Archive of Our Own ^beta

It wasn't that Trouble was uneasy in Telemain's tower—after all, he was a cat and he had a natural mastery of magic and magical situations. It was that he didn't like Telemain's tower.

                Even from his place on Morwen's shoulder it was obvious that what might look to human eyes like a bare stone entrance room, was anything but. There was magic everywhere. Messy magic. It clung to the spiralling iron staircases that disappeared into the ceiling and the windows set high in the walls. It oozed out of random bricks and floor tiles. It hovered above what looked like an innocuous brass knocker.

                "Chaos would love it," Trouble grumbled.

                Telemain, who'd just been welcoming Morwen to his newly-constructed home, paused and his glance flitted from Trouble to Morwen. "Does you cat want something?"

                "Nothing you need concern yourself with," she said wryly.

                Telemain nodded. "Very well. In that case let's get started with the preparations. The homeo-elemental matrix is already active and it's extremely time-sensitive."

                "Telemain?"

                The magician was already moving to a door to what Trouble assumed was a magical workroom, judging by the strong wards on the it. "Hm?"

                "When we spoke on the magic mirror you said you'd explain." There was a familiar note of exasperation in Morwen's voice that often accompanied her discussions with Telemain. "I'm happy to assist you and I brought the ingredients you requested, but I would very much like to know what I'm helping you with."

                "Ooooh, of course," Telemain said, stroking his neatly-trimmed beard. "I suppose I should have begun with that."

                "And I suppose I could knock some sense into him," Trouble grumbled, flexing his claws.

                "Only if he starts getting technical again," Morwen whispered. Trouble took this as an invitation to leap to the floor and begin grooming one already immaculately clean paw in preparation.

                Though Morwen had known Telemain for ages—since they'd been children really—it was only recently that he'd moved to the Enchanted Forest, after the incident with Kazul's abduction. He'd wasted no time setting up his tower and, much to the relief of Trouble and the other cats, hadn't bothered Morwen until today.

                "Follow me, Telemain said and led them up one of the stairways to a guest room on the second floor. He reached for the door handle then paused to place a finger over his lips before cautiously opening the door. A figure lay on the bed, chest rising and falling with long, slow breaths. But even though he appeared to be in deep sleep, his face was twisted in a grimace and his jaw was clenched tight. Trouble could tell just by the scent of his magic that he was a water witch, but there was something very wrong with his magic. It smelled… burnt. "This is the fellow I was telling you about," Telemain whispered. A bright orange ember suddenly appeared on the tip of the man's nose—and then fizzled away in a hiss of steam.

                "Oh dear," Morwen said.

                Telemain nodded and shut the door. "His name is Jormin. As you can see, his elemental affinity appears to have been crossed with an antithetical element resulting in—" Telemain yelped as Trouble casually sharpened his claws on his pant leg. He glared down at Trouble. "Morwen, your cat—"

                "Isn't fond of technical explanations," Morwen said calmly.

                "I was just trying to be precise," Telemain said with a beleaguered expression.

                "I think, given the circumstances, succinct would be preferable."

                Telemain sighed. "Very well. From what I understand, there was an accident involving a fire witch and their magic became…" He paused, glanced down at Trouble who'd returned to washing his paw, and continued his explanation without jargon. "Entangled. As you can imagine, the results were incompatible with the water witch's natural magic which led to chronic discomfort. He was in a great deal of pain when he arrived here," Telemain said. "And his inability to control the output of fire magic made his situation extremely precarious."

                "So you put him to sleep?" Morwen asked.

                "With his permission and just until I can complete a restoration ritual."

                "And he needs us to help clean up this mess," Trouble announced as he strutted, tail erect, back towards the stairway.

                Morwen, being sensible, followed Trouble, and Telemain soon followed after them and brought them to his workroom on the first floor. The magical chaos was even worse there. So many varieties of magical workings on so many different objects. And worst of all was the reek of a wizard staff hidden somewhere out of sight, its stench drifting like bog air throughout the workspace. Trouble began washing his whiskers to distract himself from the dankness while Morwen and Telemain fussed with the spell setup. Morwen fished the ingredients she'd brought out of her sleeve, which included a dwarven wire and a trio of gnomish crystals while Telemain retrieved elfin powder, quickroot, and skein of snowsheep wool from his shelves.

                As Telemain began mixing the ingredients and Morwen prepared the crystals, Trouble jumped back onto her shoulder. "I don't know why you're helping him," Trouble grumbled. "You hadn't heard from him for years before he showed up here with Mendenbar."

                "But he was very helpful in freeing Kazul and setting protections on Mendenbar's sword," Morwen replied quietly. "I think that certainly merits a second chance."

                Trouble sniffed. "You just wait and see, he'll get so caught up researching slow stones or griffon moss or some other thing that he'll just forget all about us again."

                "Well for now, please help me with the spell on these crystals. We need to make sure they're attuned to the correct elemental affinity."

                Trouble thwapped his tail against her shoulder so she'd know he was ready. Morwen raised her hands over the crystals.

Crystal bright and darkened wire

Be as one and bind this fire

Trouble let the magic sizzle through his whiskers and down the length of his spine, right through to the tip of his tail before releasing it to the crystals. They glowed with a pale orange glimmer and he leaped down and strode back and forth in front of Morwen, tail raised high with pride at a job well done.

                "Is everything ready?" Telemain asked. "The elemental matrix is about to reach its apogee."

                "Yes, we're ready," Morwen said, handing him the three crystals, now tightly bound together by the dwarven wire.

                While Morwen had been enchanting the crystals, Telemain had set a large clay bowl on the worktable in the centre of the room. He put the crystals into the bowl and then raised the mixture he'd made of the other ingredients and poured it over the crystals, closing his eyes as he muttered a few words under his breath. A puff of pale orange smoke rose from the crystals and the air was filled with the smell of wood and smoke as if they'd just lit a campfire in the room.

                When Telemain opened his eyes he looked rather pleased with himself—too pleased to notice Trouble prowling around the room, sniffing at the far corner where the wizard stench seemed strongest. There. In that pile of empty window frames and iron rods. Trouble took a moment to make careful note of the arrangement of items, the angle at which they rested against the wall, and then, wiggling his haunches until he had the vector just right, he pounced.

                The pile collapsed in a cacophony of wood and metal that made both Morwen and Telemain jump almost as high as Trouble had. Trouble emerged from the pile unscathed and strode back and forth across the long wooden staff now clearly visible amidst the debris. "Look what I found," he announced to Morwen.

                Morwen spun to face Telemain, brow deeply furrowed. "What is a wizard staff doing in here? I thought we agreed to dispose of the ones we'd collected once we'd finished studying them."

                "We did," Telemain said, sounding awfully put-upon ever though he was the one with a smelly wizard staff hidden in his workroom. "This is a new one."

                "A new one?" Morwen repeated, hands on her hips.

                "Yes. I encountered a wizard just outside of the forest. He wasn't particularly interested in conversation so I went ahead and melted him."

                Morwen raised an eyebrow. "And you didn't think it worth mentioning that you'd encountered another wizard?

                "It was only this morning. I had every intention of relating the matter to Mendenbar when I'm the castle later this week but it hardly seemed urgent."

                "Even so… What if they're planning something?"

                Telemain waved a hand dismissively. "The warding enchantments that Mendenbar and I created will prevent them from doing any harm to the forest. And I believed handling the situation with Jorim was the priority."

                Finally Morwen sighed. "Yes I suppose I can't fault you for that. Do you need any help administering the cure?"

                He shook his head. "No need. It should be a simple matter now of allowing the elemental congruence to harmonize with—"

                "Cut that out," Trouble yowled, taking a swipe at Telemain's ankles.

                Telemain scowled down at Trouble and then up at Morwen. "Would you mind waiting in the main room?" he asked, giving the pile of knocked-over materials a sideways glance.

                Morwen only nodded but once Telemain was headed up the stairs she turned to Trouble with a smile. "That was well done, Trouble. That fool of a magician would probably just have forgotten to mention the wizard at all if you hadn't found that staff."

                "I don't know why he has to keep those things."

                Morwen sighed and gave a little shake of his head. "Aside from getting taller and growing a beard he hasn't changed one bit since we were children. He never had a whit of sense." And then, looking grim, "But if the wizards have been prowling around the forest we'll need to be on guard and having an extra magician keeping an eye on the forest isn't a bad thing."

                Trouble sniffed. "We don't need a magician for that. I can take on any wizards who set foot in the forest—you'll see!"

                Morwen reached down to stroke his fur and scratch beneath his ears. "Even you can't be everywhere at once, Trouble."

                "Well all right. Then I guess maybe we should keep him around."

                "Come along. I'm sure Jorim will be hungry when he wakes up. I'm going to see to it that Telemain feeds him properly before anything else. And I'll make sure there's a bowl of cream for you."

                While Trouble lapped greedily at the cream, enjoying his reward for a solid day's work of spellcasting and secret-sniffing, he spared a few more thoughts for the troublesome magician. He was sceptical that Telemain could be relied upon. After all, he'd forgotten to keep in touch more than once, always getting distracted by whatever nonsense he was researching at any given time. But it seemed that Morwen had decided to give him a second chance so Trouble supposed they'd all have to live with it. In which case, perhaps there would be more chances for cream and that, at least, wasn't a bad thing at all.

The End