I have no clue why I'm starting a third fic. Like Before the Eye of God, this just came to me. It's kind of the third aspect of Type-Moon, with From Azure/Heaven's Fall being Grail Wars, BtEoG being mystery and this being magi stuff and politics.
Let me know if this sounds interesting or if I should just drop it.
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Seated on a comfortable, but not overly comfortable, leather chair, Lord de Clare carefully wrote the invitation he would send to various prominent figures over the next week, the quill in his hand absorbing excess ink so as to avoid any spilling. So engrossed was he in his task that he hadn’t even noticed Marcus de Clare’s entry into his office, and the other man now found himself awkwardly standing at attention while waiting for the authorization to sit.
After several minutes, he put down the quill and finally deigned to look up, a faint expression of surprise flickering across his visage.
“Brother, I hadn’t heard you come in! By all means, sit. Why did you not speak up?”
His warm welcome was a farce, naturally. He had known that Marcus had arrived long before he made it to the door of his private office, and there wasn’t even any need for him to write the invitations himself. The act was merely meant to remind him of their respective status; if his brother had spoken up, he would have been reprimanded.
No doubt Marcus knew this as well, but he showed no sign of offense, merely sitting down with a graceful smile. They were mirror images of each other with their blond hair, brown eyes and broad frames; the only difference was that Marcus had the healthy appearance of one used to exercises, while de Clare was sickly thin. That weakness was only a temporary setback, he knew that he would regain his usual vigor soon enough.
“I understand, Lord de Clare, your time is most precious; it is no wonder that you forgot the command that I come to you.” After a few seconds of awkward silence, he continued. “I wish to extend my congratulations on your swift recovery; father’s journal seemed to imply that you would be left bed-ridden for more than a mere month after the transfer.”
The mention of the inheritance that he had at last fully received at the age of 33, and the reason he now held his father’s title of Lord de Clare almost made him flinch, but he maintained his composed demeanor.
“Fortunately, it appears I was uniquely compatible to receive our ancestors’ burden in the sacred rite.” This meant that he had only spent that month in mildly excruciating pain and debilitating confusion, not that it was any of Marcus’ business. “But imagine my surprise when I discovered upon my return that my future confidant was off on a trip for purposes unknown to the servants, a trip that I now for a fact father knew nothing of as well. You can understand brother that it made for a poor beginning to my rule.”
The honey tone also implied that it made for quite a poor first impression for Marcus’ role as a confidant. It had become tradition among the de Clare family that any children born after the heir would be offered, on reaching adulthood, the choice of becoming the new leader’s confidant or to leave the world of magecraft forever, by memory erasure for the sake of safety. Naturally, there wasn’t a single case in which the generous position had been turned down.
“I understand, Lord de Clare. In truth, I fully intended to obtain the authorization of the current Lord de Clare, but the opportunity only appeared after father’s retirement but before your recovery.” With an embarrassed smile, Marcus leaned back in his chair. “I was left in the difficult position of acting without consent or risk being beaten to it; in the absence of protocol for such an event, I chose to act for the sake of our family.”
In other words, Marcus had arranged things to create an opportunity at the only chance he would get to act on his own initiative. It was only the fact that his brother had never shown any sign of resentment toward him, and a faint sense of curiosity, that stopped de Clare from punishing him on the spot for the lie.
Had he decided to do so, there were plenty of options open to him. From the chair he sat on to the statue of a knight by the door, the room was filled with powerful mystic codes specifically crafted to give Lord de Clare an advantage against any fool who challenged him in his study.
“Well, you’ve had your chance. Did you obtain anything from this venture, or was it merely a flight of fancy after all?”
If nothing had been gained, then it went without saying that Marcus would suffer severe consequences. At the very least, his freedom would be restricted for the next five years.
“I did. Although I admit I’m not quite certain as to the exact nature of what I acquired yet.” Marcus’ confident tone deflated with his admission. “But before I present it to you, I feel it would be beneficial for you to have the full context.”
“You did always enjoy hearing stories when we were young.” A spot of tension in the small of his back reminded him that he still hadn’t fully recovered despite his claims, so he readjusted his position to rest his head in his hand. “Very well, Marcus, you may tell me of your adventure.”
With ease born of practice, Marcus began his tale.
“It all began a month ago, when I received a most unexpected visit from an old friend who vanished a year ago…”
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It would have been understandable if one mistook the solidly built and artfully painted mansion as the main stronghold of the de Clare family, but the truth was that the Victorian building was merely a secondary house meant to house the family’s effective second in command. It could of course be claimed by the heir at any time, but such an event had only occurred once in the past six hundred years.
The red limousine that had just returned to the house was parked in the garage, and the brown clothed man who had been left in front of the door was carefully ignored by the servants; it was standard protocol for business partners.
With even step, the black-haired man strolled through the front door toward the meeting room with the confidence of someone who knew he was welcome. He wasn’t mistaken in that, since the master of the house had invited him a year ago.
Stepping into the relaxed living room, he found himself greeted by Marcus de Clare in person, the nobleman rising with a smile.
“Logan, it’s been too long.”
“It’s good to see you, Marcus.” The exchanged handshake carried genuine complicity. “Although, that was your own fault; I’m not sure why you told me to stay away for twelve months.”
“Because my father retired three days ago, and my brother is currently undergoing the rite of succession.”
With an understanding nod, Logan moved to take a seat on a couch opposed to the one Marcus had been sat on when he entered, carefully laying a briefcase on the floor in the process.
“You were afraid that they wouldn’t support your project?”
It was a long-established fact that inside the de Clare family, no opposition to Lord de Clare was allowed, and initiatives without getting his approval were heavily frowned upon. That went double for Marcus, who would hold the position of personal assistant once his brother inherited the title.
“Not particularly, he’s always been fond of discoveries.” With a dismissing wave, Marcus took his own seat. “The problem is that I’ll be bogged down by red tape once I become his aide, so it’s likely he’d pass the project to a subordinate. I’ve been working on this for a decade now; I have to be the one to see it through.”
“I don’t really get it, but you’re the boss.” As a freelancer, Logan had no official ties to the de Clare beyond individual contracts, which was why Marcus had entrusted him with his plan. “I’ve prepared a team like you asked.”
“And they know nothing of our true identities?”
“Of course not!” Offended, Logan leaned forward. “You know I only hire the uninitiated. They think you’re a representative of an important museum hiring a team to explore a cavern complex that was rediscovered recently.”
‘Uninitiated’ was the tactful term used by Logan to refer to those who didn’t even know the existence of magecraft, let alone practice it; the two of them of them had learned early how rare trust was between magi of different families, and hiring ordinary people who possessed the required skills was a good workaround. It also made eliminating witnesses without consequences easier, if things went wrong and they needed to pretend it never happened.
“Well, that’s not a complete lie, you know?”
“No, I don’t.” His earlier levity gone, the freelancer’s glare hardened. “I’ve been off the radar for a year now, Marcus, and in my business that’s not something you do lightly; some of my contacts might even think I’m dead. I’ve done everything you asked, but before I help you take the last step I need to know exactly what we’re doing. Acting without Lord de Clare’s accord is the sort of things that could too easily end poorly for me.”
Silence filled the room for almost half a minute before Marcus sighed in surrender.
“I owe you that much, I suppose. Alright, here’s the truth.” Shifting his weight to take a more comfortable position, Marcus smiled. “It all began eleven years ago, when Doctor Simone –I’m not surprised that you haven’t heard of her – discovered an ancient tablet in the ruins of a German castle. The tablet was obviously of an older make than the ruins themselves, and the inscriptions on it didn’t match any known dialect from the area. The discovery came to my attention when I noticed a similarity between the tablet and an old parchment in our family’s vault. The parchment itself is more than a fifteen-hundred years old but we’ve always considered it useless because the only thing written on it was an association between unknown symbols and the Greek alphabet.”
It took only a moment for Logan to catch on.
“You had the method to break the code.”
“Precisely, though it was always useless to us without any actual texts to translate, a problem that Doctor Simone unwittingly solved. Being only eighteen years old at the time, I couldn’t very well take action myself, so I contacted Doctor Simone under a false name, offering my assistance as someone who had the second piece of the puzzle. Naturally, she jumped at the occasion.” The memory of his own enthusiasm at the childish secrecy made Marcus smile. “Working together from a distance, we managed to translate most of the tablet. It contained portions of a creation myth that I won’t bore you with, but more importantly it also contained clues as to the location of an ancient place of worship; an entire religion that has never been discovered before.”
“Is that why made me do all that work?” His frown deepening, Logan gripped the sides of his seat. “Marcus, we can’t risk our lives for something that might not even bring us anything of worth; I’m sure it would be an important archeological discovery, but that won’t help appease your brother.”
“Don’t be so hasty, Logan. That was the story a decade ago.” With a smile that approached condescension, Marcus waved his finger chidingly. “Of course, I wouldn’t have bothered you for just that. Sharing your doubts, I didn’t want to involve myself directly, so I allowed Doctor Simone to take the helm in investigating our discovery; she would get the credit, but in exchange I would be informed of her discoveries first. It took her years to get authorization and assemble a team to track down the temple spoken of on the tablet; by the time I heard directly from her again after five years, I’d almost forgotten about the affair altogether.”
His uncle had been involved in a minor scandal at the time, and he’d been so busy controlling the damage that he almost neglected to read the letter.
“She tracked down the former place of worship to coordinates near the Hochwanner, and there she made two major discoveries over three years. First, that whatever cult or religion had written the tablet was older than the thousand year old parchment would imply; her theory was that they survived through the generations as a sort of secret society long after they abandoned their original traditions. More relevantly to our interest, she found this.”
Reaching into his pocket, Marcus retrieved a small pouch whose content, a handful of crystalline fragments, he emptied on the table.
Even as they merely lied on the table, Logan could feel the faint pulse that they emitted, and he took hold of one of them to bring it up to his eyes.
“You found a mana generator?” After a moment, he corrected himself. “You found a naturally occurring mana generator that had gone undiscovered until now inside a German mountain?”
“Yes and no.” Pausing for a moment, Marcus coughed in embarrassment at the vagueness of his answer. “To be exact, the crystals themselves don’t generate mana; what they currently exude is less than what they did when I first acquired them. However, Doctor Simone’s work indicates that they were taken by the cult – let’s refer to our mysterious worshippers as such – from a deep cave inside the Hochwanner. They are apparently fragments of something they called the sacred seal. That seal is our objective.”
The final precision wasn’t required; Logan had immediately understood. Everything else aside, if the ‘sacred seal’ was something that could infuse its surrounding with enough mana that it could still be felt centuries later, it was something that anyone would want. The fact that any magus would want it also explained why Marcus had been working through proxies until now.
“I see, that’s certainly something the de Clare family could put to use, but that a freelancer like me wouldn’t be able to take advantage of. What about this Doctor Simone?”
“She’ll be coming with us, of course; we might have need of her skills. After her discoveries, I couldn’t afford for her to go any further or to report to the museum, so I took care of her and her team.”
In other words, he had thoroughly brainwashed her. For the two of them, methods like that were nothing to be surprised by.
“Alright then, that doesn't sound like something your brother will come after me for. I'm in.”
The deal was concluded with a handshake, and both men departed together toward the airport.
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“When I heard of all the preparations Logan had done, I knew I couldn’t turn him down or ask him to wait until you’d recovered, my lord.” With a regretful smile, Marcus concluded the beginning of his story. “He might be a friend, but if I turned him down when he offered me the opportunity of a lifetime, he would have gone to another family.”
“I agree that it must’ve been quite the conundrum for you, Marcus.” Making no effort to mask his amusement, Lord de Clare gave a single clap. “However, why did this Logan feel the need to contact you? It would seem he already had everything prepared, and an opportunist like a freelancer wouldn’t share the power that this ‘sacred seal’ would seem to have out of the goodness of his heart.”
For the first time, Marcus hesitated in his tale.
“Ah, that’s-because he was he was afraid that the sacred seal would require great effort or knowledge to properly access its power. Logan’s training as a magus is incomplete even compared to someone like me who isn’t the heir. Since he isn’t trying to reach the Root anyway, it would be better for him to make an ally of our family and be paid money rather than end up with an unknown treasure.”
Silently contemplating the words, Lord de Clare eventually nodded his acceptance.
“I suppose I can only take your word for it. Very well, you’ve earned the right to continue; tell me what happened when you reached the Hochwanner.”
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Originally Posted by TheMegas
