Chapter #10The New Magician by: Seuzz   "Nice of you to show up today, Aubrey," the department chair says sarcastically as he passes your office. "Think you can call the next time you take a sick day?"
"I am many things, Terrance, but I am not a clairvoyant," you reply. That stops him in his tracks.
"Care to explain that remark?" he snaps.
"My nanny taught me never to explain anything," you retort. "I am not in the habit of explaining myself to you, and I do not propose to acquire the habit now."
"Maybe you'd be happier explaining things to the dean."
"I allow that I might. I might tell him about a once in a lifetime opportunity to acquire a very interesting artifact that necessitated my immediate departure late one night and hasty return two mornings later with an acquisition that would reflect great credit upon this department."
"You picked something up?" His eyes narrow.
"Possibly. I might tell you about it if you begin lacing your conversation with spoonfuls of sugar, and after I have squeezed it to my own purposes."
He departs with a dark look.
* * * * *
He doesn't even raise his hand. "But weren't the Carthaginians, like, into the whole burning children alive thing?"
You give him your most disgusted look. "And in what comic book did you read that, sir?"
The rest of the class titters, and the boy flushes. "I read it in, like, a history book."
"By whom?"
"I don't remember. In one of my classes."
"Heaven preserve us from survey-level experts. Now if I may continue—"
"So you're saying they didn't?"
"I say nothing. The histories were written by the victorious Romans, and there were very few Carthaginians left to dispute them. Like many imperialists, the Romans liked to impute the ugliest behaviors to their enemies."
"So you're saying there's no independent evidence that they sacrificed babies to Moloch?"
"Let us rather say that there is ample evidence that whatever they did was ineffective. Which suggests either that they did not sacrifice infants to Moloch, or that they didn't read the owner's manual before firing up the ovens. They wouldn't be the last people to plug something in without understanding how it was supposed to work."
The class laughs at what they think you mean as a joke.
* * * * *
"And how was the filet, Professor."
"Back to your usual standards, Henri," you sigh as you contentedly push the plate away. "Seared with just the right red on the inside and black on the outside, and with just the right breath of rosemary. Your new chef is a keeper."
"Thank you. I think so too."
"And how is Paolo? Did he get his fingers reattached?"
"Yes, but he flinches every time he sees a meat cleaver."
"It's no more than he deserves. He was slacking, Henri, slacking." You return to your book.
* * * * *
So pass the days of Aubrey Blackwell. The days are the worst: dealing with bureaucrats and narrow-minded colleagues, dim-witted students and coeds, and incompetents at their trades. His great respite—which you feel too, given your own needs—is his nightly research, and you feel a feverish excitement as you pore through his library. In his mask you know it intimately, of course, and can lay your hands on exactly what you need at any particular moment; and you have his own prodigious store of knowledge to draw on. But it is more than that.
Blackwell considers himself a fine magician, and he is quite skilled at what he regards as his true calling. But he is slow and methodical, and is blind to things that come to you in a flash. His own memories tell you that certain sigils should be draw up very carefully and slowly, for fear of accident. (He has learned many times in very hard ways just how dangerous these things can be.) But you can dash them off quite easily. Thanks to what he knows, you can read the sigils easily and discern their intents and meanings; but you can also see implications and latent modifications that you feel certain he couldn't. You feel yourself progressing rapidly to his level and beyond as you scribble out notes and ideas, and things that he finds hard—like the molding of icons—fairly fly out from under your fingers. You feel like a master clockmaker who has to work with Tinkertoys, but who given only a little time and the materials could fashion something much more intricate than was dreamed by their designer.
For instance, you are quickly able to discern certain exploitable gaps in some of the notes that Blackwell left behind about the Libras. That cunning book has been constructed so that only the sigils it contains are alive, and copies—even exacting ones—will not allow you to make the devices yourself. But he has left copies around, and you soon master and absorb their details. The golems, for instance, give up their secrets as you study the intricate ring of symbols that craft them from the earth. They are designed to recognize their masters, no matter that their masters are disguised, and you soon see what Blackwell (you are sure) never could: that this provides a mechanism for piercing the illusion created by a mask. You are soon able to craft a custom-sigil of your own—one that is quite alive—that if properly employed can create devices that can reveal its wearer under his disguise. Figuring out how to connect it to a mundane device, to make it actually useful, proves trickier, though.
On the other hand, you have an easier time using a variation on the same device to jerry-rig a better surveillance spell to watch over Lucy.
* * * * *
The test comes about a week after moving into your new life. It is nine o'clock in the morning, and you are in your office when your watch begins to glow warmly, which is the signal that the spy you've set on Lucy has picked up the influence of a nearby golem. You quickly take from your pocket the small silver statue that you constructed as part of the surveillance spell, grasp it, and close your eyes. A ghostly vista opens to you:
To your surprise, you are looking down into the departmental office. Lucy has not been coming to class, but she is there now, with the departmental secretary, the chair, a student who looks like a football player, and another man who looks familiar but who you can't place. The modified spell is telling you that one of them is a golem.
You quickly go down to the hall to the office to look in. Fran, the secretary turns at your entrance. "Ah, here he is now," she says to Lucy. "Saves you a trip."
Lucy turns. She looks a little thinner and less healthy, but her eye is bright, and it holds none of the fear or worry that you last you saw her suffering. She holds out a slip. "I need to withdraw from your class, Professor Blackwell."
"I'm sorry to hear that, my dear," you say with oleaginous insincerity as you take the drop/add slip. "May I inquire why."
"I've been ill."
"This is Lucille Vredenburg, Aubrey," the chair snaps. "You might have read about her."
"Oh! I didn't realize— I'm so sorry, Miss Vredenburg." You sign the slip with a flourish. "I am appalled that the university has not made other arrangement for you."
"I think they have," she says uncertainly. "But this is one of the things I have to do."
You smile and had it back to here. The football player, who has been looking her up and down greedily, mumbles something and gives a similar slip to the chair, who signs it without looking at it.
After the player and Lucy go, the chair gestures to you. "Can I have a word with you in my office, Aubrey?"
"I'll do better and give you a word outside your office. No."
You turn to leave, but the stranger catches your elbow. "Excuse, Professor Blackwell, is it?"
"Yes?"
He holds out his hand. "Jack Freeman. I teach French Lit."
"Oh yes! Now I know where I've seen you."
"I understand you're the one to talk to about the Grail legend."
"Probably. What would you like to know?"
"Hopefully," he says, looking at his watch, "I haven't got time right now to learn everything you can tell me. Can we meet for coffee later this afternoon?"
"Possibly." You exchange cell phone numbers so you can set up a rendezvous later.
After he leaves you ask Fran the name of the male student. She gives it to you: Mitch Farmer.
You now have four suspects to check out. The chair would seem the likeliest to be the golem. Fran, a widower, would be easy to get to. The football player could make himself attractive to Lucy. And the French Lit guy seems to have materialized out of nowhere.  | Members who added to this interactive story also contributed to these: |
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