7 – Prodigal Child

The castle was seated on a broad plateau. The walls were carved with dark granite, veined with pale mineral lines, a hint of immense power hidden in the somewhat unassuming building.

The walls were thick enough that sound died inside and around them. Cracks were reinforced, stabilized, and magical scripts carved into load-bearing walls, invisible until activated.

The leyline flowed downward, anchoring to the earth. Spirit lanterns emitted a constant, low glow, never flickering, never brightening.

It was not the typical home for the patriarch of a noble ascendant clan.

There were no floating towers, no soaring bridges. No excess.

It’s most interesting feature as at the heart of the castle, at Anchor Hall.

It was a circular chamber carved directly into the plateau’s core with a massive stone dais fused to the floor, upon which rested a monolith etched with a single character repeated endlessly in diminishing script.

A long scroll had been spread across the center of the room, a column of white in the midst of the dark colored carpet.

An older man was writing something on the scroll. He’d probably written it several times, even though there was really no point in it. They had technology that didn’t require such arduous kinds of spell-making.

“Albert,” Elric called, his lips spreading with fondness as the old estate caretaker looked up. “I swear, you get younger every time I see you. You don’t look a day over three hundred.”

Albert merely grunted in response, but Elric didn’t take offense. Master Albert had never been one for long speeches anyway.

“Is he in his study?” Elric asked.

Albert grunted again, which could either mean a yes, no, or a ‘bug off’.

Elric took it to mean the first.

“Always nice talking to you, old friend.”

Albert didn’t bother responding and only frowned at the drip of ink on the spell script he’d presumably botched thanks to Elric’s distraction.

As he walked away, Elric could almost feel the man thrusting stone daggers at his back.

The good mood he’d acquired from teasing Albert was lost as he climbed the echoey stairs of the stone castle. The tightness around his neck returned, the same one he always experienced whenever he had to meet with the Patriarch of the Historical Massa-dominant clan. The Earthbinder clan was said to be descended from Krenn-Of-The-Third-Edge, the first mage who discovered the massa essence.

As one of the senior members of the Celestial Assembly and the Patriarch of the oldest noble clans in the world, Edward Earthbinder, the Holy Anchor, rarely left his home.

He was one of three legendary-level mages still alive, who rarely utilized his strength but refused to surrender it. He spent most of his days inside, cultivating, preparing for some unseen war that had not yet happened in his nearly six hundred years of life. He’d neglected everything in his pursuit of perfection, driven away all of his wives and concubines, his children, both legitimate and otherwise. He cared not for his family or his riches, and if not for Albert, he would have let his estate fall into disrepair, while he remained in one spot with his eyes closed, refining his cores, growing his awareness, preparing.

He was in the same spot he’d been when Elrirc had visited him nearly five years ago. His bedroom was bare except for a single mat on the floor, where the patriarch sat cross-legged.

His beard had been trimmed by Albert. His loincloth had been changed, and his body cleaned. But he had not opened his eyes in all that time.

Elric leaned against the entryway for awkward seconds before he cleared his throat.

“It’s me,” he said, though the man could probably tell who it was, as attuned to his surroundings as he was. Heck, Edward could probably tell the second Elric walked onto this mountain.

“I don’t want to disturb your…protracted meditating, but I need a favor from you.”

The Patriarch didn’t speak for a long time, so long that Elric was about to repeat himself.

Then, finally, Edward said in a voice that sounded like the earth splitting open. “A favor?” His voice rumbled raspy and low. “My wayward son, who refuses his birthright and abandons his responsibility, is now requesting a favor?”

“Yes.” Elric didn’t point out that it had been his father who had abandoned him first. “I need a recommendation letter for a student to the Erynwall Academy of Stoichiomancy. Late admission.”

“Who is this student?”

“She is no one. Simply a talented candidate.”

“And who are her parents?”

“Mossbornes.”

“The insolence.” The Patriarch’s displeasure radiated in the atmosphere. “You would put such a child in a place with the best and the brightest? A chick should never play in the same coup as an eagle.”

Elric resisted the urge to roll his eyes. Sometimes, he forgot that the man had been a farmer before he’d become one of the strongest Massa-dominant Legendary Mages the world had ever seen.

But his statement revealed a new complication in the Ari problem. Her parentage.

With Ascendants, power level and skill were closely associated with bloodlines. There had been a few skilled Ascendants who came from unimpressive bloodlines, but none of them had been quite as skilled as Arielle.

No one would believe a Mossborne child could achieve such genius in such a short time. They would investigate and may discover her secret.

Elric needed a cover-up.

“The child is something of a genius,” Elric said. “And I have doubts about her parentage.”

“Do you?”

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“Yes. I will need some time to confirm them.”

The Patriarch inhaled deeply and exhaled, the temperature of the room dropping.

“A bird that asks for grain before learning to fly will soon lose its way,” he said.

“Of course,” Elric responded, though he didn’t know what that meant. He never knew what his father’s proverbs meant.

“I will need a favor from you in return.”

Ah. “Yes. Of course, I didn’t imagine that you would ever do anything for me for free.”

The man finally opened an eye, still meditating but regarding Elric with a sardonic look devoid of guilt or affection.

“You would go as far as to owe me a debt for a student you describe as nobody?”

Elric fought to keep his face from changing. Massa-leaning clans, particularly the Earthbinders, were known for having unflappable expressions. They could read even the slightest imbalance, and even without the Luxa, they would know simply from a single glance what you were thinking and how you were feeling.

So Elric tried not to think about Arielle, and her father, whom she had not seen in years, and her life that was now in danger, thanks to his faulty judgment of a situation.

He tried not to think about how painful extracting her power would be if she made that choice. It was the same as drawing out half her life force.

He also tried not to think of what the anomaly of the young Archmage represented.

Her skill was rough. Untrained. But she had the best control of elements that he’d ever seen. He didn’t know how she’d gotten her power, but they were nothing short of heavensent. He hoped she chose to keep them.

Even though their discovery could get both of them in serious trouble, it would be a tragedy to get rid of them now.

***

Arielle had a small dilemma about what to wear the next morning.

Elric was coming, and she had to give him her decision today.