"…Aithusa," you whisper. "That's Mother's name. Aithusa. And Fafnara for Father." Swallowing, you smile. "Thank you."
Obvious fact: "Fafnara" is obviously a corruption of "Fafnir," or possibly a reference to the Financial Aid Form Need Analysis Report. Fun fact: "Aithusa" is the name of a dragon character in BBC's
Merlin.
Stupid fact: Fans and actors alike think Aithusa is a female dragon, but if I'm reading the wiki correctly, the one time anyone genders it they use "he".
"Well, when I… when the Talons attacked, they didn't just kill Selena. They also killed Master Shadebringer, Agrithe's Head Mage. Father has replaced him with his eldest apprentice, James, but everyone knows that's a temporary arrangement until he can find someone accredited." She gives you a serious look. "You are an extremely talented mage already: you could easily make the argument that you can handle the position as Head Mage. You wouldn't quite be nobility, but in some ways that would put you in an even stronger position. From the time of Emperor Theodore Wyrmblood and the first Archmage, Lenora Thundercrier, there has been a mutual respect and understanding between accredited mages and nobility, without some of the compelled obedience of a knight. You would also be less directly beholden to Agrithe. While we would love to have you as long as you want, with a full mage-name, you could find a position anywhere in the world if things didn't work out here a few generations from now."
I like this option; it fixes basically every problem we and Ryza would have with knighthood, and the only downside I see is that she would probably have less influence. (In particular, court mages probably don't get demenses.)
"Accredited?" you ask.
Artemis grimaces. "That would be the major problem, right there," she says. "Unlike knighthood, which Father can give unilaterally, to truly take over as Head Mage you'll be almost required to be recognized and accredited by the Marble Hall. Technically, Father doesn't have to have an accredited mage as Head Mage, but it's traditional. Pretty much every other Head Mage in the Kingdoms would raise a stink, and it'd make things harder for you."
I now see a second downside.
"Theoretically, all you need is an accredited mage in good standing to vouch for you. I'm sure Sypha would be able to convince Mistress Flarestone to do that, especially after she gets to see your talent firsthand. However, you would have to go to the Marble Hall itself to make it official, and they'll surely insist on their own testing in your… unique, case."
You perk up. "Your brother goes there, right? Apollo?"
I now see another perk.
Anyways, I'm glad Artemis raised another workable option. Especially since she raised a couple of other problems with the "do nothing" option.
The sun is shining. The air is warm, even this high up, and Mother be praised, you're having fun! You'd dithered for a minute, but in the end childish glee had won out. You'd put in so much work these past few weeks, surely nobody could begrudge you a bit of playtime?
I know
I won't!
The man blinks a few times before swallowing. "Lad- Ryza, I have seen an entire flight of Whitewings doing synchronized formation flying, but that's got nothing on what you were doing."
The wonders of not needing to stay on a horse.
After talking to Kellan, you'd asked a few other people you'd met what they thought about dragons. The answers had… not painted your species in a good light. At all! Why had Artemis not warned you just how bad-
It's almost like she didn't want to hurt Ryza's feelings, but also has the emotional maturity and forethought of a teenager.
At this point in the story, the Fell Dragon himself appears. The dread overlord of dragonkind (you scoff, manakete didn't have overlords!)
Despite Shyrlonay's best efforts.
Which is
surely unrelated to the fact that Ryza's nap seems to date to around the same time as this legend.
Artemis swallows. "I know this isn't what you want to hear, Ryza, but… I'm not sure you can. All magic depends on… on those stones, and humans won't give up magic. That healing staff Healer Clara used? It has stone powder in it as well." She frowns. "There are… rumors, that some snake-oil salesmen try to pass beaststone powder off as dragonstone, and it kind of works-"
"No. No I will not push the problem off onto another people, even if they're not people I know." You frown. "There… has to be another way. If humans want to have magic, that's fine, someone just needs to figure out another source… It won't be easy. It might take me a few centuries… but surely there has to be another way!"
On a scale of centuries, "all we need to do" is figure out how to make humans make humanstones, the way manakete did and...not-laguz still do. (Names are hard. I wouldn't have remembered Shirley's if it wasn't on the same page.) Then humans won't need to grind up other people's stones to do magic.
If only
some emperor hadn't done a genocide, this would probably be a straightforward process. Or at least a process with a better-understood step 1.
So on our list of long-term plans, we should add "Talk to the animal-shifting people about their beaststones (and hope that they aren't also made from dragonstones)".
... If they use the dragonstone they found to make a tome then I vote that we burn the countess castle down anyway.
I disagree with this in strategy but agree in spirit.
[X] You'll follow through on Artemis's suggestion. You love magic, and you like to think you're good at it. Besides, you'd been planning on talking to Mistress Flarestone anyways. If you can become friends with her and the other Revisionists, they could probably help you get to the Marble Hall and get accredited, which would give you legitimacy in the world. You might even get to meet Apollo, and you think Artemis would like that. It'll all just take a while.
We have a[nother?] long-term goal now. This will be a big step towards that
I assume this is in reference to the stoneless-tome thing? Yeah, that's a good point. It'll be easier to find a dragonstone alternative if we understand why humans think they need dragon dust.
Hopefully a completely unfounded crack theory... could the dragonstone in the cave be Father, and Mjolnir be dear Mother? I doubt it... but maybe? It would be a dramatic reveal for sure.
It could be, but I'm not sure how Ryza would even find out.
I like that we went from two tantalizing choices (at least for me
) for Ryza's future to three. I'm leaning towards the Head Mage route. It would give us the opportunity to spend more time learning about magic in the long term and we would have an excuse to finally get started on
Runewrighting: Making Magical Masterpieces. I think Ryza would
enjoy it more as a job. But the benefits, power, and protections that come with holding a noble title seem super useful, and I think Ryza would appreciate having more options to solve her problems and realize her desires in the future. Even if that newfound ability to solve problems comes with problems of its own. It would likely give her more agency and ability to protect manakete if more were to appear than if she were just head mage. I will have to think on it more.
Reminder that your votes don't count unless you X them.
Or that "head mage" also sounds like a court position with its own powers and privileges, if this was expressing uncertainty over which to vote for. Or you can just vote for both!
[X] You'll follow through on Artemis's suggestion. You love magic, and you like to think you're good at it. Besides, you'd been planning on talking to Mistress Flarestone anyways. If you can become friends with her and the other Revisionists, they could probably help you get to the Marble Hall and get accredited, which would give you legitimacy in the world. You might even get to meet Apollo, and you think Artemis would like that. It'll all just take a while.
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