Nineteen

Asariel 9:30 Dragon

Cassius grunted as he swung his staff across his body again, firing another shard of ice across the gap.

The spike of ice sailed over the sand, piercing the ball of light hanging a few feet off Magister Arrentius' left shoulder. The magic orb burst in a flash as his ice collided with Flavius' target.

"Good!" Magister Arrentius called, summoning three more yellow globes, pushing one down toward the sand, shoving one out wider to his right and moving the third to about hip height on his left side. "Now, all three."

"Yes, sir," Cassius said with a nod, squinting as a bead of sweat dropped off his eyebrow and past his eye. His hair was damp and his robe was soaked through. He glanced up, hoping for a cloud, but the few that had shuffled by and blocked some of the summer sun earlier were gone and there was nothing left to shield him from the midday heat.

His arms were aching as if he had been lifting heavy weights for the last hour, even though the only thing he had been doing was moving his staff around, following Magister Arrentius' instructions and casting spells as he commanded. His head was throbbing and he felt hollowed out from the exertion of concentrating and casting spell after spell after spell.

Magister Arrentius had started close by and continually moved backward along the beach, stretching the distance of the attack. With every extra foot, the weight and strain on Cassius' body grew as he found it more and more difficult to hold the spell over the distance. It had been more than an hour, he guessed, and he wasn't sure how much more he could take before he collapsed face-first into the sand.

Still, he obeyed, pulled his staff back close toward his body as he opened himself up to the Fade again and let the mana pour into him. As he felt the energy filling him, he corralled and focused it, pushing it along the straight line of his staff to the focusing orb at the top. He watched as the crystal began to glow blue-white and a hazy cloud of frost began to swirl around it.

"Quickly now," Magister Arrentius pushed. "Snap off all three."

Cassius blinked the fog out of his eyes and peered down the beach, focusing on the three orbs. He grunted as his tired arms moved his staff, firing one, two, three more icebolts, going low, right, left. The first skittered across the sand and died before striking the orb. The second hit the target to Magister Arrentius' right, bursting it. The third was badly off-target and instead of tracking toward the last orb, it wasn't arcing and instead was heading directly for Flavius' belly.

"Off!" he shouted, knowing the third was going to miss badly and warning his mentor in case he didn't see it. Cassius cringed and turned his head slightly, but sighed in relief as he watched Flavius sweep his hand, pull up a small barrier and deflect the errant shot away. He rolled his fingers back and the milky shield vanished.

Cassius put the butt of his staff down into the sand and leaned forward on it, taking some of his body weight off his feet. He wiped his brow with his sleeve, but wasn't totally satisfied as the damp cuff of his robe was so wet that it more or less just repositioned the sweat on his head than absorbed it.

Magister Arrentius could see his exhaustion and instead of summoning the next set of targets, instead walked over and concluded their training session. He was sweaty, too, from standing under the hot summer sun, although he wasn't winded despite the effort of summoning the targets for Cassius to attack. Cassius didn't know for sure, but he guessed that it couldn't be much less difficult to summon the glowing orbs than it was to summon the icebolts to shoot at them. "Your stamina is improving."

Cassius huffed and stood back up, his body protesting as he released his weight from his staff and straightened. "Thank you, my lord, although it doesn't feel like it."

"You're only thirteen," Magister Arrentius said. His teachers in the Circle would typically add on "and just a Praeteri" at this point in the conversation, although the magister didn't. "Not only are you growing physically, you're going to soon start growing rapidly magically, too. These exercises will give you a stronger base to work from."

Magister Arrentius turned toward the water and swept his hand out in an arc in front of him, the incoming waves crystalizing in a cone of ice. The shards jutted out of the warm water of the Nocen, holding solid even as the sea crashed over and around the magically summoned sheet of ice. Cassius looked at the large area of frost that he had summoned, maybe twenty feet across and twenty feet out from the sand. And he had done it with just the brush of his hand. Cassius was pretty sure he couldn't reproduce a similar spell even if he was fresh and had a solid minute to concentrate.

Magister Arrentius snapped his fingers and the icicle spikes burst at his command, shattering into a million tiny pieces that dropped under the seawater and disappeared.

"You'll be able to do that and much more someday, too," Flavius said, perhaps reading the amazement written across Cassius' face. "I'll make sure of it."

"Thank you, my lord," Cassius said, bowing his head respectfully. "I greatly appreciate it. I only hope I'll be half as strong one day."

Flavius chuckled at the notion. "Just half? You should set your sights much higher, Cassius. I'm nowhere close to the strongest magister in Tevinter. Truth be told, I've lost a lot of steps from my youth."

Flavius instinctively put one hand over his stomach, which jutted slightly out from his belt line. His hair was growing a bit gray at the edges and starting to thin across the top. He looked out over the sea longingly and sighed, perhaps remembering better days long past.

"I'm a shadow compared to my father, and he was a shadow compared to his father," Flavius said, still glancing out across the Nocen at nothing in particular. "I wonder sometimes if our bloodline is tapped out. Each generation is getting a little weaker than the last. And now… well."

Valerie was twelve years old now and it was apparent that she wasn't going to manifest the gift. Most children discovered their magic, if they had it, well before age ten. There were stories of extremely late bloomers, but that was a handful of mages across centuries of examples. It was why the initiate level of the Circle ended at age ten – if those who had the gift hadn't figured out the most elementary control by then, they never would, and if they hadn't manifested magic by then, they never would either.

Andria was now eight years old and, despite the pushing of her parents and testing from mage teachers in Asariel, also hadn't manifested any magic. Eight was already old – Cassius had summoned his first spell quite unintentionally at eight years, but he was Praeteri. A high-born Altus typically figured it out a year or two or three earlier – and that was no doubt a growing cloud of concern in the magister's head.

But Kordelia was just three years old and Lady Junia was only about a month away from delivering their fourth child, so the future still held plenty of opportunity and possibility for Magister Arrentius and his house.

"For what it's worth, my lord, you have already taught me so much in so short a time," Cassius said with a smile.

Flavius turned his gaze from the sea back to his young mentee, and seeing Cassius' appreciative smile made a proud smile cross his face too. Cassius recognized it well, it was his fatherly smile, the same size and kind that he beamed when around his daughters.

"Well, then," Flavius said, "I'll have to make sure that you someday grow up to surpass me."


Minrathous 9:42 Dragon

Cassius tapped his knuckles on the door and listened to the shuffling behind it. A moment later it cracked open with Alex the page standing in the opening. He was dressed in his page's uniform, ready for another day of work on the floor of the Magisterium.

"Master Terro, please, come in," he said, opening the door wider.

"I'll be just a minute!" Valerie yelled through the closed door of the washroom.

"No rush," Cassius shouted back. "We have plenty of time."

"I know," she said, still shouting. "But I want to get there early. There's a few people I want to make one final check with."

"Don't stress," Cassius said. "You'll shorten your life."

The door of the washroom opened and Valerie stepped out, still putting earrings in her ears as she strode across the room. "I have a better understanding of why my father is losing all his hair and why he put on a hundred pounds. What I don't understand is why you still hang around here every year. You're not my father's page any more. You could be spending your time at home."

Cassius shrugged his shoulders. "I find it invigorating."

"Invigorating," Valerie said with a derisive snort as she finished with the earrings and hovered over to the mirror, continuing to adjust her curls of hair. "I haven't slept solidly in a week. My stomach is constantly in knots. And I've had enough of lecherous old magisters sizing me up with their eyes when I'm talking to them."

She stopped and turned her head over her shoulder and narrowed her eyes, accusingly. "My father doesn't do that when he's here, does he?"

"Never," Cassius said. That was truthful, as far as Cassius knew. It wasn't uncommon for magisters to get in trouble in Minrathous, far away from their homes and their wives, but Magister Arrentius was not one of them. His family meant more to him than anything, and he would never do anything to endanger it.

Valerie squinted her eyes a little tighter, peering into him to try to sense any deception, before she let the question go and turned back to the mirror and continued messing with her hair. "I never thought I'd say it, but I miss the humidity of home."

There was another knock at the door and Valerie turned, looking toward the shut entryway. Her eyebrow raised.

"Were you expecting someone else?" Cassius asked, noticing the confusion on her face.

"No," she said, but then motioned with her chin to Alex to go ahead and open it.

The young page went and cracked the door and was hit with a blast from the entry.

"Surprise!"

The door pushed open, nearly flattening the page, as Magister Arrentius pushed his way into the room.

"Father!" Valerie said with a look at her face that was half surprise and half concern. She shook it off quickly and bounded across the room to embrace her father. Behind him, Lady Junia followed with her hands folded properly across her waist, while behind her came her dark-haired daughter carrying a bundled child at her chest.

Cassius' eyes widened at the sight of his wife and his child as he stepped between Flavius and Junia and met her at the door with a kiss on the cheek since her hands were full.

"I didn't know you were coming," Cassius said in surprise, bending his head and planting a kiss on baby Anna's forehead, too. His daughter squirmed and smiled, her tiny arms stretching up from the bundle as she recognized the face of her father. Andria passed her over as Cassius scooped his daughter into his arms, rocking her gently. "Look at you, on your first big trip away from home. She made the trip well?"

"She fussed when we first left, but then mother took her and she fell asleep almost instantly and stayed that way," Andria said, venting a little frustration at the continued witchcraft that her own mother seemed to be able to practice on her daughter that she could not.

"Why are you here?" Cassius asked, hoping she didn't take the question as severe.

She didn't. "Father wanted to see in person whatever this bill is that he keeps going on about," Andria said and then added a slight shrug. "And he said he had other business that couldn't wait."

"Surprised to see us?" Flavius bellowed as he clapped a hand on Cassius' shoulder from behind.

"Yes, my lord," Cassius admitted. "I hope the purpose of this trip isn't anything serious."

Flavius laughed to himself and shook off the notion. "Nothing of the sort," he said. "Just wanted to see my baby girl in action. I wish I could have been here to see her sink Tilani and her devious scheming. From what you wrote, it sounded glorious."

"She did wonderfully," Cassius said, giving an approving nod to Valerie as she stood watch over her father's shoulder. "As I'm sure she will today."

"Everything is sealed up," Valerie interjected, sounding a little nervous for the first time as she said it. She did look a little rattled, now with her father on site and ready to observe her every move. It was uncharacteristic, Cassius thought.

"I know it is," Flavius said reassuringly with a confident nod to his daughter. If she was feeling nervous, he clearly wasn't. Instead his face was written with clear pride. "Now, I didn't mean to interrupt. We're going to head to the gallery. We'll meet with you afterward."

Flavius leaned forward and embraced his daughter from the side again, planting a kiss on the temple and squeezing her like he would have when she was half her current age. "You'll do great."

"Thank you," Valerie said with a small smile, forcing it through the cloud of nerves that had settled over her.

Andria took Anna back into her arms and Cassius gave her a farewell kiss as the other four Arrentiuses showed themselves out, leaving the door open behind them as they went. Cassius could hear Flavius bellowing with excitement as he announced their parting, pointing them back toward the stairs and marched off.

When they were gone, Valerie exhaled loudly and sagged slightly. "I didn't need that," she admitted, confirming Cassius' suspicions.

"You won't even remember they're there once you get into it," Cassius said. He didn't believe that was true, but he might be able to convince her of it.

Valerie sighed and spun back toward the mirror, giving her hair once last toss and then brushed her hands across her dress to flatten in, inhaled deeply once more to prepare herself, and then nodded.

"Let's go."

—-

"Next on the docket, Senate Bill 304, 'Adjustment of import duties at ports along the Nocen Sea.' This matter comes to the floor for second reading. Lady Valerie Arrentius, by proxy for Magister Flavius Arrentius, you have the floor," Magister Superiores Valerius Titan announced.

Valerie rose from her bench and headed for the podium, striding confidently as she carried her notes at her side. She began her short prepared remarks as she succinctly explained the purpose of the bill, speaking in slow, clear words that covered the chamber well.

Magister Arrentius leaned forward from the bench closer to the railing of the overhanging gallery, listening closely and nodding in time with her speech. "She sounds good."

"She sounded even better following up Felix Alexius, rest his soul," Cassius said.

"A damn curse that she didn't inherit my magic," Flavius said, shaking his head in continuing disappointment with the universe. "I could have left this all to her and died someday at peace knowing our house was in good hands."

He was right. Valerie had everything that she needed to be a strong magister. She was intelligent, quick-witted, stalwart in her belief and both willing and able to argue effectively for what she thought was right. She could flatter when she needed to but also cut to the heart of a matter through vague and flowery speech meant to disguise a person's true meaning and intent. In her weeks serving in her father's place in the Magisterium, she had worked the halls and chambers hard and effectively, keenly aware of who she could trust, who could be won and who was not worth the time.

She was often more direct and sometimes more blunt than her father might have been, but Flavius' demeanor in the corridors of the Magisterium was shaped by many years of experience that had rounded and softened the hardest edges to a more pleasing shape. He, as all magisters, had suffered defeats and indignities, but he was generally well-respected by his peers if not a particularly powerful player.

And, as of now, the heir to his seat was Marinus, the hot-headed, spiteful, angry spit who lived with a much undeserved air of entitlement even though he was nothing and offered nothing. Fate was cruel, indeed.

"She would have, already is, making you proud," Cassius reassured him.

Cassius glanced to his left to his daughter, sleeping quietly in his mother's arms as she cradled the babe across her lap, and wished, hoped that one day not too long from now she would manifest the gift and maybe one day rise to become everything Flavius' daughters could not.

"The floor is now open for debate on this bill," the Magister Superiores announced as Valerie finished her remarks.

There was a moment of quiet as the Magister Superiores waited to see if anyone would speak up. As his eyes scanned the rotunda for any debate from the benches, he found now. He lowered his eyes back down, just about ready to call the vote, when one magister rose from their seat.

"Magister Superiores, if I may."

Valerius Titan's head turned to the voice – his many years of experience running the senate had given the hoary magister a sixth sense in locating a voice with near perfect accuracy no matter where it was in the tiered chamber. He squinted, looking up the rows and gave a slight, if not annoyed nod at the lateness of the request.

"The floor recognizes Magister Maeveris Tilani of Qarinus," Titan announced. "Two minutes, Magister Tilani."

"What is she doing?" Flavius said to Cassius as his eyes locked across the chamber. Cassius had filled him in via letter on all the details of her resolution and its failure on the floor. Magister Arrentius had recognized her as an enemy, an agitator who was constantly poking and prodding the Venatori. Her poorly worded resolution was just one attempt, Flavius had written back, without elaborating.

"I don't know," Cassius said, filled with a sudden sense of dread. "Nothing good, I'm sure."

"Thank you, Magister Titan," Maevaris said as she walked from behind her bench to the center aisle and cast an appreciative but fake smile in his direction. "I won't take nearly that long."

"My fellow magisters," Maevaris said, spinning slowly so that she could address everyone in the circular chamber at once. "I wholeheartedly support this inflationary adjustment."

"What?" Cassius said to himself, caught off guard by that. "She supports it?"

"No," Flavius answered, his voice dropping to a grim note. "Wait for it."

"Too long do we wait to make these kinds of necessary fixes to our revenue streams," Maeveais continued. "And while I know many of us are hesitant about plucking additional coins from the purses of our merchants, I think we are in agreement that this change is past due."

Maevaris tented her fingers and walked one step down, a little closer to the floor, as she gathered her thoughts. "And we are also in a precarious time. The Qunari have clawed back on previous gains on Seheron and more. Our admirals have reported dreadnoughts within twenty leagues of Minrathous. I shudder to think what might happen if they mounted a serious naval assault aimed at the capital.

"Therefore, I offer an amendment to this bill, maintaining the nine percent increase, but amending that instead of dividing the new revenue as usual, that we divert it fully toward Minrathous for a period of two years, to make needed infrastructural repairs and to expand seaward defenses, which we have previously debated but not finalized due to monetary constraints. Magister Superiorers, I put forward this motion as Amendment One."

She waved with her hand and her page, the blonde-haired girl that Cassius had met before, sped down to the central pit with a paper that she handed to the clerk, who quickly scanned it and stamped it, passing it up to the Magister Superiores.

"Cock-sucking whore," Flavius cursed under his breath at the maneuver.

"That's…" Cassius stammered as he considered the idea. Would it garner enough support? Opposition magisters sometimes offered amendments they knew would fail simply to make a point and put their colleagues on record, but he doubted Maevaris was just playing politics. No, she must have thought she had enough to back it.

He glanced down at Valerie, who was still standing at the podium, looking confused. She understood procedure enough, but she had never put forth her own legislation before. As the author, she had certain powers, but Cassius realized as he looked at her eyes as she glanced up at the Magister Superiores and then back at Magister Tilani, that she was frozen.

"She doesn't know what to do," Cassius said.

"Amendment One is accepted," Titan proclaimed as he reviewed the document. "Do we have a second?"

"Second!" someone shouted from the chamber that Cassius couldn't see. Clearly one of Mae's allies.

"The motion is seconded," Titan proceeded.

"Magister Superiores!" came another voice from the chamber, shouting for attention. Cassius' eyes snapped to the sound, finding that it was Magister Vespasian – Lysander's father – who was now on his feet. He was a co-sponsor on the bill. "I posit that this amendment is not germane to the content of the bill before the chamber, and ask that it be rejected."

"Do you think that will work?" Cassius asked to Flavius, who wasn't blinking. If someone proposed a change that drastically altered the intent and purpose of a bill, the Magister Superiores could rule to toss it. That, however, was at the discretion of the leader of the senate and him alone.

"I don't know," Flavius said, himself looking frozen. By the stillness of his eyes and his body, Cassius knew that his mind was racing right now, a thousand thoughts running through it.

"The amendment does not alter that we are increasing import fees nor does it change the rate," Magister Tilani defended, making her case. "It only temporarily redirects the money to defense of the capital. We are still operating under the emergency declaration of 9:13 Dragon, allowing for reappropriation of funds, at discretion, for military needs in the ongoing war against the Qunari."

"There is no Qunari threat to Minrathous," Magister Vespasian argued, but the statement drew murmurs from the others in the chamber that suggested they didn't necessarily agree with that assessment.

"Import revenue has continued to rise even despite the lack of tracking on fees, due to increased activity as our admirals have been successful in holding back Qunari naval expansion," Maevaris continued, obviously anticipating his line of defense and having a riposte ready for it. "It would be ill-advised to increase fees and make further improvements in our ports only to have the investment erased if our defensive line fails and Qunari ships raid our coasts."

"If Magister Tilani wanted to increase our defense spending, I would remind her that she could have filed separate measures to seek it, instead of trying to tack it onto a wholly unrelated measure," Magister Vespasian bit, his voice growling as he aired his apparent frustration and dislike of his peer from Qarinus.

The Magister Superiores raised a hand to quiet them both as he paused, considering for a moment.

"Magister Tilani is correct, that these are new revenues and therefore may be redirected to defense," Titan said. "She has specified two years, not an indefinite shift in our distribution formula. Therefore, I deem that the amendment is germane and may proceed."

"Pull the bill," Cassius said to himself as he lurched forward, nearly ready to throw himself over the balcony. The author of a bill reserved the right to withdraw it from consideration for any reason, and magisters sometimes did it in situations exactly like these, to foil a change that they didn't want, in hopes that tabling it and spending more time lobbying their colleagues might change the outcome.

Valerie still stood frozen at the podium, looking composed but clearly overwhelmed.

"Pull the bill," Cassius said again, as if she might hear him and do it, even though the distance between them made that clearly impossible.

"I request the bill be withdrawn, for consideration at a later time!"

That wasn't Valerie, but Magister Arrentius at his side. Flavius had risen from his seat in the gallery and stepped to the rail, shouting down to the floor of senate. All heads in the chamber seemed to swivel at the same time, looking up into the balcony where he now stood.

The Magister Superiores looked up too, blinking and squinting. "Magister Arrentius, it is good to see you, but you are not on the roll."

"Then I'd like to withdraw the bill," Valerie said, catching on from her father's cue, snapping back into action.

"Point of order," Magister Tilani quickly called out, again as if expecting it. "The young Lady Arrentius is serving by proxy only, and therefore, by our rules, can vote but cannot offer, amend or withdraw legislation."

Shit, Cassius thought, knowing that she was right even as the Magister Superiores started speaking again to rule exactly that.

"My lord," Cassius said, snapping to his patron. "You can withdraw the bill yourself. If you can get to the floor and register your attendance with the clerk, you can then pull it back as its author."

"You're right!" Flavius said, his eyes widening at his former page's astute observation. "Help me, my boy. We must hurry!"

Flavius shuffled out from the row of benches as quickly as he could, limping his way up the stairs to the upper end of the balcony. He grimaced and swore with each step as the combination of his weight and his swollen foot slowed him down. By the time he had crested the ten steps up to the top of the gallery, he was already winded and in pain.

"My lord, please, take this," he said, offering Flavius his staff to use as a walking stick. Through the entry to the upper hallways, he could already hear the booming voice of the Magister Superiores calling for the vote on Magister Tilani's amendment.

They would have only about two minutes to navigate the labyrinth of halls and stairs of the Magisterium to make the floor and for Flavius to make it to the center pit to check in with the clerk and officially withdraw the bill. And as Cassius watched Magister Arrentius hobble along the carpeted hall toward the main staircase down, he recognized that Magister Tilani might have anticipated this move too, and known that even if Flavius tried to pull the measure himself, he would have to beat the clock and that would be a tall order in his current state of health.

Cassius could, at a sprint, easily make the floor of the chamber. He could bolt down the halls, quickly stutter step his way down the flights of stars, dodge individuals on the main floor until he came to the senate door and then rush down the aisles to the clerk. With two minutes, he was certain he could easily pass the distance.

But he couldn't do it himself. And as he ticked the seconds off in his head, keeping his ears tuned outward for the telltale signs of the end of the vote, he came to the dreadful realization that there was no way Magister Arrentius was going to make it.

As they arrived at the top of the stairs, as Flavius clenched the rail tightly and lowered himself as quickly as he could, the force of each step on his swollen, gouted foot causing his entire face to contort in agony. Not only would he not make it, he was either going to badly damage his foot or, worse, fall and severely injure himself.

Still, Cassius stood by his side, holding onto his other arm, doing his best to use his strength to help lower his patron as softly as he could step by step, tugging him and urging him to move as quickly as possible.

Flavius was huffing hard, his face flushed and red, his brow covered in sweat as he stopped for a second on the first landing to curse to himself as he gingerly slid his gouted foot along the step to the second downward bend in the staircase. The counter in Cassius' head was growing dangerously low. They had less than a minute now, maybe less than half a minute, and still a good hundred yards to the door and then the distance down to the floor.

"Maker be damned," Flavius grunted as he cried out in pain as he hit the bottom of the staircase, his feet landing heavy and hard and the spike of pain jolting up through his leg and into his back.

"We're almost there, my lord," Cassius said, dashing ahead and nearly shoving people out of the way to clear a path for Flavius. The pot-bellied magister was hustling as hard as he could, Cassius' staff lurching out in front of him and helping him drag himself along the corridor. He wasn't even lifting his bad foot any more, now just dragging it across the ground behind him, his shoe scraping loudly against the polished stone surface.

Cassius reached the door to the chamber and threw it open, glancing out into the senate. There were few bodies still lingering at the bottom of the pit, a sure sign that the vote was about to close. Valerie had left the podium and he scanned frantically for her, finding her back at the bench, her elbows stabbed into the table and her palms clenched, pressed to her face as she stared outward in trepidation at the scene before her.

"Hurry, my lord!" Cassius called, wheeling his arm to try to speed Flavius.

Magister Arrentius had nothing left to give as he clawed his way to the chamber door, out of breath and looking on the verge of collapse.

And then, devastation.

"In the matter of Amendment One to Senate Bill 9:42 304, 'Adjustment of import duties at ports along the Nocen Sea,' the vote passes by a margin of sixty two percent to thirty-six, with two percent abstention," the Magister Superiores announced. "The bill is hereby amended. The floor will entertain other amendments at this time, if there are any."

Cassius' head dropped and Magister Arrentius doubled over, breathing hard. Now amended, it was too late. The amendment couldn't be undone and its outcome was now irrelevant. Whether it passed or failed, the money would all flow to the capital and the military, with none of it going into Asariel on the Water, none of it going to Magister Arrentius' coffers, and none of it to the Venatori lords poised to benefit.

Flavius coughed hard, a crackling, wet cough as his entire body shook while he stood doubled over. He coughed so hard that Cassius wasn't sure he wouldn't vomit from exertion right there in the hall. Flavius managed to quell himself and stood back up, wiping spittle from his lips.

"That's it," Flavius said, his eyes looking out onto the Magisterium, unblinking.

"We're sunk."