Jeddard pored over paper after paper, dozens of calculations running in his head and on various tools, everything from an abacque to a star map at his disposal. When he finally stopped he stepped back, seeing the dozens of scrolls and papers hanging around the room, and he had his answer.
He had no idea what the answer was.
He blew out a long breath through his lips before he sat at the wide desk he was given for this task. It had been over a month since the High Queen assigned him these projects, and while he made some headway, the simple fact was he would have to invent a whole new series of mathematics and runesmithing techniques to even breach the surface of what she wanted. Which thus begged the question: who could get who could help him? Vitala was a master, of course, but as High Queen she had to spend her time ruling. Dallia was brilliant, but too young to have a full grasp of what he needed. He could bring in some talent and teachers from the Academy, maybe reach out to other countries and see if they’d be available for an exchange of knowledge? That was assuming the Queen loosened some of the secrecy surrounding all this...
Jeddard grabbed a quill, fiddling with it as he tried to come up with a plan. Who could help design an equation that- wait a minute.
“...What if I need someone not from this country? Or world?” He leaned back, tossing the quill away. Hazard... Hazard knew a bunch of strange equations and weird, esoteric knowledge. He might know only the basics of magic, but he learned those basics from Jeddard himself! Jeddard grinned wide and ran for the door, throwing it open to speak to one of the Royal Guards. “Quickly! Go fetch Hazard!”
He shut the door... then opened it again, “And a pitcher of water!
The door closed again, and he opened it. Again. “And some sausages!”
Jeddard set about organizing his papers across tables and piles along with his tools, and by the time he was done the door opened to reveal Hazard carrying a tray with several cups, a pitcher, and a link of sausages. The younger boy looked about the room in surprise, “I... take it this where you’ve been for the past month?”
“Hazard! Come, come.” Jeddard waved him and Hazard set the tray on a table, looking back at him.
“Jed, have you been sleeping?”
“Of course!”
“...Okay, let me rephrase that: have you been sleeping every night-”
“Innovation is ahead of us!” Jeddard pointed up, then to the stacks of papers. “I have need of your brilliant mind!”
“I’m not sure what I could possibly help with if it stumped you.”
“It’s just a bit of mathematics... and rune knowledge, and science, and engineering-” Jeddard saw the growing look of concern on Hazard’s face and grabbed a paper, “Hazard, believe me, I wouldn’t be asking you if it wasn’t important.”
“Jed, I don’t even know what’s happening; you just vanished one day.”
Jeddard thought about it, “...Huh. My apologies, I guess in the excitement I forgot to tell you all: High Queen Vitala has tasked me with several top-secret projects!”
“...Wait should you be telling me-”
“And because I’m stumped, I’ve turned to you!” Jeddard shoved the paper towards Hazard, the boy gingerly taking it. “I’m sure, sitting somewhere in that noggin of yours, is the answer to my problems!”
“Let’s start with crawling before we run, Jed. What am I looking at here?”
“So: Remera’s Synchronicity dictates that each crystal has a magical “hum” to it, yes? Much like our Resonance allows our magic to hum in tune with crystals, it’s possible to make crystals hum in tune with each other, however that is rarely ever possible naturally.”
“Right, you told me about this, to do it you usually need to carve runes on crystals and place them close together.” Hazard nodded.
“Exactly! That sort of reaction causes harmony between the crystals and a new reaction is born! However, that relies heavily on the energy of the crystals themselves to fuel the reaction. What we need is something to power an array of such crystals.”
“I mean the obvious solution seems like adding another crystal in to charge it all.” Hazard pointed out, but Jeddard shook his head.
“That would cause interference in the crystals’ harmony.”
Hazard hummed, and Jeddard could see the gears turning in his head as he thought. “Could you... channel the energy of the other crystal towards the array? Using a wire or something?”
“A wire... wait, wait hold on. Like the batteries you told me about? The little devices that powered machinery?”
“Right, like you get some magic-conductive metal and wire it from afar to the other crystals.” Jeddard grabbed a piece of paper and quickly began sketching a design out.
“Yes, yes, metals are difficult to find with high enough rates of transfer but if we add small discs to the wires with the right runes, we can...” Jeddard’s monologue turned mental as he quickly sketched out a diagram for a potential array device, then another, and another before he smiled brightly and scooped Hazard up in a hug. “I knew it! I knew bringing you here would solve my stump!”
“BACK, BACK!”
“Oops sorry.” Jeddard set Hazard back down, the boy rubbing his back with a wince.
“I’m sure you would’ve gotten it eventually, whatever it is.”
This tale has been pilfered from Royal Road. If found on Amazon, kindly file a report.
“Maybe, but you’ve given me a head start and so many brilliant ideas!” Jeddard clapped, then grabbed another paper. “How about this? A multi-crystal disk array, but we need-”
So it went that Jeddard introduced each idea and project the High Queen wanted to Hazard. The boy didn’t always have a solution but just having someone to run ideas through improved Jeddard’s progress by leaps and bounds. It felt like hours of talk, and Jeddard could tell that Hazard was just as curious, though not as excited, about all these projects as he was. If only he knew just what Vitala wanted all this for; maybe that was the lynchpin to figuring out what the projects were missing? Maybe...
...maybe he could shut his eyes for a few minutes.
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Hazard watched in confusion as Jeddard slowly sunk forward at his desk, cheek pressed against a freshly inked piece of paper. There was the briefest moment of concern as Jeddard’s eyes shut, but it was washed away when he began snoring, and Hazard shook his head as he set about tidying up the other papers and tools. He was glad Jeddard had a reason to vanish, but he knew how the elder could get lost in his science, he’d have to tell the guards to check in on Jeddard.
...Although, now that he thought about it, that could just as easily bite Hazard in the ass. The guards were practically robots, disciplined to the point of being almost entirely unquestioning. Sure, they brought him to Jeddard straight away, but considering these were all some super-secret projects, were they actually allowed to do that? If this was all work for-
There was the sound of rushing wind and Hazard turned to see the High Queen quickly stepping through a portal, quickly glancing around before she looked down and locked onto him. Before he could say anything she grabbed his wrist and dragged him through the portal into her study, using her free hand to grab his shoulder, “You saw nothing.”
“I-”
“You saw nothing, you heard nothing, you know nothing.”
“Your Hi-”
“What were you even doing there?”
“Jeddard asked me for help.” He couldn’t stop the words from flowing out of him, shrinking in her grip. He could see her Resonance flare and he feared he was about to be sent to the floor again when she let go of him and began to pace the length of the room. Eventually she dragged her hand down her face and opened the portal again, dragging him back through, letting go to move up to Jeddard and tug one of his spikes of hair and yank him upright.
“Nyeh!? Oh, hell Your-”
The Queen let go, pointing to Hazard, “Explain. Now.”
“Oh, Hazard has been helping me with my research for today! We’ve actually made great progress in-”
Magic sealed his lips, and the Queen pressed her hand to her face. Her Resonance flared again but he could see her trying to keep it steady. Didn’t stop Hazard from shrinking under her gaze when she turned to glare at him, his hands raised up. “I heard no evil, speak no evil, see no evil.”
“Is that true? I cannot help but notice my trust in assigning Lord Jeveraux this task has been compromised already.” She loomed over Hazard and he swallowed nervously.
“Your Highness, I really have no idea what I have even been asked to help with.”
Jeddard tried to speak through the magic sealing his mouth, and Vitala glared at him silently for a few seconds before she waved her hand and the magic disappeared. “It’s true! I’ve mostly just asked Hazard about the technology of his homeland to come up with solutions! Well, that, and I don’t even know what I’m making myself! Hard to spill royal secrets when the secrets are secret even to me.”
The glare remained and Vitala’s face curled. She was silent again for a moment, “And you claim his help has advanced the project?”
“I told you he was brilliant! Sure, not everything could help right away, but it would’ve taken me months to come up with these solutions and I’ll find a use for his other theories.”
Vitala’s hands clenched and unclenched before she pointed to Jeddard, “When I say “complete secrecy,” it means “complete secrecy!”” She turned and pointed to Hazard. “If at any point I find out what you have seen here has reached anyone but us three, I will personally rip out the memories of what you saw here.”
Hazard quickly, silently nodded, and the High Queen stormed out of the room, slamming the door behind her. The two stared at the door in the echo of the slam, and without turning Hazard spoke up, “Jed?”
“Yes?”
“What in God’s name did you rope me into?”
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Vitala was rarely so furious she forgets to teleport, though if any were to ask the walk to her study was to cool her head. She practically threw the door open, the Steward looking shocked. “Your High-”
“Get out.” Her tone brooked no argument from the Steward who gathered several papers and scrambled out the door, pulling it shut behind him. She was half-tempted to start tossing things around the room but instead she moved to a bookshelf, pulling on one of its books and the shelf slide to the side to reveal a dark shaft leading upwards. She stepped in, pulling the shelf back in front of the shaft, and she began to ascend upwards using her magic. She came out to an empty room lit by a single light crystal, walked into the center... and screamed. All her frustrations were let out in a long scream that echoed throughout the room, and when the last echo died she took a deep breath, running her hands back to smooth out her hair.
“It is fine.” Vitala smoothed out her clothes. “This is fine. It is fine that a literal child has been told about projects meant only for the eyes of a select few.”
The rational part of her understood that likely the boy wasn’t going to suddenly out the projects or even knew what the experiments were for, but the irrational part of her, the one that kept her on edge for danger, reminded her how quickly a secret could be lost and how devastating the effects could be once it was out in the world. Maybe she should just wipe the memories of the two...
...which might make the boy a mindless husk.
Vitala rubbed at her temples. That sort of magic wasn’t a perfect science, and a drooling husk would be entirely too noticeable. There was also the fact she sunk too much of her energy into keeping the children unaware of their uncle’s letters, so undoing all that effort would be a waste. She took a breath and moved back to the secret shaft, making sure no one was waiting in her study before she returned to the study, glancing out the window to the sunny skies. If this were a fairy tale, this would be where the skies turned dark and cloudy to tell her things were going to go poorly, but the bright skies and chirping birds told her she would have to navigate this problem on her own like she always did.
“...Or... perhaps...” Vitala hummed and left her study, moving through the spire down towards the temple, thankfully empty. The last time she had been here was the Rite of Forebears, before that... truth be told, she couldn’t remember when she visited before then. She reached out with her power, the entrances to the Temple sealing, and she took a seat at a pew nearest to the dais. She stared in silence at the carving of Saintess Alessa for a few minutes, feeling frankly ridiculous for coming here, but eventually she spoke. “By the Saintess who guides...”
Vitala trailed off, and she huffed. “You know what? No.” She leaned forward in the seat. “I will not sit here and offer obeisance. I think we both know it’d be disingenuous given who I am, if you’re even listening. If you are, then hopefully you care more about protecting your people than I believe you do. Everyone outside our borders conpires against us, and we cannot afford any slips. Let Chevalluna’s lips be still however you deem fit with whatever dreams or visions you can come up with. Or, if I could get a clear answer for once, that would be more of a help.”
The response she received was, of course, silence, and she sighed through her nose as she stood. As part of the tradition, she coalesced magic into her hand and let it drift to the carving of the Saintess, turning as it disappeared into crystal and returning the entrances to normal. She ruminated on how ridiculous the whole process was and that, if anything, the Saintess or Light would probably smite her instead, but... if there was a chance, however little, to prevent a disaster with how things were progressing?
Then she had to take it.