"I have the crown contract and a letter of rights for souls to set up our production facility," Maria said.
"I have an investor!" Sophia said.
"Ah, a productive day for everyone," Maria said, nodding in approval. Then she frowned. "Wait, why do we have investors?"
"Oh, I was talking to Lady Selena and she was interested in joining us in developing these Gehrmans," Sophia said. "She wants to talk to you about it, but she has a condition before investing, and I wanted to talk to you about it, since it's pretty strange."
"Which is?"
"We don't let Susanna Randall be an investor–"
"A sound idea. I agree with her condition," Maria said, nodding decisively.
Sophia blinked in surprise. "Wait, what? Why?"
"Susanna Randall makes me uncomfortable," Maria said, deliberately omitting any honorific.
"Oh, come on. She's a prince's fiancée and regarded as an accomplished woman, she can't be that bad," Sophia said.
"Like Lady Hunt?"
"She can't be as bad," Sophia amended.
"She stares at me like the Third Prince stares at Katarina's posterior."
"She sounds like a complete and total creep," Sophia said without a pause. "I agree to the condition too."
"Unanimous, them," Maria said, nodding in satisfaction.
"Yup!" Sophia agreed, nodding as well as she crossed her arms and smirked in a self-satisfied fashion.
There was a beat.
"Now what?" Sophia asked.
Maria gave her a smile so bittersweet it belonged in a cookie recipe. "Now we work harder than we ever have before."
Sophia stared at her, aghast. "Wait, I thought this was the point we just sit back and watch the souls come in."
"No, that comes later, right before we lose everything due to our venture collapsing from mismanagement and apathy, and all that we've built gets stolen from us," Maria said.
"No one told me about that!"
So it was with minimal fanfare that on the week before their graduation, Maria and Sophia met up with Lady Berg and officially formed the Arsenal Workshop.
That was pretty much all they had time to do. With graduations and the twin princes' party at the castle coming up, they were busy setting up the display. The supplies for the graduation party was stored in the storage building-slash-former-secret-Dark-Magic-ritual-facility, while the supplies for the princes' party were kept in an earthen dome the princes had raised, as they'd seen enough of the power of black powder to not want it to blow an inconvenient hole through one of the castle's walls.
They also began to raise the building that would serve as the Arsenal Workshop. They weren't sure what it would need, but the facilities of a smithy and tables were probably a good bet.
"And can we not put it so close to your manor next time?" Sophia said. "You're going to want people to visit eventually!"
"Why care about what I'll be doing a hundred years from now?" Maria said.
"All the smithing is going to be loud," Sophia said. "How are the children going to sleep?"
It was decided the new building would be far from the manor.
"Wow, so do I just have to bring up the children to win every argument?" Sophia said wonderingly.
"If it's a reasonable argument."
Eventually, they graduated.
Lady Maria Campbell, Knight of Sorcier and outgoing Head Clerk of the Student Council stood at the podium to present her graduating classmates. She tried to ignore the stares she was getting, likely because of the pink dress she wore. Honestly, she had something besides suits to wear, and now that she was a lady, she was bound with the social conventions of this event. Ah, for the days she could wear a suit anywhere because she was a commoner!
For some reason, many people were still red with outrage as she gave her graduation speech. Much more than usual, actually. She sighed. There was just no pleasing people. She comforted herself in the reminder that as the princes' party was at the castle, she could attend wearing her hunter garb, as she was a knight.
As she was still on school grounds, Maria's ensemble did not include her sword. The pistol on her hip she'd chosen to wear in its place garnered many curious looks, as well as outright horror from Lady Hunt and, strangely, from Katarina. The princes just exchanged knowing looks of amusement. Maria supposed if and when guns became more common they would need to create societal etiquette about their proper wear.
She was not alone, however. Sophia wore a matched set of revolver pistols in holsters under her arms, their barrels the glassy blue of crystal titanite-alloyed metal and embellished with golden double helix filigree. The leather belt around her waist that emphasized her hips also carried several spare cylinders and priming powder. Katarina kept looking at Sophia's guns, then at Maria's and back again, as if confused.
Eventually Maria stepped down, to be replaced by Lady Cavendish, who had been confirmed the next Head Clerk. As Maria made her way to her seat, Lady Cavendish made her speech congratulating all the graduates.
It struck Maria suddenly that it was all over. Her time at the Academy, where she'd made her first friends since she'd awoken her magic, where she had met Rafael, met Sophia, met Katarina, met Anne Shelley, met Diana Cavendish, where she had tortured a woman for her beloved and had learned… so much that she realized she had no actual use for since she had Light Magic, which did not have to worry about heat retention and hydrodynamics and lithology and other things those who wielded other forms of magic needed to learn… it was over. The Kingdom of Sorcier now considered her a fully responsible Wielder of Magic, with all the power and restraint therein. And so she had to leave.
It wasn't like she would never see them again. Well, she'd likely never see most of her schoolmates ever again, as she had no interest in them and they had no interest in her. But the ones who mattered to her, she would see often. Sophia was her business partner, Katarina would be nearby because of Duchess Claes and Maria's plot, everyone else will show up because of Katarina, Rafael… um… Rafael and she would…
…
Oh, great formless Oedon the unseen impregnater of women, Rafael! Without her staying at the Academy, they'd lose touch! She'd have no reason to visit the Ministry, and he'd have no need to see her, and everyone knew you couldn't maintain an affair over written correspondence!
Maria stared in unseeing horror as she realized Rafael would have no reason or desire to come to her estate, as it would remind him of that woman, and fornicating by correspondence was a basically just her exploring the labyrinth, and why hadn't she realized this sooner, now they would grow apart and soon he would grow tired of her and he'd meet someone who worked at the ministry and would severe ties with her and she'd have no choice but to put one of her guns to her head…!
The applause at the conclusion of Lady Cavendish's speech interrupted her fall into the abyss of her own mind, and Maria quickly joined in, even as her mind began to run around the banisterless circular staircase from which she would surely fall to her death…
…
Perhaps it wasn't too late for her to abandon all she'd built already, and apply for a job at the Ministry? No, that would make her seem desperate and overeager! Men didn't like that sort of behavior in women, they preferred coquettish seductresses who would offer the blood in their veins to any man who asks and stays on the ground, right? No, wait, Rafael doesn't drink blood! But… what if she offered him some! No, wait, what was she thinking, she wasn't some harlot!
"Lady Maria?"
Maria blinked as her hunter of thought slammed into a ledge that hadn't been visible from above and narrowly avoided death by the smallest margin. In front of her, Sophia tilted her head. "Lady Maria?" she said. "Are you all right?"
"Lady Sophia, I'm quitting," Maria said. "The whole business is yours, I'm quitting, giving up my lands and going to work for the Ministry so I can be with Rafael."
Sophia stared at her. Then she nodded, drew back a hand and slapped Maria full in the face. Maria barely felt it.
"Ow," Maria said so as not to hurt Sophia's feelings about how weak she was.
"Maria, you're having a Graduation Day breakdown," Sophia said. "Nicol had one before his speech last year, it's fine. You don't have to throw away everything in front of you to get the girl… or boy in your case."
"Yes, I do. We barely see each other as it is. If I don't do this, I'll be so busy that he'll meet someone else and then I'll merely be a fond Academy memory. And then I'll die alone and unloved!"
Sophia grabbed her with a slightly manic look in her eye. "No, she won't! Nicol still has a chance even if Katarina hasn't seen much of him all year, and you know why? Because he's too pretty to forget! And so are you! So don't you dare say you need to change your entire way of life to be with Rafael because if you need to do that then Nicol needs to do that and I refuse to believe my brother has fallen so far behind!"
Lady Cavendish passed them in her blue dress, slowing down as she glanced back and forth between the two as Sophia shook Maria back and forth so hard Maria's head was bouncing. "Graduation Day breakdown?" she asked.
"My brother still has a chance with Katarina, hex it!" Sophia cried.
Lady Cavendish nodded, drew back her hand and slapped them both. Maria DID feel that.
"Come ladies, the party's starting," she said.
"Ow…. C-coming…" Sophia said, a big red handprint on her pale scaleless face.
"Coming," Maria said, a big red handprint on her face. "Thank you for bringing us to our senses."
"You're welcome," Lady Cavendish said.
The three of them headed for the Academy's garden, where the party was being held.
Lady Maria Campbell, The Wandering Knight of Sorcier
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Arsenal Workshop Badge
Badge crafted by the Arsenal Workshop, the earliest manufactory of gunpowder, founded by Maria Campbell, Sophia Ascart and Selena Berg.
The ArsenalWorkshop was founded to produce, develop and repair the alchemical weapons known as gehrmans. It produced advanced models sold exclusively for the crown and more simple but artistically impressive models for the nobility.
But this is a not all that arose from this founding.
