Divination was widely derided as the least of magic.

Closely related to the bumblings of astrology, it was an ancient branch of magic relying not on study or skill, but an innate draw towards the stars. 

The problem was obvious. 

Stars came and went. 

Mages of any prospect never gave the discipline any time nor thought. To tie one’s strength to the clarity of the weather was as insane as a soldier dictating his strength on how many times he’d sneezed over the past week. 

Just as it was a profession based entirely on luck, so too did the fortunes of those who practised it.

An utterly impractical school of magic, then. 

And yet as Marina Lainsfont peered upon a night sky free of even the shadow of a cloud, all she could do was groan in regret as she considered the copy of Labrent’s Divining Divination she’d used as a wood log. Especially as she didn’t need wood logs to build a fire. 

She just wanted the extra shelf space.

For a moment, the young woman blinked up at a sight more vivid than any painting. 

The glittering stars above offered hints of secrets with such clarity that maybe, just maybe … one of them would be able to tell her what she yearned to know the most–

How to stop her face feeling sweaty the moment a hint of lunch even reached her lips. 

As both an accomplished alchemist and a mage, Marina boasted two disciplines capable of ushering away death itself. She could weave existence as easily amidst her fingertips as she could brew it in the bottom of a cauldron. 

The world wasn’t just her oyster. It was just a playground. 

Yet for all her mastery over the arcane and the alchemical, none of it was enough to prevent her pores from being clogged by midday. It always felt worse than it looked, of course. But that didn’t detract from the fervent desire she had to rid herself of the feelings of clamminess which assailed her by afternoon. And since her symptoms appeared as unexplainable as divination, she gave credence to the thought that it took the unreliable to solve the unexplainable.

And if divination still wasn’t enough, well–

There was always blood magic.

Marina wrinkled her nose as she stepped amidst the ruins of an ancient elven holding. 

The destruction was as recent as it was total. She could feel the magic in the air … and in the earth. 

Blood had been spilled. And not all of it here.

The elder root beneath the soil stretched for leagues, encompassing almost the entirety of the forest. She’d never seen the like. But then again, she had as little experience with druidic magic as she did with blood magic. Two disciplines which rarely bonded well. And the results spoke why.

A smoking wreck.

Whatever state these elven ruins had been before she arrived, they were now considerably worse. 

Something calamitous had occurred, and yet she couldn’t even begin to fathom what. The lack of clouds in the sky was no meteorological event. They’d been physically brushed aside.  A strange thing. No [Clear Sky] spell, even one cast by herself, was capable of ushering in such a clear sky devoid of a single blemish. It was akin to a beach flushed clean of all sediment and children’s toys.

What happened, therefore, was a mystery.

But not necessarily how.

“Ugh. Amateurs.”

Marina eyed the smoking remains, still seeing embers amidst the crumbled stone.

She didn’t agree with those hacks at the Royal Institute of Mages on many things. But their decision to forbid the teaching of blood magic in their halls was a prudent one. 

Of course, their reason for banning it was different to the reason she looked down on it. Oh, she was happy with using all the other parts. But whereas hearts and livers were reagents no different to leaves and roots, blood was magic of its own. 

Magic of the soul. And that meant it had a mind of its own.

Ordinarily, that is.

A curious thing met her eyes. Most blood magic was as crude as they came, using blood that had scarcely dribbled to the ground before it was sucked up in the use of some inane experiment dreamt up by an apprentice who’d failed at intermediate magic theory. And with all the disastrous effects that would follow. 

But strangely, not the blood here.

It had been filtered.

Like wine decanted through a muslin cloth, it’d been stripped of much of its potency, but also its erraticness. The knowledge that elder root was capable of filtering blood in such a manner was a discovery worthy of the Hessingly Prize In Magical Advancement. 

She could see the academic worth at least.

Sadly, Marina couldn’t see the practical one. 

Blood magic was still blood magic. And if a druid was always required to make use of it, then even the most progressive of mages would quickly return to burning their brows learning a slightly faster way to set the fire in their hearths.

Again, then. 

An evening characterised by disappointment. Though not necessarily failure. Research was the studious execution of trial and error until an anomaly became a standard. The madman’s coping mechanism with an obsession. And Marina was nothing if not obsessive in her work.

No … she was just disappointed because she’d need to wait at least 2 minutes before her [Arcane Teleport] was safe to use again.

Even so– 

If it was to avoid needing to click her tongue at the girl most likely to result in the complete loss of these ruins as Marina tested her improved [Inferno Tornado], she was willing to brave the dangers of shaving the time down.

Casually sitting on a wooden stool amidst the fallen rubble and smoking debris, a girl was painting upon a canvas. 

Characterised by her insufferable personality as much as the revealing nature of her garter belts and stockings, the Dealer pursed her lips in quiet consideration as she swayed side to side, her eyes of scarlet and gold taking in a portrait hidden from view.

Marina began to walk away.

Then, she paused, rolled her eyes, and turned around. She knew little about what horrors went on in the mind of the Dealer. And as much as she wished to not care, she was nothing if not beholden to morbid curiosity. If not, she wouldn’t be who she was. 

She’d be normal.

As such, Marina swept over, knowing it wasn’t necessary to hide her steps. Especially as the beginnings of a [Sacred Hexflare Incineration Blast] began to play at her fingers.

To help light the way, of course … and after seeing the state of the painting, to also destroy what was clearly a psychic attack on her mind. 

“What is that?” she asked plainly, frowning at the mish-mash of blots and colours.

The Dealer offered an unassuming smile towards her creation. One of the few she’d seen not to be laced with poison and the promise of time-wasting.

“A tour into madness. A glimpse into the abyss. A peek into the end. Characterised by my years of solitude and childhood abandonment as I waded through the sewers of the world, befriended only by the face which wakes in our nightmares and the dark laughter which wards away the light.” 

Marina paused, blinking as she turned to the girl whose riddles so rarely spoke of herself. 

“Truly?”

“No. It’s a cat.”

“[Sacred Hexflare Incineration Blast].”

Without hesitating, Marina raised her hand. 

What was a canvas filled with a cat so poorly drawn that even Marina could do better was replaced by a ball of white flames and black smoke.

Marina flicked her wrist, partially to send the smoke away. But also to wave away the embers dribbling from her fingertips. A small crater now existed in the grass, the sight joining well with the ruin around it.

Of the Dealer, nothing could be seen.

“Critics are getting harsher. How very dull.”

Even so, Marina was utterly unsurprised as she looked behind her. And then up.

One leg dangling over the over, the Dealer sat upon a branch as she smiled without a hint of animosity. 

But for all her playfulness, Marina saw only an enigma.

That she wasn’t able to assess what magic or technique the Dealer had used to stop her sleeves from catching the edge of her spell was noteworthy. 

To so concisely teleport, no … shift? Blink? Or was it pre-prepared spatial displacement? Whatever it was, it didn’t stop her from relocating instantly to a branch that was not hers.

The smallest miscalculation and that branch was not a seat, but a highly undignified way to die.

A dangerous girl.

But the Grand Duchess wouldn’t choose a pet who was anything else. 

Which begged the question, of course, on why she was here.

“How nice that the Grand Duchy of Granholtz possesses not a single problem, that you can instead paint to your heart’s content while efficiently harassing me at the same time.”

“I wouldn’t call this efficient. There are many more things I can do, both as the eternal bug in your eyes and the number one goon as ranked by popularity. Granholtz is the centre of the continent. It’s also the centre of problems everyone wishes to bring upon us. Every misbegotten cult, foreign power, rogue mage and undead plague spilled from a bottle simply cannot resist interrupting our peaceful way of life.”

“And how many were you responsible for?”

The Dealer thrust out her arms, gesturing all around at these smoking ruins.

“None. Neither myself nor my minions claim any responsibility for any calamity to occur in our own fields or afar. Certainly we’ve nothing to do with an elven archdruid who chose to play with fire, and has everything burned beneath his neck as a result.”

Marina frowned.

An elven archdruid. And still the magic felt sloppy. All druids, apparently, were proudly mediocre.

Still, it was unconventional enough to be worth dismissing in person.

“Perhaps you could have told me if you knew that an elven archdruid was engaged in blood magic. To study the blending of two disciplines with historical antagonism would have drawn my attention.” 

“Naturally, because I had little idea.”

“Really now.”

“Really.” The Dealer counted down with her fingers. “Blowing a hole in the Rensdralt Fortress, seeding a conflict with the Kingdom of Tirea, withholding key information regarding a new king set on bringing about total calamity. Our ambassador had to rush to deliver our letter of demands to the elves scarcely 30 seconds after the first explosion.”

Marina snorted. 

She didn’t care one whit about the machinations of Granholtz. Who they manipulated like pet rodents neither concerned nor surprised her–whether they be elves or nations. For them, they had the confidence to control a fox amidst hens. 

Because Lotus House was the hound.

If they were anything else, their mistress would have long discarded them.

But Marina was different.

She had no desire to be petted and stroked. She wanted answers. And the Grand Duchess was overdue on her first payment.

“You should have informed me,” she said plainly.

The Dealer smiled, releasing her leg only to cross the other.

“You’ve been difficult to reach.”

Not on purpose.

But this was interesting nonetheless. The Dealer’s knack for ignoring spatial barriers didn’t extend to wholesale clairvoyance, at least. That was almost disappointing.

“A respite cut too short. Why are you here, then?”

“How cold. As a member of Team Up To No Good, we share a bond of camaraderie equal to any band of nosy adventurers.” The Dealer leaned forwards slightly, chin in her palm as she rested her elbow to her thigh. “More importantly, I’m here to remind you that work with no notice, no warning and no fun in return for no pay, no holidays and no year-end bonus is what you agreed to. That was the deal.” 

It was.

Marina pursed her lips, but offered no reply. She knew precisely what she was getting into.

Lotus House, however, did not.

“Very well. What is it now?”

“Only the best of inane tasks. A door needs unlocking. One we already have the key to.”

Marina frowned.

This girl. She spoke like this for the sake of it.

“Which proverbial door?”

“It’s not proverbial. It’s very much real. A door you know very well. It’s still wobbling from when you last closed it. And I think you’ll be marvelled by what you’ll find behind it now.”

No hint of meaning came to Marina’s mind. At first.

The smile directed at her was tinged with more than a hint of amusement. That alone told Marina more than she needed to hear.

A moment later–she clicked her tongue.

Of course. Just like the Winter Court, they would turn to where even their shadows couldn’t slither for her help. And so they required fire instead. Copious amounts of it.

They may as well hire a fresh-faced apprentice still learning to juggle their first triple [Light Sphere] incantation. 

Marina sighed as she held back her thoughts … some of them, at least. 

But the criticism she wished to aim towards the enigma immune to all scrying was instead met by a branch gently swaying beneath the weight of only moonlight.

The Dealer had gone. 

Marina frowned. It was hardly unusual for her to vanish. But to do so without a suitable parting quip or mundane statement shorn of context was uncharacteristic.

A heartbeat later, she came to know why.

Though her least favourite puzzle was now gone, that didn’t make her alone.

A disturbance amidst the underbrush seized her attention. 

Marina took a step back, all the while hoping that whatever aberration had been woken from the forest was at least worth dissecting. Her alchemist’s satchel was running light. 

What she found was something far more valuable.

Stepping forth amidst the darkness beneath the boughs was a sword shimmering with a pale starlight. 

Resplendent with enough enchantments to drive the eyes of many mages attempting to appraise it into a migraine, it was a work of art as much as lethality.

And the one who held it was a man whose presence was as questionable as her own.

Cloak billowing behind him, Marina has no doubt that his dark hair and steely eyes would manage to frame itself against the night even without the illuminating light from his sword. Though his figure was tall and slim, he was no fragile reed, but as sure as the sword in his outstretched arm.

Marina observed as the man without a hint of joviality to his expression came to a halt, his cold eyes and hard expression speaking more words than the silence which came from his lips.

She’d never had the luxury of meeting royalty before. 

And perhaps were it not for the royal crest stamped across his attire, she’d never know she had. 

“A prince,” she said simply. “Now this is new.”

She twisted around to face him properly, embers igniting at the tips of her fingers.

“Frankly, I don’t know which one you are. Though I’m no farmer toiling the fields, I’m afraid my interest in matters of royalty remains exactly the same. But a prince’s heart is a prince’s heart. And these things are worth more than an archdemon’s these days. Are you certain you should be here without a few hundred knights to defend you?”

Marina awaited the response.

All she received was a dismissive glance towards the magic pooling in her hands, followed by a gaze which not only watched her … but judged her.

And she knew from a look as plain as any that it was of disappointment.

Marina hesitated.

While regicide was well within her remit, to test herself against any adversary with the audacity to approach her with his sword already drawn was an unnecessary detour in risk taking.

“... I don’t think my infamy is enough to warrant the personal attention of a prince. But I’m in no mood to inquire. You’ll have to forgive me, Your Highness. I’ve too little time and even fewer courtesies to my name.”

Offering a nod to someone who was likely still officially her ruler, Marina raised her arms out. The embers died away, replaced by weaves of light as gentle as a songbird’s hum.

She fell backwards, allowing her magic to cradle her as the world became a blur of colours.

“[Arcane Teleport].”

Even then, she was unnerved at the sight of that cold stare shorn of emotion. And for a split second, she wondered if the barrier she’d already cast would be enough should he strike. 

Something she came exceptionally close to discovering.

To her absolute shock–that enchanted sword, laden with enough magic to bludgeon through a wall, went flying towards her.

The prince … had thrown his weapon!

Madness or boldness. She couldn’t tell which it was. But as she watched the sword practically passing through where she’d momentarily been, all she could do was groan at how deranged the royalty of this kingdom was.

If a prince resorted to immediately launching their own weapons as projectiles, she could only imagine what the rest of them would do. Given the rumours she’d heard about them, the prudent choice would be to flee at the first opportunity.

Fortunately for Marina, her only enemies were far less important.

Those who had doubted her. Those who had slighted her. 

And most importantly–those who had seen her undergarments.