Leaderboard

Chris did not have to fight as much to get into House Fereis this time. It was almost refreshing if he wasn’t solely focused on the job. The servant at the door tutted under their breath and said something to the effect of, “That’s still ‘Lady Fereis,’ to you,” but they nevertheless led Chris into the house and to the grand library, where they left him in the care of the other members of the house staff cleaning the library. Estellise was nowhere to be seen, but the servant said she would be there when convenient, a phrase so loaded Chris couldn’t help but double-take as the servant left him behind. The maids were off dusting all the bookshelves at the direction of the butler in the center of the library, all of whom looked busy enough, so Chris decided to ignore them and browse at his own pace. He remembered thinking the circumstances for this job weren’t ideal -- Estellise hadn’t been able to secure him completely private access -- but he could handle some of the help if it came down to it. The first matter of business was figuring out just what exactly the heart-shaped stone the undine girl had given him was, so he looked for books on magical artifacts. It was a task easier said than done. The books were all clumped together on the shelf, but he had to go through a few of them before he found one that had anything remotely close to his thing, and even then, it just said something about a “Conjuration Enhancement Item.” Chris had to read that a few times to even make sure he wasn’t reading the word “Enchantment” lumped in there, and was going through a reread to make sure there weren’t any more citations he could follow (there weren’t) when the butler walked up to his table, breaking his concentration. “Do you need any assistance, sir?” Chris looked up and saw that there was a smile on the butler’s face, like the “sir” was perfunctory. It was a taunt more than anything. He didn’t take the bait. “I guess I’m looking for your section on Conjurations,” he said. “Enchantments too, if you can provide it. I admit I’m not entirely sure what I’m looking for, just trying to use Lady Fereis’” -- he remembered that time -- “hospitality while I have it.” The butler’s smile only grew more smug. “Ah yes,” he said. “I believe we do have some tomes on the… lesser magics here. I am not sure why you would bother the great Fereis family if that is your goal, but you could find them off in… that corner, I believe.” Chris turned to look where he was pointing and saw a maid doubling back to dust in a corner he was sure she’d dusted before. It was suspicious, but Chris was pretty sure he was still in the clear as far as people surmising what he was capable of, so he left the last books on the table and went over to check out what Conjuration had to offer him. Magic was hard, it turned out, especially for a mundane person like Chris to wrap his head around. Even for a less extensive section, every book had all these extra words that Chris could only infer the meaning of, and he could feel his eyes start to glaze over. The artifact books were all, like, archival. They were lists of stuff. He could deal with lists of stuff. Now that he was trying to read actual theory, he could hardly make head or tail of it. Needless to say, it took a lot of skimming back and through a few different books again before he was able to track the reference down. “Lodestones,” Chris mouthed the word when he found it. He kept a finger on the word and traced the following lines to ensure he picked up every word he could. “Used to bind entities to objects rather than the caster.” There was some other stuff warning about the dangers of keeping them around, but Chris was more focused on how to get rid of them. “Kill the caster, destroy the thing, or Abjuration magic…” He raised his voice and turned his attention to the maid who was surreptitiously trying to look over his shoulder. “Excuse me, I know it’s a lesser magic or whatever, but where is the section on Abjuration?” The maid didn’t know (and, to be frank, seemed surprised to even be asked), so she had to ask someone else on the house staff to take Chris over. And this maid, unfortunately, was chatty. As Chris pulled out the first book to comb through, she said, “My you sure are reading a lot. Tryin’ to master every magic or something?” “Oh, I'm not particularly magic-inclined,” Chris said, trying to ignore her. “I’m just the curious sort and found myself with the opportunity to learn.” “Well isn't that quaint! What are you looking for now, hm?” She took a step towards him, trying to get a glimpse. Chris snapped the book shut and tucked it under his shoulder, spine facing away from the maid to ensure she wouldn’t be rewarded for being nosy. He did try to oblige her a little bit. “Well, I started with enchantment, then I went over to conjuration for a bit, and those books said something about abjuration so now I’m over here,” he said. “I’ve heard of some other schools of magic too but I wouldn’t expect a noble house like House Fereis to have books on necromancy. I’m just happy with what I can find.” Whatever frustration the maid had from being thwarted disappeared when Chris implied she could still be of use. “Oh well of course there's Necromancy books too, why wouldn't there be? Of course, everyone knows that Evocation is the strongest magic but it wouldn't do not to learn what you can from others too. A lot of people read up on them for fun!” It was an opportunity. Chris could smell it. “Well, I need to finish getting what I can out of this book,” he said, “but if you can find some good primer material for me, I would be much obliged.” If this didn’t work, maybe Estellise could shoo her away when she showed up. Or he would have to use some other plan. He hadn’t committed to anything yet, but that didn’t mean he didn’t want to put something into motion soon.