3:57 The fallen officer.

Garimond looked out at the wrestling test that was happening out in the courtyard, below and before the porch upon which he and an apprentice of the Royal Magician sat.

"There is a wickedness here at work," the oversword lamented as his knuckles whitened on the iron bar that circled his porch, "that has made thieves, kidnappers, and liars of enlisted men."

"I would not call 'wickedness' what seems to have merely been a lapse in judgement," the apprentice replied, shaking her hooded head and crossing her arms over her ample chest.  "Due, perhaps, to the ferocity of the fight immediately prior-"

"The ferocity of the fight should have sparked greater concern, granted its possible repercussions," Garimond cut in, frowning.  "If I were to bring battle to southern Sembia, I would immediately check any wounded officer for shakes and blinding sickness, since those infirmities are not only native to the land, but are known to be somehow extracted, distilled, and used for poison-like attacks by some of the less scrupulous mercenaries there-"

"I don't know that all the commanding officers in your-"

"Any officer- further, any Cormyrean of any stripe- has every right to expect that a possibility of infection is treated as the danger that it is, with a temporary quarantine, exhaustive testing, and due notification- why was there no word about the original testing?"

"Because there was no original testing," the apprentice charged, just barely keeping herself from hitting the arms of her chair.  She spent a few moments waving that energy out of her forearms before resting them down again.  "It simply didn't happen."

"Every single officer that I questioned replied that they were taken into the mage's tent and given an examination," the silver haired officer countered, turning a glare over his shoulder at the bristling apprentice.  "You're telling me six commissioned officers, and two that were either released or retired, are all lying at once?"

The apprentice gave a sharp, bitter laugh.  "You also have officers telling you that they 'lost' holy items that you miraculously found in a confiscation chest.  What should I tell you?"

"I want you to tell me, honestly, why precisely I didn't hear about the results of an examination that you most certainly did have," Garimond rumbled, his eyes narrowing.  "Or should I get a diviner up here to babysit you?"

"I need no diviner to weigh my words," the apprentice scoffed in a lofty tone, crossing her legs and leaning back in her chair.  "I, unlike any of those officers, have the strength of documentation to back my words; if you'd like to go through the records and see whether or not you can find paperwork that doesn't exist for an examination that did not happen, you are by all means welcome to do so."

Garimond turned all the way around and straightened his back as though a hot iron rod had been jammed into his spine.  "Then I should counsel Officer Thom's family to sue the entirety of the War Wizards, because Officer Thom was never actually tested at all?"

"Perhaps they should sue the commanding officer who never ordered the testing, or better yet, the entirety of the Purple Dragons," the apprentice cut in with an edge of frustration in her voice.  "If you're so certain the fault is on our side, have you considered alerting the Alarphons?"

"Oh, yes of course, the Alarphons," Garimond spat, unable to keep his annoyance out of his own tone.  "Pack of shameless witches- restricting powers that they still use themselves, taking so long to process the results of a wildly dangerous magic wielder that said prisoner had time not only to escape his cell, but to cook and eat his guard, cherishing nothing better than the thought of never having to answer to another brute weapon-toter again- these are the people to whom I must turn to ask which thoughtless, useless war mage ran the apparently imaginary examination that completely ignored whatever signs could have warned anyone of the possibly life-long curse of lycanthropy afflicting a previously devoted and loyal defender of Cormyr?  I might better wait for nightfall to go and make offerings to the swamp hags."

And in the face of the oversword's frustrated tirade, the apprentice remained defiantly silent.  It didn't take a diviner to realize that she had absolutely no desire to budge from her position.  As far as she was concerned, the piece of evidence that could have been considered missing simply didn't exist, and had never at all existed.

Garimond tore his eyes away from the stony glare of the apprentice to look back at the thorough trouncing of the active officer by the man being tested.  The silence that lay between the armored guard and the robed apprentice was pushed upon by the grunts below, the distant sounds of birds and the market, and the general bustle of servants just behind the closed doors of Garimond's office, but did not break until the apprentice chose to break it.

"I do understand your hesitancy," she said, struggling valiantly to keep tightness out of her voice.  Her eyes had gone to the stone floor of the balcony, as if the sight of it would cool her temper.  "But the Alarphons would be your best hope.  I do not have any record at all of any testing that looks remotely like anything those men described."

The oversword turned around again, moved to the iron-wrought chair that sat across from the apprentice's, and sat down.

"You know more of the laws of magic than even I can hope to- is there, then, a legal way to weigh the intentions of the dead?" he began carefully, never taking his eyes from her now downcast face.

The apprentice's eyebrows raised, but no other part of her even moved.

"I of course recognize the name on the kill order," Garimond explained, his voice low and grave.  "But its owner is conveniently dead, and cannot defend himself in court.  He had an otherwise spotless record, so such a marked departure from precedent is... suspicious, to say the least."

Another silence fell between the mage and the officer, this one thicker and more alien than the last.  It seemed as though the middle aged woman did not want to believe the man before her, who, in response to her confusion, simply stared his pure intention into her eyes.

A will like that should manifest in potential magic energy of some kind, the apprentice thought distractedly, folding her hands to keep herself from picking at imaginary spots in her robe.  Splotches of white appeared between her knuckles.

"You... need a specialist," she answered.  In the pause that followed, she began staring at the whiteness between her knuckles as though she wasn't sure how to fix what was causing it.  "Either a highly talented arcane worker, a rather fearless divine practitioner, or... or a speaker."   The middle aged woman shivered in spite of herself, as though a chill wind had just passed by her.  Garimond couldn't imagine a casual breeze that would reach her bones through the natural weight of her body, let alone the thickness of her robes, but waited for her to continue.  When she didn't, he gently, but clearly prompted her.

"And precisely what is a speaker?"

The apprentice shivered again, and frowned before she spoke.  "A mage who is given to communicating with the dead.  Not just getting their corpses to talk, which any common bone rattler can do- truly listening to and talking with their actual departed selves, no matter on what plane they may exist.  Very difficult to locate and study- I don't know for sure that there is one in the whole country.  Or if there is one, that it would be a person fit to speak to."

A thoughtful hum arose from the oversword.

"Bone rattlers are few enough," the apprentice continued carefully after a few moments.  The whiteness between her knuckles had spread up to her wrists, but the very tips of her fingers had turned a furious red.  "Cultists, most of them, huddled together so securely that finding them feels like finding black worms under a rock after a heavy rain.  But when I do find one that isn't dangerous, or insane, I'll send him or her to you-"

"Thank you."  Garimond watched the apprentice continue to press her fingers together, as though she were holding something between them that she couldn't dare to allow to escape.  "You understand, of course, that we are in the pursuit of justice, on behalf of the family of-"

"The former officer down there?" the apprentice huffed, pursing her lips.  "Yes, I do understand that.  As for him, I'm handling the matter myself; I studied various strains of lycanthropy while still going through my basic initiate's training in Hermit's Wood, so I requested the authority to take over the case.  It's my hypothesis that he is under a polymorphic spell- a powerful one- and none of those are ever made to last this long.  There's always severe damage to the subject's mind, when they do."

"I'm less concerned about the 'how' of it than about the 'why' of it," Garimond sighed.  "It reeks of set up, but precisely who would benefit from making a beast out of a man is a bit less than clear."

The apprentice bit the backs of her lips for a few moments, thinking.  "I'm not an Alarphon, so don't take this as testimony."

"I won't call you down to the Pillars over it," the oversword replied simply.

"There is a record that indicates that an 'expel and expunge' order was served just nine months after this incident, due to 'flagrantly inappropriate conduct.'  It's highly unusual; I only know of a handful of others to whom it's happened in the entire history of the war wizards.  Now, I have no idea whether the two issues are connected, and they very well may not be, but I find it...suspicious, as you've said, that a war wizard would be not only cut off from the college, but utterly blotted from their records, less than a year after a magic-related kill order was issued."

Garimond tilted his head just slightly to the right with a thoughtful frown.  "Am I right in thinking that an 'expel and expunge' would include the complete erasure of all acts the wizard had performed during their time in the college?"

"That's not supposed to happen, no," the apprentice replied.  "If it did, we'd have no way of proving why... oh."  The apprentice suddenly picked up her arms, folded them in front of her, and put a hand in front of her mouth, as if to stop herself from speaking any more.

"No Pillars," Garimond reminded with a raised hand.  "I won't even say that you mentioned it.  Unless the Alarphons weigh my words-"

"Count on that," the apprentice interrupted, shaking her head quickly.  "They haven't trusted a single soul since 1365."

Down in the courtyard below, the proctor of the contest filled out a lengthy assessment form as Howler watched.

"I didn't throw the man that far," the dogmaster objected, the muscles of his crossed arms rippling momentarily as he shifted his grip.

"Yes, you did," the proctor replied without even looking up.

"No, I-"

"There are markers on the ground, and the man's back hit dirt outside of the fifth," the proctor answered, lifting his tone a bit to cover Howler's protest.  "They gave me this job for a reason; you'll get out of here faster if you just let me do it."

"On a good day, I can put a woman to that distance," Howler argued, his jaw tightening.  "And she'd have to be slight of build, at that.  That man was heavy, and the pass was quick.  You didn't see it properly; I was there doing it."

"You want to go over there and look at the scuff mark where his belt hit the ground?  Because whatever else I mayn't have seen, by means of not being the one doing the fighting, I certainly saw that.  By the time you decided to chuck him like a potato sack, you'd gotten truly angry," the proctor replied in a flat tone.  "Even young children know, thanks to bedtime stories, that werewolves get stronger when they're angry."

And Howler, who hadn't yet become accustomed to everyone knowing what he was, couldn't manage to answer.

"Like I said, I have the job for a reason," the proctor mused, adding a few numbers on the side of the page.  "What season and city were you born in?"

"Midwinter.  Couple days after a Thunder Call, that year.  And Dhedluk isn't a city by anybody's measure."

The proctor gave a short, unimpressed grunt that could have either been agreement or dissent.  "Last time you checked in for an examination?"

Howler made a very small noise of surprise, and had to actually think before he spoke.  "Four years ago, and a bit."

"Date of termination?"

"I wasn't terminated."

The proctor sighed and looked up.  "If you were still enlisted, you would have had to have a physical proving fresher than four years old."

Howler nodded slowly, sucking in his cheeks.  "There was a death order, and I assume I was considered dead as of that date.  You want that?"

"If that's the case, the line-of-duty records will probably be more specific than your word," the proctor shrugged.

"Then look for Thom, Garett," Howler stated with another short, sharp nod.  "I'm off."

"You weren't dismissed," came the retort, already three paces too late to be given to its recipient's face.

"I'm not yours to command," the dogmaster snarled, still moving to leave the courtyard as he spoke.

"If you weren't terminated-"

Howler whirled around as though he were a spun top.  "I was ordered DEAD, you idiot, and though I met no blade's edge that day, I died as surely as if I had.  I just went to the Pillars, yeah?  I had to be told who my mother was; someone pointed her out to me there.  She fell down and screamed like I was killing her.  I was her youngest son, her baby, her favorite, she cried, how could I not know who she was?  But I didn't, because I'm not her son.  And I'm not your officer.  I have to make petition for citizenship, like I wasn't born here, because I have lost everything that I used to be.  You got room for that?  On your form?"

And both Garimond and the proctor watched wordlessly, from their places, as Howler turned back around and stormed completely out of the courtyard.