Arkat Alumnus

10: Summer

Back To School - Power Without Responsibility - Missing Persons
Dangerous Knowledge - Suspicions - Rendezvous -

~oOo~

Eren, Kiki, Pavel and Welspun return to their respective schools after the three weeks of Summer Break, each with a renewed sense of purpose. Waiting for them in their various message slots or mail boxes they each find two intriguing messages.

The first of these is the same for all of them: a letter from the headmaster of the Imperial College, announcing the reinstatement of the Joint Teaching programme. Joint lessons will commence this very afternoon, with a 'Perils of Sorcery' lesson with Father Emoliant, the Imperial College liturgist. Recalling their previous lesson. with this worthy, the apprentices can't help feeling a little apprehensive - especially Eren, Kiki and Pavel, who had all had an unwelcome first-hand experience of sorcery's perils. But each of the apprentices also has an additional communication to ponder.

Eren finds a neatly folded note from Adept Hermeclus, asking her to drop by his office when she gets a chance. She hasn't seen her sponsor since the beginning of last term, soon after her attempted abduction by two unknown men, aided and abetted by another apprentice, Vey. She had told Hermeclus about some (but not all) of her adventures and misadventures, and he had been sympathetic to her fears, even going so far as to place a warding glyph on her room and teach her some protective magic. But he'd also seemed aware that she was being somewhat circumspect in her tale and had shown a lot more interest in identifying her would-be-abductors than any of the other masters. He'd been away from the city for most of last term, so she wasn't sure how much he knew about Stockfish. Perhaps that was why he wanted to see her...

Kiki finds another letter waiting for her, this one from Salazari. It is rather terse, simply asking her to visit him "at your earliest convenience". Naturally there is no explanation of why the cartographer had failed to join them for Kiki's meeting with Stockfish - although the fact that Pavel had subsequently seen him locked in a cell at the Consistory Court gave them a pretty good notion - nor of why he hadn't been in touch with Kiki before now. Although, looking at the date on the letter, Kiki sees that it had been sent almost four weeks earlier, which means that it has been sitting in her mail slot since the end of last term.

Pavel finds a rather grubby envelope, with a familiar-looking seal that immediately sets his pulse racing. The last time he'd seen this seal had been on an envelope that Carrick had left him, with strict instructions not to open it except in an emergency. If this one has come from Carrick too, then it will be the first word he's had from his sponsor since the adept disappeared - more than ten weeks ago now. Ripping the envelope open excitedly, Pavel finds a small scrap of paper with one word scrawled on it: Praxis.

This is the name of the strange entity that he and Eren had discovered in the secret basement at Imperial College, which claimed to be the guardian of a mysterious organisation called the Tripartite Fraternity. This makes Pavel wonder if the note could instead be from Master Jayron, who he knows is a member of that Fraternity. But why would Jayron use the same seal as Carrick? The two adepts clearly have some sort of connection, but he'd never managed to discover its nature. And Jayron, like Carrick, had disappeared around the time of their fateful encounter with Stockfish. Did this mean that one of the adepts had returned?

Welspun finds a hastily-scribbled letter from Filmore, which reads: "Homework club! E missing, but left stats book. Library after?"

The text is uncharacteristically brief for his friend, who is normally inclined to be long-winded, but it manages to convey a lot of information that would not be apparent to the casual reader. The first two words, for example, immediately tells Welspun that the 'E' refers to Exalian - although he's not sure what Filmore means by 'missing'. 'Homework Club' is a phrase used by the anonymous authors of a book of mischievous petty magic spells, which Welspun and Filmore had helped Exalian to decrypt at the beginning of last term. And Filmore's mention of 'stats book' must refer to the encoded book itself, which is disguised as an unedifying reference work on statistics.

Welspun hadn't been able to help with the decryption work for most of last term, because the curfew and travel restrictions meant that he, as a student of the School of Tenebrous Wisdom, couldn't easily concoct an excuse to spend time with Exalian and Filmore, who are both Imperial college apprentices. He had, however, had continued his correspondence with Filmore and knows that Exalian had been making good - if slow - progress with the book. But perhaps now that the Joint Lessons were being reinstated, there would also be a lifting of the curfew...

~oOo~

Eren quickly decides that she is too busy to see her sponsor before lunch, it will have to wait until later, following the joint teaching session.

She then proceeds to putter about and try to find ways to kill time until then. She tries to ignore the feeling, but finally admits to herself that she is simply procrastinating, worried about what he'll have to say.

The benefit of her procrastination is that she gets her room picked up, and her new robes well brushed off, prior to class. Thinking about what happened to her rooms before, and not sure if the warding is still active, she puts the orb into its bag, in a secure pocket.

~oOo~

The mood amongst the students of the joint class when they gather in the appointed classroom later that day is mixed. Most of them are happy that the joint teaching experiment has resumed, especially those that had made new friends amongst the apprentices from the other Schools, but no-one's really looking forward to this particular lesson.

As they wait for Father Emoliant to arrive - a little more quietly this time, mindful of their last encounter with the Imperial College liturgist - most of the whispered conversations concern the missing member of the class. Exalian's absence had already been noted by many of his Imperial peers during the morning, but it had been a topic of intense speculation over lunch and they were keen to share the host of rumours that had been flying around. Many of these are just wild speculation, including a grimly popular theory that he has suffered the same fate as the unfortunate Fabian [1]. Where all of the rumours concur, however, is that no-one has seen or heard from Exalian since the end of last term.

Welspun is deep in conversation with Filmore. His friend and correspondent tells him that he'd seen Exalian at the very end of last term, when the other apprentice had given him the 'Homework Club' book for 'safe-keeping'. This had been a bit of a surprise - Exalian had always been loath to let the book out of his sight - so Filmore couldn't help asking him why. At this point Exalian had seemed suddenly uncomfortable, muttering something about helping his master with a project and not being sure when he'd have time to look at the book again. It was only later that Filmore had realised why this explanation seemed so unconvincing: Jayron, Exalian's master, had been absent from the college for weeks.

Eren is too distracted to listen to the whispers. She's happy to see Kiki and Pavel again, but feels more than a little uncomfortable to be in a room with Vey. She'd done her best to avoid him all last term and he had seemed to be doing the same, but they will find it hard to avoid each other in the joint class. She still isn't sure why she hadn't told the masters about the boy's role in her attempted abduction - or the time that he'd held a knife to her throat. Actually, she had told one of the masters, she suddenly remembers: Jayron. But she hadn't seen him since the time he'd hidden her and Pavel in the secret basement beneath the college. And no-one - with the possible exception of her sponsor, Adept Hermeclus - had seemed interested in the attempted abduction.

Then a familiar voice silences all of the whispered conversations.

"Good afternoon, class," Father Emoliant intones as he enters the room. "It gives me great pleasure to welcome you all back to this grand educational enterprise. I trust that you all had a pleasant Summer Break? Excellent. Now, last term, before our lessons were interrupted, I spoke to you about the Wizardly Virtues that should guide you in your studies. Today we shall consider the first of the Vices that imperil you, both as apprentices and in your future as adepts. This lesson is entitled 'Sorcery: Power Without Responsibility'."

The basic thrust of the liturgist's lecture is all-too-well-known to the students: sorcery is dangerous and evil, because it is a corruption of the pure magic taught by the Schools, which is exercised under the holy auspices of the Churches. Sorcery is an insidious evil, because it can be superficially indistinguishable from true wizardry, leading the unwary to believe that it is no different. Sorcerers are dangerous, because their exercise of magical power is unchecked by the moral framework that guides the actions of the true adept. Worse still, once they have deviated from the true path, sorcerers are almost inevitably drawn deeper and deeper into perfidy by the seductive promise of unfettered power that the forbidden magic seems to offer.

Emoliant's elaboration of this last element of the familiar litany is where he starts to lose his students. He maintains that all unsanctioned magic is inherently dangerous to the student of wizardry, because it has the potential to lead them down the path of sorcery. The magic granted to worshippers by the Churches is obviously exempted from this condemnation, and the liturgist grudgingly concedes that certain other organisations might conceivably provide their members with wholesome magic. But he is unreserved in his condemnation of Alchemy and Petty Magic, which he describes as a "perfidious canker that has infected the student bodies of Syran's schools", as well as "witchcraft and pagan devilry, which have no place in an institution devoted to Holy Reason".

"Your masters have seen fit to turn a blind eye to these degenerate magicks in the past," he continues. "Dismissing them as harmless distractions that apprentices invariably put aside once they have reached a sufficiently advanced stage in their studies. But I believe that recent events, most notably the unmasking of a vile sorcerer within this very institution, have revealed the dangers of this misguided permissiveness. For that reason, I am confident that the Ecumenical Council, with the full backing of the Headmaster, will be announcing a new initiative to rid these hallowed halls of all unsanctioned magic. And I sincerely hope that these measures will soon be approved by the other Schools..."

~oOo~

Eren has rather mixed feelings about the lecture. She's seen the damage that a sorceror can do, and she knows the Saint Plays that warn against the temptation of unsanctioned magic. But at the same time, she feels that something is missing in the priest's approach, that it is too simplistic or not quite logical.

It is not until that evening, however, that it comes to her: There is magic that is sanctioned by some groups, but not by others! The Borists sanction some horrible things, while the occasional Rokari preacher that has visited the city condemns much of the magic here.

Also, surely it is people who come together in groups, there may be saints or essences or whatnot that provide the foundation for the group, but it is people who choose to join this group or that one. That in the end, there is a matter of choosing what you consider moral, based on choosing your allegiance.

The implications of this throw her head into a whirl, and she puts the broader implications off to another day, deciding only that she should not raise these thoughts with anyone else, and that she will try to avoid trouble without necessarily agreeing with any new rules.

~oOo~

After Emoliant's lecture, Eren takes the opportunity to grab Pavel and Kiki, dragging her friends off to the Library. The curfews and the suspension of the joint classes last term meant that they hadn't seen much of each other since the fateful events in the Boneyard and she's keen to hear their news. Passing the corridor that leads to Adept Hermeclus' office on the way, she belatedly remembers the note that she'd received from her sponsor, asking her to pay him a visit, but decides that it can wait: she needs to talk to her friends first.

Finding a quiet corner of the Library, the three apprentices swap news.

First Kiki produces the letter that she'd received from Salazari, asking her to visit him 'at her earliest convenience' . None of them have seen or heard from the cartographer since their confrontation with Stockfish, when Pavel had glimpsed him in a cell at the Consistory Court while delivering the defeated sorcerer into the custody of the apparitors. The letter had been sent at the end of last term, but Kiki only received it upon returning from Summer Break.

Then Pavel shows the others the cryptic note that he'd received, bearing a seal used by his sponsor, Adept Carrick. He reminds the others that his sponsor had disappeared after he and Pavel had discovered the abduction of Bastian, an associate of Carrick's. Pavel had delivered a message to Bastian from the mysterious fugitive that he and Eren had met in the Graveen Marshes, a man who claimed to be an old friend of his father. Carrick was sure that this message had been behind Bastian's abduction: the fugitive had spoken of a black cabal of sorcerers who were his enemies and showed the apprentices the terrible consequences of that enmity: his shadow seemed to have been ripped away, leaving his aura horribly mutilated.

If it was really from Carrick, then this note was the first Pavel had heard from his sponsor since his disappearance, more than six weeks ago. However, the note is as short as it is cryptic, consisting of just one word: Praxis. This is the name of a magical entity, the guardian of a mysterious organisation called the Tripartite Fraternity. The only member of this organisation that they are aware of is Master Jayron, another associate of Carrick's. Pavel had asked him for help, at his sponsor's behest, following his sponsor's disappearance and the attempted abduction of Eren. Jayron had hidden them in the secret basement, where they were discovered by Vey - an apprentice who had attempted to deliver Eren to her would-be abductors - and Imogen - a novice who Vey had been using as to spy on them. They had not seen Jayron since before the confrontation with Stockfish and he too had been absent from the city since shortly thereafter. Could the note be from Jayron instead?

Finally, Eren tells them that her sponsor, Adept Hermeclus - the only other person they've told about the tangled web of shadowy conspiracies into which they had stumbled - has asked to see her. Were any of these messages connected?

Kiki also tells them something that she overheard just before their Perils of Sorcery lesson: Welspun and Filmore discussing the unexplained disappearance of Exalian. Yet another missing person and yet another connection: Exalian is Jayron's apprentice.

The three apprentices sit silently for a few minutes, digesting this information. Since the dramatic confrontation with Stockfish, their lives have been relatively peaceful, but this new set of intrigues could quickly change all that.

Eren is so happy for things to be something like back to normal. Proper classes, a chance to see Kiki and Pavel, and plots afoot! Not to mention that coming off the break she has a few coppers in pockets robes that are not a complete disgrace *--at least not yet. Pity that nobody seems to have noticed, not that they are fancy or anything that would normally draw comment, it is just that she feels so much better when not in fear that her attire could draw criticism at any moment.

Eren muses "We really do need to see Salazari, we've not had a chance to tell him all that we found, down around Praxis. Maybe he would know something about it? I think we should talk to him before we go back down there, at least. Maybe we could go tomorrow night? First day back they are probably keeping a close watch for students sneaking out." Eren flushes a bit, remembering the embarrassing mess she made of her 'delivery boy' disguise the last time she slipped out.

"Maybe we could meet outside the Boneyard, near the gate to Salazari's, just before dusk tomorrow? What do you two think?"

"And as for today," Eren lets out a sigh. "I'd best go and see my sponsor, and see what he wants. I'll tell you about it tomorrow."

~oOo~

While Eren, Kiki and Pavel had been discussing their various messages in one part of the Library, Welspun and Filmore had been whispering intently in another.

Neither of them know quite what to make of Exalian's disappearance. The fact that he'd left Filmore his precious book - a seemingly dull work on statistics that is actually a cleverly encrypted collection of petty magic spells - suggests that his disappearance was something that he was at least half-expecting.

"Did he say anything... odd to you before Summer Break?" Filmore asks.

Welspun shakes his head. He'd seen Exalian occasionally at the church they both attended, but the Imperial apprentice had never been an especially diligent churchgoer and they rarely had much opportunity to chat. In fact, the last time that he'd seen Exalian there, he'd been more than usually uncommunicative, barely even acknowledging him. Welspun remembered feeling a bit miffed when he'd later seen Exalian deep in conversation with one of the Obscurist novices from their congregation. The scowl that Exalian had given him when he made a move towards them made it clear that it was a private conversation, so Welspun had left them to it.

Thinking back now, though, there had been something slightly odd about that novice. He shares his recollection with Filmore.

"Something wrong with his eyes?" his friend repeats. "What do you mean?"

"I'm not sure," Welspun admits. "It was as if he couldn't stand the light, but it wasn't exactly bright. He was screwing up his eyes, so I didn't have a good look, but they seemed... odd. Like an animal's, somehow." He thinks for a moment. "Like they were all black."

Filmore's face turns white. "Like his pupils were enlarged?" he asks.

Welspun nods, frowning. "Yes, I suppose that could have been it. Why?"

"I think I know what they might have been talking about..."

Filmore goes on to recount an occasion when he'd come across Exalian studying in a quiet corner of the Library and walked up quietly to say hello. To his surprise, the other apprentice had started with alarm when he noticed him, hastily concealing the book that he'd been reading. Filmore had pretended not to notice this, but he'd caught sight of an illustration in the book that piqued his interest. He'd gone back later and tracked the book down.

"It was a treatise on the medicinal uses of plants," he tells Welspun. "But it included some sections about poisons and... other things."

The page that Exalian had been reading was about a flower called Black Lotus, which is used to make a drug with a very sinister reputation - and one of its side-effects is the pronounced enlargement of the pupils.

"Sinister... how?" Welspun asks, feeling the hairs on the back of his neck prickling.

Filmore glances around nervously before answering.

"It's used in certain... black magic rituals," he whispers, then gulps. "Hell magic."

~oOo~

Adept Hermeclus is just leaving his office when Eren walks up.

"Ah, there you are, Eren," he smiles "I appear to have missed lunch. How do you rate my chances of scrounging something from the kitchen before dinner?"

Eren thinks his chances are slender at best and says as much. He'd missed lunch by a very substantial margin: it would be dinner-time in a little over an hour.

Hermeclus grins broadly. "Yes, that was my analysis too. What a pain. It seems we will be compelled to go out into the city to seek sustenance..."

The adept's idea of 'sustenance' proves to be a veritable feast for the young apprentice. He takes her to a tiny backstreet tavern in Eastgate, where the diminutive and obviously foreign owner serves them herself, bringing a seemingly endless series of small but tasty dishes, redolent with exotic flavours and unfamiliar spices. Eren chatters cheerfully about last term and her Summer Break while eating, avoiding the subject of Stockfish and only pausing when she notices the amused expression on her sponsor's face.

This food! Eren has never had anything like it before....the flavours, the variety! Even on feast days or after a very successful show, her family might cook up a lot, but never this variety or with so much in the way of spices.

Eren has pursued her studies because they interest her, because it is a route to success away from the stage, maybe even because it was what others expected her to do. Suddenly it hits her: if she becomes an adept, she might have enough money to eat food like this regularly! Imagine being able to come to some place like this every month, or maybe even every week, would that be too extravagant? Why she could even....

Then she notices her sponsor smirking at, and her usual fears of social situations rush back.

"What is it?" she asks. "Do I have food on my face?" she adds, hastily wiping her mouth on her sleeve.

"No, no, my dear - nothing like that," Hermeclus says, chuckling. "I'm just pleased to see you in such good humour. The last time we spoke you were... well, you seemed very much consumed by your fears."

He pauses, frowning. "But if you don't mind, I would like to revisit some of those fears now. You had good reason to be afraid, as it transpired. I'd never have pegged Master Stockfish as a sorcerer! I am curious to hear your version of the events that finally unmasked him - the versions I have heard thus far provoke more questions than they answer - but something else has been troubling me."

Hermeclus pauses as more dishes arrive, sampling them with relish, then goes on to tell Eren what he has learned about Stockfish and his subsequent death in custody.

The official verdict of the Consistory Court was that Stockfish had been a lone malefactor, dabbling in demonology for his own twisted ends. If he had come to trial, Hermeclus suspects that this conclusion might have been challenged, but his untimely demise has been treated as the end of the matter, and whatever investigation had been done by the Apparitor General prior to his death has been shelved. There has also been an investigation into the circumstances of his demise, but the details of this have not been made public. The officially recorded cause of death is "Misadventure".

"But even if we are prepared to accept that Stockfish was acting alone in the nefarious scheme that involved your friend Kiki, we still have two other unexplained incidents. The first of these - the death of that unfortunate apprentice from House Adamarl - does seem to have a connection with Stockfish, as the boy was apparently 'helping' him with a project. But what about the men who tried to snatch you from the College, at least one of whom was an adept? Were they also connected to Stockfish? If they were, then that might suggest a wider conspiracy."

"This brings me to the part that troubles me most," he tells her, with a heavy sigh. "Your description of the spell that one of your would-be abductors used convinced me that he was using gloomer magic, but that wasn't enough to identify a suspect. So I investigated further..."

Hermeclus told her that he had called upon the Spectral Guardians, the same magical entities that Eren had inadvertently summoned when she asked the College for aid. By communicating with these 'non-sentient essence constructs', her sponsor had been able to determine some information about the etheric signatures of the intruders. This confirmed that one of the intruders had been an adept from another school, almost certainly the School of Tenebrous Wisdom, and that one was an adult with no signs of essence attunement. The third intruder was an apprentice from a different school, which Hermeclus assumed to be Pavel. But the Guardians had recorded a fourth signature: that of an Imperial apprentice, but with a discernible connection to another school.

"Who was that other apprentice, Eren?" Hermeclus asks. "And what was their involvement in the abduction?"

He'd called up the spectral guardians just to interview them, like they were just a naughty student or something? Eren was still wrestling with this concept when Adept Hermeclus hits her with the question.

She starts to respond automatically "It was..." then catches herself, and starts again "It was...someone that I think is in over his head. Uh, or her head. He or she, I don't think they really understand what they are dealing with, how evil..." she shudders at the recollection of Stockfish's magics in the graveyard and at the state of the tattered man's essence.

"I don't really want to get someone in big trouble, maybe thrown out of college, maybe even the inquisition, just because they were helping someone more powerful, thinking it was the right thing to do."

She'd not really put all of this into words before, even to herself, but now that she's started she warms to her point. "After all, how much do any of us apprentices really know about the goals of our masters? We all learn about what Imperial is supposed to be all about, but then there is Stockfish...imagine if he'd had the patience to take an apprentice under his wing, to slowly guide them to seeing things his way? He's a master, a teacher, you are supposed to be able to trust him! Could you blame the apprentice then for what he might do under Stockfish's instructions?"

"I do want to get to the bottom of this, but I don't want someone just punished, I want to understand WHY."

Hermeclus is nodding. "Yes, I can understand your concern," he tells her. "And the last thing I want to do is get this other apprentice in 'big trouble'. But from what you have just told me, it sounds like he is already in trouble. You implied that he was actually assisting your would-be abductors, and not merely there by accident. If that is the case, then he may be able to help us identify them."

Her sponsor pauses, frowning deeply.

"As you say, it would be wrong to blame an apprentice for the iniquities of his master," he adds. "But it would also be wrong to turn a blind eye if you know that an apprentice is involved in something perilous..."

Eren nods.

"You just reminded me of something my father would say when the act - when we'd start bickering and telling tales: 'Are you trying to get them into trouble or get them out of trouble?' I guess I don't want to get Vey into trouble, but I hope I can get him out of trouble. So I guess I should tell you who, oh!"

She claps her hands over her mouth, far too late to stop Vey's name from coming out. Sheepishly, she continues "Oh foo, it is a good thing I'd decided I should tell, I guess! Yes, its a boy named Vey, he's an apprentice at Imperial, or was... I've not seen him much lately. I think he started his training somewhere else? I really don't know much about him, but he always seemed nice, before..." Eren waves her hands, to indicate the whole muddled mess of events.

"So there, you know. Now what happens?"

"Now? Well, now I need to make some more enquiries," the adept tells her. He smiles at the expression on her face. "Don't worry, I'll be very discrete. The last thing we want to do is spook the boy...."

Hermeclus pauses, staring at his plate for a few moments. "As it happens, I already suspected that Vey was the mysterious apprentice. I have some knowledge of his background, you see, which was the obvious explanation for his unusual etheric signature. As you mentioned, Vey started training as an apprentice at one of the Tortun schools, and he was there long enough for it to shape his essence, but he was.. ah... invited to leave, after an unfortunate... accident. Thanks to his father, who is a former alumnus and patron of *this* college, he was permitted to continue his studies here. A rare concession..."

"As for you, Eren..." her sponsor pauses again. "I'm probably supposed to say 'Keep your head down and stay out of trouble', but something tells me that you wouldn't pay any attention if I did," he smiles. "So perhaps it would be better if I gave you something constructive - and hopefully not too dangerous - to do."

"I still think that Vey may hold key to this puzzle," he continues. "But determining how he is connected to your would-be abductors is not going to be easy. If we can discover why he helped them, then that might help us to identify them - and determine whether they are connected with Stockfish. I could talk to his master - or even his father - but that is likely to do more harm than good. No - as strange as it may seem, under the circumstances, I think you are probably in a better position to investigate Vey. What do you think?"

At first Eren is very dubious about this idea, but then she remembers Imogen, the younger student whom she had encountered in the secret basement, and who eventually confessed to helping Vey to perpetrate the various pranks that had been inflicted on Eren last term. She even mentioned seeing Vey with a gloomer master![2]

When she tells Hermeclus this, his eyes sparkle. "That does sound promising! I suggest that you speak to Imogen as soon as possible and see what else you can discover about Vey's extra-curricular activities. Now, I suppose I'd better pay for our meal..."

Although disappointed that her culinary adventure has come to an end, Eren is rather relieved to be excused - they'd been talking an eating for longer than she'd realised and she was supposed to be meeting up with Kiki, so that they can go and visit Salazari! She thanks her sponsor profusely and rushes off to their usual rendezvous point.

~oOo~

Kiki sits on the wall of the graveyard swinging her heels. "What's keeping the others?" she wonders.

It's the first time that she's visited the North Street Cemetery since that fateful dawn meeting with Stockfish. Although never easily spooked, the diminutive apprentice had still been a little nervous about returning to the scene of the encounter. Sitting on the wall outside the cemetery didn't feel the least bit scary, though, especially when the street was still bustling with passers-by.

As the hour grows later with no sign of Eren, however, Kiki does start to feel a prickle of anxiety. It's not late enough to be really dark yet, but the street is much quieter and she keeps hearing small noises from within the cemetery. At first, she's happy to dismiss these as the sounds of birds or animals, going about their business amongst the abundant trees and shrubs within, but after listening to them for a while, she starts to wonder. And once her vivid imagination starts to kick in, one of the regularly repeated noises begins to sound suspiciously familiar: the sound of someone fidgeting and shifting position while they wait.

She is just about to turn around and satisfy her curiosity when Eren arrives, hurrying along and out of breath.

Finally puffing up to the wall, and seeing the annoyed-looking kicking of Kiki's heels, Eren spouts out a mix of apologies, explanations, and commentaries on the wondrous food she'd just eaten.

~oOo~

[1] Fabian: the apprentice who was murdered last term
[2] See this chapter for Imogen's information about Vey.