The Nine Bishops

It had been a harsh winter. And this particular day was the harshest anyone could remember, a day of a raging blizzard, best described as bone chilling. It was too treacherous for anyone in Seemos to go outside. And in one particular lodge, in nowhere of importance, the vicious wind was making the wooden boards that held it together creak and shake alarmingly.

Most would argue this was a terrible day, but the storyteller thought otherwise. A day like this, when people wanted nothing more than to sit near the fire, was the perfect opportunity to tell a story.

The storyteller and an eight-year-old girl sat together comfortably in front of the lodge’s hearth, warming themselves before a crackling blaze. The storyteller was robed from head to toe against the cold, but the girl, wearing only a long summer dress, had just returned from an ill-advised romp outside in the snow, which the storyteller would never have countenanced had he seen her slip out the door.

The girl’s name was Inessa. She had rich brown hair and sparkling green eyes. Her face, made rosy by the cold air outside, bore a wide smile. The girl, the storyteller noted to was always smiling, even when she was getting an earful. Inessa was very intelligent for her age, well beyond her peers. But sometimes she could be quite the little devil. Inessa liked to question the way of things, and there was nothing that didn’t pique her interest, at least for a little while.

She hated staying indoors and liked to cause a ruckus. Some might blame her parents for raising such a troublesome child, though it could be argued that it was natural for a girl her age. For now, though, Inessa was sitting quietly and calmly by the fire, looking a little bored, eagerly awaiting the end of the storm.

The storyteller gazed at Inessa affectionately.

“Would you like to hear a forbidden story, my dear?”

Inessa smiled; this was exactly what she’d been hoping to hear.

“How can a story be forbidden?”

“Well, to begin with, it’s a story that you aren’t supposed to hear. In fact, no one in Seemos has heard this story,” the storyteller replied mysteriously.

Inessa looked at the storyteller with intense curiosity.

“Is it a good story?”

“This one does not contain fantasy characters like dwarves, dragons, elves, fairies, and witches, since none of those are real. So I don’t know if you will like it.”

“But I thought witches were real!”

“Hmmm … that is up for dispute, but you may very well be right. Still, this story is not about witches, or the lot of them. So, it is best to forget them entirely. Unlike the preposterous fantasies I just mentioned—well, maybe excluding witches”—a smile gleamed on the storyteller’s lips— “the story that I am about to tell you is about something real: Magic.”

“Well, everyone knows magic is real!” exclaimed Inessa, as though her intelligence had just been insulted.

“Ah, but in this story, the magic was different and used differently than the magic you might know today. In this story, there were people who could use magic and people who couldn’t.”

“Well, that is obvious,” Inessa said, rolling her eyes. Ignoring her, the storyteller went on.

“Everyone who could use magic was called a mage. Most people were skilled enough to use a basic form of magic, but the mages who sought to better their magic, or make a living off it, joined mages’ guilds. The best mages from even the largest mages’ guilds trained a lifetime to better their magic.

“The most powerful of the mages were called the Bishops, and they were on an elite level of their own. There were always nine Bishops in all. They were considered the most powerful mages in the kingdom, and they were envied by everyone.

There was the Flame, who was like fire. Steel, the one who could not be broken. The quiet Tempest. Soot, lurking in the shadows. Static, who was faster than light. The genius, who was Wild. The beautiful Mistress. Joker, the unpredictable. And lastly, Frost.”

The storyteller paused, momentarily lost in thought.

“Why didn’t you say anything about Frost?”

“What do you mean?” the storyteller asked, trying to recollect where they had left off.

“Well, you said Steel was strong and Static was fast, but you didn’t say anything about Frost. Was there anything special about Frost?”

“Sorry, I lost myself thinking about the next part of the story. I can’t remember Frost,” the storyteller said, with a wink. “Perhaps I will remember more about Bishop Frost when I tell you the rest of the story.”

Inessa seemed disappointed by this, but asked another question.

“Before you mentioned the nine Bishops, you said that everyone who could use magic was called a mage. But were they all not able to use magic?”

The storyteller knew that to understand the story, Inessa would have to understand a hard truth, one that was withheld from her until she was deemed old enough.

“Well, a majority of the population could use magic to varying degrees,” the storyteller began, carefully.

“Yes, but does that mean some people weren’t mages?”

“About one of every five children were born without magic. Parents who could use magic had children who could use magic. The people who could not use magic never married mages.”

“Why not?”

There was so much Inessa didn’t know, but the storyteller knew she would piece things together quickly enough.

“It was considered taboo.”

“Wouldn’t some of the kids who didn’t have magic get bullied by the kids who did have magic?”

The question, coming from someone so young, amazed the storyteller. How could she so quickly understand that time with so little context?

“Yes,” he answered regretfully.

The truth was a delicate thing, so it had to explained properly. The storyteller turned somber, speaking in a tone that could pierce the hardest of hearts.

“The people who couldn’t use magic had a name. Everyone in the kingdom knew the name because it marked them. It was not the same as their spoken name, but everyone knew it, because all mages could see their name like they could see the color of their skin. The name made it easy to distinguish the mages from anyone who couldn’t use magic. Mages described the name as foul, something worse than dirt. When mages looked at someone who could not use magic, they saw only subordinate human beings. The mages treated the people who couldn’t use magic worse than dirt. And so, they called them the Filth.”

At this, Inessa curled her lip in revulsion.

“The Filth only had names amongst each other. To the mages, they all had the same name and were simply called Filth. The Filth only had each other. They had their own living areas, their own schools—if they had schools at all—and worked the most menial jobs. They held no lands and had no positions of power. There were no laws against harming the Filth, but any backlash from the Filth against a mage was punishable by death under the law. Mages were not legally allowed to have children with the Filth. The law was written so that mages would not taint themselves by having children with someone who could not use magic.”

These words were hard on Inessa’s heart. From the look on the girl’s face and the tears in her eyes, the storyteller knew she was deeply saddened by the cruelty of that bygone time. The storyteller wanted to say something that would make the truth more bearable, but Inessa spoke first.

“Did mages ever love any of the Filth?”

The question caught the storyteller off-guard, but some truths were better than others.

“Of course,” he said, comfortingly. “However, the ruler of Seemos ordered harsh punishment to those who broke the law, which made it dangerous to do such a thing.

”The ruler at this time was King Ven Fallon, and he ruled with an iron fist. He was the main reason mages were allowed to treat the Filth so poorly. You see, the Bishops may have been the most powerful mages, but they were directly controlled by the king. Any act of defiance against the king’s laws would quickly be enforced by either mage authorities or the Bishops themselves. They enforced the king’s bidding and upheld the law in Seemos. The nine Bishops swore an oath to the king, to protect and serve him even if it cost them their lives.”

“But why would the Bishops want to serve such a cruel king?” asked Inessa, wiping away the last of her tears.

“Money, power, and fame were some of the reasons. There were laws that applied to the mages, too, even if the harshest ones were reserved for the Filth. But the laws of the land did not apply to the Bishops. They could do whatever they wanted, so long as they served the king when they were called upon.”

“Okay, then, why would the Bishops serve anyone if they were so powerful?” asked Inessa, sniffing but no longer so distraught.

“Because the king was the most powerful mage of them all.”

“What kind of magic did he have?”

“You are asking a lot of questions. Why don’t I tell you the story instead? Be patient, and I promise you’ll get the answers to all your questions,” the storyteller said, smiling.

“So this isn’t the story?”

The storyteller sighed. At this rate, the girl was never going to let the storyteller get to the tale.

“Now, promise me you will not interrupt me when the story begins. In turn, I will make sure you learn everything you need to know.”

“Okay, I promise, but I just have one more question!” sighing again, the storyteller nodded.

“Is this a story about a powerful mage who frees the kingdom from the evil King Ven?” Inessa asked, obviously thinking she knew the whole plot already.

A smile flashed across the storyteller’s face.

“Of course not. It is about a Filth girl who couldn’t use magic.”