An Anti-Hero's Origin

Shadows on the Horizon

^^ Kip Hiram ^^

Without much further debate, Lady Kip Hiram was made my Teacher, -though she insisted on calling herself my Master and me her Apprentice,- and with much contention between my parents, I was placed into her care on the condition that I return once per month at the least for a 'progress report'. (Mother tried to bargain for every other day, but Kip, Father, and I all shot her down mercilessly, in an odd showing of cooperation.) There was a distinct lack of ceremony as I exited the city with Kip, stepping through an oval Gateway she summoned on our balcony and into a small stone village surrounded by sheer rocks and built into the side of a mountain, it would seem.

"This way." Kip sighed, still tired from arguing with my mother, and led me across the only large, wide-open space in the village; it seemed a sort of village square, where all the paths from the houses carved out of the cliff face all around us met up, and Gates were opening about every minute, to my surprise.

"What is this place?" I asked, hopping over a small stream which was carrying water down to the tiny fields of vegetables that were apparently being farmed on the sides of the cliff in little pockets carved out of the rocks.

"This is Hightower, the closest we have to a Transportation Hub on this entire Continent. It's in the center of the Continent, a prime place for Gates to every single City-State there is, and it's also the closest there is to a Hall of Conjuration; you're something of a Researcher instead of a Student, I gather, so you can learn almost everything about Conjuration from just examining the magic of everyone here... there's also a large amount of Enchanters making use of the greater concentration of Mana here to speed up their work, so about eight out of ten of the permanent residents are Masters or ArchMages of all four Affinities." Kip explained, leading the way up a steep staircase and into a small cabin carved out of the rock, looking down at the courtyard.

It was quite small, the entire home about the size of my bedroom in the tower, but it was furnished; a small twin bed sat against the right wall opposite a fireplace and a bathtub, along with an odd chamberpot that seemed to be full of rushing water at all times. On the back wall, a set of stone shelves with some basic toiletries and towels sat, as well as plenty of room for clothing, if any was present currently. Along the right wall, just past the bed, were several mostly-empty bookshelves carved into the stone, and a writing desk was up against the glass window we'd passed coming into this room, so that it overlooked the courtyard.

"Quite Cozy. Is this yours? I'd have expected more books, honestly..." I hummed at the bookshelves, picking up one of the only books present; the cover read 'On the Subject of Flying Monsters', and the first page I flipped to was a careful and painstakingly detailed drawing of the anatomy of a draconic creature, along with a few pages of information about it.

"No, this is yours. The books as well; think of it all as a sort of Gift, for becoming my Apprentice." She shrugged and pulled my Seven large duffel bags of belongings out of her Magical Bag one by one, grunting softly at their weight. "Here you are... seven suspiciously heavy bags, free delivery: This time." She warned me sternly, setting them on the bed.

"Thank you, Lady Hiram. I appreciate the gift of the Books more than I know how to properly express." I thanked her, then turned away and immediately began pulling out all my books, the few scant gathered resources I'd managed to get from the Hall of Research on the subjects of Alchemy and Beasts, filling one of the bookshelves completely after I'd moved all of the new books to another shelf. The last bag was just my clothing, armor, and weapons, which I placed onto the clothing shelves beside my bed.

"Call me Kip, or Miss Kip if you must; this Lady Hiram nonsense is worse than Master, and considering you refuse to call me that, just... anything other than Lady. Alright?" She sighed, rubbing her face tiredly.