Verdan Blacke, Wizard of the Grym Imperium, looked at the papers strewn across his desk and sighed as he rubbed at tired eyes.

He had slept away what seemed to have been thousands of years in his sealed cave. It had been necessary at the time; he had been losing his mind to Gloria’s death curse.

She had been an incredibly powerful Hex Witch, and without the loophole he’d been able to find in the curse, he would have lost his mind to the ever increasing pain.

The memory of that pain was dull now, muted by time and experience, but Verdan could still taste the desperation of those dark days. His teacher had toiled tirelessly alongside him, first to try and find a way to remove the curse, and then to develop the spell needed to put him in stasis.

Verdan picked up the glass of deep amber alcohol that sat next to him and sipped it contemplatively. It had taken him time to deal with everything he’d lost coming to this new time, this new place.

Now, though, things had changed.

Verdan’s biggest question, the thing he’d wrestled with since the moment he realised that Wizardry was dead in the modern world, was what to bring back.

Verdan doubted any single Wizard had had such a golden opportunity to shape the understanding of an entire branch of magic.

It was terrifying and exhilarating in equal measure, and he’d found his own path for how to balance those two parts.

The enchanting machine for the crossbow bolts, taking Dirk on as an apprentice, creating the device for testing people for their Sorcery aptitude. Even creating a pseudo-enchantment for Kai’s spear.

Verdan had cast each of those things out into the water, watching the ripples from them spread. This very trip to the north, in fact, had begun when Sebastian had heard about Verdan’s enchanted weaponry.

Verdan shuddered to think what would have happened without his intervention here, and he could hardly regret that it had happened.

The diagrams on the sheets before him, however, were so far beyond that it was scarcely credible.

Verdan had thought that he had come from the apex of Wizardry, from the heights of power, but he was wrong.

Whatever society had designed and created both the Automaton that he’d fought and the facility it was stored in were leagues past the Grym Imperium.

Verdan had been happy in his position of knowledge, of using that deeper understanding to outwit and overpower his foes.

This time, though, he was experiencing the other side of that knowledge gap.

There was nothing left in the facility except what the Kranjir traitors and their allies had been using and the body of the Automaton.

That meant that Verdan was trying to understand more about that wondrous, yet particularly complex, piece of arcane construction without anything more than what he brought with him and what he could see from its damaged remains.

So far, he’d come to several conclusions.

Firstly, the lamp that he’d been given back in Hobson’s Point by Macannan, the Steel Custodian Sorcerer, used the same style of enchantment as the Automaton, the facility he’d found in the ruined tower and the weapons of the Kranjir Chosen.

The Automaton was carved with countless sigils, some of which were small and in groups, while others seemed to be a single shape that would have covered a much larger section.

All of these sigils were inside the construct, and it was only from the battle damage it had sustained that Verdan had access to any of them.

In return for teaching Ciaran and Maeve the basics of making a gathering spiral, Verdan had been able to examine their weapons, making note of the way they were inscribed with the different sigils.

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The Kranjir made an effort to conceal these arcane marks with designs and decorations, but the little that Verdan could make out was exactly the same in style as the other examples he’d found.

Sipping his drink and getting up to pace the room, Verdan found himself wishing he knew more about enchantments. What he had here was an entirely different way of creating them, and seemingly on a much larger scale.

The idea of mass-produced enchantments seemed impossible, but that was what Verdan was seeing.

What sort of society would have such magical power at its fingertips, and what would it look like?

The Grym Imperium had been home to countless Wizards of the three citizen races, but magic had remained a tool for them directly, not something which could be spread out amongst those without the capability of Wizardry.

Perhaps in some ways, Verdan had a glimpse of that life with how he’d been using his Aether constructs. Perhaps he was actually following the same road that his forebears had, which had eventually led to this new language of sigils.

Verdan stopped and put his glass down, shaking his head slightly as he moved over to the window.

Thane Donal Macstan of Clan Thrain had given Verdan this house within the Thrain Hold, the administrative centre of both the city and the Clan. It was Verdan’s for as long as he was staying here, which wouldn’t be much longer.

The fight with the Gormagyr, the Automaton and the strange magic user had been four days ago, and it was time that Verdan accepted he would make no further progress in the short term.

What he was dealing with was just too far removed from what he was used to, and from his own magic, for him to be able to pick it up quickly.

Looking out the window at the towering peak of the Bristaen, Verdan decided that it was time to start back to Hobson’s Point. He’d put it off long enough as it was.

Of course, it wasn’t quite that easy, and he hated the idea of leaving the Automaton remains behind, but the time had come.

A soft knock at the door drew Verdan’s attention as it opened and Barb stepped in. “What is it, Barb?”

“There’s a messenger for you from Keeper Macstan, shall I show him in?”

“Please do,” Verdan said, moving back to his desk and gathering the loose paper that was strewn across it. He wasn’t sure what Sebastian wanted, but this might be a good excuse for him to speak with the Keeper and start the process of leaving the city.

Barb opened the door wider and a young Kranjir girl came in and nodded respectfully to Verdan.

Since his part in ousting the traitors within the Clan, Verdan had found himself well respected by the average person within the Clan. They still seemed to find his lack of caelin, the ritual scars that all Kranjir bore, strange, but it was nice to be appreciated.

“Wizard Blacke, Keeper Macstan invites you to dinner this evening. Wizard Mhorgain has been invited as well, as has Sorcerer Kai and Witches Gwen and Hedda. I’ve been asked to wait for your response.”

“Please tell the Keeper that I will be happy to attend,” Verdan said, not bothering to ask about when or where this dinner would be. He had little doubt that someone would arrive to escort him when the time came.

“Thank you,” the young girl said, nodding to Verdan once more before leaving the room at a quick pace.

“Anything you need from me?” Barb asked with a raised brow.

“No, but spread the word informally that we’ll be heading home in the next couple of days if all goes well. I’ll be discussing matters with the Keeper this evening.”

Barb nodded and left the room, closing the door behind her.

Verdan finished his drink and made sure his notes were secured in the desk before casting a ward on it that would alert him if it was disturbed.

That done, he got to his feet and grabbed his staff before heading downstairs, Barb falling in step behind him as he went.

Verdan didn’t really need any protection in the heart of a Kranjir city, especially not this one, but he had long since given up on arguing with any of his protectors.

Well, he also paid Barb to do just this, but he liked to think that they were past such a simple transactional relationship. Likewise with the rest of the guards back at Hobson’s Point.

Verdan’s mind drifted to Tim and Tom, and he wondered how the two brothers were getting along. Tim had been on a trip with Sylvie to meet with the Airta last he knew.

Considering that their relationship seemed to be borderline taboo for the other Airta, Verdan hoped that the trip had been a bit less eventful than his own.

Magnus Macstan, one of Verdan’s Kranjir allies and self-assigned retainer, was downstairs doing some gentle stretching exercises with his arm when they went past, but he quickly grabbed his axe and joined Barb at Verdan’s heels.

Magnus had suffered a nasty arm injury in the battle with the Darjee, and then again with the Automaton.

In fact, Verdan was pretty sure that Magnus had suffered a bad injury in every battle they’d been in together. If it weren’t for Verdan’s healing spells, Magnus would either be dead or missing a few limbs.

In some ways, Magnus seemed to be treating his relationship to Verdan as that of a Thearn to a Chosen.

Chosen were the heroes of the Clans, wielders of the ancestral weapons and seemingly all instinctual users of Aether. The Thearns were volunteers who served to assist individual Chosen, giving each Clan a number of small warbands centred around a single strong individual.

Verdan had no real issue with Magnus joining them, he’d proved his worth many times over. The problem was the precedent he was setting by doing so.

On his own, it was no issue, but combined with the situation of Verdan’s apprentice, it was a thumb in the eye of some of the more stubborn Kranjir.

Speaking of which, it was time to check in on Dirk and his growing contingent of Clan Mhorgain fighters.