Chapter 32: Hypatia (Patreon)

Elliot flipped through The North of Condyn, pages much rougher in texture than the paper he’d known all his life. The finely inked lines grew faint and difficult to decipher in spots, but the room was well-lit by the sunlight streaming down through the wide glass dome, and he could make out almost everything.

It was mind-boggling how much of the world was uncharted. A map that was over half blank seemed insane after a life on Earth, and if it wasn’t for the dread he felt imagining the search for Rowan, it might have given him a flutter of excitement. So much to explore.

Condyn was a narrow land mass, stretching roughly two thousand miles across and somewhere between twenty-five and thirty thousand from tip to tail. He was pretty sure its length was about the same as the circumference of Earth, and it was just a single continent, with no sign that it was wrapping around a sphere. How big was this world? 

The upper third of Condyn was laid out in reasonable detail—excluding the wilds—but once you passed the Crowns everything became vague. The mountain range sat like a belt across the continent, sharply demarcating the north from everything beyond.

Flipping another page, he paused at an illustration of the Crowns themselves. They were tall, needle-like projections, but what made him stop was that instead of ground, they emerged from water. A massive strait that must have been a hundred miles wide at its narrowest point separated the northern and southern portions of the continent, densely packed with stone peaks that jutted out like quills from a great beast.

Reading the small note at the bottom, he hummed softly to himself. No wonder people barely ever travelled beyond.

The Crowns form a natural barrier that is seldom crossed. Heavy currents and a multitude of ever-shifting shoals, as well as the regularity of large rock-falls, create an environment that is even less hospitable than the deeper stretches of many wilds. This is in addition to the unnaturally diverse set of warrens present throughout the range, and the attendant population of overgrown myr. The danger precludes all but the most foolhardy or powerful from attempting the passage.

“The assessor will see you now,” someone said from behind, startling him. He jerked around awkwardly to see the clerk waiting with a blandly polite expression. “This way.”

She took him to one of the back rooms, where a small man with thick glasses and slightly greasy hair was looking over his maps. The assessor looked up as Elliot walked in, and nodded.

“Passable,” he said brusquely. “Enough for an initiate level membership. Do you intend to focus on basic surveys, commissions, or both?”

Elliot swallowed, trying to mask his confusion. “I’d like to do both, ideally.” Commissions?

“Hmm,” the man replied, narrowing his eyes. “Ambitious. We’ll see.” He pulled out a piece of paper and began to write. “I assume you don’t have the skill?”

Damn it Hadrian. What skill? Am I supposed to? “No.”

The room was bland and almost colorless, in sharp contrast to the rich browns and reds of the main rotunda. Its white walls held no paintings or windows. Elliot found himself searching for something to look at to avoid awkwardly staring at the man’s greasy hair, and ended up picking an empty gray flower pot in the back corner.

“Here,” the assessor said, picking up the note he’d written and handing it across the table. “Take this to Esme outside. I’m approving you for an initiate-level membership. Do not,” he locked eyes with Elliot pointedly, “be reckless with this. Stepping a hair beyond your scope is an excellent way to die.”

“Thank you,” Elliot said, taking the paper gently, “I’ll be very careful."

“If you receive the skill, you can petition for full membership, and commission privileges," the man added, already turning back to his own paperwork.

When Elliot took the note out to the clerk—Esme—the scarred woman reached down and rummaged through one of her desk’s lower drawers, drawing out a small wooden plaque the size and shape of a credit card. It had a double-lined white border and a black seal in the center, with a furled scroll crossed over a compass.

“This gives you initiate-level survey privileges. You may map any of the explored territories to add relevant detail and the outer-most aspects of all wilds except the Fanghold, with the expectation that we will buy acceptable quality products and add them to our records. Do you understand?”

“Um, yes,” he replied, considering asking for more details but then deciding to save it for Grik or Hadrian. “That sounds great.”

“Good luck, and welcome to the guild,” she said, her smile widening into something more genuine.

Elliot spent the next few minutes going through more of The North of Condyn. It had become abundantly clear to him that making even the ghost of a plan would require a lot more than a map. Civilization seemed to cluster to the east, with a large grouping of nations around Rhodea and the Broken March that thinned out steadily as one travelled south. Wilds took up almost all of the west, and much of the east as well. Planning out a route would clearly require a guide, or joining up with an experienced caravan.

When Grik emerged from his meeting, Elliot replaced the book and they left together.

“How’d it go?” Elliot asked. He imagined a grimoire with a self-drafting map would be very interesting to a guild like this.

“Quite well,” Grik replied with obvious satisfaction. “I made a tidy profit. And you?”

“I got initiate level rights to survey, and he mentioned commissions in the future, although I don’t completely understand what that means.”

“Travel is the quintessential function of the Mapmakers Guild,” Grik replied, “forging into the uncharted wilds and cataloguing it against future need or interest. If you rise up the ranks, many organizations and individuals will offer commissions to map specific areas: warrens, resource-rich regions, or points of particular economic, cultural, or personal interest.”

“Is it normal for guilds to induct new members that quickly? I would have expected more of a vetting process.”

“An initiate-level membership is its own trial. Also, to be completely honest, the Mapmakers are always looking to swell their ranks. The wilds shift constantly, erasing the progress made recording them almost as fast as it can be made. The Greatways once tied all the nations of the north together, but since the empire fell they have been steadily deteriorating, and there is a powerful need for those willing to record the unknown. It is not the safest of occupations. The Mapmakers’ numbers tend to…fluctuate.”

They bought green tea from a merchant wheeling a handcart and then, after Elliot begged off visiting any of the other guilds, Grik excused himself to handle some other sales business.

Elliot took his time walking back to the inn. The wooden platform that curled all the way around Mother Yarba was so packed with buildings it felt almost like walking through downtown Boston. There were storefronts hosting artisans of all kinds, from painters to ironworkers, as well as more general services like taverns and banks. Once he passed through and was back on the Eastbranch, he slowed down even further. Despite the curtain of leaves and mist it was easy to make out the Gerrwood stretching below, including the triple peaks shrouded in clouds that hid Bastogne.

Feeling refreshed after the walk, Elliot pushed open the door to his room and stepped inside.

“You’re late, boy.”

He started, let out a small huff of air, and slammed the door closed to reveal Breka lounging in her massive armchair. She had placed it in the near corner, the one spot that would be hidden from view as he walked in. “Damn it, Breka.”

“I hear you had more misadventures. And our merchant turned out to be a Tsoan! He didn’t tell me that during our friendly chat.”

Elliot took a deep breath, his heart still racing. “How did you get that chair in here? It takes up practically a quarter of the room.” He glared at the walls and floor. “And there’s no stone! What did you do?”

“No time for that,” she replied, her expression smug, “it’s time for your introduction to a local expert who’s done some work for me in the past. I’ve been assuming all your idiosyncrasies are related to your origin, but there’s something about the way you use [Detailed Appraisal] that doesn’t fit. The spatial ability makes sense, and I can rationalize the blank core, but [Detailed Appraisal] is a well-known ability that is behaving in a way I can’t explain. I want it further explored.”

“Oh,” he said, taken aback. He’d forgotten that Hadrian had mentioned something along those lines. “Well yes, that would be cool.” Something was certainly weird about what he could do with the skill. Breka had been confounded by his ability to appraise the figurine, and she’d never quite understood what he meant when he described the process of the vortex.

“My friend has a particular expertise with situations like yours. She does a lot of contract work for the Greenguard, which is why she’s even in this region, and I think a visit would be illuminating.”

Elliot felt his eyebrows climb. “Really? She’s seen situations like mine?”

Breka snorted. “Well, not quite like yours. And not unusual abilities. There’s nothing unusual about [Detailed Appraisal]. She specializes in unusual use cases or styles of otherwise standard abilities.” She tossed the Tome of Eyes at Elliot. “Bring this. Let’s go.”

It was an even slower walk to the main trunk than his meander back from the Mapmakers Guild. Breka insisted on shuffling along, clutching her walking stick with both hands. She wouldn’t let him carry her waistpack either, and several passersby gave him nasty looks as they took in the sight of a healthy young man walking next to a bent-over old lady carrying a bag. After a tall man with a sword at his waist glared at Elliot and muttered something about respect, she even had the poor taste to chuckle.

The door she took him to didn’t, at first, look like a door at all. They had circled behind a sculptor’s studio built directly into Mother Yarba, and as they reached the massive trunk a patch of bark swung silently outwards. Elliot almost tripped in surprise but Breka never broke stride, shuffling into the dark opening.

After a short descent through a carved corridor lit poorly by glowstones they emerged into a wooden chamber clearly hidden somewhere within the vastness of the trunk. A long, rectangular table took center stage, and sitting in one of the chairs around it was a woman dressed in dark green. Her black hair was flecked with white and coiled up into a bun on top of her head. She was sitting cross-legged on the seat of her chair, eyes closed, as if asleep.

As they stepped over the threshold, she opened her eyes and unfurled herself from the chair in one relaxed, sinuous motion, pressing her palms together and offering a small bow. "Welcome."

"Hypatia," Breka said, smiling. "Having a good day?"

"Every day is a good day, my friend," she said, every bit as serious as if Breka had asked about the health of a sick child. "Today I am lucky enough to believe that as well as know it. And you must be Elliot Field."

"That's me," he said, bobbing his head in a pseudo-bow of his own. She reminded him of his former English Literature professor, who had been deep into crystals and spirits. "I appreciate you offering to help."

"This was a balancing of debt between Breka and I," she replied, looking almost worried. "Please do not think we are developing debt between us. All appreciation should be directed toward your employer."

"Oh," he said, taken aback. "Fair enough."

Hypatia began to circle him slowly. "You are even less simple than I had been told." She glanced at Breka. "First circle? First step? At his age?"

Elliot’s eyes widened. Wasn’t that supposed to be almost impossible to tell?

"Beyond the remit of this project, I'm afraid,” Breka said firmly.

Hypatia sighed. "A great shame. I feel as if you have much to teach me of the world, Elliot. But perhaps another time, if our paths are re-woven. The skill in question is [Detailed Appraisal], yes?"

"That's right," Breka replied before Elliot could. "Not meaningfully varied from baseline as far as I can tell. But he has some very curious visualizations that he uses with it."

"Hmm. Well, we shall see. You have your training aid?"

Elliot fished out the Tome of Eyes from his belt. "Right here."

"Good." Hypatia took a large step backwards. "Use it, please. As you would normally."

He flipped open the grimoire, trying to ignore the woman's unblinking stare as an image of a ship coalesced. Using [Detailed Appraisal], he started with the clothing on the sailors—light cottons and silks—and then moved through his normal process. The whole time, Hypatia kept her eyes fixed on his face, never wavering even slightly.

The picture slowly revealed itself to be depicting a trade ship running out of a kingdom called Vela, carrying an eclectic mixture of goods picked up along the way through a distant archipelago. As was his custom, once he had a good idea of what was going on, he started to use the vortex to pull out any details that might have slipped through his initial scans.

"Stop," Hypatia said, advancing in two smooth steps until they stood eye-to-eye. "What did you just change?"

"I started to use my visualization," he said, looking up from the Tome. "It's for squeezing every last drop of information out of something."

"What do you mean by that? Describe your process."

Elliot thought for a moment. "When I activate [Detailed Appraisal], I can sort of sense a flow of energy from the thing I’m targeting. It gets me whatever it gets me, and if I want to know more, I have to either get more information about the object from some other method or pull harder on the flow of information. That's—"

"Does the feeling of your skill seem like a pull even when you do not use the visualization?"

"Huh," he said, frowning softly, "it doesn't actually. It doesn't feel like anything. It's only when I focus on visualizing what's going on that the pulling sensation is noticeable."

"Fascinating. Continue, please."

"Um, sure. I imagine a swirling vortex, and—"

"Is the vortex’s position fixed, or variable?"

"It's fixed," he said slowly, trying to imagine putting the vortex somewhere else. "It feels like it's supposed to go where it is, or it's already there and I'm just activating it, I'm not sure."

She smiled widely. "Good, good. Is it at the back of your head, low, almost by your spine?"

His eyes widened slightly. "Yes...it is."

Her eyes sparkled. "Excellent."