Career Transmutation

Daniel Peterson

 

Balthezar Hammond had come to the conclusion that most of the taverns in Rimeport had names that oversold the establishments. He had once stayed at The Majestic Dragon and been disappointed to find that in lieu of the regal décor the name implied, the furnishings reminded him of Rimeport’s public orphanage. The Palatial, where the Zatrian Transmutation Association always held their annual conference, was passable, but hardly treated its patrons like royalty. Still, even by these standards, The Pleasant Pheasant delivered frighteningly less than what little it promised. As he approached the grungy, oaken door from the cobblestone street, Balthazar realized that today was not, as he’d previously thought, Rimeport’s trash collection day -- he’d just smelled this inn from several streets over. He held his nose and pushed through the door into a half-lit den of poverty and filth, wondering why Gryn had chosen this place to meet.

            After his eyes adjusted to the lighting and his nose adjusted to the smell, Balthezar saw Gryn waving him over to a corner booth. The five years since he’d last seen her hadn’t done her any favors. The bags under her eyes had their own bags, and her wiry, black hair stuck out at mathematically impossible angles above the oily, olive-green skin of her face. But her sharp, yellow, goblin eyes were as quick as ever.

Balthezar frowned. Whatever Gryn had invited him to this tavern to discuss, he doubted he was going to like it.

            “Balthezar, you came!” Gryn exclaimed, jumping off of her bench and spreading her arms wide in greeting. The sleeves of her scarlet robes bore the silver stripes of a Master of Arcana and the gold stripes of a Doctor Magi. The outfit was patched in several places, and the metallic, blue butterfly seal that marked her as a transmuter was tarnished and dull. She stood a good foot-and-a-half shorter than Balthezar, and there was no way he was going to literally stoop so low as to bend over for a hug. Instead, he attempted a smile and shook her hand.

            “Gryndellia Nuuk, by the Maker,” Balthezar said in a voice that he hoped sounded less repulsed than he felt. “Have you grown since I saw you last?”

            Her laugh was sudden, sharp, and shrill. “Flatterer.” She gestured towards the booth. “Shall we?”

            Balthezar slid onto the bench across from her and noted a bulbous toad congealed on the table by the saltshaker. The same toad, he noted, that had delivered Gryn’s message to him a few days ago. Balthezar tried his best to ignore the stickiness of the tabletop and dismiss questions about exactly where the beast had been sitting moments before.

            “So how’s life been since Dragonweal?” Gryn asked. Before Balthezar could reply, she shook her head angrily. “Sorry, where are my manners? Excuse me, waitress?” Her voice crackled over the grumbling din of the tavern, and a stringy-haired waitress appeared by her side. “Two tankards of Dwarven Fire-piss for me and my friend.”

            Balthezar grimaced. “Gryn, I don’t drink that stuff anymore.” Gryn’s face fell a bit, and Balthezar turned toward the waitress. “I don’t suppose you’ve got anything Q’thalian here?” The waitress shook her head as Gryn made a face. Balthezar sighed. “Very well. How about a finger of Rockbottom?”

            “That I can do,” the waitress said, revealing a gap between her two front teeth before she flew off towards the bar.

            “Q’thalian? Since when do you drink that elvish swill?” Gryn asked.

            “Aleistr introduced me to it back at Dragonweal. He gave me a full bottle as a present after my defense.”

            “Hmm. I always thought he was more into elvish leaf than elvish brew.” She took a long drag on an imaginary pipe, and, despite himself, Balthezar snorted.

            “That’s fair. He’s here at the ZTA, you know.”
            “I assumed.”

            “There’s a get-together later tonight in his suite at the Palatial,” Balthezar ventured cautiously. “I’m sure that, if you wanted to come, he’d … ”

            Gryn’s tongue made a wet, clicking sound. “No thanks. I don’t have an overwhelming desire to get high and watch horny academics hit on each others’ graduate students.”

Balthezar stiffened. “That’s not all that happens at these parties, Gryn. We also do this thing called ‘networking.’”

            “What a weird way to pronounce ‘bullshit’.”

            With an unceremonious clank, a foaming tankard landed in front of Gryn, and a small, cloudy glass of whatever passed for Rockbottom in this establishment landed before Balthezar. Gryn grabbed her tankard greedily and threw back half of it by the time Balthezar had swirled his cup and sniffed long enough to reassure himself that whatever was in the glass wasn’t poisonous.

            “Well, you go as hard as ever, I see,” Balthezar said, and she stopped guzzling for a moment to grin at him.

            “I never had a chance to slow down. Like you, I hear, Mr. Editor.”

            Balthezar put down his glass. Was this why she’d invited him here? To discuss his new position? “How did—”

            “Good news travels fast. Congratulations! Youngest editor of The Journal of Transmutation in history, right?”

            “I suppose … ”

            “That should help with the tenure committee, right?”

            “That hadn’t crossed my mind,” he lied, and she rolled her eyes.

            “Of course not. How’s Blackthorne?”

            “It’s not a bad place to be.” Balthezar was wary now and growing warier. Gryn had kept up with his career much better than he had kept up with hers. Over drinks earlier that day, Aleistr had mentioned that Gryn had lost touch with the faculty at Dragonweal Hall after defending her dissertation, and no one seemed to know where she was these days.

            “Yeah, ‘not bad’,” Gryn teased as a line of liquor ran down the side of her cheek. “You know, most of us would’ve killed for that job. What’s your teaching load? Two courses a semester? No wonder you’ve gotten so much published!”

            “I’d rather not talk about my research right now,” he said sharply. If she was looking to get him drunk so Balthezar would reveal what his research team was working on, it was not going to work. He’d been scooped before, and he wouldn’t let it happen again.

            “Fair enough.” Gryn shrugged. “After watching a million dull presentations, you must be dying to talk about anything other than transmutation.”

            “Oh, I didn’t make it to too many sessions today. I was sleeping off a hangover and only made it to an author’s colloquium on Revachim’s new book.”

            “The one about the differential geometry of Stalheim-variant transmutation circles?” He nodded, and she cursed. “That was today? Can’t believe I missed it. How was it?”

            “Dull. And the Q&A got bogged down when Sylvas ‘asked a question’ about convergent, asymptotic limits, which was really a fifteen-minute lecture. And then he attempted to answer questions directed to Revachim for the rest of the Q&A.”

            Gryn rolled her eyes in disgust. “No way,” she deadpanned. “Not Sylvas. Does he have views on the viability of Stalheim-variant transmutation circles that he feels the need to share with others?”

            “Has Sylvas ever had a view on anything he hasn’t felt the need to share with others?” Gryn chuckled darkly, and an awkward pause followed. To fill it, Balthezar ventured a sip of his “Rockbottom” as Gryn drained her tankard. Balthezar still had no clue what it was that Gryn wanted from him, but it was clear that, to get to her point, she’d need his prompting.

            “So what have you been up to since grad school?” he asked her. “No one seems to know where you are these days.”

            “You’ve been asking?” She seemed genuinely surprised.

            “Well, I asked Aleistr after I got your invitation.”

            “Aleistr’d be the last person I’d keep updated on my projects and whereabouts.” She paused. “I’m an adjunct at Glen Albia right now, actually.”

            Balthezar furrowed his brow. He’d never heard of Glen Albia, but if she was teaching at a Glen instead of a Hall … “Really?” he said because he couldn’t think of anything else.

            She frowned down at the table. “Yeah, none of the mage halls had openings for me. Glen Albia was nice enough to offer me something, though, so that’s ... something.”

            “Does Glen Albia even have a transmutation department? Don’t Glens usually just teach hedge magic?”
            Gryn half-smirked. “No, and yes. They have me teaching their alchemy and potionbrew classes.”

            Balthezar wrinkled his nose in disgust. “That sounds so—”

            “Applied? Practical?” Gryn looked Balthezar dead in the eye, and he realized he wasn’t sure how he was going to finish his sentence. It certainly wasn’t in either of the ways Gryn had suggested.

            “Sure,” he said. “But you’re a graduate of Dragonweal, surely—”

            “Surely, at some point in the past five years, a position at one of the Halls would have opened up for me?” She raised a thicket of an eyebrow at him. “You might think that. I’ve had four publications in mid-tier journals during that time. I’m the first goblin to ever graduate from Dragonweal. I’ve got great teaching evaluations. But no one seems interested.”

            Balthezar drew his breath in. “Is it ... do you think it’s because you’re a goblin?”

            She shrugged. “Could be. Could be because I got kicked out of the ZTA four years ago.”

            “What?”

            “I was giving a talk on constant-mass volume modulations to an audience of maybe five people, and Sylvas was in the audience. He started in on me and wouldn’t let me talk. Seemed convinced that constant-mass volume modulations were impossible based on a paper he’d written back in his undergrad days.”

            “A millennium ago?” Balthezar’s joke didn’t lighten her bitter mood.

            “Yeah. Anyway, he kept interrupting during the Q&A, and finally, I just lost it and transmuted my lectern to prove my point.”

            “You did what?”

            “Yep.” She leaned back in her seat and crossed her arms. “I turned it into a brick. A really heavy one.”

            “Wait, you did a constant-mass volume modulated transmutation as a demonstration in the middle of a ZTA talk?” To call up potent magic like that on a whim was ... well, awfully applied, but still impressive. But Balthezar kept his face impassive. He still wasn’t sure why Gryn had called him here, but the idea that he might accidentally acknowledge being impressed with Gryn’s work felt like losing a competition.

Gryn shrugged. “It was the end of the talk. Anyway, The Palatial has a very strict ‘no magic’ policy when it comes to the conference rooms. So I got banned from the ZTA until this year, but it was totally worth it for the look on Sylvas’s face.”

            “I can imagine,” Balthezar said. “How did no one hear about this?”

            “Oh, plenty of people heard. Maybe you just weren’t listening hard enough.”

            The table got quiet again. Gryn waited long enough for his guilt to set in before she got to the point. “I wanted to talk because I need a favor.”

            Of course. “What’s the favor?”

            “Icebrake Hall’s advertising a tenure-track position for a transmuter who works on spatiality. The ad’s practically written for me.”

            Balthezar shook his head as he inwardly breathed a sigh of relief. “I don’t know anyone at Icebrake. I’m sorry.”

            “Oh, no. That's not what I was asking. I was hoping you might write me a letter of recommendation. I think something from a peer who’s the editor of JoT might carry some serious weight.”

            Balthezar paused, uncomfortable but relieved that Gryn’s motives had finally been made clear to him. “Gryn, I’d love to help, but I haven’t really kept up with your work. I don’t think I’d be able to write you the kind of recommendation you need.”

            She smirked and produced half-a-dozen scrolls from a bag at her side. “I thought you might say that, so I brought my publications with me. These four are already out, this fifth one’s under review, and the final one here is a work in progress.”

            Balthezar’s eyes went wide, and he started stammering slowly. “Gryn, I’m not sure I

have the time … ”

            “Oh,” she stopped. “Right. Sorry.”

In the awkward silence that followed, Balthezar drained the remnants of the bile that passed for Rockbottom at The Pleasant Pheasant. “If you’ll excuse me, I have some business to attend to in the restroom.” He stood up and headed towards the back, hoping that the restroom was less of an apocalyptic vision than the rest of the tavern suggested it would be. His hopes were dashed, of course, and he was greeted by a cloud of flies and an odor that made him rethink his life choices.

            Balthezar’s mind wandered as he took care of his business. He did feel bad for Gryn, really and truly, but her professional failures were not his fault. If she weren’t so abrasive, so typically goblin, maybe she’d have some friendly professional contacts that she could call on in a situation like this.

What must her life be like teaching at a Glen, he wondered? She would have no time reserved for her research, that much was certain. Instead, day after day, she’d be expected to teach mages so incompetent they couldn’t get acceptance to a Hall, and she wouldn’t even be compensated fairly for it. She wouldn’t have a research budget either. Or a travel budget. She probably had to cover the expenses to get to the ZTA this year by herself, which ... oh Maker, was she actually lodging at The Pleasant Pheasant instead of at The Palatial with the rest of the conference attendees to save money? He swatted at a fly that had settled on his forehead. No one of Gryn’s talents and training, no matter how abrasive, deserved to live in such poverty.

As Balthezar left the bathroom as quickly as his legs would carry him, he felt a wave of guilt. He was planning to leave his friend to fend for herself, to leave her talents at the mercy of those who couldn’t possibly appreciate them. Sure, Gryn and Balthezar hadn’t always seen eye to eye in the past, and sure, he’d told her once or twice, when he was a bit drunk, that she’d only gotten into Dragonweal to increase the Hall’s racial diversity. But she deserved better than what she was getting.

“I’ve changed my mind,” Balthezar announced as he returned to Gryn’s table. Instead of sitting, he grabbed the scrolls she’d left on the table. “I think I will write you that letter.”

“Balthezar!” she exclaimed and leapt up to give him a hug, which he returned with enthusiasm.

“I’m so sorry for how I acted before. I’m headed straight back to my room at The Palatial to write that letter for you, and I’m not leaving until I finish it.”

Her crooked smile bordered on beautiful for just a moment. “I guess I shouldn’t hold you back, then. Thank you. Send the letter to me here when you’ve finished.”

“Absolutely.” Balthezar turned towards the door, but paused. “Gryn, I’m sorry for how I treated you earlier. I can be a real ass sometimes.”

“Yeah, you can be,” she happily agreed. “But you’re helping, and that means a lot.”

Balthezar nodded towards her. “Take care of yourself, and good luck getting that job. You deserve it.” And with that, he headed out into the chilly spring evening.

###

Moments after the tavern door slammed shut, the gap-toothed waitress slid onto the bench across from Gryn, silently mouthing “Wow.” Gryn buried her face in her hands to keep from laughing. The waitress had changed into the deep-purple robes of a Dreamstone Hall graduate. The letters “IP” were embroidered in rhinestones just below the robe’s collar.

“Was that really Balthezar Hammond?” she asked, and Gryn nodded. The waitress shook her head as Gryn pulled out a notebook and entered something blocky and angular onto a row of a sizable table.

“I’ve read a bunch of his stuff. If you can pull one over on him without his noticing ... ” She trailed off before finishing her thought. “That was really remarkable.”

“I know,” Gryn said, not looking up as she continued her writing. “Just one moment.” The waitress fidgeted in her seat until Gryn finished and looked up at her. “It took longer for the potion to take effect than I’d expected. Something was off – maybe he’s heavier than I thought. I’ll refine it in the next brewing. But I take it that you found my demonstration convincing, Ms. Bloom?”

The waitress in the purple robe raised her eyebrows and laughed, shaking her head. “Well, if there was any doubt in my mind that you’ve got what it takes to brew for us, Dr. Nuuk, it’s gone now. How long do you think it’ll take before your potion wears off?”

Gryn thought for a moment. “Given the dose he received, it should last at least another day or so, which should be plenty of time for him to read my papers and write me a letter. But you should look it over once he’s sent it to me if you’re worried I’ve miscalculated.”

A whole day? Bloom’s face fell a little bit. “Aren’t you worried that, once it wears off, he’ll realize that you manipulated his mood to get that letter?”

Gryn’s crooked smile extended a bit too far across her face. “Not terribly. This brew is designed to leave him with a hangover and some temporary memory loss. He won’t remember writing the letter or reading my work, and he’ll likely chalk it all up to some heavy drinking and Dr. Q’Narak’s elvish leaf.”

Bloom sighed. “You’ve got real talent, you know that? With a mind like yours, you could do all sorts of things. Are you really sure you want to leave your faculty position and come work with us at Industrial Potionbrews?”

Gryn paused for a moment, staring at the door where Balthezar had exited minutes ago. “Yes,” she said firmly. “It’s time to move on.”

END