As I enter the massive halls of the Basilica Magistrorum, I can’t help but pull back my hoodie’s hood and marvel. Like I always do, walking into this building. It’s not my first time entering, and this isn’t even the grandest that the Basilica has to offer, but the facility for preparing and running External Agents is awe inspiring in its own right. The walls, clearly older than the outside façade of the building, crest at a point several stories above them and are covered in finely detailed painted reliefs. And the detail is intricate all the way up. One evening I had been curious and let my soul wander up along one of the walls. And it did not disappoint. It told a curious story that seemed to be about the founding of the Basilica, without words, clear symbology, or any clear indication of time period. Sometimes I can’t help but wonder what stories the other walls tell.
But it is of no matter. Not right now. I can worry about that when I don’t have somewhere to be. Taking a deep breath, I shake off the impressed feeling. Flipping back on my hood, I start to head deeper into the building.
One of my classmates, Eduard, approaches from behind. He’s unexpectedly fast when he wants to be. “Gregory,” he says with a smile. An obnoxious smile, as it never seems to go away. “I was wondering if you wanted to do anything?”
As I walk towards our classroom, I look over at him moving only my eyes. “Do what?” I ask. Too many words can be problematic. Keep it short, keep it simple. Never know who’s listening.
“Well, I was thinking of having some of the guys come over to this place I found a couple days ago. It’s like a wine bar, and it’s utterly fantastic. Are you interested?” He offers.
I sigh and shake my head. I can’t help it. That sounds incredibly boring. Can’t afford it, either. Not because of the price, but because of the potential cost. Wine around here can vary wildly. Too much to drink can cause problems. I know who’s listening. No, it’s not worth the risk. “No thank you, Eduard,” I reply to my classmate politely. Politeness is key to maintaining friendly professional relationships. As are excuses. “I already have plans this evening.” I pause between have and plans just long enough to be evident, then give a slight smirk at the end. He’ll make assumptions, based on his opinion of me. In most cases, he’ll feel the excuse is valid because of said assumptions. Which is good. Don’t want anyone to mess with getting ready.
He looks at me, chuckles, and nods. “I get that,” he says in response to my smirk, “No more questions. Have fun.” He gives me a wink. And that grin does not falter. That frustrating grin. I shake my head at the strange gentleman as he whizzes away, off to draw a more unsuspecting fly into his complex and treacherous web.
I breathe deeply, then heading over to the side of the hall, near the wall, I mutter, “How do you like that? I’m not going to make it easy on you.” I know she’s listening. Don’t know how, but I feel it. My classmates might think me a bit aloof and self-isolating, but they’ll thank me. Or they would, if they ever learned how much I’ve done to protect them. I can’t help but chuckle. As if that would happen. I can’t tell them, I’d sound insane. And the only way she’d talk is if it helped her. No, I, like most heroic people in the real world, will have my achievements go vastly unnoticed by the world they affect the most.
Finishing my muttering to them while alone, I rush to the classroom. This is one of the most important classes for our job. Or, our future job. External Politics of the Other. And it’s doubly important for me. Most of these kids, they grew up in this shit. Their parents and grade school teachers and whatnot taught them elements of it already. I didn’t. I learned a lot growing up. More than most. More than someone perhaps should teach a child. But my family was a bit isolated. From the rest of the mystical world, though also from the world as well I suppose. So, while a lot of my classmates treat this as a sort of blowoff class, I know better. I suspect they are like many in my old Villa as well, that they do not fully comprehend the value of connection to the outside. Perspectives other than our own. My old classmates often discarded them, and while I suspect a future External Agent would be smarter than that, I must admit I have my doubts about a lot of them.
I enter the small room. Eduard is already in the corner, chatting with Kassidy. Drawing in the least suspicious fly we know. They’re two of the five already here. I sit down near the opening of the large, U-shaped table, on the side closest to the doors. Not quite at the open end of the U, that’s where Elodie likes to sit. Besides, this seat gives me a better angle on the presentation. The rest of the small class begins filtering in. Twelve in total. Evidently this year is a smaller crop of External Agents than last year, only around thirty of us in total. Not that that’s necessarily a bad thing, it means for smaller classes and, in theory at least, more engaged and capable Agents. It just also is taken by the Basilica at large to be a sign of the Magisterium’s decline in recent years. According to our Internal Positions class, much of the current council kept close by the Lord Magister believe our Villae are too open, and are inviting the hampering strikes by both mystic and political forces by such openness. And, though I myself am only here because of that openness, it isn’t my job or place to question the council. No, I’ll let someone else take care of that. And if I know her well enough, she’s probably already working on it. Or has someone else working on it. It’s unclear which she’s going to do in this instance. No, I need to focus. Too much I don’t know. Too much I need to know. Which means I need to clear my mind of everything else. Closing my eyes, I breathe in. Then out.
“You alright?” Elodie asks as I finish my first breath. She evidently came in while my eyes were closed.
I shrug. “Probably not,” I half joke. She chuckles. “You?” I add.
She smiles at me. “Always,” she replies, only half-joking as well. Concerning.
Court Magister Yildiz finally enters. Our unassuming teacher looks over the small class, her face not changing. As her eyes pass over each small section, we grow quiet. We know better than to irritate one of the five Court Magisters in charge of determining whether we will be trapped at a desk in the Basilica, constantly watched by those above and below us, or get to go out and enact the will of the Court upon the world at large. Only watched by those who always are watching. Even Eduard shuts up as her eyes fall upon him and Kassidy.
“Thank you for being on time today,” she says coldly. Her voice is quiet and very close to monotone, and yet it still is able to draw focus. “It shows you are capable of following directions, a good sign.” She cocks her head, looking carefully at three of my classmates who are often late, Chris, Phoebe, and Holger. Don’t know why they come in late often to this class, but I have the feeling that it doesn’t bode well for their future. “But that is not why we’re here today,” she changes the subject quickly, “This next series of lectures will be focused on an organization you shall need to learn to maneuver around and manipulate if you wish to do your job well. I know what some of you think of this class, but trust me when I say if you try to make too many waves in the world without accounting for the game, you will one day wake up dead. Or worse, sometimes far worse.”
Everyone looks at one another. That’s concerning. Not the end about dying or worse, but that Court Magister Yildiz specifically mentioned this as important to pay attention. Maybe this is something she’ll do for a bunch of organizations, but it feels concerning all the same to single it out. I also notice something else. It’s subtle, and if we weren’t sort of friends I wouldn’t’ve even noticed, but Elodie, who like me joined the Magisterium in early adulthood flinched slightly when Court Magister Yildiz said ‘the game’; meanwhile, Phoebe, who grew up in a proper Magisterial family, albeit one that had little importance or influence, or potential if we’re being honest, had no reaction to the words at all. I’m not sure what it means, but it definitely means something. Maybe something worth asking Elodie about? No, not worth the risk of being heard. Not if it’s actually worrying.
“As you are aware, there are elements of the mystical world that are not like us. Most of them, however, are younger than us. Or, at least have oral traditions lasting only as long as our own records. This is one of the few that is truly significantly older than us. The Grande Game is a truly ancient organization. As far as we can tell, it predates our founding by several centuries. In fact, it goes back long enough that legendary history doesn’t hold indication of its age, relative or real. It is a complex organization of eternal beings. Beings so suffuse with a specific aspect of the mystic that they are no longer truly human, or even arguably truly alive. And, like any loose yet complex organization, it has become subject to intense and seemingly ubiquitous factionalization over the many years. We will be going as in depth as we are able into each of these factions’ beliefs and as much as we know about their political structure. Fortunately, even though they are somewhat secretive about themselves and their Game, because their members are eternal, we have good reason to believe these structures change slowly and most of our research into them remains true.” It makes sense. Having an eternity would make one slow to change, in theory. I would not think them all like that, and might should take the more specific notes with a grain of salt though.
Court Magister Yildiz continues, not noticing or caring about the look of concern on my face. Because why would she care, she’s not one of hers. I don’t think, at least. “We will be going through the factions from the ones we’ve had the most interactions with over the years, organizationally, to the ones we’ve had the least. In this vein, let us begin with a group within the Game known only as the Mythic. They are one of the factions closer to the age of the Magisterium. Our records have the first mentions of them back in the late third century BCE, though whether this is their founding or simply when our predecessors first took note of them is uncertain due to multiple factors. Firstly, their whole way of doing things is staying subtle, hiding behind legends and subterfuge. Which leads to us allying more often than not, but also does mean that true knowledge about them prior to our establishment is difficult to ascertain. The other issue is, in that era, reliable sources exist only sparsely with respect to both location and time. So as their founding is not recounted with any specificity in one of the remaining sources, we must trust later, secondhand information on the matter.” I can’t help but be curiously enraptured by the lecture. The politics of immortals is such a strange set of affairs. The concept, even, proves so many theories my, well, family held to be less wrong than they thought, though they weren’t right about immortality either, it seems. But the fraught relationship between a bunch of bureaucratic educators and mages who wish to remain mostly anonymous and a faction of eternal hunters that wish to be feared legends looked to like boogeymen or gods, now that’s a fun thing to have a class analyzing. Briefly taking a moment to look over my classmates, most of them remarkably seem to agree.
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