Mages Must Fall

by Jeffrey Biles

  He was going to learn to work miracles.

  The man sitting behind the large stone desk was decidedly less imperious than Terrance had been expecting. Terrance had been working up to this for days, mentally preparing himself as if he was about to face the lizard beast of legend, but the man had slightly graying hair and a small bit of paunch. He wore the same matte blue mage cloth, but this version had clearly made allowances for comfort that had not been present in the Inquisitor’s garb.

  The recruiter stuck out his hand and Terrance managed to shake it instead of flinch.

  “I’m Arnt, pleased to meet ya. Are you here for the Mages' Guild, or did you mean to go to the other giant intimidating stone structure?”

  “I… didn’t know there was another…” Terrance took a breath, tried to remember to be normal. Today was a normal day for this guy. “Oh, a joke. Haha. I…”

  “A bit nervous today, are ya? Yea, I get it. This is a big day- you get to find out if you’ve got the touch. You are here for recruitment, right? If you want to visit one of the offices inside the compound, you’ll have to get a special pass at the northern entrance.”

  “Yes, sir, I’m here for, uh, recruitment.”

  “Well good. We can get this done right quick. Hold out your hand.”

  Terrance held out his hand and Arnt pulled a glove off a hook in the wall. It was unlike anything he had seen, a shifting green that seemed to twist the light around it.

  “Now hold still. This thing hasn’t killed anyone yet, but it does take a while to work.”

  Arnt put the glove on his right hand, used his left hand to roll up Terrance’s sleeve, and then put glove to skin. He frowned.

  “Hey Magda,” he yelled, “I need your help.”

  A woman walked out of a door that Terrance hadn’t noticed before, imperious and scowling. Despite her grey-tinged hair, she had the physical presence that Terrance expected from young men and the cold fire that Terrance had only seen in… well, himself.

  “I’m quite busy,” she said. “What is it?”

  She then seemed to take notice of Terrance, and the glove on Arnt’s hand. Her hard face broke into a smile, and Terrance was able to let go of the muscles he just now realized he had been clenching.

  “You found one?”

  “I’m not sure,” said Arnt. “Come over here.”

  Arnt put his gloved hand on Magda’s arm.

  “It seems to be calibrated correctly. You try it.”

  Magda slipped on the glove and brought it to Terrance’s arm. Her smile got wider, turning her face scary again.

  “Who’s your father?” she asked.

  That was out of nowhere. “I don’t know him,” replied Terrance.

  “You know who he is though?”

  “He died seven months before I was born.”

  Magda raised her eyebrows, gave a significant look to Arnt.

  “And your mother?”

  “She’s dead. She died years ago,” he lied. That lie seemed like the right thing to do- no need to get them thinking about his true purpose here.

  “Well, I guess we’ll never know then,” Arnt said, earning him a frown from Magda. “But it sounds like he’s got the touch. We can move on to the next phase, right?”

  Magda gave a curt nod. “Yes, do it.”

  “Welcome, uh…”

  “Terrance.”

  “Welcome, Terrance. You’ve got the touch. Come back tomorrow and we’ll see if you’ve got the heart to become a mage.”

  “You actually did it,” said Frederick. “You went and signed up.”

  “I did.”

  “You said you were going to kill the storm, but I thought you were just talking big- should’ve known better, I’ve known you long enough.” Frederick slammed down his beer. “I wonder how many of the Justice Guild recruits are there for revenge. You know, some Justice took some extra taxes, or fined them for littering, and then they went and upended their whole life and joined the Justice Guild.”

  “You guys ever kill anyone?”

  “Sure, but almost always people who are genuinely terrible. Murderers, traitors, thieves…” He looked around. “That is, thieves who aren’t in the Thieves' Guild. To hear some people talk, you would think we just walked around killing innocents all day. Sure, we can ruin someone’s business, but that’s not… well, I guess they do care about it almost as if it was a person.”

  “I’m thinking of Wile.”

  “Me too. You told him yet? He’s gonna need to find someone else to keep the store together.”

  “He’ll try and talk me out of it.”

  “Well yea, but what else are ya gonna do- run away?”

  Terrance shrugged.

  “I’d tell him for you, but he’d find you quick enough anyways, seeing as you’re sleeping in his basement. Maybe I’ll do it just to force the conversation.”

  “I’ll tell him.”

  “You’ll have to move out, you know.” Terrance had waited until the store was clear of customers, but Wile had known something was up the entire day. Had probably guessed it from the start. “I want to let you stay, but whoever comes to replace you is gonna need a place to sleep, and they might not be as understanding about your new hobby.”

  “It’s all right,” said Terrance. “Mages' Guild pays enough for me to find my own place.”

  Wile snorted. “I bet. They figured out how to make gold from nothing yet?”

  “I’ll miss you, you know.”

  “You’ll still need to buy stuff, right?”

  “I don’t know if I’ll be able to stomach seeing the store in disarray. I’m emotionally fragile, you know.”

  “Well you’re always welcome. And you might as well stay until you pass those trials. Maybe clean up a bit around the store in your downtime. Hell, maybe I’ll get lucky and you won’t get accepted.”

  “Maybe I’ll find you someone else, someone so good you won’t even miss me.”

  “Fat chance.” Then Wile’s voice dropped, both in volume and in tone. “You know what you’re doing is very dangerous, right?”

  Terrance nodded.

  Then Wile laughed to himself, gave a half smile. “Of course you do. You’ve probably made a danger calculation somewhere. What are your odds?”

  “No idea. I don’t have all the variables yet.”

  “But you think it’ll be profitable? Metaphorically speaking.”

  Terrance sighed. “It might keep me from going bankrupt. Metaphorically speaking.”

  “Then you have my blessing. Good luck.”

  Anne was the harder conversation.

  Terrance thought it would be better to wait until after sex, when they were both relaxed, but it didn’t help as much as he thought. He could never tell what Anne was thinking, what Anne wanted. Ever since the incident… no, not “the incident”. The murder of his brother and the death of his mother. Ever since then she had been sticking close, smothering, as if she was the one who had lost her entire family.

  Always asking if things were okay, always trying to pull him from his books. She was ready to go any time he wanted, and sometimes when he didn’t, even during her most fertile time of month. She did her art in his room now, even though the lighting wasn’t good.

  “I’m joining the Mages' Guild,” he said. No prologue, just putting it out there.

  Her head lay on his chest, and she turned it to look towards his face. She was smiling, as if relieved. “Does that mean I get you back now?”

  “What?”

  “You know how you’ve been, since the incident. Does this mean you’re getting better?” She crawled further up on him, legs rubbing him, trying to take away his ability to think. “I want the old you back. I promise I’ll keep being this nice to you. Maybe we’ll have a-”

  “Anne, stop. Why do you think I’m joining the Mages' Guild?” Terrance pushed her off of him. “Did you think I forgot?”

  She started crying.

  6

  “The first tria
l is simple,” said Arnt. “You take this book, you go home and read it cover to cover, and when you come back we’re going to ask you some questions.”

  Terrance took the tome. It was leathery and smelling of age. “When should I return?”

  “Whenever you want,” said Arnt. “But the sooner the better.”

  Terrance nodded. It would take about a day to get through this thing, if he wasn’t interrupted. He should probably take another day or two to study it in detail if he wanted to pass whatever questioning they were going to put him through. “I can do that.”

  “Good.” Arnt began to walk back from the bookshelf to his desk, but then turned around to address Terrance. “One more thing. The book must come back safely. That is very important.”

  “No problem.”

  Arnt smiled, in a way that made Terrance suddenly want to leave.

  The first ten blocks back were uneventful- and that was when they appeared. Two of them, young and gaunt, staring hungrily at the book. Whatever Frederick said about the wonders of their society, boys like this were easy to scrounge up if you knew where to look. The strange part was seeing them so far from the southeastern slums.

  “The book, and we don’t bust ya.”

  Terrance looked around- traffic was light, but it was there. The odds of someone helping out were small but not nonexistent. Then he looked at the book in his hand- the cover plastered with bright neon runes, clearly marked as loudly as possible to signal that he was part of the Mages' Guild. With that, most people would stay away, and they were far enough away from the Mages' Guild complex that a few brave ones might even help the kids who were trying to rob him.

  It was possible he could make a run for it, but holding the big book precluded him jumping many obstacles, and it had been years since he’d sprinted for any length of time. His only chance there would be to lose them before they could catch up… and while he thought, they were getting closer.

  His other option was to fight. It was made harder by the fact that he couldn’t put down the book for any length of time, lest it get stolen by a third kid who was waiting nearby to snatch it up.

  At least the kids didn’t have any weapons. Looking at the book, Terrance realized that he did. But then he remembered the brittle pages inside, some of which might very well crumble if he used the book to whack someone on the head. The book would come back, but not very safely.

  Meanwhile, they approached. Two of them, fifteen or sixteen by the looks of it, but you could never tell with these street kids.

  If he wanted to have any shot at winning this, he had to catch them by surprise and take one out before they had time to react. Terrance ran towards the bigger one, jumped, and kicked with all his might… and sailed past, barely catching himself.

  The kid laughed and then plowed into him, knocking him over. Terrance wrapped his arms tight around the book and curled up to shelter it from impact. Unsheltered from impact was Terrance himself, and his right shoulder and the side of his head hit the cobblestones with an audible crack.

  “Geez, that wasn’t supposed to happen,” said the smaller kid.

  “Shut up,” said the bigger kid. He towered over Terrance. “Just give us the book.”

  Terrance rolled over so he could see the kid… and kicked him in the balls. The bigger kid collapsed, cursing.

  Terrance’s vision was swimming, but he could see the smaller kid standing over him. Out of kicking range. “How many fingers am I holding up?”

  “What the fuck are you doing?” yelled the older kid.

  “He passed.”

  “He kicked me in the fucking balls!”

  “But he protected the book, at the risk of his health.”

  The bigger kid began to slowly bring himself to his feet. “If this had been real, I would have fucking murdered you. You know that, right?”

  “Lay off,” said the smaller kid. He held out a hand to Terrance, lifted him up. “I recommend that you do some exercise or something before the second test. Bravery won’t always save you.”

  Terrance was fully discombobulated, between the concussion and the sudden revelation of the kid’s intentions.

  “So… do I still need to study the book?”

  The smaller kid laughed. “Of course. Never disobey a Mage.”

  Terrance spent the rest of the day dizzy and distracted. Wile came into his room, shook his head, and returned with an ice pack. Anne flitted between overbearing nurture and distant coldness, occasionally fighting back a tear. Frederick sent a note.

  The next day he was able to concentrate. He studied all day, referencing what was in the book with what he knew from his histories.

  The book itself was mostly things Terrance already knew, although the arrangement of the facts was unusual- they were organized based on the various departments of the Mages' Guild.

  The Department of the Palace was the oldest and most venerable of the departments. Supposedly they were there to ensure the safety of the king and keep the evil beast trapped, but Terrance suspected their true purpose was more political.

  Next was the Department of Inquisition. Terrance was already quite aware of their activities, so much so that he barely recognized the description given in the book. “The department is organized to safeguard the sanctity of magic, and protect the populace from the evildoers who would harness it for unauthorized means.”

  Terrance didn’t know as much about the rest of the departments, so their descriptions rang more true. The Department of Works built bridges, sewers, and other vital infrastructure, ten times as fast and twice as strong as a team of regular laborers. The Department of Great Works built beautiful architectural wonders that would have been impossible without magic. The Department of Recruitment recruited and trained more members of the Mages' Guild- simple enough, although yesterday’s encounter had shown that there was subterfuge even there.

  The Department of Genealogy tracked the family history of each member of the Mages' Guild, trying to track how strength, magical ability, and personality were passed down through the generations. That was one Terrance would need to watch- it would be no good having the Guild find out they had killed his brother and start suspecting Terrance’s motivations.

  The Department of Discovery was involved in creating new ways of using magic, and so they interacted with all of the departments fairly regularly. It appeared they came out with a new discovery every ten years or so, although the discovery process was far from regular. One year they had discovered three new uses in a month, and then there had been a stretch of eighty years where no new discoveries had been made (at least, no new ones they were willing to share with a lowly applicant).

  The Department of War was all about protecting the city in case of attack. However, the last time that the city had been attacked had been hundreds of years ago, while the Department of War was often sending regiments to other cities along the rivers for months at a time. “Keeping the peace.”

  Finally, there was the Department of Resource Management. They were tasked with “protecting and managing the resources of the Mages' Guild”. Their official duties were to make sure that every other department had what they needed- armor, building tools, money. The department seemed rather large for their stated responsibilities, so there was probably a hidden responsibility somewhere in there.

  After two days of study, he was ready to return.

  7

  Terrance kept alert on the way back to the Mages' Guild, but there was no more trouble. It was a warm, pleasant stroll out of the merchants’ district, across the river, past the inner wall, and straight to the center of the inner core. That was good- he wasn’t sure he could take another lump like the one he’d received yesterday, and he wanted to be in top form for whatever this second trial was.

  Arnt took the book and inspected it for wear, seemed pleased. “You run into any trouble?”

  Terrance was taken aback. “Am I supposed to pretend otherwise?”

  “Just making conversation. No
w, which department was formed first?”

  “The Department of the Palace.”

  “Good. What about the second one formed?”

  “The Department of Inquisition.”

  “And the third?”

  “The Department of Resource Management.”

  “Name three projects constructed by the Department of Great Works.”

  “The Mages' Guild complex, the docks, and both the inner and outer city walls.”

  “Who did they build the city walls in conjunction with?”

  “The Department of War and the Warriors' Guild. For both the inner walls and the outer walls, though the projects were separated by hundreds of years.”

  “Good.”

  The rapid-fire questioning continued for nearly half an hour, with Terrance getting most- but not all- of the queries right. Then things turned more personal.

  “Which of the departments is your favorite?”

  “Department of Resource Management.” It fit with his training as a shopkeeper’s assistant, and he didn’t particularly want to go to war or go off killing unauthorized magic-users. Works or Great Works would take him away from where he could be effective, and Recruitment, Genealogy, and Discovery were eliminated for the same reason. It was Resource Management that got him involved in every facet of the Mages' Guild life, able to search out weak points.

  “Interesting,” said Arnt. “We don’t get that one often. Most people have never heard of it.”

  “Neither had I, until I read that book.”

  “So you didn’t come in here with a dream. Funny, most folks do. Building giant buildings, or protecting the city. Usually one of those two.”

  “How are all the other departments filled?”

  “Not everyone gets their first choice. They can stay a second or third year in the apprenticeship, try to impress them again, but after year three you either go home or go with whatever department chooses you. To fill up their ranks, Resource Management selects all but the most incompetent every year.”