did they fight? Was it for their own stubborn pride or was it something as nebulous and ill-defined as a sense of identity.
A high-pitched shriek from the baby caused her to drape her spare shirt over her head. She tapped her boot rhythmically on the floor in annoyance. "Hyco faiyiil luun'ithan..." she hummed to herself.
"Duun juu saluuv!" came a reply, and Tyrel cracked an eye open. It was 'Yanii'jexoff' from earlier. The little girl, unbidden, had slid into the empty seat to her right and was smiling tentatively up at her. She must've been no more than five or six. "Holum duul alax." The child grinned. "You look really sleepy. I'm sleepy too."
From a seat some ways down, a bedraggled-looking woman leaned forward. "Tyrel, leave the nice lady alone!"
The 'nice lady' started at that. Tyrel wasn't a rare name, but it was not common either. She pushed off from the soft upholstery and leaned forward. "Oh, it's no worry. I can't sleep anyhow, and she's being sweet."
The woman replied with a nod and a grateful look, twisting to shout at the boy. "Maxan! Maxan, here!" She twisted back to Tyrel - perhaps both Tyrels. "Sorry! And thank you." Her voice rose. "Tyrel!" The girl perked up and the teenager forced herself not to. "You don't bother her with silly things, okay?"
She rolled her eyes. "Okaaaayyy, mom." Then, it was just the two of them. "So, you're Tyrel, hmm?"
The girl arched an eyebrow and nodded. "What's your name?"
"Well, I'll give you a clue: it's something to do with winter."
"Telaxii?"
She shook her head.
"Well, mine's a winter name too. It means snow."
Tyrel the elder nodded. "I'll give you a second clue: when your mother called you, she called me too."
The girl's eyes widened. "Tyrel! You're Tyrel too!" Both Tyrels smiled at each other. "Well, I didn't think I'd meet another Tyrel today! I only know two: One's my grandmother and the other was in my class last year but now she's in a different class."
"I knew I'd meet another Tyrel today," the older of the two responded. "In fact, as soon as I saw you, I thought, 'that's another Tyrel, for sure.'"
The child looked skeptical. "Really?" she pressed, and Tyrel nodded. "They say we all come out when it's winter, you know."
"My mom calls me 'snow angel'," she confirmed, kicking her feet back and forth. If the bench had some nice upholstery - a necessity for what was effectively a sleeper wagon - It was still a basic thing, with empty space beneath. She kept kicking back and forth, humming a little tune and looking at her senior expectantly. "It's a way to practice music," she declared. "I use my legs to keep time." She glanced at Tyrel's lone leg. "Did you learn the same way?" she asked, and the teenager decided to mess with her a little bit by nodding. "I think everybody does."
"Oh," was all that she received in return and there was a long pause filled only with her slight disappointment. "Why do you have one leg?"
Kids. An adult would've blushed to ask such a question. A five-year-old did not. Tyrel felt a small finger poke her stump. "It's so squishy!" The girl made a face of endless amusement.
"Tyrel..."
"Yeah?"
"Did I say you could poke me?"
"Sorry." There was another pause. Then: "Sooo..."
"Well, you see there, buckaroo," the Avatar of Vyshta began, "one time, when I was just a weeeeee little nugget of a person, roundabout your age, I made me the mistake of gettin' a murderpenguin as a pet."
"You have a murderpenguin!?"
"Had, past tense, and I think you may be missing the point of this here story."
"Oh." The child shook her head. "It bited off your leg, right?"
Tyrel scowled. "Well now you've gone and ruined it."
"Sorry..."
"So anyways, I had me a great big honkin' murderpenguin, with flappy little wings and a long swingy neck and a sharp snappy beak."
"What was his name?"
"Mortimer Montgomery Masterson-Murderpenguin, Esquire."
Little Tyrel blinked.
"Monty, for short."
"Oh. My dowsingjay is named Berry."
"Well that's a nice name," Tyrel senior lied. It was boring. It was, in fact, only nice because an adorable little kid had clearly named it. "Anyhow, one day, I decided to take ol' Monty there for a swim."
"By yourself!?"
"Yeah," the teenager responded. "Why not?"
"But you said you were six?"
"Five, actually."
"But you said you were my age."
One mystery solved. "Oh. I thought you were five."
"Nuh-uh! I'm six and one quarter, actually."
"Well alrighty then. So, anyhow, I took him out for a swim -"
"You could swim?"
"Yes, Tyrel."
"Okay, Tyrel. Wow. I can't swim."
"Well, I could."
"I can run fast." She looked over at the older girl's missing leg smugly.
"Good for you. Have a cookie."
"Do you really have cookies or is that just some grownup thing to say?"
"Some grownup thing to say." She smiled tightly. "So, I was taking Monty out for a swim and -"
"My mom never lets me go out on my own."
"That's because you don't have a murderpenguin."
"Neither do you... anymore."
Child, I swear to Shiin, screw the story. I am going to destroy you with facts and logic. She went with something a touch more conciliatory, however. "Am I going to tell the story or are you gonna try to guess it?"
"What was it about, again?"
It was at that moment that Tyrel the elder knew she was beaten. "Oh, it was just about how badly I wanted murderpenguin eggs."
"Are they really yummy?" The child bounced up and down on her seat.
"I wouldn't know. I never got to eat them."
The girl's eyes widened. "Why?"
"Well, you see, I was an expert fisherman back then and -"
"Why not fishergirl?" Little Tyrel blinked in earnest curiosity. "Why's it always 'man' for everything?"
That was... actually not a bad point, the older Tyrel allowed. "Because, otherwise, men won't feel special and important, so we let them have it."
"That's dumb. How about girls?"
"Well, we're a bit tougher than them.'
The child nodded dubiously.
"So anyhow, I went swimmin' with that there murderpenguin Mortimer."
"Monty."
"Both names are okay."
"But you said Monty before."
"Whose penguin was he?"
Little Tyrel rolled her eyes.
"So, there's nothing that murderpenguins like better than tasselfish and I decided to catch me one o' them big suckers!"
"To feed Monty?"
Tyrel nodded. "Exactly! So I took out my bait and dangled it in the water. Can you guess what that bait was?"
"Miss? Are you the Avatar of Vyshta?"
With that, the last of Tyrel's confidence was shattered, though she wasn't quite certain if it was confidence in herself or in children. She sighed. "Nope," she lied, aware of her duty to not be noticed. "Just some random girl with one leg."
"Oh," the child replied. "Are you sure?"
Tyrel arched an eyebrow. "I think I know who I am." Immediately, profound questions leapt to mind. Immediately, she brushed past them.
"Oh, it's just 'cause I'm named after her and she's my hero."
Tyrel swallowed. Shit. "Tyrel, lean in close for a second." The girl did so and she whispered something in her ear. Their eyes met, the smaller one's wide. "You can't tell anyone, okay?"
It was a cold somnes, snow already coating the ground. Behind Tyrel, the wagon was receding into the distance, its flickering lamps becoming faint. Three other figures - anonymous people - had separated almost immediately, hurrying home in the cold and the dark, arms wrapped around themselves. The teenager's breath came out in wispy white puffs and her footsteps crunched in the fresh white snow. She twisted on the spot, eyes roving about her surroundings: the distant line of leafless trees, the glowing partial orbs of the moons, and the line of footprints she had left to connect her to the wagonway station. She knew the way back by heart. Likely, she could navigate it blindfolded. In the distance, perched amid the giant branches of Aldreth, Daxodreth, and Luudreth lay Saliac. There, lay her old home and Miret's. There, people knew her. There, she could simply be Tyrel.
She had one leg.
Chad sat at his desk as Alta Sansuul went on. "Why don't you introduce yourself to the class, dear?"
He watched her walk. He wasn't the only one. The class always erupted in speculation whenever there was to be a new student. Alta Sansuul usually heard a few days ahead of time and let slip the juicy secret to whoever had scored the highest on the weekly exam. This time, nobody had known. This time, the usual crescendo of murmurs and excited whispers was notably absent. Every student could hear every awkward click-thump, click-thump of the new girl's one legged steps as she made her way towards the teacher's desk. Her eyes flicked nervously their way for a moment and Chad thought he caught them before they escaped to the safety of the floor. He saw her throat tighten as she swallowed and, suddenly, it was as if he was in her shoes - shoe - and absorbing every bit of the mind-racing terror she must've been in. Still, he watched. Eyes continued to dart among the students.
It wasn't as if he hadn't seen a one-legged person before. Everyone had. There were statues of the fallen goddess Vyshta. Then, there were the discards who came back from the frontiers from time to time: ones who'd survived some sort of animal attack, writhing tree, or other unknown horror. There was lots that hadn't been discovered yet deep in the Writhing Wood. Chad watched the new girl come to a stop. She wasn't just missing a foot or anything either: it was her entire leg. He paused, trying to recall right and left. My left, he remembered, her right. There was only a tiny bit of it left and he watched it just kind of dangle there as she stood, jiggling slightly when she turned on the spot. He found himself burning with curiosity and he could not have been alone. He'd never actually known anyone with such a gnarly injury. What had happened? What was the story? He remembered not to stare. His father had told him not to.
The silence hung ripe and heavy and Alta Sansuul's eyes momentarily joined those of her students in glancing the one-legged girl's way expectantly. She opened her mouth as if to speak but, then, all at once, the new arrival took a deep breath and: "I'm Tyrel and I just got here last night from all the way out in Saliac and I'm tireder than you could imagine... but I'm happy to be here." She flashed a nervous smile, as if having to remind herself to do so. Her eyes flicked up and searched the class and Chad tried to give her a reassuring look. At least she sounded just like any other girl, really. Why would she not have?
"Well, we'll get you caught up soon enough," promised the teacher. "And perhaps be a tiny bit lenient if we see any yawns or daydreaming in class."
Tyrel's big green eyes darted to Alta Sansuul's. "Thank you Alta," she replied, and her voice was kind of nice, "But I promise you won't need to." Now, there were a couple of whispers - a couple of murmurs. The new girl had given them something else to chew on besides a missing leg. The teacher looked at her questioningly and there was a hind of something in the girl's eyes that reminded him of his brother Darien when he was about to - "I always try to put my best foot forward."
There was a collective intake of breath. Eyes widened among the smarter kids and the teacher clammed up. A couple burst out in nervous giggles and snickers. "And I always succeed, too," concluded Tyrel with a straight face. In an instant, Chad reevaluated her entirely. He grinned. The girl smiled back. Was it at him, specifically?
Alta Sansuul smiled as well, in that way that adults did when they were reacting to something unexpected from kids. "Oh? she remarked, "Then I shall expect much from you Tyrel'dichora."
The girl bit her lower lip as if stifling a grin. Then she smiled up at the teacher. "I'll do my best, Alta Sansuul," she promised, "But I'm not like... some goody two-shoes," She replied, and now even the dullest among her audience could not doubt what she was doing it on purpose. The teacher let out a snort of amusement. "Well, it seems that year three has yet another original."
Tyrel shifted on the spot, resting the little stump of her leg on one of her crutch handles. That seemed to bring everyone back to what they'd noticed first about her, before she'd been funny. "Well, instead of me asking you to keep talking about yourself," the teacher offered, "We're going to let the class ask."
Tyrel nodded.
"Ladies and gentlemen," she called out in her singsong voice, "What kind of questions are we going to ask?"
Chad knew the answer to this. It was an easy way to win points with Alta Sansuul, so his hand shot up along with a half dozen others'. As usual, one of the girls with ribbons in her hair was picked. "Relevant, Respectful, and Reasonable," she chirped and the teacher nodded. "Exactly, class!" She clapped her hands together before turning to Tyrel, speaking in a low voice. "If there's anything you're uncomfortable answering, you don't have to," she promised.
"Okay," the girl replied sheepishly, and the chorus of whispers only grew. From behind Chad, Ashon tapped him on the shoulder. "I dare you to ask it," he whispered, eyes gleaming with mischief and a hint of malevolence as Chad twisted to face him. A couple of others were looking his way as well.
"Uh huh?" came Tyrel's voice suddenly, and Chad turned back around. She was pointing at Emiin. "What is your favourite colour?" she asked, and Tyrel furrowed her brow. After a moment she shrugged. "Magenta," she declared, "And then maybe light green."
"I like magenta too," Emiin lied, or maybe it wasn't a lie. Chad didn't know her favourite colour and it probably changed every weak, realistically.
Three more hands shot up. "Do you have Titan sloths in Saliac?" came Samon's question.
Tyrel nodded vigorously. "We do, and they're huge!"
"Have you seen one?"
The girl seemed a bit lost for response for a moment and Velani whispered from the desk beside Samon. "Of course she has if she just said they're huge, dumbass."
Samon shrunk two sizes and something flashed in Tyrel's eyes. "Actually, I didn't just see one," she replied, "I got to ride on one once."
People shifted in their seats and conversation rose. Either Tyrel was one of those kids who told a lot of ridiculous stories or she'd had a really interesting life. Of course, the most interesting question hadn't been asked yet, as if everyone was just waiting for someone else to ask it.
"What other animals did you see there? Oh, are there writhing trees?"
Tyrel nodded and, all at once, she lifted her stump off of her crutch handle so she could grab it. She took a small step. "There are, and we need to hack them back every day. Saliac's not quite on the frontier, but it's close. A lot of mundanes come through it on their way there."
It was like they were sharks, ever more certainly circling in towards the question they wanted to ask, trying to make it seem natural so it wasn't rude, as if by collective agreement. Chad raised his hand and was chosen immediately. "Have you ever been to the Writhing Wood?" he asked daringly, and people leaned forward on their elbows or lifted their butts off of their seats.
With a small, close-lipped smile, Tyrel nodded. "A couple times. It was..." She trailed off. "scary but amazing."
Chad was going to ask a follow-up, but Thandar was practically falling out of his seat in eagerness to ask the next question and Tyrel picked him with a nervous but good-natured smile. "Did any of them try to eat you?" People bounced up and down nervously. Alta Sansuul's eyes scanned the room warningly, but Tyrel shook her head. "Not really. Sometimes, their branches move a bit in your direction but, as long as you keep moving, you're fine."
"Well, since we're going to be learning about the different regions of Tarlon starting tomorrow," the teacher interjected, "It'll be very nice to have someone who's lived in such a different one." She smiled. "Maybe Tyrel will really have a chance to put her best foot forward and help us with some of our wonderings."
There were a dozen hands up now. "You ever see any really dangerous animals?" asked Sandii, kneeling on her seat until a venomous look from the teacher forced her to sit properly. Tyrel nodded. "Yeah, but mostly just in the distance."
Jasco was next. "How 'bout when you saw 'em not in the distance? Were you scared? Did you fight them?"
Tyrel arched an eyebrow, taking one of her weird steps back. "Of course I was scared. I was with my dad and brother." She shrugged. "I ran away."
A few pairs of eyes went to her leg, or lack thereof, once more. How do you run? They were all thinking it, but none asked.
"What's your brother's name?" came a reprieve from Lyla.
"Calidan!"
"That's my brother's name!"
"How old is he?"
"Fourteen," Tyrel replied, eyes roving about the sea of hands and faces.
"Did he outrun you?" Thandar's question was particularly brazen, and a few people shot him annoyed looks. "Um." Tyrel's eyes flicked the teacher's way, but she didn't ask for help. That was the worst thing she could do and she seemed to know it. "I mean, he's a lot older than me, so what do you think?"
Velani made the 'poop' sign at Thandar and rolled her eyes. A few people laughed and he opened his mouth to protest. "You know what I was trying to ask!" he retorted. "I just wanted to -"
Alta Sansuul clapped and, out of reflex, Chad clapped back with the others. "Thandar, quiet time one!" she singsonged. There were two more claps. "Velani, quiet time two!" Clap clap. "Class! Three 'R's!"
As one, they recited, even Tyrel, Chad noted, tentatively.
"Exactly, everyone!" She cleared her throat as Thandar and Velani glared daggers at each other for as long as they could until retreating into their opposite-corner wall-facing exiles. "Now, do we have any more questions that follow our three 'R's or are we finished, class?" Chad wanted to die. There were so many dumb people. He raised his hand and Tyrel, scanning the crowd, chose him again. Emiin let out a frustrated huff. "So, if it's okay with you, I'm just gonna ask the thing I think everyone wants to." He wasn't trying to be rude, but he was pretty sure it was rude anyway. He plowed forward regardless, despite Alta Sansuul's warning look. "So, um..." He was starting to clam up. He never clammed up. Why did he suddenly care so much about this random girl? She'd probably be like all the other girls in the class once the novelty wore off and they'd only ever talk to each other when they were paired up for stuff. "What happened to your leg?"
Gasps and murmurs. Chad had done it again, of course: the thing everyone else had wanted to do, and at just the right moment. Ironically, he hadn't really been meaning to. He'd just honestly started feeling bad for Tyrel, having to put up with so many dumb questions. Maybe you're not so bad, for a girl, like Velani. Maybe we can kind of be friends.
"Oh," replied Tyrel after a moment, and everyone went dead silent. "It was anklechewers," she admitted, "I think you call them kneebiters here?" She looked at Alta Sansuul and the teacher nodded, along with a few other people. "I was five and I got lost in the forest and bitten. I wasn't supposed to be there and I didn't want my parents to know so I didn't tell them."
"Well that's stupid," Chad could hear Samon whisper to Ashon, and he made a note to punch the former at recess. Tyrel's eyes flicked his way, too, as if she might've heard, and he pretended to be looking elsewhere.
"It was pretty dumb," she addressed him indirectly, "but I was five and five-year-olds are dumb. Anyway, the eggs spread and they had to cut my leg off or I probably would've died." She shrugged again, only a little bit uncomfortable. "Honestly, I'm used to it and, most of the time, it isn't that bad." She sniffed and glanced about, eyes finding the teacher momentarily before returning to her peers. "Honestly, I know I'm kind of a rare thing, so if you wanna know anything, you can just ask. It doesn't bug me."
Alta Sansuul nodded approvingly at Tyrel and, momentarily, at Chad as well. He would get a checkmark today. He could feel it. For a moment, whispering and murmured conversation held the class, but then there were more hands. "You said you ran. How do you run?" There were plenty of nods and more murmurs.
"I can show you at recess," Tyrel replied eagerly. "There's two ways: the like... jogging run and the hundred percent run for your life run." She shook her head. "They're totally different."
"And, speaking of recess," the teacher interjected, "We need to get started on today's arithmetic before we run out of time." She turned to the new girl. "Tyrel?"
"Yes, Alta?"
"Thank you very much for your informative and amusing answers."
"You're very welcome, Alta Sansuul."
"Boys and girls!" the teacher singsonged, and they all perked up. "Let's all give our new student a big round of applause and make her feel very welcome today."
Chad clapped along with the others. Ashon's claps were obnoxiously loud, as usual, as if he thought it was some sort of competition.
"The empty desk near the door is yours," Alta Sansuul was telling Tyrel. "You'll find a slate inside."
Tyrel bowed her head. "Thank you," she replied in a small, sweet voice, making her way over. A few people watched, but the novelty was already beginning to wear off now that their burning question had been answered. She took her seat, pulled out her slate, and that seemed to be the cue for everyone else to do so. Velani and Thandar were called back belatedly to join in and class routine returned to its norm: waiting for the clock to tick its way to 1:00 HO so that recess could begin.
Chad had earned some goodwill, and so he was chosen for a few questions. Duly, he calculated his equations, erased with his rag and not his sleeve, and flipped his board when asked to. Alta Sansuul tried to call upon everyone at least once and, when Tyrel stood to give her answer, people took a bit more interest, just to see if she was smart. Chad found himself a bit disappointed not in her response, but in the fact that she was so far from him. He felt like he'd made kind of a friend, and he didn't want to have to wait until recess when the other girls would inevitably steal her away and she'd be busy demonstrating how she ran - not that he wasn't curious himself.
The minutes faded one into the other, and so did the equations. Times tables were easy. That was when he felt a gentle tap on his side: it was a note, passed surreptitiously by Sandii, and he took it with the smallest nod. He opened it and quickly closed it up, warmth rising in his cheeks. His eyes shot Tyrel's way and hers flicked over to meet them. Did she give a hint of a smile or did she follow the unspoken code that one did not acknowledge sending such letters. He wasn't sure. He opened it again. Then, feeling guilty, he folded it gently, tucked it deep into his desk, and decided to keep it.
The people of the village of Porto dell'Alba - at least those who were not currently at sea - looked out of their homes one warm dordian morning to witness something unexpected: there was a girl, running down the single dirt road that passed through one end of their tiny settlement and out the other. A couple made comments and went back to their routines, for people are nothing if not beholden to their norms.
Had they looked closer, they might've noticed that she was not human, like every single one of them, but eeaiko. Her long dark hair, half-gathered in a ponytail, bounced and flicked behind her as she ran in that slightly awkward way that her people did. Perhaps, they might've wondered why she was in such a hurry and where she might've been going but, if they did, they said nothing and merely remarked on the queerness of it.
Kaureerah wasn't sure why she had decided to run today. She brought with her no lute. She left no message for her friends. The bare earth fell away from her feet in the language of footsteps. The clean, crisp air filled her lungs. The sun warmed her skin and sweat beaded on her forehead She ran past the little fishing village until she came to a low promontory that she had been to a handful of times before. There, she stopped, chest heaving, hair pasted in wet bands to the sides of her face and back of her neck. There she stopped: one small woman away from the sight of all but the gods. In the grassy field around her, butterflies flickered from flower to flower, fragile and beautiful amid the shifting sea of green. In the vast sky above, puffy white clouds drifted languidly in the breeze, impossibly huge and yet gentle amid the serene blue. In the churning sea at her feet, waves rose and crashed upon the rocks, cool and refreshing and welcoming her into their cerulean world.
The people of Porto dell'Alba did not see the girl dive into the water. She swam and darted and caught the fish with her bare hands as she had done in her distant home: a place that she hated, a place that she missed. Soon, she would return to her new home, and she reflected that it was so very different from the original but, in some ways, just the same. She didn't have to go back yet.
Jocasta looked out of sorts. Rikard could sense it and it wasn't because he spent an awful lot of time looking at her. Presently, he averted his eyes and focused on his work. They were just so big and perfectly shaped and her pretty voice and smile and tiny little waist... His cheeks flushed with shame. It wasn't all about how she looked. She was smart, and didn't talk to people condescendingly. She always had some witty commentary or way to make class interesting. She was strong, too: really strong, and she knew her stuff. You're good people, Zeno Re, he told himself, Not just a pretty face. Presently, she reached up to scrawl something in chalk on the board - a basic equation for time pressure that he already knew - and her dress stretched extra tight around her chest. His eyes couldn't help it, but he reminded himself that he respected her. That she was a cool person and a good thaumaturge. If he just wanted to steal glances like a pervert, there was Trypano, and Esmii, and kind of Marci. Well, the first two, anyhow. The third was... more of a friend, though she'd sort of just disappeared lately.
Still, he stuck by his initial observation and it distracted him, even as Jocasta rolled between rows of desks with a smile and an encouraging voice that only slipped into ironic tones when she was dealing with some of the dumber students. She hadn't cracked a single joke. There was no 'bounce' to her 'step'. He'd noticed a habit that she had when she was happy or excited: every third push of her wheels, she'd push herself up a little as well. "Daydreaming again, Rikster." Suddenly, she wasn't where he'd perceived her to be; she was right beside him, leaning over and resting her chin on a hand and her elbow on his desk. "Benny for your thoughts?"
Flummoxed, he straightened in his seat until they were nearly at eye level. "No, Zeno Re."
"Is that a no to the daydreaming or can I not pay you to disgorge your innermost secrets?"
He'd been put on the spot. He was being made a fool of! Sometimes, he hated her for this! "The daydreaming, ma'am. I was just running some numbers in my head."
She smiled knowingly. "Well, then I'm sorry to interrupt." She lowered her voice. "Listen, it's okay if you're a little out of it. It's our first week back. I think a lot of us are."
Rikard nodded dumbly. "A bit," he admitted. Then, he, too, lowered his voice. "Are...you okay, Tan-Zeno?"
Jocasta paused and blinked, seemingly taken by surprise. "Not exactly, Rikard, but we manage, don't we?"
He swallowed and nodded and she rolled on to the next desk. "Pop challenge!" she called out suddenly, in her chipper Jocasta voice. "Books closed, wands ready!"
That night, he dreamt that he was in class, and that Jocasta was there, but she was the only one he recognized and, for some reason, his mind was telling him that she was... Emma? Enna? Something like that. It was weird. He didn't know anyone by that name, but he felt, fleetingly, like he did. She wasn't a teacher, either, but a fellow student, like him. They were seated together near the front, on account of his eagerness to learn and her wheelchair. After class, they went to the great hall for dinner instead of back to their dorms, and there was a yasoi girl who looked a bit like Miret, and a boy who looked like Benedetto, and another who he didn't recognize, though something about him reminded Rikard slightly of... Juulet? He knew them, as well, or had the sense that he did. Who could really say what dreams were about?
He awoke to find himself standing outside of a random dorm that he did not recognize. He was standing there, in his nightgown. A stray cat was looking up at him strangely. He cast about, but there was nobody else. Surreptitiously, the youth pinched himself, but he was most certainly awake now. Disturbed and exhausted, Rikard gathered his magic and returned to his own bed as quickly as he could.
R E D S K I E S
It was the third night of the standoff and Joshe Intaba - at least the statue of him - looked as hideous as ever. Biros, junior faculty, and regular citizens had gathered round, holding torches and placards, waving banners, and chanting for the return of Penny Pellerin, the resignation of Arch-Zeno Tojarra, and the reinstatement of Eloise, Yvette, and Jean-Marc. As of the past few hours, however, they had taken on a new and dangerous bent. There was talk of storming the Enclave. There was talk of a coup.
Now, as the final rays of sun began to fade from the sky and Eshiran looked towards Dami, the city's hundreds of bells sounded. Was it simply the passing of an hour or a call to arms? The swollen mob, feeding off of its own energy, had tried, more than once, to march towards the Violet Enclave, where the true seat of the academy's power lay. An army of mercenaries, City Guards, and constructed golems faced them, interspersed with Zenos, Tan-Zenos, Centuries, and even a few Lamplighters.
These blocked every path they could find between the angry mass and their employers but, every once in a while, someone got through, slipping off into the dusky depths of the Arboretum. Every once in a while, one appeared outside of the Enclave. They began to gather. The defenders began to split their forces. The enormous city gates closed for the first time in years, sealing off all contact with the outside world on this night - this destined night - of Lepdes, the thirteenth of Velles, DZ55. It was in Dami's hands, or perhaps even Reshta's now.
G R E Y S K I E S
What happened on the night of Lepdes, the 13th of Velles? That there had been some sort of fight - some sort of violence - was a fact to all who lived within the walls of Ersand'Enise. Those who lived without had seen, clearly, the fires lighting up the darkness into the wee hours of the morning. They had seen the great beacon at the top of the Forked Tower flicker and disappear. People were left without sisters, brothers, sons, daughters, and others who had not upped and died for no reason. It was generally accepted that there had been a revolution and that the revolution had not been broadcast. The white walls held firm.
Yet, the vast majority of students had played only a lesser role in the fighting. They may have cut down a handful of mercenaries. They may have found themselves rushing and shouting through the hallowed halls of the Violet Enclave with torches in hand and anger in their hearts, but they had not done much more. There were mysteries at the heart of everything that they would never receive answers to: what had happened to Claresse Upta, the undoubtedly corrupt and biased but genuinely peace-loving Zenith? Why would she have called mercenaries against them? What had taken place in the Forked Tower - Ersand'Enise's centre of power? Some swore they'd seen demons swarming out of it. Others had awoken in infirmaries after trying to infiltrate the double-towered prison known as the Nashorn. Clearly, it was no normal prison, but a place of infamy. Finally, what of Alassa Tojarra, who had precipitated this entire conflict? None knew her whereabouts, and it was the topic of endless speculation.
It was mostly the rebelling Zenos, Tan-Zenos, and a particular group of about thirty students who'd been involved in clandestine work for these in the past who seemed to know more about these mysteries. Yet, perhaps some did not wish to remember and, as the magic of master internal chemists was used upon much of the city to... soften their memories of the uprising, these thirty were given a choice: keep their knowledge of the horrors they had encountered or return to blissful semi-ignorance.
B L U E S K I E S
That, indeed, seemed to be the operative word for much of the city. The swathes of the Arboretum that had lain in ashes for the first twenty hours following the violence were restored with speed and a degree of imperfection. They were not trying to hide, in its entirety, that something consequential had happened. They were merely trying to return matters to a semblance of normalcy. The towers and rooftops and warehouses were restored in short order. Pardons were issued to all but the most egregious of offenders, and the wards of the Violet Enclave returned, and stronger than before. The port was first to reopen, and then the gates - but not to the refugees of Tanso, Parmoy, and Yarsoc. Businesses were back at full capacity or something like it within a week, as classes were placed temporarily on hold. The scouts of the Perrench Legion, who had made camp outside, turned back once they were satisfied that the Princess Royal was safe. In retrospect, the events leading up to her arrest had been such a comedy of errors that it ought to have raised questions.
Classes remained suspended for a further week as the faculty voted upon, implemented, and announced a sweeping series of changes. Claresse Upta had been stripped of her office, position, and pension. Declared Anto, she had been sent back to Joru in disgrace. The same had gone for Riu Kai-Tan. Giacomo Giarrone had announced his retirement, scheduled for the end of the year, to give him time to wrap up his duties and move to an emeritus position. Joshe Intaba had been promoted into the role of Zenith over his own misgivings. The position of Paradigm was made formal, and not merely the purview of retired Zeniths as it had been before Hugo Hunghorasz had made something of the office. Karim Harrarchora remained ensconced there, but there were greater changes as well. While Arderedelle Latvar had fallen on the right side of history and retained her position as Arch-Zeno, she was now joined by a pair of newly-promoted High Zenos in the form of Sigmund Bastañer and João Fabio. Tarthas'talix'tuura and Sienna Afraval had been promoted straight from the rank of Zeno, which was highly irregular, and the disbarred Vaughn Marbrand had been reinstated not as a Zeno, but as an Arch-Zeno. Finally, the council had been expanded, with its two new positions going to recently-promoted High Zenos Olivier Masson and Giancarlo Silvestri. Much was done to balance matters between those two great political alliances of the outside world: Sovereign Pact and Central Alliance. Much was done to placate the latter that this was not simply a coup of the former. Much was done to assure the former that their position would, indeed, improve.
Yet, there was still more. Numerous Tan-Zenos found themselves preemptively promoted to full communion and pressed into teaching duties, a fact that a handful grumbled about. Administration decided to fill the gaps left in the same way that it had with one of these - Jocasta Re - by holding a series of interviews for 'Advanced Placement', allowing students seventeen years of age or older who demonstrated levels of maturity, magical understanding, and ability that significantly outstripped their peers' to test and interview for Tan-Zeno positions. Thus, it was, as the conflict that had torn the academy and city apart slipped from immediacy to recency, as dorrad sweltered, refugees gathered at the gates, and trade once again bustled, the tryouts were held and classes resumed. There seemed, once more, to be something to look forward to.
A R C F I V E : F I N
UN R A V E L I N G
ONE
It was late at night, or perhaps early on the morning of Velles the Eleventh, when Isabella was awoken by a persistent pinching of her earlobe. "I'm up, I'm up!" she croaked, sitting up in bed. "Fuckin' 'ell." All around her, on stands and manikins, from lines where they hung and basins where they'd been dyed, lay the fruits of her labour. The pinching returned and it was Jocasta. <What. Want.> she pinched back, after a taking a moment to find her old refuge friend some ways away.
<Marci.> came the reply. <Hurt. Bad.>
Isabella was up within moments, dressing and swinging herself out of bed and into her wheelchair.
They'd all been called: Isabella, Luisa, Felix, and Yalen. They'd only missed Abdel. He'd slept through the barrage of pinches as was his custom. Five tethered gathered in a nondescript townhome within the faculty quarter, one with wide doors and hallways, low countertops, and a pulley lift to the second floor. Their sixth lay on the dining room table, made marginally comfortable by the inclusion of some hastily-arranged blankets and a pillow beneath her head. Though the outwardly-evident wounds had been healed, the damage was grave and irreparable.
"She'll be rabid," Jocasta was saying, in response to a question from Felix. "Blind, mad, aggressive." People hugged themselves and eyes darted around, seeking uncertain assurances that could not be given. Yalen, the only one standing, leaned against the kitchen counter, arms crossed, and avoided looking at Marceline. He'd lit the lamps and candles. They did just enough.
"But she's..." Luisa reached an arm around Felix and hugged him from the side, their wheels butting up against each other's. "Well... on zero, right?"
Isabella nodded, having arrived and been filled in second of all to Yalen. "And she's the copy, right?" she added.
Jocasta nodded slowly. "She is," the senior tethered confirmed, "as long as they didn't get mixed up. I've seen it happen." She smiled faintly. "With some hilarious results." The smile faded almost immediately, however, for all knew that there was no levity to be had here.
"Well, can she be cured?" Felix prodded. "Of the aberration effects, of course." All tethered knew that, once you were fully on two - once the tethering reached your spinal column, there was no going back.
Yalen pushed off from the countertop and uncrossed his arms. "I have the gift I received from an aberration last year," he offered. "It can reverse some of the effect."
"And then a Grey Ab," exclaimed Luisa with some relief. "Two birds, one stone!"
The others exchanged serious eyes. "I know this may sound heartless," Felix offered, "But this is just the twenty-five hour copy, right?" He voiced what all - or at least most of them had been thinking but afraid to say.
Jocasta pursed her lips, nervous hands occupying themselves by taking a moment to fix the folds on Marci's tattered dress. "Yeah," she replied, "It should be."
"So we just... put her out of her misery?" Isabella concluded, not liking the sound of it even as it left her lips. Her eyes darted about guiltily, at her fellow tethered and at their dancing shadows on the walls, dim and distant.
Felix shrugged. Yalen pursed his lips. "Whatever we do," he decided, "We can't let her wake up like that, no matter what. The way I understand copies is that the memories go back to the original."
"I can keep her under for a day," Jocasta offered, "until she disappears." She left out the unspoken 'or not'. She shrugged. "Real Marci will receive no memories from after her copy here went unconscious." She drew back from the countertop and regarded the others in turn. "That sound reasonable?"
There were murmurs of consent and a few explicit affirmatives. Hugs were exchanged. Eyes lingered on their fallen sister. If she was not the true Marceline, she was a part of her and it was all too real, eerie, and uncanny. "Love you Marce," said Isabella, squeezing the girl's unmoving hand before rolling away. "You silly little thing," fretted Luisa, pushing herself up on her arms to plant a kiss on the girl's forehead. Felix ruffled her hair with glum fondness. Then, one by one, they rolled out of the door, Isabella lingering last. "If you need anything," she assured Jocasta and Yalen, eyes darting once again to Marci's prone form, "I'm just an annoying pinch in the night away." She offered a brave smile and a nod before backing away and closing the door behind herself.
The husband and wife to be were left alone in the dining room of their home, and the latter heaved a tired, worried sigh. She closed her eyes and rubbed at the bridge of her nose. "Yalen," she began, opening them, "I know there's no reason, but do you think you could try to cure her anyway?" Just in case, her mind but not her mouth added. "I can't look at her like that and..." She shrugged. "It'll be good practice, right?"
T W O
Jocasta did, of course, call upon Isabella again, and Luisa, Felix, and Yalen. If the otherwise-incurable part of the madness was gone thanks to the last of them, not-Marceline was still utterly mad, blind, and paralyzed from the neck down, and would remain so until she disappeared.
Each took a shift watching over the girl, trading spare periods or playing hooky when absolutely necessary. They remained diligent: careful to keep her under so that her true self might not experience the horrors that would inevitably follow were she to wake.
So it was that the day passed. Marceline, as yet unaffected by the horrors wrought upon her doppelganger by her risky decisions, went about her business with Zarina, moving from tenseness to triumph. Meanwhile, the version of herself that had paid for her sins remained, lying still and silent on Jocasta's spare bed, chest rising and falling shallowly as she yet drew breath.
First, it was Yalen. Then, it was Felix, followed by Luisa. Isabella missed an afternoon period and then Jocasta maintained Marceline from afar. The afternoon drew on and the hour drew near.
The sun began to ripen in the sky, hanging like a fruit ready to drop, and Jocasta had long since returned home. At first, she looked in from time to time as she busied herself with her daily chores and marking papers, but then she began to linger. Worry sat, hard and high, atop her stomach, pulling at its strings and tightening them. She came often into the room, rolling quietly across the floor, tugging at the sheets, glancing out the window at the setting sun. Finally, it rested atop the jagged skyline of the city and began to dip below, fat and orange-pink. It could happen at any moment, she knew. She prepared herself for Marci to disappear. As the last of the sun slipped from view, she prepared the sigh of relief and waited for it to come.
It didn't.
T H R E E
How, Marci!? Jocasta couldn't get the thought out of her head. How could you fuck it up!? The girl was usually smart. She'd started a business with Zarina that had become an Ersand'Enise staple and was poised to explode across the twin continents. She'd outsmarted everyone in the Melon Derby and Thin Air, and come a hair from beating Juulet in Mano e Mano. How the hell could someone like you make such a stupid mistake!?
At some point, Jocasta slipped into acceptance. She was numb for a couple of minutes, the anxiety that had churned her insides gone. On some level she'd known. That undefinable impulse that some might call 'gut instinct' had warned her. He cleansed you, at least, she thought at the girl, but it was so much worse. It was unfathomably worse.
The sun had disappeared completely and she realized that she could wait no longer. While the Zenith had called a citywide curfew in response to the recent unrest, Jocasta was exempt from it as a Tan-Zeno. If she looked more like a student, then she was distinctive: the only blonde tethered woman in the entire city. She was allowed, so far as she'd bothered to read her intake materials during hundri, to escort two people, and... well, those had to be Marceline and Yalen. They had to get to the Groove. They had to get a white or grey ab. She didn't allow herself to think past that point.
Pushing herself into action, Jocasta turned on the spot and dodged the new wheelchair Yalen had gotten her from the Trials. She rolled out of the room and down the hallway. "My love," she called with some urgency, knocking on his door. He was soon to begin his evening prayers, she knew. She was about to knock again when she heard footsteps. A moment later, she was gazing up at Yalen, freshly bathed, his blonde hair still damp and smoothed back. By Ipté are you gorgeous!
"You radiate worry," he observed, stepping through the doorway. "Is it...?" He trailed off, and she nodded. "Marci." She wasn't sure whether to hug herself or have her hands on her wheels. Yalen solved the problem by reaching down and pulling her into an embrace. "We need to get her an aberration," he said, releasing Jocasta. He left the rest unsaid. "Jo, do you think you can teleport us?" he asked tenderly, and she swallowed in response, arms instinctively wrapping themselves around her small form. "I..." She stopped her automatic answer and considered. "I can teleport you two, straight into the backroom of the Swirl." She shook her head. "I'll follow as quickly as I can, but those... things will attack if I try to go. Can you handle her until I get there?"
Yalen scowled thoughtfully. "I... think so," he responded, "But this is aberration madness. You've got about a day from the time it sets in to clear what you can." Left unspoken were the other effects. Left unspoken was that nearly a day had passed.
Isabella was at her loom, putting the finishing touches on a project, when she felt a pinch on her earlobe. With the skill of a master, she managed to avoid ruining the pattern she'd been working on. <Marci. Here. Still.> She put down what she'd been doing and sat there for a moment as it dawned on her. Her heart sank. <Real. Marci.> she questioned. <Real.Marci.> came the response.
The Enthishwoman's hands fell to her wheels, trembling. <Need. What.> she asked. <Need. You. Portal. Now.> She looked up to find it waiting for her.
F O U R
The Vermilion Swirl was a place of pleasure. Certainly, there was the odd miserable old git who cared naught for anything but blunting his own unhappiness. By and large, however, it had established the sort of culture that made it an oasis. This was a place of privilege as much as refuge and, as a result, it was rare to see the worried, the ill, and the desperate here.
Then there were the three tethered: the Enthish clothing designer, the former priest, and the third. She was young and unmoving, laid on a table in the backroom that all knew led to The Groove. "It'll be enough," the first was saying. "I took one half this size with Luisa and Felix and it pushed each of our symptoms back as far as they'd go." Absently, she indicated a line just above her hips.
Yalen considered. He closed his eyes for focus and scanned Marceline's prone form. He could feel the nerves in her arms, shoulders, and chest firing again. He followed them down into her midsection and all the way to that invisible line just before they branched out into her legs. He scowled. "It's the aberration side of things that worries me." He shook his head. "A normal mage is a menace if they go mad, but a tethered?"
Isabella shrugged uncomfortably. "She could wreak havoc all over the city and it'd take hours to find the source."
It was at about that moment that Jocasta rolled breathlessly into the room. She took a moment to compose herself, chest heaving, and shook her arms out before fixing her hair. "So it's done? she asked. "She's taken it?" Her eyes, still adjusting to the darkness, searched her peers' faces before flicking Marci's way.
Yalen nodded. "You didn't have to run. It was pretty straightforward."
Jocasta took a few pushes, rolling right up to the unconscious younger girl. She brushed some hair from Marci's eyes. "How far did we get?" Is she...?"
Isabella nodded. Yalen shook his head. "As far as we thought," the former replied. "As far as us."
Jocasta closed her eyes. She took a deep, shuddering breath, held it, and released it before opening them. "Godsdammit, Marci: you brave, stupid little person." She hadn't walked since she was thirteen, hadn't felt anything below her waist since then and, in a lot of ways, living with effectively half a body was... her normal. Gods, she knew it was hard, though, and she shuddered to think of how impossible it would be without the Gift. "You're gonna do it, Marce." She ran her fingers through the girl's hair. "It's gonna be hard and I know you thought it was a bullet you'd dodged - Gods, I wish you had - but you're going to be okay, like me and Issy." She looked over at her childhood friend and they exchanged tight, knowing smiles. "This is a bump in the road, I promise, and there are good things waiting on the other side of it."
She could feel the tears welling up in her eyes. She tried to screw her jaw shut and will them away, but it was no use, so she ran the back of her hand across her face. She wanted to be angry. She wanted to destroy Juulet: to pound her to pieces, to make her beg pathetically for her wretched life and to coldly refuse. She wanted to, because the yasoi had hurt someone she loved, but it rang hollow. It had been Marci's choice and Marci's mistake. She had started buying into her own cleverness and invincibility and would be forever marked by it. Jocasta knew that feeling. She took a deep breath. "I want her to have privacy for a few days, to be safe from what's going on in the city." She sniffed and straightened. "That still okay?"
Isabella nodded.
U N R A V E L I N G
F I V E
The rooftops of Ersand'Enise did what they could to hold back the start, but the sun rose just the same, pale fingers of light reaching across the cityscape, into windows and bedrooms, waking those who had slept. Many had not. The city of the bells waited, its dew sparkling and swelled with destiny, like the grassy plains of a battlefield before.
Some businesses duly opened. Others remained shuttered. Some students peeled out of their nightclothes, shrugged into their dayclothes, and prepared to go to classes. Others remained shuttered. The air was drawn taut, threaded across rooftops, doors, and gardens, rigid through living rooms, a barrier in bedrooms, diving into lungs and constraining them. None who had been here for more than mere hours could breathe easy.
Yet, as a pale ivory sliver split the curtains of a large apartment just outside the city walls, one did. She had woken before, to be certain, so briefly as to not even recall it. The girl - she was too young to be called 'woman' - was in a warm haze, and had settled back to sleep without a shred of awareness.
Now, however, her eyelids fluttered. Warm and ensconced beneath her blankets, she lay there in semiconsciousness, trying to ignore the slight headache that pinched at her being and promised unwelcome lucidity. A hangover some portion of her groggy mind decided and, with the deliberateness of that thought, the veil of slumber was indelibly broken. Try as she might, Marceline could not drift away again.
She snuggled deeper into her pillow in a futile attempt, feeling something wrong but not being wakeful enough to place what it was. Groggily, she opened her eyes and noted semi-familiar surroundings. This was Isabella's spare apartment: the one above her warehouse in Fascino. She must've gone out after the party and had too much to drink, for she could remember...
An entire day out with Zarina that she could not account for. Memories from her temporary clone began to appear as well: disastrous ones that ended with -
Involuntarily, Marceline went to shift in bed, and then she felt it or, rather, didn't. It was an impossible feeling. With a start, unbidden adrenaline rushing through her, she went to kick her blankets free. She couldn't feel them. This was one of those nightmares. Her heart pounded, but she let herself be relieved. She'd had many like it: suddenly being unable to walk, her tethering suddenly having turned her into Jocasta or Isabella or... her mother! This was one of those, even though it was uncannily real and there was a tinging feeling about her waist. She tried to end the dream as she sometimes did. There was the sound of wheels in the hallway: a tethered approaching. Still, she tried to end it and everything faded mercifully to black.
They spoke in murmured worries: three tethered women around a bed where the fourth lay. "Things are getting hairy," insisted one, "real hairy."
"It's a full-on riot at this point," another declared. She twisted on the spot as the third settled a light jacket about her shoulders and bid the first do so as well. "You're... going?"
The third nodded. "It's more than a riot, too." She set hands to wheels and rolled through an archway, gently pushing the door to a room open. The others released their brakes and followed her. All three filtered slowly into the room. "Protecting those worth protecting and killing those worth killing is my job tonight," Jocasta said cryptically. "Marci is yours." She swallowed and fixed the younger girl's covers before turning about.
.
"She's already woken," Luisa offered.
"And she thinks it's a dream," Isabella responded. "I used to have them too." All three exchanged glances. All tethered had such dreams. While they had been forced to face the reality of those, they had yet hoped that Marci might not have to, that one of them might get away. "Next time, she won't," declared Jocasta with finality.
"Will she wake?"
The other two shrugged. "I don't think so," replied the blonde, "I dosed her enough for a begemot."
"But if she does..." Isabella trailed off.
"Right," Luisa concluded. "Don't let her be alone."
S I X
She was alone. She could feel it the moment that sound reached her ears and sensation her skin. She was alone in a still and quiet room and, once more, Marceline awakened to a glow upon the horizon. A grim pinkish-orange light warped and threw the silhouettes of Ersand'Enise across the surrounding countryside, as far as this second-floor apartment at the edge of Belleville.
For a moment, the girl lay there and breathed. She pulled air into her lungs and let it out: a simple thing that she had control over. From the moment that consciousness had started to reclaim her, she had opened her senses and bade her mind to feel her body. She curled and uncurled her fingers. She focused on the light touch of the covers on her bare shoulders. She'd had the most terrible dream and she worked her way down, already - in some unwelcome part of her mind - knowing what she would find. She worked her way down to wiggle her toes and...
Numbness.
Her heartrate increased as she lay there in the shrouded darkness of this room, as the distant fires of a revolution sent ominous, orange-tinted shadows to writhe and snap across the floor of her room. Her knees. Marceline tried to move them - to sense them.
Nothing.
Numbness and the sensation of pins and needles about her waist. A deep, cold, feeling congealed inside of her and she lay there for a moment. She just lay there. She lay there and thought about not thinking. Instead, her memories flooded back: two separate sets of them, as if she had been two separate people at the same time. For a moment, she imagined, she was the copy, but her heart beat faster and a frigid... something swept through her. A whole day's worth of memories. If she was the copy...
Numbness.
This was real. But it couldn't be. She was the original. She'd claimed that she was and the other had taken the risk. She'd - Her heart beat faster. She had two sets of memories. Which one had been hers!? Which person had been her!? She pinched herself just below the ribs and nothing happened but a flash of momentary pain. Everything trembled, from her breath to her fingers. She tried to twist, but there was a weight: a great awkward weight that pulled at her - or the bottom of the 'her' that she could feel - at that line. That line, suddenly, was defining. It was where she ended and she did not know why. She could not fathom why. "Issy!?" she called, and her voice felt small and rough. "Issy!!!"
Nothing.
Now, she panicked. Marci tried to sit up and... she couldn't! She strained, willing it, but there was nothing below that prickly line. She ended there and her heart beat faster. She felt her pulse in her ears and the world grew faint. Marci called upon the Gift. She scrabbled with her arms and sat up unsteadily, the world seeming tentative and unsteady. "Issy, please!!" She cast about for the owner of this place. "Anyone!" She paused, chest heaving, sweat pasting her hair against the side of her face. "Anyone!" She couldn't feel her legs or her... anything. She tried to focus. She tried to use the Gift. They were there, but they were lost to her. She lifted her hands from the bed, where they'd been supporting her, and could immediately feel herself start to fall. She clenched up and half-caught herself, arms shooting back to prevent the rest. She called upon the Gift to support her and, tentatively, lifted one arm free, reaching down to untangle the sheets.
Numbness.
It was... like touching somebody else's leg: a foreign object. With a terrified fascination, the girl ran her hand down a thigh and up again all the way to - She stopped and wrinkled her nose. Wetness. For a moment, every part of her body that she had control over tensed in revulsion. She knew what it was and she wiped her hand vigorously - frantically - on the covers. With a noise, not that of anything sapient or worthwhile, she released the hold of magic upon her form and waited for herself to fall back: to fall back so that she wouldn't feel, so that this would all be some bad dream or a temporary setback she would overcome, as she had so many others.
Nothing.
If she could just - She let out a second wail, and a third, loud enough to rip at her throat. She threw herself back. At least she could still do that. There had to be some way. She had magic. There had to be some way to undo this, to reverse it, to prevent it. She could see the shadows on the floor. Something bad was happening outside and she did not want anything to do with it. I'm broken, she screamed inwardly. I'm broken. I broke myself. I'm half a person. Half a person! She tried to picture herself: her, Marceline, in a wheelchair, just like Mama and Jocasta and Isabella. She tried to picture that her, tried to imagine her happy, like they were, but the fear won out. How had they done it!? How could they function!? Would she have to depend on the Gift to do basic things for the rest of her life!?
It was too much to even cry: too much to process, too much finality, too much all at once and it was damning. She couldn't sit up on her own. She could move! She had pissed herself, like a baby, and not even known. She couldn't even feel it. What else she might not feel remained a subject unbroached but very much present. Juulet had done this to her: a powerful person breaking her and discarding her. Marci had never thought she'd be discarded. Even in her worst moments back at the refuge, she'd believed otherwise. She'd always been clever. She'd always been sure that she would make something of herself in the thirty-odd years she'd been given. You are a stupid, worthless piece of shit and anyone who invests in you is making a mistake.
She tried to direct her anger at Juulet and swore that - whatever it took - she would see that vile bitch die in terror and agony, but it rang hollow and pathetic. What the hell is a pathetic little cripple like you ever going to do to a Goddess? Just the mental image of herself - in a wheelchair - trying to go up against that sort of Titan seemed bitterly ridiculous. Marceline was nothing, or half of nothing now. She wasn't even smart. She'd fucking mixed up herself and her copy. She'd gloated instead of just fucking shooting Juulet between the eyes when she'd had her. She hadn't taken the seed - so stupidly overconfident. She'd let herself be swayed - even momentarily - by the bitch's ridiculous story about Dory. She'd gotten Fiske involved and - She didn't even know where he was or if he was okay. The weight of her mountain of failures crushed her crippled body and she lay there numb and sobbing and just wishing she could fall asleep and fade away and it would all be better.
Only, it wouldn't. It would never be better. She had ruined herself, permanently, or for however blessedly short a time she lasted. She would lie here in her own piss and misery, the girl who had wanted to live forever, telling herself that it was too much. That she couldn't do it, that she couldn't live even fifteen more years like this. She would stop taking aberrations. That's what she'd do. She'd stop taking them and fade away quickly - just get it over with, just be a fond memory of someone her friends and family had known.
A fist clenched around her stomach and she felt sick. Did they know this had happened? Did they know that she was like this!? It squeezed and twisted. They couldn't know. They couldn't see her: none of them except for whoever had put her here. They mustn't. They wouldn't! Thus, she stared blankly at the wheelchair by her bedside and focused her racing mind with thoughts of how she might disappear and how it would be better that way.
Usually, they dispelled the rain for events like this, but whispers traveled about the student body and city at large that not only had they failed to dispel it this time, the Arch-Zenos had created it. Youths gathered by the dozens beneath awnings and overhangs. They clustered in the shelter of kinetic barriers and enhanced their hearing to listen to the Zenith's closing address over the deluge. A fraction of them were rich with spoils and winnings. Porters handles great pallets of goods, soon to pass through one portal or another. Some had made or rekindled friendships, alliances, and affairs of love. Others left embittered, present only out of obligation. The city of magic, with its white walls and sparkling towers, had proven a false dream for the second time. They were left indelibly disillusioned.
There were some, however, for whom Ersand'Enise yet held immense promise. Some would stay. Some would fight for it, or perhaps against it. Some had become rich in the span of a week, literally, figuratively, or both. After the drama of Mano e Mano, the scramble of Right or Spite, and the high stakes of prize selection, there were winners just as certainly as there were losers.
Some went back through the portals offered by the Zenos, eager to return home. Others lingered a bit longer and scooped up the unclaimed prizes at an auction later that day. The masquerade ball to conclude the Trials had been canceled due to a convergence of unrest outside the city and within though, officially, it was due to the sudden and untimely passing of Arch-Zeno Joshe Intaba, who had disappeared during his intervention in that disastrous Mano e Mano quarterfinal. Word came down that the school was in mourning but, curiously, while campus events had been suspended, classes had not.
The students would not be denied. While some, angry and majority - though not exclusively - Perrench and allied, took to protesting their unfair treatment which could no longer be ignored, others flocked, during the night of Victendes the ninth, to a large house on the Godsroad, just beyond the city's formal boundaries. This was the 'Soirée', to which they'd all been invited, regardless of nationality or popularity. If it was not an official event, then much was riding on it nonetheless, for few would dispute that the school was a powder keg and the city at large was scarcely better off. Still, great powers built up their forces and prepared their battle plans. Still, Belleville pursued ties with the City of the Bells. Still, desperate and disowned, refugees piled up by the gates in their hundreds and even their thousands.
By the time Eshiran's hours slipped into Dami's, musicians were playing, food and drink were served, and the midsized property was crowded with dozens of teens. Soon, it would be hundreds. They laughed. They danced. They socialized. Certainly, there were flashes of tension. Oraff does not craft all the same, Dami does not shape all alike, and Ipte will not force kinship upon them. By and large, however, the night was an immense success: evidence, perhaps, that the Zenith's words about the future and its promise maybe have held truth. Whatever other failings of her administration had since been exposed, at least she had been prophetic on one account, or so it appeared.
And yet... that very same night, in Balthazar Square and Dami's Cross, groups of drunken Perrench, Belzaggic, and Virangish students waved flags and chanted before being chased off by Academy Guardsmen and Lamplighters. Yet, what they missed were the others who slipped into the Courtyard of Exemplars at Arc-en-Ciel Hall and transformed the statue of Alassa Tojarra into the likeness of a pig-faced woman, replete with slurs and epithets describing her. That of the Zenith was marked with the demonic symbols of Zagnath, for greed, and Iptacht, for treachery.
The response was immediate. Penny Pellerin, who had been unfortunate enough to ingest the aberration earlier, was collected from the party as it wound down without incident and brought in for questioning. Roslyn Wicke, who'd intervened as a spectator to put an end to the match, found a letter with the seal of the school treasurer in her mailbox informing her that her THESIS funding had been reassessed and she was no longer eligible. When those students not playing hooky arrived on campus, they found notices on the door of every building that a curfew would be enforced 'until such time as it no longer proves necessary'. None were to be out past 1:00 HD upon pain of suspension from classes.
There was no stopping the news from spreading, however. Penny Pellerin had been taken into custody and not yet released. Eloise Desrochers, who had lost an arm in the violence following the quarterfinal; Jean-Marc Savard, the young Marquis d'Arouains; and Yvette Larocque, Comtesse de Chamonix had been arrested for their part in the acts of vandalism. The others had escaped, for now, but the academy offered substantial reward for their capture. The result was a second act of vandalism, right under the nose of the authorities.
For a second night, Penny was held in custody, and those closest to her would no longer remain silent. The verdict came down from above that the vandals would be summarily expelled without refund of their tuition, declared Anto, and blacklisted from the school registry. The reward for the remaining vandals was increased: A large medallion of the rare metal veldolm for each credibly brought in with supporting evidence. Curfew was extended into the hours of Eshiran so that, effectively, students could go only from class to home and the reverse. Local businesses complained of lost revenue and part-time employees. The people of Belleville made common cause with this new ally of convenience, decrying the tyranny of the mages in their ivory towers. Still, the great powers sharpened their swords. Still, the people of Tanso, Parmoy, and Oiyac camped outside of the city gates.
Then, a memorial to the fallen Arch-Zeno Intaba went up. It was an impromptu thing, formed hastily by a group of binders in Balthazar Square before they could be roughly hauled away. Yet, there was an imperfect beauty to it and the academy was loath to erase a memorial honouring one of their own fallen. On the third day of the unrest, students began to leave flowers, candles, and notes beside it. This, the academy's and city's administrators decided, was a healthy release of tension. This, they allowed in a limited capacity. The famously fair but firm arbiter of Ersand'Enise's justice stood there in Balthazar Square, ferrous and lumpen and, unbeknownst to his erstwhile peers, a symbol of what the school should have been, in contrast to what it was.
They began to stay, after curfew, in a vigil about the statue. At first, guards removed them, but then there were too many. The third night came and Miss Pellerin remained locked up in the Violet Enclave. Messengers had been dispatched to Perrence. Among them, symbolically, was Leike van de Hoek, who had lost a leg in the initial bout of unrest during the Trials. Dozens more gathered overnight, and they numbered well into the hundreds by the morning. Some Zenos refused to teach their half-empty classes. Some stood in solidarity with their students. Then, word got out that Arch-Zeno Tojarra, who had been suspended from academic duties, with pay, had been asked to withdraw her charges against those who had been involved in the quarterfinal incident.
She refused.
Now, the peaceful vigil began to turn angry. Some demanded that she be fired. Others stepped up to defend her, saying that it was her duty to ensure that the academy's laws were not ignored, no matter how perfunctory the case. These were few, however, and far between. Now came a letter from King Rouis himself, demanding the immediate release of his daughter and certifying the mobilization of the Legion de la Flamme Sacrée should she not walk out of the Violet Enclave unharmed, within twenty-five hours. The Dukes of Tojarra and five allied families of Torragon and Revidia sent similar notices urging the school to reinstate their kinswoman. King Sancho's missive stated only that he was certain that Dami's divine judgement would hold firm and that the guilty party would be held accountable. While some interpreted this as a carte blanche to encourage his countrymen, it was not lost upon others that the Arch-Zeno had struck his niece in anger. In response, the school began calling its Zenos from their primary duties as instructors and researches to their secondary duties as defenders of the school's integrity. Some heeded the call. Others interpreted it differently. It was the administrators who threatened the school's integrity, in fact, and not those who protested against them.
So it was that the hornet's nest had been kicked. The powder keg had been lit. Whatever idioms one might apply, they held true here. Lepdes the 13th arrived. Streets were largely empty. Classes were suspended. Ersand'Enise stood at the very precipice of a deep black abyss.
T H E H O R N E T ' S N E S T
Few events in the storied history of The Trials have been as consistently polarizing as Mano e Mano. Often seen in the leadup to wars, it is, at its core, combat to the death. While some argue that it gives young thaumaturges invaluable exposure to the harsh realities of life-or-death combat, others see it as nothing more than bloodsport for entertainment and a blight on the academy's noble calling.
It was against this backdrop that the final game of the five-hundred-fifty-fifth took place. It was within this context that some of the most entertaining and meaningful combats the academy and its young biros had ever seen took place. Who could forget Leon Solaire's memorable tilt against his underwear, or the Kamehameha Bros. radical fusion against Dorothea Hohnstein and Tku Pictor? And that final! What an epic scrap! Yet, when allw as said and done, most of these would pass from the memories of those who had witnessed them for one simple fact: they were overshadowed, and not in a good way. Every war needs a tipping point: some moment when it becomes obvious that bloodshed is unaviodable, when a reasonable course of events turns for the worse. That was what happened on Victendes, Velles the 9th, DZ55 when Salomé Xiuyang Solari and her partner Ingrid Pederson of Fait Accompli faced off against the Perrench duo of Penny Pellerin and Guy Attard of Fiske 'n Chips on the plains of Joru. From the very moment they walked out of the tunnel, they were headed for disaster.
O L I V E B R A N C H
C A L A M I T Y
T R A F I Q U É !
C R U S H E D
D E L I V E R A N C E ?
A R B I T E R
L I O N ' S F A L L
© 2007-2025