Leurai sighed, flicking a piece of paper into the large fireplace. He watched it burn into a small pile of ash, before standing up from his desk to mix the ashes with what remained of a few logs he had thrown in there several hours prior.

Once the paper was thoroughly taken care of, the Tiefling exited his office, and headed for that of his second-in-command, a Half-Orc Paladin called Malurall.

On his way, he passed several of his students who were trying their hardest to be sneaky. They were doing miserably, but they also appeared to be rather young, so he didn’t note down who they were for future scolding.

Upon reaching Malurall’s office door, he heard what seemed to be the tail-end of a meeting.

“-forget to communicate. We don’t want you three offing the king before the people want a new king, or before our candidate has the support he needs. Understand?”

There was a flurry of “Yes sir!”s, before almost a dozen people exited. Two of the ten graduates noticed him right away, but wisely said nothing and drew no attention to him. The rest of them noticed him not at all, chatting amongst themselves about their mission.

Once they had left, he slipped into the office and began to wait for the Half-Orc to notice him.

When he decidedly did not notice, and neither was going to, Leurai quietly coughed into his hand.

This, of course, brought Malurall’s head snapping up. Once he saw who it was the Paladin relaxed, looking back down at the maps that covered his desk. “Hey there, Leurai. What’s going on?”

“I just came to check up on you. I assume you just sent Team Stormcrow out?” Leurai said, walking over to peer at the maps himself, even though he already knew what the plan was.

“You would assume correctly. And I have to say, it’ll be a lot quieter with that lot gone.”

“Mmm, I suppose it will. Speaking of which, how are the Children and Mids coming along?”

“Better than I’d expect, and far better than you would. The Children especially.” At this Malurall rolled the map up and stuck it in a drawer. “A good number of them are already mid-tier, and three of them are approaching Graduation.”

“Already?” Leurai asked, running a hand through his hair. “How??”

Malurall laughed at the Tiefling’s expression, sitting back in his chair. “I wondered that as well. It would appear that a group of them have been sneaking out with the Mids on their off-time to get some extra experience.”

“And they haven’t gotten killed??”

“Evidently. I don’t know how they hid this for so long, but we might want to put the lot of them in with the Mids. Just for training, of course. Hordes of goblins and orcs may not be enough anymore.”

“See to it. Anything to report?”

Malurall shook his head. “Everything is running remarkably smoothly. We took care of that traitor who was trying to sell our location, so we’re completely safe.”

“He didn’t tell anyone before you got to him?”

He shook his head again. “Not a one.”

Leurai nodded. “Good. I’ll leave you to it the-”

He was cut off by a distant boom, followed by a slight rumbling in the ceiling. After a moment of silence, another boom, followed by what would have been an ear-splitting ringing noise had it been nearby.

Leurai turned to Malurall, a mask of calm across his face. “Are you

sure he didn’t tell anyone?”

The Half-Orc scowled, picking up a small orb on his desk and tapping it a few times. “Griean! What’s going on up there?”

A crackly voice came through the orb. “We’re under attack, sir! Looks like the entire Guild of-” the poor fellow was cut off by a loud crackling sound. He did not speak again.

The Paladin swore in Orcish. “We need to get out of here.”

Leurai smirked mockingly. “I’m aware. Gather the Circle and grab the most talented of the Children. Get them to the Escape room. I will grab everything important and meet you there in five minutes. I will be leaving in ten at the latest. If you aren’t there in time I wish you the best of luck. You know the rendezvous point and the escape procedure.”

Malurall nodded absently, grabbing a few things from his desk and shoving them into his pockets. “Understood. I’ll be there as soon as I can.”

Leurai dipped his head in farewell, exiting the office and Dashing back to his own. He hurried to get everything he needed from the various hidden compartments throughout the room, but once he had everything he took a moment to calm down.

Did you know this text is from a different site? Read the official version to support the creator.

This was to be expected. It had only been a matter of time. There were contingencies for such things.

His tail twitched anxiously, betraying the facade of calm he had put on. Fortunately for him, there was no one else around to see it.

He took a deep breath, and hurried out into the labyrinth of halls that made up the majority of the base.

A couple minutes later he arrived at the Escape room.

The room was large and mostly empty, save for a large platform, adorned with a ten-foot circle of magic signs and symbols.

Leurai did not enter the circle, but rather muttered a few ancient words. The runes and symbols began to glow, and a shimmering portal swirled into existence within the circle.

A minute or so later, Malurall and the rest of the Circle entered the room, ushering a small gaggle of children in front of them.

“Everyone pay attention!” Leurai barked, bringing the near-silence to actual silence. “When I tell you, you will go through the portal. Once you get to the other side, do nothing. Say nothing. Stay still and silent. If you move you will be shot in the throat, and your corpse will not be kept for revival. Do you understand?”

The children all nodded hesitantly. The Circle nodded quite a bit less hesitantly.

“Alright. Go.”

They all entered the circle of runes, the world going blue and wobbly.

This was normal.

Then the blue wobbles turned red and sharp. The whirls of color cracked, and everything went black. Something screamed and the group landed on a snowy forest floor.

As instructed, nobody moved.

Leurai glanced around. This was not the emergency point, and he didn’t sense anyone close by, but, nonetheless, he spoke the first part of the authentication code. “Are there any fellows about?”

No one responded. Nothing happened.

Leurai scowled. “Kurik! Spread out and look for signs of the guild. Delthy, get the lay of the land. Stay out of sight. See if there’s a village nearby.”

The two he had pointed out nodded and dashed off, but sneakily. The other four spread out in a small circle to clear the immediate area of potential enemies.

Leurai turned to the children. “Stay here. Stay quiet. Don’t make a ruckus.” Without bothering to stay for confirmation, he turned and stalked off to investigate where they had landed.

The circle of runes that had been burned into the grass was warped and cracked and altogether not right.

What that meant, he hadn’t the foggiest.

About ten minutes later, Kurik returned with his report.

“There were neither any messages from our associates, nor any indication that they were here at all. From what I could see, there hasn’t been anyone in this area.”

Leurai frowned. “How’s your Arcana?”

Kurik shrugged. “Not good. Why?”

“The teleportation circle was messed up. I couldn’t tell anything about why or what it did, but it certainly wasn’t correct.”

Over the course of the next several hours, every member of the Circle except for Delthy had investigated the teleportation burns, and no one could determine what in the world it all meant.

Even their veritable expert on the Arcane couldn’t figure anything out other than, “Yup, it sure be broke.”

A few hours after that, Delthy returned.

“There’s a smallish town a few miles East, from which you can see a castle in the distance. I watched the town for a good long while, and it appeared to consist only of humans. There may have been some half-elves or similarly similar races, but nothing even vaguely monstrous.”

Leurai’s tail twitched as he thought. “Go undercover there for a few days. See what’s going on. Don’t talk to people if you can help it. See what you can figure out and then report back.”

Delthy nodded and scampered off.

Leurai glanced over to make sure that the kids weren’t doing anything idiotic, which they weren’t, merely playing around with various cantrips, before he turned back and began to sketch the teleportation circle for future consideration.

-

“Rai!”

Leurai scowled, turning to Malurall as he ran over. “You know I don’t appreciate nicknames, Malurall.”

“An owl came by with a bundle of letters! Someone knows who and where we are, and they don’t care that we know!”

“Show me.”

In the center of their little camp, all of the children sat in a line in front of a stern Kurik. On the ground next to Kurik was an immobilized Screech Owl.

“Where are the letters?”

Kurik handed over a pile of parchment.

Leurai studied the paper for a moment, tilting his head at the foreign script. “Who here has Comprehend Languages?”

One of the circle members, Neridi, strode over and studied the paper for a minute before confidently reading it aloud. “The first envelope reads: ‘Mr. Sove’nar Rothethin, The third tent to the left, Clearing in the Woods, Scotland.’”

The seven remaining read much the same, but with the names and specific sleeping locations of the other children.

Leurai read the letters. “Kurik, make sure that the kids didn’t sell us out. I don’t think they did, but just make sure. Once you determine that they haven’t, send them to my tent.”

Kurik nodded, turning to one of the other members of the Circle. “You still have some good spell slots? I need a Zone of Truth over here.”

-

“None of you were traitors? I am honestly surprised.” The children before him were doing their utmost to not be intimidated, to varying degrees of success.

Leurai slapped the letters on the ground in front of them. “You recall these letters, yes? Read them now, but in short you are all being invited to a school for wizards. While I haven’t the faintest clue why they invited all of you, I will not pass up the opportunity for sources of information.”

The children looked up from their letters in confusion, though they didn’t say anything.

“This is obviously a part of the world we have never been, and I want as much information about this place as possible. It will be much easier to get information without having to leave a couple of babysitters to take care of you. This will be a mission. You are to be discreet, and subtle. You are to collect information, and learn everything you possibly can. Find the important people and make contacts.

If and when people ask you where you’re from and what your story is, you will tell them a… modified truth. You are all orphans. The orphanage you were at was attacked and destroyed. Only you and a few of the caretakers managed to get out. We lived far away from here and have only been in this area for a couple of weeks. That will be your story and you will all stick to it. Delthy will help you practice for out-of-the-box questions that may trip you up. Understood?”

The children nodded.

“Good. You are dismissed.”

The children all scampered away to do who-knew-what.

Leurai chuckled to himself, hoping that they didn’t mess everything up. Hopefully this Hogwarts place will be able to keep them occupied for a few months…