First Witch's Tale полностью

A thousand years before Emily was brought to the Nameless World, the concept of magical education was very new and the early magicians were struggling to codify the laws of magic and devise ways to cast spells safely. It was a very different and dangerous time, with inhuman threats lurking in the shadows and magicians often at risk from their own spells. It was rare, in those days, for women to study magic, let alone practice openly.

This is the story of the first female student at Whitehall, and how she blazed a trail for so many others.

The novella is written to be stand-alone, but it is – at least partly – a direct sequel to Past Tense (Schooled in Magic X). If you would like to see the novella expanded into a full novel, please feel free to let us know.

Despite the importance of Whitehall School, there have been surprisingly few attempts to unlock the secrets of the school and its history. Successive grandmasters have been reluctant to permit archaeologists to explore underneath the school itself, or to search the pocket dimension for clues that might lead to whoever built the school. Worse, a significant amount of historical material was destroyed during the wars and what remains is not informative enough to put together a full picture of just what happened, the year the Whitehall Commune stumbled across the castle and turned it into the first school of magic. The result is a hodgepodge of historical sources that regularly contradict one another, and even contradict themselves, and can therefore not be considered reliable.

No one knows who built the castle. Lord Whitehall discovered it, through some unknown means, but it was not he who laid the groundwork for the building itself. (It is generally believed the castle builders made a failed attempt to control the nexus point and were killed in the backlash.) Lord Whitehall did take control of the nexus point under the castle, allowing him to turn the building into a fortress capable of standing against almost anything, yet precisely how did that is another mystery. We know some names that have been passed down through the years - Bernard De Born, Lady Julianne, Lord Alfred, the enigmatic Dark Lady - but precisely who they were and what they did is unknown. Indeed, we have no idea why Lord Whitehall chose to found the school in the first place. The concept of a formal educational establishment was largely unknown at the time.

Regardless, we do know that Whitehall grew and flourished in the years since Lord Whitehall took control of the castle. The growing population of trained magicians laid the groundwork for the magical community we know today, as well as improving the lives of hundreds of thousands of people. The concept of educating every magician, regardless of their origins, took root at Whitehall and spread, despite opposition from various senior magicians. We know this, but we don’t know the details. Precisely when, for example, was it decided to accept female students? Or how, precisely, did Lord Bernard succeed Lord Whitehall as Grandmaster of Whitehall?

It was not until Grandmaster Gordian succeeded Grandmaster Hasdrubal, four years ago, that there was a serious attempt to open the tunnels under the school in a bid to answer some of those questions. The process caused considerable disruption to the school - quite by accident, a pocket dimension was nearly collapsed - yet it did reveal previously unknown chambers within the school. Many of those chambers had been emptied when they were abandoned, for reasons unknown, but a surprising amount of historical material was recovered, transported to the surface, and examined.

The manuscript you hold in your hands is one of them.

I cannot swear to the historical accuracy of the information contained within the scroll. Manuscripts we know to date back to the founding often contradict themselves. The unknown author of Life of Whitehall later wrote and published Life of Bernard, which appeared to indulge in a certain degree of historical revisionism. Lord Whitehall’s accomplishments were given to Bernard. (It is worth noting that Bernard’s own account of those times went to some pains to correct the record, returning Whitehall to his place of honour.) Life of Whitehall insists that Bernard was Lord Whitehall’s son as well as his apprentice; this manuscript, by contrast, states that Bernard was in fact Lord Whitehall’s son-in-law and notes that the historical Lady Julianne was Lord Whitehall’s daughter. It is worth noting that Life of Bernard glosses over the question completely.