"Potential Energy"
by Justin R. R. Stebbins
Part 2: A Change in Plans
Septimus Plutarch did not look back. It was one of his policies in life, established at a young age. He made his decisions and stuck to them, and then dealt with the consequences. Looking back tempted one to turn around and go back, and Septimus preferred to move forward.
So now, as he rode from Pluton Hold on the road to Coronaria, alone except for the horse pulling his cart, he kept his eyes trained on the path ahead. Though eventually he got bored of this and began taking in the familiar scenery once again. Far away to the west, he could just make out the shadow of the Iron Pikes, rising up from nothing. Nestled in those lonely mountains were the fortresses and mines of the Iron Gauntlet, the guild of dwarves that controlled the trade of their special metals and crafts, and had the wealthiest bank in Achaea – the bank with which he hoped to compete someday.
And just north of those peaks lay the Scar, the blasted landscape where Sir Durand the First Inquisitor had defeated the Mage-Emperor Ildrius. Plutarch had ridden by it once or twice, but there wasn’t much to see, for the Empire had erected a low but solid stone wall around the blackened land. Many an adventurous young Achaean dreamed of scaling that wall and venturing into the Scar to find the mound of Ildrius’s treasure that supposedly rested at its heart. A few had attempted it, but they either came back with naught but scars and strange tales, or never came back at all.
Plutarch looked at all these things that lay off to his side, but still he did not look back… until he heard the sound of another horse approaching. Then he turned his head and cursed.
Paulus rode his steed up beside Plutarch’s cart and matched its pace, then said loudly, once again without looking at him: “Septimus, your lord father does not want you leaving. You are to meet up with your brothers Albus and Adamas at our manor the edge of the Shadow Sea.”
Returning the favor, Septimus did not look at him either. “Our manor, Paulus? Really? You must be going senile, with all the times you forget you’re not a Plutarch. Unless one of my relatives has been foolish enough to adopt you… or marry you, perish the thought.”
“Where are you going, Septimus? Coronaria? Stop your cart, turn it around, and ask me not to report your transgression to your Lord Father. Hurry up now. Perhaps if you ask nicely, I’ll consider it.”
“Honestly, Paulus, if you speak to my brothers like that, I’m surprised none of them has killed you in a fit of rage by now.” Septimus could feel his own ire rising even now, but as always he refused to show it. “You’re lucky I’m so tolerant.”
Paulus drew his horse closer to Septimus’s cart and finally deigned to turn his wrinkled old head and look at him. “I wiped your bottom, boy! Perhaps your brothers simply respect me the way you should.”
Septimus snorted. “I highly doubt that.”
“Damn it, Septimus – stop your horse and look at me!” Here he reached out and grabbed Septimus tightly by the arm, as if threatening to pull him from his cart.
Then something happened. First Septimus felt a surge of fury go through him like a wave of heat, and then Jupiter himself looked down from Olympos and threw a divine thunderbolt, which burst from the heavens and, with a mighty flash of light and crash of thunder, struck Paulus dead. At least that’s what Septimus assumed had happened when the unfortunate old man was blasted suddenly backward, away from Plutarch, flying off his horse to land sizzling in the ditch beside the road, smoke rising from his tangled form.
Septimus stopped his cart. Paulus’s mount bolted in fear. As his brain worked to comprehend what had just occurred, Septimus climbed down from his cart and approached the old man’s corpse. It was a twisted, blackened mass – it barely even looked human. The flesh had been warped into strange shapes and patterns of massed scar tissue. One thing was patently obvious:
He had been killed by magic.
A chill ran down Septimus’s spine. He looked at his hands. They looked perfectly normal, but he knew he had felt a surge of power go through him before Paulus died.
The voice of his father echoed in his mind: “I too was seventh in line…”
Suddenly Septimus remembered an old superstition, and he didn’t know whether to laugh or cry.
“Seventh son of a seventh son…”
He said this aloud as he stared at his hands, turning them over as if looking for a magic rune to appear. Stories claimed that magi were born with bizarre birthmarks, or other distinguishing characteristics such as white hair, or heterochromia – eyes of two different colors. Septimus could recall seeing no such marking on his own body. But tales also said that magi were usually born under unique circumstances, such as during a solar eclipse, or at a place of magical power like an ancient crossroads… or when a seventh son bore a seventh son.
Terror gripped him in its icy embrace, and he found himself looking away toward the Iron Pikes again, imagining the final battle between Sir Durand and Emperor Ildrius. Since he was a child, he had often envisioned himself on the winning side, striding into battle in that black armor, dauntless against the godlike power of the mage-lords. Now he stood on the opposite side, and imagined that unstoppable legion of Inquisitors hunting him down like an animal. He could feel all of his well-laid plans – and even those of his father – crumbling down around him.
And then the mood passed.
Plutarch looked at his hands again, and the feelings of fear and doubt faded as quickly as a cloud of sea-spray in the wind. Fear was a waste of time. He glanced over the colossal ruins of all his best-laid schemes and, without a thought, swept them aside to begin building new ones. All his life, he had sought to gain power with his intellect, through political or economic means. But now fate had granted him a far greater power, one even his great warrior brothers could never hope to achieve. And he would use it. The words of his father continued to echo in his thoughts.
You are a man of great potential… We must use the tools that we are given…
First he needed to dispose of Paulus’s body, for if it were discovered, the Inquisition would soon hear of it and begin a search. Perhaps he could drag it to the bog he’d seen nearby, and sink it into the mud. It would have to do. Luckily, there were no other people on the road at the moment, and he was quite far from any settlements, so hopefully there were no witnesses. He reached down and gingerly touched the corpse’s dry skin. Despite the manner of death, it was not hot to the touch. He tried to lift it, but it proved surprisingly heavy. He had no idea dead men weighed so much.
A thought struck him: This was the first man he had ever killed. Shouldn’t he feel something? Remorse? Pity, at least? He felt nothing. Only annoyance, as if he had stepped on a bug and now had to clean it off the floor. Did this make him an evil man, he wondered? Then again, it was only Paulus. He doubted if anyone who knew the bitter old man would truly feel remorse for putting him out of everyone else’s misery.
“If only I knew a spell,” Plutarch muttered as he struggled to drag the cadaver, “to raise you from the dead, just so you could walk your own sorry corpse to the bog.”
When he finally made it to the little patch of wetlands, he had some difficulty pushing Paulus’s stiff body to a spot deep enough for it to sink. Once Paulus had disappeared out of sight into the mud, Septimus did his best to bend some of the grass back into shape to cover his trail as he made his way back to his cart.
He climbed back up into the seat and picked up the horse’s reins. He considered his next move. He needed to arm himself… but not with weapons.
“Scientia potentia est,” Septimus said to himself, and he smiled.
---
First Septimus returned briefly to Pluton Hold and visited the library, taking all the most obscure books and scrolls on magic, along with some other subjects to camouflage his intentions. He loaded these into his cart and then headed for Coronaria. He took a slightly different road this time, to avoid the marsh where he had hidden Paulus’s body. Fortunately, all of the roads between Pluton Hold and the capital were safe to ride – probably the safest in all the Empire. Which would make Paulus’s death all the more suspicious, but Septimus had no time to worry about that.
So I’m a wizard now, he thought as he rode. I should grow some sort of beard. A forked one, perhaps. And buy a cape with a tall collar. No pointed hat though.
He tried to laugh at these thoughts. Not so long ago, he’d dreamed of wearing void-iron armor…
Soon enough, the walls of Coronaria, Capital of the Empire, loomed over Septimus’s head. Extending from the top of the wall to the hills beyond the city stretched a long ramp. A gatehouse stood at the point where the ramp touched down. It was toward this that Septimus headed, merely nodding at the gate guard, who took one look at his face and the family crest embroidered on his surcoat, and then waved him on his way.
These were the gates to the city’s Sky Bridges, which extended from the elevated central districts, over the outer poor districts, and then over the outermost wall. The bridges allowed the wealthy and noble, the important and powerful, to pass over the crime-infested poverty-ridden “Iron Ring” without ever having to set foot in them. They were a marvel of engineering, dwarfing even the great aqueducts that fed the city water, especially in width – they were wide enough for four carts to ride abreast.
As Septimus rode, he looked down over the edge at the slums below. They looked so dismal, like an entirely different world he was happy to have never experienced. He wondered if he might end up hiding in such a place eventually, on the run from the Inquisition. As he looked, he saw what appeared to be a child clad in black crouched atop one of the tallest rooftops. She looked up at him, her eyes so big he swore he could almost make out their color – they looked green. But when he blinked, he found she had disappeared.
Septimus turned his gaze ahead to the elevated inner districts: the so-called Silver and Gold Rings, surrounding the tall central citadel. In the Silver Ring lived the merchants and the younger noble families, still separated from the oldest Patrician houses and government buildings in the Gold. Here in the Silver, Septimus found the city’s library. Though nowhere near the size of the great library at Xandropolis in Kemhet, it was newer – relatively speaking – and boasted quite a selection of rare works.
Septimus Plutarch headed straight in, collecting a pile of books and scrolls under one arm as he walked between the towering shelves. He headed to the stairs, down to the lower floor where the rarer works were kept. He had perused these shelves many times, and knew where to find what he was looking for. The selection of works on magic was not enormous, but it was a place to start.
He sat down at a secluded alcove and spread his books and scrolls upon the table. Without further consideration, he dove in.
And found nothing.
For hours he poured over those tomes and lengths of papyrus and parchment, and yet he came up dry. He found only simplistic information, magic history, the basics of magic explained at great length, and vague references to other arcane works that were nowhere to be found in the library. There was no concrete information. Never before had he fully considered how easy it was to say so much without actually saying anything at all. He learned nothing.
The most interesting passage he stumbled across was a single paragraph referencing an actual spell:
Many a wanderer in arcane ruins or the Blasted Wastes has attempted to reveal the hidden treasures of the magi through spellcasting, to no avail. For no matter how many times a mundane man mutters the phrase “vide arcanum,” no secrets will be revealed to him unless he bears the Gift. All words have power, some say, but only a born mage can cast a spell.
Septimus shrugged and murmured, “Vide Arcanum.”
What happened next surprised him so much that he sat bolt upright, nearly falling out of his chair. A message appeared out of nowhere, fading into view on the blank lower half of the very same page, written in a halting script with bright red ink:
Magus, heed these words: Your brethren await you, down the stairs into the ruins at the corner of Silver Way and Old North Street.
And remember, seek not the Schola. They will make you a prisoner.
Septimus had never heard of this ‘Schola.’ He wondered if it might be some archaic word for the Inquisition. Of course, the entire message might be a trap laid by that very group. He would have to be careful. But he could not simply ignore this – it might be his only path to true arcane knowledge, the kind he was having no luck finding in this library or the tomes he had borrowed from Pluton Hold.
Septimus hurriedly slammed his books shut and rolled up his scrolls, and then went about replacing them on the shelves. If they had been covered in dust when he found them, he tried to gather some dust from nearby and scatter it back on top, eager to cover his tracks. It looked far from perfect, but it would have to do. Then he walked briskly back outside.
The sun was setting as he made his way down the well-paved Imperial highway – down Silver Way, the oldest road of the Silver Ring. Old North Street was also ancient, and at their corner stood an archaic ruined temple overgrown with grass and vines. Stories said it was actually a temple to one of the titans – Ouranos perhaps – whose worship had fallen out of favor long ago. The locals now used it as a park. Some of the fallen stones there were so well-worn from the rear ends of sitting visitors that it was hard to imagine they had ever been anything other than benches.
But Plutarch hesitated to approach them now. What if there was a secret Inquisitor outpost beneath the ruins, with sentries waiting day and night on the slim chance a mage would happen across their bait, their hidden message? And yet, what other choice did he have? How would he ever learn the secrets of magic alone? It was not as if the hidden magi rumored to live among men in the Empire would simply reveal themselves to him. Would they?
Septimus sat down on one of those well-worn benches to think. He drummed his fingers on the smooth stone, watching the men and women who walked by – especially the women. The Imperial capital was truly a place of beauty, he mused as his eyes roved up and down the legs of one young maid, watching the way her dress flowed over her hips.
Then something in the air seemed to change. He felt a tingling in his skin, very subtle – an extremely mild version of a sensation he had only experienced once before… when he had unconsciously blasted his father’s obnoxious manservant straight to Hades. Septimus had the presence of mind not to look around wildly. Instead, he leaned back on his seat, stretching, and glanced to his right – the place from which, somehow, he felt the sensation must be emanating.
And saw a woman staring straight at him.
She was very striking – not only because she was beautiful, with a pale, blue-eyed face framed by long dark hair – but also because she was tall, probably taller than Septimus. Her shoulders looked broad too, though her dress was perfectly tailored to draw attention away from this, accentuating the feminine curves of her body rather than her rather masculine stature.
The pale woman stared at Septimus, and then reached up with one finger and traced an invisible line under one eye, in the shape of a hook.
In a chillingly serious tone, her voice alluring with a slight lisp, she said: “I see you.”
With a graceful wave, she beckoned Septimus to follow her. He knew how dangerous it was – that it could still easily be an Inquistor trap – but what choice did he have? If it were a trap, then he was already as good as caught. And they could not have found a better way to lure him in. He always had trouble resisting beautiful women. The prospect of learning to tap into his magical potential was not bad either.
He stood up and followed the woman. She led him into the heart of the overgrown ruins, down a flight of stone stairs, to a dark room, half caved-in, that youngsters of Coronaria often used as a secret meeting place. The half-collapsed “room” was really little more than a shaded area full of rubble, but the woman led him inside anyway. Then she approached the ancient stone wall and held her finger out before it. Without touching the stone, she traced in the air the same symbol she had drawn under her eye earlier.
Soundlessly, the stonework of the wall slid backward. The pale woman squeezed into the opening that appeared, and Septimus reluctantly followed.
It took his eyes a few minutes to adjust to the dim lighting he found inside. The only illumination came from candles on tables, and each table was littered with books and scrolls, or potion bottles and ingredients. It was all very arcane, exactly what one would expect to find when walking into a secret mage lair.
But the people were not what he expected at all. There were only six occupants, counting the pale woman, and most looked like they had walked right in off the street. They were from all walks of life – two poor and wearing rags, two middle-class merchants, and two wealthy nobles dressed in all their finery. Four were old, two were young, and half were men, the other half women. It was strange to see such a diverse group united for what he assumed was a single cause.
A few, however, definitely stood out. Four of them had skin so pallid it seemed almost translucent, with visible dark veins and a red tint to their bloodshot eyes. Three of these actually had the hook symbol tattooed under their eye, like a black talon, marking them as an obvious member of the cult. Were these some sort of branded slaves, bound by magic, Plutarch wondered? Such a thing had been commonplace under the rule of Mage-Emperor Ildrius, according to the histories…
The pale woman waved to the room in general and said, “Friends, this son of Plutarch is to be welcomed into our midst. Perform the first of the mysteries while I prepare myself.”
One of Septimus’s eyebrows went up at these last words, and he watched with some anticipation as the pale woman stepped behind a curtain at the back of the room, concealing herself from sight. He wondered what exactly the mysteries of this cult involved.
The other five cultists quickly gathered in a circle before Plutarch and began to chant. Septimus tried to make out the words, but they were from no language he had ever heard. The tone of the chant and the language was undeniably ominous. Septimus stepped closer, peering into the center of their ring, watching. He fully expected some great flash of light, or an oddly-colored flame to sprout from the floor, or a demon to be summoned into their midst.
Instead, they simply stopped chanting and stepped away from each other, and then went back to whatever they were doing before. The two oldest started carrying on a hushed conversation, while two others resumed studying books and potions. Septimus turned to the last one – a relatively young man, but with the pale skin and mark under his eye – and tapped him on the shoulder.
“And what in Hades,” he asked coolly, “was that all about?”
The man blinked at him with eyes that were colorless save for the bloodshot red around the edges. “That was the First Chant.”
“Does it… do anything? Cast a ward of protection over this hideout, or…?”
The pale, hairless little man shrugged. “None know for certain. It is an ancient tradition passed down by magi since the days of Ildrius, the Mage-Emperor. Why he and his magi performed it, well, that has been lost to time.”
Plutarch had to resist rolling his eyes – he had little respect for meaningless traditions, no matter the group that performed them. “Right. So, am I inducted as a member of your… cult, now? Who are you, exactly?”
The candlelight glinted in the shorter man’s beady eyes. “I am called Cold-Eyes, at least here in this place. We are the Hidden. For so we have remained since the fall of the Mage-Emperor, walking among normal Imperials, right under their noses, gathering in secret and collecting what magical knowledge we can, to save it from the void-iron claws of the Inquisition. And meanwhile, we infiltrate the highest ranks of the Imperium, to one day take back what is rightfully ours.”
As Cold-Eyes continued intoning his rhetoric, Plutarch scanned the books stacked on the tables, which bore strange titles like Arcanum Obscura and Transmutation: The Most Difficult Magick.
“So there is actual useful information here?” he asked. “I could find none in the libraries.”
Cold-Eyes breathed rapidly in something approaching laughter. “Of course you couldn’t! The libraries have been… cleansed, by them. By the Inquisition. Just like they wish to cleanse the world. They suppress even the existence of magic, so that many in the Empire believe it’s nothing more than a fairy tale, denying what they see with their own eyes. You know why? To keep people calm. So they think of mages only as a distant fear, a threat from which their precious Empire protects–”
“That’s enough, Cold-Eyes,” interrupted the voice of the pale woman, who now reappeared, stepping out from behind the curtain.
Only she did not look like the same woman at all. Not in the slightest bit.
She hardly even looked like a woman now. She was clad in armor – dark-tinted metal over robes of black and deep violet, standing straight and broad-shouldered and at least an inch taller than Septimus. And there was not a hair on her head – for it was covered in horrific burn-scars. Her bare scalp was a network of them, some dark and strangely twisted. The transformation was such a contrast that Septimus felt genuine terror run its icy fingers down his spine.
He had noticed a metallic tinge to her voice, and now he saw why: she wore a tall metal gorget around her neck, which rose to completely cover her mouth and nose, with only a few holes for breathing. Her eyes were sunken and dark, but gleamed in their shadowy sockets with a fierce blue fire. Beneath one was tattooed the familiar black claw mark. But her skin, however pale, lacked the dark veins and unnatural translucency and wrinkles he saw on the others, including Cold-Eyes. It was still smooth in the places where it remained unburnt.
“Welcome to the Hidden, son of Plutarch,” she said, waving her clawed gauntlet toward him.
Septimus gave his most charming half-bow. “My Lady. You may call me Septimus.”
“And you,” she snapped, her armor clanking as she stepped forward to tower over him, “may not call me Lady. Do not flatter me with gracious niceties. I get plenty of those when I walk the streets, disguised by magic to appear how I once did. Here, there is no such pretension. I know the way I truly look to your noble eyes. And I do not care.”
Septimus licked his lips, and tried to look as respectful as possible, never breaking eye contact. “My apologies…”
“Septimus Plutarch,” said Cold-Eyes, bowing his head, “you stand before Vae Victis, Second Apprentice to the Master of the Hidden.”
“Vae Victis,” Plutarch said. “Woe to the conquered… I am honored. Did the Inquisition do this to you?”
“You are bold,” she said, between rasping breaths sucked through her metal mask, “to ask so bluntly. Bold, or proud and foolish. We will see which. No, this was not the work of the Black Order. These scars came from the hands of ‘simple’ peasant folk. Despite being fair of face, I never fit in as a girl – too tall, you see, and too able to defend myself. That’s why the gang of boys was stalking me that day, and saw me practicing the magic I had only recently discovered within me. That’s why they seized me – not without some difficulty – and dragged me back to the village leaders, who were all too willing to accept their sons’ accounts of what they had witnessed the freak-girl doing in secret.
“At first they tried to cut out my tongue. I wouldn’t let them – I was too strong – so they settled for mutilating my face, trying to cut off my lips or sew them shut. Finally they decided it would be easier just to burn me. So they gathered a pile of wood, and tied me to a stake in the center. But they made the mistake of leaving me conscious, so I could feel the pain of the flames. That was the last mistake they ever made. I didn’t yet know how to control my magic, but the agony of the fire awoke it. When the Inquisitors arrived days later, they found a crater surrounded by blackened bodies.”
“Impressive,” said Septimus with a nod. “I only managed to kill the family butler.”
“Your noble status is an asset,” said Vae Victis, as if to herself, without acknowledging his comment. “We are always looking for new members in high places. One day, when the time is ripe, they will be the key to seizing power in the Empire once again, and bringing about the rule of the next Mage-Emperor. Or perhaps even the return of the original…”
Septimus blinked, looking back at the dismal little room and all the robed men and women in it, all staring at Vae Victis where she towered above them. “You can’t possibly mean Ildrius is still somehow alive?”
Cold-Eyes rubbed a slender finger over his hairless chin. “There are those who say he is. Could someone so wise and powerful truly allow himself to die? Would he not have had some backup plan? Tales speak of spells that can anchor one’s soul to an artifact, allowing life after death…”
Septimus sneered. “But why would you want to bring back Ildrius? He was a madman.”
As Septimus had expected, a murmur spread through the room. Cold-Eyes even audibly gasped, quite theatrically. Again Plutarch almost rolled his eyes. But Vae Victis only let out a hollow metal laugh.
“You truly are brave, Septimus Plutarchus,” she said. “I’m starting to like you. It’s not your fault you have been deceived by the lies put forth under the orders of the Imperium – even those penned by your own historian ancestor. Ildrius performed certain… experiments on the weak, ‘tis true, but only so that humanity as a whole might grow stronger. Had Ildrius ruled for longer, he would have led us down the path to immortality. Instead of being the puppets and playthings of the gods, the giants, the titans… we would have been their equals. We would have been gods ourselves.”
Septimus snorted. “Lofty goals, certainly, but if Ildrius were truly worthy to lead us down that path, then he would be the one telling me this now, not you. As it is, he failed. He and all his mightiest peers and apprentices, servants and slaves, cut down in the height of their power.”
Finally, Vae Victis merely shrugged. “It is a moot point. Unless he is found, he cannot return to power. Perhaps someone else could rule better – there are those who think so. Perhaps I could rule. Oh, the vengeance I would wreak…”
“Upon whom? You already blasted your village to dust.”
She gave a metallic chuckle. “Upon anyone I pleased.”
Septimus nodded slowly, wondering if everyone in this hideout was mad. “Quite… Well, I should warn you: my family is expecting me at our manor near the border to the Black Lands. I should have been there already; my visit to the library was a… detour. I’m supposed to document the glorious conquests of my two oldest brothers as they put down some petty rebellion or other. So if you want me to remain incognito, just lend me a few of your ‘Magic for Beginners’ and ‘Baby’s First Spell’ books, and I’ll be on my–”
“No,” Vae Victis cut in, raising a gauntleted hand. “We have a hidden lair in the Black Lands, a storehouse of forbidden knowledge. Cold-Eyes will travel there ahead of you. He will then meet you outside your estate, and lead you there. We can’t risk our precious knowledge falling into the wrong hands and exposing you. Besides, you need more than books to learn magic. You need hands-on training. Your Gift must not be squandered. Some in this room are not so blessed by fate.”
Septimus glanced back at the others, who looked away as soon as he did so, as if in shame. Only one man kept his eyes on Septimus – the one without the hideous pale skin. Septimus felt a familiar sensation in that gaze. His eyes went wide, and he turned back to Vae Victis.
“Let me see if I understand this…” he said slowly, trying to keep his voice low enough so only she would hear. “There are only three real mages in this room?”
“If you only consider those born with the Gift to be ‘real mages,’ then yes. The others – those who look pale and sickly, as I’m sure you noticed, like Cold-Eyes – are just men and women who sought to be more than what they were, by selling their soul to a demon in exchange for power. With each use of this power, they lose more and more of their humanity. They can fight it by fueling their spells with soulstones and other tricks, but the demon is always waiting, for as long as it takes… to inevitably claim what is theirs.
“A deadly high price, but who can blame these ambitious souls? Do you have any idea the rarity of your Gift, son of Plutarch? There are perhaps one million people in this, the capital and largest city of the Empire. Among them, I doubt there are even ten magi. We three may be the only ones. In all the vast lands the Empire holds, there are perhaps a few hundred… and many of those now live in chains in Karak du Vide, prisoners of the Inquisition. The key to making sure you do not join them… is to remain Hidden.”
“We few, we happy few…” Septimus muttered sarcastically under his breath.
Vae Victis did not seem to hear him. “You should go now,” she said, with a commanding tone in her metallic voice. “You’ve tarried in here long enough. Your family must not suspect.”
Septimus snorted. “They’ll probably be more suspicious when they see me riding up to the manor like a good little boy. But you’re right – I should be going. I’ll… be in touch.”
“We’ll make sure of it,” Vae Victis said ominously as he rose to leave.
He tried not to think too hard about that. He had only just discovered his power, and already one group was trying to control him. Previously he had wished for more control over his life, over his own destiny, and he had thought this “Gift” would give him that. But now he felt more under the control of others than ever before. But that would change, he told himself. That would change.
Just as he reached the door, Vae Victis called out to him one last time: “And Plutarch! One thing to remember: always remain calm. If you let your emotions get out of control...”
“Yes,” Septimus said, “then I might accidentally blast my pompous brothers into ash. Or freeze them in solid ice and then smash it. I’m not sure which would be more fun.”
He traced the sign over the stone door, and again it slid right open… just like magic.