~ 2 ~
Archmage
Following Lord Naberius’s departure, Founder’s Hall became a hive of hushed and anxious conversations. Ms. Richter cut these short, thanking all for their attendance and reminding them that the winter solstice was still six weeks away. Theirs was a pressing deadline, she acknowledged, but sufficient to gather additional intelligence and make an informed decision. Once she dismissed the attendees, many offered their support and assured the Director that she had done well. She thanked them and promised to follow up with each for their advice and counsel. When Miss Boon filed past, Ms. Richter asked her to remain behind.
The teacher nodded and glanced anxiously at the empty seat where Cooper should have been.
“It’s okay, Miss Boon,” Max assured her. “Cooper will be back soon.”
“Oh, it’s not that,” she muttered irritably, dabbing at her face with a sleeve. “Of course William’s fine. I know he’s fine. He probably got stuck with some incompetent of the Harbor Guard. It’s
Max waved off the ambassador’s dark pronouncements. “If I had a shiny lune for every time I’ve been threatened …,” he quipped. When this failed to elicit even the hint of a smile, Max merely shrugged. “Just because Prusias says I’m a dead man doesn’t make it so.”
Miss Boon nodded appreciatively, but her apparent worry remained.
The hall had almost emptied when Ms. Richter called Ben Polk over.
“I know you’re busy,” she said, “but I would appreciate it if you would track down Agent Cooper. It’s not like him to miss something like this. He has been helping the coastal settlements see to their defenses and was at Sphinx Point just yesterday.”
Ben Polk touched two fingers to his forehead and spoke in a voice so eerily flat and distant that he might have been daydreaming. “I’ll have him home by evenfall, Director. And then I’m off for Dun, ’less you need me for anything else round here.…”
Max felt a chill as those unblinking glassy eyes wandered over him and settled on his sword. He knew that if the Director ordered Ben Polk to acquire the
“No,” she replied firmly. “Once you’ve accounted for Agent Cooper, we need you in Dun. The goblin carrack
As Agent Polk departed, a flock of apprentices and gnomish domovoi arrived to straighten up Founder’s Hall. Ms. Richter took one of the domovoi aside, pointing out the flagstones the palanquin had cracked. “I’d like these replaced as soon as possible,” she said. “And let’s channel some fresh air in here. I want all evidence of that visitor scoured from this place. What a foul messenger. What a foul message!” She added this last reflection in an undertone before her attention snapped back to Max and Miss Boon. Stopping a passing apprentice, she drained a cup of coffee from the boy’s tray and then beckoned the others to follow as she strode from the hall.
She chose one of the Manse’s less trafficked staircases, leading them up the marble steps while the sprawling mansion hummed and echoed with the din of a new school day. Footsteps drummed and doors opened and slammed shut, accompanied by shouts and laughter from the dormitory wings. A disheveled Second Year came racing down the staircase, carrying far too many books and chomping maniacally upon a slice of ham. Upon glimpsing the Director, the boy gave a prepubescent yelp and spun awkwardly to avoid hitting her. Books and breakfast went flying as the boy crashed into Miss Boon, flinging his arms about her waist to break his fall. Both parties were mortified. Stammering incoherent apologies, the student stooped to gather up his things and braced for the inevitable tirade. He was saved by the stampede that soon followed.
More students came dashing down the narrow staircase, a blur of scrubbed faces, books, and wet hair that clung to cowls of gray, blue, and brown wool. Bidding the Director a startled good day, they swarmed past their unfortunate classmate and continued to chatter about the latest gossip, homework, and exams. Max watched them go, more than a little envious as they dashed off to study composition, divination, or whatever else occupied their busy schedules. His former classmates would be diving into their second hour of Advanced Conjuration, each resplendent in their silver magechains and a Fifth Year’s fine viridian robes.
By the time they’d reached the third floor, the flood of students had thinned to a handful of stragglers, woefully late and destined for mucking out the Sanctuary stables or patrolling the raw and windy coast. Winding their way through a maze of corridors, the three finally passed the Bacon Library and veered down a disused hallway to a suite of old classrooms. Those classrooms had been converted into an apartment that was now occupied by a living, breathing dead man.
But while Elias Bram did not fit this description, he neither fit conventional definitions for the living. For one, Bram’s sacred apple had turned to gold, which was only supposed to occur upon one’s death. For another, it was common knowledge that Astaroth had devoured the man centuries ago. But what if the Demon had kept some vital spark of Bram intact? Astaroth had spoken of past victims “contributing to his essence,” but Max assumed he’d been speaking metaphorically. If Elias Bram’s living spirit had persevered all this time, Max was not certain how to classify him.
Regardless of whether Bram was living or dead, Max still regarded him with a mixture of superstitious awe and fear. The man’s legend loomed over everything at Rowan. Even the lowliest apprentice could recite basic facts about his life. He was revered as something of a saint and a demigod—a being whose name, likeness, and history were woven into the surroundings and daily life. For Rowan students, Elias Bram was Sir Isaac Newton, Hercules, and Merlin rolled into one.
For Mystics, however, Bram was Stradivari—a virtuoso of magic whose results could not be duplicated by later generations despite every effort to divine his methods. Even Bram’s most mundane ledgers and notes were treasured documents, meticulously preserved and jealously guarded by scholars who spent lifetimes scrutinizing them in the hope of some veiled cipher or insight. It was not just his magic that was a mystery, but also the man himself. How had a shipwrecked orphan come to claim Solas’s Gwydion Chair of Mystics by the age of twenty? It defied explanation.
If a book held the answers, many might have followed in Bram’s footsteps. But to Max’s knowledge, there had only been one. And that remarkable being was Max’s very own roommate and closest companion, the mysterious David Menlo. Like Elias Bram, David was a true sorcerer, a prodigy whose genius with magic often allowed him to bypass the ancient formulae and incantations that were a Mystic’s tools in trade. Once, Miss Boon had remarked— with a tinge of professional envy—that David’s talents were like a composer simply improvising an entire symphony. Ever since David’s power became apparent, the scholars sought to analyze him with the same fervor with which they studied Bram’s papers. As it happened, the connection between the two was closer than any had imagined: David Menlo was Elias Bram’s grandson.
David’s initial claim that Bram was his grandfather was met with skepticism. After all, David Menlo was only a teenager while Elias Bram had died during the seventeenth century. The only possible link between David and Bram was through the Archmage’s wife and daughter, who had fled Astaroth’s forces and sailed west with the refugees who would found Rowan.
The pair had arrived safely in America, but Elias Bram’s wife, Brigit, had died shortly thereafter. According to the histories, Elias had promised his wife that he would rejoin her in the new land. Day after day, Brigit Bram stood on Rowan’s rocky beach and gazed into the east, awaiting a husband who was not coming. Legend had it that one evening she took up her lantern and simply waded into the sea until the waves closed over her. Her body had never been found, but some insisted that her passing coincided with the appearance of a large rock off Rowan’s shore.
