Chapter 1
The Journal of Celestial Mage Kadmus Castro
Seventeenth Sun, Tenth Cycle, Twelfth Age
The fabricator mages have built wardstones.
“Obelisks,” they’re calling them—four obsidian pillars, placed toward the north, south, east, and west of the now fully formed city.
Or uppercity, as it’s known, with many residents having relocated inside the mountains and to the undercity beneath the surface.
I don’t understand the appeal—I’d much rather feel the sun on my skin and the breeze on my face, but to each their own.
I can, however, acknowledge that the underground and inner-mountain design is a marvel, even by fabricator standards.
For shallows who have never experienced magic-made architecture, let alone our wayportals and ellixen-infused elevators, I understand why they might be charmed enough to want to live in such places.
But the wardstones—the “obelisks”—I’m not sure how I feel about those.
Because they’ve suppressed the power of the Hallow Stream.
What was once a flood of unruly magic is now a trickle. Submissive, subdued, silent. Just like back on the mainland.
Part of me is relieved, since it means my ellixen is no longer reacting in unpredictable and temperamental ways.
It’s nice not to wonder whether I’ll heal a bruise or accidentally turn it into a broken bone, summon a book or have it burn to ash, unlock a door or trap myself in a sealed room. But another part of me is…grieving.
I never told anyone—I’ve barely even admitted it to myself—but I’d secretly hoped I might one day be able to use the raw magic emanating from the Stream to increase the power I draw from celestial events.
I think I already was to a degree—I think the Stream was helping me, that it wanted to help me.
Because unlike on the mainland, the strange, residual power I’ve experienced with each new ritual has stayed with me for hours afterward. Sometimes days.
I’ve never felt anything like it before, not in all my years of practicing celestial magic.
It’s addictive.
And I want more.
But with the wards from the obelisks taming the Stream’s magic, I already know things are going to change.
More and more shallows have been attending my ceremonies over the last few months, hungry for my blessing rites that amplify their ellixen, but now the celestial power I summon will no longer be as strong or as lasting—for them or for me.
They’ll eventually stop coming to my rituals, stop needing me, stop wanting me.
It’ll be just like on the mainland, with my role as Priest slowly but surely becoming obsolete.
I blame Tephryn Alemedes. She’s the reason the fabricator mages decided to build the obelisks—she came up with the idea, taking inspiration from the natural wards that surround the two Hallow Streams on the mainland, then infusing the towering obsidian pillars with her own experimental suppression magic.
Of course she did—only an alchemist mage would be so reckless.
Transformational magic is dangerous, and infusions, especially, can be deadly.
There’s a reason why alchemy is so carefully supervised during training, and why so few mages choose it as their specialty.
The discipline it takes, the sacrifice…not to mention the risks and consequences when it goes wrong…
I’m not sure if I abhor Tephryn or admire her. I think it’s a combination of both—though I’m also self-aware enough to know her physical appeal is swaying my bias, since it would be much easier to dislike her if she weren’t so beautiful.
It would also help if she weren’t one of the only mages here who doesn’t openly ridicule me. She came to my moonfall ceremony a few nights ago, as impossible as that is to believe. A mage—and an alchemist mage, at that—attended one of my rituals.
I’d have thought she was mocking me if not for how many questions she asked afterward and the genuine curiosity that shone in her starlit eyes.
She even suggested we meet later this week to discuss the upcoming arrival of the Adastrum Devotis comets.
It’s been two hundred years since they last graced our skies, but while the power they emit is unparalleled, she’s not a celestial mage, so I’m unsure why they would interest her.
Zeranthe says I’m being obtuse, that Tephryn doesn’t want to meet about the comets but instead has romantic inclinations. I’m not sure I can trust a dragon’s judgment on such matters, nor am I sure how I’ll proceed if it turns out she’s right.
All I know is that I need to be careful. I can’t allow myself to fall for Tephryn’s allure—or any other part of her.
Nothing good would ever come of it.