“Yes, they have, and his name is Gavin Cross. They met him their very first day here, in fact.”
“Do tell.”
“It’s nothing particularly glamourous or exciting. Your brother wanted to know who his son’s mentor would be; well, he phrased it in such a way it was plain he saw no reason Wynn and the others should be separated. Sypara pounced on him at once for interfering with the administration of the College.”
Garris lost all trace of composure, erupting into deep, full-throated laughter. “That’s Carth! He never was bashful about giving his opinion.” After another round of mirth, Garris sobered and lifted his eyes to meet Valera’s. “Tell me why you want her, aside from the obvious.”
“My first vision in twenty years woke me in the middle of the night, not even a week before Marcus and Ovir found Gavin. I wrote down as much of it as I could, but the central sense of it was this. ‘The death of slavers shall herald the return of Kirloth to this world, and the Apprentices shall be drawn unto him.’ The same day he awoke in this world, Gavin killed fifty-three slavers in an unfocused invocation, and as of right now, Cothos is the only Great House of Tel unrepresented at the College.”
A polite knock announced the steward’s return with the tea service. Garris inhaled the pleasant aroma, smiling, before returning his attention to the matter at hand.
“I’ll give the order the moment I return,” Garris said and proceeded to watch the steward pour tea.
Gavin leaned against the desk at the front of the empty classroom as he waited on the students he would be mentoring to arrive. Made of oak, if Gavin was any judge, its solid, well-maintained construction lent an understated gravitas to the space. The classroom was a standard lecture hall with stadium-style seating and a large, center aisle with smaller aisles on each flank. A small current of Conjuration permeated the space, and Gavin suspected it was an embedded effect to project speakers’ voices throughout the hall.
It wouldn’t be so bad to spend my life in classrooms, Gavin thought as his eyes roamed over the empty seats of the hall, but then, his thoughts drifted back to his discussion with Marcus about what it means to be Kirloth. But somehow, I think Marcus would say it was wasting my life.
The classroom’s only door opened, cutting short Gavin’s thoughts, and he saw the young girl of House Mivar he met a few days before. What was her name? Then, a tall, stocky boy followed her, and Gavin smiled. Lillian. Her name is Lillian; his name is Braden, and that means… Short, wiry Wynn Roshan followed Braden Wygoth into the space.
Lillian led her friends down the center aisle to sit in the first three seats of the front row. Braden squeezed himself into the aisle seat, Lillian beside him and Wynn on Lillian’s right.
“Don’t worry, Braden. I don’t plan on us always meeting here,” Gavin said. “It’s far too large a space for just nine people.”
Over the next few minutes, five more people-three young women and two men-entered the hall, and none of them were wizards. They approached close enough to see the glyph in Gavin’s medallion, and almost as one, their eyes dropped to the three students in the front row. They glanced around and quickly found seats in rows about half-way between the door and Gavin.
Gavin watched the scene play out, and he started to let it pass. Then, he remembered Valera’s presentation at the start of the mentor orientation, and Gavin knew that ‘let it pass’ he could not.
“Yes, I am House Kirloth,” Gavin said, “and as the medallion also announces, I am a wizard. And yes, these three are Heirs of the Great Houses of Tel. Do we intimidate you?”
The five students glanced at each other. Gavin feared they would remain silent, but one of the young women spoke.
“Yes, milord. The whole campus is buzzing about the first wizard of House Kirloth in no one knows how long.”
“My name is Gavin, and I don’t want to hear ‘milord’ ever again; that’s not who I am.” Gavin fell silent as he looked up at the ceiling, searching his memories for the quote. When he found it, Gavin smiled. “‘…for I tell you now that I will brook no bias within your ranks. These people so desire to study and wield the Art that they propose to do so through sheer force of will, embodied as countless hours of study, and I will not have them be second-class members of the Society. You are all brothers and sisters in the Art before me.’”
Lillian sat in the front row with a huge grin on her face, but the new arrivals couldn’t see that.
“Do you recognize the quote?” Gavin asked.
When no one answered for some time, Lillian’s hand shot up.
“This isn’t a formal class, Lillian; you don’t have to raise your hand and be recognized.”
“The quote…it was part of Bellos’s address to the assembled Society of the Arcane when the first mage students came to the College. I love that part of the Histories.”
Gavin nodded. “It is pretty good. I read it for the first time a few days ago.” He directed his attention back to the prospective mages in the row above. “Please, join us.”
The students glanced at each other before standing and moving down to the front row. They sat on the opposite side of the aisle from Lillian, Braden, and Wynn. Gavin took it as progress.
“Thank you,” Gavin said and scanned the students present before continuing. “This program is intended to help new students transition to life at the College, and some of you may question why all first-years are required to participate. The thing is, even if you yourself don’t need the support this program is intended to provide, there’s always the chance that you can help provide it to others. We are indeed all brothers and sisters in the Art, and none of us is as strong as all of us. It is my hope that you will come to me…whether you have questions or need help or just need to talk…but I understand that such trust and rapport takes time to build. Let’s proceed with the introductions.”
Chapter 23
Marcus drove Gavin’s training at a relentless pace. Though Gavin’s studies focused on developing mastery of the Art, traditional, academic studies were not exempt.
It was a cool evening as the region teetered just on the cusp of autumn. The slight breeze carried the complex potpourri of scents one only found in the College’s gardens. Herbs, flowers, rare plants for the alchemy classes…all these scents and more wafted through the air.
Gavin strolled through the gardens, head bent as he wrestled with a matter that had plagued him for some time. What it meant to be Kirloth. Everything Marcus told him still circled through his mind. How could he be Kirloth anyway…that Kirloth, at least? Sure, he said he was over six thousand years old, but anyone could say that.
The sound of metal striking stone drew Gavin’s attention, and a short distance to his left, Gavin saw what seemed a very unlikely sight. Valera, Magister of Divination, knelt over a flower bed, her arms smeared to the elbows with soil and fertilizer. The flower bed was one of the few such that were level to the path; most were built up as large planters surrounded by bench-sized walls. Naturally, of course, Valera was working with the flowers because she chose to do so, but the image was so unexpected, Gavin decided to walk over and say hello.
Valera looked up as a shadow crossed her flower bed and smiled at seeing Gavin. “Hello, Gavin. How has life been treating you?”