[Bureau Office] To Test Two Options

[Atl Myrsa]

The Offices of the Lord Imperial Magus could be found on the top floor of the Arcane Bureau. The stairs lead to a solid oak door that was rather plain except for a circle in the middle that was divided into seven sections each showing a symbol of a different sphere of arcane. The only other future of the room was a man standing outside of the door. He appeared to be youngish in his twenties and human. The man was dressed in red and black with the crest of the Imperial Magus on his breast. Underneath his surecoat was a set of armor and a blade at his other side. The Guards was the physical defense and the a field against spell casting was the primary arcane defense.

The room beyond was a large and comfortable. The primary feature of the room was a large desk. Made of solid oak there were strange images carved along the sides that from the door were hard to see. The light in the room seemed to mostly be drawn there. The desk itself was clean except for a couple folders that were placed into a pile right next to were the occupant worked.

Behind the desk was a large window that took up the whole of the wall. Images showing the last battle of Diana seemed to dance across the glass. Placed in the center of the large window was a map of the Empire with markings for all of the cities and mountians and major rivers of the Empire.

Two more desks occupied the room. Located next to the door. Situated so that the occupents could look at the main desk these two were also carved from rich oak. One was completely clean and another was covered in folders and papers.

One of the remaining walls was completely covered in book selves. They seemed to be almost groaning from the weight of all of the books. Most were normal sized that one would expect to find any were else. A few were small things, and some were so large children could be squashed by them.

The last wall held a fire place that was currently ablaze giving off light and warmth in the cold winter. Four chairs were positioned around the fire each with a little end table between them. They were richly embroidered with geometric patterns on them. One last table sat next to the fire place with a pot of tea, glasses, and a couple bodels sitting on it.

Rachrot looked up and nodded her head. "His Excellency is expecting you. One moment please." She rang a bell next to her desk and waited only a moment a young human male to step out of a door to the back. He walked forward and nodded his head towards the elven woman. "Please show Lord Siannodel to his Imperial Excellencies offices."

The page lead Llanwyn to the door and paused to knock before a voice spoke. Opening the door the young man motioned for Llanwyn to enter the room. Currently the room had three occupants. The Imperial Magus, Atl Myrsa was sitting at a desk placing some papers into folders and gentle putting them away. The remaining two were at smaller desk and unlike their boss were still looking through papers. One of them, a human, looked at the visator then looked back down. The halfling seemed to have missed the presences of the stranger.

Atl smiled at his newst arrival. "Please join me by the fire place." He indicated to the fire place as he finished putting away papers. The nimalni stood up and walked over towards the chair. "Would you like some tea or wine?"

[Llanwyn Siannodel]

Llanwyn thanked the page as he walked into the room. It wasn't rare of him to address the servants and pages of an office or house. He knew what it was like to be treated as a second-rate citizen. All Fae did. And even if they weren't treated that way by their masters and bosses, he was more than willing to smile or give a friendly nod. The fireplace looked quite inviting and Llanwyn nodded in agreement at the invitation to sit there.

”Wine would be nice,” he said in reply, smiling. ”Thank you for taking time to meet with me your excellency.”

Llanwyn wasn’t always one for formalities, but this situation more than deemed them necessary. After all, the most influential mage in the Imperial Government was taking time out of his busy schedule to speak with him. It was both exciting, important and extremely humbling. The large Fae had a seat in a chair near the fireplace and adjusted his robes over the arms of the chair. His wings were tucked neatly on his back and his hair dressed half-back behind his head. He was putting his best foot forward, blue and green robes and all.

[Atl Myrsa]

Atl smiled and poured some wine into one of the glasses. He handed over the wine and took his own seat. "I hope that your trip was pleasent." Atl said remembering that the letter had come from the dolwoods. "It is always interesting to travel in the winter."

Atl sipped at his tea for a moment and then countiued. "So tel me about your self."

[Llanwyn Siannodel]

Llanwyn sipped his wine, it was a pleasant stock, earthy and a tad dry. He preferred it sweet and wet, but this was quite lovely. He smelled the current as it entered his mouth, cinnamon and jasmin were his guess. He sat back in his chair and held the glass with the palm of his left hand over the rim. A quick shuffle of his thoughts and he could likely explain himself to Alt in a matter of sentences instead of a long drawn out biography filled with "umms."

"Well," he began with a grin. ”There really isn’t much to tell.” The thought almost made him laugh as he thought about it. To this elf, who had likely never seen a 5’6” faerie before, it did indeed seem like there was plenty to tell. ”Well, there is,” he said with a laugh, ”But I doubt you’d believe half of it.”

He breathed in and grinned, "As I wrote in my letter, I have proficiencies in two spheres, but that wasn’t my original goal, or so I thought it wasn’t." He looked back, way back in his memories to begin the hopefully short story. ”Originally I was on a mission to be at one with my mind and with nature and thought that meant I should master one and then the other. Of course, I was young and naïve. Still, I trained under Master Mystic Rubeus Khalon, eventually reaching Master proficiency.”

He took another sip of wine. Alt would likely find it interesting that Llanwyn was once a Master Mystic. This would take some explanation. ”Of course, that wasn’t meant to last.”

[Atl Myrsa]

Atl sat listening to his discription. The man might be suprised at what Atl would believe. He had been through much in his life, and not all of it was pleasent. Some of it was rather painful. Others would be memorial. "I have noticed that magus have a verity of experiences."

Atl nodded his head. "I can understand that. Our plans have a way of chaning from one day to day." Atl paused and then contiuned. "So how did you start with your druidic arts?"

[Llanwyn Siannodel]

Llanwyn agreed with Atl and showed it with a nod. Things did change, plans changed, people even changed and sometimes all too quickly. This was one of those cases where literally one minute the plan was this and then all of a sudden it’s that. Life can be that way far too often and being cautious doesn’t do much to help things along either.

”Well,” Llanwyn began, ”I was a Liutenent in the Mage Corps and the Executive Officer in Arconis. It was while I was there that an accident took place. Basically, an orb of unknown origin broke and demoted three of us one level each.”

He stopped there a moment, as it was a hard thing for him to remember. All of that hard work, gone. Then after a hard breath, he continued.

”After thought and meditation though, I found myself in a much better situation. If my goal was to be at one with my mind and with nature, I had up to that point left nature out of the equation. That’s when Druidism became an obvious option for me.”

[Atl Myrsa]

Atl noddded his head. "I still remember the fractrum which besides binding my magic again had the same effect on my level. That can always be painful." Atl said nodding his head. "Please tell me about who trained you in the arts of Druidsm?"

After listening to he contiuned with another question. "Also again and in some more depth tell about why you feel a Hedge mage would be necissary to the Mage Council."

[Llanwyn Siannodel]

Llanwyn hadn't started to learn arcana before the fracture, but he could imagine how horrible it had been. After all, he had been demoted, he had felt the internal struggle it was to deal with. And he could remember his parents dealing with the grief of their lost abilities. Both of them re-trained, sure, but only as Initiates. At that point in their lives, they had more to do than arcana. Llanwyn has possibly not thought of those memories in patterns, but not they were as fresh as yesterday's events.

He smiled as he sipped his wine and spoke, but not at the same time, "Well, I started training in Arconis by a teacher I was referred to by my superior officer. Then, after leaving Arconis I wrestled with my decision, if it had been to hasty, and so on. Those were hard questions to ask myself."

"Eventually I came to realize that I had chosen a path that suited me quite well and I looked for more direction. I found it within a group of Druids in the Carmelyan Hinterlands. A gnome druid named Horbus to be precise."

Llanwyn figured that Atl might know the gnomish adept, but didn't wait to find out... he didn't want the conversation to drone on forever and eventually get boring. "I've met other hedge and it's become obvious to me that during training, their needs are quite different. Especially if one of their sphere's competence outweighs another. At higher proficiencies this becomes all the while more obvious, though at a lower level it is also apparent."

He sipped his wine and continued, "A hedge mage must be able to separate their spheres, but use the knowledge of one to broaden their understanding of the other. Their versatility spawns from their understanding of multiple spheres. And at higher levels, they must understand their barriers so as to not experiment themselves to death."

[Atl Myrsa]

Atl took in the faes training and nodded his head as they contiuned on with need for a hedge mage. Atl paused. "Part of the reason for my questioning is that before I can say yes to having a hedge mage position on the council I have to run it past the men in charge of the budget."

He paused and contiuned. "What are some of the things that you think the council will do, or should do. So that we can establish how a hedge mage will help on the council."

[Llanwyn Siannodel]

Llanwyn thought for a moment. Budget restrictions were common in the Imperial government. In fact, he could remember Palacrisis having to work something out with his budget before Llanwyn was hired on as head information gatherer, a position he left after Palacrisis demoted himself and became govorner of Arakmat. They were common, after all, regardless of how the public saw the government, they didn't actually have unlimited funds. Those whose jobs it was to watch the money flow, Llanwyn felt sorry for them.

"Well, I'm assuming the council will be monitoring the teaching of magus all over the Empire. And if that's the case, then a Hedge Mage on the council would do well to help educate the rest of the council and the headmasters of schools on how best to educate students about and in hedgemagery."

He thought for a moment, "One of the problems in hedgemagery is that students who undergo training in multiple spheres are unaware of the implications of their chosen study. One day they decide to pursue only one sphere entirely only to find out they can't reach a level of mastery they've been dreaming about. These hedgemagi do something I like to call "burn out." And it's really a loss for the entire arcanic world when the talents of an unbound soul go wasted."

Llanwyn sipped his wine and continued, "And even more often, a Hedgemagi isn't receiving instruction specific to their needs. Often the teacher is teaching for purists only, not helping the hedge student to gain a perspective of a sphere in relation to their other. I believe a program could be developed to help headmasters lead their teachers in correcting this, both through direct contact with the schools and through the other Magus on the council."

He leaned forward, his face growing quite serious. "I'll be honest with you your Excellency... I don't pretend to not see the discouragement by other magi towards hedgemagery. I respect the pure forms of course, I was once a Master myself as I’ve said. But it’s time hedgemagery receives some status in the world of arcana.”

[Atl Myrsa]

Atl listened and nodded his head in understanding. "Thoughts are all very excellent points, and I feel are very valid concerns. I have also noticed that the teaching tends towards purism." He sipped his tea for a moment. "You have given me something to think about."

He set the cup down. "Some questions. What do you feel should be the rules for admitances into the arcane academies?"

[Llanwyn Siannodel]

Llanwyn was glad to have given Atl "something to think about." The fact of the matter was that things likely needed to change, but he would let a wise council of magi come to a conclusion on that... he was not by any stretch of the imagination wise. He grinned at the next question, sipped the last drop of wine from his glass and spoke.

"If I didn't know any better, I'd think you a Mystic. It appears you've read my mind. Admission into schools is something I'm very passionate about, perhaps because my own admission was never a matter of crowns."

"Not that my own was the only way it could be done, but I do feel that this whole mess about people walking into schools and simply signing up for a class when they show no affinity whatsoever is a mistake both for the school and the student."

"My suggestion is an interview process with the headmaster. Then an interview with the head teacher of the particular sphere. Sometimes a student may prove apt to learning arcana, but not in the sphere they think they're interested in. This is simply the way of the road. In the case of a student interested in hedging from the get-go, an interview with more than one teacher would be necessary."

He motioned to Atl with his glass and smiled, "Any chance another half glass is in order? This is a fine stock." Then he continued...

"For higher proficiencies, perhaps another interview and likely some sort of task. A test if you will, to prove their willingness. After all, their studies will only get more difficult."

[Atl Myrsa]

Atl listened and nodded his head towards his interviewiee. Standing up he poured his guest some more wine before taking a seat himself again. "Some excellent points." He said after a long moment. "Tell me about any specific ideas or policies that you would like to see impliment in the arcane schools?"

[Llanwyn Siannodel]

Llanwyn grinned, "In some cases, some humor." He winked at Atl and giggled a bit. "Seriously though, a lot of talk about arcanomechanics takes place, but very little exploration and philosophy is ever undergone. I believe students should be taught arcana, not just their specific sphere. They should learn how a magic circle works, not just why they use one."

He sipped his wine, "I believe these things would increase an interest in experimentation, which leads to development in the art and further progression."