[Wizard's Thumb] I Know Nothing

[Hadrian]

He realized as soon as the words came out that he had made a social faux pas, but as often happened in these instances, his vaunted mind failed him and all he could do was stare at the helpful woman. He glanced where she bade him glance, then nodded respectfully. "Thank you, Mistress Ilune, for your help." He turned to go downstairs almost regretfully, which was not his usual demeanor when descending into the vaults of a new library. For all he had learned, he still knew little, it seemed. But the sound of Marc's footsteps led him down, and he paused there at the bottom to survey the room. He appreciated the tidiness; if one was not careful, notes could go astray quite easily. He immediately wanted to know what was behind the obfuscating door, but it didn't seem proper to hypnotize the grumpy monk, not if he wanted to develop a trusting relationship with the people here. The building Azura had described would be worth coming back to from time to time, when his studies in Zeltiva hit a brick wall as they were wont to do from time to time. And who knew; they might develop a rapport in shared research that might open the door in its own good time. One never could tell. "Thank you," he said quietly, not wanting to offend (again). His hand brushed over the keys, both the ones for a Summoner of his caliber and those that remained beyond his skill. He had worked beyond his abilities in Ravok, and very nearly died as a result. With a rush of divine energy and a gleam to the Lormar symbol on the back of his left hand, impressions began to race from the keys to him. Some of it might be useful, but the rest was random and he was still learning to sort through such things. He took A1 and A2 into his hand, trying to get more out of the ones he would use, and moved over to the novice-level books. Perhaps he would learn the coordinates of Zaiden or Kseyden, worlds that were supposed to be common knowledge for summoners, but he had taught himself and so he only knew what he could find on his own. It had to be written out. Perhaps he would find something to help him focus his searches for appropriate Memosites from Swalden's rings, or pull a being up from Fyrden to commune. A summoner was supposed to build relationships with these otherworldly beings, the better to benefit from the connection between their worlds. "Who makes your keys?" he asked. So many things could be a magical key, there was something ironic in a physical one. He had considered bending his metallurgical and crafting practice toward keys; they could certainly be easily magecrafted. Perhaps he would pick up a kit here in Nyka.

[Liar]

Hadrian’s roaming hand tripped over the worn grooves of the desk beneath the keys, showing him where many similar hands had wandered. Many fell to the drawer below the desk’s face, the softened brass handle. But even in a room full of so many keys, it was locked. The keys themselves gave him nearly a dozen flashing visions of students and scholars, of monks and civilians and foreigners, each sharing in Hadrian’s conviction, if not his curiosity. A good majority of them were nervous as well, fingers hesitating and deliberating beside his. Then, for an instant, Hadrian saw the room in dim-lit darkness, the door to the upstairs left wide open; a man stole a handful of keys, tags flailing, palms sweating. He fumbled with many different locks, searched many different lanes for a single book. If the Syliran’s fingers strayed too long on the one labeled E1, one of the many stolen by this thief in the night, he would feel it clutched against an open book, the book. The pages were stiff, the ink crisp, but despite the book’s newness he could not make out the words. It shook in the hands that held it. The pages clapped at the air as they turned, urgent. And then Hadrian was staring again at a desk with a careful arrangement of keys, and the man who called himself Marc was glancing deliberately at a page of notes to one side. E1 seemed to shy from his shadow, even without moving, as A1 and A2 whispered fading tales of eager young mages. They turned in the lock with little consequence, but the books beyond showed some promise. Marc grumbled something impatient and unintelligible. He ran a finger over a few lines of text, distracted.

[Hadrian]

Marc didn't answer, not as such. Hadrian knew what it was like to be immersed in an academic tangent, unable to surface from the deep to where human speech was intelligible, but only the sonorous whale songs of deeper knowledge. It wouldn't hurt to look at something beyond his ken, would it? If he couldn't make sense of it, he would not use it. If he thought he could make sense of it, he wouldn't use it either, but would merely hold it up to his growing knowledge in the discipline. He couldn't stop his hand from hovering over E1 as his connection to Eyris pulled information about it directly from the chavena and poured it into his hungry mind. He took it, then took A1 and A2 for good measure. When he was done looking where he oughtn't, he would return to the safer places, where he might practice in anticipation of greater feats. With three keys, he sidled up to the books themselves, free hand running over them from A1 to what he thought was most likely to be E1. He glanced over at Marc, who was busy ignoring him, and turned the key in the lock. He really did need to get a kit to fashion his own keys.

[Liar]

Above the brass lock, the door’s label was etched in tiny letters, so small they seemed to evade the eye. But still the lock turned without complaint, granting access to E1: Ambiguities and Inconclusions. The small room was lined on three walls with loosely filled bookcases, mainly thin journals and stacks of notes with subsequent binding. There was barely space for two people to stand comfortably, but luckily Hadrian was only one. Growing warm in his hand, the key that had led him here struggled to supply the information he hoped to pull from it. There were flashes of turns, a handful of individuals slowly adding to the section’s collection. Its favorite scene was the one from before, crepuscular panic and hastily flipped pages. The books themselves offered different insights. As his gift searched them through their spines, he found them more reluctant than keys, if only for their complexity, the effort in their conception. The book did not seem out of place, except that its inscribed date was out of order with the rest. It showed him a similar glimpse at the uncertain past, the same hands from another perspective. The book trembled in the hands that held it as they searched its ink and vellum for something specific. When they found it, they ripped out the page, and Hadrian felt the anguish in the book’s loss. “What are you doing?” Hadrian heard a voice say at the door. When he looked, he saw a strange man standing in the threshold, his skin like obsidian, his brow twisted in fury. He felt suddenly smaller, kneeling, forced to look up to see his face... And then the vision ended, melted from his mind as reality replaced it like stiffening wax. The door was ajar, Hadrian was standing, and there was no one else in sight. The book beneath his fingers was called Studies in Reversal, detailing a variety of attempts to sever the bond between a mage and his familiar. Each one was more extravagant than the last, each a worse failure. Whatever his intention, the book seemed to open to the removed page. The tear was so close to the spine it would have been otherwise hard to spot. A noise shuffled at the door, deliberate. Marc stood there, less annoyed than one might expect. “What are you doing?”

[Hadrian]

The sort of vision that came from that book was new, and he had to wonder if his Lykata had just opened to the door to something else, some memory trapped within the pages and pages of glyphs, or perhaps someone had managed to duplicate the memory sharing properties of the memosites of Swalden. In any case, he had no idea how long he had pored over the books in general or that one in particular, but then Marc's voice echoed that voice in the past and Hadrian turned his stormborn eyes -- too bright, too pale -- on the monk. He was not apologetic. "I was reading about things as yet beyond my ken," he said, the A keys visible in his hand. "Don't worry; I'm not an idiot. I will not attempt anything I see in here until such times as I am capable. I have opened portals to Fyrden, but have not yet found any creature I would bond to if given the chance. "There's a page missing here," he added, fingering the shorn edge of what had been stolen. The Lormar symbol was hidden, his left hand holding up the book, but he had made no attempt to hide it from the monks, from Azura. "The book misses its substance and its meaning." He didn't offer the book over. "It was also," he noted with a faint pang of disapproval, "out of chronological order." Hadrian had done more than his share of research over the years, and one developed a pathological need for order among all the stored lore of the ages, or whatever lay at one's fingertips. "What do you know of this?" he asked, about the book in general, but also the details that set it apart. He wasn't sure if Marc would be any the friendlier, and he didn't attempt to hypnotize him exactly, but he sent the faintest of hypnotic suggestions out from within to suffuse his aura: trust. Sometimes the subtlest touch could prove decisive.

[Liar]

Marc folded his arms, swift and derisive. He was himself an aurist, but he could not have known that this apparently novice foreigner could fool him. Though he was about as trustful as he seemed, the summoner could not bring himself to despise a curious mind such as Hadrian’s. His frown ebbed in the wash of that discovery, his attention drawn from the mysterious book to those unreal eyes. “You should have told me you were interested in Fyrden. It is something of a hobby, for me.” He spent a moment to peer at Hadrian and the book in his hands, an eyebrow arched high in checked irritation. “That, on the other hand, is meaningless. A mess of failed experiments by mages who tried at the impossible.” He waved a hand at the proper place. “Feel free to put it back where it belongs, with the other journals from Five-Oh-Nine. Somewhere near the end will do.” Then he turned to give the student spaceto leave the small room, holding out his palm. “I’ll take the key. This section will do you no good. You’ll find books on proper familiary in all of the D sections. You are free to browse as well, but I, ah—” He hesitated, as if in thought. A tick later, a low noise sounded at the other end of the hall, somewhere between a knock and a collision. The monk’s head turned reflexively in its direction, but otherwise he eagerly ignored it. “Tell me. How much do you know about the lowest of worlds?”

[Hadrian]

"Is it?" he asked, not mentioning that Marc's standoffish manner would generally dissuade a person from offering him details. Nobody liked their heads bitten off. "It has become a bit of a hobby of mine as well." He didn't move to put the book back, not just yet. Marc might very well be involved in the theft for all he knew, but unless the book's contributions gave him any new information, he didn't suppose holding onto it would help. "Oh, I don't know. It might help one avoid dead ends, and the authors might possibly have lied about their results. Magi tend to be a secretive lot." He smiled then, and put the book back in what seemed the proper order, but it was with a hint of regret. After such a surprising response to his generally mild extractions with Lykata, he felt as if the book were familiar, that his hand knew the contours of its spine and that he ought to keep it. Well, Yshul could appear and urge him to steal it, but barring that, he would not. Hadrian handed the E1 key back, and turned some of his attention on those D-series keys. Perhaps they had stories to tell him too. At the muffled sound, he didn't seem to react, but his auristic sense turned outward to attempt to ascertain the source. "The lowest of worlds?" He attempted to juggle these flows of information: the keys, the hidden sound, the conversation. "I was not aware there was a system rating their, hm, depth. I know of the common lower worlds, of course. I know the coordinates for Swalden, Shoyden, and Fyrden. I'll look up those of Zaiden and Kseyden when I have need of them. I read in an old Summoner's journal about a lesser known low world where the Alahean government was attempting to set up a colony. Anashis. But I haven't verified its existence. "Why?"

[Liar]

“Why, so I know where to start. Swalden? Shoyden? Common worlds, but only for those who know a thing or two. You are not the stumbling, stupid foreigner you made yourself to be. Well, forgive me...” Marc’s voice had taken on a new tone; he was no longer the peeved, fidgeting recluse who listed the company of study above human interaction, but neither was he as familiar as he seemed to wish he were. His peculiar attempt at smooth charm lacked the humility required of two strangers, the courtesy that Hadrian so eagerly wore. And with his interest piqued, he did not seem aware of the incongruity between this moment’s performance and those previous. Whatever the case, a light had lifted on the his face. He was oblivious to the aurist’s drifting attention. As Hadrian’s sixth sense pored through the thick oak wood, sickly yellow fear peered back at him. Pulsing dim life, it was tinged with orange desperation and infused with the dull haze of fatigue. “That is not exactly what I meant,” the summoner went on. “Low is not a height, but a state a being. Fyrden is a Hai of its own; haven’t you heard? A mage who partakes in familiary saves a soul from oblivion.” With the key in his hand, he hastily locked E1 and returned it to the desk, where he exchanged it for keys D1, D2, and D3. Hadrian would not have to move far; Marc made sure of it. Ambiguities and Inconsistencies was just next door to Familiary: History and Accounts, after all. His dark eyes were already pondering the books behind the glass doors when he up offered the respective keys. “You are welcome to our libraries, but I am also free to answer any questions you may have.”

[Hadrian]

Hadrian nodded to the apology, such as it was. He wasn't going to school anyone on manners, but merely use them as best he could to grease the wheels of social interaction. And as he sensed a bit of what was beyond the door, he kept his face a mask, as natural a smile as possible. "I know that the lightface is intolerably hot and the darkface intolerably cold, and that most of those living there would like to make a deal with some wizard who can craft them a body out of their own soul and summon them across the void. But I hadn't heard anyone speak of the process of familiary in such, hm, altruistic terms." He smiled. "Clearly, you know more than I do on the topic. Most of what I have read has been along the lines of warning against bonding without a high degree of willpower or one might become a slave of their familiar." Again he sent a pulse of trust into Marc's aura, then indicated the door. "What's behind the door?" Marc was either unaware of the obvious noise or thought Hadrian a simpleton if he was just going to ignore it, but Hadrian's smile remained, perhaps inviting to conspiracy, though he wondered if Azura knew what went on behind closed doors, quite literally.

[Liar]

Marc turned to the door in question. A few seconds passed, inner turmoil disguised as consideration, and then he sighed. “Ah, well. That is a thing that even the cleverest of students should not learn until their time. I am sure that, one day, you will have the privilege of that knowledge.” In the wake of the refusal, he offered an apologetic smile. He put a hand on the Syliran’s shoulder, a function of his newfound trust and the crumbling inhibitions that accompanied it. Instead conceding a truth that was apparently too important to share, he resolved the hesitation with a less than irrelevant change of subject. “Tell me,” his mouth hung a moment as he tried to recall Hadrian’s name, then dismissed the failed attempt. Despite his words, there was a kind familiarity in his tone. “Are you the mage you seem to be, or are you just a scholar playing at research? You seem to have already read into the dangers and benefits of familiary; do you think you have the willpower for a bond such as that?” His hand dropped, resigning his next actions to the power of Hadrian’s answer. “I can help you, if that is what you want.”