The Torch that Ignites the Stars (Arcane Ascension Book 3)

by Andrew Rowe

  My options weren’t particularly appealing, either.

  Nakht was around, but terrifying, so I avoided even considering him as an option.

  I could have just gone and asked Farren for information directly, but I’d discounted that at the start of the process. I knew she’d had a fight with Constantine before he vanished. I still intended to ask her for teaching (whatever that meant), since she’d offered it, but I wasn’t going to involve her in my Constantine investigation when she was likely directly involved in his disappearance.

  That left Ashon. He was, at once, both the best and the worst option.

  I’d been given instructions to go to him about Enchanting-related matters, but he also was way too interested in my Arbiter attunement. If he somehow got a chance to analyze it without my noticing, which wouldn’t be difficult, I had to hope my pending patent would be enough to keep me valuable to Farren Labs.

  So, with that in mind, I went to find him.

  ***

  “Ah. Arbiter. Hand?” He gestured at my glove.

  “No, Ashon. I haven’t accepted a job offer yet.”

  His expression sunk. “But…but why?”

  “I haven’t even finished my second year at school yet, you know. And I don’t live here.”

  He scoffed. “School? What’s that going to do for you? And I’m sure Farren would buy you a place here if you need one. You’re an Arbiter, you know.”

  “I had noticed that last part, thank you.” I sighed. “You have a point about school having minimal value in terms of my Enchanting career, but I have other reasons to be there. Friends…family.”

  “Oh. I…see.” He looked noticeably disappointed. I tried not let his feelings on the matter sway me too much. “Fine, then. Did you need something?”

  “Actually, yes. I was hoping you could quickly show me the whole process of making an attunement primer, applicator, and all that. I might be doing it someday, even if I decide not to take the job right now, and I’d like get a visual look at what it entails.”

  “Hm.” He frowned. “Sounds boring, but I guess I’ll do it if it’ll make you stay.”

  “It…won’t necessarily make me stay. But it might help the odds a little?”

  He seemed to consider that, then dropped the tool he was holding unceremoniously and stood up from his chair. The tool slid precariously toward the edge of the table, but stopped before falling this time. “Okay. Let’s make an attunement.”

  ***

  Ashon led me to a room that looked like an alchemical laboratory. This was because it was, in fact, an alchemical laboratory — just a very specialized one.

  “The purification room.” Ashon waved a hand at the room from the entrance. I saw about a dozen people sitting at stations with what I recognized to be mana distilleries. “You know how it works?”

  “Yeah, sure, the mana has to be purified before it—”

  “Great, we’re skipping this room, then.” He shut the door. “It’s boring and you don’t need to do it.”

  I frowned. It might have been nice to look at the tools there to see if any of them could be traced to Constantine, but admittedly, his equipment was more likely to be at later stages in the process.

  “This way.” Ashon led me back to a hall, around a corner, and to another room. “The applicator foundry. More interesting.” He opened the door.

  Inside, I saw a bunch of people sitting at desks with what looked like fairly standard enchanting equipment, with a couple exceptions.

  “Here, come on. We’ll grab a blank.” Ashon led me through the room, ignored everyone present, and opened a cabinet labeled “Do Not Open Without Express Permission from Management”.

  Once it was open, I could see the contents. Empty glass vials, rune-etched tools, and the most important part — thin, silvery metal discs.

  Blank applicators.

  Ashon grabbed one of those, as well as handful of tools. He didn’t bother explaining any of them, but a glance at the runes on each told me that one of them was the Signature Verifier device I was looking for.

  I knew the chances that Constantine had made this specific device personally were slim, but if I had access to the cabinet, maybe one of them…

  “Sit.” Ashon pointed me toward a nearby chair, dropping the tools unceremoniously on the table.

  I sat down as instructed. “Don’t we need purified liquid mana first?”

  Ashon blinked at me. “What, did you literally want to make a whole attunement right now? Hah. Not even I’m going to get away with doing that unauthorized. I’m going to show you the good parts, but you don’t get a real attunement. Respect the attempt, though.”

  I sighed. “Okay. That’s fine. So, if we actually had the fluid, then next…”

  Ashon slid the metal disc in front of me, then nudged a specific tool my way. It looked like an etching rod, but more complicated — it had a dozen runes on each side.

  “Know how to use this?” He asked.

  “Uh, no, not this one.”

  “Ugh. I guess I need to explain.” Ashon groaned. “Okay. This is, like, how you make attunements. It’s an attunement making thingy.”

  “Is…that the technical name?”

  “I don’t know. It probably doesn’t have one. If it does, I’m sure it’s terrible. Anyway, the attunement making thingy is how you make runes with embedded sub-glyphs, but you need to set it up — oh. I forgot a thing. Hold on.”

  He walked back to the cabinet, frowning.

  In that moment of distraction, I cast my newest spell — Spirit Tracking Analytical Arrow.

  A gleaming arrow appeared in my vision with a number below it: 0.1. A distance, in miles, from the target.

  Too close. It’s probably someone working here.

  I dismissed the spell, then quickly picked up the Signature Verifier and repeated the process.

  Another arrow appeared, with a 0.2 below it. The same problem. Unless Warren Constantine was still working for Farren Labs — a possibility, but an unlikely one — this wasn’t him, either.

  I suppose he could be…hiding in their basement, or something. Or here in disguise? Both unlikely.

  I set the device down just before Ashon returned with a small crystal.

  “What’s that?” I asked.

  “Sub-glyph instruction crystal. You insert it into the attunement making thingy. Here, press this rune.”

  He pushed the rune for me. There was a ‘click’ and a compartment opened in the device, which he slipped the crystal into.

  “So, wait. This crystal has all the instructions for the attunement? The actual functions of the attunement are…imbued in this crystal somehow, then, what, moved into the applicator through this device?”

  Ashon shrugged. “Something like that.”

  “How do the appropriate sub-glyphs get into the crystal?”

  “Oh, for that, you—” Ashon stopped as someone put a hand on his shoulder.

  Nakht.

  Ashon turned slowly. As he processed who was touching him, his expression dropped. “Uh, hi Nakht. I was just…”

  “Master Cadence is not authorized to have this much detail on the attunement making process just yet, Ashon. You can stop right there.” Nakht’s hand tightened around Ashon’s shoulder.

  Ashon winced, but didn’t recoil. “U—understood. I’ll just, uh, go put these things back.”

  “Do that. Promptly. And do not make me remind you about our policies again.”

  “Right, right. Thanks.”

  Nakht released his hand. Ashon shuddered as Nakht turned away.

  “Well, that was, uh, terrifying. You can put the things back. I need to, uh, go use the bathroom.”

  Ashon fled the area.

  I briefly stared at the items left on the table.

  There were workers around, and Nakht was probably still observing me, otherwise I would have been sorely tempted to pocket one.

  Instead, I simply picked up the items and put them back in the cabinet…


  But not before running my hand over several other items and doing a few quick tests.

  Spirit Tracking Analytical Arrow.

  As a Mind-Marked attuned, I could cast spells on myself silently and near-instantly. It wasn’t my usual strategy, but in this case, it proved very useful.

  It would have been more useful if I’d actually found anything leading to Constantine.

  Several spirit trails existed, but all within the building. I did find a couple older-looking items that didn’t link to anyone nearby, but those were, frustratingly enough, outside of my spell’s range.

  A dead-end, at least for now.

  I’d known that was likely, since my range with the spell was so short, but I had to try.

  That led to a somewhat more desperate measure.

  With Ashon gone, I was alone to my own devices, at least for the moment.

  So, I headed straight to Annabelle Farren’s office.

  It was time for a few questions.

  ***

  The door was already open when I approached.

  “Hello, Corin.”

  It took me a moment to find the source of the voice. Annabelle Farren was sitting on top of a bookshelf nearby on the right side of the room, drinking some kind of pale green liquid from a wine glass.

  She set the glass down, and it floated seemingly on its own to sit down on top of her desk near her documents. I would have been impressed if it hadn’t pitched over, spilling a few remaining drops of fluid, on the nearby papers.

  Farren didn’t seem to notice.

  She hopped down from the bookshelf, smiling, and clapped her hands together. “Here for your lessons?”

  “Uh, sort of? I was never really clear on what you were offering to teach me.”

  “Oh.” She blinked. “Did I not explain that yet? Hm. Unusual. Well, attunements. Yours, specifically, and maybe others. Probably others, but mostly yours. The Arbiter one, I mean.”

  I gave her a surprised look. “Are you an Arbiter yourself, then?”

  “Oh, praise me, no. Not technically? Anyway, mostly no. But I know a lot about them. Much more than you do. I’m going to teach you a few things. Then you’re going to work for me.”

  “I’m…not so sure about that last part.”

  She narrowed her eyes at me. “Have you…not agreed yet? Strange. Very well, then. We’ll get to that. Problems can be resolved. Everything is still in order.”

  “Right. Should I sit, maybe?”

  “I suppose.” She gestured at a chair, which was pitched over.

  I picked it up and sat down.

  There was a chair on the other side of the table, but she didn’t bother to walk over to it. She stood near the bookshelf, looking momentarily absent, then shook her head. “Right. Arbiter attunement. You know some things. You need to know other things.” She nodded to herself. “Important things.”

  “Such as…?”

  “Why we need you here.” She looked away for a moment, looking momentarily saddened.

  “I assumed that had something to do with automatic purification? I could either help make primer without a distillery, or maybe learn to apply attunements to people directly?”

  She snorted. “You don’t have enough mana to apply an attunement to someone with your own power, nor the knowledge, nor the control. Maybe at Sunstone you could try. More likely Citrine, if you want a fully functional attunement and not just a proto-attunement.”

  “Proto-attunement?”

  “Ignore that. Not important right now. Oh, you have suspicions. I see. No, we’re not planning to steal your hand.”

  “That…wasn’t exactly what—”

  “Oh! Metaphor. Right, I see. No, no, copying the sub-glyphs…well, yes, that would be useful. Much faster for mass production. I could see that being useful…”

  Wait, is she reading my mind?

  I pulled extra mana out of my hand, converting it to mental and sending it to my mind.

  Nothing of note seemed to happen, at least to me.

  “Hm?” Farren blinked. “Where was I?”

  “You don’t want to copy my sub-glyphs.”

  “Right! I mean, well, I do now. But that’s not the main reason you’re here, is it? No, no. You have a couple more important things you can help with.”

  “Such as?”

  Farren smiled. “You’ve surely noticed how good you are at moving mana from place to place, yes?”

  I nodded.

  “How would you like to move attunements, Corin?”

  I gawked at her. “Wait, what?”

  “It’s very simple. You’ve already moved enchantments before, right? A powerful enough Arbiter can move an attunement from place to place, generally within the same person’s body. If a person is willing, you can even move an attunement from one person to another.”

  I was momentarily awestruck. It was so simple, and yet, so absurdly powerful. “Wait. Couldn’t someone use that to just take someone’s attunements away?”

  “Oh, no. That’s Sovereign you’re thinking of. You’re no thief, Corin. Sovereigns can take away power from the unwilling. Your power is to give. An attunement will not allow an Arbiter to move it without the active mental consent of the attunement-holder. It’s a security feature, similar to anti-tampering runes. Attunements have a number of those.”

  My mind raced.

  Anti-tampering runes could be defeated.

  I could learn sub-glyphs.

  Could I learn how to disable the security sub-glyphs from attunements and just move them around however I pleased?

  “Don’t try.” Farren shook her head. “It’s not the right route for you.”

  I stared at her. I didn’t know what to say to that, but I needed to keep my thoughts more carefully guarded if she was reading them. “Of course. Now, you want me to move attunements…why?”

  “We have clients that would pay a tremendous amount to have their attunement moved to a more advantageous body location. As a mind-marked, I’m sure you understand the difficulties involved in having your attunement be in a part of your body that isn’t perfectly suited to your attunement.”

  She was absolutely right. “And what about moving attunements to others? I assume that’s an even more valuable service. Maybe moving a powerful attunement from a dying family member to an heir?”

  “Yes, good. You’re thinking the right way, except wrong.”

  I blinked. “How so?”

  “Moving a high-level attunement to someone who is not acclimated to it has side effects. There’s a technical term for what happens to a person when that happens — we call it ‘exploding’.”

  In spite of the joke, she wasn’t smiling or laughing.

  I didn’t, either. “Right. Ah, sure. So, then…moving low-level attunements from people who don’t need them?”

  “Good. Closer. With your assistance, we could allow services for people to sell their attunements to people who are capable of handling them. A dying Citrine sells their mark to another Citrine. Or, sure, we could pass on an inheritance, like you said. Or two attuned could trade their attunements with each other directly — while we extract a fee, of course.”

  “And…I could do all this?”

  “Eventually, yes. You’d need a much firmer understanding of the principles behind the process. And I would be prepared to offer you a small cut of the profits from any such transactions. You should know that is not a standard part of our business – your average Enchanter is simply paid a salary. But you are no ordinary Enchanter. You have capabilities no one, aside from other Arbiters, can match.”

  “About other Arbiters, I’d like to ask—”

  “No.” Her expression turned grim. “No, you will not.”

  “Ah. Right.” I frowned, then changed the topic. I really didn’t want to antagonize her. Farren still didn’t show up on my Detect Aura as being overtly powerful, but that was in some ways scarier than if she had a glimmering green aura. “Okay. Foolish question, then. Why not
just copy the sub-glyphs from my attunement that allow attunements to be copied?”

  “Can’t. It’s a function of being a real Arbiter. It’s not a standard sub-glyph function.”

  I frowned. “What does that mean?”

  “It means,” Farren smiled again, seeming to have regained her composure, “some of your powers are the will of the visages. They cannot be so easily copied.”

  “You said easily, but…”

  She shook her head. “We won’t try. We have an understanding with certain visages, you see.”

  “Ah.” I nodded. It made sense that the visages would at least be aware of this whole project, and that if certain boundaries were crossed, the visages might take drastic action. Like, say, wiping Farren Labs — or all of Caelford — off the map.

  It seemed almost unthinkable, but then again, it must have seemed that way to the kingdom of Feria before Kerivas had obliterated it.

  “So, you see, there are precious few people who can do that for us. And, perhaps more importantly, you have one final gift from the visages that cannot be copied. A place only you can go.”

  “A place?” I asked.

  “The Arbiter’s Gate.” She left the words hang in the air while I processed.

  “The Arbiter’s…you mean there’s another entrance to the spires that only Arbiters can use?”

  “Precisely.” She nodded once.

  “What’s it for?”

  She gestured toward me. “The primary thing your attunement was made for. Deals with the visages. Your attunement isn’t just a source of magical power. It’s a symbol. It says, ‘this person can be trusted by the visages’. It is a rare honor — and one we would like to make use of.”

  “You…want me to make deals with the visages on behalf of Farren Labs?”

  “Very right, Corin. Very right. We had someone—no. Never mind.”

  I nodded. The reason why they’d given me so much access to the facility made a bit more sense now.

  It wasn’t that they just wanted me as some kind of Enchanting intern or an easy source of mana purification.

  In those moments, for the first time, I understood a bit of my own value.