Chương 51: Human Voices

A few hours after his confrontation with Stella, Kir was about to leave his history class for lunch when the professor called for him by name.

"Young Gale, I have been wanting to speak to you for some time," the old dwarf said. Professor Ingotszen was a man wider than he was tall, with big arms covered in grey hair and eyebrows that hid all but the most direct of gazes from someone as tall as Kir.

Kir looked down to find Ingotszen giving him a direct stare that seemed all at once amused, challenging, and curious. His eyes were a slate grey that contrasted with his starkly white hair.

"What about?" Kir asked, his tail tensing into a slight wrap around his leg. Thus far, the classes had been almost entirely lectures on Norneau's origins as a penal colony for mages six over a thousand years ago and one short paper.

"Not now, but perhaps this afternoon once you are done with your lessons," he continued.

"Is this about the entry exam? I understand my score was rather abysmal, but I am studying now that I have access to more books," Kir said, not wanting to wind up with more work.

"A little, my lad, a little. More to the point though, I wish to understand your perspective on history as a whole. Remembering your mother, she was always rather coy with her opinion, so I'm also interested in seeing if she's come along in the last couple of decades," he chuckled. "I trust you recall where my office is?"

He wasn't giving Kir the option to refuse. "Earth tower. Floor 20," Kir said, recalling it from the information he'd received after passing his exams.

"Good lad. See you around the sixteenth bell." He clapped a hand on Kir's arm and left.

About ten minutes before the Sixteenth Bell, Kir was already sitting outside Ingotszen's office.

The teacher's hall was rather nondescript, with each identical door marked with a small nameplate. Professor Ingotszen's plate was different than most of the others though; by virtue of having thoroughly rusted from shining bronze to green, with the glossy black paint of his engraved name seemingly holding the whole thing intact, the only thing refreshed about the plate from time to time. Each door had a wooden bench slightly away from the wall, at an appropriate tail-distance for most, Kir noted.

He was still waiting there when a rattling sound came closer, and he saw Urvi walking slowly around the curve with a tray held gingerly with the palms of her hands and balanced along her long claws.

"Ah, young Gale. How goes your bean experiment?" she asked, stopping next to the bench and setting the tray down, showing it to be laden with what looked like cooked grubs, grasshoppers, and tea.

"It's drinkable. I'm almost there," Kir said. "Just can't quite get the base flavor down without the right brewing equipment."

"Well, you're waiting for the right dwarf then," she chuckled, stretching her back in a way that amplified the cracking sound with the sound of her scales ratcheting across each other. "Ingotszen made a book to preserve and consolidate many old potion recipes when he was younger."

"Oh. Um. No, I'm here because he wanted to talk to me for other reasons. And he wanted to ask me about my moms," Kir replied.

"Ah. It's for his memoirs then. Old dwarf expects he'll be dead soon, since his body's finally giving out," she said with a warm sort of sadness. "He was teaching history here when I was your age."

Kir nodded solemnly. Using magic extended a person's life, this was known, which is why the maximal lifespan of those races closest to humanity were similar, when they didn't have magic, at close to a hundred local years. What set elves apart was a near-universal ability to awaken magic while younger, such that even those with little ability at least got to live about twenty years longer than most. That was about the extent Darlae was willing to tell him.

Using magic could double, triple, or - rarely - quadruple that. And then there were magical beings like angels and demons... Kir had no idea what to expect out of his life and growth. "How long ago was that?" he asked, unsure of what else to say.

"Hmm... Two hundred fifty years or so? Give or take a decade. We're both getting up there," she answered wistfully.

Professor Ingotszen appeared then, coming from the other side of the hall.

"Oh, Urvi. Good to see you," he greeted. "And you as well young Gale. Is there something I can help you with?" He looked genuinely curious.

Kir was confused, but the next moment Urvi spoke up. "Groyg, You asked him to meet you, you forgetful old mole," she said loudly.

"I did?" He asked them both, and Kir nodded. The man shifted the book in his hand to dig in his pocket. "Ah. So I did," he said after checking a note. "And you're early." He turned to Urvi. "I would have remembered on time."

"Sure you would," she chuckled. "How about I join you? I was about to take tea by myself."

"I prefer a strong dwarven tea, made with iron seamroot," he said, opening the door and gesturing for them both to enter.

"You'll be getting erdleaf tea with honey and lemon, and you'll like it," Urvi shot back in mock grumpiness as she entered before Kir.

Soon they were all seated at the low table, with Urvi and Professor Ingotszen sharing a couch while Kir sat on a large, rather basic chair he retrieved from the corner at the Professor's urging.

Kir politely waited for Professor Ingotszen to prompt the start of their meeting, which didn't happen until the tea was served.

"You were right, Urvi, I do like this," he chuckled behind his short white beard.

"Know you better than you know yourself, old timer," she replied.

"Says the young palogan who once came crying to me asking if I would give her a better grade?" he raised an eyebrow.

"Bah! You remember that old crap but not that you have a meeting with a student who's right in front of you?" Urvi shot back.

"Well I suppose we should get started then," the Professor said, setting his cup down.

Kir had tried the tea, and it was quite good. With warm notes that reminded him of amber and sunlight, and a slightly grassy taste that complimented the lemon quite well. He set his cup down as well.

"You wanted to hear about my mothers?" Kir asked.

"Your mother, specifically," he replied. "Bridget. Human voices are rare in history nowadays, and I'd like to include her in my memoir so that she might be remembered with me, if not for her own exploits."

That made Kir raise an eyebrow. "Why would human voices be rare?" he asked. Having grown up in - well, adjacent to - a human village, they'd seemed like any normal population of humans, albeit far more efficient thanks to magic.

He'd been shocked when he learned from Bridget how fast the farming season was. Thanks to her magics, only spring and early summer were used to farm, refreshing the same fields again and again with magic; at least until she'd trained up some of the local magic users enough to use the same techniques. Then there was the building season from midsummer to mid-autumn, when improvements were made to the village. And last was winter, which was the only season that matched his expectations as far as human behavior. With people mostly staying indoors.

"Oh dear. I suppose he doesn't know. He did grow up in a human village after all," Urvi said. "The one Bridget founded with Darlae."

Prophessor Ingotszen gave Kir a sad look. "Humans are a race that gets rarer with each generation. It will only be a few generations until they've almost completely bred into other populations, so as a member of a younger race, I feel I owe the humans in my life to preserve some of their legacy."

Kir felt a strange shiver go down his spine. Growing up on Earth, the novels and media he read always presented humanity as the most common default; and most of the time any race that was expressed as more numerous were either more advanced aliens or barbaric swarms. To learn that he'd been living amongst an endangered species made him feel... odd.

"Why?" he asked. It was a question he felt in his soul.

"Why?" Ingotszen repeated. "Many reasons. Mostly it's because there are more non-humans than humans. Humans are the oldest race in the world, the progenitors of my race and that of the elves and many others. Thus, by sheer numbers, the odds of a human bonding with other races are far larger than a human wishing to be exclusive to their own race. It's just a natural consequence of demographics; if a sad one. Bridget wanted to make a place in the frontier for those who wanted a place for humanity. I told her such people were only delaying the inevitable, but she said she'd promised some old friends she would try."

Kir rubbed his chin thoughtfully. He hadn't known. There were hints of it about town, like the fact that so few people of other races lived near the village proper. He'd been so caught up in simply avoiding them because of how his demonic half was regarded that he hadn't thought that there was that sort of purpose to the village at all. There were connotations, mostly from his memories of Earth, that when applied to what Ingotszen was saying didn't quite match with what he saw of his mother.

He was afraid to ask... but he was afraid even more of not asking.

"Was she... did Bridget believe in human purity or supremacy or something like that?" Kir asked, fearing the answer.