GPCiMW Chapter 13 (Patreon)

Hi. Its been a bit since I've updated this story. After the last chapter, I realized that my plans for this story just weren't holding water and so I've spent the last like, month and a half, rewriting all my plot outlines!

My Wednesday classes were rather underwhelming. Right after lunch I had Essential Principles of Artifice taught by Professor Willkens, a distant cousin of the House Wilkens heir, who was also in the class with me. The somewhat mousey, middle-aged wizard seemed somewhere between terrified and thrilled to be teaching the heir to his house and spent what felt like half the class pandering too and complementing his future lord.

Brenden Wilkens, the aforementioned House Wilkens heir, looked rather exasperated, but chose not to say anything. With any luck the two of them would have a talk before next week and I wouldn’t have to listen to any more overblown praise about how smart, handsome, talented, and so on and so forth Brenden was.

I honestly felt kind of bad for the guy. Unlike Irgam Olmount, who I imagined took every possible opportunity to rub his superiority into the faces of his lessers, Brenden seemed a lot more reasonable and down to earth. He sat down in the row behind me and I could hear him talking cheerfully with the two houseless wizards beside him. He seemed genuinely embarrassed by our Professor’s behavior and clearly preferred the parts of the class where the man was actually teaching.

The subject material itself was nothing particularly interesting. The first half of the class was dedicated to learning about, how to use, and identify a wide range of enchanted or innately magical items. Only after winter break would we move on to learning how to make and modify our own items.

After listening to his opening lecture and flipping through our textbook and syllabus, I concluded that Professor Willkens was teaching from the exact same lecture notes that Professor Yorn––the instructor my dad had for this class––had been and promptly lost all interest in what he was saying. I knew the majority of this material already and we wouldn’t be doing any practical work for the next four months.

Introduction to Runic Scripts was better, but only by a little. On one hand, it wasn’t a class my dad had taken as a first year so at least I wasn’t just retreading the very same lessons as before. On the other hand, Professor John Jameson was quite possibly the driest lecturer I’d ever had the displeasure of listening to. His voice was a painful drone and I found myself struggling to pay attention after just the first half hour.

I did my best to listen and take notes, but by the end of the lesson I was deeply regretting my class choice––as were the seventeen other first and second year wizards in my class. Runes were a subject I was deeply interested in and had been looking forward to studying for years. They were one of the most powerful and complicated forms of magic out there and I knew that my dad had used runes to implant his own memories into me before I was born.

Unfortunately, dad had only started focusing on the subject towards the end of his third year and that was when the memories he’d given me started getting a little bit spotty. I still had most of his third year, but only about half of his fourth year and even less of his final year at Aglakok. After he graduated things got even worse, with only a tiny fraction of his final days before he died.

I had learned what I could from those memories, poring over the pages of his textbook and other references, but there were huge gaps in my knowledge. I had hoped that this class, and its upper level equivalents, would help me close those gaps, but it seemed like I would be doing most of my learning from books instead. Well, at least for this year. Maybe some of the other professors were more competent and I’d just gotten unlucky.

Annoying, but manageable.

I made it to dinner a few minutes after eight and joined Kazuma at his table where he was very slowly working his way through a bowl of ice cream the size of one of Haimi’s breasts.

He smiled at me as I sat down with my food and tapped the side of the bowl with his spoon. “You know, they’ve got these things enchanted so the ice cream doesn’t melt at all while it's in the bowl. Can’t believe the mundanes haven’t thought of it. So much better than ending up with a sad puddle at the bottom when you’re done.”

“That does sound quite convenient, but I certainly hope that’s not the only thing you’re eating for dinner today.”

Kazuma rolled his eyes and brandished his spoon at me like a weapon “You’re not my dad, Severin. I can have ice cream for dinner if I want too.”

I raised one eyebrow and stared at him.

Kazuma laughed and ate another spoonful of ice cream. “Oh you’re no fun Sev! Of course not, I’ve been here since six. You actually just missed Teveus, he left like, five minutes ago, and I just wanted to finish up before I head up too.”

“Fair enough. Maybe I’ll grab a bowl after I eat, ice cream does sound pretty great right now.” Daphne butted her head against my leg and I smiled and ruffled her hair. I wasn’t always sure what she was trying to tell me, but this one seemed pretty obvious.

Kazuma enthusiastically nodded his head, “Yeah, it's damn good! They’ve only got a few flavors, but it's all made with fresh Tauren milk and it's so creamy you wouldn’t believe. Way better than any I’ve had before.”

Well damn, that did sound amazing. I’d never had Tauren milk myself, but dad had one in his coven and even through the muted sensations of his memories it tasted a lot better than the two percent stuff I got from the supermarket. Turning the already delicious drink into ice cream was pure genius.

“Okay, I’m sold. What flavor would you––“

Before I could finish asking for recommendations, a high, clear note rang through the room, accompanied a moment later by an oppressive wave of pressure. All conversation in the room halted and everyone turned to look towards the long table at the back of the hall where a few teachers could sometimes be seen eating.

I froze for a moment, then scrambled to my feet when I realized that the throne-like chair at the center of the table that had remained empty since the opening feast was suddenly filled once more. The room was quickly filled with the sound of scraping chairs as everyone hurried to rise, but the sound was muted as though even it was leery of drawing the High Lord’s ire.

The High Lord slowly set his knife down and picked up the crystal wine glass he’d evidently just rung. “Good evening, students. I hope that everyone has had a successful and educational beginning to their semester. I stand before you to announce the tragic passing of one of our own. Christopher Warner was a promising young wizard with a long and successful life ahead of him. Born into a mundane family, he was only recently identified and introduced to our world, and I am afraid his poor mundane education cost him dearly. It is always a tragedy for a wizard to die so young, having never found the opportunity to leave a mark on the future.”

The High Lord raised his glass high into the air and suddenly I found my eyes drawn to a matching glass that had appeared out of nowhere on the table beside me. “To Christopher Warner,” he intoned solemnly. “May he make fewer foolish decisions in his next life.”

Copying the older students I could see out of the corner of my eye, I raised my glass into the air, then drank with the High Lord and the two-hundred odd other students currently present in the hall. I almost choked when the fiery liquid burnt its way down my throat, but still managed to drain my glass like everyone else. I had an unfortunate suspicion that I knew exactly who Christopher Warner was, as well as what ‘foolish decision’ he’d made in this life.

The High Lord set his glass down with a much louder thud than doing so should have produced. “That is all. Return to your food, students.” And then he once more vanished.

I collapsed back into my chair, my heart hammering in my chest and my palms slick with sweat. Suddenly my food didn’t look nearly as appetizing as it had when I’d loaded up my plate. This was my fault. I’d never gotten the man’s name, but from what the High Lord had said I was nearly certain that the student who’d died was the boy from whom I’d blatantly stolen Grace during my very first day at Aglakok.

I wasn’t sure what to do, or if there was anything I should do at all. I’d killed him. I’d as good as killed him. I’d taken Grace and less than a week later he was dead. I didn’t actually know what had happened, but most likely he’d tried doing something he’d learned about in class and, without a witch’s mana to bolster his, it had overdrawn his soul and he’d died.

“Damn tragic,” Kazuma said quietly, staring blankly down at his remaining ice cream. “I wonder what happened? I mean, I know that Aglakok gets a death or two every year, but not this early?”

“Who knows?” I said tightly, doing my best to hide the leaden lump in the back of my throat. “I’m sure we’ll find out soon enough if it happened publicly. Otherwise…” I shrugged, “Maybe we’ll never know.”

“You’re probably right.” He sighed heavily. “Damn tragic, but nothing we can do about it now. Live and learn, die and cry.” And then he picked his spoon back up and dug in with renewed gusto. Huh.

I took another look at my plate, then stood up. I enjoyed Kazuma’s company, but I just wanted to be alone right now. “I’m going to head out. I’ll see you at lunch?”

“Sure thing! You look tired, maybe don’t stay up too late tonight, eh?” He wiggled his eyebrows suggestively and I couldn’t help but smile back at him.

“I’ll try. Later man.”

I turned to leave the hall, walked a few steps, then sharply turned back to the buffet. There were a few bowls of pre-scooped ice cream sitting out beside the big serving tubs and I grabbed two without really looking. Ice cream was ice cream and I wasn’t feeling particularly picky right now.

I made the walk back up to my room in a light daze, my feet carrying me through familiar hallways even as my mind was elsewhere. Only a soft noise from Daphne stopped me from going to the wrong floor and, with a start, I realized that I was instinctively going to where my dad’s room had once been nearly two decades ago. For all that I’d made the walk from the cafeteria to my room and back a good two-dozen times in just the past week, I had far more memories of stopping two floors lower in the student tower.

The moment I stepped into my room and the door closed behind us, Daphne took a step forward and hugged me from behind. “It wasn’t your fault.”

My lips narrowed into a tight frown. That was right. I thought back to that evening, the way Daphne had directed me to a specific spot at the table and how she’d very blatantly told me to go through with my plan.

“Did you know?” I asked softly, anger gradually starting to build in my chest.

“That he was going to die?” Daphne asked.

I nodded, not fully trusting my voice right now.

“Yeah, I knew.” She sounded calm. Normal. Like she hadn’t manipulated me into killing one of my classmates.

I hadn’t known him personally, had never spoken to him outside of our one hushed exchange before the opening feast, but he’d been my classmate. A wizard. An actual person in the eyes of the High Lords and The Council.

I took a deep, shaky breath and calmly set the two bowls of ice cream I was holding down on the bench by the door. Then, before Daphne could react, I twisted free of her arms, slid a hand under her collar, and pulled her up until her feet nearly left the floor and our eyes were at the same level.

Daphne’s hands flew to her neck but I was far too angry to worry about how I was choking her. “What were you thinking!” I all but yelled in her face, “Do you know what could have happened? What could still happen?”

“Se-se-sev––” Daphne choked out, but my furious glare cut her off.

I honestly didn’t know if I was more angry or scared. There were very few things that wizards considered to be actual crimes, but killing another wizard was one of them. The Council didn’t care about dead witches, dead fuckmeat, or even dead mundanes––as long as you didn’t get excessive––but the lives of wizards mattered. If someone actually decided to investigate and the trail led back to me…well, wizards certainly knew how to inflict cruel punishments. I’d be better off killing myself now than letting ‘justice’ take its course.

The system was corrupt as hell and everyone knew it. As long as you had the backing of someone powerful and your victim didn’t, you could absolutely get away with murder, but I wasn’t powerful. Not yet, at least. That was what had happened with my dad. His death had––as far as I could tell––been swept under the rug because the wizard that killed him mattered and my dad’s life didn’t.

I squeezed my eyes shut and took a deep breath. “I trusted you,” I told Daphne flatly. “Swear to me I didn’t make a mistake doing so.”

Daphne’s hands beat weakly at my arm and I abruptly realized how long I’d been holding her like this. I exhaled and unceremoniously dropped her, my arm shaking slightly from the sudden exertion.

Daphne collapsed to the floor like a puppet with its strings cut. I watched impassively as she caught her breath, one hand clutching her neck and the other over her heart.

“So?” I asked, nudging her thigh with my foot. “What do you have to say for yourself, witch?”

Daphne looked up at me and I had to suppress a wince at the fear I could see in her bright purple eyes and the glimmering tears trailing down her pale cheeks. “He was always going to die,” she whispered, “with or without your interference. This way at least you got something out of it, and Grace ended up with a––” her voice faltered for a moment and she squeezed her eyes shut. I could only just barely make out her final words. “A kind master.”

Well fuck.

Daphne looked so fragile like this, her silver hair falling across her chest and red marks just barely visible on her neck. I raised a hand to my face and covered my eyes. And now I felt shitty about what happened to Christopher and about my response to the news. Great. Just great. That ice cream better be really fucking good.