Chapter 286 - An...unfamiliar meadow?
Gaspar’s eyes widened as the Baroness vanished in a brilliant burst of light, illuminating the chamber with a momentary blaze. The sudden radiance left afterimages dancing before his eyes, and he blinked rapidly, trying to clear his vision.
“Scarlett!” Rosa, the bard, cried out. Gaspar had barely registered her exclamation before a blur streaked past him. Fynn, the white-haired youth always at the Baroness’ side, dashed across the chamber with preternatural speed to the spot where the noblewoman had been standing mere seconds before.
“W-What just happened?” one of the Shielder children whispered, her wide eyes darting around the room. Beside her, her armored companion gripped his sword tightly, a deep frown etching lines on his young face.
Fynn scanned the floor where the Baroness had disappeared, his gaze searching every little detail. Finding nothing, he turned abruptly and bolted towards the entrance, leaving only a swirling of wind and dust.
Rosa’s violet eyes narrowed, locking onto Gaspar with a steely intensity he had yet to see from her previously. “You, Grand Wizard Hartford or whatever,” she demanded. “Where did Scarlett go? What was that just now? And what are those stone slabs?”
Gaspar’s brow furrowed as he tuned out the murmurs of his junior wizards nearby. “I don’t know,” he said through slightly gritted teeth, feeling his scowl deepen. “Those ‘slabs’, as you call them, are recollection steles. Ancient artifacts erected by the Zuver to hold memories and knowledge of past wizards.”
“Then what did it do to Scarlett? Why did it take her away?” Allyssa—the Shielder girl—pressed, her voice tinged with worry.
Gaspar’s gaze shifted to the stele where the Baroness had stood. That light he’d seen, emanating from her head… It couldn’t possibly be…
He turned and gestured sharply to two Principal Wizards from the Mistral Observatory, both clad in emerald robes. “Quickly, examine the area,” he ordered, then returned his focus to Rosa, gruffly adding, “I can’t answer your questions. The steles are supposed to store specific memories and insights for modern wizards, but they shouldn’t include any sort of translocational spell. Their effect is purely mental, accessing the mind, not the body. And while it appeared the Baroness might have activated the stele, even that should not be possible without a paired relic.”
As he spoke, Gaspar’s mind raced through the implications. What could have caused this? And why had it happened? He couldn’t say, and that fact irked him immensely. Had the Baroness anticipated this? Was that why she had asked him to identify the stele belonging to Delmont? But if so, why did her companions react with such genuine shock? And why did she herself seem caught off guard?
Perhaps more pressingly, had she truly been transported somewhere else? He had detected no spell resembling any spatial translocation magic he knew, not even among Zuverian techniques. Yet it seemed equally improbable that the Baroness had simply ceased to exist or perished.
Gaspar’s thoughts were interrupted as Rosa pulled out her instrument from whatever spatial fold her cape hid, and he noticed a subtle shift in the air around her, as if it were coalescing with power. He narrowed his eyes, unsure if he’d imagined it, but set the thought aside as she fixed him with a grave expression, fingers resting on the neck of her instrument.