Chapter 52: Admissions (Patreon)

Chapter 52: Admissions

Rain tapped a staccato on the windows of her office. It was the quintessential Mage's study, with towering bookshelves, tables replete with scrolls and reagents. Really, it was what I expected to find in a college of magic, but I couldn't help but notice how it did not match the woman in front of me.

She was like something out of the Brothers Grimm. Her too perfect face and surreptitious smiles. Liliana Vess reminded me of a noble who sat on her ivory throne and made disparaging comments about the 'peasantry' as her manservant poured her tea.

There was, in fact, a manservant, even though it was nothing more than a shambling corpse. The tea, on the other hand, was excellent.

“Necromany on this plane is so delightfully backwards,” Liliana said as her little doll refilled her cup. “So focused on pulling back the soul, or something like it, that they skip the much easier method.” Her smile was sharp.

This was clearly my first lesson, or else, if I failed, my final test. That was the feeling I got from this woman. I sipped my tea, Raven standing at my side. Lady Vess had taken her to be mine retainer, and we hadn't tried to disabuse her of that notion.

“They find too much?” I said. “It's easy to burn out a mortal body, after all. Powering it yourself though...” I shrugged. “Well, that's what summons are for, isn't it?”

Her smile turned less predatory. “Indeed. You've made a study of necromancy then?”

“I've dabbled,” I said. “but only that.”

“It is a rather difficult discipline,” she said with a sigh. “So many new practitioners are captured by the twisted thrill of it, so much so that they completely ignore simpler answers to their problems, or else,” she gestured to her zombie as it collapsed into ash, “hold it at such a distance so that it is rendered useless.”

“Magic is worth learning,” I replied. “It's why I came here after all.”

Another sip. “Rather,” Liliana said. “And I'd be quite pleased to accept you into this esteemed academy, though, I do wonder how you brought your pet along.” She waved her fingers at Raven disinterestedly. “She is different from the demons of this plane, daedra, as they are called.”

My heart rate slowed, new power, old tricks. In that artificial calm I kept my countenance clear and unbothered. “I used her natural abilities along with several spells,” I said. “Demons on her home plane are already half outside of reality, using that, she tracks my signature through the Eternities and follows via her own route.”

“Fascinating.”

“It's a good trick,” I said with a shrug.

“Hmm. A bit more than that, child,” Liliana said. “our kind has been looking for ways to ferry others across the Eternities for longer than this plane has existed. For one so young to stumble across it, well, more's the pity that she cannot bring passengers.”

I kept my feathers aggressively unruffled.

I caught the slightest hint of disappointment cross Liliana's face, gone so quick I might have imagined it. Then she reached out and rang a simple brass bell. The enchantments worked into it probably made it more expensive than if it had been made from solid gold.

After a few seconds one of the mages entered the room. A dark elf in...journeyman robes? Her hair was done up in two buns behind her head, which drew her angular features into stark relief.

“Yes, my lady?” the elf asked.

“Take the second to her rooms in the Hall of Attainment,” Liliana said.

I took another drink of my tea, sending a subtle telepathic pulse of “go with it” to Raven. To her credit, she didn't even pause as she sketched a brief bow, before exiting the room.

I'd be catching hell for that later.

After the door closed Liliana asked, “What brings you to this little corner of nowhere?”

“Curiosity,” I said. “Why are you teaching here?”

“Diversion,” she shot back with a smirk. I couldn't check the small frown before it flickered across my features. “Shall we do away with the half answers, then?” she continued. “I am rather curious, especially given how much interest our resident assassin turned scholar has vested in you.”

We weren't doing away with the half questions, apparently. Aloud I just said. “If I left every plane I met a madwoman on, there wouldn't be many left.”

Liliana laughed. “Too true,” she said. “Too true. As for why I find myself on this icy little rock, it's a simple matter. For all that the locals have no appreciation for necromancy, their use of abjuration and enchantment outstrips even many of our own kind.”

I nodded. “I'm decent at barriers myself, but I haven't put much effort into enchantment...” I said.

“I recommend the local flavor,” Liliana said. “It is almost laughable in its simplicity and scope. Though, perhaps that is only to be expected, given the power source?”

I blinked, “Oh?”

“The souls of living beings, of course. All of that energy, turned towards a singular purpose.” Liliana smiled. “It's a charming little innovation.”

“If—you say so,” I said. Her smile deepened, as she pretended to ignore my stutter. This woman, she was better at this game than I was.

“Now then,” she said. “What did you come here to learn?”

I looked over to the bookshelves. How many spell books were there, I wondered. Thousands? Tens of Thousands. “Everything,” I said. It was perhaps the most honest thing I'd said since landing in the courtyard.

She laughed. “To be young,” she said. I flicked a glance over towards her apparently youthful form. She caught that as well. “Oh, would you perhaps like to learn the secrets of eternal youth? There are many such workings, the trick is finding out which cost you are most willing to pay.”

I shook my head. Costs, huh? I'd already paid mine.

“Perhaps in time,” she said.

“If you say so,” I replied.

“Spells of power, then, or knowledge? I am quite familiar with both. Spells of ruin. Or maybe...” she paused, looking me dead in the eye, “spells to find what you lost, so many planes ago?”

I jolted in my chair, stifling the reaction. Liliana smiled at me. “How—”

“You're looking for something,” she said. “Most of us are, even if we have yet to realize it. The only question is, are you looking forward, or back?”

I frowned. Maybe, maybe I was looking for something. Or, someone. Now that she'd planted the idea in my head, I couldn't help but think back to Ritz, the girl I'd met at the start of it all. Things were simpler in Ivalice, and maybe I'd been looking for that simplicity all along. Why else had I stayed so long in a world of Heroes and Villains?

Why else had I been so dissatisfied when the gilding came off all too quickly?

“You seem taken with the idea,” Liliana said, leaning forward against her desk. “It is tempting is it not?” There was a flicker of melancholy on her face. “To attempt to resurrect the dead...”

Her words stabbed at something deep inside of me. It took all I was not to gasp. “That... is possible?”

She shrugged languidly. “For a certain definition of the word. There are always ways to bind the dead to the world of the living.” She tilted her head back towards the ash pile decorating the stone floor. “The question, as always, is the cost.”

I swallowed once, and tried not to think about too graves lying next to each other, in the rain.

I failed.

Liliana stood, sweeping around the desk. The expression on her face was conciliatory, but I felt something darker lurking in her emotions. All the same, I didn't stop her from laying a hand on my shoulder.

If she wanted to kill me, after all, she'd had ample opportunity. “Poor child,” she said. “Existence is cruel to our kind.”

I raised an eyebrow, forcing nonchalance. “Why do you say that?” I said. “Unlimited power, unlimited planes to roam. It seems almost idyllic.”

“Because,” she said. “We cannot choose our price.”