From there I led my Lady Mari through the school. The only thing she said to me was that Archmage Sigmund was a lich and to not wander off. That seemed like good advice since every hallway looked the exact same but the names on the doors kept changing even when we took eight right turns in a row. Great shrinking and spacial fuckery. How is she navigating?

After turning in random directions for ten minutes she stopped in front of a door that looked just like all the others. She still didn’t speak to me, just opened the door and waited for me to go through.

I had prepared myself for Sigmund’s appearance as best I knew how. I had steeled myself against a possibly grisly sight, but nothing could have prepared me for the sight I was greeted with when the door swung open to reveal a tall, narrow frame, cloaked in an ill-fitting tweed jacket, elbows perched on a long, sleek mahogany desk, fingers folded beneath a skeletal chin. It wasn’t unheard of for skeletal archmages to wear some kind of clothing, but almost all of them stuck to the very “doom and gloom” type stuff- mostly long black cloaks or hooded robes. This one looked almost comical in his professor-like jacket hanging loose around his bony shoulders, like a cheap movie prop. He also, bizarrely, had tied a bow-tie around his skeletal neck, opting to tighten it all the way so that it fit snugly around his cervical bones, further exaggerating the ridiculousness of the large jacket. His hand reached up to straighten the tie, which I now saw was covered in tiny ducks.

“Well aren’t you a stealthy one,” he said, not bothering to look up from the stack of papers that he was frantically scribbling across in red ink. “Although, to be fair,, the rest of us have got to actually touch the floor”. He shuffled his papers together and turned his eyes, or eye-sockets, I suppose, toward me for the first time. “My name is Sigmund. Who are you and where’s the rest?” he said as he stood from his desk, arm out-streatched. The bow tie was now old news, as it had just come to my attention that he was not wearing the matching tweed slacks, but rather a tight pair of boxer-briefs.

This seems both confusingly inappropriate and unnecessarily modest. Also, were those Calvin Klien? How in Hells did he get Calvin Klien in this world? The import taxes alone must have been astronomical. Okay, focus. They said he was watching me arive and had called me here specifically. This has got to be some kind of ruse to get me on the back foot.

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I could feel a strange prickling in the back of my head and had the uncomfortable feeling, all of the sudden, that someone was poking around inside of my mind. As I had pondered luxury imports and ducky bow ties, Sigmund had apparently been worming his way into my head and helping himself to my thoughts. You would think that a skeletal archmage would use the whole, giant magic skeleton thing to disarm people and slip past their defenses; Sigmund had gone an entirely different direction, and it was admittedly hard to combat.

“Oopsies” he whispered, in a sing-songy voice. “Somebody got too invested in Ole Siggy’s undies to properly guard their head. You should really be careful, seeing as that’s all you’ve got left”. His skeletal face curved into a very unnerving smile and he looked as though he may clap his bony hands together in glee.

Aww, fuck.

“Aww, fuck, indeed, old chap. Had I the mind to I could have put an end to your whole ridiculous existence just then. Lucky for you, that doesn’t really work in my best interest at the moment. In fact, I think you may be just what I needed”. Sigmund squared his hands, mimicking a director sizing up a shot. “Ahh, yes, perfect”.

He sat back behind his desk and signaled me closer, bony finger beckoning, voice lowering to a hush. “How would you like to be part of a little business venture, my fine, floating friend?” The sudden drop in his voice had made me nervous- what could this all-powerful being possibly think I was good for? Then, in possibly the strangest twist of entire unlikely meeting, he pulled out an enormous suitcase and popped open the locks to reveal to me a jumble of bottles with labels such as: “Hair-RY-Gro!” ,“Bone Brytener!”, and “Docter Iggenious’ All-Naturel Wart Removre!”.

“This is where the real money is,” Sigmund calmly explained, straightening bottles and organizing vials. “And you, my unfortunate fellow, would make the perfect before photo for my new advertisements!” He gestured to my obvious lack of, well, everything. “I can see it now: you, a lost little unfortunate, and wham, bam” he slammed the briefcase shut and looked at me again, his unnerving smile stretched wide across his face “Two drops of ReGro Pro and you’ve got me! A beautiful specimen if I do say so myself” he chirped as he gestured toward his awkward, lanky frame. “What do you say, partner? Where’s your head at?”

Oh crap, he’s totally insane.