Chapter Text
An envelope bearing the Magister’s seal represented so much to Varie. A decade of powdering beetle shells, scampering up and down the guild hallways, and thousands upon thousands of careful deliberate brush strokes. A carefully-coordinated invitation to a duke to watch a mural in progress had sealed the letter within. The seal was indented very deeply into gold leaf wax, bearing a winged tower, three stories tall. This was the seal of the Magister of Culture, who outranked the painting guild master, Archimedo.
The letter was Varie’s to open and read, as was the missive within, but Archimedo needed to see it. Varie dressed their best. Even though they’d had to pull some strings behind Archimedo’s back, they still respected him. Varie had their hair cut and braided into a blonde coif that curled around their ears. They wore their only nice suit, the tawny one with an embroidered collar. It was meant to be worn at salons, although Varie rarely made it to them. The painting guild kept up friendly relations with the tailoring guild in the same palace, which was the only way Varie afforded to have their clothing fitted to their twiggy body.
Varie pattered up the marble hallway. The floor was checkerboard brown, ivory, brown under their tapping feet. Groin vaults adorned with vines and birds stretched into a sky that looked real enough, but was nothing more than a guild painting. Child’s play, in Varie’s estimation: They’d been replicating the sky since they were ten years old!
Archimedo’s office lay behind a door that was always half-crooked open. Varie rapped their knuckles against the door, then held one hand in the small of their back. They held their envelope in front.
The door opened. Archimedo’s face loomed over Varie’s head. He was taller and broader than them, fatter too, with a hairstyle primarily composed of frizzy beard. His hazel eyes traveled to the envelope in Varie’s hand. He instantly recognized the Magister’s seal, and assumed correctly the amount of work Varie had put into securing it.
“So,” Archimedo said, and in that moment the sleep bags under his eyes seemed especially pronounced, “You’ve gone and done what I told you not to do.”
“I’m ready for this, Master,” said Varie.
Archimedo sighed and retreated back into his office. “It isn’t possible to be ready. Not for this. Regardless, I have letters to address on your behalf. This conversation isn’t over, but it will not be continued tonight.”
*~*~*
Varie flopped on their bunk in the painting guild’s dormitory. Finally. This would be the last time they looked at the graffiti-covered bricks and endured the hay mattress while guildmates snored. The candlelight flickered in its sconce. Varie closed their eyes and slept, fully-clothed. They had to be ready at first light in the morning. A passing night maid blew out the candle for them. Varie expected to dream of bedding stuffed with down, but instead their dreams centered on feathers and stardust gently falling from the sky.
That morning, Varie skipped up a spiral staircase and alighted a balcony overlooking the city of Plumas. There, Varie beheld Archimedo brooding over the skyline. He clutched a cape about himself in the early morning chill. Varie approached and looked out at the landscape for themself, resting elbows on the rail.
“No one can be ready for this, Varie,” Archimedo repeated from the night before. His eyes scanned the intertwining alleyways of Plumas city, where domestic rocs landed on buildings to interact with human owners, and towers spiked into the distant skyline. Beyond even that, there was a steep cliff and a drop thousands of feet to the ocean — Plumas existed near the cusp of the floating continent itself. The cityfolk tossed their garbage over it, thinking nothing of the countries beneath.
“Archimedo, you know I’m better than everyone you’ve been giving the portraitures,” said Varie.
“Yes. You are my most skilled student,” said Archimedo.
“Then why? Why’m I stuck on the murals team?” said Varie.
“You’re on mural portraiture,” Archimedo reminded them. “That should be honor enough.”
“It’s mural pay,” said Varie.
“If you demonstrated financial need, I could have raised your stipend,” said Archimedo. “There was no reason to engineer this behind my back.”
“What can I say? I want what I’m worth,” said Varie. “And named credit.”
Archimedo paused, considering the townsfolk and their mundane lives below. Procuring food from the markets, maybe enjoying the tunes of a busker, and for a special night out seeing what the local playwright was up to. There were public fountains everywhere and fresh water plumbed through the city. All this, under the protection of the Plumas Guard and their war rocs, sworn to the Avian Empress.
“This is more than about money, skill and reputation,” said Archimedo. “No tutor can accurately convey exactly how the Avias Court operates.”
“How am I supposed to learn how the Court works if I’m not even allowed to participate?!” barked Varie. “You’re always assigning me hours during the salons. I never get to go!”
“The ability to juggle subtle political stressors is, and I must be quite sharp with you, an ability you innately lack, and one I doubt you can pick up,” Archimedo said, and he sagged in a way that Varie knew meant he was nursing some hurt pride. “That said, Varie, my dear student…I would still like to help you, if you would allow me.”
“Thank you, Master,” said Varie, bowing. “That’s all I could ever want, is your help. I’d be miserable if I left you behind.”
“You are going to be miserable anyway,” Archimedo assured them.
*~*~*
The Magister of Culture occupied a great, grim office devoid of sculpture and painting. Paperwork lined it instead, in neat stacks. Artists of every stripe requested permits for this and that: Public murals, sculpted fountains, requests to bump the rival thespian group out of a popular theater. Et cetera.
On paper, the Magister of Culture oversaw every cultural event that went on in Plumas. In practice, he was hopelessly tied to the interior of the Avian Palace, a project that forever expanded alongside the ever-building architecture. He procured documentation, a quill, and a jar of ink for Varie and Archimedo to glance over. He wore clothes of deep gray, which complemented his long black braid of hair. Halfmoon glasses perched under slate eyes.
Varie could hardly believe that this, the Magister of Culture himself, had even seen a play, listened to a melody, or even experienced a bright color. The rumor that addressing this man was like talking to a big, puzzling raven was true, then.
“We thank this protégé for presenting a solution to the portraiture bottleneck, Master Archimedo,” said the Magister of Culture.
Varie felt the vellum hit their hands. For some reason, they didn’t register that they were supposed to do something.
“Please redirect your attention to the document,” said the Magister. His gloved finger tapped the top of the document form.
Varie pressed down the quill as told. Varie realized they’d been gaping, openly, at the size of the Magister’s wings.
Sure, a noble or two would address the general populace of Plumas from a distance, showing off a wingspan that almost looked like a theater prop. Up close for the first time, Varie could see that each feather alone was wide enough to block out their palms. The limbs were very much real and solidly connected to the Magister’s body through holes in the back of his coat. They were covered in black, iridescent feathers, the same color as his hair. Over his head floated an onyx halo.
What had Archimedo said about Varie’s capability for navigating delicate political situations, again? Varien focused on detailing their name, city of birth, and general life history, all with decent calligraphy. Letters weren’t their favorite thing to create with a pen. Varie expected an admonishment for a couple of scratchy letter bowls. The Magister’s face registered no emotion as he read Varie’s writing.
“Hm. Wiloma,” said the Magister.
“A surprising amount of my students hail from Wiloma,” said Archimedo. “Varien arrived at our doorstep with impressive plein air chops. It must be the mountains and fresh air that does it.”
“It’s the site of a deerpox outbreak,” said the Magister.
“Er…It is?” said Archimedo.
“Yes,” said the Magister, and he slid Varie’s documentation into a shelf. His back was to the both of them. “The pact is sealed. Exit.”
Varie could have stared at those wings forever, the way they shimmered.
Archimedo bowed wordlessly. He grabbed Varie’s arm and steered them out of the office into the Magister’s mezzanine. Sculpted hippocampi trumpted water in a fountain there.
*~*~*
Usually, for dinner, Varie grabbed a day-old baguette straight from the kitchen. They carried it in their mouth over to their painting project for the evening.
That night, Varie ate dinner with Archimedo at the top of a tower: Fresh onion soup, roast quail. The meat split from the bone juicily. Varie enjoyed the stained glass windows that cast rainbow light over the food. They only mingled with the glass crafting guild in passing, so it was nice to see a window as a piece of art, rather than a utilitarian portal. Between the both of them, Varie and Archimedo split a bottle of wine.
This was after a day spent browsing rooms normally off-limits. They’d browsed through a hallway of lifelike marble statues.
After dinner, Archimedo led Varie through a garden they had never seen before, one with twisting marble pathways and sculpted hedges. Varie stretched with their arms over their head and counted green moths. They spotted a raven, which cocked its head at them and then flew overhead onto a weathervane.
“The pact is sealed,” said Varie, deepening their voice to mock the Magister’s tone. “Am I gonna be talking to that guy every day? What a wet blanket.”
“No, you still report to me, for the time being,” said Archimedo, “Someday, perhaps, you will deal with the Magister directly, at which point the only protection I can offer is prayer.”
“So, more boring projects,” said Varie.
“Not boring; a matter of life and death,” said Archimedo, “Sometimes a person wants their truth about how they look, not the truth. How well do you think you can manage that? Do you understand what the winged can do to you if you offend?”
“Whatever. I’ll just tell them they’re wrong,” said Varie.
“You cannot do that!”
“I’ll use logic to back up my point,” Varie insisted. The winged elite listened to reason, otherwise they wouldn’t be elite. Right?
“Then I’d best show up to the guillotine early. I wouldn’t want to miss your debut,” replied Archimedo.
The two of them sat on a bench in front of a pond. Lilypads covered its surface. The blooms were still buds. Varie could see bugs skiing and the curve of fish tails in the shadows. Marble columns poked out of the lake. Varie’s gaze trailed up the fronds of a weeping willow, which leaned over a tiny waterfall. The water chattered, but Varie could swear it was speaking, saying something…
“We’d best be going,” said Archimedo abruptly.
“Why?” said Varie.
“Please, Varie, we must go,” said Archimedo.
The conversation floated closer and closer. Archimedo couldn’t tell from which direction it came.
“Quick, through the pond,” he said, and shoved Varie in.
“Archimedooo,” whined Varie. They clutched their doublet, with its embroideries and silky fabric. A blob of algae floated up from the earthy recesses of the pond. Mud sucked at their shoes and minnows fled before them.
“Please, go! No splashing!” hissed Archimedo, lifting his trousers and wincing into the pond after them.
“I thought we were allowed to be here,” Varie whispered, from their hiding place under the draping branches of the willow tree. The waterfall trickled against Varie’s leg. They suffered through every moment of pond gunk seeping into their socks and pants.
“Shh, for God’s sake, shh!” said Archimedo.
The intensity of Archimedo’s caution made froze Varie’s curiosity. Normally, they’d have taken it as an invitation to further their argument. And normally…There wouldn’t be a small parade of people in glittering garments strolling past the pond. Each was crowned with a halo, and each bore a pair of wings that poked through the cloth of their robes.
Among the winged, Varie immediately picked out one who had to be their leader: They were taller than the rest, wrapped completely head-to-toe in trinkets and gold silks, and their halo was a glowing crown. Oddest of all, this winged person concealed their face behind a mask in the shape of an owl’s face. Varie’s heart went as cold as the pondwater when it seemed like the owl’s face looked their way.
Just as easily, the owl-faced man turned back to his compatriots, and the party as a whole shuffled into the other parts of the garden.
“I thought we were allowed to be here,” said Varie, this time sincerely keeping their voice down. Hopefully the sound of the waterfall would keep them hidden.
“Yes, this is where the winged may deign to mingle with us,” said Archimedo, gulping. “You need to learn: They are powerful. They are bored. They only play games they will win. Especially that man, the one with the mask. He answers only to the Empress, and she does not consider complaints from the wingless.”
“Who was that?” Again, just like with the Magister of Culture, Varie felt charmed to see the flash of those feathers again. The owl-masked man’s four wings had shone as though leafed in gold.
“Prince Illumis II.”