"Unfortunately, due to a body swap spell Lilith is not able to pay your wadges, so the job has come to me!" the Golden Guard said.
The Golden Guard, the true right hand to the Emperor.
They had a circular golden mask with a single slit where their eyes were and a white overcoat with a triangle on his chest. And he was holding a staff with a red gem on the top.
"Now come on," they said clicking a pen.
"Will Ms. Lilith be fine?" a scout said rising his hand
"Of course, body swapping spells aren't permanent, and the more powerful the witch the shorter it lasts," the Golden Guard explained, "She'll be fine in an hour or so."
'He knows a lot about body swapping'
———————————————————————
Axel made a realization while inside of his room. Magic was amazing, and extremely annoying.
When there was just one glyph everything was pretty simple. Bigger circle, bigger spell. Fire glyph sets things on fire; light glyph makes a glow ball or makes things glow. But now with two glyphs things got much more complicated.
Using similar line that connected the glyphs on the signs Axel found that he could connect the light and fire glyph together in a circular circuit. And then things got complicated.
At first, he layered the two glyphs together in a stack. He was thinking it would be a glowing fire, instead he got a flashbang.
He still couldn't see straight, but after a while of thinking he eventually put them is a circuit got something that didn't blind him. A fireball.
Though the fireball didn't seem to be any brighter, he guessed that the light ball that the light glyph made was caught on fire by the fire glyph. But Axel didn't know why he didn't get a glowing fire.
At that question haunted Axel for hours. He eventually found out that the size of the two circles relative to each other in the circuit determined the outcome. Then he found that what he was thinking affected how the glyph worked.
The glyphs were reading his mind.
'Why are they reading my mind'
Tired of testing things that didn't make sense, Axel left his room and decided he would walk around Bonesborough again.
But as he was going to leave, he noticed the scout were much more talkative than they usually were.
Looking to one of the dining tables Axel saw Grape sitting there sowing something happily. While Axel didn't particularly want to talk with Grape, he was very curious about what got the scouts talking.
"Do you have any idea why everyone's so excited?" Axel asked sitting down to Grape.
"You don't know?" Grape asked, putting down their needle, "Apparently some scout got extremely mad at the fact Ms. Lilith not being the one not giving them their wadge, so they did something stupid and now they're getting fired," Grape answered.
"And someone being fired is something that people celebrate?" Axel asked.
"Yep! There's a whole Unbranding Party going on tomorrow night," Grape said.
"Shame the evening to morning shift won't be there then," Axel commented.
"Well, they don't need to be there," Grape replied.
"Do we need to be there?" Axel asked confused.
"You should be there," Grape said back.
"Is the party made by the Emperor's Coven?" Axel asked.
"No, it's a caste led thing," Grape said.
"The entire castle," Axel asked.
"Oh yeah, everyone who's in the castle is going to be at the Unbranding Partys, I've even heard that Ms. Lilith has come to one of them before," Grape confirmed.
'I'm guessing that the Emperor doesn't make an appearance'
"Sounds interesting," Axel commented.
———————————————————————
The workday, which was just cleaning up some trash, went by fast as Axel kept thinking of the Unbranding Party soon to happen that night.
In fact, it would be the first time that Axel had ever been to a proper party. He knew what a party was, he's been in plays where there was a party scene but that's about it.
Eventually the day flew past and they group finished their jobs and got their pay.
"See you at the Unbranding Party!" Apple said taking off.
"See you there as well," the captain said before leaving to his quarters.
'Even the captains going to the party, I wonder if Johnny's going to come out from the basement?'
———————————————————————
The time of the party came, and it was not a disappointment.
It took place in the dining hall; several scouts were playing high tempo music to keep the energy flowing. Most of the tables that scout eat at were moved, and the ones that weren't moved had drinks and food set up on top of it.
There were quite a few guard captains walking around the floor, though Axel couldn't tell if his captain was there or not. The one person that Axel knew but didn't see was Tomato Paste.
'She seems like the person to come to a party'
Though Axel didn't let that stop him from trying to enjoy the party.
Many scouts talked to each other about the jobs they did today, and about the person who got fired to have this all happen. There wasn't a quiet moment in the dining hall.
"You should have seen those lights!" a scout recounted, "They were bursting from the floor I'm telling you the Owl Lady has some serious magic," they said.
"Not as much as Ms. Lilith though!" another scout said lifting their drink up.
"Come on man, you're just saying that because you have the hots for her," a scout teased, "We all know the Owl Lady's more powerful, how else has she avoided capture so far?" they asked.
"The only reason the Owl Lady hasn't been caught is because of that stupid house demon," another scout said judging in.
As Axel kept listening into different conversations looking for a good time to jump in, he saw that someone dropped a pen on the ground. So, not wanting a scout to slip on it, he went to go pick it up.
The pen was pretty far away from the party though, so by the time he got to the pen it was much quieter.
Quiet enough to hear something, though he wasn't sure what.
Axel looked around wondering where that sound was coming from. It was a singular person, were they yelling, no they were screaming.
As Axel continued to get farther and farther from the party, the screams only became more and more noticeable. And eventually, Axel stumbled upon a scout, though they very obviously weren't the ones screaming.
"Paste?" Axel asked getting closer.
"Hey, you found me," she said, smiling underneath her mask.
"I thought you would be at the party," Axel asked getting closer.
"I've been to a hundred of them, I'm not missing a thing," Paste replied.
"I'm guessing you know what this is," Axel said referring to the sound.
"Then nobody's told you yet, then let me be the one," Paste said, "You know that coven sigils don't come off right?" she asked.
"Yeah," Axel replied.
"But unfortunately, if someone is fired from the Emperor's Coven, they can no longer have the sigil of the Emperor's Coven, so the sigil has to come off, what your hearing is the effecting of taking off something that's supposed to be permanent," Paste told Axel.
"They put them on as a cover up?" Axel asked.
"That's right! An entire party, to cover up one person screaming. It used to be a scout led thing before it went Castle wide," Paste said.
"Is there no way to reduce the pain?" Axel asked.
"No, any way that reduces the pain makes it harder to see the difference between sigil afflicted skin and non-sigil afflicted skin," Paste responded.
"What about Johnny?" Axel asked.
"He's important to the procedure, he calms the scouts down, it doesn't stop the pain, but I heard it helps," Paste said with a smile.
"Sounds like you know people who've gone through it," Axel pointed out.
"Yep! Most of them still lost their hand by the end," Paste said, "You ever see a witch after losing their main hand? They're devastated, sadden beyond belief, some of them hardly cast magic even years after," Paste recounted.
"Sounds like something no one should go through," Axel said.
"But they do, and they will, for as long as being in the Emperor's Coven is a job and as long as the Emperor's Coven has a sigil, it will keep happening," Paste said.
'Or as long as the Emperor's Coven exists, but I suppose that's a bit too anti-government to say'
"But what can you do," Paste said, "I just stay out to remind myself to never be fired," she said with a laugh.
"That's one way to look at it," Axel admits.
"Now head back out to that party, you still have things you haven't seen!" Paste told Axel, pushing him back towards the party.
"I will, thank you," Axel said while leaving.
And as Axel got closer and closer to the party, the screams got less and less noticeable. But even at the epicenter of the party, he could still hear the screams.