Yew’s office was in the tallest of the towers Felix had seen on the way in. It was even taller than it looked, or it felt that way after he had been climbing the spiral staircase for a quarter of an hour. By then, Janus’s injuries were starting to catch up with him, and they both were out of breath when they reached the door at the top.
“You can join that Chretien guy for dinner if you want,” Felix said between gasps of air as he remembered the invitation the well-dressed singer had given them before leaving them to their climb. “But once we’re done here, I’m taking the first loaf of bread I can find and going back to that bed. I don’t even know how I’m still standing at this point.”
Felix paused for a moment to reflect on the absurdity of everything that had happened that day, but forced himself to stop. Just accept all the madness, it will make everything easier.
“Oh, that reminds me, now that I can do magic or whatever it is, I need to pay back those bastards who…”
“I wouldn’t plan on that.”
The voice was plainly the one they had heard in the forest, but it sounded as though he was standing right next to them instead of behind the door.
“Is that you…um, Master Yew?” Janus asked the air.
“I’m right ahead, please come in.”
When they reached the door, Felix held out his hand for the latch, but it creaked open on its own.
Does he ever stop with the tricks?
Yew’s office was a circular room only ten or twelve paces across either way with two short bookshelves flanking a rectangular table with neatly-carved legs. The table was stacked with books, parchments, quills, ink, and a stack of dirty plates in one corner. There in a rather plush-looking cushioned chair sat the man Felix had only seen as an outline in shimmering dusk called Yew. His clay-colored hair, matted and oily, poked out from under a felt cap that even now was drawn down low enough to hide his eyes. He wore a strange black-colored jacket, or maybe it was a robe, tied with a sash over a gray smock. He was smiling a sort of wry smile, but Felix didn’t trust it, not when he couldn't see the man's eyes.
“Have a seat, please,” Yew said, and two wooden chairs that were in the corners jumped in front of his desk as if kicked by fairies. Felix no longer had the energy to question the impossible occurrences around him, but Janus was wide-eyed even now.
“How did you do that?” he asked. “Really, could you just tell us normally, without any riddles? Not that I dislike riddles…”
Ignoring Janus, Yew whispered unintelligibly, as though telling a secret to the air itself. A quill on his desk floated into the air and began moving in curving patterns. That was when Felix noticed it hanging in the light coming through the one window in the office—dust. Whichever way the quill moved, hundreds of tiny motes that were normally invisible moved with it.
Felix’s eyes narrowed. “Dust. You can make dust move how you want it. That’s how you appeared in the forest.”
“Dust?” said Janus. “Isn't he just enchanting the quill?”
Yew seemed to have almost forgotten them and was now attempting to dip the quill in an inkhorn as if he meant to write a letter with it.
“If he can move it how he likes, maybe he can give it as much power as he needs,” said Felix, his eyes moving with the flow of the dust. “Moving it at all is already breaking the rules.”
“There is a limit, of course,” Yew chimed in. “I can only move the chairs because they’re right here next to me. At a distance, I can only move the air.” The quill landed on his desk and he looked at them directly now.
“Like making the sound of a voice,” said Felix. He had no idea how the sound of a human voice came out of his throat, so maybe it could be done with dust.
“It works the other way too. I’ve been listening in to the more interesting bits of your chatter since you came to the gravestone. But I’m sure a smart kid like you must have known something was off when a gravestone that was out-of-doors was covered in dust, especially after it rained just last night.”
"Of course,” Felix lied. “But I still don’t know what this magic or Crafting stuff is all about. That’s why I’m here. He’s got business with you as well.”
“Oh, right, the ring!” said Janus.
“If you want to know how Crafting works, you should sit down first. It’s quite a catalogue of ships1 after all.”
They both sat down. Felix found the chair almost too comfortable, seeing as he was still fighting exhaustion and didn’t want to fall asleep mid-explanation.
“This shall be a very basic introduction to Crafting, but it’s still fairly important. So, look smart!” Yew opened up a book on the side of his desk, flipped to a page, and held it up to them. Here they saw four elaborate diagrams of the human body, each beside a symbol that Felix didn't recognize.
“There are some people in the world called Crafters, and there are four kinds. There are the Bards—that’s us—the Alchemists, the Magi, and the Drycrafters. Each kind of Crafter can do something that couldn’t otherwise be done with one of the elements, for reasons I won’t get into now. Suffice it to say, Crafters are just born that way.
We, the Bards, can use the Air. Through words and music, we can convey a ‘message’ from our will—the technical term is numen, but this is a basic introduction—that can move the will of other things. Now a Singer can do the same thing in a sense. The most common is using song to move the will of the opposite sex. But even that only works sometimes, and only to a certain degree. But a Bard can sing to the very earth and move its will to do, well, this sort of thing.”
Yew moved his fingers and the dust under his control began to sparkle like it had in the woods. He made it take on the shape of various birds and flowers and even a sword that swung down as if to chop the table in half before disappearing.
“How can you send a ‘message’ to a thing?” Felix asked skeptically.
“Like I said: basic introduction. Trust me, you can. I’m doing it now, aren’t I?”
“I can’t argue with that, I suppose. But what do the others do? Like Alchemists? Other than burning people’s hands, I mean.”
“Oh, did you—“
“No, it was me,” said Janus holding up his bandaged hand. “I’m okay though. Mostly.”
“Back to Alchemists,” said Felix
“What about them?” Yew answered
You might be reading a stolen copy. Visit Royal Road for the authentic version.
“What do they do?”
“Potions.”
“That’s it?”
“I’m sure they do a lot of other things, but it’s not important now. You’re not an Alchemist.”
“What about Magi?”
“Not important.”
“Drycrafters?"
“Not important.”
Felix groaned. “Right, then what is important? If you won’t tell me about anything else, what do you do here?”
“Ah, that. This is an arm of the Bards’ Guild called the Song-Catchers. The official name is something Greek, but that’s what we call ourselves. And we, well, catch song in written form. We even have a form of notation for writing down music. We ‘catch’ other kinds of knowledge too, when we have the time, but we try to focus on preserving song and poetry. You wouldn’t believe how much of the stuff from the old times has just vanished, or how much song is never even written down. So we send groups all over to track down singers and write down their songs, or find rare manuscripts that were thought to be lost, and we gather them all in our collection. That way, the poets and singers of the future will have the full inheritance of their forefathers. And foremothers. Maybe…precursors? Well, you know what I mean.”
“Oh, do you like, write commentaries on poems? Janus asked. “I’ve read stuff like that.”
“Some may be into that sort of thing, but we are out to safeguard the stuff, not interpret it. People who don’t know us think we are scholars, but we’re not. We’re more like proactive librarians.”
“Okay, supposing I buy that,” said Felix. “Why design such a dangerous test to get in? And why do you need so many weapons?”
“We need people who can respond to dangerous situations on their feet. It’s also entertaining to watch. You weren’t in any real danger of course, but people can respond to threats in amusing ways. Actually, I should congratulate you, since you were entertaining and you passed, which usually doesn’t happen. So hey, good for you.”
“Gee, thanks,” Felix replied.
“As for the weapons, there are a few reasons. The first is that the world is a dangerous place, and we send people all over the world. Running into trouble wouldn’t be a rare thing for a caravan traveling to Baghdad from here, so it’s no surprise it happens to us. If anything, it’s even worse for us since there are plenty of places that don’t like poets as a rule.”
“I’ve never seen a stockpile of swords in a merchants' guild.”
“They can afford to hire mercenaries to act as guards, but not us. Well, maybe we could, but our money is better spent elsewhere. So our members have to be able to fight on their own. But yes, normal danger is not the main reason. There are times when people are less than willing to hand over what we’re looking for. The monasteries are usually cooperative, but there are lords and other wealthy parties who hoard books like they hoard gold. For people like these, knowing they have the only copy of a great work makes them all the more keen to make sure no one sees it, even if they don’t care enough to read it themselves.”
“So, you break into their houses and steal them?” Felix asked.
“We generally, let’s say, ‘borrow’ the books, make a copy, and then return them before they are missed.”
Felix scratched his head. “This all seems very sketchy.”
“I don’t know,” said Janus. “It sounds like fun to me. Sneaking into places with magic and taking their books when they’re not looking. You use your magic to do it, right?”
“It’s ‘Crafting’, but yes, we wouldn’t be able to do it without our abilities. There are songs that can put people to sleep, songs that create darkness—"
“There are songs that can hurt people too, I imagine,” Felix interjected.
“Yes, there are songs that are used for attack. I believe the young man you met on your way here uses a song like that.”
“You mean Chretien?” Janus asked. “He seemed like a weakling. Can he really fight?”
Felix stared at Janus with wide eyes. Where had that come from? He had only known the other boy for a day, but that was more than enough to tell how completely out of character that sounded.
Instinctively, Felix imitated a technique of his eldest sister and jabbed Janus in the ribs.
“Ow! What was that for?”
“You know what that was…”
“Anyway,” Yew interjected. “Yes, Chretien’s song is used mostly to attack. His is probably one of the most powerful songs we have. He can, like myself, control an object that meets certain conditions—‘tears shed for love'."
“How does that work?” Janus asked.
“Consider that I can move objects with just the dust, which is almost totally insubstantial. Chretien can move something much more solid. Well, figuratively speaking, since it’s a liquid. With a face like that, he never lacks ‘tears shed for love”, and he can do all sorts of things with them.”
“Could he force them around someone’s head, and, like, drown them in tears?” Janus asked, his eyes wide.
“He might. You’ll have to ask him about it.”
Felix tried to collect all the information in his mind and process it. Since he had entered the fortress, he had been weighing the dangers of staying in an organization where he would inevitably have to use one of those swords himself, against the almost equally dangerous prospect of trying to return home. If only he hadn’t stolen the songs from those singers and could have joined the Guild as a normal member. Then, something occurred to him.
“Wait, so, you said you have to be a ‘special’ person to be able to do Crafting. Does that mean we’re—“
“You are. Your friend is another story.”
“I’m not?” Janus pouted. “That’s disappointing.”
“It is more that we don’t know what you are. From listening to your conversations and observing your combat with Bruno and Liste, it's obvious there’s something unique about you.”
“Wait,” said Felix. “But how did you know I could do this Crafting stuff? Do you just give the test to anyone who touches the gravestone?”
“Ah, that…” Yew said. “Let’s say, the gravestone itself is enchanted, but not by us so I don't know much about how it works. And it only shows the message if a true Bard touches it. Yeah, let’s go with that.”
“Why does it sound like you're making this up as you go?”
Yew shrugged. “I think I sound perfectly convincing. The problem must be with you.”
Felix decided to let it drop for now. There was only so much he was going to get out of this guy today.
“Janus, you said you can perfectly remember anything you’ve read, even once?” Yew asked.
“I sure can!” he said, almost puffing his chest out
“Well then, Bard or not, we’re going to take advantage of that, if you’re up to it. Do you have any Greek, classical or modern?
“Not really. Just a little,” Janus answered, looking embarrassed.
“We can have Martin teach you. Every lad should have a solid base in Greek, and it should only take a few weeks to get you where you need to be."
“Oh man, really?” Janus mewed with pleasure.
“I want someone to teach me how to read,” Felix said brusquely. “I—,” he suddenly felt more sheepish, but forced himself to go on, “I’ll only join up with this group, on that condition."
Yew smirked. “We’ll be happy to get someone to teach you—it is, in fact, a rather common request. But, while I wish I could be kinder about this, Felix, if you think that you can just walk away from our Barracks if you don’t like our terms, you are mistaken.”
Felix went pale.
“We’re not locking you up or anything, but now that we know you’re a Bard and so do you, we have to at least make sure that you’re the kind of person we can risk letting back out into the world. I saw you imitate Madina’s Misfortune Song, and while it wasn’t perfect, you could still cause quite a bit of trouble if you chose to. And as I recall, causing trouble with that song was one of the first things you were planning on doing.”
“B-but anyone can cause trouble! That’s no reason to—“
“Suppose there were two armies with equally matched strength,” said Yew, ignoring his protests. For the first time since they entered his office, his voice was grave. “One of the generals learned of your power and agreed to pay you to play that song where the other army could hear it. I can assure you, the army who heard that song would be the loser. That’s the kind of power we have. Power that can change the fate of nations. There was a time,”
Yew began to look listless. “There was a time when nearly all Bards, and other Crafters, didn’t use their abilities responsibly. Even now, a lot of them don’t. That’s another reason why we have weapons.”
“You go after other Bards?” asked Felix.
“If we have to, yes. Now, I personally think you’re a good kid deep down, but I’m the leader of the Song-Catchers and I need to be sure. But I am hoping you will join us willingly, and help preserve the song of this world.”
Yew extended his hand with a smile that almost—almost—seemed sincere.
“We’ll be fed, then?”
“Of course, of course.”
“And paid?”
“Eventually, yes.”
“Fine then,” Felix said, taking Yew’s hand. “It’s not like I have much of a choice.”