Work Text:
Perignon, like most mages, is as curious as a cat.
So when the Chancellor of Ban Ard and the Vice-Chancellor and the Dean and a round dozen of the senior teachers portal out of the main courtyard in battle robes, leaving only about a dozen teachers behind to ride herd on the students, of course Perignon goes and gets the immense piece of polished rock-crystal that he has spent literal years bespelling into a perfect scrying surface, and sets it up in the main hall, and the entire remaining population of the school gathers around to see what's going on.
Perignon brushes his fingers against the runes carved into the dwarf-forged silver ring which holds the scrying crystal, activating the spells held within, and with a crackle of Chaos the scrying crystal first goes pure white and then clears to show an image of somewhere far away, as if looking down on the scene from the height of a well-grown oak.
For a moment, Perignon is quite confused. He instructed the scrying crystal to show him what the Chancellor and Vice-Chancellor and the Dean were doing, and this is a view of a convoy of people in armor. Witchers in armor, he realizes after a moment, each with the characteristic pair of swords, and yes, that's the Warlord himself, easily identifiable by the white hair. The whole convoy is stopped for some reason, and the Warlord is looking up at a cluster of people on a little knoll, and Perignon doesn't have time to figure out what exactly is going on before the crystal shows a series of portals opening all around the stopped convoy, disgorging mages and monsters in astonishing profusion.
"Is that the Chancellor?" he hears someone ask incredulously.
"Look at that thing's claws!"
"Fuck, is the Chancellor aiming to be the new Warlord?"
"Ooh, it's dripping venom!"
Perignon scowls around at the commotion and taps a rune to bring the scrying crystal's view lower so he can see what in the name of every god is going on -
And the Witchers, moving in astonishing unison, draw little round devices from their belts and throw them at the mages, and the devices explode into black dust, and the dust blows over the whole convoy as the battle is joined. A handful of the dust seems to blow directly into the scrying crystal, and the whole image goes suddenly and completely black.
Perignon stumbles back with a yelp of shock. It's never done that before! It shouldn't do that!
"What was that?"
"Dimeritium, it must be -"
"Who the hell has that much dimeritium on hand?"
"- must have planned it, must have known this was coming -"
"- a spy, but who?"
"Silence!" Jochen Brandt bellows, and the frantic babbling stills. He turns to Perignon. "Can your device give us any more information?"
Brandt always was one of the most sensible of their number. Perignon nods shakily and steps back up to his scrying crystal. This time, knowing the dimeritium will block the sight of whatever may be happening at the convoy, he touches the runes to show what will come. "Who will win that battle? What is the fate of Ban Ard to be?" he asks aloud.
The blackness does not fade, but a silver circle appears, growing steadily larger and brighter, growing until it fills the entire scrying crystal with the image of a snarling silver wolf's head. The Warlord's sigil. The Warlord's triumph.
The silver circle shimmers and fades, and in its place there is a pair of scales, perfectly level. On one side lies a bloody sword, still dripping; on the other, the blooming branch of some sort of tree.
The image stills, and does not fade.
"Alright," Brandt says after a long moment of silence. "The first part of that is clear enough - the Warlord's going to win. And then I suppose he'll be choosing between the sword - and I can guess what that means - and those flowers. Any thoughts on the flowers, lads?"
There's some confused murmuring. Perignon frowns at the scrying crystal, trying to remember lessons from before his conduit moment. "I think," he says slowly, "those are plum blossoms."
"Great, we're going to be made into jam," someone mutters.
Perignon turns and points to Young Cammle, who intends to be a court mage. "You, apprentice! What do plum blossoms symbolize?"
Young Cammle startles, but recovers well. "Plum blossoms symbolize fidelity or the keeping of promises, master."
"The keeping of promises. But which promise?"
Brandt frowns. "Has the Warlord ever made a promise to Ban Ard?"
"Has Ban Ard ever made a promise to the Warlord?"
"There'd be a record somewhere if we had -"
"- the Chancellor's office, surely -"
"- broken now, if the Chancellor attacked the Warlord -"
"Enough!" Brandt shouts, and the din dies down again. "Does anyone know of any promises at all between the Warlord and Ban Ard?"
Perignon shakes his head; when he glances around, all the other teachers are also indicating they know nothing, and of course the students just look baffled.
Of course, all the teachers who might have been expected to know anything were among those who went with the Chancellor, which probably means they're dead, and all their knowledge with them.
"Then either it's a promise we know nothing about, or it's a new promise entirely," Brandt says. "If it's a new one, dithering won't help; if it's an old promise, then it's in the library or the Chancellor's sealed records." He glances at Perignon. "Which of the apprentices can be trusted to help us search the sealed records?"
Perignon looks over the boys. "Young Cammle, Holgersson, and Wythcliff," he decides; the three young men perk up eagerly. "Master Eberhartt, if you will oversee the ransacking of the library -"
Eberhartt of Rivia nods firmly and puts a hand on the shoulder of a first-year apprentice who looks ready to go tearing off without any instructions at all. "I'll keep them leashed," he promises wryly.
"Right," Brandt says. "Master Talbot, you and Gavh'e stay here to watch that crystal, and keep the youngest boys with you - if anything changes, send a runner up to Master Perignon."
Nikodemus Talbot nods; his journeyman, Julius ban Gavh'e, gives a little salute. Perignon doesn't like leaving his crystal under anyone else's control, but Talbot is interested in plants, not stones or scrying, so he's unlikely to do anything to the crystal. Which makes him a very good choice, actually. Brandt is demonstrating a remarkable level of sense. If he makes a play for the Chancellorship, Perignon will have to seriously consider backing him.
Assuming they all survive that long.
Almost as soon as the thought crosses Perignon's mind, someone hammers on the great doors, a resounding boom, boom, boom like the tromping of some giant. Everyone jumps; someone yelps, "But the wards!"
"Silence!" Brandt bellows; it doesn't work this time, mostly because even as he shouts, the doors burst open, slamming back against the stone walls, to reveal framed in the doorway more than a dozen Witchers, their eyes gleaming and naked swords in their hands, and a tall man in mage's robes standing front and center.
Perignon and Brandt and Talbot and Eberhartt all step forward, spreading their arms to shield the little horde of boys, but - Perignon is a scrying mage, Brandt is almost purely focused on research, Talbot spends all his time with plants, and Eberhartt is a healer. What can they do against Witchers? None of the other teachers left behind are any better at war-spells; Perignon's not even sure how many of them can muster a shield or a portal. Such things simply never come up. And most of the students aren't any better suited to battle.
Perignon had assumed Ban Ard's sturdy wards would keep the Witchers at bay at least until the mages could figure out what was going on, but with them already past the wards -
They're all going to die. He doesn't want to die. He has so much left to do!
"My name," says the tall man in mage's robes, voice cool and precise, "is Istredd, and I bear with me the words and will of the White Wolf, Warlord of the North, against whom the Brotherhood of Sorcerers and the leadership of Ban Ard have risen in violent rebellion. Here with me is Lord Treyse, head of the School of the Cat, in whom the White Wolf reposes every trust, and at whose judgment your fates now all depend. Whoso of Ban Ard or the Brotherhood that desires to escape the White Wolf's wrath, let him surrender now to the White Wolf's justice."
Perignon swallows hard. Those swords look very sharp. He can imagine quite clearly what justice the Warlord of the North means to enact on the fellows of those sorcerers who just dared to attack him. Surrendering is obviously folly. But Perignon doesn't know any battle spells and the chances of outrunning a Witcher are scant at best and there are the boys -
Eberhartt steps forward and sinks with surprising grace to his knees. "Ban Ard surrenders to the Warlord's justice," he says clearly. "We ask only that the children be spared his wrath."
"Well said," one of the Witchers rumbles, and yellow eyes scan over the rest of the remaining faculty. "Yet I see only one mage on his knees. Do you speak for all Ban Ard?"
Brandt takes an audibly shaky breath and gestures to the other faculty. "Better a swift death than a slow one," he says harshly, and kneels down next to Eberhartt. Perignon shoots a desperate glance at the nearest side door - far too far for him to reach even if he dared attempt to flee - and joins his fellows with a sob. Slowly, Talbot and most of the other teachers join them, some of them trembling, a few so pale that Perignon suspects they're likely to faint at the slightest provocation.
And fucking Grevius, the damned idiot, screeches a curse in a high thin voice shaking with terror and casts something at the Witchers; Perignon isn't even sure what it is, only that it's a poisonous sort of orange. Grevius isn't a battle mage any more than Perignon is; he works with birds, for the gods' sake!
One of the Witchers raises a hand, and a golden shield appears in front of them; the orange spell shatters against it. And then one of the other Witchers leaps, further and swifter than Perignon can really believe even as he sees it, and knocks Grevius to the floor, pinning him down with a foot on his chest and a swordpoint at his throat.
"That's quite enough of that," the Witcher snarls.
But to Perignon's astonishment, the sword does not draw blood. Grevius is stunned, yes, and the crack as his head hit the floor sounded painful, but he's not dead.
The Witcher leans down, something glinting in his hand; Grevius makes a horrible choking sound, but when the Witcher steps back, Grevius isn't dead; instead, there's a thin chain wound around his throat, not so tight as to actually harm him. Perignon stares as Grevius claws at the chain. What -
"Dimeritium," someone breathes in horror.
Oh gods.
The Witcher who knocked Grevius down raises an eyebrow at all of them. "Anyone else want to be an idiot?"
Perignon is not the only one who shakes his head frantically. He would very nearly rather be slain on the spot than have a dimeritium chain put around his neck. To have his Chaos sealed away would be a fate worse than death.
"Good," the Witcher says, and puts his sword back in its scabbard, which is something of a relief, if a very small one.
"So," Istredd says, drawing all eyes. "It has been a while since I studied here; I do not know most of you, nor do you know me. But I was trained here, and my master was Stregobor, who dared to demand that the White Wolf give him a girl for his experiments, and died for his breach of the Wolflaw. That was the Brotherhood's first offense. The second was the testimony of the mage Rience, who was captured in Hagge as an agent of Nilfgaard, yet meant to betray both Nilfgaard and the Wolflands, overthrowing the Emperor and the White Wolf both, to place the Brotherhood's chosen puppets in power. And third -"
He turns and gestures, and one of the biggest Witchers unlimbers a sack he's been carrying over one enormous shoulder and empties its contents onto the floor. Perignon claps a hand over his mouth, feeling his gorge rise; behind him, several of the younger students scream, and he can hear someone with slightly less self-control vomiting. The sack held heads.
Very familiar heads.
Chancellor Gerhart. Vice-Chancellor Mardin. Dean Marcellus. Nearly all of the teachers who accompanied them to battle, and half a dozen more, all of whom Perignon recognizes from their frequent visits for Brotherhood meetings. And that supercilious vulture Vilgefortz, the head of the Brotherhood himself.
"These men ambushed the White Wolf's Progress," Istredd says calmly, as if there aren't severed heads lying in a heap at his feet. "They attempted to kidnap the White Wolf's daughter and slay the White Wolf and his court." He raises an eyebrow, and his voice goes very dry. "Which does not seem to be a surprise to any of you."
"Of course it's not a surprise!" a voice cries from behind Perignon, and he slews around to see Journeyman Othall looking shocked and horrified. "They helped! They planned it!" He points to Perignon's scrying crystal on the table. "Master Perignon used that to show the Chancellor exactly where to go!"
Perignon can feel the blood drain from his face. Oh gods. Oh gods, he's going to die. He's going to die right here and Othall who he has refused to train four times because the boy is far too greedy for swift power instead of slow and steady study is going to take Perignon's crystal for his own and ruin Perignon's life's work -
The Witcher who chained Gavius, a lean dark-haired man with a very sharp look to him who Perignon thinks is the Lord Treyse in whose hands their fates all lie, tilts his head and saunters forward through the crowd of students, who give way in front of him like seafoam melting away. He stops in front of Othall and looks him up and down.
"Clever," he drawls, with a rather nasty smirk. "But not quite clever enough, I think. Hasn't anyone ever told you that Witchers can smell lies?"
Othall goes dead white. The Witcher turns and looks over the kneeling teachers. "So, which of you is Perignon?"
Perignon rises shakily to his feet. "I am, lord."
"Huh." The Witcher looks him over, yellow eyes narrowed speculatively. "Did you help those fuckers plan to ambush the Wolf?"
"No, lord," Perignon says, deeply grateful that the words are perfect truth. "I knew nothing of the plot until today; I scried to see what they were doing, because it was unusual for the entire senior faculty to leave together, and arrayed for battle."
"Truth," the Witcher says mildly. He glances over at the scrying crystal. "Interesting picture."
Perignon swallows. "I asked to know the future of Ban Ard," he says, knowing his voice is shaking and wishing that any of the other teachers were standing in his shoes - Brandt, who can keep his composure under any pressure, or sturdy Eberhartt, or even hot-tempered Javad who at least wouldn't be as utterly terrified. "We had begun to speculate that our survival would depend upon a promise, but what promise we do not know."
"Huh," the Witcher says, and gives the scrying crystal another very interested look. "That's some impressive spellwork."
"So it is," Istredd agrees, and Perignon sways as another wave of terror washes through him. They're going to take it, they're going to take his life's work away -
"If all goes well, I suspect Yennefer will want to consult with you about it," Istredd adds mildly. "Your crystal is correct, as it happens. We are here to offer Ban Ard's mages a choice."
Perignon swallows hard. "What choice?"
The dark-haired Witcher - Lord Treyse - smiles thinly. "So it turns out that a lot of mages have been thinking the Wolflaw doesn't apply to them," he says. "That having Chaos makes 'em too special to care about other people, I suppose. The Wolf doesn't much care for that mindset. So here's the choice." He turns in a slow circle, meeting every mage's eyes.
"If you want to live in the Wolflands, you'll make an oath," he says, clear and cool and calm. "You'll swear upon your Chaos never henceforth to use your powers to prey upon, enslave, or torment any person, of any race, on penalty of death. If you keep that oath, well and good; you'll be a mage of the Wolflands, subject to the Wolflaw, and so long as you don't fuck up, the Wolf's sword will guard you same as everyone." He smiles, thin and mirthless. "And if you do not keep that oath, then you'll be a Witcher's rightful prey."
"What if we don't swear?" Holgersson asks.
The Witcher shrugs. "You can leave the Wolflands, I suppose. Though Nilfgaard's just as likely to clap you in chains and send you back, and from what I know of Zerrikania, I don't think you'll find a warm welcome there either."
Perignon glances over at Brandt, who is frowning in thought; after a moment Brandt raises his hand like a student in a lecture, and the Witcher nods to him. "You don't want us to swear loyalty to the Warlord?" he asks warily.
The Witcher shrugs. "No. You can hate his guts if you want to. Acting against him is treason, but that's a different problem. We can handle that sort of shit if we must. The oath's to protect the common people of the Wolflands, who don't have any fucking defenses against Chaos."
Perignon tries to make that make sense. Who ever heard of an emperor who cared more about the peasantry than about treason against his own imperial self?
"So just the oath?" he asks hesitantly. "That's all we have to do?"
The Witcher shrugs. "That's all most mages need to do. You lot, we'll need to know if you were involved in that fucking mess." He jerks a thumb at the pile of heads. "But if you weren't, then yeah. Just the oath."
Perignon knows some of the graduates of Ban Ard do use their powers cruelly. Several of the heads lying on the floor belong to the mages he warns his apprentices to avoid. But no king has ever dared take such mages to task, and they tended to be powerful enough that opposing them would be pure folly, and -
And now the Warlord has decided he is going to put a stop to it, apparently.
But - Perignon doesn't use his powers to do anything vicious. The oath the Witchers want won't change a single thing about his life. It doesn't even keep him from defending himself, if he ever learns any war spells. He just won't be able to torture anyone, which…he wouldn't do anyhow.
"I will swear," he says.
The Witcher tilts his head and looks Perignon over thoughtfully. "Go on, then."
Perignon takes a deep breath and pulls upon his Chaos. "I, Perignon of Ban Ard, swear upon my Chaos that I shall never use my powers to prey upon, enslave, or torment any person, of any race, on penalty of death." He feels the oath settle into his Chaos, firm and solid but not painful.
"Fairly said," the Witcher says, with a sharp nod. "Anyone else?"
Brandt stands up, squaring his shoulders, and Eberhartt and Talbot behind him, and then all the teachers except the still-furious Grevius are forming a neat line, ushering the students into place behind them. Several more Witchers come forward to accept the mages' oaths.
Perignon glances over at his scrying crystal. The image has changed: the scales are no longer perfectly balanced. The plum blossoms have outweighed the sword.
They're going to live.
He moves slowly off to the side, feeling lightheaded with relief, and leans against a wall. They're going to live, despite the Chancellor's folly, despite Stregobor and Rience and Vilgefortz and the whole damned Brotherhood enraging the most powerful monarch on the Continent.
Even Grevius isn't being slain, though Perignon isn't sure what's actually going to happen to him, and frankly doesn't much care.
Someone clears their throat next to him, and Perignon jumps like a startled cat and whirls to see Istredd standing an arm's length away. "Master Istredd," he says weakly.
"Master Perignon," the other mage replies. "I had a few questions about your scrying crystal."
Perignon nods warily.
"Lady Yennefer has a scrying mirror, which can show distant places and even provide sound, but it does not give hints as to the future. Would you be willing to be consulted on your invention, for a suitable fee?"
Perignon blinks. "Yes, of course, so long as you would not expect anything too clear or precise. As you can see, it works in symbols, which are not always easily parsed."
"Naturally," Istredd agrees.
"Her mirror allows the transmission of sound?" Perignon adds. "I've never been able to figure out how to make that work."
Istredd chuckles. "I'm sure she'd be glad to discuss the intricacies with a fellow scholar."
Well, that's rather appealing, actually. Perignon has never before considered reaching out to Yennefer of Vengerberg - he had no idea any of her work was applicable to his own - but if she's managed to scry sound, well, that's very interesting indeed.
"On another note," Istredd adds, "have you an opinion on who should be Chancellor of Ban Ard? I was tasked with ensuring that there was no unnecessary disruption, and the sort of succession crisis which I know is common when any of the senior faculty die would definitely count as a disruption. Especially as there are so many positions to fill."
"Not me," Perignon says hastily. Being Chancellor would involve lots of paperwork and talking to people and generally not working on his personal projects or teaching his students. "Brandt maybe. Or Eberhartt."
"Mm," Istredd says, nodding. "Thank you. I'll bear that in mind."
Perignon eyes the other mage thoughtfully. "You don't plan to take the position?" Istredd is wearing the Chancellor's ring, after all.
Istredd snorts. "No. I've a place in Caingorn, and so many elven ruins to investigate that even immortality might not suffice. Give that up to play at politics for decades? Not if I can help it." He flicks his fingers, the ring gleaming. "This is just so we could get through the wards without breaking them."
Oh. Of course. That makes sense, insofar as anything about today makes sense. Which, frankly, nothing does.
"Why?" Perignon blurts. "Why would the Warlord show us mercy?" Because any other king who could, who had Witchers and dimeritium and mages of his own, would have burned Ban Ard to the ground. Maybe they might have taken the youngest students to be trained somewhere else, but the teachers and the journeymen would all have died. Had the Chancellor and his cronies attacked any other monarch, Perignon's scrying would not have shown even a chance of mercy. Only that bloody sword.
"It's really not a very accurate title," Istredd says, shrugging. "The White Wolf doesn't particularly like war. He kills monsters to save all the people who the monsters will devour. If you're not monsters, he's got no quarrel with you."
"I see," says Perignon, who doesn't.
"It is a little more complicated for Ban Ard," Istredd admits. "Given that it was Ban Ard mages who designed the Grasses that make boys into Witchers, and then decided to keep the death toll high so they could experiment to their hearts' content. Witchers don't tend to like or trust mages trained in Ban Ard." He gives Perignon a solemn look.
"Then - why does he not want our loyalty? Any monarch on the Continent would be delighted to gain a cadre of Chaos-sworn mages, especially if they are wary of Ban Ard already -"
Istredd snorts again and shakes his head. "Oh, if you want to come swear to the Wolf he won't turn you away," he says. "But not by force. The Wolf won't have slavery in the Wolflands. And that includes you lucky bastards, because the same standards he holds all his vassals to - he holds himself to, just as hard."
Perignon doesn't understand, not really. Those with power do as they please and those without it suffer their pleasure; that is how the world works, in his experience. But Istredd clearly believes what he is saying.
The last of the apprentices swears the Wolf's oath, and several of the Witchers corner Brandt and Eberhartt to ask about any experiments currently ongoing within Ban Ard that ought not be happening under the Wolflaw. Perignon watches dazedly as the other teachers and journeymen usher the boys away.
They're going to live, and be allowed to keep studying and researching and experimenting, within the limits of their oaths. They're not going to die for the Chancellor's folly. They're not even going to be punished, really, not as Perignon understands it, for the deeds they had no knowledge of.
"I would be glad to correspond with Lady Yennefer," he says at last, and Istredd nods and strides over to the Witchers and Brandt and Eberhartt, and Perignon goes to make sure his scrying crystal hasn't been damaged somehow in the commotion.
And on a whim, he puts a hand on the scrying crystal's frame and sends a tendril of Chaos into it and says, "Show me the Warlord's true purpose."
The crystal's surface goes dim for a moment, and then clears, and Perignon stares in blank bewilderment at the image it displays:
A great white wolf, larger than mountains, golden-eyed and ivory-fanged, standing guard over a map which encompasses the entire North, with tiny forms of men and elves and dwarves, halflings and kobolds and godlings, and children - so many children - sheltering behind the wolf's legs as it snarls out at the world in ferocious defiance.
"Hah," one of the Witchers says, from right behind him. "Yeah, that's the Wolf, alright." He claps a heavy hand on Perignon's shoulder. "And we're all with him. Clear?"
"Clear," Perignon says shakily. He still doesn't understand, not truly, but it's clear all the same.
The Warlord guards the North.
Perignon adds another oath to the one he has already sworn: he will never, never, never become a threat to the White Wolf who has granted Ban Ard mercy.
Even if he does not think he will ever truly understand why.