[X] A dare from Sophia Hill.
Year 1, update 2b
You are once again attending to the portly Granny Wither in her comfy little lab with the patched armchairs and wooden tables. Your magic lessons are sometimes conducted here and sometimes on the Blackstone estate, at seemingly random times of the day or night. The times never conflict with your scheduled classes, but wherever and whatever else you might be doing, Granny will simply appear with Sophia Hill in tow and lead you to where the day's lesson would take place.
It is possible there is some magical or traditional significance in the times chosen, but honestly you suspect it's just Granny showing off.
"Finish personalizing your bones in a way that makes sense to you," Granny is saying, snapping up her own set with a practiced flick of her hand and slipping them into the little velvet bag she carried with her. "You'll be the only ones using them. Use a plain tarot deck, but don't try using another mage's carved bones. Try using them to divine the answer to a question before next class."
You're not entirely sure why a mage shouldn't use another's set of bones, but Granny's ghoulish grin had been clear enough.
Sophia is staring down at her own set of bones intently and asks, "Miss Wither, how are we to know if we divine the correct answer?"
Granny smiles toothily. "It'll be
my homework to divine that."
You get the feeling she was hoping someone would ask that question.
Long before you have the skill for true scrying, Granny had lectured, the basics of Clairvoyance are seeking answers from intermediary items. Tarot and bones are common, but fire, the movements of wild animals and other things can be used.
You sweep up your own bones. The instrument you both are practicing on is a concession to your shared classes; surprising, since trying to get Granny to compromise on anything is as graceful and effortless as squeezing blood from stones. Bones that specialize in reading spirits are especially potent in the hands of budding necromancers like Sophia and yourself, and make for a good learning tool. At some point you'll want to get a set comprised of many different magical creatures, like Granny's, but at the moment you're casting with a handful of chicken bones.
Not even magical chickens. Bolf was going to use them for soup before Granny had her way.
You smile at Granny Wither, putting enough effort into it that it slides onto your face as smoothly as glass, and thank her for the lesson. Just because you're a bit tired from balancing classes and your little extracurricular project is no reason to be rude. Particularly to someone who could probably make your life hellishly difficult.
Outside Granny's homey little bungalow, you stretch until you hear a pleasant pop. It's still early, and though you should probably be looking up old battles in the library for Logistics in the morning, you're considering a nice nap before dinner.
That's about when Sophia Hill – your opposite in height and color scheme, and to hear her tell it, your rival – grabs you and whispers into your ear, "Come to the rose garden this evening, if you dare," before sweeping away grandly.
You ponder going along with her wishes. Ordinarily you would – a walk through the garden is hardly a trial.
But you really did want that nap…
---
Sophia appears just as the dessert tray rolls out, almost bowling over the poor maid. You wonder briefly how she got inside without being accosted by guards, riled up as she is. Connections on her part, slacking on the part of the guard – you should look into that sometime. Amidst the myriad and ever-replenishing others in your itinerary of course.
She slaps her hands down on the table with a bang; it's a liberty whose origins may stem from your long – if rocky – acquaintance, or just Sophia being Sophia. You raise an eyebrow, and she huffs and removes her hands.
"You never showed up," she says intensely.
Feeling refreshed from your nap, you watch her with a certain zen serenity.
"Try one of these little cakes," you offer. "Bolf does this thing with chocolate and Barunese caramel, it's wonderful."
Sophia drops into the chair opposite you sullenly. "I don't want cake," she says rebelliously.
You are almost certain that is a lie. No one could possibly dislike
this cake. She's just being difficult.
You sigh. "What was it you wanted, Sophia?"
She looks around in a cloak and dagger sort of way, as if you might be hiding people behind the drapery.
"Not here," she said tersely. "Somewhere where we can't be overheard."
You gesture expansively to the room, empty save for the two of you. Not that it's impossible that there are eavesdroppers, of course, but that is true of every aspect of your life.
"Just come oooonnn!"
You mournfully devour your cake in three quick bites. It's almost a crime to bolt down one of Bolf's creations, especially since you're pretty sure this is going to be unimportant in the grand scheme of things. But there is a small chance Sophia is going to reveal something important or attack you or confess to you or something.
Perhaps more crucially, she isn't going to go away until you join her, so you might as well agree.
---
A double line of ancient herbal topiaries tower like trees, some wattled and bulging with tree-fat and others as slender as blades beneath a canopy of horse-sized leaves. The light does not dapple but stripe as it passes through, a visual effect that you quite enjoy. Occasionally the topiaries move very slightly, through some enchantment or quality of their creation. That, you find a fair bit unnerving. Particularly the shrub animals, which have a bad habit of turning to look inquisitively as you walk by. Slanted between the stripes of shadow and light, orange glow birds serve as light sources in the early evening to banish shadowy nooks from existence.
The sun would soon set enough to send a brilliant explosion of color through the ice-stone walls of the castle, but for now the vivid flowers – starflowers and dragonsbreath, and deeper in you know that a carpet of red roses await – hold pride of place.
The frigid, white-shading-blue starflowers cluster along the winding trails down to the rock-edged pools, while the bright yellow-red dragonsbreath are scattered around comfortably sweeping blackstone benches that seem to have grown from the ground itself. Perhaps they are. Dragonsbreath also clusters around and below more green topiary, thankfully more normally sized. The gardens are largely empty at this time of evening, though you do garner a few looks from tarrying servants or visiting noblemen. You greet them and are considering how best to move them along when Sophia bluntly asks them to leave the two of you alone.
You sigh. Really, Sophia? The whispers as you move on seem very loud in your ears.
"What?" She asks defensively.
"Never mind," you mumble.
You're grateful your guard for the evening is willing to give you space, compromising by staying within sight but out of hearing range. You assume he has some magic that could cross that distance in an instant, or he wouldn't be a very good guard. Either way, it's convenient for you.
Sophia eyeballs the guard in red and white balefully, but the full-faced helm just looks back at her, and crosses his arms.
"Fine," she says finally, spinning around and crossing her arms so that her back was to the fully armored man. She leans into your personal space insolently. "So. You think you're pretty good, huh princess?"
"... Yes?"
It's true, after all.
"Then how about you prove it?" she challenges you with a crafty smile. "I rolled the bones to find the biggest source of necromantic energy on the grounds. I tr– it
probably has a necromantic ward on it to prevent people walking in. But surely a too-talented princess would be able to break it?"
"So, before this goes any further," a voice says lethargically from the short rose bushes to your right. Just the right height to hide a person lying down, you realize, mentally berating yourself. "Points for originality, using the roses instead of the forest for your secret rendezvous. But you might want to check around a little more."
An older girl, 13 or 14, rises from among the roses to a sitting position. She looks lanky and fit, with short, light brown hair splitting the difference between your fair hair and Sophia's dark brown curls.
"Spy!" Sophia shouts accusingly.
The older girl rolls her eyes. "Like I care about whatever you kids are talking about," she says from the lofty height of two and a half years. "Might wanna to check for napping– that is, for gardeners
doing their jobs first."
The larger girl finally makes it to her feet. "Jill Chaser," she introduces herself in a friendly, unassuming way, holding out a hand for a handshake. "You're the princess, right?"
"They know! Run for it!" Sophia reacts like that slightly grubby hand is a magelight shining in her face, demanding she confess all her crimes. She grabs your hand, spinning and dragging you into an awkward clasped-hand run. It's either keep up or suffer the indignity of being dragged. Or you suppose you could trip her and watch her faceplant into a rosebush, but she'd probably drag you in too.
So instead you wave off your guard – who continues to trail behind you at a steady ground-eating lope – and the gardener girl Jill Chaser trotting along beside him. Sophia races through the footpaths of the garden, periodically glancing back to see if you've lost them.
The pair of you leave the roses behind and stampede across the expansive grounds of the castle, through halls of precisely laid ice-stone and green gardened terraces. Sophia tugs at you insistently so you allow her to curve west and take you through the stables, upsetting the animals. Your legs are starting to hurt and breath coming shallowly from the exertion as you swing around the servant quarters and into the less-traveled areas of the grounds. Sophia is worse off, panting and blowing like a racehorse after a win.
But you are, apparently… here?
"'S it," Sophia puffs happily, slapping a hand against an arched doorway emblazoned with a heraldic seal. It's not yours, the heron with wings outstretched; it's a lidded eye with three rays springing from it like the dawn. Her hand rebounds off the door with a flash of pale lavender, the girl giving a muffled yelp.
Jill and the guard have been – to all appearances – left behind. It's a shame all your guards wear full-face helmets, making fun of him for being outrun by a pair of 10 year olds would be entertaining for at least a week. It is possible that he is just hiding out of sight somewhere, but you don't see how that's relevant to teasing opportunities.
You look around. It puts you in mind of the funeral service held for your parents, a certain sharpness to the memory that still stings. A small aperture of bright red columns and benches leading the eye down a narrow path of silvery square stones, each inscribed with a complex eight-pointed design on them, to the opening in the earth. Twisting, warty vines with naturally designed interlocking thorny leaves crawl along the ground and must be stepped over. The overgrowth is excessive. You may wish to have a word with the gardeners. The vines that flow like waterfalls over the obscured stonework are growing wild above a carpet of ashen, dead undergrowth. Blackish-green lichen has crept up the walls itself in symmetrical patterns, though the door is perfectly clear. There's a certain smell in the air… sweetness. Pleasant enough, though perhaps a bit cloying.
"Pretty cool, right?" Sophia preens, as if taking credit for the… whatever it is. Catacombs, maybe.
"Sure," you agree absently, still looking around. Necromancy, huh?
This is… probably kind of dangerous. Surely someone knows this is here? No one just puts up magic seals for no reason. You have no idea how long the seal has been up, but the difficulty your uncle had in finding a teacher for you suggests there is no royal necromancer on staff, putting seals up everywhere. You ask slowly, "Is there really some abandoned – yet extremely convenient – source of necromantic power right here in the castle? We're a five minute jog from the gardens!"
"I don't see why not," Sophia says with optimism. Which… okay, there are a lot of mages around the place, many mages are secretive by nature, there probably
are a few secret labs left lying around when their owners spontaneously ascended or combusted or turned into a newt. But still.
She cheers, "Let's pop this thing open already!"
Sophia is not going to let this go, is she?
[X] A powerful source of necromantic energy, Sophia believes. It could be some powerful artifact or buried soul, a locus of energy. And you just so happen to be in the market for more power at any cost. Break the seal and enter.
[X] Or for all you know it could be some guardian beast or spirit inside. This little jaunt could end with the flesh flensed from your bones, how embarrassing. Try to convince her that having your soul torn from your bodies by some ancient evil is a good look for neither of you.
[X] Working on the hypothesis that it is not
impossible this thing contains an ancient evil, perhaps you should check the castle's extensive libraries for clues to its origin rather than freeing whatever might be inside. Not that you need another research option...
[X] How much do you trust Sophia's divinations, anyway? This could be someone's favorite meditation nook, or where they bring girls. Break the seal to assuage her curiosity and let her go.
[X] Do your best to convince Sophia that opening the tomb is the work of a madman! Who knows what could be in there! Then come back tomorrow and open it by yourself. Yes, two budding necromancers may be able to handle whatever is inside better than one, but one necromancer alone needn't split any profit that may be hiding inside.
