Morgan found nighttime in Athelda-Aoun to be a bit strange. For one, the streets were remarkably well lit. This was because a number of crystals on raised columns shone a soft white light illuminating the streets. As she, Frances and Timur walked through the streets, they passed a mage walking by, casting a spell over the lamps to keep them bright.
Frances called out a greeting and apologised that they were in a rush and couldn’t chat, which the mage, a half-human half-centaur waved off and thanked her. Then they were off again, at a brisk walk.
“Where are we going?” Morgan asked.
“The Athelda-Aoun School for Magic and Mundane, where my mother teaches and stays when she’s not on campaign, which is most of the time these days.” Frances glanced at Morgan. “You’ll also be attending this school as well, at least for the morning.”
“Why—” Morgan grimaced at her own tone and took a deep breath. “Why?” she asked again.
Frances blinked and smiled. “I think that you should meet and befriend some people of your own age. There’s much I can teach you, but there’s nothing like a good friend or two to help you through your darkest moments.”
Morgan nodded, Frances seemed to know what she was saying, but she couldn’t help the worry that bubbled in her chest.
“Don’t worry about making friends too much, Morgan. Hattie is a senior student at the school and she’ll help you,” said Frances.
That did make the weight in Morgan’s stomach feel a lot lighter.
Walking up to set of large double doors set into a brick wall, Frances produced a key. “We’re here, give me a moment.”
Morgan blinked. It didn’t look like a school. All she could see were walls and buildings around them. The street didn’t look any different from those around them. Stepping in after her uncle, the harpy-troll walked into a courtyard of levelled earth. It was surrounded with the adjoining buildings of a variety of sizes and methods of construction. Some were very old, built from clay or stone, and with flat roofs. They were perhaps built by the original inhabitants of Athelda-Aoun. Others were far newer structures built from wood and plaster, covered with peaked shingle roofs or baked clay tiles.
Not realizing she was turning around, Morgan almost tripped over her feet, and only managed to steady herself by grabbing onto Frances’s outstretched hand.
“Thanks,” she said, quickly yanking her hand out of the mage’s hand.
“You’re welcome,” Frances gestured to a large building in the centre of the yard. “Wondering what that is?”
Morgan studied the building as they resumed walking. She could see what the building was currently being used for. Set right in the middle of the courtyard, it was filled with tables. This cafeteria would have had a perfectly round wall if those same walls hadn’t sported several very large holes bashed into it. The rubble had been long cleared away and those same holes were clearly being used as doorways. The harpy wasn’t sure if the building had a roof, but a very new looking wooden roof had been built over the structure.
“Yeah, what is it?”
“I’m afraid we haven’t figured out what it is either. I thought it was a temple of some kind because we found some broken up statues,” said Frances.
“And I think it was a cafeteria because the kitchen seemed very well outfitted and it showed use,” said Timur, pointing out the clay brick chimney that rose above the cafeteria. “Additionally most goblin empire temples weren’t shaped like this.”
“We just call it the Round Hall now. It’s where everybody at school eats,” said Frances.
“Why couldn’t it have been both?” Morgan asked.
Timur and Frances exchanged a thoughtful glance.
“Could have been,” said Timur.
“I didn’t think of it because in my original world it was kind of disrespectful to eat at a place of worship,” said Frances.
“Certain gods in the Goblin Empire had different rules. We just never figured out whose temple this was to,” said Timur.
By this time the trio had arrived at a stone building that had a wooden “Staff Quarters” sign hammered next to it. Its door opened before they arrived to reveal a woman with a forward twist to her spine. She leant quite heavily on a metal staff.
“Frances, Timur, this must be Morgan,” said Edana.
Morgan didn’t approach, and she tried not to react. The Firehand’s smile may have looked friendly, but she was also, The Firehand. A mage that had killed thousands of Alavari by burning them into unrecognisable messes.
“Mom, I’m sorry to bother you so late,” said Frances, clasping Edana’s hand.
“No apologies. I’m glad you brought this to my attention,” said Edana, waving them in. “Please be quiet, though, I got Ember to sleep not too long ago.”
“Just Ember?” Timur asked.
Edana shook her head as she led them into a nondescript sitting room. “Oh no. Ignatius falls asleep easily. Ember however…I think she’s going to turn out like me.”
“That’s not such a bad thing, mom,” said Frances, smiling. “Morgan, can you show us Lightbreaker?”
The harpy-troll pulled out her wand, which said nothing as she placed it on the table.
“So Lightbreaker finally chose a new wielder,” said Edana, frowning as she placed her staff on the table. Morgan blinked. The staff she realised now, from the sound it made on the table, was actually wooden.
The harpy-troll’s eyes settled on her wand. “Why did it choose me?”
“I would like to know that very much too, but you never were the talkative type were you, Lightbreaker?” Edana said. She drummed her hands on the table. “Do you know why we’re here, Morgan?”
“You know something that Frances doesn’t?” Morgan ventured.
Frances nodded, and suddenly snapped her fingers. “Ah, sorry Morgan.” From the shoulder-bag she carried she pulled out a sandwich, a pasty and a small clay pot. “Packed these for your dinner. I know you’re hungry.”
Morgan blinked. “Oh, thanks.” She touched the clay pot and blinked as she realised it was hot to the touch. Unscrewing the lid, a familiar smell hit her nose and her eyes went wide.
“Your uncle told me you really liked lamb stew,” said Frances.
Morgan could barely hide her joy as she grabbed the spoon and took a sip. It was really good, gamy and yet perfectly spiced.
“T-thanks,” she stammered. Swallowing, she glanced back to Edana who had a somewhat enigmatic smile on her face. “Sorry m’am.”
“No worries, I heard you were in a rush, and you were right to be. You were also right in that I may know something. Archmage Star the Glimmering Light was my mentor at one point in time.” Edana laced her fingers together. “She and I were not that close however. We trusted each other, she took care of me, but there were a good many things she kept secret.”
“You don’t seem surprised, Lady Firehand,” said Timur, frowning.
“No. Archmage Star was quiet on many things, but she made hints that she did not approve of King Thorgoth or Queen Ulania. That she killed Queen Ulania does not surprise me, though, I wonder why.” Edana leaned forward. “Lightbreaker, why don’t you tell us why?”
I’ve already said far too much on the matter.
“Then why did you tell Frances about that in the first place?” Timur asked.
“It was an accident,” said Frances. She took a deep breath. “Ivy and I were trying to tell Lighbreaker to be more open with Morgan and during our argument, it let the fact slip. Mom, you weren’t there when Queen Ulania died, but you were under Archmage Star’s tutelage weren’t you?”
“Yes, but I don’t know anything specific that would tell me why she’d assassinate the Queen. From what I knew, Queen Ulania wasn’t advocating war with the human kingdoms. That didn’t start until she was killed.”
“Then did Archmage Star keep any notes or documents?” Timur asked.
“She burned most of them. I’ll have to return to Salpheron to see what she left.” Edana drummed her fingers on the table. “Here’s what I know. Archmage Star vanished for almost several months before and around the time Queen Ulania died. So it’s highly likely Lightbreaker was telling the truth.”
“Was she communicating, or friends with any Alavaria mages, mom? I can’t imagine her being able to assassinate a queen without assistance,” said Frances.
Edana nodded. “She was very close to Archmage Zirabelle. Oh hmm, and now that you remind me, her excuse for vanishing was that she was going to visit her.”
Timur blinked. “You mean General Antigones’s former wife? She…she was murdered by my father through the mad mage Ixtar. That cannot have been a coincidence.”
“He likely suspected her involvement. The question then is why did this all occur in the first place,” said Edana.
Stolen from Royal Road, this story should be reported if encountered on Amazon.
“Was she perhaps worried about a resurgent Alavari Kingdom? Thorgoth had just managed to lead Alavaria out of the strife after all,” Frances said.
Edana grimaced. “A little, but it was hard to see it. She was a member of the then Traditionalist faction, but she was never close to Earl Darius or his generation. She was part of an old guard of Erisdale that preceded my generation and she was less Erisdale focused than I was. For most of her tenure as Head of the White Order, she travelled between Roranoak, Lapanteria and Erisdale.”
“So maybe, but not necessarily. Guess I’m really going to have to talk to Titania and Antigones,” said Timur. He sighed. “Thanks though, Lady Firehand.”
“One more thing,” Frances turned to Morgan. “Do you think it’s safe for Morgan to wield Lightbreaker, or at the very least how do you think we should make Lightbreaker safe for Morgan to use?”
Edana studied the wand on the table. Her green eyes narrowed, and to her dismay, Frances could see far more wrinkles on her mother’s face than there had been before and in the candlelight, she could no longer miss the streaks of white in her hair.
“Lightbreaker isn’t a malicious wand. I think that so long as we continue to caution Lightbreaker against its more enigmatic actions, it’ll be safe enough for Morgan to use,” said Edana.
“But why did it choose me?” Morgan asked.
“I cannot be sure, but each wand has preferences for wielders. Poker, here, is quite straightforward, it likes to help fire mages and enjoys working with people with tempers,” said Edana, patting her black staff.
Frances nodded, her right hand thumbing Ivy. “While Ivy chose me because…well, we made a bond and we help each other.”
Morgan glanced at her teacher, wondering what she wasn’t saying. “So who has Lightbreaker chosen usually?” she asked.
“Lightbreaker tends to choose powerful mages that have often turned into famous ones. I’m not sure if it prefers a personality type, but Archmage Star, and High Queen Yalisa were all people who held immense magical power. Maybe it’s as simple as that.” Edana picked up the white wand and handed it to Morgan. “What’s for sure is that you wield the wand, the wand doesn’t wield you and you’ll have Frances with you every step of the way.”
Taking the wand, Morgan nodded, glancing at Frances, who smiled comfortingly.
Hopefully she was going to be fine. Morgan wasn’t entirely sure if she could stand another surprise if this week was anything to go by.
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Curled up in Timur’s arms, Frances let out a sigh of contentment.
“Timur, thank you. And…I’m really sorry.”
Her boyfriend planted a kiss on her neck. “If you say sorry one more time, I’ll have to run my fingers all over you again.”
Frances giggled, and for a moment, she wondered if she might take Timur up on his offer. “Alright alright. I’ll try not to. You were right. I did everything I could have.” She rolled over to face the prince. A year ago, such closeness would have been terrifying, but they’d been together so long, she loved the moments when they could lie together in their bed, facing each other, her eyes looking into his eyes.
“I love you so much,” she whispered, nestling her head underneath his chin.
“I love you too. Even more now, with all you’re doing for Morgan. I know how much time and effort you need to take care of her.”
“You’re helping, and you’ve helped. I left all the decorating for the house to you because I was so busy with that spell, which I’ve made absolutely no progress with,” said Frances bitterly.
“Remember, your mother and every one of our best mages haven’t been able to figure out that magic either,” said Timur.
Frances nodded. It was a small comfort, though. All that reading and research and they didn’t seem any closer to understanding how song magic was performed.
“Frances if you don’t mind, I’ve noticed Morgan becoming a lot more curious about you. If you don’t want to tell Morgan about what happened, would you prefer that I did, or just remain quiet?” Timur asked.
Her boyfriend’s voice was quiet and kind, but Frances couldn’t help but feel a chill running down her back.
“Please don’t tell her. I…I want to tell her myself. I’m just…I’m just a bit nervous.”
She could see from her boyfriend’s expression that he’d noticed her stammer, but he didn’t press. He simply rubbed his nose against her forehead.
“Alright. She can wait.”
“Thanks, Timur.” She kissed him on his collarbone, settling more comfortably into his arms, not wanting this peace and happiness to end.
Tomorrow she’d have to worry about Morgan, the war, and everything, but tonight, she was safe, and happy.
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Morgan had wanted to fly to school, but Timur had insisted on walking her with Frances once she’d said goodbye to her friends. She wasn’t entirely sure why until she got to the school.
The courtyard was filled with a milieu of children of all ages, and of all species. She now remembered that Frances had told her there were around three hundred students of various ages. Some were older pre-teens and teens. They walked through the gate with their friends. The younger children raced through, running away from their parents.
There were a lot of children, though that came to school alone, or in small groups with friends, without their parents.
Morgan stared at it all, her heart pounding in her chest. Her ears overwhelmed with the sound of laughing, screaming kids, her eyes filled with color and faces.
“Morgan!” She started, eyes flicking over to her uncle, who gave her hand a squeeze. “You’re going to be fine.”
“But…what if I lose control of my magic?” Morgan stammered.
“Frances is going to be teaching today so she’ll be near and we’ve arranged for someone to show you around,” Timur looked around.
Frances’s smile brightened. “There! Hattie, we’re over here!”
Morgan’s heart skipped a beat as the scarred half-troll jogged over from where she was walking down the road. “Hi. Sorry, there was a leak in my plumbing I had to fix.”
“That’s alright. Do you need me to come over and help?” Frances asked.
“No, I’m good, thank you, Master,” said Hattie, smiling. “Nice to see you again, Morgan.”
“Nice to see you too,” said Morgan. She curtseyed, making sure not to wobble. The moment she rose, she felt her cheeks flush. Did she just perform a royal curtsy to Hattie? Eyes wide, she looked over to Frances and Timur. The former hadn’t noticed, but her uncle hadn’t failed to recognize that movement.
“Well, I need to get going. Got to look over the construction of some new terraces up top.” Her uncle kissed Frances’s cheek, and she giggling, kissed him back. “See you.”
“See you, Timur.” Frances waved the prince away and turned to her two apprentice. “Alright, let me introduce you.”
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The day began with an assembly in the courtyard. Here, Morgan stood along with a number of other very shy, some trembling children and was introduced to the school by Frances.
It was unnerving having so many eyes on her. It helped that Frances had already warned her there was going to be an assembly. What she didn’t expect was the upswelling of joy she felt when the students all bellowed:
“Welcome! We’re glad you’re here with us!”
One little boy at the end of the line even burst into tears, and to Morgan’s surprise, nobody laughed at him. Rather, a few of the other students who were helping to organise the assembly helped wipe his nose and eyes.
After that, the assembly was dismissed and they went to their classes, which Hattie soon explained were split into:
“Family Groups? That’s an odd name,” said Morgan.
Hattie’s only response was to give Morgan a flat look. “It’s a little more literal than you think. There are…a lot of orphans here. The lucky ones are adopted. The rest only have their Family Group.” Hattie took a deep breath and clambered up onto a wooden bench and waved her hand. “Franciscans!”
Slowly, before Morgan’s eyes, a small group of fifteen or so kids trickled in to form up. A few, mostly the younger ones under ten, smiled when they looked up to Hattie.
The older kids, though, were expressionless and to Morgan’s confusion, hung back.
“Hi everybody, this is Morgan Greyhammer, she’ll be joining us and we’ll be looking after her. As for today’s schedule, we’ve got Ulric’s magical objects class today, history with Eleanor, and self-defence training with Frances,” said Hattie. An unsteady smile came over her face. “Any questions?”
They shook their heads and Hattie nodded. “Alright, let’s go.”
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Classes were very different from what Morgan expected. In her brief stint at the Alavari Academy for Magic, most of the students had been older and were of the same knowledge level.
In these classes, however, two family groups were put together to create a class of about thirty with mixed ages and of varying magical talent. Thus, the instructors, in this case, a very very eccentric and funny man called Ulric, usually gave a general lesson, before overseeing the class performing a group assignment.
The group assignment in this case was to get a glass marble up a certain height and then back down without simply dropping it. Anybody under ten simply needed to get the marble up to the table. The students that were older however had to get the marble to the ceiling. The object, or whatever they built had to be able to perform the task with any extra magic being put into it. Thankfully, Ulric had just reviewed how to enchant objects.
The children in the family groups still split into smaller groups of three or five, but Morgan noticed even as she worked on enchanting her part of the magical machine that Hattie was running around, helping the younger students in her family group.
It was while Hattie was explaining to a young human called Gabriela that one of the older members of their family group approached her, a half-ogre half-human boy, Morgan vaguely remembered as being called Sely.
“So what do you think of her?” Sely asked, as he deftly cut wood with a small handsaw.
Morgan blinked, and slowly released the ice spell she was using to create the ramp they needed to get the marble down. “Of Hattie?”
“Yeah. Little Miss Scarface,” said Sely.
Morgan decided right then that she didn’t very much like Sely.
“She helped save me from the people who held me in captivity. How do you think I feel about her?” Morgan asked.
Sely’s head snapped toward Hattie so quickly his shoulder-length blonde hair shook almost into his face. “She did? My parents said that she betrayed Athelda-Aoun to General Helias.”
“Wasn’t he disguised?” Morgan asked. “How was Hattie supposed to know?”
To Sely’s credit, the half-ogre blinked and frowned. “Huh, they didn’t mention that. And everybody knows Hattie was gone for an important mission for a few months.”
“So why do you all seem to have a problem with her?” Morgan asked, not caring at how Sely’s eyes widened. “What, it’s kinda obvious.”
“Folk say things about her—”
“Folk say things about everybody. What has she actually done aside from make one stupid mistake?” Morgan turned back to her slide and taking a deep breath, thrust Lightbreaker at it and yelled out a note. A torrent of water spilled out from the nearby pail she’d filled and carved itself into a perfect spiral slide to the ground. Grinning at her handiwork, and marvelling at how easy it had been with Lightbreaker, Morgan turned back to Sely.
“Well? Got your head out of your ass?”
Sely looked up and smirked right back at her. “Yeah, kinda. Got some awkward questions for my folks, though, but that can come later.”
Somewhat glad her first impression had been wrong, Morgan snorted. “Good. But seriously, what is with everybody’s deal with Hattie?”
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From what Morgan collected, and she collected a lot because Sely seemed to have an ear for every conversation and didn’t mind sharing, most people didn’t seem to like Hattie partly because of what she’d done, but also because they were jealous of her.
“I mean, she is the Stormcaller’s first student and have you seen how bleeding smart she is?” Sely whispered as they watched their magical motion machine do its job.
“Yeah. Yeah…” said Morgan as she watched Hattie start their machine with a burst of magic. Following her direction, the older students, magic and non-magic, had built essentially a lift with a counterweight. A bit of magic, some pulleys fashioned from dowels of wood and string, and the lift fell into motion, lifting the marble up to the ceiling where a pin, another one of Sely’s contributions, tipped the lift forward and sent the marble racing down the slide.
Morgan’s eyes were for Hattie though, as she explained how their machine worked. She was so focused, that she didn’t even notice Sely chuckling to himself.
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History was actually quite fun. Eleanor, who apparently was the Firehand’s mother and the Stormcaller’s grandmother, gave a general lesson on the 2nd Great War’s start, before splitting the class up into smaller groups for self-study from their textbooks.
For the most part, Morgan enjoyed the time to just read her book. She was so focused, however, that she didn’t hear the bell ringing.
Until she did.
Ding ding ding.
Morgan froze, her eyes widened and her heart started to pound in her chest.
Ding ding ding.
She grabbed onto her chest, forcing herself to deep breaths. She wasn’t in the cell. She was safe. She was at school. Nobody was going to hurt her. She was sitting in…in her bed, trying to shut out how horrible life was—
“Morgan, Morgan!”
She blinked, looking up to find Hattie shaking her shoulder.
“I’m…I’m fine. Hattie?”
“Yes, it’s me. What’s going on?” Hattie asked.
Morgan looked around. Kids were already starting to look at her. What was she going to do? What could she do? Were they going to find out that she was a monster, just waiting in disguise?
“Hey, follow me,” said Hattie. Before Morgan could responds, the older girl pulled her out of her seat and dragged her towards the door. “Professor, we need to go.”
Eleanor’s eyes, the same shade of green as her daughter’s, took one look and she nodded. “You two are dismissed.”
“Thanks!” Morgan stumbled after Hattie as she was yanked out of the room.