The Last Daughter -- Dragon-Blooded Sorcery School Quest

Ascending Earth, Realm Year 758

The air in the cave is blessedly dry, bearing little of the inescapable cold clamminess that seems to increasingly dominate the Isle as Autumn progresses. You sit cross-legged on the stone floor, fingers moving in complex patterns you've struggled to learn, mind full of complicated equations. Beyond the strain of your concentration, you can just barely sense... something here. Essence cousin to your own, but subtly unfamiliar — solid, eternally patient, infinitely unyielding.

Your breathing slows, and so does your heart rate, matching the intangible rhythm of the Earth in this place. For the space of two heartbeats, you have it — your anima surges subtly with the strain, your Aspect Markings standing out particularly starkly as you gather a flickering, white glow into your hands. It wavers in the direction of becoming something more, but before you can truly grasp it, it's gone again. You're left doubled over with your hands braced on your knees, trying to get your breathing under control while feeling like you've just run up a mountain and back.

You feel your instructor's icy gaze on you, and prepare yourself to be corrected on something, to be told about what you're forgetting, or to be given something else to mentally juggle on top of everything. Instead, she does something worse — she gives you the shallowest nod of approval. As if you're doing everything right, and it's still this difficult and fruitless.

The cave you and your fellow students occupy is hard to spot from without. But instructor Zadaki had led you all briskly into a narrow crack in a cliff face, and into a large, domed space within. You'd all gasped as she'd summoned a small, magical light, revealing the brilliant crystals on all sides. The air here thrums with energy, and small, fleeting shapes move among the crystals at the edge of your sight. You wouldn't have needed the month and a half of formal geomantic study you've had to recognise this place as an Earth Aspected demesne, a nexus of untapped geomantic power.

Despite your frustration, as you take a moment to catch your breath, you're forced to admit that you are doing well at this, looking around at the others. While a Dragon-Blood is attuned to all five elements, the one of her Aspect will always come most naturally. Nearby, Sesus Amiti is particularly noticeable in her lack of progress. The Air Aspect is wearing a look of concentration so intense that it's almost incongruous with her soft features, performing the same exercise you had, but with nothing to show for it but a swirl of unseasonal, wintery chill coming off of her. As you watch, it intensifies to the point of a visible glow, Amiti's anima standing out a pale, sickly blue-white, wispy and insubstantial at the edges. Frost slowly creeps over the stone around her, already beginning to coat her uniform. It's a bit of an embarrassing loss of anima control, for an exercise as simple as this, and in a setting as public as this, so you look away.

Aspect isn't everything, of course. Ledaal Anay Idelle seems to be doing at least as well as you, and is evidently pacing herself better than you, the only sign of her own exertions the Essence gathered in her hands, and a slight intensifying of the glow from her red-orange eyes. She certainly seems to have the breath to spare to attempt to mutter advice to Amiti, as little good as that's doing.

"Ledaal, mind your own efforts," instructor Zadaki says.

Amiti hunches in on herself at the reprimand, but Idelle herself takes it stoically enough. "Yes, ma'am," she says, falling silent. It's impressive, on Idelle's part. Zadaki Twelve-Feathers is certainly one of the more imposing of the school's permanent instructors, as well as among the most whispered about.

She isn't the only outcaste among the faculty: Brother Lichen is a retired Immaculate spirit breaker who'd been a slave before the Dragons had Chosen him. First Light is a sixty year veteran of the Imperial Legions and an expert in battlefield magic, who first managed to initiate into the Emerald Circle during her grueling ten years of training at Pasiap's Stair. Zadaki, though, has the distinction of being the only foreign outcaste among them. A barbarian from the Northern Threshold, rumours abound as to how exactly she'd come to work at the Realm's finest school of sorcery, with few answers to be had beyond enigmatic hints.

Gossip about your instructors and fellow students, as it turns out, is your primary source of entertainment amid the constant exhaustion of your first year.

As Zadaki walks away to address another student's failings, you catch sight of something on the fire side of Idelle. A small creature peaks up from behind a crystal formation, almost impossible to spot — something like a large rat, its own coat somehow formed out of a similar mineral substance to the crystals around it. It stares back at you with disconcertingly intelligent eyes.

"Don't get distracted by the elementals, sacrifice," the third year boy on your far side says, speaking out of the corner of his mouth. His name is Cynis Irsin, and you have the annoyed suspicion that he's taking this course because he finds this exercise relaxing at this point. "They're pretty, but not very smart. Try not to follow their example."

Your status as an Imperial daughter has done little to earn you much in the way of respect from the upperclassmen. They almost universally seem to regard you first years as temporary fixtures until proven otherwise. You bite your tongue on a reply, and grudgingly follow his advice, focusing back on your work.

The crystalline rat is far from the only spirit you'll see up close that week.

---

The black pool in the centre of the chamber ripples ominously as you work, despite your best efforts not to disturb it. It's a good incentive to keep your hands steady.

"Sequence number three, now," L'nessa says. She's crouched beside you, the instructions open in her lap, carefully examining them as you work. You nod shallowly, and move on to etching the binding sequence in question into the soft clay on the outside of the circle. You're not precisely fluent in Old Realm yet, but you've memorised these sequences, at least.

The Heptagram is host to a great many binding chambers such as this, housing everything from rogue elementals to summoned demons, each using a deliberately different construction and style of binding. The one you're in now is particularly nerve wracking. The circular pool of water, located in the basement of one of the towers, is ringed by an elaborate binding circle carved into the floor. The circle's eight points, however, are formed of clay charged with Water Essence — binding inscriptions need to be carefully inscribed into each one in rapid succession, but the clay will become smooth again over the course of one month.

This is the second time you've had to do this, and while it's gotten easier, it's not a great deal less tedious for you and the other seven students in attendance. If any of you were more comfortable with your Old Realm, you might just all fill in a point on the circle and be done in half the time. As is, though, the surest way to go about it is to break up into pairs, lay down temporary paper seals, and then refresh the points four at a time.

"Maybe I should have paired up with Maia," L'nessa whispers, glancing across the circle. The pool shouldn't be large enough that your voices wouldn't carry to the far side — the black water seems to swallow the sound up disconcertingly.

You don't look up from your work as you respond. "Keric isn't so bad." A little pompous, perhaps.

"To you, maybe," L'nessa says. "He makes her nervous."

What doesn't? You don't say that, though, because it even feels a little mean to think — Maia's relaxed around you and L'nessa, somewhat, through forced exposure if nothing else. You haven't seen that much in the way of her being egregiously looked down on by your Dynastic classmates... but that might just be because of your habit of shooting them a protective glare over her head if they start in on it.

You put the issue out of your mind as you continue on to the seventh and final line of the binding. This binding has been going quickly enough that you'll have nearly an hour of study time before bed, which you very desperately need. Everytime you start to make progress, it feels as though you fall behind on something else. Even for an Exalt, it feels scarcely sustainable.

You've nearly finished your line when you hear a sharp gasp, somehow managing to make its way to your ears across the pool.

"The sequence ends with ro, not ko!" Keric says, voice sharp. "That's changed the meaning entirely!"

"I'm sorry, I'll fix it!" Maia says, staring at the clay she's been digging her own stylus into. There isn't quite an opportunity to repair the damage — the rippling in the pool intensifies, to the point that it actually starts slopping over the edges, causing you and the others to scramble backward.

Up out of the water rising a hulking, translucent figure, scarcely humanoid, with a single, staring eye suspended in what would be its torso. A watery tendril lashes out at Maia and Keric. He throws himself flat to the floor, but Maia launches adroitly clear, flipping up from a crouching position to land, cat-like a short distance away. She's forced to repeat the trick a little less gracefully as the spirit brings the next furious tendril down on where she'd landed.

You burst into action before any of the others, dashing around the circle to where Maia has just evaded yet another lashing tendril. Unfortunately, the creature is cannier than you might have hoped — while it was using one of its many arms to attack her, another had reached out and seized a heavy, wooden table behind it, sending instruments crashing to the floor as it hurls it bodily at Maia. She's just come up out of a roll, and doesn't have time to get out of the way.

You manage to put yourself between her and the table, both your arms coming up to brace against the attack, willing your skin and bone to be as hard and unyielding as stone. The antique wood hits you with the force of a battering ram, driving you back a step, but breaking against your hardened stance as though it were made of bamboo, splitting down the middle and clattering loudly to the floor. Before it can react to your presence, you pull Earth Essence from deep within yourself. Using the understanding of its flow and structure you've gained so far, you will it to form around your hand, allowing you physically hurl it directly into the thing's eye. It solidifies into a spiky chunk of dark quartz crystal, hitting the spirit's most obvious weak point like a hammer blow.

The spirit reels back, letting out a deafening bellow of pain and outrage, quickly followed by another: A lithe figure darts around its lashing arms on the far side of the pool from you, a sword in her hand. More than a few people have made fun of Sola's insistence on wearing the weapon with her uniform, but you're certainly not going to complain now. Every time it tries to swat at her, she cuts it, water spilling like blood from its near-invisible wounds.

The others aren't wasting time either. L'nessa is hurriedly finishing up the last of your inscription, and Keric, having lost the stylus Maia had been using, is simply willing the clay to remould itself into the correct shape. Two other students are occupied with this process, while Nellens Garan scurries around the perimeter of the circle, trying to shore up the binding with as many temporary seals as he can.

Faster than you can react, a watery arm seizes you around the chest, pinning your arms in place and trying very hard to pick you up, seeking to hurl you into the nearest wall before you throw another elemental bolt at it. It has a lot of trouble with this last — you will yourself to remain rooted in place, just as though you were a piece of masonry stuck fast to the floor. It's still exceedingly uncomfortable, however, the spirit's crushing grip making it hard for you to breathe, even if the same trick that helped you withstand the table earlier saves you from a set of broken ribs.

The pain stops, and you gasp in a grateful breath — the tendril has been cut clean through. Maia is standing beside you with a dagger in her hand — you weren't previously aware that she even had a weapon like that, let alone where she'd produced it from so quickly.

Then Keric finishes the inscription, and just like that, it's over. The spirit's bellows grow quieter, and its attacks cease as it slowly, gradually retreats back into the pool. For a moment, everything is quiet. Most of you are a little battered, and all of you are at least partially drenched — including Maia, for once, although you think in her case it's just her anima.

Keric straightens, and fixes Maia with a glare, looking as though he's about to say something distinctly unkind to her, when you're all distracted by the doors to the chamber bursting open, admitting Nellens Ovo, looking as irritable as any time you've seen him. He looks around at you all, noting your variously elevated animas, the water on the floor and the smashed furniture in silence for a moment. "No one's hurt?" he asks, brusquely.

"No sir," Sola says, still standing with her sword pointed at the pool of water, as though it might try something funny. It's true — none of you are worse than bruised. First year students or not, there are few things on Creation that would actually enjoy taking on eight Dragon-Blooded single-handedly.

"Good," instructor Ovo says. "Then put the sword away, Tepet. What happened?" This last is a general question, but he sends a suspicious glance at Garan in particular — you've noticed that he's harder on his kin than he is on other students, rather than the reverse. Garan shrinks back under the gaze, despite having done quite well in the minor crisis.

"A slight error in the binding ritual, sir," Keric says coolly, carefully not looking at Maia, who is now attempting to hide behind you. "Hard to say what went wrong, exactly."

Ovo holds his gaze for a moment longer, then sighs. "Very well. Be more cautious in the future, Mnemon — all of you, get the offerings over with so the servant-spirits can get this mess cleaned up." With that, he very nearly storms out, leaving you all to it.

With a relieved sort of sigh, Garan moves a strand of wet hair out of his face, and goes to carry out the last part of the ritual — offerings to help placate the beast you'd all just fought for another four weeks. You all follow suit.

---

"Well, that could have been worse," L'nessa says, still wringing water out of her tunic.

Maia hunches in on herself. "How?"

"We could have been forced to kill it," you say. There are many varieties of spirit for which 'it' would be inappropriate at best, but you're fairly confident that that monster you'd fought was one of the more bestial varieties. Probably another elemental, if not something stranger than that.

Maia grimaces a little. "Right. Yeah," she admits. That would have been significantly harder to explain — especially if it is an elemental. Those usually stay dead after they've been killed the first time.

The three of you are climbing your way out of the basement, making your way through the adjoining passageways to the central housing tower. The one you're in now is a confusing mishmash of workrooms, ritual chambers like the one you've just come from, and assorted store rooms. "Are you both going straight back to the dormitory?" you ask, idly rubbing at a bruise you picked up from taking that table head on.

"I'm not going anywhere else while I'm this soaked," L'nessa says, philosophically. Maia only gives a small nod. She, at least, is perfectly dry now.

"Good," you say, "We should have time to quiz each other on casting mudras before bed, then."

L'nessa groans. "Do you remember what relaxation feels like?" she asks.

"No," you say, half-truthfully. "We have that lecture first thing tomorrow, don't we?" You step up off the stairs, and onto a landing you've only briefly passed before, mostly filled with doors to sealed chambers beyond your skill level. You're a little surprised to see one of the doors left ajar — that's certainly not normal.

"Oh, I forgot," L'nessa says. "That one's from the dominie, too, isn't it? So we'll understand about one word in five." Ragara Bhagwei, for all his famed brilliance, does not appear to know how to render complex topics easier for younger students to follow.

"So... you're... not mad?" Maia asks, looking up at the two of you timidly.

"No," you say.

L'nessa waits long enough to realise that you're not going to elaborate, before she sighs, and says: "Mistakes happen, Maia. We're all working ourselves to the bone, here. That slip-up could have been anyone."

Maia nods, looking doubtful. Then she freezes, letting out a small sound almost like a squeak.

A moment later, you realise why. There's a group coming back this way, from the passage to the central tower. Based on the voices that drift in ahead of them, it's several boys, and one of them is unmistakably Mnemon Keric. You have no idea what he's doing coming back the way he came so quickly. "He can't be that angry," you start to say to Maia. After all, he'd covered for her with Ovo. But when you look to where she'd been standing a moment ago, she isn't anymore.

L'nessa catches on faster than you — she's making a beeline for the open door, evidently following Maia. This is, to put it lightly, a bad idea. Rooms like that are sealed for a reason, and usually require a specific ritual to open, to prevent unprepared students from simply blundering into something potentially dangerous. The punishment for not closing a door behind yourself is generally severe.

You don't give it more than a split second's thought before following, if only to keep the two of them out of trouble. As you set foot across the threshold, Maia's already closing the door behind you both with a relieved sort of sigh. "Thanks," she whispers. "I just... didn't want to talk to him so soon after that."

"Well, I can understand not wanting to talk to Keric," L'nessa says, "but this might be a little excessive."

You cast a wary eye around the space. It's a storage room, as far as you can tell, housing a shelf or two of very old looking texts, and what look to be several odd artifacts. What looks like a spyglass of blue jade-steel rests on a small table to one side of the room. On another is a large hourglass — in place of sand, tiny beads of black jade stone trickle down, one by one. The most eye-catching item here, however, is what looks like a large, golden birdcage. A miniature raiton perches there, its feathers a strangely lurid shade of red, like drying blood.

"I know," Maia admits. She follows your gaze, although she seems more interested in the hourglass than the bird. "I didn't think."

"We shouldn't be in here," you say. You don't like the way that bird seems to be following your conversation so keenly, cocking its feathered head from side to side to better see each speaker.

"Probably not," L'nessa agrees, venturing a step closer. "Why is this bird here, do you think?"

"Placed here for safe keeping," the bird says in perfectly clear High Realm. L'nessa and Maia both give a start at this. "Are you really going so soon? You've only just got here."

"What are you?" you demand, frowning at it. Or perhaps, at him — the raiton's cultured tones are unmistakably masculine.

"Well, that's a very rude question," he says, shuffling a little closer on his perch, just as golden as the rest of the cage. With a sinking feeling, you realise that it's not actually gold. The entire thing, from the rounded cage to the pedestal, is made of solid orichalcum, its surfaces shining brightly even in the dim lighting of the windowless room. "Why don't you at least introduce yourselves first?"

You hesitate for a moment, your curiosity warring with your caution. Whatever it is that you're talking to, he's contained within some kind of warded artifact made of a magical material famed for its raw sorcerous power. That doesn't imply a minor entity. "Ambraea," you say.

L'nessa casts you a doubtful look, but adds: "V'neef L'nessa."

"... Erona Maia," Maia says after a moment, voice quiet, as though she'd prefer to be ignored.

The raiton seems, of all things, overjoyed by these introductions. "Oh, my," he says, "there's so much here! I've always loved a good mononym — so much room for it to grow, and so much left to implication by its brevity." He looks to L'nessa. "And one of the first scions of an unfolding legacy. Excellent. Delicious. I haven't been freely fed true names this good in a long time." Last, he casts an oddly searching look at Maia. "Well, two out of three is good enough, I suppose." Which seems a little unnecessarily rude, but you suppose not even strange spirits are above petty elitism.

Maia flinches, taking a wary step toward the door. Still, she's too fascinated to leave just yet.

The raiton draws himself up a little further, preening some of his red feathers. Like all raitons, his features are a mix of the avian and the reptilian — a toothy snout emerging from a feathered head, and visible claws at the end of his wings. "And as for me, you may call me Yoxien, the Directory Bound in Crimson, Defining Soul of the Bottomless Library."

With that, all three of you take a very healthy step back in the direction of the door, none of you willing to take your eyes off of the raiton. You may not have heard of Yoxien specifically, but you recognise that general nomenclature well enough — instructor Ovo had delivered a brisk lecture on demonic classifications just last week. It's Maia who gives voice to what you're all thinking: "You're a demon of the Second Circle!"

"Correct," Yoxien says, freely admitting to being, somehow, a lord of hell. Demons of the second circle are beings of great power and bespoke, alien nature, far beyond the capacity of all but the greatest Dragon-Blooded sorcerers to bind. The only reason you've seen a demon this powerful before is that one of those greatest sorcerers is your own mother. "There's no need to be so skittish — you're out there, and I, as ever, am in here. I couldn't hurt you even if I wanted to. The works of the Solar Exalted are hardly as infallible as they liked to believe, but they still do not fail lightly." As if to prove this, he leans out and raps on one of the orichalcum bars of his cage with his snout. This produces an oddly pure, ringing note.

The revelation that the demon you're talking to is being kept from doing harm by a piece of Anathema artifice is of dubious comfort to you. Seeing this, the tiny raiton actually sighs, ruffling his feathers in annoyance. "I don't want to. We've only just met, and you seem like polite enough children. Terrestrials have always been my favourites — your names tend to have so much history behind them, either explicit or omitted."

"Thank you," L'nessa says, offering a brittle sort of smile. Evidently, she's decided to treat this like an unwanted conversation with someone too important to offend with rudeness. "I'm sorry to say, we really must get back to our dormitory. It's not long until curfew, and we have our studies to see to."

"Ah, of course," Yoxien says, sounding, of all things, disappointed. "It was delightful to meet you, of course." Then he eyes you in particular, a distinctly uncomfortable moment. Like he's looking into you, and seeing something there beneath your skin. Long training prevents you from shivering. "If you're ever... stuck, I may be of some assistance. Try to remember that."

You all give courteous goodbyes almost robotically — there's something about the demon, you decide, that makes you want to match his urbane tone. The thought of him affecting you that way even so caged is enough to make you all the more grateful to be leaving.

When you step back out onto the landing, Keric and the other boys are long gone. You shut the door behind you firmly, satisfied to hear the click of the sealed lock resetting behind you. You won't be able to get back in even if you tried now, without asking an instructor to show you the specific opening ritual. "Maia?" you say, quietly.

"... Yes?" she asks, fidgeting as she avoids looking up at you.

"Do not do something like this again." She flinches, but you plough ahead, undeterred. "If Keric was a pain, I would have told him off for it. You don't have to go scurrying around, hiding in a room that shouldn't have even been open in the first place. It's not as though you don't have friends here."

Maia blinks at this last part, as if that thought hadn't occurred to her. "... right," she murmurs. "Of course. Sorry."

In the end, you still manage to get in a good half hour's worth of study.

Article:

Ambraea spends her early months at the Heptagram incredibly busy, going through her tasks in a state of outwardly-suppressed anxiety and exhaustion. The day to day grind in between her lessons begins to blur together. Still, there are moments that stand out from the rest, and connections she makes with other students.

Who stands out, apart from your roommates? For this vote, I'll be selecting the top two names, so feel free to vote for anywhere from one option to all of them, although the latter would be a little self-defeating.

[ ] Ledaal Anay Idelle
[ ] Mnemon Keric
[ ] Nellens Garan
[ ] Sesus Amiti
[ ] Simendor Deiza
[ ] Tepet Usala Sola