Hope

The walk from Old Ibis’ office had been silent and relatively awkward. Desir wore a slight frown as he led Irwyn out of the labyrinthine safehouse without speaking any words at all. Even at the entrance gate, the very same guards Desir had chatted with lightly when entering, merely received a polite nod from the blue-eyed man.

Soon enough they were at the sewers and Irwyn had to try hard not to retch. How was the smell even worse than he remembered? Desir did not seem as affected, though he was frowning as he waited for Irwyn to somehow regain his composure.

“So, an Aspect damned Fowl,” the Desir growled eventually, staring Irwyn down.

“In hindsight, I should have probably said something,” Irwyn nodded. “I apologize, though in my defense, I have been mostly improvising this whole thing. I am unused to… such introductions I suppose.”

“So you became a Fowl without much talking, huh?” Desir scoffed, visibly annoyed.

“Not as such, however, I have essentially inherited the contacts I had interacted with in my hometown. Making completely new acquaintances in an unfamiliar environment is not something I have had to do before my departure,” Irwyn explained. “The Fowlship itself had been a frankly a last minute thing, sprung onto me by my mentor as I was forced to flee after a certain… incident.”

“So, you are saying that your mentor just declared you a Young Fowl on the spot,” Desir was staring even harder.

“I suppose he had planned it at least a bit in advance,” Irwyn nodded, leaving the part where that had probably been less than a day, though Desir’s expression gave him a certain hint. “Is that not how it is usually done?”

“Under normal circumstances, it’s supposed to take 3 Old ones just to make the recommendation, then it still requires a show of exceptionality,” Desir was frowning. “Though I suppose I have even fewer doubts about your capacity as a mage after today.”

“I am not sure what means or connections my mentor had used,” Irwyn shrugged. “The whole thing had been done with haste and the culture around Fowls was essentially the opposite of Abonisle where I come from. More along the line of respected specialists than leaders.”

“It’s not so easy to just proclaim someone even a Young Fowl,” Desir still stared at him after a moment. “You wouldn’t care to tell me who this mentor of yours was, would you?”

“Perhaps…” Irwyn thought about it. It was not a large secret and he had to admit he had been getting… curious about the seemingly kind old man he had known for as long as he could remember. In the end, he was willing to let Desir know in order to salvage his earlier blunder, “We have only ever called my mentor the Old Crow.”

“Old Crow…” Desir seemed to go into thought, still leading the way seemingly by muscle memory, before his eyes widened ever so slightly in recognition. “I only know about one Old Crow and as far as I have heard everyone thinks he died in the Lich war 16 or so years ago.”

“I suppose no one informed him,” Irwyn grinned.

“I don’t know much, he is from before my time,” Desir sighed, ignoring Irwyn’s jest. “But I could probably find out a lot more. I assume that is why you told me?”

“I will not say that I am not curious,” Irwyn shrugged. “However, consider this more of me setting things straight. Hiding the Fowl business was rude on my part, whether it was meant to be or not, and sating your own curiosity is a better apology than just empty words.”

Of course, it was not just sentiment that drove Irwyn to quickly mend the cracks in the relatively young bond he had formed with Desir. Although Irwyn did not actually really understand what Desir was capable of, he had clearly seen today that the Old Ibis was putting a lot of trust into the blue-eyed man. There were many small clues, like the guards at the front not bothering with any significant inspection, that his judgement was valued enough that he could just bring some unknown mage basically straight to the box without much fuss from, or other such hints. And Irwyn did not believe Old Ibis would keep someone unreliably or incompetent so close to his chest. Desir could also solve Irwyn’s biggest annoyance; namely, communication. Irwyn could read faces quite well and knew some great conversational tactics and basics of manipulation but talking with people was often… tiring. Especially with unimportant nobodies or small-time clients he would likely never meet again. Particularly if he had to do that several times in a single day. The fact that he had already forgotten the names of everyone he had met in the hideout except the Fowl themselves, who did not actually reveal any name besides their title, was a great example of that.

If, for example, Desir was the intermediary between him and Old Ibis’ faction, it would get most of the conversations involved with larger jobs out of Irwyn’s hair. He would be able to just ask Desir about most things in such case. There was, of course, a bit of personal bias as well. Going through a demon incursion alongside the man went a long way towards making him far more worthy of trust.

Not necessarily trustworthy, because that implied that such a person would do right by everyone they worked with. Few of such people dwelled in the underbelly of society thought. No, it was all about personal trust. The odds that one would betray the other. And they obviously both understood that much considering how long they had spent in this line of work.

“I will receive it in the spirit it was given,” Desir nodded, seemingly a lot friendlier again. “Though I am absolutely going to charge you for sharing anything I find.”

“I would be insulted if you did not at least try,” Irwyn laughed lightly as they trod further through the sever walkways. The putrid stench was no easier to bear.

After leaving the sewers through the very same establishment they had entered by in the morning, Irwyn had another errand to run. He no longer wore his mask as he walked down the street glancing at the pouches attached to his abdomen. There were several of them and made him look like quite the target. Which was why he visibly enveloped them in a film of half-transparent flames.

That being said, protection against other thieves was not the only reason he had put that particular barrier in place. Rather, it was something that bugged him about the conversation with Old Ibis. The man had not tried to deny or hide that the original spacial pouch he had offered had probably been tampered with. In fact, Irwyn was quite sure that the old Fowl went out of their way to let Irwyn see a twitch in their expression at the time he was supposedly caught. Like they had a game at play even after that first trick.

And from that, it all looked like a rather classical setup. All one needs to do is admit to being caught in a lie and congratulate them on beating you, because then the target won’t notice the second lie skulking a single step later. It played on pride and self-satisfaction of not being fooled, as far as Irwyn understood it. After all, a person that had just seen through deception and was led to believe that they essentially won one over the other person would generally feel good about that. And people feeling good were less on guard.

Which was why Irwyn was not letting those pouches, which were conveniently already present in Old Ibis’ office, touch his skin nor clothes any more than they had in the hideout. He could not feel any magic from them but he had learned first-hand that thinking it was any guarantee would be pure hubris. Rather, it was quite possible that Old Ibis would count on Irwyn assuming that since he could not feel any magic there was none. At least even if the pouches were enchanted in some way, they were not something specialized just for Irwyn. There had been no time for the Ibis to do that. Perhaps it was just paranoia speaking but it cost Irwyn nothing to be extra cautious when dealing with old and experienced schemers.

Of course, he could not just carry his earnings in his hands or drag around the potentially compromised pouches forever, which was why he was heading toward his next destination. Ironically, it was a place he had never visited, not even back in Ebon Respite. The kind where the security was always too tight for them to attempt working there, nor could he really visit on his own business in the past.

In particular, Irwyn was headed for a bank. Well, the bank.

There was only a single bank operating in the duchy of Black. It was guaranteed, owned, and backed by House Blackburg. To no one’s surprise, it was called the Bank of Black. Not that there was much need for any precise naming considering there were no other banks to mistake it for. It was not really a place that most people ever had the opportunity to visit. Though some services were offered, most of the bank’s functions were institutional: Regulating currency, dealing with any counterfeit operations, setting the worst and best conditions legal loaners could offer as well as countless other things Irwyn could not quite remember from the top of his head, almost all dealing with monetary regulation or enforcement.

The offered services themselves were not cheap, to the point that most smaller merchants could not afford them, though that was all second hand information. Even if Irwyn ever had been inclined to use a bank, it had never been possible in the past. There had been a small branch in Ebon Respite, though no one he knew went anywhere near a building quite literally owned by house Blackburg. There was an even bigger problem than that though: That of identity. As the singular institution in banking across the entire Duchy, moreover, one that did not necessarily exists to make a profit, they could be very picky with their clientele. Extensive background checks were par for the course from what Irwyn had overheard in the past; particularly problematic for an orphan with no actual legal identity.

But that was no longer the case. Irwyn now had the license Elizabeth had given him, registering him as a proper mage in a way that was supposedly borderline impossible to feign. Moreover, it marked him as someone associated with an influential patron. And if his reasonably confident guess about Elizabeth’s background was accurate then the bank staff would have extra incentive to not bother someone sponsored by a branch of House Blackburg. He was confident that he could at the very least be able to create an account and deposit his newfound wealth without having to undergo questioning about his background or the source of money. Irwyn also hoped to possibly get better rates than some wealthy merchant would.

Connections in high places were truly a wondrous privilege, even if the connections, or indeed the exact high place, were rather vague in nature.

Thankfully, the suit did not seem to had caught any of that truly horrid sewer smell so Irwyn could head straight there. He had figured out where the place would be in advance in his latest acquired book: The extensive map of Abonisle. Indeed, a damn book, because the city had enough layers and intricacies that it required several dozen pages just to cover most of it in a legible way. The bank actually had several branches across the city, concentrating mostly in the centralmost districts with the main office actually residing in one of the three Spires that towered over the city, though access to the spires was restricted according to the map; however, it did not mention how exactly. Irwyn decided to go for a branch that was not too large while also being reasonably close to where he was currently accommodated, just in case this required another visit in the nearby future.

The building itself was at the topmost floor, though a decent distance further in which meant it was actually two whole floors above Elizabeth’s favorite restaurant. Irwyn was even pretty sure he could actually see its roof from the vantage of the railings at the edge of the floor, though there was obviously no sign of the noble girl.

That being said, there were certain similarities upon entry. Mainly the extensive warding and someone greeting him a moment after he walked through the front door. The process went far smoother than he had expected. As things were, the first thing the greeter wanted was to confirm Irwyn’s identity, assumedly as he was a new face here. Irwyn, of course, gave his license which seemed to immediately go a long way towards making him welcome. The greeter, as they were not a mage, had used some kind of adjacent device below their desk to confirm the license’s validity, seemed rather wide-eyed at whatever information they got from it, and proceeded to immediately arrange Irwyn a meeting with a banker.

As the bank was an establishment with limited clientele, there was not much of a public area beyond the entry room occupied by the greeter. Even then, Irwyn thought they might have other areas to do basic identity checks in case multiple people arrived in short order. This was clearly a high-class place after all. He was not, however, too familiar with the whole arrangement nor did he care to inquire into it further.

Since there was no public space, any dealings were done in private offices. The one Irwyn was brought to was spacious and surprisingly cozy for a place expressly intended for business with the banker already waiting for him. And the whole arrangement ended up being far simpler than Irwyn had expected.

Whether it was the guarantor of his mage license or just the standard service, Irwyn was set up with an account within minutes by the excessively polite banker. He would pay a small management fee monthly while the bank guaranteed to maintain his balance in ‘perpetuity’ as long as there was enough money to take said fee from. Convenient if he had to vanish again for a few years, Irwyn supposed. By the dawn of the following day, he would be able to withdraw from any other branch in Abonisle up to half of his total deposit at a time, only needing to present his license which was considered the most secure identification available. The banker also offered that the bank could get him in contact with lawyers or many other specialists if need be. Irwyn supposed that, unlike Ebon Respite, Abonisle’s courts were not basically a complete sham.

Though at the end of the pitch he was politely but sternly warned against trying to overdraw his funds at several locations at once, through the means of ‘teleportation or other translocation’ as the House Blackburg would ‘protect the stability and reliability of their institutions by whatever means deemed necessary’. Well, as someone uncomfortably familiar with those means, Irwyn was certainly disinclined to tempt such threats. He assumed that meant that either there was some delay between the branches exchanging information about balance changes or they just wanted wannabe thieves to think that. Irwyn was not familiar with the complexities of magical communications and the possible security issues involved.

He just happily deposited his recent earning and was, in fact, not questioned in any way about where he got his hand on such funds. Truly, he could not find enough praise for privileges and preferential treatment now that he was on the positive side of them for once.

He left the bank with no incident but with new options for the future. His contact with the underworld was going to be good enough for a while and the funds would last him for months in his current lifestyle of getting invited to most lunches by a noble girl who did not seem to quite understand why anyone would even need to think about bills.

Things were looking up.

Two more weeks passed with no further contact from the Guild. Not that Irwyn minded as his growth continued quite quickly. Dervish had seemingly no problem devoting every day of the week to intense training. It was actually starting to make even Irwyn notice some side effects. For one, he had gotten so used to not eating lunch that on the single day off they had taken, he forgot to eat anything until dinner, even his body was starting to get used to a different cycle even on days the miraculous effects of that training hall did not restrain the need for nourishment.

But that was a small price to pay for what he was gaining. The improvements were undeniable, even if they had started to slow down over the last while. There were no massive qualitative leaps like in the first week but it was still far faster progress than Irwyn had ever experienced back in Ebon Respite. Part of that was Dervish’s advice but he believed it was mostly the complete lack of distractions. He did not need to worry about… well anything besides personal improvement.

And he did not lack for motivation. Besides the exhilaration of improving in magic, his daily spars with Elizabeth continued. He had not quite defeated her fair and square yet, however, he had managed to score a victory through attrition. The truth was that his Vessel contained a lot more mana than Elizabeth’s which allowed him to close the gap if he could grasp the initiative; he could afford to outspend her two to one and still eventually emerge the victor when she completely exhausted herself. But that was not how he wanted to win. Sure, he would not shy away from using the extra power he had available but he did not even try to win again through his reserves alone, instead attempting to outsmart or overpower the noble girl. Which had mixed results at best. Even though he was getting closer, the gap in battle experience was years wide.

A single time the previous day Irwyn had managed to achieve a draw with mutual destruction, much to Dervish’s disapproval of ‘suicidal tactics’, but even with his advantages Irwyn could not truly outperform Elizabeth in battle. But he was convinced that it was only a matter of time before he could at the very least start winning a good chunk of their matches.

A big help to that was the latest thing Dervish was helping him figure out. The week prior Dervish was finally satisfied with the test and concluded that Irwyn’s Reservoir did not suffer from any deficiency that people with overly large Vessels commonly did. Therefore, he was helping Irwyn develop spells that could actually use that amount of mana. And by ‘help’, Irwyn meant that Dervish acquired a few specialized books for him and then tossed Irwyn into the proverbial ocean to either sink or swim, at most giving him the occasional advice so that Irwyn would not run into any hidden reefs in that analogy.

And crafting a proper spell, incantation and all, from scratch was certainly widening Irwyn’s horizons. One of the things that actually mattered was the complete incantation. Even if he used just a shortened chant later on, the full words of the spell as he knew them actually affected even that, though to a lesser degree. He had been testing several options which Dervish had approved as ‘unpolished but safe to use’ which Irwyn kept improving basically every evening before going to sleep. He was quite looking forward to doing that in an hour or two.

At the moment though, they were sitting in that private restaurant room Elizabeth seemed to always insist on, enjoying a ‘mundane’ meal. In fact, Irwyn was no longer the only one enjoying the non-magical cooking as Elizabeth seemed to have gotten over her original distaste for regular food. In fact, she had not so much as suggested the so-called attuned cuisine since the first week of their meeting, which Irwyn had mixed feelings about. Although it was quite wondrous, he was still weary of possible addiction or at least ruining the taste of other food through prolonged consumption. Irwyn had no guarantee he would continue to have access to such a luxury after all.

“Thank you for the meal,” Irwyn insisted on thanking her. “I will see you tomorrow.”

“Goodnight,” Elizabeth nodded as Irwyn got up from his chair. Just in time to catch a glimpse of something in the window. It was a truly a great view: From the top floor at the very edge of the inner districts he could see all the way to the abyssal lake around the city and even beyond, the sun nearing the end of its arc across the sky. Which was when he caught a glimpse of something else glowing. Something big. Before he could focus and give his mind enough time to process what that actually was, the air cracked, webbing like that of shattering glass rising above the buildings for a split second before it mended itself.

Though the event ended up leaving behind a crater, clearly visible even from their vantage.

There had been no boom, shaking of the ground, or burst of magic to be felt, though Irwyn was not sure whether that was because of the distance, actual lack of any quaking, a feature of the architecture, or just the heavy enchantments surrounding the restaurant itself. What he did know was that he and Elizabeth were now standing beside him, staring at the large pit near the edge of the city where several buildings used to stand.

“Well, that looks bad,” Irwyn sighed as he glanced over at Elizabeth. And to his surprise, for the first time, since they had met, he thought that she seemed genuinely furious.