Chapter 53: The Cartographer's Designs
Subject: Caim Location: Malisacade - The Blightbane Guild
This scene took Caim back to his first night in Shroud. In the restricted section of the Guild headquarters, when he was terrified and exhausted. Behind him stood Marian and Mille. Before him sat Gillis, the Hexaline Knight of Progress and leader of The Cartographers.
“Are your other knights not joining us, my lord?” Marian asked.
Gillis shook his head.
“My squad is still helping out in the hall. They work diligently and efficiently without the need for me to micromanage, and I don’t need them here.”
Caim took that to mean, “I can defend myself if I need to,” but there were other, less aggressive interpretations.
For some reason, Gillis wanted to talk to him. Mille and Marian were present for Caim’s benefit, and he was grateful for that.
“For an Initiate, I heard you did pretty well out there,” Gillis began.
This could be a compliment or an accusation.
“Really? Thank you… I didn’t think a Hexaline Knight could notice someone so insignificant.”
Flattery would probably be his best bet.
“Well, all I personally noticed was that beautiful support magic. You’ll reach the next rank of your seeker hierarchy in no time.”
Caim could almost hear Mille’s inner thoughts as she suppressed the urge to interject. “The last thing this fool needs is that kind of encouragement”, or something to that effect. He must have grinned thinking about this because Gillis misinterpreted and smiled too, satisfied his words had please Caim.
“My comrade nudged me to speak to you about something. Know what that might be?”
Was I the suspect all along? No, that can’t be it. I didn’t really do or say anything strange… that I know of.
“I’m sorry, but I know as much as you. I can tell you everything we talked about before…”
Hexknight Latice, Gillis’s comrade, was the brute that assailed the Guild, starting a ridiculous melee before the true attack began. Surprisingly, the unexpected hostility hurt to remember. It’s not like they were friends, but Latice was friendly at first. To turn and start hurting people like that was shocking.
Should he even be honest when recounting the events?
“Forgive me. I’m going to cast magic on your companions now to make sure they can be trusted with this information. I’ll be cordoning off the room, too.”
“No!” Caim shouted.
Before he knew it, he’d leaped to his feet and extended his arms in an automatic, defensive response. Mentally, he’d already reached out to Scion, prepared to call upon the spell. But he didn’t start the cast.
His head pounded, and a ringing sound filled his ears. It didn’t hurt this time, his head behaving like this, but it made it so he couldn’t hear what the Hexknight was even saying. Actually, most of his senses were dulled at the moment.
Gillis was still sitting and calmly talking. He didn’t move to stop Caim, and the glacial blues of his eyes darkened a touch beneath a furrowed brow. He was distressed. Maybe a little bit of curiosity revealed itself, but it appeared bereft of malice.
“...know you probably don’t believe my intentions are peaceful when I’m also a Hexaline Knight. I’m not sure how much you know about us, but Hexaline Knights of Progress are completely different from those Tendril Cells…”
Caim’s hearing drifted in and out. He blinked rapidly to try and calm himself.
“... I shouldn’t be trying to convince you that he’s not the monster when that’s not even why I’m here. I’m here…”
“Caim,” a woman’s voice called out. “We need to speak. Soon.”
The voice was vivid, but it was only in his head like it was with Scion.
“My ‘associates’ are in a frenzy, and I hear worrisome rumors. When I followed up on a lead, I learned that you need to hear. Until then, I thought I’d warn you that you might be in danger sometime soon. That being said, we need to speak before that happens. I’ll arrange the link, so no need to do anything special. Make sure not to die. That is all.”
The woman sounded familiar, but she was gone before he could put the voice to a name. Someone from his past, maybe? It made him angry.
“Your fault,” he muttered thoughtlessly, automatically clenching his fists.
“I can understand that you feel that way, Caim, but I’ve been trying to explain that it isn’t like that. I’m no threat to you. Well, right now at least. You’re a citizen, and I’m a Hexaline Knight. With that comes certain expectations, but I don’t go around ordering people to submit to me. That’s not what Hexaline Knights are supposed to do. Not without reason, anyway.”
No, that’s not… I didn’t mean. What is going on? What was that voice?! I’m still all jumbled up for some reason.
“The spell isn’t harmful, and it will let me protect you three as well. If we were out in the wilderness, maybe I could focus solely on physical protection, but there are other things to watch out for in the civilized world. No offense to your Guild, ”
Caim felt a hand on his shoulder, and he turned to see the four slender grey digits of his faron friend. The firm touch brought him back to the moment.
“It’s alright, Caim. You were unconscious for a while, but the fight is over. Please stand down.”
The melodic faron intonation was also soothing. She’d been there when he was breaking down on his first night, she was there when he came to his senses in the Guild Hall after the battle, and she was still here now.
“I’m sorry.”
He warily took a seat, trying to quell his heart. Gillis slowly rose.
The Hexknight’s eyes were shining silver. Almost like that of a faron, but this was obviously magic. Silver patterns danced across flesh until it was almost like Gillis had donned a masquerade mask.
The masks were used in drama and fiction, but he still couldn’t exactly comprehend the concept. He remembered themes of deception and liberation, but his favorite fantasy story used masks to convey honesty in a world where truth and certainty were in short supply.
Overly dramatized as the story was, he couldn’t help but fondly recall it as he looked at Gillis’s face. By the time he calmed down, only small flecks of silver remained.
Stories existed here in Shroud, but it was different. Most people couldn’t read, and the books were different. They were made differently, and they occupied a different space in daily life.
Not to mention, books in Shroud are, well… books.
Caim jumped to his feet. The walls of the room were cast in a green glow. The lights vanished, but Caim could still see everyone, and they could still see him. Mille, Marian, and Gillis glowed pale blue. The shine touched his skin for a moment, but it didn’t linger.
“All done. We’re alone in here, and I’ve temporarily sealed off the room to make sure we stay that way. No one will be able to spy on us. The protection spell doesn’t seem to want to stick to you, Caim, but I can protect you. It is no matter. Defensive measures were merely an afterthought in a stable structure such as this.”
Gillis gestured again to the relatively comfortable Guild meeting room chair, shining pale yellow like the rest of the furniture, and Caim sat down. He loosely gripped the grey wood of the armrests, unsettled by the pronounced visual changes.
There was an awkward silence.
“Do we have to be the only ones sitting?” Caim more demanded than asked.
“I’ve discerned your Blightbane Guild employer’s trustworthiness to the best of my ability. If it would make you more comfortable, then, by all means, she may join us at the table.”
Marian thanked Gillis and took a seat. Gillis followed Caim’s eyes to Mille, the Hexknight’s eyes widening in surprise.
“Oh, did you, by chance, mean the faron too?”
“Her name is Mille,” Caim coldly corrected.
“I’ll stand.”
“Please sit,” Caim argued.
“You might not know it, Caim, but life is getting harder out there for the so-called ‘sub-humans’. I, for one, am glad to see another forward-thinker who isn’t afraid to stand up for what’s right. Are you like that too, miss Communications Overseer?”
Turning, Caim watched Marian consider the question carefully.
“Less than I would like,” my lord. “The Guild does not want to put ourselves at odds with the government. Our faron employees are hardworking, though.”
Come to think of it, Mille was the only faron at the Guild Caim had seen yet, and Cartemi only seemed to be seekers.
“Gillis, please. Just as I want Caim to call me by my given name, I wouldn’t want my title to interfere with the rest of our conversation. However, you make a good point. Our jobs bind us, and that is one small thing I envy about you seekers, as much as I find it unappealing to restrict your attention to small spheres of influence on the map.”
“Latice, as he originally unceremoniously introduced himself, said something like that too,” Caim shared.
A look of innocent surprise overcame Gillis’s handsome features, slowly transitioning to uneasiness.
“Did he really… We can’t forgive the mess he made. Well, he’s gone now and will be beyond The Barrier before long. Laws are different beyond the bubble of our nation. Tendril Cells- Sorry, Knights of Expedition, don’t often think as clearly when they have to do their job inside the theocracy’s borders. They aren’t accustomed to being home.”
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It was somewhat sad to hear this, even considering what the man did. That said, Caim couldn’t look around the city at all of Shroud’s Enforcers and excuse their behavior the same way. He’d heard stories and even seen some concerning himself.
This was all information Caim wanted to remember. It might not be relevant for a very long time, but life in Shroud needed more discernible patterns. Once he made sense of more of it, he’d be able to navigate society more naturally.
“Before we go further, please tell me everything that you talked about with Latice. Be as detailed as you can.”
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Subject: Caim Location: Malisacade - The Blightbane Guild
Once Caim finished recalling everything he remembered from his conversation with Latice and the events that followed, Hexknight Gillis’s eyes had a ferocious gleam to them. Coupled with the lasting effects of the defensive magic casting a blue sheen on the man’s skin, it was rather scary.
“Of all things… I did not honestly expect it to be something like a conversation about Infoboards. Most citizens don’t use them, but you at the Guild have the pleasure of enjoying a small portion of their magitech brilliance.”
The infoboards interested Caim, too, but this was not because he thought they were “brilliant”. They stood out against the backdrop of largely primitive city life. Architecture and many magitech creations were also among the list of things that “didn’t belong”.
“I can think of two things I’m willing to share that could have drawn out the latent mechanics in those infoboards for you,” Gillis said, holding up two fingers. “One: your upbringing. Two: you are naturally sensitive to the intentions of others with respect to a small number of key metrics. The latter, call it ‘fortuitous intuition’, is harder to explain, but it is a concept we mages study with great interest as the basis for a connection to the force we call ‘magic’. It’s obvious you’ve never heard the term, which is to be expected.”
Caim looked down at the table, lost in thought. Seated at either side, Millie and Marian passively attended the conversation. Both employees of the Guild used practiced behavior to blend in without betraying even a hint of the uneasiness they no doubt felt.
“Oh, you’re a mage too! I almost forgot,” Gillis laughed. “Most mages wouldn’t be privy to frontline forays in the magical revolution. These are exciting times!”
Using Marian and Mille as props, Gillis began to point to various parts of their bodies, as well as to his own body, to illustrate his points.
“You pay attention to body language, including your own, just a little more than others. Human or otherwise, social class, emotional state, those kinds of things. You don’t know the mage who tuned that Infoboard, yet you linked up with their intentions enough to understand what you saw once you had accidentally activated that latent functionality.”
The knight was animated with excitement, and Caim noticed he was starting to lower his guard. He quickly pressed his tongue against the side of a tooth, using the sharp, albeit mild, pain to bring his attention to bear without Gillis noticing.
I wish I could just talk about fun things without worrying about someone using me or trying to kill me, but this guy is dangerous.
“Back to the first point. Where did you grow up?”
To stall for time to pad his lie, Caim countered with a question.
“You don’t remember from the last time we met in the Tether Transit cabin? Although, I admit I didn’t know how important you were back then.”
A gentle frown appeared on Gillis’s face. He stroked his chin.
“Sad to say, but if we’ve met before, I saw you only as just another citizen in the lot even if I said something to the contrary. It does sound like me, though. I hope you understand that my life is busy and there is a wonderful world to explore and understand.”
This knight definitely wasn’t like the last one. Caim remembered the man striking him as odd before, but he seemed slightly less dangerous this time around. That’s what worried him.
“I do. It could be that I didn’t tell you everything, but I’m from a remote village. I don’t exactly know distances very well, but I can tell you the name. It’s pretty unremarkable.”
He shared the name Mille gave him, but he knew it was a terrible idea if Gillis actually decided to find out if he had ever lived there. Still, Mille told him to use it for a reason.
“Borowood.”
It was a modest village in the middle of nowhere, completely isolated from the civilized world. Mille said she didn’t even know if the place was still standing. That was how little contact the city had with the place.
“Oh? I imagine you didn’t receive a proper education, wherever that is. It explains some things, and I don’t mean that in a bad way.”
Caim silently received the comment, not exactly sure how to evaluate how much danger he was in. Gillis appeared friendly, but he was undeniably powerful and concerningly interested in Caim. Caim knew he needed to find some way to bore the Hexknight.
“As someone coming from a village, what did you first think of Tether Transit?” The knight asked with an eager smile.
“It is impressive.”
He kept his response restrained, unwilling to give in to the bait. He wanted to leave as soon as possible and not in knight custody.
“Right?! And we are still working on improvements to transportation systems like it. That’s one of my jobs, actually. But your reaction was a little disappointing, I must say.”
Caim tried to apologize, but the knight said he wasn’t offended or anything. He only expected a bigger reaction. In truth, Caim was impressed, but he also had other thoughts.
“I’m not satisfied with Tether Transit, nor am I satisfied with other forms of travel all around Shroud. It really wears you out, right?”
This evoked a reaction. Just a subtle dip in Caim’s gaze and Gillis jumped on it.
“We need mages like you to help us, you know. Even if you’re inexperienced or think you lack in talent. Even if you need to be trained, I’d consider it worth the investment. Support magic like yours might blossom into something crucial.”
No. This was not where the conversation should be going. Less attention was what he was aiming for.
“I can’t see myself being of any use to you. Many of the streets here are too narrow, anyway, and the paved paths end before you hit Riventread.”
“Too narrow? Main streets are sufficient to carry goods to major retailers, yes? And wagons are a pain, but linking the cities by rail is more difficult than it sounds.”
Caim nodded.
“No, you meant something else. Please speak your mind.”
“Something like a passenger vehicle, but not a rail cabin and not magitech. I don’t know. I haven’t seen as many mechanical things in the city as I expected to.”
“I don’t follow. This guessing game… Surely my goodwill means something to you, yes?”
“Yes, it does. If you were to change as he did, we’d die.”
Gillis realized the suggestion he’d accidentally put in Caim’s mind.
“No, no. It wasn’t a threat. I’m just impatient sometimes. You seem interesting enough to talk to, and I want to get to the core of the matter. No threats here.”
Maybe he could cut the poor guy some slack. He was immensely powerful, but right now, he looked like a child desperate for a new toy.
“It’s just...Tether Transit is cumbersome to you, right? The elevator that takes you down to the station is slow, and the stations are only in the major districts. Not only is it inefficient, but you also don’t seem to understand it. I guessed that from the way you spoke about it. Did someone outside Shroud create it? Or, is the creator dead with no intellectual successors?”
Astonished, Gillis glanced between Marian and Mille. Marian swallowed hard, but Mille kept up her calm act. Caim bit his lip and prepared for the consequences of running his mouth, but he underestimated the Hexknight’s desire to talk about his work.
“None of this leaves this room, is that understood? I will not divulge specific secrets, but we can speak in vague hypotheticals.”
They all hastily swore on the Hexaline and the Remnant herself to keep whatever he was about to share themselves.
“Imagine, if you will, a single creator and a team supporting them. We can call that creator ‘Founder’, and their team ‘ the supporters’.”
Gillis shifted uncomfortably, going through a great deal of mental strain trying to prepare a palatable explanation with these terms.
“Founder’s magic is outlandish. The cities can be improved with the assistance of the supporters, but not so much so with Tether Transit. The reason Tether Transit is different is that it was a creative project developed primarily by the supporters, borrowing Founder’s power by feeding information to them. Founder is alive and well, but their magic has heavy limitations. Material resources can not always be used so freely, and there is also the intellectual gap. Founder’s comprehension of magic and many other things is limited.”
“I don’t understand. This ‘Founder’ uses their magic, but they don’t understand it?” Caim asked.
He was curious because he was in the same boat, using power he knew nothing about.
“What if that answer was yes? Every mage has a limit, and Founder is merely one person. They do not understand the various metal alloys needed to make their work possible, so the supporters must lecture them in detail. The supporters have their own limitations, too. They do not understand Founder’s magic, even slightly. That is the frustrating impasse. It isn’t solely a matter of life or resources. The rail is inefficient, but it is also immutable. To put it in your own words, the situation is indeed cumbersome and slow.”
More strange magic. Magic is all strange to me, but I see how creating a functioning city like that would be out of the ordinary.
“Magic isn’t everything. When I came here, I believed magic could be the solution to all the world’s problems, mine included. Now, I want to focus more on understanding the mundane. It feels like I’m going backward when magic can do more faster. It also benefits from an underlying understanding.”
At this point, Gillis no longer needed to coax Caim into a conversation. He’d been wrapped up in his own thoughts and lost his filter.
“For short distances and small groups, people walk or infrequently go by carriage. But if you are looking far into the future, investing in understanding more of the mundane mechanics of the world will help you understand the arcane. That’s what I think, at least.”
With a serious expression on his face, Gillis nodded in agreement with Caim’s words.
“Yes. My team has considered this in other ventures, but some of us are… impatient, myself included. I feel that if I don’t solve the problems now, there won’t be a chance to-” Gillis drifted off.
Caim noticed Gillis’s shamefaced grin and felt a connection. He wondered how old Gillis was. Thirty? Thirty-five? His features didn’t look a day older than twenty-five, but his behavior belied experience.
“Speaking personally, I’m impatient too. But, I think living without magic gave me a somewhat useful perspective by the time I had finally acquired it. Maybe not. Blightsources would probably accelerate the development process, but some of them might be dangerous.”
“A seeker would take any opportunity to inject The Blight into a conversation,” Gillis snorted playfully. “Won’t you sign with one of my research laboratories? I could offer you the resources to see you flourish. I’m not a bad person and my personal mission, my work, I mean, reflects that. It is for the good of Shroud.”
He didn’t share what his “personal mission” was, and he didn’t look like he was willing to.
“This is me flourishing, I think. It’s a tempting offer, but unless you have the power to forcibly compel me…”
Please say he doesn’t.
“Limited authority to do so, but I won’t exercise it. Even if I did, the law favors the Guild and you seekers, which makes what he did all the more aggravating. It is going to be a headache to clean things up. I’m just happy no one was seriously injured.”
The knight sighed and tucked away his disappointment before addressing Marian. Caim noticed Marian occasionally glancing over at Mille while she listened.
“As for your Guild, my support won’t end with my absence. I will be establishing a series of workshops here for a group of related projects. An associate of mine will approach the Blightbane Guild with a generously-priced blightsource procurement contract. Additionally, I will cover the repair costs. Consider it an apology from The Shrouded Theocracy to The Blightbane Guild’s Maliscade Branch.”
Gillis looked to Mille for a moment and then back to Marian.
“I’m in the process of transferring a concentrated batch of faron and cartemi contractors here to get the workshops running as soon as the equipment arrives. Most of them are unaccustomed to the work, but we have already helped them adjust to restricting their movements to the isolated environments they’ll be working in.”
What was this?
“Wait just a moment-”
“They won’t disturb the city. I wanted to be the one to tell the Guild first before you were surprised by the change. I’ll make things more clear as the migration approaches. They’ve been gathered from all around Shroud’s Facet Cities, but they will learn to like living here.”
Caim balled his fist and, before he could suppress his anger, glared menacingly at Gillis.
“That sounds like-”
He was interrupted before he could dig the hole any deeper.
“I wasn’t lying when I said life is getting more difficult. These are civilians, and I’m saving them from the frontlines. This way, they have utility to me, and they have utility to Shroud.”
“You paint it how you like. It still sounds like-”
“It isn’t that. It will look like that to the outside world, but it isn’t. It might be a rocky transition for a number of them, but they will eventually adjust to life here.”
The temperature of the room felt like it exploded. It wasn’t a real environmental change. This was just what he should have expected of a Hexaline Knight.
He stood up abruptly, but Gillis and the others remained seated.
“I’ve heard those words before, and I won’t ‘wait and see’ history repeat itself. Your comrade brutalized innocent people back in the hall. That was horrible, but what you’re doing is leagues worse.”
“Caim, I-”
“Shut the fuck up!”
He shouldn’t have said those words. He shouldn’t be standing. He shouldn’t be doing any of this, but he couldn’t stop his body from acting.
“Caim, no!” Mille yelled.
Red light bled through the faron’s conduits, and she jumped to her feet, reaching out. Caim pushed her away and held out his hand.
Scion’s body began to form in the air, shimmering silver metal forming unfurling glittering blue metal wings.
Everything in the small meeting room was still bathed in the glow of Gillis’s spell. Caim intended to test the limits of the knight's so-called protection.