"Arslan the Red," Godric repeated, letting the name sit in his mind as he closed his eyes for a brief moment, as though he were trying to catch hold of something that hovered just beyond memory. When he opened them again, his gaze settled on the tome with renewed interest. "I don't know about you, Salazar, but from what Professor Lotho said, the man sounds like everything a knight ought to be."
"That would be putting it mildly, my dear friend," Salazar replied as he turned the brittle pages with careful precision until he found one marked by a faded red emblem near the top. "From what I can gather, his story is not merely legendary, but one of the few accounts connected to the Order that was properly chronicled with any seriousness."
"Most of the other knights had their deeds buried beneath songs, tavern tales, embellishments, and the usual nonsense that happens when bards discover a profitable subject, but Arslan's deeds were recorded with care. Someone, it seems, made rather certain that his story would not be allowed to vanish into myth."
Godric leaned closer, drawn to the illustration inked into the aged page. The knight depicted there stood in armor that balanced function and artistry, polished steel accented with shaped gold, with lion motifs worked into nearly every visible plate. His helmet bore the roaring face of a lion, his pauldrons were sculpted with regal severity, and a cloak fell from his shoulders to his knees, fastened at one side by an ornate brooch shaped like a lion's head. In both hands, he held a sword angled downward so that its tip rested against the ground, and as Godric studied the guard, the pommel, and the shape of the blade, something stirred faintly in him, not recognition exactly, but close enough to make him narrow his eyes.
"Apparently," Salazar continued, glancing briefly at Godric's interest before returning to the passage, "Arslan was a Vagabond, which means he came from a world beyond Avalon, though not merely any world, mind you. Ours."
Godric looked up, his eyes widening. "You're serious?"
"Somewhere in England, allegedly," Salazar said, smoothing one hand along the edge of the parchment. "He began as the squire of a hedge knight, was knighted when he was roughly our age, and then set off on his own little adventure with no magic whatsoever, only a sword, a horse, and what appears to have been an almost absurd quantity of honor and good intentions." A faint smirk touched his mouth as he looked back at Godric. "The likeness is rather difficult to ignore, wouldn't you agree?"
Godric huffed a quiet laugh, though he could not entirely deny the point. "Minus the part where he didn't have magic, I guess I can see what you mean."
"Yes, one imagines you would insist on bringing magic along if only to make the whole affair louder," Salazar replied dryly, though his amusement remained as he returned to the text. "In any case, his accomplishments were nothing short of extraordinary. He defeated the King of Bandits, Jack of Blades, overthrew the false king of Sandrock, and..." His brows lifted as his finger stopped on a particular line. "Ah, here it is. He slew the dragon lich of Akhbar, which suggests either remarkable courage, a complete disregard for survival, or some alarming combination of the two."
Godric nodded despite the excitement beginning to rise in him, because the more Salazar read, the less Arslan felt like some distant figure from an old lecture and the more he sounded like the sort of knight Godric had grown up wishing he could meet.
"That's not the kind of thing a man just stumbles into," he said, his attention returning to the lion-armored figure on the page.
"No, I imagine one does not accidentally wander into a dragon lich and emerge with a reputation intact," Salazar said as he moved further down the page. "However, the incident that evidently brought him to the attention of the Seven involved the Crown Prince of Cenred."
"A thoroughly detestable creature by all accounts, wretched, spineless, and draped in silks and authority he had done absolutely nothing to deserve. Evidently, the prince attempted to burn an entire town to the ground because his honor had been, as he claimed, besmirched, after he tried to force himself upon the tavern keeper's daughter."
Godric's expression darkened, the excitement in his eyes cooling into something harder.
"Arslan intervened," Salazar continued, his own lip curling with disdain as he read, "and gave the prince what appears to have been a thoroughly deserved beating. Naturally, because cowards with crowns rarely take humiliation gracefully, the prince tried to have him executed, whereupon Arslan demanded a trial by combat."
Godric let out a quiet laugh, though it carried more recognition than amusement. "My Uncle Gareth used to tell me about those," he said, leaning back slightly as the memory of old stories returned to him. "Said a man could win his freedom with a blade, no matter the charge, depending on the place and how much the local lords cared about blood looking like justice. Could be something as small as theft or something as heavy as treason, and if you survived the fight, the law called you innocent."
Salazar lifted a brow. "And did your uncle ever take part in one of these trials?"
"Really? My Uncle Gareth, accused of a crime?" Godric said, a smirk tugging at his mouth as though the idea itself had trouble staying serious. "As far as I know, and as pretty much everyone in Dark's Hollow would gladly testify, the only crime my uncle ever committed that might deserve a trial by combat is how terrible he is at dancing." He chuckled, shaking his head as the image came and went. "No, he told me he saw plenty of those trials during his travels, but he never said he fought in one himself."
"Forgive me if I find that rather difficult to believe," Salazar said smoothly.
Godric gave him a look. "What's that supposed to mean?"
"Nothing scandalous, I assure you," Salazar replied, raising one hand that did not quite disguise the amusement in his eyes. "I am not suggesting that your uncle wandered the countryside as some conveniently acquitted criminal. I am merely saying that, from the time I have spent with both of you, I would be astonished if Gareth Gryffindor had not found himself tangled in at least one trial by combat through no fault of his own beyond an uncompromising desire to see justice done."
Godric opened his mouth to argue, then paused as the point settled more comfortably than he expected. "Now that you mention it, you might not be wrong," he admitted, a small smile tugging at his lips. "Uncle Gareth does have that stubborn streak in him, especially when it comes to protecting the weak and innocent. Doesn't matter if the person causing trouble is rich, privileged, noble, or wrapped in enough holy symbols to blind a man in sunlight. If someone crosses a line, he steps in."
He chuckled softly, affection warming the memory. "That's probably why the abbot in the next town can't stand him, though with my uncle's reputation among the locals and the fact that his name is pretty much the only thing keeping bandits away from the roads near Dark's Hollow, there isn't much the man can do about it."
Salazar gave a quiet, thoughtful chuckle as he glanced between Godric and the illustration of Arslan. "You realize, of course, that you have more or less described Ser Arslan himself."
Godric blinked, then shrugged with a faint grin. "Maybe that's why I like him."
"Perhaps," Salazar said, though his attention had already returned to the page. "In any case, Arslan's demand for trial by combat did not proceed as he expected. The prince invoked an ancient ruling known as the Trial of Seven, which, as the name rather clearly suggests, meant seven knights against seven knights."
Godric's brow furrowed. "That would've put Arslan in a bad spot if he didn't have anyone with him."
"Precisely," Salazar replied. "No noble backing, no sworn companions, no courtly allies, and no convenient circle of powerful friends waiting in the wings, which meant the prince likely believed he had found a clever way to bury the man beneath law instead of simply having him murdered."
Salazar turned the page, revealing another illustration in which seven knights stood side by side, each clad in distinct armor marked by different colors, beasts, and crests. Godric leaned in again, his eyes moving over the figures as Salazar continued, "That is when the Order answered the call. They had heard of Arslan's deeds, judged him worthy, and chose to stand beside him, turning what the prince believed would be a one-sided execution into a true Trial of Seven."
The silence between them deepened slightly as Godric studied the image, and for a moment the old illustration seemed almost alive beneath the amber crystal light, seven knights gathered around one man whose fate had called them from legend into battle.
"They defeated the prince's champions," Salazar said, a faint, satisfied smile forming as he tapped the page. "Arslan was exonerated, the Crown Prince of Cenred was humiliated, and although I shall spare you every detail, the battle was evidently quite the spectacle. Still, I would have paid exponentially to witness the moment that wretched little coward realized he had summoned the very knights who would ensure his defeat."
"Naturally, after the trial, Arslan was inducted into the Order, where he earned the moniker Arslan the Red," Salazar said, turning another page. "As a member of the Seven, his legend only grew, though what truly solidified it, at least according to the accounts preserved here, was the fact that a mere mundane with a sword could stand against some of the most powerful witches and wizards in Avalon and emerge not only alive, but victorious."
His gaze moved down the page, and his brow lifted slightly as he reached another passage. "He was honored by all eleven kingdoms, save for one, the Crown Theocracy of Mithra, the holy land of Sanctism."
Godric raised an eyebrow. "Sanctism?" he asked, leaning back slightly in his chair. "I've heard that word more than once, but I never really understood what it meant, and I guess I never found the time to ask."
"Yet another rather ludicrous monotheistic theology designed to swindle the foolish, mold the fearful, and subjugate the less fortunate," Salazar replied with a careless shrug, though the precision in his words suggested that his contempt had been polished over time rather than born in the moment. "If you require a frame of reference, imagine the Catholic Church from our world dressed in Avalonian robes, armed with institutional magic, and given the political appetite of a starving wolf."
"It is the most widespread faith in Avalon, centered around devotion to a singular divine figure they call the Almighty, and I suspect you have seen more than a few of their churches scattered throughout Caerleon without realizing what they were."
"Wait, those were Sanctist churches?" Godric asked, his brows drawing together as realization settled in. "I thought they were just... you know, churches."
Salazar chuckled softly, shaking his head with the sort of amusement that made Godric feel as if he had stepped neatly into a trap laid several sentences earlier. "How adorably naïve," he said, the smirk at the corner of his mouth sharpening as he rested one hand beside the open tome. "It is only natural that, no matter the world or society, humanity eventually discovers some grand method of consolidating power and casting influence over its fellow man."
He gestured with a wave of his hand. "And what easier way to do so than by giving people something to worship, along with faux promises that their deepest, most desperate desires shall be fulfilled if only they surrender enough of themselves to those who claim to speak on behalf of an empty throne?"
Godric rubbed the back of his head, his expression caught somewhere between discomfort and reluctant understanding. "Well, when you put it that way, it sounds a whole lot uglier than just ringing bells and lighting candles."
"That is because bells and candles are often how uglier things learn to look respectable," Salazar replied, though his tone eased slightly as he turned his attention back to the page. "Which is likely why Ser Arslan found himself in conflict with the Crown Theocracy on more than one occasion."
He shrugged. "I shall leave those stories for another time, since they are rather extensive and I would prefer not to spend the entire afternoon cataloguing the many ways Sanctist authority has embarrassed itself throughout history, but suffice it to say that Sanctifex Forden, the head of the faith, was not particularly fond of the man."
Godric's mouth twitched despite himself. "Let me guess, Arslan didn't do too well with being told to bow his head and keep quiet."
"Evidently not," Salazar said, his chuckle returning as he glanced up from the tome. "Once again, it rather does remind one of your Uncle Gareth, does it not?"
"Honestly, the more I learn about Ser Arslan, the more I start seeing my Uncle Gareth in that armor, holding that sword," Godric said with a sigh. "Doesn't help that I know next to nothing about his past, not his real past, anyway. I only know what came after he settled in Dark's Hollow, before he became Captain of the Guard, but anything before that?"
He looked across the table at Salazar, his expression tightening with frustration. "He gets real quiet whenever I bring it up, like he's not just avoiding the question, but actively trying to keep me from looking too closely."
"That is rather odd," Salazar replied, one eyebrow lifting as he regarded Godric with thoughtful interest. "One would imagine he might be more than willing to regale you with tales from his youth, especially if his journey began when he was roughly your age. Men of his sort are usually either insufferably modest or insufferably dramatic about such things, and yet from what you describe, he seems to have chosen secrecy instead."
He tapped his chin lightly, his gaze drifting for a moment toward the tome before returning to Godric. "Still, I suppose it is not my place to speculate too freely on his reasons. A man is entitled to his secrets, even when those secrets are inconveniently fascinating."
"Maybe I shouldn't be surprised," Godric said, his crimson gaze shifting toward the sword leaning against the table beside him. "Uncle Gareth hasn't exactly been straight with me about where he got this, either."
Salazar followed his gaze, studying the royal blue and gold hilt with renewed attention, and for a moment the sword seemed to gather more presence between them, no longer merely a weapon resting within reach, but a question neither of them had properly asked aloud.
"I've always said it was a gift, and that part's true," Godric continued, resting one hand lightly on the pommel. "But every time I asked him how he got it, the story changed. Different people, different cities, different circumstances, and whenever I tried to press him on it, he either waved it off, changed the subject, or said it slipped his mind, which is about the worst excuse I've ever heard from a man who can remember the exact stance someone used in a duel twenty years ago."
Salazar's expression sharpened slightly. "That is suspiciously evasive, even by the standards of heroic old men with inconvenient pasts."
"Yeah, and it gets stranger," Godric said, his fingers tightening subtly around the pommel. "Back on that rooftop with Asriel, he tried to draw it, but he couldn't."
Salazar's eyes widened, and the usual amusement in his face faded beneath genuine surprise. "Wait," he said, leaning forward slightly as his gaze moved from Godric to the sword and back again. "Are you telling me the sword refused him?"
Godric nodded, the memory returning with more weight now than it had carried at the time. "He was right about that part. I didn't think much of it then, but I've never seen anyone else draw my blade, and I've never really let anyone try until that day. Then he said something else, something about there being only one sword in recorded history that answered to its wielder."
"You do not mean to say..." Salazar's gaze narrowed as he looked again at the sword, and for a moment something flickered through his emerald eyes, almost like an epiphany stirring from a place where it had been buried too long. "Caliburn?"
"Of course, I laughed it off," Godric said, rubbing the back of his head with a grin that felt weaker than he intended. "I mean, come on. Me?" He gestured to himself as though the very idea was ridiculous. "The long-lost heir of Uther Pendragon? Blimey, he's having a laugh."
"Well, I would not put it past Uther the First to have fathered a multitude of heirs," Salazar said, his grin returning with a touch of mischief. "He was, after all, the first king of Camelot during an age when Avalon was still recovering from the scars left behind by the Calamity, and history has never been particularly kind when it comes to recording the private habits of powerful men."
He rested his head against one hand, his elbow propped on the table as his eyes remained on Godric. "Who knows? Perhaps one of those heirs chose to leave Avalon behind and find a life in our world."
Godric scoffed, though the sound came more from discomfort than dismissal. "Right, good one, Salazar. Just because the sword looks pretty doesn't mean it's the legendary lost blade of Uther Pendragon."
He lifted a hand in protest, as if trying to physically hold the theory at a safe distance. "Besides, Professor Lotho said Caliburn disappeared after the final battle with Lord Sarkon, and even if it were Caliburn, why would it end up here? More importantly, why me? I'm just some no-name half-blood from a no-name town in the middle of nowhere."
Salazar chuckled softly, though the look he gave Godric was far more measured than mocking. "How amusing, then, that Uther Pendragon was once very much the same," he said, his half-lidded gaze settling on him with quiet intent. "A nameless ranger from a nameless town in the middle of nowhere, who eventually became a legend."
"Oh, please," Godric said, rolling his eyes despite the unease still lingering beneath his expression. "You're putting it on a bit thick."
"Perhaps," Salazar admitted, though his smile suggested he was not nearly as convinced of that as Godric would have preferred.
"The point is," Godric continued, looking back down at the sword as his thumb brushed along the pommel, "my Uncle Gareth has a lot of secrets, and with how tight-lipped he gets every time I ask the wrong question, I'm starting to think nothing would surprise me anymore."
His gaze lifted again toward the illustration of Arslan the Red, and the resemblance he had imagined before now felt far less easy to laugh away. "At this point, if someone told me he was Arslan the Red, I honestly don't think I'd know how to argue."
"Hypothetically speaking," Salazar said, straightening slightly as his attention returned to the page, "if your uncle were Ser Arslan, I would be very curious to know what led to the end of the Order of Seven, and more precisely, why he would choose to leave Avalon behind at all."
His finger tapped lightly against the aged parchment, though his gaze had turned inward, following the shape of the question more than the words before him. "The man was not merely respected, Godric, he was revered, and chivalry aside, he could have claimed almost anything he wished. A position of power, perhaps Lord Commander of the Kingsguard of Camelot under the reign of King Uther, whom we have so delightfully made our acquaintance, or at the very least some title, land, wealth, and influence sufficient to ensure that he would want for nothing."
His eyes narrowed as the thought sharpened. "So why walk away from all of it?"
Godric remained quiet for a moment, his gaze drifting toward the sword resting beside the table, and when he finally spoke, his words carried the uncertainty of someone feeling through an answer rather than presenting one.
"Maybe… maybe he was just tired of it all," he said. "My Uncle Gareth once told me there's only so much a man can carry on his shoulders before it isn't just his body that starts giving out, but his heart too."
He leaned back slightly, his fingers brushing against the edge of the table as he tried to imagine what kind of burden could make a knight like Arslan abandon everything history said he had earned. "Sounds to me like Ser Arslan carried the weight of the Twelve Kingdoms until he couldn't carry it anymore, and if a knight loses the reason he picked up his sword in the first place, maybe the will to keep swinging it goes with it."
Salazar's expression grew quieter, and for once there was no immediate smirk waiting behind his eyes.
"That is rather enlightening," he said, his gaze lowering to the polished surface of the table as the usual sharpness in him softened into something more reflective. "I can certainly relate to that more than I would care to admit, given everything that has happened."
A faint, solemn chuckle left him, though it carried none of his usual theatrical amusement. "I suppose that is one of the few reasons I envy you, and Rowena, and Helga as well. The three of you have this terribly inconvenient ability to see the good in others, the promise in a new day, and most of all, the possibility that people may yet become better than what the world has made of them."
Godric looked at him closely, sensing the shift in his friend's demeanor.
"As for me," Salazar continued, his expression falling, "I see darkness in everything and everyone, not because I wish to, but because it is so often there, waiting beneath civility, beneath faith, beneath friendship, beneath all the polished lies people use to convince themselves they are better than the monsters they condemn."
His gaze returned to the book. "In a way, I cannot help wondering whether Ser Arslan began seeing the world as I do."
Godric nodded slowly, the thought settling uneasily between them. "Maybe," he said. "And honestly, for a while, I think I saw it that way too, especially after Raine was gone." The admission carried more weight than he expected, and he held Salazar's gaze for a moment before letting out a slow breath. "Some days, it gets real hard to believe there's much light left when the person who made the world feel bright isn't there anymore."
Salazar looked up, and although the smirk that touched his face was faint, there was something sincere beneath it. "And yet that is precisely why you are the Lion of Ignis, dear friend, and I am not."
Godric's mouth curved in return, some of the heaviness easing from his expression. "You better believe it."
"And by the way," Salazar said, his eyes half-lidded as he looked across the table at Godric, "here is a delightful little morsel of knowledge that I personally find most amusing. Other than the Church, there was one more organization that remained in near-constant conflict with Ser Arslan throughout his years as a member of the Seven." His lips thinned into a knowing smile, the kind that suggested the answer had been placed directly before Godric and all that remained was for him to admit it. "I shall allow you to guess, although deep down, I suspect you already know."
Godric's eyes widened as the realization struck him, and he leaned closer over the open tome, his excitement now tangled with disbelief. "No, you're not saying what I think you're saying," he said, lowering his voice despite the isolation of their corner. "The Authority?"
Salazar brought his hands together in a soft, measured clap that carried more mock ceremony than sound. "Bravo, Gryffindor, and on the first try as well. I am impressed." He chuckled as he returned his attention to the text, one finger following the aged lines with growing interest. "Apparently, Ser Arslan became quite the therian folk hero, particularly in the therian kingdom of Siltvelt, where they appear to have all but deified him. According to this passage, shrines were erected across the land in his honor, and some families would even hang his portrait in their homes, believing his image could ward off evil, misfortune, and the hands of those who would drag them back into chains."
Godric stared at the page, the idea settling over him with a warmth he had not expected. "That's incredible," he said, a bright, almost boyish smile spreading across his face. "A knight from our world becoming a folk hero in Avalon because he stood up for people nobody else would protect. That's the kind of story people should still be telling."
"Indeed, though the story itself is far bloodier than the shrines would suggest," Salazar continued, the amusement fading from his face as the account darkened. "Based on what was recorded here, during the Second Servile War, the Administrator of the Burra Authoritas broke decorum and mobilized the full force of the Guild against the therian nation. One does not need to be a scholar to deduce why, since the largest concentrated population of therians in Avalon would have filled the Guild's coffers for centuries had Siltvelt fallen."
Godric's smile faded as the implication settled in.
"What they did not expect," Salazar went on, "was for Ser Arslan the Red to stand with Siltvelt. To say he bled the Guild dry during that war would be an understatement, because with his leadership, Siltvelt not only resisted the invasion but shattered the Guild's advance, toppled its command structure, and took the Administrator prisoner. Negotiating the man's release came at a rather steep price, and by the end of it, the Authority was effectively barred from setting foot in Siltvelt ever again."
Godric leaned back slightly, trying to grasp the scale of what he had just heard. "So, wait," he said, his brows drawing together, "does that mean there's no Guild in Siltvelt at all?"
"More or less," Salazar replied, though the satisfaction in his words dimmed as quickly as it had appeared. "No formal trade, no Authority presence, no Union offices operating under the usual banners, and no sanctioned Guild caravans crossing their borders with ledgers full of names and prices."
He sighed softly, his gaze remaining on the page as his expression grew more somber. "Unfortunately, that does not mean slavery itself vanished from Siltvelt. They have their own systems, their own markets, their own version of the Authority wearing a different face, because one can drive out a particular institution, Godric, but removing the trade itself is another matter entirely when the law still permits people to be bought and sold."
"Damn," Godric said, the excitement draining from his face as he looked down at the table. "For a second there, I thought maybe they'd actually managed to end it somewhere."
"Do not lose hope so quickly, dear friend," Salazar said. "I have no doubt that one day we shall see the end of such barbarism, not merely in Siltvelt, nor in Caerleon, but across Avalon itself." A smirk touched his face then, quieter than usual but no less certain. "And if the Gods are feeling particularly crafty, perhaps we may even have a hand in it."
Godric looked at him for a moment, the heaviness in his chest easing just enough for a smile to return. "Yeah," he said softly. "Maybe we will."
Salazar's eyes then widened slightly, as though a thought had resurfaced at the exact moment it was needed, and he straightened before flipping back through several pages with renewed interest. "Ah, I nearly forgot. There is something here you should see," he said, his fingers moving carefully through the old parchment. "Many years before Ser Arslan, there was apparently a fracture within the Order."
Godric's brow lifted. "A fracture?"
"Yes, and quite a significant one, from what this account suggests," Salazar said, stopping on a page that bore a sketch of several knights locked in fierce argument, their armored figures arranged around a round table while banners and emblems hung behind them like witnesses to the breaking of something sacred. "It began over the vote to determine who should become the next head of the Order. The choice fell between two candidates, both respected, both formidable, but divided by entirely different perspectives, methodologies, and visions for what the Order should become."
Godric leaned closer, his earlier unease giving way to focused attention.
"One believed the Order should continue as it had always been," Salazar said, tracing the text with one finger. "Honor, chivalry, service, restraint, and all the noble burdens that seem to appeal so deeply to your particular sense of self-destruction."
His gaze darkened as his finger moved to the next passage. "The other believed the Order had outgrown the road, the village, and the battlefield, and that it should become the hidden hand behind the Twelve Kingdoms, a guiding force shaping rulers, laws, alliances, and succession from the shadows. Think of it as their own version of the High Table, only far more political and infinitely more dangerous."
Godric stared at the page, his expression tightening with alarm. "That's horrifying," he said. "A shadow order sitting behind the ruling kingdoms of Avalon, deciding who gets to lead and who gets crushed because they don't fit the plan?"
"Precisely," Salazar replied. "He believed true peace could only be achieved if the Twelve Kingdoms were guided by the Order, shaped according to its ideals, and protected from the chaos of weak rulers, corrupt courts, and ignorant masses. In theory, it was all very noble, peace, prosperity, stability, abundance, and the usual language tyrants borrow when they wish to make chains sound like charity."
He turned the page slightly, his mouth tightening. "In practice, of course, those who refused to conform would be removed and replaced, dissent would be crushed, and Avalon would be made peaceful only because anyone capable of disrupting that peace would have been silenced."
Godric's expression darkened, and his fingers curled slowly against the table. "That doesn't sound like chivalry. That sounds like conquest with better manners."
"An excellent summary," Salazar said, giving him a brief look of approval before returning to the book. "The disagreement eventually led to revolt within the Order itself, and after what appears to have been a rather bitter internal conflict, one side prevailed, thankfully the better half, if this account is to be trusted. Those who sought to turn the Order into a hidden instrument of control were expelled, their names struck from official memory, their emblems removed, and their claim to the Seven severed entirely."
Godric watched as Salazar turned to the next page, where the writing grew shorter, thinner, and far more frustratingly vague.
"But that is not where the story ends," Salazar continued as his finger came to rest beneath a single line. "Apparently, after their exile, the expelled knights formed another order in the shadows. Unfortunately for us, this account preserves almost nothing of their history or deeds after that point." His eyes narrowed slightly. "All it gives us is a name."
"What is it?" Godric asked, his tone lowering as though the answer had already begun to weigh on the air between them.
Salazar remained silent for a moment, his eyes fixed on the line beneath his finger, and when he finally spoke, the name left him with a careful precision that made it sound less like a forgotten order and more like something that had been waiting patiently in the dark for someone to remember it.
"The Rosencruetz Orden," he said, before glancing up at Godric. "More precisely, the Order of the Roses."
Godric's expression slackened at first, the unfamiliar name striking him with a strange and immediate unease, before his features hardened into something more focused. Salazar seemed to recognize the shift, and rather than tease him for it, he continued with the same quiet seriousness. "I have searched this library from top to bottom, and even with Miss Carnahan's assistance, I could not find a single tome, parchment, scroll, archived lecture, marginal note, or half-legible scrawl on the back of some forgotten textbook that told me anything meaningful about them."
He paused. "It is almost as though everything they were, everything they became, and everything they might have done after their exile faded into the shadows along with their founders."
Godric's gaze dropped to the page, where the name sat in ink that seemed far too small for the unease it had stirred in him. "Do you think..." he began, then paused as the thought took shape in a way he did not particularly like. "Do you think they had something to do with the fall of the Seven? Maybe they're still out there somewhere, doing exactly what they were created to do, pulling strings from the dark while everyone else keeps pretending the world is only as simple as kings, councils, and banners."
Salazar's gaze narrowed in contemplation, and for a moment he looked past Godric rather than at him, as if measuring the theory against every recent disaster that had shaken Avalon. "Perhaps, perhaps not," he said at last. "At present, all we have is speculation, and speculation, while entertaining, has an unfortunate habit of dressing itself as truth when left unsupervised."
He rested one hand against the open tome, his expression thoughtful but unconvinced. "If I were forced to wager, however, I would place my Platas on a firm no. Given the state of the Councils, the Three Bodies, the Siege, and the former madman who once sat at the helm of the Clock Tower, I find it difficult to believe that a hidden cabal of knights allegedly guiding Avalon's leadership from behind the curtain would have allowed the world to descend into such abhorrent chaos."
Godric gave a quiet chuckle, though his eyes remained on the page. "Yeah, I guess you've got a point," he said, rubbing the back of his neck as the weight of the idea refused to leave him entirely. "Still, I can't shake the feeling that maybe, just maybe, they're still out there somewhere, buried deep enough that nobody knows where to look, but close enough that the moment something breaks, we'll realize they were never gone at all."
Salazar watched him for a moment, his expression unreadable beneath the amber crystal light, before his gaze returned to the old name written on the page. "A deeply unsettling thought, dear friend," he said softly, "and therefore, knowing our lives, one that is probably worth remembering."
Salazar rose from his chair with the languid grace of someone who believed even leaving a table ought to be done with a certain theatrical dignity, the legs scraping softly across the polished marble floor as he straightened and stretched his arms behind his back. "Well," he said, rolling one shoulder, "this has truly been a most enlightening afternoon, but I believe I could use a well-deserved nap, since too much reading, I daresay, is rather dreadful for one's posture."
Godric blinked, then pressed his lips together as a laugh threatened to escape him. "Did you just say Rowena has bad posture?"
"I said nothing of the sort, nor did I imply it, Gryffindor," Salazar replied, giving him an offended look that would have been more convincing had amusement not lingered faintly in his eyes. "That being said, I would not be entirely surprised if, in her later years, she finds herself regretting her lifelong devotion to the written word and the hunched position in which she so often chooses to worship it."
Godric's grin widened despite himself.
Salazar smirked and tilted his head to one side until his neck gave an audible crack, after which he gathered himself with the satisfied air of a man who had made both a point and an exit in advance. "As such, I shall leave the book to you, so that your abject curiosity may be satisfied in my absence." His gaze settled more directly on Godric, the teasing sharpness in it giving way to something more thoughtful. "Who knows? Perhaps you may uncover something I lacked the patience, endurance, or spinal tolerance to find. Until then, dear friend..."
He offered a graceful bow, one hand sweeping lightly before him. "Good day."
"Be seeing you, Salazar," Godric said, watching as his friend turned neatly on his heel and made his way toward the entrance, his robes shifting behind him as he disappeared between the rows of shelves and left Godric alone in the quiet corner of the library.
For a while, Godric remained seated without moving, his attention drifting back to the tome before him as the silence of the library settled around the abandoned desk like a heavy cloak. Eventually, he flipped the pages back to the illustration of Arslan the Red, and the longer he stared at the lion-armored knight rendered in faded ink and old pigment, the more unsettled he became.
The thought that his uncle might truly be some legendary knight from Avalon should have felt absurd, the sort of wishful nonsense that belonged in children's stories rather than serious consideration, yet the possibility refused to leave him alone. The more Godric turned it over in his mind, the more certain details began rising from memory with uncomfortable clarity, each one small on its own, but far harder to dismiss when placed beside the others.
He remembered the day of the dragon in the cabbage patch, when Headmaster Blaise first arrived in Dark's Hollow, and although the moment had been overshadowed by everything that followed, Godric could still recall the brief, subtle recognition that seemed to pass between Blaise and Gareth. At the time, he had thought little of it, or perhaps he had chosen not to think too much about it, because his world had already been strange enough without adding another mystery to the pile.
Even talk of Avalon had not shaken his uncle the way it should have, though Godric had always explained that away by reminding himself that the Gryffindors were a wizarding family, and that Gareth must have known more about the hidden world than he had ever let on.
Now, with Arslan's image staring back at him from the page, that explanation felt far too neat.
Godric tapped his fingers lightly against the aged parchment, his crimson gaze hardening as the shape of the problem became clearer. He knew, without a doubt, that he would not get a straight answer from his uncle if he simply asked. Gareth would dodge, laugh, deflect, or bury whatever truth existed beneath half-answers, weak humor, and some frustrating remark about how old men were allowed to keep a few stories for themselves. There was no mention of Arslan's true name in the text, but if the man had truly been known across the Twelve Kingdoms, then surely someone in Avalon, perhaps even someone in Caerleon, might know who he had been before the world started calling him the Red.
Until then, Godric could only speculate.
He let out a quiet breath, shrugged to himself, and turned another page as his eyes began tracing the text once more, while all around him the Excalibur Library carried on in its ancient silence, indifferent to the questions gathering in his mind and patient enough to wait for him to find the answers buried somewhere among its shelves.
****
The evening sun had begun to sink over the city of Caerleon, turning daylight slowly into dusk as the last golden rays descended toward the horizon and the days continued to shorten with the steady advance of the season. Even so, Castle Excalibur remained alive with its usual rhythm, its corridors, courtyards, staircases, and common spaces filled with students moving between homework, studies, sanctioned extracurricular activities, and the less official gatherings whispered about among the student body.
Clan activity still ran rampant across the city and beyond its walls, yet within the castle itself, members of the Congregation had grown increasingly wary of the Prefects and their newly appointed Heads, who had been strangely silent in the weeks following their announcement. Some speculated that the quiet was due to several Heads who had yet to arrive at Excalibur for one reason or another, while others argued that the Disciplinary Committee was still being organized behind closed doors, gathering strength, authority, and resentment before it finally decided to make its presence known.
Nevertheless, the Prefects themselves had more or less been excommunicated by the wider student body, with anyone wearing a Prefect badge finding themselves quietly ostracized by the same students they were now meant to oversee. It was not uncommon to see groups of Prefects from all five houses gathered together in the corner of the Great Hall, speaking only among themselves because no one else wanted to be seen associating with them.
Even Helga could feel the shift in energy pulsing through the castle, an unease threaded beneath the daily noise, and the more she listened, the more the chatter among the Prefects seemed to carry a resentful edge that deepened with every passing day. Salazar had once told her that when people were granted authority without the respect they believed should come with it, they often found ways to abuse that authority until fear stood in for the reverence they failed to earn, and although Helga did not like admitting it, some part of her suspected he was right.
The High Table had issued a decree to members of the Congregation, instructing them to refrain from engaging with the Prefects or the framework of the Disciplinary Committee for the time being, and most importantly, not to escalate matters while the situation remained uncertain. That had not been an easy order for everyone to accept, especially not for Clans like the Hounds of Cú, who were already thirsting for a reason to turn the growing tension into open war within the student body.
For Helga and the Marauders, it all felt like a grim reflection of the turmoil they had recently survived, another conflict gathering around them without their consent, threatening to drag them back into violence, politics, and consequences none of them had asked for and none of them deserved.
Helga made her way through the dim courtyard behind the castle, where the paths branched toward the lake on one side and the distant Orangery on the other. Terra students who passed her smiled and waved with the easy warmth she was usually quick to return, only to falter in confusion when she barely seemed to notice them. Her amber eyes remained fixed on the cobblestone path ahead, and her expression, normally so bright with mischief, appetite, or affection, had tightened into something solemn.
Since the feast and the Headmaster's announcement, a trembling unease had lodged itself somewhere deep inside her, not loud enough to be named outright, but persistent enough to haunt the back of her mind like the shadow of some approaching doom. She could still smile and laugh when she was with her friends, could still force herself into the familiar shape of Helga Hufflepuff when the moment required it, but whenever she was alone, the warmth seemed to drain from her, leaving behind a heaviness she did not know how to explain.
The new restrictions did not truly matter to her, at least not in the way they seemed to matter to others. Certainly, it would become much harder to pull off the pranks she loved so much with more Prefects stalking the castle grounds and watching for even the smallest excuse to exert their authority, but that was not the feeling twisting in her chest. This was not irritation, rebellion, or boredom. It was something quieter and worse, a restless anxiety that seemed to arrive without cause and deepen without warning, making her feel as though something terrible was waiting just beyond the edge of her sight.
Even her afternoon out with Rowena and Jeanne had done little to ease it. At the Pixie Pantry, the sweets and sugar that normally would have transformed her into a dangerously cheerful creature of appetite and impulse had barely tempted her, and even the cakes at her favorite café had failed to stir the usual joy.
Both Rowena and Jeanne had looked genuinely mortified when Helga settled for only one slice of tiramisu rather than ordering half the selection behind the glass display, and Rowena, with all the seriousness of someone witnessing a medical emergency, had suggested that she pay a visit to Doctor Adani before whatever illness had seized her progressed beyond treatment. Helga had laughed it off at the time, but the truth was that she knew better.
She was not sick.
It was anxiety, worry, and that strange trembling in her chest that made her feel afraid for something, or perhaps someone, even though she could not say who or what had placed such fear inside her. Helga paused in the courtyard as heat crept into her cheeks, and she shook her head sharply, frustrated with herself for letting her thoughts wander into places they had no right to go.
"Bacchus' Butterbeer, snap out of it," she muttered, smacking the side of her head with the heel of her palm as if she could physically knock sense back into herself. "What's wrong with you, Hufflepuff? Now you've got your friends worried sick because you couldn't even finish dessert like a normal person."
She let out a breath and glanced toward the darkening path ahead, the wind carrying the scent of fallen leaves, damp grass, and distant lake water across the courtyard. "Maybe I should just turn in early tonight," she murmured, though even as she said it, she knew sleep would not come easily, not while that nameless dread continued to sit beneath her ribs like a warning she had not yet learned how to understand.
Then Helga paused, growing still the moment she caught sight of a familiar figure seated upon the bench before the brick planters, where rose bushes heavy with brilliant scarlet petals seemed to glow beneath the fading evening light. A breeze from the lake rustled through his auburn hair and carried with it the scent of damp earth, fallen leaves, and the soft sweetness of roses, while Lucian Graymark, newly appointed Chief Prefect of Excalibur, sat dressed in his Terra uniform with his yellow-and-brown scarf wrapped neatly around his neck.
His attention remained fixed upon the parchment spread over his lap, and every so often he would stop writing, tap the feathered end of his quill thoughtfully against his chin, and then return to his work with the grave concentration of a man drafting legislation rather than whatever tedious document had managed to trap him on a courtyard bench at dusk.
Just like that, the heaviness in Helga's chest loosened, and a mischievous grin carved itself across her face as she crept behind him on careful feet, knowing full well that when Lucian sank this deeply into his thoughts, the rest of the world might as well have packed its bags and left him behind. He was mid-sentence when she drew close, the quill scratching steadily against the parchment as black ink bled into the fibers, and then Helga leaned beside his ear with all the restraint of a festival cannon.
"Heya, Lucian!"
Lucian screamed with such startling force that even the nearest rose bush seemed to tremble, his body jerking upright as the quill tore viciously across the parchment and left behind a long, blotted scar of black ink. For one horrified moment, he stared down at the ruined page as if Helga had personally murdered his firstborn child, and then his head snapped toward her with an expression twisted between outrage, disbelief, and the long-suffering fury of a man who had known peace for exactly three hours and watched it die in a single breath.
"Hufflepuff!" he snarled, clutching the ruined parchment like evidence in a trial. "Once again, do you possess no sense whatsoever of time, place, or basic human mercy?!"
Helga burst into laughter so hard that she had to brace one hand against the back of the bench, wiping at the corner of her eye as Lucian continued glaring at her with the wounded dignity of a scholar whose life's work had been vandalized by a cheerful natural disaster. "Oh, you should've seen your face," she said between laughs. "I swear, I thought you were gonna jump right out of your robes."
Lucian groaned audibly, the sound dragging out of him as he rolled up the destroyed parchment with as much restraint as he could manage and snapped his inkwell shut before further tragedy could occur. "There goes all of my hard work," he muttered, removing his glasses so he could pinch the bridge of his nose with the exhausted despair of someone appealing directly to the heavens. "By the Gods, why do they insist on tormenting me so, and why, in their infinite cruelty, did they give that torment your face?"
Helga slipped around the bench and took a seat beside him as though she had been cordially invited, while Lucian raised one eyebrow, his annoyance outweighing his confusion as he shifted away until he occupied the farthest possible edge of the bench without physically falling off it. Helga tilted her head at him, her grin softening into amused bewilderment. "You do know I'm not contagious, right?"
"Do not even attempt that tone with me, Hufflepuff," Lucian said, giving her a scowl sharpened by memory. "The last time you stood within arm's reach of me, you doused me with a generous helping of Bulbadox Powder, after which I spent the next fortnight in the hospital wing resisting the rather powerful urge to scratch my own face off."
Helga blinked as the memory returned, and then she laughed again, though this time with a guilty little wince tucked somewhere beneath the amusement. "Oh, yeah, that explains why we didn't see you for so long. I thought you were just hiding from everyone because you finally realized being mysterious makes people like you more."
"It was not funny!" Lucian snapped, though the slight flush rising in his cheeks weakened the severity of the declaration. "I nearly missed my exams, and I passed by the skin of my teeth because I could not stop scratching long enough to remember how much Fanwart was required in a Hardening Potion!"
"Oh, come on, Lucian," Helga said, swaying lightly where she sat as the last of her laughter faded into something warmer. "We both know you're way too smart for that. You could probably brew a Hardening Potion in your sleep and still have enough time to correct the professor's handwriting."
Lucian paused, clearly caught between irritation and the undeniable satisfaction of being complimented, and his cheeks flushed more noticeably as he spluttered for a dignified response that did not arrive quickly enough. He pushed his glasses back into place and cleared his throat with as much composure as he could gather. "Well," he said, straightening his scarf as though restoring order to himself by degrees, "I did pass, so I suppose one may say there was no permanent harm done."
Helga's grin widened, bright and victorious.
"There you go," she said. "As Pop-Pop Hufflepuff once said, no harm, no foul."
Lucian gave her a long, deeply unimpressed look. "That expression becomes significantly less charming when spoken by the person who caused the harm."
He paused. The irritation fading as his expression turned more solemn. "Then again… I suppose it's refreshing. I haven't had a decent conversation out side of the Prefects since." He sighed. "Well, you know."
Helga's expression dimmed as well, the teasing warmth from moments before settling into something far more thoughtful as she looked toward the courtyard path and then back to him. "You mind if I ask you something?"
Lucian glanced at her with one eyebrow raised, and although he gave no verbal permission, Helga took the fact that he had not immediately refused as invitation enough.
"Why, though?" she asked, leaning forward slightly with her hands resting against the edge of the bench. "The Congregation has always been part of Excalibur, and I know it's pretty much an open secret, but for the longest time, they've just been... well, there. So long as they weren't breaking any actual laws, the school mostly left them alone." She met his eyes, her earlier playfulness fading beneath genuine confusion. "So why here, and why now?"
Lucian's expression went strangely still before he exhaled sharply, as though the question had struck somewhere between annoyance and exhaustion. "I suppose you would not entirely understand, given that you are now a member of said organization," he replied. "You and your friends, I should say. I will admit, I once admired Miss Ravenclaw and her family's steadfast refusal to align themselves with the Congregation or take their place at the Table, a decades-long tradition she has now rather irreparably broken, though that is a grievance for another day."
Helga said nothing, though her eyes remained fixed on him.
"In all honesty, yes, they have always been, as you so unpretentiously put it, there," Lucian continued, gesturing lightly with one hand as though trying to organize the history into something less frustrating than it was. "From headmasters past, centuries before Blaise ever ascended to the chair, the Congregation has existed within Excalibur's walls, established by the Five Founders themselves and woven into the very foundation of this school. Generations have watched it evolve from a gathering of belligerent hooligans into a structured and governed body that rules portions of student life from the shadows, and therein lies the problem."
He paused, his gaze moving across the dim courtyard where the last of the evening light clung to stone, roses, and the distant windows of the castle.
"If the Congregation had remained in the shadows, perhaps none of us would be having this conversation," Lucian said at last, his tone quieter but no less firm. "But the Siege did more than give them an opportunity to step into the light. It gave them permission, however unofficial, to exist openly among the civil and respectable institutions of this academy, of this world, and once something like that is allowed to stand without challenge, it becomes frightfully difficult to force it back into the dark."
Helga's brow furrowed, but she let him continue.
"An organization that does not answer to the rules, laws, and regulations of this school, let alone those that govern the realm itself, cannot and must not be allowed to thrive simply because it has tradition on its side," Lucian said, his expression hardening as the conviction beneath his words became impossible to miss. "And more than that, it cannot be allowed to keep drawing students into its orbit, teaching them that loyalty to a table, a clan, or a shadow court matters more than accountability, order, or the safety of those who have no interest in playing such games."
"Lucian, I'm not talking about what's right or wrong," Helga said, her words losing the last trace of playfulness as she turned toward him fully. "I'm not even talking about what should or shouldn't exist. I'm talking about you, the Prefects, and Headmaster Blaise picking a fight with the Congregation, with the High Table, knowing exactly who they are, what they stand for, and what they're capable of."
Her gaze hardened at the last words, though only for a moment, because almost immediately the anger in her face softened into something more worried than confrontational. "Pop-Pop Hufflepuff once told me that it doesn't matter how strong your sense of justice is," she continued. "You don't go kicking a hornet's nest without thinking about how badly you might get stung, and worse than that, you sure as hell don't do it when everyone standing near you might get stung too."
Lucian stared at her for a moment, his expression unreadable beneath the dimming evening light, before he scoffed with open disbelief. "Honestly, this from you?"
Helga blinked.
"How rich," Lucian said, his expression tightening as the restraint in him began to crack. "This cautionary wisdom comes from the girl who stood against the Iron Hands, against Norsefire, against men and monsters far more dangerous than any Prefect wearing a badge in these corridors. You fought when it mattered, Helga, and unless I am mistaken, you did not pause to hold a committee meeting over consequence, cost, or collateral discomfort."
He pointed toward her. "Yet now, when I choose to stand against something I believe to be rotten, you intend to talk me down."
Helga's amber eyes widened as she rose halfway from the bench, startled by how quickly he had twisted her meaning. "That's not what I meant."
"Then, pray tell, what exactly did you mean?" Lucian asked, standing his ground as his tone hardened. "Or is the Congregation more deserving of patience now that you have pledged yourself to it?"
"Dammit, Lucian!" Helga shot to her feet, the words bursting from her before she could temper them. "This has nothing to do with me being a member, and you know it."
"Do I?"
"Yes, you do," she snapped, pointing at him as her frustration finally broke through the worry she had been trying to keep in place. "This has everything to do with you being too stubborn, too naïve, too stupid or maybe combination of all three, to realize that you're sitting here playing chess while they're playing checkers."
Lucian's expression went slack for a moment, not because the insult wounded him, but because the absurdity of it seemed to catch him entirely off guard. "I beg your pardon?"
"You heard me," Helga said, breathing harder now as she stepped closer. "You're walking straight into a fight you're not ready for because you genuinely think the Congregation and the High Table are going to treat this like some schoolyard throwdown where everyone yells, throws a few punches, and walks away with bruises and detention. But that's not what this is."
Lucian's jaw tightened, though he did not interrupt.
"This is bigger than you, bigger than me, and if things keep moving the way they are, it's going to get as big as Avalon itself," Helga continued. "And you know it. You have to know it. With this much power, history, blood, and pride on the line, they're not going to keep this between students just because everyone involved happens to wear a uniform."
The last light of the sun touched the edge of Lucian's glasses, hiding his eyes for a moment behind a brief flash of gold.
"And those Prefects of yours," Helga said, her expression darkening as she looked toward the castle, where distant windows had begun to glow against the coming night, "they're going to realize real hard and real fast that, just like you, they're in way over their heads, a not even Headmaster Blaise will be enough to pull them out of the hole you're digging for yourselves."
Lucian remained silent long enough that the breeze through the roses became louder than either of them, and when his expression hardened again, it did so with the cold finality of someone shutting a door from the inside. He rose to his feet, gathering every inch of his composure around him like armor.
"Before either of us says or does something we may both regret, Miss Hufflepuff, I suggest we end this conversation."
"Lucian—"
"No," he said, pushing his glasses up the bridge of his nose with a measured hand. "I have heard quite enough. I shall leave you to contemplate precisely where your allegiances lie, because when the Disciplinary Committee is at full strength, we shall see who is truly in over their head."
He took up his ruined parchment, inkwell, quill, books, and satchel with none of his earlier care, shoving everything hastily inside before slinging the bag over his shoulder. For a brief moment, it seemed as though he might say something else, something less polished and more honest, but whatever it was never made it past the hard line of his mouth.
"Good evening, Miss Hufflepuff," he said.
Then he walked past her, his steps clipped against the cobblestone path as Helga followed him with her eyes, watching him disappear into the deepening blue of the courtyard just as the last of the evening light slipped beneath the horizon. Only when he was gone did she draw in a slow breath, her shoulders sagging as the anger drained from her and left behind the same nameless dread that had followed her all evening.
She sank back onto the bench, staring at the ground where his shadow had been only moments before, and the weight of their conversation settled over her heavier than before, because she had come there afraid of something she could not name, and now, with the roses rustling softly beside her and the castle lights burning in the distance, she feared she had finally begun to understand it.