Title: The Tower: Chapter Seven, Part Two
***
Chapter
Seven, Part Two
Unfortunately, Gerald Montgomery was nowhere to be found. Anton
and Camille checked the classrooms, the labs, and even his personal chambers
without success.
“He has to come back sometime,” Anton muttered to himself as he
reached into his holdall for a piece of clear wax. “And I will make sure than
we know when he does.” He closed his eyes and gathered his will for the simple
spell he was about to cast, then began inscribing invisible glyphs on the
handle of Montgomery’s door. Perhaps fifteen seconds later, he finished with a
tired sigh, the energy flowing out of him like water from a cracked jug. “There.
Now when he touches it, we will be alerted. It’s better than running around
after him all day with nothing to show for it.”
“It will give us a chance to eat,” Camille said briskly, taking
Anton by the shoulders and turning him toward the double doors at the far end
of the residents’ hall. “You need sustenance.”
“I feel fine,” he protested, but internally he had to confess that
it was rather nice to be manhandled
in this simple, affectionate fashion. Anton couldn’t remember the last time he’d
been touched this way. Perhaps by his mother, or Caroline before her wedding,
almost…God, was it two years ago now? He truly needed to find the time to visit
her—letters simply weren’t enough, and her husband seemed to take issue with
her leaving his ancestral estate now that he’d got her there. Normally this
wouldn’t be enough to dissuade her if she set her mind to it, but Caroline’s
last letter had intimated that she was expecting a child, and that was no condition
to be traveling in.
Camille led him all the way off campus, to a quiet restaurant not
far away, but on a side street that Anton had never ventured down before. The
host sat them at a small, round table in the corner, brought them each a mug of
mulled cider, and then left them be while they waited for their food.
Anton took a sip and sighed with satisfaction. “How do you ever
find all these little nooks?” he asked. “You can’t have visited every city in
the empire, but I’d be willing to bet you know of places like this in all of
them.”
“You would probably be surprised by the extent of my travels,”
Camille replied, removing his hat and leaning back against the chair. He looked
delightfully casual, Anton thought, and marveled at the fact that they had
reached a point where the lumière could
be casual in his presence. “I have been to the edges of the empire and beyond,
multiple times.”
“You must have entered your profession very young.”
“I did.” Camille smiled wryly. “You could say I was born into it.
People with my condition are rare, but if we are discovered and handled with a
modicum of compassion, it isn’t unusual for us to end up in service to the
crown. The emperor has made it known that he has a place for those with unique
talents, and it cannot be said that we are without advantages in cases that
involve violent thaumaturgy. Some of us are used as jailers, to keep restrained
those with talent whom the emperor still wishes to use, but cannot allow to be
free.”
Anton blanched. “That sounds ghastly.”
“That particular prison is a rather challenging place,” Camille agreed.
“I worked there for a year in my youth, but quickly understood that my talents
and interests lay elsewhere. I developed my abilities, and here I am. Speaking
of abilities, how is it possible that there are so many disparate courses of
study within one university?” He raised one eyebrow. “I cannot imagine there
are experts in everything your fellow students seem to study available there,
and yet no one seems to study exactly the same subject.”
Anton was grateful for the change in subject. He felt as though he’d
wandered close enough to Camille’s secrets for one meal. “All of the
undergraduate students do learn the same basics,” he said, “but even those are
slightly different for each user. Thaumaturgy is not just another mental process,
it is a skill that is developed on multiple fronts, and therefore has unique
components for every user. It’s like I said earlier—there’s no telling how a
particular spell will work for everyone.
Our professors realize this, and grant each student a certain latitude in their
studies. By the time you are seeking mastery, you’re expected to have
specialized, and those specializations can go in many different directions. No
master has the same abilities, even when they share a profession.”
“And yet, there are
standard professions,” Camille rejoined. “So there must be some standard of
ability for those who undertake said work.”
“A standard, yes, but that is the bare minimum. Take myself and
the man I worked for as a journeyman in London,” Anton said, warming to the
topic. “He was a forensic thaumaturge, like me, but his ability focused more
around the place than the person. He could examine a corpse that had been
pulled out of the river and tell you where that person had been killed to within
half a block, which is truly astonishing given the size and scope of that city.
His magic had a connection to the city, the city where he’d been born and spent
his whole life, that mine never could. Likewise, my skills lent themselves more
to illuminating the death scene itself, focused on the body, not the place. We
worked quite well together, actually.” Anton had been offered a permanent
position in the London morgue, one that would have paid more in six months than
his father had made in the last year of his life, professor or no, but it wasn’t
what Anton had wanted.
“Fascinating.” From the warm tone of Camille’s voice, he actually
meant it too. Anton fought a blush.
“Not so fascinating,” he demurred. “It must be similar in your
line of work. Not every investigator can share exactly the same skills, surely.”
“Not exactly the same, true,” Camille admitted. “But every
investigator must have the same base knowledge in order to be effective at
their work.”
“There you have it, then.” Anton sat back in satisfaction. “The
circumstances are the same.”
“Similar, to be sure.” Conversation halted as their food was brought,
beef and onions in sherry that had surely cooked all day to be this tender, and
fresh bread for sopping up the sauce. It was simple but delicious, and Anton
ate with vigor.
“One would think they starve you, at this university.”
It dawned on Anton that he might be shoveling food into his face a
bit too fast. He swallowed and cleared his throat. “I eat plenty there, just
not with much variety. Eating out as I have with you is quite a treat.”
“We must endeavor to do more of it, then.”
Anton would have replied, except that his hand twitched just as he
went to set down his fork. “Oh. Montgomery is back.” He frowned at the
inconvenient timing. Camille smiled in return.
“And now you see a downside to my profession—a profusion of meals
interrupted by the call of duty.” He pushed his own plate away and stood up. “Eat
what you can while I settle the bill, and then we’ll be on our way back.
Hopefully our time with Mr. Montgomery will bear more fruit than our earlier
attempts.” He left and Anton took his advice, eating as fast as he could
without choking. It left him feeling uncomfortably full, but he knew he’d be
grateful he finished the meal in another hour, although he wasn’t as confident
that they’d get something from Montgomery as Camille was.
After all, what could a man like that, coddled and cozened for his
whole life, possibly have to do with something so complicated and vile?
I like the way you handled Anton’s explanation of abilities and tied it to Camille’s profession.
ReplyDeleteNow to see if i’m right about Gerry and his rat army ...