Since the endless night showed no desire to turn into the threat of a dim tomorrow. The ageing headmaster inhaled the soothing smell of old books and pipe tobacco, counted to five, exhaled hard, and went to work. Siccing his agile mind on the council's rule of rules. After all, they were his primary suspects. What he assumed was the cause of his Dark nightmares. And not only because they had been a pet peeve of his for centuries.

You do realise that you're the longest serving member on the council, his loathing considered.

"So? It's not my fault that the vote for evermore rules keeps going against me."

Yeah! We have to be part of the system to abuse the system, his inner sorcerer growled.

With yet another inner conflict put on hold, he went back to blaming the council in peace. The boringly evil group that was supposed to govern magick for the best of all sorcerers.

Being as they were, all magick users despised the rules, but had no problem enforcing them on others. Which meant that ever since Empris was founded, their regulations had been accepted as a necessary evil.

Well, a bit of evil is to be expected, the yes-man in him argued.

"But what the rules have done, is make it impossible to do any proper magick!"

This was true, since the way the council mishandled the rules in the name of security, spite, or any other popular claim. The group could do whatever it pleased, and call it justice. As long as three of the five headmasters agreed. All this meant that the best way to describe their rule of law, was that anyone could be arrested for nothing more than claiming innocence.

You could always suggest more exceptions for your fellow council members? They wouldn't deny themselves the liberties they deny to others.

"If I do that they will think I'm up to something." The headmasters tended to assume everyone guilty until proven innocent.

Refocusing, he admired his awkward scowl in the reflection. He had the bushiest eyebrows he had ever seen on someone almost entirely human. The swarthy hairiness was all got from his Kor side. Not that he wanted their fangs, but the muscles would have been handy for leaping up the stairs.

Considering their rules he came to the same conclusion as always, that many were just silly. Like how one couldn't wear a fake beard if it might cause giggling. That kind of pettiness made living on the Pentakl plain precarious, even for the most law-abiding sorcerer. Still, not everything could be regulated, and where the rules failed, tradition stepped in to fill the gap. One even provided an escape from the city.

The 'if you don't like it then get out'-tradition, his cynicism thought bringing a wicked little smile to his wrinkled cheeks.

Sorcerers were allowed to leave the green plain, taking their chances in the frozen wilds and becoming free sorcerers. In a fake show of generosity, the council even provided servants and provisions for those leaving. A low price for getting rid of those showing signs of thinking for themselves.

They're probably better off aynway, his justification thought

"I hope so." Lyeasrakardsul whispered, wanting to believe.

What he knew was that even against the odds, some who left found a way to survive. Confirmed by the valleys where small towers of grey stone rose above the pine trees. They were nothing like the housing towers for the city's separate, and unequal, magick schools. But they were the best option, not that being accepted by free sorcerers was easy.

Letting his sleepy brain have a break, he lit his calabash pipe. The smoke rose slowly, flowing into the shadows of his apartment. The pipe was the second of his three personal items, and the habit gave his grey beard a sickly, yellowish colour.

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For appearances sake, he always wore their ceremonial nightgown. However, warming his feet was his favourite personal item. A small pair of rebellion, in the form of pink, fuzzy bunny slippers. They were a nostalgic connection to his short life before Empris. He remembered being angry with his grandmother for not getting him a Kor tattoo like one of hers. Instead, she had given young Lug identical slippers for his birthday.

But as a sickly old man, he knew only one absolute truth: Never underestimate the value of fuzzy slippers. Even so, the bunnies weren't his dirtiest little secret. There was one other thing he could never let anyone find out. Something he had hidden deep in his subconscious. At the core of his being, he was basically nice. A terrible handicap for a sorcerer!

Most of his early memories were lost. Since his ability to remember almost anything had taken decades of private Dalmicir training. But getting dragged away by a black robed sorcerer at age four, wasn't something he could forget. It was the last time he saw his grandparents alive. Since once he learnt to divine and could see the pirate archipelago, they were long dead.

Back then we believed what Xefef tells all sorclings, his innocence regretted, that their families didn't want someone with magick, and begged Pentakl to take them away.

Once he learnt to see not just the present, but also the past, the lie became obvious. But by then it was too late, he was as much a part of the system as anyone in Empris.

It wasn't until he reached the rank of professor apprentice that he found out the whole truth. That they had the legal right to take sorclings from anywhere on the continent, by an agreement made when Empris became a nation.

Yes, yes, I'm sure that's all very fascinating! His priorities condescended. But have you forgotten about the Darkness?

Shamed back into concentration, he sat there motionless, not even rocking his chair. After many nights probing his memories, he now believed his nightmares were signalling the end of magick. That they were a warning, a final notice of sorts. Over seven centuries in the Dalmicir school, that was all about hoarding knowledge, he had filled his mind with history.

"I would bet my life that I know as much about the past as anyone. That is, if someone could bet something of equal or greater value, which I sincerely doubt," he sneered.

Then use that knowledge, his inner librarian thought, because you won't be able to pawn this off on your professor apprentices.

"Like the PAs do any work anyway! We all know they shuffle it down until it lands on the sorclings."

The council liked to see sorclings as expendable, but they weren't an endless resource. Since no one knew why so few children were born with the innate talent for magick. Still, from the council's perspective, any child brought here was nothing but a sorcerer.

So, we're not supposed to have any use for things like race or gender, his Kor side wondered.

"No! They only get in the way."

Even so, whatever sorcerers pretended in public, in private they were somewhat aware of their biological makeup. But their 'don't ask, don't tell'-tradition — combined with the rule that all sorcerers go by the pronoun him — stopped them from asking personal questions. Just a few of the things sorclings had voice-beaten into them during their first decades in administration.

Putting his pipe away, he started rocking in a steady rhythm. Letting his black-eyed reflection win the staring contest. Remembering the time, almost two millennia ago, when it had all gone wrong. Using magick to divine the past wasn't an option, not in the school towers. It was only allowed in specific areas, a rare rule that not even the highest ranks were excepted from. Instead, he used his memory as a workaround. It took him little effort to queue up the relevant pages in the secret tomes. Which described the taboo subject of their relocation, something only headmasters were allowed to read.

Diving head-first into those events, he would try to paint a clearer picture. What was clear, was that the relocation had been a cataclysmic time for magick. Since the old factions came close to being wiped out, and only negotiations had saved them. It also led to many changes in the lifestyle of magick users. They went from having no rules, to having nothing but rules, and that was the problem. Still, proving it to the satisfaction of the council would be an uphill battle on a slippery slope. Because in Pentakl, stubbornness was a required survival skill.

But we're right, his stubbornness thought. The Darkness will be the death of all magick!

But even if he could prove both cause and effect, it wasn't like he intended to do anything about it himself. Because as a lifelong Dalmicir practitioner, he knew two things for certain.

"Those who study history are doomed to watch others repeat it, and everything you need to know about the present is hidden in the mistakes of the past." The unofficial motto of his school.

And whatever happens, you won't survive long without some decent sleep anyway, his morbidity thought, actually cheering him up a bit.