Emmet lay staring up at the rafters above him. The darkness of the barn reluctantly fading away in shades of grey. The pre-dawn sun hung still nervously hiding behind the hills, waiting for the cocks to crow, and herald its arrival. In the monochrome glow Emmet lay in a pile of hay, straw itching the back of his head as the details of the world regain their hard edges – almost as if becoming real. As the world comes back into focus, the details still fuzzy, he sat up and stared into the gloom. Lucien was curled up, outer robe removed, used as a sheet over a pile of hay. Fast asleep. To the other side was Evelyn, slumped against the wall, head lolled and drooling.

He rose slowly and padded out of the barn, quietly slipping out the door. He turned his back on the glowing hills to the east and back down the road – the road to Weld. It had had a glow of its own the night before, as the three of them had fled Her Majesty’s soldiers. The fires hadn’t been anyone’s fault – not really. It was probably a torch knocked over as the adventurers fought amongst themselves and the soldiers.

Emmet stayed watching the northern road as the sun finally peeked over the crest of the hills, the light making him squint slightly. Last night – as they left – the adventurer’s tavern hadn’t been the only building on fire, Emmet wondered back to Annie and the Goodberry. Is she okay? He thought of the kind old man who had carried them to Weld – prone on the ground, his dining room in shambles. What had happened when the soldiers woke up?

It had happened again. He had just followed along and people had gotten hurt. First with Sir Reynard; the pride of being chosen for such an important quest blinded him to the truth. Then it was the escape. If it was anyone’s fault it was Sir Reynard and Mr David who had forced the encounter – Lucien was just trying to get us out alive. But how many people were dead because of that attack? How many killed because of the black sphere? And now the attack on Weld. It wasn’t their fault, but it was their presence that drew the soldiers, their presence that had hurt those people.

Emmet felt a chill, the weak dawn sun doing little to comfort him. He walked a short distance along the road, reaching a signpost with three slips of paper, the likes of which he had seen countless – usually forgettable – times before. This was, of course, the first time he had seen one bearing his own name. The wanted poster – somehow already written and distributed – bore a striking portrait of him, face distorted into a cold scowl, but definitely him. Lucien and Evelyn’s were similar, accurate and more worrisomely, recognisable renditions of their features – especially Lucien with his distinctive colouring.

The words under the portraits stuck in his mind. ‘Agent of Chaos’. It’s not really a proper crime, more a label to inspire fear and mistrust – to be prosecuted for any of this would be wrong – but still the words resonate. It struck at Emmet’s anxiety, this lack of control. How can he stop an evil, committed not by himself, but as a result of his presence? He is a healer, he entered the church to help, not to hurt.

In the growing light of a new day, it felt like the moment to make some resonating declaration. A promise, a tangible manifestation of an intent to do more. If Emmet were someone else, maybe he would. Instead, he stared at those words, Agent of Chaos. It didn’t feel like a divergence point, there was only an irritation, the beginnings of an idea, another shade of grey peeling from the darkness.

“I hate it” he whispered. Only a subject and verb for now, just the emotion bubbling away. But it was all he could manage for now.

It was only as the sun passed the crest of the hills and the new day began, that he remembered.

He had forgotten to pray.

O – O – O – O – O

Agent of Chaos – nice.

I stare at the artist’s rendition, all hard angles and rough lines – topped off with the kind of hardened scowl you need to spend half a lifetime in jail to truly master. All in all, it’s great – I wonder if they’ll see this back home? That’ll show them, not even two weeks in and already an enemy of the state! I’d love to see their faces; give it a year and I could have undead legions at my beck and call!

I twist around to the others, flaring my robes dramatically. Grinning ear to ear, I call out, “Emmet! Are you seeing this? Incredible right?”

He’s not even looking at them, staring off back the way we came again. A neutral hum is all I get back from him – I guess this does put a damper on his career at the church, but still. I turn to Evelyn who, unlike Emmet, is staring intently at her own portrait.

“What do you think? They really nailed it didn’t they?”

She looks at me funny, then rolls her eyes, “Yeah, very Dark Wizard chic,” she drawls.

“Really?” I exclaim. Finally, real notoriety.

She rolls her eyes again and doesn’t answer me any further, instead, “isn’t it going to be harder to, like, exist with a wanted level?” That, of course, takes the wind out of my sails a bit.

I still pluck the wanted poster off of the post and fold it into my satchel. This is exactly the kind of thing father told us about, the first step in becoming a feared and reviled sorcerer – albeit I had technically done nothing to actually earn the reviling. I’ll need to close that gap pretty soon though; I could never show my face back home if they figured out that I still can’t raise the dead – the danger of them finding out even higher now that my name is out there. I almost shudder, what are they describing me as? An evocation mage? Or worse, a mere fire mage? This kind of thing could get back to father! Agent of Chaos is at least a meaningless label, mysterious enough to be neutral for my reputation.

“So, what does it say anyway? The wanted posted, I mean.” The question comes from Evelyn, I stare at her incredulous.

“You can’t read?” Hilarious. She scowls.

“Lay off dipshit, of course I can read; I just can’t read this mess that your world uses.” That actually does make sense. “Anyway, isn’t this like, the Dark Ages? How many people can even read?”

“Anyone who matters can read. Hells, even Emmet can read.” I gesture widely to Emmet. He doesn’t respond. Evelyn huffs.

“Whatever. So, what does it say about us?” I’m about to respond, but a low murmur cuts me off.

“Agent of Chaos”, he’s still looking away, “that’s what it says”.

Evelyn nods absently and looks intently at the poster again, likely deep in thought. I don’t know if I can deal with travelling with an illiterate, maybe I’ll have to draw up an alphabet, it’s phonetic so it shouldn’t be too big a deal to puzzle out – even for her.

“I want to go back to the church.” Emmet disrupts my thoughts, voice muted and eyes downcast. “I-I think I need to talk to somebody – this isn’t right,” he almost whispers, still staring off. I look at him perplexed, that is back towards Weld, is it really worth the risk? Wait – that’s perfect, I can work on that idea – stabilising the death mana.

Emmet turns to Evelyn and I in turn. “I would appreciate it if you two came with me… I don’t want to go alone.” He lacks his usual nervous stuttering. There’s something else instead, like he’s folding in on himself – disappointment maybe? This must be really getting to him; he does know we didn’t actually sin or anything? I feel suddenly awkward in my earlier excitement. I bite back my enthusiastic agreement, coughing and mumbling instead.

“Ah, sure.” Evelyn nods in agreement, as if she had anything better to do anyway, and we head off. No change of clothes, no river to wash in – what I would give to have a spell to deal with this for me, I’ve seen an uncle or two use such a spell – they never let the maids touch their possessions. Then I remember my satchel, and the spell-book lying within. I pull it out, the thick tome barely comfortable to hold in both hands. The cover, probably once a cheery red has faded, after collecting generations of dust, to a dull burgundy – with a deeper red stain on its back-cover that I choose to assume is wine.

Among the various possessions in my trunk – now probably in imperial custody – this book is the one that I just couldn’t part with. I had found it years ago, when I was first managing directed mana-flow – barely a fledgling. The gold filigree of the title had long since flaked off, the book pushed deep into a forgotten bookshelf however long ago. Upon opening it, I was met – and still am – with almost indecipherable text, the entire thing written in the almost incomprehensible script of Old Mythic. It was only after months of work deciphering the opening paragraphs that I figured out what it was. A beginner’s guide to magic. I know, sounds pathetic.

It would have been the most disappointing moment of my life if it hadn’t been what this collection of low-level spells represents. Before this, the firebolt spell had been presented to me in a myriad of notes, diaries and oral accounts, all of which explained fragments of theory. All of it had to be pieced together to form my own, personal, casting of the spell. The family ideology boiled down to approaching magic as an art, harnessing immensely talented students and having them focus on creating a style of magic that was internal, instinctual and irreproducible. In theory the next powerful Sorcerer Lord will have had no master, they would be able to simply carve intent into the raw mana of the world and finally, be completely immune from the theft of their work.

In practise however, in three years of intense study, I had only just managed one perfect cast – the firebolt. I had been given only a single word in response, ‘finally’. And even then, it was only cast with directions from this book. So, I left.

The pages are yellow with age, they feel worn, held together through sheer stubbornness. But whatever charms were cast on it have held up, as the book can actually support its entire weight from any one of its pages. I flip to my latest attempt to penetrate the Old Mythic script. From what I can gather, it’s some kind of conjuration spell – it’s meant to shoot out a lubricant or something – grease. It hardly sounds worth bothering with, but it’s the only thing that I’ve found that even approaches making sense. I’ve got the gestures down, a snap followed by a fist, with the thumb and pinkie stretched out as far as they go. Its complexity should be low enough to just channel mana through it; it just hasn’t been working at all, not even a glow when I snap my fingers.

The difficulty in the language is that Old Mythic was dead at basically the same time it was created. As a construct, it is one of the greatest works of magic of all time. But it also completely fails as a language. It is specifically designed to resist decoding. As I understand it, if you don’t have the specific translation key, every time you begin reading a new page, the key changes – either minutely or makes it completely irrelevant. In effect – because I’ve stolen it – the book’s a new language every time I try to learn a new spell. The only reason I’m making any headway into grease is because the diagrams for the hand gestures coalesce every now and then.

I stare intently at the page and the black ink script starts drifting like it had been dropped in a bathtub. Occasionally, an inky trail flickers and resolves into a word or broken phrase. The ink crawls away from my line of sight. After a minute the page is blank, the script having crawled its way onto the other leaves of the book. I close it and wait until it all crawls back to the original positions.

I walk, snapping and throwing out variations of the finger movements. Emmet walks ahead, lost in his world, but Evelyn comes up and looks over my shoulder. The mana just seems to stop at my wrist, fading away into nothingness, like it wasn’t even registering as casting a spell. Is it because it’s a conjuration spell? Am I supposed to be casting it like a firebolt or something else? I have done conjuration before, the air freshener charm doesn’t even have hand motions, just a channelled desire to get rid of something.

“So what gang are you meant to be from?” Evelyn pipes up. I don’t get it, but she’s probably being insufferable again. “What are you reading anyway?” she asks, then mumbles under her breath, “…the act of instilling matter with direction, through intention, forms the foundational mana channel of the conjuration school…”, what was that? She jabs me in the ribs, “you dick, you’ve had a book in English this entire time! Can’t read my ass.”

Rubbing my side, I look blankly between her scowl and the book in my hands – the one she was reading out of – the indecipherable text in Old Mythic. I slowly flip to the opening paragraph, the one I had painstakingly strung together from the word soup all those years ago, and move it closer to her. Her scowl disappears and her expression turns perplexed, but goes along with it.

“Greetings aspiring Magus, and welcome to the wonderful world of the mystic arts. I will be your guide as we traverse the most exciting field of study there is to pursue; from farm hands to kings, magic is always there, waiting for you to reach out.

“Not all of us will be directing lightning bolts or sundering the earth, but remember, even the tiniest expression of magic is the song of the soul. No matter your particular talent – we are all different…”

“And that’s what makes us special.” I murmur the end of the introduction along with her as she finishes reading. Exactly the same as the words I managed to read back when I struggled with my firebolt. I close the book, turning it to see the familiar dull cover and faded title, and look at Evelyn. She can bloody read Old Mythic.

“Darke Mag’kx: A beginners guide, by A. E. Rothmore”, she makes out the outline of the title, once embossed in gold leaf, then looks up at me again. “What?” she asks, as if she wasn’t, apparently, the key to an untold wealth of arcane knowledge, up until now, locked behind the indecipherable mess that is Old Mythic. By Emmet’s gods, the sheer potential of this, I don’t even know what to think. She can read my book!

“Evelyn.” I don’t care if I open myself up to an illiteracy joke, this could make me, “I need you to read this to me.” I stare at her, completely seriously.

“Teach me magic,” equally serious she responds.

“Done.” And with that I flip the book back to the grease spell, “now what were you saying about ‘instilling matter with direction’?” she takes a bit to focus back on the passage, but in a moment she’s off.

“There is a distinction in conjuration between the creation of matter and the addition of the properties. The basic example of ‘grease’ is the creation of a liquid mana-construct, then the binding of the attribute of ‘lubricant’ to the construct. If properly done, the process of manifestation should correct the internal construct into a physical reality; for the diligent mage, this should impart a myriad of properties associated with real grease - thus allowing you to help your mother out in the kitchen!” she pauses with a raised eyebrow – it is a beginner’s guide.

It’s incredible though, I had only been able to figure out the hand motions and what I now realise had been a recipe for frying an egg with the spell. This internal process is all new, the two step process, just the idea of an internalised mana-construct – not just the energy burst that’s needed for fire conjuring. I shiver at the thought of how long it would have taken me to figure that out on my own – months at the very least, even with the weirder, abstract concepts.

I snap out my hand and click, feeding mana while visualising a flow of liquid, trying to let the mana saturate the image – or maybe let the intent saturate the mana. I maintain the process, trying to change the movement of mana, to make it form a coherent idea in my core. I keep it up for a while, Evelyn even pulling on me every now and then, presumably to keep me on the road. The mana is not exactly tangible, the feeling of any ‘flow’ being more of a mental construct than anything. It’s the blurry line between the physical and the thought that the actual process resides, making it difficult to establish what’s just in your head, and what’s actually happening.

I keep trying until my mana feels sort of wavy, like a pool, or flow of water, then I try a little longer. I snap my eyes open and complete the hand movement, flicking my wrist as I contort my fingers – hopefully it invokes a wave or something. For the first time, I feel my magic react; the mental pile of hopefully structured mana reacting to the movement. “Grease!” I shout, and something happens. It’s not grease – I haven’t done the attribute pairing yet. It’s not even water – which it ideally should be. But it’s a chill sensation on the outside of my fist, and a prickly heat in my closed palm.

Magic happened – now it’s just a process of refining the image.

Grinning ear to ear, I hand my book over to Evelyn – open at the section for firebolt – and keep on trying out the spell, as Emmet leads us back towards Weld.

A few hours later and I haven’t made much progress. One can’t help being disappointed, but these things usually progress in fits of inspiration after hours of practice – this is still the most progress I’ve made into learning a new spell, in a very long time. Evelyn handed my book back an hour or two ago, complaining of a headache – I can relate with the eyestrain from staring at Old Mythic for hours.

Emmet stops at a white wooden gate. I see a church at the top of the hill behind it – we must have arrived. We stand there for a minute, Emmet not making any moves, just staring up at the white building. A figure walks out from behind a simpler, lime-washed building that sits down the hill, closer to the entrance gate. He takes one look at the three of us, standing at the bottom of the hill, and bolts into the building – I hope he’s just shy.

“Uh, Emmet, do you think this is still a good idea?” I ask, not yet hearing an alarm – but it’s still early days. He just nods and opens the gate, walking up the hill and towards the closer building. I hurry after him, suddenly concerned that Emmet’s home is probably the best place to lay an ambush. He marches up to the small wooden door – the one the other guy ran into – and, after a moment’s hesitation, knocks quickly. We stand there silently, Emmet ramrod straight and stiff as a board, the atmosphere tinged with a muted tension – a distant anxiety radiating from him.

We wait longer, some scuffling sounds on the other side, maybe some hushed voices. Suddenly the door opens a crack and an eye peers out at us – followed immediately by the door flying open and another guy in priest robes whisks the three of us in the building, slamming the door behind us. He hurries down a corridor and quickly beckons us into another room, probably his own for how unbearably pious it all looks – just a bed, a desk and a small bookshelf. Once he closes the door behind us, he turns to Emmet.

“By Her light, Emmet!” That’s about as profane as they can get, using Emmet as a point of reference. “Why did you come back?” He pauses, waiting for a response. Emmet is silent, then makes a strangled noise in his throat, and rushes to embrace the other priest – gods, he’s crying. I start to feel very awkward when it doesn’t just immediately break off.

The two of them stand there as Emmet sobs into the other’s chest, the priest gently patting Emmet’s back soothingly. Luckily Evelyn pulls me into the corner, giving them as much room as possible, and I begin stare intently at the plaster and brickwork. Why did he feel the need to bring us with him?

After what could have been at most a minute or two – but felt like an eternity – the muffled sobs subside. I give it another second, ears straining for a hint of a sniffle, but there’s nothing more – and I cautiously turn around.

They pull apart and Emmet wipes at his eyes hurriedly. Eyes still red he looks up at the priest – late twenties at least, with darker hair than Emmet, his expression soft. Voice a little steadier, but still with a hint of desperation, “Brother Rodney, I just don’t know what to do. We didn’t do anything wrong!” This Rodney guy looks over at the two of us, eyes flicking to my white hair and black robes. He sighs and harder lines begin to appear in the creases of his face.

“But then why are you on those posters, Emmet?” Emmet wilts at this, eyes tracing the floorboards.

“I-it’s a misunderstanding… S-sir…S-… Reynard wasn’t on a quest to kill monsters, he-”

“Did you break the law.” It isn’t even a question, but it cuts Emmet off. The older cleric stands in the same place, Emmet hasn’t moved, but it’s as if a wide gulf opens up between them – the warmth creeping away. Emmet stands frozen, his mouth forming words but no sound coming out. Rodney sighs again, as if his fears had been confirmed.

“I’m sorry Emmet, there’s nothing we can do for you in the face of the Empire,” he answers the silence, “I’m afraid you’ll have to leave. Immediately.” A silence hangs in the room after this announcement. Emmet stands hunched, his fists clenched but unable or unwilling to say anything. The silence is, of course, broken by Evelyn as she coughs and approaches the pair, smiling.

“Sir, I realise this must be a shock, but don’t you think you should let Emmet explain?” A good plan in theory, butter him up with subservience and lower the tension of the conversation. Unfortunately, due to his apparent lack of a personality, this had no effect – I mean, just look at his room.

“Quiet. I don’t know what the two of you have done to mislead young Emmet, but I’ll have none of your simpering.”

Evelyn’s pleasant expression freezes in place, muscle spasms firing off behind a lifeless mask of feigned civility – it’s terrifying. Then she snaps forward and grasps Emmet’s hand – not punching the older priest as I had expected. “C’mon Emmet, this idiot obviously has no idea what he’s saying,” she says loudly, sweeping the two of them out of the room, Rodney staring after them; his face cycling through a few emotions before settling on a ‘holier than thou’ sneer. He doesn’t seem to notice me before I make a move to leave, but his sneer intensifies a few notches anyway as he looks to me.

“Magus.” He says, the amount of derision he can pack into a single word – while still maintaining a veneer of civility – is amazing. Doubtless worthy of a response, but for some reason I’m not really feeling the spirit of charity towards this guy, so I ignore him. Seemingly untroubled by such trifles as embarrassment, he continues unruffled, “I know trouble when I see it magus, stay away from here, and leave the Empire.” Perhaps it’s Emmet’s absence, or the familiar ground of a veiled insult, but the tension left in the wake of Emmet’s tears, dissolves, and I find myself able to speak.

“Brother Rodney,” I begin, not sure why, but I try to inject a level of gravitas into my words. I swallow, “Emmet hasn’t done anything illegal – or wrong… I-I think he just wanted someone… to…er…” I trail off as he stares off out the window, ignoring me. My faces flushes bright red and I feel the prickle of embarrassment across my scalp, I’m just stammering like a moron! What am I even saying? I turn to leave in a rush – nothing good ever comes from churches – but a whisper stops me. So soft, it could have been my imagination, but it’s there. Not muffled through gritted teeth or pursed lips, but more akin to a sigh.

“Go north to Havale, my sister lives there; she can help him.” I don’t say anything in return, I wasn’t going to thank him, and he wasn’t looking for it. I pause in silence, then slip out the door. Directly outside, waiting in the hallway are Emmet and Evelyn, between them bearing an interesting gradient of surprise, seriousness and mild bemusement – Damn, they heard that. I flush again and bustle past them, neither pausing as they both fall into step behind me. Without a backwards glance I step out the door – coast is clear – and stride down the path, back towards the gate. The two sets of footsteps behind me, not breaking stride, eyes forward, down the hill.

Emmet not once looking back.