Chapter 15. Annoying Dean
I wake up in such a good mood that Bridgit comments on it. I simply claim that I had a nice dream. Which is not in any way a lie, at that. She also notifies me that an academy footman came by while I was still asleep and requested I visit the dean for unspecified reasons. Not sure what he wants, but it's not a hardship in any case. So after a light breakfast, I do depart towards the professoratorium. The day promises to be murky, given the clouds on the horizon. We might even have rain in the afternoon. Not that it would bother me. I'll be fine and cozy in a dry and warm dorm.
The atmosphere in the professoratorium is... odd. While the secretary waves me in pretty much as soon as I explain who I am and what I'm here for, I couldn't help but notice her jolting when I said my name. Concerning. Even more concerning is the fact that the professoratorium seems to be abandoned. Where are all the people? It should be bustling with activity this close to the start of the academic year. As I step into the dean's office (very spacious office, by the way, it looks like it spans the entirety of the building's side from corner to corner), the doors behind me slam shut. OOkay? What's with the stony expressions, people? And why am I faced with a man in royal mage uniform?
He casts a spell in my direction. I'd dodge, but I can feel him massing up the intent, and it's pure light magic. Entirely harmless to me. And, admittedly, intense enough to outright heal some pretty deep gashes. I can see the golden beam extending from the guy's hand towards my solar plexus. Actually, this feels kinda nice, like a very light bellyrub. But nice or not, I can't exactly let some random person just rub my belly like that. It's uncouth! Even with magic, yes. Ask for permission first at least, you jackass.
"So... what was that supposed to do?" - I drawl sardonically - "Because to the best of my knowledge, I'm not really wounded anywhere. Unless you're trying to heal me from being a woman or something."
Mage drops his hand like he's just been burned and stares at me incredulously. His entourage, for the lack of a better word, are not any better. A standoff continues. "Well?" - I demand, putting in a touch of impatience in my voice.
"...Shit!" - and one of the guys lunges at me with the dagger. OOkay, this is getting stupid. What the hell is going on? I grab him by the wrist and twist his arm, stepping to the side in the same time. Firing off body reinforcement spell is automatic by now, I don't really NEED it, but I practiced it until it became a habit to explain away my supernatural toughness in altercations like these. He yelps, clearly not expecting the catch, and pounds the floor with his free arm, as I hold him pinned down by twisting the other one and a knee on the small of his back. "Sir Zade, help me!" - he manages, still struggling ineffectually.
Mage finally works through his surprise and facepalms. "Stand down, people." - he grumbles, rubbing at his face tiredly.
"But sir!..."
"Yes, this includes you too, squire Jenkins." - he grumbles - "Lady Gillespie, I sincerely apologize for this misunderstanding. We had received a report that you are actually an undetected talbot, and dean Ambercrombe insisted on treating it as a confirmed case."
"BUT SIR! SHE JUST CAST UNAIDED!" - Jenkins screams from under my knee. I shake my free hand in front of his face, making sure he can see the flower-embroidered sleeve clearly. He clearly fails to connect the dots. Zade just as clearly does. His palm impacts his face again.
"Jenkins, you are a blind moron. What's on her sleeve?" - he rasps. Not giving any time to the rash idiots to reply, he continues - "FLOWERS, Jenkins. Her sleeves are embroidered with flowers all the way to the elbows. She has enough facsimiles there to cast all the cantrips in the book at the same time and still have embroideries left over."
I sigh and twist the arm harder. Jenkins yelps and finally lets go of the dagger, which clatters to the floor. I drop him unceremoniously and take a step forth, kicking the dagger well out of his reach. Zade sighs heavily and averts his eyes - "Jenkins, you are going back to sir Malachi for retraining. I can't even begin to explain how much you screwed up. Honestly, the only thing you did right was not stabbing yourself with your own knife, while at it." He heaves a deep sigh and addresses me - "Once again, my deepest apologies. And my compliments on that takedown, while I'm at it. You are impressively trained in wrestling, lady Gillespie. My thanks for not wrenching his elbow, no matter how much the rash moron deserved it." We can hear some muffled sulfurous muttering from the aforementioned moron - which immediately earns him a heavy smack upside the head from Zade. "Shut up, Jenkins. Lady Gillespie was well within her rights to kill you right here and now. So you'd better be damn grateful she showed you mercy by injuring only your pride." - he admonishes - "What were you THINKING, pulling a dagger on count's firstborn daughter!? It was bloody obvious she's NOT a talbot the moment she ignored my spell. So why in the name of all that is sane and just did you decide that dagger is in any way the right idea?" And now Jenkins looks both steamed and sheepish. Guess it smarts being called out on doing the derp like this. Especially in front of everyone.
"Sir Zade, I believe you have something to write." - I quip, tapping my foot. He pauses, groans, then turns around, patting his sidebag. "Damnation, I do." - he grumbles, as he sits down and shamelessly pilfers dean's quill to start jotting things down on a piece of paper he pulls out of the bag. It's a standard "had been verified to be free of malicious influences" form that is given to anyone who had been under suspicion of being a harmful creature and cleared of it. Strictly speaking, I can think of at least one malicious entity that could shrug off light magic just as easily as I did, but to the best of my knowledge, those beasts have had been hunted to extinction in ancient times. Three guys who didn't do anything begin to shuffle towards the exit, as Zade waves at them. Jenkins follows them like a beaten dog. "Tell the dean to come in." - he calls after them.
A few minutes later (Sir Zade is still scribbling. I really need to introduce printing press, their "forms" right now are basically a parchment with department seal preaffixed. Everything else has to be written in by hand.), a tall man enters the office. He, frankly, looks malnourished, with how thin he is. I'm curious enough to actually do a passive scan. Ooh, yeah. Tapeworms suck. Literally. And this dude has a honking huge one. Explains his thinness. And the perpetually foul mood, I'm guessing. "Sir Zade, what is this?" - he inquires acerbically, as he halts in the door and backs away defensively - "I was under impression that you had the problem handled!"
Zade quirks a brow at him. "The problem, dean Ambercrombe, is handled." - he enunciates clearly - "At least on my side it is. You still need to handle yours. I do not know who was your source, but they took you for a fool. Lady Gillespie is confirmed to be exactly who she is, by the way. She is in no way talbot or selkie or doppelganger or any other malicious presence. Now forgive me for a few more minutes while I finish the document confirming this."
"And how, pray tell, this was verified so quickly?" - dean is just not giving up. Either he's a fool, a paranoid, or... Oh, wait, I'm just being stupid. He's obviously a relative of the choice idiot I handed out a beating to at the audience. Bother bother bother bother. Now I have to maneuver around this idiot too.
Zade growls. "I do NOT care for you questioning my competence, dean!" - he stabs with his words forcefully - "But in the interests of keeping this short, she had shown NO adverse reaction to Ray of Purity. Which, as you should well know, is lethal or intensely painful to ANY malicious presence the royal charter currently recognizes."
"But what about the unaided casting? I have been told she cast spells without a flower!" - jeebus. Get a clue, moron. I turn to him and very intently and slowly dust off my sleeves, showing off the embroideries. He just stares at me with empty eyes. What the fuck. Ooh, wait, nevermind, he snapped out of it. Oh, yeah, he's looking on my sleeves. OOh, and here comes facepalm.
"Yes, indeed." - Zade grumbles - "Now, mind if I finish this so I could get out of your office and let you resume the normality?"
To be fair to the dean, he quickly adapts to the changed situation. Sketching a quick bow (Just as shallow as he can get away with by politeness, of course.), he steps into the office fully, moving off towards the window, and motions me to follow. Fine. Whatever.
"I, hrm, offer my apologies for excessively hasty action." - he offers without looking at me, - "I have been advised by someone I explicitly trust, and had no reason to think they were mistaken."
"Is that all you apologize for?" - I quip back.
He jerks around, staring at me - "What do you mean by that?!"
I give him a thin smile. "I have had been awaiting some packages to arrive in the evening. They haven't, and I know for a fact they have had been dispatched." - I offer, chuckling in satisfaction as I see his jowls set into angry frown - "Therefore, they have had been intentionally tarried by Academy footmen. Now why did that happen, I wonder?"
He swallows his angry surprise and retorts dryly - "Lady Gillespie, I assure you I did NOT order your packages delayed. If indeed Academy servants had failed in their task, they shall be disciplined to the full extent of their fault."
"Is that so? In that case, I believe I shall prevail on you and sir Zade to be the witnesses as we search for the packages. You see, one of them was directly from the king, and I am under orders from his highness personally to handle the contents with utmost care and reasonable haste. Delaying that package, why, whoever did this would likely be beheaded." - I offer to him, watching Zade suddenly straighten up and pay intense attention, while dean looks like he just bit into particularly juicy onion expecting an apple.
Zade comes to his senses first and grabs the sander, shaking it all over the paper to draw the excess ink. "I am at your disposal, lady Gillespie." - he says sharply, cutting off the dean just as latter opens his mouth to say something - "Intercepting royal mail is something I may not overlook."
And now dean looks frightened. Subtly, he hides it well, but I can see the trembling tension. He was NOT expecting to be in this situation. I'm not sure if he genuinely believed in me being a talbot (This suspicion crops up way too often for my taste. Note to self, hold a public healing session or something to make it common knowledge I'm apt with light magic.) or just thought Zade would find something sufficiently dark on my persona to read me a riot act over it. I dunno why I would have any, pretty much all law-proscribed things are illegal for good reasons. Reasons like "it eats your life force" and "it makes you impotent" and "it ruins your frontal brain lobes". Baaaaad juju. Not the realm-ending bad, thankfully, but very much the person-ending bad in many cases.
"So. Dean. Would you be so kind to lead us to the room that is used to store parcels arriving to students?" - I inquire lazily. He swallows, but turns around, heading towards the door without much ado. This is actually very convenient situation for me. If it was just me and dean, he'd just fob me off to go look for the parcel on my own. With Zade in the room, however? He has to come, otherwise Zade would just arrest him on the spot.
The trip to the room is in silence, though I can passively sense dean getting tenser and tenser as we come close. He obviously didn't plan it all the way through. If he did, the parcels wouldn't be in the room to begin with, they'd be secreted somewhere out of reach, or even out of Academy to begin with. As is, he simply expected me to get in trouble on the first try and didn't even pause to consider the plan B. The hold on parcels was obviously a plan to coerce me into further concessions once the "guilt" was to be established. Goodness, Ambercrombes certainly prove their salt as choice idiots. How does a guy like him become a dean anyway? I, ah... make an unfortunate conclusion that this man will have to be replaced. I'll give him exactly one more chance to prove competence. He had to have SOMETHING going for him to keep the post, so one chance is all he gets. The parcels are the second strike, if he does something stupid again, well... It'd be very hard to justify remaining a dean after being beaten rotten by a student in an honor duel.
With clear reluctance, dean enters the room first and demands to have "...any packages due to lady Gillespie to be presented at once." The pair of footmen in the room clearly realize something has gone wrong with me and Zade flanking the dean, so the scramble is very real. Before long, there are two packages from the bazaar, which are my hookah and the molasses I bought, and one rather ornate casket with king's personal seal set into the lid. Dean visibly pales on seeing that, and swallows nervously. He probably wasn't told about this, or he would have been much more cautious. A student getting mail directly from the king is not someone you bother without a good reason, professor or not.
"When did the packages arrive?" - I ask. One of the footmen scratches his head. "Why, the last eve, milady." - he answers easily.
"So how come I wasn't alerted about it last evening, then?" - I inquire. He is faced the wrong way to see the faces dean is making frantically in his direction. The joys of being able to pick my position second, mm. Amusement much. "Ah, well, pardon us milady, but most honorable dean had requested we shan't bother students while in repose. We were to deliver the parcels on the next day's morn, while the students are attending to lecture hall." - he answers simply. Well, that was an inspired bit of ass-covering, dean. I guess I'll let you off the hook today.
"See this seal?" - I inquire of the footmen, tapping the lid of the casket. Both of them seem to be ignorant. "This is king's personal seal. If you ever get packages with this seal again, they should be delivered instantly, even if it's in the dead of night or in the middle of classes." - I explain, and both of them straighten up and nod spastically. Amusingly enough, dean does the same.
"Well, no harm done. Sir Zade, I thank you for your attendance. Might I prevail on you to appraise his highness of the current state of the package? Do tell him to send a runner tomorrow, I shall have his commission ready by then." - I tell him, eyeing dean gain a faintly green complexion as the enormity of the fuckup he almost got into finally sinks in. Hopefully, that's sufficient to scare him straight. And if not, well...
As I go to pick up the casket, dean yet again proves his mouth works faster than his brain. "Wait, lady Gillespie! There's also a matter of tables..." - oh, what the fuck. Dean Ambercrombe, what the flying fuck.
"What of it? I donate them to Academy. Per Noble Charter of Attendee, I have the first pick on the furniture I donate, while I am in attendance. You can assign them to the students in need of a good worktable once I graduate." - I retort, while picking up the casket. Footmen quickly grasp the hint and lift the other two packages, lining up after me.
"Sir Zade, dean Ambercrombe. Good day to you, gentlemen." - I offer as I walk out. Behind my back, Zade bites back a raspy laugh and shakes his head, while dean imitates a fish out of water.