Chapter 2 – Birds of a Feather Flock Together
As soon as Emryr entered the hall, he understood the jokes about Albion being the final resting place of the Crown's wealth.
The hall was cathedral-sized, adorned with ornate chandeliers hanging from above. Stained-glass windows depicted the ancestors of Britain's great ducal families. Copper pipes lined the walls, hissing steam at regular intervals. Rows of seats, arranged before an elevated pulpit, looked more comfortable than his own bed back home.
The grandeur was almost insulting.
Once he finished surveying the architecture, his attention shifted to the people.
They were different. Very different.
Each had their own eccentricity, some dressed extravagantly, others subtly. Some remained quiet, others made sure everyone knew they were there.
A few wore three layers of magical protection without even trying to hide it. Others had unstable enchantments dangling from their necks like fashionable amulets.
— "Perfectly safe. Nothing like a badly calibrated magical amplifier right next to your jugular" Emryr thought dryly.
Some students proudly pointed toward their noble ancestors in the windows, boasting about lineage. Others, more pragmatic, understood that bloodlines didn't make anyone great. Trace any king's family tree far enough and you'd eventually find a peasant with ambition.
He watched in silence, arms crossed, eyes drifting upward to the stained-glass windows.
And then something changed.
One of the windows flickered, almost imperceptibly. As if the light behind it had faltered.
Emryr narrowed his eyes.
The stained-glass window trembled slightly, as if a shadow passed outside, briefly blocking the light. distant sound of claws against stone reverberated.
The silhouette reflected in the stained glass was tall and misshapen. Not human. Something like an elongated reptile, its shape blurred, as if seen through frosted glass.
Two faint blue lights stared back at him.
It was looking at him.
The world dulled. Sound vanished. Motion slowed. Only that presence remained.
He stepped forward, weaving through the crowd, gaze fixed on the window. He didn't blink.
But before he could get closer, silence swept across the hall.
It fell all at once, like the lid of a coffin.
Then a voice rang out, clear, and thoroughly ceremonial:
— "Salute the Archduke Amberth Ambrosius, Chancellor and Pontifex of the Imperial Academy of Arcane Arts of Albion."
Everyone turned.
And Amberth entered.
He walked slowly, flanked by the eight lords of Albion. His robes were grey, interwoven with ribbons of the same hue. In one hand, he held a tall staff crowned with an armillary sphere, its concentric rings rotating silently around a glowing blue vitreum core.
His hair was long and white. Round vitreum glasses hid his eyes. His face was old, worn out by time.
There was something unreal about him. He walked like he knew the end of all things.
He moved down the central aisle with steps too precise. Too rehearsed. The stained-glass light shifted subtly as he passed, and a chill ran down a few spines.
Emryr remained where he was, still staring at the window.
The silhouette had faded. The glow had dimmed. But the feeling remained, like static crawling along the base of his neck.
A shape that shouldn't exist. Yet did.
And someone noticed.
— "Is there something fascinating in the windows, boy?"
The voice was sharp. Not loud, but deliberate.
Emryr turned his head slowly. One of the lords had stopped mid-step, eyes locked on him, curious in the most dangerous way.
Emryr blinked once, then looked back at the glass.
— "Not anymore..."
The lord took a step forward.
But Amberth, without looking, raised one hand.
That was all.
The lorde froze mid-stride and said nothing more.
Emryr's eyes flicked briefly to the figures walking behind amberth, eight in total. The lords of Albion. Each one known across the Empire. Each one dangerous in a very specific way.
And there he was.
Lord Doe.
Today, he wore the face of a man in his forties—long black hair tied back, eyes sharp and blue as frost. His coat, though elegant, was subdued compared to the others. But even masked in that form, Emryr recognized him instantly.
Emryr gave him a small, apologetic smile.
Doe stared for half a second too long, then exhaled, just a faint huff of air through his nose.
Then he turned back to the front, as if nothing had happened.
Amberth continued to the pulpit without missing a step. He moved like someone following a script he'd written centuries ago. The rings of his staff turned silently, casting soft reflections across the polished floor.
He climbed the steps. Turned. And began.
— "Good morning. And welcome."
His voice was calm. Unhurried. Every word delivered with clinical precision, not a single note out of place. Measured pauses. Clean diction. Like someone quoting himself from a time before the audience was born.
— "On behalf of Her Majesty, I commend your entrance into Albion. For some, this marks a beginning. For others, a test. For all… a point of no return."
No shift in tone. No pretense of warmth.
Just inevitability.
Emryr glanced back at the stained glass one last time.
Empty.
Whatever had been there was gone.
But the weight hadn't lifted.
Then, beside him, a voice.
— "Entropy is accelerating again."
He turned.
A girl. Silver hair that shimmered under the filtered light. Her eyes, blue like his. But clearer. Sharper.
She wasn't looking at him. Only at Amberth.
— "Don't worry," she said softly. "Some forgotten things prefer to stay forgotten. I'll accept whichever path you choose."
Before he could respond, she was gone—swallowed by the crowd like mist.
No one else seemed to have noticed her. Or if they had, they pretended not to.
He glanced around, as if searching for a voice he'd already heard. An echo. Something from a future that hadn't happened yet, or a past he wasn't supposed to remember.
He stood quietly as the speech droned on.
Emryr stopped listening.
All he could think about was that shape behind the glass.
And the fact that it had waited.
Not just to be seen.
But to see him.
Amberth eventually concluded:
— "I trust everyone has chosen their classes. Tomorrow, report to your assigned rooms. Your accommodations have been arranged. That's all."
Without further ceremony, he and the lords turned and exited through the same door.
The hall exhaled. The students scattered.
Emryr searched for his teacher, but didn't find him.
— "Did he seriously abandon me just because he's mad?" he muttered.
But the worry hadn't passed.
He remembered exactly what he saw.
And he picked up his pace toward Lord Doe's manor.
Naturally, his bad luck struck again.
Rain started to fall.
— "Great."
He sighed and looked at the grey sky before whispering:
— "Inertia negation."
Four faint blue lights flickered in front of him. With a quick mental calculation, Emryr shaped the spell. The raindrops slowed as they neared him, suspended like glass pearls before they could reach his coat.
As he walked, the feeling returned.
Something was watching him.
Not from memory. Not from mind.
From a place deeper than that. The kind of recognition the soul feels before the brain catches up.
He followed the path to Doe's manor, a three-story Gothic building tucked within the grounds of Westminster Palace. It rose beside a quiet lake and a modest garden of trees that definitely hadn't grown there by accident.
The only sound was the rain tapping gently against the water.
And then something else.
A small girl stood by the entrance, holding a red umbrella.
White hair. Pale skin.
She stared at him for a second, then waved. And ran inside.
The door remained slightly open behind her.
Rain kept falling. The clouds weighed heavier.
And Emryr realized, with slight discomfort, that he was completely alone.
He walked forward, opened the door, and stepped inside.
The interior was warm. Victorian. Elegant. Designed to be comfortable without ever quite letting you forget who owned it.
Two staircases curved upward from the central hall. To the left, a large door remained shut. To the right, another hung slightly ajar.
He didn't hesitate long.
And stepped through.