The exact nature of the ?ther remains the subject of many a theory. However, it is safe to say that the six elements found within the ?ther are the foundation for all of them. These elements, in standard order, are Quintessence; Flux; Wonder; Radiance; Aspect; and Entropy.

  Excerpt from 'Introduction to the Workings of Magic'

  Bethany's eyes sprung wide open as she awoke with a shock.

  Dream and reality seemed to mix for a moment, until the wooden beam supporting the ceiling above her stopped moving and the fluid dream was replaced with solid reality.

  Dazed, she blinked several times to drive away the last remnants of the lingering dream, before throwing off her blanket and sitting on the edge of her bed. The dim light of the morning sky filled the room she shared with Kirsha, allowing her to discern her room-mate's shape in the adjacent bed, her blanket moving up and down at a regular pace.

  Still fast asleep, Bethany thought, suppressing a yawn. She felt tired despite having gone to bed at an appropriate hour. Her crumpled bedding told her that her sleep had been restless. The last few days have been so busy. Not just for me, but for the entire staff.

  She rubbed her eyes. What time is it anyway?, she thought, eyeing the sunlit spot on the far wall cast by the room's solitary window.

  With a jolt, she sat up straight. The sun is that high already? We're going to be late again!

  Using her foot, Bethany gave Kirsha a swift prod, causing her to utter an unintelligible grunt.

  “Get up, lazy!” Bethany said urgently, trying to shake off her own remaining drowsiness. “The sun's up and we have a lot to do today, starting with preparing breakfast.”

  Kirsha moved around slightly and moaned, then hid her head under her blanket.

  “Magister Alm will punish us again if we don't hurry,” Bethany added as she prodded Kirsha again.

  “I don't care,” Kirsha answered with a muffled voice. “Let me sleep. Magister Alm can make his own soup.”

  Bethany splashed her face with water from the nearby washbowl. “All the guild's magistrae are present, remember? All thirty-four of them. That makes for a big breakfast that we, not Magister Alm, need to prepare.”

  Kirsha remained hidden and motionless underneath her blanket.

  We don't have time for this, Bethany thought. She yanked her nightgown over her head and almost fell over as she changed into her servant's dress and apron. I'm not going to get yelled at again.

  After she finished dressing, she whipped the blanket away from Kirsha, who moaned in protest and tried to grab hold of it. “No more dallying,” Bethany chided with a stern face. “We are late as it is.”

  “Just a little longer,” Kirsha said, rolling over onto her stomach and burying her face in her pillow.

  Bethany felt her impatience rising. “Really, Kirsha,” she bristled. “It's like this every morning. You should take the late shift if you don't want to get up this early. It would save me a lot of trouble too.”

  A muffled chuckle came from the pillow. “The late shift? So all those late-night geezers can stare at my bottom while I scrub the floors? I don't think so.”

  Bethany's impatience now mixed with a tinge of envy. While she was plain of face and body, Kirsha had wide hips and a posterior that could only be described as ample. Furthermore, despite her complaints about stares, she always made a point of wearing dresses that were as tight as possible in that area.

  Almost without thinking, Bethany reached out for one of Kirsha's toes and pinched it hard.

  With a yelp, Kirsha spun around in her bed. “Okay, I'm getting up. No need to be mean.”

  Well, that did it at least.

  Bethany waited for Kirsha to get dressed in case she tried to sneak back into bed, then they both stepped out of their room.

  The corridor was empty and lined with doors like the one Bethany closed behind her. The servants' quarters were by far the least lavish part of the White Candle. All the rooms here were similar to their own. One or more beds, a table with a washbowl, and a small window for the ones lucky enough to be on the west side. The corridor itself was constructed of large square stones, with minimal furnishings and no decorations, and dull red tiles covered the floor.

  Bethany gave Kirsha a little push and followed her. She had not taken two steps when a strange yet familiar feeling washed over her; a memory of last night's dream blinked into her consciousness and filled her with an immense sense of loss.

  Overwhelmed by the feeling, she staggered and stumbled, narrowly avoiding a fall. Her sandalled foot slapped on the tiled floor.

  What...?

  And then it was gone again, as suddenly as it had appeared.

  Confused, she gazed down the corridor, where the sun sigils along the walls provided dim illumination. It was as quiet and abandoned as could be expected at this time of day, yet for some reason it felt more empty than usual.

  Am I still asleep and just dreaming all this?

  Out of habit, she reached up to the nearest sun sigil and began to charge it. She could feel the ?ther moving in her body, and directed it down her arm towards the sigil contained in the rune. The familiar sensation calmed her. By the time she finished, the sun sigil's light had brightened.

  No, I'm not asleep. So what was that just now? A hallucination?

  She rubbed her cheek. Maybe I'm sick?

  She panicked at the thought of being ill, and touched her forehead. This isn't the time to get sick! The day isn't long enough as it is.

  “What are you doing?” Kirsha asked, looking back at Bethany with one eyebrow raised. “I thought we were in a hurry. Did you forget something?”

  “Just a moment,” Bethany said, lowering her hand from her forehead. It wasn't hot, and she didn't feel nauseous or otherwise debilitated.

  A hint of worry appeared in Kirsha's eyes. “Are you sick? You look a bit pale.”

  “It's nothing.”

  It has to be nothing. I've only been ill once in all my years of service for the White Candle guild, and now is not the time for it. I'm the housekeeper, and the housekeeper is never ill. She shook off her worry and rejoined Kirsha.

  When they arrived at the kitchen, they found Trent already present, slamming his fists into some dough.

  “Morning,” Trent greeted them, spinning the lump of dough around in his hands and slamming it back onto the table.

  “Good morning,” Bethany replied as she looked around and strained her ears for any sounds coming from the nearby dining hall. “Is anyone else here yet?”

  “Nope,” Trent said, halting his kneading for a moment. “Night shift just left. Haven't seen any of the magistrae yet.” He pointed his thumb over his shoulder to a pair of large wicker baskets. “Today's bread is already here, though.”

  Bethany let out an inaudible sigh of relief. Thank the ?ther, I'm still on schedule. She had recently been punished for tardiness, and even though it had been Kirsha's fault, Bethany didn't want to be berated again.

  Kirsha busied herself at one of the stoves and Bethany began preparing breakfast; putting the fresh bread in the smaller table baskets, filling up the jugs, and retrieving the plates from the cupboard. She counted the fine porcelain plates as she stacked them. Plates for all the magistrae and six adepts, I think.

  On any other day, at least half the guild's magistrae would not be present at the White Candle. They would either be at the school, visiting one of the subsidiary guilds, or exploring ruins in the far north at the Frontier or in the fallen empire of Pa in the south.

  Yesterday had been different, however. For some reason, all the magistrae had returned to the White Candle over the past few days, so that every single one of them was now in residence. The staff had been struggling to keep up with the increased workload.

  I hope they don't take too long with breakfast, Bethany thought with a frown. I already skipped cleaning the upper corridors yesterday. I can't afford to do that again.

  This content has been misappropriated from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

  Counting the plates once more, she noticed that Trent seemed agitated. He seemed to be kneading the dough with far more force than necessary.

  “Did you have a bad night, Trent?” Bethany asked.

  Trent stopped and stared off into the distance for a moment as he mulled over the question. He wasn't the brightest of people, and sometimes it took him a while to come up with an answer, even if the question only warranted a short response.

  “I suppose I did,” he finally said. “I woke up in the middle of the night, for no reason at all. Couldn't sleep well afterwards, either. It was strange.”

  “What was strange about it?” Bethany asked, carefully lifting the stack of plates.

  Again, Trent paused for a while. “I'm not sure how to say it,” he said. “First, I figured it was because of a noise or something, but I can't recall hearing anything. It was more like, instead of a sudden sound, there was a sudden silence.” He looked at Bethany apologetically. “I don't know how to say it.”

  “Don't worry,” she said, smiling reassuringly. “I know what you mean. I felt the same way this morning. It's probably because it has been so busy during the day lately; the nights seem quieter.”

  “I suppose,” Trent said, and he resumed his work on the dough. “Haven't heard a peep from the dining hall either.”

  “Maybe the magistrae are tired too,” Bethany said, shuffling towards the hall with the balanced stack of plates. “They have been busy as well, after all.” I wonder with what?

  When she entered the dining hall, she looked around in surprise. There was nobody there. The hall's long tables were lined with nothing but empty chairs.

  Bethany's frown reappeared. Nobody is here yet? But that cannot be.

  Magister Brasii was always there before anyone else, sitting in his favourite chair with a stack of papers in front of him and mumbling about things Bethany could never hope to understand. And if not him, then at least Magister Alm should have been there by now, checking up on her and the other servants. He had been looming over them for days.

  She placed the plates on the nearest table and looked around. The chairs were all in their proper positions, indicating that nobody had been in the dining hall since yesterday.

  Maybe they had a late night?

  She had only made an offhand comment to Trent that the guild's magistrae had been busy these past few days, but it seemed there was more truth to that than she had realised. It was even possible that they had stayed up all night for something or other, and had simply forgotten the time.

  If I ring the dinner bell, they should appear soon enough, she thought, but somehow that did not reassure her. The memory of the emptiness she had felt earlier lingered in the back of her mind as she returned to the kitchen.

  “Magister Brasii isn't here yet,” Bethany said with a concerned face on entering the kitchen. “I can't recall the last time that happened. He never misses breakfast unless he's ill.”

  “They had something big going on,” Trent replied, noticing Bethany's distressed look. “I just remembered that Pyrie told me that. They all went into the sanctum yesterday evening and said they did not want to be disturbed.”

  “All of them?” Bethany asked.

  “Yes. Everyone.”

  How strange.

  Bethany noticed that her mouth felt dry. Why do I have such a bad feeling about this? She stood motionlessly in the kitchen for a moment, trying to sense or hear anything that was not as it should be, but nothing came to her except an odd look from Kirsha.

  “Are you sure you aren't ill?” Kirsha asked. “'Cause you still look very pale.”

  Bethany waved her hand at Kirsha dismissively and turned away from her.

  Should I go have a look at the sanctum? Just to make sure everything is okay? If she did, her mind would be put at ease, but the magistrae treasured their privacy and servants were not allowed to enter the sanctum without supervision. She had been in trouble for that once before, just after she was hired and a little too eager in her cleaning. Not to mention that the men and women she was worrying about were the magistrae of the White Candle guild: the foremost and oldest magic guild in the entire Kingdom of Gerios. To believe that something could have happened to them without anyone noticing was ludicrous.

  I will leave it be; if I wander off now, breakfast will definitely not be ready in time.

  Later that morning, when the sun had already risen well above the horizon, Bethany stood in silence in the dining hall, shifting her weight from one foot to the other. The tables had been laid, but the food and drink remained untouched, the chairs empty, and the hall silent. None of the magistrae had appeared. Apart from the staff, only a handful of adepts who resided in the city instead of the guild seat proper, were present. And they all seemed to be as confused by the empty hall as Bethany felt.

  Talia had rung the dinner bell several times already. Anyone in residence at the White Candle would have heard it.

  Bethany's mind was racing and she regretted her earlier decision. She looked at Kirsha, who was positioned at the other end of the hall, and at the shadows that moved along the wall behind her. How long have we been standing here? The sun has climbed so high already.

  She shifted her weight again.

  Something is wrong. Something has to be wrong. The magistrae would never do this without telling anyone.

  Her frantic thinking was interrupted by the sound of hurrying footsteps coming from the eastern corridor.

  The sound of those steps was the best thing she had ever heard, and she was flooded with relief. Oh, thank the ?ther. She straightened her apron and wiped the frown off her face in anticipation of the first magistrae.

  The two people entering the dining hall, however, were not elderly men or women wearing the guild's white and soft-blue magister's robes. Instead, the new arrivals were Kinne and Pascalle, two female servants from the morning shift.

  “Oh, Bethany,” Kinne said with a worried look on her face. “Do you know what's going on? None of the beds have been slept in and the entrance to the sanctum is locked. There is no response to our calls.” Pascalle nodded frantically in confirmation of Kinne's words.

  Bethany's anxiety peaked, crushing her relief. None of the beds have been slept in? The sanctum is locked? She covered her cheek with her hand as if to steady herself.

  “I don't understand, Kinne; what do you mean, 'locked'? The inner or the outer door? And did you try ringing the attention bell?”

  “I couldn't ring the bell,” Kinne replied, raising her hands to emphasize her words. “It's the outer door that is locked. I couldn't even enter the entrance hall.”

  “Sounds to me like they aren't done yet,” Kirsha said as she approached. “If they aren't going to show up for breakfast, can we eat then?”

  Bethany did not berate Kirsha for her callous remark, being lost in thought once more. Magistrae doing strange things wasn't unheard of. Practising magic was a tricky and random thing, after all. However, not informing the servants beforehand was unprecedented. Bethany was now convinced that something must have happened. Why else would even the outer door to the sanctum be locked?

  “Bethany? What should we do?” Kinne asked, wringing her hands.

  “Let me think for moment,” Bethany said. I have to be calm about this. If there are no magistrae, then, as the senior housekeeper, I'm in charge. It's up to me.

  She grabbed her apron with her right hand and balled her fist. “None of the late shift know anything about this either, right?” Bethany asked Kinne, trying to keep her voice steady.

  Kinne shook her head. “No, it was Pyrie who asked me to clean the lower lounge, but it was as unused as the beds. She wouldn't have asked me to clean it if she had known the magistrae hadn't used it. I walked to the sanctum afterwards to see if I could find Magister Alm.”

  “Maybe something happened to them?” Kirsha asked, the first to voice Bethany's concerns.

  The women stood in silence for a moment as if considering the implications of what Kirsha had said.

  Bethany made her decision.

  “Pascalle,” Bethany said, her lips forming a thin and determined line. “Go wake up the late shift and ask them if they were told anything at all about this by any magister.”

  Pascalle nodded and disappeared in the direction of the servants' quarters.

  Bethany turned her head. “Kirsha, notify the city watch.”

  “Okay,” Kirsha said. Her usual smile wasn't present at the moment. Even she seemed to understand that the situation was too strange for things to be alright. Her quick pace as she hurried away testified to that.

  “What about me?” Kinne asked.

  “We're going to the sanctum,” Bethany said. “I need to see for myself.”

  Kinne looked slightly annoyed, perhaps thinking that Bethany didn't believe her, but that wasn't why Bethany wanted to see the sanctum. She believed Kinne; it was something else that she wanted to see, located above those doors.

  The stairway that led down to the basement was only a short distance away. From there, Bethany and Kinne hurried past the lower study hall towards the sanctum's entrance. Some of the studies' doors had been left open. A quick glance inside confirmed that each one was empty.

  Are they really all in the sanctum?

  Once they turned the final corner, Bethany needed to take no more than a single step before spotting the huge, solid double door that separated the sanctum from the adjacent corridor.

  Kinne didn't seem to notice Bethany's frozen posture. “See?” she said as she approached the door. “Nobody is here and the door is locked.” She pulled at one of the handles. “It won't open at all.”

  “No it won't,” Bethany said, her gaze fixed on the archway over the door and the bright light emanating from the large glass sphere set into it.

  To most servants of the Candle guild, that particular sphere was nothing more than an indicator of the ?ther charge left for the sanctum wards. The brighter it was, the closer it was to being fully charged. Just like it was right now. Its light even overwhelmed the light of the nearby sun sigils.

  What most servants didn't know, however, was that the sphere could also display colours other than the usual white. Bethany herself only knew about this by chance, due to a past conversation she once had with Magister Tannen when he had shown her around on her first day of work. He had told her that the indicator could show different colours, and, as he was the kind of man who loved to teach even those who weren't apprentices or adepts, he told her what those colours meant. However, as the light had never shone any colour other than white in all the years of her service, she had forgotten all about it.

  Until now.

  Kinne noticed Bethany's stare and followed her gaze towards the sphere. “Isn't that supposed to be white?” she asked anxiously. “Why is it red?”

  “Red is death,” Bethany whispered.

  It all came back to her in a flash. She had been standing right there, in front of the outer doors, which had been open. Magister Tannen stood beside her, talking about the sphere. He told her about how blue meant someone was working on the wards, and how orange meant someone was tampering with them. “And red is death,” he continued. She looked at him with surprise, and asked if it meant someone had died inside. He laughed with that typical chortle of his and told her that it meant nothing of the sort. It was nothing more than a catchy reminder; red simply meant that a terrible thing had happened. However, he never made clear what that thing might be, assuring her that she would never see that colour in her lifetime.

  Yet here it is.

  The glass sphere shone a vivid red. Not like blood, but like the petals of a rose under bright sunlight. Under different circumstances, it might have looked pretty.

  “Bethany?” Kinne asked, now looking pale as a sheet. “What's wrong? Are you alright?”

  Bethany did not answer. The undeniable presence of the red light turned her anxiety into cold fear as ideas about what Magister Tannen might have meant formed inside her mind.

  Despite feeling only moments away from panic, she managed to remain calm and in control. It was now clear to her what she had to do.

  “Kinne,” Bethany said, tearing her gaze away from the red sphere. “Go to the servants' quarters, wake everyone who hasn't been woken by Pascalle, and tell them to leave the tower. I will go back to the kitchen and tell Trent.” Her voice sounded flat and distant in her ears, like somebody else was speaking.

  “Leave?” Kinne asked, looking bewildered. “To go where?”

  “Outside. Anywhere but here.”

  Kinne hesitated, confused by Bethany's instructions.

  “Go,” Bethany added in a voice that brooked no further argument.

  With an apologetic mumble, Kinne sped away down the corridor towards the lower lounge.

  Bethany watched her go and then turned to take one last look at the red light shining above the sanctum door. “Farewell, Magister Tannen,” she whispered, before she spun around and started running.