A builder of dreams, p.2
A Builder of Dreams, page 2
However, Grandmaster Kiernan and the Architects of Khronos, who desperately want the stolen book that started everything, betray Oliver. They attack the prisoner convoys with several powerful thaumaturges, including an old man that casts an almost unfathomably powerful spell to trap everyone inside Knave Knoll and infect them with spores that affect their minds.
Siobhan and the enforcers work together to escape, and as she is trying to escape, the old man captures her satchel. She sets off the disintegration mine inside and kills him along with his companions.
Soon after, the friend trio confronts Malcolm Gervin to place the final nail in his coffin as he attempts to kill them to escape, and Ana plants a fake journal in his handwriting detailing his crimes and plans to kill her father, the head of their Crown Family.
While she’s still unrecovered from these events, the coppers try one more scrying attempt on Siobhan, which is so powerful it forces her to leave the city. She’s unable to cast her dreamless sleep spell that night, and has a nightmare of a twisted mirror locked away in her childhood house.
Finally gathering her courage, Sebastien visits Newton’s family, only to find that they have had their memories and opinions modified—poorly—by the Red Guard. They, too, now believe that Newton was experimenting with unethical magic and deserved to turn into an Aberrant.
Sebastien goes to Professor lacer, and is horrified to learn that this is standard practice for the Red Guard.
To follow up that blow, Oliver lets slip the idea to create a scapegoat for the Raven Queen to divert attention and suspicion, leading her to suspect that he did the same to her. She considers all the evidence for and against this new theory, and vows to uncover the truth.
Thaddeus Lacer contacts Oliver to pass along a request to meet the Raven Queen. He secretly stole her mother’s heirloom ring and replaced it with a fake, and plans to give the original to her as tribute when they meet.
* * *
In A Foreboding of Woe:
Thaddeus meets with Grandmaster Kiernan and agrees to help decrypt Myrddin's journals.
During their Defense exam, Sebastien uses Damien's fallen Conduit through a tear in her pants, which Professor Fekten misinterprets as flesh-casting until Professor Lacer intervenes. Later, Sebastien's impressive tree sculpture during her Practical Casting exhibition earns her seventy contribution points and confirms her apprenticeship with Lacer.
Before leaving the University, she learns that students who succumb to Will-strain are sent to the Retreat at Willowdale.
When Damien confronts Sebastien about Oliver Dryden, revealing Titus's investigation into their relationship, she assigns him to research Aberrant incidents as a distraction. Oliver also reveals Titus's outlandish suspicions. Deciding to be proactive, Sebastien writes to Titus, the Retreat at Willowdale, and the High Crown.
Siobhan assists Liza with testing the sleep-proxy spell and proposes hiring her to retrieve the blood sample from Eagle Tower by impersonating the Raven Queen. She brings Tanya and Gera into the plan.
Professor Lacer shares his theory that Myrddin's journals require identity verification and pure Will rather than spells to access. When he dismisses the possibility of splitting one's Will to cast multiple spells simultaneously, Sebastien remains silent, knowing she can split her Will. She discovers Myrddin's journal requires recognizing multiple glyphs simultaneously, confirming that he too could split his Will.
Sebastien masters the Refinement of the Nine Heavens spell, which cleanses and strengthens her body and mind with light.
Siobhan gives Tanya a spelled raven to deliver a message to the Edictum Council. When leaving, she experiences an inexplicable compulsion to attend Ennis's sentencing. Miles rescues her from a copper, revealing that he and several allies are fleeing from Pendragon operatives targeting him. As they attempt to escape, a magical trap explodes, and they're captured.
Trapped in sensory deprivation, Siobhan confronts the being sealed in her mind by her grandfather. She resists its manipulation, escapes, and uses her shadow-familiar to bribe and frighten Pendragon Corps guards into helping her rescue the other civilians. They raid the armory, providing Siobhan with gold and high-quality celerium. During their escape, Parker is captured by the pursuing captain.
From the white cliffs, Thaddeus watches the Raven Queen escape by boat. He secretly kills two pursuing operatives and sabotages their boat, earning what he believes is an acknowledging look from her before she disappears.
Siobhan leads her group to safety through the Mires. Unknown to her, the rescued captives gather to discuss their escape, portraying her as more powerful and eldritch than she realizes. They speculate about her abilities and agree to support her future revenge against the High Crown.
At Pendragon Palace, Thaddeus nearly attacks the High Crown upon learning his apprentice was targeted. A guard's memory display shows a frightening, warped version of the Raven Queen's shadow abilities, while a traumatized operative rants about her shadow companion's hunger and coldness. The advisors debate whether she has Aberrant influence. Upon returning home, Thaddeus finds a letter from the Raven Queen requesting an exchange of information.
Disguised as Liza's niece, Siobhan visits the Retreat at Willowdale and learns that Myrddin left five journals, not four. The fifth was stolen by another expedition member before returning to Gilbratha. Siobhan suspects Oliver orchestrated the theft and resolves to question Grandmaster Kiernan.
In a private mentorship session, Professor Lacer reveals to Sebastien and Damien how transmogrification relies on society's collective understanding rather than individual interpretations, which is why she has struggled so much with it.
After days of exchanging coded letters with Oliver and Professor Lacer, Siobhan confronts Grandmaster Kiernan as the Raven Queen. He confesses to betraying the Verdant Stag and reveals that Myrddin's journal contains instructions for purifying beast cores into celerium—critical knowledge as Lenore's mines will be depleted within five to ten years.
Sebastien then confronts Oliver about stealing Myrddin's journal and using her as a decoy. Their argument escalates until she declares she'll only interact with him through formal tribute like other Raven Queen supplicants. Oliver collapses at his desk after she leaves, mourning their lost friendship.
To fulfill her promises, she successfully heals Anders' dying dog using multiple stray dogs as components.
Damien presents Sebastien with his research into suspicious rogue magic incidents, sharing his theory that the Red Guard uses blood magic and possibly Aberrant components. Sebastien confirms his suspicions by revealing what happened to Newton's family.
Using her split Will technique, Sebastien successfully accesses Myrddin's journal.
Siobhan warns Oliver about the Architects' planned kidnappings in Osham, despite their strained relationship.
Walking home from Liza's in the rain, Siobhan is caught in a spell. A masked Red Guard agent confronts her in a magically created space, wielding a grotesque pink flesh-glove that negates spells.
Despite her creativity and desperation, Siobhan cannot defeat the agent. When cornered, she detaches her shadow-familiar's output. Her shadow rises up with glowing amber eyes, confronts the Red Guard agents claiming to be the Raven Queen, and allows Siobhan to escape. Upon returning and reattaching to her, it reveals it used power from the beast core she swallowed when the Pendragon Corps captured her to temporarily escape its seal. She can feel its emotions and tell when it’s lying. It wants to be remembered.
Siobhan visits Professor Lacer as the Raven Queen. He presents her mother's ring as tribute and offers tentative protection from Red Guard scrutiny in exchange for continued cooperation.
At Theo's birthday celebration, Oliver apologizes for his deceit and manipulation. He mentions the growing worship of the Raven Queen among commoners. He suggests managing the movement since it cannot be stopped.
* * *
In A Cauldron of Bitterness:
Following his meeting with the Raven Queen, Thaddeus reports to a Red Guard field base, where he argues against forcibly binding Siobhan. He reveals her dual-casting abilities and potential connection to Myrddin and his research, and suggest a consultancy agreement instead. The Red Guard captains agree to an assessment meeting.
At Theo’s birthday party, Siobhan performs magic tricks for the children while negotiating with Oliver about unlocking his copy of Myrddin’s journal. She plans to share information with the Red Guard as a bargaining chip and wonders if she should simply flee the country, but chooses to stay in Gilbratha because of the opportunities and connections she has here.
Escorted by Gera, Siobhan meets Agents Aisling, Marcurio, and Thaddeus in a hedge maze. She carefully navigates the agents’ questions with partial truths, then demonstrates her shadow-familiar spell with an elaborate, frightening illusion. After tense negotiations, Siobhan trades information about an Aberrant parts smuggling operation for freedom from binding vows and the permission to research shamanry, as long as she shares her findings with them.
Thaddeus investigates Sebastien’s background. He calculates that Sebastien’s Will growth requires impossibly dangerous practice levels, but cannot find any related information in Sebastien’s history. Believing that Siobhan was hinting at some danger to Sebastien during their meeting, he considers their possible connection—and their incredibly similar eyes.
Under divination-assisted questioning, Damien reveals to Professor Lacer that Sebastien was nearly kidnapped by Pendragon Operatives during Sowing Break. This affront triggers Thaddeus’s barely controlled fury and the feel of his Will terrifies Damien. Thaddeus then confronts Sebastien directly. When Sebastien refuses to answer under compulsion, Thaddeus takes her to a warded room containing Myrddin’s journals, which seem to recognize her identity. He concludes Sebastien must be descended from Myrddin’s bloodline—and the Raven Queen was using “him” to help open the stolen journal—and warns Sebastien against attempting to split her Will unsupervised.
Siobhan visits the Undreaming Order headquarters with Gera, touring their operations and learning about their mission to help others and pass on a debt of service. When Jackal arrives, injured, Siobhan heals him with blood magic. She guides the Order’s development, providing resources and correcting the tenets that they will follow.
Professor Lacer teaches Sebastien the dazzler spell and gives her an emergency signal artifact to contact him with. Soon after, Siobhan and Liza discover shaman Renaldo dead from Will-strain.
Thaddeus confronts Siobhan about her intentions toward Sebastien, and she remains ambiguous while reassuring Thaddeus that she means Sebastien no harm. Escorted by Thaddeus and Kiernan, Siobhan explores Myrddin’s journals, discovering his research on Carnagore, the Black Wastes, and failed experiments with space compression.
Damien’s reports that his research uncovered alarming data showing an ever-increasing number of Aberrant incidents worldwide, which seems like it might be approaching an inflection point. They fear that magic is becoming inherently unstable.
Oliver pursues the Architects of Khronos toward Osham for two weeks but fails to intercept them. Since he believes they plan to kidnap military recruits near the northern border, he warns Osham authorities. Unfortunately, they respond skeptically.
Sebastien excels during University exams, earning acclaim and contribution points through several magical exhibitions, which she acts as a last-minute stand in for.
At Professor Lacer’s grand exhibition, he creates an artificial eclipse and transports the audience’s perception to the Plane of Radiance. While demonstrating a meeting with angels, Lacer secretly curses the High Crown with a spell that will kill him if he moves against Lacer or Sebastien again. He then announces a fabricated duel between Sebastien and Frederick Pendragon. In the duel, Sebastien uses creative tactics including air manipulation and illusions to defeat the Crown Prince, ultimately winning with a punch to the nose.
The Undreaming Order interprets these events as orchestrated by the Raven Queen, analyzing her previous letter to the Edictum Council as prophecy. They prepare for coming disasters and begin mental exercises as a precursor to learning magic.
Siobhan researches break events and consciousness transfer in the restricted archives. Studying Myrddin’s journals with Thaddeus and Kiernan, they discover his work on creating a flesh body and a striking sketch resembling Sebastien, which Myrddin plans to create a sexy statue out of.
Siobhan successfully tests dream-message rituals with Deidre. Her research in the restricted archives uncovers the “crown of madness,” a spell that caused thirteen career-ending incidents among the researchers who created it.
Damien has been working at Harrow Hill cataloging records, and learned that dozens of homeless people have been disappearing. When rogue magic sirens sound during lunch with Sebastien and Ana, the three shelter near a location Sebastien has deduced—through anomalies in her excessively good memory—is a Red Guard base. Undreaming Order members do charity work in the shelter as a Nightmare-type Aberrant causes mass hallucinations throughout the city.
In the tunnels carved through the white cliffs, Siobhan questions Thaddeus about his work with the Red Guard. When she asks if break events are rising overall, Thaddeus becomes visibly disturbed. He suddenly attacks her with a paralysis spell, attempting to modify her memories to get past his vows to the Red Guard, which would otherwise require he kill her.
Siobhan fights back and flees through the tunnel system. Despite her creative tactics and desperate attempts at diversion and misdirection, Thaddeus pursues relentlessly. Though he is deliberately attempting to allow her to escape, he still performs several overwhelming feats of magic that Siobhan cannot overcome.
With Thaddeus closing in and her divination ward broken, she makes a desperate choice: throwing herself through a portal created by her the entity sealed her mind, which has once again taken over her shadow.
In the spirit realm, the shadow-creature has a physical form with quicksilver eyes and an ever-shifting appearance that reminds Siobhan somewhat of herself. It guides her through a dangerous landscape that tries to eat away at her sense of self along with her physical body, then opens a doorway back to the physical world atop the white cliffs. Thaddeus finds her there and uses space-warping magic to capture her, even though she throws herself off the cliff to escape him.
After knocking Siobhan unconscious and binding her in stone, Thaddeus removes Siobhan’s memories of their conversation about increasing break events, as well as everything that led her to that conclusion. He creates false memories to fill the gap, then returns her to the cliff base and wakes her. He has done the bare minimum, and hopes that if she comes to the same conclusions again, he will no longer be bound by vows that force him to harm her.
Siobhan pretends everything is alright to escape Thaddeus, but one facet of her Will retains her original memories, and the conflict between them is tearing her mind apart, and she blacks out and wakes elsewhere. Found by Damien, Ana, and Nat, she’s taken in Mrs. Dotts’ carriage to the Undreaming Order headquarters for treatment. Over several days of recovery, she uses her split Will to repair her fractured mind, during which she discovers a third facet of her Will. With the extra mental dexterity this provides, she avoids death and reconstructs her true memories.
Oliver returns from his failed mission to stop the Architects’ kidnapping operation in Osham. He orders Kiernan’s kidnapping and interrogation, planning to extract information before cutting ties with the Architects, and learns that Archmage Zard led the strike team.
After recovering at Westbay Manor, Sebastien returns to the city. The Red Guard confronts Siobhan using the same rain-based “destiny” spell from before. Analyst Hite is creepily fascinated with the topic of consciousness transfer and threatens to take her into custody as a research subject if she doesn’t provide valuable results within three months.
Desperate, Siobhan reveals her sealed mental passenger to Oliver, who surprises her by revealing he’s a Null and offering to help with experiments. She performs the crown of madness ritual, allowing her to perceive the spirit realm and confront the creature in her mind—which uses the spell to force understanding on her, dragging her down into her sealed memories.
* * *
A Builder of Dreams begins directly after (and simultaneously seven years before) these events.
1
Advent
Siobhan
Seven Years Before
Month 4, Day 3, Thursday 4:00 p.m.
* * *
The advantage of being thirteen years old, Siobhan reflected as she calibrated her homemade periscope toward the tower’s east-facing window, was that adults systematically underestimated your capacity for elaborate espionage. In all other ways, being thirteen was miserable.
She peered into the viewing lens of the periscope, but quickly deflated with disappointment. Even kneeling three meters off the ground on the roof of her treehouse, the device wasn’t quite tall enough to see directly through the window. She’d already scavenged the longest rusty pipe she could find in the scrap heap down by the shore.
She carefully lowered the makeshift, wobbly device back down through the tangle of branches just beginning to bud with leaves, leaned over the edge of the treehouse roof, and shoved it through the empty window hole leading to the space within.
That was alright. She had a backup plan. “This is your own fault, Grandfather,” she muttered to herself as she checked the cinches on the climbing rope she had prepared. Siobhan’s plan to breach the tower had begun with “ask nicely.” If not for him, she wouldn’t have had to evolve it to the point of “inventive heist involving two pulleys, a stolen harpoon, and possibly a set of lock picks repurposed from some old hairpins.” She didn’t know if the tower window was locked.
