Trial Run [Dusk]

[Hadrian]

30th Fall, 510 A.V. Hadrian had sent word ahead to his contact within the Knighthood that he would be delivering the magicked gems in the hopes that the prospective bearers of the things could be present to determine the efficacy of his work. Unfortunately, the master gem was keyed to a certain sergeant and the slave gems would only form their temporary bonds to knighted men and women, touched by the Windoak itself. While he had seen the linkages between them in his Auristic vision and those links looked -- felt -- right, he had perforce set their magic beyond his own reach by dunking them in the charged water. He wondered if this strange sense of alienation was shared by Areesa Tallshade and other magecrafters who had developed his level of skill, almost like he imagined it felt for a mother to birth a child: there was pride, but also the inevitable separation. He wasn't sure he could cope with post-partum depression as well as the strange wash of emotions that his family brought to bear upon him since the recent death of his mother, Plotina Aelius. All Syliran citizens knew or knew of his family, though he himself was perhaps the least known of his siblings, being the black sheep and the one who had moved away for so long. But he put those thoughts away, wondering what he would do now that he didn't have this project to take up his time on a daily basis. He was being escorted to someone's office, and so he straightened his shoulders and prepared for the trial run. He was excited. Apprehensive, too, but the excitement at least banished the exhaustion he felt hovering over him like a storm waiting to break. There would be a good deal of sleep and meditation before he decided what to do next.

[Dusk]

Hadrian was led further into the Second Tier of the Dyres District than he'd ever managed to go before. After only a few twists and turns, it became evident that very few people who didn't wear the Windoak crest ever entered these halls. Even the architecture changed - gone was the repressive gray stone found elsewhere in the city, replaced by shining white marble. When they first reached the older suites, another Knight was waiting for them, and informed him that he would take the five subordinate gems to distribute to the Knights for testing, and Hadrian would continue to the Captain's office in order to see whether it would respond or not. When that was concluded, his escort nodded and continued through the hallways. After nearly a half-bell of walking, the Knight who was escorting him opened one of the huge carved-oak doors and waved him into the room. Within was a space that was easily as big as the Inner Sanctum, with similar floor-to-ceiling windows though these were gilded and decorative rather than simply functional. There was a large dining table with what looked to be about a dozen chairs around it, as well as an area of more comfortable seating with overstuffed chairs and couches gathered around a hearth. There were a handful of men seated there, most with glasses of what must be scotch in hand. Though most seemed to be in their late twenties or early thirties, one rather sour looking man couldn't have been out of his teens, a sailor's cap perched precariously on his head. He had his own flask of whiskey, and a pipe that he was gnawing on while throwing annoyed glances at the rest of them. One of the older men stood and offered Hadrian a hand. "Welcome, and thank you for joining us. I'm Captain Lance Stalinsa and I'll be testing your wares. Your mother was Plotina Aelius, yes? You have my condolences on her loss," he said, a sad little frown overtaking his lips for a moment before he released Hadrian's hand. The other two men stood up and introduced themselves as Sergeants, both of them grizzled veterans who bore the scars of their encounters on their hands and faces. A third was already known to Hadrian, Ser Theo Darkbrow, who was the mage-knight who'd first approached him regarding this job. "She was a good woman," he murmured, as if a little unsure what to say but felt that something should be said. The last man with the pipe refused to get up, and just grumpily chewed on it and averted his gaze. "You've a sibling or two in the Order, don't you?" Lance said, offering Hadrian a glass of scotch as well. "It's good to see your family contributing to the city, in all its myriad capacities," he said with a friendly sort of smile. "Enough horseshit," the younger man moaned, rolling his eyes. "Just get on with it. I've work to do." He finally turned in his seat to pin Hadrian with a bored and slightly hostile look, raising his eyebrows expectantly. "Where's this miracle gadget we've been called here about?"

[Hadrian]

Hadrian was duly impressed with the inner areas of the Citadel, though it had yet to truly occur to him that he was being honored or privileged. He was so focused on the work, that while he had been gleeful to study the leaves of the fabled Windoak, he didn't stop to think how these men and women were handing him the bones of their icon. Though he was being allowed behind the veil of the Order's mystique, he still felt like a suppliant, basically there to be sure his work was worth the gold they were paying him. He was a craftsman, and that was all. A Captain Knight of some repute then stood to greet him, and Hadrian could not help but bob his head like any Syliras-bred boy. The awe was bred into him. That the man knew his mother was a strange enough thought, and it took him a moment to recover his tongue when condolences were made. His father would be so pleased, though. "Ah, thank you, ser. We are surviving." Nodding and shaking hands, he made the rounds. "Thank you, Ser Theo." "Thank you, ser," he said, taking the scotch. He was quick to take a bracing sip. "Ah, yes. Young Verus is a squire. We are quite proud of him. My father has three sons to help him and inherit, two daughters to make alliances, a son to join the Order, and... me." There was a crooked smile to that, perhaps the first bit of humor. He took another sip of scotch, wondering if his father had sold it to them. Even his breeding and rearing as a Syliran didn't prevent him from riling at the unprovoked rudeness of, well, it was Ser Taylor Brudt. They were all celebrities in Syliras. "Indeed," he said, mastering his anger. "The subordinate gems were already handed over, so it only remains to hand over the superior." He was glad he had made the semantic change from master and slave to superior and subordinate before talking to the Knights about them. Slavery was so frowned upon that it was, well, illegal. Reaching into his coat, he pulled out a black velvet pouch that his sister had insisted upon embroidering with a tree of real thread-of-silver. At first, he had thought she was merely trying to impress the Order, but it occurred to him just then that she might have been trying to help him. He held it out to Ser Lance as the ranking officer.

[Dusk]

"And you," Taylor muttered, shifting a little to recross his legs. When he next glanced up, it was to find Lance giving him a quelling look, and he murmured some apology and simply gulped down a good measure of his liquor. "Your family's prosperity is a boon to Syliras," Lance said quietly, turning his attention back to the task at hand. He nodded to Theo, who stepped forward to take the bag from Hadrian and hand it to one of the other sergeants. "Go ahead and put that on, Tiberius, and then we'll settle in. I imagine it will take a bit of time to test. Please, join us," he said, waving Hadrian to a seat as the rest of the group returned to the couches and went about refilling their scotch. Tiberius sat before pulling open the bag and spilling the gem into his palm. "So Hadrian, how exactly does this thing work?" he asked, voice lilting in a strange accent that Hadrian might recognize as Lhavitian.

[Hadrian]

Hadrian wasn't sure what he had done to offend a Stewart Knight, but he figured the best policy was to tactfully ignore whatever slights he might feel directed his way. The goods delivered, he nodded and took a seat. "Don't tell my father that," he said. What Ser Taylor perhaps imagined being pride, was quite the opposite. Trajan's delight in his bookish son had dimmed when his academic pursuits tended toward less lucrative pursuits than macroeconomics, and the feeling was mutual. A black sheep was a black sheep, and part of the reason he felt so unsure about staying in Syliras was the stigma -- at least, to his mind -- of the Aelius name. After a sip of scotch, he looked seriously toward Tiberius. "Unfortunately, once keyed to your blood, I could not test it myself. Insofar as I am able to gauge these things without an actual test, it seems to have been a successful enchantment. I would suggest having it mounted on a chain and, at least until the blood-bond has been tried and tested, wearing it against the skin. It should recognize the affinity and you should feel an unfolding of your awareness. It might be disorienting at first, but you should begin to develop an awareness of those holding the subordinate gems. I'm not sure how long it will take for the enchantment to take full effect, but less than a day, I imagine. The only way to test the danger alarum is, well, with danger. And if someone breaks contact with their gem, it will take that time to reestablish the link again. And I don't think they will work for anyone who hasn't sworn their oath to the Windoak and gone through their quest, but... the Windoak is beyond my ken, so the vagaries of an enchantment that uses its material are not something I can fully predict."

[Dusk]

Tiberius just sort of stared at the gem, but he kept it cradled in his palm as instructed. "Well, if this thing works, it'd be a bloody useful thing to have," he said closing his fist around it and lifting the other for a sip of scotch. "So this could take all day?" Taylor said, eying his superior with obvious annoyance. A frown cut across his mouth, sharp and ugly, and he stared first at Hadrian and then at his captain as if he might just throttle the lot of them. "If it even bloody works? I can't believe you pulled me off a ship for this. I've still got people out there, Lance! Men who are in very real danger and who depend on me to keep them safe. I don't have time to be poncing about with petching witches in the hopes that maybe they've come up with a useful bit of bauble!" Lance just seemed amused at the outburst, though the two sergeants looked distinctly uncomfortable. "You have exactly enough time," the captain said in a perfectly friendly tone, "to do whatever the hell I tell you to. So shut your mouth, drink my scotch, and stop being a pain in my ass or I'll have you horsewhipped. Again," he said with a casual chuckle. "Bollocks," Taylor grunted under his breath, though he hunkered down further in his seat and went back to drinking. As he was so ordered to do. "So tell me Hadrian," Lance continued as if no interruption had occurred, "how did you come up with this idea? As he said, seems a particularly useful sort of thing to have. Why haven't we seen its like before?"

[Hadrian]

Ignore, ignore, ignore, went the mantra in his head, though he could commiserate with the unhappy knight. When Hadrian had something that needed doing, any distraction was likely to upset him out of proportion. But the fact of the matter was that he was the easy target for the man's ire, even though the glances he shot at his superior seemed well nigh mutinous. Also, there was little one could do to change the mind of a person who had labeled the practitioners of magic as witches even if Hadrian was more properly an enchanter than anything else. The semantics were lost on most people not living in the ivory tower of academia, where he often wished to return. If only there was money in it. He took another sip of scotch as if the order had been directed at him. "Ah, my thesis project was something I called a blood-compass. I met a sailor in Zeltiva who had lost his sister to slavers, and seeing as how they were the only two people of their blood... Well, it was an experiment. I primed a crystal of rutilated quartz with his blood and enchanted it such that the rutiles swung around within the crystal to point toward the nearest match to his blood, which was his sister. When I was discussing the possible needs of the Order with Ser Theo, it seemed a logical extension of my previous work. Larger and more complex, but of the same grain, as it were." The young man kept glancing at Tiberius as there was no one more anxious than he to see this enchantment's success. With luck it wouldn't be long before the man's senses stretched out toward the subordinate gems and their bearers. Otherwise Ser Taylor would likely attempt to murder him and he would be forced to defend himself.

[Dusk]

The two sergeants didn't quite seem able to follow the talk of magical contraptions, but Lance listened intently and with every evidence of understanding. "So instead of the blood leading the artifact to its match, the blood allows the artifact to sense changes reported by another? Fascinating. You should think about working with some of the mage-knights on projects. They're always looking for someone to help them put their ideas to reality." None of his units, of course, but he at least knew what was going on in the knighthood. "If you're interested, I can speak with Quilin or Equuleus and see if they've anything going on," he offered. "I feel a bit weird," Tiberius spoke up, staring down at the jewel in his palm. "Like... I don't know, like knowing someone's in the next room even if you can't hear them. Is it supposed to be like that?"

[Hadrian]

Hadrian tried to ignore the awkward note in the air with regard to those knights who had little understanding of what he did, hoping that the results would be plain enough. Of course, he would be as lost if the knights were discussing battle plans, most likely. He nodded to affirm Ser Lance's suppositions regarding his previous work. "I would be happy to consult with the mage-knights, ser," he said, straightening his posture a bit. "Devan Nightshade was one of my professors in Zeltiva. He would have an idea of my strengths if they want another opinion on which projects to bring me in on--" When Tiberius spoke, Hadrian zeroed in on him immediately, intense gaze pinning him like a butterfly on a collector's board. Setting his scotch aside, he leaned in. "That sounds about right, Ser Tiberius," he said. "The sensations should begin to carry more specific information, and once you get used to it -- relax, please -- the strangeness will pass and it will not sit in the forefront of your mind unless you concentrate upon it."

[Dusk]

Tiberius looked like someone had poked him with a pin and he was trying not to yelp. Not painful at all, but as if the surprise made him uncomfortable, and being told to relax after that was an exercise in futility. "Fascinating," Lance chuckled, though the sergeants paid more close attention to their drink than the conversation. "If this works, this really will be an innovation. I hope we can assume that this sort of trinket is something that would be created exclusively for the knights?" he said, drawing Hadrian's attention back to him for a moment. "You'd be compensated of course, but we would so hate to find out that your designs were being used by others. Especially the Ebonstryfe. They have their own agents in Zeltiva looking for new ways of attack and defense, just as we do," he said with a bland smile.