ALL WILL BE WELL

“Jonathan.”

Jonathan doesn’t turn to look at the person addressing him, he knows who it is, and he would like to get these last few books into place before helping her.

He does not want to climb back up here again.

“Yes, how can I assist the Royal Mage today?” he asks.

“I. Uh.” Sayora shuffles around the ladder to look up at him as best she can. “I have come into possession of a scroll, and I’d like help dating it, if possible.”

“A scroll, you say?” Jonathan puts the final book into place. “Well, that’s certainly unusual…”

“That’s why I came to find you.” Sayora backs up as she sees him grab the sides of the ladder. “You specialize in these sorts of things…”

Jonathan slides all the way down the ladder, and pulls off the set of gloves he’s currently wearing.

“Right, well.” He stows the gloves in his inside vest pocket. “Let’s head over to the appraisal space, yes?”

He leads her out of the shelves of books that make up the Royal Library and towards where his desk is, near the front.

Just past it is an old, carved stone table, inlaid with Runes in moonsilver around a circular matrix.

Jonathan grabs a new set of much lighter, cotton-spun white gloves and puts them on. “Let’s have a look at your mystery scroll, then. May I?”

Sayora produces an ornate canister of tarnished moonsilver, with a few purple gems inlaid at the caps and in the center, and hands it over to Jonathan.

“...Hm.” Jonathan looks over the designs inlaid in the metal. “...I’m not familiar with this design…”

He opens up the canister and produces the scroll itself, written on aged silk that is still mostly-white, wound around a pair of wooden handles.

He sets it down, and rolls it out to find very few words, with the centerpiece of the thing being a massive arcane array with what look like unfinished Runes laid into it.

“...Sayora, what did you find?” He stares at the drawing, and the scripts around it. “...this is Noctran. How did you get this?”

“...It’s a, uh. Long story.” Sayora shifts nervously. “...it’s an old array. Like the kind used before Noctra sank, but…the scroll seems…older.”

Jonathan walks over to his desk and grabs a loupe, and places it down on the silk, leaning over staring at the scroll through it intently.

“This silk is quite old,” he notes. “Old enough that I’m not sure how it’s in this good of a condition.”

“If it’s Noctran…being in good condition at all is sort of a miracle, right?” Sayora asks.

“Perhaps. It depends on many things.” Jonathan stands back up. “You’ve handed me something of a mystery, Lady Kestrel. I’ll want at least the rest of the day to examine this, possibly tomorrow as well, to see what I can discern.”

“Can I sketch out the array, first?” Sayora asks, pulling out a notebook and a pencil from her fancy mage robes.

“Oh this will be sitting here for at least the next hour, before I try to find comparison works in the Archives.” Jonathan walks over to his desk and begins going through the drawers. “So feel free to sketch out or take down anything you might need for your immediate research needs.”

“Oh good, thank you.” Sayora begins sketching immediately, scribbling away in her tiny notebook.

Jonathan, meanwhile, assets many of his appraisal tools down along the edge of the appraisal table, and looks over the artifact before him.