Matabar

The wind brushed against his muzzle while fresh snow crunched beneath his paws. The air squeaked around his ears, tickling his hide, and his nose caught the faintest, most elusive notes of his prey's scent. The mountain goat was searching for water.

The young hunter had been following its trail for the last three hours. He'd stalked it slowly and carefully, hiding among cliffs and crags, bundling himself into the snow, and doing his utmost to keep from meeting the fearful gaze of those clouded eyes. He strove to make his quarry believe that everything would go according to plan, that the watering hole was just within reach.

In truth, only the young hunter's fangs and claws were drawing steadily closer and closer to…

"Ardi…"

The young hunter jolted.

What a strange sound. It was so foreign, so unfamiliar, and yet so gentle and intimate. It was as if… as if…

"Ardi."

***

Ardan opened his eyes. A stray beam of sunlight, somehow managing to slip past the perpetual gloom of the sullen Metropolis, glided across her fiery hair and shimmered as it reflected off her green, almost catlike eyes.

Tess was perched at the edge of the bed, winding his coarse, bristly hair — more like fur than real hair — around her slender, elegant fingers. That was one of the few "inheritances" he had been left with.

She was dressed in a light, homey gown, over which she wore a knitted, fluffy brown vest made from sheep's wool. Mrs. Okladov had allowed Tess to make that vest from leftover materials at the atelier. The cold season was drawing to a close, and for the next five months, there would be no need for knitting wool. Besides, not all the remnants could be reworked into suits or skirts. Hence why Okladov was handing out the least suitable skeins to her employees.

Ardi reached out and gently laid his hand over hers. As gently as he could, he wrapped his fingers around her fragile wrist, pulled her toward him a bit, and at the same time, he brought his face closer to breathe in the scent of Tess' favorite perfume.

It smelled of spring herbs — those that grow on the riverbank when it first awakens from winter.

He tugged her a little closer and-

"We don't have time," Tess said with a laugh, pulling away. She quickly leaned in to peck him on the forehead.

"But it's only…" The young man began to protest.

Outside, the dawn was just breaking, trying to subdue and lull the Markov Canal that had been whipped into a storm. And yet, since this was the Metropolis, the clock's hands were already creeping toward eight. It seemed Ardi had slept through his first lecture. And Tess was late for the start of her workday.

Still, given her constant overtime, Madam Okladov was understanding when Tess came in a bit late. She always finished her work on time, and no client ever complained about the quality of it.

Tess looked worried for a moment.

"I was beginning to fear that I wouldn't be able to wake you," she said softly, her cool, delicate palm brushing over his face, sweeping away the last remnants of sleep. "You slept so soundly… And every day, you sleep deeper and longer."

Invigorating potions… Ardan was practically living on them now, swallowing double doses at both morning and midday just to scrape by. He had to juggle his studies at the Grand University — and do so well enough to keep his scholarship, stipend and remain among the top students of the first year — his job at the Second Chancery (which he would rather not dwell on), and his late-evening lessons with Grand Magister Aversky, which were certainly not "easy" in any sense of the word.

And yet, despite however many loans he took out against his body — he had lost nearly twenty kilograms over the last three months — he would eventually have to repay the debt, with interest. And considering how Ardan was fighting not just constant fatigue lately, but also nightmares as well, it felt like the day of reckoning was just around the corner.

Still, he could never tell Tess all of that. No, it wasn't that he feared seeing reproach or scorn in her warm green eyes, or that she might tire of accommodating his stressful life. He simply didn't want to saddle her with the consequences of his choices.

Not her. Never Tess.

"Tess, I-"

"Are you free next fourth day?" She asked with a gentle, easy smile, the kind that was so radiant and caring that the sunbeam still dancing in the dimples of her cheeks suddenly seemed unimportant by comparison.

Tess could steer conversations so effortlessly that you found yourself happy to leave the original topic behind.

Ardi forced himself to snap out of his thoughts and consider his upcoming schedule. Today, he had lectures in Theory of Star Biology and Alchemy, followed by Military Studies (and while missing that first class was upsetting, he wouldn't lose a wink of sleep over missing the second). Then he'd have back-to-back lessons with Convel — a lecture and a practicum.

As for his evening…

Ardi sighed.

Tonight, he and Milar needed to visit the address the Ragman had provided, since it was the only lead they had left with any weight to it. That was unless you counted Ildar's personal file, in which no one had found anything noteworthy.

Ardi had asked for a copy of it. It was lying in the bay window of his tiny apartment, a place he returned to less and less often these days.

And he had a feeling that tonight would shape the upcoming week.

"Will you make coffee?" Tess asked, rising from the bed. "I'll set the table for breakfast."

Ardi watched her go — then he shook his head and snapped out of his daze.

He stood up, covered his nudity with a towel — more out of habit than necessity — and headed to the bathroom. He finished his morning routine rather quickly, taking extra care to brush his fangs — again, purely out of habit. Breathing in the aroma of venison strips laid atop porridge made from roots, he made his way to the kitchen.

Armed with a coffee pot, Ardi flicked the relay above the Ley stove. The runes sparked, and dead fire coursed through the cable, flaring up as a blue flame beneath the burner.

He wondered how many exes that Grand Magister had earned for inventing a way to transmit the Ley through cables from an accumulator to household devices. After all, that technology had, in many ways, changed the entire world.

Just as Senior Magister Paarlax's research might have changed it if it had been real and not just some fantasy.

Ley-fields, new types of generators, and time travel on top of it all… Imagine that. Even if the idea sounded absurd at its core, still…

Ardi reached up to open one of the overhead cabinets, grabbed a tin of coffee beans, and scooped some into the mortar, grinding them into a fine powder. He'd need to restock soon — provided he could time it just right, when the shipments arrived from Kargaam or Lintelar. The price usually dropped by almost five kso per twenty-five grams on those days…

But that was beside the point…

Time travel.

That was what Ildar had told Paarlax… If you added what that vampire woman had said in the "Heron," plus all those seemingly random puzzle pieces: Indgar, the Star-born werewolf, Selena Lorlov, a handful of vampires, Ildar, and… whoever was supplying this bunch with seals from the Chaos School along with artificial Stars that threatened swift death to their bearer — what did you get?

Ardi set the coffee pot down on the flame and rolled up his sleeves, waiting for the coffee to bubble. It was an old habit from the days when silverware had simply refused to obey him; otherwise, he'd have had to wash his clothes daily.

If you considered it carefully, what had seemed like separate variables in this "Order of the Spider" equation might've been tied together not only by some murky, shared goal, but also by something in their pasts.

If you assumed they truly intended to go back in time to change something, that would explain why they weren't bothered by the artificial Stars in their heads at all.

Then again, if they physically traveled back in time, would those artificial Stars travel with them? Or not?

All those paradoxes… Too bad there was no way to consult Paarlax anymore.

That might also explain the odd logic behind the Spiders' behavior. On one hand, they did seem to limit casualties whenever possible, but on the other, they often acted with staggering force.

By their own reasoning, though, it wouldn't matter how many people fell victim to them…

"Ardi, do you want some lingonberry jam?" Tess called out from the kitchen. "Iris gave me some."

Iris… Ardi remembered that she was one of Tess' coworkers.

"Yes, I'd love some," he answered, returning to his train of thought while keeping an eye on the rising coffee foam.

He himself drank tea in the mornings… or so Tess believed. In truth, it was a potion — one so concentrated that Atta'nha would surely regret ever teaching him the lore of herbs, berries, roots, and fruits if she saw him drinking it.

So, back to the Spiders' logic: No matter how many people died by their hands, it would be of little consequence. They would alter the future, and so all the dead would — contrary to the teachings of the Face of Light — come back in some new timeline. Even the children sacrificed on Lorlov's altar would never know the fate that had befallen their… alternate selves.

The thought of those children and Lorlov nearly made Ardi forget the coffee. He managed to switch off the relay just in time, then he covered the coffee pot with a dark sieve, pouring out the contents into a cup and scooping the grounds into a separate tin. He still wanted to experiment with a few more potions. Coffee wasn't common in the territory of the New Monarchy or most of the Western Continent, so the Fae and Aean'Hane of the past had known nothing about coffee-based concoctions…

Just as Ardi — lacking a complete picture — didn't truly know what Lorlov had been trying to do in the sewers. Perhaps his suspicions, later confirmed by Aversky and the scientific division of the Second Chancery, had nothing to do with reality.

Maybe the Spiders had never planned to summon an army of demons and other vile things that night. Maybe… they'd been conducting an experiment?

"Were they testing something?"

"Did you say something?" Tess' voice came from the other room.

"No, no!" Ardi responded a bit too loudly. "Coffee's ready. I'm coming."

Cup in hand, Ardan headed to the table where Tess and breakfast were waiting.

If the day of the winter solstice was important to them, then… How did the summer solstice fit into the equation? It was probably significant somehow, but Ardi might not have thought about it at all if the Sidhe Fae hadn't offered him a deal whose deadline was the first day of summer…

It was plain to see that the Sidhe and their Flame were connected to the Spiders' grand design somehow.

There were still far too many unknowns, though: how was the Chaos School involved, and what about that demonification process described in the forbidden treatise from the "House of Magic?" What exactly had Lorlov tested in the sewer system? How precisely were the Spiders connected to one another? Who was their leader when it came to Star Magic? It was unlikely that Indgar, Lorlov, the werewolf, the vampires, or Ildar alone had the expertise to toy with the theories Paarlax had set forth so freely.

And perhaps most importantly — if time travel functioned the way the late Senior Magister had hypothesized, then all the Spiders would wind up in the exact same point in the time-space continuum. That meant they must share some single, binding tragedy. But what was it? Ildar's dossier seemed thoroughly ordinary.

The next best lead was Indgar. Sleeping Spirits…

When would Arkar return from his trial at the Conclave? Maybe he'd manage to dig up something about Indgar's past. Approaching Ordargar with such a request would be pointless… He'd have to find him first. Since the Hammers incident, the leader of the Orcish Jackets had gone so far underground that even the Second Chancery didn't seem to know where he was.

All the same, Ardi's heart quickened. Thinking about the Spiders, he sensed… prey. Prey that was clever, cunning, trying to mislead him, to leave the hunter's path and slip away unseen.

But Ergar's student never lost a trail. He always followed his target calmly and meticulously, with a cool head and no bloodlust in his eyes. He recalled every lesson from his mentor, every game he had played with his friends.

And, just as with the goat whose meat he was now tearing into with his fangs, the moment would come when he'd get a chance to leap. To strike at them a single time. And that one shot would be enough…

"Ardi."

Ardan flinched and looked at his nails. They had lengthened a bit and were starting to resemble tiny, catlike claws. And in his reflection within the amber surface of the potion, he saw how his upper lip was twitching toward his nose, baring his fangs, and how his pupils had narrowed to slits.

Ardi quickly clenched his fist, hiding his claws, and brought it up to cover his fangs, turning aside at the same time.

The story has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the violation.

He could suddenly see Elena's face in his mind. That first day at the Grand University, when they'd had lunch in the cafeteria and he'd let himself drift off, scaring the poor girl…

A soft hand touched his cheek — small, warm, not trembling in the least.

Ardi turned to find Tess watching him. She had shifted around in her chair and was smiling at him with that same gentle warmth. Not just with her lips, but her eyes as well.

He said nothing.

She said nothing.

But Ardi understood. Everything was all right. It truly was.

He loosened his fist, the one with claws that had not yet returned to their usual human form. Slowly, he lowered his hand from his face, where his upper lip still twitched every now and then, revealing fangs that were far from human.

"You never answered my question," Tess reminded him, turning back to her oatmeal with bits of dried pork and slices of fried bacon.

It took Ardi a second to remember what she'd asked him.

"I'm free after classes and before my evening lessons, so… yes, I am. Although…" He caught himself before he said something he shouldn't. He'd nearly forgotten that next week, on the evening of the fourth day, there would be a performance in the new concert hall in Baliero — the one where the Dandy happened to be the primary shareholder. "Would you mind waiting a few minutes for me? I'll swing by your work. My lectures end about half an hour before you finish."

Tess smiled again, more briefly this time. She understood perfectly well that he was improvising, and she said nothing about it. Just as Milar had warned him she might…

"I took the day off," Tess said. "I'll be rehearsing all day with the musicians at "Bruce's," and in the evening, we'll head over to Baliero. Come there after your night classes. We're almost the last act at the audition, so it won't be our turn until the early morning."

"Ah… yes… of course," the young man agreed, studying her once more.

Her fiery hair was wound into a tight bun, she wore no makeup, and her clothes were modest but neatly mended. The only ornament she wore was an amber brooch her mother had given her the day she'd gotten her identification papers.

Only three days had passed since the Spiders had blown up the Temple on the Day of the Saints — a day that had very nearly…

Ardi took a few deep breaths to calm his racing heart.

Anyone else — Firstborn or human, man or woman — would likely have been too terrified to leave the house. But not Tess. Not the daughter of the Governor-General of Shamtur, a city that was practically always at war.

"Deal!" She said brightly, and in a silence as soft as her touch — she'd kept her hand on his — they finished breakfast.

They washed the dishes together in chilly water, discovering that all that remained of their last bar of soap was a tiny sliver. Then they dressed and made their way out into the stairwell.

Downstairs, they said their goodbyes with the usual hug and kiss, going their separate ways — their trams would take them in opposite directions.

Rounding the corner, Ardi broke into a run, slipping past a traffic warden who was distracted. That provoked several drivers into angrily honking their horns at him. The warden, who had swapped his red winter coat for a lighter red cloak, turned at the commotion, but it was already too late.

Ardi hopped onto the tram's step.

"Ard, by the Eternal Angels, one of these days you're going to slip and lose a leg," grumbled the familiar conductor of the route that ran to Star Square. His name was Aern. He was forty-four years old. He had two grandchildren and a wife he'd lost to smallpox. The Emperor had presented an award and a medal to Baroness Kri at his coronation for curing that very same illness.

"Good morning, Mr. Aern," Ardi said, handing over his pass. The conductor stamped it and went on through the tram. "That's all the more reason for me not to slip!"

"Smartass… Good morning to you too," the man muttered over his shoulder.

Still smiling at Aern's back, Ardan headed to his favorite spot at the far end of the tram.

They had chatted a few times in the past, when ice buildup had forced the tram to stop for repairs. Since then, they would exchange greetings and a few empty pleasantries whenever Ardi caught that route.

Rocking on the wooden bench as the tram swayed, Ardi opened his grimoire and immersed himself in his notes. Maybe it was the Spiders, maybe just his own curiosity, but he had been studying the seals of Lady Talia intently. He found them to be anything but elegant — rather crude, in fact — and yet cunningly intricate as well.

Lady Talia had worked with a colossal amount of Ley energy funneled through remarkably complex designs. If one were to translate any Chaos School seal into modern-day Star Science, you'd need at least five or six Stars, each with no fewer than four rays. And even then, such a massive reservoir of power would only be enough for a single seal — or two at most — like those engraved on the Staff of Demons.

And yet, she had managed to bypass the principle of progressive load distribution. Given that the same era had produced both Nicholas-the-Stranger's textbook and the Staff of Demons, it would seem that Lady Talia, a mere human, had outstripped an experienced Aean'Hane in her research. Considering the historical facts, this made sense…

But getting back to the seals themselves: not possessing modern knowledge of vectors, contours, arrays, the loads on specific nodes, and so on, Lady Talia had worked purely through runic connections.

Yes, her seals were incredibly difficult to memorize and even more difficult to cast, but in exchange, they didn't necessarily require six Stars. In principle, they could be scaled down to four, or maybe even three…

At any rate, Ardi felt sure that within a year or so, once he began studying vectors (on his own, naturally), he would be able to reduce the "cost" of Talia's seals to three Stars. Even now, he already had some ideas — enough to invest a few exes in experiments on the testing grounds.

"Star Square!" Aern announced.

Ardi closed his grimoire, slipped his pencil back behind his ear, and hopped down onto the cobblestones of the square. The Grand greeted its student with the same pompous, slightly haughty, and undeniably magical display as always.

The colossal skyscraper that looked like a towering jumble of enchanted spires adorned with a waterfall of pure magic stood out against the severe, brooding Metropolis. The sun, which had peeped into the city a few hours ago, was once again hidden behind thick clouds, leaving behind only the faint promise that it might visit again later.

Ardi glanced at his watch, sighed, and headed toward the main atrium doors. There were only thirty minutes left of his Military Studies class, which meant he still had plenty of time.

Ardan wiped his shoes on a special mat that seemed to be imbued with Star Magic and passed the information desk, where several staff members were working and, as usual, a few students were buzzing about. Most of the figures in their variously-colored robes had staked out the couches and benches near the fountain, under the watchful gaze of the First Emperor and the ever-present gargoyles.

"Good morning," Ardi greeted the custodian who was mopping the already gleaming floor.

"More like midday," the man grumbled, moving off with his mop.

"Oh…"

"I'm sometimes genuinely amused, Ard," came a voice from behind him, "by your need to find common ground with everyone you meet."

Ardan turned. Sitting in a complicated wheelchair — it was bristling with enough levers and hidden mechanisms that it might be able to fold out into a small sofa — was Professor Lea. As always, half her face was concealed behind a porcelain mask. She wore a black wig that had been cut into the "wave" style that was currently fashionable among women, sloping from temple to temple. Both of her hands — her real one and the prosthetic — were gloved, and her clothes were several sizes too large, concealing her body entirely.

A quilted blanket lay across her lap, covering her legs, its diamond-shaped stitching rumpled just enough to look like… well, something vaguely recognizable.

"You look terrible, Student Egobar," Professor Lea noted, the unmasked side of her cheek twitching in what served as her smile. "And if I'm the one saying that, you must really be in dire straits."

Ardan awkwardly scratched the back of his head with the tip of his staff.

"And do get rid of that silly habit," Lea added. "Otherwise, when you slot an accumulator into your staff, you'll risk shearing off part of your scalp… which would hardly add any charm to your already complicated look."

"You're probably right, Professor," Ardan answered, a little at a loss.

They stared at each other in silence until the moment grew almost uncomfortable. Then Professor Lea gave a brief nod toward the wheelchair handles behind her seat, momentarily revealing her neck that was usually hidden beneath a snow-white, silk scarf.

Over the past year, Ardi had seen all sorts of things, yet he still felt a jolt of shock. It was one thing to know what had happened to a once-promising and strikingly beautiful mage, and quite another to see it — even a small piece of that truth that her clothes, scarves, gloves, wigs, and masks tried so hard to hide.

"Will you help a lady reach her classroom?" She asked, glancing at the handles. "Since, by the look of things, you're skipping lectures?"

"I'm… just missing them."

"Is there a difference?"

Ardi shrugged. He certainly thought there was a difference. Skusty and Atta'nha would've agreed with him, and probably Bazhen as well.

"Well?" Lea prompted.

"Oh! My apologies, Professor," Ardi said, and, somewhat clumsily tucking his staff under one arm, he gripped her wheelchair handles and steered her toward the Faculty of Healing.

The chair vibrated faintly, its wheels catching every uneven spot in the polished floor and occasionally giving off a squeak. That sort of thing would have grated on Ardi's nerves, but Lea, by all appearances, had long grown used to it.

"I take it you've been resorting to invigorating concoctions?" She asked.

"What?"

"Your appearance, and those bags under your eyes that are big enough to haul half the library around," Professor Lea said. "Those are practically textbook signs of too much reliance on stimulants."

Ardi stayed silent. He couldn't figure out what to say to her.

"I always got the impression that some of the other professors overestimate your cognitive abilities, my dear Ard," Lea went on, her "hands" folded in her lap, making it impossible to mistake the prosthetic for a baggy sleeve. "After all, in my class, you hardly stand out. Are you slacking?"

"Not at all," Ardan said sincerely.

"Then why is it that during faculty meetings, I have so little to boast about when it comes to your progress? Unlike an Manish, Kovertsky, or Convel?"

She spoke with a slight note of exasperation, tinged with something akin to friendly mockery. Still, beneath it all lay echoes of deeper concern — or at least curiosity.

"Your course, Professor Lea, it's…" Ardi paused for a second, searching for the right words. "It doesn't overlap much with the other subjects."

"Oh really? And here I was thinking that Star Engineering covered the shared principles of seal crafting… but apparently Healing was left behind somewhere," Lea said, clearly teasing him. Her tone was barbed enough that someone else might have taken offense, but Ardi understood that someone in her situation might have built up more spikes and thorns than this mild banter suggested.

"I phrased that poorly."

"That's putting it nicely, Student Egobar," Lea hissed — her voice sometimes sounded oddly resonant behind her mask.

"In truth, if I'm being completely honest," Ardan said with a weary sigh, "the problem is the difficulty level. To excel in your subject, one must give themselves over to it completely. Meanwhile, my other courses share a fair number of topics, so it's easier to handle them all simultaneously."

"In other words, you're lazy."

Ardan didn't reply.

"On the other hand," the professor continued, "it's rather unlikely that someone who's lazy would be pushing himself to the brink of collapse, using so many invigorating concoctions that they've replaced your drinking water. And given how expensive they are on the Spell Market, I assume you brew them yourself — quite successfully, I might add. That's third-year exam territory. I'm surprised Kovertsky hasn't said something to you about it."

Ardan didn't tell her that the Professor of Star Biology and Alchemy had, in fact, made a few veiled references to Ardi's predicament. But Kovertsky was a different sort of person: so long as his own research was uninterrupted, the rest of the world might as well go hang. His Grand University post gave him a paycheck and access to labs — he did his job well enough but never went beyond the bare minimum requirements. Even if Ardi were to find himself literally standing at the threshold of the Sleeping Spirits, Kovertsky wouldn't initiate such a conversation.

"Although," Lea corrected herself, "I suppose that isn't really his style."

By then, they had passed through the atrium and a warm corridor, but instead of entering the healers' building, they went outside, down a metal ramp, and around the building to a smaller service elevator. It was much smaller than the one in the Menagerie, but it still stirred up equally unpleasant memories.

Ardi realized he'd never thought about how Professor Lea moved around the building. Obviously not by climbing the stairs herself…

"You have every right to tell me to mind my own business," she said, "but since our relationship is… cordial, perhaps you'll indulge me. Why are you ruining your health? And please, spare me any talk about that indecent nonsense you showed me not so long ago."

Ardi would have been lying if he'd said that he'd given up on studying the seals of the Chaos School. Quite the opposite, in fact — he'd tripled his efforts, hoping to isolate the main dependencies and ideas in Lady Talia's runic connections, then figure out how to adapt them into more classical Star Science.

And so, he replied with the truth. Thanks to Skusty and Atta'nha, honesty came more easily than a lie.

"For the sake of work, Professor Lea," Ardi said, gripping the wheelchair handles as if they could somehow keep the tightening walls from crushing him. "I often have overnight shifts, plus a lot of running around. So I brew my own concoctions. Otherwise, I'd have to choose between keeping my job and continuing my studies."

"What would you choose if it ever came to that?"

"My studies," he answered without a moment's hesitation.

"Then why-"

"Money," Ardan said simply. "Money and… other benefits."

"They must be quite considerable for you to drink so many tonics. Anyone who can brew them at that level must know exactly what sort of long-term damage they might cause."

One of those "benefits" were his lessons with Aversky. How did one even quantify such a thing? Not even the royal family had managed to find a more prestigious mentor for the Grreat Princess Anastasia Agrov than Senior Magister Urnosov. And while Urnosov was still a notable Star Mage, next to someone like Aversky…

"Of course, Professor," Ardi said. "But Matabar blood negates some of the side effects."

The platform shuddered to a stop, and Lea pulled a different lever, letting Ardi roll her out into a wide corridor that a regular student would likely never see.

Despite its behind-the-scenes function, it looked almost as grand as the rest of the university — lavish and ostentatious in every detail.

"Oh yes, Ard. I sometimes forget you aren't entirely human."

"It's fine, Professor. I hear that a lot."

"And it doesn't bother you?"

Ardi blinked. "What do you mean?"

"The fact that no one acknowledges your Firstborn heritage."

He opened his mouth to answer, then promptly shut it.

"I've never really thought about it, Professor," he admitted, guiding her wheelchair in the direction she indicated. "My father wanted me to be more human, while my grandfather… great-grandfather… wanted a Matabar. Oh, pardon me, I-"

"No need," Lea raised her good hand. "My family wasn't harmed during the Dark Lord's uprising. So Aror Egobar is nothing but a scary childhood story to me."

"I see," Ardan murmured.

They fell silent once more. Upon reaching a set of double doors, Lea opened them with a casual flick of her hand. Though the professor "only" had three Stars, they boasted nine, eight, and nine rays again — enough to provide her with the power needed to cast the simplest, weakest spells without a staff.

Ardi glanced at her prosthetic.

Perhaps she always carried a "staff" with her… or even on her, in a manner of speaking.

They continued down the hallway silently, until they arrived at a laboratory door. There, Professor Lea spoke first.

"Thank you." She flicked a small lever hidden near the armrest and put her good hand on one wheel, pushing it forward so the mechanism turned both simultaneously. "Invigorating concoctions aren't illegal per se, Ard, but they're classified as psychostimulants. Those are banned during exam periods. So please understand — it's nothing personal — but I'll be sending a note to your dean's office before exam week, requesting a blood test. Much as I admire you, Student Egobar, the rules are the same for everyone."

"Yes, Professor, I understand," Ardi said with a tired sigh.

This entire conversation had likely been a prelude to that warning. She could have simply filed the note, and even if Ardi hadn't been expelled for doping, he'd at least have lost his scholarship.

"Well then, have a good day, Student Egobar."

She was almost through the doorway when Ardi remembered something.

"Professor."

"Yes, Ard?"

"Purely as a theoretical exercise… The principle behind Lady Talia's runic connections — could it be transferred from seal crafting over to… material engineering?"

Despite her mask, Ardan could tell from the sudden, deep furrows in Lea's exposed cheek that she was scowling, thoroughly displeased by his question.

"Eternal Angels, Egobar… I warned you…"

"I am asking purely for research purposes," Ardi said, raising his hands defensively. "I swear."

And he wasn't lying. If these "research purposes" ended up being viable, it might explain why the Spiders wanted the Staff of Demons. It did nothing to address the question of where those foreign nationals on the train had come from, but… A limitless source of power — barring the mythical Flame of the Sidhe — didn't exist and likely never would.

But Lady Talia had somehow drastically reduced the cost of her seals five centuries ago. If this principle could be carried over from seal crafting to mechanical devices, then…

"In theory, if you fully understood Talia's seal methods, then perhaps you could do it…" Lea answered grudgingly, without a hint of approval. "But in the five centuries since her time, no one has ever deciphered those runic links in their entirety, which is why we call it the Chaos School. Let me remind you, Student Egobar, that this is an entirely separate branch of magic — one that, according to the International Star Magic Pact, is forbidden. And I sincerely hope that this is the last time I will ever hear you mention Lady Talia and her blasphemous research. Because the next time, I swear by the Eternal Angels, I'll report you to the Second Chancery. Please do not make me do that, and don't ruin the high opinion I hold of you, even if you continue to neglect my subject."

With that, she practically slammed the lab door in his face.

Ardi couldn't help smiling at the irony. He wondered what would happen if she did inform the Second Chancery. The Colonel would most likely call him in and demand he turn over any unregistered copies of the Staff of Demons' seals and sign a few non-disclosure forms. Then again, considering the authority they'd been granted last night, maybe it would turn out differently.

In any case, after what Lea had told him, Ardi could sense that subtle scent of his quarry again, like in the mountains. So, the Staff of Demons wasn't needed as an artifact, but rather… as a kind of grimoire. It seemed the Spiders truly did plan to construct some sort of apparatus — one requiring an inconceivable amount of power… to travel back in time.

Sleeping Spirits.

Had he gone insane?

He was basically living out one of his great-grandfather's fairy tales.

"Well, I'm in a completely different wing than where I'm supposed to be," he reminded himself. Checking the time, he headed briskly toward the stairs. He had no desire to be late for Professor Convel's lecture.