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"The Lord Emperor left his apartments!" Lord Priest Beren's apprentice Nuriya blurted out when she burst into his workroom early in the afternoon. She was practically vibrating with excitement.
"He's left his apartments? And gone where?" He had been busy working through the equations of a ritual ceremony that he hoped would be able to stabilize a local region of Schooled magic. He was annoyed at the interruption, but while Nuriya was often excitable, she didn't usually interrupt him without cause. She was his favorite apprentice for good reasons.
"To the Collian gardens! Lord Beren...he did magic! I mean..." she hesitated. "It didn't look like magic. But it was. I'm sure of it." One of those reasons was her ability to work with magic even in the wreckage of the post-Fall world. Her tendency towards improvisation in ritual construction would have restricted both her opportunities and her successes in Astandalas, but now it made her one of the most effective wizards of those he'd gathered to him in the wake of the Fall.
Beren had been one of the few Ourantha who had some skill in working outside of the constraints of Schooled magic, and he had spent the intervening years building a cadre of wizards who could both work magic and were still interested in in the "wizard" portion of "priest wizard". Magic was hard for all of them, slippery and uncooperative, even with the tools they had remaining. Lady Jivane had been...not worthless, precisely, but certainly not a skilled enough mage to forge order out of the magical chaos she inherited. Beren's division had picked up the work of trying to build something out of the shattered remains of the Pax Astandalas.
Nuriya was one of his most promising students. If she said the Lord Emperor was doing magic, then he was.
She had not been able to provide many more details, between being unable to get close enough to see what the Glorious One had been working, and being unfamiliar with the magic he was using, but she said the magic felt "tidier" after he left. (It was almost certainly wild magic. He had not seen it wielded since his youth, but he remembered a time when the Last Emperor had that power, before he was bound under the Pax Astandalas.) He had taught her better than to speculate without further evidence, but he could see from the excitement in her eyes that she was going to go back unless he ordered otherwise.
(Nuriya had never quite mastered aristocratic indifference. She was the child of two military mages who could never have hoped to rise as high as a Lord Priest's apprentice. Like many things, the Fall had changed that, and skill in magic trumped bloodline when it came to this work.)
He could hardly fault her for her curiosity; he shared it. But as much as he disliked the politics of it, he knew it would not do for an elder of the Ouranatha to be seen investigating the Last Emperor's morning jaunt like it was a surprise. However...he was the Lord Priest of the First Flame, high priest of rituals. No one would be surprised for the Ournatha to be seen sanctifying the ground that he had blessed this morning.
"Go and gather Kaden and Dell," he directed Nuriya, naming two junior wizards. "Tell them to wear their robes and bring the purification kit."
The bounce in her step was very nearly a skip as she gave him a perfectly adequate bow, and ran off to fetch her fellow priests.
Before he departed, he paused to send a page to the High Priests of the Sun and Moon, politely informing them that he was visiting the location of the Last Emperor's morning walk to ensure that nothing had been knocked magically out of place by his unexpected departure from the Imperial Apartments. Václav and Bavezh were generally more interested in playing politics and increasing their own consequence than their ritual duties, but there was no reason to risk that they might decide to involve themselves regardless.
That task accomplished, he donned his own ceremonial robes, and led his team of wizards to the gardens where the Glorious One had spent his morning.
Beren examined the space in the garden, where it was immediately obvious to his magical senses that something had changed. He had investigated this particular tangle of magic once, early after the Fall when he'd needed every magical win he could get to hold a place in the deeply political (and now mostly magically useless) council of elders. It had been well beyond his ability to do anything about then, but now he couldn't even sense it.
He directed his team through the ceremonial blessing that, with only a small modification, served as a way to reveal the state of the local magic, and his conclusion solidified: The Last Emperor had removed a nasty curse that lingered there since the Fall in the course of a few hours.
That was not the work of a minor magical talent.
As he and the team returned to his apartments, Beren dared to allow himself to hope that perhaps - just perhaps - the Last Emperor would show a talent worthy of being the Lord Magus after all.
Several hours later, he was interrupted again, this time by an extremely trepidatious page, conveying the Glorious One's summons to the Swan Room at precisely midnight. The page, he could tell, had been the recipient of several less than civil responses from his colleagues. But, while he was annoyed at the interruption, he couldn't say he was particularly surprised at the summons.
So now. A midnight summons, from the erstwhile god who had, at least once upon a time, had a great gift for wild magic. (He did not think anyone else knew that about the Emperor. He was one of the few in the Ouranatha Council who had been in the imperial priest corps when the Last Emperor came to the throne, and he was nearly positive that he was the only one left who knew anything about the initial bindings placed on this Emperor)
He donned his full formal raiment, complete with the silver mask of his office which allowed them to confer in privacy, in addition to providing some protection against the imperial taboos - an artifact which had fortunately survived the Fall. He gave one last check that his outfit was in place, and went out to join his colleagues.
Lady Catriona, the Lady Priestess of the Liminal Hours, joined him as he passed her apartments. She was a solid decade his junior, but had clawed her way on to the council of elders through ruthless networking and an incredible eye for young talent. She had been the one who found Nuriya and introduced her to him, and Beren knew she'd found others on the council similarly promising acolytes.
"Lord Beren!" she said brightly. "I see his Holiness has summoned the full council. You were out in the gardens after he was there; do you have any idea what this could be about?"
Under his mask, Beren smiled. Catriona always had a remarkable amount of energy to her, a friendly, cheerful presence that hid a calculating mind. He considered himself fortunate that their goals were generally well enough aligned for her to be a reliable ally. "Well," he said dryly, "the Lord Magus is summoning us for a meeting at the symbolic transition to a new day, after spending the morning working magic."
"That can't have been just him. He doesn't have any significant magic!" she protested.
Beren hummed. "He hasn't shown any, no," he agreed. When the Glorious One awoke, it had been much to the dismay of many of Beren's peers. The Emperor as a sleeping figurehead was useful, a man turned into a divine myth. The Last Emperor as a living person capable of making choices had the potential to disrupt all of their efforts at rebuilding society. Until now, he had manifested no greater magical ability than the ability to call light, and he had seemed content to remain a figurehead occasionally advising on the rebuilding of the world. (And if Beren had hoped for the emperor to manifest a greater magical skill than Lady Jivane ever showed, he had kept that disappointment entirely to himself.)
She considered him for a moment before saying, "You know something, don't you?"
"I think," he said firmly, "that it is better not to speculate."
"Very well," she said with a laugh as they joined up with several of their colleagues on the way to the meeting. "I will wait and see with the rest of us."
The Emperor had given them little warning, but the palace staff were still impeccably trained, and well equipped to handle preparing even as significant a room as the Swan Chamber on no notice. He arrived to find the chairs arranged for the council and the candles lit to illuminate the room with a soft, gentle light.
Once, this room would have been lit by magelight and staffed constantly with attendants as befit one of the imperial chambers. The throne alone warranted that level of attention, a throne which had once been considered worthy of the throne room of the Palace of Stars itself, and was now the center of attention for a room that had often served as a private audience chamber. After the Fall it sat mostly unused, as the Emperor rarely left the Tower save to go to court.
They waited for the Last Emperor. He heard some of the junior priests muttering between themselves, their quiet tones thick with unease. Some of them would likely be making the connection between the Glorious One's trip to the gardens today, and the fact that Lady Jivane's seeking ritual had led her to choose him as her successor as Lord Magus. Beren was content to wait peaceably. Decades of orchestrating the most elaborate of imperial rituals had left him well equipped to be patient.
The Emperor arrived at precisely midnight, and paused as they rose to accept their deference, before striding to the throne at the head of the room. He had come to this meeting dressed as the Lord of Zunidh, inasmuch as that role could take precedence over the position of Emperor, wearing jewelry in Zunidh's traditional orange and blue. Safe behind his mask, Beren watched as he sat and his guards moved smoothly to their places beside him.
The Emperor's magic was awake.
Beren could feel it wrapped gently around him, quiescent but unmistakable. This magic had nothing to do with the Schooled magic of the Empire. This was the power of a wild mage – of a great mage finally awoken to himself. (He had wondered occasionally if the anchors of the Pax had burned out his magic or simply bound him, and if so, if they bound him still. It was clear now that his magic had only needed time to recover.)
The emperor surveyed the room in silence and serene stillness. Beren suppressed a frisson of discomfort as he felt a fine tendril of magic reach out, press against his own and take his measure, and move on. The emperor's touch was light, but being read by the impassive presence before him left him feeling exposed and judged.
(Beren had watched the emperor grow into this stillness, his humanity melting away as he went from a passionate and lively man into the very embodiment of the Serene Holiness. He had once been told that who the emperor was before he came to the throne didn't matter, and this imposing, imperious presence gave more truth to that statement than he had been able to credit at the time.)
After several long moments, long enough for the less disciplined of his colleagues to begin to shift restlessly, the Emperor leaned forward, steepled his fingers, and spoke. "After careful study of the situation, we have begun the active restoration and recreation of Zunidh's magic."
That caused a stir, as well it might. Even Beren, who had seen his work in the garden, had not expected him to make such an assertive opening move. Beren watched him watch them, watched him look over the council, reading their discomfort. While they were still calculating what this would mean, he unleashed his magic.
The Emperor released his power and it swept over the room like a gale across open plains. Beren had been the focus of great power before during the coronation binding rituals, but he'd never been in the presence of this much pure, unfocused magic. He had some small gift that lay beyond what he could tap into under Schooled magic, but to compare that to the Glorious One's power would be like comparing a candle to a forest fire. (He had known the man had been powerful, but he had never imagined this.)
The Glorious One's magic held them for a moment without time or thought. When it finally receded, Beren saw the candles had gone out, and the room was filled with the gentle glow of his magic and his magic alone. The Emperor himself was glowing as he had before the Fall, his eyes burning and the air around him distorted as if by heat. He was watching them with the faintest look of challenge.
He was clearly no longer content to be a figurehead.
He had shown a small gift for magic since he had awoken. This, however, that timeless wave of power, that ease that he rested in Zunidh's magic – this was the mark of a great mage, the kind that had been the true lords of worlds before they had been conquered and woven into the greater fabric of the Empire. While Beren and his apprentices had made some progress in understanding how to work with the remnants of the Pax Astandalas, they could never hope to match what he had just done, and his next words confirmed that he knew it.
"We thank you for the work the Ouranatha has been doing to maintain the spirits and morale of the populace, and to bind as best you could the magic broken in the Fall. We expect that as we continue to settle and restore the magic your own spells will come once more to be properly ... effectual."
Beren had served him since he came to the throne, and knew him well enough to hear the disdain in his voice. What was it that displeased him so? That they had tried to hold the remains of the world together? That they had failed so badly at rebuilding the magic on their own? (Perhaps he had seen how powerless most of this council was, and despised them for it, that he had to rebuild for them the system that had stolen his magic.)
"How?" came Catriona's incredulous voice over the link.
"Never mind how," said the Lord Priest Theodem of the Zealous Anchorite, "what do we do about it?"
"He's never liked us," observed the Lady Priestess Dora of the Dragon. "He will try to remove us."
"He cannot," Catriona said firmly. "We built his power base. He can't seriously weaken us without losing his legitimacy."
"If he can restore our magic, I don't see that we need to have any conflict," Beren said. "We are his priests, this should change nothing." It would, of course. He knew that. But appearances mattered, always, and they always needed to be seen as his priests.
"With this much power, he looks even more like a god," Bavezh said. "This could be to our benefit."
"Regardless. If he has taken an interest in the world again," even through the link, Václav sounded like he'd eaten something sour, "then we are his priests. We need do nothing but represent his will."
It was one of the Ourantha's favorite euphemisms, as Beren knew well. The Glorious One's will was always available to be "interpreted" to suit whatever aims they had at the time. If he meant to restore the magic such that they could work, then they would be well placed to ensure that he was respected as he ought to be, with them as his mortal mediators.
"Agreed," said Catriona.
"Agreed," said Beren.
"Agreed," came the echoes from each member of the Council.
It was Václav's place to speak for the council and, with the Glorious One's permission, he did so, giving way graciously to the demands of the Sun-on-Earth.
The Emperor thanked them all with divine condescension, and swept out of the room.
As he rose from his obeisance, Beren thought that they were still overestimating their influence. The Last Emperor had never been as easy to control as the elders expected him to be.