Chapter Text
Dim candlelight is not ideal for reading, but at the moment, it’s all Sephrin has. Not that she can focus her eyes on her book. Though reading usually brings her a quiet solace, though it’s normally how she passes her time, today she cannot fathom the idea of reading any more words than she already has. She tries, nonetheless, because it is all she knows, it is all she has. Especially now, in this dark, bleak room.
She should be thankful for the room, really. The rent is cheap, much cheaper than it ought to be. And the room has all she needs, a bed in one corner and a table across from it. She doesn’t need anything else. Not that anything else could fit in the room. Part of her suspects it used to be a storage room. There isn’t even a window. Not that she minds too much. She only needs a place to sleep and a place to unwind from work.
As she sighs, the candle flickers, the flame dancing with her breath. Closing the book, she rests her head against the table. No, there’s no point in trying to read, not tonight. Her mind is still reeling about the utter nightmare she had gotten herself into.
At 23 years old, Sephrin Roleth had never worked a day in her life. She didn’t have to. While her family was not of nobility, they were wealthy and well off, all thanks to her father, Adric Roleth, a prolific and famous historian and advisor to many noble families. Sephrin was lucky to be his daughter, and lucky to live with him. Adric Roleth was a high elf of high birth, and so were his children. All of them except Sephrin that is. Unlike her siblings, Sephrin’s mother was human, a woman she never met, or rather, she did not remember. According to her father, Sephrin’s mother died when Sephrin was very young, a toddler or so. And somehow, Sephrin found her way to her father’s home.
“You’re the spitting image of your mother,” her father had told her. “There was no doubt you were her daughter. And, of course, you have the Roleth eyes. There was no doubt that you were my daughter.”
Adric tried often to tell his little girl about her mother, about how he met her and why they were not together, how he didn’t know of Sephrin’s birth. But anytime he brought the subject up, Sephrin made him change it. Something about her mother, something about hearing her name or thinking about her made Sephrin feel queasy. She didn’t want to know about this woman she’d never meet, this woman who she does not remember. Adric didn’t wish to push the knowledge onto his daughter, so he obliged and would change the subject to something Sephrin was more interested in, which there weren’t many subjects she wasn’t.
The Roleth estate is home to many collections of books, volumes of history, tomes on magic, novels of literature. If it was written down, Adric Roleth most likely had it in his library. And he gave Sephrin full access to this treasure trove. He learned very early in raising her that Sephrin loved to read. When she first arrived, when she was still skittish and afraid of everyone in the household, Sephrin would slink in the doorway of his office, watching him curiously. Adric would invite her in, but this seemed to always frighten the child off. So, instead, whenever he’d find her hiding in the shadows, he’d start to read whatever he was working on aloud. Little by little, the little half elf would be drawn in until, eventually, Adric managed to get the girl to sit on his lap and read to her. He asked if she knew how to read, which the little girl responded by shaking her head. So he taught her himself. And ever since then, the girl has read. If it was written, Seprhin had most likely read it.
For almost 20 years, that’s all Sephrin had to do, read and read and read. She was never asked to do more. Even now, after her father’s passing, she was not asked to do more. The estate was left to the children, herself and her three half siblings. Her two older sisters were already married with families of their own, wealthy, well-off families of their own. They were more than willing to let the younger two, Sephrin and her older brother, Glynren, continue to live in the estate as they have been. Really, all the older sisters wanted was access to their father’s library, and any money they had right to. It was an ideal will and testament, with no fighting amongst the siblings. And yet, after a few months, Sephrin decided to move out, move out of the home she had lived in for years, though no one told her she had to. No one told her she had to, and yet she had to. Something told her to. Something told her it was time for her to earn her place in the world. No longer could she continue to be a burden, a leech, on her family. She had to face the world on her own. And so, she took a little of her inheritance, just enough to find herself a place to stay, and set off into the world.
She didn’t go far. After all, the world is vast and terrifying. No, she stayed within the city of Baldur’s Gate, like a child camping in their parents’ backyard. Though she was several blocks away, in a completely different part of the city, parts she had never dared explored on her own before. Not that she did much exploring around the city before. Only when she had to, when her father or brother would bring her around would Sephrin step out of her father’s estate. It was safer in the estate. There weren’t people to deal with, just books. Books couldn’t hurt her. Books didn’t judge her.
Shortly after moving out, Sephrin realized she would need a way to earn money, else she would have to continue relying on her father’s money, and that was defeating the purpose of striking out on her own. She had no real marketable skills except that she was literate and able to write. There was only one job that qualified her for: a scribe. Scribes were very necessary; not everyone benefited from an education like her own, after all, and plenty of people needed things read to them or written down. That was something she could do. But how does one acquire a job? After all, Sephrin had never had to get a job before. She had no idea where people went to get one. Did you just go up to people and ask? That sounded terrifying. Luck was on her side, so it seemed, for a few days after finding her new home, she passed a signboard near the market. Something about it caught her eye, a paper flapping in the breeze, perhaps. Whatever it was, it drew her to it, and luckily it did. Jobs! “Help wanted”s littered the board. Her eyes scoured the board, looking for something a mousy little bookworm like herself could handle.
And then her eyes fell upon it: “Scriveners needed at High Hall.”
Sephrin’s chest swelled. Of course she knew of the High Hall. Located in the center of the Temple District, not too far from where she had made her new home, it was the home of practically all government business in Baldur’s Gate. She couldn’t possibly work at such an important, historical place of business. And yet, her eyes kept tracing the letters of the posting over and over again. “Scriveners needed.” That could be her. She could work there.
Somehow -to this day, she still doesn’t know how- she managed to force herself to go to the High Hall the very next day. She dressed herself as professionally as she could and marched herself through the busy terrace, her eyes glued to the ground, afraid to look up at the elegant windows or looming gargoyles or even the other people loitering about the outside. Somehow, she managed to make herself enter the grand doors, though she froze once inside. The hall was more palatial than she imagined, and she suddenly felt very small, very insignificant. Who was she, this timid little nobody? What right did she have to be here? What audacity did she have?
She was pulled out of her thoughts when a woman asked her if she needed help. For a moment, Sephrin’s throat ran dry, and she thought of just turning on her heels and escaping back to her flat to hide under her blankets for the rest of her years. But somehow, she managed to croak out, “I’m, I’m here to, to apply for s-scrivener.”
The woman studied her for a moment, craning her head toward the young girl as if she couldn’t hear her. But the words must have finally reached her ears, because the woman pointed down a hall and gave Sephrin directions. Left right left left right right left up down around. It didn’t really matter to Sephrin. Her head was spinning enough as it was. She was sure to get lost no matter what. But she followed the woman’s finger down the hall. Luckily, there were signs along the walls at every crossway.
Sephrin found herself within the court section of the High Hall. A slender high elf with long, blond hair, saw her lingering in the doorway and stopped short of his conversation with an older human man. “If you have business with the court, you need to check in with Liara.”
Again, Sephrin thought of bolting, but again, she managed to squeak her words out. “I’m...here to, to...I saw a posting for…”
The elf cocked a brow at her. “Spit it out, girl. I don’t have all day.”
“...scrivener…”
He rolled his eyes. “Oh great.” Sighing, he turned to say something to his colleague before returning his attention to Sephrin. “Then you are here to speak with me. Umeris Denonni. Follow me.”
The elf gave her no time to speak or even process what he just said, turning on his heels and sauntering off. Sephrin quickly scurried after him, her heart pounding with each step. He led her to an ornate office and had her sit on a wooden chair across from his desk. Sitting made her even more nervous than before. A cold sweat surged through her. She kept her eyes fixated on the dark oak desk, studying the design, the curve of the legs.
“Do you have any experience with the law? Have you worked in a court before?” Umeris asked her.
Sephrin clenched her mouth shut to keep her lips from quivering. She suddenly couldn’t speak. She had used all her speech up just to get here. All she could do was cower in this man’s presence.
Umeris cocked a brow again, watching the girl tremble. Sighing, he rummaged through his desk and procured a stack of paper, which he placed in front of Sephrin. He then slid an inkwell and pen toward her. It was enough to make Sephrin look up at him.
“Copy these records,” he said. “Let me see what you can do.”
Right. That was something Sephrin could do. Write. Furtively, she grabbed the pen, carefully dipping it into the ink. Umeris rolled his eyes again. “Today, girl. I have a hearing in an hour.”
Nodding, Sephrin got to work. First, she perused the document she had to copy, just enough to get the gist of what she was going to have to write. Then, she began writing. As she did, her shoulders slackened, her posture straightened up. It was as if she was in the room alone, just her and the quill and the papers. After about ten minutes, she laid the pen down, looking up at Umeris hesitantly. The elf had been reading over some papers, most likely for the hearing he had mentioned. It took him a minute to notice the young girl staring up at him, and a few moments more to realize that meant she was done. He seemed surprised as he took the papers from her, glancing over her work. She wasn’t sitting at a writing desk so the ink could have been neater, but other than that, she had copied the document word for word and the writing was clear and legible. More importantly, it was done quickly.
“What’s your name, girl?”
She felt her shoulders creep back up to her chin. “S-Sephrin Roleth, sir.”
Umeris blinked. Sephrin knew that look. She wondered if he would doubt her, make her prove that she was, indeed, the daughter of the famous Adric Roleth. In her pocket, she fiddled with the ring her father had given her, or rather he had given it to her mother and somehow Sephrin got ahold of it. But the ring would prove she either was his daughter or a very clever thief.
But Umeris merely chuckled before standing up. “Then, Miss Roleth, you start tomorrow. Be here promptly at 8am sharp. Do not be late.”
Just as it took Umeris a moment to realize Sephrin was done, it took Sephrin a moment to realize she got the job. Hastily, she jumped to her feet, giving the elf a polite bow. She knew she should thank him, but the words were stuck in her throat. Umeris didn’t seem to mind as he swiftly guided the girl out of the office and back to where they met. Once there, he took his leave, most likely heading to his hearing. A stunned Sephrin stood in that hall for a few minutes before finally stumbling back out to the terrace. Just like before, a crowd of people lingered on the terrace, enjoying the sunny day. The squeal of a child helped pull Sephrin out of her daze.
Just like that, Sephrin got a job.
The rest of the day Sephrin spent in a tizzy, trying to calm herself down and prepare for the next day. She had to make sure she had the proper clothes and supplies. At least she didn’t have to worry about food. She wasn’t sure what the protocol was for that, but she wasn’t planning to bring food with her in the first place. She hardly slept that night, afraid she wouldn’t wake up on time, and she left her house considerably earlier than she would have needed to, getting to the High Hall a good hour early. She sat outside on the terrace, afraid to go in before she was expected. As she sat, she watched people come and go. Everyone seemed so important and official. Again, she felt disparagingly out of place. It wasn’t too late for her to leave. She doubted they would even remember giving her the job.
“You’re early,” a surprised voice pulled her from her thoughts. She glances up enough to see the high elf she spoke to the previous day. He waits for her to respond, perhaps to explain herself, but after just a few moments of awkward silence, he continues. “Good, follow me.”
Just like the day before, he did not wait for her to process, heading toward the entrance. There’s still time, Sephrin thought, I could just leave. But something in her forced her to stand up and follow the elf once again. As he led her through the confusing hallways, she concentrated on the twists and turns, forcing herself to memorize the path. If she was really going through with this, if she was really taking this job, she couldn’t get lost every single day. Umeris was quiet as he led her, murmuring to himself as he read over a few documents. Sephrin was amazed that he could navigate with such ease while reading, but she realized she did the very same back at the library. Never wanting to waste a second, she would read and walk at the same time amongst the shelves, through the halls of the manor, and sometimes even in the garden. Perhaps, just perhaps, one day she could do the same here.
Sephrin was expecting him to stop once they made it to the main lobby of the court wing, but instead, he kept walking. He led her to a rather large room filled with writing desks. Umeris stopped briefly, glancing about the room before making his way to a particular desk. “This will be your desk. You will be provided with supplies but don’t squander them.”
That relieved Sephrin. She hadn’t brought anything with her. Umeris seemed to regard her for a moment, perhaps noticing how unprepared she was or maybe how utterly terrified she must have looked. He cocked a brow but never alluded to what he was observing.
“Your official hours are 8am to 7pm. You have an hour for lunch you may take any time after 12. You are expected to work quickly and efficiently. Officially, you report to me, but you do as the magistrates tell you, do you understand?”
Did she understand? At the time, she had nodded, because the instructions were clear enough. But perhaps Umeris should have been more specific as to what she needed to understand. Because while Sephrin understood the instructions, she certainly didn’t understand what she was getting herself into. Hours of antagonistic torture, humiliation, anamosity. Her hands hurt, her eyes stung.
On paper, the job seemed so simple to her. Show up, make copies of documents, organize said documents, repeat. But there was so much more to it than that. From the second she was shown to her desk, Sephrin was bombarded with demands. Not tasks, demands. She met a handful of the magistrates she was working under, and she quickly learned they all had their own styles and their own expectations. Some were reasonable, like Archibald who would give her a job on Monday that wouldn’t need to be completed until Thursday. But more often than not she has to deal with those like Silverthorne, who plops piles of papers on her desk, saying he needs them yesterday. In fact, he seemed to delight in giving her all of his assignments, just never in a timely manner. Sephrin wanted nothing more than to chide the magistrate, but just the thought of looking up at him made her shrink in her seat. She’d return to her humble abode late at night, her hands cramped and stained with ink, her mind numb and yet racing.
That she was in this mess was entirely his fault. This wouldn’t have happened had it not been for Silverthorne and his impossible demands.
Sephrin had only been working at High Hall almost a month when she found herself staying later and later to get her assignments done. While Silverthorne wasn’t the only one giving her work, he was the one giving her the hardest time. On that particular day, sometime in the afternoon, he had plopped a stack of papers right on top of what Sephrin was working on.
“I need these tonight,” he said curtly.
Sephrin’s eyes widened as she beheld the pile. She was in such shock that she actually spoke. “Tonight?”
“That’s right,” was his brusque reply. He didn’t even bother looking her way as he spoke, instead glancing at the clock on the far side of the room. “I’m meeting with another magistrate at 9:30. Have it done before then.”
Before Sephrin could respond, he sauntered off, disappearing in the hall next door, the hall of Magistrates. Sephrin was left stuttering to herself, her brain desperately trying to process the situation. She had been in the middle of finishing Archibald’s assignment, which was also due that very day. Shifting Silverthorne’s stack, she realized he had messed up the paper she had been writing. The ink smeared, leaving the paper illegible. Crumbling it up, she tossed the paper in the bin by her feet and ran a hand through her brown hair.
She looked at the clock. 3:23. Archibald really needed the papers by tomorrow morning; his case was the first on the docket. She was almost done with his copies, just another ten sheets. Should she continue working on them and get them out of the way before tackling the nonsense Silverthorne left for her? After all, Archibald got to her first. But she knew Silverthorne would gut her like a fish if she didn’t have his work done on time, and it was due first. And there was a lot to copy. Just leafing through the pile, she counted at least 50 pages. Was this his entire case? Did he seriously wait until the last minute to get all of his work copied? His lack of tact shouldn’t have surprised her, yet she found herself stupefied all the same.
So lost was she that Sephrin wasted a solid ten minutes in stunned silence, her eyes glazed over as she debated what her first move would be. Shaking her head, she finally got herself moving, deciding to stick with what she had been working on since she was almost finished with it, and only then moving onto Silverthorne’s ridiculous demand.
Completing Archibald’s copies only took her another hour. Once done, she made her way into the Magistrates’ hall. This was probably her least favorite part of the job. There was always the risk she would encounter one of the Magistrates while in this hall, and that was her worst nightmare. Seeing them in the scrivener room was bad enough; she didn’t want to endure them in their own domain. But she had to drop the copies off to Archibald. Gently, she knocked on the door emblazoned with his name. Listening, she waited for a reply, but none came. With a relieved sigh, Sephrin placed the documents in the dropbox on his door. One less predicament to worry about.
As she returned to her desk, she looked at the clock once more. 4:37. Technically, she was to leave in a little over two hours, but she doubted she would be able to complete this task in such a short amount of time. Already, her hand hurt. She took a moment to crack her fingers, stretching the muscles out. After cracking her neck, she pulled the first sheet off the ridiculous pile and perused it. Silverthorne’s handwriting was atrocious. No wonder he needed someone like Sephrin to copy his work. Squinting, she tried to make out what he was trying to say. Sephrin doesn’t like copying until she knows what she is supposed to write. Yes, she could start writing blindly, but doing so makes keeping the writing neat and tidy more difficult. She likes knowing how the sentences are going to flow, so that she can make the words flow just as naturally. After reading over the page three times, she sighed and placed it on the table, picking up a blank sheet, smoothing it out on her desk. Dipping her quill into the ink, she starts writing the first page.
When the clock struck 7, her fellow scriveners left one by one. The Magistrates who couldn’t leave earlier due to cases left as well. For an hour, Sephrin was the only one in the office, toiling away at the copies, stopping only to flex her fingers when she needed to get the blood flowing.
That was the night she discovered the court didn’t stop operating when the sun went down. Little by little, a few scriveners she had never met before made their way to desks that Sephrin never saw anyone else work at. She had always assumed they were there for newcomers like herself. As it turns out, they were for the Night Shift.
There were only a handful of them, not nearly as many as during the day. They seemed different, more talkative and cattier than the other scriveners that Sephrin worked with. They joked about and made ribald remarks to one another. The antithetical behavior so surprised her that she had to take a few moments to observe it. These Night Shift scriveners merely glanced at her, not saying hello or otherwise acknowledging her existence. Not that the Day Shifters did that much, but that was more of Sephrin’s own doing. She never bothered to say hello to anyone, always keeping her eyes downcast and heading straight to her desk. When one of them stared her down for a few seconds, Sephrin snapped out of her confusion and went back to her work. They laughed and kept to themselves, chatting amongst one another even as they worked.
“You’re not one of the usuals.” The voice was smooth yet sharp, making Sephrin freeze. She hadn’t even noticed the figure approach her desk, but now that she knew it was there, she could feel his presence. From the corner of her eye, she could see the black clothing that marked him a Magistrate. She felt herself shake.
Without asking, the Magistrate swiped the page she had been working on off her desk. “Ah,” he tittered. “Silverthorne. Did he just give this to you now?”
Sephrin shook her head, clenching her fists to keep from shaking.
“She’s a Day Shifter,” one of the Night Shifters announced.
While trying to avoid looking at the Magistrate, Sephrin caught sight of the clock. The deadline was approaching. Panic surged through her. She needed that paper back.
“A Day Shifter,” the Magistrate repeated. “And here so late?”
“Please,” Sephrin whispered, her eyes darting toward the Magistrate’s hand.
“What was that?” he leaned closer, a hand to his ear.
By shifting his posture, Sephrin was forced to look upon him. Her heart skipped a beat. Dark eyes regarded her, but she first noticed the shock of curly white hair adorning his head. In that instant, she found herself studying his face, from the way his eyes seemed to burn holes into her to how his lips curved into a sinful smirk. But there was something else, something that, at that moment, she couldn’t put her finger on.
He raised a brow when she continued to stare at him, not giving him a response. “What’s the matter, darling? Cat got your tongue?” Sephrin found herself watching his mouth carefully as he spoke. The way it moved, it intrigued her, though she did not know why.
With another snicker, he tossed the paper back onto her desk before sauntering toward the Magistrates’ hall. Sephrin found herself watching him as he walked away, the absolute pinnacle of hauteur. When he reached the doorway, he glanced at her over his shoulder. Caught staring, Sephrin swiftly turned back to her desk, her face burning. She heard another laugh before he closed the door behind him.
So thrown off was Sephrin that she sat there stunned for a few minutes, her heart still racing. She had never seen that man before, and yet she could tell right away he was a Magistrate. Through simple deduction, she knew his name. There was one office in the Magistrates’ hall she had never been in, one that was always locked, its occupant never around while she was there. And now she knows why. This Magistrate works at night, long after she leaves for the evening. Sitting there, she could see the engraving on the door, the name written in immaculate cursive.
Astarion.