I grew up on the border with Urish, but people look at Glarrus and scoff—what border? There's nothing but forest between us and the Empire, and it doesn't seem to be controlled. But there are always stories. My uncle claimed he built a cabin just over the border and lived in Urish for a year. The way he told it, everyone thought it was a funny joke until a courier arrived at his home one day. He opened the envelope and found a property tax bill from the Urish government—for one year of residency.

The Emperor sees all, they like to say.

- Reid Aveno, on stories from the border

If I'm being completely honest—which, of course, is a given—then I should mention that my time in that cell in Urish wasn't my first time in prison, nor was it my last. When your primary mode of operation is infuriating people in positions of power, you tend to end up in prison more than is really fair. Fair or not, it was my own fault that I had to stare down another loaf of the petrified excrement they claimed was bread. As you know, I learned how to conjure bread without an associated item bound. The fiends posing as bakers in the Urish Imperial Palace are the reason why.

Breakfast came early, and I had to wrestle with my hunger. Self-preservation won out, and I threw the bread into my chamber pot, where it belonged. I'd managed a few hours of sleep after returning to my cell, and I had what I wanted from the night's excursion, but I still had cause to look like someone who didn't want to be in prison.

I paced. I yelled out the bars, demanding to see a magistrate. I tried to teach a bird at my window how to speak Avennish. I think I could have done it if the blasted thing had known Urish to start with. It's hard to teach an animal two languages at once. Now that I think about it, I could have probably skipped Urish altogether. I must have been more tired than I remember. Hmm? Ah, yes. Where was I?

My bird friend abandoned me when the guard approached my cell to drop off my evening millstone. Knowing I would need my strength and having nothing better to do, I gnawed on it until I feared for my teeth. I had been half expecting a visit from the interrogator from the previous day. The man had some unknown intentions, but I didn't have enough information to unravel what he wanted. It could be internal politics within the palace or even a man looking to extort an Avennish national.

I didn't see Teri that day, but as we'd agreed, my shackles fell away shortly after midnight. I gathered my gear and slipped out of the cell. Voices drifted out of the guard station door. The door was shut, but I saw some light through the cracks. Along with the light, laughter drifted through the door, indicating that my jailors were slacking off playing cards. I couldn't pass through the station, but that probably meant they weren't patrolling the corridors.

I went in the opposite direction. The other end of the hall ended in a massive door that was locked and seemed to be warded against magical attacks. I slipped a transference disk under the door and stepped through when the power was available. The longer the item was bound, the greater my sense of its power, and I could feel when it would be available again.

The next corridor was more prison. I passed cells, and a few were occupied. These cells didn't have the window I'd been enjoying, and I was thankful for having one.

The inmates were all either asleep or staring into nothing. Snores covered my footsteps, and the total darkness hid me from sight. The darksight ring provided just enough power to pierce that darkness, and I navigated the corridor without issue. I knew where I was heading in a general sense. My captors had tried to confuse the route out of the palace, but I'd studied maps smuggled out of Urish before arriving in the city. I knew my way around reasonably well. Without Hav's informants to tell me, however, I didn't know which office would be the exact office I was looking for—the name of my target was unknown to me before the last night's excursions.

When I reached the administrative hall on the next floor, I slipped into a shadow and listened for anything that might tell me people were still working. Given how late it was, I knew it was unlikely, but there was always a chance of a patrolling guard.

Once I was confident, I began moving through the hall. Names affixed to the office doors made my search far easier. Near the middle of the hall, I found my mark. The office belonged to Hector Rae, the man who'd ordered the Eye of Sovereignty moved and whom I suspected was attempting to sell the artifact.

I glanced down the hallway in either direction before settling onto the floor before the office door. I closed my eyes and entered a meditative state. I reached out with my magical senses, trying to find any sources of magic in the office before me.

I wasn't expecting to find the eye. I knew where it was, assuming I wasn't too late. Traps, magical alarms, and anti-intrusion items were my primary concern.

Minutes passed without finding anything. I wasn't completely satisfied, but I didn't want to sit exposed in the hallway any longer. The door handle turned without resistance, and I pushed open the door, alert for any resistance that might indicate some other mundane security measure. To that end, I inspected around the door, looking out for tripwires or unusual things above the door.

I found nothing and slipped inside when the door was opened wide enough. Hector's office was well organized. The official had a wall featuring numerous awards for management and efficiency. Ribbons and medals hung from nails, and a small shelf held small trophies. The other wall was covered with bookshelves. There were several tomes with imperial records that I very much would have liked to read, but I didn't have time to dawdle.

I checked the drawers in Hector's oversized wooden desk. He kept nothing on the surface of the desk. I found a few notebooks and folders with information about various projects. Quick glances told me they were all legitimate administrative documents. I found nothing in those, but Hector had placed a calendar at the bottom of the stack.

It was a series of sheets bound together. The month had thirty small date boxes with appointments and notes in nearly every day. The exception to this was tomorrow. Instead of a list of appointments, there was only one, denoted with a time and a single word, circled for emphasis.

"Payday," I read out loud.

A glance through the rest of the month and back a month showed that Hector had never written that before. The sale would happen tomorrow night at eleven. I had to assume it would be at night, as the palace would be open and filled with all manner of people and functionaries in the morning. The timing was a small problem I'd have to solve.

I scanned the rest of the room for any other information, but Hector was reasonably cautious, one calendar not aside. Satisfied, I left everything exactly how I'd found it.

I returned to my cell and went to sleep. The next day passed even more slowly than the previous. My interrogator failed to contact me again, content to let me sweat for a few days, it seemed. The only thing I had to do was contemplate how bread could be so hard. I entertained the idea of carving a shiv out of the loaf, but I didn't want to break my trowel.

Unfortunately, another day passed without seeing Teri, so I couldn't signal that I wanted the shackles off a little early. When I guessed the time was about right, I gathered my supplies again and set out from my cell. The sound of the chains between my feet meant I had to adopt a rather unusual gait. If you've seen a duck walking around on land, then you know what I looked like.

On the bright side, I'd grown more comfortable with the lax night security, so I made up time with slightly less caution in the first few sections of the palace. My target was the palace atrium. It was at the heart of the complex and dangerously close to the God Emperor's quarters. If I got too close by mistake, Infinium would notice me.

Working my way out of the prison wing wasn't hard. I decided I'd have to thank Teri for ensuring the prison was staffed with some of the least diligent guardsmen I could imagine. I stepped through an unlocked door into a tunnel under a wing of the palace. Moonlight illuminated the grounds on either side of the short tunnel. One was an expansive garden that sat before the palace between the gates to the grand market and the main entrance. The atrium was just beyond the main entrance.

I crept to the edge of the tunnel and peeked around the garden. The grounds were very well lit—the cloudless sky and nearly full moon doing more to illuminate the gardens than the torches that burned along the walls and parapets. A single guard stood just outside the main entrance. Something was off about the woman, though. I ducked out of my tunnel and stuck to shadows cast by large hedges. I walked more normally, though restricted by the length of my shackles. The chain didn't make much noise against the ground, and buzzing insects were enough to mask my movements.

I checked again closer to the entrance. The guard wasn't standing, it turned out. She was slumped slightly, propped against the wall. Her eyes were closed, and her breathing was regular. She was asleep.

I had an explanation for the lax guards around my prison cell. Teri was a senior guard in that wing, and she could arrange schedules to put the right people together on guard duty. It was one thing not to go on regular rounds, but sleeping on the job was another altogether.

It confirmed my suspicions and meant the deal might already be happening. I dropped a transference disk at the base of the hedge, where I stood in shadow as a contingency. I moved past the sleeping guard and into the main entrance.

The entrance was a large room with benches where petitioners or other people with business in the palace could sit and wait. A second guard snored, hunched over a desk near a large double door. The doors were slightly ajar, allowing me to glimpse the atrium beyond. I could hear a soft noise through the door. After confirming the guard was well and truly asleep, I moved next to the open doors.

I couldn't see the people without exposing myself, but I heard two voices.

"It is remarkable that you've been able to accomplish so much. How do you avoid..."

The first voice trailed off, and I could guess what he didn't want to say. Speaking Infinium's name so close to the man would draw his attention.

"The world is not a small place, and even the most powerful need to direct their attention to things that matter the most. Trouble is brewing in Corvas, and the attention the matter requires has given us an opportunity."

The voices were moving away from me, so I risked a glance through the doors. The atrium was a massive room where the Emperor often threw lavish parties. At other times, it was used for different events arranged by the government. One of the most common events was a public exhibition of culturally significant items.

The room was lined with marble display columns. Glass boxes contained a wondrous assortment of items dating back to the founding of the Empire. A crown worn by the last king of Urish. A scepter that was a pale imitation of the Avennish royal family's famous protective item. Weapons used by Urish heroes from myth and legend.

A large man with a bright blue tunic and leather vest followed a tall man in grey robes through the middle of the displays. The robes were recognizably those worn by Urish city officials.

A pillar in the shadows on one side of the atrium provided a better vantage and cover, so I risked waddling into the room. From behind the pillar, I could clearly see the men as they approached a display at the center of the atrium. It was the focus of the collection and clearly the object of all our attention.

"And here we have the prize," the robed man, Hector Rae, said.

"It's beautiful," the large man said. Something about his accent caught my attention. "So this is the Eye of Sovereignty?"

Inside the display at the heart of the atrium was an ornate setting with a brilliant glowing black stone. It did indeed resemble an eye with a red iris and white pupil. The power of the artifact pushed at my senses. If you have the potential for it, the call of an unbound seven star item is hard to ignore.

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"It is. Before we go any further, I require two things, Dozaran."

"Payment and assurance that the eye will well and truly vanish, I assume?"

"You are correct. Your means of hiding it first?"

"Dimensional fold," Dozaran said.

I involuntarily gasped and then covered my mouth. Rare are the items that predate conventional magic items. These Fragments of old magic, like the ever burning flame at the back of my shop, are rare and irreplaceable. Some are more valuable than others, and others are significantly more useful. A dimensional fold is possibly one of the most significantly rare and useful of these known artifacts. The only reason I recognized it was because King Hessian possesses one.

Fortunately, my gasp had been covered by Hector's gasp.

"You take a great risk in telling me you possess such an item," Hector said.

"And you take a great risk by selling me one of your national treasures, Mr. Rae. Call it a show of good faith in our arrangement."

My mind caught up to the conversation, and the realization of what was about to happen made me sweat. If the eye disappeared into the dimensional fold, I would not be able to get it back.

Next to the big man, a slit opened in the air. It started as a thin white line and then expanded until it was large enough for the man to walk through if desired. Inside the fold was a massive room filled with shelves and treasures of all kinds. When I think back on it, it doesn't look too far off from the Immaculate Collection, and maybe seeing this man's hidden treasure trove is what set me on the path to starting my own collection.

There is an interesting aspect to magic and rank, as I've mentioned before. When you are a Mage or Greater Mage and unbind an item, you lose some of that accumulated power. Your body weakens and slows without the greater flow of magic within your spirit. One thing that few are aware of—because why would anyone willingly divest themselves of power—is that other effects of rank are not lost.

Even when I had one star of potential used when I entered the city, I still had my magical specialization. While I stood in the atrium as a three star mage, I still had access to the magical mastery that comes with ascension to Greater Mage.

Because of this mastery, I felt the magical attention that had shifted to the atrium when the dimensional fold opened. Hector had been too confident in the distraction of his mortal god. I felt the attention on me, and a feeling of curiosity passed over me. The attention shifted to the men, and they didn't notice.

Infinium did not intervene, but he did observe. At this moment, I saw a chance to earn some goodwill.

Dozaran his dimensional fold and returned with a sack that was no doubt bursting with gold coins. Along with it, he retrieved a glowing rune covered item. As the men were oblivious to the weight of Infinium's attention, I assumed mine would also go unnoticed. I reached out to the item.

Before I joined the military, I worked as an identifier. My skills with recognizing magic were and are such that I didn't need an ability to spell out every detail of an item. My senses told me the token granted teleportation magic. Indeed, my current binding to an item with a dimension aspect practically screamed that fact at me. Moreover, I gained a sense of the item's power. Four star teleportation magic wouldn't be enough to travel around the world, but it would be enough to traverse—or escape—the city.

"And here we are," Dozaran said. "Two thousand gold and a rare and valuable teleportation item. It has a dimension aspect, so you'll find the range is quite nice."

Avennish. The man had an Avennish accent. The revelation made me wary. Ostensibly, I knew the deal that was being brokered had come through as a buyer from Aquar, but there were Avennish nationals all over the world. Dozaran could just be an Aquar resident, or there could be information leaks within the Avennish government.

Hector reached for the payment, but Dozaran pulled them back.

"I'm not just going to hand over a teleportation item before I get what I came for, Hector. We've put a lot of faith in each other here, but let's exercise some professional caution, hmm?"

Hector nodded, not offended by Dozaran's condition. He snapped his fingers, and the glass around the Eye of Sovereignty vanished. The glass had been suppressing some of the item's power, and it spilled over the room like a wave. I had to grit my teeth and stop myself from sprinting toward the eye. It called strongly to me.

"Thank you. Cash first. Then I will identify the prize, if you agree?" Dozaran asked.

Hector held out a hand and nodded. Dozaran passed the sack of gold, which Hector struggled to hold up. He pulled out a bag with a shoulder strap and put the gold inside, standing up straight. He gestured to the eye.

"Be my guest."

Dozaran reached out, and I felt the familiar sensation of identification magic being used. This was from an item in the man's possession and not something he could inherently do.

"Oh, that is a treat. Here you are," Dozaran held out the teleportation token.

I'd intended to wait until they were about to make their escapes to try to do something idiotic, but fate had other plans. My shackles released and fell to the stone floor with a clatter. Both heads snapped over to look at me.

Knowing that I had no other choice, I decided to do what I do best. Irritate some people.

I stepped out from behind the pillar, clapping slowly.

"You've done well to uncover the traitor, I must say," I said nonchalantly.

Both men reacted to this perfectly. Hector's eyes widened, and he tried to snatch the teleportation token from Dozaran. Dozaran, meanwhile, lunged for the Eye of Sovereignty.

Hector's hands brushed the token as Dozaran moved, knocking the token out of the larger man's grip but out of his own grasp. The token landed at my feet, and I picked it up.

Hector drew a wand from his robes, and Dozaran spun on both of us, holding the eye in one hand.

"Who are you?" Hector asked, stepping away from Dozaran.

"You might say I'm an interested party. I'm here for the eye."

"Well, it's mine now," Dozaran said. He tossed the eye into his dimensional fold, and it closed in a blink. "Did you betray me, Hector? Is this your backup?"

"I have no idea who this is. He's not with you?"

"No."

They both focused on me. I flipped my new teleportation token in the air as the power of its binding settled into my soul. It felt good to have my potential filled once more.

"What traitor?" Dozaran asked me.

"Both of you. Hector is the obvious one, of course. A traitor to his country and his faith. I can only assume you're a traitor as well, Dozaran. How long have you been listening in on Avennish secrets?"

Dozaran smiled and pulled out a glowing dagger made from blue crystal. "An Avennish Soldier, then? Here to warn the Empire for some goodwill, no doubt. I haven't been back to my homeland in many years, but it will sadden me to kill one of my kinsmen."

Both men understood I was in their way. Hector's wand flashed, and I felt the power of sleep settle around me. I sculpted the magic as it fell, so it passed harmlessly over me. Dozaran's size belied his swiftness, and he appeared behind me in a blur, his crystal dagger plunging for my neck. I leaned forward as he struck at me, taking a graze instead of a stab. I then made use of my newest power.

I teleported ten feet behind Dozaran, and a conjured brick appeared in my hand. Power was amassing inside me, and the effort of duplicating bricks was no longer a concern.

My first brick hit Dozaran in the back of the head, and my second smashed a display case nearby. I summoned bricks and smashed displays one by one. Then, in a flash of light, two black disks appeared in my hand. I tossed them to either side of the room as the fight began in earnest.

Despite my skills and advantages, I knew not to underestimate a two on one fight. I moved around the room quickly, thankful my legs were no longer bound. Bricks rained down on my opponents. I dodged magical effects and a huge man who switched weapons frequently. Dozaran would open his dimensional fold and retrieve some new weapon before returning to try to kill me with it. Each time he did, I explored the space with my senses.

I reached out to the magic that filled the air around us, moving items from their displays to interfere with and confuse my opponents, but unfortunately, nothing in the collection proved useful for my fight. I teleported frequently. The cooldown for such a short distance in line of sight was significantly better than my disks, though I still used those once or twice.

While distracted by another disappearance of Dozaran, Hector caught my leg with a spell that made it seize up, and I tripped. By the time I fell and rolled over, Dozaran was above me—a massive hammer descending toward my skull. I vanished, teleporting behind Hector and kicking the man in the knee hard enough to disable him.

He grunted and fell to one knee. I felt a wave of magic from him. He'd set a timer on the fight, releasing his magic on the guards he'd put to sleep. He would likely blame me for the confrontation and the disappearance of the Eye of Sovereignty. That would have been a great plan were it not for the attention that was still on us.

I heard a guard yell, and Dozaran used the distraction to open his fold once more. I was ready for it and dashed toward the opening. Even as I did, I pulled on the Eye of Sovereignty using the magic that filled the space. Dozaran couldn't contain his shout of alarm and surprise as the eye flew out of the fold and into my hand.

As soon as I had it, I dug deep and focused on my target, bending my entire will to a destination that hopefully wasn't too far away. I triggered the teleport. In hindsight, it might have been the overlapping dimensional affinities that allowed it, but at the time, all I cared was that it had worked. In an instant, I was standing back in Hav's hideout underneath the inn.

Teleporting more than a few hundred feet was a disorienting experience, and it took me a moment to realize what I was looking at.

Hav was lying on the floor, tied up with a gag in his mouth. He shook his head at me, eyes wide. I turned, and Teri leaned back in her chair, cleaning out her nails with a dagger. Two huge men waited behind her.

"I wasn't expecting you to get here so quickly. Kind of you to not keep a lady waiting."

The teleportation to a distant location meant my ability wouldn't come off cooldown for a while, so I had no way to avoid her henchmen's cudgels.

My vision came to, lying on a stone floor back inside the palace. Teri stood behind a man in a grey robe.

"It was a bold plan," the man said. "Imagine my surprise when Teri told me about it. I never thought you'd actually do it, though."

The room swam for another moment, but my recovery was aided by the additional magic of my new binding, and my head cleared. Instead of the man I'd half expected to appear in front of, Hector Rae, I was chained up in front of another man. The same man who'd interrogated me on my first day in prison.

"A pleasure to see you again. I'm afraid I never caught your name."

"It doesn't matter."

"Don't be too hard on yourself. We're all important to someone."

A cane caught me in the jaw, making my head spin.

"You spent some time in our cells, Basen Koh. Are you so eager to return to them?"

"I had heard of the palace's hospitality and was interested in seeing it myself. After experiencing it, I thought I would write you a note, but alas, I was out of chamber pot paper."

"I see your tongue is still intact. I owe you some thanks. My rival has been brought low, and you have further damaged your kingdom's reputation in Urish. It is a shame we never found the eye. You must have passed it off to a contact or smuggler."

The obvious lie was not lost on me. The man desired power and notoriety, and I'd given him both without even realizing it. Teri had allowed me to do the grunt work and put herself in a position to gain the trust of her powerful ally within the palace and potentially displace Hav within the city's underbelly. It had been a great plan to twist what I'd been doing for their own gain. It almost made me feel bad for needing to ruin their moment of triumph.

"There is one unfortunate problem you haven't considered," I said.

"Oh, and what's that?"

I looked around the stone room. There weren't more guards or any of the thugs I'd been introduced to at the inn.

"You've failed to assess my threat level correctly."

Gaining power can be a slow process, but for those of us who were once powerful, it comes faster than most would expect. As soon as I'd bound the teleportation token stolen from Dozaran, I'd known about the synergy between my items. The three star transference discs harmonized with the four star teleportation token, granting me the power of a five star Greater Mage. More of my former strength returned every second, and my short time unconscious has brought me near full strength.

I snapped the chains that bound me. Teri drew her sword and lunged at me, but I caught her wrist and broke it. The palm strike to her gut didn't kill her, but it did launch her across the room.

The look of horror on the interrogator's face was priceless.

I retrieved the eye and left him in a pile on the floor. I left the unadorned room to find myself in a guard station. It was empty save for an elderly man with a cane. He was stooped with age, and his skin was thin and spotted. He looked ready to fall over dead, but if my intuition was correct, he'd looked like that for much of the last two hundred years.

"Luck has played as much part in your accomplishments today as anything else," the man said.

"Luck, yes, but I knew you were watching. That let me take risks."

"Not many would stand before me so casually."

"Not many have ever seen you in person."

"Oh, I wouldn't say that."

Magic flooded my mind, and it was as though I was reliving moments. An unremarkable old man riding in my caravan toward the capital nodded to me as I joined them. An old man watching the fight from the corner of the inn drew no attention but favored me with a wink. In the market square where I pretended to fight Faud, an old man stood watching, shaking his head in disgust.

"That...is unexpected."

"I can see anything in the world from anywhere, Basen Koh. Why watch the world go by from behind these walls?"

"So you always knew I was coming to investigate this sale?"

Infinium smiled at me. "I wanted to see how you would act and what you would do."

I pulled out the Eye of Sovereignty.

"What I'd like to do is return this. I wouldn't be doing my duty if I didn't ask for something in return."

"And what is it that you want."

"A promise of trade and of peace."

"Our nations are not at war."

"We weren't at war when you destroyed Avennia either."

"When I moved against your capital, we were at war. Your king set you on that path, and I moved more quickly than he thought I could."

"If a sudden change in temperament means immediate destruction, then what hope do we have of peace? That just means I should take this as a weapon to use against you."

"That would be an act of war, Basen Koh."

"The way I see it, you've already committed some heinous acts against me."

"The two people you left in that room were not acting on behalf of my empire."

"I'm not talking about them, Emperor. I'm talking about the war crimes you're committing in your prison kitchens. That bread is an affront to civilization."

"You seem to be taking these negotiations more lightly than you should."

"There's nothing light about that bread, believe me. But if you insist on returning to the topic at hand: my ask has not changed. We've stuck our necks out to help you here. I know I'm not the most orthodox choice, but my king trusts me to do what needs doing. A promise of trade and peace."

Infinium studied me for a long time.

"I worry about what you might become, Basen Koh. I can glimpse something of your fate. You will be an important ally, but I hope that impression does not hide you becoming a dangerous enemy. I will accept these terms and reach out to your king directly."

I tossed the Eye of Sovereignty to the man, and it fell into an orbit around his head before vanishing from sight and my senses.