You're the one who arranged for Ambrose to be here, and you're the one with the most detailed understanding (however limited it might be) of the situation at hand. Much as you might wish otherwise - and at the moment, you're definitely wishing otherwise - there is a certain rightness in having the responsibility for bringing the wizard up to speed on the situation fall to you.

"The problem," you begin, "is that an unknown party has put a complex magical seal on my friend, here, the exact function of which is unknown. She has... serious reservations about allowing the seal to remain on her person, I have serious reservations about meddling with a magical construct I don't understand, and since I was aware that there was somebody hopefully more knowledgeable in the magical arts than myself in the area, I convinced her to seek a second opinion."

Ambrose listens, considers the matter, and then speaks. "Do you always take problems like this to complete strangers, boy?"

You think back to when you talked to Akasha about Tatsuki's fight with Gorn. "This would be my second time doing that," you admit. "Both today and in general."

"I'm only the second?" He seems deeply amused by this for some reason. "Who was the first, if I may ask?"

"Miss Akasha," you say. "I asked her for advice about how Tatsuki could fight a Mohra demon without ending up in the infirmary."

"Really, now?" One of the old man's bushy eyebrows goes up. "Would that be Akasha Bloodriver, by any chance?"

Isshin, Masaki, and the cat blink. Masaki softly murmurs, "Bloodriver?"

"It would," you reply.

"Well, I suppose if you want reliable advice on fighting demons, one of the three Dark Lords of the Orient is as good an authority as you can hope to find."

Proving that they are indeed related, both Isshin and Ichigo silently mouth the phrase, "Dark Lord of the Orient?" wearing similarly dumbfounded expressions as they do so.

"You have an interesting choice in advisors, lad," Ambrose tells you. "Not to mention some cheek, referring to someone as important as Lady Bloodriver by her first name." He grins. "I like that. Shows free-thinking. Now then - a seal, you say? And on this young lady?"

Tatsuki takes a step backwards as Ambrose turns his attention to her. She doesn't get any farther before he raises his staff, twirls it, and causes the entirety of the seal to shimmer into plain view. Tatsuki stares down at herself, touching one half-bound hand to the heavy links of black metal wrapped about her torso. They clink.

Isshin goes white. The cat hisses and growls, looking ready to pounce. You glance around, and note that the handful of other people still in the cafeteria don't seem to be paying attention to your group. It's not like they're actively ignoring you - you see a couple of the cafeteria staff turn your way as they clean up the tables - just that you don't seem to strike them as interesting.

"My, my," Ambrose mutters. "Now that is something, isn't it?"

"Do they hurt, Tatsuki?" one of the twins asks.

"N-no," the older girl answers shakily. "I don't even feel them."

Ambrose blinks. "Well of course you don't feel them," he says, a bit testily. "What would be the point of sealing you without telling you about it, and then leaving as big a clue as the constant feeling of invisible chains to give away the secret?"

"Ambrose," Altria chides. You're starting to get the impression that the British girl has an entire separate vocabulary that consists of saying the wizard's name, merely with different inflections.

"Yes, yes, child, new to magic, don't bite her head off because she knows less than nothing - ignorance is ignorance, my dear, and it vexes me. Especially in cases where someone's taken deliberate measures to enforce it." Ambrose indicates the frail-looking chain about Tatsuki's neck and head with the tip of his staff. "Pretty sure that's part of what that section does - encourage a complete lack of normal, healthy curiosity about the supernatural. Let me guess, girl," he says, looking at Tatsuki directly, "you have no patience for fairy tales or mythology, no interest in stories about magic, monsters, and other things which everybody knows aren't real. Am I right?"

"...I believe in ghosts," Tatsuki offers weakly.

Ambrose glances at the Kurosaki family. His eyes linger on Isshin, the cat, and especially Ichigo, and the old man snorts. "Yes, I suppose you would, at that. Accounts for the necromantic bindings on the soul, especially the ones aimed outward - spiritual privacy wards, good for escaping the notice of hungry ghosts and meddlesome psychopompous idiots alike."

At the same time that Isshin scowls, Masaki smiles faintly.

"So you know what it does," you say. "You can read the glyphs?"

"Not all of them," Ambrose admits. "My Infernal's a bit rusty - not much call for it these days - and some of this language looks very old and formal, even by Hell's standards."

"What does Hell have to do with this?"

The wizard blinks at you. "What, you didn't know?"

You shake your head, clueless.

ENLIGHTENMENT!

Ow! God damn it, another one?

"Black chains, boy!" Ambrose snaps, shaking his staff. "Any time you see black chains in relation to souls, you're either looking at something of Infernal make or something that someone wants you to think is connected to Hell - and when it involves Infernal writing like this? That's the genuine article. You'd have to be an utter moron to inscribe Infernal spells that accurately onto a fake - and shortly therefter, a very dead moron. Hell doesn't care for impostors." He shakes his head. "Honestly, what is the state of magical education coming to? The Announcer did say you were from Sunnydale, but that's no excuse for ignorance of the basics. What has your master been teaching you, anyway?"