David Gaider - The Calling

It turned out he was in luck. There was a small door not ten feet from where he stood, guarded by two solemn templars more engrossed in the First Enchanter’s speech than they were in their duty. Which amazed him, frankly, but to each their own.

Before anyone knew it, he was gone. Duncan smirked with delight as he crept through the shadows deep within the tower. The thing about mages, he noticed, was that they liked to keep their passages nice and dim. Perhaps it leant an austere air to their studies, or perhaps they could only make so many of those strange lamps they dotted around the tower to provide light. Either way, it made sneaking around rather easy.

Those templars who weren’t in the assembly hall didn’t seem all that interested in looking out for people like him, either. They were far more interested in glowering at any younger mages that passed by. He’d seen two, one not much younger than himself, and another a girl who couldn’t have been more than ten years old. They had nervously walked by one of the heavily armored templars and the man had all but spit on them. Both of them had squealed in fear, clutching their leather tomes to their chests as they ran off. The templar had chortled with amusement.

What would it be like, Duncan wondered, to be brought to a place like this? He’d heard that people with magical talent were sought out while they were young, taken from their families and brought to the Circle. There they were trained to control their power or die trying.

Sounded a great deal like the Grey Wardens, now that he thought about it.

Passing quietly through the hall, he boldly crept behind one of the templar guards standing at attention. The man was practically asleep on his feet, Duncan noticed, though he had to wonder what it was that needed to be guarded so badly. Templars were almost everywhere, as were the priests in their red robes. They numbered more than the mages, at least in this part of the tower. Did they fear magic that much?

He’d known someone who could do magic once. A friend that lived on the street as he did, named Luc. Duncan had always admired his knack with picking pockets, and then Duncan saw the trick. Luc would put his hand above the pocket, and what ever was inside would simply leap into his palm. Duncan had confronted him one night and Luc had confessed: He had always been able to do bits of magic.

Luc’s father had been a mage who had come to see his mother at the whore house until she found herself pregnant. Then there was no mage, and his mother had worried constantly that Luc would develop magic of his own. So he’d hidden it from her, and hidden it from others as well. It was a curse to him, despite its uses.

Duncan hadn’t told anyone, but somehow the rumor still got around. Before long, some of the other thieves grew suspicious. If Luc could make things jump into his hand, what else was he capable of? Could he be stealing from them? Perhaps he cast spells to make them forget, or perhaps he was dangerous.

Luc had been furious with Duncan, certain that he was responsible for all the attention. It didn’t matter in the end. The templars came, and when Luc tried to run, they’d struck him down. Killed him in cold blood, right in front of Duncan. Nobody had said anything, of course. Just one more thief rotting in the gutter, and this one an apostate to boot.

Duncan knew where Luc kept his stash, hidden away in the attic of an abandoned chantry. He’d gone to collect it, considering that Luc wasn’t going to need it anymore, and he’d been pleased by the amount of coin there. It was enough to get him through some hard winters and even put a roof over his head, at least for a little while. He’d felt badly about it, even so. Far better for Luc to still be alive, even if that meant being locked up in a tower like this one. One didn’t acquire friends very often where Duncan came from.

He stuck his head into a dim chamber and saw that it was a library of some kind. Rows and rows of dusty books, and tables covered in even more books with candles burned nearly down to nothing. Duncan wasn’t sure what a mage needed to read in order to learn his spells, but apparently it was a lot. There were two mages in there now, older men in their full enchanter robes, poking through various tomes as a templar glared at them next to a roaring fireplace.

Good thing books weren’t worth stealing, so there was no need to go in.

He continued forward, avoiding the large chambers in the central part of the tower as that was where most of the people seemed to accumulate. He probably needn’t have worried. Most everyone was down on the main floor with the King and the Grey Wardens, watching what ever formalities the First Enchanter had cooked up to honor them. It had made it a simple matter to slip away. With any luck, the long-winded Orlesian would still be talking long after Duncan found his way back … preferably with his pockets full of what ever trinkets he could find up here.

It occurred to him that it was very possible he could get into trouble again. The last time that had happened, he had ended up the serving boy of the King, after all. Well , he thought, I’ll just have to make sure I don’t get caught this time, won’t I?

He ducked into an alcove and hid behind the statue there as the sound of footsteps approached. An elven man in grey robes passed by, this one with the same serene expression that he had seen on others similarly dressed. Fiona had called them “the Tranquil” with a fair amount of distaste. He had asked what that meant, but she refused to say. He knew that they seemed to act as the keepers of the tower, seeing to the day-to-day running of things and acting as the Circle’s merchants to the outside world. Beyond that, he had no idea why Fiona would shudder whenever she saw them. Their emotionless manner was unnerving; perhaps that was it?

As the man glided past, Duncan reached out and snatched a ring of keys that he spotted on the man’s belt. It was a simple matter to slip them free of their hook with nary a jingle. Duncan smiled to himself as the fellow kept on going, completely oblivious to his loss.

The keys were large and iron, the sort that you used in padlocks and gates. Or chests. That thought ran enticingly around Duncan’s mind as he crept out from behind the statue. Where would these keys fit? Would the Tranquil get to wherever he was going and suddenly discover them gone? Would he assume he lost them and retrace his steps, or raise the alarm? Duncan needed to work quickly.

It took some time to move through the next several levels of the tower. He needed to scamper back into the shadows every time some templar roamed his way, and while he poked his head into just about every room he came across, there was always either someone inside or it was just another boring storage room or something filled with even more books. Everyone was so quiet, as well, moving around with a hush that seemed completely unnatural. It served to make Duncan nervous. Not that sneaking around the home of magic-wielders wasn’t call for a bit of sweat as it was.

There were small side stairs that led up, allowing him to avoid the central staircase, and he noticed that as he moved up in the tower it became quieter and more cramped. The halls were narrow now, and he couldn’t even hear the distant thumps of armored templars walking the halls. Good. That would make things easier.

The rooms up here appeared to be mostly dormitories, each with a set of beds and large chests. They ranged from the chaotic to the neat and orderly. Was this where the apprentices slept? That made him a bit dubious about his chances of success. It was unlikely that apprentices would own anything of interest, surely.

But then he reached a darker part of the halls, where the doors were all locked. The quarters of the senior mages, then? That held more promise.