TOULOUSE FRANCE, 2022
I’ll make few promises to you as true as this one: good definitely doesn’t triumph over evil in this story. There will be no plucky heroes going on strenuous adventures to slay dragons, mainly because they’ve been extinct for aeons. There will be no moral lessons about the wholesomeness of country living amongst mild-mannered hairy-footed halflings, mainly because they were wiped out in 1289 in the Woodsain Genocide — and good riddance to the foul little drunkards, I say. Furthermore, not a single person ever feels the least bit remorseful about all the twisted necromancy, human sacrifice, or sexual inter-eldritch depravity they engage in, mainly because fantastic debauchery is an exquisite lark.
My name is Nikolai Bozerenski. My friends call me Boz, and I hope you will as well. This is my story, such as it was. I suppose it started around the time I turned twenty and was about to graduate from l’Ecole de Magie Superieure in Toulouse.
From the age of sixteen until twenty, the university dorms had been my home as I had won a full scholarship to attend based on my very exemplary wand-making.
I had just finished lunch and was click-clacking down the hardwood hallway to my dormitory when my long ears pricked at the characteristic scuffing of the man who had been the bane of my school days.
“A word Monsieur Bozerenski,” said Dean Louvois. He looked down at me over his crooked nose with his beady eyes. He wasn’t particularly fond of admitting non-humans to learn magic. Most Eldritch beings have some magical ability but are rarely sorcerers, aside from Elves and Drows, but they would never be caught dead in a human university. They have their own.
“Yes, Dean Louvois,” I said, trying to be polite and conciliatory. I didn’t want to run afoul of him after having aced my final examinations. Of course, I didn’t expect him to sabotage me, but you never know with a sorcerer.
“I wanted to — remind you that once you receive your diploma, it will be expected that you find accommodations of your own.” He paused momentarily and, with almost salacious ecstasy, said, “far away.”
I wanted to say I was planning to dig straight to China that moment, but my good manners prevented me from engaging in that lowest form of wit, sarcasm. Dean Louvois was blocking my way and seemed set on drawing out of me some kind of promise that I would be gone as soon as possible. I wasn’t about to enter into an uncompelled agreement with a sorcerer. Those are dangerous sorts of things.
The Dean ran his fingernail over his well-tended moustache and gently twisted it. I felt I had to respond. “I assure you, Dean, I have every intention of vacating the room at the earliest opportunity.”
“So long as the earliest opportunity is the end of the week.” With that, he nodded to himself and sailed off down the hall like a magnificent pouffe.
I returned to my room and tried to push the stress of finding new rooms out of my mind. I was cornered on the topic. I couldn’t return home to my family, and I didn’t have enough savings to start a venture of my own. Not without some help, at least.
My room at the university was a simple affair. A recently painted cream-coloured radiator under a large window, blocked by an enormous white oak tree. The uneven panes distorted the light, proof of their antique construction.
There were two single beds, one on each side. Mine was well made, and that of my roommate Philipe was not. Without a maid to pick up after him, he was hopelessly untidy.
Philipe had want of a stern aunt. Mine had been somewhat disgusted with my existence. There are, you see, only male satyrs. Our seductive powers are how we reproduce; the family of the lady in question is rarely happy with the news. However, my Aunt eventually came around when I showed an aptitude for the family trade, wand making. Nothing engenders talent quite like a razor’s strop.
Unauthorized reproduction: this story has been taken without approval. Report sightings.
I should point out that I am a satyr, a theriomorphic manifestation of the god Pan. I have the top bit of a man and the bottom bit of a goat. A pedantic person, wholly unlike myself, might interject at this point and say that such a creature is a faun or some nonsense. However, the silanos, satyr, and faun are so conflated that it would be pointless to try and reclaim the term.
I had taken the afternoon to sit in my reading chair and catch up on some articles related to my trade.
“I passed it, you old goat!”
Philipe was pleased with himself as he burst through the oaken door to our room, leaving it ajar. He was a round-faced boy of twenty with close-set eyes and small lips. He wore a grey frock coat over a blue cardigan and voluminous trousers tied off at the knees.
I slipped out of my seat and closed the door behind him, not disguising my irritation. “Three solid weeks of tutoring you in Influothurgy, I should expect nothing less! Well, what did you carve?"
Philipe produced a sandstone figurine. It was a crouching Elder God, whose face was primarily tentacles with small divots for eyes. The figure’s details were rudimentary but recognisable.
If I presented this to my aunt, who had taken me as her apprentice when I was nine, she would box me on the ears for being lazy. L’Ecole de Magie Superiure in southern France had proved to be disappointing. I learned little in my classes at twenty that I hadn’t learned at twelve.
“Well, Master Nikolai, admit it; I’m a natural,” said Philipe.
“Yes, Master Philipe, as soon as I can afford to hire an assistant, you’re at the top of the list.”
“Serious?”
“Not even a little,” I said, and Philipe looked hurt. “Philipe, you have the luxury of choosing something other than a trade; I do not.”
Philipe threw himself on his bed. “I don’t take it sorely; you’re right. If I had an inheritance, I’d invest in you; count on it, you insufferable goat.”
“I wouldn’t be caught dead with a bastard like you as my benefactor.”
“Boz, you wound me.” Philipe clamped his hands over his heart, forcing a pained look on his face.
I laughed and went back to reading a trade journal on amulet infusing; there were several sensational advances that I wanted to keep abreast of. Philipe and I had only just received our Letters, and both were now diploma-wielding Masters. Mine was in the Engineering of Magical Devices, and his diploma was in the Liberal Arts.
“Have you found rooms yet? I’m going to Nice for the rest of the winter. You’re welcome to join me. I could use your powers to help me defile every scullery maid in the Cote d’Azur,” said Philipe.
“Laudable,” I said. However, his reliance on my powers had grown tiresome. “Your invitation is most generous. But I am afraid my coin purse is depressingly thin.”
“Well, send to your aunt or mother for some pounds and crowns; they must be loaded.”
“I suppose they are, but I’ve resolved to make it on my own.” That wasn’t wholly true. I had been encouraged, in the strongest terms, to do so. Satyrs don’t stick around, so my father had left before I was born, and the residue of his seduction waned into nothing by the time I left for the university.
I can’t reasonably blame my mother for not having much love for me by that time, but the heart rarely listens to reason and often forms a devastating conspiracy with the tongue. I had to learn to be a bit more understanding.
“Oh, a pox on that,” said Philipe, “and coin, come to Nice, my father the Count would surely invest in you.”
I wanted to consider his offer. But Nice was expensive, and I had already worked hard to cultivate connections in Toulouse. Philipe was dear, but he would never understand having to work for his bread. He was also quite literally a bastard. Due to his father’s reputation and wealth, he enjoyed an easy life. But depending on him as a social connection was unwise.
“Well, if you won’t come, you’d better find rooms soon, as they’re filling up fast. All these aesthetes and bohemians are moving in. Anyway, try to put on something sharp.”
I lowered the journal I was reading and looked at him, “Of what do you intend?”
“You want connections, yes? Then we shall attend a funeral.”
“Charles-Francois?"
Philipe grinned. “The very same. A state funeral for his grace, the Marquis de Haute-Garonne, may he dine forever before the Yellow Host and afterwards the Green Lion!”
“What will it cost me?" I asked. I was sure he had some scheme in mind. Philipe was my friend as much as he was anyone’s — which is to say shallowly. He wasn’t likely to do something without recompense.
“Some aid in wenching,” he said, “your magic works on Elves and Drows?”
“It does.”
“Then help me debauch some saucy wenches, and we’ll call it square.”
I had been trying to avoid using my powers. I felt that there was no real point to it, and I wanted people to like me for who I was. I certainly wanted beautiful women, but I wanted them to want me naturally. And as for friends, I wanted them to like me for who I was and not because being in the vicinity of a satyr using his seductive powers made it easier for everyone. That’s why wherever we go, an orgy ensues; if we want it to. Still, I agreed.