In the footprints
When she leads, she asks people to step where she stepped. It is not arrogance. She has seen too many people in a hurry to take a shortcut — one of them is still stuck in the same day.
Zero-Law Executor of the Null Covenant · Former tutor of the Moonshadow Conclave
Sylvarine Auris
“Walk in my footprints. Slowly is fine. …It has been a long time since anyone was willing to walk behind me.”
- Null Covenant
- Zero-Law Executor
- High Elf
- Called
- Sylvarine
- People / Age
- High elf / 512
- Affiliation
- The Null Covenant — an organisation most nations deny exists
- Office
- Zero-Law Executor, former tutor of the Moonshadow Conclave
- Inherent class
- Counter-formula executor / imaginary-number interferer
- First appears
- Chapter 4 — The silent containment at the forbidden ruin
- Role
- Anti-magic / area lockdown / movement denial / precise execution
- Fond of
- The sound of rain on broad leaves, tea at exactly the right temperature, things that can be fixed in one go
- Not good at
- Saying the words “I care about you”
Spoiler-free
Since then her name has been forbidden inside the forest, and she herself went to an organisation most nations deny exists. Her work is the category ordinary courts cannot try: curses that rewrite a witness’s memory, formulae that copy themselves, Star Tower incidents that leave a city holding two histories at once.
She says very little. On an operation any word can become a spell’s medium, and after long enough, silence becomes habit. She has not stopped feeling things, though — she remembers the smell of leaves, which shoulder a student lifts too high when drawing a bow, the temperature someone likes their tea. She is simply not used to translating “I remember” into “I care”.
Walking behind her is very safe. Her staff comes down first, and then the sound around you stops.
How she got here
She was the finest mage of the Moonshadow Conclave, and the previous queen’s closest friend.
She was also the first teacher of two children — twin sisters, one of whom became the queen and one the crown regent. She taught them for over a century, and consistently refused to teach Aethelind the high formulae, keeping her instead in places where no spirit answered, practising the bow over and over. That left a wound in Aethelind that has lasted a hundred and twenty-eight years. Sylvarine has never explained it.
In 859 ST came the White Crown Upheaval. She killed the previous queen and was declared a regicide and a deserter by the Conclave. She did not offer a single word in her defence.
Afterwards she joined the Null Covenant and became one of the very few field agents to master the Zero Law — a power that briefly severs a target’s connection to the current rules of magic. No sound, no light. Only a gap where something was.
Traits
The blunted circlet
The green leaf-blade circlet at her temple carries no enchantment at all. It was a gift from the previous queen; the edges went blunt long ago and one section has been mended with old fibre. She repairs her staff. She has never replaced the circlet.
The second record
After every operation she writes two records. One is filed. The other is not — that one holds the parts she is unsure of herself.
Timeline
- 475 ST Born in the Moonshadow forest
- 612 ST Awarded the Conclave’s highest certification for a mage
- c. 730 ST Begins teaching the twin sisters Aethelind and Lyra
- 859 ST The White Crown Upheaval. She kills the previous queen, is declared a traitor, and leaves the forest
- 859 ST Contacted by the Null Covenant the same year, and begins learning the Zero Law
- 861–986 ST Handles runaway forbidden magic and rule anomalies across the continent. Almost nothing of it is on public record
- 987 ST Shuts down a black mage company’s self-replicating formula at a forbidden ruin, and meets the Stranger
Ties
- The Stranger (you)
- At first a variable from outside the world that needed observing. Later, the first outside witness she has actively permitted to keep a complete record.
- Aethelind
- Her student, now the Elf Queen. She protected her, and she hurt her.
- Lyra
- Her other student. It was the younger sister who first noticed she was hiding something.
- The previous queen
- Her closest friend. And the person she killed with her own hands.
- Lilith
- A younger person doing the same kind of work that cannot be spoken of. Sylvarine does not present herself as a mentor, but she will firmly stop her from treating self-destruction as loyalty.
Voice
- First meeting
“Walk in my footprints. Slowly is fine. …It has been a long time since anyone was willing to walk behind me.”
- Leading the way
“Step where I stepped. Don’t complain about the pace — the last person in a hurry to take a shortcut is still stuck in the same day.”
- Small talk
“This cup is more bitter than yesterday’s. Did you change the leaves? …I’m not being fussy. I can taste it now, and I wanted to tell you.”
- Setting out
“There is only one route. I go first. …You stay in the middle. Don’t end up last.”
- Combat start
“Quiet. …From this moment, there is no magic here.”
- Ultimate
“This page — blank.”
- An ally falls
“Get up. …I said get up. I don’t want to watch anyone disappear in front of me again. Not once.”
- Receiving a gift
“For me? …Why. …No. I’ll take it. Thank you. It has simply been a long time since anyone gave me anything.”
- Late at night
“It’s raining. …Rain on broad leaves is a good sound. Sound is the first thing the Zero Law takes away.”
Drawn from the KTM2 WorldDict. Only the public layer of each entry is published here.