Ignite the Sun
Chapter 56: Konrad and his friend

Chapter 56: Konrad and his friend

"Is this the right location?" Calen asked looking at a large complex connected to the city wall.

"According to what the receptionist told me it’s where all mages live, unless they own a house and have family, but even then they’re stationed here for most of the week." Isara confirmed.

"Why would they keep them all in one place?" Elira questioned.

"A lot of them belong to the army, and the rest maintains the enchantments around the city, so they have to be available on short notice."

The one to greet them in front of the complex was Geodor, he was just standing there, waiting - almost like he knew they were coming.

"Lady Sylara might have mentioned that you lot might be coming." He simply stated.

"We’re looking for Cole, is he available?" Isara asked right away.

The grand mage nodded solemnly.

"Yes, I think he’s quite shook after hearing about Konrad, but you should be able to speak with him since he’s coping rather well ."

"Great, where can we find him?"

"I’ll guide you."

"Oh there’s no need really just just-"

"It will be for the best if I guide you." His tone was gentle but firm.

***

Cole’s room was on the very top floor of the complex - as one of the most talented apprentices he was entitled to a private bedroom, a rare privilege considering how many mages the building hosted.

When they reached it Geodor knocked on the heavy door.

"Cole? You have some guests, they would like to talk about Konrad."

A few seconds later the door swung open revealing a scrawny young man with short black hair and eyes that were just as dark.

"They can come in, but I would prefer to speak with them in private, Master."

The old mage nodded.

"Of course, I’ll make myself scarce." He bowed his head slightly and hurriedly left the scene.

When Geodor disappeared behind a corner Cole inclined his head in an inviting gesture.

"Come in, this will certainly be an interesting talk..."

***

The room was rather spacious, but still retained a rather homely feel - it actually reminded Calen of his own room back in Asharil.

"Sorry for the mess, I just got back a few days ago and didn’t finish unpacking yet."

"You’re..." Isara paused looking for a right word.

"Remarkably calm for someone who just lost their best friend? Yeah, I get that a lot." Cole sighed. "That’s mostly because Iost my friend long before this domestic terrorism debacle."

"A falling out?"

"Something like that... We had a very loud disagreement about something, and he became hellbent on proving me wrong - which obviously really strained our relationship."

"That would explain why he repeated his name so many times in his notes." Calen noted. "What was the topic of your disagreement?"

"An unfinished magic circle from some myth, he was convinced he could complete the design and use it, but I told him it was just a visual representation for the story and it could never work." He smiled bitterly "I don’t feel particularly happy about the fact that I was right..."

"Do you know what myth it was from?"

"No, sorry - he only showed me the circle. I do remember that he heard the story from some shady guy when he went to the Pit though."

"From Piff?" Isara questioned.

"What? No, Piff might tell fairytales about his merchandise, but he would never say something that would result in people getting hurt in the city."

"Huh, why not?"

"Because it would mean less clients for him." Cole snorted. "Nah, the scammer is probably innocent, anyone looking for something difficult to procure goes to the guy, even I bought things from him once or twice."

"And I assume you didn’t know about his research because you were out of the city?"

"Yeah, actually my internship at the Fallen Tower was the thing that finally broke our friendship beyond repair. Konrad was convinced that he deserved it, so when Master Geodor chose me to go he lost his shit - as a result he got suspended, and we never talked again."

"Why did he want to go so badly?" Calen asked.

"Probably to get help with that circle, why else - and to be fair it was the only place that could’ve discouraged him from trying his stupid stunt."

"You think he would have stopped if he went on this internship instead of you?"

Cole shrugged.

"I mean if anything was going to stop him it would be an order of archmages born before the invasion."

’ah, so this ’Fallen Tower’ is what remains of the high council... I suppose master was right that their naming sense wasn’t very good.’

The fact that the high council was still operational to some degree led him to question a lot of things:

Do they know about Asharil?

Why haven’t they introduced a system of warp gates between human settlements?

Are they corrupted like Koravel? And are they the ones who stripped him of his title?

"...did you meet any of the archmages while you were there?" He asked cautiously.

"No, only the retainers are allowed to meet directly with the members of the order."

Well, at least the high council operates exactly the same way as it did 500 years ago. It seemed like they had to visit the Tower themselves if they wanted to find out more - Calen was fairly sure the council would agree to meet with two apprentices of Alarion.

His master might have declined to join them, but he had cordial relationships with most of the members, and was very respected among archmages.

Then Isara asked a question which didn’t even occur to him:

"How did you get to there? I thought only select few could travel between settlements freely."

"One of the retainers teleported to Mountainfall, and then transported me back with him." Cole’s eyes lit up with excitement. "It was one of the most powerful displays of magic I’ve ever seen!"

That didn’t bode very well for the education level of the current mages - sure, spacial magic was complex and required a lot of power - but Isara and Calen started learning basics of this school of magic already, in practice it was something any experienced mage could pull off.

He wasn’t going to tell that to Cole of course, and neither was Isara, although she looked like she really wanted to.

"Anything else you would like to know?" Cole asked. "I know I agreed to it, but we kinda gone off topic, and I really need to go back to studying."

"Just one more thing - did Konrad have any other friends?"

"Friends? No, I was the only one." He paused. "He did have a girlfriend though."

***

The three of them already left the complex and were on their way to the Verdant Watch’s headquarters.

"Why wasn’t she mentioned anywhere in his things?" Elira frowned

"I don’t think it’s that unusual." Calen shrugged. "We only had access to his academic materials, Cole was only in there because their disagreement was about a magic circle."

"I’m not sure if she’s involved with this case to be honest, maybe we should leave her alone."

Elira wasn’t in the wrong to think that - the girl was a tailor named Bella living in one of the poorer districts of the city, she was about as far removed from anything related to magic as she could be.

"Even so, we should still question her." Isara surprisingly stern about it. "We can’t discard someone’s side of the story just because we think they’re not important."

"That’s true, but we can’t just go to her house and question her, I doubt Cole would talk to us if we weren’t brought in by Geodor." Calen pointed out. "We should wait for Cass and Alison to return, then we’ll discuss what each side learned and come up with a plan on how to proceed."

"Fine."

***

Upon reaching the headquarters they were let into the evidence room, where they would await return of Cassian and Alison.

But that wasn’t who entered the room two hours later.

Cassian was accompanied by a young blonde woman who looked significantly more friendly than the capitan.

"You brought back the wrong guard Cass." Calen chuckled.

"Hilarious." Cassian sighed. "This is Maya, she’s the deputy captain and she’ll be the one to work with us moving forward."

"Something happened to Alison?"

"Nothing serious, I’ll explain later."

Maya smiled at the trio.

"I look forward to working with you, I’m not entirely sure if there’s anything to be done left considering what happened in the Pit, but I’m sure we’ll do fine with the scraps we have left!"

"It sure sounds like you had a much more fruitful adventure than we had." Isara raised an eyebrow.

"You don’t even know half of it..."

Cassian explained in detail all they have learned from Piff and Kalim, with Maya jumping in to fill the gaps every now and then.

"That tracks with what we learned."

Calen quickly described their conversation with Cole, not including the off-topic parts.

"I take what I said back, it seems we have plenty to do." Maya stated.