Hi there! Artemis is a very slow fandom it seems, and I've entered it very late in the game. I got the books only about three months ago and have loved every moment!
I am legally blind, so typos are a huge issue, as well as formatting. Seeking a beta reader to help clear these up.
Lastly, please let me know how I'm doing! I love feedback, especially since comedy and Artemis are very out of my element. If you look at my history, I tend to stick to one shots (or anthologies of one shots), having written only one longer story that's not an anthology, and that's for Danganronpa. If you're here wondering when the next Who We Were chapter's coming out, don't worry, I'm working on it too, but I just needed a break from murder. :D
Last, thank you Fowl Fox for the first review on FF! I post on both FF and on AO3, but I promise to reply in the prefaces for both. :D
"You can come back in, Mother, I am decent."
Quietly, Angeline creaked Artemis's bedroom door open. There was his son, about two thirds his height, in polished shoes and slacks, a button down with gold clasps, and a light emerald green cloak.
And pointed ears.
Angeline knelt down to her son's height. "No blue hair? Green eyes?" she joked.
"I'm going to get proper identification, including a Haven passport," he replied. "No."
Angeline brushed her son's hair aside, looking at his ears. "Some part of me thought you'd just be shorter. My son's a fairy," she said, more to check her own sanity than address the rest of the room. "I'm assuming Butler isn't going with you?"
"He's come down to Haven before," Holly said. "Though at his height even things made for demons are too small for him."
Angeline nodded. "You can't shrink him?"
N'1 looked at Holly. "It's a rune, it's safe for humans," he hissed at her in Gnomish.
"Tell Butler that and he'll always want to shadow Artemis," Holly replied.
"Is that a problem?" Artemis asked in English to loop his mother into the conversation.
"Butler, no. Getting your whole family involved, yes. Loose lips sink ships, isn't that a human saying?"
Angeline looked between her two guests. "Shall I leave you?" she asked. She sounded a little hurt, like she was getting shut out of yet another part of her son's life.
To be fair to her, she was.
"Look, Holly, Artemis didn't even have his family present for his first Ritual," N'1 said in Gnomish.
"We were there. Butler was there."
"Hiding. Like he didn't belong."
"Aurgh!" Holly cried in frustration, before addressing Mrs. Fowl.
"Ma'am, I apologize for keeping you out of what we are saying. Yes, we can shrink humans, safely. However, using most magic willy-nilly on humans has bad long term effects. Not the 'turn into an elf' kind, the 'inoperable cancer' variety."
Angeline swallowed hard, understanding.
"Ma'am, we will keep you informed and in the loop where it's feasible. Please understand when we shut you out it's not of any dislike of you and yours. Keeping up the masquerade isn't merely to be a jerk to humans."
"I'm not offended, Holly," Angeline said with a light smile. "From what Artie's told me you're a good, trustworthy woman."
"Coming from him that's saying something. Can you summon Butler here so we can ask him to accompany? Otherwise, we will be back by tomorrow. We might be done today, but there's a saying that the only thing slower than fairy bureaucracy is a gnome bureaucrat."
Angeline smiled genuinely at that. "Some things are the same everywhere. I'll be back with him."
"Oh," N'1 piped out as Angeline went for the door. "Extremely sorry to trouble, but I'll also need some soy sauce to shrink Butler as well."
"Soy sauce. Butler. Can do," Angeline said with a smile. "Lord knows how soy sauce magic works."
Butler unsurprisingly demanded to join them, and everyone watched in a circle as N'1 carefully drew out a new rune for the taller man.
Angeline sat on Artemis's floor with interest, having sicced her twins on their father. It would do the man some good.
Butler changed into a bathrobe, shifting nervously as he looked down at Artemis. "You're not making me as short as him, are you?"
"Well, I'm not making you demon sized," N'1 said, absentmindedly as he worked. "1.3 meters acceptable?"
Butler looked at his charge. "Enough."
N'1 finished the paper rune and blew gently to dry the soy sauce 'ink'. "Bend down, I'll put it on your shoulder blade."
"Where's yours, Artie?" Angeline asked.
"Foot," Artemis said simply. "I applied it myself. Next I have to learn to make my own."
The room rocked from a loud crack as air filled the vacuum where Butler's body had just occupied. The bathrobe crumpled, and Butler's head, identical but just over half the size, poked out.
Angeline noted Butler didn't have elf ears.
Her son did though.
"Think everything's in place," he commented gruffly.
"I have extra robes in our shuttle, I'll be right back," N'1 commented. "They might be a hair oversized, but Artemis's clothes won't fit."
"Clothes too big for me?" Butler chuckled. "That's a first."
"I'll call you from a secure line when I arrive, Mother, please don't worry," Artemis said sternly, as Butler adjusted his demon warlock attire, still unused to the almost dress-like heavy pineapple-top vegan leather robes, the tail-flaps tied shut with silver cord.
"Chop-chop, we're burning moonlight, boys," Holly chided. "Put the rune paper somewhere safe. Here, don't carry it with you."
"Where's yours, Artemis?" Butler asked.
"Bathroom drawer, between the hand towels," he answered in Gnomish. "Sorry Mother, if that paper is damaged we've got problems," he added in English.
"Offense taken, but understood," she said, mussing Artemis's sharp black hair. "This had better not take three years, you hear me?"
"I'm just going to the customs office," Artemis pouted.
"And my demand becomes even more relevant," Angeline replied.
"Do you have anyone in your family who isn't a smartass?" Holly asked.
"There's a feral cat on the grounds," Artemis replied, after a pause to think.
"Point still stands," Holly said, opening the sliding window to the balcony. "That tom pissed on my wings last time. On purpose."
The ride down was calm, and extremely uneventful. Unnervingly so. "Customs office, bank, talk to Foaly, and depending on the time, take you clothes shopping. I have a feeling you'll be staying overday, either way."
"That reminds me, what do I owe you for what you've already provided?"
"Commander Kelp took care of it," Holly said, distracted as she dipped the pod through a tunnel, signaling to the switchboard stations. "Bah, we have to wait our turn. LEP vehicle priority."
Three polished pods flung down the connecting tunnel, while Holly watched her comms board. "Cleared. I can't remember the last time I've had to wait." Her pod lurched as Holly pushed the throttle back to life, sending them down into Haven.
"You need a birth certificate, proof of residency, and sixteen points of authenticity based on this chart," the gnome drolled to Holly. "If you can't present them to me you need to fill out sections 6a, 9ii, and 13b, and go into that line," he added, pointing at a line twice as long as the one on which they'd waited.
"Sir, we can't present them because they do not exist," she said, barely containing her rage.
"Correct, and those forms give us permission to reprint your files from the registry if they've been lost, stolen, or destroyed by fire. If you lost said paperwork from a landslide, you need to also fill out form-"
"You don't understand. They never existed. Artemis and Butler weren't born in a fairy hospital," Holly said through ground teeth. It had already been six hours and they were wasting moonlight.
"Then their dullah or midwife would have processed them, you'll need form-"
"Sir, there is no paperwork because they were born on. the. surface."
"Holly, excuse me," Artemis said politely, touching her arm. She almost slapped him in knee-jerk frustration but slid aside.
"Now good sir. There is absolutely no possible way paperwork for myself and Butler exist. At all. At least not in Gnomish."
"But your-"
"Thisis my birth certificate," Artemis said, slamming down a card. "And I would suggest you read the name both quietly and carefully."
The elder gnome took the small ragged piece of cardstock in a plastic sleeve, pulled out a pair of glasses, and mouthed the words carefully.
"This isn't in Gnomish."
"Read," Artemis said, darkly.
A few terse moments of silence followed.
"Let me get my supervisor."
"Apologies for the confusion, Mister Fowl," said the sprite in charge of the district branch. He adjusted his wings in a specially made chair with slats for them to rest on while seated. The sprite thumbed through a data pad of documentation. "Anything you do have from the surface will be scanned for the master file. Passports, birth certificates, licenses."
Artemis handed over his birth certificate, passport, and provisional flight license.
"Small craft?" The sprite asked incredulously.
"Non fairy commercial small aircraft," Artemis replied with a shrug. "Though I am always interested in picking up new skills. Such as wing flight."
The sprite nervously shifted his wings in his chair, before remembering that other fairies could buy electronic ones in shops.
"That's passing a certain number of training hours, by a school or certified instructor, followed by both a written and practical exam," he said, absentmindedly as he scanned Artemis's paperwork, signaling to Butler to hand his over when done. "About one to three months, depending on if you have a private tutor versus after-work lessons."
Artemis narrowed his eyes and smirked at Holly.
Artemis looked at his new ID card. He didn't realize that holographic literally meant a projection in addition to a flat card with a shining watermark. There was his mildly annoyed mugshot, elf ears and all, in both two and three dimensions.
"Why didn't you let your mother see you shrink?" Holly asked as they walked to her vehicle for their next stop of the night. "You could have worn a bathrobe like Butler did."
Artemis just yanked at the ear. "I am trying to keep my human-ness and elf-ness as two separate entities."
"You're worried that your mother and father might think you're faking, and we're giving you power," Holly said, looking at him. "Especially now that they've seen Butler shrink without sprouting fairy ears."
"When did you start thinking like me?" Artemis asked, quietly.
"I just thought of the most nit-picky scenario. Nobody is going to triple bluff, except maybe Koboi."
"My father would," Artemis replied sourly.
"That reminds me… it almost seemed like he understood our chat on your balcony."
"Either that, or he at least knew fairy law," Butler agreed, having been briefed on Artemis Sr. on the ride down to Haven.
Artemis only nodded, deep in thought.
"The short answer is that I want my parents to see this," he said, yanking on the prosthetic, "as a separate thing from being a human. They're not supposed to be involved with your world."
"And you are?" Holly asked, eyebrow raised.
"Perhaps I dragged myself into this," Artemis admitted.
"So did your farther, from the sounds of it. Now come on, we can't make Quan wait any longer than he has."
Quan and the other demons had only been in Haven for a scant three months, but the adult imp's office in Warlock College already looked extremely lived in. To his credit, he'd scavenged everything he could from Hybras before the city sank, so the ten thousand year old troll skull and bloodletting paraphernalia had probably been arranged in some old office of his ages ago.
Artemis winced at seeing much of the ancient weaponry, and Quan, on a back-less plush office chair noticed. "Just for historical purposes, my friend. You've noticed how we handle runic magic now."
Artemis nodded, relieved.
"N'1 told me your first Ritual went smoothly."
"If convulsing on the dirt counts."
Quan nodded eagerly. "That will happen the first few times. Your body is just adjusting to the energy differential."
He hopped off his chair, looming over Artemis, and slightly above Butler. When Artemis was his usual height, the demons, even their tallest, were sort of pudgy reptiles at best and small armored alligators at worst.
Now he saw them as an elf did and it was genuinely terrifying. If he didn't know the demons personally he would have needed a spare change of slacks.
"Let me run a few diagnostics first," Quan said, pleasantly, as he pulled out a kit that looked similar to the doctor's from two weeks prior. "Take a seat in my chair, this won't be long."
Artemis allowed himself to be poked and prodded for a few minutes, to Quan's gutteral noises.
"What magic have you attempted?" Quan asked.
"Mesmer and healing."
"Show me."
"Well it's not as though I could-" Artemis started, when Quan took a dagger off the rack and nicked his own forearm, grunting.
"Trying not to heal yourself when it's become an automatic response isn't easy, Fowl," he said wincing.
Artemis reached out gingerly and placed his hands on either side of the cut. Blue sparks twinkled from his fingertips, and the flesh pressed back together, what little blood apparent sucked back along with it. Quan shook out his arm, pleased, and wiped off the blade before returning it to the rack.
"And now show me your mesmer."
"On you?" Artemis asked worriedly.
"Do you see any other willing participants?" Quan asked.
"I'll do it," Holly offered.
"This isn't an exercise in trying to fight a mesmer, Holly. I want to see how easily it comes to him."
Holly slunk back a little.
"Is it easier to mesmerize a human?" Butler grunted, reaching to remove his contacts.
"Most, yes. You, no, as you know what we are," Quan said. "Seriously the two of you can stand down. This isn't a test he can fail, I just need to see what I'm working with."
Quan pulled up a second chair, and relaxed in it.
"Fowl, I want you to put me to sleep. It won't be easy, but I'll make no attempts to fight it."
Artemis looked a little flush. "Isn't that illegal? The last thing I need is to have my passport revoked."
"I'm a willing participant, with multiple witnesses, including a LEP officer. I can tape an affidavit if needed. And I can't believe 'isn't that illegal?' came from your mouth," Quan added, matching Artemis's speech and tone exactly.
Artemis's mind was turning already how he could use that little trick if he were able.
Holly giggled. "I was thinking it."
"Not just you," Butler added.
"Very well, laugh at my expense," Artemis grumbled as he focused on the mesmer. Being ordered to do it on command with people watching was… disconcerting.
"Quan," Artemis started, letting his voice slip into a pleasant chorus. "Quan, aren't you tired? Maybe you should rest your eyes now, just for a momen-"
Artemis didn't even need to finish his sentence; Quan thunked to the floor then shuddered up.
"I'm okay, I'm okay," he grunted, pulling himself back up on the stool and looking at a chronometer on his wrist. "That was under ten seconds, Fowl. I may not have been resisting but that's no small feat."
He shook his head out, and Artemis watched Quan's pupils fully clear.
"I've watched a few fairies mesmer," Artemis admitted. "It seems to work better when the order is phrased as a suggestion."
Quan rolled his eyes, dusting off his robes. "Quite. Give the master manipulator the power behind his words and watch him go, indeed," he said under his breath. Louder, he added, "Well, you have standard elf abilities, you'll need to practice shielding on your own. Now I want to test if you're warlock material. For that, we'll need to go down to the great hall. Thankfully it's a new school year… so that should still be set up…"
Artemis wasn't sure he wanted to know what "that" was.
"A… high chair?" Butler asked curiously.
"In the more literal sense," Artemis said, looking up. A sturdy stepladder was set to the side of a two-meter-high chair with very unstable looking legs. Normally, that wouldn't be so high for Artemis, taller than he but well shorter than his bodyguard, but in his shrunk state it was double his height.
A fall from that wouldn't likely break bones, but it absolutely would smart, healing or otherwise.
"Is this some simulated panic?" Artemis asked. "Shake the chair and see if something kicks in?"
"Essentially so!" Quan replied, clapping his hands together, and passing Artemis a blindfold. "I'll levitate you down if you fall off, don't worry. But the feeling of danger should kick in any extra powers you have. The fraternities use it as a sort of hazing ritual, but it works wonders for checking innate powers as well."
"Just so long as they cleaned it after its last use," Artemis blanched.
Quan passed him a blindfold. "Up the ladder, sit, then put this on. You can grip the chair if you like."
Artemis sighed, putting the elastic around his head and carefully climbed up.
"Afraid of heights, Artemis?" Holly shouted at him.
"Remember, Artemis, it's not the fall that kills you, it's the landing," Butler added in light jest.
"Very funny. Regular comedians, you two," Artemis muttered as he slid into the seat, shakily, sliding on the blindfold with one hand and gripping the seat for dear life with the other. He heard a click and the sound of something rolling on the floor.
"I've moved the ladder out of the way so that when you do fall you won't bang your head before I can levitate you," Quan shouted at him. "Now relax, and just try to ignore the shaking. If you're warlock material, the stress should kick in a response on its own."
Artemis frowned and began practicing his breathing exercises. Suddenly, the ground and word rocked beneath him violently, and Artemis white-knuckled the chair, gripping the plastic material between his legs.
Just as quickly as the shaking started, it stopped, and Artemis went back to calmly breathing. He was reminded of a trip to Texas, and that stupid mechanical bull on display for use during one of his father's business partner parties.
He silently cursed that he should have tried the damn thing when his chair rocked a second time.
Artemis didn't know how he hadn't fallen off the thing yet. He certainly wasn't belted in place, but it did kind of feel like his backside was glued to the plastic. Maybe that was his own magical self-preservation at work, or maybe the chair was still coated with leftover sim-wine from a frat party. It certainly smelled like it.
There had to be some kind of trick to it, he considered as the stupid chair rocked again. Whatever it was, nobody had said anything, but after the shaking of the third localized earthquake he'd definitely heard Holly let out a small gasp.
'I thought I would be sprawled on my back by now too, Holly,' he thought to himself, before the chair shook again.
This time he heard both Butler and Holly gasp, before they were shushed.
Quan, no doubt.
Was Quan shaking the chair harder each time, and his magic kicking in to minimize the shock? Artemis didn't think about it. He just sat, gripping the chair like his life depended on it.
Another violent shake never came.
After a minute or two, Quan finally spoke.
"You can let go. I'm done. And take off the blindfold."
"You won't shake the chair while my hands are off it, will you?" Artemis asked, coldly. It's what he would do if the positions were reversed.
"I cannot."
Not would not. Could not.
Artemis inhaled, and slowly extricated his fingers off the seat, then, in the quickest motion he could manage, flung off the blindfold and re-gripped the chair in the event of a take-backsie.
Quan stood, three fourths Artemis's height seated, smiling.
"I'd say we have a warlock to be, wouldn't you?" he asked if Butler and Holly, both of whom were just staring at Artemis, eyes slightly bugged.
"Holding a shaking chair isn't that impossible a task," Artemis reassured his friends. It didn't seem the sort of thing to boast about. It was just a jittery seat.
"Artemis, if you saw what we did, you would be gloating right now," Butler commented, shaking his head as if to shake off a mesmer.
"What you saw?" Artemis asked from his perch before he spotted it.
The chair supports were removable, and Quan had stacked them up next to himself.
All fourof them.
Artemis panicked, and the chair began to shake and slide, as though he was riding in the Cesena on turbulent wind.
Sparks flew from Quan's hand, and the char rebalanced, before gently being guided down to the floor.
Artemis didn't even notice his whole mouth went dry until he scurried off the seat.
"Congratulations on your first levitation, Mr. Fowl. I'd strongly suggest Berrie's Guide to Basic Magic from the student store since I highly doubt you'd want to enroll."
"Artemis, you can read that in the hotel room," Butler reminded the young charge for the sixth time, trying to tease the tome out of Artemis's hands as they walked the boulevard. "If I see you walk and read one more time I will burn that thing."
Artemis sighed and slammed it shut, cradling it under the crook of his arm.
"And no practicing in front of the rest of the house staff, or your brothers," Holly chastised.
"Now that, that I'm not idiotic enough to attempt," Artemis gruffed out.
"Two more things," Butler said sharply. "One. None of us have eaten in eight hours."
Holly nodded. "I'm starving too, but we should check you in and drop everything off before grabbing dinner."
"It's 4am."
"Yes, and we are nocturnal. It's the end of the night. So, dinner."
Butler couldn't argue with that.
"And secondly, Artemis, what did your mother ask you to do?"
Artemis's face paled. "D'arvit," he hissed under his breath, flipping open his cell phone. Odd. His mother hadn't left so much as a worrying text, and he definitely had full cell service. Quickly, he dialed his mother's number.
"Artie?" his mother asked groggily. "All done?"
"No, Mother, though I've made a dent in my errands. We are staying overnight, or, overday as it were. I will be back late this evening or early next morning."
"Artie?" His mother asked a second time, and for a split second Artemis thought his message hadn't gone through. "You owe me five euro."
"I owe you- why, Mother?"
"Not you, silly. Your father. He bet you'd actually call me right away. I said that Butler would have to remind you and message on your behalf. Just be glad your brothers didn't win this one. They said your car- I didn't tell them it was a flying shuttle- would get swallowed by a whale. At least Beckett did. Myles put his pocket money on engine failure."
Artemis bit his lip. "Apologies. We did go straight to the customs office and their no-call policy was extremely strict."
"Which is why Butler texted," his mother replied sweetly.
"I'll… I am truly sorry, Mother."
"Don't be sorry, just remember to follow up next time, please. I know you're not the forgetting type, but you are both easily distracted and a little afraid."
"Afraid? Afraid of what exactly, Mother?"
"Telling us what you're up to."
"I was just getting paperwork, Mother!"
"And what other errands? Someone mentioned something about visiting a warlock?" His mother was leading him on, now. Butler must have messaged her about this too.
"I… have a lot of potential, they said," Artemis admitted. "But I'll need to practice."
"Next time you go around in floating chairs, please tell me, Artie. I want to celebrate your achievements too."
Artemis sighed. "I will, Mother."
"So," Artemis asked, scanning the menu. He'd eaten fairy food a few times now, when he'd been dragged down to Haven during the B'wa Kell rebellion, for example. But it had always been provided, he hadn't actually gotten to choose what to order. "Vegetarians my derriere. There's meat on the menu, and I don't just mean insects."
"Okay, pescatarians."
"Voles are rodents," Artemis countered, pointing to the daily special.
Holly sighed. "Some fairies are true meat eaters, like a certain Diggums, but the vast majority of us won't eat animals we could talk to. Voles, fish, and insects are too low on the food chain. Mice and rats, meanwhile, are surprisingly smart, so even those of us who will go for the occasional fried chicken won't eat mouse."
"I can't imagine the sushi being any good down here," Artemis joked.
"If you wanted sushi, you should have asked. There's a really good Atlantean restaurant that just opened up by Police Plaza. Shipped in fresh every day."
"I'm sure I'll be back in Haven," Artemis said warmly. "For now, the risotto sounds perfect."
"So, whose address is this anyway's?" Artemis asked, looking at his ID, as they walked away from dinner.
"Where we are heading next. Most faries sleep from nine in the morning your time until roughly five PM, so we can cross one more thing off your list before settling in for the night."
Artemis nodded, jogging slightly winded to keep pace with Holly and Butler.
Foaly's house. Artemis wasn't quite sure what to expect in a fairy dwelling; the buildings downtown felt much like downtown London, save being scaled for an average height of 1.1 meters in lieu of 1.8. But of the eight fairy families, centaurs were by far the smallest in number, so buildings were really designed for elves, pixies, gnomes, goblins, dwarves, and sprites. The demons had to duck to enter some buildings, and Artemis could already see several government buildings under construction with the intent to expand their doorways to accommodate the newest residents. A full-sized Butler, in the few times he'd been down before, loathed having to just about crawl on hands and knees to enter most places. Centaurs, meanwhile, were only about 1.3 or .4 meters in height, taller than elves and pixies, certainly, but not unwieldly so, and still shorter than Artemis by a wide enough margin. He considered both their length and ability to traverse stairs or narrow spaces as the larger concern.
Foaly's house didn't seem to look any different than the other houses on the side street- a tall, narrow red-brick affair that roughly reminded him of colonial American city houses. There were planter-boxes with small sim-lamps in the windows, which seemed to be growing herbs, and a pineapple design etched in the door.
Artemis knocked.
"Foaly, its us," shouted Holly, into an intercom device. "Artemis wants to talk to you."
Artemis heard one click, then another, and several more.
"How many locks do you have on this door, old friend?" Artemis asked, laughing.
"Used to be more, but Caballine was fed up with taking five minutes just to have company over," Foaly replied, muffled. "And… there."
Foaly swing the door open, blinking.
"Okay, how in the nine hells did someone in the LEP give authorization for a transfig spell?"
Artemis smiled. "Is that how you greet your guests? I shudder to consider how you greet your enemies."
Foaly reached out and flicked Artemis on the nose. "No, this is how I greet my guests," he said, snorting a half-laugh. "Always wanted to do that to you, mud boy."
"My dad knows you," Artemis said brusquely, after being ushered inside, Foaly's curiosity of how he was elf-shaped satisfied by showing off the rune on his foot and Holly's quick prosthetic work.
"Does he now?" Foaly replied, sitting fairly comfortably, legs tucked in on a long sofa. The outside of the house may not have looked any different from the rest of the row homes, but the inside certainly was a different story. A small pen with grass was set up in the entire back third of the home; Caballine was expecting a foal, and soon. A centaur's equivalent of a crib, as they were already up and walking on shaky legs before their first day was over.
"He remembers you wiping his memory, so yes." There was no malice in Artemis's voice, and it seemed like Foaly almost expected it.
"You don't seem to be mad," Foaly finally articulated.
"Given that I myself willingly subjected to it, I see no reason to be. Father may have been coerced, but certainly not forced. I am more worried as to how confused he is seeing me. Like this." Artemis gestured to himself.
"You… told him?" Foaly's voice didn't sound altogether that surprised. Artemis rolled his eyes. It was barely an attempt to hide his snooping.
"See, I am far more surprised to see your reaction at the front door, knowing you were listening in last week."
"I thought you'd been transfig'd, I could see the council giving permission for the night to hide your identity at Tara," Foaly replied. "I didn't catch enough other than seeing you explaining things to your parents on the sofa, looking like a bonda fide equinox bound fairy. I'm not base enough to put cameras in your own bedroom. Your computer, sure. But I'd rather not witness you changing or master-"
Caballine glared at him. "Ahem," he continued. "Makeovers aside, yes, I remember wiping your father. Mind you, I've had to do it often enough over the centuries that I don't remember every case. But he was what- three decades or so ago?- and a little bit different than normal. We had a lot to clear out. More than you."
"And given he's beginning to recall, I assume that means a lot of mental strain. How many years of memories were you tampering with, Foaly?"
Foaly ground his teeth, contemplating how to phrase his answer.
"More than a decade's worth."
Artemis didn't gasp often. Butler couldn't even remember the last time the teen had. Yet here he was, on Foaly's couch, a now-shaking cup of herbal tea in his hands, just shy of clattering onto the hardwood flooring.
"More… than… a… decade?" the boy finally breathed out. "What the hell did he do?"
