Life at the Sanctum was never dull, but it did become routine. Orion had spent several weeks on high alert, fearing that Morliana’s sudden intrusion into his lessons meant she was about to do something, but the old witch seemed content teaching Charms.

  She wasn’t even bad at it. Her teaching style involved using personal anecdotes to introduce a concept, then expanding on it with examples and engaging the students directly.

  Her religious propaganda was also very subtle. She only casually sprinkled it in, making it feel like a natural part of magic rather than the heavy-handed method employed by other teachers.

  Even better, having such a skilled caster teach him meant that Orion could instantly understand the perfected version of any spell, making his reverse-engineering much easier.

  He’d even gotten a level out of it!

  That, however, did not mean he suddenly trusted her. Instead, the longer she went without doing anything, the more paranoid he became.

  “I understand that you had a bad experience with her, moonbeam, but that one day shouldn’t shape your view of her. Yes, Elder Morliana is very strict about following tradition. And yes, she treated you very unfairly three years ago. But she’s not evil. She has the Sanctum’s best interests at heart and would never seek to harm its children.” Asteria told him as he paced around the living room.

  Orion huffed, frustrated that even she, who had seen exactly how everything had happened, seemed so quick to forgive.

  “I would have thought you’d be more cautious. You said it yourself that she personally pressured you to burn my research. Or have you already forgotten?” It was a cheap shot, and the way his mother’s face filled with hurt made his insides twist.

  But Orion was made of sterner stuff. If he could be emotionally manipulated, he would never have reached the pinnacle of the scientific world.

  “No, Orion. I have not,” she replied, pursing her lips. Clearly, she wanted to scold him for his behavior, but couldn’t find the courage to do it.

  Because she knows I am right.

  After a moment of silence, she sighed. “Alright, what’s going on? I know you’ve been stressed because of her taking over Charms, but this isn’t about that.”

  Orion debated, for a moment, whether to blow her off. It’d be easy to reply curtly, and she’d let it go, but there was something he wanted to know, and he didn’t like the way her shoulders slumped.

  Asteria was still young, barely in her forties, and a great beauty, but something in the way she carried herself now made it clear that the years had left their mark.

  After another beat, he nodded. “There is something.”

  She perked up, happier now that she knew she could help him.

  “The other day, before the mass, we met a woman,” he said, and watched as realization slowly painted her features.

  “Madame Giselle, yes.”

  “Yeah, her. She said you were the apprentice of Elder Yue, a Veil Priestess. You never told me about her. Or even mentioned having such a connection back then.”

  The implication that she hadn’t done all she could to protect him seemed to hit home, but for once, Asteria didn’t take it lying down. Instead, she snorted. “If I had asked that old crone for help, she would have put you through the inquisition herself.”

  Orion blinked in surprise. He hadn't expected that. Based on Giselle’s description, Elder Yue seemed to be a fairly balanced woman—or at least as balanced as witches could be.

  “We do not have a good relationship,” Asteria explained. Then, seeing that it wasn’t enough, she sighed. “This is about that man.”

  Ah, I see.

  His biological father was a taboo subject. They had talked about him once before his class ceremony, and never again. Today, it seemed, he would get some more answers to that mystery. “What was it?” He asked gently.

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  For a moment, it seemed like she might deny him, but eventually, she gave in. “I never knew my mother.”

  Just from that, Orion knew he was in for something big.

  “She died shortly after I was born. A battle witch of great power, she was ambushed during a patrol along the northern border. I never found out exactly what caused her death, but something attacked them, and no one survived. Elder Yue was my mother’s favorite teacher, and while she didn’t formally adopt me as her own, she took me in and raised me into adulthood.”

  Several questions already hovered at the tip of his tongue, but he held back, knowing that if he interrupted her now that the floodgates had opened, he might never hear this again.

  “I was a rebellious youth. I hated that my mother’s death was just another footnote in the Sanctum’s history, a reason for a few days of reprisal and slightly increased patrols in the north for about a year, then quickly forgotten. Elder Yue taught me potions, spells, and anything I asked for. Then, one day, I decided to leave the Sanctum for a sabbatical.”

  Sabbaticals were something Orion had been looking into. Not that he wanted to go back to the Sanctum after he finally left, but just the existence of that institution meant he might find a way to avoid burning all his bridges.

  He’d known his mother had temporarily left, of course. She’d said so herself the first time they talked about his father. Still, he stayed quiet, aware that she was getting to the point of her story.

  “She told me it was a stupid thing to do. That I would get in over my head, and that she would be forced to come get me out of trouble.” Asteria chuckled ruefully. “I told her I wouldn’t need her help. That I never needed it. Then, of course, I got in trouble.”

  Orion leaned in. This was the part that had never been spoken before. His mother’s relationship with the Veil Priestess was important, but not as important as this.

  “You see, I didn’t have much coin, but potioneers don’t need much to become wealthy. We are welcomed everywhere we go, especially with the Sanctum backing us. I became attached to an adventuring guild in Riverside, where I sold my potions to several teams. It paid well, for a while, but I quickly started attracting attention. Many wanted me for themselves, while others simply sought to acquire a valuable asset from a rival. So I was forced to leave and went further west, away from the Sanctum’s influence in hopes of escaping its fame.”

  Orion could see it. While he didn’t doubt that alchemists and potioneers existed outside the coven, he believed they would be lesser. It was simply a matter of resources. The recipes taught to those studying here were the result of hundreds, if not thousands, of people working over the course of centuries.

  Self-taught brewers simply couldn’t compete. Even at a higher level, they lacked the knowledge necessary to match a witch of the Sanctum.

  “When I arrived at Reprieve, the last city in the west, I was tired and angry. People who should have been trustworthy, vassals of the coven, hadn’t hesitated to betray me. Adventurers whose lives my potions had saved sold information about me to the highest bidders. And yet, I didn’t even consider turning back. It would have meant Yue was right. That I couldn’t handle myself. So I pushed on, desperate to find someone I could trust.”

  “And that’s where he comes in,” Orion murmured, earning a resigned nod.

  “He was disgustingly handsome,” she said, embarrassed. “Oh, don’t look at me like that. I was a young girl who had grown up in a sheltered space. He was the most beautiful man I’d ever laid eyes on. The moment he helped me escape some very insistent pursuers, I became smitten.”

  Surprisingly, there was little self-recrimination in her tone. But then again, she was right. If his father had truly been that handsome and was the first to help her in such a dangerous moment... Well, he could see why she would develop feelings.

  “He was an adventurer. A mage at the time, and a very skilled one. He was strong enough that no one dared approach me with him nearby, making it easy to justify my attachment. I kept telling myself I was just seeking safety. I wouldn’t do anything foolish. Then, years went by. I found out I was pregnant, and he asked me to leave the Sanctum for good.”

  Orion blinked. She had just glossed over several years, though he supposed he didn’t want to know the sordid details.

  “I was tempted to,” she admitted. “I almost did, honestly, but then I discovered that he’d been negotiating with an Archmage in Valderun. He’d sent details about me, from my spells to my recipes. Even the prayers I thought he couldn’t care less about. He’d been taking notes on everything and used that information to leverage for a position within the Collegium. I ran away, immediately contacted Elder Yue, and was taken back into the Sanctum, where I worked very hard to prove myself, going from a Madame to a Magistra in less than a year. We never spoke after she came to pick me up. So no, I couldn’t have asked her for help again, especially since she volunteered to go to Valderun to stay away from me."

  Asteria looked exhausted after that. Orion decided he’d asked her enough. There was still a lot he wanted to know, but she wasn’t in a condition to answer him.

  “Thank you for trusting me with this,” he murmured, awkwardly placing his hand over hers.

  Asteria smiled briefly, pride and sadness mingling. “That man was… His actions do not reflect on you. Nor should mine.”

  “Yeah, I know.”

  The library was almost completely empty. At least, the first floor was. Above him, Orion could see several witches flipping through valuable tomes that he would be willing to sell a kidney for, but unfortunately, he probably would never get his hands on them.

  However, his target today was not a book.

  Set sat in the back, as he always did. Surrounded by piles of basic theory, he seemed to be taking notes about the specific language used by an ancient witch to describe the impact of celestial bodies on rituals.

  He was noticed immediately after stepping out of an aisle, and the old man put his quill down, smiling in greeting, “Ah, what a treat. To what do I owe your visit, young Orion? I believe you should still be in the process of adjusting to your new lessons. Is this perhaps about your classmates? I am afraid I might not be the best at interpersonal relationships.”

  Orion sat down heavily. He took a deep breath before deciding that, although Set was still hiding a lot and probably shouldn’t be trusted with sensitive information, this was something he likely already knew. “I just spoke to my mother about my father.”

  The old man’s smile froze, and he stared at Orion for a moment. “Ah, I see. And how can I help?”

  “She told me he is part of the Arcane Collegium of Valderun. And I know you used to live there. Is there anyone you might think of? She told me he was very handsome, and that he used to be an Arcanist.” The question was a bit too vague, but he hadn’t been able to pry a name from Asteria.

  Set mulled that over for a moment before eyeing him critically. “Well, there is someone. I wouldn’t have made the connection on my own, but he used to be known as a heartbreaker back then.”

  Orion leaned forward, driven more by the desire to solve mysteries than by a need for paternal approval. He had ignored this impulse until now because his father didn’t have a role in his life.

  But the past was never completely without consequences. His mother had a connection to a very powerful witch that she couldn’t access because of her relationship with his father. He needed to learn everything about it.

  “Yes, I believe it might be him. Archmage Antares, the Secret Keeper.”

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