It wasn’t easy to maintain the Calm while trying to think of ways to beat up your best friend. Al, therefore, did his best not to think about it.

He went through four more sessions of tricks and charlatanry, plying his trade behind the smoke and mirrors his profession required. While his last client paid, Al reset his office and locked it. He calmly walked back to the break room, looking around for Aggie. No such luck. He made his way over to Milxner’s, surveying the room and quickly spotted his friend by the door, chatting with Cascade.

Al suspected Aggie hadn’t had many options in life. His build was naturally tall and muscular, with a broad chest and limbs thick with muscle. If he hadn’t gone into wizardry, he would have worked somewhere that required he did the same thing, with less pay. He might have made a good politician, but he wasn’t tactful enough to keep his extra-marital affairs quiet enough. His wife was more or less oblivious, but amongst the wizard community and certain societies, he had a reputation. He seemed to be improving it with Cascade Gold, one of the newer acquisitions to Milxner’s. She was also a Touch wizard, like Al, but her profession involved a lot more skin-to-skin contact than Al used. Much, much more. Aggie had remarked that she was good at what she did and Al had no reason not to believe him.

It reminded Al of yesterday, when Aggie had been daydreaming about his latest conquest instead of listening to him. Al wasn’t upset about it any more, but it did give him a flimsy excuse to start something with Aggie. And he didn’t have to win, just engage and exchange a few blows.

“Hey!” he yelled when he had closed the gap to just a few feet.

“Oh, hey, Al. I was just telling Cascade about that time…”

Aggie didn’t get to finish the sentence. Al shoved him as hard as he could in the chest. Aggie stumbled backwards a few steps before righting himself.

“What the hell?’ he yelled.

Al swung for his face and missed. He tried twice more, connecting on the third swing with Aggie’s jaw. It only titled his face to one side slightly. Al hoped Aggie hadn’t slipped into the Unease already.

“You never listen to me! I’m sick of it, Aggie, sick of it!”

“Al! What’s gotten into you?”

Al threw a few more punches, landing a pathetically weak haymaker on Aggie’s throat that did nothing more than bounce off his skin. Aggie finally fought back, swinging back and punching Al hard enough in the nose that he saw stars before he inhaled blood and coughed.

Aggie braced Al’s elbows, pinning his arms to his side. Al kept trying to walk forward for a few moments more, then stopped, realizing there was no more momentum for the fight. Cascade had moved aside a few feet, watching the spectacle with amusement. “You must be crazy, Al. I’ve never seen Stalagmite lose a fight.”

“He knows that, too,” his friend said before focusing on Al. “If I let go, are you going start punching me again?” Al shook his head miserably. Aggie let go and Al sunk back on his heels before regaining his balance. Cascade kindly handed him her kerchief, which Al used to staunch the flow of blood from his nose. “Now, what’s gotten into you?”

“Nudding. It’s nudding,” Al said, waving his hand as he walked away and into Ember’s office.

She looked up from her ledger, then back down with a smirk on her face. “I see you finished your first task.”

“I should have hid a bick wall. I’d have had a bedder chance ad winning.”

“Based on yesterday, you might have. How do you feel?”

“I feel like I god punched in deh nose, Ember.”

“I figured that. What I mean is, how are you feeling after the fact? Exhilarated? Drained?”

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He felt jittery from the fight and took a few deep breaths through his mouth to calm down. Maybe there was a stirring inside, the same part that had hoped the building had burned down, but Al quashed it down. He was in pain, his nose throbbing with each heartbeat. Some blood had trickled into his mouth and he tasted blood. Overall, it was something different and maybe exhilarating, but he wasn’t going to tell Ember that. “I don know. I don care. I just wan do go home, so you may as well give me my nex dask.”

Ember bristled, her tone irritated. “’I don’t know. I don’t care.’ Don’t speak like the chattel do, Alpine. You’re better than them.” She drummed her fingernails on her desk for a moment. “As for your next task, I haven’t divined anything yet. Sit tight for a moment.”

Al did so in a huff, leaning forward so that the blood didn’t drip on his robes. After a few moments, he opened his hands in an impatient gesture.

Ember held up a hand to placate him. “Why don’t you tell me more about yourself?”

“Dere’s naw much do me. I work here, I have a daughder and a wife.”

“Anything you do in your spare time? Anything you like?”

He thought about this for a moment. “I read a lod. If I have a liddle money lefdover ad de end of deh month, I buy books and newspapers. I like reading aboud Arvonne mosly, especially de polidics.”

“The what?”

“Polidics. Govermen and resources and laws, dings like dat.”

“Oh! I thought you were saying…never mind. Politics. Well, that doesn’t sound exciting, Alpine.”

“No, no id is, achually…”

Ember interrupted. “Alpine, you’re a Calm wizard. Is there a particular reason why you’re not fixing your nose and irritating me with your babble?”

“Fine. Give me a few minids.”

It took more time than that. He was still fidgety from the fight and it took some concentration to soothe his tensions. It would have been faster if he could use the Unease he was close to tapping into, but he didn’t want Ember to know he was a switcher. Besides, keeping her waiting for once was nice. As the minutes passed, he felt the blood flow stanch and the swelling reduce enough that he no longer felt the throb. He sniffed, breathed in and out of his nose for a few times, then continued.

“Fifteen years ago there was a coup and the Arvonne royal line was killed. The king and queen, both of their extended families, the two princes and the princesses, and anyone that could rally enough people to fight back. They instated a new form of government called Kalronism. It hasn’t been going too well for two reasons. One, Kalronism was only written about and, now that it’s in place, is showing all the problems. And two, the Arvonnese royal family, while not adored, was well-liked. Many people in Arvonne are beginning to sour against the new system and wish for the monarchy to return. Some of the distant cousins who managed to remove themselves from the regency enough to survive seem primed to take back power. It’s absolutely fascinating by what will happen.” He leaned forward. “Personally, I want the regency back. I want them to win. I wish I had been there and could have fought for the Alscaine family, to save them or die trying.”

Ember had been writing while Al had spoken. She paused, putting her cartridged pen down. “You’re saying a man who couldn’t even put out a tiny fire in a warehouse would have made a difference in a deposition?”

Al deflated a little. “It would have been different.”

“I see. Do you have any other hobbies, then, other than casting yourself as a hero in a putsch you were safely never going to fight in?”

“Sometimes I garden. I like early Berothian and Teidan Kan High Age philosophy. I read a lot of books with the mythology of Noh Amair, like Fraulix the Great and the Norskim.”

“You’re kidding me. Do you go out drinking? Gambling? Spear fishing off the Genale coast? Anything interesting?”

“Sometimes I go out for drinks with Aggie, but I get the feeling he might not want to do that anymore.” Aggie was Al’s only friend. The thought of losing him did fill him with a lot of regret. Maybe they could patch things up sometime in the future.

“Drinking! There we go! So you’re open to a night of debauchery, then? I’ll have a chat with .Rd White and see if we can reconcile things with him. Be at ease. I’ll speak with you tomorrow.”

Al left her office, ignoring the clearly pissed off Aggie standing nearby. He walked home in the rain, tapping into the Calm again to help speed up the healing process so his nose was back down to a normal size when he picked up Marnie at his sister-in-law’s.

After they arrived at home, Al made dinner, fed Marnie, and waited for Burdet. Long after the food had turned cold did he finally eat his meal and put his wife’s in the chill chest, noting the block of ice was almost gone. He’d have to speak with the deliverer as soon as he could.

He played with Marnie, reading her some of the books he had when he was in school for wizardry. He made up stories and grabbed items from around their house to amuse her, but Marnie started to grow restless. He walked around with her, holding her even when she began to cry.

“Mama!” she yelled.

“Shh. I don’t know where Mama is, darling.”

She cried for her mother over and over, tears running down her face. Al finally laid her down on his chest and she calmed down, sucking on her thumb.

“Dada?”

“I don’t know where he is, either, love” he said.

She looked up at him and sighed, placing her head against his chest. “Dada.”

“Close enough,” he answered, stroking her fine hair until she fell asleep.