Chapter: 275 - Into the Weeds (Patreon)

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Tala continued to eat the free food provided by the Archon compound of Bandfast.

Mistress Ingrit had just finished the most basic summary of her time away, and Tala was honestly a little surprised at how little of it fell under the  ‘anyone can know this’ classification.

-Really? You’re surprised?-

Well… probably not, no. I’ve gotten a bit used to learning almost anything I wanted to know, and humanity doesn’t really work that way.

-Well, it does for you and anyone of the upper echelons of power. Do you really think that it would be a good idea to tell the average citizen that there are dozens, if not hundreds, of high-powered arcanes, hostile to humanity, less than a thousand miles south of us?-

Yeah… that would not end well, and it’s not like they could do anything about it, regardless.

-Precisely.-

As Tala had expected, the questions asked by those present were numerous and varied.

Many were answered with either a ‘We will discuss that later.’ Or ‘You are not permitted to know that answer at this time.’ Or ‘Please submit a request, and we can discuss your acquisition of that information. That would require more detail than this meeting is intended to convey.’

Even so, noon came before Mistress Ingrit called an end to the questioning, bringing with it a replenishing of the available food and drink.

Blessedly, none of the questions had been of the type that Tala was required to answer. To be sure, they all could have been answered by her, but those that received answers, received them from Mistress Ingrit in Tala’s stead.

Throughout that time, Tala had little to do, and so she ended up talking with Lyn and Rane as quietly as they could. They didn’t discuss anything of substance, staying away from the meeting's main topic, instead just chatting about small, inconsequential things, like in the good old days.

Lyn looked at her friend, askance. “Tala, what nonsense are you spouting?”

Tala frowned. “What?”

“You said, ’No one’s afraid of being alone in the dark.’ That’s like the most common fear people have, Tala.”

Tala lifted one finger in victory. “Ahh, but that’s not true. People are afraid that they aren’t alone in the dark.”

Lyn blinked at her friend, then her eye began to twitch. “I did not need that in my head…”

Nearly an hour and many topic changes later, Tala rolled her eyes. “Rane, I don’t care how you describe it, pancakes are not ‘all crust,’ unless you make them wrong.”

“Crust is the harder, outer portion of bread. Pancakes are so thin that they are all crust.” The large man was insistent.

Their conversation moved in ebbs and flows.

Rane had to control himself as he practically threw up his hands. “Lyn, what are you talking about? Nature and day are way closer than nature and night.”

“No. Night is the natural state of existence. It takes the sun to temporarily banish the night. Without constant effort, without the constant expenditure of energy, nature is just ‘night.’”

They weren’t arguing, or trying to change each other’s opinions. They were just talking, and Tala reveled in the normalcy of such a frivolous conversation.

After lunch, close to half of the attendees were dismissed, and then the rest got settled in for the next level of informational discussion.

As they were leaving, Mistresses Odera and Aproa came over to welcome Tala back. Mistress Odera, in particular, smiled as she patted Tala’s hand. “Glad that you are safe once more, girl. Come see me when you’ve got your feet back under you. If you can.”

Tala smiled, feeling a bit of tension bleed away at the older woman’s words. And she didn’t even have to say anything comforting.

-We were really worried about her. It’s good that she’s still…-

…not a fount?

-Yeah. Maybe something that we learned can help her? Probably not, as arcanes are good at making founts, not preventing them.-

Still, we can see what’s possible.

Mistress Ingrit clapped her hands after the door clicked shut behind the last departing Archon. Mistress Odera had been the only non-Bound among the group, even for the first portion of the meeting.

Now?

Now, Tala didn’t detect anyone below Fused, save Lyn. Though, some kept their aura's fully retracted, and Tala didn't want to be rude by looking too deeply.

“Alright, Archons. Now, we get into the meat of the information.”

She turned and gestured at the wall behind her and an image that Tala recognized blossomed across it.

It was Be-thric.

Tala felt a shudder as her whole body tensed up at the mere sight of the arcane. At the same time, her mind sang out in glorious revelry at knowledge of his death at her hand.

“It’s okay to still fear him, even after he is dead.” Rane hesitated. “I assume he is dead, right?”

That’s right, Rane saw the memories of my first two interactions with Be-thric.

Tala smiled at her friend. “He is, yes. But I don’t fear him, Rane. I never did. I feared his magic.”

Rane cocked an eyebrow as he whispered his reply, “That’s a ridiculous distinction.”

“No, it isn’t, Rane. He, himself, wasn’t scary, and that made what he could do worse. If he’d been some sort of villain from a play, it would be easy to fear him and hate everything about him. Instead, he was too… human. He wasn’t evil, he wasn’t worthy of fear, but he still had the power and the willingness to do things that were terrifying. I’d fear anybody with that ability and lack of concern or restraint surrounding its use.”

“That still seems like fearing him to me.”

“I wish he’d been worthy of fearing. That would make it easier. Defeating a great villain can be liberating. Overcoming ‘some guy’ with a scary magical ability still leaves the door open for others like him…”

Rane gave her a sympathetic look. “That sounds awful. Thank you for being willing to say so much.”

Lyn took her hand and squeezed it in camaraderie. “We’re here for you.”

Mistress Ingrit’s continued speaking drew Tala’s attention back from her side conversation, and Alat filled her in on what Tala had missed, as if she hadn’t been distracted.

A large part of that was the laws and practices surrounding the saorsa-collar. She’d gone over the basics before but the more intricate details hadn’t been discussed.

As Tala tuned back in, Mistress Ingrit was refocusing on the memory and gesturing to the wall.

“As you can see, that arcane has a magical device, that device will be used to modify the saorsa-collar, while it is active. Those of you with the capacity will be receiving a one-time glimpse of the record of Tala’s magical senses during the process.”

The image began to move, showing Be-thric’s modification of her collar the first time.

Tala hadn’t thought too much about it at the time, but based on the reactions of the Constructionists in the room, she should have.

The Constructionists, and those with related professions, were wide-eyed and practically drooling as the memory ended.

Tala caught a few of the whispers. “Specifically altering an artifact style item, while it is active. How could that be done?”

“The material of the modifying artifact was… negated? Absorbed? What happened to it?”

These and similar questions preceded a storm of splintered dialogues, referencing portions of the memory.

Rane leaned in. “If I may ask, what was it like, having the collar around your neck?”

Tala gave him an arch look. “You mean, what was it like having the means of my execution affixed to me at all times?”

He hunched a little. “Yes.”

She gave a sad smile. “Honestly, I forgot it was there half the time. There was almost a perverse sense of security in it being there, even when I did remember it.”

Lyn leaned closer, confusion and concern furrowing her brow. “What? I don’t understand.”

“Well.” Tala sighed. “If they’d discovered me, the real me, they’d have triggered the collar immediately.”

Rane looked vaguely uncomfortable, but he still raised an objection. “Couldn’t he have just modified your memory again?”

“Not by that point, no. So, the fact that it was there meant I never had to second guess my situation. I was trusted, because if I hadn’t been, I’d never have even known that trust was lost.”

Neither of them seemed to like the explanation, but they didn’t contest her either.

Mistress Ingrit brought everyone’s attention back. “And now, here is another alteration of the collar.”

The next memory was of the City Lord’s modification of the collar so that she could go to Croi.

That caused another explosion of conversation, and Tala was able to hear basically everyone with any connection to working with magical items deciding to submit requests for those two memories in full, as well as all the surrounding memories.

Mistress Ingrit had been able to alter the focus of the memories so that neither Be-thric in the first memory, nor the City Lord in the second, stood out particularly.

-She removed your magesight input from everything not directly pertaining to the collar and its modification. Likely to keep the whole meeting from devolving into a discussion on the City Lord and Be-thric.-

I see that. I suppose she’s not certifying these as ‘perfectly accurate’ or anything like that. I honestly didn’t really consider how big of a deal the modification of the collar is. I’ve seen magical items expanded before, but I suppose I’ve never seen them fundamentally modified like the collar was.

Unlike the previous part of the meeting, Mistress Ingrit let the conversations play out before she continued. When most had wound down, she cleared her throat, bringing a swift end to the few that hadn’t stopped. Then, in the silence, she continued, “Now, for that specific item, we will next see how it looked when it was activated.”

A ripple of surprise ran through the room.

“When Mistress Tala killed her Pillar to make good her departure, the collar was triggered, and the House of Blood determined that she was effectively dead. Thus, she was able to escape without being chased. Please take that as all the context we will give for the moment.”

Quite a few mouths hung open in shock.

The Mage Hunters glanced her way in awe but seemed unwilling to take their eyes away from the displayed memory for longer than that.

Even many of the others seemed to take a moment to reassess her.

Master Cazor had moved several seats closer to her, Rane, and Lyn, clearly intending on talking with her when he could, but his focus was as utterly captured as everyone else’s.

“Here is the death of the Pillar, and the activation of the collar.”

Lyn took her hand and squeezed it again, and Rane briefly placed his hand on her shoulder.

It was strange for Tala to see her own memory shown on a wall for so many to see, and the previous two hadn’t inured her to that feeling.

Tala appreciated the support, but this was one memory that evoked nothing but joy, even though it hadn’t ended perfectly.

He’s dead, and I killed him myself. There was a lot to be happy about in that.

The perspective on the wall seemed to divide, showing a full five different points of view.

There were some sounds of discomfort, and a few Archons looked away, seemingly getting motion sick from the various perspectives, some of which were rotating at a good clip.

-That’s better, but it still isn’t quite the same. A two dimensional perspective just can’t capture what it’s like to be there, even with multiple viewing angles.-

Even so, Tala rather enjoyed watching Be-thric die, even when her own perspective fractured, indicating the activation of the collar.

A large number of the Archons seemed confused, and finally, someone in the front asked what many of them were thinking, “What happened at the end? Why did the memory fracture?”

Mistress Ingrit nodded. “Mistress Tala was injected with two dasgannach. One was of gold, which stripped her of her magic. Thus, the memories were not recorded ‘fresh,’ but after the fact, once she was reinscribed. Additionally, it is my understanding that the invasion by the creatures was incredibly painful, thus further harming the integrity of the memories.”

“Painful? And it was that fast? Dasgannach don’t disrupt active magics, and you can’t feel them while they’re claiming parts of you; that’s two of the core things that make them so pernicious.”

“These modified ones do it seems, which makes sense, given the purpose of the gold dasgannach was specifically to disable human magics that used gold inscriptions as quickly as possible. The pain was likely a desired feature as well, as it would disrupt any attempt to work against the execution.”

A different Archon asked the obvious next question, “Shouldn’t the spellworkings have continued, even as the gold dasgannach claimed the material?”

Someone beside him leaned over. “The spell-lines are physically… locked? Yes, physically locked while active, but if they are fundamentally changed, themselves? Mistress Tala is lucky they didn’t form other valid spellforms of some kind.”

The asker nodded, understanding, and took the opportunity to ask another question, “If one was gold, what was the other? Losing your spell-lines is highly inconvenient but hardly an execution.”

Mistress Ingrit looked to Tala.

Tala shrugged. Not really a mystery if they’d taken a moment to think. “It was iron.”

Before the obviously-building explosion of questions could manifest, one Archon couldn’t help herself from shouting out, “If that’s true, you should be dead!”

Mistress Ingrit held up a hand. “All such questions should be held until the end and are hardly important to the current subject, which is magical creations.”

The next memory showed on the wall behind her. It was from earlier in Tala’s time away, well before she’d killed Be-thric.

Tala felt a smile pull at her lips as she recognized the basic automata.

Master Boma stood in a rush, along with quite a few others, but he spoke first and loudest, “The arcanes have automata? Why was this not brought to our attention immediately? We must mobilize and destroy them at—”

Mistress Ingrit cut across the Constructionist, “Enough! It has been dealt with. They were not sanctioned constructs, and the place of their creation was destroyed by Tala herself.”

Master Boma paused, mouth open, but finally, he nodded and sat back down.

What followed was brief selections of her fights with the automata, showing the various versions, including Io. The set of memory snippets ended with the raiding of all the materials and, very specifically, the non-automata related items that she’d taken from the crafting guild’s hold.

There was a bit of special attention put on both the ingots of white metal and the device that seemed responsible for creating the material.

-We never did take the time to figure out how that worked.-

That’s why we’re getting help. There is just too much for us to handle ourselves.

-It’s definitely going to be interesting to see how they react to Io.-

Yeah, but that’s going to be a much smaller group.

There were a few questions, but most of the more interested parties seemed to have fixated on the automata, and rather than sparking questions, it seemed to have keyed off fierce debate.

Rane glanced her way. “So, how do you think I’d have done against the automata?”

Lyn huffed a quiet laugh. “Of course that’s what you ask.”

Tala quirked a smile. “You would have done great until you got to those that could rain down fire. I don’t think many of your defenses would have helped against that. It was a slower-flowing fire, so unlike a fireball, you wouldn’t have been moved out of the way.”

Rane grunted. “I’ve actually been working on addressing that issue. It'll be interesting to spar sometime.”

Tala grinned, “I agree there.”

He then glanced towards Lyn. “What did you want to ask?”

Lyn shrugged. “Were they creative at all? Or did they seem to just be magical constructs, following the dictates of their scripting?”

“The last one seemed… more, but I don’t really know.” Tala leaned close. “I do have someone I want you to meet, but that will likely be later, too.” Lyn was going to be fascinated by Rob.

Mistress Ingrit didn’t bother trying to intervene, and eventually, the animated discussions wound down so that she could continue.

The next sequence was a selection of Tala scooping up items from the House of the Rising Sun.

Lyn started laughing almost immediately, and that seemed to break the tension enough for chuckles to ripple through those watching her take almost literally everything that wasn’t nailed down.

There was some murmuring at various items that they saw, and the Archivists in the audience stood almost as one, when Tala started taking the library.

They then looked around at each other and realized what they’d done.

Then, in continued eerie synchronization, they each put in requests for all the books involved.

Tala almost laughed at how unified their individual responses were. She’d hoped that the Library would be interested in those books. We have debts to pay, after all. What do we still owe?

-Three-hundred-eighty-one gold and twenty silver.-

That’s a lot… but not that much? Tala didn’t know how to feel. How much do we have?

-Two hundred eleven gold, eighty five silver and one hundred forty seven copper.-

Why one hundred and forty seven copper? Why not transfer that to one silver and forty seven copper?

-Because this is how it is held in your account, and I aim for accuracy.-

Fine, fine. She knew that most of that had come from Master Queue and the profits from the replication and sale of her comb.

She saw the man sitting near Master Boma and smiled his way once again.

He didn’t notice as he was entirely engrossed in taking notes, or maybe making detailed requests for information. She couldn’t quite tell.

In either case, she could pay off more than half her remaining debt almost literally with a thought. Am I rich?

-No, but you likely will be when all of this is over.-

Huh. That didn’t clarify her feelings at all.

After a moment, she found herself frowning.

How much do you want to bet that the Refining process is usually expensive, and us needing a custom version will be more?

-I literally have no money, and you’re probably right.-

We can negotiate with Mistress Holly? She’ll be extremely interested in the reinscription device inside Kit. Maybe we could leverage that?

-That’s one avenue, yeah.-

Mistress Ingrit had moved on to the next set of memories, this one focusing on the artificial sun in her sanctum.

Apparently, humanity had similar devices, but humanity’s versions had been developed entirely independently, so there were lots of questions and exclamations even from the brief glimpses shared.

“They use a striated wave generation system? That’s insane! Why would they isolate and individually generate each wavelength?”

“Greater control over the light and the heat? We definitely have some trouble tuning our radiant units on occasion, and this would remove that tendency.”

“That only happens if you build the unit wrong. This is just needlessly complicated, but what about their cycle management? It looks like they tied the power variability in with the locational stability.”

“Yeah, that would force the change in intensity to be tied to the location of the artificial sun. It’s certainly better to keep those two functions separated and differently regulated.”

Rane was leaning forward, seemingly trying to listen in on the side conversations.

I’m glad I got that booklet, and those books, on the artificial sun’s functionality.

-And oh, so much more.-

That caused Tala to smile. Her side conversations with Rane and Lyn had become less frequent as more of her memories had been shown, and the two of them showed more interest in what was being conveyed by Mistress Ingrit.

The Archivist was only giving the most basic of overviews, but it was still fascinating.

Tala, herself, found that the woman’s summary of Tala’s experiences was riveting, given that they were interpreted and told by someone else, putting a lens on them that she’d never have herself.

When the latest ruckus calmed down, Mistress Ingrit folded her hands and lowered her head slightly. “Now, we arrive at some more... uncomfortable information.”

That got everyone’s attention, and even those who had been more relaxed and possibly starting to work on other things to the side straightened up and refocused.

“This is the city center of Platoiri.”

The room fell silent as the memory of the crystal and gold column came into focus on the wall.

“It isn’t easy to see, without magesight, but that is the magical heart of the arcane city. The scripting you see purifies the power flowing through the founts, and releases it into the environment. This is the chief reason that cities are so populous and compact. Each arcane wants to be in the higher magic density afforded by the column.”

A voice came from the back of the room, one of the Archivists that Tala didn’t know by name speaking in a bare whisper, but still easily heard by everyone, “How many founts are in there?”

The answer was simple, and Mistress Ingrit gave it plainly, “Roughly twenty-thousand.”

Color drained from a huge number of faces. More interestingly, however, were those who didn’t look surprised.

Mistresses Elnea and Jenna were among those, as was Master Grediv and the other higher level Archons.

Lyn was white as a sheet, and Rane’s eye was twitching. If Tala had to guess, Rane had known something about it, but not the full extent.

Mistress Ingrit continued. “This is, unfortunately, not news. Most arcane cities are running on souls that they harvested millennia ago, so while it is egregious, it isn’t something that is actionable. Not currently.”

That brought a wave of grimaces, but everyone present managed to maintain their composure, especially because those that were most aggrieved each looked to their elders, and saw their lack of surprise.

Ahh, the atrocities of the past, how little we can affect you.

Mistress Ingrit cleared her throat, “One thing that is new to us is confirmation that founts can depart if they choose to.”

That caused a stir.

“What Mistress Tala has brought back confirms that the arcanes, while they use founts as a resource, have a view of that resource's instability, and act in a way to keep their sources of power intact. It still is an abysmal situation, and they are using human souls, but in a way, they have a better means of monitoring and catering to those souls than we do.”

A lot of people shifted uncomfortably.

Master Boma was nodding, and Tala remembered that the man had been searching for a means of communicating with vestiges. He’ll be very interested to meet Rob too.

“In the vein of these founts, I will briefly go over how they are used, in general.”

What followed was a selection of memories, showing everything from the density enhancement room, the room that Be-thric had taken Tali into, to protian weaponry.

The fact that the founts in protian weapons served as a key source of magical power for the Eskau was of great interest to the Mage Hunters, as well as quite a few others.

The Librarian showed off the House of Blood’s armory, through Tala’s memories of it, but stated clearly that they didn’t have too many details on the items kept within.

Mistress Ingrit briefly covered gate-breaking and Master Himmal paid special attention to that, clearly intensely interested in the subject.

Rane and Lyn both turned to Tala, obviously aware that she would have been subjected to the process. Tala waved them off. “It wasn’t great, but now’s not the time to discuss it.”

They weren’t happy but didn’t press her.

Mistress Ingrit didn’t discuss holds directly, not quite yet.

Instead, she ran them through the traditions around Pillar and Eskau selection, as well as the culture around the raiding of the candidates of other Houses, both literally and violently, or by enticing them to switch loyalties.

Finally, when that was handled, and the understandable, but simplistic questions were out of the way, Mistress Ingrit turned to the last subject that related directly to founts: Holds.

She explained that arcanes didn’t depend on the city column to power their holds. Instead each hold had its own source of power. She pulled up memories showing the intricate spellforms required to make that happen, and how it allowed for unprecedented control and customization of the dimensional spaces.

The main exception to this rule was, of course, ether holds.

Once again, everyone’s attention was highly focused, and at the end of Mistress Ingrit’s introduction to the topic, as well as a brief overview of void artifacts, she gestured to Tala, “We’ll get to specific examples on those, soon enough. In the meantime, do we have any questions?”

The room didn’t quite erupt this time, but it was a close thing.

Yes, they did indeed have questions.

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